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Shame.

Published 17th April 2022

Internet

I’ve written many times in the past about how I think people should keep their website archives online. In fact I’ve talked about it to the point of obnoxiousness, and then far beyond that. About how old stuff can suddenly become found and loved, about the history of the web disappearing, about what remains of the public record, about accidentally destroying a web community, about losing memories… or simply about letting things live.

It’s all true. But today I want to talk about another reason I feel so strongly about this. A reason I haven’t really touched on before, but I think is one of the most important of all.

Take a look at this interview from 2013, with designer Frank Chimero. It’s actually worth reading in full; it touches on many interesting topics. For instance, I highly identify with this:

“I think I’m similar to a lot of other creative people in that I’m deeply uncomfortable with attention. It’s one of those things where if you gain any attention, you start to subconsciously — or maybe even consciously — make creative choices to have people stop paying attention to you. […]1

Attention creates expectations that feel like a saddle. And most horses buck the first time a saddle is put on them. It is a natural inclination. Maybe it’s immature behavior to want to shake off other people’s expectations? I don’t know. But, if I’m really honest about where I am creatively, that’s what I want to do — I just want to buck.”

This reminds me very much of when I decided I didn’t want to write about sitcoms for a while, because somebody mildly hinted that was all they enjoyed about my writing. It also reminds me that whenever this place gets attention for something beyond my usual audience – my Yes Minister piece last year, for instance – I feel a disconcerting mix of pleasure and uncomfortableness. Is my lack of a really popular article on Dirty Feed so far this year down to luck, people having less time for my nonsense as the world opens up again… or my choice?

But there’s another part of this interview which I can’t quite get on board with.

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  1. All the quotations in this article are edited a little to avoid the back-and-forth with the interviewers, which works brilliantly in the piece itself, but less well when quoting from it. I hope I’ve been fair with my edits, but it’s worth reading the full interview to capture the true flavour of the conversation. ↩

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Corrections

Published 24th February 2022

Internet

Open Culture, “Revisit the Infamous Rolling Stones Free Festival at Altamont: The Ill-Fated Concert Took Place 50 Years Ago”, 9th December 2019:

“The stigma surrounding the Hells Angels greatly contributed the infamy, as news of their full involvement spread. Had accused killer Alan Passaro not been in a notoriously violent biker gang, Selvin believes, he would have been seen as a hero, since Hunter had rushed the stage with a gun after an earlier altercation with the gang. (Passaro was not charged.)”

Me, 21st February 2022, 5:41am:

Open Culture, “Revisit the Infamous Rolling Stones Free Festival at Altamont: The Ill-Fated Concert Took Place 50 Years Ago”, 21st February 2022, c. 5:55am:

“The stigma surrounding the Hells Angels greatly contributed the infamy, as news of their full involvement spread. Had accused killer Alan Passaro not been in a notoriously violent biker gang, Selvin believes, he would have been seen as a hero, since Hunter had rushed the stage with a gun after an earlier altercation with the gang. (Passaro was charged but not convicted.)”

*   *   *

So, y’know, the correction here is good. Slightly less good: no acknowledgement anywhere in the article that it’s had a whacking great error in it for over two years. (We’re not talking about a tiny mistake; reporting criminal proceedings correctly is kinda important.)

Oh, and I also didn’t get any kind of thank you for helping them correct the mistake. Not even a reply on Twitter, let alone in the article itself.

Let me make Dirty Feed’s editorial policy crystal clear on this one. If you spot an error on this site, please let me know. If the comments are open, you can use that; if they’re closed, grab me on Twitter or drop me an email. Not only will you get a thank you – because I think anyone who takes the time and trouble to help me make this site better deserves one – but I’ll put a note at the bottom of the article to tell the reader exactly what was corrected.

Silent corrections are death when it comes to trust with your readers. And not thanking the person who takes the time to help fix your crap is just rude.

