The Facebook group where everyone pretends they work in the same office isn't what it seems 👀
+ Would you say that NZ a 'very negative, wet, whiny, inward-looking country'🤔
My angels!!! As previously mentioned I’m back in my hometown for a few days to speak at an event and maybe it’s cringe but as a 25-year-old I really do love it here (as a 15-year-old Rubes and I begged our parents to send us away to a town with a co-ed school lol.) I’ve been reading through my old Rookie Yearbooks (did any of the SYSCAhood read Rookie Mag? Please make yourself known!), walking past houses that I used to mow the lawns of for $15, and down the streets that I used to deliver the local newspaper down (funny that now I deliver the news in a totally different way.) I feel very calm here (which could be because it’s just me, Squish, and Tinkerbell - our 18-year-old deaf cat at home) so I’m trying to roll with that for as long as it lasts (calmness is not something I’m very used to feeling.)
Hope you’re all doing okay, let me know in the comments how you are!!!!
The crazy story behind the Facebook Group where everyone pretends they work in the same office
🗺Around the world🗺:
A bus crash in Australia, A volcanic eruption in Indonesia, Chris Luxon calls NZ a 'very negative, wet, whiny, inward-looking country'
What came first, the chicken or the egg?
The crazy story behind the Facebook Group where everyone pretends they work in the same office
The other day I posted about this group:
Which is exactly what the title says: a really mundane group where everyone pretends to work in the same office. It’s harmless and funny, and kinda feels like an ARG (Alternate Reality Game) but isn’t. Here are a few examples of the things they post:
Anyway, after I posted about it on Instagram one of you sent me an episode of Reply All (the best podcast series ever that no longer exists) which documents the history of this group, and I had to share my findings.
Basically the group was started by a bored Australian teenager called Thomas Oscar, who tried to make the most boring Facebook group possible - “a group where members pretend to be corporate drones in a non-existent office.” It started small, niche, and funny - a bunch of other teens joined and they were all assigned jobs within the company and the inside joke was super fun and meta and stupid for all involved.
What happens next will shock you: adults infiltrated. The honest disgust in Thomas’s voice as he describes what happened when adults joined the group and started ‘trying too hard with their jokes’ or ‘overdoing it’ is absolutely hilarious, and his genuine anger showed a type of teenage outrage and gatekeeping that was honestly so funny (and relatable for when I was that age) to listen to. He basically said it’s no one’s fault, but once you’re older than 25 you’re no longer funny, and you become predictable (he then boldly and correctly predicts that the host is a Mumford and Sons listener and when they go to a Thai restaurant she only ever orders a mild Pad Thai.)
“I think old people should be allowed on the internet for looking at business stuff or for sending actual emails to their real bosses, or for finding recipes.” - Thomas
What ends up happening is too many adults join the group and ruin the joke, so Thomas gives the group to an investment banker (a recurring culprit of taking the joke too far) and is subsequently blocked from the very thing he started.
Stories like this are honestly the reason I LOVE the internet (and also the reason I love Reply All) so I cannot recommend listening to this ep more!!
🗺Around the world🗺
Australia: Ten people killed in wedding bus crash (BBC)
At least ten people have died and 15 more are injured after a bus crashed on the way home from a wedding in the Hunter Valley.
“The passengers were returning from a wedding at a winery on Sunday night in the Hunter Valley when their coach overturned near the town of Greta.
Police have charged the 58-year-old bus driver with 10 counts of dangerous driving which resulted in death.”
Indonesia: Anak Krakatau volcano spews ash, lava in new eruption (AP)
Indonesia’s Anak Krakatau volcano (which means ‘child of Krakatoa’) has erupted at least seven times since Friday, “spewing ash as high as 3 kilometers (2 miles) into the air.”
Anak Krakatau, which means “child of Kratakau,” is the offspring of the famous Krakatau, whose monumental eruption in 1883 triggered a period of global cooling.
New Zealand: National Party leader Christopher Luxon calls NZ a 'very negative, wet, whiny, inward-looking country'
Then why do you have SEVEN houses here Chris????
There’s not much to this story that isn’t in the headline, but if you want to learn how the other Chris (our Prime Minister) responded, you can read that here.
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I loved Rookie Mag. Their playlists were awesome and I was always sad that nothing as cool existed when I had been a teen.
Literally everything I've ever seen or heard about NZ is super positive and lovely, idk who this guy is but even I know he's wrong and I've never been there