Cats (n)

A background image inserted behind poorly spelt captions.

Fwd: (prep)

On an eMail subject: advance notification that the content of the eMail is going to be entirely irrelevent to you, and will not interest you in the slightest.

Wikipedia (n)

A website that previews the content of students' essays or co-workers' reports before they hand them in. Sometimes before they've even been written.

Internet meme (n)

To take something witty or original and make it not so by repeating it endlessly. Sometimes something not witty and unoriginal is taken, and made even more so.

Flame-War (n)

A fun and efficient way of reducing the number of contacts q.v. you have if your list becomes too long.

Often flame-wars involve sending a high number of emails q.v. which are not adverts for viagra to another contact. This is generally considered bad form.

Facebook (n)

A website that allows users to check that their friends are having more fun than they are.

Troll (n)

An individual on a messageboard who holds an opinion different from that of the majority. This is usually regarded as rude and bad form. Hence:

Troll (v)

To have a different opinion and so be hounded from the board.

Thread (n)

On a messageboard. A series of posts becoming gradually further and further removed from the original subject.

Re: (prep)

A prefix added to subject lines of emails to make them look pretty.

Hoax (n)

A problem that you can usually solve by either visiting a website or sending an email q.v. on to all of your contacts. Often you can get some money from either Bill Gates, Disney or the son of a rich Nigerian businessman if you send either your credit card details or a valid passport soon enough.

See also: Chain letter q.v.

Hit (n)

The act of looking at a website. Usually this is done by mistake because Google misrepresented the website, and so it is best to leave the website as soon as possible. Hence:

Hit (v)

To visit a website by mistake

Cookie (n)

An extremely efficient method of allowing other people who use your computer to read your eMails q.v.

See also: privacy q.v.

Compression (n)

A way of making big things small. The opposite of the services advertised in most eMails q.v.

Chain-letter (n)

A way of distributing stories about sick children and/or fluffy animals. There is often the chance of receiving $1000 from Bill Gates if the chain letter is passed onto enough people quickly enough.

See also: eMail, hoax and spam q.v.

CSS (n)

Cascading Style Sheets. A way of designing webpages so that they will work perfectly in some browsers and be unreadable in others.

Byte (n)

Not enough stuff.

See Also: Kilobyte, Megabyte, Gigabyte, and Terabyte.

Beta-test (n)

Software that doesn’t work properly yet. This fact, however, is irrelevant because beta-test software is newer and so therefore better.

DivX (n)

A meaningless phrase that will appear in the bottom right hand corner of the good videos you download q.v. from the Internet. This is all you need to know. Do not ask any questions about DivX, and most importantly of all, do not discuss whether it is better than its reversed opponent XviD. Any conversation discussing this will be very boring.

Avatar (n)

An image used to represent a person by looking almost exactly unlike them.

Contacts (n)

The Internet replacement for friends. Most contacts are probably not using their real names. This is generally not a problem, because you won’t be using your real name either.

Contacts tend to be made up personalities by Internet users. These made up personalities can then pretend to make friends with each other. This saves much of the hassle of actually becoming friends, which requires you to do things like:

1. Remember birthdays
   
2. Comfort them when they’re sad
   
3. Act pleased when they are successful.
   

With your contacts, if they are sad or successful you can simply block them and find some happier or less talented ones. Luckily, finding ones who fall into the latter category is not hard.

Horizontal Scroll Bar (n)

Often found on extremely poorly designed websites (as opposed to just poorly designed websites). It is the Internet equivalent of trying to watch a 16:9 film on a radio. Only idiots put up with horizontal scroll bars.

Adware (n)

Horror story told to new users of the Internet to stop them sleeping at night. It also worries people who believe they still have their privacy q.v. while on the Internet

MPAA (n)

The "Motion Picture Association of America" (Not to be confused for the TV show "My Parents Are Aliens"). The MPAA is the legal equivalent of your mum telling you that if you keep pulling it, it will fall off.

See also: RIAA q.v.

IRC (n)

Another acronym q.v. which stands for "Internet Relay Chat". It is a way of exchanging insults with a single person or a group of people you have never met. It is designed to efficiently enable users to distribute insults among the maximum amount of people in the minimum amount of time.

Bookmark (n)

A way of making note of a good website, and then completely forgetting about its existance.

Auto Responder (n)

A computer programme that will automatically reply to the emails about Viagra you receive in your inbox, and ask for more.

At work it is very useful to set up an Auto Responder when you are away from your computer for more than ten minutes. This will trick people into thinking that you usually reply to your emails immediately when you are at your desk, regardless of your normal actions.

PDF (n)

Stands for Portable Document Format, another acronym q.v. that takes something simple and makes it more complicated. It is the format that one day all of your manuals will be in as you gradually lose the paper copies.

History (n)

A record of all the embarrasing webpages you have been on, not because you are like that, but just because you "were wondering what it was all about". Like your mad aunt who lives in the spare room and collects china pigs wearing fire helmets, never show this to anyone.

Acronym (n)

The usual way of communicating online. The longer and more complex the acronym the better - double points are awarded for acronyms that do themselves contain acronyms. The goal with acronyms is to make someone else ask you what it stands for so you can mock them for their stupidity.

