Here's a strange but generally true fact about Americans: We don't like it when you ask us who we're voting for."That can't possibly be true," you're saying. Americans post signs in their front yards, they slap bumper stickers on their cars, they wear T-shirts and badges and hats with the name of their chosen candidate gaudily emblazoned on them. They spend hour after hour after hour consuming incessant political coverage and writing MISPELED ALL CAPZ RANTING on internet message boards.But, see, no one's asking them to do that.Despite all evidence to the contrary, Americans like to think that we are somehow above the political fray. So it is traditionally bad form to ask an American point blank who he or she will vote for. You are asking him or her to pick sides. You are asking him or her...
Remember when I used to write columns? Yeah, it's been a while. But here's my latest. I can't say I'm particularly happy with this new thing of highlighting target words for advertising purposes. It smacks of that attitude that restaurants have when they charge for water. But I don't actually work for the fine company that hosts my columns, so I don't really have ground to stand on. They give me an audience that would normally be completely impossible for a writer of my standing. So, if they want to put target-word advertising in my columns, they've got every right to do so, I suppose.And aren't I the pot calling the kettle black, with my Google advertising over there on the right? Just as the Google advertising covers the cost of my self-important domain name (It's netted a whopping...
My attitude toward the internets is admittedly duplicitous. I have blogs in their multiplicities, yet I am inclined to roll my eyes at people who have accounts on the myriad social-networking sites like Friendster and Facebook. And, of course, I have accounts on these sites. I hate them, I think they are lame (Friendster especially) but I don't want to be left out. One of the things I dislike about social-networking sites is the fact that they seem to taunt you with how lame you are. Facebook is particularly guilty of this. It breaks people into networks based on region, academic institution or employer**, which lands me in the Wales network and the Cardiff University network. Any time I log on, Facebook kindly reminds me of my status within my respective networks:WALESMembers:...
As The Editor (I like that he always signs comments that way, as if he is a super hero who doesn't want us to know his secret identity) correctly identified Wednesday, the URL of this blog has changed. It is now, officially www.chriscope.co.uk, although the old chriscope.blogspot.com address still works. I openly admit that buying my name in URL form is a lame thing to have done, and I encourage you to take the piss about it ("make fun of me" for those of you playing along at home). Although, if you do, I will storm out of the room like Preston did on Never Mind The Buzzcocks, or like when Eric hit me in the face with a piece of candy at Angie Luukkonen's house. In a world where there are several free blog providers, there is no particularly good reason for me to have paid somebody so...
I just spotted an ad on my blog that reads:Is Jesus God?No, he is the Son of God. See what the Bible says. Free articles.Why? You just told me what the Bible says. I don't even need to click the ad now -- I don't need any free articles when you've summed them all up for me in one sentence. At least you've saved me several hours of reading. Now I can get back to my Danielle Steel...
I've finally been switched over to Blogger Beta, which is now apparently no longer Beta. It's just Blogger. So, nothing's changed. In honour of this switch (if it has, in fact, occurred), I've decided to become a conformist and start using the labels feature. The sad result of this, however, is that it makes my system of using bullet points in a post a bit silly. With labels, I should be creating an entirely new post for each separate idea, even if the idea is as simple as "Dude, look at this thing" (and I should probably create a label called "Dude look at this"). Long bullet-pointed posts addressing a number of topics wouldn't be as efficient. And, you know, efficiency is really important on this blog. It's an international resource.Also, you'll note that I now have an AdSense box on...
