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| | Issue #20.10 :: 03/07/2007 - 03/13/2007 | Much Ado About "Scrotum"
Use of Word in Children's Book Has Librarians Buzzing
| BY DAN COOK
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News flash! There’s a word called “scrotum”! But you already knew that … so why all the fuss? It’s all about a children’s book, The Higher Power of Lucky, in which the main character, a 10-year-old girl named Lucky, overhears another character saying that his dog was bitten on the scrotum by a rattlesnake. Apparently a lot of people take issue with author Susan Patron’s subject matter and word choice, with some school libraries refusing to carry the title. “I think it’s a good case of an author not realizing her audience,” New Jersey librarian Frederick Muller told The New York Times. Not everyone agrees: The book won the Newbery Medal from the Association for Library Service to Children, and it gets four stars out of five from users on Amazon.com. “The people who are reacting to that word are not reading the book as a whole,” said Pat Scales, former chairwoman of the Newbery Award committee. “That’s what censors do — they pick out words and don’t look at the total merit of the book.”
Crazy stuff online! Get ready to be disoriented when you visit www.screenvader.com, which features a trippy home page where the words “media and algorithms” and “home made music” float and rotate in response to the moves of your mouse. What’s the point? The site seems to specialize in tools for music sampling and photo manipulation, but we’re not entirely sure — and apparently we’re not alone: The web site stumbleupon.com contains comments from users who also tried to figure it out. “Cool interface but wtf is this supposed to do?” writes NeverNamed. “A little too creepy for me,” writes Rainnsong. Cryptic and creepy, yes, but YumiGirlMoo likes it anyway: “Simply incredible, ive [sic] never seen anything quite like it,” she writes.
Gloom, doom, more gloom! To read the media news these days, it looks as if the printed page will be gone before you know it. In a move that could have a major impact on newspaper revenue, New Jersey Business reported March 2 that Google is getting into the real estate advertising business. Meanwhile, investor Warren Buffett predicted recently that “talented management” in the newspaper business will not be able to outlast “eroding fundamentals.” In a letter to investors cited in the New York Post, Buffet wrote, “There’s no rule that says a newspaper’s revenues can’t fall below its expenses and that losses can’t mushroom.” Yes, it’s all quite depressing for those in the print media, especially those at daily papers, whose subscription model is the most vulnerable in a world where users expect free content — and generally get it. The good news? Alternative weeklies are well positioned to benefit from the decline of daily papers — at least in the short term.
We’re all idiots! But at least we were smart when we were younger. That’s the premise behind the new Fox reality show, Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?, in which adult contestants test their wits against kids who have studied trapezoids, constellations, cloud formations and U.S. presidents much more recently than you have. “The central theme … is shame,” writes Troy Patterson for Slate.com, adding that losing contestants are required to turn toward the camera and say, “I am not smarter than a fifth grader.” The show airs Thursdays at 9 p.m.
Dear lord, what next!? Just as Christian musicians have long copied trends from the secular music world, now there’s a Christian web site copying the success of YouTube. What would Jesus watch? Check out www.godtube.com.
Media Madness is a column exploring web sites, TV, video games, blogs, books, media industry news and anything else in the media universe that strikes our fancy. | |
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