4chan/Flags: Difference between revisions

From Bibliotheca Anonoma
mNo edit summary
mNo edit summary
 
(22 intermediate revisions by 2 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
[[Category:4chan]]
[[Category:4chan]]
[[file:flags.8.png|frame|Every country flag on 4chan. Note that this image includes England, Scotland, and Wales. It also includes the Unknown flag.]]
[[file:flags.8.png|frame|Every flag on 4chan, from flagsheet 8. Note that this image includes [[file:xe.gif]]England, [[file:xs.gif]]Scotland, and [[file:xw.gif]]Wales. It also includes the [[file:xx.gif]]Unknown flag, and the flags of the [[file:an.gif]]Netherlands Antilles and [[file:cs.gif]]Serbia and Montenegro.]]
[[file:flag_codes.png|thumb|Handy chart by /extraflags/ for all the country flag codes.]]
[[file:flag_codes.png|thumb|Handy chart by /extraflags/ for all the country flag codes.]]
Five boards on 4chan currently have flags. Four of them have country flags, which display the country you're posting from (or the location of your VPN or proxy if you are using one.) Flags are used on 4chan as a method of pseudo-identification. They were introduced on /sp/, /int/, and /pol/ on 3 July 2012.
Five boards on 4chan currently have flags. Four of them have country flags, which display the country you're posting from (or the location of your VPN or proxy if you are using one.) Flags are used on 4chan as a method of pseudo-identification. They were introduced on /sp/, /int/, and /pol/ on 3 July 2012.
Line 6: Line 6:
==Country Flags==
==Country Flags==
[[file:about-4chan-flags.png|thumb|Infographic about country flags, by /extraflags/. Was very useful while writing this article.]]
[[file:about-4chan-flags.png|thumb|Infographic about country flags, by /extraflags/. Was very useful while writing this article.]]
[[file:4chan_flag_iceberg.jpeg|thumb|This chart is pretty outdated by now tbdesu]]
[[file:4chan_flag_iceberg.jpeg|thumb|This chart is pretty outdated by now tbdesu, for an updated list check out [https://whatisthisimnotgoodwithcomputers.com/#!/flaghunter FlagHunter]]]
'''''From [https://docs.google.com/document/d/15vUp0sLaLrruObpn-KePjcV0aYEh8wVtWYHB5MF3jSU/edit /flags/+/extraflags/ book o' lore].'''''
'''''Adapted from [https://docs.google.com/document/d/15vUp0sLaLrruObpn-KePjcV0aYEh8wVtWYHB5MF3jSU/edit /flags/+/extraflags/ book o' lore].'''''
 
[[File:Unused-flags.png|thumb|flags shown: Angola, Democratic Republic of the congo, Saint Lucia, Great Britain]]
4chan has been using country flags since the 2nd of July, 2012. Flags were first implemented on /sp/ and /int/ on this date, along with the first memeflags on /pol/. Then two years later on the 15th of December, 2014 country flags were also added to /pol/, replacing the memeflags. On the 13th of June, 2017, memeflags were returned to /pol/ alongside country flags. For three years these were the only boards to have flags, but on the 4th of May, 2017 /bant/ was created. As this is being written only these four boards have geolocation flags. On the 1st of May, 2021, flags were added to /mlp/ that represent different characters. 80 in total were added, but the board designed over 300. During June of 2022, /lgbt/ got pride flags. They were removed in July. Flags are found on 4chan’s servers both as individual gif files and as a single png flagsheet, but when you see flags while browsing you are seeing little snippets of the flagsheet that have been cropped out. Clicking on a flag will open the gif file in a new tab. As a result of updates to 4chan’s flags there have been eight flagsheets in total, but so far only four have been found. Comparing flagsheets allows us to see how individual flags have changed and when flags were added, and therefore we can determine the history of 4chan flags.
4chan has been using country flags since the 2nd of July, 2012. Flags were first implemented on /sp/ and /int/ on this date, along with the first memeflags on /pol/. Then two years later on the 15th of December, 2014 country flags were also added to /pol/, replacing the memeflags. On the 13th of June, 2017, memeflags were returned to /pol/ alongside country flags. For three years these were the only boards to have flags, but on the 4th of May, 2017 /bant/ was created. As this is being written only these four boards have geolocation flags. On the 1st of May, 2021, flags were added to /mlp/ that represent different characters. 80 in total were added, but the board designed over 300. During June of 2022, /lgbt/ got pride flags. They were removed in July. Flags are found on 4chan’s servers both as individual gif files and as a single png flagsheet, but when you see flags while browsing you are seeing little snippets of the flagsheet that have been cropped out. Clicking on a flag will open the gif file in a new tab. As a result of updates to 4chan’s flags there have been eight flagsheets in total, but so far only four have been found. Comparing flagsheets allows us to see how individual flags have changed and when flags were added, and therefore we can determine the history of 4chan flags.


