I read on a semi-well-known TV blog that this guy created an internet page that generated Stephen Colbet-style “On Notice” lists. All you have to do is type in whatever you want to put on notice, hit a button and a picture will be generated that you’ll be able to save. Not sure why you’d really want to save it; perhaps to post on your blog review site, or maybe just to show it to your friends.
Now don’t get me wrong; I think the application created to do this with is pretty cool, and I like Colbert’s list and the general idea of it, but I’m not quite sold on people creating their own lists. Stephen Colbert has a national show where showing off this list of things he’s upset with will reach a wide audience. The only thing that making a list for yourself accomplishes is the sense that you now know where things stand, as in you have a concrete ranking of what you hate most, and in what order. Maybe your friends might appreciate it and you’ll all get a laugh out of it. But it won’t make a difference in the real world, and you’ll only be left with the comfort of knowing that you complained about something, even though you did it to no one in particular. Kind of like bloggers. In fact, if I had another spot, I’d throw bloggers on there as well.
The whole “not being seen by anyone” thing is sort of worked around by being able to see on the site, the last 100 lists that were made. Of course, half the time, the people don’t fill in all the boxes and many of them are just the defaults, and a lot of the lists are just excuses to throw profanity out there, but sometimes there are some good ones, like “planes without snakes”, the WNBA, Billy Bush, Cut-off shorts, and strangely enough, Charlie Dent.
Three stars for idea and execution. Minus 2 stars for a lack of real purpose, including the usual internet “busying yourself” excuse. I do invite readers to create their own lists and post them for my viewing pleasure, even if it’s not in picture form.
One response to “Putting Things on Notice”
Here’s mine.