CHANNEL TALK - PCSQUEALER
Red star at night, ladies delight
It's most imaginative company, Memory Plus, has finally seen the error of its ways and recognised that advertising in the channel is rather one-sided. Only a few months ago, managing director Richard Burnett was pictured posing with a bevy of bellringers from quality rag News of the World in support of a testosterone-ridden motorcycle team. Apparently, quite a few women got very upset about an image of three buxom blondes pictured with legs akimbo over the gigantic bikes, grinning like gormless dunces. So, by way of compensation, those cheeky japesters at Memory Plus have printed this incredibly attractive picture in its monthly magazine for the ladies to enjoy. Gee, thanks. PC Squealer was also informed that underneath that big red star the little chap has much more than a handful to play with. Why the red star? Was it to stop channel chappies from feeling inadequate, perhaps?
The perfect guest
Talking of sexist claptrap, PC Squealer recently came across a game entitled The Virtual Girlfriend hosted by every man's favourite bit of fluff, Jo Guest. Jo is the woman who was famously quoted as saying when she poses in the buff, the only thing she thinks of is a bacon sandwich and a cup of tea. Good woman. Anyway, this 'game' involves various sad executives, who should be doing the month's figures, attempting to woo 'glam model' Jo via the computer by doing her housework and generally showing her a good time. If you do all this and if Jo thinks you deserve it, she'll set your mouse on fire. According to the marketing guff, this game is 'a totally original toy that appeals to fun loving males'. Or should that be brain-dead buffoons?
Student union blues
Big-hearted Big Blue has been showing its true colours by letting the moths out of its wallet and giving a nice big donation to Dublin City University. These generous techies have stumped up a whopping #1 million of (strangely enough) IBM equipment to the uni due to the increasing number of students taking up computing as their chosen subject.
Of course, PC Squealer feels it should point out to all those cynical people that any desire IBM might have to ingratiate itself with graduates who are likely to become employment fodder in the next few years is purely coincidental.
Past imperfect
Have you ever heard about the millennium bug? Apparently it's going to cause some real damage and the end of the world will be upon us if we don't work together and bond and blah blah blah. Anyway, all those manufacturers that have started churning out loads of Y2K products will find it difficult to fix one particular time machine found in a museum in Liverpool. The equatorium, a 400-year-old clock type thing, which predicts the position of the planets, will cease to function at the dawn of the new millennium as it will be unable to accept the date of 1 January 2000, just like all those computers around the world which the IT manager couldn't be bothered to fix in time. The equatorium predicts the position of the sun, moon, other planets and even eclipses through a washing up bottle and some sticky back plastic. But because the last date inscribed was 1999, it just can't function past that. And you thought stupidity was only invented in the 20th century.
Virtual therapy
If there's one Tuesday that will go down in history as the day when grown men cried, it was when poor England was pipped at the post by Argentina.
Now you can blame who you want for this, but if you feel like taking it out on someone, PC Squealer can reveal that Kim Milton Neilson, the referee of the England vs Argentina game, is contactable at the following email address: [email protected]. We're sure he would love to hear from you.
CV or not CV?
In a case of practising what you preach, Roger Barratt, chairman of PlanIt Software, the development arm of shrink-wrap specialists The Roderick Manhattan Group (RMG), has been busy promoting his company's latest release - software that promises to make the employee selection process more efficient and effective. The software 'is a methodical, simple-to-use solution that ensures every step of the recruitment process is thoroughly executed.
The end result is that better suited, better qualified staff are employed by companies,' says Barratt. Call us old fashioned, but what's wrong with an interview? Anyway, a close acquaintance of the PC Squealer newsdesk had the good fortune to be an employee of Mr Barratt. Our man on the job happily confirms that, for RMG at least, the recruitment process used to be something of a lottery. Let's just say the parting of company between employer and employee wasn't always a rare occurrence. Our man lasted precisely three months under Barratt's exacting command before being shown the door. And he wasn't the only one. Says Barratt: 'Most employers will admit to having selected the wrong employee for the job at least once in their career.' Perhaps Barrett's next project should be a program which helps employees chose the right employer.
Honey talks
PC Squealer knows it's popular but lately people have been doing anything to get a bit of free publicity. Take, for example, the chap who works for a manufacturer. His wily PR company thought that by informing us the little chap's hobby involved keeping bees then we could find some space in the column for him. Your wish is our command.
Friendly fire
Anyone with taste will be more than familiar with cartoon masterpiece The Simpsons, in which heartless corporate megalomaniac Montgomery Burns and his simpering crawly bumlick sidekick Smithers run riot throughout the town of Springfield. So isn't it odd that Microsoft chairman Bill Gates has revealed that he too has his very own new best friend? The lucky chap in question is called Warren Buffet who revealed recently that he and big bad Bill have sleepovers at his house and have even been on holiday with each other. But don't be fooled - this relationship isn't just based on fun. Warren claimed that when the friendship first blossomed, Bill took the time to sit down with him and brainwash him - sorry, teach him - all about Microsoft in just seven hours. Warren also revealed that he's helping Bill decide whether to take early retirement. Put love aside Warren and do it for your country.
In your face
It appears that PC Squealer, in its true style, has managed to upset yet more people in the industry. Now, without naming any names or even numbers - there is a clue here - to avoid upsetting those lovely people at the company not called Amateur Four, let's recant yet another story about people who obviously miss their mammies so much when they go away that they have to get down to a spot of lap dancing. It appears that at the recent The Edge Conference in San Francisco, it was understood that senior people in the training industry - you know who you are and we have the evidence to prove it - were also enjoying the sport of the dance they call lap. So the story goes the two men in question spent a whole 40 minutes behind a curtain doing whatever it is one does with a lap dancer. And PC Squealer thought there wasn't any margin in distribution.