The Open Web

Published 14th January 2022

Internet

The new, relaunched blog of a “web developer and designer”, somewhere near the start of 2020:

“The open web is a husk of its former self, conceded to the corporate ventures whose aim is to collect as much data as possible and leverage it in the most profitable manner possible. I want to reclaim my portion of it that dream of an open web of sharing ideas, culture, and imagination.”

Spoiler: they didn’t.

“I’m not happy with the result, but I will never be. Designing for oneself is an artistic act, and dissatisfaction for me in that sense is foundational. But again, that’s not the goal. The goal is to take back my part of the web.”

Spoiler: they didn’t.

“And with that, I will pledge to improve this site steadily and to contribute to the content regularly. To not let it die.”

Spoiler: they did.

*   *   *

I think caring about the open web is a good thing. I think sharing ideas, culture, and imagination is to be commended.

But you don’t do that by redesigning your blog, posting a manifesto, and then leaving it to rot. The design and manifesto are the least important thing. If you want to take back your part of the web, then you need to share your ideas and thoughts for real, on an ongoing basis.

It doesn’t have to be every day. Or even every week. And it certainly doesn’t have to be in blog posts stretching to thousands of words. There are so many different ways of doing it. It doesn’t matter.

But however we do it: if we truly want to take back control from those “corporate ventures”, then we need to actually say something. Not get trapped in that old redesign-languish-redesign cycle.

You want people to step outside Facebook? Have something which makes it worthwhile for people to step outside Facebook. Walled gardens are only worth leaving if there’s something nice on the other side of the wall. And your latest site redesign just isn’t going to be enough.

Contributing to the open web doesn’t need much. It doesn’t need 1337 design skillz. It doesn’t need hours of your time a day. And it most certainly doesn’t need any kind of manifesto.

It just needs you to start writing, and see what happens.

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Worthy.

Published 6th January 2022

Internet

Sometimes, seeing how somebody else approaches writing clarifies how you approach your own. Or, rather, how not to approach it.

Take the following piece of advice, given to one blog writer who very much took it to heart.1

“Knowing when to stop is not exactly the same as knowing what to start. Determining what’s worthy is harder than simply finding something interesting.”

Different advice helps different people, and that’s fine. But speaking personally: I can’t think of anything more dreadful than having to decide what is worthy for me to write about. If something is interesting, that’s more than enough. Why put barriers in your way before you even start?

The person who was given this advice even struggles with it to some extent:

“Years later, as I emerge from what does indeed feel like an extended dormancy, I’m still seeking clarity on what’s worthy. But what I do know: time to start, it is. These handful of words mark an official commitment to an unofficial restart of writing.”

And I feel bad for them. Because to me, thinking about what’s “worthy” when writing on your own personal site is a recipe for treading water, and publishing nothing. And guess what: that’s exactly what happened.

We love to put barriers in the way of writing. Sometimes we want our backend to be perfect first. Sometimes we worry too much about being helpful. And sometimes we question whether what we’re doing is important at all.

It’s all nonsense. If you think something is interesting, it’s worth writing about, judgements about whether it’s “worthy” or not be damned. It might go nowhere. It might go somewhere. Just occasionally, it might really go somewhere. But the absolute worst thing that could happen?

You’ll have put something interesting into the world.

  1. I’m not linking to the source for this, deliberately. But you can easily find it yourself, if you know how to use Google and quote marks. ↩

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On Not Writing.

Published 2nd December 2021

Internet

Let me quote excerpts of somebody’s blog to you. I’m not going to link to it, for reasons which will very quickly become obvious.

Its very first post is on the 20th May 2012, “Redesign notes and switching to Octopress”:

“When I set out to redesign this site and start blogging, I knew I wanted it to be a static HTML generated weblog (also commonly known as “baked”). Coming from WordPress, this publishing workflow is a dream.

Content, which is just static HTML, is created in Markdown in a text editor, saved into version control (Git) and pushed to GitHub to deploy. This means no database (MySQL) — a potential security nightmare and single point of failure, no page caching (goodbye WP Super Cache and W3 Total Cache), no FTP and super fast page loads – all good things.

