Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

LESS SHARING. MORE SHAME.

Thursday, August 19th, 2010
by Lord Rochester
We all have that one Facebook “friend.” He’s male, mid-20s; not fat, exactly, although he sure is lumpy. His head usually has the shape and texture of a melon, and he updates his status every mother-effing hour. Now, he doesn’t post things like, “I saw Inception today and thought it was great.” That’s what Facebook is for. But this guy, this human pituitary cyst, he fancies himself a thinker. Shame is bad, right? No, you’re wrong; it’s a good thing. Dignity is dead in America, there’s no denying it, and there’s no getting it back. Telephones are nothing more than bejeweled accessories for sending pictures of your breasts, computers are now basically electronic boxes of narcissism, and currently our two greatest scientific minds are the Mythbusters guys.
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LESS OMG. MORE STFU.

Monday, August 9th, 2010
by Dimebag Darrell
I have to give Jack Dorsey, Biz Stone and Evan Williams credit. They created something that allows people to be significantly more annoying: Twitter. For certain things – following a sport, keeping track of a major developing story or the most ridiculously awesome blog on the web,  etc. – the social networking website can be exceptionally useful. However, there are many occasions where you find yourself victim to being told about the feckless events of others’ everyday lives. I respect my elders. No, I don’t mean those things waiting for death’s call in a retirement home who are just giant liver spots. (I was planning to link to a funny/creepy picture of some old dudes, but in doing a Google image search for “really old people,” a picture of Miley Cyrus wrapped in a satin bedsheet came up as the second hit. WTF?) I am referring to anyone who’s 27 or older. In my experience, once you start that cliff dive into your 30s, you seemingly start not giving a sh*t less.
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LESS DOCUMENTING. MORE LIVING.

Thursday, July 22nd, 2010
by Betty Cracked
Sitting at my son’s concert the other day, I looked around at all the other parents and noticed something strange. No one was watching the performance; they were recording it. Virtually every parent in the room had their eyes focused on a tiny digital screen rather than the stage. It started me thinking. We document almost every aspect of our lives these days; it’s like we are becoming documentary directors for our lives. Remember 110 cameras that didn’t even have autofocus? Actual film you had to bring to the photo shop to be developed? How about Polaroid cameras where you had to – imagine this – WAIT for the photo to develop and you were stuck with the results, no delete button, no redo. It was a time when your memories could be preserved as they actually occurred, bad hair and all. This generation would think that was the Stone Age.
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LESS LOUD. MORE ENDOWED.

Wednesday, June 16th, 2010
by Mary Jay Blunt
“And the loud shall inherit the earth.” Not quite, but it appears that way. The loudest in religion, politics and entertainment are perceived to be either the most knowledgeable or the most passionate. We, the people, completely buy into the hype, hanging on the words of the attention whores as if we’ve paid them from our own pockets to entice and seduce us. Our attention turns to the shit-talkers on the field or court, and not those who are humbly working for the common good. We are willing to spend money on what has been overprocessed and marketed, but not invest in true creativity or artistic prowess. It’s a Pavlovian response  to the blaring and the abrasive. Don’t believe me? Take a look at these extremely obnoxious and loud people: I’m going to go out on a limb here and make a bold claim: People who are loud are clearly overcompensating for what they are lacking. The small-endowed are trying to distract the people with their gum-bumping drivel. (Insert penis joke here). Clearly there are an abundance of people screaming “Look at me!” When we finally do, we are sadly disappointed to find out that what we are looking at is simply garbage with little thought, little inspiration, little originality and little talent. Instead of trumpeting mediocrity and foolishness, let’s push for a Renaissance. As a society, we should be actively investing time. energy and money into grass-roots movements, good music and interpersonal activities that are about actually doing than talking.
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LESS TEXT. MORE TALK.

Tuesday, June 8th, 2010
by Mrs. Robinson
We’ve become a device-dependent society, with a crackberried adult population setting the prime example for their kids. How have we ever lived without such endless connectivity? More importantly, what will happen to today’s antisocially connected youth when they are faced with having to actually converse with other people without devices in their hands? Why bother to talk when you can text, surf, update your Facebook and Twitter page and keep your peeps updated on every aspect of your life without speaking a single word? Texting is okay for quick check-in, but not long conversations. In love relationships, part of the attraction can be the sound of the object of your affection’s voice. Can’t get that from a text. Conversation lets you hear the joy in friends’ voices when they know it’s you calling to share news. That human contact enables you to pick up on the distracted tone in a friend’s voice if  she is troubled or sad. And you don’t need CAPITAL LETTERS TO TELL YOU  SOMEONE IS ANGRY; it will show in the tone of voice, face and body language.
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LESS GURUS. MORE JOBS.

