HIT AND RUN - SPECIAL CANADIAN ANARCHY EDITION [Author: Lum the Mad]

Jason Calcanis thinks he can save the Internet. This is a pretty good thing – what with IGN selling access to message boards with the ability to post HTML and images for a small yearly fee and Derek Smart still running amuck, the Internet is pretty obviously in need of saving. Alas, Jason Calcanis is neither a Greek god nor is he Steven Seagal (my first two choices for entities most likely to save the Internet), he’s merely yet another dot-bomb loser trying to justify his sad and pathetic dependency on overpriced espresso. However, since neither Dionysus nor the star of “Hard To Kill” is available, we’re left with this gem:

Please God, someone make me the CEO of Times Digital. Starting tomorrow, you would have two choices: pay $50 a year for membership or sit through a 20-second Flash-animated commercial (we’ll keep it to 75k, which is just plenty to do a nice text-based Flash animation with an image or two).

PUNISHING YOUR VIEWERS: we’d like to say that we pioneered the concept here at Lum the Mad, but really, we (and by proxy, Jason) stole the whole concept of abusing your paying customers from Interplay. EA may be evil, but they don’t make me sit through an ad for some crappy game no one bought like “Descent to Undermountain” every time I freaking re-install Freespace.

Just in case you haven’t already overdosed on Shadows of Luclin coverage, Daily Radar has another interview with Roy “Rowyl” Eltham and Lawrence “Mrylokar” Poe of Verant. There’s some info about Kerrans there in between all those ad banners and popups that Jason “Hard To Kill” Calcanis is going to save us from. Unfortunately, the writers of Daily Radar are reduced to sharing the six brain cells their entire editorial staff were alloted, and judging from the questions asked, we suspect four of them were busy writing stunning new Xbox features.

Daily Radar: Will characters need to worry about food if they’re on a planet made of green cheese?

Eltham (to himself): Jesus, where did they find these monkeys? Everlore?

(note to the humor impaired: we are pretty sure no writers for Everlore work at Daily Radar, nor are they monkeys. The Everlore guys, that is. Daily Radar definitely is monkey-staffed.)

(note to the even more humor impaired: no, no one at Daily Radar is actually a monkey. We think.)

(note to the terminally humor impaired: get the hell off our site now)

In a stunning example of webmasters taking turns doing actual hard research, we saw on The Chosen where they saw on Stomped that they saw on the Denver Post website that the family of a student killed during the Columbine massacre last year has petitioned John Carmack to stop selling games to minors. Carmack was quoted as saying “Yeah, right, whatever.”

Dale Todd, Evan’s father, said he hooked up with Thompson through research he did on violent video games. He even obtained a copy of “Doom” and played it himself. He was appalled.

Then he asked Thompson to write Carmack a letter, “just to let him know we’re on his trail.” Although he doubts the software icon will change his ways, Todd said he may consider other options.

You hear that, boy 3D-engine genius? They’re on your trail, bud. Not only that, they’re probably a bunch of teamkillers who use Gear and are camping the respawn points, too. Other folks are suing video game companies, since it’s common knowledge that the shotguns and assault rifles Klebold and Harris brought to school were actually using old CDs of “Unreal Tournament” as ammunition. Soon the only games you will be able to buy in stores are Pokemon Blue: Pikachu Gets A Spikey, Barbie Concentration Camp Guard, and Ultima Online Third Dawn.