Well, it’s been a nice break. Hope you all had a nice holiday, and are looking forward to a nice new year.

The stress of Christmas has come and gone this year, but that doesn’t mean we can’t look back and remember…here are some fun old vintage Christmas ads…

Two ways to say “Merry Christmas”: “Cancer” and “Emphysema”.

And “wow that’s a giant carton of cigs.”

Victorian Cards

I can’t really read this one very well, but I share it here because I love the image of Victorians selling all their cards attached to babies. You wanted a friendly greeting? Well now you get a BABY AS WELL. Nah but I’m pretty sure those Victorians liked babies or something. They all kind of look like aliens though.

Get Shown up by Santa!

I don’t know, I don’t think I’d buy a Zippo based on this ad. Seems like Zippo owners are jerks. I mean, here’s this guy having a little trouble with his lighter, and bam. Santa’s gotta come down and steal all his thunder with his fancy shmancy Zippo thing. Weak, Claus. Weak.

Ah, vintage ads. No matter how jaded and angry at the modern consumer-driven Christmas we become, we can at least know that it’s been going on for a long, long time.

Happy Holidays.

It’s been a slow season for SNTC, and I’m partially to blame. But I think it’s only fair you guys get a glimpse of just what’s been keeping me away from you.

I’ve spent the last year, along with about twenty-two of my peers, creating a movie -a no-budget student film- which will be making its Youtube premier sometime in early 2009 (read: as soon as I can figure out how).

Until then, enjoy some trailers! These all aired on my university’s campus TV channel, and now they’re youtubed for you to enjoy.

Meet Chad!

(There’s a whole series of “Meet…” trailers up at our channel.)

And here’s a spoof we had much joy creating:

Proving once and for all “Requiem for a Dream” is all it takes to be wildly dramatic.

Anyhow, of course I’ll be letting you know when the movie itself airs. Until then, I’ll have a bit more free time to update again.

This last reason is probably the most obvious of them all, but it combines every reason I’ve mentioned so far. Trolls.

These things are terrifying

There are people out there who have little better to do with their time than pick fights on the internet. But not just fights; meaningless fights. Stupid fights. Really really stupid fights. If you share an opinion somewhere, a troll might very well find it in his schedule to devote some time to making you wish you’d never had an opinion about anything.

You have an opinion against something? Troll will accuse you of being pro something else. The Internet ABCs are his friend.

You like someone? It’s a good thing for Trolls that Hitler existed, because he’ll be the first person your hero is compared to.

You want an intelligent opinion from a group of people? Who’s stopping troll from pretending to be a host of people to drown out the sense?

The moral of the story? It’s not the internet that prevents intelligent debate, and it’s not a certain situation or element of technology; it’s the people. The high school kids who just discovered sarcasm with nothing better to do. The college kids who think they’ve achieved enlightenment and won’t shut up until they’re satisfied everyone has heard them. The grown ups who can’t stand to see all these kids running their mouths off and will provoke them into rage just to prove their own superiority.

It’s not the internet. It’s the users.

Seriously now. These things? Scary. It’s staring into my heart. My heart.

What’s the fourth big reason intelligent debate is impossible on the internet? I’m sure you’ve already guessed.

Anonymity.

Engaging in a debate with some people on the internet? Maybe. Or maybe, you’re engaging in a debate with a single person, pretending to be some people. You know how people always joke about two people sharing an identity with the saying, “have you ever seen them in a room together?”

Well on the internet, you haven’t. And you probably never will.

A man and his avatar.

You could be getting yourself all worked up over one guy and his legion of like-minded identities…which will lead us right to reason 5.

And in the shocking conclusion of SayNoToCrack’s 5 Reasons Intelligent Debate is Impossible on the Internet, you’ll see just how of all these reasons come to a head.

One solid reason Intelligent Debate is currently impossible can be encapsulated entirely by a single link.

This single link.

That was timecube.com, one of the most ridiculous and impossible reads on the internet to date. It’s sort of like that homeless person who shouts at people on the street had a baby with Geocities and they did speed during the pregnancy and dropped the baby on its head at birth.

Welp, can’t argue with that I guess.

The point is, that guy? He made a website. He made a website calling himself the wisest human on the planet. And you know what? Anyone can do that. Anybody at all.

It can cost as little as $40 a year to own a website of your own, filled with all the information you could ever fabricate – depending on your traffic, it could even cost less than that.

And that’s all it takes. One crazy with $40 and a dream, to build a website making any half-baked argument he wants. Presenting all the fake evidence he wants. Linking to all the half-baked “official” resources he wants, building up a network of false information and insanity.

Crazy theories are not limited to the spam folder in your inbox. They’re out there, building websites. Some hurt your eyes. Others are deceptively polished. None of them are totally trustworthy.

And that’s the internet. Try arguing intelligently for long in this place. All it takes for someone to prove a point is a well-timed edit to Wikipedia (which, I might add, a startling amount of college students still try to pass off as a scholarly source) to prove whoever they want.

Looks normal as a thumbnail doesn’t it?

I’m not saying it’s a bad thing that anyone can make a website to express themselves. I’m saying it’s a bad thing that everyone does. Especially time cube guy.

Hah! So! Wouldn’t you know the first time in a long time I decide to write a series, website issues lock me out of my account so “tune in tomorrow” sits there for days. No, I didn’t forget. Here’s reason two that intelligent debate is impossible on the internet…

The Internet Alphabet

What’s the internet alphabet? A, Z. The end. Either a person believes A, or they believe Z. There’s no in between. If a person says they’re opposed to A, that must mean they love Z (even if they’re more M or K).

A long time ago I wrote an article about a song by a “family friendly” artist. Immediately I was accused of hating non-mainstream music, and loving only hardcore rap and angry depressing music full of swear-words and sex. As it turns out, I don’t hate non-mainstream music, and I prefer upbeat alternative and/or classic rock. But not on the internet. One song. A or Z.

But I see a future where one day the whole alphabet will exist on the ‘net. H’s, I’s, J’s, P’s, Q’s, all discussing in harmony.

But then I guess it’s not news, after all, the internet’s not terribly kind to language in general…