Women, and their part in the downfall of the Internet

Back in the old dark days of t'internet, it used to be that all men were men, all women were men and all children were FBI agents. It was the rule of thumb, and that was that.

In this Eternal September era of the internet, though, all sorts of folk are online. It's amazing. I've even seen women, and not ugly frumpy ones who live with 17 cats, use the interweb! And not in the 'You have to pay to see me' way either, actual real womenfolk using it for their own personal enjoyment. It's incredible and borderline life affirming. Thing is, it also often leads to disaster.

We all know that the internet is made up mainly of men. Of those which spend a serious amount of time on the internet, the kinds who belong to WoW guilds and are regulars to Justiv.tv chat rooms and the like, most of them are geeky guys. There is nothing wrong with that, frankly I'm probably classed as a geeky guy, and it is something that has major advantages. The downside is that more often than not, throw a genuinely hot girl into the mix and things start to go a little haywire. It's a bit like the excellent TV show The Big Bang Theory, except with less wit and more flame wars.

It is an unwritten law of the Internet that each and every big online streaming 'channel', every forum and every World of Warcraft guild must have at least one hot girl. It is like the changing of the seasons or Chuck Norris' awesomeness, it just is. Then, the same things always happen. Guys think that they have a shot at nailing them. They take various approaches, sometimes good and sometimes bad. Here are some of the “How To Fail With Some Hot Chick You Know From An Online Group” (yeah, abbreviations and snappy lines aren't my thing...) techniques.

The White Knight

You want to know what The White Knight's moto is? “If you protect the camwhore, you will get to nail the camwhore.” Although in this example there isn't a 'camwhore' per se, just some sort of random hot girl who is sharing a virtual space, the theory is the same. While other members of whatever online community inundate the Hot Girl with love notes, sexual suggestions and general flirtations, the White Knight will defend her honour. Why? Because there is no better way to get on a girls good side and into her pants than suck up to her like her potential new BFF!

The Dick

You know how back at school, there was always one guy who was a proper dick? He was probably either the kid from the richest family in town, related to a minor celeb or something like that. He may even have just been a stand out at something and known it. Well, either way, he was good and he knew it. That made him act the dick. Well, the same goes in geeky circles to. You do get some right proper dicks. And in terms of trying to nail the random Hot Girl who happened to stroll into the same online community, The Dick will use all his dicky moves to try to get in there – showing off, putting others down, coercion - you name it. That is why The Dick is called a dick. He is a dick.

The Bust Up

Why is it that no matter how many generations pass, the same old story always plays out – two guys fall for the same girl and then proceed to wreck a friendship over it. Really, all guys should have the following tattooed onto the insides of their eyelids “Brothers before Bitches.” In the more geeky online version of the world, though, the good old 'Its either him or me' bust up usually occurs sooner rather than later when two leading guild members\channel broadcasters\forum mods\etc. both fall head over heels in love with the same Hot Girl. It will always end in some good old fashioned drama between the supposed friends, as you just cannot do drama like the internet can, with the girl eventually winding up with some guy form outside the web who is a normal, well adjusted person. C'est la vie.

I hate you, you stupid bloody computer!

Oh, you think you're real smart, huh? Freezing just as I'm trying to save a blog update? You think you will make me write it all out again, do ya? Well no deal, buster. I'm just going to wing it.

Usually, whenever I update here, I'll write it in Open Office then just copy and paste it across. I'm weird like that, as despite the fact that Blogger gives me lots of nice tools to play with here, I'll entrust my computer with the data first. Today, that turned out to be one big royal fucking mistake.

I admit it, maybe I should have saved it more often. Maybe I shouldn't have written a page and a half before hitting Ctrl + S. Maybe I should have saved it as soon as I opened it. After all, as my old music tech teacher used to preach to us, 'Jesus Saves'. Oh well, it doesn't really matter. You've been toying with me all week, you dumb computer, running like mud. Then when I try to de-frag you, you tell me nothing is wrong and everything is hunky dory. You tell me that you haven't got a care in the world and everything is just a-okay.

I don't care. I will take you a fucking part if you test me again, you hear me? I know you can hear me, Mr Computer, and I know you are reading everything I'm typing! Mark my words, buddy, I know where you sleep and I will put you in the bath tub if you do that again!

TL:DR - My computer is a bastard.

