It’s really great and all that women of the late 1960s and most of the 1970s blazed a path of freedom for expression (RIP Betty Friedan and thank you to The Runaways), but why does it seem like people with vaginas are far more objectified now than they ever were circa 1940-1965? In today’s society, lyrics, images, and overall attitudes toward “ladies” are laughably offensive. And yet, back during the era of what is now looked back upon as overt sexism, men would tip their hats, say a few kind words, and even–gasp–have a conversation about something other than which orifice he was going to stick his dick in (not that this is ever usually an elaborate conversation topic).

It's hard to believe, but women were more derisive toward men in the 50s. Must have been all the repression.

Is it simply that women had this pent up need to be viewed as slutbags and men, likewise, had been waiting all this time to finally stop feigning politeness and just express their sole desire to fuck? I haven’t the foggiest idea. All I know is that in the last decade alone, the things that are permitted to slip by in the media have reached a point where nothing is shocking anymore in terms of sexual explicitness and an overall disregard for the idea that a woman might have a mind behind those big, dumb eyes staring straight at your cock. This isn’t to say that women aren’t in control of how they come across; all of the females reigning in the pop charts right now are entirely conscious of the sex-soaked image they have created. But it is to say that they are influenced by what they feel men want.

Really Katy Perry? Really?

Where dudes can definitely be blamed is in the category of lyrics. Most songs in the Top 40 at the moment feature lyrical content that would make Eleanor Roosevelt blush and then burst into flames. Some examples include: “I’ma disrobe you then I’ma probe you” (courtesy of Kanye West in “E.T.”), “All I need is some vodka and some coke and watch, she gon’ get donkey konged (courtesy of Pitbull in “On the Floor”), and “I heard you good with them soft lips…the things that we can do in twenty minutes girl” (courtesy of Drake in “What’s My Name?”). Look, I’m all for parading your sexual whims, but does it all have to be phrased in such a goddamn crass manner?

This is where the feminist revolution has led.

Of course, both periods of time–now and then–have their advantages and disadvantages in terms of how women are perceived, but, in the vague defense of “then,” at least ads like the one below were to be expected. The nature of how women are viewed hasn’t really changed, it’s just become repackaged for twenty-first century consumption.

A precursor to most rap videos.

In a world where no one can say anything without wordplay that boggles the mind, it’s no surprise that readers think that William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy when it is clearly not. Romeo and Juliet is a story about how sometimes the best possible outcome involves a couple of deaths. Just in time for Valentine’s, here is my analysis of Romeo and Juliet.

The story begins with two warring factions, the Montagues and the Capulets. These two families fight each other constantly, terrorize fair Verona, and ultimately cause more damage to property and life than Prince Escalus, the ruler of Verona, is prepared to tolerate. Escalus warns the two families that if they continue to fight, he’s going to lay the smack down.

Neither Gaston nor Romeo can read, but man are they hot.

Meanwhile, a young boy named Romeo is busy being emo. He, much like Barney Stinson, has used every trick in the book in order to try to win the heart of Rosaline, who is apparently super hot. Benvolio, Emo-meos cousin, comes up to him and says, “There be hotter bitches, yo.” He’s right. Unfortunately they’re all at a party held by the enemy. It is there that Romeo sees someone even hotter than Rosaline and falls helplessly in lust. This is Juliet. At this point, Romeo puts on his best Gaston impression and says, “In the world there’s only she, as beautiful as me, and that is why I have to marry Belle…er Juliet.” Fortunately for Romeo, Juliet has lived a sheltered life and falls for the first trick Romeo throws at her.

Long story short, they get married and kill themselves when they can’t be together, despite excellent planning that would’ve allowed them to live happily ever after had they not been so impulsive and killed themselves. This is where people tend to think this whole thing is a tragedy. Here’s why it’s not.

First, you have to consider who you’re really looking at with Romeo. You never feel bad when Barney Stinson doesn’t corrupt a young virgin. You definitely don’t feel bad at the end of Beauty and the Beast when Gaston dies. Most importantly, you never feel bad when an emo kid suicides. After all, it’s their greatest joy in life.

