Parody and Satire - Page 2

e-everything...
A Brief History Of Time
Why did the chicken cross the road (in Northern Ireland)?
New Business-to-Consumer Retail Craze
Chess Computers
When In Rome
City Day Of Action
Why did the chicken cross the road - football managers explain
Queen Mother 100th Birthday Interview
Beer (Enough is Enough!)

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Big Joke List

e-everything...

Three beggars are begging in New York City.

The first one wrote "beg" on his broken steel cup and he received ten bucks after one day.

The second one wrote "beg.com" on his cup and after one day he received hundreds of thousand dollars. Someone even wanted to take him to NASDAQ.

The third one wrote "ebeg" on his cup. Both IBM and HP sent vice-presidents to talk to him about a strategic alliance and offered him free Hardware and professional consulting while Larry Ellison claimed on CNBC that ebeg uses 95% Oracle technology and i2 announced begTradeMatrix a b2b industry portal to offer supply chain integration in the beggar.

Cisco just announced that virtually all ebeg traffic runs over their equipment.

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A Brief History Of Time

• 3050 B.C.- A Sumerian invents the wheel. Within the week, the idea is stolen and duplicated by other Sumerians, thereby establishing the business ethic for all times.
• 2900 B.C.-Wondering why the Egyptians call that new thing a Sphinx becomes the first of the world's Seven Great Wonders.
• 1850 B.C.-Britons proclaim Operation Stonehenge a success. They've finally gotten those boulders arranged in a sufficiently meaningless pattern to confuse the hell out of scientists for centuries.
• 1785 B.C.-The first calendar, composed of a year with 354 days, is introduced by Babylonian scientists.
• 1768 B.C.-Babylonians realize something is wrong when winter begins in June.
• 776 B.C.-The world's first known money appears in Persia, immediately causing the world's first known counterfeiter to appear in Persia the next day.
• 525 B.C.-The first Olympics are held, and prove similar to the modern games, except that the Russians don't try to enter a six-footer with a mustache in the women's shot put. However, the Egyptians do.
• 410 B.C.-Rome ends the practice of throwing debtors into slavery, thus removing the biggest single obstacle to the development of the credit card.
• 404 B.C.-The Peloponnesian war has been going on for 27 years now because neither side can find a treaty writer who knows how to spell peloponnesian.
• 214 B.C.-Tens of thousands of Chinese labor for a generation to build the 1,500 mile long Great Wall of China. And after all that, it still doesn't keep the neighbor's dog out.
• 1 B.C.-Calendar manufacturers find themselves in total disagreement over what to call next year.
• 79 A.D.- Buying property in Pompeii turns out to have been a lousy real estate investment.
• 432- St. Patrick introduces Christianity to Ireland, thereby giving the natives something interesting to fight about for the rest of their recorded history.
• 1000-Leif Ericsson discovers America, but decides it's not worth mentioning.
• 1043-Lady Godiva finds a means of demonstrating against high taxes that immediately makes everyone forget what she is demonstrating against.
• 1125-Arabic numerals are introduced to Europe, enabling peasants to solve the most baffling problem that confronts them: How much tax do you owe on MMMDCCCLX Lira when you're in the XXXVI percent bracket?
• 1233-The Inquisition is set up to torture and kill anyone who disagrees with the Law of the Church. However, the practice is so un-Christian that it is permitted to continue for only 600 years.
• 1297-The world's first stock exchange opens, but no one has the foresight to buy IBM or Xerox.
• 1433- Portugal launches the African slave trade, which just proves what a small, ambitious country can do with a little bit of ingenuity and a whole lot of evil!
• 1456-An English judge reviews Joan of Arc's case and cancels her death sentence. Unfortunately for her, she was put to death in 1431.
• 1492- Columbus proves how lost he really is by landing in the Bahamas, naming the place San Salvador, and calling the people who live there Indians.
• 1497-Amerigo Vespucci becomes the 7th or 8th explorer to become the new world, but the first to think of naming it in honor of himself...the United States of Vespuccia.
• 1508-Michelangelo finally agrees to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, but he still refuses to wash the windows.
• 1513-Ponce de Leon claims he found the Fountain of youth, but dies of old age trying to remember where it was he found it.
• 1522-Scientists, who know the world is flat, conclude that Magellan made it all the way around by crawling across the bottom.
