Addendum to May 13 Post (Google Analytics)

I also wanted to mention that I was right; a rare occurrence. My post dated May 13 that was mostly flame-bait succeeded in netting me the most visitors to date. Woohoo!

According to the theory of obtaining a thousand true fans: One down, only 999 to go.

New York Living On The Cheap: Fuggetaboudit

And so, in my panic at realizing it has been nearly ten days since my last post, I would just like to submit that I finally succumbed to the truism that NYC is the single most expensive place to live in the world.

Gas was $4.13 at the station nearest me, last time I checked. I drove a handful of times over the last few weeks, and only then to pick up/drop off my girlfriend. Thankfully, I can get nearly anywhere in the five boroughs for $2.00 (thank you, Metrocard). The food is incredible here, and sometimes incredibly expensive. I found several electronics stores in the city that mark everything up by 50-80% from original retail. (C'mon, an iPhone for $1329.99?! Are you effin' nuts?)

My unemployment insurance barely covers my monthlies, and leaves me with virtually zero spending cash. Any poetry readers care to donate to the cause of my livelyhood?

To boot, I've been sulking, not writing. It may be a cop-out, but it's the only excuse I have left to hold.

By and Large, though, I maintain optimistic and vigilant in my search for a life here.

- bademailname

Prickdom and Popularity: Directly Proportional.

I feel a rage coming, but soon. Hopefully, as has happened in the past, a torrent of better-than-decent/good writing will come from it. But first, an intro/meta-spective. It's full of embellishments, some outright lies, but mostly single-mindedness to the point of chaos. It's a first step to saying what's really on my mind, so bear with me.

Has anyone else noticed that snobbery and popularity move in direct proportion on the internet?

Follow along with this stream of consciousness, if you will. I was reading "The Next Page" this morning, a holdover from something i saw yesterday but never got around to reading. They had reprinted online a small book that had been published only for a conference held in Denver. Firstly, I found that when the slideshow started, the new window had covered up most of the logo on the page out of focus ... so that the letters spelled out "NOBserver." Which led to me thinking what snobby little pricks they were for being so high-faluting that anyone would want to view 30 pages' worth of tables of contents - with barely any comment offered as to why these specific TOCs were chosen (one small introductory page about five paragraphs deep). What's more, why are 50% of the picks all design books? Surely there's a designer that made better choices for a 13th edition of The Great Gatsby than did some design grad's senior thesis. To boot, nearly half of the design "choices" were identical to one another. Now, I realize I'm no graphic design student, but I do have two eyes and a bit of logic. Besides the stylistic choice to columnize the page numbers, or perhaps a single or double-space decision, there is little else to discern between two-thirds of the presented TOCs.

Which got me thinking that, most of the time, the most severe pricks on the internet are also the most popular figureheads: Steve Jobs, John C. Dvorak, the entire crew at b0ingb0ing - all snobbery, and yet somehow all incredibly loved for their ability to spew vitriol and scathe.

It's a given that none of the aforementioned characters wants to be a snob, (except perhaps Dvorak or Jardin), but they all seem to occasionally fall into the same pit traps as any other writer worth their salt. The motto of news agencies the world over is "If it bleeds it leads;" A more stringent rule of the internet is "If it causes emotional distress to at least one person besides the writer, post it." Web writers have long known that the stake the internet has on our psyches is one of emotional needs, and very personal; compared to the wide, sweeping lifelessness of the printed word, or the decadent past tense of video. The latter two mediums have conditioned us to feel nothing unless it is immediate. Therefore, the internet is the best source of cultural emotional temperatures, while TV, magazines and newspapers strive to reiterate our boundaries.

What's more, I LIKE Xeni, Cory, Mark, and all the other peeps at b0ingb0ing. I read that site every damn day, and I love most of the things they put in their repository. So, why am I belittling the BB gang? Simple, they are easy targets, and I myself am falling into the trap of causing emotional distress for the sake of popularity. I'm a little jealous of their fame, a little peeved that they consider themselves so hip as to be above and beyond the culture fashionistas, a little disappointed they don't post my suggestions.

In my building hatred for people I've never met, I seem to be storing it all in the pit of my stomach. Either this will be my own claim to fame when it is finally released, or it will be my downfall as it consumes me. In any case, I bet a gazillion dollars that I get more reads on this post than any before it.

Using the Skyfire beta ...

... to write this post. So far, it has been a pretty slick ride. even using EDGE it's fast (enough) to keep me from going crazy; it fortunately does not harken back to the dial-up days.

Then again, it doesn't like zooming-in on pages with rich content. Myspace does OK until you hit a friend's page that contains so much brik-a-brak you can't stand viewing it on any browser - mobile or otherwise. Sites like YouTube and Break.com may as well not have a place here, since they first have to render on a remote server before hitting your winmo phone. Video barely runs a frame per second while the audio whittles away blithely.

Strange that I haven't posted any creative works lately. It's not that I've run out of ideas - quite the opposite actually. I have a glut of ideas sitting in my head, all fighting for a little focus. It's that I can't seem to pick one idea without all the others entering my consciousness and bitch-slapping me back into a confused schizophrenia.

But that's for another time.

Skyfire is under beta now, for Windows Mobile 5 and up.

Alltop lists bademailname under Books!

It wasn't precisely what I was hoping for, but what on Earth is? Alltop was kind enough to list this blog under their Culture > Books category. Triple Huzzah! Yes, it's at the very bottom, because I get very few clicks by anyone not directly related to me; but it's there in technicolored intarweb goodness!

Now, to catch up on that whole creative process thingy I've been missing out on since my move.

Link

bademailname. now in NYC flavor

I moved to NYC over last weekend, and today marks the first day of teh internet. Huzzah! More postings to come in short order.

RAAF-1, Pelican-0

This F-111 made an emergency landing after colliding head-on with a pelican at 900m. The plane was said to be going in excess of 550km/h. The pilots were hailed as heroes for their landing effort; the jet was lauded as "unstable" with the damage caused by the bird - who was sucked into an engine. There was also a hole in one of the wings, I presume by debris from the initial strike to the radome.

Inconsequently, I think "unstable" is a poor word choice, and I wouldn't give a dime for it. If the expert had said untenable, though ... easily 50 cents.

Link. via Neatorama