Minh’s Notes

I keep a folder of bookmarks filled with pages I intend to mention at some point on this blog, because they’re just so funny or otherwise worthwhile to read. But the last time I ever drew from the “Blog About…” folder was over a year ago; since then, its growth has closely paralleled that of the National Debt. The 182 bookmarks stand as a rustic testament to my penchant for procrastination, and that’s just the ones I didn’t lose when switching to the Mac. Though many of those links are now dead, no longer interesting, or covered copiously elsewhere, I’m still going to post the interesting ones.

Well, maybe later. Instead, I thought it’d be fun to share a few of my oldest “good read” bookmarks. Here are some of the webpages I added to the “Humor” folder back in high school, sorted by date bookmarked. Seriously: it’s not every year you find this kind of brilliance on Digg or Reddit:

• Steve, Don't Eat It! – 1991 Urkel-Os (bookmarked June 23^rd, 2005)
• Under Construction (June 22^nd, 2005) – guilty
• The Onion 2056 (June 22^nd, 2005)
• Big Fat Institute for Advanced Interactive Experiences (April 11^th, 2005) – based in Cincinnati
• The Credit Card Prank (April 1^st, 2005)
• PodBrix (February 27^th, 2005) – Legos, except not
• Taste for the Web (February 8^th, 2005) – a parody of Paul Graham
• Postal Experiments (January 21^st, 2005)
• “Oh my god! There’s an axe in my head.” (September 22^nd, 2004) – in 112 languages
• BlueScreen Screen Saver (August 28^th, 2004) – free from Microsoft
• win98.c (February 14^th, 2004)
• Case Western Reserve University, circa 2000 1900 (September 2^nd, 2003 1903) – background
• Laws of Japanese Animation (September 27^th, 2002)

Entry №2071, posted by Minh Nguyễn at 2:38 AM | Edit | Permalink
Categories: High School, Summary, Web Archaeology | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Not to be arrogant or anything, but this is how a St. X graduate treats a Wikipedia article about Moeller High School:

• He rewrites its “History” section, removing text that plagiarizes Moeller’s website.
• He improves the wording of its “Academics” section, citing sources where appropriate.

This is how Moeller fans treat a Wikipedia article about St. X:

• They delete its content, filling the page with profanity and non-encyclopedic cheers for Moeller.
• Just two minutes after an anonymous St. X fan replaces the profanity with non-encyclopedic, non-inflammatory cheers for St. X, an anonymous Moeller fan strikes back with more profanity.
• Another anonymous Moeller fan, clearly a big fan of old jokes, sees fit to mock the school’s motto.

All this since Friday. What the fans are banned from shouting in the stands, they shout online. No surprise there. I should note that it’s not just Moeller fans: on Wednesday, a Regis Jesuit (Colorado) fan rambled on about how much better their team was, right in the middle of the St. X article. And I always see petty vandalism on high school articles, including when people from my graduating class libeled some of our classmates. But Moeller fans should know better than to deface an article on their athletic rival. This isn’t a Facebook wall; it’s an educational resource. And Moeller, with its “reputation for … academic and athletic excellence,” surely understands the implications of that.

Entry №1067, posted by Minh Nguyễn at 1:49 AM | Edit | Permalink
Categories: Frustration, High School, Wikipedia | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

I can’t believe it! St. X shut down Planet Xavier!

This morning, I got a letter in the mail from St. X, asking me in no uncertain terms to “cease and desist”. Who’da thunk that you would get a C&D letter without having violated copyright?

Here’s the cruxt of the letter:

The St. Xavier High School administration has determined that “Planet Xavier” (“the Web site”) has contributed to the continued misuse of school resources by encouraging students to use services such as Xanga, MySpace, Facebook, YTMND, the Encyclopædia Britannica, and Google.

Despite the IT Department’s valiant efforts to curtail the use of these Web sites, your Web site has served as a loophole, through which students have exchanged non-Jesuit-appropriate comments and, worse, non-curricular thoughts. Thus, we feel it is our duty as educators to ban the use of this Web site and thereby help students regain the immaculate grades they once received before they were introduced to the Internet.

We trust you agree with our belief that the constant abuse of computer time for “blogging” and related activities directly leads to rapidly declining grades. Persuant to this, we ask that you cease and desist, and furthermore ask that you not attempt to revive this Web site and instead devote his time and resources discouraging the practice of “blogging.” We are confident that you will respect our decision to close your Web site and obey our directions, considering the virtues of “Men, Women and Children with, about, above, across, amid, among, around, at, behind, below, beneath, beside, by, for, from, in, into, of, off, outside, over, to, toward, under, until, within and without Others,” AMDG and magis to which you swore under your breath as you were handed your diploma.

To which I say: you handed me my diploma in the mail.

Imagine my intense frustration once I realized what they had done next! Before bed, I happened to open up pX, only to find that exact same excerpt on my own website, with only a few minor changes in wording and a lot more boldfaced text.

I can’t believe they would go through such lengths to persue these “non-curricular activities”, and I especially can’t believe that they would trespass on the property of someone who’d already graduated!

Needless to say, I’m miffed.

Entry №1011, posted by Minh Nguyễn at 11:56 PM | Edit | Permalink
Categories: High School, Humor, Planet Xavier | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (2)