/Interview/ The brains behind: Uncyclopedia
05/03/2007 | Filed under Discover > Interview
Since its launch two years ago, Uncyclopedia, an addictive parody of Wikipedia, has grown into one of the largest Wikia-hosted wikis. In this interview, co-founder and college student Jonathan Huang reveals what it’s all about
.net: How did you come up with the idea for the Uncyclopedia?
JH: There’s a page on Wikipedia called “Bad jokes and other deleted nonsense”. Wikipedians would remove nonfactual content from pages that they were trying to clean up from vandalism and place it here. I read through a few pages of this before I realised that this was perhaps the best part of Wikipedia.
.net: What should I use the Uncyclopedia for?
JH: If you print it out, it’s great for wrapping fish or lining your birdcage. On the web, it’s good for flexing your comedic muscles, either in text, pictures or audio. Uncyclopedia is about comedy and sharing it with others. You can just read Uncyclopedia articles if you’re in the mood for some humour and want to be entertained, or you can take it to the next level and contribute. It’s stress relief and comedy training all in one. Some people enjoy the spotlight of putting their articles up and seeing if people like them, while others prefer to make jokes on pages funnier, or lurk behind the scenes. Whichever way you have it, it’s about enjoying yourself.
.net: Are there any rules on Uncyclopedia?
JH: There are two main rules at Uncyclopedia: 1) Be funny and not just stupid, and 2) Don’t be a dick. They’re in that order as well, so if you’re being funny and being a dick, there’s a chance your humour will stay, but overall, we strive to follow both rules as often as possible. We have articles that could be potentially offensive, but they stay as long as their comedy value outweighs their potential to be offensive. Sometimes, comedy can be heartless, but we try to err on the side of caution. We’re pretty adamant about not being cyber-bullies.
.net: Who decides what’s funny and how do you decide it?
JH: The masses, comrade! The users and admins are constantly on the prowl for quality assurance. While the admins are the ones who take action, they’re lazy and few, so obvious or suspected violations are usually reported by the common users. When reported, if an article is found to be slander, abuse or vanity, it’s summarily deleted by the admins. If it’s not a clear violation, but it’s an ugly baby for whatever reason, it gets tagged, and the author has a week to fix it before it’s reviewed again. If it’s not an ugly baby, but we’re not sure what species it is, then it gets put up for a vote among the populace.
.net: Which is your favourite Uncyclopedia entry, and why?
JH: ‘Sophia’, because it represents what I love most about Uncyclopedia – that we can take a seemingly obscure joke and run with it, building it into a page of monolithic proportions. The page began as a blank, and a user started it simply by posting a question asking who it was. Everyone saw this and added on more haikus without instruction or thought, simply because it felt right. The article wrote itself (around terrible poetry), and the most fun part was writing it. Even now, it’s a page that anyone can contribute a new haiku to. It’s easy and accessible. I also love many of the articles in the UnNews section of Uncyclopedia, which has become a haven for some of the most talented writers on the website. Some of the satirical news items people have written easily rival or surpass those of The Onion or similar publications.
.net: What’s with the obsession with Oscar Wilde and Sophia?
JH: Most of the Uncyclopedia cliches (Wilde, Sophia, Kitten Huffing) began in the early days of the project. One article claimed that inventing Oscar Wilde quotes was the “national sport of England”, and it ballooned from that point, with users pasting made-up Wilde quotes on many Uncyclopedia articles. A special section of the site was even instituted to accommodate the explosion of Wilde references. It got so out of control that we had to severely clamp down on the use of Wilde quotes because they were interfering with the articles themselves.
‘Sophia’ refers to a couple of important Uncyc elements. Firstly, we hold the Agnostic goddess of wisdom, Sophia, to be our literary muse. Sophia has no corporeal appearance (at least, she’s not manifested herself to any of us yet), but is often represented symbolically by Sophia Loren. The “puzzle potato” in the Uncyclopedia logo is our mascot and is also named Sophia after the goddess, but the potato is a separate entity. This is an important distinction, as we don’t want people to think we worship tubers.
