Dogs
Bo and Sunny, the dogs of former President Barack Obama who have been featured on the "We Rate Dogs" Twitter account, lounge on the White House lawn, Washington, D.C., Aug. 19, 2013. Handout via Reuters

Cats, they say, are the unofficial mascot on the internet — or at least, that’s what’s been claimed by the likes of ThoughtCatalog and BuzzFeed. But dogs, oft-ignored on the World Wide Web, have begun to assert their place online, too. In fact, the person behind one Twitter account with an unassuming handle (@dog_rates) but a large following (1.45 million followers) announced Thursday “We Rate Dogs” will be published in book form in October.

The person behind the account is Matt Nelson, a college student at Campbell University in North Carolina. The idea behind the account, which began in November 2015, is quite simple: People send Nelson photos of dogs, and Nelson rates them. He very rarely gives the dogs scores below 10/10, and that gimmick — along with the adorable photos of puppies, and G-rated descriptions of “h*cking” cute "doggos" — has resulted in a following that could be described as cult-like if it didn't catch on so rapidly. One joke, an exchange with a Twitter user named Brant, became so popular that it became merchandise.

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The idea of a Twitter account landing a book deal might seem strange to some, but Nelson’s Twitter account isn’t the first to do so.

Jonathan Sun, the man behind the @jomnysun Twitter account, announced in December his tweets would be turned into book deal. Written entirely in lowercase letters, and replete with misspelled words and incomplete clauses, Sun’s tweets are a sort of surrealist poetry. They’re also often strangely uplifting: “repeat: when ppl do good in the world it doesnt take from my ability to do good. it doesnt mean i can do good less. the world expands,” he tweeted in February.

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And there are more Twitter-account-to-book deals, too. “Sh*t My Dad Says,” published in 2010, is a collection of philosophical musings from author Justin Halpern’s dad ("The worst thing you can be is a liar. . . . Okay, fine, yes, the worst thing you can be is a Nazi, but then number two is liar. Nazi one, liar two."). And “Sh*t Girls Say” — a book with a similar name, although very different quotes — came out in 2012.

Here are some of the most adorable tweets from We Rate Dogs:

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