FMyLife

Fmylife
URL http://www.fmylife.com
Slogan "Get the guts to spill the beans"
Type of site Blog
Available language(s) French, English, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, German and Turkish
Owner Maxime Valette
Created by Guillaume Passaglia and Didier Guedj
Launched January 2008
Alexa rank 7,964 (January 2012)[1]
Current status Active

FMyLife is an English-language blog that serves as "a recollection of everyday anecdotes likely to happen to anyone". Posts on the site are short, user-submitted stories of unfortunate happenings that begin with "Today" and end with "FML".[2] FMyLife receives more than 1.7 million hits each day.[3] A book containing stories from the site and illustrations[4] was published in June 2009.[5]

FML has different categories such as: Animals, Health, Love, Kids, Work, Money, Intimacy, and Miscellaneous.

History

FMyLife was created on January 13, 2008 by Maxime Valette, Guillaume Passaglia and Didier Guedj. The site is the English version of the creators' original website in French, Viedemerde.fr, which translates as "shit life," or literally as "life of shit." VDM has become one of France's top ten sites. Anybody who visits the site can decide if the writer of each anecdote's life indeed "sucks" or if he or she "deserved" what happened. Members can submit stories and leave comments. Not every story submitted is posted on the blog.[6]

FMyLife has drawn attention from some social commentators, such as sociologist Pierre Mannoni, who has stated, "Even if it's done with humour, it can be dangerous to describe oneself endlessly as a loser; it can prevent you from succeeding."[6]

The website experienced a rapid increase in traffic in February 2009, according to a breakdown of web traffic by Alexa Internet.[7][8]

In March 2009, FMyLife announced that they had secured a book deal.[9] The book was released on June 9, 2009.[5]

In 2009, FML also released an iPhone/iPod touch application, in which the user can submit their FMLs, rate them, comment on them or just read them, just like the website itself. Applications are now available for Android, BlackBerry devices and ordinary cell phones, as well as several applications for iPhone.[10]

References

  1. ^ "Fmylife.com Site Info". Alexa Internet. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/fmylife.com. Retrieved 2012-01-02. 
  2. ^ "FML: Frequently Asked Questions". 2009-10-04. http://www.fmylife.com/faq. Retrieved 2009-10-04. 
  3. ^ Aucoin, Don (2009-05-30). "The culture of failure". Boston Globe. http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/articles/2009/05/30/the_culture_of_failure_thrives_on_the_web/. Retrieved 2009-08-05. 
  4. ^ "FMyLife, the book!". FMyLife. 2009-05-17. http://www.fmylife.com/blog/50. Retrieved 2009-08-05. 
  5. ^ a b "The book is now available". FMyLife. 2009-06-09. http://www.fmylife.com/blog/99. Retrieved 2009-08-05. 
  6. ^ a b Bremner, Charles; Marie Tourres (2009-03-06). "French cash in on internet despair as depression builds across Atlantic". London: Times Online. http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article5854263.ece. Retrieved 2009-03-18. 
  7. ^ "FMylife.com - Traffic Details from Alexa". Alexa. http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details/fmylife.com. Retrieved 2009-03-18. 
  8. ^ Milian, Mark (2009-02-10). "FMyLife lets you sound off on everyday problems". Los Angeles Times. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2009/02/fml-fmylife.html. Retrieved 2009-03-18. 
  9. ^ Carlson, Nicholas (2009-03-17). "'F*** My Life' Gets Book Deal". Business Insider. http://www.businessinsider.com/f-my-life-gets-book-deal-2009-3. Retrieved 2009-03-18. 
  10. ^ "FML: All official applications for mobile phone". http://www.fmylife.com/applications/official. Retrieved 2010-08-18. 

External links