Monday, April 12th, 2010
by D. Znutts
Newsflash: Social media is here to stay. And with it comes an infinite number of self proclaimed “gurus.” They’re everywhere! They’re on Twitter, Facebook, and Myspank. The most annoying of these people are the so called digital/internet media gurus. It seems the interwebs have taken narcissism to a whole new level. Now, a**holes like me can write ridiculous things about ridiculous topics (like farts) and get mass attention. Except that I don’t claim to be a guru. I’m just a broad with a sensible opinion. No, not that Jobs. I mean real positions with real job titles. Really, anything will do – Janitor, Stripper, Ass-waxer, even Toll-booth Attendant – please just don’t call yourself a “guru.” Honestly, it just sounds f*cking ridiculous. The term is abused, overused, and has no meaning. Here’s some advice to people with 5,000 mutual Twitter followers: Stop guru’ing with one another all day long! I guarantee said guru’ing ceases beyond Twitter, which in essence makes it less of a job, and more of a pathetic attempt at validating the fact that you have no actual job.
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LESS POKING. MORE PHONING.

Thursday, April 8th, 2010
by Chairman of the Bored
At first glance it may seem innocuous enough, but the ubiquitous Facebook “poke” feature is starting to reach cataclysmic proportions. Communication has degraded into some kind of cyber ping-pong: You like-me? I-like-you You-like-me? I-like-you ad infinitum. As a staff, we didn’t grow up in the most chivalrous of ages, so that’s probably why haven’t really noticed or been bothered by the migration of human interaction to  online platforms. Surely, chatting, IM’ing, and texting is how we roll too, but from a romantic perspective, it’s rather disconcerting. With all the mobiles floating around nowadays, you’d think there would be more phone calls. And yet, all we see are people tapping away on their iPhones for hours on end. They also take a lot of pictures (of food, dogs, houseplants, gardens, and genitals). Sometimes they even blast the latest Timberlake single. But talking? Seems like only banker dudes engage in that tomfoolery. “Buy! Sell! Call me in Hong Kong!” Even Tiger Woods preferred texting to talking. Technically, that was sexting, but that point gets lost in translation, because no one talks to one another anymore anyway!
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LESS SHARING. MORE SPARING.

Monday, March 15th, 2010
by The Clever Jew
The Clever Jew’s feeling like A Cranky Jew these days. For one thing, he’s getting tired of all the recent advancements in communication.  Our society has become way too open.  These days, there isn’t any news left to call your own.  It’s almost as if your freakin’ root canal is posted on Facebook before the novocaine wears off.  Case in point: when a friend of ours got knocked up last week (or at least that’s when we were informed), her entire Myspace “universe” was discussing the inappropriateness of her disclosure, given that the first trimester safety zone had not yet elapsed. Seriously? Really? WTF?!

And why was there such an incredible pre-natal feeding frenzy?  Mostly it’s because we all love a scoop. We want to be the first to hear about something so we can immediately tell everyone else in order to get credit for being the first to break the news.  Being “in the know” gives us a weird sense of superiority.  It makes us feel better, smarter, a part of elite group of “insiders.” There’s just something awesomely satisfying about being the the inaugural office-mate to announce that Corey Haim is DOA. It’s not that his death makes us feel good (there’s goes that Lucas sequel), it’s actually makes us a little sad. Well, at least until we realize there’s still another Corey left.

The point remains. There’s nothing like a solid gossipy scoop. It’s the Perez Hilton Model Journalism School.  He showed us Britney’s crotch before anyone else, and so we keep going back to see what other celeb dirt he’s got. You know, so we can tell everyone else.

The time has come to shut ’em down. We’re hoping Facebook gets an incurable virus and we’re all permanently locked out.  We want a simpler life.  Like back in the good ole’ days, when no one could unilaterally tag us in a New Year’s picture taken the moment after we slammed that tenth tequila shot. Remember when no one cared about how you felt about the weather today, or how badly your sports team blew last night, or that you scored 100 points in Bejeweled Blitz(we don’t even know what that is)… well, guess what? We don’t (and never did) care! And yet you continue to barrage us with your meaningless musings.

How about leaving a couple of things to the imagination.  Like momma always said, “Don’t show the cow your t*ts, because he’ll quickly get bored of them and only play with them on the nights when he’s wasted, and then he’ll end up seeking other boobs because the grass is always greener on the other side,” or something like that.

So here’s the thing, let’s not be such an open book anymore. Let’s communicate (or not) offline. In fact, from now on, if you want to reach us… mail us a letter.  We love getting mail.  It’s so disappointing when we open our little mailbox and only receive an assortment of bad J. Crew catalogs and dry cleaning coupons. Frankly, don’t expect a reply to your letter unless it’s stamped in red with the words “final late payment.” Otherwise, we’ll assume you’re writing to tell us what’s on your mind, which we’ve already established is a complete waste of our time.

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