May 2, 2001

3:52 AM

Large-scale, Global Anti-capitalism Protests Putting Smaller, Local, Anti-capitalism Protests Out Of Business:"Kyle Redmond, spokesperson for WorldProtest, which has thousands of members in 20 countries and co-ordinates protests all over the world, defended his organisation's approach: 'We give anarchists what they want. It's a supply and demand situation. We offer a basic menu of building defacement, vandalism of a McDonalds outlet and general looting, ending with a confrontation with the local police. All our research shows that this is what the average anarchist on the street wants'." Satire at its finest...
posted by frednorman (4 comments total)

I've seen much better satire. The premise of the anarchy article is cute but it didn't take the idea to a far enough extreme.
posted by ZachsMind at 4:51 AM on May 2, 2001

La de da. I had a nice laugh. Curmudge much?
posted by dhartung at 8:03 AM on May 2, 2001

Come to think of it.

Large-scale, Global Satire Websites Putting Smaller, Local, Satire Websites Out of Business.

"People just won't accept any old satire anymore," said a spokesman. "They want to feel that they're getting the best satire product for their money, and a national brand helps their comfort level." Lesser-known satire websites, according to researchers, are consistently rated as lower-quality. In a double-blind test, a focus group was shown a story from bbspot.com and told it was from The Onion; they consistently rated it 1.23 times as funny as focus groups told its real origin, and 1.76 times as funny as focus groups that were not told anything about its origin. Similarly, Onion stories shown to focus groups with bogus or no attribution were rated as less funny.

Clearly, the branding experience is a major part of the satire product world. The customer seeks reassurance that they are getting valuable satire, and feeling that they are getting generic satire or satire that may not have been produced by professionals leaves them feeling dissatisfied.
posted by dhartung at 9:08 AM on May 2, 2001

Visa. The only card accepted at the 2002 London Riots.
posted by pascal at 11:59 PM on May 2, 2001