Flappy Bird
By: Margaret Goree
On May 24, 2013, Vietnamese Dong Nguyen put Flappy Bird on the iOs app store. Flappy Bird, a simple game of just tapping the screen to make a bird fly in between pipes, was only intended by Nguyen to be a moderately popular app to just bring in a bit of money for him from the ads it had. In the first few months, the app seemed ignored and Nguyen didn’t think it’d get popular at all.
January 17, 2014, Flappy Bird hit Top Free App in the United States.
Through December and January, Flappy Bird’s popularity EXPLODED, with downloading increasing 136% day after day. The media caught on, giving a LOT of attention towards the app and also towards Nguyen. Nguyen, however, didn’t expect all the popularity, and wasn’t really willing to give interviews for the press.
Based on the lack of info Nguyen gave, rumors and hoaxes started circling the web about Nguyen and his game. People and press alike often would post their own theories about the ridiculously popular app.
February 8, 2014, @dongatory (Nguyen) tweeted this: “I am sorry ‘Flappy Bird’ users, 22 hours from now, I will take ‘Flappy Bird’ down. I cannot take this anymore.”
True to his word, 22 hours later, Flappy Bird was removed from both the Apple app store and the Google Play store.
Tons of Flappy Bird knockoffs have flooded the Internet, ranging from apps trying to perfectly replicate the original bird to apps like ‘Flying Cyrus’ and ‘Flappy Doge’. And used iPhones with the original ‘Flappy Bird’ app on them could be sold on sites like eBay for prices ranging from 1,000$ to more.
I’m not sure if Flappy Bird will come back; there have been some rumors that Nguyen is planning to, but I don’t know.
Honestly, I don’t want Flappy Bird to make a comeback. I’m super sick of it- and my high score on it is like 6.
But no matter how much I hate F.B., it had ridiculous popularity – and still does.
But seriously.
I’m sick of the app.
Category: Arts & Entertainment, Features, Front Page, News
