digital space role in community construction: the case of
TRANSCRIPT
Digital space role in community construction: The case of r/Wallstreetbets
BA Thesis
Name of author: Eglė Talandytė
Student number: 2022631
Online Culture: Art, Media and Society / Digital Media
Department of Culture Studies
School of Humanities and Digital Sciences
Date: 02-07-2021
Supervisor: Dr. Ico Maly
Second reader: Dr. Mingyi Hou
Abstract
In January 2020 Gamestop stock experienced a rare and unique financial phenomenon, a
short squeeze. The short squeeze is related to massive media coverage and an online
community on Reddit, r/Wallstreetbets. R/Wallstreetbets community can be regarded as one
of the catalysts for this unique phenomenon.
R/Wallstreetbets is a subreddit for amateur retail investors to discuss stocks while at the same
time stay entertained, known for its unique derogatory language and unique investing
strategies. By using digital ethnographic discourse analysis this study analyzes the factors
contributing and influencing modes of social organization in a subreddit r/Wallstreetbets.
Findings suggest that memes and unique linguistic discourse construct normative behavior of
the community which are influenced by the online-offline nexus and algorithms of Reddit.
This case illustrates a community that is although presented as an entertaining space to
gamble money, it is a highly coordinated community that exhibits unique investing tactics in
order to make money. This research contributes to the understanding of new investing
phenomena emerging in digital spaces and their relevance to community construction.
Keywords: social organization, community of practice, light communities, memes, short
squeeze, Gamestop stock.
Table of Contents
Introduction .............................................................................................................................. 4
Theoretical framework ............................................................................................................ 7 Gambling and investing ......................................................................................................... 7
Online communities ............................................................................................................... 8 Role of language in group construction ............................................................................... 10
Methodology ........................................................................................................................... 14
Findings ................................................................................................................................... 20 The ethos of r/Wallstreetbets ............................................................................................... 20 What effect do memes have in the r/Wallstreetbets community? ........................................ 24
How is linguistic discourse constructed in r/Wallstreetbets and what is the impact of it? .. 33 What part does online-offline nexus play in the construction of r/Wallstreetbets community? .......................................................................................................................... 37
Discussion and Conclusion .................................................................................................... 41
References: .............................................................................................................................. 44
Introduction
The emergence of Web 2.0 and social media have changed the way social interactions are
organized. It has facilitated social media platforms and forums to give people ability to
collectively construct online communities. This study explores what role digital space plays
in community construction in the case of a subreddit r/Wallstreetbets (WSB).
r/Wallstreetbets is a subreddit devoted to amateur investments and being entertained while
doing it. As of January 2020, the community has grown from 2 million members to 10
million. Massive growth of the subreddit is related to an increased coverage from the media
which covered short squeeze of a Gamestop ($GME) stock. Short squeeze is an inflation of a
stock price caused due to short selling. Short selling is a practice of investors, in $GME case
hedge funds, borrowing a stock, selling it and buying it again at a lower price in order to
return it to the lender and to keep the profit gained between selling high and buying low.
r/Wallstreetbets and its influence on $GME can be understood as a highly mediatized case.
The case is constructed in a mediatized way as media, both Reddit and news sources shapes
and frames how the case is presented. r/Wallstreetbets subreddit has become the main actor in
shaping the communicative discourse of Gamestop stock. It influenced the changes in regular
retail investing practices through affordances offered by Reddit and stock brokerage apps.
Gamestop is an American video game retailer. The company has for the past few years been
losing its status. Emergence of online video game stores such as Steam, Origin, Xbox Live,
PlayStation, combined together with a global Covid-19 pandemic has made buying video
games online more common rather than buying them in a store. As a result, the company’s
value was declining which made it a victim of short selling. This is where r/Wallstreetbets
steps in, in January 2020 the subreddit has been attributed to be one of the catalysators for
$GME short squeeze. A short squeeze can possibly be triggered by “holding” aka buying and
not selling the stock until the short positions of the hedge funds expire. This is exactly what
r/Wallstreetbets has been doing since early January in 2020. The community is known for its
high-risk investing practices that are oftentimes based on irrationality and popularized
through memes.
The GameStop short squeeze has increased a surge of new members, however the community
dates back to 2012 and is heavily influenced by internet culture. This is reflected in their
official community description which says “Like 4chan found a Bloomberg Terminal”. It
already reveals that their culture is similar to 4chan which sometimes can be aggressive and
offensive. This attitude is mostly reflected in their discourse, as they refer to themselves as
“apes”, “autists”, “degenerates”. Moreover, they proudly express that they are not experts in
investing and as they describe it, they have a “YOLO” (you only live once) attitude towards
it. From the first glance it might seem like a chaotic community without actual goal of
making money and rather investing irrationally without analyzing certain stocks and relying
on memes to find a new potential stock. However, my research and analysis reveal that this is
a tightly focused community, with its norms and rules and a goal of making money for a
common amateur retail investor.
This research looks to contribute to understandings, not only of this online community but of
community building online in general and its impact offline. Given the fact that most of our
social lives are mediated in online spaces, it is important to understand how communities
function and how it shapes users’ behavior. Since January 2020 multiple academic research
articles and papers have been published, however they come from economic and financial
background and focus on analyzing the subtleties of $GME short squeeze. Analyzing an
online community that is based on investing is relevant as there is a growth of retail investors
in the recent years (Black, 2007; Abudy, 2020; Deloitte, 2021). According to a survey
conducted by Charles Schwab, an American financial services company specialized in annual
examination of how the US citizens think about savings and investments, has found that the
pandemic has increased a number of retail investors; moreover, GameStop short squeeze has
strengthened the trading boom (Fitzgerald, 2021). Retail investing is strengthened due to
availability of no-fee stock brokerage trading apps and platforms for example Robinhood, TD
Ameritrade, Degiro, Trading 212 as they make trading available for “common people”. What
we witness is an infiltration of user-generated culture such as r/Wallstreetbets in the stock
market through available trading apps. As a result, not only new communities revolving
around investing are emerging, but also creating disruptive effects as seen in a $GME short
squeeze case. What was previously considered as a practice of elite done through institutional
traders now meets its competitors of retail investors coming into being through digital
culture. My research will contribute to understanding of an emerging phenomenon and its
relevance to community construction.
Therefore, this study aims to answer the following research question:
What factors within a subreddit r/Wallstreetbets play a role in influencing and contributing
to modes of social organization?
Sub-questions:
1. What effect do memes have in the r/Wallstreetbets community?
2. How is linguistic discourse constructed in r/Wallstreetbets and what is the impact of
it?
3. What part does online-offline nexus play in the construction of r/Wallstreetbets
community?
In this study, r/Wallstreetbets is investigated by using digital ethnographic discourse analysis.
I have developed a comprehensive investigation into the factors that play a key role in
developing a large number of loyal users and community cohesion by analyzing the
community of practices. The focus of research lies in understanding group construction in
online spaces by exploring how communicative discourses operate through which impact of
disseminated discourses influence new users to join the community.
In the next chapter I explore the theoretical framework for my research. Furthermore, in
Chapter 3 I present the methodology used for my data collection. Chapter 4 displays the
results and analysis of the collected data. Chapter 5 constitutes the discussion and conclusion
where thesis limitations are discussed. The thesis is concluded by a list of references.
Theoretical framework
In this chapter, I provide an overview of the conceptual framework adopted in this research
that was relevant for my analysis such as sociality, community of practice, light communities,
and the role of language in group construction in general. The purpose of this chapter is to
outline the way these concepts apply to my research.
Gambling and investing
There is not much literature related to online communities and investing. Given that
r/Wallstreetbets presents itself as an investing community with gambling like attitude, it is
worth looking at literature between investors and gamblers. The community exhibit gambling
like attitude by investing into stocks without analyzing them. Without analyzing stocks, it
cannot be easily determined whether they will grow or decline. Thus, it might seem that the
community members base their investing choices by a chance and hope of a positive
outcome. However, the analysis points to a contradiction as community members make
conscious choices rather than taking blind chances. They weaponize the mass of 10 million
community members to make money as in the case of short squeeze of Gamestop stock. As it
is illegal to instruct masses to make certain investments, they create an image of a community
that takes blind investing chances while the actions of members reveal that they carefully
coordinate their investments.
According to Statman (2002) people are risk averse and are willing to take risks in
investments if they offer high expected monetary returns. Statman (2002) distinguished four
shared factors that influence investors and gamblers to invest or gamble. Firstly, they believe
to be above average which leads to overestimation of their performance in investing and
gambling. Secondly, people suffering from lack or decline in money turn to investing or
gambling. Thirdly, they are driven by emotions such as hope and fear. Fourthly, they enjoy
the collective mind between all the players.
As it will be seen in analysis, r/Wallstreetbets community members exhibit these four
attitudes. Some members of the community view investing as a form of entertainment and
risk money by committing to high-risk investments that are rarely based on any analysis. For
others, it is probably a more rational approach in order to gain a quick buck. In both cases,
the monetizing effect of this group comes, unsurprisingly, with various emotions such as fear
or excitement which are induced while watching the stock go up or down. Moreover, the
incline of community members can be partially attributed to second point of Statman. As
previously mentioned, the pandemic and new affordances to invest through no-fee trading
apps has increased a number of people investing, and thus potentially joining online
communities. Lastly, online communities offer collectivity and cohesion, with
r/Wallstreetbets not being an exception.
Online communities
Understanding the influences of investors and gamblers helps in understanding why users
join r/Wallstreetbets. As pointed out by Statman (2002) collectivity is important to gamblers
and investors, thus it is not surprising that they would turn to online communities. The
emergence of the Internet has transformed aspects of sociality and social interaction, which
brings community emergence central. R/Wallstreetbets community contributes to the success
of gaining money through a network effect. Increasing numbers of community members
improves their strategy of “holding” stocks. $GME stock is not the only stock where strategy
of “holding” has been used, it can also be seen in AMC entertainment, and BlackBerry
stocks. It is through this shared collectivity of r/Wallstreetbets members that they achieve
intended results and form normative values. By failing to hold on to a stock as community
they would fail to achieve the intended gains from stocks.
One of the most significant developments of the Internet is social network sites (SNS),
“group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological
foundations of the Web 2.0 and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated
content" (van Dijck, p.5, 2013). Social network sites have evolved a long way since their
emergence and have become tools for communication, content sharing and group
construction. SNS are not neutral platforms but platforms relying on data and algorithms that
are used to analyze patterns of what people like and show more of similar content (Bucher,
2018). The logics of social media are constituted by programmability, a two-way process
between users and programmers, distinct popularity principles on different platforms
measured in quantified terms, connectivity, defining how socio-technical affordances of
digital media influences users’ choices and actions, and datafication, a way of quantifying
each content into data (van Dijck, 2013). It can be said that SNS can be directly linked to
sociality, conscious or unconscious way of considering the mutual relationship among the
participants and how it affects their behavior. Thus, online communities can be understood as
spaces where mutual relationships are formed through interaction through which mutual
community culture is built. However, it is important to take into account how above-
mentioned factors influence production of online communities and shape it in particular
directions.
According to Enfield & Levinson (2020) the way humans socially interact lays foundation for
forming social life. Although communicating feels natural it is a highly structured and
complex practice where our communicative repertoires are based on various context specific
factors.
Understanding that communicative repertoires are structured, and context bound is relevant
for analysing online communities. Wenger (2010) wrote about offline social contexts;
however, it can be applied in an online space as well. Engagement in social contexts is a dual
process of meaning making (Wenger, 2010). Firstly, people engage in direct activities,
conversations in a social life. Secondly, meaning making is influenced by physical and
conceptual artifacts, which can be concepts, stories, documents and forms of reification
(Wenger, 2010). This dual process of meaning making is what creates shared experiences
between community members, and it is a way for them to organize their repertoires. This
behaviour is similarly organized in online communities; however it differs due to digital
component. In the case of r/Wallstreetbets community members engage in direct activities
such as commenting posts in conversations or giving awards. Secondly, they produce forms
of reifications such as context specific memes. Thus, we see that communicative repertoires
are structured on a basis of dual meaning making that creates shared experiences around
which members organize their participation in the community.
Such communities can be regarded as community of practice, a social learning system that
encompasses complex relationships, dynamic boundaries and constant negotiation of identity
and cultural meaning (Wenger, 2010). Being a member of a community of practice entails
having a common interest where through dissemination of information community members
learn from each other. r/Wallstreetbets can then be understood as an online environment with
a shared common attitude towards investing where possession of group dynamic knowledge
is relevant before being considered as a member. This knowledge of the community is
relevant in order to organize and maintain the shared experience.
Light communities is another concept that helps in developing an understanding of online
communities. Such communities emerge out of complex social life patterns and can be
understood as “focused but diverse occasioned coagulations of people” (Blommaert & Varis,
p. 54, 2015). These are the groups that are not tied by the same background or culture but by
a shared focus or a certain interest. Those shared interests are bound to a specific time and
space. r/Wallstreetbets can thus be understood as a light community as it is an open
community of 10 million people, not tied by their thick identities such as race, gender,
nation-state or family. It is a light community, as practices specific to r/Wallstreetbets are
bound to its context and would not be understood outside of the community. It can be derived
that while community of practices provide a learning environment of context specific rules
and norms, it is through learning them that one becomes a part of a light community.
It is through learning norms and rules that one becomes a member of community, thus
integration is a keyword in understanding it. According to Blommaert (2017) it is a process
of an outsider becoming a part of a new culture. To become a member of r/Wallstreetbets
community, users must follow practices of chronotopes that invoke orders of indexicality
valid in specific context (Blommaert, 2016). In r/Wallstreetbets chronotopes are witnessed in
specific linguistic repertoires and in the use of derogatory terms as “apes”, “retards”,
“degenerates” to identify themselves and other members.
Role of language in group construction
The way collectivity is built in online communities is highly related to shared cultural
practices. One of the shared cultural practice is memes. Internet memes as defined by
Shifman (2017) are a collection of digital items that share characteristics of content, form, or
stance which is created with awareness of each other and circulated via the Internet by many
users. In the case of r/Wallstreetbets sharing memes is one of the most common
communication tools in the community. It is through memes that users share their ideas and
experiences. Multiple factors are involved that influence how the meme will be seen.
According to Shifman (2017) items that are positive, upbeat and surprising have a higher
level of meme spread. Secondly, users prefer memes that are provoking and has high-arousal
levels. Clear and simple memes are perceived better than cluttered and complex ones. Users
being able to relate to knowledge reflected in the meme result in more spread. Positioning of
a meme, choosing location and specific context, is another important factor for virality as it
targets selective users that are associated with those specific contexts. Moreover, participative
memes which invite for discussion, or any other activities related to a meme can enhance the
spread of it.
It is through memes that users of communities learn about certain inside norms, jokes,
behavior and rules of a community. Users’ inclusion or exclusion in the community is
determined through this learning.
Communicating in online spaces can be difficult due to the lack of emotions that can be
conveyed and lack of cues that are typically seen in face-to-face interactions such as facial
expressions and body language. One way that this is resolved is through the use of emojis
which also functions as a shared convention in online communities. The use of emojis
according to Kelly & Watts (2016) can be used as a way to maintain a conversation when no
words are left to say. This way then emojis become a way of maintaining connections. The
use of emojis can also be understood as a way to signal the end of conversation. It is a
conventional way of showing the recipient that they have not been ignored and the sender of
emojis has acknowledged the message. Moreover, by selecting emojis that are relevant to the
context provide a playful way of communicating as it increases intimacy and closeness. The
use of repetitive emojis shows indication that certain behaviors are permissible, that would
not be appropriate in other contexts. In online communities the repetitive use of emojis reveal
a certain social norm of that community. These emojis are most likely only interpretable only
within specific communities. As it will be seen in the analysis, for r/Wallstreetbets rocket,
diamond, hand emojis have specific meaning that can only be understood by community
members and that make sense only in the WSB context. Moreover, members use emojis in
clusters which form sentences. This way users replace classic linguistic discourse.
