love

Have you ever committed yourself to a lover? Has that lover ever turned on you, trodden on your commitment, and crushed your dreams of a white picket fence and perfect baking every Sunday?

Then please take a seat. For I wish to bring you the story of a man who was in that very position and decided he needed to buy himself something nice.

It just so happens that the something nice was a Halo suit of armor.

I am grateful to an emotional Reddit reader who sent me a link to Bygone Bureau, a culture and travel magazine that … Read more

These days, love comes, love goes, love doesn't necessarily even stay the night.

Do you need more proof of this sad and very modern truth? Oh, you do. Then please let me help you. A survey conducted by market researchers Lab 42 declares that 33 percent of human beings have broken up with their beloveds by text, e-mail, or Facebook.

Yes, Facebook.

You might imagine that I am talking about 13-year-olds. Because you definitely, surely have to be 13 to be on Facebook. Yet, no. This survey purports to offer the truths of 550 people older than 18--and, clearly, … Read more

Love is a wonderful thing--so wonderful, in fact, that you may feel the desire to memorialize it in the form of your mouse cursor. Love AnimatIon Cursor lets you do exactly that. To be quite honest, the program isn't really our cup of tea stylistically; on top of that, it's not particularly easy to use. But if you're in love with love, we suppose it could be a cute addition to your desktop.

We installed Love AnimatIon Cursor and weren't sure what to do next; there was no interface, no system-tray icon, and no change in … Read more

I have been a best man at five weddings, but have never myself managed to be a ring-slipper.

However, I understand the need for one human being to permanently attach themselves to another. Even if that attachment is virtual.

So I find virtual tears coursing down my virtual cheeks as I receive information that there is a problem with virtual marriages.

The game-makers (and matchmakers) at online-game site Nexon tell me that of the 26,982 in-game marriages that have joyously occurred in a game called MapleStory, 20,344 have ended in divorce.

Because I happen never to have played MapleStory, nor indeed even wondered what it is, I am grateful to Nexon for offering me correspondence with respect to the details of the world's next great social plight.

"I was young, naive, and thought I had met 'the one'," declared one player from Vancouver. "She asked me what I wanted in MapleStory for my birthday, and I told her that the only thing I could ever want was for her to marry me."

I feel virtual sniffles coming on. My shirt is becoming virtually damp. What could have possibly gone wrong?

Tyler--for that is the Vancouveran warrior's name--continued: "She started saying that I wasn't the person she fell in love with. That I had changed, and that I didn't seem to care about her anymore."

So far, so not very virtual. This sounded like an everyday occurrence in our venal little world. Spouses change their minds. Spouses feel insecure. Spouses decide you aren't "the one" any more. But wait, there was more.… Read more

Just what we need. Another button on the Web. But Chris Lyman, CEO of SendLove.to, believes there is a gaping hole in the feedback market; that Likes and Tweets and Shares and Comment buttons don't do enough to collect opinion and give people feedback on themselves.

We're not insecure enough already?

"Public figures should be insecure," Lyman says. And there is in fact already a business model here: Polls. Lyman wants to to better: "The social Web should be able to deliver in seconds," what existing polling systems, like the Rasmussen presidential poll, do now.

SendLove gives Web surfers the ability to like--and importantly, to dislike--people they're reading about. Users can also comment on the people they are reading about.

What gives SendLove some potential is that commentary on individuals is collected in one place (on each site or blog). So as a site covers a popular figure--say, a politician, celebrity, or sports figure--the readers can see what other people have to say about that person outside of a particular story. You can track how public opinion on a person is trending over time, see how various articles affect the trend, and compare the popularity on the site you're on with the overall Web-wide popularity. It's an interesting and different way to get into discussions about public figures.

… Read more

Google loves Lucy.

In order to demonstrate that love, the company's doodlers have created something special for Lucille Ball's 100th birthday.

Well, it would have been her 100th birthday today, but Lucy is sadly no longer with us.

Still, in a blog post, Google doodler Jennifer Hom explained: "Lucy's creativity, absurdity, and ever-changing facial expressions (especially when she was scarfing down candy, stomping on grapes, or touting a new energy drink) have brought joy and laughter to generations of viewers."

Google's doodle offers a click and play feature, through which you can watch clips … Read more

American Express is promising cardmembers who use Facebook special deals and discounts. The only catch? AmEx needs access to your Facebook interests, likes, and friends.

In a new program dubbed "Link, Like, Love" and unveiled today on AmEx's Facebook page, cardmembers will be able to choose from a variety of special deals. By using the new app on the Facebook page, members can access a personalized dashboard through which they'll find deals and discounts based on their Facebook likes and interests, and the likes and interests of their friends. Cardmembers can then pick the deals they … Read more

Is it pride in pulchritude? Is it pressure from the opposite sex? Or might it even be that not so many people like to see men naked?

In an intellectually titled piece of research--"Let My Fingers Do the Talking: Sexting and Infidelity in Cyberspace"--Diane Kholos Wysocki, a professor of sociology and women's studies at the University of Nebraska at Kearney, and Cheryl D. Childers, a professor of sociology at Washburn University, create a snapshot that some might find intuitive and some might find depressing.

Their numerical conclusions appear clear: two-thirds of the women surveyed said … Read more

It started on Facebook. She looked into his two-dimensional eyes, ignored the fact that the game was called Mafia Wars, and decided that this might be love.

Oh, perhaps it didn't start with precisely those indications of love and foreboding, but I can tell you how it ended--with an $8,386.88 lawsuit for "misrepresentation, promissory estoppel, defamation of character, and intentional infliction of emotional distress."

All of us who read romantic novels must pay a debt to the Tri-City Herald, which dutifully recorded the progress and regress of a Facebook relationship between Cheryl Gray, 50, from … Read more