After we wrote about Uber's weekend stupendous, wintry price-gouge-athon, a reader in otherwise lovely Los Angeles left a transit horror story of her own. Here's the brief tale of one woman's very expensive, very short trip to Hollywood.

Copied and pasted, in its entirety:

While many people's counter-arguments focused on ill weather and the fact you can take the NY subway for $2.50, I live Southern California where neither of these factors were an issue. This past Saturday, I booked Uber (with no clear warning that surge pricing was in effect until I received the receipt) to take us just 14 miles (it's actually 12 miles, but our driver took us the long way, of course). The trip cost an outrageous $357.

It wasn't snowing; it wasn't raining; it wasn't New Year's Eve. It just happened to be 7pm—not 9pm where most people are prime to go out nor 2am when bars are closing. There was absolutely no excuse whatsoever to be charged the surge price—not even their "supply and demand" cop-out justification, which falls short in this instance. On a clear night with near-perfect weather and at least 10 Uber vehicles within my proximity at the time of the reservation, there was plenty of "supply."

I e-mailed Uber support 4 times and still haven't received a response. Then I went on Uber support and noticed they marked my case as "solved," even though nobody had gotten in touch with me.

I've always been an avid Uber user, but with non-existent customer support and a lack of transparency, I truly believe they have more issues than meets the eye. When filing for a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, I noticed there are many complaints against Uber for these issues. The constant uproar on their social media pages complaining about the price surge, not receiving receipts, stonewalling customer support, marking cases as "solved," and the fact that this business doesn't even have a phone number, raises many eyebrows.

Uber is so deeply and cowardly rooted in its "supply and demand" key messaging, that they use it as a crutch when under fire—whether it's with the media or with the public. Which I guess, shouldn't be a surprise, given Uber CEO Travis Kalanick was once quoted saying "Make sure these writers don't come away thinking we are responsible when things do go bad...for whatever reason these writers are starting to think we are somewhat liable for these incidents that aren't even real in the first place," in an accidental e-mail that included the press. Oh, they're real alright, buddy.

Uber has been a PR nightmare from day one. Kalanick, go back to the drawing board and educate yourself on how to run a legitimate business. I'm sure accountability and social responsibility are covered in Chapter One.

Our reader here isn't the only one with an unexpectedly pricy ride through California:

It's been 3 hours. Any updates on reversing your outrageous charges that I didn't approve? @travisk @Uber_LA

— your favorite (@sexysexyaha) December 16, 2013

Remember: the free market is infallible.

While performing her hit song "Roar" at the NRJ Music Awards in Cannes on Saturday, Katy Perry suffered a devastating lip-sync malfunction.

After her mouth was unable to match the backing track creating an awkwardly long delay, the show's host stepped in and pulled the plug on the performance.

"I’m sorry to stop all your energy — I prefer you to be the best," he said, before asking Perry if she wanted to go again from the top.

Perry agreed, except that the second time around there was no backing track at all, forcing the singer to say fuck it, we'll do it live.

After footage of the incident went viral today, the show's producers released a statement claiming Perry was always supposed to sing live, but a "technical problem" led to the playing of a "bad soundtrack." Sure.

Here is the full performance, including the lip-synching fiasco and the failed recovery attempt:

I hate to be "that guy linking to some infographic," but here is a great infographic showing just how minuscule your salary is in relation to America's top earners, and why that Communist Manifesto book sold so many copies, despite mixed reviews.

60 Minutes, CBS News’ hour-long Sunday newsmagazine, had a good run during its 45 year history, during which its target cohort had kids and retired to Florida. But as the last month indicates—Benghazi! Amazon drones! NSA!—it’s time for the glossy production to clean house. Or, more likely, die.

To recap: On Sunday 60 Minutes aired an inside look at the NSA, whose leaders and employees were depicted by host John Miller as wronged victims of their old colleague, the leaker Edward Snowden. The report was transparently flawed: Miller is a former deputy for the Director of National Intelligence; interviews with NSA employees were monitored by dozens of agency minders; and producers neglected to interview a single NSA critic. It was like watching the agency play T-Ball, with CBS’ equipment, and Miller narrating the game as if it were the World Series.

