About Fausto Fernós
Fausto Fernós is the host of iTunes’ #1 LGBT talk show, the Feast of Fun podcast, which he produces and hosts with his partner, Marc Felion.
Born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Fausto Fernós created the Feast of Fools in 1998 as wacky artists variety show in Chicago, Illinois. Feast of Fun grew out of an audio blog to promote the live show into the world’s most downloaded talk show aimed for gay people.
When he’s not blogging, recording or sleeping, Fausto can be found at the gym or appreciating the beauty found in nature.
Comments
VOTE 4 DA FEAST OV FOOLS AS TEH BEST AN’ GAYEST PODCAST NAO K
lolcats Fantastic!! The guy you talked about Kevin Nalty from willvideoforfood.com has some funny vids on youtube Check out Viral Video Genius http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXJVxmWTmkg where he talks about his inspiration. Loved the show and voted today as I do everyday. Keep pumping out the great content
And of course there is his musical Video about him bring White Bucks back in style http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPKWtaaZHC0
LOLZ! Fausto, your monologue over my little FOF arrangement…priceless!
i wonder what Toonces would say.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toonces_the_Driving_Cat
http://www.allyourbasearebelongtous.com/
There, user generated internet phenomena of the past.
WEZ IN UR IPOHD – MAKIN U LAFF!!!!
‘Meowspeak’
Of course, way before LOLCATS was the whole Usenet ‘meowspeak’ controversy.
In the days before Usenet groups were swamped by spam (and yes, I remember the day the first Spam letter ever posted on every Usenet group – darned Green-Card lawyers) there was the rec.pets.cats Meowspeak controversy.
The group’s charter was to talk about cats, taking care of them, health issues, on and and on. Then, one fateful day (late 80’s – early 90’s?), someone posted the very first meowspeak post. Meowspeak looks something like “Wen Meomie found lotsa bitsa wet cardbord inna laundry, gess hoo she blamed, inna youshual hoomin respons?” (I’m quoting one of the few examples I’ve found w/ a quick search. It’s always spoken in first person from the point of view of the cat. And it’s usually the whole post.)
It definitely precedes Caturday/ LOLCAT language – don’t know if there are any direct connections.
In any case before you knew it , there was war in rec.pets.cats between those who were frankly revolted by meowspeak and those who thought you were a miserable, non-cat-loving human being if you didn’t love it and spend all day chanelling your gramatically and orthographically challged felin. If I remember correctly the group eventually split up and there was something like rec.pets.cats.meowspeak. (and, back then, creating a new Usenet group was a vastly complex process requiring approval and votes from other Usenetters).
I haven’t been to Usenet groups in a while – as far as I can tell most of them are pretty dead by now (strangled by spam, then absorbed by Dejanews Google Groups). I might be wrong though, just haven’t looked for them recently.
“The Meowspeak Wars” – a moment in history.
Alec
I Voted Today! Have you?
I loved today’s twist on the opening theme song. Really good.
If you like the lolcats, there is a whole page of lol80’s that are really funny.
http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?action=showall&boardid=41&threadid=58137
In regards to email gullibility syndrome, there is something a friend of mine once called “Evil Seeds”. It’s when you say something about someone, either in word or through email or message board postings, that may not be totally true, but somewhere down the line it sticks in people’s minds. Let’s just say that Marc had a long standing feud with someone and they walked into the bar and he wouldn’t acknowledge them. So someone sees this and without knowing the situation went around telling everyone that Marc was rude to a FOF fan and acted really stuck up towards them. Now, we all know that’s not true but for people who don’t know Marc, that story, no matter how unfounded it is, may stick around in the back of their minds, so that later on when someone suggest they listen to FOF, they’ll think twice because they’ll have the idea that Marc isn’t someone they’d want to hear from. That’s an Evil Seed.
Oh, and Steven, I know you didn’t mean to do it but you said something about not knowing if a person was male or female and you called them “it”. Knowing several transgendered people has made me very sensitive to this because it’s a common occurrence. People do it without really thinking about it and it can really hurt when you are referred to as an object and not a person. Just a little helpful hint to all my friends out in FOF land. You can use “they” or “them” when referring to a single person who’s gender you are not sure of.
The “Evil Seed” sounds too much like real life for me. Like I tell everyone “If you want to know something or want to hear my side of something, just ask!”
