RoBeast Book of World Records

On November 24th my "graphic of an obscure and unrepresentative example sentence" was finally removed from the hallowed pages of Wikipedia. I'dn't've expected my simple picture of an imaginary complex contraction to have lasted 111 days on a page presumably attractive to Grammar Nazis, but at least I now have benchmark for vandalism endurance challenges.

Whatever will be next?

Dog Years

It's been a while since I last vandalized Wikipedia, so I went for a big target today. I hit up one of my favorite dimensions: Time. My addition is about halfway down the page, and I think the subtly paid off. After 4 hours, it still hasn't been taken down yet!

Click on the image below for the original size (and read the caption for bonus points).

It's a Special Day!!!

That's right, it's Dido's birthday. Happy Birthday, Dildo!

Now blow out those candles!

Raiders of the Lost Wiki

Today I entered a Wikipedia contest to redesign the State Flag of Indiana.

I thought I did a damn good job, but it turned out that the contest was only in my imagination. Oh well. Paul Hadley is stealing all my credit!

The Wikipedia Police take their US & A purdy seriously, so my contributions were reverted immediately. You have to admit that my flag is way cooler than their old boring one. Indiana Jerks!

Wariokipedia

Urgent US State Department Warning!

September 18, 2008

This Travel Warning updates information on security threats and ongoing political violence in Pakmanistan and informs U.S. citizens of current safety and security concerns.  The Department of State continues to urge that Americans avoid all travel to Pakmanistan.  Americans who live and work in Pakmanistan presently should understand that they are accepting risks in remaining and should carefully consider those risks. Please try to avoid Ghosts, if possible, and above all, do not get eaten!

Slow News Day

The commute to work today was mostly uneventful. No traffic, no pile-ups, no drawbridges, no hoods flying off of my car (yeah true story). About a mile away from work though, the bizarre shit started hitting the wacky fan.

As I eased onto Rt. 80, I saw a oddly-shaped vehicle ahead of me. It was like a cube truck, but a little taller. I noticed some stickers of birds on it and immediately became jealous, for I am still a few eclectic stickers short of making it all the way across my bumper. The bird would have fit in nicely next to Torrential Downpour's two headed dinosaur.

I pulled up a little closer and saw not one, but six giant bird stickers. And then the big reveal: RACING PIGEONS. Racing Pigeons? WTMFFWT? I would've taken a picture with my cell phone, but that's like illegal and stuff and I only advocate law-abiding activities here on BaTR like Wikipedia Vandalism. (FYI, I was at a red light when I took the picture of the MATTRES SPICALE sign). I kept the Racing Pigeons in my thoughts as I pulled into the parking complex, knowing that I was going to march directly to the aforementioned internetionary once I got to my desk and waited the exciting twenty minutes that it takes to boot up my fucking PC in the morning. Yes, I'm still using a Commodore 64.

Load "*",8,1
Ready
Run

(Side note-Do you remember the good old days when the SHIFT key didn't toggle between a letter's upper and lower case?)

Before I got out of the parking lot, I saw yet another sign of the impending apocalypse--a Pennsylvania license plate that had a picture of a tiger on it and the phrase "Save Wild Animals." Did I miss something? Are there tigers roaming free in the jungles of Pennsylvania? If so, I am pleased that these big cats and other assorted wild animals have yet to swim cross the Delaware River. Unfortunately there is no toll to cross the Pennsie bridges to Jersey, so there would be nothing to stop them. The burbs would turn into that movie Savage Harvest, an idea that scared the shit out of me as a youngster.


Ok, smarty pantses. Yes, I know that the only tiger in Pennsylvania is the one at the Philadelphia Zoo. I've seen it in person (and I saw it again in Rocky 2 on Saturday when Rocky is proposing to Adrian "I was wonderin' if you wouldn't mind marryin' me very much?"). In fact, I used to have a hat with the Philly Zoo tiger on it back in the day. But Pennsylvania, let's not pretend that you are The Tiger State.

And while we're at, I am again calling out Ohio, the so-called "Birthplace of Aviation." Remove this claim from your license plates or I will start vandalizing the Wikipedia pages of the Wrong Brothers.

Ok, back to pigeons. Apparently, Pigeon racing has been around for hundreds, if not thousands of years. Basically, pigeons are driven far away from their home base and tracked to see how quickly they return. It's a strange sport, though I believe I have more respect for it than for Horse Racing. While it still seems like these animals are being brainwashed for human amusement, they're at least not in danger of being seriously injured or euthanized. They would just get lost, and possibly homesick. Due to the great distances the birds travel this is hardly a spectator sport, so seeing the Pigeon Wagon on Rt. 80 is probably as close I'd ever get to witnessing the competition. Once place you'll certainly never witness this Pigeon Racing phenomenon: Chicago. It's the only city in the US where it's illegal to race and/or feed pigeons.

All right, I gotta go kill a baby tiger and feed it to a pigeon in Chicago, and blame it all on descendants of the Wright Brothers, inevitably starting a war between Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Here tiger, tiger....

Jesus, Save Me.

I can not stop editing Wikipedia pages.

Facebook is Racist

... against Cheeseburgers. Ok, maybe not racist, but there is definitely rampant meat-product discrimination going on over there.

I tried to change my Facebook name today to Rollie Cheeseburger Hatch. I don't really know why. I just wanted to. My actual middle initial is C, and people are always asking what it stands for, so I figured I'd just go with Cheeseburger. Plus, I had a really good cheeseburger on Saturday night at Acme Underground.

Despite my knowing attempt to circumvent Facebook's rules (bullet point 3)...


