Paste on 'The Knife of Aristotle'

This is an entertaining article:
https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2017/05/the-knife-of-aristotle-isnt-just-a-fake-fake-news.html

It's about a media watchdog site, called The Knife of Aristotle, that seeks (sought?) to combat fake news.  The author, Brock Wilbur, describes how he applied for a writing position with The Knife of Aristotle, and soon realized the whole operation had the appearance of a cult.

USAUKNews.com

Come on, USAUKNews.com, who are you trying to fool?

Your article from May 27 is titled: "Emily Weinman: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know"

A Heavy.com article from May 27 is titled:

Your opening:

A Philadelphia woman is facing a number of charges and police offciers have been placed on desk duty following a violent arrest on a Wildwood, New Jersey beach Memorial Day Weekend.

The original video was captured by a beach-goer who said she “woke up” to witness what looks like a brawl or fisticuffs between Emily Weinman and police officers. Screams of “stop resisting” and “I didn’t do anything,” can be heard as police struggle with, then punch, the 20-year-old. 

The opening from Heavy.com:

A Philadelphia woman is facing a number of charges and police officers have been placed on desk duty following a violent arrest on a Wildwood, New Jersey beach Memorial Day Weekend.

The original video was captured by a beach-goer who said she “woke up” to witness what looks like a brawl or fisticuffs between Emily Weinman and police officers. Screams of “stop resisting” and “I didn’t do anything,” can be heard as police struggle with, then punch, the 20-year-old.

You're using somebody else's content, and your site has AdSense ads?  That's just sketchy.

Could this be the end of the Timcast?

Tim Pool's YouTube channel received a community guideline strike, on the grounds of "promoting dangerous acts, violence, or drug abuse."

This puts a halt (for now) to any live-streams.  On Twitter, he wrote: "Just got word that my Youtube partner manager dropped me. Incoming ban hammer?"  Things sounded bleaker on Reddit, where Tim wrote: "My partner manager just dropped me. Welp, youtube was fun while it lasted..."

I don't know what a "YouTube partner manager" does, but it sounds like it could be an important role, possibly.

Crack watchers

I subscribe to a few chiropractic channels on YouTube.  They're relaxing to watch, and I wouldn't be surprised if YouTube's algorithm starts to favor these channels more and more over the coming months.  (It's hard to think of a less-controversial subject than chiropractic adjustments).

There's that Dr. Gregory Johnson guy in Houston.  His videos typically get between 5,000 and 20,000 views each, and his most popular video (from two months ago) got over 2,000,000 views.  There's also Dr. Ace Thayer in Southern California; his videos typically get between 10,000 and 30,000 views, and his most popular video (from three months ago) got over 3,700,000 views.  Apparently I'm not the only one who watches these.

Autoload of annoyance

Lots of news websites have an "autoload" feature for their articles:  When you reach the end of one article, the next article will automatically load in the space at the bottom of the screen.  This is annoying when a news website also puts the links for their "About" and "Contact" pages at the bottom of the screen.  The autoload feature actually moves those links out of my reach before I can click on them.  What gives? 

I took these two screenshots while browsing NRN.com (Nation's Restaurant News).  I wanted to learn more about the site, but here's what happened:

Now to just move my mouse over the links, and....

Missed again!

After a couple tries, I realized I should just go to the site's homepage and navigate from there.

I don't know if there's an obvious solution that I'm missing here, or if it's really just a case of multiple news sites having a glitchy UX. 

TheVoiceHubs.com

Come on, TheVoiceHubs.com, who are you trying to fool?

Your article from May 21, 2018 is titled: "Woman who threatened parent of Sandy Hook shooting victim sent to jail"

A CBC.ca article from June 7, 2017, is titled: "Woman who threatened parent of Sandy Hook shooting victim sent to jail"

Your opening:

A Florida woman pleaded guilty and was sent to prison Wednesday for threatening a man whose six-year-old son was killed in the 2012 mass shooting at a Connecticut school, which she contended was a hoax.

Senior U.S. District Judge James Cohn sentenced Lucy Richards, 57, to five months in prison, followed by five months of home detention.

The opening from CBC.ca:

A Florida woman pleaded guilty and was sent to prison Wednesday for threatening a man whose six-year-old son was killed in the 2012 mass shooting at a Connecticut school, which she contended was a hoax.

Senior U.S. District Judge James Cohn sentenced Lucy Richards, 57, to five months in prison, followed by five months of home detention. 

You're using somebody else's content, and your site has AdSense ads?  That's just sketchy.

(H/T to /u/BlogSpammr.)

Cluttered Fortune

Look at all this clutter you get at the bottom of Fortune articles.  There are four rows of sponsored posts, served by a combination of Outbrain and Dianomi.  There's another column of sponsored posts, served by Ideal Media.  There are three display ads served by AdSense.  And there's a commercial playing in that annoying pop-out window that follows people down the page.

