The cutesy coverage of instant messaging — "CU l8r 2 IM," writes Ben Smith in Politico — is foolishly dismissive, failing to recognize that a generation which grew up with IM at home has made it indispensable at work.

White House records-keeping rules require that all written communications be archived for posterity, including IM, so government lawyers are inclined to ban it from Obama's administration. And the answer is, well, they'll just have to pick up the phone. Are they clueless? Try having a dozen simultaneous conversations on the phone.

The real issue is the risk of embarrassment when an administration's documents become a matter of public record five years after the president leaves office. Private, casual conversations will all be exposed.

There's an obvious answer — one that the Obama campaign has inexplicably adopted, then abandoned.

Twitter has become a sort of public instant-messenger for the tech elite, who chatter at each other all day with "@" replies. Most Twitter messages are public, and the embarrassment is instantaneous. Why not get it over with? By Twittering every little policy thrash, the Obamans can satisfy their leader's desire for transparency and meet disclosure rules.

Jabber isn't just another AIM wannabe. It uses XML trickery to connect to every popular instant message service — AIM, ICQ, Windows Live Messenger, and Yahoo — and to let programmers connect it to other services, be they for man or machine. It's already widely adopted by the IT workers whose managers sign the purchase orders for Cisco networking hardware.

By building Jabber support into its switchers and routers, Cisco can make it easy for admins to get alerts from their hardware in the same IM window as their buddies. Cisco can also sell companywide IM setups that are closely tied to Cisco network gear for security and monitoring.

Cisco recently picked up PostPath, which makes Linux-based email, calendar and collaboration software. I'm sure someone at Cisco plans to bundle Jabber's instant messaging with PostPath's Outlook-like features and dub it a "platform" to compete with Microsoft.

But Jabber's main competition isn't Redmond, it's Dulles. Cisco can now offer managers a way to ban AIM from the workplace, or at least to manage it locally with Cisco equipment rather than routing employees' conversations straight to AOL.

This oustandingly well-done music video is nearly a year old. But even online-TV maven Nick Douglas says he's never seen it, so it's today's mindless lunchtime entertainment. Tip for the Olds: The song is a rewrite of Puddle of Mudd's "She Fucking Hates Me." Tip for the Youngs: The graphics are from an ancient MMORPG called RuneScape that dates back to January 2001 — they didn't even have iPods then!

Josh: http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2246210,00.html
Pareene: wow
Pareene: that's worse than the new indiana jones
Josh: what does it even mean?
Pareene: i don't know!
Pareene: it sounds like a malcolm gladwell ripoff
Pareene: hah after reading the description of the fleming story i hope they keep it intact in the movie
Pareene: bond is a dick at dinner, the governor of the bahamas tells him a sad story, everyone learns a very important lesson. BOND WILL RETURN IN "A SMIDGEN OF COMFORT"
Josh: ha! "A Mote of Sympathy"

[Redacted]: we got mailed a t shirt from 23/6, that huffpo humor site. i am staring at it now! I bet it will generate "buzz."
pareene: hah
pareene: is it a "funny" shirt??
[Redacted]: on the front it has their tagline, and on the back it says "tagg romney is a stupid name"
[Redacted]: which is funny enough I guess
pareene: ha
[Redacted]: exactly the level of funny I was expecting
pareene: funny until south carolina
pareene: then billy beer
[Redacted]: i have no idea what to do with this shirt. it's fucking huge. it would be perfect for pre-slimmed down huck
[Redacted]: maybe that 500 lb policeman
pareene: it would be better if the shirt just said "more like FAG ROMNEY"
[Redacted]: ha
[Redacted]: that would be awesome
pareene: then you could wear that xtra large novelty t-shirt with pride

Upside! It's the easiest medium in which to be funny. But the same virtues that make IM a perfect mode for communicating trivial passing thoughts make it a terrible mode for communicating about real problems, and people will not quit using it for both—particularly at the same time. This can result in dire, friendship-ending fights based on misunderstandings and even IM breakups. (The sick saving grace of the IM breakup is that it does make the breakup conversation easier to blog about afterwards. Cut and paste.)

