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The phrase is a line of subtitled dialogue from the introduction to Zero Wing.

"All your base are belong to us" (often shortened to "All Your Base", "AYBABTU", or simply "AYB") is a broken English phrase that was central to an Internet phenomenon, or meme, in 2000–2002, with the spread of a Flash animation that depicted the slogan. The text is taken from the opening cut scene of the 1991 European Sega Mega Drive version of the video game Zero Wing^[1] by Toaplan which was poorly translated by Sega of Europe. It was popularized by the Something Awful message forums.^[2]

[edit] Transcript and translations

A summarized GIF animation of the scene.

[edit] Examples

It appears from the original text that CATS may be the name of an organization, not just of the particular cyborg villain appearing on the screen.^[1]

[edit] History

On February 23, 2001, Wired provided an early report on the phenomenon, covering it from the Flash animation to its spread through e-mail and Internet forums to T-shirts bearing the phrase.^[3]

On April 1, 2003, in Sturgis, Michigan, seven people aged 17 to 20 placed signs all over town that read, "All your base are belong to us. You have no chance to survive make your time." They claimed to be playing an April Fool's joke, but most people who saw the signs were unfamiliar with the phrase. Many residents were upset that the signs appeared while the U.S. was at war with Iraq, and police chief Eugene Alli said the signs could be "a borderline terrorist threat depending on what someone interprets it to mean."^[4]

In February 2004, North Carolina State University students and members of The Wolf Web in Raleigh, North Carolina exploited a web-based service provided for local schools and businesses to report a weather-related closing to display the phrase within a news ticker on a live news broadcast on News 14 Carolina.^[5]

[edit] In popular culture

The phrase on U.S. Route 50 in Nevada

The phrase or some variation of lines from the game has appeared in numerous articles, books, comics, clothing, movies, radio shows, songs, television shows, video games, webcomics, and websites. Notable mentions include:

• In late 2000, Kansas City computer programmer and part-time DJ Jeffrey Ray Roberts of the Gabber band The Laziest Men on Mars made a techno dance track, "Invasion of the Gabber Robots", which remixed some of the Zero Wing video game music by Tatsuya Uemura with a voiceover phrase "All your base are belong to us."^[6]
• On June 1, 2006, the video hosting website YouTube was taken down temporarily for maintenance. The phrase "ALL YOUR VIDEO ARE BELONG TO US" appeared below the YouTube logo as a placeholder while the site was down. Some users believed the site had been hacked, leading the host to add the message "No, we haven't been hacked. Get a sense of humor."^[7]
• In Guitar Hero 5, an Xbox 360 achievement (or PlayStation 3 trophy), named "All Four Bass Are Belong To Us", is a play on word of the phrase.

[edit] See also

• Engrish
• Internet memes
• List of Internet phenomena

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: All your base are belong to us

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Zero Wing

• Website remix animation