I’d like to come out of the closet. For a long time I have hidden my affection and it’s time to admit it. I am…a Michael Jackson fan. I don’t really care about his personal life; he’s a bit of a freak but I don’t obsess over it. However, he is an outstanding artist. I don’t think anybody can deny that he’s a great performer - he has unquestionable talent as a singer and dancer, and he puts on a damn good show. He’s unbelievably creative - downright brilliant when it comes to his music videos. Smooth Criminal, Remember the Time - he’s a showman. There’s a reason Thriller is the top-selling album by a single artist of all time…because it’s GOOD.

The hyperbaric chamber, the intimate relations with kiddies, the plastic surgery, the skin recoloring, the chimpanzee - yeah, I know he’s a weirdo. But I like his music and his videos, and that’s that.

I was checking out the new Google Patents service, which is a much improved interface over the one offered by the USPTO, and which I’d heard about via Googling Google. I was also looking at information about the onstage 45-degree lean performed by Michael Jackson and his dancers during concerts featuring the song “Smooth Criminal” - it’s a damn cool move, one that was done in the original video with wires. (Up until I read this article, I had assumed they just had hyper-developed muscles from so much dancing - I didn’t realize it was faked!) To perform it onstage, Michael Jackson developed a special device, which received U.S. Patent 5255452 in 1992 - “Means and method for creating anti-gravity illusion.”

So I thought “hmm, has the King of Pop created any other patents?” I searched for Michael Jackson and got far too many results, so I figured I’d put his name as it was shown in the Anti-Gravity Illusion patent: Michael J. Jackson. The first hit was for that very patent. The second was for: Internal nasal implant. Yes, this entire post was an elaborate joke about Michael Jackson’s nose. I just had to share my amusement.