Home Repair for DIY Dummies

Yeah, this one needs repair...

It's said that a house is the most expensive thing most people will ever own. What isn't usually mentioned is that maintaining that home is one of the reasons it's so expensive. That's probably why so many websites are jammed with do-it-yourself information (some of it pretty bad). But what if you're not a toolhead? What if you can't tell a flange from a frammis? (hint: there are flanges, but there's no such thing as a frammis) Have no fear, InfoBarrel.com's reagenaguda is here to advise you in "Home Repairs: When to Call an Expert." 

OK, we'll grant, grudgingly, that Reagan is on the right track, and even did a fairly good job of spinning this content (awkward wording such as...

Gutters for Dummies

Leaky downspout

There are probably worse places on the internet to look for home maintenance advice than eHow.com, but no one here at the Antisocial Network knows where they are.... except we're pretty sure Bubblews.com would have been a good candidate before it folded up its metaphorical tent. If you do look for home maintenance advice at eHow.com, you'd be wise to steer clear of anything written by serial dumbass Lacy Enderson, author (we use the word loosely) of such rubbish as "How to Fix Gutters."¹

If you needed advice about your gutters, would you want it from someone who thinks that

"Rain gutters installed along the perimeter of your roof provide a water runoff so water doesn't pool on your house"?

Safe Stops for Dummy Drivers

Brake lights

We're down one today as the Antisocial Network's staff geologist sits in the corner mumbling to himself and playing with mineral samples: Tectonics week was awfully hard on him... but life goes on. That's why we're handing out a Dumbass of the Day award in another category – cars – to eHow.com's Andrea Stein (a repeat offender), sharing her lack of automotive knowledge in "What is a Brake Light Switch?"¹ at ItStillRuns.com.

We caught on that Andrea was an automotive ninny just by reading her first paragraph:

Mountain-Building for Dummies (Tectonics Week 7)

Pretty mountains

Tectonics week wouldn't be complete without a visit to HubPages.com, perhaps the biggest remaining content farm besides the Demand Media empire. So that's where our staff geologist goes today, to the hub of one Livingsta A, a "data assurance officer" (according to LinkedIn) who claims to have a physics degree. Uhuh... Livingsta treated us all to her version of tectonics in the marvelous content she called "Types and How Mountains are Formed – For kids" (now at Owlcation.com). We repeat: uhuh...

Liv (may we call you Liv?) opens by telling us that

Deep-Sea Trenches for Tectonics Dummies

A deep-sea trench in the Caribbean

Using a familiar word for an unfamiliar concept often creates serious problems for the common dumbass. Take, for instance, the word "trench": most people immediately think of a long, narrow ditch for burying pipes or cables. Our staff geologist, like others in his field, thinks instead of a subducting oceanic plate. It's not a straight-sided vertical hole (spade wide and shoulder deep), it's just called a "trench" because it's so long and narrow. Apparently, however, eHow.com's Mary Freeman didn't learn about trenches while picking up her "degree in human communication," which is very easy to tell from the lack of rudimentary knowledge she displays in the article "Characteristics of Deep Sea Trenches."¹

As is often the case among freelancers, Mary begins by displaying her ignorance in the first sentence:

Plate Tectonic Theory for Dummies (Tectonics Week 5)

For the fifth Dumbass of the Day in his tectonics week, our staff geologist returned to mining the internet's richest vein of garbage written by grasping freelancers, eHow.com. He found today's dumbass, Sheri Lamb, by simply googling the site for the word "tectonics." Sheri demonstrates a journalism major turned freelancer's typical scientific illiteracy in the piece she called "What Drives the Process of Plate Tectonics?" Sadly, visitors to the post (relocated to Sciencing.com by Leaf Group) are not going to learn the correct answer... Sheri opens with a bang in a sentence no newspaper editor (even in the sports section, we hope) would allow to stand: "Scientists claim the theory of plate tectonics has caused the movement of continents ever since they were formed."

We're pretty sure saying that the theory of plate tectonics causes plate tectonics is circular reasoning; regardless, we're darned sure her claim's wrong. Sheri goes on to explain that...

Earthquakes for Dummies (Tectonics Week 4)

Strait of Malacca

eHow.com isn't the only content farm filled with the work of halfwit freelancers, though with helium.com, suite101.com and AssociatedContent.com gone, it's the biggest one left. A few little guys remain out at the edges of the Panda universe, sites like InfoBarrel.com and WritEdge.com¹ that try to keep the bull to a minimum. In the case of InfoBarrel, though, there's still plenty of the old crap on the site; crap like "Biggest Earthquake in History" by a putz claiming to be named Xath Cruz.

Xath's piece is actually about the ten biggest earthquakes in history, a list he (she? it?) copied from somewhere and translated into dumbass-ese. What left our staff geologist scratching his head was rubbish like: