Recently, I was linked to this website, Written? Kitten!, a website that posts a random picture of a cute kitten from Flickr for every 100, 200, 500, or 1000 words typed. This is what happened when I was left alone with the text box:
So I guess this encourages people to write 'n shit. That's neat. Too bad I honestly have nothing to write about. That's the problem with writing, y'know. Nothing to actually write about. And when you're given a reward every 100 words, do you know what is encouraged? Rambling.
Yeah, that's right. Rambling. I don't have anything to write about at the moment. I'm not working on an essay, I'm not even writing a story. I have no interest in doing so. So I'm writing for the sake of writing. It's sort of pathetic, in a way. A slight way.
Wait. OH MY FUCKING GOD. IT'S A KITTEN. A FUCKING ADORABLE AS SHIT KITTEN. I... wow. This does feel good. I like that kitten. I like him. I like him a lot. He's... fuzzy. His ears are standing to a slight angle, and he can see himself angled in the reflection in the mirror. But he also looks sort of sad.
Why is he sad? I doubt we'll ever know. Maybe he's out of yarn. Y'know, I'll accept that. Kittens are pretty susceptible to being upset over noticeable lack of yarn. I wouldn't go so far as to say they become depressed or anything, but yeah.
Another kitten, eh? Not any kitten either. A lolcat. And a particularly mischievous one at that. It's chewing on... what's that? Tampons? Eurgh. Y'know, that's the thing about the internet, isn't it? Everything comes back to female anatomy. Even the places on the internet that feature cute pictures of kittens - the places you thought you'd avoid any mention of ovaries and vaginas and milk-nipples - seem to be scattered with the occasional reference to, say, tampons. The kitten is chewing the tampon to bits, which improves considerably the tampon in question, but still creates images of those... slightly darker places on the internet.
That's the thing, too, about being rewarded by something every so-and-so things. Some people - not many, but some - have limits. For example - I tend to limit myself to a few kittens a day. A necessary, self-enforced limit, designed exclusively so I do not have cute overload. It's a real thing. Really. Every year, thousands of people are diagnosed with cute overload. It affects us all. And yet there's no governmental body established to prevent the risk of cute overload in the home and workplace? It's appalling.
So, too, is rewarding writers with kittens. Writers are fickle people. They accept things like kittens. But it starts with kittens, doesn't it. Soon employers will establish a system wherin writers get paid with kittens, and not money. After that? They'll get paid for bits of kittens; a picture of an ear, a paw, a wet little nose. ...and once you've reached that, what comes next? ANARCHY. ANARCHY COMES NEXT. Once writers accept that they will, indeed, write for the reward of "pictures of moderately adorable kittens," the whole economy collapses overnight. Writers everywhere go poor but for thousands of images of kittens. Corporations go bankrupt as they realize their petty money is no longer inherently valuable - the people of the earth write for kittens now.
And the smug kittens - like the one I was just "rewarded" with - or was it a reward? Or a SOCIALIST TRAP??! - they sit in glee as all of mankind rises up. "Take the kittens," we say. "We love the kittens. We shall work for kittens." And eventually? "We will work for THE kittens." And that's how the slavery begins. Kittens enslave all of mankind because, after all, it was the writers that sealed our fate.
...ohh, but they are painfully cute. Come here, kitty, lemme hug you, ya fuzzy bastard... ^_^
Well, that's it. It was a pretty fun time I had on Written? Kitten!, and I imagine if you are the kind who is enamored with the cuteness of our feline friends, then it could be a useful carrot-on-a-stick-type self-rewards program. For me though - a man who is quite the stranger to ever sitting down and writing anything longer than blog article-length opinion pieces - this website is but a charming gimmick. But it is a good gimmick. Why not give it a visit?
