Sometimes a habit becomes a tradition, and then everyone venerates or denigrates it as they see fit. Once this happens the only rational thing for a human being to do is to abandon whatever the fuss is being made about. Just concentrate on increasing the distance between yourself and that thing. You don't talk about it, you don't think about it, and most importantly, if you do it, you don't make a big deal about it.
Carbonated beverages are probably the third dumbest consumer beverage, coming in after bottled water and slightly behind energy drinks. When it comes to poisoning yourself I tend to think like the Greeks: hemlock or bust. Why stretch the suffering out over years and why pretend it doesn't harm you? What's wrong with alcoholism? Why do some people avoid the bottle but fall for the Full Throttle?
Fortunately I'm not here to answer those questions. Shit I barely even understand them, or the complex consumer economics research that goes into creating them. However we all know that the people who invented bottled water became incredibly rich shortly after the year 2000, and the people who mass marketed energy drinks became rich shortly thereafter. (These data for North American markets only). The grandfather product that all these imitators were imitating was the venerable Coca Cola, brand extraordinaire!
While cigarettes and booze were repeatedly demonized throughout the 1900s, Coca Cola took some mild flak for involving cocaine in their recipe. Profit flowed as freely as the drink flowed out of the iconic bottle's neck. Times were great. An hundred years later and things are still fantastic. Coke managed to survive the 80s, managed to survive all competition, and even managed to survive moralism and nutrito-facism. There is no stopping Coke, or any soft drink, and I think that's wrong.
All they do is sell you poison. Sugar liquor, by any other name, with ingredients you wouldn't throw on your worst enemy. Pepsi, Coke, independent manufacturers. When sugar was demonized in the 80s they all switched to carcinogenic sweeteners that people still drink and that have not been banned. You know when drinking gets serious? It gets serious when you mix white rum and Diet Coke, because all you have to do is add a tylenol to nuke your liver for good. When you recover, just blame the alcohol.
4/28/11
RIP Perfect Couples... You Were Just Getting Good
I like to bring up the NBC series 100 Questions, because it used to air after Community – the disconnect from a nimble, funny show to a clunker with a laugh track was so insane that it used to make tears well up in my eyes. Going from Community to 100 Questions (with only one commercial break in-between) was like finding yourself passive and bored with the rebound relationship after a short and incredible but ill-fated relationship with someone you genuinely liked and understood.
In September 2010, with Community safely renewed and airing its second season, NBC seemed to throw the same type of curve-ball at me. By this time I knew exactly the flavor of heartache to expect. Perfect Couples was a huge stinker. Generic, had a laugh track, was about three yuppie couples. I turned the TV off in disgust, "They're going to shit-can that show so hard all the actors will need neck-braces."
Between September 2010 and February 2011 Perfect Couples became a decent show to watch. It was a pleasant surprise. Apparently they had learned from their errors and made improvements. The cast was alright, and even though the show was still on the generic side, it actually had some funny moments. Of course the show was shit-canned recently and replaced by a bizarre and twisted wreck that nobody loved. I was right, but at what price?
I feel sorry for NBC. Perfect Couples could've been one of those shows that ends up being better than what it copies. Friends wasn't as good as nostalgia leads you to believe. It was, quite often, an arid wasteland of puerile yuppie pretensions and sexual tension (which really sold the show). With Perfect Couples the relationship units were already established, so there was less tension, but then again, one of them contained Olivia Munn. The rest of the cast was also good, but everyone is waiting to see if Olivia Munn is going to end up anywhere other than the one-a-month reports for Jon Stewart.
There's not much more to say. I can't find the show anywhere and I don't want to look around for it. If it was still on TV I might've watched it another two or three times in my life, and it probably would've amused me. It just worries me that networks don't have the patience to try out many shows beyond the first season, and that their analysts apparently don't give breathing room for increased performance.
Remember Cheers? Cheers was not at first a smash hit, but TV afficionadoes still refer to it like it's a god. But I guess Cheers was a 'critical success'... who holds those keys, anyway?
In September 2010, with Community safely renewed and airing its second season, NBC seemed to throw the same type of curve-ball at me. By this time I knew exactly the flavor of heartache to expect. Perfect Couples was a huge stinker. Generic, had a laugh track, was about three yuppie couples. I turned the TV off in disgust, "They're going to shit-can that show so hard all the actors will need neck-braces."
Between September 2010 and February 2011 Perfect Couples became a decent show to watch. It was a pleasant surprise. Apparently they had learned from their errors and made improvements. The cast was alright, and even though the show was still on the generic side, it actually had some funny moments. Of course the show was shit-canned recently and replaced by a bizarre and twisted wreck that nobody loved. I was right, but at what price?
I feel sorry for NBC. Perfect Couples could've been one of those shows that ends up being better than what it copies. Friends wasn't as good as nostalgia leads you to believe. It was, quite often, an arid wasteland of puerile yuppie pretensions and sexual tension (which really sold the show). With Perfect Couples the relationship units were already established, so there was less tension, but then again, one of them contained Olivia Munn. The rest of the cast was also good, but everyone is waiting to see if Olivia Munn is going to end up anywhere other than the one-a-month reports for Jon Stewart.
There's not much more to say. I can't find the show anywhere and I don't want to look around for it. If it was still on TV I might've watched it another two or three times in my life, and it probably would've amused me. It just worries me that networks don't have the patience to try out many shows beyond the first season, and that their analysts apparently don't give breathing room for increased performance.