• 1568-Saddened over the slander of his good name, Ivan the Terrible kills another 100,000 peasants to make them stop calling him Ivan the Terrible.
• 1607-The Indians laugh themselves silly as the first European tourist to visit Virginia tries to register as "John Smith".
• 1618-Future Generations are doomed as the English execute Sir Walter Raleigh, but allow his tobacco plants to live.
• 1642-Nine students receive the first Bachelor of Arts degrees conferred in America, and immediately discover there are no jobs open for a kid with a liberal arts education.
• 1670-The pilgrims are too busy burning false witches to observe the golden anniversary of their winning religious freedom.
• 1755-Samuel Johnson issues the first English Dictionary, at last providing young children with a book they can look up dirty words in.
• 1758- New Jersey is chosen as the site of America's first Indian reservation, which should give Indians an idea of the kind of shabby living conditions they can expect from here on out.
• 1763-The French and Indian War ends. The French and Indians both lost.
• 1770-The shooting of three people in the Boston Massacre touches off the Revolution. 200 Years later, three shootings in Boston will be considered just about average for a Saturday Night.
• 1773-Colonists dump tea into Boston Harbor. British call the act "barbaric," noting that no one added lemon.
• 1776-Napoleon decides to maintain a position of neutrality in the American Revolution, primarily because he is only seven years old.
• 1779-John Paul Jones notifies the British, "I have just begun to fight!" and then feels pretty foolish when he discovers that his ship is sinking.
• 1793- "Let them eat cake!" becomes the most famous thing Marie Antoinette ever said. Also, the least diplomatic thing she ever said. Also, the last thing she ever said.
• 1799-Translation of the Rosetta Stone finally enables scholars to learn that Egyptian hieroglyphics don't say anything important. "Dear Ramses, How are you? I am fine."
• 1805-Robert Fulton invents the torpedo.
• 1807-Robert Fulton invents the steamship so he has something to blow up with his torpedo.
• 1815-Post Office policy is established as Andrew Jackson wins the Battle of New Orleans a month after he should have received the letter telling him the War of 1812 is over.
• 1840-William Henry Harrison is elected president in a landslide, proving that the campaign motto, "Tippecanoe and Tyler too" is so meaningless that very few can disagree with it.
• 1850-Henry Clay announces, "I'd rather be right than president," which gets quite a laugh, coming from a guy who has run for president five times without winning.
• 1859- Charles Darwin writes "Origin of the Species". It has the same general plot as "Planet of the Apes", but fails to gross as much money.
• 1865-Union Soldiers face their greatest challenge of the war: getting General Grant sober enough to accept Lee's surrender.
• 1894-Thomas Edison displays the first motion picture, and everybody likes it except the movie critics.
• 1903- The opening of the Trans-Siberian Railway enables passengers from Moscow to reach Vladivostok in eight days, which is a lot sooner than most of them want to get there.
• 1910- The founding of the Boy Scouts of America comes as bad news to old ladies who would rather cross the street by themselves.
• 1911-Roald Amundsen discovers the South Pole and confirms what he's suspected all along: It looks a helluva lot like the North Pole!
• 1912-People with Reservations for the voyage of the Titanic get their money back.
• 1920-The 18th Amendment to the Constitution makes drinking illegal in the U.S. so everyone stops. Except for the 40 million who don't stop!
• 1924-Hitler is released from prison four years early, after convincing the parole board that he is a changed man who won't cause any more trouble.
• 1928- Herbert Hoover promises "a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage", but he neglects to add that most Americans will soon be without pots and garages.
• 1930- Pluto is discovered. Not the dog, stupid; the planet. The dog wasn't discovered until 1938.
• 1933- German housewives begin to realize why that crazy wallpaper hanger with the mustache never came back to finish his work.
• 1933-Hitler establishes the Third Reich, and announces that it will last for a thousand years. As matters develop, he is only 988 years off.
• 1934- John Dillinger is gunned down by police as he leaves a Chicago movie theater. And just to make the evening a complete washout, he didn't enjoy the movie either.
• 1934-As if the Great Depression weren't giving businessmen enough headaches, Ralph Nader is born.
• 1938-Great Britain and Germany sign a peace treaty, thereby averting all possibility of WWII.
• 1944-Hitler's promise of Volkswagens for all Germans as soon as they've won the war doesn't prove to be as strong an incentive as he had hoped.