IM is also just sort of insidious and ADD-enhancing: Sometimes everyone is talking to you at once when you're trying to focus. Or, oh no, sometimes no one is talking to you and you're like "God, what did I do?" We'd probably be better off without it. But is it possible to swear it off?


(At this point, both Choire and I get an email about someone vile).

From what we've heard, MyM sounds a lot like Meebo, the website which allows users to access multiple instant-messaging clients at once. MyM will actually hook into Meebo, as well as Friendster, MySpace, LiveJournal, AIM, MSN Messenger, and Yahoo's own IM software. Internally at Yahoo, MyM's already been dubbed "awkward," and some are worried that competitors will block it.

I'd say those concerns are typical of Yahoo these days — suggest something new, and people come up with reasons why you can't do it, rather than fixes for those problems. Awkward or not, it's to these Yahoos' credit that they actually managed to launch something against internal opposition. We're still skeptical that Yahoo needs yet another social service, but we're intrigued all the same. Anyone got an invite? Send it in.

Memily: Thank you for taking me on a gay ass date to see Claire Danes' Broadway debut on Friday
Rhymes With Smellolcait: You are very welcome. I know how you love Times Square.
Memily:the bright lights dazzle my eyes!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: a feast for the senses!
Memily: So much beauty.
Rhymes With Smellolcait: plus, the homeless man bar was a treat, I'm sure.
Memily:I can't believe those women have to wear bikinis
actually I totally can believe that
what i can't believe is how hot they were!
those ladies could be around the corner at Hawaiian Tropic Zone easy!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Working/living under the Port Authority apparently does a body good.
Memily: it's not like they were missing teeth!
Maybe they like being a big fish in a small, dank, dimly lit pond.
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Who doesn't, really.
Memily: Ha! speak for yourself.
Oh but (segue!)
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Yes!
Memily: Claire Danes apparently does like to be a big fish in a small pond, having allowed herself to be stunt-casted into the Roundhouse production of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Roundabout. Roundhouse was a much beloved Nickelodeon show, m'dear.
(at least, beloved by me)
Memily: also a drama camp i attended! in fourth grade!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: ohh. You've got major theatrical chops.
Unlike La Danes
Memily: Ooh look at you, segue fever is catching!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Yeah, I'm a quick study. Like Eliza Doolittle!
Memily:She IS a quick study. You know, the one thing that makes Pygmalion less fun than My Fair Lady, besides the lack of , you know, fun songs like "Without You," is that it doesn't have like a montage scene where they teach her stuff
Rhymes With Smellolcait: instead we just got magical gliding set pieces.
Memily:When (shows cards) I played Eliza Doolittle in Eastern Middle School's production of My Fair Lady. the director made me practice the scene where she has to talk with marbles in her mouth with atomic fireballs! The set pieces were really, really impressive. I loved how they would slowly recede into the background as the other set popped up
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Yes, it was very pretty.
The whole thing was very elegant and refined.
But a little staid.
Memily: I kept wanting to break out into "Art and music will thrive without you/somehow Keats WILL survive without you ..."
Rhymes With Smellolcait: haha! you should have.
Memily: um I am am huge fucking dork! Heh
"you, dear friend who talks so well ... you can go to Hartford Heresford and Hampshire!"
Rhymes With Smellolcait: well, I believe I freaked about because the guy from Talkin' Broadway was sitting next to you.
So we're both dorks.
Memily: Um, YEAH.
He smelled good
But you know what STANK?
(HA!)
Claire Danes' bloody English accent!
Accents!
Both of 'em!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Oh dear. The play is just so BRITISH. it seems like an exercise in futility to cast an American. I would have liked to have seen a bedraggled Emma Watson. Or Posh Spice, perhaps.
Memily: "Tawoo bonches of viiiilets traad in the maad. A fool daooys waooauges! Why daunt yawoo look whehhh yoaahh gawwwing?"
Rhymes With Smellolcait: a little za-za-zoom.
Memily: Omg POSH SPICE.
YES.
I mean, ANY Spice will do!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: She's got a sense of humor, and she could just ape Mel C for the first part. That girl was traaaashy.
Memily: Mel B would be a really fun choice b/c then it could have POSTCOLONIAL SUBTEXT.
Rhymes with Smellolcait: oh ho ho!
I wonder if she's grown accustomed to Eddie Murphy's baby yet.
Memily: Ha, she is growing accustomed to being FACED.
Anyway, that is a funny part. It needs to be someone funny ... a funny British lady.
Why can't I think of anyone who isn't, like, 50?
Tracey Ullman! Jennifer Saunders!
Yeah, no.
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Dawn from The Office!
Memily: Oh um I don't know if I told you this but I forgot to own a tv
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Oh, yes. You did mention that.
Memily: so I basically don't understand anything anyone ever says. I'm like "oh Kid Nation" and then I just listen and nod for like half an hour.
Rhymes With Smellolcait: haha
Memily: I did get the guy from the CW to start sending screeners of top model and gossip girl though
Anyway. Claire Danes reminded me of how she was in the Our Town episode of MSCL
like
"Look, I'm ACTING! Look at all this ACTING!"
I was excited for you though when she did her signature move.
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Yes!
Major Pro: Crumple Face
Major Con: Crumple Face
It's such a love/hate relationship
Memily: Actually we were debating this this morning
as you know (and everyone knows!) Josh is a major supporter of La Danes
Rhymes With Smellolcait: But of course.
Memily: and he was like, she is great in closeup
and I was like "closeup of her meaty thighs!" but actually I sort of see his point.
do you think she's just not a theater actress?
And if that's the case
what movies has she been good in?
Rhymes With Smellolcait: She's PRETTY. but in a really "Handsome" way. You know? Like broad-shouldered women from the 40's?
Eleanor Roosevelt had she not been in some sort of tractor accident.
Memily:To refresh your memory, here is her CV from the program:
"Pygmalion marks Danes' Broadway debut. Her film work includes Matthew Vaughn's Stardust, Lajos Koltai's Evening, Anand Tucker's Shopgirl, Thomas Bezucha's The Family Stone and Richard Eyre's Stage Beauty. Danes also starred in Jonathan Mostow's Terminator 3: Rise Of The Machines.
Rhymes With Smellolcait: It's so erratic!
I think she's a good actress, and could be good on stage. But not in this part.
It just doesn't work.
I mean T3: Rise of the Machines is some of Tony Kushner's best work. And his dialogue is often very stage-y.
Memily:I think the mistake was that she played it for pathos. It's a funny part! We are supposed to feel a little sorry for Liza at the end
but not from the first moment of the play!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: Oh god. We had a whole Act (IV, I believe) of Crumple Face
Memily: Oh. Was that when I fell asleep?
Rhymes With Smellolcait: It was too much. And then there was that weird, off-tone dollop at the end with 'Enry 'Iggins looking pensive.
Oh, I took a long nap during Act II. But was fully awake for Crumple Face (right after intermission)
Memily: I totes didn't notice
you didn't slump over and drool or anything!
Rhymes With Smellolcait: I'm good at sleeping during the theatre. That $46 glass of Cabernet I had in the lobby was probably not a good idea.

