The Dark Side of the Internet: A Guided Tour

First of all, before anyone asks, I have no idea how I found any of these. No idea. I follow a lot of random links and then instantly forget how I got there. Just like in real life.

Regardless of where they came from, I have a nice little collection of these online oddities filed away in a bookmarks folder labelled, simply, 'wut'. These are a few of my favourites.

To set the tone, here is the dude with the World's Biggest Chin

.

That is so much chin. It's like four separate chins all combined to form one massive chinny appendage on one poor guy's face. I could die happy if I saw him eating in a restaurant and had the opportunity to say to him, 'Sir, you have a bit of chicken on your... chin,' and it is a whole chicken leg. The poor guy is actually trying to raise money for an operation to have it removed by offering the sale of advertising space on the chin. As my housemates pointed out, this is not a very good offer. Imagine: he finds a sponsor and gets their logo tattooed. Investors grin surreptitiously at each other. Then, he wanders across the street to the hospital and has the whole thing lopped off and tossed aside. Not a lot of bang for your advertising buck. Unless, I suppose, you are promoting an expensive new product that would appeal to surgeons.

So we've started off with a few light-hearted laughs at somebody else's torment, let's move onto something that will almost (if not definitely) knock your socks off.

Time Travel Police

If the title alone hasn't convinced you, you should hurry up and read that. It may be pretty much one big run-on sentence, but it is worth it.

The very first thing the author of this site does is declare that what he is about to say is totally not a hoax. Here's a hint: saying 'THIS ISN'T A HOAX I SWEAR I SWEAR!' before you even tell anyone what you're talking about isn't a good way to convince people that you're telling the truth. Before you have even finished that sentence people will be looking at you with shifty eyes, subtly working out where the nearest exits are.

As soon as the author has established that he is totally not foolin' y'all, he goes on to inform us that the UK government has established some kind of Time Travel Safety Net. Now here's the thing: I don't think that happened. I'm sorry to seem skeptical, mysterious anonymous conspiracy theorist, but I think if a major first world government started spending parliamentary time discussing time travel, I feel like I would have heard about it.

He goes on to say:

You are receiving this E-Mail from the Synchronity Time Police (UK Division) it is a general announcement bringing you News of a New Organisation against Time Travel Crime, our Web Site is still under construction and we are aware that we are the VERY FIRST Synchronized Community fighting Time Travel Crime, but how can we do this if Time Travel is not yet possible? we can't actually arrest any Time Criminals because there aren't any yet but we have set up this service because we think that people should do something NOW to prevent Time Travel ending up in the wrong hands and we don't want it to end up like the internet which is very hard to control and police because it is not owned by one single individual,

I had to cut him off mid-sentence because that last sentence was about three paragraphs of rambling about the internet. First of all, can I just say how much I love the things he chooses to capitalise? Synchronicity Time Police makes sense. But Web Site? News of a New Organisation? Those do not need capital letters, sir and/or ma'am. As for the content itself, well, it kinda speaks for itself, doesn't it? I think any comment I could make would do little but take away from this natural wonder. That being said, I totally call first dibs on doing a Time Travel Police song. Keep your greedy mitts off it, the Gregory Brothers.

Let's move on...

...to the GREAT BAMBOOSICAL.

As far as I can gather, this is a movie musical that aspires to teach people about the benefits of bamboo. Sounds kinda dodgy, but dodgier ideas have worked. The first sign that this isn't one of those comes when you see that their tagline appears to be:

 "You'll laugh the beef right off the menu!"

I... I just... thankyou, the internet. Just. Thankyou.

Despite promoting the apparently hilarious side of bamboo knowledge, this is an issue the producers of Bamboosical take totally seriously. They have a list of facts promoting the health benefits of bamboo-based food products. Hell, they even have a picture of Beck eating a burger, captioned with the phrase 'Beck loves it!'. The best thing about this is that you know I'm not making it up because here is the damn link right here.


