IAM Christopher Poole, aka "moot," founder of 4chan & Canvas. AMA!

How do you justify rallying against the lack of anonymity that Facebook provides and then requiring it for your next project?

How do you justify rallying against the lack of anonymity that Facebook provides and then requiring it for your next project?

I think it's important to understand the difference between advocating for anonymous contribution, and a pro-anonymity-is-the-only-way!!!!! zealot. (I'm the former!)

I want the public to understand the importance of having the option to contribute anonymously. At SXSW, I focused on anonymous authenticity, and the creativity that anonymity allows for. The ability to fail quietly without having that failure associated with your name/identity allows for more experimentation and limit pushing. People also contribute in a totally raw, unfiltered way, that I'd argue is more authentic than real-ID.

That said, there are times where you do want to know who that other person is, and where real-ID is preferable. A good example is news websites and YouTube, where the comment quality is often terrible. Facebook rolled out their Comments product recently, and TechCruch, which has had a lot of trouble in the past keeping comments on track, adopted it and and it radically improved their comment quality.

So to sum it up: There isn't one way of doing anything. I'm not saying everywhere online should be anonymous, nor do I think everywhere should use read-ID. I just want options! And for people to understand how valuable anonymity can be, and why it's worth protecting.

PS: As we've said before, Facebook Connect on Canvas is temporary. We're only planning to use it for the private beta period, and hope to see you on the site once we're out of beta. Thanks for bearing with us!

Do you get asked questions like this a lot? All answers are very well written and I've enjoyed reading them. Thanks for doing the AMA. Been a good read so far.

Most 4chan threads that I post in as myself tend to instantly become "question time with moot!" threads. I always enjoy them though. It's really nice to be able to chat and connect with the community, and it's something that's become harder and harder to do over the years.

Thanks for the kind words and thanks for reading.

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Dammit...

Edit: It seems I've new-fagged my way near the top, so I guess I should ask some questions.

• According to your wiki, you were a witness in the Sarah Palin e-mail hack trial, explaining 4chan terminology. What was it like sitting on the witness stand, and with a straight face explaining things like "dub gets", "desu", "lurker", "newfag", etc.?

• Have you ever received any serious threats or been intimidated by the Church of Scientology or FBI, where you felt like you might actually be in some serious trouble or danger?

According to your wiki, you were a witness in the Sarah Palin e-mail hack trial, explaining 4chan terminology. What was it like sitting on the witness stand, and with a straight face explaining things like "dub gets", "desu", "lurker", "newfag", etc.?

Pretty surreal.

Have you ever received any serious threats or been intimidated by the Church of Scientology or FBI, where you felt like you might actually be in some serious trouble or danger?

None. The media often uses "4chan" and "Anonymous" interchangeably, which is wrong and misleading. To their credit, the Church of Scientology and FBI seem to understand that the actions of people flying the flag of 4chan or Anonymous don't necessarily speak for the community and certainly not the 4chan.org administration.

How have you gotten away with hosting a site that consistently has child pornography posted on it? Have there been serious attempts to shut it down?

How is the site monitored - do you forward illegal material and IP info to the FBI?

Has anyone gotten arrested for posting illegal content?

What info have you turned over to the government about Anonymous?

How have you gotten away with hosting a site that consistently has child pornography posted on it? Have there been serious attempts to shut it down?

How is the site monitored - do you forward illegal material and IP info to the FBI?

4chan gets almost one million posts per day, hundreds of thousands of which are images. As with any large UGC site a very, very small percentage of these posts end up being contraband or questionable content. We have a team of volunteers who do an excellent job removing prohibited content, including CP, which is then automatically reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children's CyberTipline.

NCMEC acts as a clearing house and forwards reports to the appropriate law enforcement. This is how all major ISPs and online service providers do it. Here's the law.

Has anyone gotten arrested for posting illegal content?

Yes. Anyone who posts illegal content on 4chan is an idiot.

DO YOU LIKE CATS

DO YOU HAVE A CAT

I'm pretty sure this is his cat

His name is Seymour :)

Have you become 100 percent immune to the horrors of the internet over the years?

Not entirely, but there isn't much that fazes me at this point.

Have you ever used your status to try to pick up women? If so, did those women turn out to have penises?

"I founded an internet company that lets college kids trade memes anonymously for free."

"Kinda like 4chan?"

"Exactly like 4chan."

"What do you mean?"

"I founded 4chan."

"Moot founded 4chan."

"Nice to meet you."

Hahahahaha.

Have you ever used your status to try to pick up women? If so, did those women turn out to have penises?

