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'{{short description|American entertainment website}} {{Multiple issues| {{more citations needed|date=November 2020}} {{Update|date=November 2020}} {{Primary sources|date=February 2021}} }}{{Infobox website | name = Newgrounds, Inc. | logo = Newgrounds2018logo.png | logo_size = | url = {{URL|https://www.newgrounds.com/}} | registration = Optional; only required to vote, review, comment and submit content | language = English | website_type = Entertainment | company_type = [[Privately held company|Private]] | foundation = {{start date and age|1995|7|12}} | location_city = 333 W Glenside Ave, [[Glenside, Pennsylvania]] | location_country = United States | key_people = '''Founder/[[Chief executive officer]] (CEO)'''<br>Tom Fulp<br />''' '''Site Programmers'''<br>Josh Tuttle & James Holloway<br /> '''Artist/Animator'''<br>Jeff Bandelin | services = Indie games, animation, art, music and user-generated content, [[Internet hosting service|hosting service]] }} '''Newgrounds''' is an online entertainment website and company. It hosts user-generated content such as games, films, audio and artwork composition in four respective website categories. Newgrounds provides visitor-driven voting and ranking of user-generated submissions.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://medium.com/@SeanBuckelew/newgrounds-64831b97a5a8|title=Newgrounds: Everything by Everyone|last=Buckelew|first=Sean|date=December 27, 2014|website=Sean Buckelew|access-date=April 21, 2018}}</ref> The site's owner, Tom Fulp, founded the site and company in 1995 and produces in-house content over at the headquarters and offices, based in the [[Glenside, Pennsylvania|Glenside]] neighborhood of [[Cheltenham Township, Pennsylvania|Cheltenham Township]], [[Pennsylvania]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cheltenhamtownship.org/businessdirectory/business_dir.htm#N|title=Cheltenham Township Business Directory|date=January 2007|access-date=November 20, 2008}}</ref> Newgrounds's slogan since 2006 is "Everything, By Everyone".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.newgrounds.com/ |title=Newgrounds.com — Everything, By Everyone |access-date=January 1, 2019}}</ref> Newgrounds's slogan from 1995 to 2006 was "The Problems Of The Future, Today!"<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/wiki/about-newgrounds/history|title=Newgrounds Wiki - History|website=Newgrounds|access-date=February 18, 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=http://newgrounds.com/ |title=Newgrounds.com — The Problems Of The Future, Today! |access-date=February 12, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060209041725/http://newgrounds.com/ |archive-date=February 9, 2006 |url-status=bot: unknown }}</ref> ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' ranked the website at number 39 on its "50 Best Websites" list in 2010.<ref>{{Cite magazine|url=http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2012721_2012922_2012919,00.html|title=50 Best Websites 2010 - TIME|author=TIME Staff|date=August 25, 2010|magazine=Time|access-date=August 18, 2019|issn=0040-781X}}</ref> ==Layout and overview== ===Content and general=== [[File:Newgrounds Tankman logo.png|left|thumb|The Newgrounds logo used from 2006 to 2018. This logo and ones similar can be seen at the beginning of numerous flash games and videos on the website.|alt=]] [[User-generated content]] can be uploaded and categorized into either one of the site's four web portals: ''Games'', ''Movies'', ''Audio'', and ''Art''. A Movie or Games submission entered undergoes the process termed ''Judgment'', where it can be rated by all users (from 0 to 5 stars) and reviewed by other users. The average score calculated at various points during Judgment determine if whether the content will be "saved" (added onto the database) or "blammed" (deleted, with only its reviews saved in the ''Obituaries'' section). Art and audio compositions are processed using a different method called "Scouting". All users can put art and audio onto their own page, but only those that are "scouted" will appear in the public area. Like the ''Judgment'' system, it stops stolen content, spam, or prohibited material reaching the public area, using users and site moderators (referred to as "Mods") . Once an individual is scouted they are given the privilege to also scout others to those Portals. Since showing animated movies and games was the original purpose and they are