Melissa Ong
Melissa Ong | |
---|---|
Born | May 25, 1993 |
Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley[NIS 1] |
Occupation(s) | TikToker, influencer, former UX designer |
Years active | 2020–present |
Website | Official website |
Melissa Ong (born May 25, 1993),
Early life and career
Ong grew up wanting to become a YouTuber;[2] she has said that her ultimate goal is to have a comedy show on HBO or Netflix in the style of Nathan for You.[3]
In an essay for Business Insider, Melissa Ong writes that she attended the University of California, Berkeley. She then went to work in the tech industry, interning for Cisco and Adobe before going to work for Yahoo! and later Google. Ong writes that she disliked both jobs; after suffering a mental breakdown while working at the latter company, Ong drafted her resignation letter and submitted it. By the time she left, Ong had already achieved her first viral video on TikTok, and was beginning to focus more on the platform.[NIS 3]
Internet career
Ong began inconsistently posting videos sometime before 2020, eventually noticing that she was gaining between 10,000 and 100,000 followers. She began producing videos in earnest after quitting her job in early 2020,[2] posting under the handle chunkysdead.[4] Ong describes her humor as "dark and raunchy and satirical comedy",[2] telling The New York Times that she spent a decade "in the deepest corners of Reddit, cultivating this personality".[3] In one incident, Ong appeared to intentionally post her Social Security number online, garnering 4 million views and making a follow-up video stating that nothing adverse had happened as a consequence.[5] In another, she reacted to a video of a U.S. TikTok executive while wearing clown makeup.[6] By May 2020, Ong's videos had drawn over 54.6 million likes,[4] and as of March 2021, Ong had amassed over 3 million followers.[2] More recently, she has launched a YouTube channel.[4]
Step Chickens
At one point, Ong's videos began frequently featuring a chicken costume – she had purchased the costume in October 2019 for a Halloween party, but felt it went unappreciated. Those videos mostly failed to attract attention, but on one video, a user commented "Stepchicken what are you doing." The comment inspired Ong to create a series known as "CornHub", in which she satirizes popular tropes in pornography.[7] On May 8, 2020, Ong released an installment in the series which featured her wearing the chicken suit and enacting a parody of stepbrother–stepsister pornography. The video went viral, garnering 1.1 million views.[3] A day later, Ong asked her followers to simply comment "e." in the chat, which over 30,000 of them did. According to The Daily Dot, Ong said that this is when she "realized her power" to persuade her followers to engage in silly tasks. In the comments of another video, Ong's followers branded themselves to be a "cult" known as the "Step Chickens" and call her "Mother Hen". Ong asked them to change their profile pictures to an image of her , which many did; she also began asking them to execute "tasks", such as spamming the comments sections of others users.[3][7]
The Step Chickens brought significant attention to Ong, who gained a million followers over the next two weeks. One early task Ong's followers performed was flooding the comments of
Abram Brown with
See also
References
- ^ Song, Sandra (July 6, 2020). "How a TikTok cult leader reclaimed online trolling". Paper. Archived from the original on December 25, 2022. Retrieved December 25, 2022.
- ^ a b c d Mather, Katie (March 9, 2021). "How Melissa Ong rose to fame and started a 'cult' among fans". Yahoo! News. Archived from the original on January 16, 2023. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Lorenz, Taylor (May 26, 2020). "Step Chickens and the rise of TikTok 'cults'". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 23, 2022. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- ^ a b c d e Brown, Abram (May 25, 2020). "Birds of a feather: The Stepchickens cult on TikTok is the next evolution of influencer business". Forbes. Archived from the original on January 16, 2023. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- ^ Crimmins, Tricia (October 1, 2021). "'This gave me second-hand anxiety': Comedian shares 'Social Security number' on TikTok, says nothing bad happened". The Daily Dot. Archived from the original on December 24, 2022. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- ^ Molloy, David (August 4, 2020). "TikTok: What TikTokers make of Trump's ban threat". BBC. Archived from the original on January 20, 2021. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- ^ a b c d Joslin, Trinady (May 26, 2020). "TikTok 'cult' wars started with a woman in a chicken suit". The Daily Dot. Archived from the original on December 24, 2022. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- The Cut. Archivedfrom the original on December 24, 2022. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
Non-independent sources
- ^ "About Melissa". melissa-ong.com. Archived from the original on December 24, 2022. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
- ^ See video content and title notes on Ong, Melissa (May 8, 2020). My birthday is on the 25th. #fyp #famousbirthdays. Retrieved February 10, 2023.
- ^ Ong, Melissa (March 18, 2022). Cucci, Dorothy (ed.). "Melissa Ong, aka Chunkysdead, makes 6 figures in a single month as a content creator. Quitting Google to become famous was a risk that paid off". Business Insider. Archived from the original on January 16, 2023. Retrieved December 24, 2022.
External links
- Melissa Ong on TikTok