Remember Cheers? Cheers was not at first a smash hit, but TV afficionadoes still refer to it like it's a god. But I guess Cheers was a 'critical success'... who holds those keys, anyway?
Yeah Yeah...
For a minute or two yesterday it was almost possible to believe that Political Maverick Jack Layton was going to become a prime minister. There was this sense of optimism and energy, almost limitless, that something dynamic was finally going to happen in Canadian politics. Certain senior mandarins in parliament were already crying and cracking open priceless bottles of brandy.
Desperate operators roamed the streets of Canada in a last-ditch attempt to rustle up support for Harper and Ignatieff, each of whom were in their 'situation rooms' taking shots of maple syrup and shouting into microphones phrases such as (but not limited to): "Show me the votes!", "This isn't politics; it's a slaughter!", and my favorite of all time: "There's no time for the harmonium, just get the fuck out of Bridle Path!" Who even knows who they were talking to, but my guess is Prince.
Yes it sounded like the Liberals and Conservatives, after decades of dual-monopoly stranglehold over the Canadian Voter, were finally about to get a solid drumming for their misbehavior. Jack Layton had the image, had the poll numbers, had even half an ear among Quebeckers under the age of 35, had young voters countrywide, and just one final precipice to climb: the hearts and minds of Canada's most stubborn voters: knee-jerk Conservatives and habitual Liberals.
Desperate operators roamed the streets of Canada in a last-ditch attempt to rustle up support for Harper and Ignatieff, each of whom were in their 'situation rooms' taking shots of maple syrup and shouting into microphones phrases such as (but not limited to): "Show me the votes!", "This isn't politics; it's a slaughter!", and my favorite of all time: "There's no time for the harmonium, just get the fuck out of Bridle Path!" Who even knows who they were talking to, but my guess is Prince.
Yes it sounded like the Liberals and Conservatives, after decades of dual-monopoly stranglehold over the Canadian Voter, were finally about to get a solid drumming for their misbehavior. Jack Layton had the image, had the poll numbers, had even half an ear among Quebeckers under the age of 35, had young voters countrywide, and just one final precipice to climb: the hearts and minds of Canada's most stubborn voters: knee-jerk Conservatives and habitual Liberals.
4/25/11
User Comment Rodeo: Award Show the First
I've been sleeping on User Comment Rodeo posts lately because I got very, very tired of reading them and also because I haven't seen a lot of good or juicy ones,. but mostly I've been too lazy to make another User Comment Rodeo post and there have been other interesting things to talk about. Prefab Sprout and the 80s pop debacle, for instance. That is some of my best blogging, right there. Timely, informative, helpful, and could even save you if you get cornered by a pack of label-wary musicoholics.
So I was browsing the CBC news website, as usual, and found a rather well-written user comment with an actual structure (!) and some focus, plus it was written interestingly. It was in response to a story about oil prices or oil politics or something usually bitched about relentlessly but which is of considerable significance. Rarely do I find a level-headed, nonpartisan comment on CBC. If you read the old User Comment Rodeo posts, you can see a few descriptions of the archetypal comment posters. The rarest thing of all is that I found this post before anybody had voted for it, so it was in an ineffable state where nobody is opining or telling you what to think about the comment.
For those reasons and more I consider the following user comment worthy of an honour. The first User Comment Rodeo award of excellence, given only to comments of outstanding value, insight, and entertainment. I doubt I will go into ecstatics, but to be safe I will show the post before I discuss it:
Look at that beautiful 'zero' rating. Untouched, unsullied by idiots, fresh from the poster. And what a post. Goddamn Latin phrase indicating which group is unpleasant? Goddamn Latin phrase indicating the entire 'user comment' mentality and existence, man! But we can't be too surprised that intelligent or educated people use the CBC website.
Note the non-partisan appraisal of the situation. Harper is not at fault for oil prices. Goddamn right he isn't. If he had that much control all Canadians would be nerve-stapled cyborgs by now, and pulling him around on a sleigh. See the awesome dismissal of Harper, somewhat partisan, but seemingly more personal. That is beautiful commentary right there. If this was putting down a troll it would be a true masterpiece.
But this post doesn't need to put down trolls, because the Latin opening already takes care of the entire internet's population of trolls. Look at that unerring perspective, that perfect disclosure of chemical ignorance and naivete: the punctuation, grammar, and structure. Even the odd statistical fact is great. This user comment is like Vonnegut coming down from the heavens and blessing the illiterate and subliterate with pure bleak satire they'll never understand.
Sure there are a few misspellings. Sure the perspective is perhaps even a little too truthful for anybody who's grown up on lies and self-entitlement. Sure the metaphor is upper-brow and probably flawed, and even a little offensive to Monster Truck Enthusiasts... but it's true. That's good imagery even though it doesn't make one bit of sense. I value that kind of honesty that does not pick sides, does not preach, but rather says a thing straight up as it is.
4/24/11
A Word or a Few Hundred of Thanks
I have no idea what it's like to be the number one comedic internet writer in America. I'm sure it involves a lot of tedious days being angry at the hacks who are better known than you, and then feeling justified anyway, because better known hacks are not internet celebrities of the same caliber as you.
Seanbaby recently wrote his 101st article at Cracked.com and it is a greatest-hits collection that must be read to be believed. 80% of those articles are among the funniest available on the searchable internet. Anybody who thinks that he is played out and dull needs to read my blog more, or simply purchase a sense of humor. Now this article isn't some lazy clip show where Seanbaby talks about what he's done and smiles gently at the memories. It's a rather biting, funny clip show where he talks about reactions to the things he's done and how he managed to conjure them out of weeks of apathy and modern loving.
