lovehatethings

For years of online gaming the avatar has become a player's online manifestation that outstretched the simple handle. And although I'm not downplaying the rationale for such a creation within a gaming community, there now has become a growing affection for stylized avatars within social networking communities. Whether it was through people disguising their true image on MySpace or not wanting to get "tagged" in Facebook or simply thinking their Twitter icon looks cool as a zombie or anime character, avatars have taken on meme of the month status.

Within a Massively Multiplayer game experience, I can appreciate a need to be distinguished from the hundreds or thousands of other players who are all trying to decide which player to frag or cast a spell on. In fact, being someone who's absolutely useless with names, I can appreciate a unique avatar. When playing online poker, I rarely remember someone by their screen name, but I have a far easier time remembering someone who sucked out a river inside straight draw by their crop circle pic of Futrama's Bender... I hate you ironically-named MadSkillz69.

There is also a certain need for privacy with some people who want to use social networking sites and want to avoid a photorealistic representation for one reason or another. I find it hard to justify a constant shuffling of personal avatars on a weekly or daily basis. After all, isn't the purpose of an avatar for someone to be able to identify you when a real picture is unavailable?

While I'm not a player/user of Second Life, I would imagine that radically changing one's appearance on a regular basis would not only be counter productive to maintaining intergame relationships, but frustrating to any other players who would not want to persist in figuring out each person every time they logged on.

I'm not one of those Twitter users with thousands of people on my list, but even within the short list of people that I do follow, it seems there is constant change. Whether it's a manga, hobbit, alien, superhero or South Park character that you choose to represent you, I crave consistency for at least a short period of time.

And, just for the edification of those of you who participate in every avatar meme, allow me to let you in on the "down low" about a couple things. First, your dog, baby, or garden gnome is not you. As much as I appreciate you actually using a real photo as a representation, I'm not buying the miny sorcerer's hat and the rake. Also, yes your baby looks cute in the same way that all babies look cute when you have someone making face and bubbling out gibberish while popping two dozen pics on your Kodak C340, but I'm not social networking with your baby... unless of course they can type, "LOL, I can't believe how drunk we were!" after every picture that you post. At that point, they'll at least be on par with 75% of the rest of Facebook.

Next, appreciate the size of your avatar on most social network pages. To place family portrait in the space instead of a simple headshot pretty much just screams "Hey, I'm going to justify the time I spend online with friends as extended family networking time because it's not MY profile, it's a FAMILY profile. If you're going to have a picture that includes you as your avatar, how about JUST you. Also, for all you college guys who use a picture of a bikini model or your favorite emo singer as a pic that represents you, congratulations, you have now become a less than one-dimensional facade of a human being on a platform that only allows a single dimension.

I'm all for individualized expression on a medium that has moved from text to images to audio to video. I know that many of you like to express your inner values by changing your pic from laughing you to serious you to Macauley-Culkin-Shockface-in-Home-Alone you, but I beg you, please, stop.

I will cop to the fact that my avatars are always photoshopped to remove photorealistic aspects, but, anyone who knows me will always recognize my face and not that of a stuffed animal or a car. Also, I rarely, I repeat RARELY change any of my social network representations. I'm quite ready to admit that, from day to day, my macrolife doesn't change that much and, even though I could create some crazy avatar to pretend that my life is somehow more interesting or exciting than it is, I'm prepared to allow the static, consistent avatar choices I've made to be an indication of someone comfortable with who they are and not seeking trying to keep up with the meme of the month club.

Okay, I'm showing my age a bit here, but I remember Paul Lynde from the center Hollywood Square for many years. I also remember him as getting way too many laughs for jokes I didn't understand as a very young child. That said, in reading some of his best lines in retrospect, either this guy, the writers, or a combination of both were comical wizards when it came to one-liners and double entendres. Often set up by Peter Marshall 's questions, I now get why Lynde was so loved for so many year.

As a side note, I always thought the voice for Roger the Alien on American Dad was a dead ringer for Lynde... kudos Seth. Here are some of my Paul Lynde favorites:

Peter Marshall: In "Alice in Wonderland", who kept crying "I'm late, I'm late?"
Paul Lynde: Alice, and her mother is sick about it.  

Peter Marshall: According to Tony Randall, "Every woman I've been intimate with in my life has been..." What?
Paul Lynde: Bitterly disappointed.   

Peter Marshall: What is a pullet?
Paul Lynde: A little show of affection...  

Peter Marshall: Prometheus was tied to the top of a mountain by the gods because he had given something to man.  What did he give us?
Paul Lynde: I don't know what you got, but I got a sports shirt.  

