This collection of essays about Seinfeld includes original pieces as well as material culled from a wide and diverse range of sources-academic journals, popular magazines, newspapers, books, etc.-and the views provided by the authors are just as eclectic. But, if a book perfectly achieves what it sets out to do, I see no reason to hold back. It probably sometimes looks as though I give out five-star ratings too liberally. (Now, on to my originally posted review of the book): PC sensibilities were outraged, of course. When Jerry's friend, George (who arrives at the bubble boy's house first) encounters the bubble boy, he isn't Tiny Tim from Dickens. Elaine is moved to crying by the story of the bubble boy, as voiced by the bubble boy's father.īut, folks, this is Seinfeld. There was, maybe once, an iota of sentiment, a concession to decency, and that was in an episode called "The Bubble Boy," where Elaine chides an emotionless Jerry that it is more important to visit and entertain a homebound, bubble-encased kid with an immune deficiency than it is for Jerry to proceed with his long-planned vacation. The show would never violate the "no hugging, no learning" rule set down by producers Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld, along with their aim to do everything differently than all other sitcoms. There was never once a "Very Special Seinfeld." No pandering to phony sentiment. I won't go into the myriad reasons why I think Seinfeld is the best sitcom, but there is one particular quality about it that separates it from the rest of the pack, something that allowed it to NEVER jump the shark. In the meantime, I've gotten hold of several seasons worth of DVDs of the show and really hunkered down to watch them. Would I have said that with such certainty only a few short months ago? Her name was Kathleen Creighton, but she went by ‘Casey’, presumably a reference to her initials.Was Seinfeld, as the subtitle of this book posits, the greatest sitcom ever? Kathleen was well known on one of the earliest online communities, The Well (her WELL username was ‘casey’). She was the BBS/online service reviewer for the San Francisco Bay Area computer newspaper MicroTimes, and a contributor to WIRED magazine’s Street Cred section. And, she was a tech savvy online pioneer who staked a digital claim on the domain name ‘’ when she registered it in August of 1994. It was a time when the word, domain, would for many first bring to mind an episode of Seinfeld which added ‘master of my domain’ into our modern lexicon. But speak of an internet ‘domain name’, and you’d likely draw a blank stare. That’s what writer Joshua Quittner found and reported in his October ‘94 WIRED magazine article “ Billions Registered ”, in which he described the surprising number of Fortune 500 companies who had not registered their domain names, many of which had no idea what a domain name was or why they would want one. To demonstrate his point, Quittner registered the domain ‘’ in the process of educating the McDonalds Corporation what it was and why they should care. He ended that article inviting readers to email him at to offer suggestions on what he should do with the domain. He eventually relinquished it to McDonalds in return for a $3,500 donation to a Brooklyn school for computers and internet access. Sadly, Kathleen Creighton passed away just a few months after she registered ‘’, before she ever had an opportunity to make any use of it. There was no web site, no email addresses, just a WHOIS registration record with a contact name and email address to whom my inquires went unanswered. When I next sent my inquiry to the technical contact on the registration record, they informed me of Kathleen’s recent demise, and transferred the domain to me. Master of my domain seinfeld episode registration# I had just happened to be the next ‘Casey’ who was interested in staking the same digital claim that Kathleen had, and the domain became mine. Was I lucky? If so, it’s always come with the sad reminder that it came from somebody’s passing.
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