
If your journey home last Friday involved traversing Liverpool Street station, then you were shit outta luck. The station was forced to close for an hour and a half, from 7pm, due to 12,000 smug, self-indulgent idiots giving thousands and thousands of pounds of free advertising to T-Mobile by recreating one of their adverts. What a whimsical generation we are. And oh great, I just did a Facebook events search for ‘flash mob’ and over 500 results came up. I guess it doesn’t matter to anyone that they were invented by some guy at Harper’s Magazine to make fun of people’s need to be in on the next big thing OR that they are no longer shocking to ANYONE (Even my 95 year old Great Aunt knows what they are) OR that if you go to one, you’re gonna be surrounded by people like this….









Is it possible to revolt against the public?
JAMIE TAETE











Reader Comments
February 9th, 2009
4:27 pm
12000 people who doesn’t deserve to be called Londoners
February 9th, 2009
5:00 pm
cunts,
a life times supply of don’ts right there!
February 9th, 2009
5:53 pm
I remember seeing people do this at some random station in London and back then it was actually cool and interesting, now i’d probably just walk past
February 9th, 2009
6:03 pm
The public are CUNTS, Who doesn’t know this ….
February 9th, 2009
6:20 pm
I was on my way home on friday evening, desperate to get home (or to the pub). I was chucked out of the staion as I came up through the underground and had to wait in the cold outside ( I could have got a bus but finding the right one prooved tricky). thinking there was some kind of catastrophy I was somewhat disgruntled to find a load of overexcited teenagers with whistles revolting against the sytem through the medium of dance.
I shared a withered look with a middle aged banker as I angry boarded my train.
I should state now that I am only 22.
February 9th, 2009
6:39 pm
Bunch of pricks, havent they got better places to be than dancing in a train station..try fabric next time
February 9th, 2009
6:45 pm
I’d wish that all involved would be forced to sit and look at a picture of themselves. Look long and hard until they see what the rest of the world sees and gag at the realisation…. but they’re blind stupid.
these kids and posh middle aged women who claim to be ‘absolutely barmy!’ make me cringe.
February 9th, 2009
8:12 pm
I knew there’d be some Burberry in there. Found it! Chavs… I wonder how many of them are wearing white “trainers”…
February 9th, 2009
8:13 pm
dude should retire from smiling and never make a comeback.
February 9th, 2009
8:14 pm
I so just got Rick Roll’d.
February 9th, 2009
8:14 pm
you just wasted a month’s worth of DON’Ts on one meager blog post.
February 9th, 2009
8:14 pm
That desperate teenage Scouser should be holding up a “NEED DENTAL HELP AND LIPS” sign instead of “Free Hugs.” He needs more than braces to fix that crater…
February 9th, 2009
9:20 pm
maybe you should stop being a miserable cunt and realise that maybe people thought it might just be a laugh. get over yourself.
February 9th, 2009
9:48 pm
when do you ever have to pay for hugs?
February 10th, 2009
12:23 am
..flashmobs will be used as subliminal tools of oppression by right wing fascist states in the near future! You mark my words, the idiots will all be “spontaniously” gathering in stadiums and arenas for “a bit of a laugh” just as the nerve gas is released!
Zombie walks are only marginally a step up!
February 10th, 2009
12:53 am
A cunt with shit teeth, a cunt underneath an info sign, bitches screaming, a bitch with an ipod that has her name on the back of it,a cunt in a jack daniel’s t-shirt, cunt in a cowboy hat,a cunt with shit hair, bitches that are ugly and niggas.
Fucking hell. Fuck ing Hell. Fucking hell.
“maybe you should stop being a miserable cunt and realise that maybe people thought it might just be a laugh. get over yourself.”
You were probably there or thought it was such a”joke” idea. Dick bitch. Go finger yourself then put those fingers in your mouth and savour the taste.
February 10th, 2009
10:11 am
We have to share natural resources and tax spending and healthcare with these people. What a fucking waste.
February 10th, 2009
11:12 am
Terrible sheep, but not as sickening as the real/fake flash mob for Tmobile!!
February 10th, 2009
12:01 pm
If taking ecstacy is less dangerous than riding a horse, let’s get this lot on horseback and on E … SOON.
February 11th, 2009
12:25 pm
what is facebook?
February 11th, 2009
1:10 pm
Rick Roll’ed is no way as good as boxxy
February 11th, 2009
6:10 pm
almost as cool as this cunt
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Abt8aAB-Dr0
February 11th, 2009
10:21 pm
Who got a facebook invite to this? I did.
“5 of your friends are attending”. I have 5 less friends now.