I know we've just met, but would you fancy my penis in your vagina?

Juliet is almost as bad. The entire play she just talks about how she wants to get laid. Seriously. Read it again if you don’t remember that part. She talks about how she wants all of Romeo’s parts, specifically his penis. After she gets married, she makes a comment about how she’s paid for but unused. Not to mention the amount of time she spends drooling over his looks. The chick really needs to get some. Maybe the tragedy is that she was a princess and not a hooker.

Next, there’s this idea that it is a tragedy because two lovers died. After all, they were so much in love, right? Not really. They knew each other for 10 minutes before they decided that they were meant to be. I’m no expert, but that’s unhealthy relationship behavior. Plus, they just liked each other because they were the hottest people in the room. That’s not necessarily a bad reason to like a person, but it’s far from tragedy when that couple breaks up.

In any case, the reason it’s an ideal situation is this: let’s assume that Romeo and Juliet had managed to get together and stay alive. When they finally realized that they didn’t actually like each other but were highly in lust, they would’ve divorced. Now, the Capulets and Montagues don’t precisely get along to begin with. When they break up, the city would’ve fallen into more chaos than ever before. Not only that, but the death of Romeo and Juliet actually spurred the two to work together. For the little people of Verona, this was the happiest day ever. No more did they have to be wary of fights between two retarded families. They could finally live in peace, and everyone learned a valuable lesson: When emo kids die, everyone prospers.

Personally, I think the whole thing was set up by Prince Escalus. He knew that Romeo and Mercutio, a relative of the Capulets, were good friends. It was just a matter of convincing Benvolio, who always wants to keep the peace, to get Romeo to meet Juliet. Kind’ve puts Benvolio’s comment about hot bitches into perspective, doesn’t it? After that, you find a way to get Romeo banished, convince the priest to set up a ridiculous plan to make Juliet want to kill herself, and never send a letter to tell Romeo what’s going on. Star-crossed lovers die. The rest of the town lives in peace. Tragedy? I think not.

P.S. Juliet Capulet is a stupid name.

P.P.S.

Ted Mosby: “Hey Romeo, if you try to get with Juliet, the Prince of Cats will kill you.”

Romeo Stinson: “Challenge accepted!”

If you aren’t aware of Pokemon, then you’re further out of the loop than I am, and I’m talking about something that seems as if it hasn’t been relevant in years. But as social networking has become the most important thing ever, the metaphor that Pokemon has so profoundly explored becomes more and more impressive. What am I talking about? I’ll explain.

Gotta Catch ‘Em All

The Pokeball is the standard method of catching Pokemon.

The basic premise of Pokemon is that you “Gotta catch ‘em all”. This, oddly enough, is the same premise with social networking. The more friends you have, the more people who like what you’re promoting, or the more people that comment on your status updates, the better. The more different types of people, mindsets, and backgrounds you have, the more likely it is that you will reach someone who understands you, wants what you are selling, or can provide assistance in a situation. Pokemon knew this before Myspace was even theorized.

The Pokedex

Now, you have lots of Pokemon, but that’s not very helpful without some form of organization. To combat this, Pokemon gave us something called a Pokedex. It has random bits of information about each of the Pokemon, such as their weight, size, and type. Myspace and Facebook have similar things called profiles. People fill out these profiles and say their age, professions, relationship status, likes, dislikes, etc. This allows you to know who you are targeting or which Pokemon to use in any given situation.

But you can only use six

Seriously, Magikarp does nothing.

Pokemon originally had 150 types of creatures that you could catch, but you were restricted to using six at any given time. Originally we thought that this was because the scope of the game would be obscene if you could use all 150 at once, but that wasn’t it at all. Pokemon was creating a top list. Social networking sites mirrored this later. Myspace, for example, originally allowed you to pick eight friends that would be listed as your top friends. Why would they do that? It seems like you’re just isolating all of your other Pokemon. But, it makes sense. Just as with your real life friends, experience is only gained when a Pokemon is used in battle, and you learn to trust, love, and depend on specific Pokemon. When you choose your six Pokemon, or your eight Myspace Pokemon, you’re really just saying that these are the friends you trust to fight for you. Sometimes, you change up the order because you hope that another Pokemon can become useful. Sometimes, your friends are just Magikarps (Pokemon #129)that refuse to evolve and can only use splash.

