CULTURE BUZZ: Via his Twitter , John Hodgman (yes, that “PC guy”) takes a stand against “meh” — calling it “…almost universally seems to signal: I am just interested enough to make one last joyless, nitpicky swipe and then disappear.” An official “meh” backlash? Is “meh” the new FAIL? How many joyless Twitterers do we think responded: “@hodgman meh”?

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The Best Links:

1. John Hodgman on “meh” - Waxy.org
2. ‘Meh’ —- the Apathetic Expression Enters Dictionary - Chicago Tribune
3. Urban Dictionary: meh
4. John Hodgman’s Twitter

TV BUZZ: (No that's not a typo): Jimmy Fallon's much-maligned web show is getting a second chance. Or maybe the internet is self-correcting for the first chance that Fallon never got, because he used to laugh during sketches at SNL. Laughing is in this year.

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The Best Links:

1. NYT critic Virginia Heffernan leads the charge
2. Jimmy Fallon Is Winning (Online) Friends and (Possibly) Influencing People
3. Craig Ferguson would like you to give Jimmy Fallon a chance.
4. Rex Sorgatz has noticed it as well.
5. Geeks like Jimmy!
6. Heffernan also wrote this, which is kind of an endorsement.
7. Late Night With Jimmy Fallon - Featured on BuzzFeed

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/18/boo...

The New York Times has joined the Gladwell backlash with a review calling his new book: “glib, poorly reasoned and thoroughly unconvincing”.

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The Best Links:

1. Outliers: Malcolm Gladwell’s New Book
2. The Malcolm Gladwell Backlash

CULTURE BUZZ: With his third book — Outliers — about to come out, the critics have sharpened their knives for the New Yorker staffer and his enormous afro. Has the superhero + free lunch model of success run its course for Gladwell? He says his new book is definitely not a self-help book.

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The Best Links:

1. Malcolm Gladwell Doesn’t Think He’s An Outlier Himself
2. Outliers “Feels like a sumptuous Chinese meal that an hour later leaves a diner feeling hungry.”
3. What the Hell, Malcolm Gladwell — Where Are The Ladies?
4. The Thankless Job Of Being Malcolm Gladwell
5. Outliers: Malcolm Gladwell’s New Book - Featured on BuzzFeed
6. Malcolm Gladwell’s Very Own Site

CELEBRITY BUZZ: It seems the tide of public opinion around the ‘Queen of Quirk’ has changed and the inevitable backlash has begun. I think the think the tipping point may have been the ukelele. Oh Zooey, I will always remember you as you were in The Good Girl .

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The Best Links:

1. “Is Zooey Deschanel the Most Boring Person Alive? A Scientific Survey.”
2. The Unbearable Quirkiness of the Unstoppable Charm Of Zooey Deschanel
3. Amazing Girls
4. Zooey Deschanel’s Music Career
5. Zooey Deschanel Sucks or Rules: Let the Internet be the Judge
6. Deep thoughts from Zooey Deschanel

FOOD BUZZ: The brewing discontent of the cupcake-haters. We’ve already seen them banned in schools . Will the expansion of Crumbs, a cupcake place that’s growing at a Krispy Kreme-like pace, turn more people against the lowly cupcake?

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The Best Links:

1. Can Crumbs Take Over the (cupcake) World?
2. Professional Curmudgeon Joel Stein Strikes Back At Sweet, Sweet Cupcakes
3. Will The Expansion of Crumb Bring About Cupcakemaggedon?
4. New York Magazine Coins the Term “Cupmudgeonism”
5. Cupcake Ban - Featured on BuzzFeed

SPORTS BUZZ: After 8 golds, the internet begins wondering: Is Michael Phelps a douchebag? All he does is eat, sleep, and swim, but he still leaves just a little bit of time to be a douche.

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The Best Links:

1. JUST ASKING: Is Michael Phelps A Douche? (With Examples)
2. Comment From Someone Who’s Worked With Him
3. Michael Phelps Douche’s Out At A Nightclub In Beijing

MUSIC BUZZ: Bloggers and indie bands agree: They don’t love Radiohead’s music. Is this just the usual crowing of the less-talented, or the voice of the silent, Radiohead-hating majority?

