How do you explain ILX to the uninitiated? Esp. without sounding like a weirdo? And do you hide it from anyone?

http://forums.reebosak.net/images/smilies/emot-iiam.gif

oh whatever i just say "on a messageboard i post to a lot." who cares

^^^^^ Basically what I do, too.

I call it "the real internet" and people go "oooo wow" but I tell them it's a secret then they check my history and I get caught for strokin' to porn at work. :(

ILXORS WAHT ARE THEY?

followed by:

ILXORS WAHT ARE THEY PART II - TEH PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN, BUT WAHT KIND OF BUNCH OF DICKS?

DEAN! that's really dirty

it's under the desk, come on

If they'd ask me what a message board is, then I would ask them: "R U TUOMAS?" and proceed to give them a copy of "Internet for Dummies." I mean, really, if they don't understand, then either they are, like ancient and who cares what those ole geezers think, or just being silly.

omg dean i'm not sure how that makes me feel

My boss finally clocked that I wasn't actually looking at work all the time, and I had to explain what it was. The whole concept was just completely alien to her. Especially when I said we get more traffic than our v. expensive company website.

eww how'd she figure that out?

I've tried the "message board" explanation on a couple of girls, and more than once they assumed it was a sleazy dating/meeting people site. I had to be like "no, no, it started as a sleazy music site!"

How do you explain yankin' it at work to the uninitiated? Esp. without sounding like a weirdo?

A: You don't.

People I've told about ILX never seem to give a fuck. Even the music freaks. This is sound evidence that people suXor. They usually tell me about some other board they like and I check it out and OMG, I cry.

I showed ILE to a friend once, and he was like, "Wow. That really is everything. That is really just a bunch of random shit. Wow." I think he was befuddled.

I go the rock-critic route first (I still pretend this to myself); they have to drag the message-board part out of me.

http://www.floheiss.com/agas/uploads/1182848558.CT.giveafuckometer.gif

also, eyes usually glaze over at "large british contingent"

Oh, I was joking. I haven't been caught.

How do you explain cornholing to the uninitiated? Esp. without sounding like a weirdo? And do you hide it from anyone?

Message board. If they don't get that, I don't mention it any further.

I have a co-worker in his mid-60s who looks at porn at work. He thinks he's being surreptitious by shielding the screen with a piece of paper, but another co-worker, who sits in the cubicle next to him, has reported seeing vast amounts of titties over the past few months. :/

VAST

So THAT'S where the titties at!

Apparently, he looks at hentai quite a bit, which is just ... o_O

I play a game with myself at work. I refuse to filter my GIS's, so I see how many screens I can get into it without seeing something shocking. The less specific the search, it seems, the more tits are on it. And then I have to hit the back button really fast.

Searching for things involving monkeys is pretty safe, I learned today.

I also say, 'I read somewhere on a message board'. If my partner hears me say this, she instantly jumps in and says 'He read it on a nerdy message board called I Luv Everything and all they do is post pictures of cats and argue about hamburgers and giggle and make geeky lists of the top ten P-Funk moments.' Or words to that effect.

3 out of 4 ain't bad.

When I went to Boise recently, my old friend & former coworker asked what I was up to in the NM. I said, "Oh just talking to people on messageboards, it's kind of a bittersweet life." He said, "Yeah, but that's what you did up here. We talked about them all the time, remember?" And I said, "OMG you post to ILE! How did you find out about that?" He clarified he meant the local like 'here is a show by our crappy band in our house' message boards. Oh yeah. I told him NO ONE from Boise posts to ILE. That was a LIE though. Squirrel_Police did (does?). But I did not try to explain that whole thing to him.

"that internet thing i'm on" usually suffices as a vague description.

My boss finally clocked that I wasn't actually looking at work all the time, and I had to explain what it was

DUDE, jesus! really? gah, now she'll know it isn't work when it's on my screen either :(

Just change to a new style sheet.

If I ever need to explain where I heard something, and I say ILX and people don't know what that is I just dismissively say "a messageboard that is decidedly lacking in final fantasy fans, fan fiction writers and thirteen-year olds" and that usually garners murmurs of impressedness, like some sort of cyber el dorado. my friends are mostly nerds

ILX came up in conversation a month or two ago while I was hanging out with a group of people, one of whom I met through school but who also reads ILX. A third person (who doesn't read ILX but probably reads quite a lot of AMG) said, "Oh, so THAT'S why you're facebook friends with Ned Raggett."

