Oh her god!

"Maddox is my god. He gives me strength."

Wendy calls him her "god", her inspiration.

But who is this Maddox guy? Thought I'd write a little about this famous and famously notorious "pirate" who roams the information super highway.

George Ouzounian Maddox, born in 1978, is an American of Armenian descent. Living in Utah (which he loathes), he majored in Mathematics in the University of Utah, and has worked as a programmer.

A hugely popular "online journalist" known for his controversial views, he runs one of the most notorious (and popular) personal websites out there--the unassumingly titled "The Best Page In The Universe".

It's a satirical weblog littered with his offensive and politically-incorrect opinions. Maddox isn't just equally ruthless when dealing with politicians (be them Democrats or Republicans), but also anyone and anything he deems beneath his contempt--that includes old people, animal lovers, feminists, and even whales.

Or what he states on his own fan-site (sounds familiar?) as "kicking babies, setting shit on fire, teasing the disabled/unfortunate, eating twice your bodyweight in (preferably endangered) meat and making dumbarses the world over, cry themselves to sleep for the rest of their days".

When not dissing people and things, he writes about movies, music, celebrities, and just about anything.

His entries are usually short, egoist, and in bad taste. He doesn't try much to justify his skewed opinions, and occasionally, throws in an illustration or two to highlight his points. Like his posts, some of these illustrations are in bad taste too: his recent one on whales shows a sperm whale munching on sailors, his previous ones include old folks being fried in the sun.

He's also known for the following:

i) Earlier this year, he tried inviting some videogame programmers over to work on a game which he describes as a "game with pirates in it that doesn't suck. He put up a Flash preview of the game, and it has a pirate running over old folks, a poodle getting kicked over the fence, zombies, and lesbian sex. In his entry, "The Best Game in the Universe", he writes: "Is it too much to ask for a game where the main character murders feminists with his giant boner, lesbian centaurs get their backs broken with sledge hammers, elderly people get body slammed into cactuses, and emo dumbasses get prostate examinations with the business end of my shoe."

ii) Maddox claims his site reached 100,000,000 hits in March 2005. He has a huge legion of fans, but he has his critics too who argue that all Maddox does is insult and make profane remarks about things without any conscious efforts to reason. He also refuses to address any criticism on his "hatemail" pages, but chooses to diss his detractors instead.

iii) His enormous popularity and influence has led to his website being blacklisted not just in the US but elsewhere in the world. On January 8, 2004, Etisalat, the United Arab Emirates' sole telecommunications carrier, banned his website; Saudi Arabia and Qatar followed suit on September 11, 2005. But the one that really got to Maddox was when the popular web filtering company, Websense, placed his website on their banned list (citing it as "tasteless"), making it inaccessible from schools, offices, and public libraries. Maddox wasn't amused. In retaliation, he blocked Websense from this site (citing them as "fascists")

iv) Maddox's following, which includes youngsters, has led to the forming of Mothers Against Maddox by Beth Robbins, a housewife--her slogan being "Help us fight and finally shut down the most hateful site on the Internet". When the website ran a petition against Maddox, legions of Maddox supporters rip it apart by flooding it with vulgar comments; the petition was eventually called off. What's interesting though is that there are unsubstantiated rumours that Maddox himself is behind Mothers Against Maddox (sounds familiar, again?).

v) Maddox has his own online store selling T-shirts and stickers with messages like "Littering Kicks Ass". As he puts it, "You're not doing me a favor by buying this stuff. I'm doing you a favor by selling it." He did, however, recently contribute 50% of his profits from his store to Katrina victims, donating $3,068.

vi) Currently, he's writing a book which is due to be out in March 2006. He's also planning to work on an adventure comic book based on his pirate alter-ego.

Like him or loathe him, Maddox is so big among the young that some analysts even think he has political influence over the new generation. But America has always been liberal when it comes to Maddox's form of expression. Mind you, were Maddox a Singaporean, not only would his website be banned, he would probably be hauled to court for some of the stuff he writes.

But having said that, the Internet is global, and it's pretty evident that he has found himself ardent followers like Wendy, who may be trying to imitate his controversial style of writing and attention-seeking gimmicks. Kinda like localising Maddox's brand of blogging for fans in this region, no?

In any case, couldn't help but notice one post Wendy's almighty made about the whole naming business in the blogging world. Apparently, Maddox doesn't like his website to be referred to as a blog, and worse, himself as a blogger.

His definition of a blog:
The word "blog" is literally shorthand for "boring;" a vulgar, overused word that strikes your ear with the dull thud of a cudgel to the soft spot of a child. It's an abbreviation used by journalism drop outs to give legitimacy to their shallow opinions and amateur photography that seems to be permanently stuck in first draft hell.

His definition of a blogger:
Term used to describe anyone with enough time or narcissism to document every tedious bit of minutia filling their uneventful lives. Possibly the most annoying thing about bloggers is the sense of self-importance they get after even the most modest of publicity. Sometimes it takes as little as a referral on a more popular blogger's website to set the lesser blogger's ego into orbit.

His definition of the blogging community:
Losers, goths, bedwetters, and journalism dropouts.

And his definition of blogebrity:
Wow, guess what this one stands for? Too easy. Hey, anyone can do it: take a blogger who's a chef, and you get: BLEF. A blogger who's a dentist? BENTIST. A female blogger with an itch? You guessed it: a BITCH.

I still think the guy's an ar*ehole, but at least he got THAT right. =)