Helen A.S. Popkin

To be fair, this Facebook photo features two Americans, one of which is me.

British Facebook users are under the influence of old demon alcohol in 76 percent of the photos in which they are tagged, according to a recent survey. More than half said they sure wouldn't want their employers or co-workers to see those photos. And yet, two-thirds of survey respondents said they'd intentionally tagged their "friends" in embarrassing photos to make sure other Facebook friends got a look.

So the big take away from this survey seems to be that three quarters of British Facebook users are lousy friends.

Sure, only 8 percent of survey respondents said they'd been tagged in such photos on Facebook that might cause them to get in trouble with their employers or even lose their job. But nearly all survey participants (93 percent) said they'd actively untagged their names from photos they found "too embarrassing." 

That's some pretty lax observance of the Golden Rule, IMHO.

It might really make me question the superfluous "u" spellings of our former rulers across the pond, if my own self-hating xenophobia didn't make me suspect that we Americans are way more obnoxious when it comes to blatant attempts to humiliate our closest compatriots via tagged photos on Facebook. 

Alas, I just don't have the science to back that up.

The survey — conducted by photo website MyMemory.com — is restricted to British Facebook users, and only 1,781 of them at that. With such a humble polling pool, we are not even assured how accurately it applies to the more than 30 million Facebook users in the UK.

Such a survey does remind us however — especially during holiday party season when drunkenness has been known to occur — how it's important to remain vigilant about who's posting what about you on Facebook. Now, it used to be you didn't have much control over who tagged you in photos. Over the summer however, Facebook rolled out new privacy settings that allow you to approve who can tag photos of you, as well as who can see those photos.

More than 50 percent of the survey respondents said their settings allowed Facebook friends to view photos tagged with their name, and a quarter said their tagged photos were set to "Public."  One in 10 however said they blocked their friends from seeing photos in which they are tagged. 

You can change the "Public" default settings on tagged photos by clicking the drop down arrow at the top right of your Facebook page, choosing "Privacy Settings" and on that page, scroll down to "How Tags Work" and click "Edit Settings."

— via The Telegraph

More on the annoying way we live now:

• You've got 7 days to approve Facebook Timeline
• FTC settlement aside, Facebook still owns your privacy
• Facebook's porn attack: Lawmaker wants answers

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about privacy, then asks you to join her on Facebook and/or Twitter ... because that's how she rolls. Oh! Also, Google+.

via BuzzFeed

Our pre-caffeine roundup is a collection of the hottest, strangest, and most amusing stories of the morning. Here's everything that you need to know before taking that first sip of coffee today: 

Who could ever get tired of ancient mysteries when there are so many dinosaur fossils, hominid skeletons and mysterious markings to decipher? Check out the top ancient mysteries of 2011.

One of the most desolate spots on Earth recently got a visit from one of the most elusive characters on Earth — the cable guy. Four very high-tech and capable cable guys, to be specific! (Meanwhile, you took the day off work and you're still waiting!)

So. you can either wait for the Facebook Timeline announcement to appear at the top of your Facebook profile, or you can roll out your own timeline no. Either way, you've got 7 days to approve it before it automatically goes live.

Two years ago, only 18 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers owned a smartphone; now 44 percent do.

Meanwhile, the average teenage girl in the U.S. sends nearly 4,000 texts a month!

Oh, and is Apple working on a tinier iPad for 2012? Could be!

That said, Dell is ditching netbooks. Forever.

And Chrome just knocked Explorer out of the No. 1 browser spot for the first time since practically forever! (I exaggerate.)

Speaking of the Internet, Vinton Cerf, one of its pioneers, and 82 other Internet inventors and engineers signed a letter to Congress protesting SOPA and related Internet legislation that they say would "create an environment of tremendous fear and uncertainty for technological innovation, and seriously harm the credibility of the United States in its role as a steward of key Internet infrastructure." And they're right.

Meanwhile,  a senior executive at a tech company that makes monitoring software secretly installed on 141 million cellphones says the FBI approached the company about using its technology but was rebuffed. The FBI denys it. Gee, who's telling the truth?

In closing, the 30 Most Important Cats of 2011.

