Lists -- What R They Good 4?
May 19, 2000
7:20 a.m.
So I'm wandering around the other day, and I come upon the Lycos 50. For those of you who don't know, theis is a page that Lycos puts up to report ont he top fifty queried words. of course, they do some cleaning up. They take out all the direct pornographic references, and do a few other things that you can read about by following the link if you're interested, rather than have me tell you here. What's left is a true cornucopia of today's pop culture. Number 1? Pokeman, of course. Mother's Day was big--registering a second and a fifth place slot. Tattoos. There's one you wouldn't have seen a few years back, I'll wager. A few hot women. A few hot men. Hot movies. Hot games. And i'm sure you're dying to know that at 37th Cristina Aguilera loses out big time to Britney Spears, who comes in at #4 on the Lycos charts. None of this is too surprising, of course. The Net and pop culture are a match made in heaven. But I thought it interesting that buried in here are four items that don't seem to go away. Most surprising--the civil war. The others: The Vietnam War, The Holocaust, and Adolf Hitler. I'm not sure what it means. Heck, I suppose it could be one guy who wrote an automated routine to query on Hitler every three seconds or something like that. I read an editorial in yesterday's paper by Cal Thomas (I think)--who is a pretty stauch Republican. In hit, he was bemoaning our latest generation's lack of contact with the past, and he was rolling out the age-old concerns about generations that fail to respect history are doomed to repeat it. I don't really disagree with him. But ... Well ... Four of the most important historical events in the past century are on the Lycos top fifty list. People are paying attention. Some, anyway. The rest, of course are clicking on the top ten models list or the top ten race car driver list. But some people are paying attention. The problem here is that the Lycos 50, or Cal Thomas's opinon or the Zagby polls or any other way of measuring public thought don't measure the one thing that really matters. Do you know what I'm thinking here? Can you fill in the missing piece? The one thing that matters? If you think so, leave your thougths on the message board. Otherwise, just go check out Britney Spears.  What? Typosphere didn't make the list? Daily Persistence is © Ron Collins |
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on the CD: Sara McLaughlin again...Mirror Ball this time |
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