Thursday, February 22, 2007

MLB No Longer Accepting New Players

In a tersely worded press release, Major League Baseball sent a strong message to thousands of college, high-school, and Little League athletes who someday hoped to become professional baseball players: "You're too late."



read more | digg story

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Digg Will Allow "Multiple Votes" Starting Monday!

Foster City, CA---Popular social bookmarking site Digg.com announced that they will be abandoning the "one vote per user" policy that has been a prominent feature of the website since its inception in 2004.

"Basically, we felt that our users should be able to express their enthusiasm for the stories submitted to our website by 'digging' them as many times as they wanted," stated founder and CEO Jay Adelson.

"I know some people will be puzzled by this decision," Adelson continued, "but we are hoping that with all that clicking going on, users might actually click on one of our damn advertisements once in a while, because frankly, we need the money right now."

Many users expressed concern that submitters would just keep clicking on their own stories until they were promoted, but Adelson was quick to point out that "it isn't like most of our users are socially inept, tech-obsessed geeks who have nothing better to do than to spend all day on our site repeatedly mashing the 'digg this' button."

Nevertheless, when asked if he was concerned that top users might instead hire outside agents to click on their story multiple times until it reached the top of the homepage, Adelson admitted that "we hadn't thought of that one."


Thursday, February 15, 2007

Wikipedia Founder Says Site Is In "Lockdown" Mode; Further Editing Disabled

Huntsville, AL--In a shocking announcement this morning, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales announced that the "free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" will no longer allow users to add or alter any content on the popular website.

"Basically, we have achieved what we set out to do," claims Wales. "There is nothing out there in the world today that you can't read about on Wikipedia."

"Besides, we just got tired of all the vandalism. Who by this point isn't sick of seeing something like 'Jose is a fag' pop up all of a sudden in the middle of an article about the ongoing violence in Darfur?"

The Wikipedia founder went on to say that the site would continue to cover current events on the homepage, but that any existing article will be switched over to "lockdown" status until further notice.

"We may open up the site for some minor editing in a few months if there are any updates that need to be made," explained Wales. "Also, we are looking into the possibility of corporations 'sponsoring' new articles for a negotiable fee."

Wales admits that "the formerly free encyclopedia that nobody can edit" does not have the same appeal as their original slogan, but thinks that the impact of this policy change will be negligible.

"We haven't had anyone submit a new article in months," explained Wales. "Just seemed like it was a good time to take a couple steps back and look at the big picture here for a minute."


Tuesday, February 13, 2007

94-Year-Old WW2 Vet Called Back To Active Duty

Kingman, AZ--Homer Winston, a 94-year-old veteran of World War 2, was suprised to find a letter in his mailbox this weekend asking him to please return to active duty with the United States Marine Corps. According to Winston, "I told them to keep me on the inactive reserve list six decades ago, just in case they needed me again."

"I haven't been out of bed in close to three years and have never even heard of Iraq. But if they really want me back, I'm going, wherever the hell it is!"

Due to an understandable lack of volunteers willing to return to Iraq after they have already seen combat, the Marine Corps announced yesterday that they would begin involuntarily recalling inactive Marines to the embattled region. Apparently, the recalls affect everyone from recently enlisted soldiers to anybody receiving a military pension of any age.

"I know we can't expect much from some of these older soldiers, but if they can put on the uniform and walk around a bit, that might scare the enemy into surrendering," said military recruiter Jack Scheisskopf.

"Some have mockingly called us an army of 'great-great grandfathers' but who would know better how to defeat our enemy and then get us the hell out of there better than a WWII vet?"

As for PFC Homer Winston, he is certainly looking forward to "hopping aboard the B-29 Superfortress and showing those dang Japs what he is made of."

"Even at ninety-four, I've still got some fight left in me. Just show me where that bastard Tojo is hiding out, and I'll do the rest," boasted Winston.


Monday, February 12, 2007

Netflix Run By Idiots?

