Not Everything On The Internet Is Accurate

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Yes, it’s true, not everything on the internet is accurate. I know, I can hear the collective, “WELL DUH,” I just got in response to that statement. However, before you write me off as a John Madden-esc conveyor of the stupidly obvious, I’m not referring to online rumors which question Obama’s citizenship, warn us of death panels, or outline alien conspiracies lead by Hillary Clinton who’s actually an extraterrestrial reptile in disguise. Intelligent people can shrug off such nonsense as being the ravings of lunatics who thought The X-Files was a wonderful series of docudramas. No, I’m talking about businesses/organizations which don’t update their websites.

Anyone who knows me, and even some folks who don’t, knows I’m sending out proposals, hoping to get my book published. It’s, more or less, the defining fact of my existence, other than being a remarkably virile specimen of manhood that is. Anyway, when approaching publishers with new work, writers go to The Writer’s Market online, compile a list of publishers who accept a particular kind of work, visit each publisher’s site to obtain their submission packet guidelines, and begin mailing out packets. So far, I’ve received half my packets back, marked return to sender, from publishers who’ve gone out of business without mentioning it on their sites.

If the waste of postage isn’t irksome enough, my nurse & friend, Dani, just drove downtown to visit an abandoned museum/church. She’s a huge Elvis fan, and I had heard of The 24 Hour Church Of Elvis, so I looked it up and found http://www.24hourchurchofelvis.com/. On the very top of webpage it says, “408 N.W. Couch The new location for the 24 Hour Church of Elvis!!” in big blue letters. The site advertises movies visitors can watch, souvenirs one can buy, etc… So she packed her family in the car, drove downtown, paid six bucks to park, and found a single window displaying a cardboard cutout of Elvis surrounded by Barbie dolls. Next to the window is a coin slot and a hole in the wall, where visitors can watch a minute long movie for $.50. That’s it, no museum of Elvis memorabilia, no experts to answer questions about his life or the church’s defining philosophy, no gift shop, just a window of disturbing imagery and a hole in a wall.

It’s not the wasted postage or the six bucks blown on parking that bothers me most, although those things do irk me. What really bothers me is the laziness and sloppiness which contributes to outdated information being left for people to find and act upon. These are tough economic times, businesses fold, I get it. However, it takes five minutes to update a website to keep people from wasting their time. Get it together people.