Peter Marshall: It is considered in bad taste to discuss two subjects at nudist camps.  One is politics.  What is the other?
Paul Lynde: Tape measures.   

Peter Marshall: True or false, the navy has trained whales to recover objects a mile deep.
Paul Lynde: At first they tried unsuccessfully with cocker spaniels...   

Peter Marshall: When you pat a dog on its head he will usually wag his tail.  What will a goose do?
Paul Lynde: Make him bark.  

Peter Marshall: Burt Reynolds is quoted as saying, "Dinah (Shore)'s in top form.  I've never known anyone to be so completely able to throw herself into a..." A what?
Paul Lynde: A headboard.   

Peter Marshall: In one state, you can deduct $5 from a traffic ticket if you show the officer...what?
Paul Lynde: A ten dollar bill.  

Peter Marshall:  If you were pregnant for two years, what would you give birth to?
Paul Lynde:  Whatever it is, it would never be afraid of the dark.  

Peter Marshall:  What did James Watt invent after fooling around with his wife's tea kettle?
Paul Lynde:  James Watt Jr.  

Peter Marshall: It is the most abused and neglected part of your body-- what is it?
Paul Lynde:  Mine may be abused but it certainly isn't neglected!

Peter Marshall: In the Bible, who was found in a basket among the bulrushes?
Paul Lynde: Colonel Sanders.

Peter Marshall:  Now listen carefully, Paul...during the time of the hula hoop, the yo-yo, and Davy Crockett hats, who was in the White House?
Paul Lynde:  I'll say the yo-yo!

Peter Marshall:  Eddie Fisher recently stated, “I’m sorry.  I’m sorry for them both.”  Who or what was he referring to?
Paul Lynde:  His fans.

Peter Marshall:  According to the old song, "At night, when you're asleep, into your tent I'll creep."  Who am I?
Paul Lynde:  The scoutmaster!

Peter Marshall: Is it possible to drink too much water?
Paul Lynde: Yes, it's called drowning!

Peter Marshall: True or false, Guatemala once declared war on Germany.  
Paul Lynde: Yes, and it's a good thing Germany never found out!

Peter Marshall: Paul, why are forest rangers in remote locations ordering goats as standard equipment?
Paul Lynde: Because the sheep are wising up?

Peter Marshall: You have a bunch of unwanted hair. According to Dr. Thotusen, what is most often the cause of unwanted hair? A bunch of it?
Paul Lynde: Running over a llama.

Let's pretend for a brief moment that my mind isn't a dark and scary place. Instead, after listening to this, go listen to American Beauty by the Grateful Dead.

Is it just me or does Hallowe'en seem more culturally devoid every year? I know. I get it. I'm kidless. And while baby goats shouldn't be a consideration for one's love or hate of Hallowe'en, I'm thinking back on my own childhood at memories of All Hallow's Eves gone by and realizing that there really aren't that many fond memories. I'm not saying I hated the event, in fact I remember, at the time, having a certain anticipatory delight in thinking up costumes and gathering free candy. Quite simply, the costume/candy ritual was fun, but did not inspire near as many found remembrances as other holidays.

Let's take a sobering look at Hallowe'en: pre-pubescent, confused children try to hide behind dollar store Transformer masks as they threaten homeowners with vigilante violence unless they fork over individually-wrapped sugar confections. Clearly then, Hallowe'en has come to serve several purposes:

1) attempt to feed disenfranchised children once a year and allow for governments to forgo actual food subsidies.
2) satisfy the powerful dentist lobby, where 4 out of 5 dentists agree more candy is a good thing... no, bad thing... well, privately, a good thing.
3) seeks to encourage indentured servitude of cane workers in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
4) bows to the snack food lobbyists who don't have tons of money, but keep the assistants of government officials knee deep in Junior Mints.
5) endorses gang swarming for the purposes of intimidating the middle class.
6) allows our vampire overlords to come out one night a year and feed on Blood Red Twizzlers.
7) makes lower class kids feel inadequate when they have to wear their Superman Underoos as a costume.
8) enables the rarely-seen-at-other holidays "razor-blade-in-the-apple" lunatics.
9) forces adults, who would never otherwise think of dressing up, to participate in a drunken costume party ritual.
10) remind me, that despite all else, for two years I had the coolest stormtrooper costume in town.

The disappearance of original screenplays in Hollywood. Free up screenwriters and support independent film.

While I've certainly had my obligatory lovehate on the Canadian and US elections, the self-perpetuating of election news cycles have allowed bloggers to be up front and on point with political snippets on a minute to minute basis. Whether it's bloggers that work for CNN, CNBC, Fox News, or some of the larger independent blog sites like Huffington and Drudge, people (including network news producers) are turning to blogs on a more frequent basis for information. Such a relationship has also reinforced the persistent echoing of Uncle Ben in Peter Parker's head: "With great power comes great responsibility." 

