Apart from being a complete social networking whore, the mysteries of Web 2.0. have never enticed me enough to give much of a toss until recently.

For those that don't know, Web 2.0. is the nebulous title of everything about the internet that makes things easy and convenient. RSS feeds that conglomerate all your favourite sites into one digested page; social networking like Facebook and MySpace that make the toils of real life socialising mediated for your hermit convenience; sites like Digg that recommend all the hilarious articles that will make you King of Banter; sites like del.ici.ous that, um, put your bookmarks online even though bookmarks are mainly redundant if you use a RSS reader. All sorts of wonderful things that are rapidly becoming fundamental for proper internet use. Your younger brothers and sisters and, shite, the next generation will be all over this kind of crap, making you feel decrepit and useless for still thinking Google is a miracle.

And I personally intend to pre-empt those smug little bastards by jumping on the bandwagon while I'm still convincingly young. In short, GOOGLE READER is now the only site I ever read. I've subscribed to all the stuff I would've haphazardly browsed individually, likely missing all the decent content, and it appears in digested form for my convenience. It even refreshes frequently so I know immediately when a new article has appeared on any of the subscribed sites. I've literally only been using it for the past two days and already I've read more than I ever would by manual browsing. And it encourages reading proper web sites like The Guardian by making all the otherwise overwhelming information small and non-arghfucktoomuchtocompute. I hear Putin is heading for a landslide victory. That is pretty lame.

Went to see THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD the other day and was excellent, albeit long-as-fuck like its title. Casey Affleck proves that genetics are bullshit and acts the crap out of Robert Ford, being sympathetic and intensely creepy in equal measures. Brad Pitt is his usual self, this being a Proper Film and all, and does an okay job. I'm not going to be all, 'Yeah man he can act you know, haven't you seen Fight Club' because he doesn't deserve that kind of support. But it is rather good that he backs these kinds of film. His producer credentials are also surprisingly immense.

MASS EFFECT is now officially completed and officially my second favourite Bioware game after KotOR II. I won't nerd out and explain its many charms; having already spent two hundred words on Web 2.0. and already discredited any potential coolness. But I will say that if you like RPGs and occasionally play shooters, then check it out. The cheese factor is high, but considering this is a bonafied space opera epic the campness is pretty subdued. It would be perfect if the combat wasn’t so flawed.

Anyway, going back to write more for this Victorian essay on Henry James and Elizabeth Barrett Browning to prove that I can be highbrow as well as pop culture scum. And that I can write very long sentences and get away with it.