Wednesday, March 31, 2010

German brewery wins rights to brand a beer: "Fucking Hell"

German brewery wins rights to brand a beer: "Fucking Hell"

Dabitch's picture

The European Union trademarks authority has permitted a German firm to register the brand name "Fucking Hell" for their light ale. They won the rights by showing there is a town named Fucking in Austria. Fucking liked its name so much, they even named several fucking roads Fucking as well. You know, so you'll know where you fucking are.
The towns mayor, Franz Meindl, isn't too pleased, since the town has no brewery and he hasn't heard of any plans to build any either. Juergen Stoll the owner of Wank Inn which is a mere 48 minutes away from Fucking has suggested that the Mayor of Fucking should lighten up a bit and use the town name infamy to their advantage instead.

The Trade Marks and Designs Registration Office of the European Union said in a statement that it had rejected a complaint that the trade mark "Fucking Hell" was upsetting, accusatory and derogatory.
"The word combination claimed contains no semantic indication that could refer to a certain person or group of persons. Nor does it incite a particular act. It cannot even be understood as an instruction that the reader should go to hell," the Office said in its statement.

Posted via web from Digital Anthropology

"The Real World" part deux? "The Sims" Creator Developing TV Show with User-Generated Episodes

“The Sims” Creator Developing TV Show with User-Generated Episodes

Will Wright — creator of innovative video games such as SimCity, The Sims and Spore — is working with former Nickelodeon and SpikeTV president Albie Hecht to develop a TV show called The Creation Project for Al Gore’s Current TV.

According to IGN, the unconventional show would give viewers the chance to develop their own TV episodes via a “StoryMaker Engine,” which provides them with all the tools and images they need to create original tales. The StoryMaker Engine was designed by Wright himself.

Wright, Hecht and their team would sort through the submissions and choose winners, turning each winning story into two half-hour episodes. This vision is in keeping with the theme of creation present in all of Wright’s games.

If it gets a greenlight, the series could premiere by the end of this year, but nothing’s certain yet. Wright has a record of success, though; The Sims is the bestselling computer game of all time, and SimCity and Spore didn’t fare too badly, either. Wright is tapping into the human desire to create, and you never know — that might translate from the family computer to the living room TV.

Posted via web from Digital Anthropology

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

At what point do you stop loving Google and start fearing them?

Lindsay Lohan sues E*Trade over milkaholic: Thinks world is out to get her.

Lindsay Lohan sues E*Trade over milkaholic

This is awesome. The New York Post reports that Lindsay Lohan is suing E*Trade for $100 million, claiming that the boyfriend-stealing "milkaholic" named Lindsay in the company's Super Bowl commercial above from Grey Advertising was clearly modeled after her. "Many celebrities are known by one name only, and E*Trade is using that knowledge to profit," Lohan's lawyer says. "They're using her name as a parody of her life. Why didn't they use the name Susan? This is a subliminal message. Everybody's talking about it and saying it's Lindsay Lohan." It's anyone's guess why Lohan would claim that a two-bit skank was clearly inspired by her. Still, if she has stepped down to milkaholism from all that booze and blow, she might actually live to see 25. A rep at Grey tells the Post that the name Lindsay is "just used a popular baby name that happened to be the name of someone on the account team."

Posted via web from Digital Anthropology