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Up one level | To Tom Geller's writings | Home Website reviews for The Net: Bizarre Please note that the writing samples below were written around February 1996, and many of the sites reviewed have disappeared, moved, or changed. -- Tom Geller 1 800 SEX-STUD Live Partylines & International Netquirer The Darmok Dictionary House of Sacred Squirrels Ovi's World of the Bizarre Page from the Future The Bathrooms of Madison County 1 800 SEX-STUD Live Partylines & International Netquirer This self-proclaimed "Pothole on the Information Superhighway" offers up a mix of links to phone sex ads, super model home pages, U.F.O. theorists, and stuff about O.J. - the man and the citrus drink. (Yes, there really are links to orange juice concerns!) All of this is presented like the front page of a supermarket tabloid, with plenty of beefcake butts and B-I-I-I-I-G, colorful headlines. There's not much original content (except for the phone sex ads), but it's loads o' fun for slackers and perverts anyhoo. Content: Good Aesthetic: Excellent TechnoSmart: Good Author: Tom Geller Back to top The Darmok Dictionary I can understand a life dedicated to studying the subtleties of Star Trek. But to just one episode? That's the premise behind The Darmok Dictionary, an exegesis of the allegorical language used in the brilliant Next Generation episode, "Darmok." The site's author picks apart the language with the assiduousness of a doctoral candidate, featuring sound clips, references to other Trek episodes, storytelling techniques, Asian languages, and comments posted in the Fidonet Trek forum. There's really not much to this site besides text, but it engaged me from beginning to end. Content: Excellent Aesthetic: Poor TechnoSmart: Poor Author: Tom Geller Back to top House of Sacred Squirrels (Note: In keeping with The Net's "Sympathy for the Devil's Home Page Designer" policy, this review is written in the style of the page it reviews.) Do college students have too much time on their hands? People Do. U-G-L-Y spells yooglee: so say I, with panache, and at random. Surrealist? Nyet. Dada? Nyetnyet. Just plain weird, and so are your friends (Fox Homepage, Dirtquest). You're looking the very picture of xpliq! It makes me happy: means nothing, tastes great. You don't need drugs to fish in my stream of consciousness, but it couldn't hurt. Content: Excellent Aesthetic: Poor TechnoSmart: Good Author: Tom Geller Back to top Ovi's World of the Bizarre Ovidiu Gherghe has collected some very funny stories on this Web site -- stories of the incredible sort that friends are always e-mailing to friends. You know the kind. And while it's a great read, the presentation is lacking; the text is split into dozens of pages, navigational buttons are rare, and on the day that I visited it none of the main page's graphics loaded properly. Ovi does know some fun HTML tricks (he shows 'em off at http://netmar.com/users/ovigher/webplay.htm), but these pages need work. Content: Good Aesthetic: Poor TechnoSmart: Poor Author: Tom Geller Back to top Page from the Future 100 years from now it's possible to look into the past, scientists are puzzled by the most trivial facets of our lives, and they like posting their personal diaries for long-dead people (us) to read. These are some of the impressions I got from this fanciful site, purportedly the work of a team doing research on the late 20th century in the year 2090. But as a present-day reader asks, "If you are from the future, how come you're using America Online, you fools?" Content: Good Aesthetic: Good TechnoSmart: Poor Author: Tom Geller Back to top The Bathrooms of Madison County Here's a story about a trip to the God-kissed acres known as Madison County, Iowa, with no concern for the quaint bridges they have there. Well, okay.. there are links to souvenir shops ("I covered the bridges in Madison County" t-shirts and the like), but this site is really about a man's trip back home to see his mother, about the woman he takes with him, and how Diet Coke seems to go right through you. With lots of pictures, it's a good show. Enjoy it. Content: Excellent Aesthetic: Good TechnoSmart: Good Author: Tom Geller Back to top This page was last updated on Monday, February 09, 2004 at 3:06pm CST. All contents copyright 2005 by Tom Geller.