Fark mainstream on Jeopardy
Founder Drew Curtis says Fark is the 'Twitterization' of news
Recently, Fark, the popular aggregator of news, was a category on Jeopardy, marking the second time the 10-year-old provider of hilarious headlines appeared on the popular game show.
Here's a brief interview I had with Drew Curtis, founder of Fark.
BF: Jeopardy chose Fark as a category because it was a type of news. Do you think Fark's headlines are a new genre of news?
DC: Well sorta. We fit into a lot of categories. You could say we're the Twitterization of news (except we predate them by about 8 years. Still it fits). You could say we're the comedy version of the daily show, except we just about predate them and they use us heavily as a resource (which is fine by me, a mention once in awhile would be nice though). The main reason they chose us is because making Fark taglines into Jeopardy questions creates instant curveballs - they catch contestants offguard. Although this time around one of the contestants figured out the schtick immediately. She kicked ass.
DC: in my opinion, one that makes you laugh at something that's just wrong enough that you immediately feel embarrassed that you laughed at. Which makes you laugh again when you realize what you just did.
DC: They did it before in oct or nov 2007. It was the same context as before, however it was during their tournament of champions and none of the contestants got any of the clues right. Which is why I think Jeopardy decided to do it again, because they love stumping the players.
BF: Is this the most mainstream coverage Fark has had?
DC: Hard to make that call. We've had really good coverage in the past.
I've been on CNN, FoxNews, in Time, Newsweek, Playboy, etc and so on.
We created one hell of a ruckus in the sports world when we rickrolled
the mets last year. Readers Digest does an annual roundup every
November of Fark taglines. We're all over the place, just below the
surface. Although of everything so far this is probably the coolest mainstream
coverage we've ever gotten. And, it's happen twice. I can't thank the
folks at Jeopardy enough for picking us for a catagory. Would love to
do it again too.
Bambi Francisco Roizen
Founder and CEO of Vator, a media and research firm for entrepreneurs and investors; Managing Director of Vator Health Fund; Co-Founder of Invent Health; Author and award-winning journalist.
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Fark.com
Startup/Business
Joined Vator on
Fark is a satirical news forwarding site. The Fark community identifies
odd, funny and entertaining news stories from across the Web and Fark
presents them in a clever and engaging way.
In January the site had over 4 million unique visitors and 60 million page
views - and there's tremendous growth potential beyond these numbers. The
Fark community also submitted 60,000 stories and posted almost 900,000
comments in January alone.
In addition, the site is in a pivotal strategic position as it directs
substantial traffic outbound to other sites (Fark generated approximately 50
million outbound clicks in January).
Drew Curtis
Joined Vator on
Founder/CEO/Sole Owner Fark, Inc