But what of the music of Bamboosical? They don't appear to have any sample songs, but here is the product description of their CD:

Ridin' Ranger is the mute hero from the film "The Great Bamboosical." He brings the top secret recipe of the Bamboo Burger™ plant-based patty to feuding Bambooyans and Rednecks. This CD includes 6 cosmically cool cuts from the film Soundtrack for only $9.99 (plus S&H). Profits go towards the cost of filming "The Great Bamboosical". Order your CD today and enjoy a rhythmically rocking ride with Ridin' Ranger!

Obviously the message of Bamboosical is a subtle one. Also, the hero is mute? Isn't it a musical? Isn't he supposed to be preaching the gospel of bamboo through song? A mute hero in a musical could actually be a really good idea, but I am willing to wager that the idea has not been brought to it's full potential here. There is a lot more to see on that site (I am particularly disappointed that the link marked simply 'COWS' doesn't appear to be working), but I can't possibly go through it all. Mainly because I want to go have a hot shower and a lie down and being on the computer is preventing me from doing that.

And so, our tour ends here.

-Smackie Onassis

P.S. If you haven't voted on my poll you are officially not my best friend.

Rosie O'Donnell Sucks

Again, I have found myself skimming through the darkest corners of the internet. In the course of my totally normal internet searching, I sometimes find I've taken a wrong turn and veered off course. Before I can stop to get my bearings, I find myself in the red light district of the internet. And it's wonderful.

There is a fan page on facebook under the banner of 'Rosie O'Donnell Sucks'. It's a fair enough idea, Rosie O'Donnell is a terrible, horrifying human being. The problem is, there is nothing more frustrating than discovering that people with hysterically awful opinions hold even one of the same opinions as you do. On the one hand, you want to agree with them. On the other hand, you don't want to encourage them.

To illustrate what I mean, here are some examples'. Names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Tits McGee PEOPLE NEED TO LAY THE FUCK OFF ROSIE IF SHE HAPPY WITH WHO SHE IS THEN FUCK LET HER BE HAPPY WHY YALL HAVE TO DISCRIMINATE SHIT IM GAY WHAT YOU GONNA DO TO ME OHH DSNGE YOU CANT DO ANYTHING. RUDEEE ASSES FUCKERS SHE DOESNT DESERVE THIS DISCRIMINATION.

01 April at 06:45 · Flag

Tits McGee

I bet you wouldn't say the same thing about Rush L, Sean H, Glenn B, Mark L, or Bill O. Go ahead and say it and I MIGHT have a little respect for your opinion about this MORON. If you refuse than I think everyone will think as I do that your statement is just the ramblings of a hypocritical Dumbocrap Libtard.

11 June at 00:53 · Flag

Let's be clear: everyone here is awful. Everyone. There's not a single word cluster there that doesn't make me want to claw at my brain with my fingernails. I'm really not sure on what grounds Tits McGee there thinks Rosie is being discriminated against. To be honest, I don't think he or she really honestly knows what the word actually means. All (s)he knows is that when (s)he doesn't like what someone else is saying, that's discrimination. I have free speech, darn tootin', and that means that you can't say anything that offends me. What confuses me more is the use of the word 'DSNGE'. Any way I look at it, I can't for the life of me figure out what this word is supposed to be. I can only conclude that it is some kind of synonym for burnsauce and is meant to be pronounced as a mash of letters. I included the reply there for the truly excellent use of the phrase 'Democrap Libtard'. Ooooh, DSNGE!

And we're just warming up.

Tits McGee Thank you for this group, FINALLY. I hate this woman and I hate everything about her.She ALWAYS loves flaunting her FAT opinions about EVERYTHING as if people are listening to her. If I was Elisabeth Hasselback, I would just went in for the right hook, cause that fat bitch deserves it. Love Tits McGee.

25 January at 03:09 · Flag

If there's one sensible criticism I can make about Rosie O'Donnell, it's that her opinions are FAT. Geez, O'Donnell, send your opinions out for a jog or something. Tell them to cut down on the carbs, I don't know. It's not healthy. Fat whore deserves to have boiling water thrown up her to scald her insides. Love Tits McGee.

