“We were hoping that we could enhance our user experience, while furthering our motto of ‘the smart choice in navigation’ by giving our product more human like abilities” explained Tim-Tims CEO Peter-Frans Paulwall. “Unfortunately the devices seemed to have taken on a sinister streak.” he continued.

There are numerous reports of these GPS devices going out of their way to hamper the drivers ability to navigate, and some going so far as to take personal dislikes to their owners.

Initially the devices began to play little pranks like taking the long route to peoples work places, deliberately making them late. Soon they developed very human like traits, such as getting morose, and declaring “what’s the point?” when asked to find a destination, or getting sulky and refusing to tell the driver where to go at all.

Soon the devices began to take on attitudes common to the sex of the voice that they were speaking in. If a male voice was selected, the navigation system would refuse to pay any attention the GPS satellites that they get their directions, by declaring “they knew better”. If a female voice was selected, then the machine would get cranky and agitated as soon as the driver didn’t do exactly what was suggested by ‘her’.

The next development was for human like mental conditions to appear. Reports of the machines developing disorders much like the human Tourettes Syndrome became common, especially when an eldrly persons voice was heared by the built in microphone. One distressed user reported taking to his elderly mother to  church, when the GPS became extremely abusive, blurting out strings of expletives along with questioning the pensioners faith. (of course these machines are strictly atheist, not having any soul at all)

Next up was split personality disorder, where the directions given would constantly change and completely contradict each other, though the voices (most often two distinct, but sometimes three voices would bark direction at the driver, each voice being completely oblivious to the other(s)

Probably the most sinister turn came (one such as reported by the BBC here) when systems began to recklessly endanger lives, bringing a driver to the edge of a cliff, with full intention of to give direction to “keep going straight, 200 meters) . Its not fully known if this is due to acute depression on the part of the GPS, whereby it attempted to end its own artificial life, or if the computer had taken such a dislike to its owner that it attempted to end his/her real life. Such morbid antics were hinted at earlier by the BBC (here) whereby the navigation device would bring truck drivers to crematoriums, then laughing at the precarious nature of human existence.

“Of course we shall be doing everything in our power to rectify this situation” announced a press release from Tim-Tim. Recalls are currently under way.

In the mean time, drivers are just suggested to “learn to find their own god-damn c*** sucking bloody way”, though it is though this suggestion came from one of the particularly grumpy devices themselves.

The virus came to public attention last week when a live televised presentation at the BT young scientist awards was interrupted by a catalogue of [depraved imagery]. Teachers made vain attempts to sheild the eyes of younger children as a presentation about how cola can rot teeth gave way to images of that can best be visualised by inserting the keywords “upskirt toothless donkey gangbang” into Googles image search.

While the display duration of the images usually lasts around three seconds, other varients of the virus display images for a matter of microseconds thus attacking the subconscious of the hapless audience. Eager to find out if this variant had any real effect on people, we spoke to one young executive as he left the conference centre of the Travel Lodge off the M50 where his company‘s regional sales meeting was being held: “All the figures for the quarterly sales presentation seemed good, and Jack did a really good job with the clip-art, but I just felt unnerved by the whole thing. And for some reason I can’t get images of Charles Manson and 9/11 out of my head”

Experts have been alarmed at the speed at which the virus has mutated - a new variant of the virus searches for compromising images on the users own hard drive. Irish talkshow host Ryan Tubridy became first public victim of this varient when a talk he was giving to potential RTE advertisers was interrupted by images of the talkshow host, bound and naked with a stiletto pushed firmly into his face. The audience was assured that this was a random computer error and proceedings soon got back to normal. Order was shortlived however as the auditorium quickly cleared when the next speaker, Pat Kenny, was seen approaching the podium with his laptop.

In a surprise announcement yesterday, John Gormley, Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government announced a new scheme to both bolster the “green image” of the building and property sector, while also allowing them to reduce costs.

The harebrained idea from an increasingly erratic and eccentric government involves using domesticated animals to do the work normally done by CO2 producing machines.

