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| Source: Joaquin Baldwin, AN ANIMATOR WHO WORKED ON ZOOTOPIA |
Well, the past week has certainly been interesting. The I Will Survive Meme has come and seems to be going (hopefully), President Obama’s executive order regarding Net Neutrality was overturned, and Revoltech announced they’ll be doing more poseable Zootopia figures (which we’ll be covering very soon, don’t worry).
So, first things first- we at ZNN are fairly worried about what the lack of legal protection for the internet in the US will mean for the future. Ideally, the big ISPs like Comcast and AT&T will seek to gain their profits from big sites like Netflix (which actually uses a HUGE chunk of broadband space, and account for over 1/3 of all downstream traffic in North America), and ignore little sites like us. But, my guess is they’ll start by rolling out new costs for all websites, where we would have to pay the ISPs to provide fast speeds to you, our viewers. In order to prepare for that, we are looking into possible ways to monetize ZNN so that we can afford to keep things consistent for everybody, no matter where they live. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on filling it with ads or anything like that- in fact, if you have any suggestions for ways we could do this without negatively affecting things for you, we’d love to hear about them in the comments. In the meantime, please consider supporting us on Patreon if you aren’t already. That can help us be ready for whenever we start to see the effects of this change. Thank you.
As for I Will Survive, as you can see in the cover image, Joaquin Baldwin, an actual Disney animator who worked on Zootopia, used the IWS meme to spread the word about Net Neutrality. This is but one of many expertly made memes, but it goes further than that. Since we last discussed it, even more online magazines and youtube channels have picked up on the meme. Some of these include PewDiePie (yes, PEWDIEPIE), The RoundTable, and Romper.com. You can see it for yourself by following the links in the previous sentence, and we’ll include the videos after the break.
However, this meme seems to be short-lived, capturing the internet’s attention for about a week before dying off. How do I know this? Well, ZNN first discovered this was happening when we saw a sudden explosion of pageviews to the site (over 300,000 in one day!) and investigated. Since last Wednesday, which is when The AV Club released their article about it, the pageviews have come in steadily decreasing waves. We feel it’s safe to say that the internet’s collective attention has moved on to other things (such as net neutrality), so hopefully things will be back to normal within the fandom soon.
That said, if you discovered ZNN through the meme, you’re more than welcome to stick around! We’d love to hear from you!
We have one final post to make regarding I Will Survive, which should be coming later today, by a very special new member of the ZNN staff. After that, unless something else completely unexpected happens, that should be the end of it.
So, what have you all thought about the sudden and unexpected spotlight that’s been placed on the fandom? Did you discover the zootopia fandom through it? What are your thoughts overall? Let us know down in the comments, and check out the videos I mentioned after the break.
I wonder if the new staff member perhaps had a major hand in the creation of the original comic?
Personally, I would have rather we did without the sudden spotlight, because I've seen an overwhelming majority of either negative reactions or mockery from both actual fans and the "internet public" in general. But, the public does as the public will, and hopefully if anything we got at least a few people looking past the ridiculousness to find the calmer and more dedicated fandom behind that chaos.
I'm writing that last bit on IWS, and though I am no stranger to this site, I definitely had no role in the creation of that comic.
Andy, i know you and your crew worried about this but it's not the end of the world because it's still going to be a same but a pre-2015. You wondering why i said that? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oB3bfrmfT-I Yes she is a cat but she does a good overview and helps bring up how the net neutrality debate is a tough one with pro's and con's for both sides.
I know its not the end of the world, but in any case I'm worried about the fact that it happened.
Hehe, this is almost too glorious to be true.
Judy, please respond…
I'm glad this has ended but unfortunately I am afraid what image this has given the fandom ever since that first article. And moreso I am afraid of the potential amount of antishippers that might have risen due to the lack of understanding.
Aww, I was hoping for the review by The Bible Reloaded. It was a great comedic review from genuine outsiders who also tore into the clear (conservative Hispanic Catholic) religious overtones. Coming from a Hispanic former Catholic (who still hasn't been excommunicated; ain't gonna bell, book and candle me) it was quite insightful.
I'll be honest, I've never heard of them. Could you send us a link? We could add it in.