Puck girl

There was a popular video a couple weeks ago featuring a little girl attending a Washington Capitals game.  In the clip, the girl is trying to get Brett Connolly's attention so that he'll toss her a hockey puck.  Connolly tosses over a couple hockey pucks, but both times the hockey puck is given to another child.  Finally, Connolly tosses over a third hockey puck which gets handed to the girl.

Look how happy she appears in the YouTube thumbnail:

My favorite part of the video is when Connolly tries tossing the third puck over the glass, only to have it fall onto the ice.  For a brief moment, the little girl's face twists into an intense, ogre-like rage:

Connolly, don't turn around!

Oh, phew, she's back to normal!

Tim Pool

I like Tim Pool.

He's isn't alt-right.  (Far from it!)  But he frequently defends the reputations of people who are falsely accused of being alt-right.

My favorite comment of all time

If someone asked what your favorite internet comment of all time was, would you have an answer?  Well, I do.  It came from a Pajiba article posted on October 30th, 2008, titled: "The Ten Most Unusually-Hot Celebrity Women." 

Maggie Gyllenhaal was #2 on the list, and Pajiba pasted this photo:

A commenter named "ms shai" responded thusly:

I know I've mentioned it before but Maggie Gyllenhaal bears more than a passing resemblance to the eyeless flesh monster in Pan's Labyrinth.
I can't watch The Dark Knight without yelling at the screen and telling the Joker "Watch out, she's behind you!" He must've been so scared. No wonder he pushed her off that ledge. Sweet Jesus!
By the way I was yelling during the movie because I'm black. Sorry. 

Posted by: ms shai at October 30, 2008 4:00 PM

That's the funniest internet comment I've ever read. 

Kylie causes controversy

On March 14, there was a report on the local news about Kylie Jenner and the backlash she faced over her new makeup line.  Kylie had chosen provocative names like "barely legal" and "X-Rated," and the reporter said "the Twitterverse fired back."  Then they showed this graphic:

The graphic didn't attach any handles to these tweets, so I tracked down the authors and noted how many replies/retweets/likes each tweet received.  I also noted how many Twitter followers each author had.  Like I said, this was back on March 14th, and the tweets in question have received some additional replies, retweets, and likes.  However, these are the statistics from the day of the news report:

Tweet #1:  "Seriously Kylie Jenner, choose better names for your products.
This was tweeted by @GirlAboutToon_ on March 21, 2017.  When I checked, her tweet had 7 replies, 10 retweets, and 15 likes, and the account had 786 followers.

Seriously @KylieJenner, choose better names for your products. You have 12+ year old fans! "Barely Legal" "Virginity" 🙄

— Girl About Toon (@GirlAboutToon_) March 21, 2017

Tweet #2: "Disgusted"
I think this was tweeted on March 14, 2018, by @ElizabethLee.  The woman was complaining about Kylie Jenner's brushes, and the final word of her tweet was: "Disgusted."  When I checked, her tweet had 2 replies, 0 retweets, and 2 likes, and the account had 58 followers.

Kylies new blushes which are aimed to her tween/teen market, are called HOT AND BOTHERED- X RATED-VIRGINITY-BARELY LEGAL.
Wth is wrong with her? Seems she's getting desperate for att. & any way to get her name out there,even at the expense of her young fans is ok. Disgusted

— Elizabeth Yorkshire (@ElizabethThee) March 14, 2018

Tweet #3: "Kylie named a brush barely legal. I'm gagging."
This was tweeted at 10:44 PM on March 13, 2018, by @yeahkendrv.  When I checked, her tweet had 0 replies, 0 retweets, and 0 likes, and the account had 101 followers.

Kylie named a blush barely legal I’m gagging

— Kendra Lillpop (@yeahkendrv) March 14, 2018

The puzzling tweet is the one from 2017, since it suggest this "controversy" over Kylie's make-up line is a year old. 

Viper's World News, May 2018

Educate yourself:

JamesNews.com

Come on, JamesNews.com, who are you trying to fool?

Your article from May 11, 2018, is titled: "Dan Stevens Joins Legion Creator's Astronaut Film Pale Blue Dot"

A Screen Rant article from May 11, 2018, is titled: "Dan Stevens Joins Legion Creator's Astronaut Film Pale Blue Dot"

Your opening:

Legion star Dan Stevens will stick with Noah Hawley, signing on for the director’s astronaut drama Pale Blue Dot . Hawley created the FX series Legion, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. He also created the acclaimed series Fargo, inspired by the Coen Brothers’ Oscar-winning film.

The opening from Screen Rant:

Legion star Dan Stevens will stick with Noah Hawley, signing on for the director’s astronaut drama Pale Blue Dot. Hawley created the FX series Legion, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. He also created the acclaimed series Fargo, inspired by the Coen Brothers’ Oscar-winning film.

You're using someone else's content, and your site has AdSense ads?  That's just sketchy.

Vice-en-us.com

Vice-en-us.com is another website that sprung from the same mold as ABCNews-us.com.  The website is currently live, however the top stories on its homepage are from December, and the homepage has an ABC logo in the top-left corner.

