News

This is a little idea I'm trying out, inspired by my favorite Denver radio station. A little bit of comedic news that hopefully manages to have some humor. Not sure if I'll do it every Friday, but I'll give it a shot for now.

Piece 1

Wal Mart once again tries to use every avenue possible in order to bolster their sales by opening a MySpace-esque "social networking" site called "The Hub", where teens can create their own pages and upload videos of themselves. Of course, the entire operation is really just a marketing scheme, a way to get kids to film personal videos to make into commercials, as well as an oppurtunity to gain precious market research. Too bad it is all done in classic Wal Mart fashion. Content is screened and censored, users cannot email each other, and the entire site is a white businessman's attempt at "cool". It is unsurprising that Wal Mart would fail to see why this is the wrong way of doing things. After all, sites like MySpace are popular because of their wealth of lyrics, tons of free music, and sexually explicit/incriminating photographs. Nor is it a shock to see the entire project is a giant advertisemnet. What is a little strange is that the site contains such lines as "I'll school my way by looking hot in my Wal-Mart clothes to school to catch a cute boy's eye. ..." Ignore the fact that the sentence isn't gramatically correct, and realize that Wal Mart is trying even harder to align their clothing with the hip and coolest of kids. I guess no one in the company read the bottom line of this article which describes a 14 year old girl blowing her monthly $150 clothing budget at Abercrombie, which of course is only practice for four years from now, when she'll spend triple that amount on alcohol, cigarettes and birth control.

I predict the Hub will die after September and will never return. The floor is open for betting folks.


Piece 2

Denver and surrounding areas are choking on smog. Oh sure, it may look like pristine mountains and plains surrounding the city and its neighboring towns, but it looks like they're about break the record for summer ozone alerts. It just goes to show you that Denver can try all they want, and suceed, to ban smoking in public areas, yet they're still all going to die. Smoke 'em if you got 'em.

Piece 3

Australia is facing a massive surplus of grapes, resulting in huge amounts of unsold wine, with a liter being sold for cheaper than water. Anyone who goes or went to Loyola College knows how strong our study abroad program is, but this news will send it right down the crapper. Upon returning in the fall I expect no emails to study abroad, only ones with the subject "get loaded in Melbourne", as half the campus ships out for the same country. As for the rest of us, we will remain in Baltimore laughing our asses off, because Natty Light is still cheaper.


And today's Miracle Baby....

An ex Navy Quarterback is accused of rape, and the man's defense was that it was "sex gone bad". After the carnival that was the Duke Lacrosse trial, this is the kind of story where you can't be sure which person is telling the truth. Guess we'll have to leave it to karma. If he's innocent, may he get through unscathed. If guilty, then it won't be long before he heads to jail and sees what "sex gone bad" really means. Never in my life would I have guessed that a college kid would use a joke college euphemism in a court trial for rape. Crazier things have happened I suppose.