Nate Silver started writing about how wrong polls were in a little Daily Kos diary, and lo and behold, he ended up predicting the primaries better than anyone! Then all the pros were like, who is this kid? When he revealed himself as a Baseball Prospectus writer, a very thin slice of stat geeks were all like, "ZOMG unbelievably awesome!"

Imagine if you found out that Richard Lawson had been selected as the new announcer on Monday Night Football. That's the level of thing that I'm talking about here, people.

So of course New York did a big story on this kid, what with his acceptable level of quirk. He's basically the smartest pollster in America now, amazingly. And we'll cut through all the technical mumbo-jumbo and give it to you straight:

As of October 8, the day after the town-hall debate, Silver’s simulations had Obama winning the election 90 percent of the time.

Brevity! [NY Mag; pic via Chicago Reader. To better understand this issue, read everything at Fire Joe Morgan immediately.]

Waxman's schadenfreude on our recent layoffs:

So, now Nick Denton is laying people off, just like those dinosaurs in mainstream media.

The difference is, mainstream newspapers fired real journalists.

OH SNAP.

What the Gawker empire represents is as transitory as the people he employs. Denton has indisputably proved that you can create a lucrative business model out of highly targeted blogs, fed by tightly managed staffs of journalists who've numbed themselves to nagging doubts that what they do every day is journalism.

Ha. I have no doubt that what I do here every day is not "journalism," per se. It's called "blogging," and it has elements of journalism. What an asinine argument. I expect far more accurate insults from an actual journalist, Sharon Waxman.

Denton is ripe for mocking, and he knows it... "Gawker Media is behaving like those big media companies that we mock so easily." (Used to? Does this mean they will no longer mock and smear and malign journalists at big media companies? Too late. Had I known, I might have stayed at The New York Times.)

We apologize for singlehandedly forcing you to quit your job at the New York Times in order to seduce venture capitalists into funding your upcoming "primary, multi-platform source for the best original and aggregated content, adapted for the digital age." Although, to be honest, we will continue to smear and malign journalists at big media companies, when necessary.

And while I'm at it,

Yes?

let me publicly lament the flight of talented colleagues, Jeff Leeds of the Times and Gabriel Snyder, once of Variety, to the world of celebrity infotainment, and the kingdom of snark, respectively. Leeds, one of the best music journalists working (or, rather, not working) has gone to Buzznet, where he will be the editor-in-chief. Snyder becomes managing editor at Gawker. Like other journalists, they have to eat, so one can hardly blame them.

And to think: they could have applied at The Wrap News.

[Waxword]

"I'm very sorry to say, it's come to this: can you confirm on the record that Trig Palin is Sarah Palin's biological son? . . . Since this is a crazy idea, it should be easy for you or someone to let me know, the most popular one-man political blog site in the world, what the truth is."

HAH. The most popular one-man political blog site in the world wants the truth, Senator!

The McCain campaign did not answer his question. Instead, they forwarded the emails to Washington Post media "critic" or whatever Howard Kurtz! They knew he'd come down hard on Sullivan for such impudence. Or at least they knew he'd print the emails and ask Sullivan for a comment and let them have a comment and then not come to any conclusions about anything, because he's Howard Kurtz.

If we know anything about spotting liars—and we've watched a lot of Columbo—we know now conclusively that Sarah Palin did not give birth to Trig, because they didn't deny or confirm anything and instead attacked the questioner.

Kurtz: "Sullivan, one of the earliest bloggers, has been on a tear about Palin lately, calling her 'a compulsive, repetitive, demonstrable liar.'" Then of course instead of listing a single example of one of those lies and saying whether or not it counts as a lie Kurtz moves on entirely to documenting a "veiled debate" between Sullivan and Ross Douthat. Howard Kurtz, everyone! (This is why we're never invited on his show.)

Baby Talk [WP]

Emily's literary style is informed by a lifetime of urban experience:

The Clinton Years were glory days and we loved Rudy. Booming economy (or starting to), and it was Court TV…I think we also had a million snow days that year. Oklahoma City scared the hell out of us and the WTC was attacked that year too i think (or maybe it was in 5th grade–regardless, that was really really creepy), but things were still good. Hey, even my grades at Dalton were finally getting good!

Her ability to transcend hardship resonates with her fellow strivers in the Rotten Apple:

I guess a girl in New York can’t win. One minute I’m getting accused of having an eating disorder for being honest about my reluctance to eat a burger in the Hamptons and the next thing I know, I find out that guys see me as pigging out because I go nuts on foods like lobster salad.

Can you relate? It’s the reality of New York life.

Still, she's unafraid to give the unvarnished truth about her impressions of a new bar, damn the consequences:

I sat with a girl I hadn’t seen since 9th grade–now a lawyer–and we compared Park Avenue colorists, and she was with my other lawyer friends.

It’s a carefully crafted, intimate mix of people and if you get New York, you understand that this is a really good place to hang out and it’s only going to get better. But it would be ridiculous for me to sit here and write fluff. You’re not going to get that on this blog.