“It” is gender neutral. Grammatically you can call a baby an “it” but most parents don’t like it when you call it an “it.”
My shame runs deep, PupDon! Thanks for calling me out on that! 🙂
What if you’re hispanic? There is no THEY in Spanish. Only EL or ELLA. (ellos is masculine)
I voted too.
I got a tangential mention in FoF. I don’t know whether to be happy about that or not :-\
No shame needed, Steven. Ur good peoples (keeping with the theme of the show, hee hee).
I only like being called an “it” if I’m involved in some hot sexy roleplay and some hot leather daddy is using me as his sextoy. Damn, that got me all turned on now, I need to go rub one out.
I’m not entirely sure if I should post here or in the spellchecking thread, but regardless, today’s episode made me think…
Languages tend to evolve over time, usually due to misspellings and variations in pronunciation. That’s why Old English is different from Middle English, and why Middle English is different from modern-day English. But even within modern-day English, there are subtle variations between American English, Canadian English, and the Queen’s English.
I think it’s easy for those of us living in America to forget that the Feast of Fools, while based in Chicago, reaches out to an international audience—not only to Canada and the UK, but to non-English speaking countries as well. Of course people are going to spell things differently than one might expect!
It’s important that we all remember that the main symbol of the GLBTQ community—the rainbow—represents our vast diversity. Our culture is comprised of multiple cultures from all walks of life all over the whole world. Spelling, while important in general, isn’t quite as important as diversity, inclusivity, and unity. We’re all here to share opinions and ideas, so as long as we’re able to communicate our ideas, the presentation of those ideas shouldn’t matter as much as their content.
I only ask that you try your best when it comes to spelling and writing what you have to say.
Superboy : How about “ellas” for a group of girls?
DynaMike: Which seems more likely to end up in the American lexicon?
Pwned
or
Nucular.
The difference is that one is a really funny/popular quip made by youngins (like bitchin’, nifty, tubular…), and the other is an oft-harped-upon misnomer by our current President.
Some people are being edgy and funny and are fully understandable. Some people have English as a second language and make some understandable flubs in the gerunds and plurals. Some people you just want to hold down and beat with a grammar stick because you know they would come off brilliant if only they would concentrate on their rough edges for a bit.
But it’s my pet peeve. You don’t have to adopt it, and I would probably miss it if you did.
epilonious: My comment might not show it, but it’s actually one of my pet peeves as well. I have a strange bout of OCD whenever I’m looking at articles on Wikipedia and have to edit every single spelling, grammar, and/or punctuation error I come across. I know where you’re coming from.
Hell, just today at work the assistant manager of the bakery at my workplace admitted that he didn’t know how to spell “streudel”. I bit my tongue.
However, both of these examples have context. I edit Wikipedia to make it more polished and professional-looking. I despise people who make more money than I do at my job who can’t even spell words that are associated with their specific job or department. Telling people to use a spellcheck or correcting people within a thread would be a case of me sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong. If someone states that they’re not entirely sure how to spell something, I’d definitely help them. But when a complete stranger comes swooping in and starts telling people how to type, it just seems pretty arrogant.
Leo LaPorte – so not Gay, though Gay-friendly. I worked with him at TechTV (Yes, the network no one ever got). When Leo says, “Makes its own gravy.” he’s not talking about the same thing as Fausto.
Leo’s reference probably has more to do with Gravy Train dogfood slogans.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSerzbcwC0Q
DynaMike, please don’t tell me that “pitcher” will eventually become the acceptable way to pronounce the word “picture”. Oooh, that makes my skin crawl when I hear it and so many people do it these days.
“One of the things that breaks my pedantic little heart is when I see very big mis-spellings in titles and posts. Rather than succumb to my inner bitchy-ness and drop by to say “I think you meant to spell it THIS way” in every post I find, I suggest that people give Firefox a try.”
I admitted that it was a pedantic thing to do… and I used the word “suggest”. I pretty much disclosed fully that it’s something people who were only interested in improving their spelling could try. I made a point to not single out any examples of bad spelling or grammar and just threw it out there as something that bugged me. Therefore, I figure I buffered myself pretty well against any arguments of arrogance.
Several other people have touched on the fact that performance and skill are unrelated to spelling ability, and touched on the fact that spelling and grammar is one of the things that will alter people’s perceptions.
