The Fall and Fall of IMDb

I've been a bit off the map lately due to a visit from my dear old Ma, so I haven't been posting too much. It's interesting hearing her comments on Bangkok, which often make me do a double-take and go 'really?' and wonder if I used to think the same thing when I was new here. I think I shall blog about this next, but for the next week or so, I'm the family tour guide. So for now, I just wanted to write a quick post about and rant about an interesting paradigm shift on the mighty Internet Movie Database - specifically, from good to absolute crap.

The IMDb is a priceless source of info for movie geeks like myself, and I can often waste hours clicking through to find out things like one of Kevin Spacey's early roles was as a subway thief who robbed Meryl Streep in Heartburn. I subscribe to the news RSS feed on the awesome Netvibes, which has been my homepage for years, but have noticed recently that the quality of 'news' on IMDb has really dropped. I've blogged about this before, but the news item I saw today made the godawful gossip rags at your local grocery store seem like great literature in comparrison.

Alyson Hannigan apparently - are you ready for this? - craves pickels when she's pregnant! Wow! If that itsn't front-page news, I don't know what is. From the article:

The star's actor husband Alexis Denisof admits he has to be careful about the pickles he picks up - because his choosy wife will only eat the ones she craves. He tells Eonline.com, "If I bring the wrong ones home, she won't touch them. It has to be the exact right ones. They're the sweet, kosher pickles. They can't be the pepper, garlic or whatever - it has to be the right one.

Awful. I remember when IMDb was the place for inside news, for scoops on the industry, for cutting-edge rumors and behind-the-scenes stories, not gossip about the snacking habbits of B-list celebrities, but it seems those days are gone. So, I'm officially announcing that due to this waste of my time, I'm getting rid of the IMDb feed on my RSS page, and will spend more time at AICN or Rotten Tomatoes, which actually have relevant news that's of interest to anyone with an IQ larger than their shoe size. Give me a call when your news is remotely relevant, IMDb dudes, I'll be waiting.