/dev/null/kevin

I hate spoilers.  I don't like having movies, TV shows (or books, Harry Potter leakers) ruined for me and will do everything possible to avoid anything that could reveal major plot points.  Even in the way back days of USENET, I would avoid discussions of upcoming shows.  I also don't watch movie previews of movies I know I want to see.  The same goes for the "scenes from next week" at the end of some TV shows.  The people who make those teasers and trailers don't care about what they spoil; they're job is just to get you to watch it.  I won't even watch the beginning credits of the new Battlestar Galactica because it contains spoilers.

My problem is that almost anything can be a spoiler.  I have a pretty good memory, and a fairly logical mind, so it doesn't take much for me to connect things together.  Show me someone in a certain situation and I can pretty much guess how they're going to get into it.

With so many "web 2.0" feeds and instant communication, avoiding spoilers is harder than ever.  I am on the west coast, so huge plot details appear in my RSS reader before I even see some shows.  I found out who won the first season of Survivor while I was online years ago.  Recently, I actually deleted quite a few RSS feeds in anticipation for the inevitable Harry Potter leak that was to come (and it happened within hours of me doing so).

I had the season finale of Heroes spoiled for me due to a careless Twitter tweet.  The worst spoilers are the careless ones.  People who don't think before they speak (or tweet).

Sometimes people try to be clever and just give a little "hint" at a spoiler.  Don't.  Telling me that "you'll never see the surprise ending coming" means that I will.  Telling someone there is a surprise ending spoils the surprise.  Saying the ending made you happy or sad ruins the surprise.  Pretty much anything you say will spoil the ending.  So shut up! 

What really confuses me are people seek out spoilers!  People watch Entertainment Tonight, read TV Guide, or visit Ain't It Cool to get every piece of gossip and news about something coming out (TV Guide is really bad because they get advanced viewings of everything and then write articles like the shows have already aired).  Then people spread those spoilers carelessly because they assume everyone already know this stuff (bastards).  And then do you know what these spoiler-mongers do after the movie comes out or the TV show airs?  They will complain about it and say thing like "I could see the ending coming" or "it was too predictable."  Of course, dummy!  You read the script Harry Knowles posted!

So, in conclusion, seek out spoilers if you must, but don't assume that anyone else wants to know what you do.  I don't.

For this post only I am disabling comments just in case some jerk wants to put some spoilers in the comments.