A metaphor for friendship

It’s not just a metaphor for social networking. It’s a metaphor for friendship. You should go out and catch ‘em all. Catch all the friends you can, because sometimes a lame Pokemon like Metapod will evolve into Butterfree, and then you win the game. Sometimes your worst enemies become your best friends. And sometimes, if you’re really lucky, one of your Pokemon will make you peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.

Since Behind the Hype is an L.A.-based website, we don’t really believe in having a section for book reviews. Though, from what I can tell about my brief stay in New York, where once people clutched copies of meaningful literature like The Sound and the Fury or Tender is the Night during the 1960s, they now walk around parading copies of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and any of the “novels” from the bane of intelligence, Twilight. So New York may be waning in its literary credibility as well. Anyway, with or without a book review section, I feel inclined to speak about a recent reading Chuck Klosterman did at the Union Square Barnes & Noble.

The cover of Klosterman's latest collection of pop culture essays

Now, I should give the disclaimer to those who are Klosterman enthusiasts that Klosterman himself makes a living off of commenting on and condemning the latest pop culture trends. That is the job of someone who has a strong and informed opinion on the most important matters in life: Film and music (and for some, including Klosterman, sports). Of late, it appears, Klosterman has lost the panache he had in his previous novels, such as Killing Yourself to Live and, his masterpiece, Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs (thank fuck he used an Oxford comma in the title).

Klosterman's most seminal work

To quote The Pretenders, “Don’t get me wrong,” I agree with Klosterman on a great many things, like his hatred of Coldplay and why they are a prime example of why no one can ever be happy in a relationship, his comparison between how time works in Saved by the Bell and in real life, and his assessment of internet porn, but these are all instances extracted from Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, which was published seven years ago. In his latest attempt at embracing being typecast as the guy who talks geekily about pop culture, Klosterman maintains none of the clout from his 2003 juggernaut. Eating the Dinosaur is, to be frank, not that good. And to make matters worse, when Simon & Schuster says, “Dance, monkey, dance,” Klosterman obliges. That is to say, he added two additional chapters to Eating the Dinosaur, first released in 2009. And this is precisely why he was at Barnes & Noble: To promote the book and its modifications. I don’t know if that means sales have been good or bad. The publishing industry is more of a mystery to me than why Christina Hendricks from Mad Men was voted 2010′s best looking American woman by Esquire (I still think it’s Angelina Jolie).

The man, the myth, the pop culture essayist

The questions asked of Klosterman were typically inane and true to form for book readings (i.e. “Have you seen Inception?” or “Do you prefer musical artists with a message as opposed to those who just perform without a social agenda?”). In turn, he seemed to make his answers as close to what he thought people wanted to hear (i.e. he liked Inception and his favorite band is Kiss). But where once Klosterman exuded originality and that rare authorial quality of not giving a shit, he now seems to be clutching desperately to commenting “accurately” on pop culture, the chief example being his newly added chapter about Lady Gaga and the accompanying depreciation of Madonna (a massive faux pas in my book of sins).

Another of Klosterman's better literary endeavors

It simply seems that, in becoming an unwitting member of pop culture, Klosterman has lost his previous identity as a pop culture commentator. I think he might get it back though, pending a fall from grace and a return to not being so overtly contrived.

You all know what’s happening. You see it taking over the supermarkets, the florists, even the dentist’s office: Hearts. Everywhere.

We call this epidemic of red and chocolate, Valentine’s Day, and it can either be a source of bliss or agony, depending on your fragile state of mind.

Despite the plethora of books out there that declare people to own their single status, let’s face it, most people aren’t completely satisfied with their vibrators or Youporn.

The trouble is Valentine’s Day stigmatizes this one group rather cruelly. This scarlet lettering has inspired restaurants to hold anti-Valentine’s Day themed dinners for bitter women. Chocolate cake and sorrow for dessert. I’ve been to a couple. Imagine restaurants filled with grimacing vodka-infused women and confused bus boys.