Who among us can say that?

[Pic via NYM]

It's not like the man has to start something new. His own news site, Breitbart.com, does huge traffic because it's where all of Drudge's wire report items link to. He also has a video site, and he worked on the launch of the now-successful Huffington Post (though he's since divested—he's a true conservative believer).

Breitbart works the afternoon shift at the Drudge Report. The two have remarkably seamless editorial styles, though some feel Breitbart has a lighter touch. More importantly, while Matt Drudge himself rarely speaks to the press or flits about in public settings, Breitbart is actually popular, and even a bit of a real-life schmoozer:

Before we left [a party at the Republican convention], the pundit Jonah Goldberg accused him of being the most popular guy in the room.

At the National Journal party, publisher David Bradley was delighted to finally put a face to the name. “That’s Andrew Breitbart?” he exclaimed. Walking into the Weekly Standard party, a friend from L.A. greeted him. “Have you had a chance to take a shower yet?” joked Steve McEveety, who is Mel Gibson’s producing partner.

Okay big shot! Breitbart is truly Dr. Jekyll to Drudge's Mr. Hyde. And a good man to know. We plan to get a good deal of comedy value out of his new venture.

[NYO]

That quote is from John Koblin's piece in today's Observer. It's got more gems: Adam Nagourney couldn't find a seat at his own paper's workspace, then bitched about having to cover the convention with so many other, lesser reporters. Fox's Greta Van Susteren, though, was more than happy to be there.

Greta Van Susteren, the Fox News anchor, spent Aug. 25 blogging—“I like the blogging!” she said—and produced 10 blog posts, including an online poll: “What do you think Michelle Obama thinks about Hillary Clinton?”

But there are hardships!

“I don’t like it,” said the Bloomberg News editor Al Hunt, who is covering his 17th convention. “It’s chilly and you can’t hear anything. Have you been to the porta-potties here? Because don’t go.”

Elsewhere in the Observer, Felix Gillette reports that he thought he knocked over Bill O'Reilley's laptop! But no, it was Karl Rove's laptop.

At HuffPo, media critic Rachel Sklar asks Anderson Cooper about the altitude, and Cooper reveals that he wishes he'd had a Bar Mitzvah. If, somehow, Cooper had added that he also wished to be on Saturday Night Live, in a Broadway musical, and Canadian, Sklar probably would've fainted. (After filing 1,500 words.)

And hey, did you know that there are bloggers at the Democratic National Convention? It's true, according to the Chicago Tribune's Washington Bureau. "The political bloggers are here because this week Denver is the center of the Democratic Party's political universe," we're told. Good to know! Even Katie Couric stopped by the blogger area to figure out what bloggers did all day, exactly.

And lovable David Carr, America's Favorite Recovered Crack-Addict-Turned-Times Reporter, hauls his Carpetbagger vlogging suit out of the closet to bug "members of the media" in Denver! Watching this video, we were struck by how these were exactly the same parties that are thrown in DC every week except in Denver. They still look terrible.

Who is he?

Tucker Max is, essentially, a born asshole who managed to parlay that asshole-ness into fame. The wonders of the internet. He went to the University of Chicago and Duke Law School, and has spent his life since graduation relating stories about himself being drunk and hooking up with girls. Throw in some poop jokes and random destruction of property, and you have Tucker's entire oeuvre.


His stories got extremely popular online in the early '00s, thus his ensuing internet fame, book deal, and movie deal. A 20-year-old reading his stories would reasonably consider him a passable writer with a good sense of humor and some awesome adventures. A 30-year-old reading him would reasonably consider him a juvenile prick who did all the same stuff that everybody else did when they were young and crazy, but never got enough sense beaten into him by life to stop being an idiot.

Tucker is 32.

What's wrong with that?

"My mom told me when I grew up I could be anything I wanted. So I became an asshole," Tucker writes. His life goal is "To be a celebrity that gets paid to get drunk, act like an asshole, and get drunk some more." Okay, fine. But his self-esteem is predicated on the idea that being an asshole is cool, and anyone who objects is not gonzo enough to worry about.

No. Hunter Thompson was gonzo. Tucker Max is just...an asshole. We're just pointing out exactly how much of an asshole he is, so we assume he's not upset about it.

He's kind of racist, he's probably scared to death of women who aren't self-loathing, he thinks he's a far better writer than he actually is, he talks tough to little guys while hiding behind a friend to make himself feel powerful, and just about everyone who's dealt with him in person—from employees to coworkers to shock jocks—thinks he's a prick. None of which would be that important if he hadn't positioned himself as some sort of heroic rebel. There's a time when being an asshole goes from being funny to being repulsive; that time was many, many years ago for Tucker Max. But he forgot to change.

His stories aren't really that crazy, either. Ninety-eight percent of frat guys in America have all the same pastimes. Do some different shit, bro.

