It's not so much dark times now, as profane and loud. Satire you'll have, oh dear me, indeedy yes. "Vomitous" and "awash" are two words that come to mind. It used to be that everyone would be famous for 15 minutes. How antediluvian. Rather, everyone will now want a satirical YouTube film with 15 megabytes.

Satire we'll have. Rather, the real dearth in our world will be sweetness, comfort, thoughtfulness and civility. If I could do "Peanuts," that's what I'd be doing. Alas, I've tried. And oh, you get way, way richer.

And why is their level of discourse so much calmer and smarter than Western blog comments?

“Those overpowering Satan’s seduction are few, and we sacrifice those few since they may win us Paradise,” read a posting on both sites this summer on the subject of “vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices.” It continued: “Yet, keeping them alive is beneficial for us, since every one of them is tantamount to an entire people. So we must find a way to save those lives and harness that zeal.”

The post led to a vast and heated online discussion among extremists, illustrating the new complexity of the topic. As the jihadists on these sites move from discussing ideology to the practical aspects, it becomes clear that their biggest technological challenge will be moving on from the radio-wave technology that has proved highly successful in remotely setting off homemade bombs against military convoys in Iraq to the more delicate task of getting the explosive to its target and then detonating it without being exposed.

See, Western blog commenters would move from discussing ideology to discussing, like how other commenters are racist Rethuglicans and how much they love Tyra and how Ekhlaas sucks so much compared to Firdaws recently, don't you think? The new guy sucks, bring back Abu Abdullah al-Qurashi!

Sure, Al7orya doesn't sound as funny as 4Chan, and they're debating how best to blow people like us up, but why are they all so much more polite about it?

Living to Bomb Another Day [NYT]

Here are the two interpretations of The Huffington Post that Arianna and company would like you to forget: "left-wing Drudge Report" and "unedited celebrity Livejournal." The increasingly bloated HuffPo still is mostly an unhealthy mixture of those two things, of course, but their ambitions are higher. They have to be, to justify that ridiculous internal valuation. Hence HuffPo Chicago! And, more importantly, HuffPo Living, full of bullshit local-news quality health stories, "how to beat workplace stress" listicles (or often worse: links to those listicles posted elsewhere), alternative medicine quack-bloggers, and other "grab the apolitical old women" content. (To be fair, this shit does fit in well with Arianna's moony guru-filled California lifestyle, just as the media and political sections compliment her strident populism and personal hatred of the establishment press.)

And with entertainment and style sections, HuffPo now calls itself "The Internet Newspaper." Real newspapers across the nation spiral into bankruptcy, but HuffPo's overhead costs are much lower, what with not paying most of their contributors. And also what with not having any original reporting.

The site is still another damn aggregator, curating and linking real work done by traditional newsgatherers. With insane raving commenters, of course. And "blogs" from Nora Ephron. [Three years later and they still call each "post" a "blog." This still drives us insane.] This is the point L.A. Times media writer James Rainey makes in his slightly bitter piece on Arianna and the site. "I confess I'm as charmed and amused by the beguiling Ms. H as anyone," he says, "but also slightly queasy about whether her Huffington Post will ever offer original content and reporting that lives up to the hype and pretty packaging." What, you're not happy with featured content like "One Millenial Speaks Out: Why I'm Enrolling in Culinary School"? [Ed. note: we wuz wrong.]

But, you know, they're still working on that whole original content that will make their site actually worth what they'd like to cash out thing!

Another infusion of capital, $10 million to $20 million, is in the works, Huffington said Tuesday, to hire more reporters and editors and upgrade the site's technology. She would like to beef up political and media coverage and put at least one reporter in each of two dozen cities by the end of 2009.

Yes of course.

Still. How does the "HuffPo, even if it's not worth $200 million, is still a hot commodity that you should buy for a lot of money" story keep afloat? How the hell did that $200 million number get traction in the first place? Ken Lerer, the quiet, New York-based co-founder and Chairman, certainly helps. He's got business acumen and influence, yes, but the guy also founded a PR firm once upon a time. Nina Monk's Fools Rush In, her history of AOL/Time Warner, illustrates Lerer's ability to work "with" the press:

Hah. That's the co-founder of that strident defender of media independence and transparency the Huffington Post reveling in how well he tricked the media into loving a white-collar criminal.

