• by Jack Feuer , December 5, 2007

Hello, my name is Jack, and I am a blog addict.

Last week and well into this one, the ad blogs were aflame over Adweek's new, inexplicable 36-times-a-year frequency, which in English translates to "we're killing it." However, they cooled after about a week. Still, if you sifted through the charred ruins, you'd have discovered me discovering the ad blogs. And what a fascinating mix of mayhem and morons there was to discover.

Up until now, my blog participation was limited to lurking on AICN and yukking it up over the dedicated pinheads that populate the comment boards of various magazine sites. But when Nielsen, with its usual grace, shot itself in the face with that ludicrous press release, I was, for the first time, reading about something that directly impacts me and my friends. In this case, the magazine I worked at off and on for more than 12 years.

Adland. AdSpy. Adverganza. Adscam. Whoa. A cornucopia of asinine online opinions, inaccurate declarations and ridiculous accusations. I was tripping over stuff so mind-blowingly stupid, I thought at first the writers were kidding. Like Adweek sucks because its journalists never worked in advertising. (Working in a business is a prerequisite to covering it? Who knew? So that's why Edward R. Murrow had such an undistinguished career.) Or, Adweek sucks because its reporters are lazy. (Blaming the book's agonizing downfall on its reporters is like blaming Travis' troops for losing the Alamo.)

Of course, my former colleagues also succumbed to the posting madness, bending themselves into painful pretzel shapes to avoid directly acknowledging the 800-pound editor in the room. And the Ad Age idolatry on some of the blogs was, frankly, just funny.

It really didn't matter what was being said, though. I kept returning to the blogs again and again. Dreaming about how I would respond to the more virulent idiocy. Writing posts and then deleting them, muttering to myself and developing strange facial tics.

I had fallen headfirst into the crap and was hooked. It was like being bitten by a werewolf, except I could still type.

I was a blog addict.

I even tried to quit, taking a little cyber-vacation on AOL. Almost immediately, I devoured all 71 comments about a putative new reality show featuring immigrant bachelors begging American hotties to wed them so they could get a green card. ("How many of you are going to say with pride that someone you know is a tomato picker?") Then I went looking for another fix.

And there you have it. My eyes are red, but the truth is clear. I used to dismiss bloggers as idiots with a domain name. They're that, and worse. But they're also digital heroin. An information highway to hell.

My name is Jack and if you touch my mouse, I'll eat your liver.