Line 19: Line 19:


On the 2nd of January, 2013, the second flag update was released and introduced revised flags for Antarctica, Curaçao, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Libya, Saint Martin, Sint Maarten, and South Sudan. This update also fixed the names for these countries and territories, replacing the country domain codes with proper names. Notably, Libya was renamed from ‘Libyan Arab Jamahiriya’ to ‘Libya’ as well. Since /extraflags/ and its tools weren't around yet these flags were created without gloss and still remain without gloss to this day. Libya’s flag looks like it has gloss, but upon closer inspection it can be seen that the middle stripe of the triband has no gloss and the top and bottom stripes are upside down textures from other flags. Antarctica’s white flag is seemingly the Unknown flag without the question mark. Montenegro and Serbia were given correct names but Åland Islands and Timor-Leste were still named ‘Unknown’.
On the 2nd of January, 2013, the second flag update was released and introduced revised flags for Antarctica, Curaçao, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Libya, Saint Martin, Sint Maarten, and South Sudan. This update also fixed the names for these countries and territories, replacing the country domain codes with proper names. Notably, Libya was renamed from ‘Libyan Arab Jamahiriya’ to ‘Libya’ as well. Since /extraflags/ and its tools weren't around yet these flags were created without gloss and still remain without gloss to this day. Libya’s flag looks like it has gloss, but upon closer inspection it can be seen that the middle stripe of the triband has no gloss and the top and bottom stripes are upside down textures from other flags. Antarctica’s white flag is seemingly the Unknown flag without the question mark. Montenegro and Serbia were given correct names but Åland Islands and Timor-Leste were still named ‘Unknown’.
 
<gallery>
flagsheet5.png|Flagsheet 5
flagsheet6.png|Flagsheet 6
flagsheet7.png|Flagsheet 7
flags.8.png|Flagsheet 8, the current one
</gallery>
In April 2014, 4chan’s third flag update simply renamed Åland Islands from ‘Unknown’ to ‘Aland’. Unfortunately, this update did not fix Timor-Leste’s name as well so it remains as ‘Unknown’ to this day. Later in July, for 4chan’s fourth flag update, Ecuador’s Coat of Arms was added to its flag to perhaps differentiate it from the very similar Colombian flag. Ecuador’s flag was not remade from scratch—rather, the Coat of Arms was simply pasted onto the existing flag.
In April 2014, 4chan’s third flag update simply renamed Åland Islands from ‘Unknown’ to ‘Aland’. Unfortunately, this update did not fix Timor-Leste’s name as well so it remains as ‘Unknown’ to this day. Later in July, for 4chan’s fourth flag update, Ecuador’s Coat of Arms was added to its flag to perhaps differentiate it from the very similar Colombian flag. Ecuador’s flag was not remade from scratch—rather, the Coat of Arms was simply pasted onto the existing flag.


Line 26: Line 31:
Ecuador went through 3 flag changes. The first being the Ecuadorian flag without the Coat of arms, the second being with the Coat of arms, and the third being with the Coat of Arms slightly changed.
Ecuador went through 3 flag changes. The first being the Ecuadorian flag without the Coat of arms, the second being with the Coat of arms, and the third being with the Coat of Arms slightly changed.


Users of /sp/ could post as the flags of England, Scotland, and Wales following the UEFA EURO 2020 football championships. This feature returned during the 2022 World Cup. It is unknown why these flags are returned to the Union Jack marked as "United Kingdom" outside specific events, and why this feature isn't implemented on other boards.
Users of /sp/ could post as the flags of [[file:xe.gif]]England, [[file:xs.gif]]Scotland, and [[file:xw.gif]]Wales following the UEFA EURO 2020 football championships. This feature returned during the 2022 World Cup. It is unknown why these flags are returned to the Union Jack marked as "United Kingdom" outside specific events, and why this feature isn't implemented on other boards.


Western Sahara, the United States Minor Outlying Islands, and Heard and Mcdonald Islands cannot be collected as legitimate since they have no legitimate/official internet service providers.
Western Sahara, the United States Minor Outlying Islands, and Heard and Mcdonald Islands cannot be collected as legitimate since they have no legitimate/official internet service providers.
Line 32: Line 37:
North Korea and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands when posted with some local WiFi hotspots will show as China and the Falkland Islands. This will also happen with Guernsey WiFi, instead of posting as Guernsey, it will show as Jersey. Cuba doesn't have public Internet access due to the Communist Regime, and thus cannot be legitimately collected. North Korea and Turkmenistan have WiFi in certain hotels and hotspots. These show up as their separate countries and their geoIP locations as both North Korea and Turkmenistan.
North Korea and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands when posted with some local WiFi hotspots will show as China and the Falkland Islands. This will also happen with Guernsey WiFi, instead of posting as Guernsey, it will show as Jersey. Cuba doesn't have public Internet access due to the Communist Regime, and thus cannot be legitimately collected. North Korea and Turkmenistan have WiFi in certain hotels and hotspots. These show up as their separate countries and their geoIP locations as both North Korea and Turkmenistan.


If you have any questions about flags, feel free to ask in the [https://boards.4chan.org/int/extraflags /extraflags/] thread on /int/.


