Creepypasta

A creepypasta is a horror-related legend which has been shared around the Internet. The term creepypasta has since become a catch-all term for any horror content posted onto the Internet. These entries are often brief, user-generated, paranormal stories that are intended to frighten readers. The subjects of creepypasta vary widely and can include topics such as ghosts, cryptids, murder, suicide, zombies, aliens, rituals to summon supernatural entities, and haunted television shows and video games. Creepypastas range in length from a single paragraph to extended multi-part series that can span multiple media types, some lasting for years.

This digital-based genre began in the 2000s. In the mainstream media, creepypastas relating to the fictitious Slender Man character came to public attention after the 2014 "Slender Man stabbing", in which a 12-year-old girl was stabbed by two of her friends; the perpetrators claimed they "wanted to prove the Slender Man skeptics wrong". After the murder attempt, some creepypasta website administrators made statements reminding readers of the "line between fiction and reality". This case is part of a pattern of people, especially children, developing misconceptions around the reality of creepypastas.

Other notable creepypasta stories include Jeff the Killer, Ted the Caver, Ben Drowned, Sonic.exe, and Smile Dog.

The word creepypasta first appeared on 4chan, an online imageboard, around 2007. It is a variant of the slang copypasta (from "copy and paste"), another 4chan term which refers to blocks of text which become viral by being copied widely around the internet. Creepypastas are a form of modern day folklore following many of the same narrative techniques such as first-person narrators and integrating true information. The integration of true pieces of information within the stories of creepypastas is part of what makes them appealing and somewhat believable, as it does with folklore. Where people spread folklores by word of mouth, creepypasta stories are spread through digital channels, making them easily accessible and creating a sense of community amongst those who participate in them. Unlike copypastas, all creepypastas are horror fiction, and the term also encompasses multimedia stories that may include videos, images, hyperlinks and GIFs along with text.

What counts as the first creepypasta is debatable. Scholars and writers such as Time's Jessica Roy have seen similarities in the chain emails of the 1990s, which disseminated hoaxes and urban legends, for example, by promising a terrible fate for users who did not pass them along. Horror stories such as the Rake, a fictional monster created by 4chan users in 2005, have been retroactively considered creepypastas. Some consider the 2001 story "Ted the Caver" the first.

The first major source of creepypastas was 4chan, and that website's culture was influential in shaping the characteristics of the genre. Major dedicated creepypasta websites started to appear from the late 2000s: Creepypasta.com was created in 2008, while the Creepypasta Wiki and Reddit's r/nosleep were both created in 2010. According to Time magazine, the genre had its peak audience in 2010 when it was covered by The New York Times.

The definition of creepypasta has expanded over time to include most short horror fiction whose first publication is online. Over time, authorship has become increasingly important: many creepypastas are written by named authors rather than by anonymous individuals.

Creepypasta entered the news cycle most prominently in 2014 with the "Slender Man stabbing", where two 12-year-old girls tried to kill another girl under the belief that the Slender Man character was real.