Dat Boi is an

Internet meme An Internet meme, commonly known simply as a meme ( ), is an idea, behavior, style, or image that is spread via the Internet, often through social media platforms. What is considered a meme may vary across different communities on the Internet ...

originating from the

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website Animation Factory. The meme garnered popularity on

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in 2015 before gaining more recognition through

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in 2016. It is usually accompanied by a person saying "here come dat boi" with the reply "o shit waddup!".

History

According to Animation Factory employee Ryan Hagen, the frog

GIF The Graphics Interchange Format (GIF; or , see pronunciation) is a bitmap image format that was developed by a team at the online services provider CompuServe led by American computer scientist Steve Wilhite and released on 15 June 1987. ...

used in the meme was created by designer Josh Doohen. The meme's name originates from an edited news screenshot and the line of text often used in association with the image ("here come dat boi! o shit waddup!") was taken from a different meme featuring a computer-animated ''

Pac-Man originally called ''Puck Man'' in Japan, is a 1980 maze action video game developed and released by Namco for arcades. In North America, the game was released by Midway Manufacturing as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America. Th ...

'' character from a video called "Here Comes Pacman". The frog image and its caption were first put together on

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, according to '' Vox''. ''

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'' writer Chris Plante referred to the caption in a June article, stating that the Dat Boi image itself was "not enough" and should be paired with the caption. In May 2016, the "here come dat boi!" caption came under criticism after various Facebook users claimed to find it an " appropriation of

African-American Vernacular English African-American Vernacular English (AAVE, ), also referred to as Black (Vernacular) English, Black English Vernacular, or occasionally Ebonics (a colloquial, controversial term), is the variety of English natively spoken, particularly in urban ...

". As a result, certain Facebook groups discouraged use of the meme. Dat Boi was featured in ''

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'' "Month in Memes" article for June 2016. Matt Furie, creator of

Pepe the Frog Pepe the Frog () is an Internet meme consisting of a green anthropomorphic frog with a humanoid body. Pepe originated in a 2005 comic by Matt Furie called ''Boy's Club''. It became an Internet meme when its popularity steadily grew across Myspa ...

, explained in a June 2016 interview with ''

Comic Book Resources ''Comic Book Resources'', also known by the initialism CBR, is a website dedicated to the coverage of comic book–related news and discussion. History Comic Book Resources was founded by Jonah Weiland in 1995 as a development of the Kingdom Co ...

'' that he was "devastated" to find out that Dat Boi had "begun to overshadow Internet Pepe".

Notable uses

*Meme-themed commercials and games based on the 2016 edition of

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's '' Kids Pick the President'' featured both of the phrases associated with Dat Boi. *In May 2016,

MTV News MTV News is the news production division of MTV. The service is available in the US with localized versions on MTV's global network. In February 2016, MTV Networks confirmed it would refresh the MTV News brand in 2016, to compete with the likes ...

posted an image of Dat Boi, alongside other social media trends, onto its

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account. *

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tweeted an image of its

Slippy Toad is a fictional character from the ''Star Fox'' series of video games published by Nintendo. He was created by Shigeru Miyamoto along with Takaya Imamura, who also designed the character, and was based on the assistant director of the original ' ...

character next to the Dat Boi frog on May 13, 2016. *The Twitter account for the restaurant chain

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tweeted an image of Dat Boi, calling the frog "Dat Busboi". *The Twitter account for ''

Roblox ''Roblox'' () is an online game platform and game creation system developed by Roblox Corporation that allows users to program games and play games created by other users. Created by David Baszucki and Erik Cassel in 2004 and released in 20 ...

'', a computer game, retweeted a GIF featuring four

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created in Dat Boi's likeness. *Kenyatta Cheese, co-founder of ''

Know Your Meme ''Know Your Meme'' (''KYM'') is a website and video series which uses wiki software to document various Internet memes and other online phenomena, such as viral videos, image macros, catchphrases, Internet celebrities and more. It also invest ...

'', described Dat Boi as "a piece of culture" to the editors of ''

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''. *In an interview with PopSugar about viral trends, model Josh Ostrovsky mentioned the meme and admitted, "obviously I love Dat Boi". *The

Australian Manufacturing Workers Union The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU), or more fully the Automotive, Food, Metals, Engineering, Printing and Kindred Industries Union, is an Australian trade union. The AMWU represents a broad range of workers in the manufacturing se ...

posted a "Dat Boi" meme to comment on the

2016 Australian federal election The 2016 Australian federal election was a double dissolution election held on Saturday 2 July to elect all 226 members of the 45th Parliament of Australia, 45th Parliament of Australia, after an extended eight-week official campaign period. It ...

. *Also during the 2016 federal election in Australia, SBS Comedy published a satirical article claiming that the "Dat Boi" frog had become the most popular candidate for

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among youth voters.

References

{{reflist, 30em 2010s fads and trends Fictional frogs Internet memes introduced in 2015 Internet memes Computer-related introductions in 2015 Fictional characters introduced in 2015 Internet meme characters

History

Notable uses

See also

References