.net: How popular is the site?
JH: Slightly more popular than www.netmag.co.uk, and less popular than (our host) wikia.com.
.net: What kind of entries do you mostly receive?
JH: Uncyclopedia has several internal ‘projects’: the main article space, which houses general humour of many kinds, from political satire to Wikipedia article parodies to “I maed a yuky doody” (an article that defies categorisation, good taste and spelling).
Our secondary projects include UnNews, a great satirical news section, UnBooks, UnTunes, UnQuotable and several other small corners of the site that are generally modelled after Wikimedia projects. These sections are usually intitiated by one or a few ambitious users; some survive and some die out quickly, but they’re all welcomed with open arms. Except UnRecipes – we had to axe that one after the lawsuits came pouring in. As far as specific entries go, the majority of the articles we get are actually deleted very quickly as being either entirely factual (often copied and pasted straight from Wikipedia), vanity or slanderous articles about non-notable people, or test pages from people giving the Mediawiki software their first go-round. The legitimate articles we get run the entire gamut of humour.
.net: Do you get many complaints? If yes, what do people object to?
JH: Yes, there are lots of complaints, from both internal and external sources. Internally, the complaints are generally about the way the site is run and are often aimed at site policies or administrator actions that are seen as unfair. Because there’s no central ‘adminstration’ per se – as our admins are scattered around the globe – there is a lot of variability in how sysops interpret rules, and there have been flare-ups about perceived misuse of administration privileges (some fair charges, some exaggerated). In general, users have direct access to admins in some way, from user discussion pages to our IRC channel, and most conflicts are worked out without too much fuss.
Externally, we’ve had complaints about slanderous articles (most of which are removed under our vanity policies) and from people who are offended by certain types of humour (usually not removed under our “chill out, it’s only humour” policies). Amusingly, we’ve also had lots of comments about our perceived bashing of Wikipedia, despite a general feeling of community – or at least neutrality – with them. In fact, many of our users are also dedicated Wikipedians. And then there’s the people that think the site is a subpar, unreliable, online factual encyclopedia. These people scare us.
.net: What’s the “no vanity” policy all about?
JH: Originally, when the site began, we had a vanity welcoming policy so long as it was funny. People could poke fun at their close friends, and others, with usually fairly amusing results. As the site grew, however, this was no longer practical, as in jokes between friends degenerated into internet slugfests. We could no longer tell the difference between a small practical joke and hate speech. Flamewars erupted, and people complained. The consequence is that we no longer allow vanity, because the potential for abuse is far too high, as there is too big of an audience. We now disallow references to people that aren’t famous. We’re not interested in being controversial, but rather just funny.
.net: Who are you anyway?
JH: I’m just another college student, and I program small things here and there to amuse my friends. But what’s more interesting is the variety of people that form our community at Uncyclopedia, ranging from teachers to Wikipedia editors (those traitors!), to lawyers, to undertakers. We come from all walks of life, and though we have vastly ranging interests, sometimes even clashing senses of humour, we all share a common will to write things that make people smile.
.net: What’s next for the Uncyclopedia?
JH: One of the great things about a website composed entirely of user-created content is that nobody can predict what exactly will happen next. In the short run, we have our third Poo Lit Surprise (yes, that is a groan-worthy pun on the Pulitzer Prize) writing competition. Past competitions have generated some top-notch articles and introduced some of our current top writers to the site. In the long run, we’re beta-testing a rating system that will help us rank funny, and flag unfunny, articles, as well as introducing a slew of features that will help community building and editing.
Finally, I’d like to thank our community team for contributing answers to some of the questions here, they did a wonderful job.
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Comments
Travis King / 10/03/2007 / 19:00 / http://www.teamunited.com
Uncyclopedia is such a great site. This article reminded me to go and revisit and edit some of my contributions. It warms my heart that there is still a group of people who are completely enamored with the male member. Keep up the good work!
