Some People Who Really, Actually Deserve To Be in the Internet Hall of Fame
Dissatisfied with this afternoon's inductees into the Internet Hall of Fame, Gizmodo's Mario Aigular has posted an alternate list of people he says "made the Internet worth coming to in the first place, and kept us clicking." This turns out to be a group of people that has left us dissatisfied.
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The blog's alternate nominees includes people it thought the Internet Society left out. "You probably haven't heard of most of them," wrote Aguilar, even though the list of this afternoon's 33 inductees includes Craig Newmark of Craig's List fame and Al Gore of Vice Presidential fame. Thus, we get an alternate, more "real" list. But, with just one woman—on there because she's hot—this list doesn't feel very complete.
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Gizmodo did that thing where they include a woman to make sure they get the lady quota, but just happened to go about it in the most offensive way possible. Our one female pioneer is model, actress Cindy Margolis, who Aguilar has chosen for the following reason:
From the get-go, the Internet offered an unlimited variety of hot chicks to ogle. We could make an entire list of prurient pioneers who deserve to be on this list, but we chose the one who's in the record books: Cindy Margolis, the original queen of Internet hot, distinguished in 1999 for 70,000 image downloads in a 24-hour span. And that's without nudity!
This woman is most certainly attractive and most certainly brought people to the Internet. But Aguilar doesn't give her very much credit. The masses came not because of Margolis's smarts or savvy, but because she showed a little leg and not too much boob. As the only woman on the list, we also get the feeling that women only contributed in the porn department (a very big Internet department!), which obviously isn't true. Aguilar, couldn't you have chosen just one other woman who had something else important to do with the Internet. Just a few examples real quick: Arianna Huffington? Alexia Tsotsis? Any of the female computer scientists who developed some sort of computing language? No, Aguilar did not learn anything from Facebook's billionaire boy club problem. The actual list, by the way, only includes three women. But, not one of them got famous for her rack.
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But what can we expect from a list that also includes the man who writes Aguilar's paycheck? "He's here because, on the internet, gossip is king. And because he signs our checks. And also so we don't all get fired," writes Aguilar of his boss, Nick Denton, who owns the whole Gawker network of blogs. Sure, it's a nod to the absurdity of this inclusion, but it also reads a teeny-tiny bit sincere.
