"WHEN SOMEONE IS SO POPULAR ON MYSPACE THEY HAVE FAKE PROFILE MADE ABOUT THEM, THE REAL PERSON MAKES A "PROOF" BY TAPING THEIR NAME AND MYSPACE ID NUMBER AND SENDING IT TO MYSPACE AUTHORITIES."

[via fimoculous and Tomorrow Museum]

Don't engage a heckler unless you have to.

This is the simplest rule of all, which Dane Cook flagrantly ignores. A rude comment on MySpace? Were any entertainer to take the time to personally respond to all of their online hate, they would have little time to do anything else (unless they were Dane Cook, who would just be chilling, regardless). Restrict your energies to those who are heckling you in front of a large audience.

Turn the crowd against the heckler.

This is accomplished by subtly placing yourself and the crowd together as one group, and positioning the heckler as an outsider who is assaulting both of you. This is key. Don't allow the crowd to merely be a neutral observer, refereeing the spat. If that happens, they may well decide the heckler was right, because—let's face it—you are a jerk. The crowd would never indict itself at the same time as you, though, so be buddies with the mob.

Always be funnier than your heckler.

Goes without saying. If your name is Dane Cook, this could be a problem. If your heckler is funnier than you, just call security and sit quietly.

Don't let your mouth write checks your ass can't cash.

That heckler that just called you a pussy: Can you really kick his ass? If not, don't say so. That literary critic who said you can't string a sentence together: Is he a far better writer than you? Then don't call him a hack. That commenter that pointed out your idiotic error: Are you really going to execute him? (Yes, you are). Always be sure you can back up what you say. Humiliation compounds at a geometric rate.

[pic via ohnotheydidnt]

Phillips isn't even two years older than his ex; they're both in high school. She took the photos herself, apparently under no duress, and e-mailed them to him. As awful as his behavior is (a report says that when cops warned him about possible jail time, he replied "fuck that, I am keeping them up"), it's an interaction between two minors.

After all, this case provides plenty of evidence that Phillips and his girlfriend had sex, which in their state of Wisconsin is illegal under the age of 18. So should he be strung up on statutory rape charges too? Do we just use laws in any case they technically apply regardless of the point, which is to protect children from sexual exploitation by adults?

Or are the laws even reasonable in an age when teenagers are sexually active and have access to cheap communication? Do we need new anti-defamation laws for spreading humiliating photos of anyone, regardless of age? Or is it only minors who will get protection when an ex spreads their dirty naked pics?

Sorry if I'm the only one worked up about this; some of us have a history of raunchy photo-taking and a few crazy exes.

For each time you did the following in the last thirty days:

1 point

• Asked for a digg
• Added someone on Facebook the day you met them
• Visited MySpace
• IMed someone asking who they are
• Messaged someone on a site like Facebook when you could have called or e-mailed
• Used a "Sent from my Blackberry/iPhone/etc." e-mail signature
• Discussed an Apple rumor
• Made a joke about fonts

2 points

• Commented on a blog just to say you liked or hated something
• Posted a Craigslist missed connection
• Used MySpace
• Submitted your own blog post to Digg
• Asked someone to blog you
• Added to a Wikipedia talk page
• Bought a Threadless T-shirt

3 points

• Told a personal story in a Yelp review
• Used Tumblr
• Gave a bad review on Amazon to a book written over thirty years ago
• Added a celebrity on Facebook
• Made a YouTube response video
• Twittered about your blog
• Got fake-married on Facebook
• Friended someone on MySpace, LinkedIn, Friendster, or Yahoo 360
• Asked anyone to tag anything

4 points

• Invited someone to add their photo to a Flickr group
• Invited someone to a Facebook app
• Vlogged
• Made a Facebook event that wasn't really an event
• Blogged about dealing with someone in the service industry
• E-mailed a press release
• Wrote "why do I care" in a blog comment

