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Top 10 Internet Annoyances

2003.01.14

Here are ten things you see on the Internet that sort of annoy me. Everyone writes one of these "Top 10" lists around this time of year. It's compulsory, like dropping AOL when you get high speed Internet.

1. The term "Blog"

With apologies to Ren and Stimpy and various "neojournalists:"

What types down stairs wearing old underwear

and leaves you in a fog?

What's great for a laugh and cuts downloads in half?

It's bLog, bLog, bLog!

 

It's bLog, bLog, it's long, it's wordy, it's weird.

It's bLog, bLog, I think I'll stop shaving my beard!

Everyone reads a blog! You're gonna love 'em, bLogs!

Come on and write your blog! Everyone needs more bLogs!

2. Pop-Positions

The only thing I find more annoying than pop-up ads are the various mangled terms used to describe the variants. Pop-under, pop-over, pop-after, pop-before, pop-in, pop-out, pop-left, pop-top, hop-on-pop, pop-up video, soda-pop, don't-call-me-pop, pop-up, pop-down, pop-it-all-around....

If you've never seen a modern American male teenager attempt to run across campus while wearing stylin' hip hop jeans, you just have not lived to see it all. One hand behind holding up the pants while the other flails helplessly attempting to maintain balance. While carrying a backpack. In the rain. More fun than a rabid squirrel in a tent revival. Pull your pants up, kid, while they'll still stay up of their own volition.

3. Use of chat room spelling on papers and advertising.

Sry this is l8, and so on. This is about as goofy as the trend of young male teenagers wearing their pants down under their derrieres.

I have the same exact reaction to people who are attempting to spell words by typing upside down and backwards. 7734, son, I used to do that with my old Casio.

I really shouldn't write this stuff after watching a Tommy Lee Jones movie.

4. Microsoft and innovation in the same sentence.

'Nuff said.

5. Ease = Cheap

If Microsoft's IIS is cheaper than a free Linux server because its server software is easier to use, then logic forces me to conclude that an Xserve is the cheapest server of them all - for the same reason.

6. Did you know Satan's contractual obligations with Mike Dell end in Q2 2003?

7. Niches

Computer articles that use the new buzzword for Apple: "niche" is the new "beleaguered," only with less hate mail.

8. Internet Research

"Internet" and "research" in the same sentence makes my blood boil. Just watch: "I got all of my references from www.google.com." BAM! Owwww, that hurts.

9. Cause of the Day

Soapbox issues that seem really important at one time but not at all at another. Mine, for example, is the banning of rumor site writers from Macworld press functions. What's up with that now? Not much. Just look at GraphicPower, which was such a hotbed of activity a few months ago for MWNY. Kid's off on a completely different tangent now. Ahh, youth.

10. At Number Ten

End of the year Top 10 lists, especially those that have contrived items just to round off the lists. Puh-leeze. At least we waited for the new year to publish ours. At least most of ours are related to the Internet one way or another.

Recent Lite Sides

• What if Apple thought like a PC company?, 11.01. Apple has innovated and blazed its own trail. But what if it had followed the path taken by the PC copycats?
• How Microsoft can turn Vista lemons into lemonade, 10.22. How Microsoft could profit by no longer allowing manufacturers to sell new PCs with Windows XP installed.
• iPods that never passed beta or focus groups, 09.13. "What most Apple fans don't realize is that there were a few iPod variants that never made it out of beta testing and the focus group stage."
• Pigs fly, snow in Death Valley, and Dvorak uses a Mac, 08.03. What has the world come to when John Dvorak, founding member of the Axis of Macevil, walks into the temple of All Things Macintosh?
• More in the The Lite Side index.

Links for the Day

• Mac of the Day: iMac Core2, Sep. 2006 - Apple introduced the biggest screen ever in an iMac with a 24" Core2 Duo model at 2.16 GHz.
• List of the Day: MacBook List for those using a MacBook or MacBook Pro.
  
