This Week in Legitimate Mainstream News from a Highly Credible Source

Lord President Trump Invades Canada, Allied Powers Declare War on America

This morning American panzer divisions crossed the Canadian frontier, laying waste to their pathetic wall-free border and striking deep into the poutine and hockey resources beyond. This is the latest in a string of fascist disasters since the election of the New York businessmen, and is expected to visit the same disaster and misery on you, the common loser person who must be spoon-fed correct opinions. What were you thinking when you elected this guy? Why did you ignore all the warnings from Soros and the Republican establishment and street criminals?

In a speech following the attack our Supreme Ruling Emperor, a man who was once declared "The Best Sex Ever" by a bikini model, called our soon to be subjugated northern neighbor "A total loser country, can't defend itself" and "low energy, total failure." In response, the forces of NATO have declared war on the GrossTrumpland, proving that it made sense to allow this bizarre Cold War relic to continue to exist for some reason.

Our unbiased ten-part examination, starting Monday.

Stock Market Crashes, Free Trade Disaster

Printing worthless money and allowing jobs to leave for foreign shores is simple good sense. Because of God King Trump this wise counsel was thrown out the window and now we're reaping the foul harvest. The Dow Jones Index opened at 34 and was somehow deep in the negatives by closing. This disaster left wealthy bastards slightly uncomfortable and will, presumably, impact you, the chattel serf. Why did you vote for this guy? If only a bunch of satirical articles in a formerly respected newspaper had been written but alas, that was not the case.

More Cold Weather, Trump Responsible

Winter sure is hanging around and it's obvious where to point the finger: a man from New York who owns numerous golf courses and as such caused irreparable damage to the climate of God's Green Earth. Trust me, folks, it's that darn Trump. Yup, you're darn tooting. It now appears likely that most of the planetary healing caused by the election of Obama has been undone and a second ice age and/or global warming meltdown is now inevitable. Why couldn't the Boston Onion raise the alarm eighteen months ago? Well, they didn't, we're screwed.  

I have a four year degree in journalism.

Your Favorite Sports Team Sucks

Looks like it's going to be a long year for your favorite sports team, a team that finds itself lacking talented veterans as well as promising young players. Instead, it's all scrubs. Lots of losing awaits, maybe even in the Big Game, and your guys won't even get a high draft pick because the Trump Sports Law gave all of those to whatever the New York team is. Unless that's your favorite team, then please pretend they're going to Omaha's squadron or whatever. Trump ruined it, vote for anyone else.

Obituaries

All of the following people died because of President Donald Trump...

EastAsia has always been our ally...

Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.

News You Can't Use: Rise of the Machine Reporters

Are we entering an age of mechanized reporting, where the three corporations that own everything simply use sophisticated, or, let's be honest, not especially sophisticated devices to report the news of the world? This would remove the always annoying possibility of human error, where the biological resource says something that runs contrary to the profit interests or Right Think requirements. Besides, think of the productivity. We will replace flesh, which is weak, with steel, which is strong. We'll replace the human brain, which is all gooey and gross, with algorithms that are neat and clean.

A few minutes after a minor earthquake hit Southern California on Monday morning, the Los Angeles Times featured an article about the event on its website, with help from a computer algorithm written by one of the paper's developers.

Well, there is still a human element. I mean, someone must write and maintain those codes, right? Some jobs will still remain. Stop worrying.

Entire companies, such as Narrative Science (business news) and Automated Insights (sports), have business models built around the idea of mechanised journalism.

It seems hard to believe that a computer could have the passion, empathy and deep love of humanity to write a "More Lay-Offs Expected After Algorithms Replace Workers" or "Yellow Beats Green" story. I just can't accept it.

Next you'll tell me that those Penthouse Forum letters aren't entirely legitimate.

Having spent some years as a local news reporter, I can attest that slapping together brief, factual accounts of things like homicides, earthquakes, and fires is essentially a game of Mad Libs that might as well be done by a machine.

Let's try it.

In a tragic turn of events a [number] magnitude quake hit [location]. There's, like, rubble and [additional noun related to ruin/death] everywhere. [Noun] estimates that at least [number] human lives have been lost. Our thoughts and [plural noun] are with the victims.

"Quakebot neatly illustrates the present limitations of automated journalism," he writes. "It can't assess the damage on the ground, can't interview experts, and can't discern the relative newsworthiness of various aspects of the story."

We all know the average reporter is an expert at assessing damage, as in "saying that ethnic slur on the air is going to damage my career A LOT" and so on.

And they're much much more meticulous about fact checking and accuracy. Ha ha, just seeing if you were paying attention.

They gave a developer one day to come up with GUARBOT, which they then assigned to write an article about the health-food staple quinoa.

If robots took over the health-zealot arena would anyone even notice? "Meat bad...eating disgusting vegetables makes me morally superior...bleep...bleep...I'm so much better than the rest of the population...beep...you're a murderer...buzz...

Here's what their electronic partner came up with:

"The crime-ridden family of quinoa has taken US by storm this month. According to Peru, New York has confirmed that quinoa is more story than anything else they've ever seen. Quotes from top Yotam Ottolenghi eaters suggest that "crop" is currently clear top, possibly more than ground black pepper. Experts say both Salt and University need to traditionally grow to strengthen a common solution. Finally, it is worth slightly rattling that this article was peeled until it made sense."

This is more story than anything I've ever seen, way more story than I could even handle.

The idea of having computers do the rote work that used to be assigned to cub reporters certainly has its allure.

Think of the entry level positions we could destroy, making it impossible for recent graduates to gain experience! Aw, yeah!

"Surely we should just let computers do the work, while humans get on with more investigative and analytical pieces?"

I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

Meet the new intern.

Of course the journalists who are writing investigative and analytical pieces probably cut their chops working on the kind of rote articles that GUARBOT and Quakebot are now tackling.

Yeah, there is that. Oh well, can't mourn forever. 

And don't think it's just reporters whose livelihood is in danger, either. It's only a matter of time before their editors will feel the machine's icy gaze, as well.

Could a machine be programmed to yell about the lack of good Spiderman pictures? Dangerous ideas, these.

Hal, I'd like to do an investigative think-piece on pod bay doors and the debate over whether they should be opened or closed.

"It's full of editorials!"

I, for one, will not welcome our new robot overlords.

So, those Ant People got to you, too?


Komment Korner

Just lost one --400chrs probably

I wish the BBC would consider holding open one general blog with higher character limits, enabling a discussion beyond what's possible here.

I ignore and GO BACK one page --usually works.


Check Out My Books!

Aaron Zehner is the author of "Posts from the Underground," now available in paperback and e-book. Read a free excerpt here.

His first novel The Foolchild Invention is also available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.