Sit down, take a deep breath. This is going to hurt. We've all been screwed over at one time or another. By fraudsters, by corporations who don't care about individuals - even by a government. It's painful, and when it happens, it can challenge our faith in humanity. However, we can deal with it. People are tough, we realise we were conned; we learn from it, we move on. However, all of this is nothing compared to the single biggest screw-over in history. You're being screwed by it right now. It screws with your mind, it attempts to defraud you, it misinforms you. But you love it. You may not even know what you'd do without it. It screws you and you beg for more. I'm talking about... THE INTERNET.

Ways the Internet screws you

So, you think I'm crazy. You think the Internet is the pinnacle of invention? A Utopia to bask in the shared knowledge of humankind? Well, here are just a few of the ways the Internet screws many people on a daily basis, perhaps some will sound familiar: -

The Internet as a moneymaking tool

There's no doubt about it, the Internet is a great way to make money. You are bombarded by advertising every time you load up a webpage. Your email offers you fantastic investment opportunities in Nigeria, or cut-price drugs that almost certainly won't kill you, honest. There are links on almost every page that will make somebody money if you click them. There are popups, popunders, adware, spyware, malware, trojans, rogue diallers, affiliate links, and every other scam and advertising strategy under the sun.

The problem is that although somebody, somewhere, is clearly making a lot of money out of the Internet, nobody is really sure who it is. It's not me, and chances are high that it isn't you either. You put up with junk filling your screen and trying to infest your computer on a daily basis, and don't make a penny. I've heard rumours that all of the money made on the Internet eventually filters through to the account of renowned astronomer and xylophone player Patrick Moore who spends it all on sherbet lemons.

The domain name system

So it's time for you to carve out your own space on the Internet. What better way to publish your opinions to the world and achieve online stardom, or promote your business online, right? The first thing to do is get yourself a domain name, so you head to the website of your favourite registrar to grab YourName.com. Maybe it costs $8 or something, but that's no problem to get your own piece of the web, right? Wrong.

Turns out your name is already registered. So are your initials, any abbreviation of your name, your nickname, your name in reverse, your name with your year of birth appended to the end and the Klingon translation of your name. The problem is, you didn't reckon with Dave.

Dave is a genius, and man of foresight and vision. In the 1990s, Dave registered your domain. He also registered the names of everyone else in the Western world, the name of every country or city, your dog's name and every word in the English and Swahili dictionaries. But it's no problem, if you'd like the domain based on your name, all you have to do is pay Dave $5,000. It's very useful to him to host a page full of adverts on you know? Or alternatively maybe you'd like to register something really snappy like argh-there-are-no-decent-domain-names-left-but-I-finally-found-one-that-was-available-take-that-Dave.com. Even then chances are it's not available and you have to get the .org version. And it's a well known fact that if you have a .org domain, passing children will spit on you.

Yes, the domain name system is a wonderful thing.

Conclusion

Not only do you get screwed by the Internet, but you are happy to pay to get screwed by it. You are a slave to its whim. It torments you, it abuses you, it is pure evil incarnate. But hey, at least it's better than TV, right?