From the above article.

[quote]The origins of Kiwi Farms lie, as you might expect, on 4chan. In late 2007, Sonichu, a homemade comic-book series mixing the Sonic and Pokémon franchises, came to the attention of the anarchic, anonymous message board’s video-games community, /v/. Sonichu was the work of a self-described “artist, gamer and creative type” named Christine Weston Chandler — later dubbed, using the honorific attached to anyone unfortunate enough to come to the attention of 4chan, “Chris-chan.”

[quote]Sonichu provided an unwittingly revealing look into Chandler’s life and fantasy world. Users on /v/ responded by mocking the art and its creator immediately. To them, Chandler was asking for harassment by putting the comics online. Within days of “discovering” Chris-chan, a profile about her was posted on Encyclopedia Dramatica, the wiki of record for 4chan and similar communities. After pleading with ED’s admins to remove the page, Chandler started vandalizing it, establishing an abuse/reaction cycle in which the reward for provoking her was more fodder for the mob.

[quote]Kiwi Farms (whose name wasn’t coined until 2014) grew out of the groups who harassed Chris-chan in 2007 — but it’s obsessed with Chris-chan in way the original groups no longer are, and as a result its parent communities hold KF in (mostly mutual) disdain. KF’s first wiki, “the CWCki,” was created because users felt Chandler’s page on Encyclopedia Dramatica wasn’t detailed or accurate enough. Since 2008, every drawing, video blog, tweet, Facebook post, eBay listing, Etsy item, and PSN purchase Chandler makes has been archived on the CWCki and exhaustively discussed on the forums. During this time, various accounts of hers have been hacked, and the leaked data hosted on the CWCki. A whole coterie of KF members have also pretended to be Chandler’s friends and romantic partners in order to con Chandler into giving them more embarrassing content (photos, videos, drawings, etc.), which are then used to torment her. In the most extreme instance of this, they goaded a 13-year-old boy into masquerading as a 19-year-old girl in order to have phone sex with Chandler (and record it, of course).

[quote]It doesn’t just stay online, either. KFers show up in real life to document Chris-chan’s court appearances, to photograph the Chandlers’ residence from the street, or to surreptitiously photograph Chandler herself in public places. Over the course of eight years, they’ve contacted Chandler, her pastor, and her parents, posing as journalists, former classmates, psychiatrists, potential business partners, and others, in the hopes these ruses yield more confidential info. Twice, female KFers arranged real-life dates with Chandler, both of whom used fake names and wore wires to record these outings. Packages and letters are routinely sent to Chandler’s residence, many of which contain obscene materials designed to unsettle the recipients. In one instance, someone sent prostitutes to visit Chandler’s house, then called the family to taunt them about it.