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February 2004: Paul Smith - Anti-Hero Kinda-Worship.
"No more Heroes anymore" sung The Stranglers, a matter of twenty-six short years ago. I for one still cynically agree. I admire Schumacher immensely as a driver, but is he really hero material? Kurt Cobain's dead and so is Ernest Shackleton. I love my dad, but I'm still young enough not to have to respect him that much. The closest I have to a hero is probably writer, comedian and skewed documentary maker Dave Gorman. You may remember him from such BBC shows as The Dave Gorman Collection and Dave Gorman's Important Astrological Experiment. Before Christmas he did a 73-date tour of the country, and I was fortunate enough to catch his performance of 'Dave Gorman's Googlewhack Adventure.' The tale he told, in a slightly croaky, emotional voice was one of international travel, Creationists and ping-pong. Take my word for it, that man is a bona fide genius. If you find my word too flimsy to place your faith in, learn it for yourself by buying the recently published Dave Gorman's Googlewhack Adventure or Are You Dave Gorman? Both are available in bookshops - Bad ones as well as all good ones. About now you're probably wondering what this has to do with the world of I.T. Well, Googlewhacking as a somewhat obscure Internet word game. Simply go to search engine site Google.com and type in two random real words, without putting them in speech marks. Muezzin Echelon provides nearly 250 matches amongst the billionsish of web pages out there. This ISN'T a Googlewhack. The words Pterodactyl and Loran appear somewhere on a page on 23 sites. This isn't a 'wack either. Purlieus Shirr - two matches. Close, but no smokers' requisite. Wagnerian Technetium - no matches. [except...well, they're together on this page now, aren't they... Whack!] I've gone too far. A Googlewhack is a single incidence of a pair of words on the same page on the entire 'net. For reasons beyond my ken they're amazingly satisfying as well as rather tricky to find. Just don't let yourself spiral into a race against time to get a chain of ten 'whacks by meeting GW site owners and getting them to find further 'whacks for you before you're 32 and technically a grown-up. Not unless you're going to do an inspired stage show and write a book about your experiences. Even then, don't bother. Dave's beaten you to it. To learn more about this game (or Olympic endurance sport, as Gorman elevated it to) visit googlewhack.com or davegorman.com.
Paul Smith is still 'resting'. Job offers to info@snapsandbytes.co.uk please
407 'whacked-out words Dale. Any problems please let me know buddy.
Paul.