The Fall

Day 24: It has been said that democracies have a life expectancy of around 200 years. America did pretty well by comparison, although I had really hoped its demise would not occur in my lifetime. The major flaw in a democratic government is the very thing it prides itself on nurturing: the voice of the people. Yesterday, we witnessed what happens when a society has been dumbed down by the combination of a wishy-washy educational system which insists that "no child be left behind," the entertaiment field and its promulgation of violence and sex, and the bloody effing internet which has removed almost all filters from our social interactions and supplies more misinformation than it does facts. In the end, these factors have rendered a majority of our population stupid, immoral, gullible, and worse, manipulable. According to Natural History magazine, "27 percent of Americans believe in astrology, while in recent years, colleges and universities have graduated fewer than 1,000 Astronomy majors a year." That and other similar exhibitions of an unenlightened mindset are what has brought us to this sorry pass. Our American democracy has proved to be its own worst enemy.

Frack!

Day 109: The origin of the word "frack" is unclear. Many people believe that it is a shortened form of "fracture," and that may well be the case. But which came first, the chicken or the egg? During the 1970s, a science-fiction TV serial called "Battlestar Galactica" debuted the word as a euphemism for...that other word which starts with F. Indeed, most of the characters portrayed on the show couldn't get through a sentence without using it, in the same manner that many people today liberally salt their vocabulary with its counterpart. I was a fan of the series, but when I forswore television to preserve my sanity, I missed its final episodes. That said, I was more likely to curse by saying "frack" when I was angry, or to call someone a "smeghead" (a term I'd picked up from the popular British sci-fi series, "Red Dwarf").

Cursing creatively is an art. Many vulgarities have been so over-used that certain words have lost their impact (case in point, the synonym for "frack"). Vulgar speech evolves; it is a living thing. In my parents' era, "frig" meant the exact same thing and carried the same force that our current f-word delivers. Nowadays, it's said without thought for the tender ears of children or little old ladies.

On the other hand, the dual definitions of "frack" supply extra weight. To illustrate my point, I've created a cartoon for your enjoyment. I can hardly be called an artist, and this adventure called for quite a mix of media. I drew the original sketches in pencil, traced them off in ink, photographed them, and then coloured them on the computer. It was a long process. I'm fracked.

When The Walls Come Tumbling Down

Day 241: In the light of several recent events, I have been pondering the instability and impermanence of the internet. This monster was released upon the world untimely; unmuzzled, unleashed and relatively uncontrolled, it brought into the peace of our lives a whole new wealth of woes. With it came viruses and hackers, and it made identity theft a fear in the hearts of us all. It gobbled our time; it disenfranchised our families; yet we embraced it and confided in it, dumping our deepest secrets into the electronic ether where they might be retrieved by anyone with a mind to prowl. We trusted it. We gave it our family photos, our driver's license and credit card numbers, our service records. We allowed it to follow us into department stores and forests, into our doctors' offices, into our best friend's wife's bedroom, and we invited it to document the event which transpired there.

Once we awakened to the error of our ways, once we had discovered to our embarrasment and shame that our secrets were available for public perusal at a click, we tried to stem the tide. Alas, it was too late. Fools that we are, instead of withdrawing from its maw, we fed it more of our personal data, blindly believing that the odds would fall on our side, and that the inevitable would somehow pass us by. We did not understand just how insidious the Monster is, nor how pervasive; nor, indeed, how fragile. Websites change. Our most carefully crafted security measures can be circumvented. The internet houses hundreds of thousands of parasitic organisms, each waiting for a victim, and still there is no check, no collar put on this maleficent and virulent beast.

The internet is an unstable edifice. It is not a vault. It is not impermeable. It is not unbreachable. It is a house of cards, ready to tumble at the slightest breeze.

SNAFU - Some Nut's All Flickr'd Up

Day 234: I've been holding out hope for a return to normalcy at Flickr for several days now, but staff are reluctant to respond in any but the most oblique and vaguely insulting way to over 23,000 angry users. My complaints about the redesign are minimal and largely related to slow internet; in fact, there are more than a few things I sincerely like about the new interface.

That said, I am angry beyond words that Flickr broke faith thousands of users by substituting a different product for the one we purchased with our subscriptions, and without notice. I am aghast at the lack of response by staff to user complaints. Flickr has effectively alienated its client base even while soliciting advertisers to address them. That just doesn't make good business sense.