Conference thebay::joyoflex

A hush falls over the crowd.

Several people injured.

- dave

Radio Declares Forced Early Retirement Was Unfair.

(Obviously wasn't plugged into the right contacts.)

- chuck

    There is a lovely book "What the papers didn't mean to say"
    (author forgotten) which had ones like:
    
    EIGHTH ARMY PUSH BOTTLES UP GERMANS
    
    BALLOON RACE - SIX DROP OUT
    
    and there are always those advertising signs:
    
    CHINESE TAKE AWAY FOODS
    
    - Giles

    This headline appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle about three
    years ago.
    
    	"Atari Sues Ex-Founder Nolan Bushnell"

    Finding the humor in it is left as a challange to the reader.
    
    
    Bernie

    
    
    	I think he is only an ex-employee now.
    
    zack
    

    Give that man a see-gar.  I suppose there are somethings we can never undo.
    I can become an ex-husband and Mr. Nixon an ex-president, but Nolan
    Bushnell cannot be an ex-founder of Atari any more than, say, DaVinci
    can become the ex-painter of the Mona Lisa.
    
    Bernie

Newsgroups: net.jokes
Path: decwrl!pyramid!pesnta!hplabs!hao!seismo!think!mit-eddie!genrad!panda!enmasse!keith
Subject: Headlines
Posted: 16 Jun 86 17:52:13 GMT
Organization: EnMasse Computer Corp., Acton, MA
 
In the 1920s some editors at the London Times had a contest to see who could
get the most boring headline in the paper.  The winner was 
 
	Earthquake in Chile - Few Are Killed
 
A Washington Post writer thought this was not a very good example and recently
asked readers to send in the most boring examples of actual headlines
they could find. He and some colleagues picked some winners.  The
main criterion that they had to satify was that the headline had to
practically insure that you would not read the article.  He wrote a very
droll summary of the results of the contest.  The following gives the
general idea of the column.  I am sure that net readers can easily compete
in such a contest and it might give us some respite from the puns until
the next batch of Dave Barry columns come in. 
 
A headline far more boring headline than the Chilean earthquake:
 
	Worthwhile Canadian Initiative
 
His comment was that the mention of Canada in a headline was not a requirement
for it to be boring but that it certainly was very helpful.
 
He had several categories of boring headlines.  One is the event that
is now not going to happen, that you did not know was supposed to happen and
that you would not have cared about in any event.  Examples were:
 
	Premier of Nepal Will Not Resign
 
This is especially good because it is set in a distant corner of the world.
One closer to home:
 
	University of Rochester Will Not Change Its Name
 
Other categories included events that always occur:
 
	Teamsters Head Target of Federal Investigation
 
and those that never occur:
 
	Newark Looking to Rebound
 
An uncategorized one that almost won the contest was:
 
	Economist Dies
 
The first runnerup was:
 
	Turbulent Times for Eugene D. Engen
 
He was especially impressed by the use of the middle initial, which he
said caused him to be completely uninterested in who Eugene D. Engen
is and to doubt that times could possibly be turbulent for him.
The winner, from the NY Times science section, was so boring that even
the net will have trouble topping it:
 
	Scientists Debate the Nature of Reality
 
There were more examples and a few more categories in the original but
you have the general idea.  The net can have its own category - boring
subject lines for postings to the net - with examples such as the
always popular:
 
	Re: Re: Re:  Weird C Compiler Message

    Then there was the cub reporter who was ordered to write concise,
    informative headlines.
    
    The news story was about an inmate who escaped from a mental hospital,
    committed rape, and disappeared. 
    
    And without further ado, here's the headline the cub reporter wrote:
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             NUT BOLTS AND SCREWS
               
    
    --bs

From The Boston Globe of 21-Dec-1988:

	New Cabinet
	in Israel faces
	baptism of fire

I can't remember exactly when this appeared, but from the
Middlesex News:

	NMI DENIES RADIATION IN EMPLOYEE'S SUIT

Not a headline, but . . .

	[Former New England Patriots football player] "was arrested for 
	threatening his estranged wife and a man she was seeing with
	a knife.

Clay

    Is it me, or are newspaper headlines less assertive than they used to
    be? Saw this in yesterday's Nashua Telegraph:
    
    		GLOBAL TRADE WAR AVERTED, MAYBE
    
    -b

    WELD KEY
    IN AUTO
    EMISSION
    STANDOFF