Word: gimmicks
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...interesting question is: Why are people so interested in building a machine like Deep Blue? Obviously, IBM arranged the match as a gimmick to get publicity for its increasingly powerful computers. But why a chess match? One could understand a demonstration of technological prowess in the area of national defense, but chess...
Yankovic and Foxworthy perform in concert as well, but the Jerky Boys (one failed movie aside) thrive only on recordings. Their one unvarying gimmick: merciless prank phone calls. On their latest album (Jerky Boys 3), they ring up pizza places and massage parlors and torment people at the other end with idiotic requests or unprompted verbal abuse. To callers responding to classified ads they've placed for power tools, the Boys babble psychotically and refuse to give any information. You know the album has gone awry when you start cheering the hang...
...productions; it also represented a low-water mark for political rhetoric. Susan Molinari, in her chirpy keynote speech, sounded like a PTA president urging more money for the school gym. Even Elizabeth Dole's acclaimed "Oprah-style" turn on the convention floor was the sort of motivational-speaker gimmick that plays better in person than on the TV screen; we've seen this act in too many infomercials...
...problems he does identify, Perot will need to come up with some answers this time around. He has wavered on prospective solutions. He initially derided the balanced-budget amendment as a gimmick and then embraced it. He pressed for a substantial increase in the gas tax, then eased off it. He has sought advice from his circle of friends and advisers, but some are dismayed by the candidate's refusal to evolve, suggesting that he's like a Vegas comedian who uses the same jokes over and over, refusing to freshen...
...existence of Anonymous, who had an exemption to the Eighth Commandment. Parker now says that in February, "I warned Joe that those unequivocal statements were going to cause him trouble. It's never a good idea not to tell the truth." But Joe didn't listen--the whodunit gimmick was boosting sales--and Parker didn't insist. Instead, Parker published an item by senior editor Jonathan Alter guessing at Anonymous' identity, thus dragging the magazine into Klein's credibility gap. "In retrospect, I shouldn't have published the item. Our interests diverged at that point." Parker has apologized to Alter...