#1 Spotted In Melbourne, Australia. I Should Add, I’m In Agreement With This One, I Don’t Think It’s Unpopular
We managed to get in touch with the administrators of 'UUU Signage' and they were kind enough to tell us about the inner workings of the group.
Currently, 'UUU Signage' has 410,000 members. "We never wanted it to be this big," they told Bored Panda. "We started out as a small corner of the UUUniverse, even though some people refer to Signage as 'the original group.'"
"The UUUniverse began with a now-archived group known as 'Useless, Unsuccessful, and/or Unpopular Memes' which spawned a community that went on to form many groups. There's one for just about every topic, including UUU Cats Refurmed, UUU License Plate Spotting, UUU Cook, and even very niche groups such as UUU Standpipe Spotting!"
#4 A Storm Blew Over My Porch Sign This Week And I Set It Back Up Without Paying Attention. Walking To My Front Door Just Now I Realized The “O” Is Now Hidden Behind The Crate
The admins said these splinter groups' membership usually consisted of people from the UUUniverse. However, for whatever reason, UUU Signage exploded in popularity and began reaching a wider audience.
"Membership requests have only increased exponentially since then," they said. "The important thing to remember is that 'Useless, Unsuccessful, and/or Unpopular' is more of a 'brand' than actual criteria for submitted content. We welcome all contributions as long as they comply with our rules, which are pretty straightforward"
"As far as the community itself, we moderate pretty strictly when it comes to join requests. We have a set of questions that lay out very clearly what the group is about and what we will tolerate," the admins explained. "If a potential member doesn't answer all of them, or fails to answer them to our satisfaction, we deny their request for membership. This helps keep out potential trolls and spam bots, too. We don't have any statistics but we get thousands of join requests daily and we deny more than we admit."
#8 Found In A Local Shop. Idk Kinda Useful For Me.. I Did Leave A Tip For The Cause
Facebook communities this big often become chaotic breeding grounds for trolls, and some slip into 'UUU Signage' even with its strict admission policy. However, the chances of them causing any trouble are minimum, since they get kicked out the second they show their true colors. "We get plenty of trolls and we moderate pretty strictly. We have zero tolerance for any sort of bigotry," the admins said.
"We shut down arguments as soon as we see them and mute people who participate in them (regardless of what side you’re arguing for). We preemptively close comments or delete posts with topics that we know from experience will make people argue. Over time, we've put rules in place to help prevent people from sucking the fun out of the group (by ruining jokes by repeatedly explaining a sign when no one asked, or dogpiling the OP for not knowing something, etc.)."
#12 On The Back Window Of A Van Which Was In Front Of Me At A Red Light
Some of the most common issues within the group are: 1) people not reading the rules and then being surprised when they get suspended or blocked from the group for breaking those rules, and 2) people who want to debate politics and/or insult each other in various ways, which is related to the first one.
"We also run a separate group, Signage Help Desk, where we invite members and even ex-members to post everything from technical questions to the inevitable 'Why did I get banned/muted?' Members seem to get angrier with being muted than being outright banned so we get a lot of people asking why. We also get a lot of members asking why their particular post was deleted and we are happy to offer them an explanation, although they are not always receptive to our answers," the admins explained.
#14 Sign On The Door Of The Storage Shed In The Bar That I Work At. We Call It "The Crying Shed." If You've Worked Food Service, You Know. (Admittedly, This Sign Gets Lots Of Laughs And Attention So It's Actually Pretty Popular Lol)
#17 Left Overnight By My 14 Year Old Son. Popular With Me Because Who Doesn’t Love A Polite Teenager? Unpopular With The Cat Because He Can’t Read And Drank Out Of The Toilet
From toilets to stadiums, as you can see, the signs that get featured in this group come from a lot of different places. "With [so many] members, it's hard for us to pinpoint any particular member or location as a frequent contributor because they do come from all over," the admins said. "We don't allow 'viral content' – the pictures of the signs must be taken by the person who posted the image."
"If we did not have this rule, the group would be overrun by people sharing images they either 'found in the wild' or just plain didn't take themselves. This helps keep the content fresh and avoids people spamming the same 'funny sign' they found on Reddit or The Chive that day." And that is precisely why the group has caught our eye. It's original. Not just another content recycling 'factory'.