Death Round: 20 points

• Sent an unneeded "reply to all"
• Sold someone's contact info
• Played Second Life
• Rickrolled someone
• Reviewed your own book on Amazon
• Complained that someone reblogged a third party's content without crediting you for finding it first
• Said the word "microcelebrity"
• Invited your whole address book to something
• Talked like a LOLcat in real life

Results
0-10: Get the hell off my blog. But first digg my story.
11-15: You must feel great about yourself. Add twenty points for taking the quiz.
16-25: Very mediocre. Why are you reading this on your Playstation? Go play GTA IV.
26-40: All your Tumblr posts are stolen from other people's blogs. Your Twitters are about Twitter. But somehow all the YouTube clips you IM me are two years old.
41+: All my base are belong to you. Oh god, you probably laughed at that. You can haz the finger, jackass.

Picture: A very funny College Humor article. Before you go, I was serious about the digg.

11. YouTube

At risk: Daredevils, fictional characters
Case 1: While trying to perform a stunt for YouTube, four teens crashed their Ford Explorer, injuring three and killing one. No details on how awesome the clip would have been, but hopefully it'd be more exciting than "ghost riding," the 2005-07 fad of rolling an idling car down the street while dancing beside it. The result of that fad, besides a few lame videos, was two deaths. Other stupid deadly stunts include subway surfing and fake stunts that end up in banner ads.
Case 2: A man who explained on YouTube how to tie a hangman's noose has been accused of inciting suicide. A few days after the news reported it, someone else posted instructions (though this user has posted plenty of other knot-tying videos, and who could hang themselves with the festive purple and yellow rope he uses?).
Case 3: Of course fictional characters die often and violently: Lonelygirl15, Harry Potter, and the radio star.


10. Myspace

At risk: The lonely
Case 1: Remarkably, no charges were filed in the case of the family who carried on a hoax relationship with 13-year-old depression sufferer Megan Meier over MySpace, then "broke up" with her and thus driving her to suicide. But this is only our first glimpse at two themes of Internet-caused deaths: Tragic romance and preying on the lonely.
Case 2: In this case, MySpace technically saved lives. Cops investigated a 12-year-old boy's MySpace death list, warned everyone who was on it, and searched his home. They didn't find weapons and he said he was just fooling around, so he was just charged with juvenile delinquency. Other death threat cases include a dog and another empty threat against high school students. But just to be safe I make my little sister keep a Google alert on her name, cause she''d be the first to go if some trenchcoated freak started shooting up the cool kids in her school.
Case 3: Of course while stupid people may reveal their murder plans on MySpace, they may be inspired by the site too. Heather Kane saw another girl on her boyfriend's profile and hired a hitman to kill her. Good thing she bumped into an undercover cop instead.


9. Facebook

At risk: Anyone who pisses off a muslim
Case 1: A Saudi Arabian father beat and shot his daughter earlier this year for chatting on Facebook. A preacher in the Islamic country called the site a "door to lust;" many Saudi women use aliases on the site and post drawings instead of photos. But there are still plenty of photos of hookups in the Facebook group "Single and Looking in Saudi Arabia."
Case 2: After a Jewish woman in Melbourne rejected a friend offer from one Ibrahim Dirani, he allegedly wrote to her, "I am Hezbollah and I am going to kill you and all of your family — promise you."
Aw,


8. Pornography

At risk: Viewers of extreme or illegal porn and the people who know them
Case 1: It's hard to feel too sorry for those who kill themselves after they're implicated in child porn rings, like these four suicides in 1998 and these six in 2004.
Case 2: Porn doesn't only kill the depraved. The story of Jane Longhurst, an English woman killed by "a man obsessed with violent sexual pornography," was tragic enough to encourage many UK lawmakers to ban extreme porn.


7. Spam

At risk: The terribly gullible
Case 1: Spammers and scammers can easily take your money if you're dumb enough to give them your passwords and financial info. But some Nigerian scams go far beyond online fraud; many scammers lure their victims to Nigeria to continue paying money in person; fifteen victims were killed after they got suspicious.