In Japan, it’s worse. Instead of one day of emotional suffering, the country decided to create a complementary holiday called “White Day” on March 14. Valentine’s Day in Japan is exclusively for men. Women will buy ludicrously priced chocolates for their true loves, who will hopefully return the favor on White Day, with even more lavish presents. The first White Day, celebrated in 1978, was concocted by a delicious candy company that has been earning very sweet profits since.

I love relationships, especially with good, sexy people. But I have never really been the type of person to agonize over being single’s on Valentine’s Day. I’m certainly not a subscriber to those endless survival guides that teach lonely people how to cope with the day’s chocolatey bittersweet loneliness. Why do they need to be called survival guides? Do we really get that close to death if we spend this day alone?

If you want to be in love, you should want it. And I think it’s perfectly okay to admit that you like love.

On the other hand, if you want reasons to embrace your singleness, I just happened to jot down a few perks right here:

1. A new study of couples found 56 percent of young adults in new sexual relationships were infected with HPV. The risk of contracting a disease has always been my favorite reason for not hooking up. And who enjoys the awkward, “Can you please just not get that into me?”

2. None of your friends will resent you. For those of you in loving, committed relationships that resemble picture frame stock photos, single people hate you, sorry.

3. Most people don’t care about Valentine’s Day. You’d think with all the hoop-la surrounding the holiday, that it was the second coming of Christ, but really, it’s mostly Walgreens that exaggerates the holiday. Valentine’s Day used to be a big deal in 5th grade when we made valentines for our classmates and ate heart-shaped cookies. As Chet Baker once eloquently crooned, “the thrill is gone.”

4. There’s no pressure. I’ve always felt an incredible amount of pressure to celebrate amazing Valentine’s Days with guys. I helped my friend’s boyfriend plan an insanely romantic hullalbaloo for her, complete with Tiffany jewelry! When a partner’s sentiment doesn’t match yours, or if it’s simply a letdown, there’s really nothing worse.

5. You can be with someone if you really want it. As of 2002, there are 904 dating service establishments all available to serve you and find you a potentially suitable mate. Apparently it works too: $489 million in revenues. Or if you’re a millionaire, you should really visit the Millionaire Matchmaker, who is the most entertaining crazy person I’ve ever seen on t.v. Apparently, she has a 99 percent success rate, which makes about as much sense as this astrologer who has a money-back guarantee if a spell doesn’t work.

Still I personally don’t advocate singledom.

I love being in love, and I think that there is nothing more ideal than finding your soul mate.  More than the candy, flowers, and expensive four-course dinners, I prefer the free massages.

Because on the off chance that the chocolates are fruit-filled disasters, the flowers are carnations and dinner comes from the drive-thru, you can always ask for a massage to make up for everything else.

I have a love/hate relationship with social networking sites. While they provide the ability to maintain contact with people that you wouldn’t otherwise have contact with, they also seem to become the main method of communicating with people you would otherwise have a real relationship with. Why call a person when you can write on their Wall? Why visit a person when you can respond to their every tweet? Social networking becomes a way of saying:

I’m vaguely interested in your life, but not enough to put forth effort into making an actual connection.

At least social networking is only 3x as popular as human interaction.

This isn’t a bad thing on its own. After all, many of your hundreds of Facebook/Myspace friends don’t deserve more than a two sentence comment. Most of them don’t even want to know more than what your status and moods are. There is nothing wrong with that. What starts demeaning relationships is when that becomes your only method of communication with the world, including the friends that you once would’ve talked to on the phone or seen in person.

Why does this happen? It’s easy. Phenomenally easy. Take, for example, a friend’s birthday. Facebook will tell you when someone is getting older. If you’re happy that they’ve aged another year, you can immediately write on their Wall telling them so. Within fifteen keystrokes and a couple clicks of the mouse, they’ll know that you wish them a “Happy Birthday!”. Your obligations as a friend will have been fulfilled, and everyone on Facebook will know that you care enough to spend 30 seconds on them.  Or you could text them, which is slightly more personal. Or you could call them, which takes actual interaction. Think about it for a second. Which of these are you most likely to choose?