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The Best Links:

1. David Berman: “Never before has there been a ‘greatest band in the world’ who had so little to say about anything.”
2. Apples Vs. Dim-Witted No-Talent Hacks
3. The Hold Steady Say Radiohead Have ‘Lost The Plot’
4. “I hate Radiohead. There. I said it.”
5. I Run From Radiohead’s Music, And From The People Who Like It
6. Was That “In Rainbows” Thing Just Cynical Sales Tactic?

TECH BUZZ: Julia Allison’s NonSociety project has inspired a wide variety of satire. The launch of the project — timed perfectly with Allison’s appearance on the cover of Wired — has stirred up the inevitable backlash from bloggers, who’re already tired of Allison’s particularly noxious strain of ubiquity (of course, they could always just not look ).

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The Best Links:

1. Nonsociety As One Big Valtrex Ad
2. NonExciting: Live Boringly.
3. NonSociety.net: Parsing The Bizarre
4. NonSociety Fanpage: “Goofbal and loveable, sass but serious when needs!”

CELEBRITY BUZZ: With falling ratings for her show and declining circulation numbers for her magazine, is the Oprah Empire entering its sunset phase? The New York Times reports on the fissures starting to show in the Queen of All Media’s façade.

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The Best Links:

1. The Pope of Media No More
2. OMG Oprah LOL!!!
3. Tremors of Discontent in the Oprah Empire
4. Not Many Emmy Noms, Either

CULTURE BUZZ: Enough with the brass tubes already! There’s a rising backlash against the sci-fi inspired, Victorian-flavored subculture and its love of all things Jules Verne.

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The Best Links:

1. The Times Style Section: Once Again, Totally, Totally Wrong
2. Worst of All, It’s Inconvenient
3. Bulky, Ugly, Steampunky Watch
4. “Basically, it’s Goth with goggles and leather hats instead of eye makeup and black dresses.”
5. Dumb Steampunk Mouse
6. Steampunk Chicken-Walker Mech Costume
7. Steampunk Flat-Panel LCD Mod
8. Merlin Mann’s Steampunk Penis Pump

CELEBRITY BUZZ: Everybody loves Tina Fey. Or do they? Yes, they do, mostly. Despite the delicious Schadenfreude a Tina Fey backlash might produce, one just doesn’t appear to be materializing, even though her new movie, Baby Mama , has been getting tepid early reviews. She’s still got that one funny show

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The Best Links:

1. “Baby Mama” Is No. 1 at the Weekend Box Office
2. Mixed Reviews on Metacritic
3. “Why is this photo so ugly, Tina Fey?”
4. The “Stop Tina Fey” Petition Has a Stunning 38 Signatures
5. “Baby Mama” Is Boring, But Then Fey Didn’t Write It, So
6. Tina Feytigue
7. Guesses On When the Inevitable Backlash Will Commence?
8. Review: Coulda Been Funnier, But Fey is Good
9. There Can Never Be Enough Tina
10. Review: “It looks cheap, shiny, and bereft of depth”

POLITICS BUZZ: Angry journalists are circulating a petition calling out ABC’s George Stephanopoulos and Charles Gibson for the crappy job they did at the last debate. Stephanopoulos was “somewhat taken aback” at first by the sustained furor sent his way. We can understand: We take a lot of email heat any time we post anything having to do with animals being harmed . We just report the facts, people!

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The Best Links:

1. An Open Letter to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos and Charles Gibson
2. Mainstream Journos Are Pissed Off
3. In the Last Debate, Everybody Lost
4. ABC Deluged With Angry Comments
5. Amen!

TECH BUZZ: The introduction of Flickr video has unintended consequences: Angry Flickrites. Citing site slowdowns and a fear of an YouTuber influx, many long-time Flickr users are up in arms about the addition of Flickr Video. By up in arms, we mean they’ve started petitions and angry-sounding Flickr groups.