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Why did the chicken cross the road (in Northern Ireland)?

SINN FEIN: That would be a matter for the chicken. Sinn Fein and the chicken are not part of the same organisation, although we share some ideals. If there are presently any chickens in Sinn Fein, we are not aware of it.

ORANGE ORDER: The chicken is entitled to walk in a peaceful manner on the Queen's Highway. It's a traditional route. Anyone who tries to deny the chicken his rights to walk on the road will find the road blocked at both ends until the chicken is allowed to walk in a dignified and non-threatening manner, without accompanying bands if need be.

DUP: We are implacably opposed to the chicken crossing the road until the chicken's armaments have been removed and the chicken itself declares its diabolical intentions.

IRA: On behalf of the people of Ireland, we reserve the right to defend the roads of the island against the chicken. For 800 years the Irish People have resisted the imposition of chickens by force of arms and shall continue to do so until the chicken is expelled from our land. Anyone collaborating with the chicken, or assisting or enabling the road crossing by chickens, will be deemed legitimate targets in our struggle against tyranny.

UFF: We, the loyal defenders of Ulster roads, reserve our right to retaliate against any precipitory hostile actions by the chicken. We shall meet this with deadly force. (A donation to the Loyalist Prisoners Association will ensure free passage of the chicken with respect to the road and the crossing thereof, till the same time next month anyhow. Do chickens have kneecaps?)

UUP/SDLP Joint statement: We believe that only by working together in unison, and with the majority of the people of this island, the British and Irish Governments and our friends overseas behind us, can we find the answer to this question. If we do not, or cannot, then our children will rightfully ask us the question, 'So why did the chicken cross the road?'

THE HOME SECRETARY, UK GOVT: While not normally commenting on security matters, Her Majesty's Government feels it is right and proper, in this instance, to make a statement on this affair. - Members of the Special Air Services involved in a covert anti-terrorist operation on the road at 8:42 this morning observed the chicken attempting to cross the road. As the chicken was approached by one of the soldiers involved, it was seen to make a threatening movement and action was taken to nullify that action. It has not been ascertained why the chicken was crossing the road, and it seems unlikely that we will now discover the motive.

PETER MANDELSON: Whilst I recognise that the agreement and the act of parliament requires the chicken not to cross the road, I recognise that it is a huge step forward for PIRA to state that it is in favour, in principle, of permitting independent poultry farmers to view some feathers on the floor of the chicken coop from time to time. This now permits me to reconstitute the assembly and to declare that I am chicken.

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New Business-to-Consumer Retail Craze

They're calling it shops or "S-Commerce" and it's being rolled out in Cities and towns nationwide. "It's a real revelation," according to Malcolm Fosbury, a middleware engineer from Hillingdon. "You just walk into one of these shops and they have all sorts of things for sale."

Fosbury was particular impressed by a clothes shop he discovered while browsing in central London. "Shops seem to be the ideal medium for transactions of this type. I can actually try out a jacket and see if it fits me. Then I can visualize the way I would look if I was wearing the clothing." This is possible using a high definition 2D viewing system, or "mirror" as it has become known.

Shops, which are frequently aggregated into shopping portals or "high streets", are becoming increasingly popular with the cash-rich time-poor generation of new consumers. Often located in densely populated areas people can find them extremely convenient. And Malcolm is not alone in being impressed by shops. "Some days I just don't have the time to download huge Flash animations of rotating trainers and then wait five days for them to be delivered in the hope that they will actually fit," says Sandra Bailey, a systems analyst from Chelsea. "This way I can actually complete the transaction in real time and walk away with the goods."

