Planking

Planking (from English planking = 'planking', 'planking' and to plank = 'plank') or Lying Down Game (English 'the lying down game') is an internet phenomenon . A person lies down with his face down and his arms folded sideways, as if he were standing in the watchful position, usually in public places, and lets himself be photographed or filmed.

The Lying Down Game

Gary Clarkson (* 1982) and Christian Langdon (* 1985) and other friends from Somerset , England, began to lie down in all possible places at home in 1997/1998 and called it the Lying Down Game . Over time, they began to seek out more daring spots, first in public places, then in the middle of the city. Langdon was already hanging from the roof of a house and trying a sharp fence; more and more took part. At the end of 2007, the two started the Facebook group The Lying Down Game. This attracted over 1,500 members in the first two weeks. In September 2009 it had 64,000 members, in May 2011 over 107,500 members and 20,500 photos.

The media first became aware of the phenomenon in early July 2009. Newscaster Martin Stanford of Sky News tried to live on the show and interviewed while John Carden, one of the operators of the Facebook group. The next wave of attention came in early September 2009 when employees of the Great Western Hospital in Swindon took photos during the night shift, posted them on Facebook and were suspended for doing so. At that time, the game was also made by the English football club Accrington Stanley as an expression of joy after a goal. In addition, several local Facebook groups have been founded and corresponding images are also published elsewhere, for example on Tumblr or in blogs.

Planking on a construction site

Since July 2010 at the latest, it has also been known under the name “Planking”.

It is mainly under this name that it has spread in Australia . It became widely known through NRL player David Williams , who did it publicly at a rugby game at the end of March and then reported about it on the popular radio station Triple J. The local Facebook group is called Planking Australia . Williams spoke about it on The Footy Show in April, showing it off with a host. Sam Newman , another host on the sports show, landed on a car and a trash can; News anchor Karl Stefanovic slumped on the studio table; Presenter Kerri-Anne Kennerley flopped on the couch in her morning show. Police warned of planks that were too risky and reported a Queensland planker trying on a police car. On May 15, 2011, 20-year-old Acton B. died in Brisbane after falling drunk from a balcony seven stories while planking. As a result, the hitherto national media interest expanded worldwide.

For example, the Austrian news anchor Armin Wolf lay down on the moderator's desk during the background moderation for a report on the Australian incident at the end of ZIB 2 on May 17, 2011 and, in this posture, referred to the weather. ORF General Director Alexander Wrabetz praised it on Twitter : "ArminWolf teaches planking in zib2 ... a lived educational mission". TV “ weather frog ” Wolfgang Unger followed him in Burgenland today and showed it on May 19th on a park bench. Just a few days later there was another serious accident: A 20-year-old Australian fell from a moving car. He's in a coma . One of the most famous and oldest plankers in August 2011 was the 85-year-old Playboy founder Hugh Hefner and his Playboy bunnies on a dining table.

Potential predecessors

Lying Man in New York

The artist Christian 3 Rooosen (idea and model) and photographer Michael Abromeit began the Lying Man project in New York in 1999 during a study trip to New York. The idea was born out of necessity (three short afternoons together in New York and no money, just a broken camera). Hundreds of thousands of free postcards of some of these motifs were distributed across Germany.

A plat ventre

Alexis Clairet and Stenkat started the French art site A plat ventre (French: 'belly', literally: 'on a flat stomach') in 2004 . There people are shown lying on their stomach in different positions, divided into several categories, often as if they had been hit on the floor. The first picture is dated July 3, 2004.

Playing dead

Playing Dead ( "dead play," kor. 시체 놀이 , si-che-no-ri ') is a similar phenomenon in 2003 South Korea began. It is important to distribute a disordered amount of bodies that appear like corpses (and not like sleeping) in the given space in a humorous and convincing way.

In the Japanese manga Crayon Shin-Chan , published since 1990, the main character Shinnosuke Nohara often plays a prank on his mother by lying dead on the floor when she returns from errands. Even then, this idea was not entirely new and was copied from the male protagonist of the cult film Harold and Maude (1971), who gained the attention of his mother and the disgust of the marriage candidates she dragged through staged pseudo suicides.
The manga became an international hit since the late 1990s. In early 2003, group photos of South Korean students playing dead began to appear on the Internet. It also made it into the mass media in early 2003 through a popular comedy / variety show where Shin-Chan was named as the source. There was a sharp surge in digital camera sales in the early 2000s, which was likely a contributing factor to the Internet phenomenon. Its popularity made it one of the first Internet phenomena to be documented by the Korean media. There are also English-language sites with such images such as playdeadpics.com, registered since May 2006, as well as groups on Flickr and deviantART .

Web links

Commons : Planking - collection of images, videos and audio files

Lying-down-game at knowyourmeme.com

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b ^c ^d Cathal Kelly: Lying Down Game latest Web rage , thestar.com, September 18, 2009

↑ ^a ^b Lying Down Game , knowyourmeme.com, 2010

^ The lying down game , facebook.com, May 16, 2011

^ Lying Down Game takes over web , metro.co.uk, July 9, 2009.

↑ Find an odd place and lie face down… Is this the most pointless internet craze yet? , dailymail.co.uk, July 9, 2009

↑ Sky News Plays 'The Lying Down Game' on YouTube , uploaded July 14, 2009

^ Richard Savill: Hospital staff suspended over Facebook 'lying down game' pictures , The Telegraph, September 9, 2009

↑ What do you call this ... phenomenon? , giantbomb.com, topic start: July 25, 2010, 2nd post by HandsomeDead

↑ Does that shirt make me look fat? ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , 2010 ("1 year ago"), "This is also known as the" lying down game "which is the correct way to say it or before that it was called" planking "."

↑ Recording of the rugby game ( memento from May 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) on Youtube , uploaded on March 27, 2011, last accessed on May 15, 2011

^ The Footy Show- Planking ( memento from June 20, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) on Youtube, uploaded on April 29, 2011

↑ Kerri-Anne Planking , May 12, 2011

^ Nathan Mawby, We're lying down on the job , Herals Sun, May 14, 2011

↑ Cameron Atfield: Planker charged over police car prank , brisbanetimes.com.au , May 11, 2011

↑ Georgia Waters: Layabouts plank Their way across town in net latest craze 12 May, 2011.

↑ "He died for a stupid photo" at Spiegel Online , last accessed on May 15, 2011

↑ Armin Wolf plankt in ZIB 2 , on Youtube, last accessed on July 17, 2011

↑ kurier.at: "Armin Wolf is lying flat in the ZiB 2-Studio" ( Memento from September 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive )

↑ Burgenlanders try “planking” , burgenland.orf.at, May 19, 2011

↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from May 22, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.