Stop Asking Why!

I am getting really sick and tired of people trying to impose their elitist mindset on people who simply ask a question.

In the programming and computer business, forums are an integral part of the job. No one person can know everything, so access to these forums is an invaluable way to get answers to questions or problems that may arise.

That being said, these forums are littered with moronic mouth-breathers who cannot just answer the damn question. Instead, answer someone's question with a question of their own. They ask, "Why". Who care's Why? They don't even bother to answer it and then ask why that person needs to know. They just ask why as if they have some profound insight into the situation and know that the person asking the original question is wasting everyone's time.

If you don't know the answer, or don't want to help, shut up and get off the forums you simple-minded plebeian. It is not your place to ask why, only to give the answer the person is looking for or keep your mouth shut.

Innocent Poster: "How do you move a file from one folder to another?"
Elitist Prick: "Why would you want to do that?"
Me: "It doesn't matter why you fucking idiot. Just answer the man or go die in a hole. By the way, just drag and drop it."
Innocent Poster: "Thanks."

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

We've all heard of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse at one point or another. Pestilence, War, Famine, and Death have been major staples in popular culture for a while. But, did we get it wrong?

I am going to attempt to put a new spin on this interpreted story.

First, we must look at the names and affects of each horsemen. Pestilence, War, Famine, and Death all seem as though they perform a specific purpose... but there is one problem. Pestilence, War, and Famine are all cancelled out by Death. They are not needed. They're end result would be Death, but since Death would handle all of that anyway, they are obsolete in bringing about the end of the world. So, perhaps there is more to them or something wholly different.

Again, we must remember that these Four Horsemen were brought about to end the world. So, let's take a look at the scripture.

I watched as the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals. Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, "Come!" I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest.

— Revelation 6:1-2 NIV

Often called Pestilence, this Horsemen is actually referred to as Conquest more often. However, notice the symbolism of the crown and bow. This horsemen represents the corruption of the kings and the downfall of empires. One could refer to this as war, but not necessarily. The chaos that would ensue from a completely dismantled civilization from within would surely be catastrophic.

When the Lamb opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, "Come! Then another horse came out, a fiery red one. Its rider was given power to take peace from the earth and to make men slay each other. To him was given a huge sword.

— Revelation 6:3-4 NIV

The order of these Horsemen plays a big part, I feel, in the end of the world according to Revelations. After the governments of the world are toppled by Conquest, War comes and finishes the work set in motion by Conquest.

When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, "Come!" I looked, and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, "A quart of wheat for a day's wages, and three quarts of barley for a day's wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!"

— Revelation 6:5-6 NIV

Once War has finished his work, the Horsemen people refer to as Famine marches in. but I do not think I agree with the assumption that this horsemen represents famine. While he does mention food in this interpretation, it's the wording that puzzles me. "A quart of wheat for a day's wages" could mean food is scarce, but I think more so it represents Control. After War, a demoralized and scattered people would be easy to control. The scales in his hand represent the law of such control, the high prices for food it's punishment, but saving the oil and wine (used in Christian mass) for people's redemption.

When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, "Come!" I looked and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.

— Revelation 6:7-8 NIV

Finally Death would ride out. Many believe that the sentence "They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth." refers to each horsemen being given one quarter of the earth to affect. But what seems more apparent here is that Death itself would be the cause of Death by sword, famine, and plague over one quarter of the population. Since it makes no mention of Death, but only war, famine, and plague, it seems as though this horsemen takes to making the final blow on all outlying lands.

In this way, it would seem that the end of the world as people claim Revelations predicts would actually be a destabilization of civilization, a culling of the population, with certain mainstays of our political and religious ideals being destroyed and reformed. As a whole, the Four Horsemen represent chaos and anarchy, and they are the vessels to make this happen.

On a simpler note, they could each represent one of the four seasons of spring, summer, fall, and winter in that order.

Search Crazy

I think we've officially lost our minds in this country. Am I talking about the craptastic economy or the surge of debates over global warming? No... I'm talking about search engine websites.

Do we really need more of them? Honestly? Now Microsoft has entered the fray with bing.com. Is there any reason to switch from Google to Bing or from Yahoo to Google? No. They all return the same damn results! Now, some of you might be asking why this is such a big deal. Well, it isn't. It just seems kind of senseless to create a whole brand new search engine when the one's that existed already were doing the job. What, was Google sending innocent people links to Meatspin when they searched for local church groups?

Search for anything you want in all of the search engines and I will guarantee you'll get the same results for all of them.

Illegal Downloads Made a Safer Internet

Illegally downloading music and software is far safer for the internet than regulating it and the benefits of regulation are nonexistent.

The RIAA and MPAA have spent the last 10 years making every attempt at curbing the downloading of music and movies to the point of issuing hefty multi million dollar fines towards "offenders". These racketeering actions have convinced even congress that the RIAA and MPAA have a case worth siding with and laws have been put in place to help protect these two organizations from evil fifteen year olds downloading their favorite songs. In fact, I think congress initally opted for the death penalty, but the RIAA and MPAA in all their mercy convinced congress to rethink that. After all a dead customer can't buy anything. By the way, great move guys. CD sales are still at an all time low.

