Author Archives: Richie

What’s In a Name?

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Oil, Coal To Get New Names
Fossil Fuel Industry Launches Major Rebranding Campaign

Oil wells are a thing of the past.

Richieville News Service – WASHINGTON, D.C. 

In a major re-branding campaign aimed at countering negative public perceptions of their products, the fossil fuel industry today announced that oil and coal would be sold under new names, ones designed to highlight their “likeability” and “friendliness.”
“Oil and coal are things of the past,” said Terry Podsnap, a spokesman for Earth.Green, a fossil fuel trade organization. “Today, let me introduce you to Ollie and Carol, your energy friends.”

In addition to being the new names for oil and coal, Ollie and Carol are also the names of characters created by the same design team that came up with Wenlock and Mandville, the mascots for the 2012 London Olympics. According to press material, Ollie and Carol live in a magic organic garden at the base of an ancient redwood tree near an unspoiled wetlands in a house powered by the wings of friendly butterflies.
The public will be introduced to Ollie and Carol over the next few weeks through  print, television and Internet advertising,  YouTube videos and  Twitter posts. They will have their own Facebook page and the Disney Channel is developing an animated Ollie and Carol television program. 

Earth.Green said it hoped the re-branding effort would go a long way to repairing the damage caused by the Gulf oil spill and the recent West Virgina mine disaster. “Mountain top removal for coal mining sounds bad,” said Ms. Podsnap, “but who could be against getting Carol out from under a ton of rock? Everyone is against oil spills, but Ollie on the water sounds like fun, doesn’t it?”

The Earth.Green spokesman said if the early response to the Ollie and Carol marketing campaign was positive the trade group would move ahead with its next re-branding effort. “Say good-bye to Global Warming,” she told reporters. “And say hello to Willy Weather!”

For more Richieville humor, read the comic sci-fi novel, Rate Me Red.

I, Spy? Part II

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Facebook Creates New “Foreign Spy” Status
Vows To Keep Information Private
Better check your friends list.
Richieville News Service – PALO ALTO
Delivering what it said was another improvement in service, the social networking site Facebook today announced that its 300 million users would now be able to choose “foreign spy” as a status for their profile pages. The announcement came soon after news that at least one of the alleged members of the recently-arrested Russian spy ring had a Facebook page. 
“This is what Facebook is all about, telling the world who you are and connecting with other people just like you,” said Mindy Lammle, Facebook Vice-President for Personality Definition. “This is especially important when you’re just starting out, infiltrating a new country. It makes it so much easier to stay in touch.”
Ms. Lammle promised that thanks to new Facebook privacy controls, spies would be able to limit viewers of their profiles to “friends,” “friends of friends,” or “friends in high-level government jobs.” She said it would be easy for foreign agents to set up their profile pages, using Facebook’s automated system to search their computers and upload their address books and she added that Facebook would never share  spies’ private information, including safe house addresses, secret codes and of course, name of employer.
Although so far  it has only been alleged that Russian spies are on Facebook, Ms. Lammle said she was sure the new status option would show that agents of many countries are already on the network. “People put everything on Facebook,” she said. “Why not this?”
For more Richieville humor, read the comic sci-fi novel, Rate Me Red.