still the dominant media of the site, those submissions are all displayed in an area just called the "Portal". This displays not only what is in Judgment, but it also displays the statuses of recently judged submissions, and various winners and most popular submissions. Content and context are liable to be reported for review to the Mods and staff members by flagging it for violations to the site's guidelines; a weighted system recognises experienced users and gives their flag more voice. The Homepage of Newgrounds includes featured submissions from each category, as well as awards and honors to users whose submission that fall under the site's requirements to earn them.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.retrojunk.com/community/post/index/45064|title=The History Of Newgrounds {{!}} Retro Junk|website=www.retrojunk.com|access-date=April 21, 2018}}</ref> All submissions have a rating. Adult-oriented content is allowed with adult ads, but is supposedly restricted only to users aged 18 and up, though there is no safeguard to assure this. Online competitions and contests are open at some times, where an individual can win and receive prizes presented by either a recognized user or staff member upon following a given theme. [[File:Strawberryclockillustration.png|thumb|Pictured here is a depiction of members of the Clock Crew, a small group on Newgrounds]] ===User communication and behavior=== The site includes a ''Community'' portal, where users are able to communicate with others through various [[Internet forum]]s. Threads in the forums can be locked if they are in violation of forum rules. Another communication system developed on the site, termed "Private Messaging" and abbreviated as PM, is also granted, similar to the service of [[email]] where users can send messages via the site to other users. A live [[chat room]] is also available. Any user breaking the rules of site use anywhere on the site can be sent warnings or subjected to sanctions, such as restrictions of membership or banning, by the Moderators or Staff. ==History== ===1990s: organization=== In 1991, at the age 13, Tom Fulp launched a [[Neo Geo]] fanzine under the name "New Ground" sending issues to approximately 100 members of a club originating on the internet in [[Prodigy (online service)|Prodigy]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/wiki/about-newgrounds/history#wiki_toc_1|title=1991: The Zine|website=Newgrounds|access-date=April 20, 2018}}</ref> Fulp launched a website as ''New Ground Remix'' using a hosting service, increasing popularity in the summer of 1996 after BBS games ''Club a Seal''<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://gimletmedia.com/episode/episode105-how-we-first-met/|title=#105 At World's End - Reply All by Gimlet Media|website=gimletmedia.com|access-date=September 25, 2017}}</ref> and ''Assassin'' were created by Fulp while a student at [[Drexel University]], Pennsylvania. Fulp created the sequels to his creations, as games Club a Seal II and Assassin II, along with the decision to develop a separate hosting site, titled as ''New Ground Atomix''.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/wiki/about-newgrounds/history#wiki_toc_4|title=1997: The Tale of Two Newgrounds|website=Newgrounds|access-date=April 20, 2018}}</ref> [[File:The Behemoth (2007) (cropped).jpg|left|thumb|upright|Tom Fulp (pictured in 2007) is the creator of Newgrounds.]] Fulp began experimenting with Macromedia Flash, along with programming a Flash-compatible homepage that was later introduced to his secondary site, "Telebubby Fun Land", and was later released. Fulp later merged his two websites to form another website with the name ''Newgrounds'', leading to him to change hosts to accommodate the increasing traffic, and started selling merchandise to pay for the website's hosting bills. Introducing banner ads to pay for growing payments in 1999, Fulp partnered with [[Troma Entertainment|Troma]], who hosted the site in exchange for a share of ad revenue. A chat room and message board was added onto the website, which allowed people visiting the website to interact with each other. Many users had begun submitting their own Flash creations to Fulp, so he created a portion of the site called "The Portal" to display them. A friend of Fulp's named Ross developed the "Grounds Gold System", which allowed users to gain points for voting on submissions online. Ad revenue had increased, so Ross was hired, starting development of the current automated Portal, which would allow users to submit their own generated content to the website and have it judged by anyone visiting. Tom Fulp released Pico's School in 1999, and Pico became the main mascot of Newgrounds, until 2006. ===2000s: Developments=== After the [[dot-com bubble]] collapsed, Newgrounds struggled in paying its hosting costs. The affiliation with Troma ended in 2003 and Newgrounds switched to another bandwidth provider, which significantly reduced hosting costs. 