It Came from Something Awful
How a Toxic Troll Army Accidentally Memed Donald Trump into Office
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Narrated by:
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Dale Beran
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By:
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Dale Beran
About this listen
This program is read by the author.
An insider's history of the website at the end of the world, which burst into politics and memed Donald Trump into the White House.
The internet has transformed the ways we think and act, and by consequence, our politics. The most impactful recent political movements on the far left and right started with massive online collectives of teenagers. Strangely, both movements began on the same website: an anime imageboard called 4chan.org. It Came from Something Awful is the fascinating and bizarre story of 4chan and its profound effect on youth counterculture.
Dale Beran has observed the website's shifting activities and interests since the beginning. 4chan is a microcosm of the internet itself - simultaneously at the vanguard of contemporary culture, politics, comedy, and language, and a new low for all of the above. It was the original meme machine, mostly frequented by socially awkward and disenfranchised young men in search of a place to be alone together.
During the recession of the late 2000s, the memes became political. 4chan was the online hub of a leftist hacker collective known as Anonymous and a prominent supporter of the Occupy Wall Street movement. But within a few short years, the site’s ideology spun on its axis; it became the birthplace and breeding ground of the alt-right. In It Came from Something Awful, Beran uses his insider’s knowledge and natural storytelling ability to chronicle 4chan's strange journey from creating rage-comics to inciting riots to - according to some - memeing Donald Trump into the White House.
©2019 Dale Beran (P)2019 Macmillan AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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- By David Larson on 09-18-17
By: Franklin Foer
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Pure Invention
- How Japan's Pop Culture Conquered the World
- By: Matt Alt
- Narrated by: Matt Alt
- Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Japan is the forge of the world’s fantasies: karaoke and the Walkman, manga and anime, Pac-Man and Pokémon, online imageboards and emojis. But as Japan media veteran Matt Alt proves in this brilliant investigation, these novelties did more than entertain. They paved the way for our perplexing modern lives.
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great book ruined by ending
- By Grant Holder on 06-07-22
By: Matt Alt
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We Were Feminists Once
- From Riot Grrrl to CoverGirl®, the Buying and Selling of a Political Movement
- By: Andi Zeisler
- Narrated by: Joell A. Jacob
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Today, feminism is no longer a dirty word, and women purporting to stand up for women's equality now include high-powered names like Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, and Emma Watson. Hip underwear lines sell granny pants with "feminist" emblazoned on the back. In every bookstore, there are scores of seductive feminist how-to business guides telling women how to achieve "it all".
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Fantastic book despite shoddy narration
- By Seth H. Wilson on 05-19-16
By: Andi Zeisler
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Hateland
- A Long, Hard Look at America's Extremist Heart
- By: Daryl Johnson
- Narrated by: Derek Botten
- Length: 8 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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America is a land in which extremism no longer belongs to the country's shadowy fringes, but comfortably exists in the national mainstream. That is the alarming conclusion by intelligence analyst Daryl Johnson, an expert on domestic extremism with more than 25 years of experience tracking radicalized groups for the US government. In this book, Johnson dissects the rapidly expanding forms of American hatred and radicalization, including white nationalists, antigovernment militias, antifascists (Antifa), militant black nationalists, and extremist Islamic groups.
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Excellent research and information
- By S. Razo on 12-26-23
By: Daryl Johnson
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The Marketing of Evil
- How Radicals, Elitists and Pseudo-Experts Sell Us Corruption Disguised as Freedom
- By: David Kupelian
- Narrated by: David Kupelian
- Length: 4 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Americans have come to tolerate, embrace, and even champion many things that would have horrified their parents' generation - from easy divorce and unrestricted abortion on demand to extreme body piercing and teaching homosexuality to grade schoolers. Does that mean today's Americans are inherently more morally confused and depraved than previous generations? Of course not, says veteran journalist David Kupelian.
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This should be recommended reading.
- By E. Giuetti on 08-01-17
By: David Kupelian
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The Manipulators
- Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Big Tech's War on Conservatives
- By: Peter Hasson
- Narrated by: Andrew Eiden
- Length: 6 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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For better or for worse, Google and social media - “Big Tech”, collectively - have become the new public square. Unfortunately, this public square has a watchful referee standing behind them, ready and waiting to blow the whistle if they veer too far from the preferred narrative. Americans have given these companies enormous power to select the information they read, share and discuss with their neighbors and friends.
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Good Content....Run 1.2x Speed or You'll Go Crazy
- By Peter on 05-17-20
By: Peter Hasson
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Antisocial
- Online Extremists, Techno-Utopians, and the Hijacking of the American Conversation
- By: Andrew Marantz
- Narrated by: Andrew Marantz
- Length: 15 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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From a rising star at The New Yorker, a deeply immersive chronicle of how the optimistic entrepreneurs of Silicon Valley set out to create a free and democratic internet - and how the cynical propagandists of the alt-right exploited that freedom to propel the extreme into the mainstream.
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Amazing read!!!
- By Nick H on 10-23-19
By: Andrew Marantz
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The Age of American Unreason
- By: Susan Jacoby
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 14 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Combining historical analysis with contemporary observation, Susan Jacoby dissects a new American cultural phenomenon - one that is at odds with our heritage of Enlightenment reason and with modern, secular knowledge and science. With mordant wit, Jacoby surveys an antirationalist landscape extending from pop culture to a pseudo-intellectual universe of "junk thought".
