Might I mention Google has seemingly taken the side of the cybersquatter in the continuing battle over disinfotainmenttoday.com? Any internet queries to my old domain name are simply redirected to a placeholding page at for domains with no site. I posted all the same material to a new domain name, dareland.com, but Google won't switch the links. Only the material at disinfotainmenttoday.com comes up in a search, despite the fact that every one of those pages clearly points to a generic page while all the actual material someone might be searching for resides at dareland.com.
You'd think there would be a simple solution, just aim the searches to where the material actually is, but there's a catch, or more accurately, a cache. Google tries to limit mirror sites by comparing all new sites to all old sites already indexed in their cache. If the content is substantially the same, it's decreed a "mirror" site of something already indexed, so it doesn't get indexed. In other words Google won't index dareland.com as long as the material there is substantially the same as the material already indexed from disinfotainmenttoday.com, even though it was cached from an address that no longer exists. It's like your mailman continuing to deliver your mail to your old address, only in this case you can't just kill them.
There's no simple solution at Google. No button you can push. You've got to leave it up to their robots to figure it out, and yeah, I do mean employees.
Ever try to get Google to update their cache? Yeah, man, that's my primary gripe of the week. You jump through every hoop to get indexed by those bastards but there are no hoops to jump through to get UN-indexed. There's simply no way to get searchers pointed in the right direction once a decision has been made by the almighty cache, blessed be its holy name, Indiana Jones and the Cache of Google, what can I do? Sneak in there at night and fiddle with their settings?
Christ I hope you're not following this. It appears I have to go back and rewrite myself, absolutely everything I've ever written, most of which has already been indexed, TO A CERTAIN DEGREE, before Google will acknowledge my new existence at Dareland.
To what degree? They won't say. Industrial secret, how Google works, don'tcha know.
sing it with me brothers...
It sucks to be a member of the bourgeoisie
But it's the mighty cache of Google that's killing me.
When I try to be a mensch to everyone I see
It's still the mighty cache of Google that's killing me.
Google has everything I've ever posted to the net in its cache, but anyone looking for the material is directed to a blank page instead of the actual material, which is completely available, albeit somewhere else, which is another good name for a column. I could write a column called "Albeit Somewhere Else" in seconds flat if I weren't so busy re-fucking-writing all my old material just enough to be indexed by Google, then reposting the old version after the indexing, which still won't get rid of all the bad links to nowhere.
The only potential beneficiary would seem to be Godaddy, who get all those hits from people looking for me, some of whom presumably go Hey, forget about my search for the story of Margie Schoedinger, I want to buy a domain name from Godaddy. These fictional characters forget all about me, which isn't really good business. I can't think of a single business that has thrived by convincing it's customers to forget all about them.
But Godaddy also hosts dareland.com. They've already got all the material, so either way they got you. They won't let Google redirect it since only the domain name owner can change the DNS numbers, and Google refuses to acknowledge the site is down as long as the DNS numbers point SOMEWHERE, albeit just a page of ads from Godaddy, who believe in the sanctity of ownership, which is why I'm using them, hoping they'll protect my sanctity the same way they're protecting the cyberputz who owns disinfotainmenttoday.com. There's no budging Godaddy, and that's a good thing, so the only real enemy to easy access to the dens of Dare is Google.
Why does this mean so much? My whole scheme to find my missing daughter was that some day she'd look herself up in Google and find this, but now if she looks herself up in Google, she'll either end up at Godaddy, or worse, Google's cache of a page that's clearly about her but no longer links to me. This is where the National Enquirer would go back up and delete that clever headline, replacing it with "Google Prevents Man From Finding Daughter in a Dispute with a Cybersquatter."
All I need is a hit song that goes something like this, to the tune of Dinah Blow Your Horn.
Google change your cache
Google change your cache
Google change your cache for me-e-e.
Google change your cache
Google change your cache
Google change your cache for me.
Someone's gotta stick it to Google
Stick it in a place I know-ow-ow-ow
Someone's gotta stick it to Google
Stick it where the sun don't show
My crystal ball says the fates have decreed that I should be difficult to find. Is it my daughter's cosmic task to become internet savvy before contacting me? The troll at the gate, what the hell, let's go ahead and call it Googlegate, three questions before you can enter: what's your name, what's your favorite color, and are you tenacious enough to dig deeper and actually find your father?
