MTV, announcing the passing of Big Star bassist Andy Hummel, provides some context for the kids:

Big Star influenced other areas of pop culture as well. “In the Street,” one of the songs from their 1972 debut album #1 Record was the theme song to “That ’70s Show,” re-recorded by fellow power-pop legends Cheap Trick. Plus, the title of Katy Perry’s hit “California Gurls” is a nod to Big Star’s “September Gurls.”

“My manager, Bradford, he’s from Mississippi, and he’s a huge Big Star fan,” Perry said. “And with the death of one of their members [Chilton], I had just written that song, and he’s like, ‘Katy, just for me, will you please title it ‘California Gurls,’ with a ‘u’? People won’t even know!’ “

Maybe now they will! Sigh. Sorry, Andy.

It’s definitely nice to learn that a species thought to be extinct for 65 years is still on the planet. Specially one as cool and freaky-looking as the Horton Plains slender loris, which was recently found and photographed, for the first time ever, in a jungle in Sri Lanka by the Zoological Society of London. Where has this short-limbed, huge-eyed nocturnal primate been hiding all this time? We’ll have the answer soon. With those giant peepers, that thing doesn’t stand a chance of keeping any secrets from the hot new eye-tracking lie-detector system developed by psychologists at the University of Utah. Says Gerald Sanders, of the company, Credibility Assessment Technologies, that is now commercializing the system:

“The eye-tracking method for detecting lies has great potential. It’s a matter of national security that our government agencies have the best and most advanced methods for detecting truth from fiction, and we believe we are addressing that need by licensing the extraordinary research done at the University of Utah.”

That’s right, loris, so out with it! Where were you on all the nights between 1932 and 2002?

We’ve all been there, Paul: “If you don’t understand a brief post like this one, CLICK ON THE LINKS. I’m not putting them there for decorative purposes.”

There’s an (allegedly) iPhone-taken video with 60,000 views that went on YouTube on June 9, 2010. It’s not very good or very funny, but it surely is black ops marketing for one major burger chain, even though it’s shot in another major burger chain. And this is how the greatest minds behind the big business of viral marketing today apparently think is the best way to get their video “picked up” by blogs: casual emails that look pretty much like emails anyone with a blog gets on a daily basis except… less good.

subject: “The [NAME OF BURGER CHAIN 1] Miracle Bun”
date: June 9, 2010

We werent sure where to send this, one of our friends suggested we try to email it out to a bunch of blogs and sites. So here we are.

Here’s what went down. Last week my buddy dragged me to a [NAME OF BURGER CHAIN 2] for the first time in forever. What happened once we got our food was the craziest thing. I’m still kind of creeped out by it. You sort of have to see to understand. Check it out for yourself. And please please post and pass along, we are trying to get this to the world.

[VIDEO LINK]

Thanks a trillion.
Toby Crenshaw
Jake Smith

What’s weird about this email is: those two names actually Google up as real people? So I was giving this a “wait and see.” But then there were more emails!

subject: “tip/ submission something miraculous from [NAME OF BURGER CHAIN 1]?”
date: July 6, 2010

hey there. saw this the other day and thought it might be cool for the site or someone you know…

I found it on SFist and then saw it on Barstools too. It’s two kids from San Francisco who went to the [NAME OF BURGER CHAIN 2] s @ Fishermen’s wharf and found somebody special in their bun. Makes me wonder if it might be an irreverent marketing ploy to stick it to the Golden Arches. Check it out and pass it on.

[LINKS TO SITES AND VIDEOS]

Jen Marsh

subject: “new work for [NAME OF BURGER CHAIN 1]?”
date: July 20, 2010

been a fan of the site for a while now, and thought you might be interested in this.
I’ve seen this video a bunch of places recently was wondering.
Regardless, a fun jab at the Golden Arches.

[VIDEO LINK]

Regards
Tyrese Washington

They’re still at it! They’re going to make this video happen if it kills them.

If you really want to look at this video, which isn’t much to see, you can copy and paste this URL:

Maybe it’s not even viral marketing for the burger chains! Maybe it’s like, just guys who want to be famous, or to have proven their prowess at going viral. Who knows? We don’t. But also: do not want.

