Happy Independence Day! I hope my American readers are celebrating the occasion by grilling the flesh of animals and drinking cool, refreshing beverages beneath the scorching sun. And I hope my non-American readers are spending the day weeping bitterly over their sad misfortune of not being Americans.

But today isn’t just the Fourth of July! Today is also Wednesday, which means it’s time for a “Snide Remarks” Classic column. We’re doing this every Wednesday this year in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of “Snide Remarks.” Today’s blast from the past is called “The Royal Treatment,” and it was originally published July 12, 2002. It’s about the Queen of England visiting a chat room. The comedy, it writes itself.

If you thought my C-grade review of “Transformers” was too harsh on the lovable, it’s-summertime-so-we’ve-all-lowered-our-expectations action flick, then you definitely will not enjoy my friend Dawn Taylor’s thorough trashing of it, which is funnier and more insightful than my review was. The part about sociopaths is especially good.

The Oregonian ran a great story on Sunday about a local woman who was sued, harassed, and stalked by the RIAA for allegedly illegally downloading music — and now she’s suing them back for the two years of harassment they caused her.

Tanya Andersen is her name, and when the Recording Industry Association of America accused her in 2005 of having downloaded thousands of songs, she responded, quite truthfully, that she hadn’t downloaded any songs. She didn’t even know how. She still belonged to a CD mail-order club, for crying out loud.

She offered to let the RIAA inspect her computer, which would have settled the matter then and there. The RIAA refused, telling her the only way to end the case was to pay them thousands of dollars.

Continue reading…

Patriotism sometimes makes people do crazy things, like release movies on a Tuesday instead of Friday. In order to take advantage of the Fourth of the July holiday, the Hollywood gods have blessed us with two new releases today: “Transformers” and “License to Wed.”

One of the most anticipated films in a summer full of anticipated films,“Transformers” will probably do very well with its target audience: people who are already huge fans of the old cartoon series and the toys it was based on. Without that context, it’s a fairly middling action-adventure movie, a little dumber and not as entertaining as some.

If “Transformers” isn’t your thing, then I recommend as an alternative that you pound a railroad spike into your head — anything to avoid seeing “License to Wed,” which is as big a pile of poo as we’ve seen all year.

This week’s special Tuesday edition of “In the Dark” has been delivered to subscribers (one of which you should be!). The podcast version is here. Do enjoy.

We now return you to your regular pre-holiday schedule of not doing any work.