State of Cracked

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State of Cracked

Postby Arakiven » Wed Apr 15, 2015 4:34 pm

So ever so ever since this website replaced Cracked.com as my main time killer on the Internet, I haven't been over there at all. Anyway, I got back on Cracked this morning and red one of their articles and put in a few comments, but something felt off.

I know I can't judge the site by one article, so I'm asking those of you who frequent Cracked. What is the state of the site? Have the articles gotten better? Platued? Dropped more? Is the comment section the haven of understanding, sarcasm, and puns that I once knew it to be? Has anyone mentioned me?

When I first discovered Cracked.com, it was the best thing ever. The articles were hilarious and the comment section was full of Jewish bears and Indian guys who recognized they had differences, but didn't care. We were all there to tell jokes and have fun. Is that still the case?
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Matthew Notch » Wed Apr 15, 2015 7:18 pm

Yes. It's exactly as it used to be. The problem is obviously you, Arakiven. Maybe you should be more wacky and Jewish.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby sunglasses » Wed Apr 15, 2015 8:55 pm

Or rich.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby KleinerKiller » Wed Apr 15, 2015 11:40 pm

Arakiven wrote:So ever so ever since this website replaced Cracked.com as my main time killer on the Internet, I haven't been over there at all. Anyway, I got back on Cracked this morning and red one of their articles and put in a few comments, but something felt off.

I know I can't judge the site by one article, so I'm asking those of you who frequent Cracked. What is the state of the site? Have the articles gotten better? Platued? Dropped more? Is the comment section the haven of understanding, sarcasm, and puns that I once knew it to be? Has anyone mentioned me?

When I first discovered Cracked.com, it was the best thing ever. The articles were hilarious and the comment section was full of Jewish bears and Indian guys who recognized they had differences, but didn't care. We were all there to tell jokes and have fun. Is that still the case?


It hasn't been the same for quite a while. Wong bans longtime users for slightly disagreeing with his opinions, the comments have become infested with angry Tumblrites who suckle at the teats of misinformed outrage, fewer people are joking around or willing to accept the jokes of others, and a lot of the articles seem to be geared solely toward gathering as many angry clicks from arguments as possible. Those are just some of the reasons why I severed my ties to the site before fleeing to this safest of havens.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Suckerfish » Thu Apr 16, 2015 3:50 am

In terms of a lot of their articles, I think they are putting out some of the best ones in years despite losing their best columnists to other sites and their own editorial and video teams. They have great fact based articles, and the slice of life articles tend to be my favorite on the site. Even most of the columns are pretty good.

The whole ambiance of the comment section, and the camaraderie has changed though, partly because of an exodus of commenters (how's it goin guys?) and just the general entropy of the internet where everything always gets worse. The community has changed, and grown worse, partly because Cracked, like everyone else, is trying to constantly go viral, which can range from relatively harmless (IRS article today, which is tax day) to terrible (gamergate, Feminism, etc). I can't really fault them for the clickbait, mostly because everyone else is doing it now, and the columnists gotta eat, but I wish they were more self aware about it. Wong especially doesn't seem to understand how certain articles can bait certain replies, and that the way information is presented is a big factor in the community and he doesn't seem to care.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby NathanLoiselle » Thu Apr 16, 2015 4:03 am

The articles are most definitely not as funny as before.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby SilverMaple » Thu Apr 16, 2015 6:37 am

There are definitely still some good articles being put out, although I just roll my eyes at all of the blatantly clickbaity stuff about feminism and such. As long as Felix and Bucholz stick around, I probably will too. But I have noticed that ever since I joined this site, I've been spending a lot less time on Cracked, and I can't remember the last time I actually commented on there. I'm sure there's no connection between those things, though.

Image


Besides, I finally achieved my goal of getting top comment on an article, so I can say I'm done and feel pretty good about it. Granted, a throwaway joke about how much I hate toast crumbs in butter is hardly side-splitting or profound, but whatever, it's my legacy now. I'll take it.

(Also, no self-respecting human being needs a spreader thing to put butter on corn. Fuck you, buy a butter dish.)
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby thatindianguy » Thu Apr 16, 2015 7:31 pm

Ah' remember ma' first top comment.

It was on the Bollywood rip offs article.What can I say? I saw my shot and I took it.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Edgar Cabrera » Thu Apr 16, 2015 7:41 pm

And thus a legend was born.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby FireIsTheCleanser » Fri Apr 17, 2015 6:52 am

I haven't really been on Cracked since I joined this site either. I was already visiting it a lot less often but now it's like eh... Sometimes I'll see an article that I think might me interesting and think I might read it later but I never do. It feels off. Do they even do Quick Fixes anymore? I'd always read those if nothing else.