My only concern is people I know who hear about ILX from me will start reading it and catch me talking shit about them.

Haha, the latter is my concern too. Sort of. I worry more now that I have non-ILX friends on Facebook and a whole bunch of friends who are all signified with "you know X through TEH INTERNETS YOU GREAT BIG LOSER".

I still sort of pretend it's related to Sinister because the common link of a band seems like a more reasonable excuse than a random bunch of googlers just talking shit about nothing. And I say things like "oh, a friend of mine said..." even though I've usually no idea who ever posted it. I cover a lot of "I was talking about them in, er, the pub with some, um, friends" ground when passing on theories about things that I've lifted wholesale from here. I'm in denial, basically, and I can't be bothered explaining, so pretending you're all real and I know you all is a whole lot easier.

I always "skip this step" when Facebook asks me how I know an ILXor who's requested to be my friend.

The thing about my co-workers (age range 24-50) and other acquaintances is that when you say message board they either assume it's sleazy sexy hook-ups or they don't understand at all. Similarly, a number think that Myspace is for complete losers who don't have real friends and who might be seeking 11teen year olds.

I was eating lunch at a bar downtown and I heard 2 girls and a guy (in their early-mid 20s) gossiping about the scandalous news that another co-worker had a Myspace account (As in, "OMG, can you BELIEVE he is on Myspace??"). They went on to accuse each other of having one, and they called over a hostess to join in teasing the guy, as he vehemently denied it.

Conclusion: the average joe is pretty unaware of what goes on on the internet.

waht

i've actually gone off a couple of IRL friends who've sneered at the whole idea of being part of any kind of internet "community" (yeh, i've probably described it as that, too). in 200 and fucking 7, it seems a bit backwards and small-minded.

xpost: yes, but jesse ... maybe the three of them were on facebook instead ;)

i sort of vaguely explained this to a coworker last week and he is still kind of like 'waht?' and occasionally asks questions about it which i kind of skirt around very quickly.

another friend of mine moved here and was like 'hey how do you know all these ppl you hang out with?' and i told her and she actually thought it was kind of cool.

So what about the other part of my post? Has a new person in your life (a sig. other, for example) been exposed to ILX? Have you been caught talking about anyone?

On the gay thread there was a case of one ILXor getting caught posting the details of a 3-way by one of the participants--a house guest--when he left ILX up on the screen. And then there was the time that one person's band mate found his detailed criticisms and confronted him with them.

One of my co-workers has just discovered Bebo and was explaining how it worked and everyone else thinks it's kind of odd or pointless communicating with people via the internet, so Jesse probably OTM re conclusion.

It's people like that, and my parents, that I fudge explanations for. Just that, a couple of years back, I suddenly started mentioning to my mum on the phone I was going out for a pint with so-and-so and someone-else and they were all "oh, I haven't heard you mention them, where did you meet them" and I *really* can't be bothered explaining because I know they just won't understand.

(haha, like I'm in my 30s and I have to have reasonable explanations for my parents as to the reasons for expanding my social circle)

if i ever do have to explain ilx to my parents at least my dad posts to some car messageboard so he can't make fun! they even have faps, guys!

see, i'd just say "my friend ailsa" and my mum wouldn't give a fuck. my parents know about it, and i've sent my dad links to a couple of threads i thought he'd be interested in. but his basic take on it was "the posts are all too short, and it just gets derailed really quickly". my dad OTM.

Has a new person in your life (a sig. other, for example) been exposed to ILX? Have you been caught talking about anyone?

mrs fiendish used to lurk here, but got bored (round about the time when it just became non-stop moaning about nu-ILX earlier this year) and hasn't really been back.

and hey, i suppose i got stet into it too :)

but yeh, there've been a couple of people to whom i've said, look, check this out, you'll love it (esp ILM) and they've not bitten at all. i guess "understanding of ILX" is just another criterion by which i can judge folk.

I always "skip this step" when Facebook asks me how I know an ILXor who's requested to be my friend.

that is so boring! make something up that is half-truth and half-not!

i do not care what people think about 'the message board i like' or 'the internet'

I hate talking about ilx with anyone, except maybe close friends, and have asked my wife not even to bring it up around other people.