Linguistic repertoires including written discourse, memes and emojis within community
function as a way of maintaining a connection with community members. Hidden messages
in emojis and memes highlight a phatic effect. Phatic communication is dissemination of
messages that do not have any relevant content, through which bonds of personal unions are
established (Blommaert & Varis, 2015). Such messages function as a way to have a small
talk rather than convey ideas. According to Jakobson (1960) in Enoughness, accent and light
communities by Blommaert & Varis (2015) it is a way for people to bond and maintain
harmonious atmosphere in interpersonal relations in order to keep communication channels
open. Through phatic communication people express their belonging and union to a certain
community. In r/Wallstreetbets phatic communication is seen not only in the dissemination of
memes and emojis but in actions taken by users such as upvoting/downvoting and giving
awards.
Upvoting and downvoting on Reddit is a way to engage with a post. Upvoting is a function
by which users can show their support to a post, by upvoting posts visibility goes up.
Downvoting is the contrary to upvoting, a way to show disapproval for a post, which moves
visibility down. Awards can be given to posts and comments to show appreciation towards
the contribution. Popularity principle by José van Dijck (2013) considers how each platform
is influenced by algorithmic and socio-economic components which boost popularity of
people or ideas. This shows how platforms are engineered to filter out popular content,
resulting in more visibility, which in turn influences what people are exposed to. By looking
at platforms through programmed sociality, a term used by Bucher (2018) we understand that
they are composed of specific programmed arrangements, which shape sociality in ways that
are specific to a social media platform in question. Thus, members on r/Wallstreetbets are
gathered together through computational means which are exemplified by certain norms and
values.
Utterances of upvoting/downvoting and giving awards are part of phatic communication. It is
important for community users to be involved and be part of a group through small acts of
contributing. This way users can indirectly inscribe themselves within a community.
According Blommaert & Varis (2015) imaginary audiences online are powerful actors in
dictating discursive behavior. Through phatic communication users not only establish bonds
and social cohesion but inscribe themselves into a community.
Our society can be understood as “post-social”, where relationships are constructed between
human and non-human actors due to increased digital objects. Networked communities are
now central for creating social ties between people, as compared to traditional communities
(Blommaert & Varis, 2015). Thus, it becomes important to understand how these
communities’ function and contribute to modes of social organization, especially when we
witness a rise of new social practices such as investing as a form of entertainment.
Methodology
The aim of this research is to investigate what factors within a subreddit r/Wallstreetbets
contribute to modes of social organization. R/wallstreetbets has a large and established
community on Reddit and I will be analyzing this community to understand what factors play
a pivotal role in developing a large number of loyal users, community cohesion, and whether
it influences users to invest in meme stocks. I particularly focused on researching factors in
relation to posts about Gamestop stock as member growth on the subreddit in January
correlates with exponential stocks’ growth (Subredditstats & Yahoo Finance, n.d.). Memes,
humor, and Reddit’s algorithms can be discerned as important factors that contribute to the
member bonding and growth of a community. In order to best understand what the
community practices are, how it contributes to the growth and cohesion of members and what
behavior it elicits in members, a digital ethnographic approach to discourse analysis was
used.
Digital ethnography builds upon ethnography before digitalization with its roots in
anthropology. These anthropological roots situate ethnography within a distinct ontology and
epistemology. In ethnography “man is seen as a creature whose existence is narrowly linked,
conditioned or determined by society, community, the group, culture.” (Blommaert & Dong,
p.8, 2010). This suggests that every act performed by people is assessed and measured
socially. Language, according to Blommaert & Dong (2010) within ethnography is seen as a
socially loaded tool that allows for humans to perform as social beings. Implication of this is
from an ethnographic perspective language becomes deeply situated within relations of
power, availability, accessibility and patterns of human social behavior. These patterns of
human social behavior in terms of digital ethnography become tools for understanding how
meanings are constructed and assigned to specific technologies through a study of chatrooms,
discussion groups or any other virtual realities (Kaur-Gill & Dutta, 2017). Ethnographers, by
studying language do not simply study the sentences and utterances but rather invoked
meanings, performativities and their effects in society (Blommaert & Dong, 2010). In a
digital environment this becomes a study of collection of texts and the meanings they invoke
in specific digital contexts. Building up on this, context plays an important role within
ethnography. Any research object is “a uniquely situated reality: a complex of events which
occurs in a totally unique context – time, place, participants, even the weather, quarrels
between the subjects and the ethnographer” (Blommaert & Dong, p.19, 2010). Social
constructions in digital environments are situated within many different contexts. Digital
ethnography then is directly involved in understanding what part digital media plays within
any specific context of knowledge production in online research (Castriotta, 2017).
Consequently, in ethnographic fieldwork, it is crucial to understand the importance of
contextualization as every event carries rich cultural meanings and lets us understand its
features, structures, and processes.
Ethnography lets us understand different cultural groups within their norms and practicalities.
Ethnography is a qualitative method of understanding how meaning is constructed in cultures
and communities by “going native” in the sociocultural space. It is an inductive approach that
starts by gathering data. This data is ethnography data, it are linguistic and semiotic
utterances that are analyzed in the context of production. Varis (2016) explains that
ethnography produces “thick descriptions” through which lived reality of people can be
understood. Due to digitalization, it has become crucial to include the digital aspect as part of
the context as it has opened new ways for producing culture and meaning and thus also opens
news paths to understanding and accessing people’s communicative repertoires. Digital
ethnography is a research methodology focused on “the ways in which people use language,
interact with each other, employ discourses, and construct communities, collectives,
knowledge and identities, through and influenced by digital technologies.” (Varis & Hou, p.2,
2016). Digital ethnography allows to collect, store, interpret research data, and gain deeper
understanding of cultural phenomena and practices enabled by digital technologies.
Such an ethnographic approach to discourse analysis, according to Jones, Chik & Hafner (p.
6, 2015) studies “the way different ‘technologies of entextualisation’ affect the kinds of
meanings people can make in different situations, the kinds of actions they can perform, the
kinds of relationships they can form, and the kinds of people they can be”. A digital
ethnographic approach to discourse analysis allows to form an interpretation of socio-cultural
space through an in-depth immersion in the community and investigation of behavior elicited
by the members. This digital ethnographic approach to discourse analysis puts context
central. However, as culture production in the digital age is now inherently polycentric
(Blommaert, 2010 ; Maly & Varis, 2015), it raises “new type of issues related to
contextualization that ethnographers of digital culture and communication need to address.”
(Varis, 2016). Digital environments are characterized by replicability and scalability (boyd,
2014). Online material is quickly and easily recontextualized, which creates circulation of
complex reuses of content and uptakes (Varis, 2016). The understanding of interplay of
multiple and layered contexts in WSB community will be an important part of my analysis
due to its recontextualized content nature. One of the features that stand out in the community
is their creation of memes by extracting videos and pictures from original contexts and
adapting them to fit into community. Since meaning is always dependent on contexts,
recontextualization implies a change of meaning and redefinition and thus requires
understanding of these reuses of content. Another important feature of digital ethnography is
the notion of indexicality, connection between signs and their meanings influenced by
contexts. Indexicality helps to interpret how actors in a context construct meaning by certain
gestures, words and cues.
Moreover, as suggested by Jones, Chik & Hafner (2015) my analysis of data will be guided
by 4 important elements:
- Texts: Collection of semiotic elements including conversations, both spoken and
written, videos, websites etc. connected through cohesion and coherence form
intertextual and multimodal socially recognized actions.
- Contexts: Meaning of texts is understood not only in literal textual elements but also
in relation to material and social contexts situated in communication practice. It is
important to consider how offline and online spaces interact.
- Actions and interactions: Besides considering structure and meaning of texts in
contexts, it is crucial to focus on how people use texts to achieve certain social goals.
- Power and ideology: Discourse constructs certain “versions of reality” or in other
words, ideologies and power relationships between individuals and groups.
This way I derive a holistic and interpretive understanding of WSB community behavior
taking place in a specific socio-cultural setting. $GME short squeeze is a unique
phenomenon, which became a weaponizing tool against the elite hedge funds. Community
members have been rapidly increasing due to the media coverage the WSB community has
gotten. For some community members short squeezing the stock became a movement against
hedge funds from Wall Street for their role in the financial crisis in 2008. For others it
became a way to earn money through investing as a “common man”. What this case reveals
are how affordances of Reddit and stock brokerage trading apps can be exploited to achieve
monetary gains and not be accused of market manipulation.