===Unknown Flag===
===Unknown Flag===
[[file:xx.gif]] "Unknown" is a relatively common flag on 4chan. It appears when a thread is moved from a board without flags to a board with them, as on flag-boards ever post must have one. It also appears when posting from an IP range that 4chan doesn't have a location for. Its ID is XX.
[[file:xx.gif]] "Unknown" is a relatively common flag on 4chan. It appears when a thread is moved from a board without flags to a board with them, as on flag-boards every post must have one. It also appears when posting from an IP range that 4chan doesn't have a location for. Its ID is XX.


===Rare Flags===
===Rare Flags===
Line 73: Line 79:
! Old Flag !! New Flag !! Country !! ID !! Notes
! Old Flag !! New Flag !! Country !! ID !! Notes
|-
|-
| [[old:-aq.png]]/[[file:old-an.gif]] || [[file:aq.gif]] || Antarctica || AQ ||
| [[file:old-aq.png]]/[[file:old-an.gif]] || [[file:aq.gif]] || Antarctica || AQ || These are unconfirmed and may not have ever been in use
|-
|-
| [[file:old-bn.gif]] || [[file:bn.gif]] || Brunei || BN || This flag was posted on /pol/ with the filename "Brunei__Saturated_Glitch_.gif" which implies the saturation was applied by accident
| [[file:old-bn.gif]] || [[file:bn.gif]] || Brunei || BN || This flag was posted on /pol/ with the filename "Brunei__Saturated_Glitch_.gif" which implies the saturation was applied by accident
Line 98: Line 104:


===Anomalous Flags===
===Anomalous Flags===
 
[[file:bhutanvape_bloated.gif|frameless|right|Enlarged Bhutan Vaporwave flag.]]
[[file:portoia_bloated.gif|frameless|right|Enlarged Portoia flag.]]
These flags are incredibly rare and were probably only ever used by 4chan staff.
These flags are incredibly rare and were probably only ever used by 4chan staff.
{| class="wikitable sortable"
{| class="wikitable sortable"
Line 184: Line 191:


>The infamous Brotherhood of NOD flag<ref>https://desuarchive.org/mlp/thread/2968320/#2969928</ref>
>The infamous Brotherhood of NOD flag<ref>https://desuarchive.org/mlp/thread/2968320/#2969928</ref>
Thanks to the Yotsuba Archive, all of these flags were preserved. They will be added here soon


In the first half of 2013, these flags were randomly assigned:
In the first half of 2013, these flags were randomly assigned:
Line 246: Line 255:
===/mlp/ Character Flags===
===/mlp/ Character Flags===
[[file:mlpflags.png|frame|The current board flag spritesheet on /mlp/.]]
[[file:mlpflags.png|frame|The current board flag spritesheet on /mlp/.]]
During a town hall sticky in Feburary 2021, an Anon suggested that flags be added to /mlp/. The mod agreed and asked the board to design some flags, and the horsefuckers quickly got to work. The designs went through several iterations and a few large threads before they settled on the final design and got to work turning every pony into a flag. In the end, the mods chose 80 to be added to the board. They were added on 1 May 2021. You can see every flag that was made here: https://www.duendeinexistente.com/flags/
During a town hall sticky in Feburary 2021, an Anon suggested that flags be added to /mlp/. The mod agreed and asked the board to design some flags, and the horsefuckers quickly got to work. The designs went through several iterations and a few large threads before they settled on the final design and got to work turning every pony into a flag. In the end, the mods chose 80 to be added to the board. They were added on 1 May 2021. You can see every flag that was made here: https://www.duendeinexistente.com/flags/ (ded link, TODO put them all here)