6. Blogging

At risk: Those already at risk of dying
Case 1: There's a trick to making listicles like this: Put the weakest item in the middle. Unfortunately the New York Times spent an entire trend piece on the bogus idea of "death by blogging." But Gizmodo editor Brian Lam tells me, "Only bogus to lazy bloggers. I did 75 hours this week and anyone over fifty would die doing that."


5. Ebay

At risk: The already dead
Case 1: Seung-Hui Cho bought empty clips and holsters on Ebay before his Virginia Tech rampage. He got his guns and ammo elsewhere, though Ebay notes that the sale of ammunition on Ebay is legal.
Case 2: Ebay's death profits tend to come from the memorabilia. Celebrity deaths bring predictable results, like sales of Pope tchotchkes and autographed Heath Ledger posters. But Ebay has also hosted auctions for supposed Columbia shuttle pieces, video of insurgents shooting down planes in Iraq, the car used in a murder, and O.J. Simpson's book.


4. Drugs

At risk: Druggies
Case 1: Internet drug sales are ridiculously easy (see "spam" above), so easy that every decent men's magazine did an "I ordered Viagra off the Internet" story by 2005. But that means irresponsible doctors can prescribe dangerous drugs, such as this 2002 case of deadly drugs sold online, or this case of a doctor whose patients sometimes became addicted or were hospitalized, or a 2007 case where a 57-year-old Canadian woman died after taking an illegal sedative she ordered online.


3. Webcams

At risk: Suicides
Case 1: Webcam suicide is one of the darkest modern phenomena, an example of loneliness and despair in a supposed age of connection and hope. Those who have fallen that far and recovered may want to forget it ever happened. Webcammer Stacy Pershall has long insisted that despite reports, she did not try to kill herself on camera in 2001 by overdosing on pills but merely took some Advil "to get a few hours sleep" — on her bathroom floor.
Case 2: While Pershall's viewers worried about her and called the cops to save her, those watching Brandon Vedas in 2003 egged him on. He OD'd on five drugs and died a room away from his unsuspecting mother.
Case 3: A father named Kevin Whitrick hanged himself after the apparent encouragement of people watching his webcam; viewers later said they thought it was a joke, and indeed they'd acted worried after seeing him die. After all, he was in an insult chat room, which brings us to another cause of death:


2. Chat rooms

At risk: Hopeless romantics
Case 1: A man rejected in real life by his chat room lover in 1999 cut his own head off with a chainsaw in her front yard. Enough said.
Case 2: Plenty of innocents have been killed by online predators like the man who killed an altar girl, the Texas A&M killer, and this guy in a rural North Carolina trailer.


1. World of Warcraft

At risk: 10 million players, particularly the already crazy ones
Case 1: World of Warcraft addiction may not necessarily be deadly for the player, but it can be hell on their family life. Of course, Kim Trenor was probably crazy long before she moved cross-country with her 2-year-old to see a guy she met on the game, and definitely before she and Royce Zeigler beat "Baby Grace" to death. But if it weren't for that damned game she never would have met the allegedly abusive Zeigler.
Case 2: WoW isn't the first game to drive addicts mad. At least one Everquest player allegedly shot herself after getting hooked on the game.
Case 3: And of course any time you put a beautiful bit of fantasy in the world, some kid will try to imitate it. Happened with Superman, happened with WoW when a Chinese boy jumped off a 24-story building. His parents sued game maker Blizzard saying he was imitating the game, in which some players like to platform-jump, an activity totally unrelated to actually playing. Again, totally not WoW's fault, but something had to convince that boy he could leap off a tower.

