0h D£@r_
What do you think the most clicked on link on the internet is? “Kim Kardashian naked”?...No, that's old news. “Monkey and kitten on skateboard”??...Nope. (ok, try to concentrate).... “Donald Trump naked”??!!? ...oh come on, that's gross, what's wrong with you?
No, it's three unassuming but maddening little words strung together to seemingly bail you out whilst simultaneously screwing you further any time yu try to do just about anything online...
You know this trio of harassers - They're the stocky ones blocking your front door when you return carrying a load of shopping after a long day surfing the web. They spring up while you fumble for your keys, ready to stop you from entering your home before the ice lollies melt and the wine gets warm. One minute you're bounding up the path, tired but excited - ready to put your feet up, pop a cork and enjoy the spoils of the day and the next you're reminded just how frustrating the digital world has become for an analog brain.
Your first two attempts to get through a dispassionate rebuke from these aggy interlopers. As you desperately flounder around your memory banks for those magic words, irrationally worried one more wrong answer will get you permanently barred from your own gaff, these gatekeepers offer you a lifeline, albeit one covered in thorns. Don't worry they infer, ushering over three of their mates whose slickly benevolent grins and cheap polyester suits promise help while prophesying further disaster. “Oh not these a-holes AGAIN,” you think when faced with the biggest party poopers this side of cyber-space. You place the shopping bags down, resigned to the fact that by the time this is all sorted, those Soleros are puddles and the next time you probably won't even remember where you live.
You hang your head, sigh heavily and click the link: Reset my password. (I've dropped the whole getting-shopping-home-people-on-the-doorstep analogy now, it's served its purpose - this is just you at the computer in your pants trying to buy cinema tickets or get back onto your frigging email after someone else has been on.
Text by Ian Greenland