Haha no. I don't go out much and rarely drink/don't visit bars. I'm not sure where else people meet women?

Can you explain Canvas to us. What is it for and what makes it different?

Canvas is a place to share and play with images. We're trying to reimagine forums in a world where everyone has a fast, modern browser.

Where are we now? The site is a fast paced collaborative image editing community. Post a fun picture and within minutes there will be multiple remixes of it. Sticker the ones you like. The frontpage works a lot like Reddit but with stickers for upvotes.

Where are we going? More realtime. Much more discussion. More image editing features. More types of content on the site. Better ways for groups to share and have conversations together.

What we've launched so far represents just a kernel of the long-term vision we have for the site, and we're extremely excited to grow the community and explore what's in store!

Why is facebook a requirement to join Canvas? I don't like apps and 3rd party stuff that may or may not be pilfering, existing or non-existing information from a possibly imaginary facebook account.

Reposting this from earlier.

We're using it during the beta period to handle invites and authenticate users (make sure they're real people). We don't surface your Facebook details anywhere on the site except your friends invite panel, if you request an invite.

Once you register an account, you have the ability to post anonymously by toggling a checkbox next to every comment box, that stays checked until you uncheck it.

How many people does 4chan employ?

None. It's just me, a volunteer part-time developer, and a handful of volunteer moderators and janitors. The volunteers all do an incredible job, and don't get nearly enough credit for their hard work. Hats off to them!

Is there truth to this image?

Zero truth. I've posted a few other responses re: our relationship with law enforcement here, here, and here.

Would you fight Mark Zuckerberg to the death?

I'm pretty sure he said he's met him before. I wanna know how that interaction went. I would wager big that the Zuck was an ex /b/tard.

I've met Mark a couple times, and we've messaged before. Every interaction has been positive. I don't agree with everything Facebook does or his stance on identity, but he's a nice and extremely smart guy who believes in what he's doing.

has anyone ever recognised you on the street? do you actually feel like you 'connect' with the memes (ie do you feel like you're part of the 4chan community), or do you find them not funny and insignificant?

oh and do you ever post in 4chan as an anon?

has anyone ever recognised you on the street?

Yes, it happens regularly, depending on where I walk. Areas with lots of college students/young people can be a minefield, so I tend to avoid them.

do you actually feel like you 'connect' with the memes (ie do you feel like you're part of the 4chan community), or do you find them not funny and insignificant?

Absolutely. I've been using 4chan daily for seven and a half years—the humor and culture definitely resonates with me.

oh and do you ever post in 4chan as an anon?

Of course! I've had to more and more over the years, since a single post by me can derail a thread in an instant.

Did you really perform a Barrel role as per a fans' request?

Yep, that was the first time I was ever recognized in public. Richmond, VA in 2008!

A car drove past me as I was crossing the street and yelled "Do a barrel roll!"

So I did.

A car drove past me as I was crossing the street and yelled "Do a barrel roll!

Have you ever taken a look in the mirror and said "I'm so internet-famous that cars break their vows of silence just to talk to me"?

Do you consider yourself a celebrity? If so, how do you intend to use your voice in the future? You've definitely got the good side of 4chan pinned with Canvas, but do you want to leave it with these two businesses or utilise this kind of piranha pit-style interaction further and eventually do something on the scale of, say, Wikileaks or Anonymous (mainly just the idea of using anonymous flash mobs for social good)?

Have you ever taken a look in the mirror and said "I'm so internet-famous that cars break their vows of silence just to talk to me"?

Cars break their vow of silence in New York a lot :)

Do you consider yourself a celebrity?

I suppose others might. Thankfully it hasn't affected the way I interact with people or live my life.

If so, how do you intend to use your voice in the future?

I tend to be pretty camera and attention shy, so not sure. I've been meaning to write more, and will be doing more to spread the word about Canvas and things I care about.

The four things I spoke about at SXSW this year were fluid identity, creative mutation, playing with media, and shared experience. All things I find fascinating and think are extremely important, and not things I hear others talking about or evangelizing.

1) What do you think, 10 years from now, the lasting cultural legacy of 4chan will be?

2) If you could go back in time to 10 years ago and do anything differently, would you?

3) What aspects of 4chan (other than the obvious /b/ != 4chan) do you wish people knew more about?

1) What do you think, 10 years from now, the lasting cultural legacy of 4chan will be?

That it shaped 'Net and IRL culture in a way that few other communities/websites have.

2) If you could go back in time to 10 years ago and do anything differently, would you?

Re: 4chan, I'd involve more people in the running of the site/share more of the responsibilities. Do a better job at engaging the community through news posts (something I did for years and haven't kept up with), and more active participation and moderation.

