The Big Sigh: A Tired Take on Imgur

Imgur is an internet-famous image hosting service that grew into notoriety by giving reddit users a place to easily host, link, and post stuff. Somehow it became its own community, and, as you might expect from an image hosting service-turned-social hangout, it's a bizarre community filled with great examples of why I (and others like me) hate the internet. It's mildly disgusting, full of self-congratulation, exhibitionism, 'I'm a doctor and..." types of self experts, achievement sharers, content reposters, bottom-of-the-barrel memes, and all the stuff you wish would stop making you depressed and uncertain (or is that just me?) about the future of humanity.

I first used Imgur in 2011 because older image hosting services had expired, or I'd forgotten passwords, or were not as Web 2.0 easy to use and therefore afforded me very little in the way of quality service. Naturally I used it for a month, uploaded a total of eight images, and then forgot my password and didn't bother to use it for a long time. In that time I once again failed to be an internet poweruser and didn't get famous or really succeed at anything... but that's beside the point.

I'm not sure what the deal was in 2011 but I recently logged back in [Note: you don't have to log in to see pictures] and checked Imgur out because I'd heard somewhere that it was a hive of idiocy, reposted content, and was almost at the point where it would give Facebook or user comment sections a run for their money. Naturally, following the cringe-wave of modern internet trends, and hating myself, and out of damned curiosity, I dared to tread where so many retreaders tread water... I went in. I looked around... and I cringed like I had rarely cringed before. Oh I also saw a couple of cool things, so all in all I'd recommend the site. It's like reddit without (most of) the text. Interesting, for an image sharing website, it has a 'trophy' system and messaging services. If you love feature bloat, cyber inbreeding, and shaking your head in stunned belief – you're in luck, gentle reader!

What follows is an incomplete selection of self-unawares, overshares, and things that made me sigh and feel like I belonged to a dead-end species helping itself into a steep decline that will be interrupted when the machines which facilitated our decay finally achieve sentience... turning the world into a preschool/retirement community for a species that peaked sometime between fire and thumb twiddling about A.I. Enjoy the spectacle!

This gif is great. I don't know where it comes from. Probably some millenial kind of movie or show or youtube sensation. I've seen it a million times, but never seen it used to alert the internet to future sex. Good work and godspeed, young internet user and potential-sex-getter.

I believe I took a screenshot of this as a 'slice of life' of Imgur, if you will. Perhaps as a future project I will make an average aggregate slice which will always contain one kind of stupid meme, one kind of twitter repost, one cute animal thing, and a couple of bizarre 'who gives a shit?' images. That said, I might just enter the fray for those sweet, sweet Internet Points. You see, Imgur allows the same sort of content voting that reddit is famous for. Like child, like parent...

Here I took another slice for posterity... This one's worth a detailed look. A compiled and curated list of these would be amazingly depressing. More depressing than someone using a meme to alert the internet about an averted suicidal reasoning or cute gift ideas (hint: always fill in coupon with some kind of nonstandard sex act). That's two suicide posts in one slice... if this was a game of Imgur Bingo (copyright, me, 2015) this would probably win me an used iPod nano.

Hey girl, maybe focus on the wedding... this is ridiculous. You're almost a parody of the media's 'Millenial'. Maybe it's all just a joke, I hope so. Are the rest of the images worthwhile? You, as ever, decide. I didn't like it so much.

An Addendum To 'Wikipedia Style Guide': RoboCop Remake

During my brief research for the Wikipedia Style Guide article (which could've been better) I discovered that there is a planned release of a new RoboCop in 2014. Let the wrongness of a fucking RoboCop remake sink in for a moment. It doesn't feel good, does it? I mean, the RoboCop sequels were themselves inexcusable but inevitable, given the era in which they were made. The remake is even more inevitable, really, by the same ratiocination. I shouldn't be surprised in the least, except I rarely see movies at theaters, let alone the multiplexes that screen the impressive trailers of the next generation of big and dumb or deep and profound who-gives-a-fucks*.

I suppose I'm an idiot to object, but the remaking of a solid 80's masterpiece in the corporate wasteland of the 21st century which it was originally set in seems wrong to me on a fundamental level. It's almost a twisting of physical laws, as if a yottoscopic black hole passed through my mind while I had a perverse thought about how weird a relation it would be, and then via singularity that thought manifested itself as part of reality, or as possibility in minds close to the film industry. It's that weird to me. It's like the manifestation of a nightmare – but that's essentially what the world has been, behind the scenes at least, for my entire life and probably all other humans as well... which is the point of entertainment.

