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SCP Foundation

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SCP Foundation
The logo of the SCP Foundation
Available inEnglish[a]
URLwww.scp-wiki.net
RegistrationRequired[b]
LaunchedJuly 19th, 2008[1]
Current statusActive
Content license
CC Attribution / Share-Alike 3.0

The SCP Foundation is a creative fiction writing website that describes the exploits of the SCP Foundation, a fictional organization responsible for containing entities, locations and objects that violate natural law. The SCP Foundation has inspired numerous spin-off works, including the video game SCP – Containment Breach.

Overview of series

In-universe, the SCP Foundation is a secret organization entrusted by global governments to contain and study anomalous entities, locations and objects that defy natural law (or SCPs, as each is referred to by their Special Containment Procedures file number).[3] Some SCP objects, if left uncontained, could pose a threat to humans or to humanity's sense of reality and normalcy.[3]

The existence of SCPs are kept secret by the SCP Foundation to prevent mass panic and to allow human civilization to function normally. When an SCP is discovered, the SCP Foundation deploys agents to either collect and transport the SCP to a Foundation facility or to contain it at its location of discovery if transport is not possible. Once SCPs are contained, they are studied by Foundation scientists. Prison inmates acquired by the Foundation (referred to as D-class) are used to interact with certain SCPs due to the danger posed by the SCPs and the expendability of the D-class.[3]

The SCP Foundation maintains documentation of the special containment procedures for all of the SCPs in its custody. These documents describe the SCPs and include instructions for keeping them safely contained.[3] As of 2015, the SCP Foundation currently maintains containment procedures for over two thousand SCPs; new procedures are frequently added. [4]

Examples of contained SCPs

SCP-087, with SCP-087-1 in the background.
  • SCP-055: SCP-055 is something that causes anyone who examines it to forget its various characteristics, thus making it indescribable except in terms of what it is not.[4]
  • SCP-087: SCP-087 is a staircase that appears to descend downwards forever.[5] The staircase is inhabited by SCP-087-1, which is described as a face without a mouth, pupils or nostrils.[6]
  • SCP-108: SCP-108 is a woman who has a portal to an otherwise-inaccessible Nazi bunker contained within her nose.[7]
  • SCP-173: SCP-173 is a statue composed of rebar, concrete and spray paint.[4] It is stationary when directly observed, but attacks people when line of sight with it is broken.[5]
  • SCP-294: SCP-294 is a coffee machine that can dispense anything that can exist in liquid form.[5]
  • SCP-426: SCP-426 is a toaster which can only be referred to in the first person.[5]
  • SCP-1171: SCP-1171 is a home whose windows are always covered in mist; by writing in the mist on the glass, it is possible to communicate with an extradimensional entity whose windows are likewise covered in mist. This entity bears significant hostility towards humans, and does not know that the Foundation members are humans.[4]
  • SCP-1609: SCP-1609 is a mulch that teleports into the lungs of anyone who approaches it in an aggressive fashion or while wearing a uniform. It was previously a peaceful chair that teleported when sat in, but it entered its current aggressive state after being inserted into a woodchipper by a rival organization.[4]

Community

The SCP Foundation series originated in the "paranormal" /x/ forum of 4chan, where the first special containment procedure (known as SCP-173) was posted as a creepypasta thread during 2007.[4] Many other special containment procedures were created shortly after, inspired by SCP-173. In 2008, the SCP Foundation series was transferred to its current Wikidot website.[4]

The Wikidot website has received media attention for its creative writing contests. The contests are free to enter for website members.[8] However, users need to submit an application before they are allowed to contribute content to the website.[4] Writers from the Daily Dot and Bustle have noted that the website maintains strict quality control standards, and that sub-par content tends to be quickly deleted.[4][9]

The SCP Foundation also maintains a forum on Reddit and a role-playing community.[4]

Analysis of writing

The majority of the works of fiction on the SCP Foundation website consist of individual pieces, each of which purports to be the "special containment procedures" documentation of a particular SCP object.[4] The SCPs are also sorted into classes, with the majority being classed as: "Safe", for objects understood well enough that they can be contained easily and will not manifest abilities without deliberate activation, "Euclid" for objects that are unpredictable or not well-understood but are not a high-level threat, and "Keter" for objects that require extensive containment procedures and which pose a large-scale threat to human life. In addition, the containment procedures may provide the history of the entities and any testing performed on them.[4] The reports are written in a pseudo-scientific tone and often "redact" information.[10] The SCP Foundation series also contains several hundred "Foundation tales", which are short stories written within the SCP Foundation universe.[4] Such tales might feature the viewpoint of a low-level Foundation employee as an item breaks containment, causing harm and death.