It comes down to effort. The more personal your attempt to communicate with a person is, the higher the effort. Leaving a message on a website is instant. A text is slightly more effort. Calling a person means you might actually have to spend some time talking to a person. Of course, you could get lucky and just get their voicemail.

The more this becomes an acceptable way of dealing with people, the less meaningful relationships will be. When you have a conversation, you create a unique experience with that person. When you know a person by their status updates, you have the same experience that everyone else does. You never have an intimate interaction. Without mannerisms, tone of voice, facial expressions, and even touch, you really can’t know a person. You can never be friends. You’re just text.

At least you can always talked to stuffed animals.

Which is fine for the hundreds of people you don’t really care about. But for the ones you do? Don’t forget to make the effort. Because when you ever stop making the effort, not only will you be treating your friends as if they’re not worth a call, but they might realize that they actually aren’t.

My first adventure in Nepal led me to to the top of a mountain in one of the lesser known Rookum district in the Western Terai. With my guide Budrie (we communicated successfully 50% of the time), we began with a 25 hour bus trip and then 2 days of ferocious trekking through stunning rice paddies, mountain scape, and shanty towns to arrive to the capital city of Calalinga in Rookum, a part of Nepal that no Tourist has ever heard of.

My goal was to meet, find, and potentially rescue a family of siblings who had recently been orphaned by the annual diarrhea or cholera epidemic that comes at the outset of every monsoon season (late spring). This year’s cases numbered in the thousands, and fatality rates have reached triple digits.  When Papa Michael (Director of Papa’s House: volunteernepal.com) shared an article in the Himalayan Times about 6 orphans, the oldest– 13, who was left with the job of taking care of all her siblings after both parents died from cholera, I knew that I had to do something. For those of you who are pretty dumb (just kidding!, I didn’t know what it was before I came to Nepal either), cholera is a disease that is pretty much eradicated in the world, except for in developing nations like Nepal. It is a water borne disease that causes a large amount of watery diarrhea. Treatment is relatively cheap and effective, but in rural regions of Nepal, there is little to no education, money, or outreach to help those affected.

Papa’s House arranged a last minute trip/rescue operation to try and meet the journalist who would hopefully lead me to the orphans. If it was possible, I would bring them back to Kathmandu so they could the join Papa’s House Family.

I prepared for my trip to combat cholera, bugs, by arming myself with a lot of anti bacterial sanitizer, three pairs of
surgical gloves, and a laptop computer.  Little did I know that none of these things would be necessary for what I encountered.  After the 3 day harrowing journey just to meet the journalist, I was shocked to discover that the orphans would require an additional 7-8 day hike to reach, as they lived in a very remote part of the district.

Additionally, the journalist, who was once captured by Maoists, proved to be less than grateful for my efforts.  He seemed wary of me and Papa’s House and informed me that a financial donation (via him) would be a more effective way to help the orphans. And, to go into a region with such rampant cholera (where even health workers were fleeing) without medicine or money was pointless. It was devastating.  The entire time, I was thinking– This could have all been settled with a quick phone call. But we were in Nepal, a country where rolling black occur daily; why would cell phone service be any better?

However, the journalist did manage to set up a a small meet and greet with a local military official the next morning, who was able to give me some numbers and data regarding the epidemic… as well as some other interesting information:

The official had also read the same Himalayan Times article and was shocked by the story of the orphans. While he was appreciative of my efforts, having come all the way from America to rescue these kids, he too, was moved by the story and said he sent military helicopters to undergo a search and rescue for the family a week prior.  However, he found nothing.  Yup. NOTHING. He questioned whether

or not the orphans even existed, and implied that journalists sometimes make up stories like this one to gain sympathy or make the government look bad.

Meanwhile, my journalist is sitting right next to me (the one who met the children and wrote the story about the children) and Budrie (my translator) is sitting on the other side, probably absorbing 50% of the conversation.

I looked at my cup of tea an wondered if I had lost my mind. Later on, I asked Budrie what could have possibly happened. The two were completely negating each others’ stories… Budrie looked at me quizzically and offered, Maybe the kids disappeared? Thanks, Budrie. That’s helpful.

