The Limey Report » contest

Share Your Best Story…

thelimey — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:39:43 +0000

There are few human pleasures with quite the sanguine appeal of shopping online for that shiny new gizmo. The downside, of course, is the risk to your plastic. If you found a way to pay for the toys without sharing your data you’d feel a lot safer, I bet? Well, not only is there now such a way but if you indulged in a little holiday shopping for that special someone, you can both win big cash just for sharing the tale…

eBillMe.com, the secure-payment service that does not risk your card, has a contest to find the most romantic or funny online shopping endeavor. Maybe you bought a dayglo-pink teddy for your Brother-in-Law? Or a re-wedding ring for your Wife? Well, this is the story they want to hear. Sign-up today and you could win $1,500 for this month’s best story and $15,000 in cash for the best one of all. Here’s the scoop…

Did your holiday shopping leave you with a tale? Well, don’t hang around here – Sign up right now and let’s see if you win!…

[Can't see the video? Check it out here]

Does This Make My Ass Look Big??

thelimey — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 20:59:00 +0000

Those of you so blessed as to live among the resplendent glories of New York will know that two dedicated Geeks have just emerged after 123 hours in a plexi-glass bubble in Times Square, watching non-stop movies to win the “Netflix Popcorn Bowl Challenge.” Five days, fifty-seven movies, only ten minute breaks for bathroom needs, and no sleep allowed at all. None!

Susan Sarandon delivered their final challenge [her 1991, Ridley Scott-helmed yawn-fest, 'Thelma and Louise',] at the conclusion of which the two hardy winners, Suresh Joachim of Canada, and Claudia Wavra of Germany gained a new Guinness World Record, a lifetime subscription to Netflix, the ‘Popcorn Bowl’ Trophy, $10,000 each, and butts the size of an outlying planet.

I love movies to a point where the risk of needing a twelve-step program is an ominous daily reality, but I’m not sure whether to envy these people or find them professional help? Watch the video and see what you think…

Oscar lost a friend…

thelimey — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 20:31:00 +0000

This is truly a sad day.

As I reported recently, GM has abandoned plans to be part of the Oscars next year. Today, AdAge has the news that the Korean car maker, Hyundai, has taken all of their spots.

This, dear reader, is no less than tragic. GM and Oscar have a place in the world that is shared by a very small group – They are universal icons for the American dream. Show their logos to any being on Earth and you’re assured of instant connection. They will know the brand and fervently admire that place it calls home. Today, that caché was diminished.

GM has been a friend of the Awards for over ten years, and to have one American icon replaced at the event of another by a firm that embodies the very source of its troubles is almost akin to a death. This is a magnificent country and in these troubled times we need to celebrate that as much as we can, but the forced retirement of an American classic is cause for concern, not rejoicing.

In time, GM’s board will turn things around. Until then, the Awards are undeniably weaker.

Photo by Mika Hiironniemi

Is This Really Our Future??

thelimey — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 21:44:00 +0000

Following on from yesterday’s story about the risk of an Actors strike, today brings news of yet another nail in the coffin of the craft as whole.

As both of my regular readers know, I hate ‘reality’ television with a passion that could crush a planet. And the creatively vacant people at Lifetime are about to prove why even that depth of revulsion is barely enough.

On November 11 they will debut a six-part series called, “Blush: The Search for the Next Great Makeup Artist.” Contestants will fight for $100,000, a contract with Max Factor and a shoot for ‘InStyle.’ magazine. Lifetime’s press release says Max Factor’s name and logo will be integrated into “every element of the show, from product use to a branded studio.”

The show is produced by MediaVest, the ad agency for Procter and Gamble…who own Max Factor.

So Lifetime intend to create six obsequious, undiluted infomercials then present them to the audience as a serious contest, without a trace of regard for those viewers’ intelligence. And each one will be stuffed with honest commercials to really drive up the profits.

As with all reality shows, everyone on the set will be non-union. So despite Lifetime’s vast potential profit from this disingenuous insult, not one Actor will get a single day’s work. And this is the kind of programming we’re supposed to get excited about seeing in Hi-Def.