The SCP Foundation does not have a central canon. Rather, each containment procedure and tale forms its own continuity.[4] The genre of the site has been described as science fiction, urban fantasy and horror.[11][3] The content and the stories on the website are released under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 license.[12]

Reception

The SCP Foundation has received largely positive reviews. Michelle Starr of CNET praised the creepy nature of the series.[5] Gavia Baker-Whitelaw, writing for the Daily Dot, praised the originality of the SCP Foundation and described it as the "most uniquely compelling horror writing on the Internet".[4] She noted that special containment procedures rarely contained gratuitous gore. Rather, the horror of the series was often established through the reports' "pragmatic" and "deadpan" style, as well as through the inclusion of detail.[4] Lisay Suhay, writing for the Christian Science Monitor, also praised the SCP Foundation's "tongue in-cheek style".[8]

Alex Eichler, writing for io9, noted that the series had varying levels of quality and that some of the reports were dull or repetitive. However, he praised the SCP Foundation for not becoming overly dim and for containing more light-hearted reports. Additionally, he praised the wide variety of concepts covered in the report, and noted that the SCP Foundation contained writings that would appeal to all readers.[7]

Spin-off works

The SCP Foundation has inspired multiple independent video games. One of these games is SCP – Containment Breach. In the game, the protagonist is a member of D-class personnel who attempts to escape the facility he is stationed at during a containment breach. During the escape attempt, the protagonist is forced to avoid numerous SCPs, including SCP-173, a concrete statue that moves towards and attacks the player when not observed.[4] Other SCP Foundation video games include SCP-087 and SCP-087-B, both based on SCP-087, with the latter being loosely inspired by it.[13]

In addition to video games, a stage play entitled "Welcome to the Ethics Committee" was performed in Dublin during 2014. The play focused on the SCP Foundation's Ethics Committee and its task of limiting unethical tactics utilized by the SCP Foundation to contain the paranormal.[14] A live-action web-series also entered production in 2013 which was based on the SCP Foundation.[5]

Notes

  1. ^ Separate SCP Foundation wikis also exist in Chinese, Russian, Korean, Japanese, Thai, Spanish, Polish and French.
  2. ^ Registration is only required to submit works. The site is free to view to people without an account.

References

  1. ^ Roget. "History Of The Universe: Part One". SCP Foundation. Retrieved 12 February 2015.
  2. ^ "scp-wiki.net Site Overview". Alexa Internet. Retrieved 13 May 2015.
  3. ^ a b c d e The Administrator. "About The SCP Foundation". SCP Foundation. Retrieved 13 February 2015.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Baker-Whitelaw, Gavia (January 9, 2014). "Meet the secret foundation that contains the world's paranormal artifacts". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 6 February 2015.
  5. ^ a b c d e f Starr, Michelle. "SCP Foundation web series coming to YouTube". CNET. Retrieved 6 February 2015.
  6. ^ Zaeyde. "SCP-087". SCP Foundation. Retrieved 17 May 2015.
  7. ^ a b Eichler, Alex. "Enter the SCP Foundation's Bottomless Catalog of the Weird". io9. Retrieved 6 February 2015.
  8. ^ a b Suhay, Lisa. "Urban Druid writing contest: What's behind the dark-side fiction?". The Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 17 March 2015.
  9. ^ Peters, Lucia. "The 10 Scariest Urban Legends on the Internet to Bring a Shiver to Your Spine This Halloween". Bustle. Retrieved 6 February 2015.
  10. ^ Dinicola, Nick. "Creepypasta Gaming: Where the Internet "Learns Our Fears"". Pop Matters. Retrieved 6 February 2015.
  11. ^ "SCP-087: Escaleras a lo desconocido". NeoTeo. Retrieved Mar 26, 2015. "Esta es una comunidad de usuarios y de fanáticos del sci-fi y el terror..." (translation: "This is a community of users and of sci-fi and horror fans...")
  12. ^ DrClef. "Licensing Guide". SCP Foundation. Retrieved 27 May 2015.
  13. ^ Smith, Adam. "The Neverending Stairway: SCP-087". Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Retrieved 7 February 2015.
  14. ^ "Welcome to the Ethics Committee", at Belfield FM/UCD Student Radio; by Una Power; published 8 October 2014; retrieved 15 April 2015
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