- The Overuse of "LOL"
- Random Pop Song Lyrics
- Stupid Quotes
- Inside Jokes
- Countdowns
- The F2 Thing
- Copy/Paste into Profile
- "Love" of New Boyfriend/Girlfriend
- Shoutouts/BFF's
- Random Skater Bullshit
- Link to Your Xanga
- Use of AOL
Everyone does it unnecessarily, even myself. The good news is that we can all cut back on it. We all know that we've watched other people talk on AIM and see them not even smiling as they enter "lol." Then when something is actually sort of funny, and they crack a smile...you get "ROFLMAO LOLLL HAHAHOWEJEWIOWEFRWIO." Except maybe without the "OWEJEWIOWEFRWIO" part. Some people use "lol" as a shield. You'll say something to them, and they won't understand what you mean whatsoever. To avoid sounding stupid, it's a simple "lol." If that's not bad enough, he or she sometimes follows that up with the question "what?" proving to you that they don't understand at all. But anyway...
You can find these in the average 15 year old girl's AIM profile...you know, those lyrics that they really don't understand, but put them in there because they talk about love, no matter how vague the reference? Yeah, those lyrics. It's either that, or those "life is over" lyrics...since a suburban-area kid's life is just so awful, I know. Next time you listen to the radio (accidentally), you're sure to hear the pop lyrics from the newest shitty song by Jessica Simpson or someone ("The real me is a southern girl"...shoot me now) and 15 minutes later, those lyrics will be in an AIM profile near you. Oh, and by the way. Hoobastank's "The Reason?" Yeah, you're not the only one who insists "I'm not a perfect person" in your AIM profile.
This is absolutely intolerable. All stupid quotes should come at the price of one backhand (pimp) slap to the face. The next time I see "It's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all," I punch someone. Look, there's nothing inspirational about all this bullshit. Nobody cares about how you think some quote means so much. Especially when it's some generic, overused, obvious truth about something. "It wasn't supposed to end like this." We all could have figured that out without your profile. If you find it necessary to have a quote in your profile, at least make it something funny and/or badass, like "Every man dies; not every man really lives," from Braveheart.
While not as bad as some of these, the concept behind inside jokes in an AIM profile is just kind of stupid. Is it honestly worth your time to type "FLYING MONKEYS! LOL SO AND SO!" in your profile? Do you want people to ask you about that stupid occurence? I just don't get it.
Countdowns are useless. The best new example I've found was Jun's "14 days..." reference to his license. Look, nobody cares. If it's actually something that somebody cares about, like how many days are left in school, we probably don't need your AIM profile to determine that. If you want to tell us when some event is, cool. Maybe we'll give you a prize or something. But a countdown? Fuck that. I'm not going to ask you questions about it, like you want me to.
It has died down lately, but that whole "Click here and press F2" thing was extremely annoying. You'd hit F2, and every time it would be like "If you love someone more than they'll ever know, put this in your profile." And you'd just feel like hurting someone. The timestamp/F2 trick was usually complete with little asterisk stars. F2 leads me to my next point.
Speaking of copying and pasting F2 functions into your profile, there also is the basic "copy and paste this into your profile" deal. It generally comes in two varieties: "If you could not live without your friends, copy and paste this into your profile," and "If you love Jesus Christ, copy and paste this into your profile." First of all, the last time I checked, humans need food, water, and shelter to survive. I'm really not sure where friends came into that. (And yes, I know that humans are social beings by nature, and that we would be severely depressed without friends, but you wouldn't die). Oh, and proclaiming in AIM that you love Jesus is not going to get you a free pass to the pearly gates, especially when you go out and drink, smoke, and have premarital sex the same night you copy and paste it into your profile.
This one makes me laugh. People get together with some person for a week, and they proclaim their love for this person in their AIM profile. There's nothing wrong with making mention of said boyfriend or girlfriend in your profile, but to proclaim your heartfelt love to this person when you probably won't even care about them in a week or two is just kind of stupid looking. If you've been together a long time, and it actually feels like more than a stupid crush, then OK. You've earned it. Example: I know this girl that was all about how much she loves her boyfriend in her AIM profile, and how perfect it is. She sucks him off and then he dumps her. Yeah, they were really in deep, passionate love, lemme tell ya. Quit making fools of yourselves.
These are unacceptable. It's getting repetitive, but nobody cares that you have certain friends. Especially since you probably don't even really like these people and only associate with them generally to attract the guys (yes, this shoutout business is generally a girl thing) that you want to hook up with, a la SSS and bBuBcD, the latter being more emphasized. Sorry, it's true. "BFF" and "BFFL," best friends for life or whatever, is quite simply a joke. Katie from Trinity (insert Robert from Poland joke here) brought this to my attention in a humorous way. A girl I know is moving away, and the fact has made its rounds in the AIM profile business. Katie asked, "Were they BFFL's?" (as a joke). Yes, people from other schools are aware of how air-headed and simple people from my school are...much to my amusement.
This was especially prevalent a year or two ago, when the big fad was taking place. Serah (Enola Legend) was moving from California and taking over our simple minded "prep" facade, Blink-182 and bands like them were going mainstream, et cetera. Every other kid on the block thought he (or she) was cool because he or she had a reference to skating or some punk bullshit in AIM. It's still happening, but not quite as much. Be sure to laugh at these people if you ever see them online.
Xangas are generally stupid and all the same...people give a documentation of their day that nobody cares about, because it really isn't even remotely interesting (see my fake Xanga). But the real problem here is that I always click them in boredom, and I am always disappointed by them and their boring-ness. Argh.
Note: AOL member profiles are not accessible through AOL Instant Messenger.
This AOL use is just getting ridiculous. AOL is so terrible in comparison to just about every other ISP...it's really just embarrassing at this point to still be using it. May God have mercy on your soul if you still use AOL. I have nothing more to say about it, except you're stupid if you are using it by choice.
And that brings my list to a close. But I'm sure there's still more that I'm missing (three contractions in one sentence...hail the lazy). So be sure to crack down on this if you see it in your favorite freshman's profile.