Why does anybody care?

It's a mystery! We would have stopped writing about Tucker Max long ago were it not for the massive outpouring of public interest. Our theory is that everyone has met a Tucker Max or two in their lives; that loud ass guy at the bar hitting on the dumbest, drunkest girl and annoying everybody else in the place, and telling exaggerated stories about it for the next six years, bro. Nobody likes that guy.

But please notify us if you detect his awesomeness.





[All previous Tucker Max coverage]

• "Tucker truly is an asshole. i have been in the movie business for many years and worked with a lot of super-assholes, and aside from a few (fuck Scott Rudin) Tuckers the worst." Why? Our tipster says Tucker is lazy, appearing on the set only about half the time. Which, he clarifies, is not unusual for producers, except Tucker is "not really a producer he's just a
  tool."
• "Tucker baby talks his dog. not kidding at all, he uses a baby talk voice when talking to it even in front of other people. wtf?"
• Although Tucker would be expected to hit on all the women on set, per his books, he is in fact "standoffish" towards them most of time, supposedly.
• Most of the actors, and the movie's director, and most of the crew is very friendly, our tipster says. Tucker is the lone problem child. He also says that the movie will be much funnier than the script made it sound—we'll have to reserve judgment on that point. Tucker reportedly considered directing the film himself; "whoever convinced him not to do that should get his money for this."
• Tucker "got into an argument a few weeks ago with one of the teamsters who run basecamp, and hit the roof on the guy and tried to fire him. guess what dipshit, you can't fire teamsters w/o cause. tucker had to eat crow on that one, it was funny."
• At the movie's wrap party, "the crew gave him a personalized straight jacket, which should tell you what they think of him. they tried to make it out as a joke, but it wasn't it was what they thought."

Here are the gifts that the crew got at the wrap party. Our tipster writes, "a shirt and beer glass. real classy Tucker."

The actors at work (Tucker character in white t-shirt):

Tucker and a rapt crowd:

Drew Curtis' experience:

I spent three days on set, here's my take on things.

Tucker is completely out of control. As he explained it to me, he's
spent so much of his life not having to report to anyone that it's
killing him having to work with other people. Judging from the
agitation I'm seeing, that's an understatement. The first day I was
there, Tucker and Nils (the other screenwriter guy, who's really the
brains behind the operation) were in a heated argument in the corner. I
asked Nils what it was about, he tried to downplay it. But from what I
saw personally, this is a normal occurrence for Tucker.

Nils tells me that the actor playing Tucker, Matt, who really seems to
have his shit together, is the complete opposite of Tucker (super nice
guy, etc etc). I've spoken with Matt a few times and he really couldn't
be nicer to a guy who's only got about 3 lines. Bob Gosse, the director,
is the brains behind it and seems to butt heads with Tucker pretty much
constantly.

Tucker apparently thinks that the actor playing him has to actually be
him in real life. Or something. I have no idea what the deal is. To
me it looks like Matt's doing a fantastic job. I think Tucker's just a
control freak. He interferes constantly with the acting, the directing,
even sometimes the lighting. He doesn't know shit about any of this
stuff.

The sad thing is apart from him this is a really good group, who all
seem to have their shit together. My previous experience with filming
is limited to a few episodes of FarkTV that I was in. That was pretty
much 6 guys and a handicam. There's a full film crew out here, easily
100 folks working just on logistics. I was kinda surprised, I figured I
was gonna see 6 guys and a handicam. It's a full blown production.

The actors are doing a great job with the material. And speaking of
which, I read the previous articles about the movie on Gawker. The
script does read pretty lame, but the main actors are delivering it
extremely well. It all sounds very natural. I think also that this
pretty much isn't a movie the Gawker demo is going to like anyhow.
NASCAR-loving fart-joking middle America will eat this stuff up. If
this succeeds it will be in spite of Tucker and not because of him.

[Previous Tucker Max coverage. Please note the relative balance of this post.]

everything in me says not to engage this question, but sheila [ed. note: not our Sheila] you should know that i haven’t slept more than 5 hours in recent memory. and please try to imagine how it would be if every aspect, every second, every thought, every moment of your life felt like it was conceivably part of your ‘work’. you speak of clubbing? dining? hamptons? my god the hamptons? the truth is that even my weekend in bedford wasn’t entirely restful because i still felt ‘on duty’ because i knew i’d be writing about it. and nothing i do when i’m off right now will be entirely ‘vacation’ either. my laptop is with me wherever i go, and i’m always in ‘blog’ mode. and that’s okay. i love this and i want to do it. this is what i’ve chosen to do with my life.

Fuckin A right. We can only imagine.

this misfit thing? my weight was a physical manifestation of being a misfit but i’ve been a misfit my entire life. the only thing i can do–the only thing i know how to do–is write about people, places, things, experiences. past, present, future. Be the ultimate narrator.

God forgive me for covering this.

