# Planking > Planking is a late-2000s photo trend peaking in 2011 where participants lie face-down, stiff as boards, in unusual locations and share images online. Planking is a photo fad from the late 2000s and early 2010s where participants lie face down, stiff as a board, in unusual public locations, then photograph the scene and share it online. The trend peaked in mid-2011 after spreading through Facebook and mainstream media coverage in Australia and the UK, but took a dark turn when a 20-year-old man fell to his death attempting to plank on a seventh-story balcony in Brisbane. The craze spawned rival origin claims, celebrity participation, legislative proposals, and a heated debate about its possible connection to the slave trade before fading into obscurity by 2013. ## Origin The earliest documented version of planking traces back to around 2000 in Taunton, Somerset, England. Gary Clarkson and Christian Langdon started lying down in public places just to confuse people. Clarkson described it to The Guardian as "just a really stupid, random thing to do"[3]. They called it the "Lying Down Game" and spent years passing the idea along to school friends before their friend Daniel Hoppin took it online with a Facebook group in 2007[1]. "They'd started lying down in bars and clubs to try to spin people out," Hoppin told the BBC. "So we began a Facebook group to see who could get the craziest photo"[1]. The group grew slowly until British media picked up the story in July 2009, at which point membership jumped from 8,000 to 35,000[1]. In September 2009, seven staff members at Great Western Hospital in Swindon were suspended for playing the game while on duty, which brought another wave of attention[6]. Independently, in Australia around 2008–2009, Sam Weckert and friends started doing the same thing on dance floors and low-lying objects like post boxes and public bins in South Australia. Weckert created the "Official Planking" Facebook page to share photos and claims to have coined the term "planking"[2]. A separate claim credits Paul Carran, a New Zealander living in Sydney, with coining the term in 2008 after hearing about a similar game friends were playing in the UK[4]. Adding another layer, comedian Tom Green produced video evidence that he performed a strikingly similar stunt called "Dead Guy" on his cable access show in Ottawa, Canada, as early as 1994. Green would lie face down on crowded sidewalks to see if passersby would stop to help. "I don't want to take anything away from anybody, but I do have video evidence," Green told CNN in 2011[9]. He even contacted Rogers Cable to dig up the old footage, posting it to YouTube on July 12, 2011[3]. - **Platform:** Australia/Twitter - **Creator:** Gary Clarkson and Christian Langdon (original "Lying Down Game" creators), Sam Weckert (coined/popularized "Planking" in Australia), Tom Green (claims earliest known video from 1994 as "Dead Guy") - **Date:** 2011 ## Overview Planking follows a simple set of rules: lie face down with your body completely straight, arms pinned to your sides, fingers pointed, and toes angled toward the ground. Your face should be expressionless, pressed flat against whatever surface you've chosen. The whole point is location. The stranger, more unexpected, or more precarious the spot, the better the photo. Participants would snap a picture and upload it to Facebook, dedicated planking blogs, or other social media platforms for others to rate and admire[1]. The activity drew its humor from the absurdity of seeing a person frozen in a rigid prone position in places where no reasonable human would ever lie down. Park benches, police cars, shopping cart handles, mailboxes, public trash cans, rugby fields, and balcony railings all became planking stages[4]. At its peak, the Official Planking Facebook page had over 130,000 fans and dozens of single-topic blogs like BestPlank, PlankingMissions, and iPlanking hosted user-submitted photos[4]. ## How It Spread The planking craze broke out of its niche origins in March 2011 when Australian rugby league player David "Wolfman" Williams planked on the field after scoring a try during a Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles vs. Newcastle Knights match on March 27[4]. Australian media ran with the story, and planking exploded across the country. Australian chatshow host Kerri-Anne Kennerley opened a show by planking on the TV sofa. Police served a trespass notice on a man caught planking on a squad car[1]. The Official Planking Facebook page rocketed past 130,000 fans within its first week of mainstream attention[4]. Celebrities piled on fast. Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, Demi Moore, Chris Brown, Rosario Dawson, Ellen Page, Kristen Bell, Dwight Howard, and Diplo all posted planking photos[3]. Basically the entire cast of The Office got involved, and even Flavor Flav joined in[3]. The fad crossed to New Zealand, where it alarmed authorities and educators. On May 19, 2011, a student was caught planking on the ledge of a secondary school building. Six days later, another student planked on a railway line in front of an oncoming train[4]. On May 13, 2011, journalist Michelle McMurray proposed "Global Planking Day" for May 25[4]. On July 28, fans at the premiere of the "Electronic Daisy Carnival Experience" documentary at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles planked in a row in front of police during a crowd control standoff[4]. ## How to Use Planking follows a straightforward formula: 1. Find an unusual, unexpected, or visually interesting location 2. Lie face down with your body completely rigid and straight 3. Keep your arms flat against your sides with fingers pointed 4. Point your toes downward toward your feet 5. Maintain a blank, expressionless face pressed against the surface 6. Have someone photograph you in position 7. Post the photo to social media with a creative name for your "plank" ## Cultural Impact Planking was one of the first photo fads to demonstrate how quickly a simple physical meme could go global through social media. Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard addressed it publicly, making planking one of the few internet trends to draw comment from a sitting head of state[1]. Queensland police warned about potential criminal charges for dangerous planking[8]. The Philippines' proposed Anti-Planking Act of 2011, filed by Rep. Winston Castelo, made it one of the rare internet memes to inspire actual legislation, even if the bill was widely ridiculed[10]. The slavery debate triggered by Xzibit's tweets brought unexpected historical and racial dimensions to what had been a lighthearted trend. The Washington Post's coverage and academic commentary from Professor Rediker forced a brief but real conversation about the optics of a pose that bore visual similarity to how enslaved people were forced to lie during the Middle Passage[4]. Nate Lanxon, editor of Wired.co.uk, placed planking in the lineage of viral memes alongside Lolcats, Hitler Downfall parodies, flash mobs, and extreme ironing. "Exhibitionism has been around since the dawn of time," he told the BBC. "YouTube and digital cameras just takes it into a whole new realm"[1]. The meme's connection to broader cultural theory was explored in academic and journalistic contexts through the lens of memetics, the study of how ideas replicate and spread. Susan Blackmore's work on meme theory was frequently cited in analyses of why planking caught on[6]. ## Fun Facts - Tom Green's 1994 "Dead Guy" segment, his earliest known proto-planking clip, was so obscure he had to contact Rogers Cable in Canada to help dig up the footage[9]. - The Lying Down Game Facebook page, started in 2007 by Hoppin and friends, was still functioning as of 2015 when Inverse checked on it[3]. - Seven hospital workers at Great Western Hospital in Swindon were suspended for playing the Lying Down Game while on duty in September 2009[6]. - Acton Beale's fatal fall at Kangaroo Point actually increased the Australian planking Facebook page's membership by roughly 29,000 fans in the days following[8]. - Before planking had a name, similar "bizarre photograph poses" had appeared in South Korea as "Playing Dead" in 2003 and on a French art website called "A plat ventre" (on one's belly) in 2004[4]. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is planking? Planking is a photo fad where a person lies face down, completely rigid with arms at their sides and toes pointed, in an unusual or unexpected location. Someone photographs the pose, and the image gets shared on social media[1]. ### Where did planking come from? The activity has multiple origin claims. Gary Clarkson and Christian Langdon started doing it in Somerset, England around 2000 as the "Lying Down Game"[1]. Sam Weckert popularized the "planking" name in Australia around 2008–2009[2]. Tom Green produced video evidence of a similar stunt called "Dead Guy" from his 1994 cable access show in Ottawa[9]. ### What does planking mean? The name refers to mimicking a wooden plank: lying flat, rigid, and expressionless. The humor comes from doing this in absurd or unexpected places[5]. ### How do you use planking? Find an unusual location, lie face down with a straight body, arms by your sides, toes pointed down, and have someone photograph you. Post the photo online with a creative name for the plank[4]. ### Is planking still popular? No. Google searches for "planking" bottomed out in 2013, and the trend had largely faded from public consciousness by then[3]. ### Who died from planking? Acton Beale, a 20-year-old Australian man, fell to his death on May 15, 2011 while attempting to plank on the balcony railing of a seventh-story building in Brisbane[8]. ### Did planking have anything to do with slavery? Rapper Xzibit claimed in July 2011 that planking's pose resembled how enslaved people were forced to lie during transport on slave ships. The Washington Post explored the claim with input from historian Markcus Rediker, though Xzibit later clarified he wasn't calling the game itself racist[4]. ### Which celebrities did planking? Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, Demi Moore, Chris Brown, Rosario Dawson, Ellen Page, Kristen Bell, Dwight Howard, Diplo, and Flavor Flav all posted planking photos during the trend's 2011 peak[3]. ### Was planking ever illegal? In the Philippines, Rep. Winston Castelo filed the "Anti-Planking Act of 2011" to ban planking as a form of student protest[10]. In Australia, Queensland police warned plankers could face charges for "unauthorised high-risk activity"[1]. ### What memes came after planking? Owling, Tebowing, horsemaning, and batmanning all emerged as physical pose memes inspired by planking's formula of striking a pose in an unusual place and photographing it[7]. ## References 1. [Who, What, Why: What is planking? - BBC News]() 2. [Remember the Planking Trend? - Communicate Online]() 3. [Viral Postmortem: What Did Planking Mean?]() 4. [Planking - Know Your Meme]() 5. [Planking]() 6. [Planking - Urban Dictionary]() 7. [Planking and the contagiousness of culture | Delayed Gratification]() 8. [How Planking Begat Owling: The History of an Internet Meme - Good.is]() 9. [Walking the plank: Meme causes man to fall seven stories]() 10. [New clues in planking origins mystery - CNN.com]() 11. ['Planking' Photos -- Rapper Xzibit Says It's RACIST!!!]() 12. [Twitter index: Demi Lovato release 'Unbroken,' Anti-Planking Act | The Independent | The Independent]() 13. [SunStar | Latest Philippine News in English and Bisaya]() 14. [Xzibit Blasts Celebs for 'Planking' | News | BET]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/planking Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library