Silly season? Yes, I may have heard of it
You may have heard that, now Parliament has risen, that it is what newspapers refer to as the “silly season”, meaning that any old bollocks will find space awaiting it in the paper. Or so some people hope, it would seem.
But can it be so? Let’s look at some email titles culled from my inbox at work:
- “Rage Against the Machine - PC rage overtakes road rage”
- “Text Message Injuries (TMI) - The Solution - Interview Opportunity”
- “Wireless broadband to exceed two billion customers by 2015, says Analysys Mason” (OK, not particularly silly, but completely fits the standard analyst prediction: far enough away that nobody will call them on it, large enough that people say “Oooh, 2 billion!”)
- “Northeast Blackout Anniversary Pending - Experts Available for Comment” (an anniversary of a blackout? Now that’s desperation)
- “Bebo tries to beam messages to Earth-like planet” (transparently pointless. Sigh.)
Update: ooh, another one: “Research published today shows that men are becoming more domesticated than technical and find it more difficult to set up a PC than follow a recipe or assemble flat packed furniture.” I so completely believe you. (Except when was there ever a time when setting up a PC was more complicated than today? It’s a complete pain - home networking, user vs admin accounts, secure passwords, and all the rest.)
And that’s before we get onto “makeup for men” (© every paper, courtesy of some PR agency for some cosmetics firm which is trying, as it does about every, oh, December and July, to persuade us that guys will wear slap). Uh-uh. Ain’t gonna happen (reason being: women wear makeup to look young, which is an evolutionarily determined attractant; for men to look young isn’t attractive in evolutionary terms). Sorry, but the cosmetics industry is not going to double its turnover overnight. Or at all.
So, got a favourite silly season story so far? C’mon, share. At least I didn’t name the PR firms involved here..
- These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
- Tis the season to be tweaking.. Paul Thurrott (27 August 2004; score: 33.03%)
- Being polled for the US elections? Do us a favour and lie (6 September 2004; score: 25.82%)
- That's funny, I thought the answer was 'an iPod' or 'Robosapien' (7 December 2004; score: 24.3%)
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July 31st, 2008 at 7:17 am
I’m always sceptical about anything that refers to numbers in billions. Someone told me recently that there are six billion shortwave radios in the world which, given that there are only six billion people, means there must be an awful lot of people who own a dozen or so of the things.
“For men to look young isn’t attractive in evolutionary terms”, though? That sounds like a myth put about by older men to me.
July 31st, 2008 at 9:31 am
Brilliant post - as a PR consultant myself, I have been on both sides of the fence on this one. Although I think text message injuries are a little bizarre unless of course you are texting while doing another activity like sky diving, wind surfing or roller blading.
Bebo beaming messages to another planet does seem pointless but sometimes silly season can produce some funny and interesting stories. Although I don’t read it, the story that always sticks in my mind for being completely pointless but mildly amusing was that of a lady who thought her son had been abducted by aliens from her back garden. She claimed to see a blinding light and when the light had faded she saw her son there back in the garden only now he had turned into a fish finger. I mean seriously, where do they get these people from. They must have been desperate for news that day.
July 31st, 2008 at 10:17 am
PR people wouldn’t do it if it didn’t work, and I would hypothesise that the reason it works is not just because parliament (and most people at least partially) are on holiday and there’s no real news. It’s also because journalists go on holiday to, and before they do want to submit the copy to keep going for the next few weeks. The noble Guardian tech writers may be able to produce 5 stories in one little hour and maintain the highest standards of quality, but for most mortals that means writing a load of tosh and mostly regurgitating press releases.
I think my favourite has to be the press release on the sociology research done on why people go to coffee shops. Apparently, they like the atmosphere, and drinking coffee with friends. Crucially, if the quality of the coffee deteriorates beyond a certain point then they will switch to another shop. Nobel prize material if ever I saw it.
Regarding your assertion that men looking young isn’t attractive in evolutionary terms, I too find it hard to believe that’s the real reason. My wife puts a bit of makeup on and I go ‘oooh!’, while I’m sure if I do it, I’d just look like an overweight bloke with a bit of makeup on. Best thing for my attractiveness to my spouse would be for her already impaired vision to deteriorate some more.
July 31st, 2008 at 9:17 pm
@David (and others) re the cosmetics thing: evolutionarily, there seems to be selection for women who look young; and men who don’t look adolescent. Cosmetics make you look younger. Women tend not to go for men who are younger than them; they go for men who are slightly older. Selection for survival? There’s also the fact that girls look more like women at an earlier age than boys look like men.
It’s a long leap to cosmetics for men being pointless, but they’d almost do better with “frownliner: look as old as the boss”.
August 1st, 2008 at 12:01 pm
There’s seasonal tripe in “The world’s oldest jokes revealed by university research” story in today’s DT.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2479730/The-worlds-oldest-jokes-revealed-by-university-research.html?DCMP=EMC-new_01082008
Not quite sure what is meant by “Academics have unearthed”. But if unearthed means read, they could’ve done it anytime they wanted. I’d even have lent them my copy of the Penguin Classic, The Earliest English Poems, which has that joke and many more. First published 1966. Classic indeed.
August 1st, 2008 at 1:48 pm
I’m starting to think this should be crossposted or similar with the Churner Prize, which is surely going to be working overtime this summer..
August 5th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
I think Isaac Asimov did the definitive job on the Original Joke.
wg
August 5th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
Although some of the stories are indeed trivial, nothing is more pointless to me than the current political news agenda starring the beleaguered Gordon Brown against Dave ‘dude, where’s my manifesto’ Cameron. I’m finding it a great relief not having to endure the same tiresome politicians spewing forth so much meaningless rhetorical vomit at Mssrs Humphrey and Naughtie each morning when I’m trying to enjoy my breakfast. Similarly, I’m welcoming a hiatus from same old tired storyline in the papers about everything from the global crunch to knife crime to people getting sunburned in cloudy weather as being Gordon Brown’s personal fault. Even though he also bores me to tears. Until politics gets a bit more lively in this country, I’m game on for a year of Augusts.