[Times]

Here's the thing: the gossip reported in Page Six, on Pagesix.com, on TMZ, in the Daily News' gossip columns, and in every celebrity weekly, has never been lamer or weaker than it is right now. Take it from me—I've spent the past year skimming those news outlets daily. And, okay, obviously I'm insanely burnt out, but I think that as celebrity-focused coverage has mushroomed and our standards for what constitutes "celebrity" have become incredibly broad—come on, we're supposed to care about Hulk Hogan's divorce?—whatever was once juicy or appealing about paying attention to "gossip" has, for many people, disappeared entirely.

One of the reasons gossip has become boring is that many self-styled stars are letting it all hang out just as much, if not more, than Jakob and Julia. You want "universal transparency," Ricky? Look no further than Britney Spears' underpants, or Amy Winehouse's shirt.

But then there's also the fact that "second hand information, information embargoes, secret sources, tips, etc." have never been as fundamental to the "gossip industry" as publicists, managers, deliberate leaks, strategic appearances, and press releases. And by controlling the dissemination of information about themselves 100%, Jakob and Julia played the game in the most old-fashioned way possible.

So Ricky's right: something to do with the kind of thing Jakob and Julia have done is eventually going to put "Page Six" and its ilk out of business. But Jakob and Julia haven't wrested the means of production out of the evil gossip overlords' hands. They've only hastened the demise of the whole enterprise by adding their own voices to an already out-of-control cacophony.

I don't think I'm the only one who's so overwhelmed by the whole shebang that I just can't bring myself to care about any of it anymore.

Sean has chronicled his search to find lasting satisfaction in temporary employment via—what else?—a blog! He still hasn't found what he's looking for, but he has inspired his fellow twentysomethings, says the author of a book about workplace trends. ""He sends the message 'job-hopping is O.K.,' 'moving around is O.K.'"

And, she says, it's a good thing someone is sending this message, because it's not like Sean and his contemporaries have a choice in the matter. "The reality is they might prefer one job that would last forever and end with retirement, but that kind of job doesn't exist anymore."

But you know what you can do? That's right, rise to Internet-fame and convince yourself that that's your metier!

"Talking to [Sean], and scrolling through his Web site, one can't help but conclude that he has in fact already found his job, one not available to his parents' generation, but which his will refine and perfect."

"Mr. Aiken's life work might well turn out to be the marketing of Sean Aiken."

Michael Wolff was talking to lefty media blogger Rory O'Connor at the bar.

We asked him if he'd been asked to sign a non-disclosure agreement for Newser.

He laughed. "Never! No NDAs, never," he said. "That's the rule of the road."

So there might very well be a tell-all in his future. Rory laughed and said, "It's inevitable!"

Wolff agreed: "Inevitable."

"It could be called, "I can't believe those idiots gave me money to do it all again!" Rory said.

We asked Wolff about the algorithm that is Newser's kind of main claim to fame. Users can move an indicator on a continuum that runs from hard to soft news. "I have no idea how it works," Wolff said. "The tech guys explained it to me but I zoned out halfway through. Go ask that guy," he said pointing into a web of white-haired bespectacled men. "The one with white hair and the glasses."

Later, Caroline Miller was lingering by the door, ready to escape. Man, why didn't she get an NDA out of Wolff? "Because I'm feckless!" she said. Nice.

"Michael doesn't even have a contract," she said. "This whole thing is all on a handshake."

So what exactly does Wolff do for Newser? Here's what he does not do: "He's not allowed to talk to anyone on the inside," Miller said. "He's not allowed to manage anybody. What he discovered a long time ago about himself is that he likes to fire people. He has the ideas but I make them happen."

So he has ideas. And did he bring the money? No. "It's all Pat's money anyway!" That would be Patrick Spain, the CEO of HighBeam and soon to be the main character of a really harsh book about how the internet sucks.