I’m glad it’s the weekend. I think we all need ten-pounds of Hershey’s and at least two days to get over such a shameless assault.

Photo by Frida

Emmys…Failure on an Epic Scale!

thelimey — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 18:40:00 +0000

Last night, this country was subjected to one of the most boring, incompetent, ego-saturated intellectual vacuums in the history of this or any other sentient race.

When you’re sixty you’re expected to be a little slow and forgetful. After fifty-nine years of unfettered practice, aided by the cream of this glorious nation’s performing community, the Emmy’s are entitled to no such concession.

Some TV critics are giving this ghastly spectacle overly-kind and upbeat reviews. I would be guilty of fraud and intellectual rape if I even considered it right to concur. The entire, skillfully-coutured charade was 15-minutes of worthwhile viewing squeezed into 3-hours of mind-crushing banality, then smothered in lip gloss and hosed with cheap perfume. All it lacked was a street lamp to lean on.

According to Neilsen, 12.2 million people watched the show – one of its lowest ratings in 15-years. And I couldn’t act surprised if you paid me! Everyone on that stage was there because the Emmys consider them the best of their kind…And that was the best they could do.

If this was their report card, they should deem themselves lucky to get more than an “F”.
~~~
ARTICLEURL

MTV Scrapes the Barrel….Again

thelimey — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 19:40:00 +0000

In what may be their dumbest, most dangerous and calculated attempt to boost their ratings to the dizzying heights of double figures, MTV is now casting a new “Reality” show where impressionable teens will be required to suffer borderline-anorexia in order to win fame on the Runway.

“MTV is looking for girls willing to shed 30-80 lbs to become a model and win $100,000!” says the brazen announcement for ‘Model Maker’ on MTV’s site.

There’s no other word for it: This is sick.

Driven by the incessant and powerful influences exerted on them by the media this show’s target audience of teenage and young-adult girls are already susceptible to the slightest negative perception of their appearance or value. And now a network, whose content and performers could be justifiably cited as a prominent source of this withering propaganda [Try and name one plus-sized Singer or Model?] plan to selfishly exploit this terrorizing insecurity and need for validation to boost ratings and their own bottom line.

The show’s still in casting and may not debut for months [or, please God, ever!] but the mental imagery is already worrying; I see long lines of young girls and their Mothers standing patiently in line outside MTV’s offices, keen to let the station exploit their young darling’s paralyzing fears about her own value and worth…which MTV helped create in the first place.

If anyone has suggestions as how we might change MTV’s [excuse me while I use an irrelevant term] ‘mind’ about this, I’d be happy to hear them. Meantime, I’m off for a sandwich…

Oscar doesn’t wear a Sombrero !

thelimey — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 18:49:00 +0000

General Motors announced yesterday that it’s dropping the Oscar and Emmy ad campaigns that have been a fixture of those ceremonies for over ten years. Personally, I couldn’t be happier.

The Oscars are a glittering celebration of a uniquely American industry that brings enjoyment and fun to every being on Earth, supports thousands of American jobs and creates countless more in other industries, and pours over $7-billion a year into this wondrous nation’s economy.

GM, on the other hand, is a brand that was revered worldwide as an American icon, and whose bosses recently rewarded thousands of industrious American citizens whose sweat and devotion built both that image and its related empire by discarding them to welfare and relocating the entire label to Mexico so they could use cheaper labor to make better profits.

The Oscars are among the most prestigious and highest-rated events in the entire US calendar and as resolutely American as Apple Pie, Baseball and Archie Bunker’s chair, and any firm that abuses this nation’s workers in such a despicable way has no right to be identified with such an event. ABC should wish them well and show them the door, then open discussions with a firm who still believe and invest in this country as strongly as they and their splendid parent company do.

If GM doesn’t want the workers, we can live without their ads…And the cars.

A Banquet of Banality…

thelimey — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 18:33:00 +0000

