Christopher "Moot" Poole, the 26-year-old founder of the influential, controversial, and anonymous message board 4chan, announced Wednesday that he would be stepping down as the site's administrator.
In a blog post on the site titled "The Next Chapter," Poole wrote that he's spent the last two years working to make sure 4chan could exist without him.
Poole also wrote that from a user perspective, nothing about the site will change. Poole said he'll need time to reflect on the experience of running 4chan over the last decade.
I'll need time away to decompress and reflect, but I look forward to one day returning to 4chan as its Admin Emeritus or just another Anonymous, and also writing more about my experience running 4chan on my personal blog. The journey has been marked by highs and lows, surprises and disappointments, but ultimately immense satisfaction. I'm humbled to have had the privilege of both founding and presiding over what is easily one of the greatest communities to ever grace the Web. It was truly an honor to serve as 4chan's founding administrator, and I look forward to seeing what the next decade holds for the site.
4chan has remained a notorious site over the years, playing a pivotal role in the 2014 "Fappening" celebrity photo hacking scandal. And just last week, it made headlines for harassing a used car dealership caught on camera under-tipping a delivery guy.
In 2011, Poole attempted to create a follow-up to 4chan called The Canvas Network, but it ultimately failed.
Last week, Poole wrote about the dissolution of Canvas, explaining that he donated the remaining $40,000 the startup had in capital to charity.
In the 11 years that Poole ran the site, 4chan generated 42 billion pageviews.
Eleven and a half years of @4chan, in numbers: