People Liking Things

June 9, 2014 / / No Comments

People like things a lot these days. They have favorite things, so many many favorite things. They love to vote for things. Vote them up, vote them down. Maybe it’s to compensate a bit for losing the opportunity to vote for politicans who aren’t human garbage. I don’t know.

They express these warm feelings of approbation by clicking buttons on web pages, or fingering them where they float just under their glass touchscreens, or talking to their fucking Google Glass Life Monetization Accessories™ or something. I don’t know; I’m rapidly getting to the point where I don’t want to know.

As I write this 166,333 of these upstanding citizens — who have nothing to fear from the torturers and their colleagues! — have paused long enough in their otherwise laudable pursuits of the Good Life to mash the favorite button on this:

what-is-wrong-with-people

Certainly there are other gentlemen and ladies out there, children even, perhaps, who have found themselves, as the young sometimes do, unconvinced by the ethical pantomime of their elders, who find this odd and sad and objectionable. Maybe there are some who, like me, find it goddamned horrifying. To whom this is just another toxic cherry atop the towering summertime sunstroke shit sundae layercaked out of Twitter and The Rest. Not to put too fine a point on it.

But our numbers are, I fear, dwindling, and dark times are ahead.

If you are so inclined, feel free to press one of those lovely round buttons below to express your support for my wee bedtime divagation. The irony will be delicious.

Today In Recreational Fury

January 6, 2014 / / 1 Comment

“That we as a society are condoning information destruction and core library closures in Canada is unbelievable, and in my view, undemocratic and probably criminal… that would be an interesting aspect to investigate,” adds the scientist.

“Through a misguided policy purportedly driven by the desire for cost savings in the public service, and I believe this was only one reason for this action, we have trashed a network of world-class marine and fisheries libraries, the envy around the world. The rest of the world cannot believe what is happening in Canada on this issue.”

Concludes Wells: “If I were still working for the government, I probably would be fired for being concerned and outspoken about the future of aquatic science in Canada and the impact of current federal policies.”

What’s Driving Chaotic Dismantling of Canada’s Science Libraries?

It’s Loud And It’s Tasteless and I’ve Heard It Before

August 14, 2013 / / No Comments

Remember George Carlin’s ‘Asshole, Jackoff or Scumbag?’ Well, if you’re not an old fart like me, you might not, so enjoy:

This Carlin bit comes to mind, or to my mind at least, about… well, about 5 to 10 times a day, to be honest, lately. Because let’s face it folks: we are positively awash in assholes, ass-deep in jackoffs, and drowning in a sea of scumbags. Turn on the TV and you’re assaulted with full-auto barrages of all three. We’re lied to, manipulated, and milked for every last goddamned bit of consumer-juice we’re good for, pretty much every waking second. Let’s not even get into the mild-mannered khaki-wearing foryourowngooder digital buttspelunkers at the NSA, and their shitweasel enablers in every boardroom and Congressional Blowjob Parlor the world over. But I sense I am getting away from my main point here. Focus, stav.

To wit: fuck these guys. Specifically, fuck the Interactive Advertising Bureau. Also, fuck the Digital Advertising Alliance. While we’re at it, fuck the Network Advertising Initiative, the Direct Marketing Association, the American Advertising Federation, the Association of National Advertisers, and just for fun, fuck the Interactive Advertising Bureau all over again. Fuck them in the eyeball with Hitler’s petrified diesel-dipped dick.

Here’s why (beyond the obvious).

TEV4

Are the people behind this assholes, jerkoffs, or scumbags? I will let you decide, gentle reader.

Whichever way you go, the sheer dimwitted audacity of that is kind of breathtaking, isn’t it? I mean, it doesn’t take much in the way of balls to lie to stupid people in the media these days — hell, it’s expected — but doing it in print seems quite a bit more ballsy. And stupid.

Stupid and Ballsy™, the new hit show on Fox, coming this fall.

But I’ve got to thank them for dragging their big dumb testicles across my chin. I must admit that working up a nice frothing head of righteous indignation at stuff like this helps reassure me that even though I’m getting old, I’m not getting any more willing to gobble down the crap and ask for more. Recreational fury keeps the valves clean.

So, anyway: they recommend you send an email to StopMozilla@aboutads.info to somehow validate the spurious FUD-flavoured bullshit they’re spouting. Me, I’d suggest you send a message to that address, too. But perhaps one that compliments them on their massive, stupid, stupid balls.

Lockdown

July 4, 2013 / / No Comments

That world formed the web’s foundations — without that world to build on, Google, Facebook, and Twitter couldn’t exist. But they’ve now grown so large that everything from that web-native world is now a threat to them, and they want to shut it down. “Sunset” it. “Clean it up.” “Retire” it. Get it out of the way so they can get even bigger and build even bigger proprietary barriers to anyone trying to claim their territory.

Well, fuck them, and fuck that.

Marco.org

Fuck The USA

June 28, 2013 / / No Comments

It’s amusing that the stupid punk rock protest songs I remember from 30 years ago are the songs that are circling back for me lately. I love lots of Americans, but you know: I’m leaning forward into the old old familiar fuck-the-USA stance tonight. Outgrown hobbyhorse saddle smells like sunscorched leather and my own ballsweat. A familiar smell of my youth.

Jacket

It’s not like I’m any happier with my own left-behind home, friends. Part of getting old seems to be, at least for me, loving individual people but loathing them and their dimwit convictions in aggregate. So it goes.

Anger? Anger is an energy.

I woke up to pounding on my door

May 28, 2013 / / No Comments

Increasing numbers of ‘terror suspects’ are being arrested on the basis of online and CCTV surveillance data. Authorities claim they act in the public interest, but does this intense surveillance keep us safer?

Update: I posted this yesterday. This morning I woke up still waist-deep in a dream. I’ve been dreaming more vividly in the last year or so than I think I ever have before in my life, and loving every second of it — actively looking forward to dreaming when I go to bed — in no small part because of the uncharacteristically (for me) frequent and rousing sexy dreamtimes.

But this dream this morning wasn’t just very sexy, at least in the third act. Though it early-on involved a lot of semirandom JamesBonding, with action sequences and exotic locales and ladies aplenty, the final segment of went like so: it had Been Revealed To Me By Those In The Know that Facebook and other social media sites that encourage you to frame and tag faces in photos with people’s names were feeding that data into government databases. You know, For Nefarious Purposes.

To the rescue! Sadly, swinging into action to right this wrong didn’t end up being all that exciting, though. Sitting in front of a computer is something I do too much of when I’m awake. In the dream, I heroically reopened my long-dormant Facebook account and started tagging faces with random, amusing-to-me names. The high point, just before I woke up, was tagging a picture of Stephen Harper with the name Whoopi Goldberg.

Small victories, I guess.

Bullshit and Counterbullshit

May 24, 2013 / / No Comments

Step 1: Saccharine art-directed wall of text ad copy (which, honestly, is just a little too twee, even if its heart is in the right place) gets auto-elevated to pretentious ‘manifesto’ by virality hopefuls pitching their product at Facebook likers and overwrought teenagers.

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Step 2: Random loveable cynic Livejournaller rewrites manifesto, hilariously.

YOU EXIST. BE AS SELF INDULGENT AS YOU CAN. DON’T THINK TOO MUCH. BAD SITUATIONS ARE EASY TO CHANGE AND IF THIS ISN’T TRUE FOR YOU, DON’T GET LOSER GERMS ON THIS SIGN. MY EVERY THOUGHT IS SO DEEP. IF YOU ARE YOUNG, ATTRACTIVE AND PRIVILEGED, LOVE IS EASY. NO FATTIES, NO OLDSTERS, NO HOBOS. NOTHING IS COMPLICATED WHEN YOU CAN BUY WHAT YOU WANT. DIFFERENT TYPE SIZES CAN MAKE APHORISMS PROFOUND. EAT RAINBOWS, SHIT STARS. ASK THE NEXT PERSON YOU SEE HOW DESPERATE THEY ARE, AND SHARE YOUR DESIRE TO HUNT THEM FOR SPORT. TRAVEL OFTEN; TOURISM IS AN ADEQUATE SUBSTITUTE FOR DEPTH. IF YOU ARE UNHAPPY, IT’S PROBABLY BECAUSE YOU MISSED YOUR CHANCE AT AWESOME. LIFE IS BEING BORN ON THIRD BASE AND ACTING LIKE HITTING A TRIPLE IS SIMPLE. HANG ON TO THOSE DREAMS, IT MAKES IT EASIER TO SELL YOU. LIFE IS SHORT AND BRUTAL IF YOU CAN’T AFFORD TO LIVE A WINSOME CLICHE. WELCOME TO HELL.

Step 3: Clumsy Photochop remix.

The_Holstee_Manifesto-930x616[1]

Step 4: Profit.

Humans

May 13, 2013 / / 1 Comment

2053 nuclear detonations, 53 years. Lunacy.

What a piece of work is a man! How noble in
reason, how infinite in faculty! In form and moving
how express and admirable! In action how like an Angel!
in apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the
world! The paragon of animals!

Here’s a palate cleanser, though, which goes some way towards making me feel that the Obvious Ironic Quote above is maybe not so ironic after all.

http://youtu.be/KaOC9danxNo

Anger Soup, Disappointment Salad

March 7, 2013 / / No Comments

Here’s your Superbowl-and-circuses, Citizens™! Please enjoy the clash of these broken, opiated gladiators we have assembled for your pleasure. You will also enjoy these messages exhorting you to buy more products and services. Because the awareness that you have no value as anything but Consumers may upset, you are encouraged to treat our crass blandishments as entertainment. More entertainment to entertain you! We have been assured that there will be no shortage of websites that will fall all over themselves to give you a chance to watch our ads online, just in case, heaven forfend, that you were unfortunate enough to miss the opportunity during the game itself. We aim to please, as long as pleasing means you’ll like us more and buy more of our useless garbage.

Oh Oracle Google! Consort to the Apple-onian godhead, second among our modern pantheon, the smoke of our ad-view offerings wafts skyward, and your powerful limbs engorge with ad revenue. It is a mere 4% of your Olympian might that does not spring from selling us Product, and we in turn swell with pride. Even Facebook, so unloved but so tightly wound around our lives like the snakes on fleet Hermes’ staff, even Facebook is an ad-revenue eyeball-offering 85%-er.

Our Dionysian rites, on screens big and small, are littered with more Products more!, sometimes so risibly over-the-top as to temper the bite of tragedy with some welcome if undeliberate corporate comedy. And music — oh terpsichorean muse — we enlist your aid in winging ever more goods into our hands. Goods, I say, because goods and products are the same, and they are Good!

OK, enough faux-classical silliness. Yes, the cranky old man has a wild hair up his butt again. But all of these things and more boggle me right upside my head.

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