Being able see whether or not shoes and clothing fit has been a real bonus for Bailey, "I used to spend my evenings boxing up gear to return. Sometimes the clothes didn't fit, sometimes they just sent the wrong stuff."

Shops have a compelling commercial story to tell too, according to Gartner Group retail analyst Carl Baker. "There are massive efficiencies in the supply chain. By concentrating distribution to a series of high volume outlets in urban centres-typically close to where people live and work-businesses can make dramatic savings in fulfillment costs. Just compare this with the wasteful practise of delivering items piecemeal to people's homes."

Furthermore, allowing consumers to receive goods when they actually want them could mean an end to the frustration of returning home to find a despatch notice telling you that your goods are waiting in a delivery depot the other side of town.

But it's not just the convenience and time-saving that appeals to Fosbury, "Visiting a shop is real relief for me. I mean as it is I spend all day in front of a f***ing computer."

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Chess Computers

The game of chess has been under a cloud since then IBM computer, Deep Blue, beat the top human Gary Kasparov, in a match a couple of years ago. However, good news is on the way with the announcement that Aquarius, the Devon-based water powered chess computer, is poised to make its debut later this month at the Sixth Devonshire Inn Chess International in Sticklepath and hopes to challenge IBM next year.

The Aquarius project has been beset with problems from the start, as its technical director, Colonel Walter Polhill (retd.) explained:

"Basically, it's an extension of an old Greek design for a clepsydra or water-clock, only far more complex. It's powered by the water wheel at Finch's Foundry next door to the Inn and makes its calculations through a vast number of buckets that are incessantly being filled or emptied. That's its big advantage over IBM, you see. Their binary system allows only the digits 0 and 1. We use analogue buckets which can be full, empty or anywhere in between."

The colonel admitted that the project has not run smoothly: "We had hoped to launch in 1996," he said, "but the dry summer caused a sudden power failure. Lack of rain stopped play, you might say. But it won't happen again.

We've put in an 8.6 gigagallon, 8-speed, 64 parallel aqueducts wetdrive with Reservoir Added Memory. It had teething troubles in '97, I must admit, when a thunderstorm led to the whole thing being clogged up by water-spiders and dragonflies. We had to drain it completely, then re-boat the system with a team of men rowing out to the central processing unit with buckets. But that's all water under the bridge now. We were set to go again last year, but made a dreadful mistake in switching to the new Rainbows 98 wetware. It was full of bugs and even our new millennium bug filter couldn't cope. The waste-bucket overflowed and we were slopping out its Completely Damp CD-drive for hours."

But does the project hold out any hope for the average player? Not many of us have access to a water wheel, after all. Col Polhill smiled as he unveiled the latest product from his laboratory. It looked, at first glance, rather like a glass of beer. "Meet Deep Brown," he said, "the world's first frothtop, beer-powered chess computer, with its own internal sloppy-drive.

It's the same technology as Aquarius, but with memory held in bubbles instead of buckets. Alcohol both powers it and kills bugs. There's even a top-of-the-range model that runs on Champagne. We tested it in a match against the monastery at Grenoble who have a similar machine powered by Green Chartreuse. They put up a brave show, but stood no chance. It was as we said to them at the start: "Magnum, the most powerful clepsydra in the world. It could blow your head clean off. You've got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel plucky? Well do ya, monk?"

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When In Rome

Rome, January 6, 1 B.C.

Dear Cassius,
Are you still working on the Y zero K problem? This change from BC to AD is giving us a lot of headaches and we haven't much time left. I don't know how people will cope with working the wrong way around. Having been working happily downwards forever, now we have to start thinking upwards.

You would think that someone would have thought of it earlier and not left it to us to sort out at the last minute. I spoke to Caesar the other evening. He was livid that Julius hadn't done something about it when he was sorting out the calendar. He said he could see why Brutus turned nasty. We called in the consulting astrologers, but they simply said that continuing downwards using minus BC won't work. As usual, the consultants charged a fortune for doing nothing useful.