Joe Bloggs / 02/04/2007 / 08:52
Unfortunately it appears that Uncyclopedia is falling prey to one of the foibles that makes Wikipedia such an imperfect beast…namely ego. Wikipedia is fairly useless as an encyclopedia (despite what “Jimbo” and his toadies like to drone on about) because it presents itself as an encyclopedia while being regulated not by documented and verifiable fact, but by consensus. So if the masses agree that the moon is, in fact, made of frozen yoghurt, then Wikipedia states matter-of-factly that the moon is made of frozen yoghurt. However, with Uncyclopedia stating that the moon is made of frozen yoghurt might be the point of the humor. Uncyclopedia is stumbling down the same contentious path as Wikipedia because of Administrators and their bias. Even more than Wikipedia, Uncyclopedia has become the domain of Admins and their whims. The site boasts that most entries do not survive a day, and I suspect this is true. Admins are trolling Uncyclopedia enforcing their interpretation of the rules. If an Admin thinks an entry is humorous then maybe it can stay, but if the Admin doesn’t get the humor, then even if the entry is put forth according to the rules, it is likely to get axed. Humor is a slippery and wiggling eel of an issue and eel of a thing and Admins are ill-equipped to be neutral and unbiased. I challenge you to test my theory (as I have repeatedly) carefully follow the rules, then provide an entry, and see how long it survives. My favorite exchange between an Admin and rejected contributor concluded with “it just wasn’t funny, it has no place here.” So maybe contributions to Uncyclopedia should first be submitted to the Admin humor police to ensure they think it is worthy.
HIndleyite / 16/04/2007 / 21:52 / http://illogicopedia.wikia.org
Re: Joe Bloggs. This 'humour policing' has unfortunately begun to happen in recent times on Uncyc (where, I have to admit, I am an admin). But then you may argue that without policing anarchy would rule and a lower quality humour wiki would result. The site's guidelines clearly state that entries must be 'funny and not just stupid'. It is pasted on peoples' talk pages when they begin to edit. Deletions can be contested if the contributor really cares and in most cases are restored to the user's personal space for development. Admins prefer to delete stuff if no time or effort has gone into it. Granted, a lot of good articles started out this way but the increasing numbers of admins keen to hit the delete button now means the Uncyclopedia has started to take itself a bit more seriously, if this is at all possible...
If you want inclusionism, you would be better served at the Illogicopedia (http://illogicopedia.wikia.com/), where nonsense and insanity reigns and just about anything is accepted.
gene / 01/05/2007 / 03:28 / http://www.deltatheta.org
The Uncyclopedia is a funny and necessary addition to the misleading notion that wikipedia spreads intelligence. You can run searches for almost anything, Vikings, Captain Planet, you name it.
FACT ALERT: UNCYCLOPEDIA IS HILARIOUS.
NeedAbrain / 04/05/2007 / 17:44
Re:JoeBloggs. You may take for comparision all other-language "uncyclopedias". There you will find a 99% of vanity pages and plain stupid entries about made-up voids. I am myself a non-native English language speaker, by I have chosen to join Uncyc instead of my local variation.
Aslos, there are several kinds of humor accepted in Uncyclopedia, from plain nonsense to hardcore dark comedy, the only thing determining if the entries would stay is that they have to start with a premise and the author shall spend some work on its ideas - that is, one-line-articles and small digressions are not tolerated. Aside from vanity, almost all deleted entries are just teenager Internet-speak non-laughing material or plain hate speech, as stating: "Niggas U R monkees, lol".
Quite reasonable, don't you think so?
dieta / 12/05/2007 / 11:28 / http://www.suplement.info
good article, thanks
proxy / 13/05/2007 / 07:46 / http://bestproxy.info
Uncyklopedia - ive love this parody of Wikipedia :)
Mathew Browne / 20/05/2007 / 17:28 / http://www.mbwebdesign.co.uk
Uncyclopedia is a growing breed of websites whose inherent amusement factor and readability mean much time wasted at work. The LOL acronym is used a lot online, but this is one website where I often do laugh out loud.