[Emily Brill]

Not only will bloggers have Internet access, workspaces and couches for napping in the "Big Tent" headquarters, they will be provided food and beverages, Google-sponsored massages, smoothies and a candy buffet. On the final night of the convention, Google is co-sponsoring a bash with Vanity Fair magazine for convention-goers and journalists that has become one of the hottest party invites.

A candy buffet — that's so perfect. Perhaps it could be located in a mocked-up "Parents' Basement" zone to make the bloggers feel just slightly more condescended to.

And a fancy Vanity Fair party. Welcome to the Establishment!

Granted, the bloggers each paid $100 for access to their "Big Tent," but that just makes their participation a waste of time, energy and money. And, as the Journal said, Google is still sponsoring many perks, so it's not like the $100 buys a claim on total independence. (If you don't think bloggers can be bought with candy and massages, you just haven't met that many bloggers!)

[WSJ]

PRWeek (my old employer) is having a tournament of PR blogs, and the PR blogosphere hasn't been this excited since some shit happened with Apple's PR department about some gadget one time, probably! Thanks to his campaign of vote-trolling spam, Kerr's spitballed blog about license plates and delis defeated PR tech nerd/ Edelman blogger god Steve Rubel's Micropersuasion, and Kerr is taking the opportunity to tell Edelman—the Wal-Mart-flacking superfirm that surely makes Kerr's annual income in about an hour—that they suck the big one:

Hi everybody:

I just wanted to give you all a very sincere thank you for taking the time and clicking through to vote for my blog at PR Week's blog competition last week.

Amazingly enough, my PR Rock and Roll blog beat Steve Rubel's Micro Persuasion blog by a vote of 65% to his 35%. Just to put this in perspective — Rubel is Edelman Worldwide's Internet guru with 2,200 Twitter followers, a long running blog, a periodic column in Ad Age and an invitee to many conferences.

I have to PAY to get into my conferences, 30 people follow me on Twitter, my blog has been around for two months and the only column I have is the one holding up the side of my house! :)

Believe when I tell you that I was waiting for an avalanche of votes to come in for Rubel and turn the tables on me, but it shockingly never came. I think the fact that Edelman's other competing blog got crushed may be an indication of what people think about that company?

So I thank all of you so much for taking to the time to vote.

I am on to Round Two beginning Wednesday, and we're up against something called Communication Overtones. I'll be asking for your vote again (or votes, if you have access to more than one computer), as we stumble on to victory through the social media underworld!

THANKS.

Drew

Ha, you just gonna sit back and take that, Edelman? Let's hope this starts all sorts of undercover sniping to us that we can write about.

[In fairness, Drew Kerr's blog is probably more entertaining than Steve Rubel's for the average reader.]

“We are trying to push free speech,” she said, while acknowledging that the ads would still have to conform to the cable companies’ restrictions on content. “I’ll put out the cacophony, and the cream will rise to the top.”

Oh, chief executive. Is this your first trip to the internet? If by "cream" you mean "lip-syncing girls in short shorts" than yes, sure, it'll rise above the cacophony. But they're not encouraging that sort of thing—they're courting political bloggers. First up, a group of activists are raising the funds necessary to air an ad accusing the media of not talking enough about how John McCain cheated on his first wife. Finally, publicity whore political activists have a soapbox!

The young man was a Tucker fan, and quit a real job to go be a paid assistant on the set of Tucker's film, where we pick up his experiences:

I quit my stable job at a publishing house and moved out there. He said I could stay at his house, but when I arrived he made me sleep in the backyard the first night. Tucker had other assistants but I detected animosity right from the start. One guy continually tried to commit assault on me. I figured because of my lesser stature it was all part of the "breaking in" process. Well, 5 days into production, I'm being threatened with crossbows and berated at every turn. Tucker has me doing ridiculous tasks like getting him water at a perfect temperature. The first few times he'd say it was 10 degrees too hot. I knew he was joking, but I'd take it back and add some of the cold water (which I realize is poposterous, but if you'd seen this guy he'd sic on me with choke holds or really hard arm punches, you'd understand). Finally on day 8, I bring him a paper cup filled with water; he takes a sip and throws it right in my face. I practically fell over a chair. This was in front of Jesse Bradford who even cautioned Tucker that it was a little too far. Tucker told Jesse to shut up, and then Nils (the "other" Tucker) intervened.

After two weeks of constant abuse, including Tucker letting me use the bathroom in his house, which had his shit in the toilet that he didn't flush. I quit on the spot. Nils first tried to comfort me by saying that Tucker is a jerk, and that it wasn't worth quitting over. I said I understood until HE confides that it was him that left the gigantic log in the toilet for me.

I understand that guys like to laugh and joke and get along. I do the same thing with my friends. On the IHTSBIH set, however, it was a very different story. These people weren't funny. They were "fratastic" in that douchebag sense. On my last day on set I talked to Matt Czuchry, who I got to know rather well. He told me that the Hollywood business was cut throat, and that he'd had his share of lumps. He said everyday he was losing respect for Tucker and that he worried this role my be career ending because the character doesn't have any redeeming qualities. Actually, he said the character Tucker as it was written might appear to, but after studying Tucker himself, he realized the guy was a fucking prick.