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Interesting, but explanation by redescription
- By T. Andrew Poehlman on 07-15-08
By: Susan Jacoby
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What Were We Thinking
- A Brief Intellectual History of the Trump Era
- By: Carlos Lozada
- Narrated by: Christian Barillas
- Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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It is an irony of our age that a man who rarely reads has unleashed an onslaught of books about his tenure and his time. Dissections of the white working class. Manifestos of political resistance. Works on identity, gender, and migration. Memoirs on race and protest. Revelations of White House mayhem. Warnings over the future of conservatism, progressivism, and of American democracy itself.
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Useful book
- By Kindle Customer on 11-22-20
By: Carlos Lozada
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Program or Be Programmed
- Ten Commands for a Digital Age
- By: Douglas Rushkoff
- Narrated by: Douglas Rushkoff
- Length: 3 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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In 10 chapters, composed of 10 "commands", Rushkoff provides cyber enthusiasts and technophobes alike with the guidelines to navigate the digital new universe. In this spirited, accessible poetics of new media, Rushkoff picks up where Marshall McLuhan left off, helping listeners to recognize programming as the new literacy of the digital age - and as a template through which to see beyond social conventions and power structures that have vexed us for centuries.
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Good book, but with some crazy ranting
- By Bjarne on 02-05-15
By: Douglas Rushkoff
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Hate in the Homeland
- The New Global Far Right
- By: Cynthia Miller-Idriss
- Narrated by: Kelly Burke
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Hate crimes. Misinformation and conspiracy theories. Foiled white-supremacist plots. The signs of growing far-right extremism are all around us, and communities across America and around the globe are struggling to understand how so many people are being radicalized and why they are increasingly attracted to violent movements. Hate in the Homeland shows how tomorrow's far-right nationalists are being recruited in surprising places, from college campuses and mixed martial arts gyms to clothing stores, online gaming chat rooms, and YouTube cooking channels.
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Insightful solutions to combat our current times
- By Jacqueline Castillo on 07-17-22
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The Rise of the New Puritans
- Fighting Back Against Progressives’ War on Fun
- By: Noah Rothman
- Narrated by: Noah Rothman
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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The Left used to be the party of the hippies and the free spirits. Now it’s home to woke scolds and humorless idealogues. The New Puritans can judge a person’s moral character by their clothes, Netflix queue, fast food favorites, the sports they watch, and the company they keep. No choice is neutral, no sphere is private. Not since the Puritans has a political movement wanted so much power over your thoughts, hobbies, and preferences every minute of your day. In the process, they are sucking the joy out of life.
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Great, fast summer read
- By Joseph Spiegel on 07-18-22
By: Noah Rothman
What listeners say about It Came from Something Awful
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Alexander Short
- 07-20-21
feels good man
good narrator, good writer, good story.
I highly recommend
now omw to check out "the twenty days of Turin"
thx!
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- Wentzel
- 08-15-23
based? based on what? this review?
As someone who is the right age group but only somewhat chronically online I remember hearing about 4chan by a self-proclaimed furry anarchist. then I heard all the anti establishment anonymous stuff in highschool. Then I went to college where I actually went outside, and after I graduated suddenly 4chan was full of Nazis and the stoner frog cartoon was officially declared a white supremacist hate symbol. It was very confusing.
This does a good job of explaining all that was really happening in more detail and it does a really good job of having all that make sense and explaining exactly why the Internet was a mistake.
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- AB
- 12-23-20
The best of the "explaining internet trolls" subgenre
Highly recommend for anyone interested in a strong account of how our internet culture came to be. Unlike other books that have come out recently to "explain" the anime nazi phenomenon, Beran accounts for broader social phenomena on both left and right, and does a good job trying to contextualize events.
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- Britta
- 01-08-23
Brilliant
This book is so well researched and informative. I cannot recommend it enough. So many questions answered
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- gern blanston
- 12-11-21
absolutely worth a listen
a good exploration of the background and social impact of the chans and Tumblr.
a little uneven in the portrayal of alt right vs the black bloc enthusiasts where criticism of both could lead to a more honest narrative in my opinion.
the same could be said for "gamergate" as far as a balanced examination of both sides.
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- Jesse H
- 04-28-21
fantastic breakdown
great story and more relevant than ever as we evolve into a new world where 8chan/kun seems to have picked up where this book left off.
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- Prerit Pramod
- 09-25-22
Truthful, gripping and frightening!
This is a masterful weaving together of trends and events to explain an ostensibly inexplicable direction of the modern political and social trends. The writing and the narration is powerfully gripping, incessantly intriguing and, on the whole, outright frightening!
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- Amazon Customer
- 03-28-22
Must listen!
Great reporting, analysis, storytelling from researcher Dale Beran. Highly recommended listen and I'll probably get the book to read again. Whole new historical perspectives and rabbit holes you didn't know existed. Wonderful book!
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1 person found this helpful
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- nico g
- 09-20-20
Great Book
Breadth and depth, this book is a fascinating listen. I’ll listen to it again in a year.
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- Jennifer
- 08-23-22
Important Modern History Lessonv
This book should be required reading for college-level American history and political science majors. It gives a very in-depth analysis of how the dark trenches of the internet led to a political and anti-government revolution.
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