Any way you arrange my daughter's three names before searching for them, the number one spot that comes up at Google for Nisa Paris Dare is at disinfotainmenttoday.com, which was my plan, but which no longer exists, so let's say I simply replace my daughter's file at dareland.com with something completely different. Google will index it since it's completely different from the other file, then I change the file back to the original, and they eventually cache it. Since there's no way to get them to delete the bad link, at least the new one would come in at number two. Here are some stupid questions: Would this ridiculous scheme work? What the hell else can I do?
The whole bible can be fixed with only four words, "sometimes it's as though." Add the phrase "sometimes it's as though" to anything in the bible and, voila, it makes total sense without your ever having to drop your common sense and believe in anything supernatural. Sometimes it's as though the world were created for man. Sometimes it's as though woman came from man, giving him power he doesn't actually have since man clearly comes from woman. Sometimes it's as though there were someone watching over us and sometimes it's as though we're totally abandoned. Sometimes it's as though there were immutable rules to live by. Sometimes it's as though chaos rules the day. Sometimes it's as though there were humans with special powers not granted the rest of us. Sometimes it's as though this is heaven. Sometimes it's as though this is hell.
Sometimes it's as though there were a whole new definition of God -anything beyond human understanding. As soon as we understand it, it's no longer God. If someone asks if you believe in God, ask yourself if you believe there's anything beyond your understanding, at least at the moment, and the answer's gotta be yeah, of course. The very question is beyond human understanding. Is there a God? Hah! You're asking ME? As if I would know. No one knows. But if you define God as everything you don't know, then there sure as hell is a God because chances are you don't know shit. And the less you know, the bigger God is, which is why so many fundamentalists are the most ignorant assholes on the planet. The deeper your devotion to God, the greater your ignorance, and the deeper your devotion to current understanding, the greater your knowledge. This is something I know, so I know it isn't God, just me, making shit up as I go along, trying to accurately reflect my own experience against the carnival mirror of what's around me. Just because you look funny in a carnival mirror doesn't mean you ARE funny. If your thoughts are a pinball, you better keep your hands on the flippers or your whole motivation will go down the wrong hole. Sometimes five balls aren't enough, sometimes one lasts forever.
"The men the American public admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth."
- H.L. Mencken -
"The only distinction between Bush and Gore is the velocity with which their knees hit the floor when big corporations knock on the door."
- Ralph Nader -
"People see what they believe, not vice versa, when it comes to social injustice.
"And this mind-altering trick of perception keeps moral outrage at bay, especially among the rich, a new psychological study suggests.
"By reducing outrage, this mental hoodwink also impedes social change because it inhibits people from taking action, allowing injustices to persist, said lead researcher Cheryl Wakslak of New York University.
"Research has shown that people become emotionally distressed when confronted with inequality. The privileged minority is particularly affected, and they are likely to have a nagging worry that their cash and prizes are undeserved.
"To keep a clean conscience and legitimize privilege, individuals often alter their perceptions of the status quo.
"The details of how that mental distortion provides the relief, however, remained a mystery until now."
"Give me the Justice Department, Entertainment Division."
- Richard Dawson as Damon Killian in The Running Man -
"The goal of all inanimate objects is to resist man and ultimately defeat him."
- Russell Baker -
"Those who flee temptation generally leave a forwarding address."
- Lane Olinghouse -
"Men are not against you; they are merely for themselves."
- Gene Fowler -
"I am waiting for a good movie about me."
- the Zodiac Killer in his last known letter to the San Francisco Chronicle in 1978 -
"Some Seattle school children are being told to be skeptical of private property rights. This lesson is being taught by banning Legos.
"A ban was initiated at the Hilltop Children's Center in Seattle. According to an article in the winter 2006-07 issue of 'Rethinking Schools' magazine, the teachers at the private school wanted their students to learn that private property ownership is evil.
"According to the article, the students had been building an elaborate 'Legotown,' but it was accidentally demolished. The teachers decided its destruction was an opportunity to explore 'the inequities of private ownership.' According to the teachers, 'Our intention was to promote a contrasting set of values: collectivity, collaboration, resource-sharing, and full democratic participation.'
