Electric Grapevine: Caught in the headlines
By Nik Green
A scroll through Yahoo the other morning left me rather confused over the priorities in which mainstream media use to line up our daily news feed. A headline speaking about the importance of getting some folks to safety in the aftermath of the tsunami seemed reasonable to me until I looked further into it.
“Twilight Stars moved to safety.”
Yeah, umm, how about the tens of thousands of Japanese folks who are directly affected and lost everything? Will I sleep better at night knowing these soon to be forgotten actors narrowly escaped a minor inconvenience? Would some of us be better off without more Twilight sequels? Well, outside of 15-year-old girls, probably.
The “emergency” was solved by moving these actors off of a beach. OMG you say again if you’re 15 and texting your fellow Twilighters about this near tragedy. This brings to question how these little emo tweens would mourn such a loss. If they roam around pale and withdrawn while wearing all black daily, what would they wear in a time of mourning?
Shaking my head I turned back to the main page to digest the next headline.
Something about “Chaos in LA” led me to think that perhaps repercussions from the Tsunami were en route to Tinseltown. Imagine my relief when the catastrophe was the fact that my former hero Charlie Sheen was down one porn star on the day. Well thank God. Sheen’s porn star quota certainly has been front and center, why should it be any different on this day.
A day later she returned, and I let out a sigh of relief placing Sheen firmly back in hero status. I found this out because I was back on Yahoo reading the fourth headline which was “LOST CITY OF ATLANTIS FOUND”.
The caps lock should ensure I do not have to repeat that headline. I’d be interested to see how the headline manager at Yahoo organizes his daily life with this prioritizing skill set. Does his to do list consist of: buy milk, take out garbage, PUT OUT HUGE FIRE IN KITCHEN?
This tidbit of data was actually behind a story on Tim Horton’s finally debating a change to lids that work. Apparently improving customer service had slipped off their agenda.
Regardless, plastic lids came before the finding that a city thought to have been dreamed up by Plato and existing 9600 years before Christ had been located. I realize the average Canadian is likely more confounded by the dynamics behind the cap to their double double than the whereabouts of Atlantis, but at least bump the story up one notch on the blotter.
Creating a more effective sieve to strain the news into separate, distilled channels may be a solution to this unorganized influx of data and bile. The once news-oriented Yahoo should look at creating subsidiary sites. Religion motivated unrest stories? Yes they go under Yahweh.com. Redneck murder trial? Yeehaw.com. Charlie Sheen updates – Yayo.com. Not sure what Yayo is? Google it.
P.S. This being the third time I’ve slammed Timmy’s, I should likely let them fall off my own media agenda as I’m sure somewhere there is a lawyer sharpening his pencil as I continue to rip on the beloved franchise. Luckily for me, any legal paperwork would likely be saturated in mediocre low end coffee due to their malfunctioning lids and rendered invalid.
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