About

Nobody's Perf- is an interruptive catchphrase used to describe a subject of interest, such as a fictional character or a celebrity, or an object, as an exemplification of perfection. The phrase, which is typically cut off mid-sentence for dramatic effect, has become quite popular among various fandom communities on Tumblr in early 2010s.

Origin

The earliest use of the phrase, specifically in the context of online fandom, can be traced to a forum discussion thread on the RuneScape fan community site Runelocus^[8] on July 3rd, 2011. The phrase was used by forum member Smudge to sarcastically comment on video of a young girl dancing. On September 18th, 2011, Tumblr user ohmytardis^[1] featured the phrase in a text post to highlight Scottish actor David Tennant (Doctor Who) as the archetype of male actors, the earliest known instance of the meme posted to the microblogging site.

Spread

At the early onset of the meme on Tumblr, the catchphrase had been usually iterated in the form of text (i.e., nobody's perf- / david tennant), before it took on the multimedia format with a photoset uploaded by Tumblr user MicrowaveableMorgan^[2] on October 14th. Throughout 2011, the photo sets continued to proliferate on Tumblr through several tags, including nobody's perf^[3], nobodys perf^[4] and nobody's perfect.^[5] In 2011, there were more than four unique instances of "nobody's perf-" posts that accrued at least 1,000 notes including brochumaslany's Mean Girls post^[9], melthedestroyer's text post^[10], themysteriousfox's post^[11] collecting other interrupter phrases, and conquerorwurm's CandleJack's post^[12]. In 2012, there were more than four unique instances of "nobody's perf-" posts that accrued at least 1,000 notes including missvoltairine's sarcastic post^[13] on white dudes, theechelonbrain multi-actor post^[14], im-better-0ff-this-way's text post^[15], and heylittlebabeyourechanging's rock star post^[16]. In 2013, there were more than three unique instances of "nobody's perf-" posts that accrued at least 100 notes including olitz4ever's actor Tony Goldwyn's post^[18], thecracksinmyvessel's anime post^[19], and fuckyeahjinkxmonsoon's post^[20] on the gay television channel LOGO.

Notable Examples

Derivatives

Other phrase combinations that also indicate perfection have also become popular on Tumblr, including perfect bands don't exi-^[6] and perfect couples don't exi-.^[7]

Search Interest

External References