Brijit Cuts Magazine Pile Down to Bite-Size Pieces [WaPo]

"Reader comments, almost universally hostile, are the only thing really worth reading on Kurtz's blog," says Silverstein. It's true, the poor guy's getting hammered. Some of our own favorites include:

• "You must be kidding me. Could there be a more narcissistic, self-pleasuring blog than this one? I know all blogs have a measure of ego in them, but holy crap, Howie, reading this is like listening to you masturbate. 'Oh, Howie, you're so good ... yeah, just like that ... tell me more about your lunch with George Will.'"
• "I looked at your book and it's missing the subtitle: 'As told by Sherri Annis.'"
• "Tucker Carlson made an interesting point when I was on his show today.
  I just realized this website is 100% parody. Whoever is behind this: keep it up!
• "Not only would I not hit a dog in the ass with your lame new book, I intend to go so far as to purchase a dog, just to keep on hand, so that I can constantly fail to hit him in the ass with your lame new book."
• "Okay, this is a joke, right? A parody of a vanity blog the likes of which the world has never seen? All you left out at the beginning of each entry, Howie, is 'Dear Diary.'"
• "You suck up to really horrible people like Glenn Reynolds and Michelle Malkin and then play this false equivalency rhetorical game. It's really revolting to those of us out here sick of the media playing along with the GOP. It's been done for so long that you don't realize you're being punked any longer.

  I would suggest you spend a year outside the Beltway, away from the cocktail parties and such, and reconnect with the rest of America. Then you might realize what we're all on about."

After all, there are plenty of things he could to that would change his trajectory! For example, he could quit blogging. He could quit dating Julia Allison. He could quit blogging about dating Julia Allison. Those are three things!

But doing all those things is just part and parcel of Jakob continuing to be his terrible self. So he probably will continue snowballing! Or maybe not. We talked about this a lot over here. One of us thought this: "Jakob has *NO IDEA* what he's talking about. Once he hits 30, he'll notice all the missing seats in the front row of fame, conspicuously not occupied by all his fameball cohorts."

Jakob's having a moment, a moment he'll be unable to sustain for much longer unless he takes things to the next level by, say, dumping Julia for Heidi Montag and marrying her on live TV.

But whatever. He'll probably still be rich, though. And maybe he'll make yet more money off this whole "fameball" concept. It's at least as punchy as "The Long Tail" or "The Tipping Point," right?

So how did the world's first celebrity cheese fare in its final taste test? If you believe the hype, not only did it do very well, but it is an outstanding example of dairy brilliance. Like wine-tasters, cheesemakers have a language all of their own to distinguish their creations from their plastic-wrapped ugly sisters.

A spokesperson for the cheese described it as having "a caramel nose, a sweet twiggy greenness and a creamy good length of flavour". Mr Calmer called it "lemony, with a certain "spritziness".

Wedginald, the cult cheese, finally gets its big taste test [Independent]

Before blogs, if some dude you were dating didn't have the balls to break up with you in person, you might show his Dear Jane letter to a few of your closest girlfriends. Dating advice columnist and Star talking head Julia Allison, being Julia Allison, sent her friends the email in which CollegeHumor and Vimeo cofounder Jakob Lodwick dropped her like a hot potato minutes after he sent it to her.

Later, of course, she posted it on her blog.

She had sort of broken up with him first, though, or tried to—she was upset because he'd blown her off, but somehow found time to update his blog, Obeastiality. "I'm upset with you because I feel like you're putting me in a position where I have to—for my own self-respect—stop seeing you," she wrote to him.

FYI, ladies? Never do this! When you send the "I'm sort of dumping you but leaving the door open for you to say you still care" email, you are basically sending a letterpress-printed hand-calligraphied invitation that says, "Dump me please."

And that's what Jakob did.

You deserve more respect than I've been treating you with. I think you pretty much nail it in this email. I tend to walk all over girls I date, in the sense that they aren't as high a priority as they ought to be. You are not an exception, and I will only grow more selfish (inconsiderate) in the future. For example, this week will be worse than last week.
I am not capable of giving you what you deserve in a relationship, even an "alternative" relationship, so, we should stop seeing each other. I think you are awesome, but I think it's impossible to be together.

Now, the high road to take in an instance like this is: Get angry, sure! Bitch about the jerk you wasted a few months with to your close friends. Take a lot of hard yoga or kickboxing classes or whatnot and buy yourself some new shoes and have sex with a 23-year-old! But bloggers don't think like that—at least, not right off the bat. Their first impulse is, of course, to blog it out.

"And so there it is, the demise of a budding relationship. All over... what, exactly?" Julia wrote. Well, if we had to wildly guess? We'd say that writing about a relationship while you're in it, especially in a public forum, always kills it, unless you're Calvin Fucking Trillin. And if we wanted to delve a little deeper, we'd say that the funny thing about the critiques of each other that Julia and Jakob have posted on their respective blogs could just as easily be about themselves.

