I'll be out of town for a day or so, so here's for the weekend: There's this Simpson contest about where Springfield is. There's a lot of Springfields around the nation, and a bunch of them sent in videos and they're having a vote to find out where America wants Springfield to be. (from the cartoon perspective). Someone out there like me found a way to find out how many hits the votes were being sent from by area - using counters and URLs and cookie backtracers etc. - actually it's not that difficult unless you work for the government and have to abide by the patriot act.

The local news got a hold of it, and was asked by USA Today not to print it until they released their source, stating, "we're all on the same team".

Done. Guilty. This is a direct admission that the media is controlling the news, and free press is DEAD. Thankfully, the reporter for the local news reported the scoop, and didn't blackmail USA Today for a cushy desk job with a huge pay increase to regurgitate the news we see every day. I'd raise a donation for the reporter's retirement fund, but the reward for work well done is more work, right?

If I were the public, and not just me, I would boycott USA Today for this reason - thankfully, I have no regard for anyone that works there, and don't purchase their product. Maybe I should find out who advertises there and write them - they might hop off the bandwagon faster than MSNBC got rid of Imus.