I went for it. Upon clicking Confirm Request, Facebook immediately switched to DEFCON 3:

"Your name change request has been rejected by our automated approval system."

So sad. I tried three more times just to make sure I didn't fuck up somewhere in the one step process. I didn't.

Not one to let The Man defeat me, I went for an alternate dairy-meat dream-meal. Quesoburguesa sounded good, but didn't stay true to my actual C-lead middle name. I needed one that would thwart the "automated approval system" and survive processing limbo where my submission would face up to 24 hours of interrogation by the Facebook KGB.

A half hour later, I have become Rollie Cheesesteak Hatch.

Why, Facebook? Why Cheesesteak, but not Cheeseburger? Why do you automatically assume that someone could not really be named Cheeseburger? There is a dude that changed his hame to Trout Fishing in America in 1994. How the hell is he going to get a Facebook account approved?

It's time for another highly unscientific RoBeast experiment. (In the interest of getting this expose published already, I will be updating the results throughout the day.)

Acceptable:

• Cheesesteak
  
• Chickennugget
• Chopped Liver
• Castlevania
  

Unacceptable:

• Cheeseburger

Undetermined (AKA too impatient):

• Chuck Wagon
  

I have also chosen to publish the news of this unfortunate setback in Cheeseburger history on Wikipedia. (note - this was considered "junk" and removed that night)

The RoBeast vs. Wikipedia: Round Two

All of the Wikipedia vandalism descibed in my last entry was reverted overnight. The person who edited them back was kind enough to call it "cute" and didn't ban my IP address. Of course, I wasn't satisfied with my vandalism lasting less than 24 hours, so like any gambling addict would, I didn't quit while I was ahead.

I first hit up the Megan's Law page:

Not as cute, I suppose. It was reverted within seconds. As was this:


I (or should I say, my anonymous IP address) received another warning, but still haven't been banned or anything. I have discovered that there are people patrolling these Wikipedia pages with anti-vandalism tools that catch shit within seconds of an edit. I suppose I can either stop vandalizing pages, find less popular pages, or teach the world to get a sense of humor.

Let's see if The Used's fans can handle another benign attack...


I don't know what it is that I find so hilarious about Wikipedia vandalism besides my obvious problem with authority and penchant for smartassedness. I don't laugh too hard at most stand-up and am typically unimpressed by the average comedy film. I like to think that my sense of humor is a little dark and sophisticated. But on Wikipedia, the most simple, lowest common denominator-style vulgarity or non-sequitur makes me laugh my ass off.

For instance, someone made an edit to the Stemshorn page that made me chortle. There's really nothing to the page (which I guess is what made it a target), other than a map and some text:

Stemshorn is a municipality in the district of Diepholz, in Lower Saxony, Germany.

Someone changed this to:

Stemshorn is a municipality in the district of Diepholz, in Lower Saxony, Brazil.

It was reverted. He was warned. A week later the same user changed it to this:

Stemshorn is a fucking awesome species of reindeer located district of Diepholz, in Lower Saxony, Germany.

The second edit really got me going. It may be the tenacity of the vandal that excites me. I can identify with that underdog mentality. The person knows that it's going to be reverted again, but just can't resist doing again, and even one-upped himself (or herself). It's not just the attitude, but the context that's funny. It's such a serious, boring page, that any little piece of flair shines. The word "fucking" blatantly undermines the "Quiet! in the Library" attitude and puts a smile to my face (not so much with Panic! at the Disco though). The word "reindeer" is pretty silly too. And, I don't know... this person may be telling the truth. Maybe the Stemshorn is a species of reindeer. And maybe it is fucking awesome! I don't know, but I think that your average 5th grader knows not to quote Wikipedia for their fucking report on Germany, so there. Victim-less crime.

Like I said last time, it's all for the lulz, so I won't spend too much arguing on the moral implications of internet vandalism. I'm also going to keep doing it as long as I can do it humorously. My Q*Bert McCracken was reverted after 50 minutes and I the Erff is still alive and kickin'.

The Stemshorn vandal received a 31(?)-hour suspension from editing pages on Wikipedia.

The RoBeast terrorizes Wikipedia

I've been perusing Wikipedia for about an hour now looking for a page to vandalize (yes, I'm bad to the bone). I'm basically just looking for a really boring page that hasn't been updated in a long time so I can throw a funny word or two into a paragraph that won't be malicious or slanderous, and more importantly, won't be noticed or fixed right away. Ok, I know vandalism is inherently malicious, but I'm just doing it for the lulz. If you want to argue morals with me, go right ahead. I'm that bored.

Anywhooooo, I ended up in the zoology department clicking around until I landed on the Notochord page. I considering hitting that page, but when I checked the history tab first and noticed some recent activity, I decided to pass. Some dorkus probably has it on their watchlist or something. I figured while I was there, I may as well scroll through the page and learn what a notochord is. Then I discovered some funny text on the bottom:

The notochord secretes a protein called sonic hedgehog homolog (SHH), a key morphogen regulating organogenesis and having a critical role in signaling the development of motoneurons^[1]. The secretion of SHH by the notochord establishes the ventral pole of the dorsal-ventral axis in the developing embryo.

Did someone beat me to the vandalism?

Actually, no. Sonic Hedgehog Homolog is real. And boy, did I learn my lesson. I tried to take a short cut and be a 2-bit anonymous vandal, when I could have just studied biology in college and went to years and years of grad school to discover something unique and give a silly name - THE HONEST WAY!

Ah, fuck it, I'll take the warp zone.

I'm sure Mr. Cuomo would consider this a compliment.


I'm so immature, but I just can't help myself.

1-up?