On the gay thread there was a case of one ILXor getting caught posting the details of a 3-way by one of the participants

waht

that sounds dramatic

lol really??! it's like nothing to feel weird about, i feel... i'm totally nonchalant about it whenever it comes up. i just think it's fun u know, and it's not like i don't do other things. i mean i'm not holed up in here staring at the computer all the time

lol that does sound dramatic

Aye, but my mum's kind of used to me just having the same old friends for ages, and all of a sudden a whole new bunch of them turn up all at once. All over the country. And saying "it's because I post shit about stuff all over the internet" kind of makes it sound mentalish.

Last time the appearance of random new friends up and down the country happened, it was because of Bowlie, and that was because of Sinister, and that was back before my parents had probably even *heard* of the internet. And I could at least justify it as "we all liked the same band then we went to see them and all had holiday-camp hi-jinks together" and that doesn't sound as weird as, well, this is.

It *is* weird. I get what Grimly means about people's ability to get it. My husband thinks ILX is odd, but likes pretty much everyone he's ever met indirectly through it.

that is so boring! make something up that is half-truth and half-not!

This is totally a key difference between you and me, Rrrrrrobyn. I love filling out forms when I have a clear, discrete answer for each question, but when I'm asked something more qualitative, or when none of the boxes apply, it bothers me. I wish I was more laissez-faire when it came to stuff like that.

I don't have a big problem with my non-ILX friends knowing (though I'd rather they didn't post), just parents and work colleagues.

and by I'd rather they didn't post, I mean I'd rather they didn't lurk and read stuff I've posted

I think ILX discourse is encouraging my real-life eccentricity. At least that's the excuse I tell myself. Sob.

i just say "music message board" and that usually does it.

none of my IRL friends are internet peeps and they really don't get the whole posting-on-forums thing. i've been posting on another forum related to buk0wsk1 for about 7 months, and even though i've only read a handful of his books and never really respond to the lit threads, i just like hanging out there and i've made some really awesome friends. shit, i even met my best friend there.

but it is a weird situation trying to explain something funny i read, or some interesting character who posts here, to people who don't 'get it'. but like rrobyn, i don't really care what people think that much.

but since i've spilled my guts about my love life here, i can't tell object of my affection about this site, even though i think he'd really like it :(

cyberhighway pit-stop pickle bar

also, i have friends that post here, so i never feel too embarrassed about it.

i think eccentricity should be encouraged!
xpost

perfect. i dunno, i think my take on it is that it's meant for people with opinions, people who think a lot and need to like think with other people, on paper. which i don't think is necessarily weird. i mean hey it gives u an excuse to write, which is good. i don't really write much else, besides work emails.

perfect re: pickle bar ; )

I also say, 'I read somewhere on a message board'. If my partner hears me say this, she instantly jumps in and says 'He read it on a nerdy message board called I Luv Everything and all they do is post pictures of cats and argue about hamburgers and giggle and make geeky lists of the top ten P-Funk moments.' Or words to that effect.

-- moley, Thursday, July 19, 2007 10:19 PM (1 hour ago)

My gf also does this. With eerily similar verbiage (she has also mentioned 'the top ten P-Funk moments'!).

i actually think of i thought of your girlfriend when i read that post, which i know sounds ridiculous, but just from the way you've alluded to her b4, it sounds like she would chime in that way

lol

i was actually just wondering where u've been but i realized i've pretty much been hanging out on gay sesame street for a while

and its different branches, of course. what i'm saying is, i'm a big homo.

I do not hide it, and I tell people it is a website where frustrated music journos fight. If they balk I tell them that John D4rnielle posts here and that I'd thank them to suck my dick.

ILX is less nerdy than 99.9% of the rest of the Internet, so there shouldn't really be any issue.

A third person (who doesn't read ILX but probably reads quite a lot of AMG) said, "Oh, so THAT'S why you're facebook friends with Ned Raggett."

o_O

My (utterly miniscule) level of 'fame' continues to bemuse me.

i was actually just wondering where u've been but i realized i've pretty much been hanging out on gay sesame street for a while

-- Surmounter, Thursday, July 19, 2007 11:52 PM

wut

lol, u know, the gay friends thread? it's really hip Hoos u should stop by sometime

i don't think they eat ALL of the straights that show up

hip Hoos u

well, i showed my good friend olivia ILX cuz she's a librarian and wondering what the hell to do with it, and i showed her ned's (i think?) 2007 rolling librarian/library assistant thread and she was like flippin her shit

and i do email threads to ppl pretty often, i think people are generally interested to read about the crap they obsess about

obsess or obssess? obsess.