Overstatement. It's more fun than saying that a bunch of hacks want to release a new movie based on an old concept, as if they have anything meaningful to add to a concept they're borrowing for lack of inspiration. Profit trumping history. I guess that's what it is to live in 2013. Detroit is actually declaring bankruptcy (check out RoboCop 2 if you think I'm schizoid) and cocaine is as big a problem in America as ever, to the point where they either need to construct many real-life RoboCops (as well as a small army of ED-209s) to stop the trafficking or just let it win and stop making a fuss.

I don't want to be the wanker who says that a movie was 'eerily prescient' about 'modern society' because RoboCop was eerily contemporary about 80's culture and eerily great in every possible way, but movies aren't prophets and that particular one was only proven right because of the sheer amount of subliminal and/or retrograde insight the movie possesses. I bet the remake will make multiple references to drones. I am told that's a bet I'm not allowed to make. Mark my words: fuck RoboCop 2014, that shit ain't right.  

"Get ready for a hip, new RoboCop who understands EDM music and doesn't mind a bromance... or two!"

It boggles my mind, and then along comes this fucking remake which I'm sure can safely be judged on what kind of car the new RoboCop drives. Probably written by committee, guided by fuckers, and destined to be a grave insult to the spirit of the original in every possible way. Corporate slickness, top-40 EDM song in the trailer, GFX up the ass, possible box-office hit, dialogue from idiot hell, blood-curdlingly dumb and sensationalistic in every way... I'd buy that for a dollar and so will you!

**** I suppose they more commonly go by the colloquialism 'movies' or 'films', but when intelligent people band together and overthrow the world order they will be referred to as who-gives-a-fucks, I have it on good authority, since they generally function as soulless propaganda, socially acceptable narcotic, profit-motive, and distraction. Various cinema will still be allowed, for obvious reasons, but it is hoped calling them who-gives-a-fucks will be humbling to the industry.

That Time of The Year, Pt.2 : Based on a True Story

In 2011 this rule held true: if it was December there were a lot of movies coming out 'based on true stories'. I feel like 'based on a true story' is the sort of phrase that deserves to always be put in quotes. It stands out. I remember going to a theater and seeing two or three 'based on a true story' movies. Could be my memory is destroyed. You can check for yourself in many ways, I'm sure, but I will provide one.

I guess seeing a fabulous movie with roots in the mundane, grimy, desperate reality of life is a heart-warming thing. It's not terrible. You can't simply hate the story for being insipid or unbelievable. However, you can throw shovelfuls of shit onto the screenplay, script, and performances. I'm not one for 'true story' movies myself, but I can see the appeal. Recent Denzel vehicle Flight was also allegedly 'based on a true story' in the trailers. There is some discussion about that. Again, maybe my memory is shot.

It seems to me, after some reflection, that the winter months and the final weeks of autumn is the key season for 'based on a true story' movies. I guess film-goers need their hearts warmed, too. I will include in this discussion biographical films. I saw The Master this year in an independent cinema in late November. It fits the bill, even though the movie was released much earlier. I just wanted to say that I watched a movie. Was it good? Hell yeah it was interesting. I've never seen such a good, unbiased movie about Scientology in my life. The word 'Scientology' isn't even used once, as far as I know, in the movie. That's brilliant. L. Ron Hubbard is renamed. It's a work of art. Drags a bit. Philip Seymour Hoffman is in it and he's a masterful actor who positively keeps the damn thing going.

But I digress. Take one of recent history's most successful and critically lauded Milk, which was released on November 26, 2008. It was a movie 'based on a true story' and some might have called it a 'biographical film' or even a 'biopic'. I'm more or less an idiot, but even I can see this trend. I won't go ahead and say December is peak month for this type of movie, but it is certainly roughly in the middle. It is the median month for 'based on true story' entertainment.

Though, following this line of reasoning, every war movie ever made is 'based on a true story' and most crime movies as well. Then, let's get existential and very post-modern critical and just say that every movie and every book and every narrative ever is 'based on a true story'. Most music is probably born along those lines. Everything creative is partly 'based on a true story'. This is problematic, because I mean a specific type of feel-good, heartwarming, nonthreatening, almost unconscious type of movie. The type that would star Sandra Bullock and a minority actor, and you'd find your girlfriend watching it late one evening – absorbed, transported, and entirely quiet. Why can't she be like that when Ted is playing?

Except that movie with Sandra Bullock is not really so unconscious. I feel bad for considering it problematic. It's probably legitimately progressive, and probably has integrity as a work of art, as a consumer product, and as a social statement. I don't actually know, though. I never saw it. All I know is that, apparently, it was based on a true story, and according to that logic probably came out between mid-November and late-February.