Digital ethnography is fundamentally a subjective and interpretive research; however, the
collection of data and its analysis is guided by strict procedures to allow researchers to
construct an understanding of social events beyond the surface (Blommaert & Dong, 2010).
I have been an active member of r/Wallstreetbets community since November 2020.
Familiarity with community is one of the reasons for choosing it for my research. According
to Hymes (p. 13, 2003) learning ethnographically is continuous with learning in ordinary life,
“much of what we seek to find out in ethnography is knowledge that others already have”. By
immersing myself into the field I was “learning the meanings, norms, and patterns of a
way of life” as every other community member (Hymes, p. 13, 2003). Being a community
member helped me form a general understanding of the community, the style and content of
user interactions. After this, I have been observing WSB over the span of 4 months between
the beginning of January and the end of April. I have been browsing the subreddit and
comprehensively reading, documenting posts and comments a couple of times per week. My
participation was covert as I chose not to comment or post anything. I have chosen to actively
observe community since January as it was the period of exponential member growth which
can help me in understanding the community construction for my research.
For the analysis, I have selected the 5 most popular monthly posts relating to $GME and the
5 most popular comments with replies to them under each post between February and April.
Top popular posts on Reddit refer to the ones with the most upvotes. I chose to focus on top
posts as it represents what kind of content is popular among the community. Similarly, the
top comments reflect what kind of content members upvote and support. In total collected
data accounts for (15) screenshots of posts and (286) of comments with replies to them. The
selected data are emblematic for the norms and culture of the group. According to Blommaert
(2020) emblematic data tells the full story of a certain event or situation. The collected data in
the case of r/Wallstreetbets is emblematic as community practices and norms can be inferred
from them, which gives and an overall understanding of how the community is constructed.
Moreover, the data reveals how for some community members investing into Gamestop stock
became a form of an online movement against the elite. Analysis of the collected data will
help me gain a deeper understanding of communicative repertoires and practices of
r/Wallstreetbets community. For my analysis, I will be taking into account what part
algorithms play in the community construction as they are “part of the mechanism and
dynamics of social and cultural production in everyday activity” (Varis & Hou, p. 6, 2016).
The visibility of top posts is influenced by the users interacting with subreddits posts in
certain ways. This produces an idea of what type of discourse is seen as more legitimate and
credible on the subreddit.
For the analysis, I categorized the collected data by attributed subreddit flairs.
R/wallstreetbets uses flairs to help users filter (through links in the sidebar to either show or
hide certain content) specific type of posts, they can be understood as categories of posts. The
collected data between February and April has been attributed the following flairs: “YOLO”,
“OC” (Original content), “MEME”, “CHEERS MATE”, “SHITPOST”, “DISCUSSION”,
“NEWS”, “DD” (Due diligence), “LOSS”, “GAIN”. Among these, the most emergent flair
has been “MEME”, meaning that most of the collected data contains memes in the shared
posts. These memes are directly connected to Gamestop stock and r/wallstreetbets
community part in the investing into the stock. As mentioned before the content regarding
memes in the community is recontextualized. Blommaert (2020) argued, such memes are
applicable to variety of real-life situations while it maintains its original emblematic
meanings. Furthermore, among all the collected data I identified multiple emergent themes.
The data reveals a big story of the phenomena taking place, gives a better understanding of
community behavior and the significance of their actions.
Online communication in context such as Reddit is neither public nor private, hence it is
important to consider users privacy. Reddit is an open discussion website with large number
of users and with massive mainstream media attention, which makes it a public forum.
However, as people might share sensitive information and there is a lot of sensitive topic
subreddits, for some people it might be seen as a private forum. Thus, it is important to take
privacy into account. Digital environments are characterized by persistence and searchability,
meaning that online materials can be easily traced back (Varis, 2016). These factors make it
crucial to consider how ethnographic analysis is going to be presented in order to protect
people’s privacy. One of the ways to achieve this is to anonymize the data. My data contains
indirectly identifiable information of users such as their usernames. I have chosen to blur out
the usernames of users that will be presented in my analysis and use pseudonyms instead. As
Varis (2016) puts it blurring out usernames is a necessary part of research documentation
despite it not being real names. Behind usernames there is real people with their identities
built online. Even if usernames are blurred out the user can be traced back by quoting the
material in search engines. Issue of “Googlability” needs consideration in cases of extremely
sensitive material that may pose serious risk for the people (Varis, 2016). As a researcher I
am aware that it is my responsibility to ensure that I do not jeopardize and put any users in
danger. My research data mostly reflects a humorous discourse and do not include sensitive
material that can be used to harm users; thus, I have chosen not to paraphrase textual
material. Users by signing up on Reddit agree with terms of service that state that user’s
comment, and post history is accessible by everyone and is archived. Inherently, when
signing up on Reddit users are aware that it is a public forum, however it is safe to assume
that Reddit users do not expect to be observed for research purposes. For my research I
consider users posts as public as they were posted with an intention to achieve a certain goal
in the community.
Findings
This chapter aims to answer research question and sub-questions. As mentioned in the
introduction chapter, this study aims to identify what factors within r/Wallstreetbets play a
role in influencing and contributing to modes of social organization. I will be answering the
research question by dedicating sub-sections for each sub-question, in order to analyze the
discourse of the community to understand socio-cultural behavioral patterns among the
community. I will begin by explaining the context in which my data was generated. To
interpret the data, I will analyze the type of content that is considered popular among group
members. This way I aim to identify specific characteristics of the subreddit through analysis
of the most popular posts and user interaction with them. Additionally, I will analyze what
part online-offline nexus plays in the community construction. The analysis of the data is
based on digital ethnography and conceptual framework collected through relevant academic
literature. I will argue that memes, humor, linguistic discourse and Reddit’s algorithms play
significant roles in developing a large number of loyal users, building community cohesion
and discourse construction.
The ethos of r/Wallstreetbets
To understand the discourse and what makes this community grow exponentially, it is
important to understand the foundations of the subreddit. R/Wallstreetbets describes the
community as a way of “making money and being amused while doing it. Or, realistically, a
place to come and upvote memes when your portfolio is down”. R/wallstreetbets initially
started as a subreddit for amateur high-risk investing. While any type of investment is risky, a
high-risk investment has a high degree of risk but at the same time carries a potential benefit
of a substantially high return on the investment. Such investments are seen by many as
gambling. It is investments where not much logic, thought or consideration is taken into
account. Community members often discuss new potential stocks and trading strategies. They
identify themselves as “degenerates”, “apes”, “retards” due to their lack of expertise in
trading. The way they refer to themselves in such names can be understood from the
perspective of “a basket of deplorables” which Hilary Clinton referred Donald Trump
supporters as. “Deplorables” given Clinton’s definition is people who “hold ‘racist, sexist,
homophobic, xenophobic [and] Islamophobic’ sentiments” (Blair, p. 4, 2016). According to
Blair (2016) Trump supporters exemplify these qualities more than supporters of Clinton.
What this resulted in is Trump supporters taking “deplorables” as a badge of honor and using
the label in a reveling way (Moberg, 2019). In the same way we can see that referring to
oneself as degenerates, apes, retards can be contrasted with professional investors who are
imagined not to be part of this community. These “others” would most likely be referring to
themselves simply as investors, retail investors and institutional investors. What distinguishes
self-identification between r/Wallstreetbets members and regular investors is holding
different views on investing. Self-identifying themselves as “degenerates”, “apes”, “retards”
is a way for them ironically show their awareness of their lack of knowledge in finance and
take it as a badge of honor in a similar manner as Trump supporters did when Clinton called
the “deplorable’s”. This resembles a ‘Robin Hood’ populist discourse that claims that
‘common people are now taking on Wallstreet’ to counter economic and social inequalities.
Moreover, referring to themselves in derogatory terms is also reinforced by the fact that
community members often are engaged in content that is fun rather than financially based.
The name of the subreddit “wallstreetBETS” suggests that the subreddit sees itself as
gambling by betting on stocks. The practice of betting or gambling on stocks is highly
speculative and is the opposite of legitimate trading in the stock market. Thus, why this
community regards itself as a fun way of making money which is controversial from
legitimate trading practices.
In the beginning of January, the subreddit became associated with Gamestop stock and
gained massive growth of new members. Figure 1 reflects Google trends with keywords of
“GameStop” (blue line), “r/Wallstreetbets” (red line), “$GME” (yellow line). The subreddit
gained a massive influx of new members in January as it went from 2 million to around 8
million members. At the same time between January 4, 2021, to January 29, 2021 share
prices of $GME has skyrocketed from $17.25 to $325.00 (Hu, Jones, Zhang, Zhang, 2021).
Indicating, that there is a correlation between the stock and subreddit. Correlation does not
imply causation and the rise of members in the community can also be explained by the
increased cover it has gotten from the media in January. For this reason, I have chosen to
focus my analysis on the discourse about GameStop in the subreddit.
Figure 1: Google trends using terms “GameStop”, “r/Wallstreetbets”, “$GME”
R/Wallstreetbets can be understood what Blommaert (2017) describes as a tightly focused
community where members are unacquainted, however all of them follow certain rules of
conduct that are shared among everyone and are assumed to be learned by new members.
Official rules of the community are listed on a right side of Reddit. (Figure 2).
Figure 2: Rules of r/Wallstreetbets
Every subreddit has official rules as it is part of Reddit interface, it is a way for community
members to follow general guidelines. The list of rules is extensive but briefly, the official
rules of the community include, posting rules such as posting gains/losses of investments
which must show gains/losses of more than $2,500 or $10,000 USD. No political opinions
are allowed, no discussions about cryptocurrency, post titles must be clear, no discussion of
penny stocks and special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), no pump and dump
schemes and no market manipulation. The list of rules can be understood as official rules that
keep the community consistent with its purpose of being an amateur high-risk investing
community that is clean from unwanted content such as politics, cryptocurrency, penny
stocks, SPACs, pump and dump and market manipulations.
However, while it has an official list of rules it also contains unwritten norms that are shared
among group members. According to Jennifer et al. (2014) unwritten rules in online contexts
are not prespecified by authority, for example moderator of the subreddit. They are rather
learned by community members through social interaction and communication. These
unwritten norms are reflected in their language bound specific to r/wallstreetbets context.
Community members use made-up terms to describe various actions such as “tendies”,
originating from 4chan meaning investment returns, “stonks”, stocks, “diamond hands”, for
when a trader is holding on to a stock, believing in its success enough not to sell it even when
the stock is declining, “paper hands”, contrary from “diamond hands”, traders are called
having “paper hands” when they sell stocks early before making substantial profits,
“bullish”, when a trader feels bullish, it means they expect the stock to rise, “bearish”,
opposite of bullish, it means traders are expecting the stock to decline, “bag holder”, a trader
whose position has severely dropped in value. Another unwritten rule, as already mentioned
is using self-derogatory identification. It is through self-identification that users become part
of the community as it reflects one’s commitment to the community and it distinguishes
member from an outsider who would not refer to themselves in derogatory terms. Both
official subreddit rules and the unwritten ones are specific to communication in
r/Wallstreetbets.
It is a community consisting of members from different parts of the world, each of them
having their own private interests and financial goals, bounded by a common interest in new
risky investment opportunities. In fact, the lack of shared financial goal within community is
instrumental as individuals systematically nudging for profit by artificially influencing
inflation or deflation of stock prices would be considered as a market manipulation (Calo,
2014). Community members often emphasize that their posts and comments are not a
financial advice but rather an opinion as a way to avoid being caught as market manipulators.
It can be said, although members differ by their financial goals, they all exhibit interest in
new investment opportunities that will help to achieve their personal financial goals through
mutual collaboration as seen in the case of Gamestop stock.
Despite having different motivations, it is a community that is solidified by shared norms and
common interest in investment opportunities which constitute behavior of the community
members in r/Wallstreetbets. Being a member means understanding and following these
conventions. As it will further be seen, the use of common norms is what makes this
community feel tight, despite having 10 million members.
What effect do memes have in the r/Wallstreetbets community?
Figure 3: Video meme
The meme in Figure 3 reflects what can be considered a typical behavior of community
members. The context of the meme is related to investing without prior research or
knowledge and rather “YOLO”ing into the stock, in this case $GME. The title of the meme
reads as the following, “Me, a long-time lurker who suddenly YOLO’d on $GME trying to
understand how I got myself into this mess”. Figure 3 is a clear example of a re-entextualized
semiotic material. Re-entextualization is a process in which semiotic object is extracted from
its original context and placed into a different one possibly resulting in different meaning
outcomes (Varis & Blommaert, 2015). The video meme portrays characters named Meeseeks
from a TV series Rick and Morty. The characters engaged in a conversation blaming each
other in turns for roping in them into a certain situation. The transcript of the video goes as
the following, “I can't take it anymore. I just want to die! We all want to die! We're
Meeseeks! Why did you even rope me into this? 'Cause he roped me into this! Well, him over
there, he roped me into this! Well, he roped me into this! Well, what about me? He -- he
roped me into this. Well, that one over there roped me into this. Well, he roped me into this.”.
Placing snippet from Rick and Morty into a context of r/Wallstreetbets creates a new
meaning that can be understood between community members. It shows how each member in
the community is a possible cause for making “YOLO” investments. In this case, the video
meme reflects how a user became a part of the group through observing it which led him to
invest into GameStop stock. The irony of the meme reflects how members of the community
share a feeling of being in the same boat. 27.5 thousand upvotes and multiple awards
(emoticons at the top, next to username) suggest that the post creator is not the only member
feeling this way. Awards on Reddit which can be bought by Reddit Coins can be awarded to
specific posts and comments. It is a way of showing appreciation and recognition to a
contributor.
The conversation of Meeseeks in the video shows that users feel stressed due to the
investments made as they make them feel as if they “all want to die”. They all question what
made them “get into this mess” or in other words, join a community and start making
investments. The post and video suggest that members although they do not make others join
on purpose, but they influence other members to make investments by “roping them in”. This
is also reflected in a comment section under the post. (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Reactions of members to a meme in figure 3.
Community members confirm that the post creator is not the only one feeling this way.
Commentators agree that they also became a part of community through observing it and
joining in with investing as the post for them is seen as “too accurate”. Figure 3 reflects how
community members make investments by observing community and seeing what others do.
Choosing to invest into a stock without prior knowledge within this community is a very
common practice especially among meme-stocks. According to Aloosh, Choi, Ouzan (2021)
meme-stocks are stocks that go viral exclusively on social media networks such as Reddit.
R/Wallstreetbets foundation as they present it themselves is built on a “YOLO” attitude
which undermines the legitimate investing practice, investments based on due diligence, a
personal research of potential stock. Some of the members on r/Wallstreetbets do and share
their due diligences of stocks, however; “any due diligence conducted by another person is
not a substitute for one’s own due diligence” (Spevak et al, p. 2, 2015). The practice of
making your own research and analysis of stocks is one of the reasons what makes
r/Wallstreetbets a risky environment for investments. As the given example reveals, members
choose stocks based on what is popular in the community rather than making their own
analysis of stocks. The YOLO attitude describes their willingness to lose money on a stock,
as you only live once, thus their investments resemble acts of gambling.
This attitude plays a very vital role in the community as it makes investing seem more like
entertainment and gives space for users to try investing without prior knowledge. Members
are stimulated not only by seeing massive gains from members but from overall experience
of the community that is built on irony, humor and memes. As it will be seen in further
analysis the investments users make are not done only for entertainment as community can be
understood from an outsider perspective but also to make money.
Figure 5: $GME stock chart meme
Irony of the community is reflected in the connotative meaning of the memes. In Figure 5 a
meme is made out of a $GME stock chart. Members of the subreddit since December have
been trying to trigger a short squeeze of the GameStop stock by holding onto the idea of
holding the shares until the short positions of the funds expire. Short squeeze is an inflation
of a stock price caused due to short selling. Short selling is a practice of investors, in $GME
case hedge funds, borrowing a stock, selling it and buying it again at a lower price in order to
return it to the lender and to keep the profit gained between selling high and buying low. As
mentioned before by artificially influencing the stock price to go up, r/Wallstreetbets would
be accused of market manipulation. However, since it is not done in a nudging way, as for
example asking users to invest in a particular stock explicitly, it cannot be regarded as such.