P.S. SUPER BOWL SUPER BOWL SUPER BOWL SUPER BOWL SUPER BOWL

The Great Big Facebook Conspiracy

I was having a ponderance the other day. It happens from time to time. I have a lot of time to think, and get an awful lot of it done while staring at the white pages in front on me that I really should be filling with text. It is both an awful burden and an absolutely wonderful curse and I love it, as a little bit of mental masturbation is always a lark.

What is more fun that thinking is completely off the wall thinking as, I will admit, that I do have a soft spot especially for conspiracy theories. Now, I'm not exactly the sort of person who sits at home refusing to use electricity because 'the man' is onto me, all the while eating cold tins of beans and wearing a tin foil hat. I'm not quite that bat shit crazy yet. In my autumn years I hope to achieve it, but alas for the moment I appear to be borderline sort of normal. Still, it's fun and pretty much just human nature to look into things – Do aliens exist? Did we really get to the moon? Was the Titanic an insurance job? Just how is Jared Allen's hair cool? That sort of stuff.

Last night, when I was once more failing to get to sleep, I did some thinking. In it, I came to the conclusion that Facebook is a massive conspiracy. Now, I know how mad that that sounds, but hear me out. I promise I'm not a nutcase who is currently sat in the bushes outside your window touching himself.

Just imagine for a minute, if you will, that you are some big powerful government man. There, don't you feel important? Looking over all the peons with a sense of unjustified superiority like that, whoa boy you sure are a big shot. But, I hear you say, what are all those zillions of people out there up to? What are they doing? Thinking? Interested in?

Also, just the other day, you happened to be having a nice informal, dress down top secret meeting with some of your bestest buddies in Industry. They were complaining that it was getting harder and harder to control the surfs, what with the advent of movable type. It was much harder to predict their patterns and advertising had become awfully broad spectrum (as anyone who has seen L'Oreal advertised on Kerrang! TV while then flicking to MTV2 only to see fish fingers being hawked will attest to).

If only there was a way to not only find out what people were up to but to also track what they were interested in. If only...

Now for the conspiracy bit – I really do have a hard time believing that something like Facebook sprung up all by itself. I mean, no doubt that the guy\guys (depending on which legal POV you take) who dreamt it up in Harvard did have nout but the best intentions for it at the time, but I find it a struggle to believe that in 4 years a business can go from helping a few Uni students keep in contact to gaining a massive, multi-billion dollar user base. Think of all the personal information that is kept on Facebook – they can word filter what you are thinking, track what you click on, see where and how you update and so on and so forth. And I mean sure, although it is not done obviously, Facebook does sell data. If I had a wager on it, I'd bet that that data was not just stuff to advertisers to see if you would prefer a red or green car...

But anyway, as I've shown already if I put money on it I'm usually wrong.

Assuming I haven't been hauled away in the dead of night, see you Sunday!

The Internet and How It Saved Christmas

I love the internet. Not only does it allow me the possibilities to go and troll lots of uppity people, blather on and on about my simply ridiculous points of view and moan about a whole manner of things, it also lets me not have to talk to anyone face to face.

I don't like people. I don't like the general public. I like my friends, sure, and I like my family. When jobs have forced me in the past to interact with people I have obliged, but in general my rule of thumb is people should be avoided at all cost. It's nothing personal, I'm sure you are a great laugh, a nice person and a gentle yet thorough lover. I just don't care.

That isn't to say I'm a total recluse. Of course I go out. Sometimes I'm not entirely happy about the places I get dragged to, but I go. As much as I dislike dealing with the general public, the thing I'd hate more is to sit inside hating on strangers. That would just be odd.

Anyway, I digress. Christmas Shopping. Where as meeting random people for a laugh in a nightclub is one thing, wandering around town with fistfuls of bags of presents is quite another. That is not exactly my idea of fun.

This is where the internet stepped in. For the first time, I did every single last bit of my Christmas shopping (all right, I bought ONE thing in a shop) online. And from only two websites – IWOOT and Amazon. It was brilliant. It was a revaluation. Frankly, it was damned near erotic.

But do you know what the absolute bestest thing in the whole wide world is? It now means that either over the weekend or next week when I go into London to look at all the pretty lights, shop displays down Regent Street and have a mulled wine in Covent Garden, I can do it without the burden of shopping bags. And that, my dear friends, is what it is all about.