The British Film Institute has inducted the classic Flash animation Badger Badger (officially titled “Badgers”) by British animator Mr Weebl into the BFI National Archive. The National Archive preserves films meeting at least one of the following criteria:
- Aesthetic (artistic excellence)
- Historical (film history / cultural record)
- Impact (cultural impact)
- Technical (technical innovation)
- Completion (collection enhancement)
The cultural impact of Badger Badger on animation on the web is hard to overstate. Indeed, I mentioned it as a fond memory in my recent short essay about the state of the Internet, “The best is over”.
I am glad that the BFI is taking seriously the effort to preserve the hits of the early viral Web, such as Badger Badger and videos like it. Somebody has to preserve the Internet from before it became content, and an animation of dancing badgers is as good a place to start as any.