Critiquing all those nutty web sites.

Dan Crowley, 17, gets such a kick out of silliness on the Web that he wrote a book about it, 505 Unbelievably Stupid Web Pages. One site in his book discusses penguin conspiracies (thepenguinconspiracy.tk); another shows corn growing (iowafarmer.com/corncam/corn.html). UPFRONT recently spoke to Crowley

How did you find such a variety of silly Web pages?

Basically, the variation is just there on the Web ... You find a lot of interesting stuff out there.

For a site to be stupid, what were your criteria?

Just something that you wouldn't expect, something very bizarre. An example is the Leonard Nimoy Should Eat More Salsa Foundation (lnsemsf.com).

Sounds weird. What's that all about?

Well, you know Leonard Nimoy, right, the guy who played Spook on Star Trek? They don't really give any real reason except that salsa is excellent, and Leonard Nimoy is excellent, and that if he would eat salsa, he'd be "an unstoppable force of excellence."

Is there any danger to so much silliness on the Web?

I think it's freedom of expression.... it's a good outlet for people to express their creative talents. And it's easy and cheap, too.

Article Details

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Title Annotation:	Q&A)(writer Dan Crowley
Publication:	New York Times Upfront
Article Type:	Interview
Date:	Dec 8, 2003
Words:	195
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Topics:	Authors Interviews Teenagers Works Web sites Analysis Web sites (World Wide Web) Analysis Writers Interviews Youth Works

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