Review of Look Shiny

Nick Douglas, the creator of Look Shiny, is primarily known for being the first editor and writer of Valleywag, a San Francisco-based tech gossip blog about big-name Silicon Valley professionals put out by Gawker Media (which also produces such gossip blogs as, Gawker in New York, Wonkette in Washington DC, Defamer in Hollywood, and tech sites like Gizmodo and Lifehacker). Douglas was recruited for Valleywag by Gawker Media founder, Nick Denton, for Douglas’ outsider status from the web-scene (he left his undergraduate English program early at Grove City College in Pennsylvania to write the blog). He was fired from his Valleywag position in November of 2006 for “misunderstanding of the purpose of the site”, but within two months one again contriubeted regular postings. Douglas also wrote media and technology commentaries for Eat the Press, The Huffington Post’s media news section, before launching Look Shiny in February of 2007.

Douglas seems to have moved away from the tech-related gossip he was churning out at Valleywag, toward more generalized personal

critique on his own life: that of a young blogger in an urban landscape with liberal politics and a wry and pithy sense of humor. He posts new videos regularly, addressing issues like how not to show up, how to respond to people asking for money on the street, and how to not get things done: basically, all things a vaguely neurotic educated young person thinks about all the time but fails to confront directly. Episodes can be accessed through the archives and generally don’t last longer than about four minutes. Most are filmed in what is presumably Douglas’ home office, but he takes it to the streets of San Francisco from time to time to interact with the community.

Check out The Following Things Are Not Funny, and get acquainted with Douglas’ sense of humor. Hint: the phrases, “the internets,” ‘the interweb,” and “a series of tubes” are decidedly unfunny…but cancer is.