Vice-en-us.com was registered on December 17, 2017, via DomainsByProxy, and the WHOIS page lists the following servers:

Name Server: NS1.C46874.SGVPS.NET 

Name Server: NS2.C46874.SGVPS.NET

Those two server names are also listed on the WHOIS page for ABCNews-us.com.

YahooNews-us.com

The domain YahooNews-us.com was registered on April 25, 2018.  It has the same layout as FoxNews-us.com (which I wrote about yesterday). 

And, just like the fake Fox website, YahooNews-us.com was registered by a "James Jones" using the e-mail address Buzman544@gmail.com.

FoxNews-us.com

The domain FoxNews-us.com was registered on April 25, 2018.  Its front page is similar to the fake news site ABCNews-us.com, which I documented in November.  It's even running the same stories:

According to WHOIS records, FoxNews-us.com was registered by a "James Jones" using the e-mail address buzman544@gmail.com.  That e-mail address is linked with another fake news site, SundayPost.org, which was previously covered on both Snopes and LeadStories.

Well done, Fox59.com

I love reading Fox59.com  It's my first stop for news about Indianapolis.  Last night, they ran a story titled "Police department writes ‘popo’ on squad cars to relate with young residents."

It began:

BATH TOWNSHIP, Mich. – In an effort to create a better relationship with their community’s youth, one Michigan department has changed its squad cards to read “popo” instead of police.

Fox59 embedded an image from the Facebook page of the Bath Township Police Department, which showed a squad car with the word "POPO" emblazoned on its side.  Later, the folks at Fox59 realized the image was a photoshop intended as a joke, so they updated the article.  The new title is "Police department jokes about writing ‘popo’ on squad cars to relate with young residents."

It begins:

BATH TOWNSHIP, Mich. – In an effort to create a better relationship with their community’s youth, one Michigan department has thought about changing its squad cars to read “popo” instead of police.

Emphasis mine.

Newshubber.com

Come on, Newshubber.com, who are you trying to fool?

Your article from April 30, 2018, is titled: "Australia to fund Great Barrier Reef restoration and protection."

A BBC article from April 29, 2018, is titled: "Australia to fund Great Barrier Reef restoration and protection."

Your opening:

Australia has pledged A$500 million (£275m; $379m) to protect the World Heritage-listed Great Barrier Reef.

In recent years, the reef has lost 30% of its coral due to bleaching linked to rising sea temperatures and damage from crown-of-thorns starfish.

The opening from BBC:

Australia has pledged A$500 million (£275m; $379m) to protect the World Heritage-listed Great Barrier Reef.

In recent years, the reef has lost 30% of its coral due to bleaching linked to rising sea temperatures and damage from crown-of-thorns starfish. 

You're using somebody else's content, and your site has AdSense ads?  That's just sketchy.

A Rusev Day poll

I noticed WWE.com ran the following poll some time in January:

Was the poll inspired by my website, IsTodayRusevDay.com?  I suspect it was!

Also, I'm dismayed 31% of the respondents answered "No."

CosinePulse.org

Come on, CosinePulse.org, who are you trying to fool?

Your article from May 4, 2018, is titled: "A Guy From Portland Discovered A Way To Turn Salt-Water Into Drinkable Water."

An article on KPTV.com from February 2, 2017, is titled: "Portland teen discovers cost-effective way to turn salt water into drinkable fresh water."

Your opening:

A Portland teen is turning heads across the country all because of a science experiment that began in his high school classroom. Companies like Intel and universities like MIT are now invested in his findings.

With certainty you'll want to remember his name

"My name is Chaitanya Karamchedu, but you can call me Chai," said the Jesuit High School Senior.

The opening from KPTV:

A Portland teen is turning heads across the country all because of a science experiment that began in his high school classroom. Companies like Intel and universities like MIT are now invested in his findings.

With certainty you'll want to remember his name.

"My name is Chaitanya Karamchedu, but you can call me Chai," said the Jesuit High School Senior.

You're using somebody else's content, and your site has AdSense ads?  That's just sketchy.

WalkWithElias.com

An anonymous person registered WalkWithElias.com on January 25, 2018.  I'd thought about registering that domain around the same time I registered "IsTodayRusevDay.com, but I couldn't foresee what to do with it.  I visited the URL recently, and it redirects to a WWE shop page selling one of Elias's t-shirts:

https://shop.wwe.com/elias-walk-with-elias-authentic-t-shirt/HR2004.html?AID=10448224&PID=4003003&SID=jgr65dsmkq02gkyn043ku&utm_source=CommissionJunction&utm_medium=Affiliate&utm_campaign=CJ&utm_content=4003003

Commission Junction is an affiliate marketing service, so I presume whoever registered WalkWithElias.com is hoping to make some bank off of people buying an Elias t-shirt.  That's a good strategy!  And it's far less obnoxious than camping on a domain.

The Ballad of Sexy Dave

Immortalized in song: