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As Jake Shane struggled to remember one of his outfits from Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour to answer a moderator’s question, a fan in Goldstein Auditorium came to the rescue and yelled “A YANKEE JERSEY.” He immediately responded to the audience and yelled “PERIOD” to the fan.

“I think he’s a very personable person, very extroverted, very fun person,” senior Caitlin Higgins said. “So seeing that brought to life, in real life not just through my phone on TikTok, it’d be really exciting to watch.”

Shane is a TikToker with over 2.6 million followers on his account @octopusslover8. University Union held a soldout show entitled “A Conversation With Jake Shane” on Friday filled with “nyming” (acroynyming), obsessions over Taylor Swift and twirling of plush octopuses. Shane even announced his new podcast coming out next year called “therapuss,” which will be more fun therapy, he said.

@octopusslover8 comes from a joke between Shane and his roommates. They used to send each other different pictures of octopuses and call each one “puss,” Shane said. The puss has become a symbol of his brand with merch of octopi and TikToks of “Pussy PSAs.” UU hand-stuffed 500 purple pusses, available to the first 500 audience members.

Many of Shane’s TikTok ideas stem from his roommates, whom he met when he attended the University of Southern California. They can usually be heard in the background, and many bits will stem from them.

Shane’s famous “nyming,” which can be found on his merch, stemmed from one of his roommates, he said. “Nyming” is when he takes a phrase and changes it into an acronym like “ISH” or “I’m so hungry.”

“Julie was really sick one weekend, and she kept saying, like, ‘I’m SFS,’ which is ‘so f**king sick,’” Shane said. “Then, we just all started doing it and then they just started getting funny and now we ‘nym’ all the time.”

Shane started blowing up, his first one with over 260,000 likes, doing skits of different historical events, Allie D’Angelo the UU host said. D’Angelo asked if he did any research before making a skit.

“Of course not,” Shane said.

Shane said his process is to get high and find a skit. The skits range from George Washington denying chopping down the cherry tree or Katniss Everdeen doing a “get ready with me” before the reaping in “The Hunger Games.”

“I smoke and then I get comfortable and then I GTG which is ‘go through comments,’” he said using his famous “nyming.”

Shane rarely sets up for his famous skits. The most he does is throw a wig on, he said.

Freshman Keely Bova convinced her friends to get in line at 5 p.m. on Friday because how much she enjoys Shane’s TikToks. Other audience members saw on social media that people were already in line and rushed to claim their spot, especially with the 500 pusses on the line, freshman Sophie Fleischer said.

Higgins even changed her dinner plans to get takeout to claim a spot in line. Higgins and her friends ate together on the floor of the Schine Student Center lobby.

Viewers put their plush octopus on their heads. Audience members flocked to Schine Student Center early to wait in line just to get their hands on one of the 500 stuffed animals.
Cassandra Roshu | Photo Editor

Shane was recently named one of Social Media’s Forbes 30 under 30. However, he was also one of People’s Sexiest Swifties.

“That was like actually crazier than Forbes,” Shane said. “That was like the best moment of my life.”

Shane went to four Eras Tour shows and shared he’ll be going to one more in Tokyo. Another TikTok that helped him gain his following was a video of him reacting to Taylor Swift’s “All Too Well (10 minute version).” He regularly shares videos about Swift to connect with his followers and even got a like from Swift herself for his reaction, Shane said.

D’Angelo asked if Shane thought Swift was going to release a new album soon. He does not think so because he thinks she likes to have her re-release albums have time to shine, and “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” just came out, Shane said.

“Oh my god, I sound like a crazy person,” Shane said.

Recently, Shane has been on a “Hunger Games kick” and has been posting different TikToks from Katiness Everdeen’s perspective. Sophomore Katie Metis was excited to get to know him better because she loves all the new things he’s been experiencing in the spotlight, including new jokes he posts. Metis, while sporting his “JACKPUSS” merch, believes they’d be best friends and anticipated “A Conversation with Jake Shane” since it was announced.

Shane was surprised people wanted to come to see him. He worried an audience wouldn’t fill Goldstein Auditorium, but they did.

“I was like no but they’re actually not gonna come,” Shane said. “It’s gonna freak me out. Make (the venue) smaller and they were like, it’s fine.”

Published on December 2, 2023 at 3:17 pm

Contact Rosina: rlboehm@syr.edu