For your viewing pleasure... 5:06 is particularly entertaining.

Have a suggestion for the Friday Funny? Email the RRJ blog editor. 

October 25 will no doubt go down in history — not because of a likely shift to the right in Toronto — but, obviously, because it's the first day of production for the Winter 2011 issue of the Ryerson Review of Journalism. 

We asked the Twitterverse for some guidance as we head into the next busy/ulcer-inducing/fun/terrible/sleepless three weeks. Here's what we heard. 

"Bring a pillow to the mag lab. You may want to cry at some point. It's okay. Let it all out. Then get back to work." Thanks, @myohmy

"Wear Depends" (?) Er, thanks @alexhunnings. We'll file that under "inside jokes." 

"Just try not to kill each other" Sure, we'll try @mawilson

"coffee. pencils. sleep. reminder there's life out there." Wise words, @roundsletters

"Wisdom from carpentry: "Measure twice, cut once." From CBC's Dead Dog Café: Stay Calm, Be Brave, Wait for the signs" Very true, @thismagazine

This seems fitting.

The journalism world has been all a flutter this week discussing some of the most heinous crimes in Canadian history: the Russell Williams murders. At issue is how to deal with publishing and broadcasting details in an era of instant communication. Reporters have been live-tweeting nearly every disturbing element of the case (using hashtag #colrw), raising questions amongst journalists and citizens alike about how much is too much. On Tuesday, when the case turned from the shocking but comparatively tame underwear fetishism to the murders of Cpl. Marie-France Comeau and Jessica Lloyd, some had had enough. "If you're live-tweeting the #colrw trial, you're unfollowed. Sorry, but horror-show stenography isn't why I'm on twitter," tweeted Maclean's columnist Andrew Potter. His colleague, Scott Feschuk, soon followed suit: "What's the purpose of so much #colrw coverage? What in the public interest is being served by it?" Questions were also being raised about how to report on the subject in the dailies—should the papers print the photos of Williams in women's lingerie, and if so where? John Cruickshank, publisher of Toronto Star said the paper's cover—two juxtaposing photos, one of a lingerie-clad Williams, the other of him in full Colonel apparel, with the headline "A depraved double life"—was necessary to tell "a story we shouldn't turn our heads from."

The Globe and Mail wouldn't strike most people as a Rob Ford type of newspaper, but the publication has cut ties with columnist Stephen Marche following Flabbergate, or, the column in which he theorized Ford was popular for being fat (I would normally link to that, but the Globe pulled the article from its website following enormous backlash. Marche, only two months into his freelance contribution to the paper, told OpenFile's Craig Silverman that he was not informed why the article was pulled from the site and that editors never expressed any concern about the article's content (the piece, he adds, was submitted two days early). But, he was told that he no longer has a column in the paper.

What's this? More supposed evidence that print isn't dead? This week, a British study claimed to show there is no correlation between newspaper sales and hits on the publications website—as in, when hits go up, newspaper circulation doesn't necessarily go down. "Indeed, the opposite case could be argued: that newspapers that do well on the web also do better in print… Understandably worried traditional journalists should know that the internet is not a threat," says Jim Chisholm, analyst and author of the study. Chisholm says it boils down to loyalty, and that readers are going to the sites as well as reading the papers. Not surprisingly, he does not go into great detail about why circulation is actual dropping if it's not because of that darned internet.

Live online coverage of everything from Question Period to the Academy Awards is rampant, especially on Twitter. So what’s next on the instantaneous coverage docket? Court reporting, of course. 

Last Thursday, Ontario Supreme Court justice Robert Scott agreed to allow journalists to bring electronic devices, including BlackBerrys and laptops, to former-Colonel Russell Williams’s sentencing this week. Journalists will be tweeting, blogging and covering the story live from the Belleville, Ontario courtroom. This apparent first is a coup for media access to court proceedings, but it’s also an important test-run for future cases. 

Reporters learning how to negotiate this new territory can turn to a recent feature in The New York Times, which details reporters’ experience using Twitter to cover a murder trial in Connecticut. The article discusses the difficulties of self-editing, the lack of an vetting system to ensure accuracy, the judgement calls about what gruesome details to share solo, and the legality of court reporting in 140 characters.

The Times article provides a snapshot of the decision making journalists will face at this week’s hearing, despite the fact we are unlikely to see live-coverage of a jury-trial anytime soon in Canada (because we do not sequester our juries from the start of a trial like the U.S., it is likely a judge would deem live-coverage too detailed to avoid influencing the outcome). Although electronic devices will likely remain in the same legal grey area as recording a proceeding—to be determined on a case-by-case basis by the judge—how journalists handle Williams’s high-profile sentencing is liable to set the tone for future decisions. If their coverage is deemed responsible and valuable, the media are more likely to gain such unprecedented privileges again in the future. This apparent first could create a much more open court experience than Canadian journalists have historically enjoyed. 