I dont think I have any friends who AREN'T complete and utter interweb nerds. They're all either IRCers, LiveJournalers, oldskool usenet nerds or wikipedia admins, sysadmins, ILXors, SA goons, etc etc etc.

I am not sure what this says about me now I think on't.

it says u would be my friend if we lived in the same country? i have this one friend who's been into liveJournal since we were like 15. i dunno at that point i was only into gay chat rooms on AOL. i guess i'm kindof late to nerdDom proper

Well considering I have worked at ISPs since 1999, I suppose that rly doesn't help my cause =)

Dude yeah all my friends are like that but we all grew up around computers. It's weird when people my age all front like luddites or genuinely don't know how to save a document in Microsoft Word.

i know i'm kind of jealous trayce i was just thinking i want to explore computers as like a profession again. my highschool C++ teacher was like devestated when i dropped out of her AP class. oh god i hope she's not like one of us...

um so i have a problem with likes and lols lately? pls feel free to slap me around a bit

i want internet nerd friends. i worked at isps too but the people were mostly the asshole kind of internet nerds, assuming there's another kind. nobody around me irl cares about any of this shit(my wife actually faps but she doesn't lurk that i know of)

A lot of what me & my fiance talk about is our respective message boards. He quit posting to SA, thank god, because those people are just not that great to hear about. It does mean he downloads me stuff, though.

i want internet nerd friends

me too :(

haha it was a little weird when i was going to australia and mentioned that i sort of knew these gothspeople there...

You make it sound like there are 300 people there.

like sparta?

i only have a few friends who also read ILX. most of the people i know are aware of it bcz idolator linked to the lol80s thread

most of the people i know WHO ARE AWARE OF IT etc

Hahah mookie =D And then you met us, and were scarred forever! Hooray!

A third person (who doesn't read ILX but probably reads quite a lot of AMG) said, "Oh, so THAT'S why you're facebook friends with Ned Raggett."

o_O

-- Ned Raggett, Friday, 20 July 2007 13:04 (39 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

This may have happened to me too, Ned.

May have?

It occurs to me that, for grebt lolz, none of the people I currently work with are at all into intarwebs in this manner.

AND I WORK AT A FRICKING ISP. Mind you theyre all sales and finance people so why would they.

xp: ok ok ok it did happen.

What the HELL.

Dare I ask the context.

...But it wasn't that hot girl who mentioned it, unfortunately. (:

It was just a mate who said something like "Do you post on ilx? Is that why you're friends with Ned Raggett?" And I said: "yes, this is correct." then we fried shrimp on the barbie all day. See, even in Australia you're a big deal.

Ned's AMG reviews got me interested in like 90% of the music I listen to know, though I didn't know about ILX then (it was only later when I went back and saw his name on the reviews that I realized it)

It was just a mate who said something like "Do you post on ilx? Is that why you're friends with Ned Raggett?" And I said: "yes, this is correct." then we fried shrimp on the barbie all day

Hahahah this cracks me the fuck up for some reason.

Like its a scene out of "The Castle" or some shit.

"Hows the serenity?"
"Just lovely darl. By the way I didn't know you knew Ned Raggett!"
"Yair. We go way back"
"Lovely darl" *drinks beer*

=)

In Sydney, to raggett is actually a verb of common use among some of my friends. It means to move amiably from room to room, or from one knot of people to another, saying hello and making sure everyone's having a good time. Eg: "I might raggett the party, make sure everyone's drinks are full'.

Just kidding.

i honestly believed you, till i scrolled down.

it somehow seems perfectly legitimate.

one of ned's facebook friends is (quite likely, but unconfirmed) a guy who posts on an entirely not-related-to-ilx forum that i also post on. weird.

omg moley that was perfect

yeah, I even went to school in Sydney and I was thinking o rly

Somehow I wouldn't be surprised by any of it.

(Droone, is your friend a musician or a music freak or...?)