So that was my final explanation. A mysterious disappearance, an potentially unethical journalist, a shady government official, and me at the top of a mountain, wondering just how this story was going to end.

It turns out, that was my ending. After being asked for official documents that I didn’t have, I was expected to leave politely, and head back down the mountain, empty handed without kids and answers.

As painful as it was to feel a sense of failure and confusion, it was eye opening and remarkable to learn and experience what communication is like in Nepal. With limited email, phones, cell phones, and mail, people make must make pain staking efforts to get information, which oftentimes, is still marred with inaccuracies.

What I learned from my adventure is that information is the key to solving these problems.  You can rescue orphans, but the true gift is preventing them from becoming orphans in the first place.  Health education (especially in rural, lower caste areas) is vital and hopefully the aim of my next visit to Nepal.

In other news, I’m back and happy… and living in New York City. (Kinda like that other salsa from those old Pace Picante Salsa commercials)

There are two things that everyone likes to hate, Zombies and Nazis. Zombies will always have a special place in my heart, but today is the day of the Nazi. With the release of Wolfenstein and Inglourious Basterds, Nazis are back in the popular scene. But why do we enjoy killing/watching Nazis die as much as we do? To find out, we need to get to the bottom of what makes a Nazi.

Anger

Suntan lotion is a Nazi elixir

Nazis hate the world. They hate everyone who isn’t like them. The reason for that is because everyone else can tan. Nazis by definition are the whitest of the white people, second only to Albino’s. While their blond hair and blue eyes might make them attractive, their near see-through skin deserves some tanning. And they can’t do it. It’s a well known fact that Nazis confuse being dirty with tanning. Because of this, when they shower, they get angry. You would too if you lost your tan after cleaning. This is the primary reason for their anger, and why they felt the need to destroy anyone who could tan. Note: that Nazis avoid sunscreen at all costs.

Good Intentions

Science could've saved millions

The Nazis didn’t start wanting to kill anybody. They just wanted to learn the secrets of tanning. That is what all the human experiments were about. Plus, when they made people dig their own graves, it was just so that people could be out in the sun. How else do you tan? It had additional benefits too, as people playing in the dirt started looking more tan. Remember, that Nazis can’t tell the difference between dirt and melanin. They were just trying to help, but eventually their frustration took over. That’s when the killing started.

More Hopeful

Hint: Not a tan

You may think that anyone who confuses dirt with a tan is stupid, but Nazis are really just more hopeful than most people. They see brown color, and their optimism leads them to believe that they’ve tanned. Think about it. They thought they could conquer all of the world and create one super race of people to live in a Utopia. That’s really hopeful. But, what they should’ve realized was that while they would never be able to get a tan, if they decided to breed with other races, their children would be able to. It is really a shame that genetic research was so poor at the time, and that Hitler just didn’t understand the way to create an Aryan race that could sit out in the sun without burning.

When you think about it, everyone likes blond haired, blue eyed people…as long as they aren’t Nazis. So why do we enjoy watching Nazis die so much? I’ve narrowed it down to two main reasons. The first is that we’re very cynical and don’t like hopeful people. So when bad things happen to the optimistic Nazis, we’re very pleased. The second reason is that they want to kill us because of our tans. And no one likes someone who is violent with envy.

Extenze will have you believe that the longer something is the better, but it’s simply not true. Longer than it’s good refers to a situation in which something would’ve been very good, if it had ended long before it actually did. How much better would the Matrix have been if there hadn’t been a third movie? It’s not just movies, either. This problem extends to all media. We’ll cover some classic examples to explain what it means to be longer than it’s good.

Fantasy Book Series

Harry Potter and the Holes of Plot.

