34 Feared Dead After Launch of London Olympic Logo
At least 34 people are known to have died, with that number set to rise by nightfall, after the disastrous launch of the new Olympic logo. Although the online animated version of the logo was removed after causing epileptic seizures in a number of viewers, it was only as the day went on that it became clear that the static version on posters also posed health problems for vulnerable members of the public, some of whom have burst in a fit of apoplexy.
One woman, whose stomach remains were found scattered over Gloucester and parts of Hereford, was known to have exploded in rage at breakfast time over her husband and a cleaner, while a pub full of victims detonated in Northampton after watching The Six O'Clock News and getting really annoyed.
'This has got to be stopped,' said one publican. 'People are bursting willy-nilly.' 'It's like that scene in Alien,' said a local, 'but with sloppy design being the cause of rupture rather than an interplanetary parasite.' 'I fought in the Falklands,' said a third, 'and once saw a pile of Argentinian legs which I then bayoneted just to be on the safe side. But nothing has prepared me for the full horror of this contemporary design. The people who came up with this should be taken outside and shot.'
Channel 4 refuses to back down over plan to show Olympic logo
The head of Channel 4 refused point-blank to yield to requests from medical groups, the Church of England, Corin Redgrave, delegates at the G8 Summit and a superstar pressure-group consisting of Bono and Julie Walters not to show the animated Olympic 2012 logo on Channel 4 tonight at 9 o'clock.
The planned transmission, which is believed to involve broadcasting the logo constantly for an hour, will go ahead, despite warnings that it would result in hundreds of thousands of people bursting so hard that they could cause billions of pounds' worth of damage.
'I understand that people are bursting all over the place, but mostly from their stomach,' said a Channel 4 spokesman. 'But we've also got to respect the fact that showing the logo is in the public interest.'
When asked: 'Why is it in the public interest?', he responded: 'Because when we said we were going to show it, it caused a huge public row that got reported in the newspapers bought by people. Which now makes it in the public interest. So we have no alternative but to show it. We'd love not to show it, but there's no way we can do that now. D'you see?'
Another spokesman, who asked not to be named, said: 'Epileptics are funny, aren't they?' The way they wiggle about.'
For other London Olympic logo stories, go online, where, for one day only, half the internet is devoted to coverage. Most popular stories so far are:
1) Big Brother contestant ejected after calling housemate 'a London Olympic logo'.
2) Energy produced by stomachs bursting in apoplexy makes massive London Olympics logos 'a viable source of alternative energy worth having a debate about,' says Peter Hain.
And:
3) Plans by London Olympic planners to replace logo with a graphic drawing of a burst stomach 'an improvement' say protesters, but it 'would be a lot better' if it also featured detailed photographs of logo designers after they had been taken out and shot.
Armando Iannucci
Sunday June 10, 2007
The Observer