"The children were allegedly incorporating into Legotown 'their assumptions about ownership and the social power it conveys.' These assumptions 'mirrored those of a class-based, capitalist society - a society that we teachers believe to be unjust and oppressive.'
"They claimed as their role shaping the children's 'social and political understandings of ownership and economic equity ... from a perspective of social justice.'
"So they first explored with the children the issue of ownership. Not all of the students shared the teachers' anathema to private property ownership. 'If I buy it, I own it,' one child is quoted saying. The teachers then explored with the students concepts of fairness, equity, power, and other issues over a period of several months.
"At the end of that time, Legos returned to the classroom after the children agreed to several guiding principles framed by the teachers, including that 'All structures are public structures' and 'All structures will be standard sizes.'"
"As part of sweeping economic restructuring implemented by the Bush Administration in Iraq, Iraqi farmers will no longer be permitted to save their seeds. Instead, they will be forced to buy seeds from US corporations which can include seeds the Iraqis themselves developed over hundreds of years. That is because in recent years, transnational corporations have patented and now own many seed varieties originated or developed by indigenous peoples. In a short time, Iraq will be living under the new American credo: Pay Monsanto, or starve.
"A new report by GRAIN and Focus on the Global South has found that new legislation in Iraq has been carefully put in place by the US that prevents farmers from saving their seeds and effectively hands over the seed market to transnational corporations. This is a disastrous turn of events for Iraqi farmers, biodiversity and the country's food security. While political sovereignty remains an illusion, food sovereignty for the Iraqi people has been made near impossible by these new regulations.
"The US has been imposing patents on life around the world through trade deals. In this case, they invaded the country first, then imposed their patents. 'This is both immoral and unacceptable,' said Shalini Bhutani, one of the reports authors."
"While companies claim GM [genetically modified] crops will feed the world in fact they are largely irrelevant to ending hunger: around the world they are driven by commercial interests, not a concern to 'feed the world' or raise productivity. The real challenge is poverty eradication; land reform; water conservation; and increasing production by promoting mixed, low chemical-use farming which favours naturally improved and locally adapted plants."
"If a man be gracious to strangers, it shows that he is a citizen of the world, and his heart is no island, cut off from other islands, but a continent that joins them."
- Francis Bacon -
"Literature is news that stays news." - Ezra Pound -
"If this is coffee, please bring me some tea; but if this is tea, please bring me some coffee."
- Abraham Lincoln -
"A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle." - Erin Majors -
"Our sensors can pick up normal life functions, but what about abnormal life function?"
Disinfotainment Today is apparently for free and seems to appear weekly. Go ahead, reproduce it daily, I dare you. Go ye forth and cut and paste and see where it gets you. Disinfotainment Today consists of information from oodles of sources, cut up, thrown in the air, and trod upon, just like my life, just like yours, just like America. Everything is everywhere, so I apologize if you're seeing the same thing twice, unless you like it, in which case good for me. If you see something that you feel should be attributed to you, or if you think I actually OWE you anything, please accept the fact that much of everything that everybody does is unacknowledgeable, and if everyone had to seek permission from all their influences, artistic progress would grind to a standstill. Legally, it's either satire or fair use, but should you be thinking of suing me over something, you should know it wasn't actually me who did it, it was someone else, unless you're Bill Hicks, in which case you're dead so what difference does it make?
I agree with Anji Murphy completely about Ann Coulter being a total nut job.
I'd like to add one more question.
Has anyone ever HAD SEX with her?
Or better: Will anyone ADMIT to having sex with her?
She's said several times in the past she can't get a date. Guys are intimidated by her.
I can't recall ever seeing her actually being connected to anyone besides a gossip column wink-wink posting that she
was seen 'canoodling' with someone.
If her so-called 'stalkers' are so numerous maybe they could lasso their energies into a potential sequel to the 'Crying Game'
and call it: Ann Coulter: A Crying Shame
Bill Maher: Philip Perry, Treasonous Fucker (huffingtonpost.com)
Five years after 9/11, you figure our government would have already solved the obvious security concerns, like protecting our chemical plants or keeping razors away from Britney. But we've failed miserably. Why? Meet Philip Perry.