The minister who was flanked on one side by RTEs Eco-Prince and all round know all Duncan Stewart (believed to be the mastermind behind the proposal) detailed various ways which a builder could reduce their carbon footprint (thus allowing them to sell off their precious carbon credits)

Starting off with site clearing which can be done by a heard of goats rather than the usual JCB, the minister then suggested using Moles for digging foundations, Beavers for wood cutting and carpentry, Otters for Plastering, “Security-Bears” and Giraffes for scaffolding and to act as cranes.

When it was pointed out to the minister that some of those functions were currently done by humans rather than machines, the minister agreed, but explained that it really difficult to come up with ideas for the scheme, and they were the best so far.

Controversially, he then went on to cite proposals for the use of pelicans instead of Buckets and feeding pigs cement, sand and water and letting them excrete concrete rather than use a cement mixer.

Public opinion is mixed, for example Leo Oosterweghel, director of Dublin Zoo is unhappy at the proposal – “a lot of the animals that were suggested are non native, and if this scheme is to go ahead, there would be fears for the security of the more tropical and difficult to acquire zoo animals” he went on to explain “although the zoo is located in the relatively peaceful Phoenix Park, it is flanked by some areas that have quite a large transient population of ‘tarmac laying specialists’. These people might not be adverse to ‘borrowing’ elephants from the zoo, to be used instead of steamrollers and compactors, especially if they can then sell their precious carbon credits for a quick buck.

On the other hand Borris Brogan, a midland farmer who recently sold all his traditional livestock to set up a beaver farm is delighted with the proposal : “They said I was goosey-gander mad – sure who’d be wantin’ eat a beaver? they said…To be sure they do taste a little fishy, and get pretty violent if touched when they’re not expectin’ it (and sometimes even when they are), but I knew better so I did.”

Needless to say the Government opposition is ridiculing the proposal, but that doesn’t seem to mean much to a government such as the current one, where half baked off the wall ideas are the only ones being seen through to completion.

This months RTFlea Guide talks you through some of the exciting highlights of the new RTFlea Season, starting with :

Mailbag

2009 will see the return of one of RTE’s flagship programs. Mailbag was a veritable Irish institution.  When it left our screens nearly 2 decades ago, Ireland lost its premier platform of public complaint and people simply stopped complaining. This provided the grounding for major economic boom. Eager to maintain these conditions, the government fired Arthur Murphy from RTE and destroyed all archived material. The reemergence of economic hardship has led many economists to believe that there is no need to suppress Mailbag anymore. Public opinion grew stronger and the government finally caved in to pressure following October’s unprecedented march on government buildings by over 200,000 old people demanding that Mailbag be returned to its rightful place of tea time on Saturday.

The Apprenticeship

14 new hopefuls battle it out for a coveted apprenticeship in a garage in Finglas. They must work hard to impress dodgy garage owner Phil who will put our contenders through their paces with tasks like scratching the serial numbers off engine blocks and inflating invoices. This years contenders include Deano, a heroine addict on parole who is participating in Mountjoy prison’s ’stop stealing start working’ program. We also meet James, a recently fired financial services worker who will do anything to stop the bank from foreclosing on his  Audi TT and Jack, a 19th century cockney street urchin hoping to move up in the world.

I’m a celebrity get me out of here…no seriously, please!

Now in its 10th season the popular series returns to our screens with an added twist! Acquitted celebrity murder accused Barry George enters the jungle and they’ve taken away his medication. Watch as tensions run high, very high, and see if Timmy Mallet lives to regret joining the show in a desperate last ditch attempt to save himself from obscurity, penury and that guy on his estate he owes £80 to.

Who do you think you are?