However, since the Musicrusade™ of the twenty-first century music has become the new scam product of scamming sites. There are thousands of sites that offer "legal" downloads of songs for a small start up fee of $30 to $60 and songs at 10¢ a piece. The problem though is that these sites are no more legal than downloading songs from torrents and in some cases these sites disappear shortly after taking your money with no access to any of the songs they advertised.

The Musicrusade™ solved nothing except helping the RIAA offset their profit percentages. None of the money won in these lawsuits goes to any off the artists they claim to protect and the notion that downloading music illegally steals from the artists is completely false. Since this copyright crackdown CD sales have continued to plummet and the downloading of music has, and will, continue... and untrackable.

I for one fully endorse the downloading of music. There has never been any evidence whatsoever to prove that music downloading hurts any artist or performer. CD sales were dropping long before the surge of internet downloading, and the drop has continued long after the mainstream downloading services have been blacklisted.

To go on a small tangent here, if you would like to know how ridiculous these laws are, according to the laws the RIAA pushed for, playing a CD in your car that you paid for rightfully with friends in the car who did not buy the CD is considered illegal since they are hearing their intellectual property without paying. Sounds ridiculous right? Well, that's because it is.

Copyright law has become a new means of extortion from companies who do not know how to adapt to the changing times. Maybe CD sales have been dropping because they have been releasing a crappy product. There's food for thought.

The Internet Is a Ruined, Clogged, Horrid Version of Itself

These days searching through the internet is a lot simpler than it used to be. A quick search in any of the more popular (and even some less popular) search engines will pull up a list of just about anything you're looking for in a matter of seconds. However, if one was to look at the list these search engines pull up most of the time, a list of links to sites never heard of promising everything can be seen.

People like to refer to the early days of the Internet being the wild west of the Internet's history. It was a time when only the most knowledgeable could get a website up and running, register a domain name, and manage the server to allow any kind of server side processing. It was a mystery, uncharted territory, and only the bravest of souls would dare peruse its dim lit back roads.

However, despite its unforgiving appearance and rough edges, there was something that could be said about it's integrity. Due to the effort needed, and money required, to make anything public back then, it was a safer bet to trust what you were seeing online. It was a nerd's paradise.

Now, fast-forward fifteen years, the marketing potential of the internet has long since been realized. The Internet Bubble phenom is long over, the lessons have been learned, and the internet is now a highly polished, regulated, smooth, and glossy version of itself; it's terrible.

It takes absolutely no effort to publish a web site these days. Editing, manipulating, and sharing a site is as simple as just buying or downloading a prefabricated site and uploading it to a server and, bingo, in business.

People like to say that the Internet has evolved and become more efficient. On the contrary, the Internet has not improved one bit. Much like a fit and lean man gaining two hundred pounds, under all that fat, that lean and fit Internet can still be found. Who wants to cut through all that fat though to find what they're looking for? More importantly, who can even know if what they found is what they were looking for and not just more fat?

Let's presume someone wanted to download an mp3 of their favorite song. That person goes to their favorite search engine and types in the name of the song and tries to find a site to download from. Let's just assume, for the sake of this article, that the person is looking for a completely legal means to download the song. Of course, first they check all the big boys; Amazon, iTunes, Napster. Despite their search of those sites, their song cannot be found there. So, they resort to searching the lesser known sites on the Internet.

The problem is about 99% of all mp3 download sites are complete scams. The Internet has become a cesspool of banner ads, scams, and misleading links.

• We are NOT interested in getting that silly ringtone on our phones.
• We will NOT download your silly game inundated with spyware.
• We are NOT interested in finding out who's searching for us.
• We will NOT check our credit score on a site who's lifespan is probably two weeks.
• We are NOT interested in winning a free Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Nintendo Wii.
• We will NOT get that free laptop, iPod, or iPhone.
• We will NOT work from home for $5000 a day.

SO STOP ASKING!

Anyone who falls for this should be ashamed of themselves.

Let's clean this place up, or at least run a few laps around the track and burn off some of this fat we've gathered over the last fifteen years.

Row You Bastards!

Much like the oarsmen on a longboat traversing the waves of the north Atlantic ocean heading out to battle in an unknown land with only the motivation to not die, we sit here in our office of Perpetual Ineptitude. The way in which our desks are aligned in relationship to each other is much like a classroom where we all face in the same direction. We don't have any walls thus making our workplace cubical-free. Behind us, in the back of the room, sits the whipping seat; the desk where the boss sits and overlooks us much like a warlord overseeing his abused and mistreated warriors. Day in and day out, we are reminded of our worthlessness, our incompetence, and our allegiance to the code machine to which we are imprisoned.

His seat, however, benefits from the luxury of secrecy and anonymity by having his eyes over our shoulders while hiding his nefarious deeds from the prying eyes of his over-worked and beaten subjects, conveniently aiming his monitor away from those who could see. To quell any talk of rebellion or outrage, he speaks light of any situation that we may feel too harsh, desperately trying to find common ground with the likes of us to help lessen the perceived gap between boss and underling. Truly, he is a master of deception and propaganda, but the peons are not fooled. They see through the clever disguise just waiting for the right time to spring into action and steer this mercenary ship back home.

The Question of Insurmountable Nature and Perplexing Quandaries; Am I Loved?

Yes.