BALK BTW: I don't know that they really give out those awards to cocks.
COCK BTW: Jonathan Franzen got one, and he's a major dick.
BALK BTW: Ba dump bump.
COCK BTW: Okay, that was too easy, but whatever, I'm pissed! I've done some amazing work this year and I deserve to be recognized! And $500k over the next five years? Do you know what kind of damage I could do with that money? I'd be pumping through silk!
BALK BTW: Uh, fine. Let's look at some of the winners. Hmm, soprano Dawn Upshaw. "Her repertory takes in the sacred work of Bach, modern works by Stravinsky and new music by composers like John Harbison."
COCK BTW: So what? Did you hear "My Cock Sings Sondheim"? My a cappella version of "Putting It Together" ALONE deserves that award. Dawn Upshaw can blow me,
BALK BTW: Playwright Lynn Nottage. "The plays of Ms. Nottage, 42, have been produced throughout Europe and the United States, at theaters including Second Stage in New York and the Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago. 'Intimate Apparel,' the story of a young black seamstress in early-20th-century New York, continues to be widely produced in regional theaters."
COCK BTW: BFD. "GlenHairy GlenCock" ran for twenty-seven straight weeks at the Winter Garden, and I played every role for the first three months. And "Schwing Awakening" is STILL being performed at high schools nationwide.
BALK BTW: Stuart Dybek "is the author of three books of fiction, including 'I Sailed With Magellan,' and two collections of poetry. His work has appeared in many publications, including The New Yorker and The Paris Review."
COCK BTW: Whatever. Michiko Kakutani called "The Jane Austen Cock Club" a 'heartbreaking work of, yes, staggering prickness.' My short story collection "What We Talk About When We Talk About Wangs" is widely acknowledged as a pioneer of "cocky realism." And New Yorker poetry? Done it. Check the current issue, page 83. "This shaft winding down now/At cock-speeded summer's end/In the taintlike salmon sun...."
BALK BTW: Okay, okay. There's also an installation artist.
COCK BTW: "If These Balls Could Talk," my homage to anonymous Testicular-Americans, is STILL showing at the Museum of Natural History, and that was made ENTIRELY OUT OF SCRIMSHAW. I'm A COCK, do you know how hard it is to work with scrimshaw?
BALK BTW: Let's see, someone who works in robotics...
COCK BTW: Need I remind you of Cocktron Five? Does dildonics count for nothing?
BALK BTW: I'm sorry, Cock. There's always next year.
COCK BTW: Fuck that. I'm just gonna sit on Your Ass and wait for my Nobel Cock Prize.
BALK BTW: Uh, okay.
COCK BTW: Anyway, I've been meaning to talk to you about your choice of masturbation material lately. That "Meg White" sex tape was unaccep—
BALK BTW: This conversation is over.