Eric Alva: Don't Ask, Don't Tell: From the Inside Out (huffingtonpost.com)
Soon after combat began in Iraq, I was in charge of 11 U.S. Marines on a logistical convoy when I stepped on an Iraqi landmine outside my Humvee vehicle and became the first American wounded in the Iraq War. The explosion was so powerful it blew me to the ground ten feet away and took off part of my right leg. I can still remember the ringing in my ears from the blast. ... To be honest, each time I was commended on my courage, I couldn't help but remember how scared I was that I would be found out as gay and kicked out of the military.
Savage's abrupt "Wake up": CAA reportedly dumps radio host following Etheridge smears (mediamatters.org)
Hollywood's Creative Artists Agency has reportedly dropped its representation of radio host Michael Savage two days after announcing that it had signed him as a client. CAA's dumping of Savage followed a rant on February 26, documented by Media Matters for America, over singer Melissa Etheridge's Academy Awards acceptance speech, in which she thanked her wife. Savage said, "I don't like a woman married to a woman. It makes me want to puke. I want to vomit when I hear it. I think it's child abuse."
Benjamin Radford: Pseudoscience on TV: Weak Investigations (livescience.com)
Throughout the series, the team's actions bear little resemblance to any sort of real scientific investigation. According to the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, investigate means "to study by close examination and systematic inquiry." Judging by the episodes that have aired, the examination is not close, nor is the inquiry systematic. It is instead a hodgepodge of half-baked, unscientific experiments and studies with no clear purpose or protocol. It is, in short, pseudoscience.
NOAM COHEN: A Contributor to Wikipedia Has His Fictional Side (nytimes.com)
In a blink, the wisdom of the crowd became the fury of the crowd. In the last few days, contributors to Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia, have turned against one of their own who was found to have created an elaborate false identity.
How to make a surrealist film (film.guardian.co.uk)
Grab a giant seashell, send for a rotting donkey, and don't forget to press your dinner jacket ... Peter Bradshaw and Andrew Gilchrist offer 10 tips for any budding Buñuels.
Everything is copy (books.guardian.co.uk)
Bestselling novelist, Oscar-nominated director and razor-sharp hack, Nora Ephron has always used her life as material. Now, with typically grim humour, she is tackling growing older. Interview by Emma Brockes.
0:28 Illuminar, the device to blind you from the truth
1:18 The White House
1:40 The 9/11 divide
2:05 The Illuminati star
2:05 The 666 bar code stripes
1.50 before he pulls down the newspaper the lower half of the screen forms
a pyramid (womans arm is the left side, right side is the skirt of the
waiter + wrinkeled newspaper), the yellow dot seems to resemble the eye on
top of the pyramid.
Notice also the weird position of her hand?
Dallas Raines, the weatherman on KABC, just said this was the driest winter on record.
Tonight, Tuesday:
CBS begins the night with a RERUN'NCIS', followed by a RERUN'The Unit', then '48 Hours'.
On a RERUNDave (from 1/17/07) are Tina Fey, Terri and Bindi Irwin.
Scheduled on a FRESHCraig are Poppy Montgomery, Jeremy Roenick, and Paul Morrissey.
NBC starts the night with 'Dateline', followed by a RERUN'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit', then another RERUN'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit'.
On a RERUNLeno (from 1/29/07) are Bill Cosby, Mary Lynn Rajskub, and Katharine McPhee.
On a RERUNConan (from 5/24/06) are Hugh Jackman, Tim Russert, and Gnarls Barkley.
On a RERUNCarson Daly (from 1/11/07) are Rob Corddry and Chingy.
ABC opens the night with a RERUN'America's So-Called Funniest Home Videos', followed by 'Primetime', then a RERUN'Boston Legal'.
On a RERUNJimmy Kimmel (from 2/14/07) are Clay Aiken, Gabrielle Union, and Madeleine Peyroux.
The CW offers a FRESH'Gilmore Girls', followed by the SERIES PREMIERE'Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search For The Next Pussy'.
Faux has a FRESH'American Idol', followed by a FRESH'The Wedding Bells'.
MY has a FRESH'Wicked Wicked Games', followed by a FRESH'Watch Over Me'.
A&E has 'CSI: The 2nd One', another 'CSI: The 2nd One', 'Dog The Bounty Hunter', another 'Dog The Bounty Hunter', still another 'Dog The Bounty Hunter', and yet another 'Dog The Bounty Hunter'.