I evaluated some great systems including Octopress, Middleman, Nesta CMS and I’m keeping a close eye on Calypso (built on Node.js and MongoDB), but in the end I opted for Octopress as it fitted my needs. I’m still ironing out a few kinks with Octopress, but overall I’m very pleased with how its worked out.”

Their next post is on the following day, the 21st May 2012. It’s called “My 2012 front-end web development workflow”:

“So far 2012 has been a big year for me in progressing my front-end web development skills, tools and process. I’ve also been busy learning new languages and frameworks and getting up to speed on the latest advancements.”

Excellent work.

Their next post is over three years later, on the 25th October 2015. This one is called “Site Design Refresh and Blog Reboot”:

“A lot’s happened since my last blog post three years ago in May 2012, which partly explains the lack of updates.1

[…]

Process has been another factor towards my lack of writing. I love using static site generators like Jekyll and Middleman for prototyping, but as blogging platforms they don’t work for me. There’s too many steps between writing and publishing – opening a terminal, running rake commands to generate a post, editing markdown files, committing to git, and running rake build/deploy tasks. This gets in the way when all you want to do is write, and creates friction when trying to create posts on mobile devices whilst travelling (although there’s tools like Prose.io).

I’ve been tempted to reduce my site to a single page calling card and move my writing to Medium, but that goes against the Indie Web principle of POSSE (Publish on your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere). With a personal website you retain control and ownership of your content. But there’s no denying that Medium has raised the bar in terms of the writing experience on the web. I’m currently in the process of rebuilding the back-end of this site in Ruby on Rails, and I’m planning to use Made by Many’s excellent Sir Trevor content editor (see the demo) for a great writing experience. This will inspire me to write more.”

The post then concludes:

“I’m excited about my own little space on the internet for the first time in years and have lots of blog post ideas that I can’t wait to share.

Next time I won’t leave it three years…”

This is the last post on their blog, at the time of writing. Over six years ago.

And in that one post, there is a triple-whammy of all my favourite things. An excuse for not writing. An announcement of a new blog design.2 And a promise of loads of posts to come, which never happen. Most people only manage two of those things in any given blog entry, so that’s quite an impressive achievement.

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  1. The writer here then goes into exactly what they have done for the last three years, which is, in fact, genuinely more exciting than anything I have done in my entire life. ↩

  2. Backend, but it counts. ↩

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Yet Another Boring Post About Twitter Which You Can Safely Skip

Published 26th August 2021

Internet

Recently, I was involved in some TWITTER DRAMA involving my account being locked. I won’t recount the story here, because TWITTER DRAMA is boring, and I write about interesting things on here, like Fry & Laurie recording dates. Suffice to say, Twitter literally think I post material which “promotes or encourages suicide or self-harm”. You can read the whole thread about it here if you’re really interested.

So I was not in an especially good mood, as I read this post about Twitter, by Greg Storey. Because I would really like to leave Twitter for good. The company accusing me of encouraging suicide does not especially make me want to stay on the service.

But something about Greg’s post gave me pause.

“I would also add, what does it do for you? Engagement isn’t nearly what it was in the first five years, not even the first ten years. So why do we continue? What’s the point anymore.”

Because my question is: engagement for who? Surely not just for himself, which would be a perfectly legitimate thing to write; he specifically includes the reader in his question. “Why do we continue?”

So, let me give you my answer. I continue because engagement on Twitter for me, right now, is at an all-time high. I get far more interest in the stuff I post on there now than I did two years ago. Something happened during the pandemic which meant that I approached some kind of critical mass concerning interest in my writing. Cumulating with by far the most popular thing I’ve ever written.