The other day a gang of jobless local yobs attacked two “charity walk” trainers, who were clad in workout gear, for being too fancy-but the attacking chav pack had no knives or bottles. The fancy do-gooders are named Fraser and Gareth, so, well, in England, they basically had it coming. But it’s not just the youngs who are running this class war! “’There was an older bloke of about 40 and at first when he walked up I thought “Thank God, there’s an adult who will calm things down’ said Gareth. ‘But then I saw he had a key in his hand and he slashed my cheek.’” Margaret Thatcher, where are you?

“It’s a symbol for us. The way the Confederate flag used to be. But the flag today has taken on so many unfortunate associations, nobody feels good about showing it anymore. So we’ve embraced moonshine: making it, moving it, drinking it. Moonshine has become a point in our identity. It’s a way of saying, ‘I’m from here.’”
–The resurgence of moonshine brings to mind the nice article on the history and production of the stuff Garden & Gun magazine did last year. And also, the many versions of the classic folk ballad that goes with it. Here are six more, in ascending order of my preference.

To Knifecrime Island, where the streets are paved with discarded polystyrene kebab trays. The folks behind the Keep Britain Tidy campaign have come up with this “saucy seaside postcard”-inspired advertisement suggesting residents of this seat of Mars bars wrappers might want to do a bit of tidying up, particularly now that there is a massive budget crisis and soon the space on the streets will be needed for corpses.

Unfortunately for these civic-minded campaigners, other organizations are less than amused by their “cheeky” (haha, get it? It’s a joke about asses!) message. There is a group called the Plain English Campaign, which has objected to the ad because they don’t like it up ’em: “Do they think we all have filthy minds? Maybe we should start a ‘Keep it clean’ campaign for them,” says some busybody.

This echoes the contretemps of last year, when Plain English had similar complaints about another campaign:

“The Keep Britain Tidy campaign should take its own advice and “bin the filth” by removing posters which use “offensive” sexual innuendo, campaigners said.

The posters — which use phrases including ‘trim my bush’, ‘see the size of our Fanny’s’, and ‘Are you a dirty Chucker?’ — were ‘offensive and inappropriate’, the Plain English Campaign said.

Chrissie Maher, founder of the Plain English Campaign added: ‘As a woman, a grandmother and a tax-payer I am offended, disappointed and disgusted to find that such a worthy cause considers this language suitable for public information.’”

Well, perhaps. Still, when one considers the level of putrescent sludge the average knife-wielding Briton considers both acceptable and familiar nowadays, desperate measures are clearly required. If that means posters suggesting that people take it from behind, so be it.

It’s one thing to have privilege and exercise it. We kinda expect that! This is New York City, we’re not ignorant about how things work. But it’s actually just insulting to have it, exercise it and then play dumb: “Luke Russert, son of Tim Russert, the ‘Meet the Press’ host who died in 2008, worked at City Hall during summer 2007. In an interview, Mr. Russert said that he juggled two internships that summer — one at the mayor’s office, the other at NBC, working for Conan O’Brien…. Asked what role his connections played in landing the job, he said: ‘I don’t really know about that. I went through the application process like anyone else.’”

Being on Facebook sucks, says Facebookers: “The American Customer Satisfaction Index, developed by the University of Michigan’s Business School, included Facebook in its regular survey of consumer satisfaction with companies. The result: Facebook came out with one of the lowest ranks of any company measured by the Index — a 64 out of 100. That puts Facebook in the bottom 5% of all private sector companies, and in the same range as the IRS tax e-filing system, airlines and cable companies.” There’s a sliver of a silver lining for Facebook, though: “older people in the survey”-who do nothing but complain and will probably die soon-” were, on average, a bit less satisfied with Facebook than younger ones.”

Since time immemorial, human beings have loved to consume beverages-and loved to use computers. So I hereby declare today to be an important annual holiday with regard to laptop and logic board safety. How many laptops have we seen destroyed by a forgotten cup of coffee or a dripping bottle of Vitamin Water? This is especially true for those who foolishly keep iguanas and cats and other pesky critters in their homes. So many. So take time today to move those beverages back! Let’s set a two-foot perimeter today. Maybe you can create a special beverage place farther from your typing area? The future-you will thank today-you when you both catch up in the future. Let us know how this goes!