You'll notice there are no party picks of Tucker and the actors after the first week or so. This is not a coincidence. I've never been so incensed with an individual. Perhaps I was asking for it, chasing a pipe dream with no regard, but nobody should have to deal with what I did. I haven't even scratched the surface...

I'm done with the fucking asshole for good. I've found a new job, similar to what I'm doing before, but I don't' think I'll ever forget the sheer humiliation I faced.

After quitting, the assistant sent Tucker a pretty polite email asking for his check, and wondering if Tucker would be putting up any photos of him in the film's Flickr page. The response:

From: Tucker Max
Date: Mon, Aug 11, 2008 at 10:19 PM
To: [Former assistant]

It's not MY fault you couldn't hack it. Don't come crawling back AND don't waste my time with bullshit promises if you wont back them up. You know something about photos? The person who takes them — or the person who employs the person who takes them — owns the copyright. I OWN THEM. You want them? Pay me.

You want your money? Jeff has it. Get it from him. I warn you, he's been in an extra bad mood lately.—

"...highly entertaining and thoroughly reprehensible..."
-NY Times describing TuckerMax.com

He asked for his check to be mailed to him, and said that he just wanted the photos to show his friends. Tucker wasn't fooled:

From: Tucker Max
Date: Thurs, Aug 14, 2008 at 5:20 PM
To: [Former assistant]

You want the photos so you can cry to Gawker. I didn't get where I am today by being a moron. You'll get your photos like everybody else – when the movie is done shooting.

Jeff will be passing through your area after we wrap. He'll hand deliver the money. We'll bring a camera along for the DVD extras. Now stop fucking bothering me.—

"...highly entertaining and thoroughly reprehensible..."
-NY Times describing TuckerMax.com

[DISCLAIMER: My personal belief is this story is authentic, though as some commenters have pointed out, it could be some ruse by Tucker fans to plant a fake story. Though, counterpoint: the story makes Tucker sound bad, not good, so if it were a plant (and we've seen some bad attempts), it would be a stupid one. Verdict: Real in my considered judgment, but if not, I hope Tucker writes a triumphant note soon so that we can mock it.]

[Complex Blog]

The scene: Tucker is sitting next to an FBI agent on a plane, swapping stories:

Yeah…this guy is fucking cool. THIS is the type of person that deserves to sit next to me. I decide to tell him Embassu Suites part of The Austin Road Trip Story, and he loves it. He comes back with this one about his exploits with the US Border Patrol:

Agent Jones “I thought I was bad ass until I hung out with those guys. They are unbelievable. One time I was out with them right at to the border. There is a big fence with concertina wire and what not all along this stretch, but the Coyotes had cut a hole in it—”

I interrupted him.

Tucker “What is a Coyote?”
Agent Jones “They are the guys who smuggle illegals back and forth over the border. Anyway, the Coyote was smuggling about a hundred Tonks through the hole, and—”

I interrupted him again.

Tucker “What is a Tonk?”
Agent Jones “Oh—that’s what Border Patrol calls illegal immigrants who have made it into the US. They can’t call them ‘wetbacks’ or ‘spicks’ because obviously those are racially charged names, and ‘Mexican’ isn’t accurate since a lot of illegals are not from Mexico, so they say ‘Tonk.’ They call them that because it’s the sound made when you hit them on the head with a Mag-Lite.”
Tucker “HOE-LEE-SHIT.”
Agent Jones “I told you those guys were nuts. Anyway, so there we are, four trucks on this hill like 200 yards from the hole in the fence. We are totally blacked out, wearing night vision goggles and we can clearly see the Coyote hustling about a hundred Tonks through the fence. The Border Patrol guys wait until all of them are through the hole and about 50 yards into our side, when all four trucks simultaneously turn on all their spot lights and sirens. Of course, the illegals shit themselves and bust ass back to the border…and in the darkness, they all run right into the concertina wire. It was a fucking mess. Some of them did not make it.”
Tucker “You have to be kidding me.”
Agent Jones “Nope. You think our force continuum is loose? These guys shoot anything they want. You should see their situation reports for deaths. They’ll take out guys with rifles at 100 yards and write in the report, ‘Subject was threatening agent with a rock.’ It’s a joke.”

I get off the plane and part ways with Agent Jones, who is officially in my Awesome Guy Hall of Fame. Riding a great buzz, basking in genius slick maneuver that got me into first class, and having just heard some hilarious stories, I head to the gate for my Newark to Nantucket connection in a great fucking mood.

[Previously. Tucker would like you to know that he has several fans, thank you. ]

Some of his main problems with the poster:

2. My head:
The left side of my face seems to be melting off of my skull. I guess I am looking directly into the Ark of the Covenant? Are they going for the bells palsy thing here? My left side looks like Brittany Spears' vagina.

