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With the end-of-year holiday quickly approaching, it's time for agencies to show their appreciation for the gatekeepers who prevent their Very Urgent Messages from disappearing into circular-file oblivion by greasing their palms with token "assistant gifts." A Defamer operative embedded on one of the big studio lots demonstrates his gratitude by offering this review of the trinkets CAA just dispatched to the call-rolling class:

CAA kicks off the gift-giving season with the absolute shittiest digital camera that money can buy. At least I THINK it's a camera. The "Cam-Corder" (no brand, just CamCorder thank you) looks like a miniature Polaroid, and it takes pictures and video…I think. The instructions are so arcane that it's impossible to tell what the contraption actually does. I'd say that they picked them up from the going-out-of-business Good Guys on La Cienega, but there was actual thought put into this, because the CAA logo is prominently tattooed on the camera.


Once I installed the batteries, and figured out how to turn it on, I ooked through the postage-stamp sized viewfinder and snapped a shot of my office. Then, a little red light started blinking and I saw nothing. I futzed with it for a few minutes and then gave up. A few minutes ago, I decided to give it one more try, but now it looks like the battery has been totally drained.

UTA, the bar has been set.

Nice and low, apparently. If the other agencies inject just a tiny bit of thought into their gifts (you know, picking something not from the Taiwanese gray market), maybe they can jump a few places higher on the phone sheet.