Rather they do it through memes and present it as a joke, which cannot be considered as a
market manipulation, at least for a time being. While the behavior members exhibit point to
market manipulation, there currently are no policies and regulations in regard to market
manipulation for online communities filled by millions of anonymous users. What this
shows, is that users know what they are doing, and in this way uses the opportunity to make
(or lose) money.
Triggering a short squeeze of $GME has been successful, however not “infinite” as
community members had hoped for (Figure 6). The community of the subreddit have been
trying to compare the short squeeze of Gamestop stock to Volkswagen stock in 2008, which
is where the infinity term comes from. Volkswagen ($VW) stock at that time “was a
“perfect” or “infinite” squeeze because there was less stock in free float than needed to close
out all the short seller's obligations” (Godfrey, p. 2, 2016). As stocks are volatile it is hard if
not impossible to witness the same short squeeze, in this context $GME to behave in the
same way as $VW. Thus, hoping for an infinite profit becomes ironic as members are aware
of the fact that the stocks behaved differently. As in Figure 6, “chances of leaving moms
house = Infinite”, reflects that leaving mothers house becomes an unlikely event in the same
way as for $GME to be regarded as an infinite short squeeze.
This explains the irony of the meme in Figure 5. Lower stock price is circled in the Figure 5
as buying a stock at a low-price by a large volume of people leads community members to
believe that the short squeeze is going to happen by pushing the price, hence the ironic post
title “$GME squeeze incoming”. The responses by community members show a mutual
understanding of the irony in the meme.
Figure 6: Responses by members to a post in Figure 5.
What makes the meme funny within this community is their mutual goal of triggering a short
squeeze against the outside group, the hedge funds and professional investors. By identifying
with the group practice of holding the stock, members display that they are part of an in-
group, opposing to out-group which are the hedge funds. Another factor, that makes the
meme in Figure 5 considered funny within the community is the connotative meaning behind
the meme and mutual understanding of it is what. Memes that have deeper and hidden
meanings are more valued, therefore irony becomes a tool used in memes (Chen, Liu, Zhang,
2019). The discourse of the meme is situated around r/Wallstreetbets context which indexes
groupness of the community. The meme would be incomprehensible for an outsider, and thus
would not have the same funny effect on them. Memes in communities function as
subcultural knowledge that defines collective identities and cultural boundaries (Literat &
van den Berg, 2017). Thus, creating and sharing a meme that demonstrates knowledge of the
community not only inscribes the creator into an in group but also results in positive
reception by community members. It is through these memes that a group constructs their
identity and organize normative behavior such as holding the stocks.
Figure 7: Video meme
Figure 7 is heavily appreciated by the community members. This is reflected in 85.9k
upvotes and multiple awards (emoticons above the video) which are given as a token of
appreciation and support. Figure 7 represents another video meme that reflects the logics on
which the community is built and thus can only be understood by the members that are
familiar with community logics. The video starts with a street sign pointing to a Wall Street.
One of the prominent users in the community is sitting inside of the car. Inside the car two
diamonds are hanging from the rearview mirror, chicken tenders are placed above the glove
compartment. Instead of speedometer a stock-o-meter is used which is pointing to 0 until
driver changes radio station to 69 and stock-o-meter turns green and shows GME instead of
0. Next scene shows the driver changing clothes into clean ones compared to dirty ones
previously and driving away. It can be observed that there is a sticker on the back of the car
that says, “Hang in there” and the car plate says, “2 DA MOON”. Keith proceeds driving in
Wall Street and drives past a sign that points straight to “easy retirement” or to the left for
“hedge funds”. The car suddenly transforms into what looks like a red Lamborghini and
drives to the left towards hedge funds. On the way it destroys “Melvin Capital” sign and
drives into Robinhood CEO garden where the car transforms into a rocket and flies to the
moon.
This example shows how a meme within a community operates via combination of
intertextual understandings of the signs relevant for the community. Memes meanings
depends on the context and it might hold different meanings among different cultural groups.
They can serve as a connective tissue for internet cultures but the focus in memes should not
only be on the text but also on the surrounding cultural practices (Shifman, 2017). In this
case, for members to understand what is being communicated in the video, they must
understand indexical meanings of the signs.
As each sign or an index, such as, diamonds, chicken tenders, sticker on the car (“Hang in
there” referring to holding $GME) , car plate (2 DA MOON, referring to getting monetary
gains enough to buy tickets to go to the moon), hedge funds, Robinhood (retail investor
trading platform commonly used in the community) in this video meme holds a connotational
meaning that is recognized among community members. Consequently, in order to be a part
of community a member must be acquainted with its norms and communicative practices.
However, signs that are used in the video are not the only mode of communicating what is
meant by the video.
The video meme can be understood as a multimodal sign, which through analysis advances
understanding of how meaning is produced and communicated in the online space. Analyzing
signs multimodally means extending analysis and looking beyond fragments of speech and
writing but considering other modes such as movement of images (Bezemer & Abdullahi,
2019) and how meaning is produced in the interaction between different modes of
communication. By looking beyond, the indexical signs it can be seen that the video reflects a
frame of in-group of community members and out-group of hedge funds in a similar way as
in the example in Figure 5. The video implicitly influences members to hold the stock as this
way the short squeeze will be triggered. If subreddit users want to be considered as an in-
group member, they should follow the behavior of a driver. It signifies that by following
behavior of the driver in the video, you will be able to “go to the moon” if you hold your
stocks.
Varis & Blommaert (2015) noted that with the rise of the Internet there is a rise in “empty” or
phatic messages which function as a way to establish social ties between community
members. They are usually considered empty as they do not hold any relevant value to it,
thus can be regarded as small talk (Varis & Blommaert, 2015). Figure 3 reflects a meme that
is a video taken out of its original context and placed into a new one. Figure 5 reinforces
r/Wallstreetbets culture through the use of irony. On the other hand, Figure 7 shows an
example of a meme that is an original content of the creator. It shows users’ creativity and
connectivity to the community through incorporating signs relevant for r/Wallstreetbets.
While these examples are different type of memes, Figures 3, 5, 7 reflect how memes work as
phatic communication tools. Phatic communication functions by bonding users in
interpersonal relations by establishing and maintaining a friendly atmosphere through which
union with the community is expressed (Varis & Blommaert, 2015). These cases display
three community members sharing what can be seen as relatable content to other members.
The meme in Figure 3, shows how a user feels bound to a community by investing into
GameStop. User expresses his relation to a community through a meme which suggests that
users tend to be influenced into investing by other members in the community. By sharing the
meme user establishes a bond with other members. The same way in Figure 5 and 7, union
with the community is expressed through an original take in a meme creation. Meme creators
choose to create original content in which common community indexes are used to show both
that they are in fact community members, and two to establish a friendly bond with the rest of
community members.
Furthermore, phatic communication is also reflected in the upvotes and comment number of
these posts in Figures 3, 5 and 7. Figure 3 counts 27.5k upvotes and 588 comments. Figure 5
counts 44.6k upvotes and 4.2k comments. Figure 7 counts 85.9k upvotes and 2.4k comments.
Upvoting and commenting content is a way for users to inscribe themselves within a
community and give a sign that they are part of it. Varis & Blommaert (2015) argue that such
online communities are not bound by strict rules and deep values but rather by loose bonds of
shared interests that are enabled by social media affordances. In the context of
r/Wallstreetbets from the given examples we see that members are bonded by a common goal
of making money by using speculative investments. Achieving the common goal is enabled
by affordances of Reddit and retail investing platforms, such as Robinhood, most commonly
used in the community.
As previously mentioned, r/Wallstreetbets claims not to be a movement that aims to
manipulate the market which might seem by seeing users invest into $GME. However, the
actions of then community as can be seen in the examples point to the idea that users use a
collective force of triggering a short squeeze. The instilled cultural norms of the community
are designed to promote making money collectively. They do so implicitly, through memes
as seen in the examples, or through sharing their own opinion, rather than advice which
would make such community illegal. As already mentioned, giving advice on investments in
a community of 10 million members would be regarded as coordinating market manipulation.