— compiled by Helen A.S. Popkin, who invites you to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

via BoingBoing.net

Our pre-caffeine roundup is a collection of the hottest, strangest, and most amusing stories of the morning. Here's everything that you need to know before taking that first sip of coffee today: 

The government's proposal to ban drivers from using cellphones in any way — even with hands-free help — is dividing police and lawmakers alike, who agree on one thing: Any such ban would likely be hard to enforce.

Meanwhile, a conservative Florida organization's opposition to the reality show "All-American Muslim" has stirred up a storm of controversy that's got Lowe's, a Muslim rights group, travelwebsite Kayak, actor Kal Penn and the hacktivist group Anonymous all choosing sides.

Come the revolution, the proletariat will no doubt want to get a move on rounding up not only the politicians and corporate fat cats responsible for the U.S. economic decline, but Hollywood's aristocracy as well. Gwyneth Paltrow has a new iPhone app that can help!

In other iPhone news, a map meant to provide driver's education to students around the country has been pulled by Apple from the App Store after a campaign by the U.S. senator and the Coalition for a Secure Driver's License.

Today, Verizon Wireless will (finally) offer the Samsung Galaxy Nexus — the first Google phone with Android 4.0, aka Ice Cream Sandwich.

Google just announced a series of new features and they all center around Hangouts.

A new service, available for developers now, and scheduled for public launch in early 2012, lets website developers put turn-by-turn controls into their pages for free, including "full-color moving maps, audio directions and even automatic rerouting, if the driver misses a turn."

Here's how the military could spy anywhere on earth.

Here's how Amazon's Kindle could spy on you.

In closing: A collection of Etsy products inspired by exobiology ... because Science is awesome!

— compiled by Helen A.S. Popkin, who invites you to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

Goop/Apple App Store

Come the revolution, the proletariat will no doubt want to get a move on rounding up not only the politicians and corporate fat cats responsible for the U.S. economic decline, but Hollywood's aristocracy as well. Alas, as Gawker Stalker no longer features Google Maps, this will prove time-consuming, cutting into the ensuing Enlightenment.

Well, good news, comrades! Gwyneth Paltrow is here to help with a location-based iPhone app for Goop, her weekly lifestyle newsletter which urges readers to "nourish the inner aspect" via buying stuff you certainly don't need, and probably can't afford. (Like Oprah's Favorite Things, except nobody gets anything free.)

For a mere $3.99, iPhone users receive Goop's classist and clueless content in a whole new medium — one that includes a couple of videos featuring the flaxen-haired screen siren dropping serious Benjamins throughout Manhattan, and that handy location feature to help users pinpoint the locations Gwyneth likes to go.

Indeed, the Goop app even offers a "Favourites" feature so you can keep track of which of Paltrow's "favourite" places are also your own. Notably missing from the selections are Zucotti Park (Ground Zero for the Occupy movement), as well as the best place the breadless might obtain a suitable substitute such as 6^th-degree vegan cupcakes — or as fake British people spell it, "cupcaukes." (Note the superfluous "u," which denotes all things classy.)

Please also note: Our revolution riffing aside, when we recommend Goop as a tool for the rank and file uprising, we are totally joking. Given the current climate of increasing economic disparity, we can't help but wonder: Is Paltrow joking too?

via Gawker

More on the annoying way we live now:

• Can a Wikipedia blackout save the Internet?
• Why PayPal's bad reputation is bigger than Regretsy
• Comic Sans gets the defense it deserves -- finally
• Devastating explosions, courtesy of Old Spice
• Why 'Community' is the only Internet crossover that matters
• 'Planking spree' ends in $303 fine, shame

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet — at least until the Stop Online Piracy Act becomes a law, making snark a libelous felony. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+.

via BuzzFeed

Our pre-caffeine roundup is a collection of the hottest, strangest, and most amusing stories of the morning. Here's everything that you need to know before taking that first sip of coffee today: 

Americans now are spending more than a hour a day with their cell phones, more time than they do with print media. And TV time? That's up, too, whether it's live TV or DVR programs or DVDs, and still the biggest in terms of where we focus our media attention.