MacArthur Foundation Gives Out 'Genius Awards' [NYT]

DOREE: hey so i had a thought re: "The Hills"
CHOIRE: go on!
DOREE: i feel like "The Hills" is the new "Sex and the City" for this younger generation
DOREE: they are taking their cues from these "women" about how to be in a relationship, and, like, "making it" in glamorous industries.
CHOIRE: right.
DOREE: (also, 4 women)
CHOIRE: HELLO
DOREE: it's a love letter to LA too, the same way that SATC was a love letter to NYC.
DOREE: like, it makes you want to live this glamorous life in LA.
CHOIRE: aspirational. and which is all about the shift in power from NYC to L.A that is SO going on.
DOREE: yup. but of course, it's a reality show, and not scripted.
CHOIRE: " " " " (those were scarequotes)
DOREE: which I think is related to just the fact that ensemble shows about and for women are, like, only on Lifetime now. like that horrible "Army Wives." and i'm not a believer in "Lipstick Jungle." it will suck.
CHOIRE: well. there's more women on TV than EVER.
DOREE: ok but there are almost no women friendship shows. except "Army Wives." which doesn't count.
CHOIRE: that may.... be true.
DOREE: i think it is. there are shows like the kyra sedgwick show
CHOIRE: i'm going through them all.
DOREE: where she's like the tough loner. but like an ensemble cast of women? no.
CHOIRE: there's medium, holly hunter, glenn close, the new lili taylor, "Tell Me You Love Me"....
DOREE: they're all lone women.
CHOIRE: at least, i think, no ensembles.
DOREE: yup. like, we joke about it? but "The Hills" really has struck this weird chord
DOREE: and it's kind of sad, because, like, we mock "Sex and the City" and bemoan it and all that, but it's positively genius next to this. and it was scripted. we weren't reliant on the deep thoughts of a bunch of 21-year-olds. and yet...
CHOIRE: and you're right.
DOREE: ok, now what?
DOREE: HA
CHOIRE: bring it!
DOREE: talk to me for one more second
DOREE: re: the power shift from NYC to LA
DOREE: i mean... entourage. heh.
DOREE: but what else.
CHOIRE: well!
CHOIRE: the celebrity media for one has moved west—both in subjects and locations; also TMZ
DOREE: right
DOREE: no celeb mag is yet headquartered in LA though.
CHOIRE: no sure
CHOIRE: but they've built up out there.
DOREE: yes, totally.
DOREE: huge west coast bureaus.
CHOIRE: and what else?
DOREE: teen vogue is now an LA magazine
DOREE: HA
CHOIRE: denton and i had a huge talk about this.
DOREE: did you take notes?
CHOIRE: god no
DOREE: heh
CHOIRE: but part of the shift is just money
CHOIRE: real estate, and silicon valley
CHOIRE: ha. there's more like millionaires and shit.
DOREE: but that's in northern CA
DOREE: but you're saying just west in general
CHOIRE: california is one big city. but yeah, ish.
CHOIRE: and what does New York have solely? the publishing industry. big whoop.
DOREE: talk dat ish.
CHOIRE: adsfasdf

