Internet Lies Translated
Did you notice? On the Web some words never mean what they sound like. No joke!
Often they signify something they were never intended to mean in real life or when first coined.
Some terms and expressions just do not reflect what they were meant for originally.
Sadly most people still don’t realize it. I want to help you know and forever! See below!
How the Web Lies to You and What it Really Means
To make you more web-savvy I collected a often told Internet lies and translated them into what they really mean.
You probably have come across a lot but never really understood their true meaning.
Fasten your seat belts. To help you, I translated them to explain and add some much need context.
- Coming Soon: I don’t know when, probably never. Often seen on websites that are “under construction” indefinitely.
- Free: use it it for free now, we make you pay later, once you depend on it. Also: pay with your data. Most free online services including Google and Facebook.
- No strings attached: we know you distrust us for a good reason. Sleazy marketers love that phrase.
- Copyright [current year]: this site might be abandoned but runs a script that updates the year in the copyright notice. Stingy website owners are always scared of getting their content shared.
- Interesting photos: stolen images. I just don’t know anything about them besides that they were popular elsewhere so they must be “interesting”. Also: creative images and the likes. Content theft!
- Make money online: click our ads! We get commission from these affiliate networks. Still popular MMO strategy.
- Privacy policy: we just use your data for advertising, or when the NSA, CIA, FBI, GOP, DIY asks us to. In case another company buys us we can also sell our user database. Also called profiling policy.
- Click here: we know you are a dummy that does not know how the Internet works. This is not a call to action.
- Is now open source: we let others do the work for free and then earn big $$$ by reselling it. Google products are open source nowadays. So what? They still own Android and Chrome. You can just see the code and re-use it according to their rules.
- Social: this will transform your social life into a virtual computer game. It’s the opposite of social life.
Want more truths about the Web? Try these. Do you want more specialized linguistic guidance?
You might want to read the real SEO glossary It’s hilarious!
It sheds a light on what SEO experts mean when they speak of search engine optimization and the likes.
“Make money online: Click our ads, we get commission from these affiliate networks”
I only realized that waaaay eventually. Sucks for the newbs that get played like that; I myself nearly bought very expensive adsense teaching stuff through a certain well known blog…
lol
thanks for this translation, will feature this on my site. thanks :)
Hahha! Excellent compilation, Tad. Actually I don’t really know if I should laugh or cry, because no matter how humorous the above lies may be, they’re still very true. Get it? Lies, Truth? Haha, I crack myself up. Ok, lame.
I like this… Can I respost in my Blog? i’ll give you backlink of course :D
ups sorry, I translate it into my language. “Bahasa Indonesia” thx.
firdaus: Of course! Any translations are always welcome!
Good job, the “privacy” is surely one of the most famous web lies ever. The bigger the website/services the greater the chances are that your data will be shared or sold. “Click here”… I think I browsed away from some sites just as soon as see a stupid lines or pointer as this one…There are way more creative ways or simple wayss atleast other than to tell people “click here”.
It seems that I am a fool, for I have fallen for all of these. Thank you for making me doubt my self worth. Oh website, when will this abusive relationship end?
Open source software can’t be resold dumbass! It’s open source! someone would just take the source and redistribute it for free (duh).. Would get rid of that one..
btw, if you’re wondering to yourself “Then how do they get rich??” – they sell support, ONLY – the software itself is always free.
sikanrong: You smartass better read and understand first before flaming. I know how open source works. “Is now Open Source” means a company opens up a formally closed source product to make people fix it after it was not profitable with paid workers. Then they will sell a “professional version” of it then. Next time you better think twice before offending me.
[…] up, I’ll move to the funny and entertaining side of last week’s. First with a post of Tad Chef of SEO 2.0 who was thoughtful enough to translate the most common Internet lies. Secondly, I will introduce […]
haha,Open Source and Copyright 2008.
Not that I doubt you, Mayor, but can you provide some examples of Open Source programs that sell a professional version? All the OS I’ve seen are 100% free no matter what.
Dick:
Movable Type
http://www.movabletype.com vs http://www.movabletype.org
Adobe Flex
http://www.adobe.com/products/flex/
Sugar CRM
http://www.sugarcrm.com/crm/
Maguma did that but they went out of business so only the OS version is still available
http://sourceforge.net/projects/openstudio
etc. etc.
@onreact: thanks for your permission. :) I post it on my blog at this page. I uploaded your “permission certificate” too as I don’t want to be one of those your list-guys ;)
touché
[…] SEO 2.0 | Top 10 Most Known Internet Lies Translated […]
Hi,
I found hilarious both of yor posts, the one about SEO and this one. I read that translations are wellcome so here it is the spanish translation:
http://ceslava.com/blog/las-29-mayores-mentiras-de-internet-y-seo-traducidas/
Congratulations for your work, funny and useful.
Ha – they are brilliant. I got fed up with my abandoned sites having out of date copyright, so have just implemented the script. Even the coming soon ones ;)
This is too pessimistic and negative thinking. If everybody starts
thinking this way then Internet will be useless and worthless
@Onreact
Most of those examples of “FOSS” software are not actually free, and of those that are, the “enterprise edition” is exactly the same but with bundled support services. Next time you better think twice before making a fool of yourself.
“Click here: We know you are a dummy that does not know how the Internet works”
I made it policy on our site that none of our writers are allowed to use terms like ‘click here’. Mind you I do that for accessibility reasons as well, because a ‘click’ is out of context for people who don’t use a mouse to browse the web.
I can’t believe I didn’t know about this blog. Consider yourself bookmarked.
Mike.
Malaz: So how does that contradict my point? Did you understand my message at all? Open Source is currently used as a marketing tool by companies that aren’t necessarily supporters of free software activism but solely bsuiness poeple out there to earn money. Nothing wrong with earning money, but that’s a deceptive tactic.
Mike: Basically there is nothing wrong with making people “subscribe now” or “try now” but “click here” is just sooo 1999.
You should add this too.
10 things, I don’t know why but it drives social media crazy.
amzing 10 is equal to 100 most known internet lies translated. full marks.
GameLet: Add what?
paresh: What are you talking about?
[…] kebohongan yang sering kita jumpai di internet yang saya terjemahkan dari posting aslinya di seo2.0.onreact.com : Apakah pernah terfikir bahwa di WEB, seringkali sebuah kata tidak merujuk pada arti yang sudah […]
Have to agree that these are the top 10, since most anyone that uses the Internet comes across at least three of these a day while searching the net.
Lol brilliant;
Another new one is you could win $10000 worth of prizes….Just subscribe here, stumble this, click this, review this and make a post about why the purple is the colour of zortastic fungi monsters from the moon,
Not each time the statements are misguiding, though! Some websites do really pay you for doing things, and also for participating in contests
[…] Vía Seo. […]
That gave me a nice laugh. On the converse, some websites are regularly updated but they don’t update their copyrights!
this is very good post, and this is funny in a way, tks
Good information – this will definitely open a novice web users eyes – to what things actually mean when correctly translated!
7 and 9 are totally wrong.
So is no. 1.
Though never have I seen a Coming soon that actually came, I know there are a few (I can feel it that way)