This article reminded me of a few classic laughs and of why I consider myself an admirer of Seanbaby's technique. He trumps the Maddoxes and Tucker Maxes of yesteryear because his bitterness is simply played down in favor of things that are funny. He plays bitterness properly, and not always transparently. This is why he is a humorist and not a 'personality' - although he seems to have personality to spare. Plus he is not so egotistic, less of an exhibitionist and finally as a truly creative writer/humorist he does not ring the same old jokes in a different order. Well he rings the same old jokes, but they ring true. That's the best part.
In something like 10 years Seanbaby has recycled more useful novel jokes than most people invent in a lifetime. And his one-liners are as sharp as ever. And he's even truthful about a lot of things, which is alright, because I am damn sick of empty, exhibitionist narcissism on the internet. If you're going to write on the internet, you should try a little content that doesn't revolve around self-worship. See Seanbaby for solid examples. The ego is often as ugly as the stupidity it worships.
Anyways I just wanted to add my congratulations without resorting to a fawning post over at Cracked.com's comment sections. As an impartial observer of the internet I can only applaud his efforts to make the world a little less miserable and stupid. As an aspiring humourist/writer I get a sense of hope that the art isn't dying. It's always dying, of course, but at least it goes on living all the same.
Sometimes it's humbling to see somebody in the prime of their career, but when they deserve it, you gotta just hand it to them. Even Seanbaby's dumb retrospective article is considerably more amusing than anything I've read on the internet all week. In fact it isn't even dumb. It's smart, comprehensive, well-written, and will make lots of people laugh. In this shit era, that warrants congratulations.
Oh and is it just me or does Eukanuba Nosferatu sound like a done deal? Dog shows and vampiric mass murder are woefully under-examined in film.
Seanbaby recently wrote his 101st article at Cracked.com and it is a greatest-hits collection that must be read to be believed. 80% of those articles are among the funniest available on the searchable internet. Anybody who thinks that he is played out and dull needs to read my blog more, or simply purchase a sense of humor. Now this article isn't some lazy clip show where Seanbaby talks about what he's done and smiles gently at the memories. It's a rather biting, funny clip show where he talks about reactions to the things he's done and how he managed to conjure them out of weeks of apathy and modern loving.
This article reminded me of a few classic laughs and of why I consider myself an admirer of Seanbaby's technique. He trumps the Maddoxes and Tucker Maxes of yesteryear because his bitterness is simply played down in favor of things that are funny. He plays bitterness properly, and not always transparently. This is why he is a humorist and not a 'personality' - although he seems to have personality to spare. Plus he is not so egotistic, less of an exhibitionist and finally as a truly creative writer/humorist he does not ring the same old jokes in a different order. Well he rings the same old jokes, but they ring true. That's the best part.
In something like 10 years Seanbaby has recycled more useful novel jokes than most people invent in a lifetime. And his one-liners are as sharp as ever. And he's even truthful about a lot of things, which is alright, because I am damn sick of empty, exhibitionist narcissism on the internet. If you're going to write on the internet, you should try a little content that doesn't revolve around self-worship. See Seanbaby for solid examples. The ego is often as ugly as the stupidity it worships.
Anyways I just wanted to add my congratulations without resorting to a fawning post over at Cracked.com's comment sections. As an impartial observer of the internet I can only applaud his efforts to make the world a little less miserable and stupid. As an aspiring humourist/writer I get a sense of hope that the art isn't dying. It's always dying, of course, but at least it goes on living all the same.
Sometimes it's humbling to see somebody in the prime of their career, but when they deserve it, you gotta just hand it to them. Even Seanbaby's dumb retrospective article is considerably more amusing than anything I've read on the internet all week. In fact it isn't even dumb. It's smart, comprehensive, well-written, and will make lots of people laugh. In this shit era, that warrants congratulations.
Oh and is it just me or does Eukanuba Nosferatu sound like a done deal? Dog shows and vampiric mass murder are woefully under-examined in film.
4/23/11
Prefab Sprout, The Case Of
Musical consumerism is deadly business. I can think of little else these days. I see reality TV shows and some I watch eagerly and there is a moment when I think I can blog about them. Later I act on that impulse to my discredit. Even a reality television show perpetuates musical consumerism in some small way, funding hacks and their inane side-projects for one possible example. I am confident the world would be a worse place without professional musicians. There is really no choice, and therefore the best choice is pretending that you don't have a choice. Hence Prefab Sprout, who are so intelligent as to be tunefully respectful of your lack of choice.
When at least one part of a song is done compellingly it is interesting at least. Novelty of course is important, but not always crucial. Authenticity is severely hyped at times, and there's almost no point in wanting to win that fight – it must be regarded as unessential, because even good songs get played out, and you've got to replace them with some tune or lyric that sticks in your mind. Obviously a good mix of tune and lyric are necessary, and which is more important is subjective if not rhetorical.
When at least one part of a song is done compellingly it is interesting at least. Novelty of course is important, but not always crucial. Authenticity is severely hyped at times, and there's almost no point in wanting to win that fight – it must be regarded as unessential, because even good songs get played out, and you've got to replace them with some tune or lyric that sticks in your mind. Obviously a good mix of tune and lyric are necessary, and which is more important is subjective if not rhetorical.
4/22/11
4/20/11
One Year Later
The sheen which developed on the waters of the Gulf of Mexico is nothing compared to the one Charlie Sheen, recent activist for mental illness, has managed to create for himself lately. Obviously the timing is off. Charlie Sheen is already in BP Oil Spill Month 5 mode, when people just sort of shrugged and the damage control had shut everyone up about talking about anything. The two situations are similar in this way.
