How many of you are experiencing a huge spike of ad phone calls... or silent phone calls?

For a while we were being harassed almost daily by phone calls from construction companies, then it changed to several times a day boiler room type calls for a variety of causes.  Along with these, we get silent calls where no one is on the line.  My daughter thinks it's a plot to make us drop our land line....  What happened to the no-call list anyway?

Ethanol and Meteorites... what could possibly go wrong?

Corn ethanol is useless, but we could have told you that...

Something else I'll need to beat to death when it shows up at my door...

The blind leading the blind.  What ignorance is doing to teaching evolution.

Cereal that looks you in the eye.

Oops... the NYPD attempts to hashtag its way to popularity.

Is the seafood you're eating illegal?

Tracking the meteorites that have hit Earth.

The boycott of Rush Limbaugh is actually doing well

Despite what his crisis management team is saying. Attacking Sandra Fluke pissed off some died in the wool Republicans who have never before been involved in a cause.

Just what we'll need for the nuclear winter....

Orange juice and a portable sun?

Why we have bulimia and anorexia in this country

While other countries have people dying of starvation. We are told to want more, buy more, eat more, yet blame ourselves for wanting too much, buying too much, eating too much. Instant beauty is being promised when you buy just a few packs of cream, makeup, diet food, clothes....



We are being sold an unattainable lie.

(*edited for clarity)

How one man can change the hate-filled air waves

Read Spocko and learn.

But we KNOW you listened to this ad!

So you obviously want to buy our product!

A company called IMMI is perfecting software that goes in your cell phone and catches every snippet of audio you're exposed to, then automatically determines which ads you heard. And more!

To get a handle on the effectiveness of a given ad, IMMI's data can show, for example, when a panel member is exposed to a movie trailer on TV and whether that same consumer later goes to see the movie. Similarly, IMMI data can show if a panelist watching a promo for a TV program will later watch the show, either on TV or online. IMMI thinks it can expand that idea from films and TV shows to consumer products like shampoo or toothpaste. It is testing its technology with a national grocery store chain.

"We follow the same person from end to end," says Tom Zito, IMMI's chief executive.

I would recommend that IMMI start working on developing a cute, non-threatening mascot right now, because they are frankly talking about some scary shit. People volunteer to carry these phones for just $50 a month.

You've got to be carefully taught

To be a consumer in the US. You must always want more, faster, now. Start teaching the kids early:

The school district that approved McDonald's-sponsored report cards has a hot new partnership with Bus Radio, a friendly company that advertises to kids as they ride to school!

The company serves a sonorous mix of inoffensive music, public service announcements (buckle up, kids!) and a few harmless advertisements (maybe McDonald's?) to over 1 million children in 23 states. Bus Radio is based in Needham, Massachusetts, but lost its contract with the Needham school district after uppity parents objected to the crass commercialization of something as innocent as a bus ride.

There is no escape. You must consume! Or the terrorists have won!