Fox News...squeaky wheel gets oil. Underdog news outlet movin' up...

Move on up!

Well, they won't have Fox News to kick around any more!

And, the brass at the underdog "network" have Helen Thomas to thank for it.

The White House Correspondents' Association has announced that they will be playing some musical chairs in the briefing room at the White House in the next few days.

Say what?

A classic case of squeaky wheel getting the oil?

On the heels of the unceremonious departure of Helen Thomas, Fox was given the nod to pack up their kit 'n kaboodle and slip into a prestigious slot in the front row where all the action is.

According to the WHCA, politics did not play a role in their decision to move Fox "up".

"We were  persuaded by Fox's length of service and commitment to the White House television pool."

Since the forced retirement of Helen Thomas (who was shown the back door for making inappropriate comments on-the-fly a few weeks ago ) three of the major news outlets have been chomping at the bit to inch closer to the podium where they would be better placed to eyeball the President at White House press briefings.

Under the revised seating plan, Associated Press will hold court in the center spot, vacated by Thomas.

Fox News will feather a little nest (in the old wire services spot) alongside CNN and a couple of reputable Broadcast Networks of note.

In the spite of the changes, Bloomberg remains in the second row, as NPR moves up from the third row to Fox's current second-row seat.

Although the Financial Times will now get a regular seat, U.S. News & World Report lost theirs.

Meanwhile, Politico and American Urban Radio Networks moved into the third row, as the Washington Times fell back into the fourth without argument.

The foreign press pool was granted its own seat under the revised plan.

Several news organizations either petitioned to get regular seats in the briefing room - or made a bid to keep their current seats - which signalled all may not be cozy and well in the White House Press Room just yet.

Is there a spot for moi?

The Tattler, you fool!

http://www.julianayrs.com

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Joe Sestak...Fox News chases down Senator in corridors of power!

What a hoot!

If you turn to Fox News you'll catch a harried attempt by reporters and camera-men to corner their latest prey Senator Joe Sestak.

Fox is hell-bent on getting a verbal statement about the brewing scandal around former President Bill Clinton in the wake of the news that at the direction of the Chief of White House Staff, the former President was asked to act as an intermediary to "test the waters" in respect to dropping out of the primaries.

BACKGROUND

http://fraudphishing-financialmisdees.blogspot.com/2010/05/barack-obamascandal-brewing-scurrilous.html

Just moments ago, Fox reporters - who have been staking out territory on Washington Hill with the ultimate aim of having a go at Senator Joe Sestak - suddenly spied their target and began a merry chase.

The Senator tried to avoid the aggressive Fox reporters by ducking  down a stairwell.

The paparazzi followed in hot pursuit as they hurled pointed questions in his direction.

The Senator was due to "vote" on an issue and used that excuse to explain his failure to be straightforward with the press.

Sestak previously noted for the record that he was not going to dodge questions.

Hence, the reason Fox News chose to appear unexpectedly on his doorstep, for an impromptu interview.

Senator Sestak promised to make a statement shortly, so now media hounds wait with bated breath in the corridors of power for the answers.

News at 11!
 

http://www.thetattler.biz/

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John McCain...Matt Lauer puts Senator on hot seat on Today Show! Sarah Palin vetting issue...

That John McCain is a piece of work!

On the heels of the announcement that Sarah Palin has been signed on to be a commentator on Fox News, Matt Lauer put John McCain on the hot seat this morning in respect to allegations set forth in Harry Reid's (Senate Majority leader) just-published book that accuses the Senator of failing miserably in respect to the vetting of the VP hopeful.

The interchange became particularly hostile when Lauer pointedly inferred that Senator McCain didn't even bother to properly research Palin's background before selecting her as a running-mate.

When quizzed about the specifics, John McCain tried to weasle out of the dilemma, by flatly denying any knowledge of any action his staff may have taken in that regard.

"I wouldn't know," he shrugged, as he shifted uncomfortably in his perch on the set.