Speaking of which, medical scientists strongly endorsed the National Transportation Safety Board's recommendation Tuesday to ban nearly all use of cellphones and other portable electronics by drivers, saying the gizmos are just too distracting for the limited multitasking power of the human brain.

In other mobile news, a smartphone security company has predicted that in 2012, there will be more malware masquerading as legit apps, apps that will fleece consumer pockets and malvertising — real-looking ads that lead trusting souls to fraudulent sites.

Facebook is making it easier for people who express suicidal thoughts on the social networking site to get help, enabling users to instantly connect with a crisis counselor through Facebook's "chat" messaging system.

Whoops! Companies that missed the chance to register their trademarked names as ".xxx," a new Web domain, may find that others picked them up instead.

I know it doesn't feel like it now, but please believe me: There are worse things than losing access to Wikipedia — even temporarily. For example, the Stop Online Piracy Act could become a law.

Alexander Graham Bell foresaw many things, but the inventor certainly never could have anticipated that his audio-recording experiments in a Washington lab could be recovered 130 years later and played for a gathering of scientists, curators and journalists.

Ooooooh! Check this out: A new imaging system can capture visual data at a rate of one-trillion-frames per second is fast enough to create virtual super-slow-motion videos of light particles traveling and scattering through space!

Meanwhile, Google is donating $11.5 million to several coalitions fighting to end the modern-day slavery of some 27 million people around the world. It could very well be the largest ever corporate grant devoted to the advocacy, intervention and rescue of people being held, forced to work or provide sex against their will.

In closing, cats hate Christmas. Just so you know.

— compiled by Helen A.S. Popkin, who invites you to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

Wikipedia

I know it doesn't feel like it now, but please believe me: There are worse things than losing access to Wikipedia — even temporarily.

For example, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) (aka H.R.3261) could become a law. The anti-piracy bill, which goes before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, makes the streaming of unauthorized content a felony. Which is all well and good, but as the Electronic Frontier Foundation warns, the bill's "vague language would create devastating new tools for silencing legitimate speech all around the Web."

SOPA is staunchly opposed by free speech and digital rights advocates, as well as top Internet portals such as Google, Facebook, Twitter and Wikipedia. In anticipation of the hearing, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales is conducting a straw poll to gauge Wikipedian interest in a community strike — a blackout of either the U.S. Wikipedia pages, or even the entire site. So far, 87 percent of respondents are in favor of a strike.

Why such a strong anti-SOPA turnout? Despite its authority in the U.S., SOPA has international ramifications. Websites that run afoul could be de-indexed by search engines, blocked by Internet service providers, and blackballed by payment processors such as Visa or PayPal as court-ordered by the U.S. Attorney General.

Here's a worst-case scenario free speech supporters say is entirely possible: Proxy servers such as those that aided the Arab Spring are also used to stream content that qualifies for copyright infringement. Shut down the proxy server for a SOPA violation, and the voices of protest could be muffled as well.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation breaks down more big beefs with SOPA:

SOPA gives individuals and corporations unprecedented power to silence speech online. Under SOPA, individuals and corporations could send a notice to a site’s payment partners, requiring those partners to cut the site off — even if the site could never be held liable for infringement in a U.S. court. Since many sites depend on this revenue to cover operational costs, even one accusation of infringement could be ruinous.

SOPA gives the government even more power to censor. The Attorney General can “disappear” websites by creating a blacklist and requiring service providers (such as  search engines and domain services) to block the sites on the list.

SOPA uses vague language that is sure to be abused. The bill targets nearly any site that hosts user-generated content, or even just has a search function, by failing to provide protections for legal speech.

SOPA would not stop online piracy. The powerful tools granted to the Attorney General would present major obstacles to casual users, but would be trivial for dedicated and technically savvy users to circumvent.

Wikipedia's dog in this fight is its parent organization, Wikimedia, "a nonprofit charitable organization dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual content, and to providing the full content of these wiki-based projects to the public free of charge."

What's more, Wikipedia is a community-edited entity that exists on the Internet, and as with any website, is subject to abuse. An accusation of infringement under SOPA — a copyrighted photo or other such content, could mean no more Wikipedia for anyone. (Then how are you going to come off as super-informed at the drop of a hat?)

