Yes, I hate the Internet. The Internet sucks.

Today, after writing this little gem on the soul-sucking/totally legal world of creepshots, I was asked by one of my coworkers if writing about the Internet had changed my opinion of it. I said, without hyperbole: "Yes, I hate the Internet. The Internet sucks." But once we had all gone back to reading TMZ (or whatever it is people do on #fridaze), I felt bad for being such a negative Nancy. After all, there are pet GIFs! Wikis! Tumblr fandoms! Other glimmers of hope/positivity! I am heartened and intrigued by projects like Paul Ford's ~Tilde~, which I don't "get," but kind of want to. And not only because I like using this guy ~ to denote silliness/hype.

Anyway, anyway. We have a ~cool new feature~ in Links today. Just skip to the GIF for more info. Let's go to the links!

1. Marketers are all up in your selfies. Smile! Whenever you post a picture to Instagram or Pinterest, you're actually on candid camera. Companies like Ditto Labs scrape your pictures and scan them to find things like the logos you wear and the products you use. Whether you like it or not, of course.

2. The government should maybe chill on hackers. America's laws against cyber-criminals are notoriously harsh, and once they're in jail (this lawyer claims) they face inhumane, "Dostoyevskian" conditions. Clearly we need to take cybercrime seriously ... but maybe the zeal has gone too far.

3. Brunch is for jerks. Then I am a jerk. (WHAT NOW, NYT?)

Dory is so over GIFs, you guys. (So over GIFs, in fact, that it's become sorta hard for me to find one every week. That's why I'm making the Friday GIFs an open call: Please, please send me GIFs or YouTube videos of your pets and/or small children. They deserve to be famous. And by famous I mean, featured in an obscure newsletter.)

Pocketable: Amazon is evil -- but they ship me stuff so fast! (3131 words/13 minutes)

Postscripts: Space sushi. Sandwiches. The Snappening. Why the White House is using emoji and how candidates use Facebook. Big Brother is coming for your lolz. The Internet of Things is coming for your life. Stop Wikipedia-freeloading and Facebook-schadenfreuding. Is FaceTime a good way to say good-bye? Idk, but I'd rather not try.

Enjoy the weekend!
@caitlindewey

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