The CEO of the company that owns The New York Times announced in Hamburg last week that the newspaper's website will adopt a "first click free" strategy, which will allow some free access to content in spite of an upcoming paywall. At the World Editor's Forum in Hamburg last week, Janet Robinson said readers will have access to a set number of free articles a month. Details about prices and subscription packages for print and online will be announced later this year. 

Toronto's soon to be ex-mayor railed on news outlets Tuesday at the Democracy and Journalism lecture hosted by the Canadian Journalism Foundation. David Miller said there is an increasing tendency by the media to report on the “trivial” and “titillating” at the expense of “important” and “relevant” news. Among the causes, he said, is the need to fill the 24-hour news cycle, and an interest in personality and trivia.  The trend, he says, is threatening the quality of public debate.

The Toronto Star subscribers will soon be getting an American bonus with their papers.

Effective this Sunday, a 16-page international weekly version of the New York Times, including the Canadian version of the New York Times Book Review, will be included in the Sunday Star. 

The section will look just like the Times newspaper—that is, with the original layout and typography—and will include features and commentary on everything from world affairs to social trends. And yes, crossword lovers, the famous NYT word game will be included, too. 

The book review will be a 12-page tabloid abridged from the New York Times Book review. The Star's current book review will continue to run on Sundays.

Of course, there's no such thing as a free lunch. The extras will come, no charge, in the issues of Sunday Star until November 21. Then subscribers will have to pay $1 a week. The single issue cost will also go up by $1.

Readers have to opt-in, which may not be an easy sell, though the paper's clearly banking on readers warming up to the idea in the next month. The Star has set up an aggressive ad campaign to get the word out, including 15- and 30-second TV spots on Global Ontario, CP24, Omni Television, CBC, CFTO and at Raptors and Leafs games at the Air Canada Centre, as well as, of course, newspaper ads. 

Guys! Guys! Jetpacks are finally here! And the LAPD has already invested in thousands, despite that costing about a billion dollars!

I particularly enjoy the part where they gloss over their extreme stupidity with a bad joke. Read Craig Silverman's article with the whole story here.

Got a suggestion for the Friday Funny? Email the RRJ blog editor.

Hey all, did you know The Globe and Mail launched its redesign on Friday? Of course you did—after months of hype and anticipation, the national newspaper's print and online redesign went public (as well as their microsite, Canada: Our Time To Lead). But after checking out both the print and web versions, it's actually not that stupid of a question. Sure, there's the glossy paper, all-colour pages and a slightly smaller size, but the paper or the site really didn't seem that different. Some obvious changes, yes, but when it was touted as "the most significant redesign" in its 166-year history, I was expecting something more dramatic than a re-jig of the homepage and some fancy paper. What about you?

Lessons in cover letter writing: A copy of Hunter S. Thompson's (pre-fame) cover letter for a position with the Vancouver Sun is making the Internet rounds this week. Highlights include: "most of my experience has been in sports writing, but I can write anything from warmongering propaganda to learned book reviews" and "I can work 25 hours a day."

Algonquin College has launched gojournalism.ca, a new journalism site offering what it calls "community-powered reporting." Through the project, the site says "the public can commission and participate with journalists to do reporting on important and perhaps overlooked topics." Journalists can also pitch stories they hope could be funded by the public or mainstream news organizations. Check out their video for more on the project.

GoJournalism from Joe Banks on Vimeo.

Daily newspapers are not dead yet, apparently.

That's the news coming out of the NADbank (Newspaper Audience Databank)'s Fall 2009/Spring 2010 readership study released today. The organization collected newspaper readership data from the million-plus markets—Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa-Gatineau, Calgary, Edmonton and Halifax—and concluded that "daily newspapers continue to be a vital source of news, information and entertainment in seven of Canada's largest and most competitive markets." The study also includes readership stats from 31 Canadian daily newspapers. 

On the whole, the results are positive. At least three quarters of adults in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa-Gatineau and Calgary read a printed or online edition of a daily newspaper each week. And while you might assume the majority are reading newspaper content online, an average of less than 25 percent of newspaper readers—and as low as 5 percent, in the case of the Toronto Sun—are visiting Canadian newspaper websites. 

As is the case with the majority of contemporary polls, though, you have ask—were any cellphones called? The missing column in these stats is the average age of those polled. Just sayin'. 

Hey there blog post readers. I'm Wendy Gillis. As regular readers know, each week we choose a (funny) theme and bring you all kinds of stories (or, usually just one) based on that theme. This week: favourite This American Life journalists making it into the annals of pop culture history. Act One: Ira Glass on The Simpsons.