3) What aspects of 4chan (other than the obvious /b/ != 4chan) do you wish people knew more about?

I think that's the most important one, but also that the "15 year old hacker nerd" stereotype isn't very accurate. People often confuse the entire 4chan community with /b/. We have ~50 boards, all with their own amazing sub-communities and cultures. And tons of normal, functional people use the site. Our [first!] meetup at Barcade a few months ago was proof of that—everyone who showed up was extremely sociable, nice, and we all had a great time.

How much of the initial ideas and pillars of 4Chan (anon posts, images, whatnot) came out of the community around SA?

On the day it was founded, 4chan was posted to the anime sub-forum of Something Awful and so many of the first users from from there, but the site itself is 100% based on a Japanese site called Futaba Channel, or 2chan.net.

Futaba Channel is in turn based on 2channel (2ch.net), which is a huge text BBS that's inspired a lot of the anonymous and otaku culture in Japan.

I had the opportunity to meet 2channel's founder, Hiroyuki Nishimura at SXSW Interactive this year, and it was a real treat. Here's a profile on him from Wired: link

What made 4chan so popular?

The community. 4chan's culture is unique and spreads and draws people in like no other. It's also important to realize that 4chan wasn't some overnight success, and there was never "hockey stick"-like growth. Its growth has been entirely organic (we've never advertised, past posting it on day one to IRC and a forum), and has been a slow steady build over seven and a half years.

thanks for the reddit sign up for canvas. excited to play around with it!

Thanks! The entire team loves Reddit and Redditors, so we're excited to have you guys play around with it. Please feel free to submit any feedback you have via the feedback form on the upper-right, or by e-mailing [email protected].

So Canvas is essentially a social medium for the generation and propagation of user-created images? Meme-type communication and whatnot? Right?

This is insane. Assuming this is successful, you'll have created the medium for a post-literate society. Do you realize the type of basic cognitive shit you're messing with?

What can I say, I was moved by Idiocracy.

First you said no way there were gonna be captchas. Then you said they were just temporary. Now they're still there. So is some of the spam.

How much has that affected posting rates?

Edit: grammar nazi got me there.

Most of the spam you see now is posted by hand, by people paid by the spammers. As long as they keep making their conversions ($), there's an incentive to spam, and pay humans to do it.

reCAPTCHA cut down on almost all of the automated spam, and that's the reason we've kept it. Unfortunately, it looks like it's here to stay, but in my opinion the hassle of filling a CAPTCHA out occasionally sure beats having every index page flooded with porn and link spam.

What is the nature of your relationship with Max Goldberg and do you feel YTMND can be saved?

Max is a friend. Last I heard, he's hard at work on the next version of YTMND. Just be patient and you'll be pleasantly surprised!

Why have you chosen Christopher Poole as your pseudonym?

Do you ever plan on going by your actual name?

What is your current relationship with Shii and W.T. Snacks?

Why have you chosen Christopher Poole as your pseudonym?

Do you ever plan on going by your actual name?

Christopher Poole isn't a pseudonym :)

What is your current relationship with Shii and W.T. Snacks?

I'm still in touch with W.T. Snacks and see him every few months.

Since Reddit is 4Chan a week later are you doing this AMA from the future?

Mayhaps.

I THINK YOU SHOULD GET FAT. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON JUSTIN BIEBER? HAVE YOU EVER SEEN A GROWN MAN NAKED? HOW ABOUT THE INSIDE OF A TURKISH PRISON, HAVE YOU EVER SEEN THAT? WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE TYPE OF OUTER-SPACE PHENOMENA? ARE YOU TOM CRUISE? LOOKING FORWARD TO YOUR REPLIES~

♥

What is the best thing that happened to you because of creating 4chan?

The incredible people I've met and friendships I've made.

I saw a screening of the movie Get Lamp, and I happened to notice your name in the credits. I thought about asking the director if it was you, but I figured there must be plenty of people with that name. When I got home I googled your names together, and sure enough it was you. So, what's your connection to Get Lamp and its director?

I donated to Jason Scott's Sabbatical Kickstarter to help fund GET LAMP, but more importantly he's a great friend of mine who I'm fortunate enough to see regularly. Jason has been incredibly supportive of me and 4chan over the years and I'm lucky to have him as a friend and advocate.

I watched your TED talk a while ago and really enjoyed it. You brought up a lot of good point regarding anonymity online and that's what I've always loved about 4chan. I post occasionally and lurk a lot more but its fascinating to see what people say and do when it's not connected to them.

