Facebook: Viral News, Your News!

Hang it up, CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, Fox and all you other "news" sites. The Facebook News Network has arrived.And it's hot, hot hot!

From the irritatingly peppy news music to the eagle-eyed staff, whiplashing from camera angle to camera angle, the Facebook News Network brings you the news from Facebook. Who has a new friend? Who added a new video?


And incredibly importantly, hard-hitting news on what someone who you don't yet know (but you can change that!) is doing somewhere. In this groundbreaking news venture, the FNN team takes it to the wall. Yes, they dare all with "in your face" reports from comments left on walls.

FNN's got game. It's got video, too. We predict that FNN will soon be among the top, top, top items on YouTube.

And that Stephen Colbert will be jealous. Stephen, what's on your wall?

FNN: no wars, murders, financial scandals, nasty weather, missing kids or other airwaves clutter, just real people news in the ultimate crowdsourcing. It's viral, virtual, and highly viewable.

The only questions are: how long will it take for the FNN to win its first Emmy?

And most importantly of all, when will my Facebook news make it to FNN?

In other breaking news, Mashable wants to know if you should be allowed access to social networking at work. Get in on this early. Heck, Facebook it. You might wind up a star!

YouTube: Advertising for a Finnish School Shooting

Lakshmi Tatma Survives 40 Hour Surgery; Extra Limbs & Organs Removed

Tiny Lakshmi Tatma has survived a marathon 40-hour operation by 30 doctors.

Lakshmi is two years old, and has never been able to stand or walk. She's attached to what doctors call a "parasitic twin," another baby that didn't fully develop.

She has four arms, four legs, four kidneys, two stomach cavities, tangled nerves and two chest cavities. Born in a remote village in India's Bihar, the child had to be hidden when a circus tried to buy her. .

A team of 30 doctors separated two fused spines Tuesday. The surgery in Bangalore was the little girl's only chance of living a normal life.

Rub-A-Dub: Texas Man, 87 Rattlesnakes Share Tub

Yea, I know. Everyone's got a hobby. But Jackie Bibby, the "Texas Snake Man" spends his free time with rattlesnakes.

Bibby hung out in a bathtub with 87 rattlesnakes yesterday. He was fully dressed, the snakes came as they were.

Bibby's latest record-grabbing stunt took place in a clear plastic tub created for him by the Guiness world record folks. Yesterday's lounge-in (eat your heart out, Yoko), lasted for 45 minutes and broke his prior chillin' with rattlers record by 12 snakes.

Bibby didn't boogie his booty. Nope, he says that his success with fully-fanged, venomed rattlers is based on calm and slow, if any, movements. And, apparently, just plain liking rattlers.

He also holds the word record for suspending rattlesnakes from his mouth their tails. Ten of them--and Guiness says so.

Not only that, but Bibby's cuddled head first into a sleeping bag with 20 rattlesnakes. When he went in feet first, he shared the bag with 112 snakes.

Although he's got some great authentic pickup lines (hey, baby, wanna see my snake; world-record certified!), getting someone to curl up with him might put him behind the curve.

Bibby's website offers a fascinating look at his hobby and his action-packed life. A chemical dependency counselor, he's appeared in movies, and on TV. His fun stuff also includes riding rodeo bulls, hang gliding, and sky diving.

The Dublin, Texas man has been doing his snake thang for more than 30 years. He's had to be hospitalized eight times for snakebite.

I'd called that a charmed record. Why does he do it? I'll let you know after I talk with the one and only Texas Snake Man.



Photos: publicity stills, courtesy of the Texas Snake Man.

Chupacabra Unmasked As Coyote

You may remember when a Texas woman claimed to have found the head of an actual blood-sucking chupacabra, and promptly set up a business selling tee shirts marking her find.

The mystery is solved, thanks to modern science.

Turns out that her find is: just another coyote. Texas State University biologists, working from DNA samples provided by KENS-TV, celebrated Halloween by unmasking the dead critter as pure "Texas Coyote."

No one is quite sure why the body was hairless, but one thing is sure: Coyote, that Native American trickster, once again has the last laugh.

Missing Woman Case: True Crimes, A Chicago Cop & The Media

The increasingly bizarre story of a cop's missing wife continues as Stacy Peterson's sister tells Greta Van Susteren that Stacy feared her husband would kill her. Meanwhile, police used cadaver dogs to search a pond near Chicago's Clow Airport and removed guns from Sgt. Drew Peterson's home.

Missing Woman Case: The True Crimes of Bad Journalism turned the spotlight on the disappearance of young Stacy Peterson, Stacy, who's now 23, is the 53-year-old Peterson's fourth wife. His third, Kathleen Savio, drowned in a mysterious bathtub accident after Peterson became involved with Stacy, who was then 17.

Fox News has stepped up to the plate, deploying Van Susteren to the scene. Her exclusive interview with Stacy's sister, Cassandra Cales, revealed a tangled web of strange actions and comments by Peterson as Stacy's family launched a search for her.

Former Los Angeles detective Mark Furhman is also on the scene with Van Susteran. Furhman, who took a career and personal beating during the O.J. Simpson murder case, has rightfully had his public credibility boosted since O.J.'s recent Las Vegas arrest in an armed robbery case. He's now an author, radio talk show host, and analyst/commentator on crime cases.

