Okay, it's that time again. A new century and grand new technologies that are swinging the world around and upsetting the balance of our understanding.
We've got fantastic ways of connecting to other human beings and I'm afraid that for some of the people out there our etiquette hasn't really caught up. I'm going to do a quick and short list to see if perchance I can clean some of this up and maybe you'll look into these and say 'Hey, I know someone who does that' and with all the kindness of your heart you'll tap them on the shoulder and ask them not to. It'll improve the world just that much.
First thing's first.
Cell Phones
I love cell phones. I don't own one but I think they're brilliant ways of keeping safe, keeping in touch, and letting those you love know where you are as well as conducting business. The new Smart Phones allow for a whole new layer. However, there are a few behaviors we need to address.
1.Do not talk on your cell phone in a line of people. - I don't care if you're at the movies, at the coffee shop, or in the grocery store.
If you pull out your phone and punch up someone's number because you're bored or decide to have a conversation that's longer than 'I'm in line, I'll call you back when I'm not' then you are a giant cock.
2.Don't change your answering machine message to a song clip. - We know you love Ke$ha. If we have to listen to one of her songs every time we call you for a business call then we'll slowly go insane and you'll wake up one morning with someone standing over your bed about to stab you in the eye with a bubbly-headed pop star's hit album.
Also, don't let your kids record your answering machine message, particularly if their speech is incomprehensible to anyone but a rhesus monkey.
3.Don't listen to music on the shitty little cell phone speakers in public. - Headphones are all well and good but everyone around you is quietly cursing the bastard who realized the speaker-phone function could be used for this.
The latest from the Black Eyed Peas sounds like crap through a quarter watt speaker.
4.If you drive and talk on your phone, please die. - I realize there is a small subset of the population who can drive competently with a cell phone attached to their ear. This group is so tiny that you're not one of them. No, you're not.
If your wife is pregnant and perhaps also on fire in the back seat then I can see that you would need to place that call. Otherwise pull into the gas station, have a burrito, and sit on your cell.
5.Don't answer your cell phone while in the bedroom with your significant other. - I don't know where to start on this one. Cell's are banned from the bedroom after 10:00 PM.
If you are balls deep in me and you get a text and you answer it, I will roll over and rip out your liver then use it to finish. This is rude on a whole other planet.
-------------------------
Your Facebook/Myspace/Fetlife/Twitter/ Other social network/Instant Messaging
These networks are a brilliant way of building new relationships and meeting people from lives long past. Without them we'd never have experienced real connectivity with many sections of the world and many people would believe themselves to be entirely alone. However, lets be honest here, some of them are being mis-used in a big way.
1.Frenetic checking of Facebook walls is BAD. - I can understand wanting to see what your friends have posted and what they had to say about the latest event in your life. This is perfectly fine.
If you neglect the people in the room with you to get onto Facebook for more than a minute or two then that's extremely unpleasant. If you are checking it every ten minutes...or cannot wait until you're in private to check it and hence are checking it while walking down the street on your cell phone or standing in line to get coffee then you need to take a break and possibly close your account.
You're an addict.
2.More than 6 Twitter updates a day- Twitter is an interesting system for updating the world on events happening immediately around you.
On the flip side if you are updating every five minutes with everything you're doing and my Twitter feed contains shortform descriptions of the size and weight of your poop then it's exhibitionism...not blogging.
3.Images of your penis/vagina. - If you post a picture of your genitals in a place where people are going to stumble into it without particularly meaning to then I'm afraid we need to have a talk. Most of us aren't professional photographers.
Your willy/cooch looks like a shriveled sausage left one night too long in the fridge without proper lighting and angle-work. Human genitalia can be lovely things...but not on a .2 megapixel cell phone camera.
4.Come ons as introductions - Now I realize guys are more guilty of this than girls but I've run into plenty of women who do it too. I don't want to fuck you the first time we have a conversation on the internet.
I don't need your hooha for a hat or your wanger up my bum. We're going to have a civil talk that will probably involve exchanging some form of name and possibly getting a good idea of whether or not we can humanly communicate.
5.Chat speak/Message spamming - No. If you cannot type out the word 'You' then you should not be on the internet. You need remedial keyboarding classes.
While I realize it is extremely difficult to punctuate and capitalize every sentence much less to go back and find the typos while having a conversation there is a certain bare minimum that should be observed here. Using abreviations like 'a/s/l', or worse 'i wnt 2 fuk u' is a sign of significant brain damage.
If you need to press enter more than four times to finish a sentence then you're not having a conversation. You're shrieking like a street preacher.
Most people don't
think that this
is particularly
easy to
read so
we would appreciate
if you would
knock
it off.
Take a second and type out the whole sentence. If we're IMing, we're probably not in a hurry.
