Hello and welcome or Why this isn't on myspace/facebook.

This is my blog. Like I said over there in the profile section I don't know how I feel about blogs. Yes I know they let you get your ideas and such down, but I fear they are just something people do because they feel they are being trendy. Personally I finally started one because I wanted a place to write down all this stuff I think about and say to myself, "I should write this down." Why don't I do this in a journal if I feel these are just for being trendy? Because, I being human, am vain. I want others to read what I write here and comment on it. I want to share my ideas, to be engaged in conversation, to have my hypocrisy pointed out to me.

Why the name Internet Roadstop? You know when you are on a roadtrip and you get off at the gas station? You find all sorts of things at those little stops. Maybe it's the world biggest piece of bubble gum, or maybe just a combination Quicktrip/Qdoba/Tobbaco Shop/Knife Store. Despite what it might actually be it's something unique, and most certainly a collection of ecletic things. This is going to be what you find here. You'll find things that are random, maybe insightful, meaningful, tired internet meme's and sometimes an actual well thought out debate inviting comment and counter debate. Sometimes you are going to find things you don't agree with. These are my opinions, and while I think they are correct of course, this does not make them correct. Feel free to tell me that you think they are wrong, but be prepared to debate if that is the case.

And now for one of those times. Why isn't this myspace and facebook? Because I despise those two things. Now, I've been told that is because I like to think of myself as belonging to some internet elite. This maybe the case but I have another idea I'd like to put out there. In high school, if you are a geek/nerd/bookworm, you are ostracized and made fun of. In normal everyday society, at least in the US, if you don't know who the next idol winner is going to be, or who the contestants are, you're looked at funny. However, if have a passing understanding of how pyshics works and can explain why Han Solo's claim that he can make the Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs is funny.....you are looked at funny. Thus was born the internet. It was where people who didn't fit in these situations could go. Here you were regarded for how much knowledge you had.. Here was the place for the high schoolers that didn't like football but loved star trek. In short, it was a safe place where one could find a place to fit in and belong.

Now along comes myspace and facebook. On the surface these seem like good ideas. A way to keep track of your friends and share pictures. Sounds great doesn't it? Except that's not what it is. Really, it's just a giant trendy popularity contest. Everyone is busy sending inane bulletins and cluttering up each others pages with applications. Oh sure you can ignore that shit but then people look at you wierd when you tell them you hate those stupid applications. You're back to the situation where you can fucking explain how nuclear fusion can work but somehow you're the one left out because you don't have that app that tells you who the idol winner is.

That's what I see those two sites as. An attempt to bring to the internet what high school and society has. A way of trying to impose an hierarchy where those who are different are placed at the bottom. Maybe I'm wrong, but I look at those site and all I see is a popularity contest. Before when you got the wierd looks and whispering because you knew all about the Soviet Union but not who that one actor in that one movie was, you could go to the internet where those people would leave you alone because the internet was a strange place in and of itself. Now the internet is becoming one more popularity contest where people can be ostracized becase A)they don't have a myspace/facebook or B) they don't have tons of friends on those sites.

Message end.