Their interview with Cales revealed several key components, including a fight between the couple just before Stacy disappeared, and a strange late night shuffling of the family cars. Peterson, was seen watching police activities wearing a mask made from an American flag bandana, dark sunglasses,and a dark cap pulled over his forehead.

Peterson, who was giving "abandoned husband and father" type media interviews, at the same time insisted that he doesn't want to be photographed, citing privacy concerns. If you think that's inconsistent, listen to what Cales related in Van Susteran's interview. Peterson earlier said that his wife left him for another man, that she has psychiatric problems, and that she had planned to disappear "deep down" like her mother. Stacy's mother disappeared eight years ago; that case has not yet been solved.

The Chicago Tribune, recovering from the sob sister account of Peterson's reaction to his missing wife, followed the money. Peterson received close to two million dollars in insurance policies and funds from the sale of joint properties after this third wife, Kathleen Savio, died in a mysterious bathtub accident.

Stavio's life insurance paid one million dollars to the couple's sons, who lived with Peterson and Stacy while Peterson, as guardian, controlled those funds. Investigators have reopened that case.

Also curious: Stacy disappeared at a time when media coverage of the disappearance of two other young Chicago-area women was at an all-time high. With Peterson saying that Stacy left him and her children, would those disappearances have provided an additional cover for any potential discovery of another body? This case has multiple possibilities and twists, but one overwhelming reality: Stacy Peterson is missing, and her family is terrified of what the police might find.

The Illinois State Police has opened a Tip Line at 1-815-726-6377.

Missing Woman Case: The True Crimes of Bad Journalism

Get out the milk cartons, folks. Here's the poster children for missing journalism in a case that's at least a scandal, and may be a deadly crime.

Wife #4 disappears. Police re-open investigation into the death of wife #3, found dead in a bathtub after filing an order of protection against her husband.

The husband, 53-year-old Drew Peterson, is a veteran Chicago police officer. Not only do we now have a cop investigation of a cop, the 23-year-old missing woman's name is Stacy Peterson, eerily close to the infamous Laci and Scott Peterson case. That definitely makes it "made for a TV movie" fodder.

And, there's also a 30-year-difference in age that seemingly only matters at the start of the romance, when she was dangerously close to being under age. Maybe. In fact, the math of the case when you add up some numbers that this Fox News story doesn't tell you.

To get those numbers, a reader has to also find the Chicago Tribune article, which fairly screams in purple prose and lounges in lavender shades of Mickey Spillane. The Trib tells us that Peterson and wife #4 (the 17-year-old, not the dead 40-year-old in the bathtub) "met six years ago."

That would be 2001, roughly. In 2004, wife #3, Kathleen Savio, dies in bathtub incident. And, according to the Trib again, the current Peterson couple has two children, one of whom is four years old. That's a birthdate of 2003. You do the math.

But we aren't done yet. The Fox story, high up, includes a statement that Peterson isn't considered a suspect. Really? Then why trumpet the possible connections between dead wife #3 and missing wife #4?

OK, we'll grant that the combination is a natural for news coverage--unless you're writing for the Trib. Or unless you then muddy the waters with a hinted-at link to two other missing wives.

Fox News suddenly veers and slogs into a swamp: "But Stacy Peterson is the third wife to vanish in the last six months in the Chicago area, the latest in a series of mothers whose families say they would never leave their children behind.

Chicago police found a body believed to be that of missing 39-year-old Alma Mendez, a mother of three, who disappeared Sunday on a jog near a forest preserve."

So now Peterson is #3 in a series of women who've disappeared, and whose connection may be: they're wives and mothers. One of them is Lisa Stebic of Plainsville, Ill who disappeared six months ago. However, the Fox story tells us, her husband, Craig, has been named as a "person of interest" by police.

Then why drag her case, and that of Mendez, into the Peterson (Stacy) case, Fox? You creak open a door to a "wives gone missing!" macabre exhibit and then immediately slam it. That's called over-reaching to tie into other news stories, at the cost of clarity for readers.

Back to the Chicago Tribune though, which is long on sentiment, and short on up-front facts. "...
Sitting at a desk in his house Wednesday afternoon, unshaven and with bags under his eyes, Drew Peterson, 53, said his wife, Stacy, 23, called him about 9 p.m. Sunday and told him she was leaving....."Sorry, I get choked up about it," Peterson said, his voice cracking....
As the couple's two children, ages 2 and 4, scampered around the house, he talked about celebrating the couple's fourth wedding anniversary Oct. 18. "

Bring out the tissues. This is sob sister journalism.

The Trib story does have some facts, including Stacy's age and the notation that the couple married two years after they started dating. But wait! That would be (counting on fingers) in 2003, if they met six years ago.

Back to Fox, who identified wife #3 (dead in bathtub) as still Peterson's wife in 2004. Is your head spinning yet? Mine is. So was #3 his ex-wife at the time of her death? Buried deep, deep in the Trib story is some more insight into the whole numbers game. Why is the Trib more concerned with the baggy-eyed, cracking-voiced husband who also is found "chuckling softly" than with a straight-up accounting of facts?

Darned if I know. But I do know this: a woman is missing under suspicious circumstances, and between two major news sources, you still can't get the whole story.

And I call that missing journalism. Are we sure there isn't a milk carton category for that?

Note: Have you seen Stacy Peterson? If so, contact the Illinois State Police immediately.