With all this, I’m reminded of Adam Buxton’s views on Twitter. I’ll quote the relevant part of his discussion again:

IAIN LEE: If I wasn’t doing this career, I would get rid of Twitter, but Twitter’s a really good tool for selling stuff, for selling, you know…
ADAM BUXTON: Yeah, is it? I don’t know.
IAIN LEE: Well it is… I think here, because this is a brand new radio station, you’re building an audience from nothing, so for me to say to 47,000 people: “I’m on tonight at 10 o’clock and I’ve got Adam Buxton on”, some of those people will listen.
ADAM BUXTON: But if you weren’t on Twitter, I just don’t believe it would really materially affect the way that your show went.
IAIN LEE: I’m going to bear that in mind, thank you for that.
ADAM BUXTON: I just don’t believe it. I really don’t. I mean, I’m sure it’s different if you’re sort of a pop star, or maybe if you’re younger, I don’t know.
IAIN LEE: That’s rude.
ADAM BUXTON: But I often say at gigs: “Raise your hand if you’re here because I tweeted about this” – two, three hands go up.
IAIN LEE: But those three people, though… loud laughers.
ADAM BUXTON: I mean, they are amazing. They’re the best chaps in the audience.

Since that conversation in 2016, Adam Buxton has left Twitter. And I’m sure it’s working out great for him. He really doesn’t need to be there. Like Greg Storey, he got to the point where Twitter didn’t help him any more.

But this is my problem. With the point I’m at right now, I really do need Twitter. Pretty much my entire audience is on there. While Greg Storey can scoff that engagement has fallen, or Adam Buxton can say that he doesn’t need it, that is simply not true for everyone.

Which is fine. I’m not trying to say that people can’t talk about what is true for them. That would be ludicrous. But with these conversations, there needs to be some understanding what what might personally be true for you, isn’t true for everyone. If I deactivated my account and left Twitter now, virtually nobody would read anything I wrote on here. Most of my hits come from Twitter. And that’s the kind of situation that Greg misses entirely.

And so I’m stuck. Stuck with a service which directly accuses me of promoting suicide, because I want people to read my silly writing.

Cheers Twitter, thanks a bunch.

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Five Nice Things

Published 3rd November 2020

Internet / Meta / TV Comedy / TV Presentation

I’ve had it up to here with Twitter. This is not an in-depth article about the perils of social media. It’s just a simple statement of fact. I’ve had it up to here with Twitter.

I could list the many reasons why I’m bored with it right now. People coming into your mentions and explaining your own jokes back to you is a big one. People piping up with the ludicrously obvious take, when you’ve tried your hardest to tweet something more interesting, is another.1 The constant stream of unpleasant news is a third. I know the world’s going to shit, I am literally paid to put news bulletins on air, and monitor them closely. I don’t need to be told all this stuff in my free time as well. It’s just too much to cope with.

Then there’s the thing which pushed me entirely over the edge yesterday: making a crap joke about “nations and regions” in terms of television playout, only for someone who doesn’t even follow me to pipe up with some nebulous political point against me. And when I tried to politely explain I’m talking about something technical rather than anything wider, they block me. I got enough of this kind of aggressive, bad faith shit in the playground when I was 12. Right now, I don’t feel like willingly putting myself through it as an adult. I am bored of other people making their neuroses my business.

So for now, I’m deactivated.

Of course, it won’t last. I’ve not stormed off for good. Lots of people who I really like talking to, I only actually know on Twitter. And speaking entirely selfishly, Twitter is where I get the vast majority of hits for Dirty Feed from.2 At some point I’ll be back, like a dog eating its own fetid puke. But the longer I can take a break from it, the better for my mental health. So if you wondered where I’d got to, there’s your answer. I’m just trying to do something more useful for a bit.

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  1. If you worry you’ve done that to me… you probably haven’t. The people who come up with these obvious takes are entirely oblivious. ↩

  2. This article will be read by virtually nobody. That’s fine. You’re special. ↩

Now He’s Gone

Published 2nd October 2020

Internet / Music

Last year, I wrote about some odd little snippets of The Shangri-Las which had been uploaded to YouTube. They included an unreleased song, rehearsals for “Remember”, studio chatter, and an excerpt of a whole different version of “Leader of the Pack”. As I’m sure you’ll agree, this is one of the most exciting things which has ever happened in the entire history of recorded music.