Will a Wikipedia  blackout stop SOPA, the way it led the Italian government to back off on a law that would infringe on its editorial independence? Jimmy Wales thinks so:

My own view is that a community strike was very powerful and successful in Italy and could be even more powerful in this case. There are obviously many questions about whether the strike should be geotargeted (U.S.-only), etc.

(One possible view is that because the law would seriously impact the functioning of Wikipedia for everyone, a global strike of at least the English Wikipedia would put the maximum pressure on the US government.)

At the same time, it's of course a very very big deal to do something like this, it is unprecedented for English Wikipedia.

Wales emphasizes that this is a straw poll only, and not a vote that will decide such a strike. "Even if this poll is firmly in 'support' we'd obviously go through a much longer process to get some kind of consensus around parameters, triggers, and timing," he writes.  

via Venturebeat

More on the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA)

• Software alliance yanks support for piracy bill
• Congressman blasts Google's stance on piracy bill

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

via BuzzFeed

Our pre-caffeine roundup is a collection of the hottest, strangest, and most amusing stories of the morning. Here's everything that you need to know before taking that first sip of coffee today: 

The long-sought "God Particle" is cornered, scientists say! The news is not the final answer some were hoping for, but progress is significant step ... and also, awesome.

And if you need a refresher on the Large Hadron Collider and why it matters, check out Alan Boyle's Higgs vs. hype: A guide to the boson buzz. (It makes learning fun!)

Meanwhile, Facebook is making us miserable. Just sayin'.

Also, a new website that keeps track of everything you download from file-sharing sites could spell trouble for the scores of people who steal copyrighted music and movies. Not so awesome.

iTunes just got updated with some minor fixes. So check that out, Apple users.

Wireless carriers may be pricing themselves out of the tablet market; a new study shows that more tablet owners are choosing to use Wi-Fi only connections instead of cellular for their devices. Shocking. (Not really.)

Old Spice just gave you the bestest Christmas present you totally didn't even know you wanted: DevastatingExplosions.com.
Two years after the launch of the Ban Comic Sans Internet movement — when Comic Sans hatred hit critical mass — the much-maligned font gets the defense it deserves -- on Tumblr!

In ther news, the "Gender math gap" is cultural, not biological, turns out. Researchers find no innate differences between sexes that account for disparity. Get it girls? Math is not hard.

That said ladies, Buzzfeed hopes you take note of this: 1930's Advice To Single Women.

— compiled by Helen A.S. Popkin, who invites you to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

Comic Sans Project/Tumblr

Oh honestly, people. What is your problem with Comic Sans?

Excuse my lack of design sophistication, but I actually (and actively) like that faux comic book font designed by Vincent Connare for Microsoft, and released in 1994. Further, I've come to believe that unified Comic Sans hatred is as artistically-informed, hip and meaningful as living in Williamsburg, Brooklyn in 2011. Which is to say, not very much. (Oh, snap!)

Comic Sans Project

Now, two-plus years after the launch of the Ban Comic Sans Internet movement — when Comic Sans hatred hit critical mass — French designers Thomas Blanc and Florian Amoneau have launched a new Tumblr blog, Comic Sans Project.  

"We are the Comic Sans defenders," reads the blog intro. "We fear no fonts and we will make the whole world Comic Sans. Because Helvetica is sooo 2011."

As such, the blog features more than a dozen instantly-recognizable logos re-imagined in the much-maligned font — from the golden McDonalds "M" and the stacked "Star Wars" logo, to tech titles including Tumblr, Android, Microsoft and PlayStation. (What, no Facebook?)

Mashable reports:

What’s next for the Comic Sans Project? There are 20 more logos in the works, including NASA and M&M’s, says Blanc. “We also plan to use the benefits of this little fame to find a job in Paris. We will redesign logos of French advertising agencies and send it to them.”

Adobe AE seems to be the first outside submission so far, but get ready Comic Sans defenders. According to the blog, "In a few weeks, we will set up a submission system on the Tumblr, please be patient."

(Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBCUniversal.)