===/lgbt/ Pride Month Flags===
===/lgbt/ Pride Month Flags===
[[file:lgbtflags.png|frame|The board flags spritesheet from /lgbt/ during June 2022.]]
[[file:lgbtflags.png|frame|The board flags spritesheet from /lgbt/ during June 2022, 2023 and 2024.]]
For Pride Month 2022, /lgbt/ got pride flags. TODO: crop and label them
For Pride Month 2022, /lgbt/ got pride flags.<ref>https://archive.ph/p66f5</ref> They returned in 2023, with no changes.<ref>https://archive.ph/TqahG</ref> The flags were also included in the [[4chan/API|4chan API]].<ref>https://archive.is/vwrAN#selection-9.13702-9.15022</ref><ref>https://archive.is/f8xFq#selection-9.13686-9.15006</ref> In 2024 the flags returned with no changes<ref>https://archive.ph/9tHT7</ref>, but were not included in the API.<ref>https://archive.ph/GBKa6#selection-9.13686-9.14110</ref>
{| class="wikitable sortable"
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
|-
! Flag !! Name
! Flag !! Name !! ID
|-
| [[file:AAP.png]] || AAP || AAP
|-
| [[file:Achillean.png]] || Achillean || ACH
|-
| [[file:AFAB.png]] || AFAB || AFB
|-
| [[file:Agender.png]] || Agender || AGR
|-
| [[file:AGP.png]] || AGP || AGP
|-
| [[file:Ally.png]] || Ally || ALY
|-
| [[file:AMAB.png]] || AMAB || AMB
|-
| [[file:Androgyne.png]] || Androgynous || AND
|-
| [[file:Aromantic.png]] || Aromantic || ARO
|-
| [[file:Asexual.png]] || Asexual || ACE
|-
| [[file:Bear.png]] || Bear || BR
|-
| [[file:Bisexual.png]] || Bisexual || BI
|-
| [[file:Boymoder.png]] || Boymoder || BOY
|-
| [[file:Butch.png]] || Butch || BCH
|-
| [[file:Chaser.png]] || Chaser || CHR
|-
| [[file:Cis.png]] || Cis || CIS
|-
| [[file:Demiromantic.png]] || Demiromantic || DRO
|-
| [[file:Demisexual.png]] || Demisexual || DSX
|-
| [[file:Dom.png]] || Dom || DOM
|-
| [[file:Femboy.png]] || Femboy || FBY
|-
| [[file:FtM Femboy.png]] || FtM Femboy || FFB
|-
| [[file:FtM Repressor.png]] || FtM Repressor || FR
|-
| [[file:Gay.png]] || Gay || GAY
|-
| [[file:Genderfluid.png]] || Genderfluid || GFL
|-
| [[file:Genderqueer.png]] || Genderqueer || GQR
|-
| [[file:Hon.png]] || Hon || HON
|-
| [[file:HRT Femboy.png]] || HRT Femboy || HFB
|-
| [[file:HSTS.png]] || HSTS || HST
|-
| [[file:Intersex.png]] || Intersex || INT
|-
| [[file:Labrys.png]] || Labrys || LAB
|-
| [[file:Lesbian.png]] || Lesbian || LES
|-
| [[file:LGBT.png]] || LGBT || ALL
|-
| [[file:MtF Butch.png]] || MtF Butch || MBT
|-
| [[file:MtF Repressor.png]] || MtF Repressor || MR
|-
| [[file:Nonbinary.png]] || Nonbinary || NB
|-
| [[file:Original.png]] || Original || OG
|-
| [[file:Pansexual.png]] || Pansexual || PAN
|-
| [[file:Poly.png]] || Poly || PLY
|-
| [[file:Pooner.png]] || Pooner || PNR
|-
| [[file:Prison Bi.png]] || Prison Bi || PBI
|-
| [[file:Prison Gay.png]] || Prison Gay || PG
|-
| [[file:Progress.png]] || Progress || PRG
|-
| [[file:Queer.png]] || Queer || QR
|-
| [[file:Questioning.png]] || Questioning || QES
|-
| [[file:Repressor.png]] || Repressor || REP
|-
| [[file:Sapphic.png]] || Sapphic || SPH
|-
| [[file:Straight.png]] || Straight || STR
|-
| [[file:Sub.png]] || Sub || SUB
|-
| [[file:Switch.png]] || Switch || SW
|-
| [[file:Trans.png]] || Transgender || TRN
|-
| [[file:Transfem.png]] || Transfem || TF
|-
| [[file:Transmasc.png]] || Transmasc || TMA
|-
| [[file:Twink.png]] || Twink || TNK
|-
| [[file:Twinkhon.png]] || Twinkhon || TKH
|-
|-
| - || -
| [[file:Woke.png]] || Woke || UKR
|-
|-
|}
|}

Latest revision as of 14:11, 27 June 2024

Every flag on 4chan, from flagsheet 8. Note that this image includes Xe.gifEngland, Xs.gifScotland, and Xw.gifWales. It also includes the Xx.gifUnknown flag, and the flags of the An.gifNetherlands Antilles and Cs.gifSerbia and Montenegro.
Handy chart by /extraflags/ for all the country flag codes.

Five boards on 4chan currently have flags. Four of them have country flags, which display the country you're posting from (or the location of your VPN or proxy if you are using one.) Flags are used on 4chan as a method of pseudo-identification. They were introduced on /sp/, /int/, and /pol/ on 3 July 2012.

Country Flags[edit]

Infographic about country flags, by /extraflags/. Was very useful while writing this article.
This chart is pretty outdated by now tbdesu, for an updated list check out FlagHunter

Adapted from /flags/+/extraflags/ book o' lore.

flags shown: Angola, Democratic Republic of the congo, Saint Lucia, Great Britain

4chan has been using country flags since the 2nd of July, 2012. Flags were first implemented on /sp/ and /int/ on this date, along with the first memeflags on /pol/. Then two years later on the 15th of December, 2014 country flags were also added to /pol/, replacing the memeflags. On the 13th of June, 2017, memeflags were returned to /pol/ alongside country flags. For three years these were the only boards to have flags, but on the 4th of May, 2017 /bant/ was created. As this is being written only these four boards have geolocation flags. On the 1st of May, 2021, flags were added to /mlp/ that represent different characters. 80 in total were added, but the board designed over 300. During June of 2022, /lgbt/ got pride flags. They were removed in July. Flags are found on 4chan’s servers both as individual gif files and as a single png flagsheet, but when you see flags while browsing you are seeing little snippets of the flagsheet that have been cropped out. Clicking on a flag will open the gif file in a new tab. As a result of updates to 4chan’s flags there have been eight flagsheets in total, but so far only four have been found. Comparing flagsheets allows us to see how individual flags have changed and when flags were added, and therefore we can determine the history of 4chan flags.

