”He went from being this renegade making films that were banned and an eyesore for the Chinese government, to kind of being the pet of the government.”

Michael Berry, of University of California, Santa Barbara, on Zhang Yimou, who directed the spectacular Summer Olympics opening ceremony in Beijing.

In addition I have offered to send the MAD Magazine Editor a $20.00 Circuit City Gift Card, toward the purchase of a Nintendo Wii….if he can find one!

Jim Babb, of Circuit City’s corporate Communications, apologizing to MAD magazine for pulling copies off the shelves in response to a parody of a Circuit City newspaper ad about “Sucker City.”

“Wait until Bob Garfield sees these new ads.”

AdRants, talking of an ad for Snickers, featuring ‘animals digitally tortured and forced to take on human qualities’ by agency NoS/BBDO Poland. The reference to Advertising Age critic Bob Garfield is because of his recent ‘open letter‘ to the president of another ad agency.

“More Americans died from pandemic flu in the 20th Century than died in World War I. It will happen again. Prepare now.”

PSA for the state of Ohio on its pandemic flu preparedness plan and publicizing of its website, OhioPandemicflu.gov

“At the moment the channel for reporters to use the internet is fully open.”

Beijing Olympic spokesperson Sun Weide, on the move by China to lift the blocks on several long-barred websites, that were only accessible by the media at their hotels.

“Never before in an election cycle has so much attention turned to the youth vote…”

Steve Capus, president of NBC News, on hiring the late Tim Russert’s son, Luke, to cover the Democratic National Convention this month.

“But what the clueless HR team doesn’t realize is that the manager community will find a way to shorten it for them – simply by hitting the “delete” button when they receive it.

Blog on MyRagan.com on why “HR is Clueless”

“The new Delicious is just like the old del.icio.us, only faster …”

From a blog post on Del.icio.us about the new, improved tagging and search features launched this week.

“Beard was supposed to shed her clothes and denounce the wearing of fur, but why anyone would wear fur in the summertime in Beijing is beyond me.”

John Crumpacker, in SFGate on U.S. Olympic swimmer Amanda Beard’s failed attempt at a stunt in Beijing, on behalf of PETA.

“Where is the protest against surgeon who remove big part of your brain?”

Someone going by the name of PeterH2 on the discussion page of the Wikipedia entry for the 2008 Summer Olympics, reacting to a question about the use of American English in the entry.