Thus, we can see that this is not a community bound by strong ties but rather a community
that is built on a money-making goal by combining humor and memes.
These examples reflect one of the connective tissues of the community. Shifman (p. 100,
2017) has argued that “memes play an important role in the construction of group identity
and social boundaries”. Members identify themselves in memes such as Figures 3, 5 and 7 as
it gives a sense of union and belonging. The role of memes function as a way of
understanding and connecting community members through shared humor and reality. In
order to understand the memes, users of the subreddit need to understand the context. In this
case, memes are situated around events that are happening in the community, typical
behavior of members and thus produces meaning that can only be understood by this
community. This way community members relate and communicate to each other through
memes. Relationship that is achieved between community through phatic communication can
be understood as conviviality. Phatic communication in its nature is meant to establish a bond
without delving too deep into a conversation. However, the act of phatic communication
through sharing memes and upvoting them should not be downplayed to a mere way of being
polite. The given examples shows that these acts of communication through memes create a
bond between r/Wallstreetbets members and set a discourse that determines the norms of
community.
How is linguistic discourse constructed in r/Wallstreetbets and what is the
impact of it?
For digital communities to exist it is important to find common denominators that form a
unique community with its own norms and communicative practice (Graham, 2019). So far, I
have established that memes function as a connective tissue of r/Wallstreetbets. A second
denominator that weaves the group together is a linguistic discourse specific to community. I
will be looking at written discourse although language entails both written and spoken
discourse, as well as memes. In the comment section (Figure 8) under the discussion in
Figure 3 multiple comments can be found in regard to cultural logics of the community. The
community members create jokes related to buying the GameStop stock and becoming
billionaires as an outcome. For people reading the discussion with no connection to the
community or relation to the GameStop stock the comments would not be very meaningful.
However, for the members that have been part of the community these comments are both
understandable and relatable. In Figure 8 a user says that he is becoming a “Gorillionaire
soon” and another user gives an explanation of what it is “Gorillionaire: (noun) those who
sell gme at $69,420,420,69”. Even with user’s explanation of what a “Gorillionaire” is
without understanding the context and knowing community codes it becomes
incomprehensible for an outsider to understand the discussion.
Figure 8: Comment section under the discussion in Figure 3
Figure 9: Discussion under a video post
Figure 10: Discussion under a video post
Further example of context specific discourse in r/Wallstreetbets can be seen in Figure 9 and
10. Figure 9 is a discussion under a video post in which one of the members is parachuting
and holding a flag that says “GameStop”. The post title reads as “I just like this stock”. Users
under the post are using indexical language “going to the moon” to suggest that GameStop
stock profits will be high enough to afford going the moon. In this case not only the indexical
meanings of language are important but also complementary use of the emojis. In Figure 9
the usage of rocket emojis contribute to the context of messages of “going to the moon”. A
third response however is a cluster of emojis: diamond, hands, rocket and a moon. Cluster of
diamond and hand emojis signify holding $GME stock without selling (diamonds are strong),
as opposed to “paper hands” (paper is weak) of selling the stock. Rocket and moon emojis
signify what users have said before “going to the moon”. However, these emojis would not
have meaning whatsoever without understanding r/Wallstreetbets context. The same way
emojis are used in Figure 10, in which text “APES STRONG TOGETHER” is enriched by an
ape, diamond and hands emoji. Emojis in Figure 9 and Figure 10 form sentences and become
a language on its own, replacing classic linguistic discourse.
Emojis can function as a playful way to engage in an interaction (Kelly & Watts, 2015).
Through maintaining playful atmosphere users are more likely to bond and engage in the
community. The choice of emojis is relevant to the context as this way it enhances feelings of
closeness within community by displaying that indexicality of signs is understood. The usage
of emojis also signalize what type of discourse is permittable in the community. Community
members in r/Wallstreetbets are sharing community specific linguistic repertoires
(incorporating emojis and using specific slang), distinct identity (referring to themselves as
“apes”, “retards”, “degenerates”), emblematic culture revolving around gambling stocks.
These practices can be understood as chronotopes as they invoke orders of indexicality valid
in specific timespace configuration (Blommaert, 2016). Timespace configurations or context
attribute specific modes of behavior as positive and desired through the use of relevant
indexical orders, that have value within community context. The identities that are
performed in the community are bound to this specific context as it is a space where this
specific discourse is accepted and deemed as the norm.
Linguistic repertoires within the community together with the use of emojis can be
understood as a way of maintaining a connection with community members. Emojis, in the
same way as words inflict meanings dependent on sentences, interpretation and context. The
interpretation of emojis is therefore bound to a specific timespace configuration (and of
course also the order, just like in a sentence). As Kelly & Watts (2015) argues, collections of
emojis can be discrete and isolated symbols that are used to create larger communicative
structures. This way emojis generate meaning over time and become a valuable connective
tissue for the community through mutual understanding of the context. The given examples
show how emojis and context specific language functions as low-cost way of maintaining
connection and thus can be also regarded as phatic communication. (Kelly & Watts, 2015).
By using emojis members show knowledge of the community and at the same time indicate
their connectedness to the community. Moreover, it produces a discourse that determines
what is acceptable in the community, considered funny, the way (new) members should act in
order to fit in.
Hence, r/Wallstreetbets can be distinguished as a digital space where users enact specific
identity judgements (apes, degenerates etc.), use specific language repertoires, self-
deprecating humor and irony in relation to investing in order to stay amused. Using the same
identity work in other investing communities as for example r/Investing that is more focused
on learning about investing and not risking money blindly would be regarded as inappropriate
and even deviant. Identity practices members of communities perform are bound to specific
timespace conditions and a change of context would trigger a change in interactions,
discourses, codes of conduct (Blommaert, 2016). Thus, learning the chronotopes of
r/Wallstreetbets enables members to form a community together that is bounded by its
humorous, irreverent attitude and gambling like context.
These context dependent chronotopes is what forms light communities, which Blommaert &
Varis (2015) describe as “focused but diverse occasioned coagulations of people”. Meaning
that r/Wallstreetbets community can be understood as a group of amateur retail investors
having an interested in high-risk investing that is not bound to fundamental investing
practices. Coagulations of people around a shared interest does not create uniformity or
homogeneity (Blommaert & Varis, 2015). This is especially relevant in an online context,
such as r/Wallstreetbets as it an open forum where everyone can join. Thus, it is a space
where people have a shared interest and shared community of practices however at the same
time it is a coagulation of people with very different identities outside the forum.
What part does online-offline nexus play in the construction of r/Wallstreetbets
community?
Given examples show that the memes and the discourse of the community function as group
bonding factors. These given examples also show that there is an interplay of online-offline
context in the community which is manifested through investing in $GME that results in
either positive or negative outcome depending on gains and losses. Such experiences are
experienced by members as seen in Figure 11. Users indicate “how much this movement
means to a lot of us”, “my parents will be very grateful for the wealth to come”, “this has
been one of the most wholesome/stressful experiences in my life”, “I just want to pay off the
mortgage”. The comments are in discussion post of a prominent user announcing that he will
not be posting as much in the subreddit. The comments reflect mixed feelings about how
users feel or have been impacted by investing into $GME together with the community.
Moreover, it again reveals the logic of the community. It is not only a place for humor, and
memes as it can be seen from an outsider perspective but rather a place for making money
together as users reveal their gratitude in how the community helps them with making
money. In Figure 12 the caption of the post indicates that a user has bought a car with gains
(known as “tendies” within the subreddit) from $GME. The car is placed outside the
GameStop store to show a connection between the new car and GameStop store. These
examples portray that an online community has influence over the offline world.