Tits McGee WHAT A SLOB, AND WITH A BIG MOUTH TO TOP IT OFF, A FARM PIG IS MUCH MORE PRETTY TO LOOK AT, AND SMELLS BETTER TOO, WISH SHE WOULD JUST GO AWAY, JUST LOOKING AT HER TURNS MY STOMACH ........... NO BRAINS, BUT LOT'S OF FAT, SO STICK HER ON THE GRILL

22 January at 10:07 · Flag

Tits McGee likes this.

I have never seen anything more quintessentially Texan than this comment. Starting off with a farm-related insult, following through with some home-style, all-caps hatred and to top it off, the Universal Southern US Problem-Solver: throw the bastards on the grill.

Tits McGee she is a queer

10 November 2009 at 12:10 · Flag

Keepin' it simple. Keepin' it honest.



-Smackie Onassis

Oh Internet. You so crazy.

The internet is great for many reasons. There's porn, fantasy games, user-submitted humour sites and a great deal of other things designed for the express purpose of keeping awful people well and truly locked away in their parents' basement. No offense, awful people.

Sites like StumbleUpon that let you jump from random page to random page of the internet might as well be called 'Go on, I dare you', but you know me. I'm never one to refuse a dare. I've compiled a list of a few wonderful things I have found in the deepest, darkest corners of the web.

I'd like to share that list with you.

First, there's the pages that have no explanation, but don't NEED one because they are just that amazing. These are pages such as the genre-defying Selleck Waterfall Sandwich or the free access television program featuring a man who paints while running on a treadmill and doing one other random activity. Here's a video where he paints, runs and eats a pie, but there are also clips where he blends drinks, makes pancakes and is watched by some kind of Jungle King, all while painting and exercising. Oh yes, get ready for a wasted afternoon.

While we're talking videos, I found an endlessly entertaining Romanian video site the other day. I found it after clicking on a link to a video of a man covered in bees, which was more entertaining than I could have possibly imagined. I initially watched it because I was thinking about that Eddie Izzard bit that you will know if you are as much of a comedy nerd as most people I know. But not only is this particular Romanian beekeeper (who, according to the video, holds the world record for being "covered in the most bees") completely chill about being covered in bees, he's so cool with it that he's going to drink a beer. Hell, he'll even smoke a cigarette covered in bees! In fact, he's so relaxed about all the bees crawling over his body, he might even ride a donkey. You may think I'm just being funny (if so, thanks) but I am only just falling short of directly quoting the video. I also particularly enjoyed the footage of a reporter getting hit by a horse, which I guess is the Romanian equivalent of the widely circulated 'Reporter Gets Hit by a Car' video.

Of course, then there are the little things. The small, personalised corners of the internet that may not seem that interesting at first. But people often reveal much more than they intend to when they use the internet. You might remember when AOL's search logs were accidentally leaked to the public and everyone started getting worked up about the user who spent hours upon hours searching for flowers and song lyrics, before switching to hours and hours of searches along the lines of  "beauty and the beast disney porn, holocaust rape, japanese child slave, molestation and rape porn, virtual children, 3d molestation and rape porn" and so on and so forth, before switching back to looking up Fall-Out Boy lyrics and orchids. 

But as much as I like reading about other people's sexual deviancies, I prefer the more subtle nods to an internet user's character. While browsing something I wouldn't be able to remember even if I were trying, I came across a site offering free linux software, uploaded by users. One piece of software caught my eye because of how unabashedly self-deprecating the description was:

Wallcal is a simple, stupid, useless calendar for your desktop.

I created this instead alot of useful calendars because:

- I don't like Aqua, Graphite, Aero. I like freedom, I love KDE, I'm looking for my personal desktop style..
- Some famous calendars don't work on my PC.

Every month it will show you a photo of my honeymoon in Ireland. Of course you can change them.