And CBS needed a home run. Earlier this month, CBS aired a credulous interview with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who used the segment to unveil his grand plan to have unmanned octocopters deliver merchandise. The plan is preposterous—it would send whirring blades, piloted by GPS only, into residential areas—and currently illegal under FAA guidelines. But Amazon could not have asked for a better advertisement: A glowing portrait on one of the few broadcast shows that purportedly speaks truth to power.

Yet that same truth-speaking has troubled the show, too. In early November host Lara Logan was forced to retract a marquee scoop she’d delivered a week prior—an exclusive interview with “Morgan Jones,” the pseudonym of a British military contractor named Dylan Davies who alleged lax security standards at the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, which came under attack in September 2012. Davies had lied—he had never alighted the consulate; he had never, as he claimed, killed a terrorist with his own bare hands. Logan and her producer were forced to go on leave (and are scheduled to return early next year).

60 Minutes is a strange show in today’s media market. It’s the most-watched show in the history of television, yet is subsidized almost entirely by advertising aimed at retirees. And despite its archive of high-profile snafus, it enjoys a permanent Important Organ of Journalism status. It’s an even stranger show within the confines of CBS, where 60 Minutes producers have long operated out of their own special silo, away from the rest of CBS News. They even have their own Midtown studio, across the street from the news division’s headquarters.

Creating a massive broadcast success out of a tiny bubble is a high-wire act, though, and 60 Minutes keeps on tumbling down. That’s one reason Dylan Davies managed to trick the show’s producers: They never bothered to ask their CBS News colleagues with better government intelligence sources to vet his story. That might also be why it never occurred to Logan to disclose that her husband spread military propaganda during the Iraq War. Who was going to tell her otherwise?

60 Minutes has produced fantastic journalism, won hundreds of well-deserved awards, and otherwise worked very hard to create a space for serious journalism in a medium that rewards maximum vapidness. But those accomplishments can only be described in the past tense. Nothing is forever. It’s time to tear it down and build something new.

Bad news for Canada's most famous person: Daniel Dale, the Toronto Star reporter who Rob Ford accused of being a pedophile during a recent interview, has rejected the Toronto mayor's apology and is proceeding with a defamation lawsuit.

"I never called Mr. Dale a pedophile," Ford said to Toronto's city council on Thursday. "I have never used that word to describe Mr. Dale. I do not believe Mr. Dale is a pedophile nor did I intend to suggest that in my comments."

For the record, this what Rob Ford told Conrad Black during his interview last week. "I guess the worst one was Daniel Dale in my backyard taking pictures. I have little kids. When a guy's taking pictures of little kids. I don't want to say that word but you start thinking, 'What's this guy all about?'"

Ford went on, backtracking further from his statements, and said he never actually saw Dale in his yard. "To be clear I never personally saw Mr. Dale peering over the fence or taking pictures," Ford said. "My neighbor told me however that he did see someone doing this. Mr. Dale apparently denies that."

"Apparently." Dale not only denies peering into Ford's yard, he also called Ford's apology bullshit.

I asked Mayor Ford to 1) retract all of his false claims about my conduct and 2) issue an unreserved, abject, complete apology.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 17, 2013

His statement today didn't come close. I'm proceeding with a defamation lawsuit.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 17, 2013

Considering that Canada's anti-defamation laws are reportedly so strong that local papers are afraid to publish some damning reports on local politicians, Rob Ford has good reason to be concerned. No wonder he's taken up religion.

[Image via AP]

A bill to ban credit checks in the hiring process was introduced today by Elizabeth Warren and six Senate colleagues. Over 40 other groups also back the bill, which has plenty of support and even mirrors a similar bill introduced in the House two years ago.

Credit checks, which are useful in actually bestowing credit and lending money, are also currently used by 47 percent of employers when they decide whom to hire. Credit checks in theory give an idea as to the potential employee's responsibility and overall competence in life and work. But as you probably suspected, that's not the case in practice. According to the senator's press release on the proposed bill:

A bad credit rating is far more often the result of unexpected medical costs, unemployment, economic downturns, or other bad breaks than it is a reflection on an individual's character or abilities...Families have not fully recovered from the 2008 financial crisis, and too many Americans are still searching for jobs. This is about basic fairness—let people compete on the merits, not on whether they already have enough money to pay all their bills.

