KEY POINTS:
Maybe the London Underground isn't the best place for this ad with the tagline, "Inner peace through outer violence", for the video game Burnout Dominator. The British Advertising Standards Authority agreed and pulled the poster. Games firm Electronic Arts tried to say the poster of the realistic car wreck was "obviously for a video game". (Source: Adfreak.com)
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After hearing some insider gossip, the Herald phoned New Zealand On Air yesterday to ask if there were any new local sitcoms in development that had been granted funding. Definitely not, declared CEO Jane Wrightson. "We don't have any sitcoms on the books at the moment." Six hours later, a story appears on the newswires with Ms Wrightson announcing ... wait for it ... two new sitcoms in development that have been granted NZOA funding. Anyone who's ever tried to get funding knows the process is certainly not that quick; so does Ms Wrightson not know what's going on in her own company or was someone telling porkies?
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Jock regularly rings the North Shore City Council and has a simple way to get through to the operator. "When you first get the answer message, hit 0, then the extension you want or if you don't know it, hit 0 and you go straight to the operator who usually answers within 15-30 seconds. I find them really efficient."
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Now that BZP party pills are to be banned, some are suggesting those seeking a high will opt for an alternative hard drug instead. They may be right, but it probably won't be cocaine. The Economist reports that the price of cocaine is relative to geography. Obviously Colombia is the cheapest place to buy cocaine, at US$2 ($2.60) a gram, but the further away a country is from the main producers in South and Central America, the pricier it is to traffick there; which is why New Zealand tops the list, with a gram costing US$714 ($928).
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Alan Murgatroyd pities the poor reader complaining about her temporary lunchroom digs, but says at least she has a table. "For many years I frequently had to eat my lunch (and maybe even the subsequent dinner) strapped to a jiggling chair in a space smaller than the average lavatory, off a tray balanced on my knee. Scrumptious airline food, without a newspaper or mobile phone. Governments could fall, presidents be assassinated and I would be blissfully ignorant. Of course it was in the top left corner of a 747 carrying me to some exciting destination, so maybe there was some compensation."
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The Melbourne City Council will reconsider hiring private investigators to have sex in illegal brothels in an attempt to entrap and then shut them down. According to ABC News, the council stopped the practice several months ago but will put the issue to a vote on Tuesday, after complaints about an increasing number of illegal brothels.