Just in case you were under the quite understandable impression that “Reality” shows couldn’t get any dumber or their creators more desperate, our friends at The Food Network would like to prove you wrong.

The formerly respectable channel has decided it’s time to gorge on a slice of the lucrative ‘Reality’ pie and are currently prepping a competitive eating show, due to be called “Eat the Clock.” Produced by Rachel Ray’s shingle, “Pie Town,” it’s pitched as a blend of a speed-eating contest and that curious CBS odyssey, “The Amazing Race.” Two teams, each blinded by the prospect of unbridled gluttony and fast, easy cash, will race between what clearly be some of L.A’s less ‘selective’ eateries and stuff themselves [even more] stupid in timed eating binges.

The sad part is, if there’s one thing you chaps do better than any other sentient life-form yet known, it’s eat! And this show offers those of your peers with a lust for free money and no self-respect the chance to become fleetingly famous and moderately rich, simply by proving they can eat more like a pig than the semi-evolved oinker sat next to them.

…The Food Net could get so many entries from Georgia alone, this ghastly idea could run for ten years!

But that couldn’t happen…Could it?? Just the merchandise nightmares should make any sane CEO gag! T-shirts with the ketchup stains already in place – Order now and your favorite star will hand-sign the vomit! Or baseball caps that double as musical Charmin dispensers? The list is horrific and endless…and more likely than you might want to think.

Now I think I see why that splendid raconteur and gastronome, Emeril, decamped to The Style Channel? If this ghastly idea ever sees daylight, those in charge at the Food Net can kiss any notions of refinement or style a fond adios forever!

The pilot for “Eat the Clock” will be shot in the next few weeks, with the season debut in early ’09, should the Food Net let it reach that level of revulsion without strangling those guilty of such facile inception. Cross your fingers now, boys and girls – If we do ever suffer a full season they may otherwise engaged…down your throat.

I Think I’ll Move into a Cave…

thelimey — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 18:31:00 +0000

Enjoy your Thursday, folks – For those of us who find sports less than irresistibly transfixing, this is the last day of freedom we’ll see for two weeks.

NBC’s coverage of the Olympics begins tomorrow and will continue at levels akin to saturation-bombing until we’re finally free of the whole gargantuan yawn-fest on August 24th. A total of 3,600 hours, played on every conceivable media platform – including cell phones. Almost 3,000 hours of that will be live and every snooze-inducing moment will be shown in Hi-Def.

Hands up if you could even remotely care about any of the above? No, thought not…Nor me.

One group who do care are the NBC bosses and their accountants. NBC will gross over $1-Billion in advertising revenue for the event. By the 24th, anyone with the intellectual fortitude to watch even half the coverage is going to know every monosyllable of the ad-makers pitches better than they know their own children!

We who hate sports are, it seems, as devoid of option as we apparently are of value; If your interest in the genre is even fractionally below what would make a 12-step program your only viable recourse, you might want to consider spending the next two weeks watching the walls.

…There’s going to be nothing else to look at

Justin Timberlake – Oscar Host??

thelimey — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 22:45:03 +0000

It seems that pop ‘”hunk” turned Actor, Justin Timberlake, is being seriously considered for the role as Host of the 2009 Academy Awards, according to a report in the National Enquirer.

Those in charge at AMPAS [Oscar's Dads] were reportedly “wowed” by Timberlake’s natural, funny performance hosting the ESPY Awards last month, and apparently want him to join the illustrious – though evidently less than selective – clique of Academy Awards hosts, taking the baton from 2008′s iconic MC, Mr. Jon Stewart.

Personally, I think the prospect would compel any rational person to regard the notion of taking a bath with their toaster with a degree of appeal and gravitas that might usually be considered unhealthy. But bearing in mind the source of the story was the National Enquirer I’d suggest you put that on hold…for now. It’s fair to say, though, that Justin is a competent singer, a moderate dancer and his showing at the ESPY Awards was one of which a professional comedian could be bearably proud. The first question that speculates crossing one’s mind, therefore, is ‘Could they really get him to sign?’ Well, Justin would be offered a very nice paycheck, three hours of prime-time and an audience that’s measured in billions.

…You do the math!