Tuesday, January 14, 2003

Steve Case resigns from AOL, starts virtual french fry delivery service, uses stock to buy Canada and a Scandinavian country to be named later Fresh from his "failure" at AOL, where he used the inflated stock of a  dial-up access company to buy media giant Time Warner, Steve Case has already embarked on another adventure of even greater proportion. Steve had barely cleaned out his desk at AOL when he got a spam (actually, 10,000 spams) inviting him to join a Nigerian pyramid scheme to sell virtual French Fries over the internet. Intrigued, Steve responded to the spam, which originated in the remote southern Nigerian village of Spamspamspam' Alotto. The village emperor, Chuck the Most Exalted Guy, helped Steve establish himself as an Official Source of Virtual French Fries.  Within hours Steve was so excited about his new venture that he called half a dozen technology and financial magazines. "It's the next big thing," said Steve to CBS Marketwatch.com. "It's going to change the fast food business forever," Steve told CNet.com. "Lose 20 pounds in 20 days," Steve told the Wall Street Journal.  As the WSJ editorial staff is obscenely overweight, this last claim drove straight to the core of their chilly little hearts. The journalists, who had been cowering under their desk avoiding angry baby boomers, jumped at the story. Across every newspaper financial page, in every investor newletter, Steve's words echoed. The company issued an IPO within hours. The stock soared from an initial offering of negative 2 cents a share to $95,467 a share, rising so quickly  that nearly a dozen splits in the space of an hour couldn't stop the surge.  Which brings us to this morning. Steve woke up to his newfound riches and decided to do what he had done before: buy something with absolutely nothing.  "What should I buy?" mused Steve.  At that very moment, six hamsters crawled out of his pillow and performed an evocative number from the musical Chicago. When done, they said in unison, "Buy Canada!" and crawled back into the pillow. I should say at this point that everybody has pillow hamsters, but very few ever get to see them. So Steve made Canadian prime minister Jean Chretien an offer, and Jean, hoping that the deal would get his name in the papers, signed on. The Canadian Flag was immediately changed to the little AOL triangle thingie, which looks suspiciously like a variation on the Eye of Sauron.  Case then took out an option with the European Union to buy a Scandinavian country at a later date, hoping to determine by spring which one has the best weather and smells the least of fish. 11:44:14 PM

Pesky's Tuesday Quickies CNN head resigns, couldn't figure out how to spell CNN After spending two years attempting to spell CNN F-O-X, Walter Isaacson finally gave up and resigned today.  A family friend blames simple dyslexia, but Walter himself has reportedly confessed that he missed six days of spelling class in the fifth grade. Word is he will relocate to Florida where he will run his own alligator stunt show for tourists.  The human will work for food My agent Susan the human has a big job interview on Thursday. All hail to the human as she seeks employment in (gag) the tech industry in (choke) the Silicon Valley. Susan happens to be rather well versed in the uses of something called Documentum, and as it appears nobody else has bothered to learn much about the mysterious Documentum, she has a shot.  For those of you unfamiliar with Documentum, it is both bigger and smaller than a breadbox.  It costs a lot of money, and if the people in your company don't know what they're doing, can be about as useful as a lock without a key.  Foreign correspondents, anyone? The Rat seeks foreign correspondents of the non-human variety. If you have talent and lack opposable thumbs, submit 700 words or less, your non-human species, your preferred nom de plum (sic), and either a photo of yourself or a short description of your most identifiable features. Susan the Human will then create a staff picture for your post, which you can also use in your own site if you like, or on your next fake ID.  Your "photo" and story will appear on this page along with a link to your regular site, if you have one.  No compensation is offered, but you will have the admiration of rats everywhere.  Which should be more than enough.  Submit to pesky@mackerelstreet.com .  Reports should be related to current political topics, may contain no more than one carefully chosen obscenity, and will be copy edited for grammar.  Update: Submissions can be made any time in the next two weeks, and "foreign" can mean whatever you like :).  12:10:26 AM