Last year, the Army undertook a war crimes probe, with, as evidence, some 4000 photos and videos from Afghanistan. Which sound in some cases really bad, and in some cases, in extremely poor taste: posing next to dead bodies alone seems like a gross way to pass the time. Apparently people really get into this: "Soldiers have told investigators that such photos of dead bodies were passed around like trading cards on thumb drives and other digital storage devices." 12 soldiers in all have been charged, most of them for lesser crimes; five were charged regarding "premeditated murder." Now Der Spiegel has just published three of the photographs, but apparently has access to a large number of them. And now, what will happen? "Commanders in Afghanistan are bracing themselves for possible riots and public fury triggered by the publication of 'trophy' photographs of US soldiers posing with the dead bodies of defenceless Afghan civilians they killed." The first court martial will result in a guilty plea to murder—and evidence against the others involved.

Why Journalists Should Think Hard About Their Twitter Wallpaper: A small but excellent point!

The New York Times continues its inexplicable war against the phrase "no problem," which we noted last week. Asked an apparently very bored reader of the Styles section, to the Social Q's column: "Have you noticed that young people are substituting the phrase 'no problem' for 'you're welcome'?" The useless answer: "Take a common transaction: I pass you the milk. You thank me. I reply: 'No problem.' Well, of course it's not a problem! It's a common courtesy." Oh, these young people and their highly offensive slang!

From time to time, The Awl offers its space to normal, everyday people with a perspective on national issues. Today, we bring this special report on technology from one of my Murray Hill Gramercy-adjacent building's porters, who enjoys golf, tattoos, talking about sports with the doormen and who may or may not have been a "dancer" in his previous career. (As told to Choire Sicha.) READ MORE

How bad do you want to be on TV? Bad enough that maybe you could be tricked into being held captive for two months in a villa outside Istanbul, because there actually was no show? BECAUSE YES, THAT HAPPENED. The nine women weren't harmed but "were told to fight each other, to wear bikinis and to dance by the villa's pool." Which, sounds pretty much like my last weekend, only much longer, and therefore better? But also, how do you know that the reality show for which you are "auditioning" is a real reality show, not a prison? There are a couple of ways to know, and one of them is that there are cameras filming things. But seriously this is clearly the worst thing about our modern age, the people being held captive, so much worse than blogs and Facebook. This is like, what if you were forced every day to update your status on a Facebook that wasn't actually connected to the Internet and no one could see it? Oh and also losing your liberty. Bad too.

Roger Ebert came out of the A.A. closet last week, with a long and fascinating essay about his experience in A.A. Lots of people loved it, and found it pretty educational. But what are the negative repercussions of this, asked some in the comments-as A.A. has no public spokespeople and it asks that media outlets keep members private and also (mildly) asks that members don't represent the organization publicly. (It seems like a fine point-but how well can an alcoholism treatment program be perceived if its spokespeople later kill people whilst driving drunk, say?) Of course, it's unlikely that Ebert will give people a bad impression of A.A., unless he goes on a stabbing spree or something later this year, which in any event would be kind of awesome, really-and yet he now finds himself in some pretty strange company, with people who've gone public to improve their reputations and/or careers... or just because they were too wasted to know better. Or because they had a tacky memoir to sell! READ MORE

Even though it's a fake, the Jenny Holzer Twitter is still really good. There's something profound about authenticity in there, but I'm off to find some lunch!

Pretty much every day I decide I want to nuke Twitter from my life. But the secret is in being careful with what you consume on the Twitter. Twitter's greatest user is longtime indie musician Kristin Hersh, of Throwing Muses fame-and now I realize that her husband Billy O'Connell has his own account too. If you only follow the two of them, you get this hilarious double open-faced sandwich of child-rearing and band-touring and adult debauchery. Related true story: I walked up behind a friend the other day, and he was watching the Twitter tutorial video on their website. Me: "What are you doing!?" Him: "THIS DOESN'T EVEN MAKE SENSE."

Where is Bret Easton Ellis? He is living in Los Angeles, spending lots of time on Facebook, and also he is finishing the sequel to "Less Than Zero," which will allegedly be published a year from now, according to Dana Goodyear. Also he is struggling with Twitter. And quoting Joan Didion, perhaps unknowingly.

Today's in-house New York Times "Innovation" email-it comes out every Friday from the web folks and it touts, well, online innovation-addresses one of our favorite topics: The idiot emails that reporters blast the newsroom with when they are looking for random sources for a story. READ MORE