AMC offers the movie 'Carrie', followed by the movie 'Dead Calm', then the movie 'Original Sin'.
BBC -
[1:00 PM] As Time Goes By - Episode 2;
[1:40 PM] My Hero - Ep. 1 Christmas;
[2:20 PM] Keeping Up Appearances - Episode 2;
[3:00 PM] The Benny Hill Show - Episode 54;
[4:00 PM] The Saint - Ep. 10 Where the Money Is;
[5:00 PM] The Avengers - Ep. 16 Who's Who?;
[6:00 PM] Cash in the Attic - Episode 9;
[7:00 PM] Cash in the Attic - Ep 20 Larsen-Edgar;
[8:00 PM] Whose Line Is It Anyway? - Episode 14;
[8:30 PM] Whose Line Is It Anyway? - Episode 6;
[9:00 PM] Eddie Izzard: Definite Article - Eddie Izzard: Definite Article;
[10:00 PM] Robin Hood - Ep 1 Will You Tolerate This?;
[11:00 PM] Whose Line Is It Anyway? - Episode 8;
[11:30 PM] Whose Line Is It Anyway? - Episode 10;
[12:00 AM] The Benny Hill Show - Episode 53;
[1:00 AM] Robin Hood - Ep 1 Will You Tolerate This?;
[2:00 AM] Eddie Izzard: Definite Article - Eddie Izzard: Definite Article;
[3:00 AM] Rocketman - Episode 1;
[4:00 AM] Rocketman - Episode 2;
[5:00 AM] Rocketman - Episode 3;
[6:00 AM] BBC World News - BBC World News. (ALL TIMES EST)
Comedy Central has 'Scrubs', another 'Scrubs', last night's 'Jon Stewart', last night's 'Colbert Report', 'Mind Of Mencia', 'South Park', and 'Jim Gaffigan: Beyond The Pale'. .
Scheduled on a FRESHJon Stewart is Richard Jadick.
Scheduled on a FRESHColbert Report is Mark Frauenfelder.
FX has the movie 'The Tansporter', followed by the movie 'Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story', and a FRESH'Dirt'. .
History has 'Worlds Biggest Machines 3', 'Barbarians', 'Ancisnt Discoveries', and another 'Barbarians'.
IFC -
[06:10 AM] ¡Yo Soy Boricua, Pa'que Tu Lo Sepas!;
[07:40 AM] Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss;
[09:15 AM] The Invisible Circus;
[10:55 AM] A Decade Under The Influence: Part 1;
[11:55 AM] A Decade Under The Influence: Part 2;
[12:55 PM] A Decade Under The Influence: Part 3;
[01:45 PM] ¡Yo Soy Boricua, Pa'que Tu Lo Sepas!;
[03:20 PM] Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss;
[05:00 PM] IFC News Special;
[05:15 PM] A Decade Under The Influence: Part 1;
[06:15 PM] A Decade Under The Influence: Part 2;
[07:15 PM] The Last Days of Chez Nous;
[09:00 PM] The Field;
[11:00 PM] The Children of Heaven;
[12:35 AM] Cry, the Beloved Country;
[02:30 AM] The Field;
[04:25 AM] The Children of Heaven;
[05:55 AM] Billy's Hollywood Screen Kiss. (ALL TIMES EST)
SciFi has 'Stargate SG-1', another 'Stargate SG-1', still another 'Stargate SG-1', and 'ECW'.
Sundance -
[07:00 AM] Inheritance: A Fisherman's Story;
[08:15 AM] Assisted Living;
[09:30 AM] Portrait of a Bookstore as an Old Man;
[10:30 AM] Fried Green Tomatoes;
[12:45 PM] Omagh;
[02:30 PM] Molly and Mobarak;
[04:00 PM] The Proposition;
[06:00 PM] One Punk Under God: Episode 6;
[06:30 PM] Swinging: Season 1: Episode 101;
[07:00 PM] Omagh;
[08:45 PM] Assisted Living;
[10:00 PM] Ellie Parker;
[11:45 PM] Fried Green Tomatoes;
[02:00 AM] Swinging: Season 1: Episode 101;
[02:30 AM] Jude;
[04:35 AM] See The Sea;
[05:30 AM] The Proposition. (ALL TIMES EST)
Les Paul, who is credited with inventing the solid-body electric guitar, has donated $50,000 to his Wisconsin hometown.