Charlie Sheen has spilled all over pop culture while his true problems lurked under the surface of the water, disrupted by dispersants, and this has gone on for years. Then suddenly we see the pathological outbreak in a series of almost unbelievable news stories – crashed cars, threatened ex wives, domestic allegations, alleged use of substances – and it is capitalized on.
With BP and other corporate hijackers of democracy and ecology, we see the pathological behavior and wait until the moment of infamy, and then let them get away with it (since we are disenfranchised, our outrage counts for nothing anyway). One year later and the outcry is buried in new outcries. No anti-worldrapists got offended when plutocracy and capitalism eroded another massive chunk of the world. Not even Charlie had it so easy.
If only an oil spill were as profitable and easy to manage as a fame spill.
Charlie Sheen has spilled all over pop culture while his true problems lurked under the surface of the water, disrupted by dispersants, and this has gone on for years. Then suddenly we see the pathological outbreak in a series of almost unbelievable news stories – crashed cars, threatened ex wives, domestic allegations, alleged use of substances – and it is capitalized on.
With BP and other corporate hijackers of democracy and ecology, we see the pathological behavior and wait until the moment of infamy, and then let them get away with it (since we are disenfranchised, our outrage counts for nothing anyway). One year later and the outcry is buried in new outcries. No anti-worldrapists got offended when plutocracy and capitalism eroded another massive chunk of the world. Not even Charlie had it so easy.
If only an oil spill were as profitable and easy to manage as a fame spill.
4/18/11
So You Want to Listen to Some 80s Pop?
Pop music in the nineteen-eighties is like pop music in general: a minefield. You no doubt know this, but you see that what with half your friends buying turntables in the last eighteen months, and other half still listening to niche genres you don't fully understand, and the third half has an habit of listening to unbearable racket and weak shit. In other words you are burdened by the fact that you enjoy music snobbishness and general one-upmanship. That kind of skullduggery is going to get you pwned, and the secret weapon, despite recent and nauseating 80s worship, is 80s pop. In an excruciating write-up, I will suggest some 80s pop cards you can hide up your album sleeves.
It is a double-edged sword of course. If you are looking for musical weapons, you're already clearly a music bastard. People no doubt gather just to whisper in awed tones about your musical unorthodoxies and iconoclastic statements. I like to imagine that I am impartial. There was a diseased time when I cared a little too much about what I listened to, and felt sharply any criticism of my musical taste. Then I realized it was all a consumerist defense reflex and let it go. Mostly. You never come all the way back from musical snobbery.
It is a double-edged sword of course. If you are looking for musical weapons, you're already clearly a music bastard. People no doubt gather just to whisper in awed tones about your musical unorthodoxies and iconoclastic statements. I like to imagine that I am impartial. There was a diseased time when I cared a little too much about what I listened to, and felt sharply any criticism of my musical taste. Then I realized it was all a consumerist defense reflex and let it go. Mostly. You never come all the way back from musical snobbery.
4/15/11
YouTube Hates....
...any attempt at a serious erection. I'm not going to write a disclaimer. Let's get to this article. Do you like to laugh and cry uncontrollably when you masturbate? Are there not enough low points in your life? YouTube's got your back, son.
I've been lulled into watching a video playlist that has included incomprehensible low points of male fixation. By this I mean video game females, the unparalleled nadir of modern sexualization. There are enough points of contention for research, and if anything the inventiveness of cyber hussies is something... impressive. And I mean impressive in the way that any delusion, nurtured enough, becomes impressive - the sort of impressed where you feel happy to merely be an onlooker, but there's that knowledge that will never be erased from your mind or anybody else's.
In other words, if you spend enough time looking into the smut abyss... you will see lowest points. The nadirs. This is no byssus moment (internet high-five!) but this is the moment where you have to accept without going mad the fact that the human race is so goddamn weak and dissipated that lonely men don't drown themselves in alcohol and self-loathing and outrageous one-liners and hopeless chases or gun clubs anymore, and instead form constructive sexual fantasies including (but not limited to) inanimate objects, cartoon characters, animals, humans posing as animals, video game 'babes', stuffed animals, and probably at least four hundred other paraphilias. Leave it to YouTube to know what's up. Let's leave downright criminal things out of this and still be depressed. I feel I had to post this analysis. I know it'll be incoherent.
Now I was just looking casually for some smut, and the playlist started out innocently enough. French commercials for dreamcasts featuring models spraying water on each other. Brasilian butt-model videos, and generally just videos of very beautiful women in very artificial scenarios. Things involving real, paid, adults, nothing particularly schlocky except for a 'lesbian kiss' or two for the deluded, credulous homophobes with the stunted minds.
The video playlist goes downhill right around the time it uses models from the Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball. Beach Volleyball videos are only just being understood by scientists, and this sport is still being played by actual women, so it's not like anybody really needed a video game about it. Well that's Japan, right?
Reality check. Japan has several thousand words for 'uncanny depressing adolescent fantasy' and about three hundred for 'creepy pitiful fixation'. Japan knows the dice are loaded. Just ask the octopus and the fisherman's wife. Is it a parable? Is it prophetic? What.