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The Best Links:

1. The Popular New Flickr Group Are About Being Mad at Flickr
2. Flickr Users Are Up to Their Old Tricks
3. NO VIDEO ON FLICKR!!!
4. We Say NO to Videos on Flickr
5. Sign the Petition Below
6. The Predictable Backlash Has Arrived

MOVIE BUZZ: Much disliked horror auteur Uwe Boll throws down the gauntlet: If 1 million people sign the petition against him, maybe he’ll quit. The director behind such stinkers as Bloodrayne and House of the Dead has dared the internet to end his career. Anti-Boll Blogs are trying to grow the cause: As of now, the signatures have jumped to over 53,000.

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The Best Links:

1. Uwe Boll’s Petition-Baiting Interview
2. Stop Dr. Uwe Boll Petition
3. One Million Signatures to End Uwe Boll’s Directing Career!
4. Boll Can Still Be Stopped!
5. “If this isn’t a worthy cause, I really don’t know what is”
6. Uwe Boll’s Storied Career
7. Boll’s Films Are “Nearly Impossible to Sit Through”

CULTURE BUZZ: Maxim gets flack for placing Sarah Jessica Parker at the top of the “unsexiest women” list, also for having an “unsexiest women” list in the first place, and also for generally being lame and shallow. Even the dudes we know who are the totally dudest of dudes don’t read this magazine. So why do we care?

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The Best Links:

1. Hustler Is More Enlightening than Maxim
2. Maxim, Entertainment Weekly Agree: Jews, Blacks, Asians Not So “Sexy”
3. 10 Women Unsexier Than Sarah Jessica Parker
4. Weirdly Timed with the SATC Movie?
5. SJP Unfazed by “Unsexiest Woman” Title
6. Faux Reviews Land Maxim in Hot Water

MOVIE BUZZ: Daniel Day-Lewis may have just won his second Oscar for There Will Be Blood , but some have already begun challenging the praise he’s received for his scenery-chewing performance. They say that Day-Lewis’ motivations are unclear, that his acting is gimmicky, and that his histrionics take the viewer out of the action. In other words, they think he’s a ham. Of course, hamming it up has always been a pretty good way to win yourself a gold statue.

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The Best Links:

1. There Will Be Backlash
2. Daniel Day-Lewis, Too Great to Be Good
3. The Great(ness) Debate: Flesh, Blood, Day-Lewis (and Oscar)
4. Acting You Can See
5. Biggest Acting, Best and Worst: Over the Top, Ma!
6. There Will Be Ham: Over the Top with Daniel Day-Lewis

MOVIE BUZZ: New York sketch group Olde English pairs with comedienne Jackie Clarke to take us “behind the scenes” of surprise hit Juno with its attention-grabbing screenwriter. Hey, did you know Diablo Cody used to be a stripper? Seriously, she was a real, live stripper - naked and everything!

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The Best Links:

1. Behind The Scenes With Diablo Cody (Official Video)
2. Diablo Cody’s Secrets To The Screen Trade
3. “Diablo Cody” Didn’t Even <i>See</i> Juno!
4. “We Always Assumed [she’d] Become a Punchline About Five Minutes After She Wins an Oscar, Butit Looks Like We Don’t Have to Wait That Long!”
5. Enemies of The Year, #10: The Stripper Who Wrote Juno

CULTURE BUZZ: “Eat, Pray, Love” is now tops on everybody’s list of books to bash. What’s with all the hate? Are people upset about the book’s self-absorbed cultural appropriation? Or are they mad because a female author is so successful? We’ll let the blogosphere attempt to figure it out.

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The Best Links:

1. The Expected Backlash Arrives on Cue
2. The New York Post’s Typically Perfect Headline: “Eat Pray Loathe”
3. Gilbert Responds to the Backlash
4. What if She Were a He? A Thought Experiement, Sorta
5. Annonying or Enlightening? Now You Can Vote!

POLITICS BUZZ: A viral, homemade campaign ad goes bad. There’s no doubt the song in this video is catchy. But that doesn’t make it good.

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The Best Links:

1. Oh Noes! It’s the Blogosphere!
2. The Original, Cringeworthy Video
3. We’re Laughing at You, Not With You
4. Would Be a Good Sitcom Theme
5. “It’s audio-visual waterboarding.”