RTE’s popular and utterly inane examination of the lineage and family history of minor Irish celebrities returns for a second season. Featured celebrities this year include former Fair City scumbag George ‘Mondo’ McMahon who explores his links to the protestant landed aristocracy and Golden Boy broadcaster Ryan Tubriddy who traces his ancestry to a herd of Indian Elephants.
Talking with Rachel Allen

Following the success of her award winning series of cookery books, the English language gets the Rachel Allen treatment as she makes an complete dogs dinner of pronunciation and diction with her faux gentile/not quite Dublin accent.

House-Hunted

RTE revisits 4 couples from last years House-Hunters program who have since ran into some slight difficulties with their mortgage payments and are now being ruthlessly pursued for arrears by their bank.

House-Hunted in the sun

Having exhausted all avenues in pursuing their arrears, the bank offload the debt to a debt collection agency who in turn sell the debt on to a marauding gang of South African poachers who chase our hapless couples across the savannah for sport.

Lotusnotes CEO Mike Rhodin began his address by unveiling the new ‘business-speak’ thesaurus and explained the factors that drove its development: “In today’s globalised world, the language of business is constantly evolving. Continuously shifting paradigms mean that today’s business leaders need to keep up to date with the very latest hollow euphemisms, spurious weasel-words and inane bullshit”. Automatic internet updates are a core feature of the business-speak thesaurus. Rhodin explained how these updates can prevent users from using embarrassingly out of date language. “Todays business leaders may need to obtain increased efficiencies by streamlining personnel operations, but tomorrow they may need to extract key synergies by rationalizing human resources. Imagine your embarrassment as board members read your latest circular about streamlining personnel operations! Our regularly updated business speak thesaurus will ensure that outbound e-mails will never contain such grossly out of date language”.

The second key feature of Lotusnotes 2.4 is the innovative use of the now widely used ‘emoticons‘. Rhodin elaborated on this exciting new development: “In today’s globalised world, businesses need to convey a wide variety of sentiments to an increasingly diverse set of stakeholders. Temporal constraints and rapidly evolving markets mean that business leaders often have to be prompt in their communications. Our development team took note of the burgeoning use of ’smilies’ among the younger age cohort and applied the concept to our software suites”. The fact that over 80% of the emoticons convey what might be perceived as negative or critical sentiments such as :

 ‘work harder’ , ’make more money’ , or

’you’re fired’

has led to them being dubbed ’Frownies’. Rhodin went on to cite the latter sentiment as an example in his presentation: “In today’s globalised world, Increasing flexability in the workplace means that businesses may need to rapidly offload human resources. With our new ’frownies’, its as easy as ‘> : ( ==’ “. The frownies that are available in the current version of Lotusnotes are by no means exhaustive. IBM hope to have regular internet updates available that allow users to download newly developed frownies. Rhodin pointed to the current development of a ’you’ve been outsourced’  frownie which is in the final stages of product testing.

Of course, much later on, when they collectively sobered up, they realised that they had misread, and misconstrued the issue entirely. Firstly there was a clause somewhere in the slogan, pertaining to the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Secondly, the shame that they were so keen to tell us we could not live with, related to television licenses, rather than driving motorised vehicles. Of course we can live with that kind of shame, and have no intention of buying (a) a television license, and (b) a television.

We bought a van the very next day.

Kelloggs have refused to be interviewed on the new range or products, stating only “If people would just try them for three weeks, they’ll understand. Especially when they loose a dress size, as thats the only reason anyone bothers to eat these days”

Neon Flea Circus were also unavailable to comment, but an anonymous insider (Niall) from the group did mention they were indeed slightly worried that the products would eat their fan base literally from the inside out…

NMFlea

from the video sharing website youtube.

VERNON KAY: So James, you failed to win in any of your nomination categories this evening. Bet’ya don’t feel so ‘beautiful’ now eh? eh?

JAMES BLUNT: Ha ha, well there was a lot of really fine talent out there tonight so loosing was almost an honor for me

VK. Hey there are no losers here what with all the booze and birds around, I’ll say there are lots of folk here out for a bit of ‘James Blunt’ eh?eh?

