If you run into a person within a couple of weeks after their vacation (and if they're a pushy dick who cares naught for how little you care about their vacation) they will make that moment you chat at a party, bump into each other at a grocery store, or see each other at the mall into the dreaded vacation slideshow trope. Now any place can be the living room of the worst, most show-offy family on the block. With each swipe across the screen they show off yet another picture of a time when, no matter what you were doing at that exact moment the picture was snapped, they were having more fun and making more lasting memories than you were.

Apple.com
"Somewhere on here I have proof that I'm better than you."

These people are social sociopaths. They lack empathy as well as all sense of how little anyone cares about anything they do with their lives. One day they will learn all of that, and it'll probably be the same day they learn it's much easier to put the pictures in a Facebook album so their friends list can secretly hate-click through it in a jealous rage brought on by never having enough money to go on vacations themselves.

Speaking of not having money ...

Kickstarter is, essentially, a website where beggars who don't smell like piss and probably don't have horrible afflictions and addictions and who don't hold signs god-blessing you for even looking at them can beg the world for cash just like the people who do. They need your money to complete a dream project, like a video game, or a movie, or a potato salad. It brought begging into the digital age, legitimized it to a degree, and democratized the powers once held by financially conservative corporate big-wigs.

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Hey, look! It's this guy again! Hi, this guy!

Then people took the idea of crowdfunding to its logical, absurd, and sad conclusion: sites where people can just ask for money. Begslist.com. Ebeggars.com. Cyberbeg.com. People flock to these sites, write out their reasons, and wait for money, and I have no idea if they ever actually get any. No ultimate dream project. Just a lot of stories of tough times and bad choices. It's like reading the diary entries of minor characters from The Wire. In rare cases, there isn't even a sob story beyond, "Hey, give me money." It's hard to tell how many of the stories intended to tug at the heart strings (and wallets) are true.

I sometimes find myself wishing I had the money to donate to some of the beggars whose stories ring true. Sadly, I'm broke most of the time and couldn't part with a penny. But maybe I can make a post where I ask people to donate money to me so I can turn around and donate to people I deem worthy of my donated money. Shit. I think I just invented a new industry: donating to donors for the cause making the donors feel a sense of worth. The site will be free to use, but you can donate to keep it running. I'm gonna be rich!

Magazines have always had a dual purpose: 1) to inform the reader about whatever topics the editors chose to address that day, week, or month, and 2) to be jack-in-the-boxes that shoot spring-loaded subscription cards at you from the moment they're opened. It's almost like a self-defense mechanism, like magazines are sea creatures that poop out their undesirable innards when a predator tries to pry them open.

This is a thing people make in factories with large machines, yet when people buy one they have to treat it like fresh produce. Before you eat that corn on the cob you're going to need to peel off the husk first. When you buy a new issue of a magazine, you have to pluck the subscription cards out of it first. Magazines must be properly prepared before their information can be consumed.

Since the rise of the Internet and iPads, magazines have made a smooth transition into the digital world, which means no more subscription cards. At least, not ones printed on paper. No, they were just waiting for publishers to find a new way to beg readers to stick around a bit longer. In due time, they came back in a new form:

I don't know what to call them, but they pop up, showcasing a variety of sites. From the questionably legit:

To the totally, 100 percent, without question, shining example of legitness:

Paid subscriptions aren't the currency websites traffic in. It's, well, traffic -- traffic on the site itself and, more importantly, traffic from every other outlet onto which a site extends its tendrils. They want you to like them on Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr and other such places the website can digitally stalk you as you're busy stalking people on the same sites. They want your email so they can be wherever you are online. Shit, it wouldn't be surprising if one day they asked for your Xbox Live gamertag so random characters in Skyrim and Grand Theft Auto can remind you of new content on a real-world website. It's a common practice that, like the most resilient zombie in the horde, just won't die. When the Internet is powder you can snort and feel on your brain, our amygdalae will be slathered in the slimy resin of requests to follow Brobible on Twitter.