Hey, quick question. Because I’m curious what you people think and I don’t have a lot of other people to ask.
Month: June 2004
There has to be a better way of blocking referrer spam than adding each bogus link to my .htaccess file individually. It’s a tedious process, and there are new links every day. A few weeks ago I made the mistake of clicking on one of those links instead of pasting it into my web browser. And, of course, it turned out to be porn — of the pop-up, gonna-have-to-shut-down-your-browser-to-get-rid-of-it variety. The deluge of fake referrers started the next day. More whois searches than I care to count revealed that they’re all owned by two or three people, but the link titles are so different — and they’re not immediately recongizable as porn — so there’s really no wildcard I can add to the .htaccess file.
Still, there’s gotta be something I can do with these fuckers’ e-mail addresses, right?
Some movie stuff.
If there’s one thing that makes this 20-year-old sitcom worth revisiting — and there is only the one thing — it’s its value as an ethnographic specimen. What’s all the more startling is that such a thing is unlikely ever to be said in the vicinity of a Tony Danza vehicle again. But look how much our culture has changed in the last two decades….Of course, you only need to watch one or two of these 22 episodes — crisp and clear, despite the fact that they date from 1984-5 — to marvel at such a cultural shift. Then you can use the discs as coasters to keep those unsightly moisture rings off your coffee table.
Because they look so odd in makeup, the effect is quease-inducing. They fall victims, indeed, to the Uncanny Valley Effect. This phenomenon, named in 1978 by the Japanese robot expert Masahiro Mori, refers to the ways in which humans relate emotionally with robots. Up to a certain point, he found, our feelings grow more positive the more the robots resemble humans. But beyond a certain stage of reality, it works the other way: The closer they get to humans, the more we notice the differences and are repelled by them. In the same way, the not-quite convincing faces of the two white chicks provide a distraction every moment they’re on the screen. We’re staring at them, not liking them, and paying no attention to the plot. Not that attention would help.
Again, just sharing. That’s what this weblog is for.
George Lucas should not be allowed to name his own characters. (He shouldn’t be allowed to write or direct his own films, if the last two are any judge, but that’s beside the point.) I mean, honestly. General Grievous? Why not go all out and just call him Johnny Bad Guy?