2004 saw Newgrounds recovering from the online market crash, and the [[Numa Numa Dance]] viral phenomenon made its debut on Newgrounds near the end of the year, and became one of the first viral videos on the internet. Medals, the equivalent of in-game [[achievement (video gaming)|achievements]], were introduced for the first time through the API software in 2009, soon followed by a "Sharing" component that would allow content to be distributed within games, such as custom level designs. The Art Portal in its complete form was launched in June of the same year, along with the renovation of the company's headquarters. In later 2009, Fulp raised the file limit of Newgrounds to allow Mark Haynes to upload the eighth episode of his [[web series]] ''[[Super Mario Bros. Z]]'', of which Fulp was a fan.<ref name="eighth">{{Cite web|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/513950|title=''Super Mario Bros. Z'' ep 8|website=[[Newgrounds]]|access-date=2007-10-09}}</ref> In 2006, JohnnyUtah made an animation based on character controlling a Tank in Newgrounds logo called TANKMEN, it became one of the most popular animations on the site and made TANKMEN more popular, sequels, a prequel and fan animations for TANKMEN were made, he became the current mascot of Newgrounds making Pico a secondary mascot of Newgrounds and then get declined in relevancy slowly due to no Pico’s School 2 and years since any spinoffs of Pico were created by Tom Fulp. ===2010–present: Financial concerns, copyrights, and format changes=== {{Further|Ruffle (software)|Friday Night Funkin'}}{{Expand section|[https://github.com/ruffle-rs/ruffle ruffle-rs support]|date=April 2020}} In 2011, the Newgrounds Annual Tournament of Animation (NATA) began as a 4–6 month long animation competition on Newgrounds sponsored by [[Adobe Systems|Adobe]]. In 2012, Newgrounds published their first mobile game, titled ''GroundCats'',<ref>{{Citation|title=GroundCats - Newgrounds|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2q8ZuGhvszA|language=en|access-date=2021-02-18}}</ref> on [[iOS]]. That same year, major changes to the website included the launch of the video player, allowing users to publish movies that were not in .SWF format for the first time, and support for HTML5-coded games, which meant users were no longer limited to submitting movies and games made in Flash. In 2013, the site suffered heavily through financial issues and closed down its online merchandise market the year after. Platform mobile game ''[[Geometry Dash]]'' developed by RobTop Games allowed songs from Newgrounds to be used in levels made with the level editor with the release of its 1.9 update in 2014. The Audio Portal consisted of submitted copyrighted songs for use in the game, leading to [[nightcore]], along with [[Mashup (music)|mashups]], banned as a result. The issue of copyright protection came to a head in 2016, when the site received a serious challenge to deal with the content and files containing unlicensed commercial music and images, resulting in many submissions being removed by moderators and staff. In 2018, new servers and video-encoding-software were unveiled, along with developments for the site to be ad-free, and improve page performance. In November and December 2018, Newgrounds experienced surges of new members originally from [[Tumblr]], when that site began restricting adult content after illegal child pornography was found on that service, resulting in its [[iOS]] app being removed from [[Apple Inc.|Apple]]'s [[App Store (iOS)|App Store]].<ref>{{cite web|author=Aparajita_1989|title=Tumblr shutting down? No. But there's exodus and Newgrounds is gaining from it|url=https://piunikaweb.com/2018/11/22/tumblr-shutting-down-no-but-theres-exodus-and-newgrounds-is-gaining-from-it/|website=Piunika Web|access-date=December 5, 2018|date=November 22, 2018|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Asarch|first=Steven|title=Why Is Tumblr Banning Adult Content? Censorship Causes Alternative Platforms to Rise|url=https://www.newsweek.com/tumblr-censorship-ban-alternatives-pillowfort-1244094|website=[[Newsweek]]|access-date=December 5, 2018|date=December 4, 2018|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Fulp|first=Tom|title=Welcome, New Artists!