Peter wants to clarify something about his quotes in the Consumed column (Gothamist is certainly both goofy and geeky); he also floats the possibility of the next Treo, the 610, being available this spring. We'll be asking Peter for his 600 when he gets the 610. more ›

Sorry, boys, the girls from Tatu are not lesbians. Lena Katina (red hair) of the supposed lesbian duo Tatu tells the Sun, "We are very tired of each other and it’s not fun playing lesbians any more." She also adds they have boyfriends in Moscow. And that's boyfriend with a -y, not -i, like the bois in this week's New York magazine. more ›

Gothamist was glad to find out that no, we weren't crazy (this time) and in fact, it was the Modest Mouse song "Gravity Rides Everything" from The Moon & Antarctica that was on a Nissan minivan commercial. Deviated Septum confirmed this and alerted us to the fact that "Gravity Rides Everything" had also been used in a beer commercial. Well, you got to sell out some time... we'll check in again when Built to Spill is used in a commercial. more ›

Slate's Rob Walker looks at the dominance of 50 Cent's songs as cellphone ringtones. He feels that hip-hop, overall, translates better to tinny, even if polyphonic, cellphone medium. While Walker suggests that TV theme songs are so familiar that they are hard to mess up when translating to cellphone ringtone. Well, yes, that and having the specific task to be memorable on top of some sort of narrative. more ›

A three year old basketball "prodigy" is causing a stir in both the advertising and sports worlds. Mark Walker has the uncanny ability to sink baskets, and has now become the center of a youth talent campaign from Reebok, which basically make Mark it's small-human mascot. Slate's Rob Walker freaks out about using kids so young for these purposes (he also clarifies that he's not related to Mark Walker). about kids being used for spokespeople, including Mark and Darren Baker. more ›

(d) Just like AOL’s dial-up service, AOL Broadband will suddenly and inexplicably depart, leaving you with connectus interruptus. more ›

Slate's Rob Walker weighs in on the ostensibly pro- and anti-war ads by Tom Ridge and Martin Sheen. Martin Sheenhas had a history of activism, but certainly his role on The West Wing gives him more of a platform. Before September 11, 2001, there was much buzz about people preferring a president more like The West Wing's Jed Bartlet: A comparison of the Josiah Bartlet and George W. Bush presidencies. more ›

The new novel Jennifer Government by Max Barry got a rave in the Times book review this past weekend, and I was affected: I just ordered it from Amazon. It also helps when the review is by someone I'm familiar with, in this case, Rob Walker who writes about marketing for Slate.com. A satire about an extreme marketing scheme in a world dominated by corporations, Nike will assasinate kids at shoe stores in order to make it seem like a new kind of Nikes are the hottest thing and thus drive sales. Enter Jennifer Government, a federal agent, to stop the madness. Of course, I'm not reading it just because there's a federal agent named Jennifer. I'm also reading it because the movie rights were bought by Steven Soderbergh and George Clooney's production company. I hope it will become a movie. I rather "Jennifer Government" be a recent movie with the name Jennifer in the title, rather than Jennifer 8.
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and the post-production companies faced. more ›