Recently, I decided to go and listen to it again. And… hang on, what’s all this? Surely the video isn’t shorter? Am I imagining things?

Luckily, I had downloaded the original version of the video at the time. (My spidey-sense was tingling enough on my original listen that I thought that would be a sensible thing to do.) The version of the video I downloaded last year was 3:38 in duration. The version currently on YouTube is 2:35. Hang on, a whole minute missing? I can’t hide the tears, but I don’t care.

So, for those of you who want to hear that minute which mysteriously went missing from the upload, here you go. An alternate take of the start of “Leader of the Pack”, which according to the video description has Betty on lead vocals1:

As for why that minute was silently removed… who knows. The account where this bootleg audio was uploaded is arcane to say the least. For instance, they also uploaded this amazing stereo version of the Shangs magnum opus “Out in the Streets”, which has never been officially released anywhere:

So, a minute of Shangri-Las history: we don’t know where it came from, and we don’t know why it disappeared. But hey, I said last year that the Shangs were “fuelled by myth and mystery”. Even in 2020, mysterious things keep happening. It’s all highly appropriate.

That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t grab an extra minute of fun if we can get it.

  1. Health warning on this claim: a noted Shangri-Las expert who I’ve had the odd email exchange with doesn’t think it actually sounds like Betty. This is precisely the kind of stuff I’m terrible at figuring out, so at this I just throw my hands up and say “Whatever it actually is, it’s interesting, innit?” ↩

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Strange Things Which Have Happened to Me on the Internet Part #23898372

Published 20th June 2020

Internet

Right now, I’m vaguely thinking of the next redesign of Dirty Feed. (I always get antsy after three years or so.) Don’t expect it until at least 2021; I’m the kind of arsehole who has to start from scratch, rather than using an existing theme. This kind of control freakery is very useful when directing television channels, and very not useful when trying to get anything else achieved.

But all this got me thinking of something very weird which happened to me, well over a decade now. None of this is still online; we have to rely on the Wayback Machine for this one.

Firstly, here’s Red Dwarf fansite Ganymede & Titan from 2007, which I designed:

Ganymede and Titan design from 2007

And here’s somebody’s personal website from 2007, which I had absolutely nothing to do with:

filecore.net design from 2007, looking pretty much identical

There’s just some kind of link here that I can’t quite put my finger on. And just in case you think this might just be some kind of bizarre coincidence, a quick poke around Kayak the Planet reveals a reference to http://www.filecore.net/css/gandt.css. Very good, well done.

So whatever, my site design was ripped off, by someone best described as a “forum acquaintance”. That’s far from unusual. I didn’t even really care that much; the design was good enough for what it was, but far from my finest work. It’s certainly not worth bleating about 13 years after the fact.

Except for one other thing.

Scroll down on Kayak the Planet, to the About Me section, and you get the following:

About me
The space for the megalomania to emerge.

Late-twenties. Geek. Grey eyes. Dark hair. Bad skin. No glasses. No fashion sense. But passionate about kayaking and the interweb. Speaks fluent English, passable Finnish and atrocious German.

Oh, recently married too. Can now be considered as owning flat and wife. No car. Excellent public transport except on the way home.

I recently decided to set up my own company to try and make my living as a full-time freelance proofreader and editor. At some point I might even achieve this goal. Until then, I’m mainly just sitting around wanking.

Now, let’s take a trip to ofla.info in 2007 – nothing to do with Ganymede & Titan, but my own personal site from the time:

About me

25. Geek. Brown eyes. Brown hair. Bad skin. Glasses. No fashion sense. But passionate about good telly and the interweb.

I recently left my job at makro in order to try and make my living as a full-time freelance web designer. At some point I might even achieve this goal. Until then, I’m mainly just sitting around wanking.

So this guy not only ripped off my website design for G&T. He then went to my own, entirely separate personal site, and ripped off my “about me” section. My personal description of myself: cut, pasted, and lightly adapted. Wanking gag and all.

Brrrrrrrr.

Deviance.