4. Lips:
It looks like I'm wearing Maybelline Water Shine Diamonds Liquid Lipstick.

5. Fashion:
My character is sporting a very high collar I mean damn they should be snow capped at that altitude. It's going for the vampire lurking in the castle basement vibe. An Olympic pole vaulter would have a tough go clearing that collar.

As official Dane Cook Myspace blog commenter She-Cactus writes: "Hahaha, lmao!"

[Myspace via Adages]

If you can write three concise, timely and relevant posts each week in your topic of choice, then we want to hear from you. Just picture it now: your name in lights all over your city. Your mom will be so proud.

Oh, and we'll pay you for it. A little at first, but as your page views grow over time, so will your ability to make more.

Sound good? Then click the Apply Now button below. We'll ask you some questions and get some information we need to process your application, including the city in which you'd like to contribute and the category you think is most relevant. Not sure? Pick one and we can work with you later on getting it right. For example, if you want to be the Yoga Examiner in Des Moines, you will choose your edition: Des Moines and your category: Fitness. Your topic may have appeal in more than one category, but choose the one you think it fits into best.

Ladies and gentlemen, the future of media: today the Yoga Examiner in Des Moines is spamming you with Digg requests, tomorrow... oh, wait, this is the present of media, right here in New York.

(Also, they are not bloggers. "They are not bloggers, but Examiners, which means they look closely at topics and examine every aspect of them." Ok then.)

The promotional campaign kicks in next week so get excited! Get particularly excited if you're a traditionally paid staffer at an Anschutz paper (all six of you guys!), 'cause this seems like a dangerous experiment.

He's a cheapskate.

Last week we noted how Tucker scoffed at a former blogger who wondered why he only made $82 for six months of work. Other employees tell us the standard pay for Rudius bloggers is somewhere in the $80/ quarter range, with one noting "I got just a tiny bit more than that when my site was doing really well." Sweet. So Rudius must be making a lot of money.

You work hard for the money.

One Rudius employee was ordered by Tucker to move to a different, more expensive city because Tucker thought that they could better do their job elsewhere. Once the employee had gone to the trouble of packing up and moving and finding a new, more costly apartment, we hear, their pay was reduced to almost nothing. Which seems like the standard Rudius pay rate, now that we think of it.

He's not popular with publishers.

We hear that at least one book agent quit working with Tucker because he flaked out on book proposal deadlines. (Not true? Email us!)

He's not popular with the bloggers that work for him at Rudius.

The emails we've received from disgruntled bloggers alone are ample evidence of this. He attracts bloggers he's interested in with the promise of writing for a wider audience—though, as you can tell by their pay, not necessarily more money. But when bloggers tire of Rudius and leave the fold, we hear, they are bizarrely wiped from existence in Tucker Max's world:

If an author leaves the site, the circumstances are never discussed. Not even on the message boards. It's reminiscent of some 1984 thought-crime type thing. The author is simply never mentioned again, the site stays up and repeated questions about "what happened" are ignored.

He's vindictive.

Those who have worked with Tucker say he's very protective of his "image," such as it is. We hear that his failed appearance on Opie and Anthony is a very sore point. This sensitivity manifests itself in both the disappearing of his fallen disciples as mentioned above, and in an atmosphere in which Tucker Max sycophants feel that harassment of detractors is a way to win approval. One blogger, Violent Acres, wrote a Tucker Max parody a couple of years ago. This resulted in 70 harassing phone calls from a crazed Tucker fan in a single weekend—and we hear the harassment is still ongoing, though the blogger has filed a police report.

Is it Tucker's fault that he has a crazy fan? Not necessarily. But it is Tucker's fault that he expressed his discontent with a cast member on his movie by taking a big crap in the toilet in the guy's trailer, taking a photo of it (do not click that link), and then blogging about it.

Can't wait till the movie comes out!

[Read all previous Tucker Max coverage here. Anybody else with Tucker stories, email us.]

Deceiver, July 31:

Who is this guy?

I think we might be able to find out. If you go to the Google cache of MargaretSweet.com, which is the site for an astrologer named, aptly enough, Margaret Sweet (who’s also a friend of Hunter’s), there’s a page called “Helpful Dudes.” But despite the plural, apparently there’s only one dude who Margaret Sweet considers helpful:

Robert (Bob) McGovern - Healer

Bob McGovern is an intuitive who has worked as a healer since 1988. He works with energy in the area of the emotional fields. He uses philosophy, psychology and the intuitive to find resolutions that move people back into alignment with the universe and into a place of peace, harmony and joy.

Bob uses the intuitive to help people with a variety of life issues, including relationships, career and health. His knowledge of the past and the future helps people find balance in the present. He is able to separate out surrounding negative energy, which allows people to have a clearer perception of their own options and choices. He works to empower people so that they can respond to the challenges of daily life with greater discernment and fuller understanding.