It can happen quickly: a woman wrecks her car and her insurance company is dragging its feet. In the meantime, she either needs to pay to fix the car either out of pocket or on credit, or she risks not being able to go to work, where she makes the money to pay back these creditors. So the cycle begins—a cycle that has little to do with responsibility and everything to do with sheer bad luck (and possibly low pay). In fact, nine states have recognized that fact and banned employment credit checks already.

Yes, credit checks make sense when you're making sure someone can actually afford to make good on a loan. But in these cases, it actually keeps them from making the money that they can use to, well, get better credit. The poor get poorer, indeed.

[image via Getty]

It was 10:24 p.m. on a Saturday night, and KSN's weekend news anchor Justin Kraemer just wanted to get the fuck out of there. So he told his coworkers as much. While still on the air. With a hot mic.

"I’m embarrassed," he told The Wichita Eagle in his first interview since the Sign-Off Heard Round the World. "I did something extraordinarily unprofessional. It’s something that’s drilled into you from the minute you start in this business to always consider the microphones hot."

The FCC indicated it would not fine KSN for Kraemer's fleeting fuck, as it took place during the 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. time slot during which "indecent or profane speech that is broadcast...is not actionable."

But according to the Eagle, KSN decided to part ways with Kraemer just the same.

Kraemer said it was "fascinating" and "surreal" to see the clip go viral, but he understands why it happened.

"TV news has got a lot of issues right now, and one of the biggest issues with TV news is that a strong argument can be made that it’s insincere and fake," he was quoted as saying. "At least I’m real. If I have an epitaph, that’s what it is."

Kraemer told the Eagle he plans to leave town and is "pretty positive I’m going to end up landing on my feet."

In fact, there is reason to believe he already has.

A tipster writing into Gawker says Kraemer already had one foot out the door when he dropped his F-bomb.

According to the tipster, Kraemer was recently hired by Colorado Springs NBC affiliate KOAA, and last weekend was to be his final weekend at KSN, which is why he was so eager to leave.

We've asked KOAA for a comment, and will update if they respond.

[video via KSN]

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Everybody loves vintage street photography, especially when it's from New York City. Every decade has its distinctive taste; I personally love the Seventies. But what about the Nineties? Oh dear, those years! Only twenty something years ago! But can you remember what was it like on the streets of New York City?

Gregoire Alessandrini—currently working as an Audiovisual Executive Producer for Louis Vuitton—was a film student in New York in the 1990s, and he took his Leica camera with him everywhere he went to document the sparkling city life. Now he is running a great blog, called "New York City in the 1990s," based on his personal photo collection.

Images of lost landmarks, transformed locations, street parties, the meat market, 42nd Street, old diners, signs and grafitti, New Yorkers and sidewalk scenes, Halloween, Gaypride, Wigstock and so on—all of these moments are ultimately interesting to see through Alessandrini's lens. Here is a selection of his photos for you to remember—and to be amazed—at how everything has changed or, in some cases, stayed surprisingly the same.

All photos by Grégoire Alessandrini.

Police are saying that a Reno gunman shot and wounded four people at the Renown Regional Medical Center before committing suicide earlier this afternoon.

Firefighters in Kingston, Ontario battled a major building fire this afternoon that may have been caused by a propane explosion. Worst of all, it left a man trapped on a crane at the site of the blaze — and the play-by-play of his dramatic rescue was captured on Twitter.

Canada's CBC reports that firefighters were alerted to possible explosions around 2 p.m. ET today. Residents within a half mile of the fire were asked to evacuate their homes, and the fire has since been contained, but for a time a crane operator was left trapped at the edge of his crane while the flames burned.

Twitter user ChrisInKingston caught the man's mind-blowing helicopter rescue from a few blocks away. Here's what he saw.

Princess / Victoria streets student housing construction in flames #ygk pic.twitter.com/fi26CNpMiA

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

heard an explosion, flames grow higher and dangerously close to the Legion Villa pic.twitter.com/Fpc3DDks5V

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

flames have now spread to the south side of Princess St #ygk pic.twitter.com/Jbe6xrcRrz

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

I can't see from here but this doesn't look good for the new gas station #ygk pic.twitter.com/baVhXVs1pw

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

A crane operator is trapped. @CKWS_TV pic.twitter.com/t83clcsJ7z

— Morganne Campbell (@Journo_Morganne) December 17, 2013

that Crane Operator sitting in the cold, waiting to be rescued by 8 Wing Trenton, will have an amazing story to tell #ygk

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

rescue underway! #ygk pic.twitter.com/yDhSGwu1Y0

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

the got him! pic.twitter.com/wBxar0yCT1

— Chris in Kingston (@ChrisInKingston) December 17, 2013

A Harvard sophomore didn't want to take his finals exams yesterday, so he shut down the school by emailing bomb threats to Harvard police.

