# Shock Sites
Shock Sites are websites built to disgust or startle whoever clicks the link, packed with gore, porn, or scatological images meant to trigger an immediate visceral reaction. Starting with Rotten.com in 1996 and growing through bait-and-switch pranks on early message boards, links like Goatse.cx and Lemonparty.org turned tricking friends into one of the defining rituals of the early web.
## Origin
On July 23, 1996, Thomas E. Dell, the founder of the web hosting company Soylent Communications, registered Rotten.com after running a script that scraped the internet for available domain names[4]. In the site's FAQ, Dell said he only launched Rotten as a "what should I do with this domain now that I blew a hundred bucks on it" excuse, then started uploading crime scene photos and images of dead bodies[6].
Rotten.com is treated as one of the first true shock sites, and its layout barely changed between 1997 and 2015[4]. Its early success set the template that later sites copied: pick a memorable domain, put a single revolting piece of content on the front page, and let word of mouth do the rest.
- **Platform:** World Wide Web (early message boards for viral spread)
- **Creator:** Thomas E. Dell (Rotten.com, 1996)
- **Date:** 1996
## Overview
Shock Sites work through one basic trick: get someone to click a link with no idea what they're about to see, then hit them with a single disgusting image, video, or looping GIF. Some, like Goatse.cx and Lemonparty.org, opened directly to one pornographic photo meant to make the viewer flinch and slam the tab shut[1]. Others, like Rotten.com, hosted galleries of crime scene photos, autopsy images, and death footage stitched together as a running catalog[2].
A separate branch, sometimes called ethical shock sites, skips the porn and gore and attacks the viewer's principles instead. Bonsai Kitten, launched by MIT graduate students in December 2000, pretended to sell kits for growing kittens inside sealed glass jars so their bodies molded to the shape of the container[3]. Animal rights groups filed complaints and news outlets covered the outrage before the site was widely confirmed as satire[4].
The format spread through bait-and-switch culture on early forums, IRC, and imageboards like 2chan and 4chan, where posting a masked link labeled as something innocent was a running gag[4]. Urban Dictionary catalogs the same use case, defining a shock site as any URL sent with the express purpose of startling whoever opens it[5].
## How It Spread
The category grew alongside message boards and imageboards through the late 1990s and 2000s. Goatse.cx launched in 1999 and became the standard bait-and-switch link of the era, sending clickers to a photo of a man stretching his anus with both hands[4]. Because the URL sounded like a normal domain, it worked well when disguised inside forum posts or IM chats.
Lemonparty.org was registered on October 3, 2002 according to DomainTools[2]. The page consisted of a single pornographic photograph of three elderly men set to Jimmy Soul's 1963 doo-wop track "If You Wanna Be Happy." By November 21 of the same year, the site was updated with a hyperlink to a picture of a cat labeled "omfg crazy! Click here to wash your eyeballs!"[3]
Bonsai Kitten took a different route. MIT graduate students posted the site under the alias "Dr. Michael Wong Chang" on December 20, 2000, with a fake how-to guide and gallery of doctored images[4]. Animal rights groups pushed for its removal in 2001; the domain BonsaiKitten.com is now defunct and redirects to a ThinkGeek plush toy product page, though a mirror is preserved on Ding.net[7]. Urban Dictionary entries from the following years listed Goatse, Tubgirl, and Lemonparty as the canonical examples any web user was expected to recognize[5].
## Frequently Asked Questions
### What is Shock Sites?
Shock Sites are web pages built to offend or startle visitors, usually by showing a single pornographic, violent, or scatological image or video the moment the URL loads[4].
### Where did Shock Sites come from?
The format traces back to Rotten.com, registered by Thomas E. Dell on July 23, 1996 and stocked with crime scene and autopsy imagery[6].
### What does Shock Sites mean?
The term covers any site designed to trigger an immediate reaction of disgust or shock, often used as a bait-and-switch prank where the link is disguised as something harmless[5].
### How do you use Shock Sites?
Users typically drop a masked link into a chat, forum thread, or DM and wait for the target to click, a trick built into examples like Goatse.cx and Lemonparty.org[1].
### Is Shock Sites still popular?
Many of the classic domains, including Rotten.com and Goatse.cx, are dead or redirected, and Bonsai Kitten now points at a plush toy page, though mirrors of the originals still exist on sites like Ding.net[7].
## References
1. [https://web.archive.org/web/20010202065200/https://bonsaikitten.com/]()
2. [https://whois.domaintools.com/lemonparty.org]()
3. [https://web.archive.org/web/*/lemonparty.org]()
4. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/shock-sites]()
5. [https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Shock%20Sites]()
6. [https://web.archive.org/web/20120124060403/http://rotten.com/FAQ/]()
7. [https://www.ding.net/bonsaikitten/index.html]()
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Source: https://meme.com/memes/shock-sites
Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library