That really does sound intuitive, doesn’t it?

The “Helpful Dudes” page also lists McGovern’s Santa Barbara phone number and mailing address, which are current as of June 12, but I don’t think it’s good netiquette to give out that sort of info in blog posts.

NYT, August 10:

But little is known about Mr. McGovern, who is 64, according to records, and lives with his wife in a modest ranch-style home a few miles from downtown Santa Barbara. The Web site Margaretsweet.com, which promotes spirituality and New Age practices, recently carried a brief biography of Mr. McGovern, describing him as “an intuitive” and “a healer since 1988” who had worked “with energy in the area of the emotional fields.” The biography is no longer on the site.

“He uses philosophy, psychology and the intuitive to find resolutions that move people back into alignment with the universe and into a place of peace, harmony and joy,” the site said. “Bob uses the intuitive to help people with a variety of life issues, including relationships, career and health.”

The description of Mr. McGovern, posted in a section called “Helpful Dudes,” also said he tried to empower people so they could deal with the challenges of everyday life with greater understanding.

“His knowledge of the past and the future helps people find balance in the present,” it said. “He is able to separate out surrounding negative energy, which allows people to have a clearer perception of their own options and choices.”

Deceiver was steadily working this story long before the Times printed one word. All it takes is a one-sentence credit to avoid these things. Play fair.

[Deceiver]

Excuse me? Did you write the email below, or am I seeing things? Is this a joke?

Have you let the very small amount of fame—that I am almost entirely
responsible for—really go that much to your fucking head that you
think you can talk to me that way?

If you don't like our arrangement, if you don't like that fact that I
found you as a complete nobody doing nothing and have given you the
opportunity to reach the world, then you can go back to where you were
when I found you.

In fact, thats a good idea. You go ahead and go your own way. Let's
see how you do when you don't have anyone to blame but yourself.

Tucker's advice to Woods on how to make more money? An "offer to 'let' me drop out of college and become a prison guard so I could make another $100 writing for a different Rudius site."

• Amazon has deleted negative reviews of Tucker's book, for unknown reasons. Conspiracy?
• Tucker plagiarized a line in his script about "man talk" from this scene in the movie Goldfinger.
• Tucker stole some guy's fiancee over the internet (though we are suspicious of this one, because it had a rather suspect tone of "no woman can resist Tucker's sex charms").
• "It is apparent from his you tube videos that Tucker Max mistreats his cast by letting them injure themselves in their off time. One of his actresses severely bruised her leg while dancing in a bar." We have not watched said videos. Volunteers?
• Tucker has stolen story ideas from other websites. WE WILL NOT READ ALL OF HIS STORIES IN ORDER TO VERIFY THIS. Sorry.
• Tucker's network of websites, Rudius Media, is run by a cheap bastard named Tucker Max. One ex-Rudius blogger wrote about his experience of trying to get paid for six months of steady blogging work, and finally receiving the check: "Think of a very very very low number. Then divide it in half. That’s about how much I got paid. Odds are, you may still be thinking of too high a number." We hear the sum was less than $100 for six months.
• Two sample (very unverified) incidents taken from the blog Tucker Max Is A Douchebag:

  Tucker gets in an altarcation with a woman at a bar:

  Tucker threw his drink at her, Candice threw her drink at Tucker with lightning fast reflexes, then he proceeded to grab Megan by her hair and hit her in the face with his pathetically small hands. With a bruised face, and a bruised ego, he took his shriveled penis back to his buddies.

  A longtime member of the Tucker Max message boards bemoans the fact that Tucker has allowed his fame go to his head:

  The more I thought about it, however, the more the fact that TM is basically lying in his stories began to bother me. His whole hook is that these stories are “true.” Anyone could just make this shit up and pass it off as fiction, it would get e-mailed around a few times and be forgotten. But Tucker presents it as true, that it actually happened to him, and it didn’t, he’s lying and that’s unacceptable. What gets Tucker his attention is people going “Man, I can’t believe that this actually happened to someone, that shit is so crazy!! I wish I were him.” In short, he was interesting because he represented something that many people wish they were but don’t really have the balls to be. Unfortunately, he wasn’t really that person, Tucker is more a persona than anything else.

• "I have a friend who used to go to Duke with Tucker; he told me that Max likes to feed on the souls of kittens and the tears or orphaned children."

Feel free to write in, Tucker.

[pic via Underage Lolita]

A tipster forwarded us the following text, which they say is an entry that was deleted from Tucker Max's ex-girlfriend's blog. We don't follow the man's love life closely enough to know whether this is true, but the blog does have Tucker Max listed as its contact person. Portions of this post have been floating around the internet for some time now. That's our disclaimer. Now here's the alleged Tucker Max love experience:

Humiliating
Last night Tucker blew me off. Again.

