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My dad calls, bellowing down the phone like a Broadmoor escapee.
"All Your Base Are Belong To Us! All Your Base Are Belong To Us! Ha Ha! Geddit!"
Do I slash my wrists now, or pray that this viral e-mail
meme hell will one day end?
In case you haven't been sent it yet, AYBABTU
is a cult catchphrase doing the Internet rounds at frightening
speed - just like "Kilroy Woz 'Ere" but even less political.
It's taken from the badly-translated Japanese dialogue in a shit 1989 arcade
game, Zero Wing, which also boasts hilarious lines such as "SOMEBODY
SET US UP THE BOMB".
It's funny the first time. Slightly amusing
the second time. But we've been sent twenty e-mails from practical strangers informing
me of this great cultural phenomenon, and I'm now setting up a filter on my mail
to automatically fire any mention of this phrase into oblivion.
T-shirts? Sure - I've already seen two this
morning. Some spotty kid in Essex is doubtless throwing together a novelty house
choon which will be all over Ayia Napa come July like a virus:
"All Your Bass Are Belong To Us - checkit."
Alastair Campbell is already briefing Tony
Blair on how to get down with net-savvy yoof.
"All Your Votes Are Belong to The Labour Party" is already a contender
for General Election slogan.
Ironically-mulleted Hoxton fashionistas
won't be heard using anything other than the recognised abbreviation. "All
Your Base", darling.
Self-righteous geek pedantry will be raised
to a new level: "It's 'All Your BASE Are Belong To Us, not BASES! Durr!"
- before they try and make up their own, e.g. "You step in road hit by car",
which will of course singularly fail to catch on.
Our glorious tabloids will start riding
the bandwagon - joyful in the knowledge that it means nothing and can therefore
be easily applied to anything -
Ministry of Agriculture: 'All Your Foot And Mouth Are Belong To Us'
Hello front cover: "Posh Spice says: 'All Your Gucci Are Belong To Us."
And at the other end of the spectrum The Guardian will have exhaustive
editorials documenting AYBABTU as a premier example of the internet gone mad.
Not only is it totally meaningless, but hold
on - how long does it take for one of these jokes to percolate into the global
consciousness? The game's twelve years old, for fuck's sake.
Well, at least they've stopped saying "Whasssuuuupp".
Haven't they?
by Mike
Fisher
related links:
All
Your Base shockwav movie (1mb) »
AYB
picture gallery »
AYB
eyechart »
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