The Downfall of MSN Messenger

As some of you may know I have a certain fondness for the days of my youth. They were simple times of marble seasons, hide and seek tip and other such cliches. I'm sure some of you might even remember the good old days before Facebook and other social networking sites when kids would sign in to MSN Messenger and talk about cute boys and shit instead of doing homework. I personally liked this era. Signing in to get my daily fix, to see if anyone has humorously changed their display name, to see if anyone new has added you and to hopefully chat to that highschool crush of yours. For many people I know MSN was the reason they created their email account, with many still embarrasing us to this very day. For anybody I know who grew up in that era MSN Messenger is now dead.

The death of MSN has not been swift and kind. No MSN has been dying of a horrible degenerative illness for quite some time now. This time 18 months or so ago MSN happily fullfilled my online interaction needs but now I only sign in for the convenience of checking my email. But do you want to know the moment when I knew, without a doubt in the world, that MSN was terminal? It was when I started getting new, unfamiliar people adding me. I shrugged and accepted at first, what's a fresh face here or there? I might even know them? But then I started getting more. One of them sparked up a conversation with me. It went something like this.
Oh of course, it's not a real woman interested in me. No no it's just a delightful advertising campaign designed to lure in perverts. At last I was comfortable and things were back to normal. MSN was still not being used by actual friends, woman were still not interested in me and I was still a sad, lonely blogger without any prospects of female company. Few! What a relief. So now everyday I sign in to MSN to check my email for Facebook updates (fuck that seems convoluted) and decline a few more offers for companionship by people with particularly effeminite emails (no killin_n_shit@hotmail.com's here) as well as closing the tabloid-ish Ninenews popup boasting a slideshow of celebrity kids or a breaking news article about how Lady Gaga is strange.

It's sad to see a once loved communication medium dying in such an embarrasing, demeaning way. So from me here at Infinite Possiblogities I'd just like to acknowledge the youthful joy and distant friendships MSN allowed us to maintain for so many years, even if we did have to appear offline on the odd occassion to avoid that annoying kid with the big ears who's dp was always something shit like a boggle-eyed penguin. Wait...why was I sad again?

I Am Legend (The Will Smith Marathon Comes to a Close)

Yes, I think I Am Legend is a great movie. Why did I open with this? Well I Am Legend is up there with Daria and anchovies in that I could speak to 100 people who've experienced it and I would get a 50-50 split of people who will love it and then those who loathe it. Not that I've ever had a complete understanding as to why people hate it. I went to see the movie with my brothers and then girlfriend and while my brothers and I had a blast the ol' GF came out saying "that movie was the worst." Her exact reasons for disliking it have never really become apparent to me and I have spoken to many others who offer only flimsy allusions as to what they might find objectionable about it. So what's all this fuss about? Let's dive right in.

Ok so it turns out that Will Smith is the sole survivor in a now quarrantined New York City after some dumb bitch cured cancer by making a zombie virus. The movie kind of rushes through that whole part of the story because it's quite apparent that the science behind it is about as sturdy as a cardboard box in a monsoon but to be quite frank it doesn't really matter. The point is Will Smith is alone. Really alone. At the beginning Will Smith is seen going about his regular survival routine in a flawless, well thought out way. But as the movie rolls on you begin to realise that without the company of his fellow man Will Smith is slowly succumbing to madness. There's something quite satisfying about the way the movie portrays Smith struggling to survive both the zombies and his own loneliness. It's an extremely sympathetic and moving performance. From an artsy English Extension 2 Fagboy perspective there are lots of beautifully subtle techniques you can furiously finger your bum over. I like the way that the movie slowly eases you into questioning whether Will Smith has lost almost as much of his humanity as the savage zombies.

This brings me quite nicely to yet another example of controversy that the movie stirred up. You see there are two different endings to the movie. The original one and then the newer one that they used in the theatrical release. I think there's merrit to both endings but I think I prefer the one they ended up going for. But, in true nerd fashion, amoungst the people who like it there is constant debate over which ending is the best. Many people the original ending is bolder and more edgy and feel that the newer ending was just a big, action movie, explosion copout. I don't really feel that way but whatever, I could not be fucked getting involved. So anyway, I think I Am Legend is fantastic. I guess it appeals to the part of me that likes the idea of mankind being obliterrated and then watching the lone survivor wander the empty streets trying to cling on to his humanity. I kind of worries me really, should I really be able to identify with him that well?

I Robot (The Will Smith Marathon Continues)

Whereas The Pursuit of Happyness was a somewhat irregular Will Smith role I Robot seems taylor made for him. Will Smith is a man of action, quick wittedness and charisma as we've come to expect. So anyway, the year is 2035 and robotics has come a long way. All robots are apparently manufactured by a single, multi-billion dollar corporation who are planning to put their brand spanking new unit into every home in the country. Will once again plays the role of a city cop who is apparently the only person in the world who doesn't like the idea of entrusting our lives to the care of programs and before long has made it his personal mission to prove that robots are capable of human harm.

You see, Will Smith has a tragic, flashbacky issue with robots that naturally remains supressed for the majority of the movie. Lucky for him he becomes involved with an initially-uptight-hostile-woman who eventually becomes something of a love interest and whom Smith is eventually able to confide in. Mind you the romantic interest in this movie is a little lacking but I'm fairly certain they always are in Will Smith movies. In fact pretty much every aspect of I Robot feels like it was manufactured by a Will Smith Movie Machine. If I had to sum up the movie in a breif sentence I'd say "it's like Ghost in the Shell if it was concussed and had Will Smith in it." I mean it's the same not too distant, slightly souless setting. It's the same "what makes us human" and "could robots develope a soul" cyberpunk philosophies being explored. It even has the robot/computer software teaching us about the nature of our existance situation in it. The only difference is that aesthetically everything in I Robot is so blindingly white it looks like a eutopia for Apple. Speaking of product placement did I mention the 2004 vintage Converse Hightops? Well they're in this movie and quite shamelessly referred to on more than one occassion. Mind you I actually found this entertaining and quite frankly I don't give a shit if they're plugging products in a movie. But you know I thought it might be worth a mention because bloggers love tossing themselves off over how clever they are at finding product placements.

Oh and stop me if this sounds familiar to you at all. The bad guy was one of the good guys being motivated to kill and oppress people in order to "save humanity from itself." I mean you clever script writer types could come up with something a little bit less overused than that? It's the kind of plot twist I'd expect from a Resident Evil game and even though it doesn't actually make I Robot any worse it certainly stikes me as somewhat lacking.

But all in all maybe I'm being a tad harsh. Do I like I Robot? Yeah I suppose so. It's entertaining and has a plot that makes sense and if you haven't seen Ghost in the Shell already you might think it raises some pretty interesting ideas even if they're only alluded to or breezed over. In a lot of respects it's comparable to Independence Day in that it is improved a vast amount by the fact that Will Smith is in it. Mind you Independence Day is by far a worse movie, but I stand by my comparison. As I said before this is a typical Will Smith movie and it's done pretty well. Movies like this serve as a nice reminder that cliche's can actually polish up quite nicely if you treat them right.