Hey there sexy boys and girls ;) Current mood: confident Hi Everyone, As you all know I've been traveling all month and am currently in London with Benji having an amazing time. I love London, it is definately one of my favorite cities in the world. We went shopping at Harrod's yesterday and had a blast, that store has everything! So much fun! In the meantime, I'm sooo looking forward to my new show which begins shooting next month. Loving the casting videos! Some of you have been so sweet and so creative. It's going to be hard for me to decide which potential BFFs I should chose for my show! Luckily I have a great casting team helping me while I'm traveling. Doron Ofir's Casting team have been traveling the country and so far they have auditioned over a thousand girls and guys – but just so you all know – its all been by appointment only so make sure you log onto www.ParisBFF.com to apply for the show. And just to clear up any misinformation you may have heard, there are NO open calls for the show! Everyone they invite has applied thru the site and they've picked out the best contenders to interview. With so many applications to go thru they are trying their utmost best to read and contact everyone from the official casting application. Every event is exclusive and hand picked by invitation only. I didn't want my potential BFFs to have to wait in a long open call lines. So whoever made up that there wasn't a big turn out has no idea what they are talking and just another lie on the internet as usual. But who cares, I don't pay attention to the haters! I only pay attention to you, my true friends and supporters, love you guys!! I am so excited! I just know that I'm going to have an unbelievable group of potential BFFs for the show and I want to thank everyone who is applying and can't wait to see all your tapes as well as all the casting departments selections when I return.
Love you all,
Paris :) xoxo

It is supposed to contain the entire digital catalogs of participating labels, which include all but one of the major record companies. Beyond that the vision is unclear. There will be some free, ad-supported streaming of music, which sounds awful; some downloadable music and maybe a subscription option. As the Times pointed out, there is a big reason to doubt whether MySpace can pull this music thing off:

MySpace will have to prove that it can actually sell music. Though the company earns $70 million a month in advertising for the News Corporation, according to estimates by Pali Capital, it has never successfully sold products on a wide scale. A download service for independent music, begun in 2006 with Snocap, a music start-up, was considered a disappointment.

[Times]

Despite giving the generation a stupid name (The Look At Me's), Newsweek concedes that obsession with documentation isn't entirely a generational phenomenon. But the Internet does qualitatively change our view of recording life. MySpace and camera phones document things that would previously remain secret or temporary.

If Ashley Alexandra Dupré were in the same scandal ten years ago, the call girl wouldn't have been so well-documented and wouldn't have stolen the news cycle from her client Eliot Spitzer. She wouldn't have felt like just another hot girl. But seeing her MySpace page (which was no more packed with self-promotion than the average teen I know) evaporates some of the mystique. So, thanks to the superdocumented life of Gen Y, everyone's prefabricated for their rise to fame. Like Ashley, we won't even have to do something new.

Apparently, the difference between a $3,000 hooker and a $50 hooker is the ruined aspirations. "Kristen's" Myspace page, as uncovered by NYT. She's got a decent voice, $50 bucks says Perez Hilton signs her to his new label deal before summer.

[www.myspace.com] And http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/nyregion/12cnd-kristen.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

After being the target all week of slanderous and degrading stories, horribly manipulated pictures and articles in the media, I have had to show my cards and announce under the gun and under vicious personal attack that I am in fact pregnant.

Once they got a glimpse of my expanding physique a few days ago, they have been like a pack of coyotes circling their prey whilst eerily howling with delight. Starting with a London publication and then New York and Chicago all writing false defamatory degrading stories about all of the dark possible reasons I could be putting on weight. The US tabloids have been calling all day wanting confirmation on all kinds of insane theories.

It is unfortunate that I couldn't have announced something that is this much of a blessing and that has made us so incredibly happy under better circumstances.

Pardon my seething contemptuous tone but ladies, You KNOW if you were pregnant and you felt you were expanding uncontrollably by the moment as a result and the worldwide media started badgering and harassing you for it, plastering you everywhere in an unflattering light, you would be mortified as well.

The more I think about it, the more it sounds like the kid has a case, even if he's a nasty (and uninspired) little demon.