Published 25th October 2019

Internet / TV Comedy

Currently, I’m going through a load of old Dirty Feed articles, for preparation for the site’s 10th anniversary in January.1 And this particular piece about the now-dormant Dirty Feed Tumblr caught my eye.

There is no polite way of saying this. The most popular post I ever made on Tumblr was a collection of pulp book covers featuring women about to have sex with dogs.

Now, you may not be particularly keen on my bestiality material. You may prefer my in-depth articles about sitcom edits instead. But it was definitely the most popular post I ever made on Tumblr, by an order of magnitude. I mention over 200 likes/reblogs in that previous piece; it had over 400 before it was removed.

Removed? Ah, yes. Sadly, that post is no longer available, due to Tumblr’s porn ban in December 2018. As soon as that ban was announced, I stopped using the site. I never really clicked with Tumblr anyway; the porn ban was the final straw.

But the fact remains: by far the most thing I ever posted on the site was deleted by Tumblr. That’s a mildly annoying state of affairs, even if I’m not using the site any more, and even if the post did feature an illustration of an Alsatian with a particularly lascivious look on his face.

*   *   *

OK, fine. If you want an article on sitcom edits, let’s talk about some sitcom edits.2

Back in 2012, I wrote a series of articles on pre-watershed edits made to Red Dwarf on Dave. One recurring motif presented itself: time and time again, some of the funniest moments in an episode were cut.3 Kryten sticking up his finger and saying “Swivel on it, punk!”; “Rimmer Directive 271 states just as clearly: No chance you metal bastard”; “Santa Claus – what a bastard! He’s just a big fat git who sneaks down chimneys and steals all the kid’s favorite toys…”; “No officer with false teeth should attempt oral sex in zero gravity”; “Men! They’re all bastards!”; and by the funniest moment in Red Dwarf VIII:

CASSANDRA: I already told you: Rimmer dies of a heart attack, and then you and all the other Canaries die too; all except Lister, Kryten, Kochanski and the Cat. I’ve seen it.
RIMMER: That’s as well as maybe, but have you seen this?

RIMMER flips his middle finger to CASSANDRA, then turns and storms out.

CASSANDRA: Yes, I’m afraid I have.

My analysis of pre-watershed I’m Alan Partridge edits brought up similar points: “Don’t rub your fanny on me!” and “He means his cock!” were gone. And if I ever get round to writing something about pre-watershed Porridge edits on Gold, I’ll be sure to mention that the climax to the episode where Fletch sticks two fingers up to the camera is pixellated, destroying the joke entirely.

*   *   *

This isn’t really an anti-censorship screed, at least not per se. My point is simply this: when things are deleted from the internet, or cuts are made to programmes, it’s worth remembering that the effect of such things isn’t random. It’s not arbitrary chunks that disappear: it’s the outliers that go. The rudest joke in a sitcom episode; a blog post which takes a left turn into filth. And those outliers are often one of the most popular parts of a piece of work.

And slowly but surely, the corners of things get knocked off. Censorship is often talked about – sometimes correctly, sometimes not – in terms of how dangerous it can be. But often, the enemy is the sheer blandification of pop culture. It’s not that anybody dies. It’s not about suppressing important conversations. It’s about which bits of our culture survive in the popular memory, and which don’t. Which is both very important, and not important at all.

And that leads to one of the joys of owning your own little part of the internet. Away from social media giants changing their policies on a whim, and away from UKTV’s bizarre editing policies, you can quietly sit and document things. And documenting these things shifts the power dynamic back towards the integrity of the text, however slightly, rather than companies just doing things because it’s easier. I find it immensely rewarding.

Especially when – just occasionally – you get to stand up for an author’s original intention, when it never managed to make it to the screen properly in the first place.

Though that’s not as important as dog cock, obviously.

  1. Come on, like I’m going to be able to resist writing something appallingly self-important for it. ↩

  2. “Others may wish to skip on to the last chapter which is a good bit and has Marvin in it.” ↩

  3. Bizarrely, not the rhythmic thrusting of Kryten and Lister in Polymorph. ↩

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