Any news agency that gets duped by a blog post cries foul over the blogger's resposibility. Any reader who gets deceived when they buy into a false fact or "opinion as fact" mopes and pouts about how blogs have done them wrong. But the simple truth of the matter is that bloggers don't owe anyone anything. If a news organization gets duped by a blog post, I say "Hell Yeah!" If CNN or Fox News can't do some fact checking before they run with something, their discredit serves them right. And, while I would admit that a casual reader is far more likely to buy into something they read on a blog, I offer up the bastardized consumer warning: "Reader Beware".

Producers of personal web content owe their readers nothing. If readers start to get what they don't expect, they will stop reading.  There are few to no examples of paid blogs these days, so no fiscal responsibility is at risk. I support the idea of writers inventing complete bullshit if that suits their fancy. If nothing else, it will start to hone readers' skills of detecting such crap, because, I guarantee you, 90% of what gets presented on respected news outlets on a daily basis is laced with bias, spin, and gatekeeping filters amuck.

I know it's a bit of a cliched cop out to shout "FREEDOM OF SPEECH" on the web, as pretty much anything that can be said, has, is, or will be said. And, that said, I'm a proponent of wild anarchy reigning webwide since all other major media outlets are constrained by advertising and the moral outrage of motivated minority groups.

The web needs to be the great frontier. The web needs to be the autobahn where we will allow participants to go as fast as they need to go because we believe that to restrict everybody for the sake of the idiotic few is anathema. The web needs to be the Wild West where all that is required to stake a claim is an idea, storage and bandwidth.

I have only one responsibility as a blogger - free expression. The blogger is the guerilla pamphleteer of days gone by: someone who threw a thousand pieces of paper up into the circling breezes of the town square to be consumed by anyone who had the inclination to pick one up. As soon as bloggers start to cede responsibility over their content to any other than their own sensibilities, freedom is lost. I'm not advocating bloggers enacting anything that will incite physical harm, but, that said, only someone with an entrenched credibility can move others to action anyway - and even the best orators cannot get people out to do something as simple as voting.

The community will self-regulate by ignoring anyone whose credibility is lost. For those who missed that: The community will self-regulate by ignoring anyone whose credibility is lost!

Deride anyone who seeks to encapsulate your ideas. Deny anyone's right to silence your voice.

Love your freedom of expression. Hate any rules that try to scare you from it.

We will stake our claims.
We will police ourselves.
We will express ourselves in every language, including objectionable.
We will post with abandon.
We will breach taboos.
We will cross every line.
We will not apologize.
We will not relent.

Sure, everyone knows "Rock, Paper, Scissors".  And sure, some of us "experimented" in university with the occasional drunken binges of throwing "dynamite" or "gun" into the mix, but the folks at www.baseballbatyouth.com have taken Roshambeau to a fantastic new level. Three options have expanded to twenty-five; this is no longer a game for drunken escapades.

You may have to make saving throws against spells or find ways to build your armor class... Gygax Beware!  Sorry... became a geeky teenager for a second there. Expand your Roshambeau and party it up with friends.

How might your mom, dad, or grandparents be even bigger geeks than you? Oh, and porn too!

According to Mary Richert (I really don't know who she is, but she probably doesn't know who I am either) of guardian.co.uk, social networking sites are more popular than porn sites. In the article she asserts some criticisms about social networks that I agree with. Most importantly, she states that, in comparing social networks to the antisocial aspects of porn, "there's something similarly antisocial about social networking sites."

My immediate concern is that internet technology has been driven by porn since its inception. Broadband was developed simply as a way to get porn faster delivery times. Porn drove peer to peer applications for almost a decade... let's face it, while many people on Kazaa were downloading Britney Spears songs, other were looking for Britney Spears lookalikes in compromising positions. Bandwidth demands spiked for Pam Anderson and Tommy Lee and, a few years later, for A Night in Paris.

While, from a purely moral and sociological perspective I can appreciate the fall of porn from this pinnacle position, I fear the future without the omnipresent push of porn. I don't expect holographic technology is going to be demanded for people to talk to in-laws overseas, but 3-D porn? The movement that is going to bring the tactile/kinesthetic cyber interfaces of the future may be left in the cold if lonely education has to prompt change instead of porn.

We have reached a precipice my friends. As Trekkie Monster of Avenue Q sang: "Why you think the 'net was born? Porn. Porn. Porn."