back to article Raised £350bn in crowdsourced funding? Tell me about it (not)

His Girl Friday, All The President’s Men, Pravda, Broadcast News... As a journalist, I ought to be thrilled by reading books and watching dramatisations about other journalists being journalists and generally going about doing their journalisming. Yet there are few things in popular media as forlorn as a journalist talking about …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

    Just for laughs... why on earth did Mr Dabbs subscribe to the Okinawa international film, festival Japanese language (they do have on in English) mailing list? Planning some holidays in the sun?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

      I heard they are showing a bunch of Japanese classics, including

      The Last Samurai

      Black Rain

      Rising Sun

      1. tony2heads

        Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

        rubbish

        only good stuff from Japan was by Kurosawa - like Kagemusha or Seven Samurai

        1. Paul Westerman
          Stop

          Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

          But Miyazaki, surely?

    2. Daedalus

      Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

      The second and third words are respectively "Ni hon go", meaning "Japanese language" and "Me-Ru-Ni-Yu-Su", meaning unknown. Just in case this guy is having us on....

      1. Daedalus

        Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

        And indeed he is not. The first "word" is indeed to be found as the title of the Japanese Wikipedia article on said festival.

        We will now contemplate the awesomeness of having readers of Reg, and Dabbsie in particular, who also read Japanese...

        1. Steve the Cynic

          Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

          "We will now contemplate the awesomeness of having readers of Reg, and Dabbsie in particular, who also read Japanese..."

          Speak for yourself. I used Goggle Mistranslate...

          EDIT: Although the fact that I recognised 日本語 as being "nihongo" / Japanese-language tipped me off that there was a faint aroma of rattus rattus in the wind...

          1. Daedalus

            Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

            @Cynic: very nice. Now I know what "May-Ru Ni-Yu-Su" is a mangling of.

            1. xperroni

              Re: 沖縄国際映画祭 日本語 メールニュース

              Now I know what "May-Ru Ni-Yu-Su" is a mangling of.

              For those who still didn't get it, it's a wasei-eigo word meaning "mail news".

              The whole subject line actually translates to "Okinawa International Film Festival mail news in Japanese", which Google Translate gets close enough.

              I do happen to be studying Japanese, is that a crime?

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'm sure you were railing against something

    But my attention was drawn to the rather pleasing lady examining the toilet. You could have left the toilet out, and it would have been even better, and still have had no more or less relevance to the text.

    1. Nick Ryan Silver badge

      Re: I'm sure you were railing against something

      I think the rather pleasing lady was there to demonstrate that some people do have bends... and even use them. She is not a nobend.

      1. Kubla Cant

        Re: I'm sure you were railing against something

        Only tangentially relevant, but it's Friday:

        One of the most annoying things in the world is the pictures used to illustrate the personal finance pages in newspapers. The things they're writing about have no visual attributes (what does a photograph of an ISA look like?), but they have a quota of pictures to fill, so they fill the spaces with irrelevant pictures connected to the text by tendentious captions.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I'm sure you were railing against something@Nick Ryan

        "She is not a nobend."

        Despite the open goal that post offered me, I have resisted the considerable temptation to respond inappropriately. Who says the Reg commentards are bunch of dirty keyboarded tripehounds?

        1. Euripides Pants
          FAIL

          Re: I'm sure you were railing against something@Nick Ryan

          "Who says the Reg commentards are bunch of dirty keyboarded tripehounds?"

          Reg commentards, thats who...

      3. Robert Forsyth

        Re: I'm sure you were railing against something

        I think "nobend" is missing a k at the beginning and a hyphen/space after the "b", if it isn't obvious.

        The picture is to illustrate the effect of the gushing cheesy words of a particular press release partly described in the article.

  3. wowfood

    The part about "A recent survey" just makes me think of the daily fail.

    A recent study has found that *Insert item* causes cancer. With the actual contents being that there has been an observational study performed which found a link with "insert scientifict name for Nutrient X" and cancer. "Item" contains "Nutrient X" and will therefore give you cancer, ignoring the fact "Item" has 0.1mg and the observational study only found a link with those consuming 300mg or more per day.

    Reminds me of that other thing we had recently, about how meat is as bad for you as smoking. For advice on how much this was bunk, just google

    examine.com high protein diet cancer.

    I would post the link but my works firewall is about as accurate as an american with an assault rifle surrounded by friendlies.

    1. Jonathan Richards 1
      Go

      Daily FAIL

      > *Insert item* causes cancer

      *Insert item* causes cancer and reduces house prices.

      FTFY.

      1. Nick Ryan Silver badge

        Re: Daily FAIL

        *Insert item* causes cancer and reduces house prices.

        FTFY.

        *Insert item* causes cancer, reduces house prices and creates an in influx of criminal child molesting immigrants.

        FTFY (v2)

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Daily FAIL

        > *Insert item* causes cancer

        *Insert item* is how babies are made...