In the new Mike Judge film Idiocracy, Luke Wilson is frozen in an Army experiment, and wakes up in 2505 to find he is the smartest man in America. Unfortunately, Netflix apparently thinks that 2505 is still a thousand years away...




Saturday, February 10, 2007

Shock Jock Howard Stern Claiming He Slept With Anna Nicole Too!

New York, NY--In a shocking admission likely to fascinate and confuse those of us already following this story (and really, who isn't), shock jock Howard Stern admitted to sleeping with Anna Nicole Smith soon after she appeared on his popular radio program at the beginning of 2006.

"Yeah, I banged her," explained Stern. "And it was right around the time when she got pregnant with that kid as well."

Stern added that "I know this is really gonna confuse a lot of people, because of Howard K. Stern, that douchebag lawyer of hers who has the same name as me, but I had to come forward in case there was any chance of me inheriting that money that Dannielynn has coming to her."

Stern is of course referring to the multi-million dollar settlement being held in limbo in the courts that resulted from Anna Nicole's previous marriage to billionaire J. Howard Marshall.

"Now that I think of it, I am the third Howard in her life. How odd!"

In a last-minute press conference, Stern also admitted that he kept this story under wraps because "she was still pretty fat when I nailed her, and I didn't want anybody to know that I had taken one for the team."

"But now that there is a whole bunch on money on the table here, I thought I would come clean, so to speak," claimed Stern.


Friday, February 09, 2007

Al Qaeda's "Greatest Threats" Now On DVD

Basra, Iraq--In a move predicted to generate millions of dollars for their holy war against America, the radical Islamist group al Qaeda has compiled a DVD box set of some of their most chilling televised messages broadcast to date. The collection, entitled Video Jihad: The Best of Al Qaeda Uncensored was released last week to take full advantage of the upcoming Valentine's Day holiday shopping surge.

"We noticed how popular these speeches were on YouTube, and figured we would get in on a piece the action," stated a masked al Qaeda operative who threatened to chop this reporter's head right off if his true identity was revealed.

"All your favorites are here--Bin Laden, Zarqawi, al Zawahiri and more! If they have ever wiggled a bony index finger in the air while shouting 'Death To America!', or threatened to blow up the White House, they are on this video."

"In addition, there are bloopers, outtakes, and extended ranting as well on this three-disc compilation. My favorite clip on the DVD is the one where Osama's turban keeps unraveling on-air during a recent taping."

"The look on his face is priceless," added the masked militant.

Amazon.com reports that sales of the DVD set have been brisk, but also that many copies are being returned with quality issues. "Basically, it looks like these discs were all burned on a laptop in some cave in Afghanistan during a sandstorm," reported an Amazon employee who begged not to be identified.

"Still, we are recommending that our customers only leave positive reviews for the collection on our site, if they know what is good for them."


Monday, February 05, 2007

Scheduling Glitch Shelves Beatles iTunes Ad!

Cupertino, CA--The Apple Corporation is looking for an explanation from CBS after they failed to air a commercial announcing the upcoming release of The Beatles song catalog on their iTunes music downloading service. The 30 second long advertisement was scheduled to air immediately before the halftime presentation of yesterday's Super Bowl XLI broadcast, but was shelved by CBS when they discovered that the show was running a bit long.

Apple spokesperson Ellen Doppler stated that "Apple is very disappointed that our commercial was not aired as promised." The ad, featuring the Lennon-penned classic "Good Morning, Good Morning," showed Apple users all over the world enjoying this lesser-known track from the groundbreaking Sgt. Pepper's album, as they put on their iPods and went about their morning routines.

Doppler added that "CBS did finally get around to running the spot overnight during an 'I Love Lucy' rerun, but it didn't have nearly the same impact as it would have had during the actual Super Bowl telecast." The spokesperson went on to say that the licensing rights alone for the song snippet were "in the millions of dollars, not to mention the cost of airtime, and what we spent to produce the ad."