The Memenets

THE BATTLE OF BROS ICING BROS: News from the Frontlines against the Axis of Ice

San Francisco!  A call to arms!  

The Battle against icing is no longer just at our doorsteps; a vile invasion from our shallower neighbors to the South.  No my friends, it is being fought right here in our very streets and sadly we are losing.  From Bay to Breakers to SOMA startups, to the Palo Alto palace of Facebook HQ, the bros of the Axis of Ice are swiftly moving from viral meme to being fully entrenched as a cultural institution.  

Yesterday, the Resistance against icing received intel from Gawker agents that none other than Mein Zückerberg himself was spotted icing one of his employees; the two-first-name-having Firefox founder Blake Ross.  It has also been known for some time that the douche-repository site Office Icing was created and run by San Francisco tech-marketing startup [NAME REDACTED]. 

While there were momentary celebrations of victory when Bros Icing Bros appeared to have retreated from battle, new intel reports that this retreat is temporary and that Bros Icing Bros will soon return as a fully funded startup in what is sure to be a 'Blitzkrieg of Bro'.  Estimates of our potential casualties were not yet available at the time of this broadcast. 

We are not safe San Francisco.  Simply refusing to participate is no longer enough to repel the Axis of Ice.  We must fight back with our own memes.  We at the Resistance have created these icing alternatives to aid you in the good fight. 

Bros Flasking Bros: Jameson preferred. 

 

Bros Ricing Bros: Rice-A-Roni's profits are in the toilet, help a fallen SF icon.

 

Actually that's just fucking retarded, never mind. 

 

Can also be done in conjunction with any alternative above.

 

Bros Tazing Bros.  

Got It At Ross

I was strolling around Dolores Park yesterday and ran into these guys rapping about Ross and screaming for someone to give them a beer.  Figured that was a good time to figure out what's their story.  They're Abraham Linkin and sure to be the next big thing in Bay Area meme-music.

Myspace.

Don't Ice Me Bro!

(Yelp employee is “iced” in San Francisco, via Bros Icing Bros)

Ok, first let's quickly explain the concept.  “Icing” is when a friend/coworker/complete fucking douchebag sneaks a bottle of Smirnoff Ice up on their victim (or into the possession/vicinity of) and announces: “You totes got iced bitch/bro/brah!”  The victim of the “icing” must then do one of two things:

  1. Deflect the “icing” with their “ice shield,” which must be a bottle of Smirnoff Ice that they already had in their immediate possession, or…
  2. If the victim does not posses an “ice shield” they must drop to one knee and pound the entire 12oz bottle of date-rape/shame flavored juice.  

For the past week I've heard an alarming number of reports that this phenomenon is spreading like wildfire amongst the employees of Los Angeles creative industry companies, particularly in the music industry and talent agency circles.  It seems more than likely to me that this a guerilla marketing tactic, designed to boost sales (the rules of the game certainly support that) and get Smirnoff's awful product into the hands of the young and hip.  Just look at these “blogs” and their definitions of the rules:

(via You Got Iced! tumblr)

Consider the amount of detail spent on describing and listing all the variations of the Smirnoff Ice product on the Bros Icing Bros 'Dealing With Bitchin Bros' page.  It reads like advertising to me.  Some try to argue that the game is based on the fact that Smirnoff Ice sucks (duh) and that 'every bros worst nightmare is having to pound an Ice', and that because of this it can't possibly be a marketing campaign supported by Smirnoff.  That's a pretty fucking weak facade for arguing the 'authenticity' of “icing.”  People don't realize just how sinister and engineered the world of advertising and brand development is.  Take PBR for example.

What scares me more than anything is that it hasn't only spread to the LA-douchebag-Ari Gold-wannabe types working as assistants in mstrm media outfits.  No sir, “icing” has gone so far as to cross into the ambiguous borders of hipsterdom.  

  • On Friday I received a report from a friend working for a LA based music label that there had been a phone conversation with a Pitchfork staff writer.  This staff writer had just been “iced” in Pitchfork's New York offices.  
  • On Saturday, I discovered that the You Got Iced tumblr had posted pics of indie band The National being “iced” at a recent LA show.  
  • And as you can see from the hipstamatic print of the Yelp “icing” we are not safe, even here in San Francisco.  

While I do believe that the phenomenon began organically (perhaps in the frat scene of South Carolina universities, as the Bros Icing Bros founders claimed in an interview with The Awl,) but I am highly suspicious that a huge amount of momentum has been engineered by marketing firms or whatever sinister brand-guru-Wunderkind that Smirnoff has on their payroll.   I just have a hard time believing that such a douchetool prank can make it's way from the daily homoerotic mating rituals of Southern frat Neanderthals and all the way into the lives of young East AND West Coast creative industry types, just by being “viral.” 

But then again, there's always the theory that AIDS originated in a lower species of primates before making the jump to humans…

SF Neighborhoods in T-Shirt Form

I'm pretty sure these shirts are a meme from yesteryear and I always hate being late to the lolparty, however these things date wayyy back to 2008, a year before anyone read San Francisco blogs.  Anywho, the only thing I don't like about these shirts are that there are only four of them.  Make more, design nerds!  LIke a shirt of the Richmond featuring a fog monster eating a frat boy, or a shirt of the Mission featuring a fog monster eating a frat boy in a hoodie.

Anyway, these pieces of fashionable hyper-local cotton were created at the sexy people at Ape Do Good Printing.  Unfortunately, I cannot find a link to buy these shirts, which is such an epic first world problem it makes me want cry.

For those of you who want to actually buy a neighborhood shirt, Headline Shirts has an alternate.

(photos ripped straight from the Ape Do Good Printing flickr stream.  Hat tip to Generic via ??? via ??? god this tumblr shit is hard)

Don't Get Caught in a Bad Hotel

I know I rallied against Lady Gaga memes earlier, but this is tops.

A flashmob infiltrates the Westin St. Francis hotel in San Francisco and performs an adaptation of Lady Gaga’s song “Bad Romance.” The event was organized to draw attention to a boycott called by the workers of the hotel who are fighting to win a fair contract and affordable healthcare. Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer activists put the song and dance together as a creative way to tell the hundreds of thousands of LGBTQ people from all over the country coming to San Francsico in June for Pride to stay out of the boycotted hotels.

(thanks Jackson!)

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