How to get on the OBO/MBM
Mac Millings bites the hand that birthed him
As you’re here, there’s a good chance you have also visited Guardian Football, a decent site which, much like nostalgia, wanking and this article already, isn’t what it used to be.
Perhaps you’ve visited the football blogs. If not, allow me to describe: commenting there is precisely like shouting a pointless opinion about football in a crowded pub, only without the comfort of alcohol or the exquisite thrill that comes with the potential for being a victim of casual violence. (The cricket blogs, on the other hand, are just like going to a county cricket match – willfully eccentric, desperately unimportant, and there are only ever about 30 people there.)
If you’ve been to the blogs, then you’ve probably followed a Guardian Minute-by-Minute report (or MBM, as it is “popularly” known). The MBM is a purely 21st Century phenomenon, but only in the sense that this happens to be the 21st Century. 2011, it is, and we’re reading text-based commentary. Teletext with user feedback. Ceefax 2.0.
Still, there you are, trying to avoid doing something worthwhile. You see other people emailing in. You’re more insightful than them – and much funnier – and you want people to know. And why not? It’s about time your genius was recognized, and it’s going to be at least 6 months before your screenplay/novel/book of anguished poetry is going to be ready for you to think about sending in to publishers before shelving it because you know they just won’t get it.
You’re in luck. Millings is here. (Savour those two sentences. You’ll never see them adjacent again.) The MBM is easy to infiltrate, and there are several approaches:
The “Gary Naylor”
Gary Naylor is the Old Faithfulof football insight, expelling his wisdom with regularity – a porn star’s cock of soccer sapience, if you will, spurting silky gobs of acumen on request, with minimal fluffing required. You can watch his DVDs read his comments all you like, you’ll never be half the man he is. He’s the late-Old-Testament God of MBMs – he doesn’t walk amongst mortals as much as He used to, but you’re always aware of His presence.
How, then, do you use Him to get onto an MBM? Treat Him as any 21st Century Guardian reader would and deny His existence. A simple “Who is this Gary Naylor?/He’s on every MBM, can he possibly be real?/You realize, don’t you, that your entire readership, including Gary Naylor, is the invention of an under-medicated basement dwelling netgimp?” gets you straight on, every time. Yes, you’ll look like an unimaginative first-timer, but micro-celebrity beckons. Do you want your name published on the text-based pseudo-commentary arm of a major global website and its literally threes of readers, or don’t you?
Alternatively, you might mock him. I could link you to upwards of 200 MBMs into which I have insinuated myself by this technique alone. But I won’t because then I’d look like I was obsessed with the man, which this close-to-500-words about him clearly show I am not.
But if you must, you can still try to be him. I have done so successfully once, but it’s not something I suggest you try at home. For a start, if you are to e-impersonate him with any degree of accuracy, all of your emails must contain a link to one of your self-penned articles, meaning that you’d better get working. Recent estimates suggest that the collected works of Gary Naylor make up approximately 82% of all web content.
Puns
Any pun – literally, ANY pun – will get you onto an MBM. It doesn’t matter how bad they are; in fact, the worse the better. Is there a Global Pandemic in the news? You’ll need to write to Scott Murray about Plague Bellamy (or to Andy Bull on the OBO about Quarantino Best). Perhaps there’s been a scandal over a sexist commentator. Sounds like there’s a hint of Misojohnny Metgod in the air. Scan the team sheets. Is Fabrice Pancrate playing in the midweek Euro Tin Pot game? Then Rob Smyth is dying to hear your pancreas/spleen/gall bladder gags. And if Emmanuel Pogatetz is on the pitch, things are about to go Pogatetz-up. They have for me. On three separate MBMs.
Write under a pseudonym
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