I don't even care. It's too tragic. I'm sorry, Japan. Moving on, there are videos about teen models. So obviously the video playlist is depressing here, because, hey, immaturity. I'm not kidding myself, reader. This is an obscure blog post about what gets wanked to on about the last place a mature discerning adult human being would look for smut, and this blog post isn't even even half as depressing as the innocent video playlist it critiques. I'm not going to talk about the inherent sexism in all of the videos. Some of the videos actually celebra–
This entry in the field of depressingly amateur, terrible music, insane costume design, weird postures and facial expression smut is noteworthy, because it sees you and just laughs. Try to get hard to this? That one girl knows your dirty business and thinks you are lower than a worm. Look at her face – she isn't pretending to be overly serious, she just thinks you're a dork. Didn't you know YouTube hates you? It's got your back when you look for soft-core smut, but it is not playing the game seriously at all.
You better just find somebody, even if she's bigger than society tells you she should be, has bad skin and a shitty attitude and a decrepit materialist's soul. Then you learn your lessons from her and never, never allow yourself to fall this low again. You hear me? You work your way up. We can all be better, but you are making so many people feel better about themselves that you have to improve yourself before they feel any shame. Depressing man-children of the world, you have three years to get your shit together or nobody will ever take you seriously again.
First step. Do what the Italian woman in the video is telling you with her facial contortions to do, and delete your weak, tepid, depressing store of soft-core YouTube internet smut.
Here's a final link to the playlist, so you can witness the witless for yourself. Women, if you're going to watch this.... I know this rejoinder is weak, but you do some stupid god damn things too.
I've been lulled into watching a video playlist that has included incomprehensible low points of male fixation. By this I mean video game females, the unparalleled nadir of modern sexualization. There are enough points of contention for research, and if anything the inventiveness of cyber hussies is something... impressive. And I mean impressive in the way that any delusion, nurtured enough, becomes impressive - the sort of impressed where you feel happy to merely be an onlooker, but there's that knowledge that will never be erased from your mind or anybody else's.
In other words, if you spend enough time looking into the smut abyss... you will see lowest points. The nadirs. This is no byssus moment (internet high-five!) but this is the moment where you have to accept without going mad the fact that the human race is so goddamn weak and dissipated that lonely men don't drown themselves in alcohol and self-loathing and outrageous one-liners and hopeless chases or gun clubs anymore, and instead form constructive sexual fantasies including (but not limited to) inanimate objects, cartoon characters, animals, humans posing as animals, video game 'babes', stuffed animals, and probably at least four hundred other paraphilias. Leave it to YouTube to know what's up. Let's leave downright criminal things out of this and still be depressed. I feel I had to post this analysis. I know it'll be incoherent.
Now I was just looking casually for some smut, and the playlist started out innocently enough. French commercials for dreamcasts featuring models spraying water on each other. Brasilian butt-model videos, and generally just videos of very beautiful women in very artificial scenarios. Things involving real, paid, adults, nothing particularly schlocky except for a 'lesbian kiss' or two for the deluded, credulous homophobes with the stunted minds.
The video playlist goes downhill right around the time it uses models from the Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball. Beach Volleyball videos are only just being understood by scientists, and this sport is still being played by actual women, so it's not like anybody really needed a video game about it. Well that's Japan, right?
Reality check. Japan has several thousand words for 'uncanny depressing adolescent fantasy' and about three hundred for 'creepy pitiful fixation'. Japan knows the dice are loaded. Just ask the octopus and the fisherman's wife. Is it a parable? Is it prophetic? What.
I don't even care. It's too tragic. I'm sorry, Japan. Moving on, there are videos about teen models. So obviously the video playlist is depressing here, because, hey, immaturity. I'm not kidding myself, reader. This is an obscure blog post about what gets wanked to on about the last place a mature discerning adult human being would look for smut, and this blog post isn't even even half as depressing as the innocent video playlist it critiques. I'm not going to talk about the inherent sexism in all of the videos. Some of the videos actually celebra–
This entry in the field of depressingly amateur, terrible music, insane costume design, weird postures and facial expression smut is noteworthy, because it sees you and just laughs. Try to get hard to this? That one girl knows your dirty business and thinks you are lower than a worm. Look at her face – she isn't pretending to be overly serious, she just thinks you're a dork. Didn't you know YouTube hates you? It's got your back when you look for soft-core smut, but it is not playing the game seriously at all.
You better just find somebody, even if she's bigger than society tells you she should be, has bad skin and a shitty attitude and a decrepit materialist's soul. Then you learn your lessons from her and never, never allow yourself to fall this low again. You hear me? You work your way up. We can all be better, but you are making so many people feel better about themselves that you have to improve yourself before they feel any shame. Depressing man-children of the world, you have three years to get your shit together or nobody will ever take you seriously again.
First step. Do what the Italian woman in the video is telling you with her facial contortions to do, and delete your weak, tepid, depressing store of soft-core YouTube internet smut.
Here's a final link to the playlist, so you can witness the witless for yourself. Women, if you're going to watch this.... I know this rejoinder is weak, but you do some stupid god damn things too.
4/14/11
Portal Two
Well here's a new game that looks like it won't be a huge disappointment and an actual bonafide step forward for computer gaming. It doesn't matter if it's all hype, and the first game made the step forward, and this is just a polished, well-presented expansion pack building on it. We know it'll be decent. Episode Two of Half Life was worth the wait, after all. Portal 2 is going to make each and every gamer shit George Romero's pants. I was going to post an exciting YouTube comment I saw on an "Aperture Investment Opportunity #4", but YouTube Assassins have seen its worth and 'disappeared' it under more-liked comments than mean less.