        FTFY

    2. Alistair Dabbs

      >> The part about "A recent survey" just makes me think of the daily fail

      To be fair, the DM guys write this stuff not because they are lazy (they are not) but because this is exactly the kind of thing DM readers want to read. People often blame the DM for turning readers into nutters but publishing works the other way around: you target your readership with stuff they want to read. The Guardian does this too, of course.

      1. Alistair
        Childcatcher

        Re: >> The part about "A recent survey" just makes me think of the daily fail

        I have for years used an email tagline.

        The sum total of intelligence on the planet is a constant.

        I think we passed 7 Billion last year did we not?

        (oddly, its a relevant icon)

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Passing off crap as news...

    Those guys at Fark.com have known this for years...

  5. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

    So...

    Marketing bods exaggerate, distort the truth and downright lie.

    Lazy journos print anything that makes an easy story.

    You can't trust what you read, hear or see on TV to be true without fact-checking it yourself.

    Also:

    Water is wet.

    The sky is up.

    Politicians cast no reflection.

    etc.

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: So...

      And feeble forum contributors are too scared to reveal their names. So it goes.

      1. Martin Budden Silver badge

        Re: So...

        That may be true, Mr Dabbs, nevertheless his point is still valid. So says I, unfeebly.

        Is unfeebly even a word?

  6. Ben Bonsall

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    We also offer courses in other valuable skills of high-performing people:

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    *Offer applicable to first 100 applicants to yesterday's webcast

    1. Nick Ryan Silver badge

      Re: FruitExpert Launches Free* Online course in lemon see-sawing!

      - Yougurt Weaving

      I nearly applied for this course but then you made a classic marketing mistake - you outsourced your spell checking... possibly to Nigerians, which reminds me - a lost relative of mine seems to have passed away but there are difficulties in releasing his money...

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: FruitExpert Launches Free* Online course in lemon see-sawing!

      Anyone trying to sell this kind of stuff deserves a full metal jacket being popped into him

    3. drolex

      Re: FruitExpert Launches Free* Online course in lemon see-sawing!

      Wow! I have just finished FruitExpert Online course in lemon see-sawing and now I have become a millionaire over-achiever with a car and a yacht and stuff! Thank you FruitExpert!

      My colleague Grumpy Mark didn't want to take the course, and now he's dead.

    4. Irongut

      Re: FruitExpert Launches Free* Online course in lemon see-sawing!

      Dear FruitExpert please sign me up for your course in Full Metal Jacketing. I have no major malfunction!

    5. Solmyr ibn Wali Barad

      Re: FruitExpert Launches Free* Online course in lemon see-sawing!

      Coming soon:

      - Mushroom Milling

      - Pearshaping

      - [redacted] Polishing

  7. ysth

    One thing I want to know...

    Is "journalisming" pronounced with 4 syllables or 5?

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: One thing I want to know...

      It's pronounced 'jism'. Try saying it now so your office colleagues can hear. Go on, nice and loud.

      1. Nick Ryan Silver badge
        Coat

        Re: One thing I want to know...

        That'll be the journalisming monkeys then... I know, I know, with a poor pun and obscure reference like that I'll get me coat...

  8. Zog_but_not_the_first
    Mushroom

    What to do? What to do?

    Nuke 'em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

  9. Chris Evans

    O.K. Alistair so what type and style of Press release do you like?

    Maybe I should say "what type and style of Press release would you read?"

    As a starting point.

    1. Alistair
      Coat

      Re: O.K. Alistair so what type and style of Press release do you like?

      I personally prefer "blank". It leaves so much open to interpretation.

      (you didn't specify, but just in case I'll get me....)

      1. Martin Budden Silver badge
        WTF?

        Re: O.K. Alistair so what type and style of Press release do you like?

        Hang on just one moment... we have an "Alistair Dabbs" and an "Alistair" posting replies as if they are both the author of the article. Would the real Mr Dabbs please stand up? (No Spartacus impressions allowed)

  10. Gannettt

    TOTALLY agree on the point about press releases telling you how much a trendy startup has raised. i think that's all the Flipboard Technology section consists of these days.

    Look at your column not as self-indulgence, but rather a peek behind the curtain at the journaismistic art.

  11. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

    Here is some verbal nonsense that I recently saw elsewhere.

    "Hello everyone

    "a new approach is necessary to imagine the righteousness of Jesus with

    brand-new innovations when evaluating God

    Prior to the debate about God , you should also try http://www.wwwwwwwwww.www

    ;-)"

    Well, I haven't looked at the actual site and I don't intend to, but, when did the Jesus business get overrun with new-approach innovation gobbledygook? Doesn't it already have its own?

    Then again, this may be randomly generated text, and also may be a malware site, and actually makes Jesus cry.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    customisable PRs

    Opera, for the press release of a new product, created a PR Machine.

    You just move a slider and you get a different type of PR; from geek to supercorporate (with the obligatory stock image).

    A funny way to do a PR and joke about it too.www.operasoftware.com/press/theprmachine

  13. Andy Hards

    I heard Churl's banana cake recipe

    was really rather good. But if Louis is still there then she's deffo not coming back!

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