The U.S. Army had a short list of big cities with the right mix of minorities (high), unemployment (also high), income and education levels (both low) for optimum recruiting. Among Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore, Newark, N.J., and Los Angeles; Philly had the best retail space available. Working with digital marketing shop Ignited, the Army opened a sleek retail and video-game center in north Philadelphia's massive Franklin Mills mall in September.

Here's something no one saw coming in 1789: First Amendment protections extend to some types of spam. In September, the Virginia Supreme Court vacated the 2004 conviction of Jeremy Jaynes, a notorious spammer, because the state's anti-spam law made no exceptions for political, religious or nonprofit groups. Instead, "it prohibits anonymous transmission of all unsolicited bulk e-mails," making Virginia's law "unconstitutionally overbroad," wrote Justice G. Steven Agee.

Santa's got a brand new bag of servers. The home media network may find some tech limelight this holiday season, if only by default. Since this is shaping up to be the blandest tech-shopping season in a decade - bellwether categories like Apple products, flat panel TVs, PCs and video games are absolutely bereft of major new products - home networks are a bigger deal that they might otherwise have been.

This summer's Olympics served as a test bed for emerging media of all sorts, from massive online streaming to live and VOD mobile video. In one bleeding edge mobile trial that occurred around the venue itself, Coca-Cola and Chinese media company Pioco created an unprecedented network of 1,500 Bluetooth hot spots that broadcast Coke commercials to passers-by on their cell phones.

Sadly, the debut issue of Food Network Magazine doesn't tout "Paula Deen's 137 creative ways to use government cheese!" on its premiere cover. The announcement by Hearst Corporation and Food Network that they will test-launch the new magazine - set to hit newsstands this month with a trial run of 300,000 copies and a follow-up in January - might seem to come at an odd time, what with Wall Street pushing up more daisies than House and Garden (also dead).

Don't be surprised to see homemakers and female golfers huddled en masse at your local newsstand, mourning the latest glossy casualties. As the publishing industry grapples with an economic recession and sinking ad pages (down 3.1 percent during the first half of this year compared to 2007,per the Publishers Information Bureau), it's not just big-name mags that are shaking in their boots, it's the niche pubs, too.

Which 13-year-old girl is more rebellious: the brunette in a miniskirt and 3-inch heels who lost her virginity in middle school, or the blonde wearing a long-sleeve shirt and an ankle-length dress who is freaked out by the condom demonstration in health class? Some might say the latter girl has more gall. After all, that 13-year-old keeps her arms and thighs covered in the era of kiddie thongs and Vanessa Hudgens's topless shots. She not only defies her generation's dress code - she spits in the face of societal norms.

Pity the Parents Television Council. The group, whose mission is to "ensure that children are not constantly assaulted by sex, violence and profanity on television," fulfilled its policing obligation last year by slamming the debut of The CW Television Network show Gossip Girl. The council singled out the show as its "Worst TV Show of the Week" and described the behavior of rich, designer-clad, over-sexed Upper East Side teenagers as "mind-blowingly inappropriate."

Attach your product to a recognizable enough commodity - say, a celebrity politician who's running for president - then kick back and watch the money flood in. Maybe: Not all ideas are created equal, but we do live in a capitalist democracy, so that's for you to decide. After all, the only votes that really count are those made with the almighty dollar, and marketers are hoping to enjoy some economic stimulus, Obama-style.

Think of ridicule - the blowtorch of rhetoric, the scimitar of political life - as a self-styled member of a dysfunctional family. Ridicule is the one who blasts pretension, demolishes artifice, scorches phoniness. As a family member, Ridicule would be particularly annoying. A smartmouth. A pest. Occasionally a wit. Occasionally a monster.