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The only internet database I know of with a search interface that satisfyingly queries its structured data is vndb [1]. You might laugh, but I think it's a good example of an open-source project where an opinionated maintainer rejects lowest-common-denominator design. For once I don't feel like I'd rather use bare SQL (looking at you, every web storefront ever), but vndb even supports that! I do wish were more sites like it.

IMO almost no directory projects get both the wiki and database parts right like wikidata and vndb do (at two very different scales). Those two have in common: (come to think of it, so does OpenStreetMap mostly):

- query builder in addition to the search form [1][2]

- web query runner (SQL, SPARQL) [3], both with a custom backend [4]

- open data license (ODbl, CC0) [5]

- db dumps as files over http [5]

- (A)GPL source. Both also self-host their git web ui [6]

- no login-walls, and no ads

[1] with relational subqueries https://vndb.org/v?f=["and",["olang","!=","en"],["staff","!=...

[2] wikidata's is experimental and incomplete https://query.wikidata.org/querybuilder/?query={"conditions"...}

[3] https://query.vndb.org/?sql=SELECT+'https://www.wikidata.org...

[3] https://query.wikidata.org/##defaultView:ImageGrid%0ASELECT%...

[4] https://dev.yorhel.nl/sqlbin [4] https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikidata_Query_Service

[5] https://vndb.org/d14 [5] https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Data_access

[6] https://code.blicky.net/yorhel/vndb [6] https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/g/mediawiki/extensions/Wikibase


I think it might be more memorable when the med students do the writing ... and singing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVxJJ2DBPiQ

    Diagnosis, Wenckebach *(what?)*
    It's AV nodal block and that's a fact *(yeah)*
    Take PR interval and lengthen that *(yeah)*
    bradyarrhythmia and heart attack *(oh-no!)*
AI songs do make sense if AI will be making the diagnosis!


I wouldn't bet much on KYM's provenance research. Memes spread so far so fast on the information superhighway, those that started on some Korean photography forum or Russian anime newsgroup, you'd never know if you weren't there ... or know where to look. KYM often cites 4chan because it's popular, in English, and well-archived (ironic indeed) and KYM editors will take the earliest hit from the third-party archives as provenience, when the archive itself might be younger than the meme.

You can find discrediting examples in the mid-2000s thread collection the internet archive recently released ("archive ten billion"): memes appear in the chanological record years before they anywhere Google knows of. But how can you know that's the real origin? Even "Know your memes" first appears in there as a /b/ catchphrase in April 2006, but you must notice that's also when the /b/ posts in the collection begin.

Edit, another example:

4chan is also known as a Mongolian basket-weaving forum, among other things: corruptions descended from the meme of referring to anime as "Chinese cartoons". An old 4chan saying, as KYM finds? No, it came from that Russian anime newsgroup, ru.anime.chainik, after its parody FAQ from 2002 was translated by users of an associated LiveJournal group and added to a since-deleted Uncyclopedia article.

  Q: Что такое аниме?
  A: Китайские порнографические мультфильмы.
The full FAQ is on the author's website, which is still online, shounen.ru/anime/tech/afaq.shtml But is it entirely original to that newsgroup? Some of those terms seem to have come from FIDO...


a mirror of the uncyclopedia page https://mirror.uncyc.org/wiki/Onime

the livejournal stuff is also still up https://ru-onime.livejournal.com/71601.html

(2005)


Thanks for your reply and examples, very informative. I agree it's an awful metric but seemed it might hold water when I first typed it. Full disclosure, I have never actually visited 4chan despite ample opportunity.


This is exactly why it's so famous; everyone knows of it but is scared to visit (or admit they visit) so it's a perfect "source of anything".

(This post originated on 4chan)


"Underwater basket-weaving" was a derogatory term for impractical university classes back in the 70s (?)

and Mongolian is a stand-in for mongoloid, which fell off the euphemism treadmill as a descriptor for people with Downs syndrome.

So "Mongolian basket-weaving forum" means "place for r*, useless people"


^_^)

data:image/gif;base64,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


That blew some dust off some brain cells. ^_^


Kinda like the old oekaki boards, eh? Forums where you drew your posts with tools embedded on the page. The pen here ought to draw without anti-aliasing for authenticity ;)

Here's a page from a Japanese board, 20 years ago to the day: https://coolier.net/oekaki/173.htm

From the nearly sequential unmoderated post IDs, one surmises its visitors were a little more... civil than HN has been today. ^_^

Here's a western one, 2008-2015: http://archive.tewi.us/tegaki/showtags.php

This forum had no text entry! All comments were handwritten and drawn. Its last days saw what might be the most expressive biddings of farewell ever posted on the web: http://archive.tewi.us/tegaki/sortbytag.php?t=1&p=2

Is it a coincidence both sites are Touhou-themed? What we can see is that the second had a lot of tumblr users...

Right! 4chan still has an oekaki board, one of two boards with special UI. The editor (tegaki.js) records lossless replays as proof that posts are original. Fitting the theme, you can watch a Reimu being drawn here in 39m51s: https://boards.4chan.org/i/thread/699320#p737995

-

That kind of linework with no anti-aliasing is something special when displayed unscaled at the right DPI. I think it's the crispness that makes it pop. Same with Easytoon animation: 1-bit 160x120 GIF can look this good? (https://danbooru.donmai.us/posts?tags=easytoon_%28medium%29+...)


Yinz misreadin' this comment. It's saying it was still like this in 2010.


  pkill Mozilla
sadly apt in that nothing can adopt


Maybe this guy's work is still floating around somewhere. Here's a retro art gallery with a mix of east and west: https://tomseditor.com/gallery/browse

So much is out there that this gallery of someone's favorites is entirely distinct from the first one: https://pixelation.org/index.php?topic=32978.0

If you filter by platform, the Japanese PCs are FM, MSX, X68k, PC-98xx, and PC-8xxx.

self-portraits:

https://t.vndb.org/sf/97/94697.jpg

https://tomseditor.com/gallery/tag/computer (some modern retro-styled stuff obviously made it in)

How It's Made: https://tomseditor.com/gallery/i/51199/drawing

"Draw me on one of your LCD screens" https://tomseditor.com/gallery/i/44324/debut-81

"ぜんまいちゃん" must be the first OS-girl https://tomseditor.com/gallery/_x68k/png/50403.png

Incredibly, googling zenmai-chan finds posts from 2022. 1992 to 2022, that's older than the idea of memes on the internet!


btw... The first one there is a NEC PC-9801VX(0/2/01/21), but the drawn model number looks more like MX (doesn't exist) or UX (look different). The notebook's single labeled dial means it's probably a PC-9801NA/C. The X68000's graphics tablet might be a Wacom UD or UD II with a stylized menu strip. Its monitor is a Sharp CZ-60(6/8)D. The misplaced indentation on the X68k's second tower is an error.


Sharp pixels have always been around too. Even in 1982 there was the pc-98's 640x400 crt monitor that would clearly render dithers -- which its games still chose to use all over, even when they got 16 colors. An lcd doesn't do much worse, and in fact those city nightscapes with pinpoint stars and lights look fantastic on modern displays.


TIL that Рейму Хакурей (Reimu Hakurei) is a bot that removes possible vandalism on Russian Wikipedia, and that its creator's page rains touhou powerups.


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