(Actually, check uncyclopedia's entry for LOL which is pure genius)
mo adem / 12/09/2007 / 14:14
this is the grooviest website ever made
Manforman / 23/11/2007 / 01:04
As a banned, exiled, whatever you call, former Uncyclopedian, I just wanted to share a few thoughts:
Stress relieving - I disagree with that statement. In my experiences, when you're stressed, contributing adds only more stress because all you want to do is relax, not contribute. Also, when you read Uncyclopedia, don't you feel the need to contribute? IMHO, the reply to that question is yes, though it might be different for you.
Also, what is a dick? A dick is an opinion, not a fact. Most of my edits (the ones recently) were in good faith. I was not warned recently so I had to assume they were in good faith - and then I'm banned. Our rules can't be vague so we know what is and what isn't acceptable and thus we know what we're doing right.
Also, my final days weren't fun. I reluctantly engaged into a revert war when this SmackBot person keeps on adding irrelevant unfunny Oscar Wilde quote to my article (Note that even Chronarion said above " It got so out of control that we had to severely clamp down on the use of Wilde quotes because they were interfering with the articles themselves").
Necropaxx / 15/12/2007 / 20:44
Uncyclopedia is great. I have been a member for over six months and love it. The idea that complete BS is accepted as fact is hilarious to me. Keep going, Uncyclopedia.
DJ / 10/02/2008 / 09:49
Uncyclopedia is great. I have been a member for only one month and love it. It ranges from clever to down right stupidity but it is enjoyable. Sure we delete a few articles but these are generally racist, overtly sexual or just plain tasteless and have no place outside a hate site. Visit and contribute, we always want more people.
Joshua Cain / 05/04/2008 / 22:10 / http://californiabeachvacations.net
Wow, I had never heard of Uncyclopedia. Thank you for writing this article. I love comedy, and browsing this site really had me laughing. It is awesome when a site starts as a parody of another site, but then starts to develop a mind of it's own, and grow into the type of site that Uncyclopedia has become.
And the Poo Lit Surprise is a hilarious pun.
Andrew / 28/06/2008 / 19:17
Uncyclopedia is a great site. I have been a member for less than a week, but I love it. I have always loved comedy, but this is beyond any other comedy I have read or seen.
dexter111344 / 04/08/2008 / 19:59
Manforman, you were always a dick. A funny dick, but a dick nonetheless. You were always violating the rules on voting pages(namely VFD), insulting others, etc. And to Joe, we usually decide what is and isn't worth keeping by a vote. Why am I responding to old comments? Oh well...
Colin "All your base Heaney / 17/09/2008 / 16:46
Hmmm...from my experience, nobody (except cajek.) get banned for no reason. I've been banned a few times, but when I look back on them, I can most definitely see why. Also: most users who actually get steamed about articles being huffed end up leaving within their first two months. I've been a member for almost two years, and have never had reason to complain.
Phillip / 31/10/2008 / 04:29 / http://learnthekana.com/
I think Uncyclopedia is hilarious and a great way to unwind after a stressful day at the office. Keep up the great work.
Shtanley Gibbonsh / 30/01/2009 / 14:19 / http://www.thisisnotmywebsiteeither.com
Uncyc = win
Chuck norris = win
you = not win.
Joe_SheA / 01/06/2009 / 10:49 / http://uncyclopedia.org
Incoming message for JoeBloggs:
"LOOK OUT! THERE'S A GRUE BEHIND YOU!"
JoeB: No there isn't.
/grue appears
Message:
"You have pissed off the narrator."
GAME OVER
LongLiverh3 / 07/06/2009 / 06:22
I am physically addicted to Uncyclopedia. And DJ Irreverent, I know you're there, I hate you. You too, Colin.