The YouTube comment was noteworthy and to the tune of: "Who torrents a Valve game? They publish the only games worth playing anymore." That is not exaggeration via paraphrasing. It's true you should technically, if you are not lacking money for food or rent, pay for a Valve game. That is an unspoken rule of gaming. To break that rule is to become a troll, and risk the peculiar diseases of trolls.
But let's not lose sight of reality. We want this to happen properly, but in order to avoid heartbreak we should not get excessive. I'm going to let Valve tell you why Portal 2 is going to be worthwhile:
"Leave it to Valve to add a stock cartoon duo to a game that does not need them. And leave it to IGN to hype a game based on talking robots."
All I'll say is this: the robots, quoted out of context like this, give me a major Star Wars Prequel Trilogy vibe. Furthermore, who the hell is writing MSNBC's copy? It's funny to see Valve outplay two news sources with boilerplate, and that is why they are at the top of the establishment pile.
The YouTube comment was noteworthy and to the tune of: "Who torrents a Valve game? They publish the only games worth playing anymore." That is not exaggeration via paraphrasing. It's true you should technically, if you are not lacking money for food or rent, pay for a Valve game. That is an unspoken rule of gaming. To break that rule is to become a troll, and risk the peculiar diseases of trolls.
But let's not lose sight of reality. We want this to happen properly, but in order to avoid heartbreak we should not get excessive. I'm going to let Valve tell you why Portal 2 is going to be worthwhile:
All I'll say is this: the robots, quoted out of context like this, give me a major Star Wars Prequel Trilogy vibe. Furthermore, who the hell is writing MSNBC's copy? It's funny to see Valve outplay two news sources with boilerplate, and that is why they are at the top of the establishment pile.
4/12/11
The Debate is On!
Moderated by the unparalleled Steve Paikin, the Canadian debate is happening right now, and it is a little rude. I'll be quick about it so I can get back to watching: everything has been rough, nobody's been excessively rude, but there is some frank backbiting. Harper has been calm thus far, not even breaking a sweat as the other politicians condemn him soundly. Layton and Duceppe are definite secondaries as Ignatieff and Harper go at it. Let me paraphrase an injunction by Iggy: "This isn't bickering, Mr. Harper, this is debate. This is democracy."
Harper's weakness is foreign policy, the G20 is a definite black eye, but Ignatieff and Layton have a lot to prove, and Duceppe has to reach out to angophones. Where is Elizabeth May? The consortium vetoed her away. Is that fair play? I say, "No way." Shame, shame, shame.
Talks of coalitions, party brandings, closed door meetings, and all that other good stuff abound. Watch. Consider. Vote. Laugh, because some of the bickering is relatively petty.
Oh and the other big news is that humanity gained space 50 years ago, via Mr. Yuri Gagarin, cosmonaut, lately of Russia. Props to him and Russia for winning the first leg of the space race. (Lets also remember the many people who died, laboured, and sacrificed so that we could fire unreliable columns of machined steel out of Earth's atmosphere.)
Harper's weakness is foreign policy, the G20 is a definite black eye, but Ignatieff and Layton have a lot to prove, and Duceppe has to reach out to angophones. Where is Elizabeth May? The consortium vetoed her away. Is that fair play? I say, "No way." Shame, shame, shame.
Talks of coalitions, party brandings, closed door meetings, and all that other good stuff abound. Watch. Consider. Vote. Laugh, because some of the bickering is relatively petty.
Oh and the other big news is that humanity gained space 50 years ago, via Mr. Yuri Gagarin, cosmonaut, lately of Russia. Props to him and Russia for winning the first leg of the space race. (Lets also remember the many people who died, laboured, and sacrificed so that we could fire unreliable columns of machined steel out of Earth's atmosphere.)
Continuing Canadian Context
Go ahead and ask them now, some weeks later, what the political landscape of Canada is. It features nothing the Group of Seven might have done except for the map with its abstract political colours. Harper is blue, Ignatieff is red, Layton is orange and May is green. Let's ponder these colours. Green is the colour of life, Orange is the colour of Hollander royalty, red is the colour of life (but also Soviets and the dying Maple Leaf). Blue is the colour of disenchantment, also of life, and thirdly of lack of options.
Since the election has been announced there has been a deafening silence about the government deficit and the global depression (or recession if you're an optimist, or end of capitalism if you're an alarmist) and everyone opened volleys of 'family politics' and other types of sensationalism. In this country you do not play politics on weighty issues. Let me explain: families, in Canada, are doing well. Most families are in the easy-to-control low-to-mid middle class, relatively wealthy, perhaps overspending on credit, but doing well and employed, with an exception rate of less than 10%. This comes out to maybe 15,000 out-of-work families facing destitution or hard times, probably half that and maybe even less than that. There is no particular zone of concentration as in the '90s. The east coast probably can be weighted a little.
What makes this weak politics is that this group of people is easy to hoodwink. They think their fair taxes are monolithic tithes to the state. All an aspiring prime minister has to do is promise that these taxes will be reinvested into the middle class family background that pays the majority of them. It goes without saying that the poverty line does not discriminate between families and individuals, but families are more important. Help them, and help yourself to a political majority. This is all theory, but the parties have acted on it as if it were a rule.
So each of the big three politicians started election season by flogging family politics. Some friends of mine distilled it thusly: Conservatives meant a straight family with not even a gay child, while the Liberals and NDP would help any family. Never mind the family unit is the sort of ancient structure that is known to be able to survive all kinds of nonsense. Maybe in the 'post-industrial' era families are endangered or suddenly overwhelmed by the corporate world structure. Anyways, because in most countries all people come from families, they are the safest bet for politics, and that is why for weeks there were shameless attempts by each party to win this faction over.