|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1436452|website=Newgrounds|access-date=December 5, 2018|date=November 20, 2018|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Fulp|first=Tom|title=Welcome, 2nd Wave of New Artists!|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1436757|website=Newgrounds|access-date=December 5, 2018|date=December 3, 2018|df=mdy-all}}</ref> In the wake of the [[Adobe Flash Player]] no longer being supported after the end of 2020,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://theblog.adobe.com/adobe-flash-update/|title=Flash & The Future of Interactive Content|date=July 25, 2017|website=Adobe Blog|access-date=August 18, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171202123704/https://theblog.adobe.com/adobe-flash-update/|archive-date=December 2, 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref> Newgrounds developed the '''Newgrounds Player''' as an alternate [[Media player software|media player]] to continue viewing old Flash projects.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/flash/player|title=Newgrounds.com — Everything, By Everyone|website=Newgrounds}}</ref> Newgrounds also introduced support for HTML5-based games and animations as an alternative to Flash, which can be uploaded in the form of a .zip file.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.newgrounds.com/wiki/help-information/content-submission/games-and-movies|title=Newgrounds Wiki - Games and Movies|website=Newgrounds}}</ref> On January 31, 2021, when the third episode of the [[adult animated]] [[web series]] ''[[Helluva Boss]]'' was [[YouTube#Controversial videos|age restricted]] by [[YouTube]], Newgrounds expressed interest in hosting the [[Censorship|uncensored]] version of the episode and "promo with a front page banner," something which series creator [[Vivienne Medrano]] supported.<ref>{{cite tweet |author=Newgrounds |author-link=Newgrounds |user=Newgrounds |number=1356041129347739648 |date=January 31, 2021 |title=We'd love to host the uncensored version and promo with a front page banner! |accessdate=January 31, 2021 |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20210201043004/https://twitter.com/Newgrounds/status/1356041129347739648 |archivedate=February 1, 2021 |url-status=live}} See her response [https://web.archive.org/web/20210201043325/https://twitter.com/VivziePop/status/1356089681855696896 here].</ref>{{efn|1=See Helix D's tweet thread beginning [https://web.archive.org/web/20210201041624/https://twitter.com/its_helixD/status/1356031845121441824 here] and conversation with TeamYouTube beginning [https://web.archive.org/web/20210201042012/https://twitter.com/TeamYouTube/status/1356040957318340609 here], then continuing [https://archive.is/72RTZ here], on January 31. The same day, Medrano noted that they "[https://archive.is/oJr45 literally added in more censorship to the final]" and that they would be making edits before a new version "[https://archive.is/4KDBb that's widely viewable]" would be available}} On November 1st 2020, [[Friday Night Funkin'|Friday Night Funkin’]] was uploaded to Newgrounds, it became the highest rated game on Newgrounds in it’s 25 year run, the game is popular on [[YouTube|Youtube]], [[Twitter]], [[TikTok|Tiktok]] and [[Twitch]], the game includes famous Newgrounds characters such as Pico, Skid & Pump, Tankmen, Hank J Wimbleton from the Madness Combat Series and Ritz the Rat. The game also includes many other Newgrounds characters in the background in Week 5, has made Newgrounds itself gain more new members and become more relevant, it also made Pico more well known among Newgrounds and Flash community as well as Skid & Pump, Tankmen and Ritz. == See also == *[[List of Internet forums]] {{Portal|Philadelphia|Internet}} ==Notes== {{notelist}} == References == {{reflist}} {{wikiquote}} {{TheBehemoth}} {{Cheltenham}} [[Category:Flash games]] [[Category:Internet forums]] [[Category:American entertainment websites]] [[Category:Free music download websites]] [[Category:Browser-based game websites]] [[Category:Obscenity controversies]] [[Category:Cheltenham Township, Pennsylvania]] [[Category:Internet properties established in 1995]] [[Category:Internet memes introduced in 2000]]'