"someone posted a friend of mines phone number and says its mine this jackass Karmi, on a website that is coming down but frankly i have waaay more relevanat things to do than worry about a website with insanely inflated viewing numbers some tiny clusterfuck of annoyance that i only ever rememeber when i ( rarely ) go on the internet as i am making music films and raising a child conducting my life getting laid and tivoing suze orman- so wtf? STOP CAllING MY FRIEND KATHERINE, SHE HAS THREE KIDS AND HAS NO TIM E FOR INTERNET BULLSHIT- SHE SPOKE TO SOMEONE AS ME TO PROTECT ME OUT OF SHEER CURIOUSITY TO SUSS OUT THE PERSONS VIBE AND SAQID HE W2AS A TOTAL SOCIOPATH LOSER AND NOW SHE HAS TOC HANGE HER NUMBER AS THIS RETARD POSTED IT as if ID ac=tually speak to Karmi personally! PUHLEASE ( aka chris) i never ever ever speak tp [people off the internet myself i have people who do that for me, and she also has a husband and thank god this is her secondary phone as shes basically thrown it away- and i will make sure i get the lawyeres whow eresorty of moseying to hurry and take thaT fucking site down as the webmaster ( trannie named brooke) lied at the icann hearing and now irt has to get dponw throughthe federal squatters law theres just been more important things but seriously this is stupid , obviously none of you here have engaged in terrorising Katherine or her kids with stupid phoners about we cante evr figur eout what- just "oooheee i have a famous persons phon e number and im in bumfuck Maryland" its just stupid obscene and RUDE, remember m,anners are free. youve fucked someones secondary cell up but it aint mine but its still insane and rude and Chris whoever the fuck you are i dont write back on this site personally so whoeevr was on shift was obviouswly fucking with you it takes about 8 people to run this site for some reason and tho i do read the comments i dontrtend to write lengthy letters back personally although occasionally i wrote a friend or somneone i like or post at someones space b ut not too often, trhats just how these my spaces work- so dont go offended - i love this my space and i dont need this karma wierdness- get off my cloud.
Karmi + CHRIS your just creepy, leave me alone leave my friends alone and go post with your people. until they get kicked off the net.
as fro ou guys here i love you and support all our efforts to im prove our lives an d i welcome all the new people here and its really awesone that id ont have to use one of those computer programs id die of embarsssment to add a million friends - i dunno i just think thats retarted id rather have it happen slow and organically so we can all getto know one another
loadswof love and be nice or leave
nam myoho renge kyo
Courtnoi"

Jerry Yang is desperate to avoid selling to Microsoft: the Yahoo founder, like most Silicon Valley bigwigs, hates the lumbering software giant to the north; the big bad media mogul is cuddly in comparison. Yahoo's long felt the absence of a social network site: it tried and failed to acquire Facebook. And Murdoch's keen to cash in on his smart investment in MySpace, which is worth about ten times what he paid for it. For a 76-year-old, the media mogul is surprisingly faddish: he's noted that rival Facebook is adding users more rapidly than MySpace; and is demonstrably more enamored with the venture's founder, Mark Zuckerberg, than MySpace Tom and his own team.

So this might be a good moment to get out. News Corp., which certainly can't afford to mount a competing bid for Yahoo after spending $6bn on Dow Jones, already floated the idea of a swap of the social network for Yahoo stock last year, in the Times of London, which Murdoch owns. With Bill Gates' Microsoft the alternative, Yahoo may now be more receptive.

Now if you disagree, let me defend my first assumption by saying my editor told me to write this. And let's get the first example of self-exposure out of the way: All the Gawker Media writers. We've had that idea shoved down our brains, we all know bloggers love themselves. But beyond that, the world outside the NYC creative elite is full of self-exposers.

Take, for example, Tila Tequila. On her own, a freak of nature who landed her own MTV reality show because she's "MySpace famous" and she's the simulacrum of sex. But Tila (whose career actually started when she posed for Playboy) is just a prettier version of an entire generation of trailer trash putting their entire lives online. Again, I thought this was blisteringly obvious, but people's horror at a little self-exposure suggests otherwise.

People in the sticks have been gushing about their personal lives online for years. Myspace is made of normal people being attention whores. Random examples I just dug up: this kid, this kid, and these twelve pages of freaks mocked by the site Something Awful.

