Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died
He leaves behind a complicated legacy. It's important to note that credible allegations of domestic abuse lead him to sell SA in the past year, and this can't be set aside.<p>At the same time, SA's influence on the modern internet can't be understated. The 'image macro' of early SA (maybe created by Lowtax himself, from what Fragmaster says in his video in the link) is the direct ancestor of today's common meme image--impact font text over a silly image, easily accessible to anyone who wants to post it.<p>Many of today's well-known internet comedians and writers grew up with the site. And it's hard to estimate how big the impact (positive or negative) of things like ADTRW leading to 4chan have been, not to mention things like the rise of Let's Play videos, or the creation and eventual shutdown of BitTorrent Barnyard (and its ensuing spinoffs).<p>The site itself still remains one of the last vestiges of the old internet--one of the few sites that both survived and managed not sell out and go headlong into monetization--and as a result, is one of the last sites on the modern internet that (maybe ironically) is not entirely awful.