This is how majority politics works. I have no idea how these aspiring governments are planning to fund their extravagant family subsidies, but it will probably include wasteful consulting, forms in triplicate, and a communications blackout. Nearsightedness is a curse on the populace, but a blessing to the politicians.
Since the election has been announced there has been a deafening silence about the government deficit and the global depression (or recession if you're an optimist, or end of capitalism if you're an alarmist) and everyone opened volleys of 'family politics' and other types of sensationalism. In this country you do not play politics on weighty issues. Let me explain: families, in Canada, are doing well. Most families are in the easy-to-control low-to-mid middle class, relatively wealthy, perhaps overspending on credit, but doing well and employed, with an exception rate of less than 10%. This comes out to maybe 15,000 out-of-work families facing destitution or hard times, probably half that and maybe even less than that. There is no particular zone of concentration as in the '90s. The east coast probably can be weighted a little.
What makes this weak politics is that this group of people is easy to hoodwink. They think their fair taxes are monolithic tithes to the state. All an aspiring prime minister has to do is promise that these taxes will be reinvested into the middle class family background that pays the majority of them. It goes without saying that the poverty line does not discriminate between families and individuals, but families are more important. Help them, and help yourself to a political majority. This is all theory, but the parties have acted on it as if it were a rule.
So each of the big three politicians started election season by flogging family politics. Some friends of mine distilled it thusly: Conservatives meant a straight family with not even a gay child, while the Liberals and NDP would help any family. Never mind the family unit is the sort of ancient structure that is known to be able to survive all kinds of nonsense. Maybe in the 'post-industrial' era families are endangered or suddenly overwhelmed by the corporate world structure. Anyways, because in most countries all people come from families, they are the safest bet for politics, and that is why for weeks there were shameless attempts by each party to win this faction over.
This is how majority politics works. I have no idea how these aspiring governments are planning to fund their extravagant family subsidies, but it will probably include wasteful consulting, forms in triplicate, and a communications blackout. Nearsightedness is a curse on the populace, but a blessing to the politicians.
4/8/11
State of the Internet
There was a glorious time when lots of TV series were freely available on YouTube, and there weren't just nonsense links. That era peaked maybe four years ago, at this point in time. Piracy is obviously still rampant, but when you could rustle up a genuine, entire series on, at last resort, a Chinese or French video site – happier days. Now you look around and your feet start kicking rebelliously at the leash. Unboxings, music videos, shout outs, 'viral videos': the entire goddamn world's PR department, is what this nonsense is. Oh look, some Minecraft videos, failblog videos, LPs, bro? Rants? No, YouTube is still of some definite worth.
I have been following at some distance The Young Turks' channel on YouTube; they always play a good hand at the stories they go after. Then there's the University of Nottingham's chemistry channel which is a nice blend of theory and sci-porn (mostly the former, obviously). There are also about 20 channels, each with three or four subsidiaries, which show up regularly (daily) in the top 100 - which as a rule I mistrust. Those view numbers are scary things, when you start thinking about the raw amount of time they represent. More or less, though, right?
Russia Today is always worth watching if you're in the habit of watching news and analyzing things as they are reported: I find that, between all the sources you are given as options, you get some shadowy idea of events, but very sharp impressions from the camera. That sounds in theory like a bait and switch scenario, right? I'm not trying to say anything that's just a consequential thought. Valid question I suppose.
And there are lots of niche channels that could appeal to you on YouTube and a fair bit of actually interesting or informative or pirated (good luck to the cyber detectives) material that can be found with the investment of a few minutes' thorough work.
Clearly, every wise person on earth would've thrown out their books if the internet was really the summit of civilization, so I think that book-apocalyptics stories about the internet, while dismally abundant, are still kind of a trite narrative device. So many noxious books have been printed and sold and hoarded and worshiped that, even counting the good ones, you have a general argument that a lot of paper was wasted and a lot of dirty solitary habits created. Some public habits, entire modes of thought, dependencies: you could go and talk about it.
But I recommend you read about it somewhere, instead.
I have been following at some distance The Young Turks' channel on YouTube; they always play a good hand at the stories they go after. Then there's the University of Nottingham's chemistry channel which is a nice blend of theory and sci-porn (mostly the former, obviously). There are also about 20 channels, each with three or four subsidiaries, which show up regularly (daily) in the top 100 - which as a rule I mistrust. Those view numbers are scary things, when you start thinking about the raw amount of time they represent. More or less, though, right?
Russia Today is always worth watching if you're in the habit of watching news and analyzing things as they are reported: I find that, between all the sources you are given as options, you get some shadowy idea of events, but very sharp impressions from the camera. That sounds in theory like a bait and switch scenario, right? I'm not trying to say anything that's just a consequential thought. Valid question I suppose.
And there are lots of niche channels that could appeal to you on YouTube and a fair bit of actually interesting or informative or pirated (good luck to the cyber detectives) material that can be found with the investment of a few minutes' thorough work.
Clearly, every wise person on earth would've thrown out their books if the internet was really the summit of civilization, so I think that book-apocalyptics stories about the internet, while dismally abundant, are still kind of a trite narrative device. So many noxious books have been printed and sold and hoarded and worshiped that, even counting the good ones, you have a general argument that a lot of paper was wasted and a lot of dirty solitary habits created. Some public habits, entire modes of thought, dependencies: you could go and talk about it.
But I recommend you read about it somewhere, instead.
4/6/11
Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Takes in This an Interest
My unaccountably small audience, YouTube has become self-aware!