Half-an-hour before his scheduled exam, 20-year-old psychology major Eldo Kim sent out an email claiming that there were two shrapnel bombs on campus. He listed four possible on-campus locations — including, of course, the building his exam was scheduled in.

It took about 20 minutes for the school to alert students, around the same time they began evacuating the named buildings. President Obama was briefed. Kim's final was canceled.

At the same time, the FBI — in coordination with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives; the United States Secret Service; the Harvard University Police Department; the Cambridge Police Department; the Boston Police Department; and the Massachusetts State Police — responded to Harvard Yard.

He must have only gotten an A- in campus terrorism, because despite evasive tactics that included the anonymous email service Guerrilla Mail and using TOR to hide his IP address, Kim was confessing to an FBI agent by nightfall.

He told the agent he chose the word “shrapnel” because "it sounded more dangerous."

He's facing five years in prison, but hey, no finals.

[image via Shutterstock]

Tensions are high right now with India following the arrest of their consulate's acting head, who was handcuffed over visa fraud charges as she dropped her daughter off at a Manhattan school.

Authorities have accused Devyani Khobragade, India's deputy consul general for political, economic, commercial and women’s affairs, of submitting false visa applications and lying about paying her nanny only $3 an hour.

Because visa fraud isn't covered under the Vienna convention, Khobragade wasn't given diplomatic immunity.

According to the Times, everything escalated when details that she was strip searched (some Indian reports say a cavity search) became public.

It is not unusual in India for domestic staff to be paid poorly and be required to work more than 60 hours a week; they are sometimes treated abominably. Reports of maids being imprisoned or abused by their employers are frequent.

But the idea of a middle-class woman being arrested and ordered to disrobe is seen as shocking. Airport security procedures in India provide separate lines for women, and any pat-down searches are performed behind curtains.

India's national security advisor called it "despicable and barbaric."

And now Indian officials are retaliating. Today, workers removed a maze of cement security barricades from in front of the American Embassy, saying the barricades were blocking traffic.

Officials also downgraded American diplomatic privileges, withdrawing airport passes, stopping import clearances — including alcohol — for the US embassy, and demanding that Consulate staff turn in their ID cards.

An opposition leader and former finance minister gave a TV statement advocating that all same-sex partners of diplomats be arrested in retaliation.

“The media has reported that we have issued visas to a number of U.S. diplomats’ companions. ‘Companions’ means that they are of the same sex,” Yashwant Sinha told NDTV. “It is completely illegal in our country. Just as paying less wages was illegal in the U.S. So, why doesn’t the government of India go ahead and arrest all of them? Put them behind bars, prosecute them in this country and punish them.”

The State Department gave a statement earlier today, saying that they were looking into the intake procedures to ensure appropriate procedures were followed. The US Marshals Service said the search was standard operating procedure.

[image via AP]

[Cecil Williams, a 61-year-old blind man, was struck by a train after he fainted on the subway platform this morning. His seeing eye dog tried to stop him from falling and barked, alerting passersby. Both Williams and his dog, Orlando, were hit, but escaped serious injuries. "The dog saved my life," Williams said. Photo by John Minchillo via AP.]

Don't get it mixed up with the other little blue pill — the FDA posted a warning this morning alerting young males to the fact that methylphenidate, the active ingredient in Ritalin and Concerta, can lead to long-lasting, painful erections. The agency formally documented the problem in men aged 8-33.

A Connecticut jury awarded the ex-wife of former Bush White House deputy counsel John Michael Farren $28 million in damages after Farren brutally attacked her with a flashlight when she asked for a divorce.

The assault occurred back in 2010, when Mary Margaret Farren served her husband with divorce papers. He begged her to reconsider but when she told him she'd only consider counseling, he attacked her in a rage with a Maglite. At one point she passed out, only to wake up to him choking her.

She was able to secretly activate their New Canaan home's panic alarm — summoning police — and escape to a neighbor's house.