As for myself, I just can't see the sand in an hourglass flowing upwards. We have heard that there are 3 wise guys in the East working on the problem, but, unfortunately, they won't arrive till it's all over. Some say the world will cease to exist at the moment of transition. Anyway we are continuing to work on this blasted Y zero K problem and I will send you a parchment if anything further develops.

Vale.
Plutonius.

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City Day Of Action

INTERNATIONAL CITY DAY OF ACTION, 11 AUGUST, 2000

Next Friday will be the International City Day of Action. On this day, we ask you all to don your finest pinstripe, apply your monocles, glue mobile phone to ear and then head off down to Brighton to disrupt as many dreadlocked men and women with dogs on string as possible.

Plan of action:

• to picket henna tattoo stalls
• throw cheap pewter jewellery into the sea
• storm the dole office and glue the doors shut
• throw soap and other cleansing materials at the men with dogs on string
• occupy any spare grassland and start laying foundations for new 'superbank'
• hand out photocopies of salary slips
• hang the dogs on string with their string as a little ironic joke
• set fire to unattended shopping trollies
• raid off licences destroying cans of special brew, tennants super, thunderbirds and cheap cider
• destroy copies of any Levellers albums

Police advice at present to the men with dogs on string is:

• to get a job
• to get a haircut
• have a wash
• avoid police vans
• "to mind those stairs, sir, as they're very slippery and treacherous, like - very similar to the ones down the station, sir, if you catch my drift"

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Why did the chicken cross the road - football managers explain

Arsene Wenger
"From my position in the dug-out I did not see the incident clearly so I cannot really comment. However, I do think that he gets picked on by opposition players and fans who are clearly chickenophobic."

David O'Leary
"To be fair, he's just a baby chicken really and crossing the road is just a big exciting adventure for him. He'll enjoy the experience as long as it lasts and learn from it, but I don't seriously expect him to cross it this season."

Sir Alex Ferguson
"As far as I'm concerned he crossed the road at least a minute early according to my watch."

George Graham
"I want good, solid team chickens who'll cross the road in a straight line when they're told and how they're told. There's no room at this club for a prima donna chicken running around aimlessly - he's not worth it!"

Gianluca Vialli
"When the fish are down, he'll just be one of the chaps. It doesn't matter to me whether he's an Italian, French or English chicken as long as he's willing to die on the pitch for Chelsea."

Peter Reid
"Just cross the f***ing road, you chicken f***!"

Glenn Hoddle
"The chicken was hit by the lorry when crossing the road because in a previous life it had been a bad chicken."

Brian Clough
"If God had wanted chickens to cross roads he'd have put corn in the tarmac. Anyway, I'm more interested in Wild Turkey."

Ron Atkinson
"Spotter's badge, Clive. For me, Chicko's popped up at the back stick, little eyebrows, and gone bang! And I'll tell you what - I've got a sneaking feeling that this road's there to be crossed."

Ruud Gullit
"I am hoping to see some sexy poultry."

Gordon Strachan
"I'm really proud of the wee fella. Let's face it, if it had been one of the big chickens everyone would be saying how well he'd done,but as it's one of the wee chickens it must be luck."

John Gregory
"Two months ago that chicken was saying he was happy here. Now he tells me he wants to cross the road. I feel like shooting him."

Kevin Keegan
"OK, so the chicken's dead, but I still feel, hey, he can go all the way to the other side of the road."

Joe Royle
"I can't understand why they're letting female chickens cross roads these days. They should be at home laying eggs."

Alan Hansen
"Well, you have got to look at the positioning of the cars that let the Chicken get so many crosses in."

Harry Redknapp
"It's a hard road to come to. I only had one Chicken available and he was down to the bear bones and not elligible to cross. He didn't arrive until after a shopping trip to Harvey Nic's and then demanded a No.10 shirt....... On the plus side I thought the young chick Frank did very well"

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Queen Mother 100th Birthday Interview

Maam, may I start by thanking you for this rare opportunity to talk with someone who has played such a key role in the computer industry over the last 100 years.

My pleasure, dear boy. Is that a bottle of Gordon's on the table behind you?

What was your introduction to IT?

