Sideswipe

Rare opportuinity for first-home buyers to get on the property market: This Kids cubby house in Auckland was being offered on Trade Me with a starting bid of $3500.

New Zealand's Fair Go has been named Coolest UnCool Series by US media tracking analysis company Global Language Monitor. It described the show as defending consumers against injustice, "even battling (and winning) for a 1c discrepancy". Global releases its Television Buzzword List for the 2004-05 season in conjunction with the Emmy awards. The top buzzword is "refugee", from the on-going coverage of Hurricane Katrina, followed by "desperation" from Desperate Housewives, "Camp Cupcake" from Martha Stewart's incarceration. Close behind were "reality TV" and "curmudgeon" from the Hugh Laurie medical drama House, "backstory" from Lost, "tsunami" from the South Asian disaster, and "mobisodes" - one-minute episodes for mobile devices. Phrases deemed no longer hip include "You're fired" from The Apprentice, but Seinfeld's "Yadda, yadda, yadda" is still worthy. Worldwide, the Largest Global Phenomenon from a Single Word prize went to "Idol/Idool/Idolo", with more than two dozen American Idol-type shows spanning the globe.

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Ever thought mugshots on online dating services seemed too good-looking? Match.com is being sued by staff-members who say employees posed as interested date prospects - online and in-person - to trick account-holders into resubscribing. Match.com is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic emails sent by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends, people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a marketing ploy.

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A reader writes: "It's good to know that the New Zealand Blood Service takes anaemia so seriously. I recently tried to give blood but was informed that my previously low (1999) iron levels - now completely fine - prevented me from giving blood for "a while". A summary of my donor history did, however, inform me that I am allowed to commence giving blood in the year 2242. Now I have something to look froward to should I make it to the ripe old age of 266."