Paul has contributed $25,000 to a local museum that is planning an exhibit honoring the 91-year-old Grammy winner. The other $25,000 was given to a hospital that served his family over the years, officials announced last week.
The Waukesha County Historical Society & Museum, which is raising money for the Les Paul exhibit, announced the combined $50,000 in donations. The museum had raised about $1 million by last summer toward its goal of $4 million.
Paul, who was born in Waukesha, now lives in New Jersey. He has donated many artifacts and memorabilia for the planned exhibit.
A rock archive Web site is fighting back against a copyright lawsuit brought by some of music's most notable classic rock acts, dragging two major record labels into the battle.
In December, Led Zeppelin, the Grateful Dead, Santana and the Doors sued Wolfgang's Vault claiming that the Bill Sagan-owned Web site violates intellectual property rights by selling merchandise and streaming concert archives belonging to the musicians.
In response, Wolfgang's Vault attorney Michael Elkin recently filed a 40-page counterclaim against the musicians and their labels, Sony BMG and Warner Music Group.
It also alleges that the two record companies unsuccessfully sought to negotiate licenses to the concert footage, and when that was not possible, "conspired with each other to concoct fictitious legal claims in an effort to appropriate for themselves the use of musical recordings through an abuse of this judicial process."
The singer of the group Deep Purple, Ian Gillan (L), and guitar player Steve Morse perform during their concert in Tirana March 4, 2007. Picture taken March 4, 2007.
Photo by Arben Celi
Jerry Springer is taking on another TV show. "The Jerry Springer Show" host and "Dancing with the Stars" alum will be the new frontman of "America's Got Talent," NBC's Craig Plestis announced Monday.
Springer is "the perfect ringmaster" for the TV talent competition, Plestis said in a statement. "To say the least, he is known for presiding over an unpredictable show where the unexpected is the typical order of each day."
Regis Philbin hosted the show during its premiere season last year. The New York-based star of "Live with Regis and Kelly" opted not to return to "America's Got Talent" because of the "heavy travel schedule" involved with the show's tapings in Los Angeles.
The US military in Afghanistan Monday defended the erasing of media photographs and video after an incident which left up to 10 civilians dead, saying this was allowed in "extreme circumstances."
Photographers and cameramen working for international and Afghan media said soldiers deleted footage of a site in eastern Nangarhar province where US troops opened fire after an ambush.
Afghan officials say 10 civilians were killed. The US-led coalition says eight died in the ambush and subsequent return fire, but has not admitted outright to causing civilian deaths.
The journalists had gone beyond a security perimeter and had been asked to remove their images to "protect the integrity of the investigation," he said, adding that the scene may have been altered before they arrived.
As far as "CSI: Miami," "Dexter" and "Nip/Tuck" are concerned, it is. All three shows, set in Miami, have filmed in the southern California port city as well as at other locations in and around Los Angeles. "We go to Long Beach all the time," "Dexter" executive producer Clyde Phillips said.
One of the challenges posed by shooting in Los Angeles are the hills that appear in shots of the horizon. Shooting in Long Beach eliminates that problem. The productions also have found that the beaches in the area can mimic Florida's, complete with office buildings near the waterfront.
Scott Wade transforms the dusty rear window of one of his vehicles into a work of art, Sunday, Feb. 25, 2007, at his home in San Marcos, Texas.
Photo by Eric Gay
64-year-old former teen idol Fabian was riding with his manager and daughter near Palm Desert on Friday night when a car sideswiped their vehicle and it rolled several times, Fabian's spokesman, Steve Moyer, said in a statement released late Sunday.
Fabian and his daughter, Julia Forte, were examined and released. His manager, Oscar Arslanian, was taken to a hospital for scalp lacerations and blood loss. He was expected to make a full recovery, Moyer said.
On Saturday, Fabian was performing at the Spotlight Casino along with Frankie Avalon and Lou Christie when he fell off the stage. He suffered a scrape to his chin, said Paul Speirs, a casino spokesman.
He will rejoin Avalon and Bobby Rydell for several shows in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Four big U.S. radio station owners have agreed to pay $12.5 million to settle investigations by the Federal Communications Commission into whether they received secret payments to play certain songs, sources familiar with the situation said on Monday.