I wouldn’t consider someone who works out at the gym 6 days a week dropping by to say “this exercise will help you lose tummy fat for the summer season.” arrogant. I would figure they value their appearance, and wanted to give a helpful tip to anyone else who was concerned about their appearance.
I value spelling and grammar and how it reflects upon me. So here we are. 🙂
There is value in spelling and writing clearly, I agree. But at the same time, lets encourage everyone to conquer the demons of self-expression while they battle the seven headed hydra of semi-illiteracy.
What was that exercise for losing tummy fat?
Epilonious, DynaMike, if you haven’t (though I bet you have) – read “Eats, Shoots and Leaves” by Lynne Truss. Although it’s about punctuation rather than spelling, her first chapter on how rough it is to be a “punctuationist” resonates with us “spellists.”
I have that same problem with bad grammar. I used to grit my teeth when our corporate officers at my previous job would send emails full of grammar and spelling errors. It just made me lose my faith in my upper management.
Now, seeing as how I’m the major internet geek, I sadly know the origin of the LOLCATS trend, which can be traced back to the site 4chan.org where the LOLCATS are one of the many memes of the site.
Although, most of the speak in the LOLCATS pictures are not ebonics so much as they are 1337 (leet) speak that are meant to only be real jokes to those of us who know internet 1337 speak. Plus, that’s how a lot of members of 4chan often speak like that on the site.
Many of their memes are absolutely random, absurd, oftentimes nasty.
Here are some humorous (if not random) memes from the site as well:
The “black kid got gyped” meme: http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y22/TheEndless88/n48919539_34082487_4427.jpg?t=1186152342
This isn’t a meme so much as it is a popular image:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y22/TheEndless88/n48919539_34082480_3294.jpg?t=1186152424
And the “SUDDENLY!” meme:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y22/TheEndless88/1178141045699.jpg?t=1186152469
This is what happens when a group of ADD-ridden teenagers with internet and photoshop capabilities gather together and form an online community that is based in the insane, the random, the grotesque, and the strange.
Fear it.
By the way, just to let you guys know, you weren’t speaking 1337 (leet) speak correct. (The language of the internet pretty much)
What you meant to write was:
“\/\/3’r3 50 h4pp3h u r |1573n1n 3 73h f3457 0f f00|5 p0d(457! |-|45 1 |057 m4h m1nd? |\|0 1 h45 |\|07. 1m 7ry1n6 2 74|k |13k L()L(47! 17’5 phun.”
So, because I’m a huge internet geek, I will tell you the origin of the LOLCATS.
It all goes back to a site called 4chan.org, where LOLCATS are one of the many memes on the site that is usually only prevalent on a specific day of the week that the users in the /b/ section of the site call “Caturday” Which day this is is only known to the members of the site, and are regular posters.
They have many memes which make little to no sense whatsoever and only serve as a way to fulfill their ADHD-ridden insanity that they bring into the internet.
From the eclecticlibrarian
OH, HAI – U IZ SO CUTE!!
Hey, the 3G iPod didn’t have a color screen! I call bullshit! 😉
One could argue, Steven, that it isn’t that far from an obsessive spell-checker to an obsessive tech detail checker (or those who look for odd details in movies). 😀
Can anyone post images in the comments, or just us?
eclecticlibrarian = me
Steven: You’re right. I did a little GIMP magic on the image to give it the color screen. I surfed through the appropriately tagged Creative Commons attribution share-alike images to find one that seemed to work with the text. I was hoping no one would pay that much attention to the iPod generation. 😉
Alec: I read a review for that book (in ‘New Scientist’ for some reason) but I haven’t had a chance to read it yet. It seems like I’d find it pretty interesting.
Wow, I’m so glad to see that the comments have almost reached 40 for this show. If people would comment like this on every show, Fausto would be so much happier. He’d stop calling me in tears. So please, keep it up! 🙂
fausto, how did you post the image in the comment?
I noticed that googling “lolcat gay” and “gay lolcat” on google bring FOF up 4th and 6th respectively, not bad.
KITTEH POWER!!!
To post a pic you have to enclose it in an image html code. For that pic, we just grabbed it from our flickr account.
Steven shouldn’t 0to worry about getting replaced … sexy blond nerds are always in demand!
does anyone know why it’s a cheeseburger?
http://www.365tomorrows.com/08/18/lolcats/
Check this out