Somewhat of a music freak, yes.

thinkin' about raggett
that dude gotta have it

He sees a tape recorder and he grabbit

Moley's greatest hit

Hey if you're all so impressed, how about starting a birthday thread for me? I'll be 40 on Sunday.

Happy birthday to whatshisname!

thinkin' about raggett
that dude gotta have it

-- jergïns, Friday, 20 July 2007 15:17 (40 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

He sees a tape recorder and he grabbit

-- moley, Friday, 20 July 2007 15:37 (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

But he better watch out for Super Carrit.

:-D

BOTIM

"Normal people" listen to Wolfmother and restrict their internet usage to MySpace, so it doesn't come up. Because if it did, their inferior brains wouldn't be able to get their head around it. Trust me on that one. I've been there. So I avoid it until they borrow me iPod and ask "what are The Smiths? Some local band?"

I'm the only person I know in real life who knows Ned Raggett. MAYBE HE ISN'T AS BIG AS HE THINKS HE IS?!?

I'm reasonably slimmish.

Actually, I did attempt to explain ILX once.

http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/7629/obietriceeq0.jpg

It kinda failed.

Still waiting for my birthday thread!

it's too early!

Ah.

It's a FORUM

I tell people it's this place where a bunch of music critics and British people hang out.

if you think talking about ilx is hard, try explaining 'gearslutz'

hookers and tools?

the best placement for drum overheads is on your knees

It's a website about...nothing!

I talk about ILX to my best friend (who understands forums, lurks on ILX occasionally, but is weirded out by the idea of me actually meeting people from the internet, although he briefly met a couple ILxors, himself) and his brother quite often. With anyone I just say "this music board I post to", or something to that effect, and don't really elaborate.

With anyone else...

I hide it from my boss.

People still listen to Wolfmother?

Did they ever? Normal people don't listen to Wolfmother, anyway. They listen to, like, RHCP.

Explaining Momus:

me: "He's a musician and a writer. Wears an eyepatch because some kind of amoeba ate his eye? He's kinda famous for the eyepatch."

BF: "Well, maybe he should have an amoeba eat his other eye, cause I've never heard of him."

oh snap (the eyepatch)

I'd never heard of Momus before I came to ILX. Is he really that famous in the real world?

Apparently not, though I do have a couple friends (non-ILX!) who listen to his music.

i heard of him when he did that time he let people suggest songs for the album or whatever

"stars forever"

I was a big fan of his first two records back in the 80s. I haven't really listened to him much since then.

He was famous for getting panned in the NME.

I have only heard one Momus song in my life (Hairstyle of the Devil)

I still think this record is great, but it's total sensitive smart-young-guy fodder:

http://img378.imageshack.us/img378/1710/imageuploadimageav5.jpg

It's always weird because the lead singer in my band is a big fan of Momus and he's introduced Momus to a couple other of our friends and they sometimes talk about how great his music is, and I'm always just like, "Yeah, OK, but he used to post idiotic shit on ILX!"

"Murderers, the hope of women" is amazing.

I really try not to mention it, because it's really kind of like corresponding with a serial killer.

ha ha xp

Yeah I have a momus album and knew "hairstyle of the devil" and "murderers" years and years ago, so was mildly amused to see him posting on here. Then rapidly unamused as I read on. I don't care for his schtick at all really, but I can see why others would like it, so its all good.

When I first started reading ILX I immediately pirated all of Momus's music. And deleted it a few weeks later.

no harm no foul

I knew of his music for years before ILX. I think if you are/were into certain particular scenes, particularly the arch post-monochrome set él records type thing, he was definitely on your radar. Then there was that lawsuit and the writing songs for people who gave him money thing which got him a lot of press.

I'm pretty sure I'd heard of him back in 1992 or so, perhaps earlier. I know I was playing "I Was a Maoist Intellectual" on shows of mine around then.

I never heard of him until ILX.

I remember one night reading the reviews of Giant magazine and there was Momus, Mtn Goats, and a really famous band in which a friend of mine plays auxilliary guitar. I laid in bed thinking, huh, what a small world.

I don't talk much about ilx, but when I do, it's usually, "There's this messageboard I go to and..."

i knew some momus music pre-ilx, then i was like 'woah, it's momus on my messageboard!' and then i was like, 'oh... it's momus.'

That's pretty much what happened with me as well.