Figure 11: Comment section in a discussion under a post of a prominent user
Figure 12: Profits from $GME
Blommaert (2017) categorizes boundaries between online and offline nexus as porous. The
way identities are constructed is dependant of both online-offline context as these examples
show. Online-offline relationship works in two ways in r/Wallstreetbets case. Firstly,
community is made up by different chronotopic nature of identities, which are shaped outside
of r/Wallstreetbets. These identities are influenced by different “thick” diacritics such as
nationality, gender, ethnicity, religion, class, age etc. (Blommaert, 2017). This way the nature
of r/Wallstreetbets is influenced by offline world. Secondly, light communities can
complement or accentuate thick community identities. In this case, from the example in
Figure 11 we can see how wealth gained from $GME will be appreciated by the parents or
will help paying off mortgage. In figure 12 we can see how it already has helped a user gain
wealth and buy a new car. This way thick community identities might be influenced by
online light community identities.
These online identities and relationships experienced in the community are also dependent on
social media platforms, in this case Reddit. Social media platforms are one of the central
forces in construction of sociality (Van Dijck, 2013). A platform as Reddit offers its members
a space for communication but what users experience is subject to algorithmic processes. The
way Reddit is perceived by its members is channeled by specific objectives of algorithms.
This illustrates once more that technology is not neutral and can be characterized as a
mediator rather than an intermediary as it is built on ideological and technological media
foundations (Van Dijck, 2013). What we see in these examples is that Reddit facilitates
communal activities through sharing, commenting, upvoting, downvoting, giving awards.
However, at the same time, it is a partially automated system which is engineered to
manipulate connections which in turn “manipulates the sociality in people’s everyday
routines” (Van Dijck, p. 12, 2013). Reddit functions as a sociotechnical assemblage, meaning
that there is an ongoing interaction between human and non-human actors. This way
members not only communicate through the affordances offered by Reddit but also build
groups in relation to algorithms. What we see on r/Wallstreetbets subreddit is manipulated by
algorithms to cater the specific desires and likes of people. The collected data reflects that
community is heavily populated with content relating to GameStop stock. Shared posts
(Figure 3. 27.5k, Figure 5. 44.6k, Figure 7. 85.9k, Figure 12. 77.1k) and comments (Figure 4.
37-1k, Figure 6. 1,2k-3.3k, Figure 8. 340-562, Figure 9. 50-647, Figure 10. 705, Figure 11.
334-5.4k) that have some relation to $GME are heavily upvoted by the users. Metrics that are
produced in social platforms are accepted as legitimate way of measuring and ranking content
and ideas (van Dijck & Poell, 2013). The metrics these posts, and comments produced are
subject to popularity principle. Platforms according to (Van Dijck, 2013) are built in
accordance with ideologies that value hierarchy and competition. Thus, by creating content
that corresponds to what is popular in the community will result in fast reactions such as
getting upvotes, awards and being considered popular by other members. What this results in
is that a platform sees popular posts as more valuable, thus pushes them to be more visible, as
for example through Reddit push notifications that notifies users of new popular content in
the communities, they are active in.
Bucher (2018) argues that algorithms are complex technical systems that cannot only be
described as technological data alone as they are connected to a broader social endeavour and
thus can be referred as sociotechnical assemblage that instil particular ideologies and ways of
world-making. It becomes clear that r/Wallstreetbets community production is not only
dependent on their interactions but also on algorithmic affordances of Reddit. Algorithms
constantly evolve and are developed in relation to how users behave (Bucher, 2018). This
gives an indication that algorithms have power in pushing community construction in
particular directions. We can understand algorithms as political, in a way that they produce
certain realities through algorithmic systems (Bucher, 2018). What this means for
r/Wallstreetbets is that a particular discourse is recognized as vital in the community thus
strengthened through an ensemble of algorithms. In that sense, community of r/Wallstreetbets
is “highly mediated and conditioned by algorithmic systems.” (Bucher, p.6, 2018). These
sociotechnical assemblages create new conditions through which sociality is constructed
online. Reddit becomes a site that is algorithmically designed to at least co-determine the way
people socialize and communicate. This way algorithms increase the use of the system and
engagement between users. One way of doing this is through different post hierarchy choices
in the subreddit. Users can sort posts by “hot”, “new”, “top”, “controversial”, “rising” with
“hot” being set as a default. This categorization of posts can be seen as a way to push certain
ideology within community as “hot” posts will be the ones that gain the most upvotes and
comments in a short period of time. Thus, certain information in the subreddit will be
prioritized over other. It is through these programmed sociality acts that algorithms have
power to shape groupness of community members. We see that algorithms do not only
function as a way to interpret the culture but also produce it.
Discussion and Conclusion
This study conducted digital ethnographic discourse analysis on a subreddit r/Wallstreetbets
to analyze what factors within a subreddit r/Wallstreetbets play a role in influencing and
contributing to modes of social organization. The research focused on the multimodal
discourse in the community about Gamestop. This was one of the catalysators for the
subreddits growth. I explored the specific actions users take in the community to create bonds
and social cohesion. This was explored by analyzing the effect of memes in the community,
how linguistic discourse is constructed and the impact of it, and by looking what part online-
offline nexus plays in the construction of r/Wallstreetbets community. The findings and
analysis show that memes, shared experiences, humor, vocabulary specific to community,
emojis, and algorithms are the main modes that contribute to social organization and bonding
of community.
The findings suggest that memes in the community have an ironic undertone which functions
as a way to mock their own behavior that does not go in line with legitimate trading practices.
The irony reflects members awareness of the situation they put themselves into that is an
outcome of investing before prior research. It is through this shared experience that users feel
bonded to the community. Moreover, for them memes function as a tool to reflect collective
identity of r/Wallstreetbets as they are composed from subcultural community knowledge,
and thus functions as a way of in-group inclusivity tool. Firstly, it includes the creator of a
meme as an in-group member, as they explicitly show that they possess knowledge of
community. Secondly, the commentators, upvoters, award givers inscribe themselves into a
community through phatic communication.
Examples reveal that memes influence members to construct normative behavior of the
community. Through connotational meanings of indexical signs members are constructing a
group culture that comes with specific behavioral scripts that organize behavior in the group
and on the stock market. This can be understood from two perspectives. Firstly, it is a mode
to walk around market manipulation and not be accused of it. Secondly, members resemble
behavior of each other to be considered as a member.
Not only upvoting, commentating and giving awards function as phatic communication but
meme creation also functions as such. Through memes members reflect their commitment
and knowledge of community as a way to create a bond and cohesion.
Secondly, the usage of context specific vocabulary complimented by the use of emojis in the
community function as a way to maintain playful atmosphere and distinguish itself from
other communities. By using community specific discursive practices members index their
understanding of communicative norms and enhance feelings of mutual closeness. The study
shows that members embody chronotopes such as distinct identity of “apes”, “degenerates”,
“autists”, linguistic repertoires, and cultural identity that revolves around amateur high-risk
investments. These modes become key if a user wants to be recognized as a member.
Moreover, these practices are context specific and signalize to users what normative behavior
is accepted in the community.
The study shows that these identity practices can be understood through the lense of light
communities. For community members, r/Wallstreetbets becomes a place where they share a
common interest in investing and hold the same attitude. Outside of this light community
users orient to different sets of chronotopes.
Thirdly, algorithms have proven to be a major factor in contributing to building a
r/Wallstreetbets community. Findings suggest that sociality is manipulated by Reddit itself as
there is an ongoing interaction between human and non-human actors. While members have
agency in choosing what they see, the subreddit pushes a certain discourse about Gamestop
which in turn gets more visibility from members. Reddit becomes a platform that determines
how sociality is organized.
It initially seems that the community is built on humorous, meme-filled content based on an
irreverent attitude and gambling like context. However, this study reveals that although
r/Wallstreetbets community might seem like a place to gamble money and enjoy entertaining
memes, it is a community that cares about making money and it is not only done for
amusement. Examples show that community members actions are highly coordinated to
produce a positive outcome of monetary gains. Members thus are bonded by this shared goal
and communicate in a specific way to display groupness.Further research is needed as
communities based on growing retail investing are underexplored. Research can be extended
by interviews with community members to get a better image of how community is
constructed. Moreover, there are multiple investing communities on Reddit which are
dedicated to investing. Future research could analyze emergence and different cultural
identities of them to see how they compare. Furthermore, it is interesting to consider what
role did r/Wallstreetbets play in the $GME stock growth and short squeeze. In general, this
paper provides useful knowledge on what roles digital spaces play in constructing sociality in
underexplored investing community.
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