Predators & Editors
By Tom "Frienster Be Damned " Waters
Decemeber 1st , 2006
If you'll indulge me for a week, I'd like to discuss Myspace. It's a phenomenon that intrigues me, and don't you pretend for one second that you don't know what it is. In the last year, the free networking/dating/marketing web site has gotten more than its share of good and bad press in print and on television, from Dateline to The Daily Show and everything in between. Its one of those internet communities that's effectively making the world a smaller place one friend add at a time. A co-worker of mine told me about it three years ago when I was coming out of a semi-deliberate celibacy phase and looking to score. I signed on and I've never looked back. It's funny how there's a stigma attached to net dating. I'm not going to lie and say that I've never done it, because I have and with mixed results. There's a hell of a twist at the end of this essay, so stay with me here and I promise to deliver a monstrous pay off. The money shot on this article is monstrous.
First of all, as a general rule, if a girl has a picture with a friend then odds are that she's the small whale holding up the base of the bar in the picture. Group shots are a fake out. If you see a pic of a hot girl and her amputee/mustachioed/flat chested/eczema skined friend, then she's the latter. This is what they call a bait and switch. As I already said, there's a stigma to net dating, but some of us just don't shine in bars, or we don't know how to turn on the charm in a competitive habitat. I'm off the market now, but we'll get to that later.
Secondly, never accept a friend add from a band. They are tremendous pains in the ass, the majority of them don't have enough talent to pen a toilet bowl jingle, and they constantly send out event invites, blog updates about nothing, and they're pages are so riddled with bells, whistles and sound files that they're likely to crash lesser computers in a heart beat. Nobody needs the late breaking info on Death Soul Coughing Machine-A Love Story. Most bands and clubs are a gigantic pain in the ass, so avoid them like the plague, and this means YOU, Quote Night Club. Go fuck yourselves because I will never set foot in your establishment thanks in large part to sending me an event invite every other day for the last two years. NOBODY CARES that much about Quote Night Club. Piss off! I will also take a moment to point out my own glaring hypocrisies because as of late my main purpose for being on Myspace has been shameless and relentless self promotion. I try and keep it to two bulletins per week, though, which people can either read or ignore.
Thirdly, if you're a blond 19 year old from Tonawanda, ghetto slang is not only ill conceived and inappropriate, it's retarded. Have a bit more sense and style than to dub your profile alter ego as 'Ashley Y'all' or 'Logan, Bitches!'. Even if you're trying to score a black guy he's going to have more taste and discretion than to put up with your urban wannabe ass.
Fourthly (which isn't even a word), for the love of god and all that's holy, learn how to spell! If you can't type, you don't deserve to be on a computer, and everyone makes a mistake once in a while when they're posting to their personal blog at four in the morning, but if you can't abide by universal laws of grammar and syntax, shut your computer down and take your own life. The internet has created a generation of people who don't know how to spell and it drives me up five walls.
Letter fifthly (also not a word): It appears as if the goth community is maintaining life support thanks in large part to Myspace. While that niche of circus freaks should have died off long ago as a fad, they're still going strong. Marilyn Manson's career has long since petered out, Tim Burton has directed his way into obscurity, and nobody ever gave a damn about Souxie and The Banshees, and yet they continue to pretend that they're Wiccans and wear bad black clothing in a futile attempt to hide their fat rolls. You're not a vampire, so give it up. The music sucks, Hot Topic sucks, and if you're a fat chick you should just concentrate on giving astounding hummers because you're not going to get a guy otherwise. At least skateboarding losers have gone underground with their tacky lifestyle. You should take some notes, do the same and stop torturing the rest of us with your unforgivably horrible taste in everything.
Number Six: Making friends in reality is infinitely more important than having 8,000 friends online. While it may seem staggering and overly impressive to have 326 acquaintances that you never talk to on MySpace, I'd be more impressed if you waddled off from your computer and made nice with ten to twelve living, breathing, functioning, sociable people in the realm known as the real world (and I'm not referring to the television show here). While the internet has brought us all one step closer in terms of being on speaking terms with everyone on the planet, personal contact still holds more weight. Sixty percent of the fat chicks in Buffalo hold more weight than that, but I'm not going to go there. Okay, I am.
Seven: There are some tubby bitches online, so be careful. I'm talking Orca sized, gargantuan wooly mammoths that roam the earth on all fours emitting sonic cries for food and devouring everything in their path. It's called Jenny Craig. It's known as self control. Put the keyboard and the rack of lamb down and stop eating, for chrissakes, or if you can't, don't try and fake guys out into meeting you out at a bar because no one is going to appreciate the delicate and wonderful person underneath. I'm a guy with a few pounds on me, but that's intentional. I'm off the market, and my girlfriend has gotten me fat on purpose, so I have an excuse. Besides, guys are allowed to be fat. We have personalities.
Eight: Nobody wants to read your shitty poetry, so don't bother. Sure you have a tortured soul and twisted yearnings to share unforgivably awful prose with the rest of the world, but nobody cares. Mail away some boxed tops for something that resembles talent and then post your blog. Poetry is dead. Give up the ghost.
Nine: Anyone who sends or participates in chain letters, forwards or throwaway quizzes should be dragged into the street and shot in the head. Don't send me anything on Myspace or otherwise if it's not an original thought from out of your head. I have more important things to do with my time than read a corny joke from forty years ago or take a love quiz on who the last person was that gave me a hand job in a Denny's parking lot. The answer to that one would be Val Townsend, and that's going back a few years.
And here's your bombshell: I met my current girlfriend on Myspace. We've been together for almost three years now and I never would have crossed paths with her if it wasn't for the internet. I talk a mean game online, and we just happened to come across each other one summer after a really bad breakup and it worked out. I'm tremendously fortunate, and the odds of meeting a hot woman online are incredibly small. Her picture looked a bit plain, but I met her out at a safe half way point and I was pleasantly surprised. Lindsay's a 9 with a brain, a good job and a body that never quits, so I hit the jack pot. If there's one thing MySpace is good for, it's promiscuous and instantaneous sex, so be careful, play it safe and wear a Jimmy Cap. That's all for this week, folks. I'll see you on the super information highway. I'm the guy with the clown nose.