Here's Julia on Jakob: "He's an intriguing, colorful, free-spirited, deeply creative soul. He is also aloof and self-centered and unapologetically narcissistic, which in moderation would be fine, but he pushes the boundaries towards 'asshole.' He's incredibly erratic—immature with bursts of maturity. Myopia with bursts of self-awareness. Selfishness with bursts of... well... there were a few moments—tiny glimpses—of who he could be if he took into account the feelings of others. It was something very special. I really liked that person—there I saw joy and an energy, an active curiosity, an exploratory mind with a lot of passion."

And here's Jakob on Julia: "You cannot build a media shrine to yourself when your self is shaped primarily by someone else."

Dear Patients,

I'm sure by now you've heard the horrendous and hurtful allegations which have been leveled against me as reported in the press. Rest assured, these accusations are false and I plan to defend against them vigorously to clear my name and professional reputation. I am disheartened and appalled at the way in which the press and media have been manipulated by a few disgruntled individuals who are attempting to advance their own economic agendas. I am confident that upon the completion of the legal process, I will be able to return to my practice and care for the many patients whose trust and respect I have earned over the years. I appreciate the countless well wishes I have received, and I am eager to return to my practice as soon as possible. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for believing in me.

Fondly,

Brad J. Jacobs

The "libel" in question is this comment, which basically accuses Mandy of being a bitchy weirdo who's in love with herself. (And hey, who isn't?) Mandy uses the platform of her blog to take on her accuser.

1) Spectacular. This is from a girl named A., who when I sent out an email about moving to New York wrote me saying she knew a band I was friends with. She also (I just checked the original note she sent me) brought up how tall I was because she said she had a couch I could stay on that was limited to someone who was 5'7". So that's why I would have said my height. I think she then talked about how men treated her based on her looks, saying they expected a dominatrix-type role, so I said what do you look like? She said she was brunette and heftier. Cool, whatever, I'm not the one who brought it up.
2) It was pretty clear she was a little out there, so I got off the phone as quickly as I could, but then she called me up soon after. Why? She had a great opportunity for me to invest in a play she was putting up. Jeez, A., do you think if I would have invested in your play you wouldn't be libeling me on Gawker? I wonder!
4) I'd also like to make a special plea: If I ever say anything along the lines of: "Stock brokers, lawyers, bankers, diplomats, I've had them all," you have full permission to shoot me directly in the face. Thanks so much.
5) Lastly, would like to point out that when I talked to A. I was literally a few weeks fresh from a divorce after having spent nearly a decade with the same guy, which makes the line, "I've had them all," even more comic and ridiculous.
Awesome.

Blogs. Seriously: Kill them all.

Seriously: It shouldn't be possible for an idea this stupid to become dispersed as widely as this one was. True, the American suckers born every minute have always fallen for gimmicks. Auntie Joyce cites a famous example from the 60s, when "a New York publicist received front-page newspaper coverage in the 1960s by having a showgirl sit on an ostrich egg in an attempt to hatch it." That's kind of cool, actually! So, see? Back before the Internet, gimmicks actually had to be ... good? Ish? At least sort of compelling?

Today, gimmicks only have to be able to divert our attention for a fraction of a second, a glimpse, a click.

Kyle MacDonald got a book and a movie deal based on the fact that, on one particular day, a blog editor had a post quota to fill, and then a few hundred thousand people saw a link and went, "Huh, okay." Then, when they got to his blog, they found that it was full of unremarkable, insipid, insight-free prose. Didn't matter: Kyle's paperclip journey had begun.

So maybe that's the true meaning of "find your own paperclip": Find your own stupid idea that will make a million bored office workers perk up for a second, so that for the rest of your life you can be "that [gimmick] guy" and we'll all have to hear about it for a couple of months, thinking every time we do of all the ideas that take more than a minute to explain. You know, the ideas that no one will ever read about.

Now, we love us some Huffington Post: Arianna's comically-accented fearlessness, Laurie David's hypocritical stridency, and Rachel Sklar's rack have provided us with countless hours of entertainment. But this thing is almost as sad and tragic as genocide, without genocide's saving grace of at least being a well-defined plan with a clear goal. We'd smack our monitor and yell, "BE MORE FUNNY," but that would give the site credit for being funny in the first place, and with headlines like "Britney Spears Appears on the Cover of Allure: Re-Touch Me Baby One More Time," that is not a credit which we are willing to extend. We'd actually rather read Nora Ephron babbling about her sagging throat skin. DO SOMETHING, Barry Diller, this is appalling!

