Twitter hashtags are (still) not news

Posted inRants
A few weeks back, I ranted a bit about Twitter hashtags being mined for shitty "news" by shitty websites. It's more than a pet peeve. Pet peeves are minor annoyances. This isn't a minor annoyance. This is a form of Internet cancer. Today, thanks to the wonders of Farking, I came across a great blog post by someone whose Tweet became the "THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!!" social media story of the day, a minor nothing that was turned into yet another misleading and false tale of Internet anger thanks to shitty news on shitty websites. You might remember a story…

Small town nitwits try to harass writer out of teaching job

Posted inRants
So here's a story that got me steamed. Two "think of the children!" nitwits, Deanna Stepp and Wendy Apple, of Middleburg, PA, are raising a stink because a high school teacher there also writes romance/erotic fantasy novels. The teacher of 33 years -- apparently well liked and respected by her students, according to a Facebook page in support of her -- writes on her own time, and does so under a pen name. But according to these two moral crusaders: “We are not questioning Mrs. Buranich’s teaching credentials. We are not even questioning her ability as a writer ... .…