On the 28th of December 2010 a twitter conversation transpired between a number of people that resulted in the birth of a term. That term is “Thong Rig”. To be “Thong Rigged” is to have the auto correct change the spelling of a word resulting in you looking like an idiot.
We have all had that happen to us, especially those of us using Apple devices like iPhones and iPads. The auto correct can be somewhat unkind at the best of times. This conversation however was one of the funniest I have ever had on twitter. Making it funnier was the fact that my wife (@Kate_Gray) was sitting right next to me as it happened. She was laughing her head off.
This is an attempt by myself to reconstruct that conversation as best I can. It is unfortunate that the timeline in twitter will only go back 7 hours. So I had to construct this using links and trying to remember what happened. So it might not be 100% perfect. But what it does do is convey the general idea and I don’t think the meaning is lost.
Have a read and you’ll know what we are talking about when we say; “You’ve been thong rigged”. Thong rigging also has it’s own hash tag #thongrig so feel free to use it and spread the meme.
Many Thanks to:
for the damn funny experience!
Back on the 28th of December 2010
The_Rooster: PLEASE follow @Kate_Gray she has so few followers she is checking up on what I tweeted like a freaking day ago!!!! Please save me….
space_cadet: My wife @Superspeechie has 4 followers, me, my brother, his wife, and Julia freakin’ Gillard…please follow my lovely wife 🙂
The_Rooster: @space_cadet: retreated in sympathy mate
The_Rooster: @space_cadet make that retweeted – stoopid auto correct
The_Rooster: Ok now she is covering up her iPhone not wanting me to see her tweets… Before they are tweeted geeze
BZB: @The_Rooster @Kate_Gray This is going to be fun *makes popcorn, gets comfy* ;D
Kate_Gray: @The_Rooster go bite me can’t keep up with those people i’m friends with
The_Rooster: @Kate_Gray but your quoting my bloody tweets!!! Not the interesting people
Fifikins: @The_Rooster @Kate_Gray Twitter is not a place for domestics 😉
Kate_Gray: The things that @The_Rooster talks me into
Fifikins: @BZB My money’s on@Kate_Gray (sorry @The_Rooster!)
BZB: @Fifikins I’m with you!
Kate_Gray: @The_Rooster I have better thongs to do and someone has to look after the lifs
jameswilliams90: @Kate_Gray @The_Rooster damn autothongy!
space_cadet: @Kate_gray btw, whats a “lif” 😉
The_Rooster: Shit a bloody brick now there is a book going on who the winner is going to be. She might wear the f^*%ing thong but I wear the pants baby!
space_cadet: @Kate_gray @the_rooster lol – thongs to do 😀
The_Rooster: @Kate_Gray ROFLMHO that’s gold and the old auto correct bit you rig on the arse!!!
BZB: @The_Rooster Bwahahahaha!
space_cadet: @the_rooster bit “rig” in the arse…wow – snapped!!
jameswilliams90: @Kate_Gray @The_Rooster damn autothongy!
jameswilliams90: @space_cadet @the_rooster @kate_gray don’t want to get your thong caught in the rig…
space_cadet: @jameswilliams90 for sure – getting anything stuck in a thong rig, arse or not, is gonna give you the shits. Especially if you have lifs!
space_cadet: @the_rooster @Superspeechie my rig never gets stuck 😉
superspeechie: @space_cadet pretty cool though. Julia is interested in my tweets lol
The_Rooster: @space_cadet @jameswilliams90 yeah byb gosh those lifs can be a pain in the rig
Fifikins: @The_Rooster do they fit you rig on the arse?
The_Rooster: @Fifikins the are no rigs on my arse just for the record….
Fifikins: @The_Rooster that’s what she said 😀
jameswilliams90: @The_Rooster @space_cadet @kate_gray *crying*
Kate_Gray: Laughing so much have tears in my eyes
The_Rooster: @jameswilliams90 @kate_gray she’s wetting herself….
Kate_Gray: @space_cadet kids
The_Rooster: @jameswilliams90 @space_cadet @kate_gray yeah it was that funny here as well
space_cadet: Bed time – night all.
jameswilliams90: @space_cadet night night, don’t let the rig thongys bit.
Kate_Gray: Going to have to watch that auto correct or fix up my typing on small keyboard
The_Rooster: @Kate_Gray excuses excuses…
I hope that goes some way to explaining Thong Rig…
Feel free to follow me on twitter @The_Rooster
Comment Armageddon
January 10, 2007 — The RoosterSo there I was catching up on some RSS feeds that I had missed over the Christmas New Year break. I made an unexpected find while I was doing that. Michael Arrington’s TechCrunch is a respected authority in Web 2.0 circles as far as covering new start-ups and the culture of the Internet and technology news. But this post caused some controversy.
TechCrunch covered a website that was a social network for budding photographers. So what you might say. Well this is a social network for amateur pornography. I have not linked to the site covered because that is not what this post is about. Arrington covers the site in a very matter-of-fact way that you would expect. It would seem that his readers don’t appreciate it, generally. True this is not the sort of thing that TechCrunch usually covers and that might be why there was the reaction that there was. Still not sure it was worthy of the reaction of some.
The real action here is the comments. There are no less than 191 comments at the time of this post. It is the most entertaining run of comments that I have read in a long time. Like fies to a dead cow everyone turns up for a go. It has everything from name calling to preaching doom and gloom. There are “hissy” fits and passionate pleas. Everything, you name it you will find it here.
What’s more the names read like a who’s who of the blogosphere. Featuring in order of appearance:
I am sure there are some I missed or did not recognise. These guys probably subscribe to TechCrunch so I am not surprised that they do. But for them to be motivated enough to comment, you can imagine. I learned some things about Robert Scoble that I did not know. He actually kicks butt in an argument. Still not sure why they got involved, no one wins a flame war.
Very entertaining and well worth the read. Not often I recommend to skip the article and go straight to the comments. I am not about to make judgements about the merits of Arringtons choice of topics but suffice to say his readers have spoken. But from my perspective it doesn’t seem like it fits the TechCrunch mould. It says a lot about knowing your audience.