Last night, Spanky and I were reading some fanfic and movie parodies on the internet.
While reading this parody of the movie 300, I accidentally highlighted the text and noticed what I called “invisible internet ink.” Spanky laughed and said something like, “That’s Whytex.”
Me: How do you do that Spank?
Spanky: It’s Whytex.
Me: It’s cool, Spank, it’s invisible. I want you to show me how to do that.
Spanky: It’s just WHITE text! This is where she rolls her condescending teenage eyes.
Me: Oh. This is where i get evil ideas.
Spanky: Haven’t you ever been to an internet forum… and looked to see the hidden messages?
Me: Yeah, but I never saw any hidden messages. Never thought to look for it, what kind of people leave hidden messages?
Spanky: That’s where all the snarky comments are. I don’t think my Whytex is going to show up in the rss feeds.
She claims she is going to have a lot of fun telling all her friends at school about this. I claim I am going to blog about it. She tells me I will look like a fool.
January 17th, 2008 at 2:22 am
Oh cool! I’ve never noticed this before either. Hey Kitty you saved my ass with my boys. This would have come up sooner or later and now I know. I won’t be uncool!!!
Well, at least for 4 seconds.
January 17th, 2008 at 7:49 am
Kitty, too funny! I sometimes notice the whytex on sites that are overusing key words to attract hits from search engines, but I didn’t know that snarky messages could be hidden in the comments that way.
January 17th, 2008 at 8:26 am
I was just struck by the realization, or was just reminded, that everything has an underground. How satisfying about the forums and the invisible text. I don’t spend much time in forums, but only knew about this when I started online, and knew people used to use it to get hits from search engines before it became a no-no.
Yay underground!
I love that people are persistent, in general, and always find a way around the obvious.
The teen-age eye rolling is awesome too.
January 17th, 2008 at 9:03 am
Kym, 4 seconds if youre lucky. Or a rock star. If you’re over 21, you can’t be cool to them.
Fightingwindmills and Videoxy, I read that last night, that people used them to attract hits from search engines. The way it was used in the parody we read was a sort of copyright protection.
Apparently that writer had a lot of problems with people stealing her work. She’s a published author thanks to that blog.
January 17th, 2008 at 4:06 pm
I don’t think it works here as well as it would work on my humble blog, but still…
January 17th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
It works in the RSS feeds (Google Reader has a default white background) which was my intention. I could have chosen the same color text as the background on this page, but the feeds would see it.
Of course if the people reading the feed highlight the text, they will see it.
January 17th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
okay so I know about white text but I never think to see if someone is being snarky to me through it….hmmmmm paranoia is setting in.
January 17th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
It’s mostly teens doing that.
Come to think of it, a friend of mine told me she did something like this with her photographs posted on the web. Copyright protection.
January 18th, 2008 at 3:42 am
Isn’t it fun! I’ve been using every trick I know busting some online activities that should not have happened. I might go back and leave some white text surprises just for fun.
January 18th, 2008 at 3:52 am
What did you see or do, Jen? Do tell.
January 19th, 2008 at 2:39 am
OH no, my bro in law has been making profiles online where he should not be and he is busted. I have unleashed my inner pit bull on him.
January 19th, 2008 at 8:10 am
I used to leave secret messages to my [then] girlfriend in my posts using the white text thing… I still use white text, but only as a spacing technique.
Hi Kitty. The address is on my About page, but I thought this would be a nicer way to give it out…
January 19th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
Oh Boy.
It’s the modern version of invisible ink.
We used to use lemon juice.
Remember that?
January 19th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
Uh oh, Jen. Spy stuff.
Gabriel, thanks. That’s a neat idea, and so romantic, leaving secret messages for your girlfriend. I’ll have to check out your archives.
Anita, I remember the lemon juice! LOL.
January 19th, 2008 at 10:26 pm
Oooh— Lotsa snarky possibilities there… Great idea, for something that I just forgot.
January 19th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
I’m surprised no one has thought to snark with me and leave a white text comment.
January 20th, 2008 at 4:22 am
In the old days, people building webs would put black text against black backgrounds or white text against white backgrounds to double up on search engine hits. Because of that, search engines started cutting sites that had hidden text in them. Don’t know if they still do that.
Speaking of diappearing text, you know if you publish a post and then take it down it still shows up in feeders?
January 20th, 2008 at 4:22 am
[Um, building sites, not webs, sheesh.]
January 20th, 2008 at 5:15 am
Hey Max, yeah, I know it still appears in feeds, but I was getting a lot of outside hits on that post and had to add an edited note or just delete the post. it was something I had to think about for a while. Since it is in the feeds, I decided to put it back up with the correction. That way feed readers have a chance to discuss it.