YouTube is worse. (Again, Something Awful sums it up.) The site churns through attention-whoring and personal self-exposure like a pig through gristle, destroying people's lives until they realize, hey, everyone will forget about this next week, might as well sell the clip to Geico before I drift into oblivion.

You know all the above; you might not have seen the smaller but thriving world of live streaming video on Stickam. And Justin.tv and Ustream and BlogTV and Operator11, where teens and the occasional desperate adult talk about their lives as they happen, making for the most thrillingly dull footage known to man, as well as a reliable wanksource.

Compared to all the above, Julia Allison with her relationship weblog is a princess of privacy. Jakob Lodwick is just another opinionated blogger who happens to be the ousted founder of a startup. (Oh wow! He's a libertarian! So are half the young middle-class males online!) Patrick Moberg and his "NY Girl of My Dreams" is just a glorified Craigslist Missed Connection, with a twist appealing to a morning show.

To pretend this young New York crowd are the most egregious fame-seekers is to ignore the rest of the country. None of their fameballs have rolled as big as Tila Tequila, and not even Moberg stayed in the public eye as long as Justin Kan (of Justin.tv) in San Francisco, Chris "Leave Britney Alone" Crocker in Tennessee, "Chocolate Rain" singer Tay Zonday in Minneapolis, or Miss Teen South Carolina.

By the way, it's not all vomitous; if it weren't for the free-for-all of the Internet, no one would have heard the advice of Ms. Tionna Smalls. Tay Zonday is, well, kind of a good singer. Andy Samberg might some day make a movie as good as his early online work at The Lonely Island. And that's why fameballs are the future.

Miracle on Bedford Ave [MySpace]

i think/hope we foundteh PERFECT plaCE, its a w village 4 floor house 2 floors are being rented by the owners, itllcost ...alot...

There have been 13 ten-minute episodes so far, and here's what you've missed: our girl Dylan is a considerably less-endearing, blander Angela Chase in her twenties who works at "Women's Attitude" magazine and doesn't know what to do with her life. Then she starts blogging because she's a "writer," often addressing her webcam directly between bouts of pacing her bedroom.

She lives with a bunch of her friends—all stock characters straight from the "twentysomething character handbook" that surely must be out there somewhere—and there is actually a lot of sexual tension between the male and female members of her household! They're just like you: they worry about selling out a lot, and people at work forget their names sometimes.

Sadly, the website Quarterlife and its social-networking capabilities is actually used and referenced in the show. You can even "upload and share media—across the web!" The show also features people sitting around using computers quite often, which, as we all know, is inherently fascinating.

The Quarterlife-as-interactive-experience website is absolutely stuffed with content—some of it vaguely humiliating—that no quarterlifer in possession of anything even resembling a life would ever be able to slog through. There's a column by Alexandra Robbins—not the author of the show's script, but the author of "Conquering Your Quarterlife Crisis," whose columns range from "How Do I Get Over My Fear of Failure?" to "One Reason It Rocks to Be a Twentysomething Today."

"We were all geniuses in elementary school, but apparently the people who deal with us never got our transcripts, because they don't seem to be aware of it," Dylan says in an early episode.

Apparently NBC got the transcripts, because they picked it up the series, written by Marshall Herskovitz and Edward Zwick from MSCL and thirtysomething. TV-watchers, someday soon you are in for a lot more dialogue like that!

Now, in our defense, we recycle, we turn off lights, we don't even litter, which basically qualifies us as saints in this city. We have been known to, upon occasion, not completely tune out Al Gore.

Still... a Time rendition of Vanity Fair's "Green Issue" leaves us cold.

Former senator George Allen, who's been stumping so long he can put an audience into a trance faster than most, suggested General Petraeus "and the troops." Of course, of course, the troops too!

Ali seemed to be the only one who didn't make up her answer in the elevator; she chose French prez Nicholas Sarkozy. Hammy Brian Williams had some mic trouble; "No thanks, Whoops," he answered when the "View" host offered him hers. Is it just us, or are Williams' much-written about secret comedy chops on their way to being overexposed?