4chan’s flags were created by UK-based developer Mark James for his website Fam.gifFAMFAMFAM back in 2005, seven years prior to their usage on 4chan. Mark released the first version of these flags on the 30th of August, 2005, then would go on to release a second version of his flag set on the 2nd of February, 2007 where he revised 4 flag designs and added 8 more flags to the set. Angola, the DR Congo, Saint Lucia, and the UK were redesigned, while Catalonia, the European Union, French Guiana, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, Montenegro, Réunion, Serbia, and Svalbard and Jan Mayen were added as flags to the set. Flags made for the second update have a different build quality compared to flags from the first version; they are generally about 100 bytes smaller due to stronger compression and use a milder gloss (Serbia barely has any gloss at all). 4chan uses this 2007 version of the flag set, explaining why our flags of Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Guadeloupe, Lesotho, Mauritania, Paraguay, Tokelau, Tuvalu, and Venezuela are currently outdated as these countries have changed their flags since around 2007 or Mark James intentionally used their older flags.


4chan has gone through six evident flagsheet updates, although the most recent flagsheet is named ‘flags.8.png’ which implies there have been seven updates instead. The exact dates and order of flag updates is hazy and more information is required to validate details. Initially, 4chan used FAM’s default flag set; however, many of these flags—which were made in 2007—were outdated by 2012. This briefly allowed users to seemingly post from the An.gifNetherlands Antilles and the Libya.gifLibyan Arab Jamahiriya despite the countries dissolving years prior. 4chan uses MaxMind’s GeoIP database to assign a poster’s IP to a country, but this database assigned IP ranges to countries and territories that did not have flags included in the 2007 FAM set. This forced Antarctica, Curaçao, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Saint Martin, Sint Maarten, and South Sudan to hoist the Unknown flag if posted and were named ‘Country: Unknown’ when hovered over. Despite the ‘Country: Unknown’ name, the gif files themselves were named properly according to their country domain code. In other words, if you saved one of these Unknown flags, they would have the filename, for example, ‘gg.gif’ (Guernsey), or ‘je.gif’ (Jersey). This allowed third-party archives to properly display the country or territory a poster was from despite the Unknown flag and name. Even today archives such as 4plebs and Desuarchive still use the same flagsheet from 2012 where they created their own custom flags for the aforementioned countries and territories. Back on 4chan, and interestingly, Montenegro and Serbia were also named ‘Country: Unknown’ despite having their proper flags. The same issue affected Åland Islands and Timor-Leste, but they were instead just named ‘Unknown’.

Released late 2012, 4chan’s first flag update removed the Netherlands Antilles and replaced it with Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba. It is not known whether Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba had its current flag (a copy of the Netherlands) or the Unknown flag as its first recorded post is from October 2013. Countries and territories with the Unknown flag had their name changed from ‘Country: Unknown’ to their country domain code. For example, upon hover, Curaçao was named ‘CW’, Jersey was named ‘JE’, South Sudan would have been ‘SS’, and so on… Despite the name changes they still hoisted the Unknown flag if posted.

On the 2nd of January, 2013, the second flag update was released and introduced revised flags for Antarctica, Curaçao, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Libya, Saint Martin, Sint Maarten, and South Sudan. This update also fixed the names for these countries and territories, replacing the country domain codes with proper names. Notably, Libya was renamed from ‘Libyan Arab Jamahiriya’ to ‘Libya’ as well. Since /extraflags/ and its tools weren't around yet these flags were created without gloss and still remain without gloss to this day. Libya’s flag looks like it has gloss, but upon closer inspection it can be seen that the middle stripe of the triband has no gloss and the top and bottom stripes are upside down textures from other flags. Antarctica’s white flag is seemingly the Unknown flag without the question mark. Montenegro and Serbia were given correct names but Åland Islands and Timor-Leste were still named ‘Unknown’.

  • Flagsheet 5

  • Flagsheet 6

  • Flagsheet 7

  • Flagsheet 8, the current one

In April 2014, 4chan’s third flag update simply renamed Åland Islands from ‘Unknown’ to ‘Aland’. Unfortunately, this update did not fix Timor-Leste’s name as well so it remains as ‘Unknown’ to this day. Later in July, for 4chan’s fourth flag update, Ecuador’s Coat of Arms was added to its flag to perhaps differentiate it from the very similar Colombian flag. Ecuador’s flag was not remade from scratch—rather, the Coat of Arms was simply pasted onto the existing flag.

