Friday, June 14, 2002

APOLOGIES to those who've found the site inaccessible for much of the past three days. My server provider insists things are now back to normal, or will be soon.

DEPT. OF MOSS-GATHERING: During this biggest advertising slump of the past umpteen years, Rolling Stone has decided to abscond with one of the last links to its past, the occasional long articles and essays on non-celebrity topics. It's hired an editor from the British-born "bloke mag" FHM, who claims (as so many middle-aged people have always claimed about their youngers) that Those Kids Today just don't like to read. What rot.

The shortening-down (dumbing-down?) tactic is nothing new, but is endemic to publications whose runners are now much older than their target readers, who imagine their (the publishers') own generation were young geniuses but Those Kids Today don't know nuttin'. I'm actually noticing, at least in my own town, a longer-attention-span generation of adolescents, and an even-longer-attention-span generation of grade schoolers following them.

But short attention spans are what advertisers wish audiences to have--all the better to bombard with flashy brand images. The new Rolling Stone won't be more reader-friendly, it'll be more advertiser-friendly. RS publisher Jann Wenner, ever the generational-bias hypocrite, simply refuses to publicly admit it.

THERE IS NO JOY IN B-BALL VILLE. The Lucking Fakers took it all again. Damn it. At least the righteous Red Wings won the hockey title.

REMEMBER THOSE ADS in comic books that combined superheroes with Hostess Twinkies? Here's the memoir of one of the guys who wrote 'em.

posted by clark 3:14 PM

Tuesday, June 11, 2002

YOU'VE HEARD ABOUT 'EM all your life. Now here are accurate descriptions of some of the Warner Bros. cartoons you'll never see on TV.

posted by clark 12:19 PM

Monday, June 10, 2002

ONE OPINION WHY Americans might never get interested in the soccer World Cup: "The only way Americans are going to learn another country's name is if it attacks us."

posted by clark 8:38 PM

ARCHIVES:

• Past weblog entries.
• 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, 1998, 1997, 1996, 1995, and 1986-94 columns.
• Reviews of literature & art, nonfiction & culture criticism, movies & videos, and music & noise.
• Longer articles and essays.
• Some slightly weird little fiction pieces.
• X-Word crossword puzzles, now with on-screen solving.
• Cyber Stuff, links to cool and/or useful sites.
• A listing of many Things I Like (and a few things I hate).
• The origin and future of MISCmedia.