23/6 [HuffPo]

The Newsier Newser [Paid Content]

The Observer's Chris Shott reports:

The 500-square-foot alleged bogus-license boutique remains locked up behind steel shutters, pending a hearing on June 28. But don't be surprised if a "for rent" sign appears outside the spray-painted storefront in coming weeks.

Outraged, we sent Wayne, our Virtual Lower East Side correspondent, to canvass the virtual populace of Vice's bad Second Life rip-off.

Hey skeezers! Long time no see. So I'm a little lonely in here. I've been wandering around in this perpetual dusk for a couple of days now and haven't seen that many bros or dudettes. Today I caught sight of mad peeps dancing but upon further inspection they were all robots. Gnarly! I even saw a dude passed out on the street in front of Arlene's but he was just [bum192], a drone. I was personally bummed to hear Tattoo Heaven Smoke Shop (TatHev, we call it). I remember when I first moved to New York and I got a fake ID from there. It said I was from "New Hamshire" and it worked for two years until some fucking bouncer at the Cooler confiscated it at a Pixeltan show. He was from that state and knew there was a P somewhere in there.

Finally I ran into Thalia who seemed to run away from me a couple of times before I cornered her between a payphone booth and a shuttered deli.

Wayne: hello
Wayne: hey!
Wayne: thalia!
Wayne: comeback!
Wayne: hey!
t h a l i a: hey
t h a l i a: what's going on
Wayne: not much. i have a question for you
t h a l i a: ok
Wayne: do you know where a guy can get a fake ID around here? i'm only 19 and I want to get wasted!
t h a l i a: um, i'm far from being 19 these days
Wayne: how old are you? i mean if you care to answer
Wayne: you kind of look like your early 20s!
t h a l i a: ya thanks?
Wayne: Anyway, I just read that they shut down this fake ID place over on 2nd Street
t h a l i a: my profile says 106
t h a l i a: i beleieve
Wayne: what do you think about that? Is the LES losing its character?
t h a l i a: (i'm a typing genius by the way)
t h a l i a: this sounds like an interview
t h a l i a: losing its character? have you seen the condos going up?
Wayne: this kind of IS an interview
t h a l i a: cool, gotta run. talk again soon.
Wayne: bye?

Rackets Doom Lower East Side/East Village Retail [NYO]

Page Sizzler [VH1]
Previously: OMG!

So for some reason, at 3:00 pm today, the virtual LES was shrouded in a premature crepuscular darkness. As I strolled by Pianos, I noticed not a soul was inside. So I made my way to El Sombrero. Since I couldn't figure out how to open the door, I decided instead to hang out in the middle of Rivington. And that's when I saw her. Wearing a black tanktop and flared jeans, her chest thrust forward and a brown ponytail secured with a white scrunchie piled atop her head was Ayam. It was nighttime and yet, her eyes were hidden behind a pair of reflective sunglasses. She could be a hooker but there was only one way to find out. Goddammit, where is the solicit prostitution button in this game?

Ayam: Can you talk
Wayne: um, yeah
Ayam: Because I just said hi.
Wayne: Hi. What are you doing standing in the middle of the street?
Ayam: Good question. I'm not sure
Wayne: Do you live in the LES or just in the VLES?
Ayam: Just VLES. You?
Wayne: Yah. I live around the corner on stanton and allen.
Ayam: Are you here for a show?
Wayne: No Just hanging out. You?
Ayam: I'm just here to make sure people get to the shows they want to.
Wayne: [realizing she works the game] Well, if you ever wanna come back to my place, I live right around the corner...Wait a sec, you're not outsourced to India are you?
Ayam: Texas.
Wayne: Ok I gotta go do some shit.

Above what looks like a mid-90's VRML map—a little post-Tron!—the hapless reader is told:

What you are witnessing is a ridiculously-realistic virtual version of New York City's Lower East Side, a.k.a. the place where every angst-ridden, music-loving teenager (that means you, or maybe you a few years ago) dreams of running away to. This teensy neighborhood is so brimming over with cool bands, fun hangouts and bars, and pretty people that it can take about ten years to come out the other side once you move here... So vLES wants to send you there now to give you a head start. You can create a little person and then walk right into faithfully recreated virtual versions of legendary LES venues and see real bands play.... vLES is going to be so totally the opposite of boring, you don't even know.