Advert (n)

The main content of the Internet. One of the best ways of finding out about the latest sexual craze.

Banner Advert (n)

The top fifth of a webpage

Pop up Adverts (n)

A method of causing a user to install an ad blocker.

Blog (n)

The badly written and poorly spelt outpourings and creative delusions of a talentless and self-obsessed moron. Hence:

Blogger (n)

A talentless and self-obsessed moron with creative delusions. The perpetrator of a blog q.v. Sometimes bloggers are called writers. This should be avoided at all costs, since this acts to legitimise blogs and imply that something literary, or at least worthwhile is being created.

Blogsphere (n)

Sometimes Blogosphere. The sum total of all the crapulent tosh written on blogs q.v. across the world. It is important to appreciate the alternate spellings of this word since the blogsphere is something you want to avoid having any contact with whatsoever. The disagreements on spelling are the result of the disorganisation and muddle thinking of those who are part of it. As a general rule Blogsphere is used more often because it is slightly shorter and so appeals to the laziness of bloggers q.v.

Broadband (n)

The way the good stuff on the Internet gets onto your computer. It is measured in numbers. The bigger the number the faster you can get good stuff onto your computer. As a general rule, on the Internet, you want to get the biggest possible number in as many things as possible because bigger numbers are better

Copyright Law (n) - archaic

A concept that does not apply on the Internet.

See also privacy q.v. and spelling q.v.

Download (v)

When most people use the word "download" what they actually mean is "steal".

Email (n)

A way of distributing adverts for viagra.

FAQ (n)

FAQ stands for Frequently Asked Questions - another example of lazy and unclear thinking, since they are actually the answers to Frequently Asked Questions. In addition, they are almost never actual questions. Instead they are a way for lazy writers to add the content they want to a website without having to use proper paragraphs and continuous prose. They are a very good way of seeing just how out of touch a website designer is with his readership.

Gigabyte (n)

A lot of stuff.

See also: Byte, Kilobyte, Megabyte, and Terabyte. q.v.

Internet Explorer (n)

A rubbish way of looking at the Internet. If you find anyone using Internet Explorer you are able to insult their intelligence and computer knowledge for hours, suggesting that they use FireFox instead. The best thing is, more people use Internet Explorer than any other browser, because it is the most obvious way of using the Internet. This means that if you've had a bad day you'll always be able to find someone using it to abuse. For some people, abusing Internet Explorer users has become a career.

IP Address (n)

The unique and identifying code number of any computer connected to the Internet, designed to allow unscrupulous users to identify, crash and/or permanently damage computers of other users.

JPEG (n)

Another Acronym q.v. that no one knows what it stands for (it actually stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group so make sure you forget that before moving on). It is the standard image container format for pornography.

Kilobyte (n)

Not very much stuff.

See also: Byte, Megabyte, Gigabyte, and Terabyte. q.v.

LAME (n)

LAME ain't an MP3 Encoder. This is a brilliant Acronym q.v. Firstly, because it is an MP3 Encoder. Secondly, because it is recursive (contains itself within itself). Finally, because not only does it not actually spell Lame but rather LAAME, but also because it has had to be twisted out of recognition to make it spell that, going as far as using dialectical contractions.

Link (n)

A word (usually blue and underlined) that will take you to another page. Usually this page is a 404 error page.

Mailing List (n)

A collection of eMail q.v. addresses of people who are interested in hearing about where they can purchase cheap Viagra.

Megabyte (n)

Quite a lot of stuff.

See also: Byte, Kilobyte, Gigabyte, and Terabyte. q.v.

Messageboard (n)

A place where a group of likeminded people can get together and further re-enforce their bigoted opinions and prejudices.

MP3 (n)

"MPEG-1 Audio Layer" - MPEG stands for "Moving Picture Experts Group". This is a very good acronym q.v. because when you expand it you are no closer to working out what it actually means. All you need to know is that this is the best way to download albums that you would otherwise have bought.

Open Source Software (n)

Software that is easier to use because you don't need to hunt for a keygen or crack after you have downloaded q.v. it.

Password (n)

A way of deluding people that they still have some vestigages of their privacy q.v. remaining. Often people will use very complex passwords like %$hI93.£$^%hj78 (feel free to use this password yourself if you are unable to come up with a random string of alphanumeric symbols on your own). These are a good idea because they are very difficult to remember and completely disregard the fact that most passwords are stolen by keyloggers or by hacking into databases rendering the complexity of the password itself irrelevent. A good practice is to use the same password on every site you visit.

Podcasts (n)

Like blogs q.v. but on a much worse scale since not only do they assault your eyes, but also your ears as well. While blogs q.v. are a haven for failed writers and journalists, podcasts are home to talentless radio presenters, DJs and media types. The name is an intrusive attempt at marketing Apple's iPod, despite the fact Podcasts have nothing to do with iPods at all. If you're very unlucky, the podcast will be regularly produced and you will be able to use an RSS Feed q.v. to get it downloaded onto your computer as soon as it is uploaded onto the Internet.