— via Mashable

More on the annoying way we live now:

• Devastating explosions, courtesy of Old Spice
• Why 'Community' is the only Internet crossover that matters
• 'Planking spree' ends in $303 fine, shame

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

Old Spice

Old Spice just gave you the bestest Christmas present you totally didn't even know you wanted: DevastatingExplosions.com.

http://www.devastatingexplosions.com/

A simple click on the homepage plunger releases a Flash storm of random devastation so awesome I just want to walk away from this website in slow motion without looking back or flinching — which is weird, but looks great — as the fire whirl created by heat vortices blows my hair forward and ashy debris settles across my face and body in an entirely fetching pattern.

Oh! I almost forgot to mention the best part! The website reigns destruction on a variety of classically exploded things: A car, a boat, a barn, etc., Click enough times (and how can you not?) and you get the whole montage!

Sure, DevastatingExplosions.com isn't as obviously useful as the "Bear Deodorant Protector," a product which, Old Spice assures, "exists and is available for purchase" for a mere $19.99. But unlike a sculpture of bisected bears which opens to hold and hide your Old Spice deodorant, DevastatingExplosions.com will neither speed up your imminent appearance on A&E's "Hoarders," or cost you a dime.

What is the point behind this totally awesome idea of Wieden + Kennedy, the totally awesome marketing team that blessed us with totally awesome Old Spice Man? 

What do you care? It's a gift. Click and enjoy!

If I didn't mention before: It's awesome!

More on the annoying way we live now:

• Why 'Community' is the only Internet crossover that matters
• 'Planking spree' ends in $303 fine, shame
• Live-tweeting office antics gets congressional aides canned

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+.

via BuzzFeed

Our pre-caffeine roundup is a collection of the hottest, strangest, and most amusing stories of the morning. Here's everything that you need to know before taking that first sip of coffee today: 

Scientists at the world's largest atom smasher have new data that shows with greater certainty where to find a long-sought theoretical particle that would help explain the origins of the universe!

If you haven't done all your holiday shopping yet, heads up! Nook just got a huge update and Kindle Fire is about to.

A NYPD Facebook probe raises free speech question: How much leeway should police officers have in expressing controversial opinions?

Apple has released "Rewind 2011," a list of the best and most popular iTunes Store downloads.

Who plays Angry Birds? People mostly over the age of 35, turns out.

A congressional aide working in the Washington, D.C. office of Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash., should've listened to his mother in September, when she told him to cool it on Twitter.

More than 1 million of you people clicked on this story about a planking spree that led to a $303 fine and shame.

People are focused on this nonsense when there are real, genuine problems in the world. For instance, THEY MIGHT BE CANCELING COMMUNITY!!!

Google's top three executives own 2.3 private jets each ... because why now?

In closing, please enjoy the 40 best protest signs of 2011. (Heavy competition this year!)

— compiled by Helen A.S. Popkin, who invites you to join her on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+. 

A congressional aide working in the Washington, D.C. office of Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash., should've listened to his mother in September, when she told him to cool it on Twitter. Instead, he and two of his co-workers carried on into December, upping their office antics with tweets about drinking at work, watching Nirvana videos on YouTube and slamming their boss — Stevens — all on that slammed boss's dime.

Since mom's words went unheeded, however, lucky us! We now have the tweeted evidence of the allegedly alcohol-fueled tweets of legislative assistants Seth Burroughs (@therocketship1) and Elizabeth Robblee (@betsybites) and legislative correspondent Ben Byers (@Byers_Remorse).

"The Capitol Hill staff culture has always resembled a fraternity party for the just out of college professionals who dominate the offices," Politico reports. "In this case, staffers clearly crossed the line, Larsen’s office says."

I'll say!

Here's just a few of the tweets sent during work hours from the personal Twitter accounts of the three now-fired aids chronicling "December to Remember," (hashtag #D2R) a phrase "coined by the trio of staffers to define their attempt to spend the final month of the year in a state of perpetual debauchery," as first reported by Northwest Daily Marker.

@TheRocketship1: @Byers_Remorse I destroyed my work blackberry. Twitter will have to suffice as our mode of communication. D2R is making its mark

@TheRocketship1: My D2D teasm showed up this morning at 9:00am with shots of Jack. What a glorious and frightening way to kick off the month.

