Things I Hate About the Internet

Somewhere between the Westboro Baptist "Church" planning their usual bullshit at Ronnie James Dio's memorial service and Dekalb County (Georgia) paramedics missing the point, I did not know where to start today for fear of going on an incoherent rant about just how incredibly stupid people can be. Instead, I have decided to compile a list of things on the internet that annoy me so that I can keep the ranting spirit alive in a more light hearted manner.



1. Pirates/Ninjas/Bacon/Chuck Norris/Rick Rolling and any played out meme that just won't die.
All of these things were cute for about two minutes. I don't care about "Talk Like A Pirate Day" because not only is it silly in a not cute way, but pirates didn't even talk like that. The ninja thing is only slightly less annoying than the pirate thing, and Chuck Norris, while cool in his own right, isn't that cool or bad ass. "Never Gonna Give You Up" isn't even ironically entertaining, and might be one of the most irritating songs ever written. And no, not everything is better with bacon.

2. Facebook 
There is one reason I have a Facebook account, and that is because I was pressured into it by my friends - real people that I interact with. Of the 131 people on my friend list, there are two that I have never actually met, and the only reason they are there is because they are just that cool. So, when all these privacy issues came up, I went in and deleted half my profile because I am not interested in having my interests linked to the the world. I've spent hours on my privacy settings to make sure that everything on my profile is available only to my friends. If it weren't for the fact that 129 people that I know personally on both sides of the Atlantic would freak if I deleted my account, I would have done so months ago. I hate you, Mark Zuckerberg. I hate you with all that I am, and if I have to change my privacy settings one more time because you don't respect that I am not on Facebook to talk to strangers, I'm done. Fucker.

3. Grammar Nazis
The only Grammar Nazi I respect is my husband, because he doesn't log onto a forum or comment section for the sole purpose of correcting people as though he were their 11th grade English teacher, and because he's hot. Even then, when he corrects me, which is rare, I email him this:

He stopped correcting me after this picture appeared in his inbox for the 14th time.

If a person has such a pathetic existence that they have to pore over an article to correct an honest mistake, or correct the comments on said article, they really need to re-examine their lives. The worst part is that they rarely have anything more to say, which suggests to me that they are more than a little neurotic and more than likely keep their toe nail clippings in a shoebox under their bed. I cringe when I see horrific grammar and bad spelling, but my life isn't so empty that I feel the need to smugly correct people I don't know or care about.

4. Ads with sound/websites with sound you can't mute.

I realize that I must be in the minority when I say that I have never clicked on an ad on a website, much less bought anything because of an ad I've seen on a website. I ignore them entirely. If I want to go shopping, I have an entire town to shop in and websites that I use for things that I can't find in town. So, if I go to a website and nearly jump out of my skin when some ad begins to talk to me or otherwise make noise, I go to another website. The worst offender was one that had a buzzing insect on it that you could not shut up. When that one was everywhere, I just never had my speakers on.

Just as bad are websites that hit you with music the second the page loads. To be fair, most of them allow you to turn the music off or mute it, but there are quite a few that don't. If I am on my computer, chances are I'm already listening to music and I don't want some midi version of "My Heart Will Go On" drowning out my Jane's Addiction.

5. Google Earth
I would never dream of looking someone up on Google Earth and showing up at their house at 3am with a knife in one hand a tube of KY in the other, but I have to admit this - it's made me a stalker too.