January 25th, 2000 at 11:13 PM

Well, a mere two days after another periodic evening of complete frustration with words led me to create and post six journal images at once, I grew really excited about a few things and dumped the following pile of text onto the opening log page. It's a journal entry of sorts, so I've decided to reprint it here. 

Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'.
Tue.01.25.00.23.13
The Future is now, and the future is starting to make me think crazy. I don't normally do this, so pay attention while I get this out of my system. I think Butterfly had the right idea when he sang " We're just babies man, we're just babies ," on the first Digable Planets album. Kubrick knew  what he was doing with the image of that giant newborn hovering in space at the end of 2001. And only somebody like Beck can handle the literary implications of something as absurd as the lives we will soon be leading now that the twenty-first century is upon us.

We like the boys with the bulletproof vests.

The internet has barely learned to walk. It has caught on and spread faster than any other technology earthlings have ever been presented with, and we're still in the terrible twos. Gone are the glory days of never-ending messy sites designed by college freshmen using Netscape Composer, cross-linked and full of pictures of friends, useless biographical information and a seldom updated Site of The Week. Some of that stuff still hides in the corners of the web. But the college students and the kids who used to champion their uninteresting pre-fabbed AOL homepages are growing up to become clever and artsy. And some of them are getting paid for being clever and artsy. I don't thing many people understand where this crazy-web-thing is headed. Part of me wants to rant on about the internet as the driving economic force of world economy, as a realm that will spawn unheard of forms of artistic expression, as the tool that will ultimately end prejudice, as a medium that will create new kinds of happiness and inconceivable forms of psychological disease. History will look back on the 20th century as the tail end of the dark ages. There will be a huge anti-net counterculture movement that will last a long time but ultimately fail. Children wont understand how things "used to be". Our ever-increasing comfort with and need for instantaneous data-retrieval will completely destroy the institution of marriage. Individualism and capitalism will evolve into an unrecognizable hybrid. Most importantly, we are going to continue to encounter better more powerful ways to access information and to access each other. So to help you understand where I'm coming from, here's some of the stuff I have recently been investigating that got me all wrapped up in this rant in the first place:

Metafilter Community Weblog is one of a new generation of frequently updated log sites allowing users like you and me to post curious news stories, sites to check out, and opinions on these things. It costs nothing , it's free of advertisements, it's bringing people together, and it's the way we are going to get our news in the future. Who needs AOL-Time-Warner telling me what's important when I can join a news community that shares my interests like Metafilter or Slashdot.org ? 

To see which of the many log sites is getting the good stories first, visit the Web Log Scoop Index . It tells you which sites are scooping most frequently, and also provides links to the scooped stories, listed by popularity. Now not only do we have constantly updated log sites, we have a constantly updated page to tell us who's updating most efficiently. And WebSoup lumps all of the zany Sites Of the Day that you could ever want to see onto one fast loading page of text.

Visit A List Apart to see a recently published list of the best designed sites currently available on the web. The winning sites are truly remarkable: fast loading, engaging, and beautiful. Kaliber1000 , a crazy fresh web-mag, took grand prize.  Photomontage packs some great art into a very small space.  And the most beautiful web-site I have ever seen, Eneri.net , uses Flash animation and Shockwave to express the personal feminine sentiments of its author as no other medium can. The sleek efficiency of the web CAN be emotionally touching.

Instant messaging and live chatting may be the most important Net resource of all, because it brings strangers together and helps keep friends in touch. I've been using ICQ for a year now, but the next step has arrived: rush right out and download the recent version of Odigo .   It is compact, sleek, colorful, and completely compatible with ICQ (but less convoluted), so you can hold on to your current buddy list.  It lets you find friends with similar specified interests. It lets you choose a face. It lets you declare your mood. It uses skins. Most impressively, it lists other Odigo users who are viewing the same web page you are viewing. Or, if you choose, only those users who share your interests. You can contact these people and chat with them. It's non-stop community. 

The people who came up with InfoRocket believe that people are interested in paying money to get the answers to various questions.  It's basically an eBay for people seeking information. This sort of small time financial transaction sure would be easier if we all used electronic money.

Don't forget to stop by The Simpsons to download a 700k program that gives you free dial up internet access from almost anywhere in the country, as sponsored by everyone's favorite dysfunctional cartoon family. The only catch is that you have to keep a banner thing at the top of your screen and click on it once in a while. It's actually a small price to pay for dial up service. I connected at 46000 baud on my first try. Then, since you still need an email account, surf over to WhatTheFuck.com to get ad-free web based email as programmed by a couple of clever 18 year-olds. I grabbed r@whatthefuck.com . It's gonna catch on. Join the movement before it becomes old hat next month.

Speaking of WTF, finally there's a way to tell a woman she has facial hair without hurting her feelings. A way to subtly tell your boss that he has a flatulence problem. A way to send a friend mouthwash and a gentle hint . WTF?? Am I drunk? Has humanity lost its edge?

Yes. We like the girls with the cellophane chests.

At DaveNet , you can read some much more coherent commentary on the growth of the internet, changes in technology, and life in general.  Dave's writing is honest, and he updates the column frequently.

There now, do you see what I'm getting at? Something is happening out there. I'm nearly positive that it's all for the best, put goddamn if I dont have fun trying to puzzle it out. The web has grown to a point where you can surf sixteen hours a day, constantly discovering things you never knew existed,  never reading the same thing twice. I hope I'm not driven to post this kind of update again anytime soon. I am trying to remain part of the solution, after all. Sombody please email me and let me know how I'm doing.