Remember when there were still thread categories in ILX? I remember one of those categories was something like "MOMUS MOMUS MOMUS MOMUS MOMUS", and it took me quite a while to figure out what the hell that even meant. Then again, some of those categories I never did figure out before they were gone.

YOU DON'T SAY

I'd never heard of Momus before ILX, though I keep seeing his name everywhere now (latest siting in Stuart Maconie's 'Pies and Prejudice' about the English North/South divide).

I quite like his writing - but I find some of his non-music art ideas (e.g. unreliable art museum curator) a bit crap, and better just thought of rather than acted upon. The new Big Idea - a guided tour of the London South Bank as if it's Japan - sounds similarly crap.

I'd like to be able to see the categories again. Did it have 'relationships' making up 70% of the threads?

I was always more impressed with Chris T-T posting than Momus.

Who's he?

i pretend its how i find writing work

actually thats kinda true but still

I found writing work that way as well, still do.

I haven't told anyone about ILX. I'm in two minds about it. On the one hand I think "why not? what's the worst that could happen?". On the other hand I think "well, if I woke up and found that I'd crapped myself in my sleep, would I tell anyone about that?"

nah man ive got work thru ilx too its just funny to be like 'oh i saw it on this forum for music writers to find work' when youre beefing with dr morbius on a workday

When I've mentioned ILX to random people about 45% of the time they've heard of it, usu through being music nerds. So then they're like "OH, YOU'RE on there, too??" and I hafta explain that no, I don't read ILM at all; yes, I do know Ned Ragget.

sounds horrible

whenever i say i saw something that couldnt possibly be from a message board for music writers i just say i saw it on 'some blog'

i just refer to the whole thing as a music forum, makes it seem more acceptable (better than 'bullshit forum').

pretty sure a "music forum" or "a message board for music writers" is atually more embarassing than "some blog" or "bullshit forum," sorry dudes

nah cuz message board for music writers makes it sound like i dont actually like any of yall and im just here to clock dollars

the only time it ever comes up is when someone asks me how i know certain people in chicago, anyway.

I can only see this headline as reading "unurinated."

(Adopts cab driver mannerism) I had that Chris T-T on my radio show once.

Didn't know he posted here though.

(FTuomas'I he is Brighton based musician. Nice chap.)

I lament the absence of Categories

The first place I saw the name "momus" was in bit of graffiti on the wall of a cubicle in St Andrews student union, around 1995. There was a rumour, for a while, that he was actually doing a degree up there, and had written the graffiti himself.

Most of my friends have heard of or have been to poptimism, so when I mention ILX I often refer to it as "that message board I hang round on with the poptimism gang".

i don't explain it at all, though my gf knew about it before she met me

i used to try & explain ILX but nobody I know IRL has heard of it or cares. my wife was "concerned about how much time you spend" until she realized I wasn't using ILX to hook up w/younger women -- DUH/LOL etc.

of course if I ever have a job interview again I fully expect to hear 'oh are you lovebug starski'

peace to m coleman

i don't tell anyone about this bullshit motherfucking madness that's destroyed five years of my life.

keeps things simple.

"destroyed"?????

"ruined"

did you ever post under your real name?

Why do you stay here if it's destroying/ruining your life?

my boyfriend will sometimes ask if i'm "loving eveything" when i am using his laptop

how do you think i feel? this board is all my fault xxxxpost

did you ever post under your real name?

-- El Tomboto, Monday, March 24, 2008 8:35 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

yeah, but only about once.

Why do you stay here if it's destroying/ruining your life?

-- HI DERE, Monday, March 24, 2008 8:36 PM (32 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

im overstating a little. i got to meet louis jagger at least. but also: addicted.

how do you think i feel? this board is all my fault xxxxpost

-- DG, Monday, March 24, 2008 8:37 PM (24 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

you must carry a heavy burden of guilt.

i'd like to think it keeps people off the street but like anyone here would ever go out

lol

DG is the new Oppenheimer.

We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed... A few people cried... Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the prince that he should do his duty, and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form, and says, "Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds." I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.

Not long ago I showed my friend - a librarian - the thread where people were prank IMing Oberl1n tech support and he was very amused. I don't think he's looked at ilx since though.

I fairly recently realized had pointed out to me that by using an IRL nickname as an ilx handle for 5ish years anything I post here is pretty easily findable by any potential googlers. I like to think I have no secrets though.