Who committed the Crimes against quizzes? The quiz that appeared in Wednesday’s Times2 section of The Canberra Times — with the not-so-coincidental similarities in answers — has got even the paper’s staff scratching their heads…

  • Q1: Which private detective has been played by Richard Roundtree and Samuel L. Jacson? A: John Shaft.
  • Q2: What is the official currency of Vietnam? A: The dong.
  • Q3: Which river in Thailand that flows from north to south is altogether 335km long? A: Wang River.
  • Q4: Which member of the superhero team The X-Men shoots optic energy beams? A: Cyclops.
  • Q5: Which British musician released the album Every Picture Tells A Story in 1971? A: Rod Stewart.
  • Q6: Which US president was succeeded by Richard Nixon? A: Lyndon B. Johnson.
  • Q7: Which animated cartoon character made his first appearance in the 1940 short Knock Knock? A: Woody Woodpecker.
  • Q8: According to all four canonical gospels, during the Last Supper, Jesus foretold that which apostle would deny him three times before cockcrow? A: Peter.
  • Q9: In human anatomy, the vertebral column is also known as what? A: The spine.
  • Q10: Which American novelist wote the sci-fi novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? A: Philip K. D-ck.

The paper’s editor-at-large Jack Waterford was none the wiser in an email to Crikey this morning: “It did not escape notice here, or by some of our readers (in arrears), but I have no idea about how and why it came in.” The mystery continues…

Rudd gets mis-tweeted. Jessica Rudd, daughter of Kevin and author of Campaign Ruby has embraced Twitter wholeheartedly in recent months and often tweets her excitement and take on political news. She made an appearance in The Australian‘s Strewth this morning, after tweeting — one would assume in response to Bob Brown ripping into the Murdoch press — “The late Enoch Powell famously said, ‘for a politician to complain about the press is like a ship’s captain complaining about the sea.”

But Jessica Rudd immediately followed that tweet with another, saying: “Nowadays, with glaciers melting and sea levels rising, the captain has a point and Powell would have had to use an alternative analogy.”

Why did Strewth’s James Jeffrey fail to mention the second tweet, which quite clearly turns the first one on its side?

Kennett still lobbing Guthrie grenades. Humorous to see Jeff Kennett continuing his war on ex-Sunday Age editor Bruce Guthrie more than 15 years after their brawl first exploded. In his regular column in today’s Herald Sun, a pitch ostensibly about The Age‘s financial woes is used as cover for Jeff’s real agenda — to get back at Bruce for his March 20 Sunday Age op-ed that slammed the drive from Tullamarine airport to the city as a “blight” on Melbourne.

Eight weeks ago, Guthrie was scathing, noting that Melbourne’s gateway was a poor cousin to somewhere such as Hong Kong: “… the approaches to the place look increasingly untended. Once they had a kind of bucolic appeal; now they just look neglected. Surely we can do better. I’m not even asking for public art; in fact, I would settle for some decent landscaping on the freeway median strip and verges.”

This morning, Jeff, who did not mention his foe by name, was eager to engage: “Some weeks ago an article in The Sunday Age criticised the drive from the airport into the city. Since that article was published I have travelled that route several times, taken on board the criticism and compared the drive from the airport to the city with other similar trips I have taken around the world.”

But the ex-premier was happy to report that not only was the Tulla “well-constructed” but happily, there is also an “orderly culvert which has an increasing quantity of greenery on either side.” Once again, Bruce and his paper had failed to fulfil their apparent role as a “fierce defender and promoter of the city”.

“Jeff who?,” Guthrie retorted, when contacted by Crikey after he stepped off stage at a Sydney Writers’ Festival forum with A A Gill on the future of newspapers (they concluded there is one). “Just wait until he reads this week’s column.”

Guthrie’s book Man Bites Murdoch lays bare the bitter background to the spat, which exploded in the mid-1990s over a The Sunday Age‘s perceived anti-Jeff stance when Bruce was editor. In one famous instance, Kennett called Conrad Black’s adviser Dan Colson on his car phone after Black had moved on Fairfax CEO Bob Mansfield at a Melbourne board meeting. “You sacked the wrong man!,” Jeff bellowed. “Guthrie, you should have sacked Guthrie!” Colson received the call as he was being driven to the airport on, you guessed it, the Tullamarine Freeway. — Andrew Crook

ABC Online headline confuses ‘p-edophilia’ with ‘homosexuality’. ABC Online had a very unfortunate error yesterday morning (duplicated on its RSS feeds so it shows up wherever people take “ABC Breaking news headlines”). The headline writer has written the word “p-edophilia” where they obviously meant “homosexuality”. That much is obvious when you read the first paragraph.

Here’s the story. And I’ve attached a screenshot, if they fix it.

Here’s my tweet when I spotted it. — blogger Gabe McGrath

Petition accuses ABC of lurching to the Right

“More than 1000 people have signed an online petition complaining about the ABC’s political coverage, with many saying a tough interview by 7.30 anchor Chris Uhlmann with Greens leader Bob Brown is evidence of a lurch to the Right.” — The Australian

Veteran journalist Joseph Wershba dies

“Joseph Wershba, who as a CBS television reporter working with Edward R. Murrow revealed the story of Lt Milo Radulovich, whose dismissal from the Air Force because of his relatives’ leftist leanings became a symbol of the anti-Communist witch-hunts of the 1950s, died on Saturday at a hospital near his home in Floral Park on Long Island. He was 90.” — The New York Times

Why Twitter is a necessary tool for journalists

“A distinguished freelance journalist whose work I admire told me the other day that she is ‘not on Twitter’ adding: ‘I don’t see the point.'” — The Guardian

Kindle outsells print books on Amazon

“Amazon is selling more e-books on Amazon.com than print or hardback combined, a marker that probably could have been hit much sooner if its digital books could be read outside the Kindle platform. Then again, if that were the case, Amazon might not also be talking up the success of its $114 ad-supported Kindle, now the bestselling of the homegrown e-readers.” — Paid Content