Downside of condoms: feeling. Upside of condoms: they prevent the Holocaust.

Guys, he was just arrested barely two weeks ago for punching a prostitute he hired (according to the cops), after the hooker tried to bite his tongue off. Is now really the time to go bragging to the press about how many people your imitation of him is bringing into your Brooklyn and Rockville Centre churched?

Bored and feeling like watching some 'Rebel Sport Super' players from New Zealand switch shirts with each other, in slow motion? Well, here you go. No, I have no idea what 'Rebel Sport Super' is.

No idea why they went to all this trouble—they spoofed Die Hard and 24 as well—but let's be glad they did, because not much real news is happening on this religion-tainted Friday. [Smooth Originals via Adfreak]

In your finally Friday media column: the New York Times "eats crow" (funny joke LOL), the Newseum wins, ASME loses, and police charge Fox with being annoying:

The Daily Beast, Tina Brown's online journalism venture, has decided to sully itself by accepting money from a company in exchange for displaying various sales pitches for said company on its pages. Is nothing sacred?

The fake front page story in Thursday's Los Angeles Times was a PR disaster; staffers are signing a petition calling it "embarrassing and demoralizing." Naturally, then, management is planning a sequel.

There's really nothing we can think of that the LA Times would not do to make a buck, right now. They will inevitably sink ever lower! Too bad, since today's front page is verrrrrrrry low.

Nobody would be surprised if skeevy American Apparel boss Dov Charney and nebbishy, schoolgirl-stroking Woody Allen turned out to be the same person. So naturally they're in court, accusing each other of the same things.

Bloomberg Spends $3 Million on TV Ads in Mayoral Race [NYT]
Related: Mayor Mike's New Spanish Language Phrasebook [Cityfile]

All the world's "money" is now merely decorative, its value determined totally by bulk weight, like hay. And since currency is now cheaper than ink, it's a perfect advertising medium!

In your swashbuckling Wednesday media column: XXL-Giant feud update, NPR infighting, nobody's scared of ASME, the Boston Globe is mad, son, and dead goats save newspapers:

• To celebrate 1,000 episodes (and 35,892 sound effects), CNBC's resident buffoon, Jim Cramer, rang the opening bell of the NYSE today. [CNBC]
• Sales of romance novels are on the rise, since in times like these, we all just want to indulge in happy endings. Or something along those lines. [NYT]
• Why is the New York Times Co. frantically looking to cut costs at the Boston Globe? For one thing, it's on track to lose $85 million in 2009. [NYO, Portfolio]
• It's hard getting people to pay for newspaper content they now get for free. Let Coke guide you, Arthur Sulzberger Jr.: "Coca-Cola took tap water, filtered it and called it Dasani, and makes millions of dollars a year." [NYT]
• Magazines are blurring the line between editorial and advertising by putting ads on the cover. If they don't, they go bust. Rock, meet hard place. [NYT]

Burger King's SubservientChicken.com: Five years old, and still doing stuff in a chicken outfit.

Here we have, you know, big ass butts, pimping food to children. Which is totally wrong, which is, of course, the whole point, because SO COOL ad agency Crispin Porter Bogusky, the inventors of all the weird Burger King ad shit, did this ad, and they just love doing things that people will say is too weird and also wrong, because it generates "Buzz," just like Midtown Manhattan. The point is Sir Mix-a-Lot is teaching obesity and sexuality to your kids and you're really okay with that, deep down, because you love Whoppers.

Whoa now, magazines are fighting dirty! Advertising is scarce. Magazines have that hungry look. The rules are gone. So one title (Update: or someone pretending to be) is telling advertisers a competitor's folding. HARDCORE!

Since you were wondering, here's an update on douchebag ad man and former CNBC host Donny Deutsch's love life: that other guy's wife is now Donny's girlfriend, okay.

Edwina Pearce, a spokeswoman for the Cancer Council Victoria, which produced the ad in Australia, said the boy, whom she identified only as Alexander, shed real tears.

The death of advertising euphemism strikes again. Embarrassingly Victorian demure ads are still preferable to in-your-face vagina-throwing (in this context). The literal translation of these metaphors: "Cut Your Pussy Bush, With Schick." [via Adfreak]