We've got fantastic ways of connecting to other human beings and I'm afraid that for some of the people out there our etiquette hasn't really caught up. I'm going to do a quick and short list to see if perchance I can clean some of this up and maybe you'll look into these and say 'Hey, I know someone who does that' and with all the kindness of your heart you'll tap them on the shoulder and ask them not to. It'll improve the world just that much.
First thing's first.
Cell Phones
I love cell phones. I don't own one but I think they're brilliant ways of keeping safe, keeping in touch, and letting those you love know where you are as well as conducting business. The new Smart Phones allow for a whole new layer. However, there are a few behaviors we need to address.
1.Do not talk on your cell phone in a line of people. - I don't care if you're at the movies, at the coffee shop, or in the grocery store.
If you pull out your phone and punch up someone's number because you're bored or decide to have a conversation that's longer than 'I'm in line, I'll call you back when I'm not' then you are a giant cock.
2.Don't change your answering machine message to a song clip. - We know you love Ke$ha. If we have to listen to one of her songs every time we call you for a business call then we'll slowly go insane and you'll wake up one morning with someone standing over your bed about to stab you in the eye with a bubbly-headed pop star's hit album.
Also, don't let your kids record your answering machine message, particularly if their speech is incomprehensible to anyone but a rhesus monkey.
3.Don't listen to music on the shitty little cell phone speakers in public. - Headphones are all well and good but everyone around you is quietly cursing the bastard who realized the speaker-phone function could be used for this.
The latest from the Black Eyed Peas sounds like crap through a quarter watt speaker.
4.If you drive and talk on your phone, please die. - I realize there is a small subset of the population who can drive competently with a cell phone attached to their ear. This group is so tiny that you're not one of them. No, you're not.
If your wife is pregnant and perhaps also on fire in the back seat then I can see that you would need to place that call. Otherwise pull into the gas station, have a burrito, and sit on your cell.
5.Don't answer your cell phone while in the bedroom with your significant other. - I don't know where to start on this one. Cell's are banned from the bedroom after 10:00 PM.
If you are balls deep in me and you get a text and you answer it, I will roll over and rip out your liver then use it to finish. This is rude on a whole other planet.
-------------------------
Your Facebook/Myspace/Fetlife/Twitter/ Other social network/Instant Messaging
These networks are a brilliant way of building new relationships and meeting people from lives long past. Without them we'd never have experienced real connectivity with many sections of the world and many people would believe themselves to be entirely alone. However, lets be honest here, some of them are being mis-used in a big way.
1.Frenetic checking of Facebook walls is BAD. - I can understand wanting to see what your friends have posted and what they had to say about the latest event in your life. This is perfectly fine.
If you neglect the people in the room with you to get onto Facebook for more than a minute or two then that's extremely unpleasant. If you are checking it every ten minutes...or cannot wait until you're in private to check it and hence are checking it while walking down the street on your cell phone or standing in line to get coffee then you need to take a break and possibly close your account.
You're an addict.
2.More than 6 Twitter updates a day- Twitter is an interesting system for updating the world on events happening immediately around you.
On the flip side if you are updating every five minutes with everything you're doing and my Twitter feed contains shortform descriptions of the size and weight of your poop then it's exhibitionism...not blogging.
3.Images of your penis/vagina. - If you post a picture of your genitals in a place where people are going to stumble into it without particularly meaning to then I'm afraid we need to have a talk. Most of us aren't professional photographers.
Your willy/cooch looks like a shriveled sausage left one night too long in the fridge without proper lighting and angle-work. Human genitalia can be lovely things...but not on a .2 megapixel cell phone camera.
4.Come ons as introductions - Now I realize guys are more guilty of this than girls but I've run into plenty of women who do it too. I don't want to fuck you the first time we have a conversation on the internet.
I don't need your hooha for a hat or your wanger up my bum. We're going to have a civil talk that will probably involve exchanging some form of name and possibly getting a good idea of whether or not we can humanly communicate.
5.Chat speak/Message spamming - No. If you cannot type out the word 'You' then you should not be on the internet. You need remedial keyboarding classes.
While I realize it is extremely difficult to punctuate and capitalize every sentence much less to go back and find the typos while having a conversation there is a certain bare minimum that should be observed here. Using abreviations like 'a/s/l', or worse 'i wnt 2 fuk u' is a sign of significant brain damage.
If you need to press enter more than four times to finish a sentence then you're not having a conversation. You're shrieking like a street preacher.
Most people don't
think that this
is particularly
easy to
read so
we would appreciate
if you would
knock
it off.
Take a second and type out the whole sentence. If we're IMing, we're probably not in a hurry.
Took me 4 months to finally get someone to stp tlking lyk dis. The main argument is "It's too much effort." Which frankly, is a pretty stupid response.