4chan’s sixth flag update in 2017 brought about five flag redesigns. The blue band of France’s tricolour had been darkened, a single yellow pixel from the US flag had been removed, Vatican City was resized from 16x11 pixels to 11x11 pixels, Uzbekistan was remade with lighter, more accurate colours, and Western Sahara’s flag was reversed so its red triangle was correctly placed on the left-hand side. This update may have been the start of /extraflags/ users contributing to 4chan’s flags, with them creating the current Uzbekistan and Vatican City flags from scratch using a custom gloss to closely resemble Mark James’ FAM flags. Similarly, in 2019, 4chan’s seventh and most recent flag update introduced a revised Myanmar flag by /extraflags/ users and also added Kosovo to the set, which also hoisted a flag created by /extraflags/ users.

Ecuador went through 3 flag changes. The first being the Ecuadorian flag without the Coat of arms, the second being with the Coat of arms, and the third being with the Coat of Arms slightly changed.

Users of /sp/ could post as the flags of Xe.gifEngland, Xs.gifScotland, and Xw.gifWales following the UEFA EURO 2020 football championships. This feature returned during the 2022 World Cup. It is unknown why these flags are returned to the Union Jack marked as "United Kingdom" outside specific events, and why this feature isn't implemented on other boards.

Western Sahara, the United States Minor Outlying Islands, and Heard and Mcdonald Islands cannot be collected as legitimate since they have no legitimate/official internet service providers.

North Korea and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands when posted with some local WiFi hotspots will show as China and the Falkland Islands. This will also happen with Guernsey WiFi, instead of posting as Guernsey, it will show as Jersey. Cuba doesn't have public Internet access due to the Communist Regime, and thus cannot be legitimately collected. North Korea and Turkmenistan have WiFi in certain hotels and hotspots. These show up as their separate countries and their geoIP locations as both North Korea and Turkmenistan.

If you have any questions about flags, feel free to ask in the /extraflags/ thread on /int/.

Unknown Flag[edit]

Xx.gif "Unknown" is a relatively common flag on 4chan. It appears when a thread is moved from a board without flags to a board with them, as on flag-boards every post must have one. It also appears when posting from an IP range that 4chan doesn't have a location for. Its ID is XX.

Rare Flags[edit]

Anons reacting to a rare flag sighting
Ditto

Certain flags are more common to find than others. Countries with very low populations, or limited access to the Internet can be very rare to come across while browsing 4chan. These are often referred to as rare flags, and are pointed out by many when they are sighted.

Retired Flags[edit]

Some information on retired flags.

There are various flags that have been retired, and now will no longer appear on posts from their previous IP ranges. Not much is known about them; we can only infer from the archives that they have been retired due to an extremely long time since the last post from that country. A1, A2, AP (anonymous satellite providers) are now defunct as they were a glitch, they could not be saved and could only be collected through screenshot. These flags looked like the flag of Andorra. A1 was known as “Anonymous Proxy”, A2 was known as “Satellite Provider” and AP was known as “Asia/Pacific Region”. All these flags were labeled as “Unknown” instead of using the “question mark” flag.

Flag Country ID Last Seen Total Posts Notes
Ad.gif Unknown (Anonymous Proxy) A1 9 July 2013[1] 11[2][3][4]
Ad.gif Unknown (Satellite Provider) A2 26 August 2016[5] 910[6][7]
An.gif Netherlands Antilles AN 13 June 2017[8] 24[9] One of the rarest flags, with only 24 archived posts. The first 12 were posted on /sp/ from July to September of 2012. The rest were posted on 13 June 2017 on /pol/, during a timespan of only ten minutes. Notably, this was the same day that memeflags returned. This flag is still on 4chan's servers despite the country dissolving in 2010.
Ad.gif Unknown (Asia/Pacific Region) AP 9 July 2019[10] 7,518[11][12][13] Would say "Unknown" when hovered over but redirect to ap.gif when clicked on.
Cs.gif Serbia and Montenegro CS n/a 0 This flag is still on 4chan's servers despite the country dissolving in 2006.
Eu.png Europe EU 8 July 2019[14] Not to be confused with the memeflag. The pre /pol/ Harbor Europoor memeflag is included in the search results due to how the flag worked at the time
? Other O1 n/a 0 On the drop-down on 4plebs. Not sure if this was ever even on 4chan. Could have been one of the anomalous flags.

Note: Andorra is used as a placeholder for regions that don't have flags. This list may be inaccurate due to incomplete archives.

Updated Flags[edit]

Over the years some flags have been updated.