Still! We do give him props for verbally smacking the 41-year-old MySpace guy (whose alternate suggestion—surprise!&mdash was his new boss, Rupert Murdoch) when he tried to sound 15-years-old by saying he wasn't exactly sure what this General Petraeus guy was all about. (And he isn't even the MySpace founder who lies about his age!)

The real message in the news, "whatever that message may be," gets lost for young people, he thinks. Honey. AARP's got you on deck; you sound silly.

"My wife and I thank you," an almost misty-eyed George Allen said to a horrified Whoopi Goldberg, thanking her for "Ghost." WTMI, Senator, seriously.

And a slightly scary Post grande dame Liz Smith scolded the panel for being too upbeat, and TV chat-host Joe Scarborough, who is awfully tall, suggested George W. Bush. That did it for Whoopi, who then kicked everyone out. We thus leave it to you, dear readers, because other than maybe that "your mom" should be Time's Person Of The Year, we got nothing.

Imagine what would happen to this world if Rupert Murdoch didn't have the final say in everything? If (shudder) the people had some pull? Mass chaos! Rivers full of blood! Matter ceasing to exist!

Actually, the people don't seem to mind the messianic mogul's leadership; 99.5% of them voted to re-elect him as chairman. That .5% is so screwed. Murdoch also managed to get a dig in at NewsCorp-owned MySpace's rival, Facebook. "We're going in slightly different ways. They [Facebook] are more of a utility—I won't say a phone book—for friends to connect with each other." MySpace, he said, is more "cultural." Did Rupert Murdoch just call Facebook white trash?

Dear Tionna,

Crying in Clinton Hill

Dear Crying in Clinton Hill,

First off, dry those tears! Tionna is here to help you. What Suzanne did was maddd wack. She broke the code; she messed with your ex girl. You said that this was someone that she wanted to get down and dirty with and you knew that. I have learned in my past with heavy drinkers that a drunk tongue speaks the truth, so her sleeping with Molly is something that she wanted to do and she did it.

I will give Suzanne some credit: she did admit that she cheated once she was busted. Most people don't! And Molly only told you because she's a hater and mad that you have moved on with your life and have someone new that you love and adore. Like you said, a person with the "characteristics."

Molly isn't really a threat. However, she can turn into one based on the fact that she works near Suzanne. But I think if you think Suzanne really has a thing for Molly and you still want Suzanne ... Do what my friend D did: Make it a 3-some relationship! People do it every day. They live in a relationship with three people. I am so serious and it works for them. Then you won't have to be stressed because you know everything. Think about it like this- you had sex with Molly, you had sex with Suzanne, Suzanne had sex with you, Suzanne had sex with Molly, Molly had sex with you, Molly had sex with Suzanne. Hell, y'all a team already and dont even know it. So why not reap the benefits of having two women since Molly is always around anyway.

But if you don't want anything to do with Molly at all in that way or can't face seeing them two being intimate around you, then end all ties with Molly and ask Suzanne to make a choice. I know it will hurt if she picks Molly over you but at least you will know what's up. See what happens. But I still think the triad thing would be a great idea.

Ooh, definitely let me know how this goes.

Tionna

Tionna,

I'm in a big problem. I've been seeing this guy for the past year; now it hasn't been the best of relationships but I've become emotionally attached and there are times i just want to walk away. I haven't met any of his close friends/family or really know that much about him. I've spend almost every night with him and in the past I've snooped ... YES ... I snooped and found e-mails/myspace messages and texts all that allude to the fact that he maybe cheated on me if not physically then definitely verbally. He has a Myspace and never approves any of my comments and hides his friends so i can't see them. Aside from that the relationship hasn't been that great. He stays home all of the time when he's not working and never goes out with me. Granted I haven't been with anyone else but I have gone out with other guys when he is to lazy and stays home. So you're probably wondering why I'm still with him. I guess i am too. Overall, he is a sweet guy and cares for me but he doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve.

