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You thought it had been settled, didn't you?

You've been practicing the new pronunciation (or the old one).

And now you're going to have to think again.

Recently, the White House very presciently decided to open its own non-purple Tumblr account. It took the occasion to declare with seeming finality that GIFs -- those very files that so many people find funny -- are hard, not soft.

Hard as in hard "g." Gif like "gift." Not like "jiffy."

Some giffers fell in line. Now they will have second thoughts. For the … Read more

What can I tell you about men that you don't already know?

They're ungracious, semi-literate buffoons whose ability to lift even one buttock from the couch is dependent only on the urgency of their bodily needs.

Men are insensitive, unfeeling, gross, dirty, and smell not unlike your garbage disposal. They eat food with the delicate air of a depressed rhinoceros.

These are not my opinions -- though a lifetime of research suggests that they may have some validity. These are the expressions offered by a Samsung ad for its Evolution TV Kit.

You can see that it took … Read more

We like to give advice to the less perfect here, principally because the perfect tend not to feel they need advice.

When it comes to those who rob, pilfer, or otherwise break the law, we tend to suggest that they don't taunt the police. Another suggestion is to turn off your phone.

This latter suggestion might have been useful for two men who stand accused of taking things that weren't theirs from a car.

Police in Fresno, Calif., say that a 911 operator received a call. No one was on the other end.

However, the dispatcher decided to keep listening and then, as KJRH-TV reports, voices were heard.… Read more

I am drawn to pain like Einstein to thought.

So when I heard that Yahoo had allegedly bought Tumblr for $1.1 billion, there was only one thing to do. (Editors' note: Shortly after this story was published, Yahoo and Tumblr officially announced the acquisition.)

Wrap myself in foil, log on to Tumblr and survey the posts tagged "Yahoo."

I tried to let my eyes waft at random in the hope of finding fair balance or at least something more than purple haze.

The first thing I saw was a post from someone called "world-peace-not-war." I … Read more

Congress is a dog that won't go for a walk.

We can tug at its leash as hard as we want, but it sits in the middle of the sidewalk, barking a defiant "no." It's not a purposeful no. It's just a refusal for the sake of it, couched in principle.

Then along comes America's most ambitious politician.

No, it's not Paul Ryan or Elizabeth Warren. It's Larry Page.

The man who is Google stood at last week's I/O 2013 conference and made his own types believe that he was … Read more

Life becomes more meaningful when someone from a long way away reflects your own thoughts.

It makes you feel less alone, less forlorn on your island of one.

I was, therefore, lifted to heights previously unimagined on hearing that the head of Saudi Arabia's religious police has declared that Twitter is an appalling waste of time, mind, and soul.

Actually, it's worse than that.

As the BBC reports, Sheikh Abdul Latif Abdul Aziz al-Sheikh mused that anyone who uses Twitter "has lost this world and his afterlife."

It may well be that the Sheikh's biggest … Read more

It's a natural instinct to resist if someone tries to steal something out of your hand.

In Las Vegas on Thursday afternoon, that instinct might have cost a 15-year-old boy his life.

As the Las Vegas Sun reports, Marcos Vincente Arenas was walking down the street, holding an iPad. … Read more

It has been established many times that relationships are complicated.

You can be dating a self-described humanitarian who ends up treating you like a farm animal. You can believe that your liaison is anything but dangerous, and then you discover a casual faithlessness that assaults your craw.

This seems to happen even in the case of Netflix use.

If you really love the one you're with, you'll wait to watch a TV show that's in your Netflix queue, so that you can watch it curled up in beautiful unison.

Research from Netflix suggests, however, that more than … Read more

The past is a cockroach.

It never truly goes away. It simply makes more copies of itself, each a little different from the last.

How quaint, though, of Qantas to think that its fliers should read a book.

No, not a book on some fancy machine. A paper book, with a cover and a booky smell, given to you if you're one of its fancy passengers.

These are, allegedly, no ordinary books. As Ad Age reports, Qantas claims they are "bespoke." Yes, like a hunting jacket.

The company has teamed with publishing house Hachette to offer high-fliers … Read more