Old Flag New Flag Country ID Notes
Old-aq.png/Old-an.gif Aq.gif Antarctica AQ These are unconfirmed and may not have ever been in use
Old-bn.gif Bn.gif Brunei BN This flag was posted on /pol/ with the filename "Brunei__Saturated_Glitch_.gif" which implies the saturation was applied by accident
Ec1.gif, Ec2.png Ec.gif Ecuador EC The Coat of Arms was added to this flag in April 2014. It was slightly changed at some point.
Old-Eh.gif Eh.gif Western Sahara EH Changed in the sixth flag update, in 2017.
Old-Fr.gif Fr.gif France FR Changed in the sixth flag update, in 2017
Libya.gif Ly.gif Libya (prev. Libyan Arab Jamahiriya) LY Changed in the second flag update, on 2 January 2013
Old-Me.gif Me.gif Montenegro ME
Mm.gif New-Mm.gif Myanmar MM Changed in the seventh flag update, in 2019. Created by /extraflags/ users.
Old-Uz.gif Uz.gif Uzbekistan UZ Changed in the sixth flag update, in 2017. Created by /extraflags/ users.
Va.gif New-Va.gif Holy See VA Changed in the sixth flag update, in 2017. Created by /extraflags/ users.
Ad.gif Xk.gif Kosovo XK Andorra was used as a placeholder until Kosovo's flag was added. Changed in the seventh flag update, in 2019. Created by /extraflags/ users.

Anomalous Flags[edit]

Enlarged Bhutan Vaporwave flag.
Enlarged Portoia flag.

These flags are incredibly rare and were probably only ever used by 4chan staff.

Country ID Flag Notes
Bhutan Vaporwave ? Bhutan Vaporwave Limited Edition.gif "posted on /int/ in 2011"[15]
Easter Egg/Senpai ? ? Possibly fam.gif?
Portoia ? Portoia.gif "posted once on early /sp/ with zalgo text before being deleted"[15]

Board Flags[edit]

Board flags, previously troll flags, are colloquially referred to as memeflags by most posters. These flags are not determined by poster location, and instead can be chosen from a drop-down menu underneath the posting field.

Current board flags on /pol/[edit]

The current board flag spritesheet on /pol/.
Icon Display Name Drop-down Name ID Date Added
Ac.png Anarcho-Capitalist - AC 13 June 2017
An.png Anarchist - AN 13 June 2017
Bl.png Black Lives Matter Black Nationalist BL 13 June 2017
Cf.png Confederate - CF 13 June 2017
Cm.png Commie Communist CM 13 June 2017
Ct.png Catalonia - CT 27 October 2017[16]
Dm.png Democrat - DM 13 June 2017
Eu.png European - EU 13 June 2017
Fc.png Fascist - FC 13 June 2017
Gn.png Gadsden - GN 13 June 2017
Gy.png LGBT Gay GY 13 June 2017
Jh.png Jihadi - JH 13 June 2017
Kn.png Kekistani - KN 13 June 2017
Mf.png Muslim - MF 13 June 2017
Nb.png National Bolshevik - NB 13 June 2017
Nt.png NATO - NT 19 May 2022
Nz.png Nazi - NZ 13 June 2017
Pc.png Hippie - PC 13 June 2017
Pr.png Pirate - PR 13 June 2017
Re.png Republican - RE 13 June 2017
Mz.png Task Force Z - MZ 19 May 2022
Tm.png DEUS VULT Templar TM 13 June 2017
Tr.png Tree Hugger - TR 13 June 2017
Un.png United Nations - UN 13 June 2017
Wp.png White Supremacist - WP 13 June 2017

Pre /pol/ Harbor[edit]

Screenshot of the Hipster flag

Prior to the event known as /pol/ Harbor, there were no country flags on /pol/, only board flags. Most returned in 2017 but some did not. Flags were added to /pol/ on 3 July 2012. Sadly there are no archives of /pol/ from that time, and archives of other boards are missing images (otherwise I'd have more than one screenshot). These flags could not be chosen and were instead randomly assigned per post.[17] From reading people talking about it on other boards in the archives, a few of these first-generation flags can be gleaned:

>Dong flag[18]

>Hipster flag, which is an Apple icon[19]

>Retard flag, which is a reddit icon[20]

>The infamous Brotherhood of NOD flag[21]

Thanks to the Yotsuba Archive, all of these flags were preserved. They will be added here soon

In the first half of 2013, these flags were randomly assigned:

Icon Name ID
Il.gif JIDF IL
Jw.gif Le Happy Merchant Face JW

Sometime in late August or early September, these were replaced with the drop-down and many new flags. There was no option to not post with one of these, and the default choice was random. Random was replaced a few months later with the option to not use a flag.

Icon Display Name Drop-down Name ID
Us.gif Amerifat American US
Kp.gif Best Korean - KP
Bl.png Black Nationalist - BL
Cm.png Communist - CM
Old-cf.gif Confederate - CF
Re.png Insufferable Conservative RE
Eu.png Europoor European EU
Gy.png LGBT GAY GY
Pc.png Hippie - PC
Il.gif Palestine Israeli IL
Dm.png Liberal - DM
Rp.gif Gold Standard Libertarian RP
Mf.png 3. ??? 4. PROPHET! Muslim MF
Nz.png Nazi - NZ
Ob.gif NOBAMA Obama OB
Pr.png Pirate - PR
Rb.gif Rebel Alliance Rebel RB
Gn.png Tea Party Tea Partier TP
Tx.gif Texan - TX
Tr.png Tree Hugger - TR
Wp.png Tolerant White Supremacist WP


/mlp/ Character Flags[edit]

The current board flag spritesheet on /mlp/.

