BuzzMachine

Not funny
: Maher tries to find humor in a dead child. He fails.

Flashmopes
: Says Jenny the Librarian:

You know flash mobs are “over” when they land on “Jim Mullen’s Hot Sheet” in Entertainment Weekly (August 22/29, 2003, p. 12)”

“Flash mob: hundreds of people are alerted by text messaging to show up at a certain time, and they do! The only hard part is getting Mom to drive you there.”

Subscribe to The Week
: There’s a good cause behind these ads for The Week: If you subscribe, you prove that blogs can be good for business. So subscribe already. (More on this here)

: Thanks to Glenn Reynolds for the plug.

: Bloggers: If you’d like to sell The Week as well, leave your name in the comments. If this test is successful, I’ll pass on your name…

The PC editor
: Watch the Orlando Sentinal’s “public editor,” Manning Pynn, twist his knickers in knots trying to justify not calling Hamas a “terrorist” organization.

In April, the committee adopted this standard: “Use caution when using these terms [militants, terrorists], which can show bias toward one side in a conflict. Generally, ‘bombers,”attackers’ or ‘suicide bombers’ are preferred terms.”

The term “terrorist” certainly expresses judgment: It imputes to the person or organization being described the motive of trying to instill fear. “Militant” seems to me much more neutral. And that may be why the Sentinel, despite its style committee’s decision, continues to use that term to describe Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

Most of the news organizations I surveyed do the same.

I’m afraid that the horse is out of the barn on the labeling of al-Qaeda. Although journalists strive to avoid expressing bias in reporting the news, the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, so shocked Americans — including the news media — that they almost universally applied the term “terrorism” to what had happened. I don’t think the Sentinel will retreat from that.

Does that mean, though, that we should extend that judgment to all attacks on civilians? …

Oh, man, if you can’t tell a terrorist until he bombs your town, then you have a problem with language and logic. You’re “afraid” that horse is out of the barn? Oh, that horse got blasted out of the barn long since.

See the post below on how PCthink is making a lie of news and art. This guy proves the point.

Damn, scrap that convention junket
: Says Reuters:

Iraq has postponed to next April a trade fair aimed at attracting foreign companies to help rebuild the country, a senior official said on Monday, but he blamed a shortage of hotel rooms rather than security concerns.