It is horrible, cringe worthy. The basic idea was that is was gonna be “soooo jokes”.
It was really just a stunt to grab facebook pics and make yourself out to be a really fun guy who goes out and does ‘wacky’ stuff. Kind of like… Jim Morrison. Yeah him. Did he do Flashmobs? Probs. Let’s organise one!!!
February 13th, 2009
1:42 pm
fuck i missed it !!
February 13th, 2009
1:48 pm
untermenschen…
February 13th, 2009
1:57 pm
I’m re-reading “No Logo” - this is Naomi’s worst nightmare. Frightening stuff.
February 13th, 2009
2:10 pm
there is only one way to stop this and that’s for someone to let off a bomb at the next one. surely there are some radical Muslims who can do us all a favour.
February 13th, 2009
2:16 pm
So that’s what London’s like. Hm.
February 13th, 2009
2:17 pm
Vice: The ugly, twee, silly little children of terrible journalism.
February 13th, 2009
2:46 pm
We were actually promoting a club night just round the corner that night, thanks fagbook for making it impossible for anybody to get there. Imo, we all d/l LOIC’s and DDOS them out of the interbutts, srsly fuck these guys…
February 13th, 2009
2:46 pm
horrific
February 13th, 2009
3:10 pm
man, it was great !
We went Steaming through the crowd and burst out the other side with about 20 assorted iPods each.
cheers!
keep em coming, suckers.
February 13th, 2009
3:25 pm
a Good argument for back-dated abortions.
February 13th, 2009
3:39 pm
The original Vice would never publish such a ridiculous article. You have misinterpreted what Vice was all about and become mainstream, ignorant & a bully to boot.
February 13th, 2009
3:41 pm
The girl in the 3rd pic down just sums the whole thing up “Like, OMFG, we are sooo fucking coooool and craaaazzzeeeee!!!! LOLZ!!!!!!”
Fucking shoot me.
February 13th, 2009
3:46 pm
how can you honestly call anyone else ’smug, self-indulgent idiots’ with such distain, and complain about how ‘whimsical’ our generation is, when you just comfirmed yourself as the very same in about 200 words?
February 13th, 2009
3:54 pm
release some gas that puts them all to sleep. it’ll be like a field of iPods and mobile phones for all
February 13th, 2009
4:11 pm
ahh jamie, i remember the days when you used to roll around the floor at panic and show me photos of mucky toilets on your camera…i miss those days.
February 13th, 2009
4:28 pm
2nd pic-what a sensational minger!
February 13th, 2009
4:38 pm
It’s like a “don’t’s” convention.
February 13th, 2009
5:17 pm
Interesting. Completely agree, but you you [author] do sound like Melanie Phillips. With a few swearwords.
Here’s to more Daily Mail-VICE collaborations.
February 13th, 2009
5:27 pm
MASSIVE UK FAIL. Evacuate.
You won’t believe this, but it’s true:
Giving Australian people jobs in PR and media is the reason why this country is fucked. One person who just landed and doesn’t know shit says something dumb, and the other one who’s just landed and thinks everything zany is dead exciting, reports it. The public read it and think it’s news when in fact it’s a recycled Australian press releases.
LONDON = WALKABOUT
February 13th, 2009
6:13 pm
What a bunch of bell ends. People obviously not from London, or dont deserve to be
February 13th, 2009
6:23 pm
This is why I want to move out of London.
Fuck You, LDN
February 13th, 2009
7:14 pm
If these chumps are so easily swayed into congregating in small spaces and making twats of themselves why don’t we advertise one in Guantanamo or Auschwitz?
February 13th, 2009
8:22 pm
see the people who go to these things are the kinda people who come up to you in work and tell you to cheer up cos your not gurning like a cunt at the drop of a hat Facebook is responsible for some of the worst shit around flashmob’s are balls and the people who attend them should be kicked in the fanny.
February 13th, 2009
8:55 pm
I am so glad i dont live in london any more……. that kinda shit turns me into michael douglas out of “falling down”.
February 13th, 2009
10:38 pm
yes photos of some great don’ts but there was 12,000? you had 4 pics? so fuck vice and fuck any liverpool stn city boys who couldn’t get back to dagenham for a night puking on their loafers. great to take back the underground and again also fuck all you yanks
February 13th, 2009
10:57 pm
they are all idiots!
February 14th, 2009
3:21 am
“giving thousands and thousands of pounds of free advertising to T-Mobile by recreating one of their adverts”
Yeah right. Only cause you said so.
February 14th, 2009
3:21 am
I think this is the only vice article i have read where the comments tend to match the tone and views of the author.