The list here is somewhat endless and contains many extremely good examples. However, as fantasy books aren’t terribly popular, we’ll start with these. At a glance, we have Sword of Truth (should’ve ended at book 1), Harry Potter (should’ve ended at book 6), and most famously the Wheel of Time. The Wheel of Time holds a special place in everyone’s heart. It consists of 12 books, but it is unfinished. The writer, Robert Jordan, came down with a rare blood disease and died before finishing “the last book.” The series was superb through the 7^th book, at which time Robert Jordan realized he was getting very, very rich and decided to make nothing happen for the subsequent five books. As each book is about 1000 pages long, that’s a lot of nothing going on. To his credit, when he learned he was dying, he decided that the next book would be his last in the series. Unfortunately, he died before he completed it, and the task was given to Brandon Sanderson…who decided to extend the series by 3 more books. Had it ended at book 8 with a stunning conclusion, the Wheel of Time would’ve been world renowned as the best fantasy series ever. Instead, the readers wished Robert Jordan’s death…and subsequently got their wish.

Music

Should've ended pre Load

How many songs are there that should only be 2 minutes long and feel like forever at 3 minutes? This happens all the time with amateur bands that you hear at bars. You start thinking that a song is pretty decent, then it never ends, and you wish the band would explode in a torrent of flames. While the exploding thing rarely happens, musicians continue to go on for too long. The best example of this is Sonic Youth. There is a song called The Diamond Sea. You’ve probably heard it on the radio for about 4 minutes. I did, and it was one of my favorite songs, until I found the 20 minute long album version. That’s too long. To Sonic Youth’s credit, I haven’t removed this song from my playlist yet because I still like those first 4 minutes.

Movies

Definitely Longer Than It's Good

Ever watched a movie that you thought should’ve ended before the third hour mark? How about one that should’ve ended before the ten minute mark. Titanic, for example, could’ve been an hour long and not given me a headache. In any case, the most stellar example is Blade. The first 5 minutes of Blade is the best movie ever. It’s action packed, has awesome acting, and it has a great story. It even ends with a cliffhanger. How will the vampires get back at Blade?! But then it keeps going on…and on…and on…and what you end up with is a terrible movie. And then they made two more. I would’ve paid $10 to see the first 5 minutes in the theatre on repeat for 2 hours.

Video games (Flash games in particular) are continuously worse than they should be because of longer than it’s good.  Buffets also tend to be longer than they are good. This list also includes baseball games, church, and marriage. So, if you’re a creator of something and you’re out of brilliant ideas, just stop. Just because it’s short, doesn’t mean it’s not amazing.

Next Monday Xbox will be releasing an update to their Xbox 360 Dashboard that will allow users to download most 360 games as well as Xbox original games without having to go to the store. The 360 games won’t be out the same day as they are in stores. All this begs the question, “How is the largest used game buyer and seller going to survive when all the game discs are gone?”

Those little avatars could harm a fly let alone take down the might Game Stop.

As of now you get pretty much cheated on trading your games to Game Stop and EB Games because they need to make a profit. The new updates to the Xbox Dashboard might just be the first step in changing the gaming landscape. If this goes well maybe Sony and Nintendo will expand their online arcades to Microsoft‘s extent. You can’t return purchases made on Xbox Live so if you really want a return on your investment buying the physical game will still be the way to go.

Xbox is making it more attractive however by allowing you to play the game off of their server. You don’t have to have a massive hard drive to store all your games. They will instead be attached to your profile and your console. I for one, am over joyed at the thought of more Xbox original games being made available. Also a warning to Blockbuster. Netfilx users who have Xbox 360s now can browse from their console. Before you had to search for movies on your computer then you could watch it on your console.

Dinosaur? Or safe for now?

But can all this destroy Game Stop? No. At least it won’t destroy Game Stop on Monday. Down the road when everything can be streamed in through the serious of tubes Game Stop will be one of the first to go. For now Game Stop still sells the same titles from the Live Arcade for cheaper and with that trade in possibility. This isn’t a perfect end all be all upgrade. It will make you more lazy and more antisocial. If Microsoft was smart this would be coming out in May at the beginning of the summer instead of at the end.

Game Stop should take head of this development and begin figuring out what Game Fly has already done. Trade ins through the mail. It is a sad state of affairs when people only want to do business in their boxers at home, but that is where the money is.I think that it depends on how quickly Microsoft can get the new titles up on Live. If too much time goes by then retailers will have nothing to worry about. Game Stop  you have been warned.