Sorry, I thought you were going to interview me about G&T, not IT. But I do remember my father building a model of the difference engine for my fifth birthday. It never actually worked, but it was very good at crushing ice for drinks. To be honest, I didn't really pay much attention to IT for a few years as my family were a bit preoccupied with a little family squabble in Europe.

Are you referring to the Great War?

We prefer to call it a small family argument.

But didn't millions of people die?

No one I'd ever had a drink with.

Can we get back to computers? When did your fascination really begin in earnest?

I suppose it was when that nice Mr Turing popped round for drinks in the 1930s. He was convinced he could decipher German messages by means of some colossal electrical machine. I pointed out to him that it was far easier if you married into German royalty. How we laughed! Funny he never married though...

And then came the second World War...

Again, it was just family problems, you know how these things happen. Anyway, I seemed to spend a great part of my time visiting aeroplane factories or on the royal train, stopped in a tunnel - something to do with the Brits?

The Blitz?

It was all so long ago... Any more tonic?

So what happened after the war?

Well, that was when I finally got some time to myself. When my daughter took over the reigns - little family joke there, ha ha -, I could spend more time reading some of the popular computer publications of the time, like Empire Computing World and Personal Electronic Servant - I've got some clippings from the fifties here...

[reads aloud] "John C Dvorak speaks his mind: Why on earth doesn't Microsoft get its act together? When I tried to phone their press office in Redmond, they told me they'd never heard of Microsoft. Who does Bill Gates think he is? Now there was an IT commentator - well ahead of his time."

He's still alive, you know.

How can you tell?

Which other publications did you read?

One of my favourites was ZDNet UK, although it was a bit boring for the first thirty or forty years, something to do with having no other Internet news wires to lift stories from, I believe.

And in the sixties?

Well, of course I was flattered that ICL - what did that stand for, Imperial Computers Limited? - named its mainframe operating systems after my late husband, but it was a bit of a shame they only got up as far as George IV. A few more versions and they'd have got there.

Perhaps we could turn to the 1970s...

Any more of that Gin? Thanks. Ah yes. The seventies. That was when personal computers first appeared. Of course, we never actually used them, you understand. We always rang for a servant who loaded VisiCalc and worked out how much we owed the bookies and the wine merchant. I feel that in terms of a perfect user interface, we've never bettered the concept of having someone else do all the tedious UI bits for one.

Which personalities from the IT world do you remember most fondly?

I met a young man - Harry Mellison I think his name was. He was quite mad. Wondered if he was related to the family in some way. Then there was a chap called Andy Grove - thought he could put a whole computer on a chip. Mad as a hatter - he kept announcing he'd built a faster computer but when people asked if they could buy one he went and hid under the stairs. Thought everyone was out to get him, poor chap.

Which operating system do you favour?

Well, my favourite has to be the one where one is born into the aristocracy and spends the whole of one's life doing no work at all whilst receiving large amounts of cash and a number of castles and stately homes.

Er, I was actually thinking about operating systems for computers...

Ah! Silly me. You must excuse me, I am a hundred years old, you know.

Yes, I had heard.

Well, I tried that Windows one once, never could get to grips with it - I think it was some kind of family tradition, some of my relatives kept bricking up the front of the computer to avoid window tax. Then I tried that one with the Penguin, but my son in law kept shooting the PC every time the logo appeared. Very fond of wildlife, young Philip.

One last question - how do you see the IT industry changing over the next 100 years?

One thing is sure, young man. I'll still be here, come and ask me in 3000.

Thankyou, your majesty, and may I say how radiant you are looking?

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Beer (Enough is Enough!)

A group of militant alcoholics have blockaded a brewery in Sheffield, South Yorkshire in protest at "the exorbitant tax imposed on booze in the United Kingdom", Government officials said today.

Fears have been growing that the protests will spread country-wide and some panic drinking has been reported.

The protesters have demanded that the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair meets the group "If he thinks he's hard enough" and are said to be concerned that he may be looking at their "birds".

In a press conference late last night, the leader of the protest told the waiting media "you're my best mates you lot" then requested a group hug.

He finished by demanding that the Government remove VAT on donner kebabs.

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