@betsybites: @TheRocketship1 were you just drinking jack and coffee during your meeting?

@TheRocketship1: Dear taxpayers - I hope you don't mind that I'm watching YouTube clips of Nirvana at my government job. Thanks, you're the best.

@TheRocketship1: @betsysbites It was a nice touch when you referred to the boss as a p****y at the end of the day #ilikethenewbetsy

@TheRocketship1: I really like DC, but I could have used another day away. The silver lining is that I don't have to see my idiot boss. #smallvictory

While the staffers were fired eight days into #D2R, the ill-advised tweets revealing bad behavior during office hours dated back to the summer. Perhaps their jobs could've been saved, if @Rocketship1 heeded his mothers words of warning, which he tweeted in September:

@Rocketship1: Mom just yelled at me, so I'm on Twitter probation until further notice.

To be fair, Twitter and politics have had a stormy relationship from the beginning.

It took another perturbed mom to point out to Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., that tweeting through the president’s first speech to Congress is simply rude.

In 2009, Jeff Frederick, chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia, thwarted his own party’s coup with this tweet:

Big news coming out of Senate: Apparently one dem is either switching or leaving the dem caucus. Negotiations for power sharing underway.

And what's a few drunken tweets on the taxpayer's dime compared to compromising the security of a congressional delegation in Iraq via Twitter, as accomplished by Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., who tweeted this as-it-happens update regarding his group’s location and destination:

"Moved into green zone by helicopter Iraqi flag now over palace. Headed to new US embassy Appears calmer less chaotic than previous here

So all in all, recently fired congressional aids, this is going to look great on your resumes!

More on the annoying way we live now:

• 'Planking spree' ends in $303 fine, shame
• Why 'Community' is the only Internet crossover that matters
• Why PayPal's bad reputation is bigger than Regretsy

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+.

via The Smoking Gun

While the Internet has since moved on to such awkwardly posed photos as horsemaning, coning, owling, Tebowing or whatever, in Wisconsin you can still get arrested for planking.

Two brothers were charged with disorderly conduct after police came across Facebook photos and a YouTube video of the two on a "planking spree," which included stiff-as-a-board poses atop a memorial monument, a police squad car, a bank ATM machine, and merchandise displays at Walmart and Lowe's stores, " the Smoking Gun reports.

Approached individually by the police, both Alexander Hart, 19, and Ryan Hart, 21, first claimed the photos were Photoshopped before finally fessing up.

Planking, in review, is the apparently super-fun practice of having one's photo snapped while lying board-stiff in an awkward location, for the purpose of uploading that photo to Facebook.

The fad originated in the UK, but blew up big in Australia earlier this year after the Planking page hit Facebook, with countless pictures of Australia's youth planking in the middle of busy sidewalks, balancing atop mail boxes, across the arms of chairs, on bike seats and backs of couches.

Planking went International after Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard warned plankers that their "focus has to be on keeping yourself safe first," following two planking deaths in that country. While there are are no  fad-related fatalities widely reported in the United States, it's obviously frowned upon by law enforcement officials — not because it's intrinsically dangerous or criminal or anything. It's just really stupid.

"Municipal Court judge in Manitowoc found Alexander Hart guilty of disorderly conduct on the strength of 'planking'  photos that were posted earlier this year to his Facebook page, as well as an incriminating YouTube video," the Smoking Gun reports.

Alexander was fined $303, which is nothing compared to the punitive shame of having one's outdated planking photos surfaced months after their alleged relevency. Here's hoping he hasn't uploaded any photos of himself "horsemaning" on a scared City Hall statue or "Tebowing" in the American Legion parking lot.

Hart's brother Ryan faces his own disorderly conduct trial next week. "Ryan Hart apparently upset cops by lying across a police memorial monument in front of the county jail. An officer compared the act to going to a cemetery and planking atop a gravestone."

via The Smoking Gun

More on the annoying way we live now:

• Why 'Community' is the only Internet crossover that matters
• Planking: A Facebook fad to die for?
• Why PayPal's bad reputation is bigger than Regretsy

Helen A.S. Popkin goes blah blah blah about the Internet. Tell her to get a real job on Twitter and/or Facebook. Also, Google+.