Viral Spiral

Long ago, I signed up to an internet community and got dogpiled when one of the community members got his friends to join in when he targeted me. Names and details have been fictionalised for entertainment purposes.

Copyright, Wrongs, And How To Make A Living From The Internet

I don't know if you realise this but we all infringe on copyright every day. Every single, no-I'm-not-pulling-your-leg day. Go on, read the linked article at least three times. It's staggering. I mean, even looking at this post requires you to download it onto your PC, at least temporarily, so you can read the damn thing. In doing so, it made a copy of this file to store on your computer, but you didn't ask me if I'm okay with that, did you, you dirty thieving pirate, you?! Just kiddin'. But that's the problem. If you're mad keen on copyright, contact the PRS and pay for a licence before you sing Happy Birthday in public. Seriously, that's where we're at.

Customer Service Shenanigans

It used to be said that the customer is always right. These days I'm convinced it's being said that the customer is a chump. A bit of respect, please?

I used to try to be a bit considerate about them, having worked in customer service myself, but eventually I came to the conclusion that people who can't or won't do their job and make no effort to be helpful deserve what they get, and if they annoy me I give them Hell. And nothing annoys me more than dun dun dunnnn...

Pirhana Pedicure

RE: the change in my profile description, when friends came round for pizza and a chat last night, one of them, Tom, was amused when I told him about this blog after hearing about the fish pedicure treatment thingy you can get in the Arndale Center, Manchester. The conversation turned from a rather horrible-sounding beauty/pamper treatment option to what would happen if a Kingsian event* occurred while someone's foot was in the bowl.

Webcomics and whatnot

Nadia liked it. She says she'll comment when she gets a chance.

Meanwhile I've been looking for inspiration online and discovered a plethora of strange and scary webcomics that have convinced me I can do just as well if not better if I go nuts with my latest GIMP plugin for five minutes. Heck, you need to take a shedload of narcotics to appreciate some of them, they're that crazy. I've been reading a lot of cracked.com lately, can you tell?

Blogger bother

I was annoyed about the recent outages, but they seem to have resolved. After two Blogger-less days, it occurred to me that the powers that be might well have resolved the situation by now, and I should clear the cache and cookies, then try logging in again, which I did. 

It's alive! It's alive, I tell you! *Maniacal laugh*

Online time-wasters

Should there be a twelve-step group for internet addicts? I'm becoming concerned that I may be addicted. I mean, I'm beginning to look like this:

The best excuse I can come up with for faffing about on Facebook, tweeting twaddle on Twitter and creasing up on Cracked.com is that, well, it's fun. And, as a certain Lolcat would say, it is relevant to my interests - if you like to read sweary articles about five reasons a zombie apocalypse will never happen. Which I do. Relevant to my interests? I'm a horror fan. Yeah.

It's beginning to take its toll. I've been up late at night just to read how some scary creatures *gasp!* resemble us, and 7 terrifying things the internet has unleashed on the world, etc. Cracked, is, of course, the worst offender. But it's so damn entertaining!

It's actually pushing the lolcats out. There's no escape. Once you get caught in the gravity well of ROFL, it's pretty much over. Like a fly stuck in a spider's web, you can struggle all you like, but you can't break free. And that's when the funny comes to get you. You've really got into 5 classic movies you didn't know were remakes and just had to read 5 reasons the good witch was a bad one. Then there's... but it's nearly 2am!

I could argue that I'm doing research for a possible future article about five naive art producers and why their drawings alone are hilarious, or five lol sites and why they are funny. But I'm busy doing this, and smoothing graphics for anything, particularly for this blog, can take hours. The more detailed the image, the longer it takes. And where do the images go? T'internet. 

Sigh!