Not the Trend of the Century
Here’s yet another complaint about the recently completed O.J. Simpson trial.
Trends Journal in Rhinebeck, N.Y., which chronicles business and social trends, in its latest newsletter argues that Americans don’t see trends coming.
Why is that?
“This is largely due to a persistently ‘off trend’ public receiving low-trend-value news from much of the media,” the publication says.
In other words, too much attention to events that don’t represent long-term trends.
Adds the newsletter: “No major trend event since the Vietnam War has tallied a fraction of the coverage that the ‘trendworthless’ O.J. Simpson trial has received.”
Mobilizing Into Action
The Pentagon has launched another rescue operation.
Actually, it’s the Pentagon Federal Credit Union, which late last week issued an emergency memorandum detailing financial assistance programs for members furloughed by the federal budget crisis.
To instill a bit of confidence, the institution added that it is “one of the world’s strongest credit unions.”
Also issuing reassuring words to federal workers and the public is the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace in Yorba Linda, which late Friday afternoon changed its phone message to remind people that as the only presidential library built and operated without taxpayer funds, it is open “today and every day.”
Last week, the library offered free admission and a gift-shop discount to federal workers who had time to kill before being called back.
Hoop Dreams
Hoping to score points in making a case that basketball is the most popular recreational sport, round ball manufacturers this month published a 10-page glossy brochure on people who shoot hoops.
Among the fun facts is that, among team sports, participation from 1987 to 1994 rose 32% to 47.3 million.
That compares to a 0.6% drop among softball payers to 30.8 million, a 13% increase in touch football players to 23 million and a 12% rise in tackle football players to 13.1 million.
Outscoring basketball in the growth department, however, is beach volleyball, which showed a 38% rise in participation to 14.2 million.
Briefly. . .
A New Hampshire ski resort, taking advantage of the upcoming election, has renamed itself the Presidentials resort and launched what it is calling a “New Hampshire Presidential campaign that will knock your socks off.” . . . The National Cable Television Assn., in describing cable television tycoon Ted Turner as chairman of its upcoming convention in Los Angeles, says, “Ted was cable before cable was cool’ ”. . . . Following a “Star Trek” management tome comes the latest entry in the pop management arena: “Winnie-the-Pooh on Problem Solving,” described as a book “in which Pooh, Piglet and friends explore how to solve problems so you can too.”