Lauer was so taken aback by the response, that he was inclined to probe further for additional answers.

"I am surprised," Lauer quipped.

"You were the presidential candidate."

In so many words, McCain proceeded to assert for the record that the former beauty Queen allegedly energized the party.

In addition, he beamed that he was not only proud of Sarah Palin, but proud of the campaign they waged.

In a bold-faced attempt to shut down the line of questioning, McCain was quite adamant that he wasn't going to Sunday morning quarterback at this juncture.

"I have no intention of looking back over what happened a year ago," he smugly retorted.

"I'm sorry, you'll have to get others to comment on it."

Maybe Lauer can dial in to Fox's "O'Reilly Factor" tonight and ask Palin directly, when she makes her first appearance as a news commentator for the controversial Fox network.

News at 11!

http://www.julianayrs.com

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Las Vegas...Battle of the Bands! Rock 'n Roll at dawn, dudes...

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery!

When I tossed open the curtain, and slid the window open wide bright and early this morning in my Hotel room, I was hit with a blast of rock 'n roll!

They start early in Vegas, don't they?

After showering, I took the elevator downstairs, and headed off for a morning cup of java.

Heh!

Was that Alice Cooper screaming the last few strains of the band's celebrated hit - "School's Out" - on the Freemont Street stage?

Shucks, missed capturing the classic little number on video.

But, lady luck was on my side.

"Are we allowed to do another song, "Alice" asked the stage manager in charge of the early morning riser.

Once that tidbit of dialogue fell on my ears, I snatched up my new HD Video Recorder just in time to catch an encore number in which "Alice" proceeded to tear off the head of a doll.

The truth of the matter?

The performance wasn't quite up to par.

Did "Alice" have a rough night, or what?

You got it!

Turns out, the musicians on stage were a Tribute Band!

The impromptu performance (and the one that followed that featured a Bon Jovi look-a-like) was a special promotion for the - "Battle of the Bands" (May 13th) - being taped for Fox News.
http://www.billetkontoret.dk/presse/presseusa/Las%20Vegas%20showgirls.jpg
The teaser was being whipped up to throw the spotlight on a myriad of talented young musicians playing the strip in honky-tonks, casinos, and Hotel lounges around "sin" city in search of the elusive big break.

Later in the week, I'll upload the video, and you can decide for yourself if it was a tribute or a travesty!

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13 year old buying Hookers with Dad's credit card is a marketing scam!

About two weeks ago, I heard a story about a 13 year old stealing his Dad's credit card to buy XBoxes and Hookers on a morning radio show. After seeing the story surface on several mainstream media outlets, I even wrote the Police Chief of the town (Newark, Texas) where it allegedly happened because it sounded a little too bizarre to be true.



Maybe it was the part of the story, where the escorts were conned into believing the boys were suffering from a disability (restricted growth) and State law dictated they couldn't be discriminated against? Perhaps it was because the escorts were not arrested because the boys were more interested in playing computer games??



The Police Chief never replied and I gave up on the story. Now, just as I thought in the beginning, the entire thing was nothing more than a hoax. Of course, the hoax had a purpose, which was to build backlinks to hawk credit cards by a company called money.co.uk.



It's ironic that a company selling financial products would use fraud as a marketing tool (my opinion).



JD Rucker wrote about this on NowPublic:

What a virtual world we travel through sometimes. A (relatively) innocent marketing ploy designed to draw in backlinks for a financial services comparison website in London has stirred up media attention ranging from the front page of Digg to coverage on Fox News.



When money.co.uk posted a story titled 13 Year Old Steals Dad's Credit Card to Buy Hookers, the idea was that it could be read as a humorous parody piece that could get attention from social media sites, yield quality backlinks, and draw in hundreds of thousands of visitors. The backlinks would help the site achieve higher rankings on search engines, especially for the target keyword phrases that would include the words "Credit Card".