They also separately agreed to set aside 4,200 hours of free radio time for independent musicians, the sources said.
Clear Channel Communications Inc., CBS Corp., Citadel Broadcasting Corp. and Entercom Communications Corp. have agreed to pay a total of $12.5 million, the largest fine collectively levied against the industry.
"(The FCC) is looking at a $12.5 million monetary contribution, no admission of guilt," said one FCC official, who said the five commissioners that vote on agency rulings could make a decision as early as this week.
A veterinarian feeds a baby Crowned Sifaka lemur named Tilavo on Friday, March 2, 2007 at the Vincennes zoo, east of Paris, France. Tilavo is one of the two baby lemurs born in the zoo in the beginning of January as part of a European breeding programme handled by the zoo. He must be fed artificially because the mother has problems nursing him. The zoo owns 10 lemurs out of the 20 living in captivity around the world. According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, the Propithecus verreauxi coronatus population, which lives in northwestern Madagascar, may be betweeen 100 and 1,000, and is categorized as 'Critically Endangered' due to habitat loss or degradation from agriculture/livestock and wood harvesting.
Photo by Michael Sawyer
Almost as soon he was sprung from jail by a radio station's money, Bobby Brown and Hot 99.5 FM bailed on the deal.
The 38-year-old R&B singer spent three nights in a Massachusetts jail last week for failing to pay child support. He was released after the station paid the $19,150 he owed on the condition that Brown appear on "The Kane Show" for a week. He was to discuss the case and how he could turn his life around during studio appearances beginning Monday.
But Brown backed out of an on-air phone interview with the morning show Friday, saying he hadn't agreed to be an employee of the station.
Both the station, which broadcasts in the Washington area, and Brown's attorney decided the deal wasn't in the singer's best interest and that Brown will return the money.
A television photographer who was fired for urinating in a cemetery while covering the funeral of an Iowa soldier was denied unemployment benefits. Gerry Edwards, of Center Point, was dismissed in December by KGAN-TV in Cedar Rapids.
In November, Edwards urinated near a monument at a cemetery while he was there covering the funeral procession for 23-year-old Sgt. James Musack, of Riverside, who was killed in Iraq, court records said.
Another journalist photographed the incident, and it was e-mailed to Edwards' managers. Records said officials escorted Edwards out of the building within hours and gave him a choice of resigning or being fired.
The administrative law judge who heard Edwards' appeal for unemployment benefits said the act of urinating at the cemetery was disrespectful, unprofessional and offensive.
A girl reacts after being smeared with colored powder during Holi celebrations in Mumbai, India, Saturday, March 3, 2007. Holi, the Hindu festival of colors, also heralds the coming of spring.
Photo by Gautam Singh
In early February, the lead story on CNN.com - "the most trusted name in news" - was about tattooed fish.
Emblazoned on the website was a large picture of a fish with some kind of design on its belly. I don't have fish but if I ever wanted any, I'd probably get that fish. It looked pretty cool.
Here's the problem, though: Surely there were more important things happening in the world. I think there is a war going on somewhere. Is Social Security fixed yet?
Don't get me wrong. I like oddball news as much as anyone. In fact, I make a decent living showcasing a daily collection of silly news, offbeat items, and real news with amusing headlines on my website, Fark.com, which attracts 3.5 million unique visitors each month. What's scary, though, is that the ratio of filler news to real news is now so high that the content of Fark and major news websites is often nearly identical. That should never happen because, in theory, mass media outlets are staffed by full-time, serious journalists who have better things to do.
Asian small-clawed otters play in their enclosure at the National Zoo in Washington March 3, 2007. The otters' natural habitats are in parts of China, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam and Indonesia.
Photo by Jim Bourg
You have reached the Home page of BartCop Entertainment.
Make yourself home, take your shoes off...
Go ahead, scratch it if it itches.
The idea is to have fun.
Do you have something to say?
Anything that increased your blood pressure, or, even better,
amused or entertained?
Do you have a great album no one's heard?
How about a favorite TV show, movie, book, play, cartoon, or legal amusement?
A popular artist that just plain pisses you off?
A box set the whole world should own?
Vile, filthy rumors about Republican musicians?
Just plain vile, filthy rumors?
This is your place.
