JWhiting.com

Why is the Internet so great? Because it tears down barriers to information and communication enabling the dream of creating truly free and democratic societies? OK, yes, there’s that, but the Internet also shows naked celebrities and often makes you laugh…

I saw Brandon Hardesty on Jimmy Kimmel Live last week, tried to find this video online, couldn’t, tracked Brandon down through the Tubes and he quickly got back to me with the link below. Are the Internets awesome or what?

As you’ll see in this video Brandon is a grocery store clerk from Baltimore who re-creates scenes from movies in his parents’ basement. He does everything, the shooting, lighting, editing and acting. As in all the acting, every part.

Brandon is currently tackling Oscar-nominated films for Jimmy Kimmel and this is the first of the series, Brandon’s take on There Will Be Blood.

If loving this is wrong, I don’t want to be right.

I usually hate it when Web sites go out of their way to throw up IP filters that let them to change their portal’s content depending on where you’re surfing in from. This sort of “region detection” could be used for good but most often only serves to block content (esp. video) to people visiting from other countries. (What’s even worse is when those same sites won’t serve you the video you want, but will still run the ad that preceeds it, a dirty underhanded bait-and-switch eyeball-slavery move that should be outlawed.) This blocking phenomenon especially pisses me off when the content I’m looking for (i.e. Stephen Colbert, Daily Show and today a Jimmy Kimmel clip) is legally available on the cable airwaves in this country, exactly the same as it is stateside.

There’s no reason why something that’s on the Internet in Kansas shouldn’t be available in Kingston, Khartoum or Kuala Lumpur. It’s not the ‘AmericaWeb’ or the ‘IranNet’ or the ‘ChinaTubes’. It’s the Internet. The whole point is that it should be available everywhere all the time. If you start to parse the Internet out according to any arbitrary set of rules, you rob it of its value, its very reason for being.

That said, imagine how much my ass was chapped this afternoon by this total dick move from Yahoo:

Mere minutes ago, I surf over to ‘my.yahoo.com’ where a specially placed Yahoo banner ad catches my eye. The ad is apparently promoting new skins/themes for the ‘My Yahoo’ page.

The first banner ad I saw said:

“The new backgrounds and layouts are awesome!” - S.

(Click the ad below to see the full-size image:)

Now while I’ll admit that I’m not completely satisfied with my current ‘My Yahoo’ background and layout, it generally takes more than one recommendation by a person who can’t even be bothered to include more than their first initial to convince me to click on a banner ad. I mean who does this ‘S.’ man/woman/dog think they are anyhow?

And that’s when I was hit by the follow up pitch:

“Blows the old one out of the water!” - N.

(Again, click the banner below to see the full-size image:)

I momentarily stumble over the “old one” comment. (I thought we were just talking about backgrounds and layouts… Weren’t there several, albeit mediocre, old ones?) But then I see that this is an entirely new recommendation. Holy shit. Both S. and N. have weighed in on this issue with full-bore exclamation-mark-laden enthusiasm.

What the hell, I decide. If it’s good enough for two of the most common letters in the English language, then it must be good enough for me…

Trembling with anticipatory glee, I click on the exciting yellow ‘Show Me’ button.

Here’s the full-page message that follows:

We appreciate your interest in the new My Yahoo! Beta. Unfortunately it is only open to My Yahoo! users in specific countries.

Um, then why…? But…? Really…? [Sighs, pushes back from computer. Goes to read a book.]

OMG, NY Giants win! What an awesome game.

And now onto serious things: If Microsoft succeeds in buying Yahoo, it will mean bad things for the Internets.

If Microsoft buys Yahoo, I plan on leaving my long-time beloved Yahoo account and I hope if you’re a Yahoo user, you’ll consider doing the same.

In case you haven’t heard, Microsoft recently announced that it wants to eat Yahoo. This is so Microsoft: Bet heavily on the wrong horse, beat that horse until it’s well-past the point of death, look up sheepishly minutes before the race is over and then shell out a ton of bucks to buy the number-two-horse in hopes of pulling off a last-minute win.

Microsoft is, of course, the anti-Internet company. Remember in the 1990s how they bet big on expensive CD-ROMs as the way of the future? How, when they realised they’d seriously missed the mark, they decided to kill Netscape by stitching Internet Explorer into the heart of Windows so that they could try and claim in anti-trust suits that the two were inseparable? Brutal.

My beef with Microsoft and the Internet started in the early 2000s with a couple of asshole moves related to Hotmail.

In typical Microsoft fashion, Hotmail was purchased by Microsoft in 1997 after the software behemoth realized that it had missed the free e-mail boat. With an agressive advertising campaign, it lured a ton more users into its big new free e-mail service and then started to remove features.

In 2002 (found here):

Users of Hotmail’s free service can no longer set up an unlimited number of filters for unwanted email messages, according to Internet magazine.

The publication said users who want to set up more than 10 filters now receive a notice indicating they must switch to one of Hotmail’s premium services.

Users receive this message: “You have reached your filter limit. You must delete an existing one, or sign up for MSN Extra Storage to increase your filter limit.”

And then, in 2004, Microsoft shut down free POP mail service: (found here):

Microsoft Corp. on Monday will start charging for a Hotmail feature that allows users of the Web-based e-mail service to access their e-mail using the Outlook e-mail client.

Think Microsoft is going to play nice once they take over the number two Internet search engine company? I don’t think so. They’ll do what they always do: try to crush the competition at all costs and once they’re the king of the castle, ratchet up the fees and shut down innovation. (Their vision reads something like this: “Hotmail Plus […] offers 2GB [!] of e-mail space and an account that doesn’t expire, for $19.95 per year…” Bad things.)

If you’re a Yahoo user, please consider telling them that you will leave them if they’re bought by Microsoft. You can leave them feedback for Yahoo here.

The Microsoft feedback link is hard to find (are you surprised?). Go here to let Microsoft know that you will leave Yahoo if they take over.

Online just got a little smarter. (”George loves online.” <— who said it?)

Yesterday while blogging about meat-eating, I stumbled upon the full-text of Fast Food Nation over at Google. Wow. Those two rich multi-coloured geniuses are raising the bar again.

And then this morning I wake up to discover that The Atlantic Monthly is tearing down the wall that separates its content from the world. All of a sudden everyone has access to articles that date back to 1857. Like this excerpt from a November 1857 travel piece by Ralph Waldo Emerson:

One would think from the talk of men, that riches and poverty were a great matter; and our civilization mainly respects it. But the Indians say, that they do not think the white man with his brow of care, always toiling, afraid of heat and cold, and keeping within doors, has any advantage of them. The permanent interest of every man is, never to be in a false position, but to have the weight of Nature to back him in all that he does. Riches and poverty are a thick or thin costume; and our life—the life of all of us—identical.

Who knew the Internets could feel so old and wise?

As quoted over at Boing Boing:

Beginning today, TheAtlantic.com is dropping its subscriber registration requirement and making the site free to all visitors.

Now, in addition to such offerings as blogs, author dispatches, slideshows, interviews, and videos, readers can also browse issues going back to 1995, along with hundreds of articles dating as far back as 1857, the year The Atlantic was founded.

We’re pleased to bring The Atlantic before a broader online audience. We hope that the quality of its writing, the trenchancy of its insights, and the depth and thoughtfulness of its reporting will inspire many of our online readers to join the Atlantic family by becoming print subscribers.

See the Atlantic Monthly editor’s note here.