• September 6 in LEM history: 99: G4 vs. Pentium III - 00: Setting up a server - 02: Norton Utilities warning - 10 greatest computer annoyances - 06: iMac Core2 Duo - Mac mini Core Duo - The iMac Core2 value equation - 07: Apple seduction - Why I really want an iPod touch - iPod history, 2005 to present - Upgrading a Power Mac G - Apple intros iPod touch, classic, and video nano

Recent Content on Low End Mac

• Anticipation: New iPods Now, New Macs Later, Kev Kitchens, Kitchens Sync, 09.05. The season of new iPods is at hand, but new Macs may wait until 2009.
• Listen to Just the Music with the V-Moda Vibe Earbuds, Tommy Thomas, Welcome to Macintosh, 09.05. Well built, the noise canceling earbuds will let you hear all the nuances of your music without letting through background noise.
• Buy a MacBook Now or Wait?, MacBook touch Patents, Samsung X360 Takes on MBA, and More, The 'Book Review, 09.05. Also 20 years of portable Macs, data backup and preservation, universal U-Charge battery charger for Mac 'Books, bargain 'Books from $150 to $2,699, and more.
• Source of iPhone 3G Problems, Army Uses iPods as Field Translators, Gains with Business, and More, iNews Review, 09.05. Also UK bans iPhone ad as 'misleading', iPhone password easy to bypass, GM to offer radios with USB in 2009 models, weather tracking software, and more.
• Macs Gain Ground in August, Consumers Most Likely to Buy Macs, LaCie USB Speakers, and More, Mac News Review, 09.05. Also migrating Time Machine to a new drive and two new keyboards from Logitech.
• Best iPod touch Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.05. Refurb 8 GB, $199; new, $284; refurb 16 GB, $299; new, $370; refurb 32 GB, $399; new, $453.
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• Best iMac G4 Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.05. Used 15" 700 MHz CD-RW, $279; 800 Combo, $300; 1 GHz $390; 17" 800 MHz SD, $439; 1.25 GHz, $449; 20", $569.
• Overclocking a Mac mini Got Me Hooked on Souping Up Macs, Adam Geller, My First Mac, 09.04. Stories of hot rodding iBooks, G3 iMacs, and PCI Power Macs on the cheap.
• Apple Will Not Abandon Optical Drives, the Mac Drought, Purposeful Mac Acquisition, and More, Dan Knight, Low End Mac Mailbag, 09.04. Also Mac OS X 10.5 on a G4-upgraded Blue & White G3 and problems using a flat panel display with a Quadra 700.
• Only Leopard Runs Routine Maintenance Tasks after Startup or Waking from Sleep, Charles W. Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 09.04. Mac OS X 10.5 runs routine system maintenance scripts as soon as possible after starting up or waking up your Mac. Earlier versions of OS X do not do this.
• Tomorrow's Solid State Drives and Notebooks, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 09.04. Flash drives are great but have some shortcomings. Some thoughts on building better SSDs and notebooks to use them.
• Best 12" PowerBook G4 Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.04. Used 867 MHz Combo, no APX, $490; 1 GHz, $550; SuperDrive, $625; 1.5 GHz w/o APX, $660; w/APX, $675.
• Best Mac mini Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.04. Used 1.25 GHz G4 SD, $549; 1.42 Combo, $409; new 1.83 Core2 Combo, $569 after rebate; 2.0 SD, $769 after rebate.
• Best 17" PowerBook G4 Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.04. Used 1 GHz, $779; 1.33 GHz, $799; 1.5 GHz, $859; 1.67 GHz, $910.
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• Another Free POP3 Provider, Recharging a Dead PRAM Battery, Current Kanga Value, and More, Charles W. Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 09.03. GMX email now available in US, Panasonic UJ-841S drive won't burn discs, restoring a dead PRAM battery in a Pismo, and thoughts on Kanga value today.
• Best eMac Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.03. Used 700 MHz Combo, $120; 1.25 GHz SuperDrive, $150; 1.42 GHz, $349.
• Best Mac OS X 10.5 'Leopard' Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.03. Mac OS X 10.5, single user, $99; 5 users, $140; 10.5 Server, 10 users, $395; unlimited, $850.
• Best MacBook Air Deals, Low End Mac Deals, 09.03. Refurb 1.6 HD, $1,499; new, $1,690 after rebate; refurb 1.8, $1,699; new, $1,919 a/r; refurb 1.6 SSD, $2,099; new, $2,294 a/r; refurb 1.8, $2,299; new, $2,400 a/r.
• Psystar Strikes Back, Countersues Apple, Frank Fox, Stop the Noiz, 09.03. Psystar is trying to paint Apple as a monopoly and force it to license the Mac OS.
• More links in our archive.

<go to the Lite Side index>

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