You can imagine how painful the internet is for anyone who is not YouTube or Facebook. Go ahead, imagine, and I bet it feels good. That's good pain right there. Wait! This is a disaster! In my bombastic, semi-Colbert-semi-internerd style, I warn you that this new self-inflating digital economy is actually a bubble, and may burst!
I just made that discovery, when I was as usual researching the decline of my era on the internet, on YouTube itself. I realized that my sources could be improved a little, but more importantly I learned that:
No wise body on earth can watch the next two complete videos in sequence. I have prepared them as a perfect deathtrap. To even attempt to complete the watching of either (let alone both) will probably result in an exploded head, internet's Homestar Runner-style. I watched a bit of either, and I'm not going to review the experience here – YouTube's comment sections, here I come!– but this is basically the sort of challenge that is a long, subtle joke about the world right now. What makes it a challenge is not finishing it, even, but comprehending the exact style of your death this entails.
The first sequence in this challenge will serve, at most institutions, as an introduction to internet politics.
Now, the second is an advanced choice, doubles as internet politics 1102, and is a reckless move on my part; I feel a certain duty to the internet so am forced to post it in sequence, with a long introduction link sentence.
In an alternative YouTube Video Sequence, you may laugh harder – but you will learn less, and your mind will be less damaged. Feel free to comment about your general sense of dread, bigoted sense of superiority, or experience with the challenge! As a scientist, I may be able to make some use of your otherwise pointless generosity.
You can imagine how painful the internet is for anyone who is not YouTube or Facebook. Go ahead, imagine, and I bet it feels good. That's good pain right there. Wait! This is a disaster! In my bombastic, semi-Colbert-semi-internerd style, I warn you that this new self-inflating digital economy is actually a bubble, and may burst!
I just made that discovery, when I was as usual researching the decline of my era on the internet, on YouTube itself. I realized that my sources could be improved a little, but more importantly I learned that:
No wise body on earth can watch the next two complete videos in sequence. I have prepared them as a perfect deathtrap. To even attempt to complete the watching of either (let alone both) will probably result in an exploded head, internet's Homestar Runner-style. I watched a bit of either, and I'm not going to review the experience here – YouTube's comment sections, here I come!– but this is basically the sort of challenge that is a long, subtle joke about the world right now. What makes it a challenge is not finishing it, even, but comprehending the exact style of your death this entails.
The first sequence in this challenge will serve, at most institutions, as an introduction to internet politics.
Now, the second is an advanced choice, doubles as internet politics 1102, and is a reckless move on my part; I feel a certain duty to the internet so am forced to post it in sequence, with a long introduction link sentence.
In an alternative YouTube Video Sequence, you may laugh harder – but you will learn less, and your mind will be less damaged. Feel free to comment about your general sense of dread, bigoted sense of superiority, or experience with the challenge! As a scientist, I may be able to make some use of your otherwise pointless generosity.
4/3/11
Geez. Wow.
It's a good thing I tried to catch up to the internet news lately. Doubtless you have heard this story, or a story like it, plenty of times: noxious blog post is posted, public gets upset, author is a remedial celebrity and spin doctor, spin doesn't take, offense is broadcast – everyone chuckles in the end, because it's kind of funny.
Even Scott Adams knows there are some kinds of shit you don't touch. Not even as a blogger. Not even satirically. I blog anonymous and I wouldn't get in anyone's face or talk lightly about retardation or gender or any stupid thing. I prefer the borderlands of insensitivity and general curmugeonliness. There is one stinking turd that is so bloated with gas that even looking at it wrong can set it off. Even looking at an opposing turd the wrong way can set it off. You don't even look at this turd, let alone blog about it on your smug, high-class, oft-visited blog (which is solely buoyed by celebrity and little-more-than-average writing skills).
Anyways, the poor fellow took the nebulous, cringe-worthy subject of 'Men's Rights' to task in the most circumlocutory style possible: in short he pissed off everybody but his most dedicated fans, and even those have put at least one Dilbert mug at the back of cupboard. The irony of Men's Rights does not need to be brought up, and the ire of feminists has been alluded to by other sources covering the story and how it has been covered. It's been covered to death, and the best part is it makes me realize I am out of the loop. How do I generate controversy, gain blog hits, and become infamous?
Even Scott Adams knows there are some kinds of shit you don't touch. Not even as a blogger. Not even satirically. I blog anonymous and I wouldn't get in anyone's face or talk lightly about retardation or gender or any stupid thing. I prefer the borderlands of insensitivity and general curmugeonliness. There is one stinking turd that is so bloated with gas that even looking at it wrong can set it off. Even looking at an opposing turd the wrong way can set it off. You don't even look at this turd, let alone blog about it on your smug, high-class, oft-visited blog (which is solely buoyed by celebrity and little-more-than-average writing skills).
Anyways, the poor fellow took the nebulous, cringe-worthy subject of 'Men's Rights' to task in the most circumlocutory style possible: in short he pissed off everybody but his most dedicated fans, and even those have put at least one Dilbert mug at the back of cupboard. The irony of Men's Rights does not need to be brought up, and the ire of feminists has been alluded to by other sources covering the story and how it has been covered. It's been covered to death, and the best part is it makes me realize I am out of the loop. How do I generate controversy, gain blog hits, and become infamous?
4/1/11
Survivor Watch: 22. Pt.2
What they'll never be able to reproduce is the novelty. Other features of this gilded idol may be failing, but the one thing that cannot be produced (via magic or trickery or money) is any significant excitement to parallel the drawing power the show had in its first season.
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