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Why the Internet is still the best invention ever

Written by LINDSEY KLINGELE

Friday, 08 December 2006

In our day-to-day lives even the most productive of us have some time to kill. Grad students, nine-to-fivers, hell, even teachers on their lunch hours wind up staring down the clock at some point. I bet even the busiest man in America (Mel Gibson’s publicist?) has the need to take a few minutes before his lunch hour to let his mind unwind. And you can bet that what all of these people are doing with their spare time is much less likely to involve hatching schemes for reforestation or mass-puppy-saving than Google-ing their own names.

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Oh yeah, like you’ve never done it.

The Internet, my favorite invention of the week (last week it was the Blimpie meat slicer), continues to offer up the amusement that my imagination-addled mind cannot. Many others have come to rely on the glories of the Internet for a bevy of commodities, conveniences and basic life skills, including: apartment hunting, job hunting, end-table-selling, Christmas shopping, electronics browsing, music finding, life-partner-searching, one-night-partner-searching, 5-second-partner-um…clicking, etc., etc.

I, however, choose to spend my Internet time in far more pointless, but equally far more amusing ways. And I will list them for you, here. And you will read them; because you are online, and have therefore obviously have nothing better to do (unless you want to go plant a tree or rescue a Labradoodle or something).

Stream video of concerts that you’ve already been to in real life

And other wonders of YouTube. I stumbled upon this time-waster after typing in an artist that I enjoy into the search engine at YouTube. Through the magical speed of the Internet, one of the links that instantly came up was labeled as the date of a concert I had recently attended. After clicking on the link, I saw not only a taped performance of the same concert, but also video of myself singing along in the audience (at the time I thought the guy standing next to me and holding up his cell phone was just a little weird, but now it all fits together…) Now I can’t stop typing other concerts or events that I have attended into YouTube, just to see if my face will pop up again. Try it- it’s addictive, narcissistic and awesome- the live-version alternative to google-ing yourself.

Stalk people

Ahhh, craigslist. The perfect outlet for ball-less individuals who want to reach out and touch someone- not in actuality, of course. No, forums such as Missed Connections and Rants and Raves offer you the ability to vainly and anonymously try to track down anyone whose phone number you may have failed to acquire in real life, make statements to your significant other that they will probably never decipher/read, or just bitch about the guy who ran into you on the Red Line and made you spill your coffee but who you were too chicken to yell at in person. An outlet of sorts, that can be useful to some, and can provide endless entertainment to others (see below).

Witness other people stalking people

Question: What’s more fun than randomly trying to track down someone who you made “intense” eye contact with over smoky haze and Jager Bombs? Answer: Reading about other people who are trying to find someone whom they made intense eye contact with over smoky haze/Jager Bombs or Chai steam/Bukowski novels or whips/leather corsets (hey, the Internet doesn’t judge). It is both hilarious and unnerving to read the amount of people who are seriously trying to track down a ‘shared moment’ online- especially when they use phrases like, “i’m the slightly bulky girl w/ the hello kitty purse- your the one w/ the nose ring and lrg package!!!” Tell me that’s not more entertaining than an America’s Next Top Model marathon.

Secretly hope that other people are stalking you

It’s such a vicious cycle.

Attend free coulrophobia rehab

While perusing Wikipedia one day, I looked up the specific word for my clown-fear, and came up with this, “Coulrophobia is a mental condition concerning the fear of clowns and mime artists. It has attracted a large amount of interest in the entertainment media and on the internet, where websites have been created to specifically address the condition.” Not only does my condition have a name, but I can actually CURE it online through coulrophobia rehab sites! Amusing and beneficial- talk about two birds with one stone. The Internet is really onto something here- just imagine all of the other fears that can be tackled through its Web sites and community blogs. Just imagine.

Repeatedly enter sweepstakes that are most likely not legitimate

Note: only try this if you don’t mind having your email account clogged up with promotional offers by 300 companies per minute. Only the strong, the naïve, and the truly bored will appreciate this Internet time-killer, and its dangling promise of free cosmetics, CD singles and non-FDA-approved medical supply samples. Try www.thefreesite.com, www.totallyfreestuff.com or www.slickdeals.net. Or just type the words “free,” “saver” or “cheap bastard” into Google and see what happens. You’ll probably have to sign your life away, but you may get a free subscription to Footwear News in the process!

Type your way to free therapy

See all of the above. Using the Internet to a) yell at strangers who will never know, b) post your frustrations into a cyber world that will give you approximately 1.3 seconds worth of attention, c) cure your most secret, hidden fears, or d) just convince yourself that you have to be normal in comparison to what’s out there- all of these things are the more useless functions of the Internet that can actually keep you sane. Which, ironically, makes them less useless. Huh.

Comments

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