Did you start 4chan, especially /b/, with that intent of making an anonymous community or is that just what kept you interested and kept it around?

Thanks for the kind words!

Did you start 4chan, especially /b/, with that intent of making an anonymous community or is that just what kept you interested and kept it around?

Nope, it was something that developed on its own and has definitely helped keep me interested/fascinated over the years.

The main thing that appealed to me about Futaba Channel, the site 4chan is based on, was the rate of posting. The ability to hit force-refresh every second, and get a whole new page of posts was really incredible, and impossible to find on Western BBS. And remember this was eight years ago.

Also it helped that it was image-based, since I don't speak or read Japanese :) I think that's helped 4chan grow over the years too, since image-based communities are more inclusive than text-based, because you don't need to speak the language to appreciate the content. 4chan is accessed by almost every country on the planet!

How did the Andrew WK Q&A wind up happening, and do you think there's ever a chance for any other similar events? Or is Andrew WK the only person insane enough to do a Q&A on 4chan? Do you even bother going to conventions anymore? Snacks still goes to some in the Atlanta area from what I understand but I imagine it's a complete pain in the ass for you now.

How did the Andrew WK Q&A wind up happening, and do you think there's ever a chance for any other similar events? Or is Andrew WK the only person insane enough to do a Q&A on 4chan?

One of moderators saw that he tweeted about 4chan, and reached out to his manager via e-mail. Andrew was totally into the idea of doing the Q&A, met up with us at said moderator's apartment, and we all had a great time doing the threads. Andrew was incredibly generous with his time, and incredibly nice to boot!

Do you even bother going to conventions anymore?

I don't go to anime conventions any more, but I do attend a few tech conferences. Last year I was at TED, SXSW, and TechCrunch Disrupt NY and SF.

1) How long do you predict 4chan has the potential to grow it's site traffic before it's too much for one guy and a team of volunteers to handle? Do you ever foresee expanding into a larger "team"?

2) Given that it was a small project to begin with in 2003, and there's obvious potential for some competition, in another eight years time do you see 4chan being threatened in anyway by emerging websites competing for it's traffic?

3) Is 4chan a business, or just a convenient hobby for you?

1) How long do you predict 4chan has the potential to grow it's site traffic before it's too much for one guy and a team of volunteers to handle? Do you ever foresee expanding into a larger "team"?

I feel like it's less a team size issue, and more a community carrying capacity. 4chan is visited by approximately 12 million people every month, but I'm not sure the software (design wise) nor community will scale past 15-20 million people.

The biggest issue is that although we have no structural barriers to entry (registration, etc), we have incredibly high sociocultural barriers to entry. The community has created it's own unique culture and language that is hard for outsiders to parse (think: "lurk more"), and actively resists growth, so it's hard to imagine the site doubling in size any time soon—even if we had twice the staff.

2) Given that it was a small project to begin with in 2003, and there's obvious potential for some competition, in another eight years time do you see 4chan being threatened in anyway by emerging websites competing for it's traffic?

No, I don't. When 4chan launched, it was the first English imageboard, and now there are thousands of sites that look and function exactly the same, but 4chan is still by far the largest and most influential. And 4chan has eight years of colorful culture and history that isn't easily replicable for a new site, since it's a function of having passionate users and time. Some more thoughts here.

3) Is 4chan a business, or just a convenient hobby for you?

4chan has always been run in my spare time, as a hobby. I never envisioned it being something big, or a business. I think investors/startup people use the term "lifestyle business" to describe it.

How do you feel about a girls having folders just for your pictures?

Also, what's your type of girl and why?

How do you feel about a girls having folders just for your pictures?

Haha, I'm not sure they do?

Also, what's your type of girl and why?

Hm. Smart, nerdy, independent, passionate, pretty..? Must like space, trains, and cities. And food. I love food.

Are you dating?

Are you dating?

Are 4chan and canv.as truly anonymous?

To other users, yes. Internally? 4chan logs IPs and other info provided by users for active posts (and has since day one, since rate-limiting, bans, etc all work via IP). On Canvas, all users are accountable for the content the post, even if done anonymously, but we don't show other users who you are.

You are my favorite person on the internet. Thank you for your recent talks on anonymity online, they meant a lot.

Thank for the kind words, and happy to!

Due to overwhelming demand, we've temporarily disabled direct signups for Redditors. However when we start releasing invites, you'll get priority and be one of the first to receive one via email!

:(

Shhhh, PM me.

Firstly, thanks for maintaining 4chan for as long as you have, when I imagine it can be quite the hassle at times, and also thanks for what you've done with Canvas so far.