Cock BTW: Are you kidding? Why would that bring me down?
Cock BTW: I find it, dare I say, a beacon of hope?
Balk BTW: Really? You're not at all disgusted by the idea of wrinkly old bodies, with their flabby skin and rank odors, mixing together in hip-shattering moments of passion that mingle the smell of sex with the stench of death?
Cock BTW: You're an idiot.
Cock BTW: Listen, jackass, I know you're trying to kill yourself with booze and cigarettes, but guess what? I've done the research: All Balk men live into their nineties. So you know what? We're stuck with each other for another sixty years, at least. And here's the deal: I am still going to be wanting some.
Cock BTW: I don't want to get too flowery or poetic or whatever, but here's the thing: When you stick me into someone, it's not just about something as base as sex. Which is not to say that sex is a bad thing. But anyway: It is an affirmation of life. Being stuck into someone, thrusting back and forth in a dance that both brings you as close to another person and makes you, for however long you keep together, feel the very essence of what it is to be human, is the ultimate defense AGAINST death. Don't you think that, as we grow older, we're going to want that more? Hasn't it occurred to you that the closer we come to the grave the more important it's going to be to us to stare death in the face and say, Come when you must, but until that day I am celebrating my life in the best way I know how: By being stuck into someone. I live. I breathe. I am human.
Balk BTW: Wow.
Balk BTW: I never thought of it that way.
Balk BTW: That's amazing.
Cock BTW: Good. Anyway, when we get up there make sure we're still doing it with the younger set. Because I can't get it up for those Golden Girls bitches.

Elderly assert sex still a fact of life [The Age]

Relays our correspondent in real time:

Page Six's Paula Froelich is on the Star Jones show right now.
It is the ladies chatting.
Her and Vivica Fox and some other chick and Star.
The third is Rita Crosby— so I guess two women and Rita and Star.
Paula says we are still a third world country.
She won a $50 bet from John Gibson that there were no WMDs. SHE KNEW.
Paula just told a story about being set up on a date with a friend's ex husband—they're all yelling so I can't hear. It is like a public access show without the great graphics and professional production.
The segment just ended.
Her guest is Dustin Diamond now, via satellite, talking about celeb sex tapes.
She just doesn't understand it. She says it was a career boost for him. "Excuses are tool of the incompetent—they build blah blah blah" she said to Dustin.
With the fakey black southern thing and the mumbling she is tough to hear.
She said she did some research on this sex tape thing.
"Kim Kardashian, she gettin' paid"—"Paris Hilton, she gettin' paid."
Guess the Star-Al tape won't be coming out. Oh well.
Now she transitions to a story on the soldier who had someone shoot him so that he didn't have to go back to Iraq.
I can't go on because my head exploded a minute ago.
Okay. Finally done with that solder who shot himself... Ooh, Star's open letter is coming up.
They said there was part 2 of the lame Isiah Washington interview from yesterday coming but they never aired it—that is good b/c they spent 20-25 minutes with him yesterday and never mentioned why he was booted from Grey's Anatomy.
The Open Letter: allows me to talk with you and be honest and direct. She rang the opening bell at the stock exchange and more Americans are losing jobs to Indians (India Indians—not here-first Indians) and that isn't right. All for trade and global economy but self preservation starts at home. HUH? Oh—and part 2 of Isiah Washinton interview is tomorrow...now go discuss amongst yourselves.
Is that stolen from Mike Myers on SNL?