Mrs. Farren was eventually hospitalized with a broken jaw, nose and other injuries. Her husband was charged with attempted murder and spent six months in jail before he was released on a $750,000 bond — down from his original $2 million bail.

Farren was apparently representing himself in the matters, but stopped showing up to court after the jury was selected. On the day the trial was set to begin, he emailed the judge saying that he had entered a Hartford, Connecticut-area hospital. He did not give a reason why.

In his absence, the judge entered a default ruling last week.

There's speculation that Farren may be trying to prep an insanity defense for his upcoming criminal trial — he told prosecutors that doctors found evidence of a "brain defect or disease" in an MRI during a preliminary hearing this summer.

Before his arrest, Farren had held multiple high-profile positions, starting out as George H.W. Bush's undersecretary of commerce before joining Xerox as a corporate vice president and general counsel.

But after his most recent stint in the White House as a deputy counsel under 43, Farren appeared to have lost his way. According to a 2010 New York Times piece on the assault:

That chapter of Mr. Farren’s government career came to what seemed like an abrupt end. He left the job suddenly a few weeks before the 2008 presidential election, although the White House had expected top aides to stay until the end.

At the time, Mr. Farren had told an acquaintance that he wanted to leave before the administration turned over, to get a jump on the job market. If so, his plans might have changed; he has not worked full time since. On Thursday, the bail commissioner reported to the court that Mr. Farren was “retired.”

Farren faces up to 70 years on the attempted murder, first-degree assault, and risk of injury to a minor charges.

[image via LinkedIn]

At least two people won the $636 million Mega Millions jackpot tonight — one in Georgia and one in California. Because you're never going to win the lottery, but if you do, it'll be the night someone else wins too.

Brazil has no official interest in granting Edward Snowden permanent asylum, despite the NSA whistleblower's open letter to the country offering to help investigate the United States' massive data-mining program.

The official reason given is that Brazil has not yet received Snowden's formal application for asylum, which is required before the country could consider honoring his request. But according to Brazilian paper Folha de. S.Paulo, Brazil's government doesn't want to pursue an investigation into the NSA's spy programs and therefore has little incentive to grant Snowden amnesty.

The issue, though, has divided Brazil's Congress. "Brazil should not miss the opportunity to grant asylum to Edward Snowden, who was key to unraveling the U.S. espionage system," Senatore Ricardo Ferraso wrote on Twitter yesterday. And some congressmen have asked Russia for permission to interview Snowden.

But other members of Brazilian congress oppose granting Snowden asylum, saying such a move would cause more harm than good, especially with the U.S., one of the country's largest trading partners.

There's still, technically, a chance Brazil would accept Snowden, which is more than he has in his home country: On Monday, White House spokesman Jay Carney shot down suggestions that the U.S. could grant Snowden amnesty if he returned the classified documents he took last spring.

This seeing eye dog, Orlando, leapt onto the subway tracks yesterday to save his blind master. Would your dog do the same thing?

Cecil Williams fainted on the uptown A train platform yesterday and fell onto the tracks. ENTER ORLANDO, WORLD'S BEST DOG. This dog, who does not even get paid, leapt down onto the tracks with Cecil and kept licking him to wake him up.

What's that—an oncoming train? Look out, Orlando and friend!

THE TRAIN LITERALLY RAN OVER THEM BUT THEY WERE OKAY.

Orlando sat by his master's side in the space between the tracks and they both survived.

Cecil Williams told the New York Post that "he will give Orlando a special treat, as well as affection and scratches behind his ear." You're god damn right he will.

Orlando the dog makes all the other subway heroes look like shit. No offense.

[Photo: AP]

Monday night, Australian police had to rescue a tourist after she accidentally walked off a pier because she was too busy checking Facebook on her phone.

The woman strolled off Melbourne's St. Kilda's Pier into Port Phillip Bay at about 11:30 p.m on Monday. Witnesses quickly called police, who found the woman 20 minutes later, floating on her back because she couldn't swim.

"She was still out in the water laying on her back in a floating position because she told us later that she couldn't swim," Senior Constable Dean Kelly told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "Initially she apologized. She said, 'I was checking my Facebook page on the phone and I've fallen in.'"

The woman was taken to a nearby hospital but was fine, as was her phone—according to police, she "kept hold of her mobile phone throughout the entire ordeal."

[Image via Shutterstock]