February 14th, 2009
10:50 am
RE: first comment.
It is ‘who don’t’ not ‘who doesn’t’ - Fuck London
February 14th, 2009
11:12 am
RE: comment #48
“great to take back the underground”
Hahahahahaha. Yes you were really “taking back the underground” with that display of stupidity. Power to the (spotty, greasy, ignorant, chavvy, trustafarian) People and all that!
Alternatively, you could grow up and stop believing that this sort of jaded stunt makes you look like anything other than a common-or-garden mainstream cretin.
February 14th, 2009
11:38 am
I hate it when people get in my way! Especially 12,000 smug, self-indulgent idiots!
Fucking cunts!
February 14th, 2009
12:35 pm
RE:almost as cool as this cunt
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Abt8aAB-Dr0
#22 Written By cock cockson on February 11th, 2009 @ 6:10 pm
I swear if I had been going up that escalator I’d have given Rob a ‘high five knuckle smash’ in his twatty, smug, feed-the-world, pious face.
“yah Go Rob!” - she needs a fucking slap too
February 14th, 2009
2:17 pm
no actually, think they’re pretty representational of Londoner’s
February 15th, 2009
5:24 am
Vice magazine readers (myself included once) are generally desperate to see themseves above the general norm of the population, which is fine. This is the general population, having a laugh. Not what I’d choose to waste my time on, but still, its only a laugh. Yeah T Mobile have sucked the life out of something that you must all admit the first time you saw one of these things was quite cool. This may not be your idea of a good time, it may be a bit of an annoyance, but all I’ve come away with from reading your comments is, once again, Vice readers are snobs.
Check out my band you wannabe something you’ll never be idiots http://www.hailofabuse/myspace.com
February 15th, 2009
10:50 am
This is Vice-fail NOT London fail. Who writes this crap? A trustafarian wannabee? Sure, squeal your opinions like a bratty little piggy, but at least get a single fact right. The T-mobile flashmob wasn’t free advertising, you hapless moron, it was an £8m ad campaign. It wasn’t 12,000 people members of public, it was 500 professionals. These people in the picture did not take part in the T-Mobile flash mob. Now run back to mummy and daddy and ask them if you can borrow the Bentley to drive through the real world for a minute.
February 15th, 2009
12:15 pm
Lighten up you smug twats
February 15th, 2009
12:21 pm
Hey Vice, when is your next collaboration with Lynx?
February 15th, 2009
12:41 pm
Dear Nathan Barley’s
Spewing out a bunch of nasty angry bullshit doesn’t make you cool.
It’s the easiest thing in the world to take the piss out of other people - the last copy of sugarRAPE was a piece of finely crafted journalism compared to this piece of utter turdery
February 15th, 2009
9:05 pm
Man. What happened to vice?
A fucking child could get more amusing content out of this topic.
Its almost as if we all have different opinions or some shit! Crazy! Get over yourself and tell me something I didn’t know.
February 16th, 2009
10:33 am
This is a pathetic and badly researched piece. Flashmobs were around for a long time before they were appropriated by T-mobile for advertising purposes. Mobile clubbing was copied, not invented, by their ad.
Leave the youngsters alone; as if you weren’t looking for a laf when you were that age. Or maybe you were one of those who never got invited to stuff and stood there making snide remarks out of sheer resentment. What a shame you never grew out of it.
Being mean is not cool.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
February 16th, 2009
1:40 pm
i’ve met the man in the street… and he’s a cunt.
February 16th, 2009
2:08 pm
it serves you right for living in east London fuckers
February 16th, 2009
2:23 pm
[...] they could be catching criminals. Sometimes these railway station events attract hundreds of people causing huge inconvenience to people who actually want to catch a train. Other times they attract more police than [...]
February 17th, 2009
3:17 pm
this destroys the meaning of flashmob… how you can call this a flashmob is unbelievable
February 20th, 2009
10:32 pm
If it was all about protesting people’s rights to public spaces then i see no problem.
but they were re-creating an advert.
how silly is that, in order for the youth of today to be radical and rage agaisnt the system they needed the inspiration of t-mobile and the medium of facebook to conduct this event.
they are just a pawn in the game.
February 25th, 2009
2:58 pm
Stephen Parker thinks they’re all fuckers too. Yeah fuckers!!!!!
February 26th, 2009
7:11 pm
Someones being a tad bitter and old, if the kids aren’t stabbing each other who are we the over 25 age bracket to complain.
March 8th, 2009
1:50 am
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November 20th, 2009
6:12 pm
maybe once upon a time this was cool, but the facebook generation is so fickle that this just becomes annoying very quickly. Just another band wagon for everyone to jump on.