And sure, all he's doing is promoting his software, but with the few short lines of a product description, the reader knows that here, here is a guy who hates his life.

If it's baffling product descriptions you're after, wrap your eyes around this description for a recently released work of young adult fiction, one of those books that tries to be 'hip with the kids' despite the fact the author was clearly a middle aged woman from birth.

Madison still loves logging on to Friendverse to see what her BFFs and her cute new boyfriend Nate are up to. But the latest social networking craze is Status Q, which is all about rapid-fire status updates. When one of Mad's friends has to pull off a high-pressure heist, the gang relies on Status Q to send coded messages to each other...all in the middle of a school dance!

What's YOUR status? How about O...M...G.

...sorry, what was that about a heist? I mean, I vaguely understood all that blather about social networking, but did you say something about a high-pressure heist? I think you might have your angle a little askew, YA fiction author Katie Finn.

'But hey,' you might be saying, 'What is there for me? I like my women like I like my coffee. That is to say, with a good hot slice of crazy floating in them.'

Well, wait no longer, because I have the exact right woman for you. I'm not sure who this woman actually is, but her blog is called 'Naked Seduction'. In it, you will find a few blocks of text interspersed between photos of this girl, who is apparently in the films business. But judging by the sheer strength of the crazy sauce garnishing the entire thing, I have a suspicion that those pictures aren't the real deal. No proof, mind you, but I have faith that we live in society where suspicion alone is enough to have someone locked up for life. Here is a paragraph of her writing, with punctuation added by me in a vain attempt to make it a bit more coherent.

Yes it's true, this is what I do! This is what I do, the best to seduce you with, the nakedness, naked emotion, naked heart, naked mind and naked confession. Naked, naked soul and naked compassion. I seduce you with the pure naked me and my naked love. I seduce you like a woman. I seduce you like your best friend. I seduce you like you. I seduce you with the distance only on the other side of the computer. Seduce with the nakedness with danger. I am your mirror only reflects you...

That's right, she'll seduce you like your best friend, which is probably going to be awkward. But not as awkward as when she starts seducing you... like you. I have no idea what that means and it's still creepy. To be fair, after my attempts at editing that, I must admit that it does have potential in the ever-lucrative arena of performance poetry.

-Smackie Onassis

Facebook: A Public Service Announcement

I'm going to go right ahead and say it: I have never been as opinionated in my life as I am right now. I have always been fairly passionate, but at the moment I seem to have an opinion on pretty much every subject.

There's a reason for this sudden influx of ideas. Like most things happening in my life at the moment, it can be traced back to that dreaded CFI*. You see, before the Incident I had always been a terribly busy person. It was all study and work and theatre and music and writing and on and on and on. Then, suddenly, I find myself all holed up on the couch scarcely able to make myself a sandwich, let alone any of those other things. I spent a good majority of that time reading about issues and then forming opinions. As a result, I've got opinions coming out of all major orifices at the moment.

Of course, it wasn't the only thing I did with my time. I also watched a great deal of youtube clips and as a result, I no longer have anything resembling an attention span when it comes to movies. If a movie can sensibly be measured in hour units, I find myself wondering, 'Do they have anything closer to the three minute mark? Preferably featuring a pug?'. I could give you a full list of pug-themed youtube clips off the top of my head. I think that when they sell pugs, they come in a deal with a video camera and a youtube account. Which is just fine by me.

Due to the constant thinking, reading, evaluating and opinion forming, the way I use other aspects of the internet has changed. After noticing that I rarely spoke to a huge portion of people on my facebook list, I made the decision to do a mass cull. It seemed irrelevant to have more than a hundred people classed as my 'friends' who I never even communicated with. I even felt used, like little more than a cog in a wheel fueled by self-indulgence and false popularity. So I cut them from the team.

But it wasn't just that. There was also an element of self-preservation. You see, I have this debilitating condition that is unfortunately prolific on the internet. You see people afflicted with this disease on every messageboard, every discussion forum, every corner of the internet that some poor fool has allowed people to comment on. This condition means that if I see someone, anyone, express an opinion, no matter how unimportant, and I think they're wrong, I must say something. I have no choice in the matter; I simply need to call them on it. And, quite frankly, it was getting a tad inappropriate. I mean, when you haven't spoken to your sister in over a year and suddenly you're all up in her internet, informing her that whatever unimportant sentiment she has expressed is sadly misinformed, it does start to feel slightly awkward.

So I thinned the numbers. Cut a few from the team. And it felt good. The more secure, more select shortlist of people. It felt like some kind of elite group. Some kind of elite group whose membership was decided solely by me.

It was a buzz.

After that, I would skim my list of remaining friends every now and then, evaluating who could stay and who could go. I was like the mad and all powerful judge in some kind of awful reality tv show. I told myself that this was all just me being very sensible. I told myself that no longer would I be used to bolster some cockknuckle's gargantuan number of friends. No longer would my friendship be treated as a commodity. No longer would I fall victim to this online popularity contest that social networking has become!

But after a while, I found these deleting "sessions" becoming more and more frequent. I'd had a sniff of the power usually only experienced by Endemol producers and Southern US Governers: the power to kick people out of an elite group at will, with no real pre-requisites other than because I said so.

Soon enough, I found myself looking for faults, waiting for another person to slip up so I could slam my finger down on that button and declare to the world, 'NO FRIENDSHIP FOR YOU'. A power trap that I'm sure more than a few people have fallen victim to since Facebook's inception in the early 2000s, back when it was known as Facemash (seriously).

So I urge any of you, if you start to feel yourself drifting into this pattern, just... just let it go, man. Are you blocking that person because you honestly don't want them to be all up in your business on the internet, or because when someone says something stupid it feels good to punish them, damnit. Before too long you might find yourself doling out timed banishment sentences for minor grammatical offences.

So by all means, delete the jerk who updates three times a day with the same cut/pasted piece of self-promotion. Delete the guy who hasn't replied to your comments in just over 8 months.

But, be careful. Because by the time you realise that you're trapped, it will already be too late.

-Smackie Onassis

*The now standard abbreviation for the Circus Flip Incident. I feel it makes me sound just slightly less ridiculous.

Spammer Scammers: A Love Story

As some of you may have noticed, I have spent a lot of time on the ol' internet of late. When you can't work because of an injury, the internet is an excellent way to pass the time. A seemingly endless source of information, some of it factual, others laughably inaccurate. Most of it gold.

You may remember I had a bit to say a while ago on the subject of spam emails. Since then, I have encountered the best spam scam I have ever seen in my entire life. Vegatrain was checking his junk mail folder and found that he had received an email offering 'compersation for scam victims' [sic].

I cannot express how much I love this.

At first, I was slightly amazed at the gall of it. A scam that includes the word scam in its subject header? And doesn't even spell compensation correctly? Surely, no-one would fall for that. But then I realised the simple brilliance of it. Here, you have an email scam that specifically appeals to people who have already proved that they are gullible enough to fall for email scams. Where most people would look at an email offering them infinite riches in exchange for little more than their credit card details and simply scoff, this email is appealing to the exact people who are most likely to go, "Well! It's about time I was compensated for all those scams! Here's my name, bank account details and my mother's maiden name."

Sheer genius.

And sure, this isn't exactly an ethical way to rake in the riches. But in my opinion, if you are thinking lazily enough to fall for something as ridiculous as that, you probably deserve to learn your lesson.

I have seen something similar on ebay, one of my favourite places on the internet. While searching for whatever it is I'm after (usually badges, occasionally mittens or shoes), I often see random products mysteriously labelled as 'punk/emo', as I mentioned briefly in this entry. On something like a spiked wrist cuff, that seems reasonable. But on a Flight of the Conchords badge set? Or any kind of product that features Hannah Montana? It seems a tad more random. But since writing that last entry, I have thought a bit more about this and have come to the conclusion that this too is brilliant.