During a town hall sticky in Feburary 2021, an Anon suggested that flags be added to /mlp/. The mod agreed and asked the board to design some flags, and the horsefuckers quickly got to work. The designs went through several iterations and a few large threads before they settled on the final design and got to work turning every pony into a flag. In the end, the mods chose 80 to be added to the board. They were added on 1 May 2021. You can see every flag that was made here: https://www.duendeinexistente.com/flags/ (ded link, TODO put them all here)

/lgbt/ Pride Month Flags[edit]

The board flags spritesheet from /lgbt/ during June 2022, 2023 and 2024.

For Pride Month 2022, /lgbt/ got pride flags.[22] They returned in 2023, with no changes.[23] The flags were also included in the 4chan API.[24][25] In 2024 the flags returned with no changes[26], but were not included in the API.[27]

Flag Name ID
AAP.png AAP AAP
Achillean.png Achillean ACH
AFAB.png AFAB AFB
Agender.png Agender AGR
AGP.png AGP AGP
Ally.png Ally ALY
AMAB.png AMAB AMB
Androgyne.png Androgynous AND
Aromantic.png Aromantic ARO
Asexual.png Asexual ACE
Bear.png Bear BR
Bisexual.png Bisexual BI
Boymoder.png Boymoder BOY
Butch.png Butch BCH
Chaser.png Chaser CHR
Cis.png Cis CIS
Demiromantic.png Demiromantic DRO
Demisexual.png Demisexual DSX
Dom.png Dom DOM
Femboy.png Femboy FBY
FtM Femboy.png FtM Femboy FFB
FtM Repressor.png FtM Repressor FR
Gay.png Gay GAY
Genderfluid.png Genderfluid GFL
Genderqueer.png Genderqueer GQR
Hon.png Hon HON
HRT Femboy.png HRT Femboy HFB
HSTS.png HSTS HST
Intersex.png Intersex INT
Labrys.png Labrys LAB
Lesbian.png Lesbian LES
LGBT.png LGBT ALL
MtF Butch.png MtF Butch MBT
MtF Repressor.png MtF Repressor MR
Nonbinary.png Nonbinary NB
Original.png Original OG
Pansexual.png Pansexual PAN
Poly.png Poly PLY
Pooner.png Pooner PNR
Prison Bi.png Prison Bi PBI
Prison Gay.png Prison Gay PG
Progress.png Progress PRG
Queer.png Queer QR
Questioning.png Questioning QES
Repressor.png Repressor REP
Sapphic.png Sapphic SPH
Straight.png Straight STR
Sub.png Sub SUB
Switch.png Switch SW
Trans.png Transgender TRN
Transfem.png Transfem TF
Transmasc.png Transmasc TMA
Twink.png Twink TNK
Twinkhon.png Twinkhon TKH
Woke.png Woke UKR
  1. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20130711022519/http://ibm5100.net:80/int/tables/table_A1.html
  2. ↑ https://archive.4plebs.org/_/search/boards/pol.sp/country/A1/
  3. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20130711022519/http://ibm5100.net/int/tables/table_A1.html
  4. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20130517124212/http://www.ibm5100.net/sp/tables/table_A1.html
  5. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/int/thread/64003230/#64030144
  6. ↑ https://archive.4plebs.org/_/search/boards/pol.sp/country/A2/
  7. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/int/search/country/A2/
  8. ↑ https://archive.4plebs.org/pol/thread/129711398/#129719204
  9. ↑ https://archive.4plebs.org/_/search/boards/pol.sp/country/AN/
  10. ↑ https://archive.palanq.win/bant/thread/8356109/#8356426
  11. ↑ https://archive.4plebs.org/_/search/boards/pol.sp/country/AP/
  12. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/int/search/country/AP/
  13. ↑ https://archive.palanq.win/bant/search/country/AP/
  14. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/int/thread/108130907/#108140222
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 https://archive.4plebs.org/pol/thread/59704752/#59705281
  16. ↑ https://archive.4plebs.org/pol/chunk/146841910/500/5/#146849517
  17. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/q/thread/1457/#1515
  18. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/mlp/thread/2968320/#2969854
  19. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/g/thread/25980713/#25982130
  20. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/mlp/thread/2968320/#2969873
  21. ↑ https://desuarchive.org/mlp/thread/2968320/#2969928
  22. ↑ https://archive.ph/p66f5
  23. ↑ https://archive.ph/TqahG
  24. ↑ https://archive.is/vwrAN#selection-9.13702-9.15022
  25. ↑ https://archive.is/f8xFq#selection-9.13686-9.15006
  26. ↑ https://archive.ph/9tHT7
  27. ↑ https://archive.ph/GBKa6#selection-9.13686-9.14110
Retrieved from "https://wiki.bibanon.org/index.php?title=4chan/Flags&oldid=10903"