JD Rucker summed up his article with a rationalization on why this occurred:

With the heavy emphasis that search engines place on inbound links, many websites are desperate for any form of viral link-building. It may not be "ethical" through some perspectives, but it is arguably justifiable in the competitive Internet marketplace.



Until the search engines come up with a better ranking system, we can expect sensationalized parodies to continue to pop up.

I'm probably going to be a little less kind when I say this appears to have been a marketing scam designed to sell credit cards.



I wonder what Bill O'Reilly will have to say? Fox picked up the story and "story about this in Wired News.



Bill is often fond of accusing the blogosphere of spreading not very well founded rumors. I guess one shoe doesn't fit all and it's never wise for people who live in glass houses to throw stones?



Now that is what I consider a rather "piffy" comment.



Sorry Bill, I do watch your show from time to time, but being a blogger, who "sometimes" tries to be thoughtful about what I write -- I couldn't resist making a point! I also agree with Jeanine that if this story were true, the hookers should have been arrested.



Now saying that, I do agree with you that an awful lot of "spinned yarns" and "malicious garbage" is plastered across the electronic universe. In fact, last time I checked, the more "malicious garbage is a current theme of this blog.



Full story on NowPublic, here.



Original Digg submission, which was "dug" 2507 times, here.

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Has hacking become too easy? Ask the child predator who just got 110 years for doing it!

Here is a hacker, who ended up in a lot of trouble after using malware to blackmail underage girls into creating pornography of themselves. The problem is it was probably a little too easy for him to obtain the tools, he used to pull his "hack" off!

This leads me to be slightly cynical that putting one person behind bars for 110 years is going to solve the overall problem, we are facing with the irresponsible use of technology.

Picked up this up from Sharon Gaudin (Computer World) courtesy of the NY Times:

A North Carolina man last week was sentenced to 110 years in prison after admitting that he and a co-conspirator hacked into computers used by young girls and used illicitly gained data to blackmail them.

Ivory D. Dickerson, 33, a civil engineer, admitted that he conspired with the other person to send emails or instant messages to underage girls as part of a scheme to trick them into opening a file containing the Bifrost trojan horse. The malware would give Dickerson and his co-conspirator control over the victim's computer, and they tried to use hacked information to coerce the girls into creating and then electronically sending them lurid photos of themselves, prosecutors said.

Dickerson used all the normal techniques to monitor his victims, such as keylogging software. He also had a tool, which enabled him to hack into web cameras and record what was going on.

This concerned me from a privacy perspective so I decided to see what would pop-up if I Googled "hacking webcams." To my utter amazement, I found some shocking results, which are pretty scary.

In fact, one site has a tutorial on how to hack webcams, using a Google search string.

In most instances, this can be prevented by password protecting whatever camera system you install.

Please note that criminals could use your cameras against you in a variety of ways that threaten both your privacy and safety.

Going back to the article about our hacker using BiFrost malware, a Sophos rep is quoted as saying:

The Bifrost malware, "is relatively easy to obtain," said Richard Wang, manager of SophosLabs U.S. "It's not something you need to pay for. Since we first saw it in April of 2005, we've seen over 1,200 different versions of this Trojan. The guys who write them are always trying to put up new versions to hide them from anti-virus software."

I'm guessing that Mr. Wang means the malware can be obtained from one of the hacking forums that seem to be out there (pretty easy to access) on the Internet.

So far as Mr. Dickerson, lock him up and throw the key away, preferably on a deserted island. Saying that, here is yet another example that it doesn't take a whole lot of skill to be a hacker nowadays. In fact, it seems to be a little too EASY!

It's a shame that parents now have to become computer security experts to ensure the safety of their children. Maybe the answer is to take a hard look at all the enabling factors we seem to see too much of these days?

ComputerWorld article (courtesy of the NY Times), here.

Fox News has a pretty telling video about the subject of webcam hacking, which can be seen, here.

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