It has been bruited about that maybe Yahoo has hired Marissa Mayer, employee #20 at Google, in order to get acquired by Google. I cannot see the sense in that as an acquisition tactic, but it has led to further speculation that Google is interested in Yahoo for its patents.

Now that makes sense! In fact, here are just four of the many valuable patents Google would acquire from Yahoo:

• US PATENT 893749039 Improving the rapidity of the embarrassment of a corporate board through non-vetting techniques

• US PATENT 989209374 Significantly depressing corporate value by the refusal of no-brainer acquisition offers through the innovative application of self-importance

• US PATENT 463874738 A new calculus of corporate value that rewards the acquisition, mishandling, and abrupt closure of genuinely innovative services with loyal user bases.

• US PATENT 784789909 Techniques for the alienation of a company user base by re-imagining customers as consumers and services as Big C Content.

(The truth is that I have a soft spot for Yahoo as one of the original engineer-led sites, and I hope Marissa can lead it back from the brink.)

Hanan Cohen points to DearMarissaMayer.com. I’m more ambitious than that; I’d substitute “Yahoo” for “Flickr” on that site.

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The DSM — the psychiatric tome that lists diagnosable (and thus billable) disorders — is being overhauled. Famously, in an earlier edition, homosexuality stopped being counted as a disease. I have some hopes that some illnesses of the Internet will be formally recognized:

Internet Conceptual Infantilization: Sufferers believe what they read on the Internet simply because it is on the Internet.

Wikiperfectionism: Sufferers engage in pitched battles over small questions to which there is no conceivable right answer. Also known (rarely) as “Disproportioniki.”

Narcissistic Hypothetical Opportunism (“Craig’s Disease”): Sufferers believe more than 50% of Craigslist Missed Connections ads apply to them, even when they refer to someone of a different body type, hair color, race, or time zone.

Blogger’s Phantasm: The unsubstantiated belief, exhibited in a writing style characterized by heightened expression, that a lot of people both read and care about your blog. It’s true, my dawgs!

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Reddit’s Timeline lets you see reddits from the past and future. This is crowd-sourced humor, and whole bunches of it are pretty damn funny. Of course, some, not so much.

Many of the posts are in jokes about Reddit — e.g., in the ’30s, someone posted “Ron Paul born – Great Depression to be ended soon?” Or in the Victorian Era: “We did it Ladies and Gentlemen! After 8 years of making our voice heard in every decent publication the empire has to offer, we did it: Arthur Conan Doyle is bringing back our hero!” But most are not directly about Reddit.

To explore it, go to Reddit and look for the column towards the right called “reddit timeline.” Click on any of the periods, or on the up and down arrows to scroll more epochs. The 1920s is a pretty good one. Also, the Year Zero, and 1558.

Actually, browsing anywhere will lead you to something funny. IN MY OPINION.

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Megan Ganz is a writer for the TV show Community that I started out not much liking until I had seen a few episodes and now sort of love. Except that it’s on “hiatus,” never a happy word in TV land. Megan is undergoing community interrogation over at Reddit, and one of the comments linked to her “meeting notes.” You should take a look.

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This photo (via Reddit) made me laugh:

(Here’s some context.)

This comment, from lerxstlifeson also at Reddit, made me laugh louder:

At my school there is a four way intersection with high foot traffic where “free hugs” people stand. One day on the opposite corner, a kid walked out with a sign that read “Premium Hugs $1”.

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Here’s my top ten list of top ten lists of top ten lists:

1. The Top Ten Top Ten Lists of All Time

2. TopTenz Miscellaneous

3. MetaCritic music lists

4. Smosh’s Top Ten Top Ten Lists of 2011

5. Top Ten 2011 Top Ten Lists about CleanTech

6. Top Ten of top ten horror movie lists

7. NYT Top Ten Top Ten Lists for 2011

8. Top Ten Top Ten Lists about Agile Management

9. Top Ten Top Ten Video Lists of 2011

10. Brand Media Strategies Top Ten Top Ten Lists

Come on, people! If just nine more of you compile top ten top ten top tens we can take it up a level!

Bonus: The media can’t get enough of top ten lists. When they run out, they write about why they write about top ten lists:

1. The New Yorker

2. Forbes

3. NPR

4. NY Times

5. Discover

6. CBS

7. Poynter

[Later that day:] I’ve removed one from the list so that there are actually ten, not eleven. Oops. (And again, later, because I am a @#$%ing moron.)

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“Hey, it’s very very very very very very nice to see you!”

“Yeah, it’s been a very very very very very very long time.”

“How’s Jan?”

“She’s very very very very great, but very very very very very very very very very busy.”

“Well, better that than bored.”

“That’s so so so so so so true.”

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You Barcelona birds don’t know how good you have it.
You give your city two stars
because once a tourist left you a crust that had some mustard on it —
Don’t eat the yellow bread, is that so hard to remember? —
and last February a pigeon bullied you aside.
You ought to come to my city some February.
Is there even a word in Spanish for slush?
Yeah, Boston would grow you a pair,
and then would shrivel them up until they make a high-pitched ting.
How you like them tiny frozen apples?
So why don’t you go back to TripAdvisor and fix your ratings
even if you have to make up a new login.
Try “A_Little_Perspective23”
or “WuzWrongDaFirstTime.”
Stoopid Barcelona birds.

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