I went insane. I cut off all my hair with kitchen scissors like Frida Khalo.
Today I examined the fallout (actually quite cute and flippy. I am good at
everything). I also thought, "Bunny... there is something terribly awry. Why
are you so angry? Why have you become a bitter and horrible person since you
met Tucker?"

Today, while I'm working, Tucker is hovering over me asking me the same
question.

I have decided to make an itemized list of reasons why I might want to cut
off all my hair like a rape victim.

[Note: This is truly humiliating. If anyone were to make a medicine to cure
low self-esteem, I'd take it in spades; I'd do the 10k walk for closet
self-loathers, and wear the empty wine bottle lapel pin. I wish to God these
FACTS were fabricated or embellished, but the awful truth is that they are
not. I only hope this helps the other girls who don't like themselves].

What it is like to date Tucker Max.

-You will get fried chicken for your birthday. Later that night when you
both go to a bar, you will want a diet coke, but won't get one because that
is one less beer that he can drink.

-He will hang up on your favorite aunt, and be stunned when you get upset
that he referred to your mother as "that fucking bitch" because she called
you at a late hour.

-He will scream at you because you don't like the instant coffee he bought
you.

-He will never kiss you, and barely fuck you, even if you beg him to for
months. You are now the Virgin Mary. He will still try to coerce crazy
whores into coming to Chicago to fuck him. He will kiss them because they
are whores, and don't you know that you're only supposed to give good
passionate sex to women that you don't know or give a shit about? I didn't
know that either.

-You will beg him to take a shower, which he will not do. But he will shave
his face to have long make-out sessions with any random girl.

-You will read every piece of writing he has ever done and be supportive of
all his creative outlets. When you then ask him to read your own novel he
will drop it after chapter one because it's a waste of his time. He's not
good at editing.

-You will give him the greatest head of his life on a regular basis. He will
still suck in bed.

-He will make sure you know that you aren't very hot, only sort of cute, and
that your head is too big for the rest of your body. You also have
unattractive dark circles under your eyes and your tits are too small. He
will never compliment you.

-You will be bi-sexual and okay with him sleeping with other women, but this
will not be enough. He needs freedom.

-If he is an insensitive asshole to you, it is only because you are selfish.
You should understand that his parents sucked and now you have to pay for
this. How this is logical, I'm not really sure.

-When he has major surgery you will not leave his side. You will spend day
night waiting on him hand and foot, making sure he is comfortable and well
cared for. You will even wipe his ass when he takes a shit. Later he will
tell you that it was all unnecessary. He didn't need or want you to be
there.

-When he is supposed to pick you up and take you to a party, he will get
black-out drunk and fuck some girl instead of showing up.

-He will tell you he loves you and wants to have children with you. When you
then get pregnant, he will say that he has about two to four more years of
drinking and whoring left to do, so a baby isn't in the cards. He will
coerce you into an abortion by threatening to give away your dog if you try
to have the child. Then he will be evasive so that you will be forced to
dump him and he can get off scot-free.

-When you get upset about this, he will tell you that you are
over-emotional. When you try to explain how this hurts, he will ignore you
till you find yourself screaming and breaking things. He will explain these
outbursts to his drinking buddies as so: "Yeah she's fucking crazy. She
flips out on me like every third day."

-When you go to stay with your parents (read: bawl day and night) for two
weeks, he will fuck other women in your bed. The night you return he will
try to go out with a whore he's just met and wonder why you're upset about
that. He needs his freedom.

-When you are at your parents, he won't take your calls. Instead he will
spend his time e-mailing some whore. Later, he will not stop e-mailing this
same whore, because all whores come before your feelings even if the whores
are half as attractive and barely capable of forming cogent sentences.

-When his ex-girlfriend dies and then comes back to life, you will nurse him
through the depression. You will even be fine with her coming to stay at
your own fucking apartment so that he can decide which of you he wants. This
is so that you can be fair to both of them because you are a good person.
unlike them.

-Later on you will catch him telling this covert bitch who pretended to be
nice to you that he is only keeping you around because you are willing to
support him financially. They will laugh at you behind your back for being
"over-emotional." Oh how silly you are!

-When Tucker bounces back from his depression you will not be needed
anymore. You will just hand over the keys to his car and not say a word when
he drives it all over Chicagoland while black-out drunk.

-When girls come to the apartment, he will become "Cooooool Tucker Max." He
will dress and act differently. He will be an asshole to you. Why are you
upset? Don't you know "this is the Tucker Max show?" This pathetic statement
is his actual quote.

-And finally (though I could write pages and pages of this horrible shit):
When you've been stood up by the very first date you've planned in a year,
you will call Tucker and ask to hang out with him. He will not come pick you
up in YOUR OWN FUCKING CAR, because HE lost your license the night before
and you won't be able to get into the club he's going to. When you ask if it
's possible to go anywhere else he will refuse because there are free drinks
and whores in said club. Whores are very special. Much more special than the
woman that did all the above things out of unconditional love FOR A FUCKING
YEAR!

posted by The Bunny at