So this past weekend I ran into his friends and of course they do not know me but through the power of Myspace i know who they are and what they look like. I told my b/f they were there and hitting on me...but i never once told them who i was since the b/f wouldn't like that so i remained a mystery. Meanwhile his good friend—a very hot friend—was hitting on me nonstop. I forgot what it was like to have some guy hit on me even if he just wanted to get in my panties. Oh I forgot to mention i was with a guy friend of mine who apparently liked me more than just a friend. So the guy (the friend of my b/f) asked for my number but I didn't give it to him instead I took his and danced the night away with him. Tionna, all I keep thinking about is this dude and i know it's wrong and I'm not that slutty girl that breaks up friendships or any of that but i think I'm fascinated with something NEW and EXCITING and I'm tempted every day to just pick up the phone and call him.

Please help..what would you do?

ttyl - LP

Dear LP,

Your problem really isn't a big problem but many women go through these same issues. First, you never met any of his family or close friends, then you snooped into his email/Myspace (a no-no), then you assumed that he has cheated on you based on your snooping. LMAO.

First off, let be the first to tell you that Myspace is a relationship killer. When I was a freshman in college, I took a class on Internet and Identity and you know what the whole thesis of the class was that people's identities change when their real one is shielded by the computer. So what you may think is "cheating" is what we call in the hood "Myspace G." That is G meaning game. Everyone on Myspace plays a game. That's why so many people love it. You can be whatever you want on Myspace; a baller, a single guy, a singer, whatever. Its all game so don't assume he's cheating on you from that bullcrap.

Another thing is, theres no such thing as verbal cheating. Verbally, we can say what the hell we want. That doesn't mean that we mean it. If he's online telling some chick yeah, we gotta hook up or whatever, that doesn't mean anything. I have over 4,000 friends on Myspace and get plenty of messages of men saying what they would and wouldn't do to me because I can't do anything to them, they don't know my ass. So who cares? That's how people think. If talking was a sin, we would all be in hell right now—feel me?

So don't use that against him and stop snooping! That is corny and we always end up being the ones hurt by that (I have learned that the hard way) and now it's something you can pass along to someone else.

Lastly, your man forgot that what he doesn't do another man will be happy and willing to do in a hot NY minute. But you can't teach him that by taking his friend's number on the low. All that does is make you seem like a skeet and maybe that's why he didn't want to introduce you to his friends in the first place. Communication is the key in any relationship, so go and talk it out with him. Put everything on the table and if his response doesn't bring closure to the problem, leave his laid back ass alone.

Good luck and keep in touch,

Tionna

Come on, just ask her!

Sitting next to a couple on a date is one of the more trying experiences of eating out in New York. This is especially true when the couple is made up of two horrible individuals: Each trying to impress the other with the breadth of their knowledge, holding forth, laughing too quickly, being fake-vulnerable. But at a certain point the unease becomes addictive. Your interest in your own conversation wanes. All you want to do is eavesdrop. It hurts so good.

At one point, over his bavette with summer panzanella, he told her, "The thing about the generation in their early-twenties is all they care about is Myspace, big parties and taking pictures of themselves." And then she said, "Yeah," in this infuriating and slightly incredulous way that one greets unexpected and insightful news from a credible source.

A single tear of rage fell from my cheek into my scallops.

Later that night, a guy was telling me about the worst date conversation he'd ever overheard. It happened at Marlow and Sons in Williamsburg and included this line: "This Can album changed my life. I hope it changes yours in the same way."

There was also a lot of talk of "making work. Both people were nominally artists. Later I figured out that I had dated the girl who was having that conversation, so.

New York-based video production intern (Art Student preferred) needed for web project with Big Momma Productions. Project involves sourcing images and creating/prepping collages for animation.

Applicant must be detail-oriented and very proficient in Photoshop with some experience in After Effects. We are looking for a great illustrator with a unique, fierce, fun artistic style. Your role will be very hands on. The content is art, style, & pop-culture oriented.

Duration:

Month of August - looking for someone with the right qualifications asap.

Salary:

Stipend

Contact Info:

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