JB: [silence] Why would they want to get me? What did I ever……….oh……..[silence]
[END VIDEO]  

Neither James blunt or Atlanta records were available for comment today. It is not known whether or not Blunt will change the title of his upcoming biography: “Inside James Blunt: a journey to my special place” in light of the current revelations.

The Fleaconomist

As America continues to reel in the aftermath of its sub-prime mortgage crisis, analysts fear that a new and more devastating economic catastrophe may be emerging. The Nation may be witnessing the start of a ‘subprime rapper’ crisis with R&B recording artists filing for bankruptcy in record numbers. This week, investors watched nervously as shares in P-Diddy reached a 5 year low and shares in 50 cent ironically dropped to 50 cent. In 2007, market fundamentals remained strong with concert, record and merchandise sales showing robust growth in the last quarter of the year. Despite these positive trends, high profile rappers like Chicago’s Kayne West, and even entire posses like New York’s Wu-Tang Clan, have seen their net worth effectively disappear. Other indicators point to rocky times ahead for the sector with foreclosures on ‘pimped’ rides reaching a 6 year high and dentists reporting strong demand for gold tooth extraction.

Goldman Sachs analyst Leonard Green commented that the ’sub-prime rapper’ crisis does not necessarily stem from any contraction in the sector’s overall growth but may be attributable instead to a disparity between market fundamentals and individual outlays. Green explained that “these guys are making a lot money but tend to blow it all on really really expensive, unnecessary and opulent crap”.

He continued: “Busta Rhymes may have felt that he could easily afford the 28 personalised gold plated toilet seat covers that he ordered for his Florida mansion, but when they had to be re-cast after it was realized that ‘Rhymes’ had been spelled without an ’h’, he probably should have reconsidered his purchase of that boat that used to belong to the Notorious BIG“.
 
Other analysts have argued that symptoms of a crisis were evident as far back as 4 years ago. One inauspicious event that went largely unnoticed in the financial community was New York rapper Ja Rule’s appearance on MTV’s cribs. It later emerged that the‘Crib’ in question didn’t even belong to Ja rule and that he had been sleeping on Method Man’s couch for a number of months.

Unsurprisingly, parallels have been drawn between the current crisis and the mid 90s market shock which saw MC Hammer file for bankruptcy with debts of over $12 million. While Hammer’s lavish lifestyle was ultimately the root cause of his demise, analysts have warned that current individual spending patterns far surpass those of the previous 2 decades. This, coupled with constant media pressure to maintain very outward displays of net worth, point to a greatly intensified crisis this time around. Meryll Lynch analyst Paul Goulder explains: “Although MC Hammer had debts of over $12 he was easily able to keep his creditors at bay as his acquired assets were easily liquefied. Someof todays rappers may have difficulty converting their assets into cash given current trends in personalized items” He continued: “Usher may have a difficult time selling his main residence due to the fact that every single wall in his house is adorned with ornate

muriels of Usher”. Goulder cited another example of the pitfalls of personalisation, that of Sean Combs who in August 2005 changed his name from ’P Diddy’ to‘Diddy’. The ensuing re-branding operation cost the rapper over $118mn after everything from personalized cars to his own personalized music player, the ‘iPdiddy’, had to be completely replaced.

With uncertain times ahead, many R&B stars have had to suffer income reductions and find themselves adjusting to more grounded spending patterns. In an interview with Forbes last month, 50-Cent admitted that his champagne consumption has had to be somewhat moderated: “yeah I got to stop using that Cristal shit to brush my gold teeth man”. Others face more serious problems. Former R&B superstar Jennifer ’J-Lo’ Lopez who once extolled the fact that, despite net annual earnings in excess of $160mn, she was still ’Jenny from the block’ felt the irony of those words as multiple bank foreclosures forced her to move back to ’The Block’. We spoke to J-Lo’s former class mate and current Block resident Yolanda Cole who stated “We gonna learn her broke ass some respect when she moves back here - Don’t be fooled by the rocks I got!? the only rocks she gonna get here is crack”.