1)Now that you've maybe had some time to reflect, do you feel like splitting /r9k/ into a bunch of smaller boards was for the better? Some sick part of me misses the unique blend of spices it entailed but considering it strayed from it's original intentions to include misogyny and camwhoring I can't really say I mourn it's loss.

2)Sorry if this strikes a nerve but how do you feel about people making money off of the memes popularized by 4chan? Like icanhascheezburger or Hot Topic or other places selling merchandise, or maybe to a lesser extent even Know Your Meme. Do you feel like this might be an "injustice" to your users who created it?

3)Do you still plan on keeping the textboards? I still kind of like them even though people rarely post and it's been overrun with a bit of spam.

4)Speaking of spam, now that the captcha is in place is there any chance of an /hc/ type board being reinstated? I'm kind of tired having to shift through /b/ for that type of content......

5)Any chance of including some of the 4chan extension or 4chan X capabilities to the site? Like watching threads, expanding threads, expanding images etc. Or is this too much of a burden on the site?

6)Do you have any new ideas or boards in mind you might be willing to discuss? I think someone mentioned a /diy/ type board and you seemed keen on the idea

7)Any new ideas for Canvas you'd be willing to talk about? What do you hope to accomplish with the end product for it, and do you intend to eventually make money off of it as opposed to 4chan?

I just want to thank you yet again for 4chan, and even if you don't respond to all or any of these I hope you at least read it.

1)Now that you've maybe had some time to reflect, do you feel like splitting /r9k/ into a bunch of smaller boards was for the better? Some sick part of me misses the unique blend of spices it entailed but considering it strayed from it's original intentions to include misogyny and camwhoring I can't really say I mourn it's loss.

Yes. I do miss some of the old /r9k/ culture though.

2)Sorry if this strikes a nerve but how do you feel about people making money off of the memes popularized by 4chan? Like icanhascheezburger or Hot Topic or other places selling merchandise, or maybe to a lesser extent even Know Your Meme. Do you feel like this might be an "injustice" to your users who created it?

I don't mind it, but I really don't like Cheezburger's model. That said, Ben (their CEO) is a smart guy and great businessman. But again, I don't like the model (if you skim through the ROFLCon II 2010 video here, you can see some of that discussion).

In the end, they're doing something that we've chosen not to do—monetizing 'Net culture—and there's no reason to resent them for it.

I feel like there's a better way to pay thanks to the people who are creating content, but I don't know what it is. Flattr, maybe?

3)Do you still plan on keeping the textboards? I still kind of like them even though people rarely post and it's been overrun with a bit of spam.

Yep!

4)Speaking of spam, now that the captcha is in place is there any chance of an /hc/ type board being reinstated? I'm kind of tired having to shift through /b/ for that type of content......

Doubtful. If you look at the boards we've added over the years, we've strayed away from adding adult ones, and focused on worksafe. Worksafe is participatory and builds community, whereas adult is more consumptive and transient. We want to focus on the former.

5)Any chance of including some of the 4chan extension or 4chan X capabilities to the site? Like watching threads, expanding threads, expanding images etc. Or is this too much of a burden on the site?

Nope. We pride our barebones functionality, and think offering added functionality in the form of an extension is a good tradeoff.

6)Do you have any new ideas or boards in mind you might be willing to discuss? I think someone mentioned a /diy/ type board and you seemed keen on the idea

/diy/ is high on the list, as are a few others. Wait and see :)

7)Any new ideas for Canvas you'd be willing to talk about? What do you hope to accomplish with the end product for it, and do you intend to eventually make money off of it as opposed to 4chan?

Too many to list. We've got a lot in store, think the community will be extremely pleased, and can't wait to build a future with them.

I just want to thank you yet again for 4chan, and even if you don't respond to all or any of these I hope you at least read it.

Thanks for taking the time to respond to my AMA!

Mootles, how do you feel about the splinter and spinoff Chans? Y'know, 7chan, 420chan, plus4chan, etc. Do you actually, like, go and visit any of them, or even have one that you actually like?

Mootles, how do you feel about the splinter and spinoff Chans? Y'know, 7chan, 420chan, plus4chan, etc.

The more the merrier! 4chan is never going to be all things to all people, so it's great to have others filling those voids.

Do you actually, like, go and visit any of them, or even have one that you actually like?

I don't visit any imageboards besides 4chan. One can barely keep up with 4chan!

How many memes are you personally responsible for, if any?

Hm, probably a small handful.

Did your family disown you for 4chan?

Nope! Nobody in my family, parents included, knew about 4chan until 2008 when I was 19. They've all been extremely supportive.