Category Archives: Information Stupor Highway

Idiocy on the internet.

Dear Google, Back up off a bitch

Dear Google,

Back up off a bitch. Seriously. You’re getting to be like the creepy uncle who wants to kiss on the lips. Get out of my personal bubble already.

So here’s the back story: I’m doing a little cursory web-searching for an article I have due, when at the bottom of the page I notice this:

One of the Google guys’ newest brainsurges, Social Search results. (Ed. note: Clearly the real buzz today is Google Buzz, but that’s not pissing me off — yet — so I’m running with this. Run with me.) Basically, below the “legitimate” results Google presents me, I now get this, a section of results from people in my “social circle.” And according to the web giant, this fellow, [name redacted], is a buddy of mine, who has germane information to share. Well, I beg to differ. Not only was this entirely unhelpful, but I have no fucking clue who this guy is. And I don’t care.

I’ve done a decent job of keeping the circumference of my social circle off the internet — you know, like actually social — so the fact that Google purports to have some insight into my personal life is presumptuous at best and unnerving at second best. OK, Google, I say. I’ll play your little reindeer games. Show me whom you think my social circle encompasses.

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Sun’s Schwartz Tweets Larry Ellison the Finger in 5-7-5

I guess it’s official: The Internet has killed formality. Today we add another awesome resignation to the annals of unprofessionalism, and watch executive dignity go the way of the Full Sentence. In the wake of an Oracle takeover, Sun Microsystems CEO Jonathan Schwartz tweeted his way out the front door:

Of course we all must know that this is not actually how he tendered his resignation, despite BoingBoing’s assertion of such. Though, it’d be a lot cooler if he did.

[via NYT via BoingBoing.]

Reader Appreciation: Really, what are the odds?

Thanks to the reader who found the site by searching
mountain dew mead.”

See: Mead, M’Lady? Prithee, Mountain Dew

Bulk Mail Bards

Not so long ago we looked at an awesome piece of spam mail that seemed acutely aimed at the Unhappy Mediator’s proclivity for the scientific. Well, yesterday I found myself once again immersed in my junk folder, and the language lover in me was struck by the inventive word choice and unusual rhythms of a handful of emails. They were downright… poetic. Indeed, the subject heads and first lines seemed to form perfect lyrical couplets. Below, a selection that would give even Chaucer a chubby. Shake William’s spear. Thaw Robert’s Frost. Make ee cummings. I’ll stop, I’ll stop.

Sad truth on your size
Potion for heroic banging

Avoid bed-loser’s fate
Love-skill increment

The night is a time to have fun in bed. Make this fun lasting!
Best girl-digging skills

Need your knob up?
Any girl will stay with you

I got a lot about you
In shape for making it?

Harder banging is real
Exploding ardor every night

Want to see her happy tears?
Don’t pay for delivery

High amour degree
Shoot your gin into her vagina

10 seconds and it’s up and firm
Confirm on receiving

Not OK, Google.

There I am doing an innocent Google search for the latest on the Conan/Jay debacle when I notice results ensconced in freakin’ talk-bubble-boxes (see yellow highlighting):

Not OK, Google. If I wanted to search Twitter I would have fucking searched fucking Twitter. As if I didn’t feel had enough by this Conan craziness, now you gotta go search-resulting me comic-book style? F you, dude. Like I’d want to get my TV entertainment news from some hip hop radio station. Or this guy.  Totally lame.

Bigger picture, this is an unnerving turn in the world of internet search. That may sound dramatic. But. It’s hard enough as it is to click a credible source online without the Twitter vomit of no-name bozos appearing directly below legitimate news results — which are of questionable reliability to begin with, and yet the best we’ve got to go on. Throw a rock in the air you’re bound to hit someone stupid. Throw a query in the Cloud you’re bound to hit his latest tweet. Blerg.

More groundbreaking news: People love porn

The real news here? Ladies, we’ve obliterated the latex ceiling.

But seriously, is that graphic blow up of a diseased snatch really necessary? And reported where, AVN? (Don’t open that at work. FYI: AVN Magazine is described by its publisher as the Bible of the adult industry.)

[via Gizmodo via 9Gag via TheNextWeb]

Reader Appreciation: Kids these days

Thanks to the reader who found the site by searching
how the young in the us are getting dumb.”

Have Your Cake – And Play It, Too

Though I wasn’t invited to this design-heavy games-n-cupcakes new years party, I’m thoroughly enjoying the digital results. Pastries and gaming — playstries? Count me freakin in. These folks got together and made 100 cupcake honoring 100 awesome games. Some highlights, from video games…

…and old school analog favorites…

Even the site itself is kind of a game. Pure gold.

Reader Appreciation: Almost redundant, isn’t it?

I like this monkey.

Un-Happy new year, folks. You may have noticed a brief, unannounced NMH dematerialization in the final days of the aughts. I’ll cop. The Unhappy Mediator took a protracted tropical hiatus from virtually all things media, edged into realm of actually-happy, and as such, stymied the site’s editorial mission.

But I’m back, and to honor that mission in the nascent decade, I’d like to introduce a new rubric, Reader Appreciation, wherein we doff our post to those virtual visitors who keenly and deftly stumble upon the heart of No Happy Medium.

Without much further ado, and with the best of wishes (and a sheepish apology for half a December of neglect), the first NHM reader shout-out:

jkljkl

Thanks to the reader who found the site by searching                     “asshole with bluetooth.”

This Week’s Top Nerd-mail Dec 13-19

Seasons greetings from the Norwegian Coastal Administration.

[From Norway to you, via my inbox]

Related: Top Nerd-mail Dec 6-12