Entry 19: "Raising the Userbar"

Yo!

Man, I've really got to get back on schedule here. 9:40pm is obviously not within the 7-8pm timeframe. Gotta set some alarms next week. Anyway, I've been noticing this recurring trend in the message board community. They're called "Userbars", and they're basically copy-and-paste-able HTML code that inserts super-thin GIF images into your message board or blog posts, website, what have you, whenever you paste it in, and where HTML tags are applicable. This is apparently a way to take a super-small MySpace page with you wherever you go online, because there's a pasteable Userbar for just about everything you could be involved in, and you can paste in as many bars as you want to tell the world about who you are, what you're into, what type of music you're into, even whether or not you download asian pornography (seriously. There's a Userbar for that, too)!

Thanks to the extreme difficulties involved with getting the userbar images themselves I was gonna show you here hosted and linked one-by-one without worrying about the host site deleting them for site bandwidth and you seeing a post full of dead image links, as I'm sure the above bar is soon to be, I'm unable to show you a collective sampling of the available u-bars. Just Google "userbars" by clicking HERE and look around those sites. You'll soon see what I mean about the multitude of bars out there.

Anyway, my gripe is: Is it really necessary to come out with stuff like "Toilet user" and "spoon user"? Yes, they're humorous, but it's almost like an episode of Futurama. Stupid humor just for the sake of stupid humor, except in a bad way: the Userbars don't get away with it as easily as Groening and company do, and nor should they. Also, there's the overuse factor. These things are so popularly used in message boards across the internet, you'd be hard-pressed to find a board without at least one... dozen... displayed somewhere on it. Bottom line: Yes, the userbars are good and pretty darn funny depending on what website you see them posted on, but please, people. Exercise moderation in Userbar posting. Remember: Friends don't let friends post stupid crap. ...Or something like that. Ah, forget it, you get the joke...........................................But that's just me.

See you next Monday.

-D.