November05

Everyone Loves Bac(o)n

I subscribe to two magazines: Readymade and Wired. The former allows me to dream about projects that I would love to do, but will rarely find the time. The later lets me try and stay on top of what's what in the technology world – and also introduce me to a slew of cool gadgets and web sites to check out. When reading this month's issue of Wired, I came across an interesting word in Jargon Watch:

Bacn n.
Spam by request. Bacn (pronounced "bacon") is a byproduct of legitimate email lists and feeds – bulk messages for which the recipient has signed up yet never has time to read.

So there's finally a word for all those damn emails I “thought” I would want to read whenever sent. When in reality, they're starting to piss me off more than spam. Honestly, do I need three Williams Sonoma emails a week? More importantly, why in the hell did I sign up for that!?!

What bugs me worse than that is the choice of name for this new nuisance. Let's do a straw poll real quick:

What would you rather eat, spam or bacon?

I would guess that 99% of people asked that question would choose bacon – it's that awesome of a food item. I even know vegetarians who miss the smell (if not the taste) of bacon. And raise your hand if you would, even though you're full, force down another piece of bacon. Bacon is good on sandwiches. For breakfast. On burgers (even ones with peanut butter). In baked beans. Or, just by itself.

You can all put your hand down now.

My point is this – whoever thought “email you want, but just not right now,” should be called “Bacn,” is wrong. Bacon isn't something you'd like to eat, just not right now. It's the food you want to eat pretty much all the time, but isn't good for you.

In it's purist form, we're really talking about something you want to read, just not at the present time. Therefore, from this day forth, I think Bacn should be replaced by “Lotr,” (pronounced Loter). Think about it, tons of us would like to read The Lord of the Rings, but just not right now.

+ original post date: November 5, 2007 07:10 AM
+ categories: NaBloPoMo, Web Stuff