Wires Crossed #8 – September 24

It’s My Party And I’ll Invite Who I Want To

It’s My Party And I’ll Invite Who I Want To
Well, not quite. British teen Rebecca Javeleau got the shock of her life when she invited 15 mates via Facebook to her house to celebrate her 15th birthday. As can be the case with email and the internet, the invite went viral and next thing she knew she had over 21,000 people advising her they’d be popping along to say hello. Mum has since cancelled the event, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be some wannabes turning up wanting to party hard.

An Apple A Day…
Steve Jobs is a grumpy sod at the best of times. Who remembers last year when he told an app company to change its name as it was ‘no big deal’. Now he’s allegedly told a journalism student, Chelsea Isaacs, that ”Our goals do not include helping you get a good grade. Sorry,” after Issacs failed to get a reply from the Apple publicity department about a query she had about the iPad. Apple is not known for their cooperation with bona fide media, let alone journalism students. Some journos are also a little weary/wary of Isaacs as she laps up her 15 minutes of fame, and does appear to have a little more ambition than writing up technology.

Big Is Beautiful
So you’d like a large-screen television, huh? How about one that is 5,000 square metre and weighing 75 tonnes? Big enough for you? That is what the Charlotte Motor Speedway in North Caroline, US is putting together with Panasonic to give their audience a true up close and personal look at what is happening on the track. It is thought the screen will be a world record, and overtake what is claimed to be the biggest board at the Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Texas. Who needs 3D TV when you have a screen that is a tall as some business building in the CBD.

Shooting the Messenger
Talk about being all over the place. A former student in Coalinga, California is suing the principal of her old high school for causing her emotional stress. It seems Cynthia Moreno wrote a scathing account of her town on her MySpace page, only for the then principal of the high school, Roger Campbell, to make a copy of it and send it to the local newspaper who published it. Death threats and the non-fatal shooting of the family dog followed, all allegedly due to the publication of the story. There are a few issues here. Do people not realise that their MySpace pages are an open book? Why did the principal take it upon himself to send what is obviously a private diatribe to the local newspaper? It reminds me of the Google Goggles, which stops you sending out emails to acquaintances after a night on the turps. Mayhap MySpace should put in something similar (although there is no evidence that Moreno was under the influence when she wrote her rant).

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