A filthy, yet apt analogy.

We hardly knew ye.

I know that journalism in America, like as a thing, is long dead, but for serious. Huh? For serious what? Why for serious this. And this. And this. But don't click on those links, because you're just going to encourage them to keep doing this. It's like feeding the squirrels. What is? I'm getting there, settle down. Every year Apple has a press conference which they call a keynote address, but really it's a press conference. And then news outlets show up and pretend that giving a giant electronics manufacturer free coverage is news.

I mean, that's not news, right? Like, the planet is on fire, the President is reckless goon, the UK is imploding and the Bahamas were recently leveled by a hurricane. That's news. Horribly depressing news, but you know, actual news. Apple revising their line of cell phones is not. It's, you know, business.

Pictured: Not news...so like what are we doing here?

We’re spiraling towards extinction,
but on the bright side you can
ger an iPhone 11 for just $699!

I guess it's one thing for tech sites to talk about it, and maybe business news can too because business reasons but it doesn't really feel like the kind of thing that should share headline space with say, our many mass shootings and climate disasters. Like, CNN, and whatever you may feel about CNN, at least they're not Fox, but anyway, CNN had an entire article about how surprisingly affordable the new iPhone is...which, that's just an ad for Apple, right? And by affordable they mean seven hundred dollars.

I mean, unless...wait, do you hate Jennifer
 Aniston? What are you, a monster?

Yes, of money. But, as the CNN article gushes, it's less than some previous models have cost. Holy shit! Also there're new iPads and Apple Watches which, like the phones, are now relatively less expensive. So what if you don't even wear watches, why not pick one up? Or two? Also, also the Apple Streaming service is only five bucks a month and sure, you already subscribe to like five of these but what's one more? You don't want to miss Jennifer Aniston's new show do you?

Sure, you could get a Galaxy, that is,
if you don't really care about having
friends to call on it. Pfftt...Galaxy...

Ok, full disclosure, I totally have an iPhone, so understand that my principled outrage only goes so far. In fact, it's sort of a comfortable hypocrisy, but then I'm not saying the stuff they make is bad...well, it's not great, I mean, a couple of my iPhones have broken on me over the years and I did get a lemon of a Macbook once, but what am I supposed to do? Not keep buying their stuff? Switch to a Windows laptop or a Galaxy phone? Like a barbarian? Where was I? Oh, right, the intersection of news media and the corporate interests that drive them.

All I'm getting at is that maybe let's all be a little more skeptical of the incestuous tangle of corporations and their constant circle jerk of cross promotion and-sorry, that was a surprisingly graphic analogy...but was it apt right? Because I think it was.

Above: an incestuous circle jerk of cross promotion.