Also, yesterday's article had the title 7 Signs You're Aging Way Sooner Than You Thought You Would sounds like the article would be more fitting on the Yahoo or AOL homepage. I skimmed through the article and read enough that it wasn't really like that but still.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Dr. Ambiguous » Fri Apr 17, 2015 7:36 am

I don't read much Cracked anymore, really just when an article gets linked here on the forum or on IRC (and not always even), and that makes me sad. I used to love reading Cracked, it was part of my daily rituals (though done as a nightcap before bed). About two years ago when this site started, I popped on over here. I'd felt Cracked had been declining a bit over the few preceding months, but not drastically so. I got behind on the site as I became more involved in TCS and dedicated more of my free time here.

As I continued to read the articles they showed a marked decline in quality, and I eventually just gave up on it. The increasingly rare times I've read it since then suggest to me that it's continued following the same trend. Quick-Fixes became two pages (seriously, what the fuck is up with that)? Articles became three pages. Article titles and the articles themselves became even more click-bait oriented, which contributed greatly to the site's decline. The increased focus on SJW-esque articles, many of which coupled themselves with the click-bait. Cracked's brand of feminism and their poor handling of sexism. I read more and more of that sort of drivel, and less and less of the truly interesting and funny articles that they use to churn out on a daily basis. That's not to say that we don't ever get good things from them now, but the quantity of it has declined to the point that I don't even bother reading most of the articles that we talk about here anymore. I'm not a regular Cracked reader anymore, so maybe I'm not the best person to answer the question in the OP, but that's my take on things anyway.

I also find it interesting, how two years after I (and many of the old-timers on this site) had this experience with Cracked, many of the newcomers have much the same, even those who started reading Cracked after I/many of us stopped. It gives me a strange feeling of deja vu. I don't have any actual point there, it's just something mildly intriguing that I noticed.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Arakiven » Fri Apr 17, 2015 7:21 pm

I remember when I first stumbled upon cracked, I was googling a topic for school and one of there articles came up. It actually had infromation I could use, and was hilarious at the same time, a few articles later, I was hooked.

This was quite a while ago (2,3 maybe 4 years. I'm bad with time), back when photoplatsy came out once a week and I don't think they released articles daily (and if they did it was less articles at a time than it is now). I didn't start commenting until a year after I found the sight because you couldn't comment from a phone.

I do remember what my first comment was, (but not the article it was on) it was one of the top 5 comments and someone even compared me to Buttchocolate, which I considered the highest of honors.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Tuli » Fri Apr 17, 2015 7:44 pm

There's an article titled 7 Real Humans Who Survived Shockingly Violent Deaths on the front page right now. SURVIVED. DEATHS. I think my eyes rolled right out of their sockets upon seeing that.

The article itself is actually one of the interesting ones but my god that title. So that's one area where quality has definitely declined...

But I'm in the same boat as most of you, reading less Cracked since I got on TCS. So I dunno if Cracked got worse, or I just found something more interesting to waste time on. :P
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Edgar Cabrera » Fri Apr 17, 2015 8:01 pm

Tuli wrote:There's an article titled 7 Real Humans Who Survived Shockingly Violent Deaths on the front page right now. SURVIVED. DEATHS. I think my eyes rolled right out of their sockets upon seeing that.

The article itself is actually one of the interesting ones but my god that title.

Going by the url the original title was along the lines "7 Real Humans Who Survived Shit That Would Kill A Terminator", so I guess that Title Guy not only is into sensationalism, but also on oxymorons.
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Re: State of Cracked

Postby Jeckel » Fri Apr 17, 2015 8:14 pm

Great, there goes another comment section to the abyss of people that can't simply ignore article titles. It was an interesting article, but the discussion isn't going to go anywhere because everyone has to make their own "witty" comment about the title guy, as if any point they are going to make hasn't been made a million times in a hundred different articles.

And that is my main problem with Cracked comment sections: they have become so repetitive because people don't bother to read others' comments, but still think that whatever they have to say is so important that it has to be posted so others will read it. I will never understand the narcissism it takes to post comments on the internet without reading the comments of others, if only to avoid looking like an idiot for reposing something that has already been said more times than can possibly be necessary.

This has been going on since the regulars jumped ship and they were replaced by the influx of youtube and facebook people that wouldn't know a decent conversation if it sat on their face. If anything will finally push me completely away from cracked, it will be these people with nothing to say filling the comments with crap everyday.
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