Think about it - this kind of tagging specifically targets people who have simply typed punk/emo into the search engine when the only thing they know about those subcultures is that they want to be a part of them. They buy something ridiculous, get laughed at and then (hopefully) learn a valuable, much needed lesson. And the seller makes a profit!

Say what you will about capitalism, but when it is used to take of advantage of people who really only have themselves to blame, I can't do anything but embrace it like a warm kitten.

-Smackie Onassis

Ride The Meattrain

Today when Meattrain got home from work, he told me that there were three things he did at work today.

1. Read a facebook message I had sent him re: fisting.

2. Read my blog

3. Start his own blog

He was a bit distraught that the name 'Ride The Meat Train' was taken (WHO IS USING THIS NAME? WHO?), but then settled on Let The Meat Cake.

I am glad he has adopted this nickname.

-Smackie Onassis

What's In My Bookmarks Bar?

 - Wikipedia page for Richard von Krafft-Ebing's "Psychopathia Sexualis"

 - Ebay store selling reasonably-priced mandolins

 - A pug licking the screen (so adorable)

 - Leviticus Jewelry, an online store that sells just the best pirate-ship ring

 - Costume Dogs

 - World Of Solitaire

 - RhymeZone, a really great rhyming dictionary

On The Entertainment Value of Fetish Porn

Most people who know me are probably aware that I totally dig fetishes. I don't get aroused by them, or use them for any kind of sexual purpose at all really, but holy hell, I can't get enough of them. I find them both hysterically funny and intensely fascinating.

I'm about to start a psychology degree by correspondence. While the whole subject of psychology is interesting to me, I'm hoping to eventually do post-graduate research. Specifically in the area of sexual fetishes. Because, man, what even the hell. When someone has a fetish for swallowing another person whole and then inflating to twice their size before pooing them out (This is a real fetish. There are whole forums on the internet dedicated to it.), I just... I mean, just why... how, even? I want to know.

Last night, Meattrain brought up a fetish that he finds particularly funny, the one that involves getting your jollies by cooking and eating someone. Or, alternatively being cooked and eaten yourself. In a simpler time, there might have been one or two cases of these kinds of people ever finding each other and actually carrying out these acts. Then in the first week of the internet, there was ten of them*. I had, of course, heard a lot about this fetish, and followed the legal battles that always ensued when the courts were all "Hey! You murdered that dude and ate him!" and got the strange and unexpected response of "Yeah, but he was totally gagging for it."

Meattrain asked me if I had actually seen any of their porn. I hadn't, because unlike my housemate, I have a soul. However, when he described just how funny it was, I started getting pretty curious. See, it's very hard to make acceptable porn for a fetish that involves cooking and eating another human being. You can't have sex with someone you've just skinned and boiled, I guess. The way these guys have dealt with this is to make soft-core porn that consists of attractive women, trussed up and covered with food. Meattrain described one image he particularly liked where a women was done up to look like a turkey, complete with a banana sticking into her "lady bits". Naturally, his main problem with this image was the fact that you can't put banana with turkey because it would plain old ruin the flavour. He suggested a parsnip instead, although Vegatrain thought a carrot would do the job nicely.

After this discussion, Vegatrain and I went into the courtyard for a tea-break, and I couldn't help mentioning how I excited I was to look up this website. Vegatrain responded by burping loudly, explaining that with my talking about porn he wanted to give the worst possible impression of us to any neighbours who might be listening. I agreed and played it up to the best of my ability.

Smackie: I am sure looking forward to a large serving of porns tonight.

Vegatrain: The women in porn are often looking forward to large servings themselves!

I didn't actually end up looking up those images, as my computer promptly decided it didn't want anything to do with it and refused to let me do anything but listen to twee pop and play pokemon like a good little girl.

But, if you're that curious, I looked it up just now and it is pretty disturbing.

Warning: That link is not safe for work, unless you work in a place called Kannibal Kitchen, which I'm pretty sure doesn't exist at all, so why would you lie like that?

-Smackie Onassis

*not verifiable (i.e. I made that up)