HumorFeed is a satire and humor news aggregator website founded in 2003 by Bill Doty and Uncle Sharky, who brought together a group of around 20 news satire webmasters. It displays headlines submitted by its members in a list generated daily in an RSS feed which many members also include on their own sites. At present it includes approximately 60 members.

Background

The idea behind HumorFeed was to create a fair and equitable system that would enable members to effectively cross-link with one another's content. Each member is allowed to submit one headline per day; the headlines are randomly sorted when the feed is generated at midnight EST. This is to help ensure that all contributors receive equal exposure on the feed. In addition, HumorFeed is a selective organization, screening applicants via an anonymous peer review process designed to ensure that member sites are able to meet standards of talent and professionalism consistent with the existing members. Approximately half of all HumorFeed applicants reviewed are accepted. The feed is also moderated daily and screened for inappropriate (NSFW) material. At present it averages 10 to 12 headlines a day.

Features

In addition to listing headlines in the actual RSS feed, HumorFeed promotes its members via features such as the "Soup of the Day" link (a periodic link to interesting sites), a store where member publications are listed, and other features. It also produces "Check Please!", an ezine which publishes serious articles on satire news and journalism. There is also a blog run by HumorFeed members which tracks issues of interest to satire webmasters in the news, "The Bitter Cup". In December 2007, HumorFeed began listing original videos submitted by its members as well.

Annual Satire News Competition

In January 2006 HumorFeed initiated an annual competition for its members using a panel of independent judges. The awards panel for the first two years included a range of noted humorists and journalists including Andrew Marlatt of SatireWire, John Markoff of the New York Times, Robert Zelnick of Boston University, Eric Weiner of National Public Radio, and Madeleine Begun Kane of "Mad Kane's Humor & Satire".

Winners, best stories of 2005:

1st: BSNews.org, "Bush Sells Louisiana Back to the French"

2nd: Confusion Road, "Terry Schiavo Dies: Congress Orders Feeding Tube Reinserted"

3rd: BBspot, "Microsoft's AntiSpyware Tool Removes Internet Explorer"

Winners, best stories of 2006:

1st: Confusion Road, "Time Magazine Names Air 'Gas of the Year'"

2nd: All Day Coffee, "Iraq Study Group Caught Cheating"

3rd: BBspot, "Teen Using Myspace To Lure Bands to Los Angeles"

Winners, best stories of 2007

1st: Enduring Vision, "Ford to Market Car Bombs in Iraq"

2nd: Sports Pickle, "Homeschool Phenom Scores 118 Points Against His Mom "

3rd: The Gay Black Jew, "Bush Down to 8 Friends on Myspace"

History

HumorFeed was founded in 2003. Uncle Sharky, the webmaster for U.S. Press News, and Bill Doty, the webmaster of Broken Newz, did the initial site design and coordinated the community of sites that began HumorFeed (with later design assistance from Joe Peacock of Mentally Incontinent). Sharky managed the day to day operations of the site from 2003 until August 2005, when he appointed Watley Review webmaster E.F. Watley as the new HumorFeed webmaster. Sharky remains active as the HumorFeed business manager.

On January 18, 2006 the Sacramento Bee included HumorFeed in a timeline of notable satire publications and shows ranging from the founding of Mad Magazine in 1952 to the debut of the Colbert Report. In July 2007 the Al-Jazeera English news analysis show Listening Post interviewed several members of HumorFeed in a feature on news satire and its relationship to mainstream media.