What's up with Brad Pitt these days? [Pop] [lock] [extended windmill] [exagerrated shrug], basically. At least that's what Pitt('s stunt double) told Jimmy Fallon('s stunt double) in their interview last night, which was conducted in the form of breakdancing.

Pitt was on the show to promote his recent [headspin] [kip-up], Fury, a generally well-reviewed World War II drama that's perfect for people in the Venn diagram intersection of History Channel enthusiasts, Fallon fans, and B-boys. Run out and see it today, both of you!

[h/t Digg]

While San Francisco is rolling over for Airbnb, New York's attorney general is going after the so-called "home sharing" startup. After subpoenaing records from thousands of Airbnb's New York users, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has issued a report on the $10 billion rental site's impact on the city. What he found isn't pretty.

According to the report, 72 percent of Airbnb's rentals in New York violate zoning and other city laws, making them illegal. The "vast majority" of revenue is earned in what the Attorney General describes as "gentrified or rapidly gentrifying neighborhoods." What's more? Just six percent of "Commercial Users" dominate the rental market.

Ninety-four percent of Airbnb hosts offered at most two unique units during the Review Period. But the remaining six percent of hosts dominated the platform during that period, offering up to hundreds of unique units, accepting 36 percent of private short-term bookings, and receiving $168 million, 37 percent of all host revenue.

The report shatters Airbnb's marketing myth that the service helps ordinary people pay the bills by renting out spare bedrooms. The report points to one operation that controls 272 listings, taking in $6.8 million in revenue. "Well over" one hundred users control ten or more listings each.

Airbnb doesn't dispute the attorney general's findings, the New York Times reports:

Airbnb declined to aggressively dispute the numbers in the report, which draws on four years of data it provided to the attorney general after a court fight.

"We need to move forward," an Airbnb spokesman, Nick Papas, said. "We need to work together on some sensible rules that stop bad actors and protect regular people who simply want to share the home in which they live."

As we learned in San Francisco, Airbnb helped write legislation governing their service—and made sure the law had no teeth for enforcement against "bad actors."

But the moneyed startup is going to have a harder time lobbying its way to legality in New York. Regulators are already gearing up to go after Airbnb's most egregious offenders:

Mr. Schneiderman and city regulators will also announce Thursday a joint enforcement initiative to shut down illegal hotels. Various regulators will investigate violations of building and safety codes and tax regulations.

"Anyone operating an illegal hotel should be on notice that the state and city will take aggressive enforcement actions in this area," said Mr. Schneiderman. "A slick advertising campaign doesn't change the fact that this is illegal activity."

Sounds like Shell might not be the last Airbnb poster girl to find herself evicted.http://valleywag.gawker.com/poster-girl-fr...

Read the attorney general's report below:

To contact the author of this post, please email kevin@valleywag.com.

Photo: Richard Robbins

Earlier this week, Blake Lively's Preserve posted an ode to the antebellum Southern belle, worthy of a teen circa 1915 who just loved all the pretty dresses in Birth of a Nation. Turns out part of the paean looks a lot like an article from Examiner.com. We checked the rest of the site and found another damning similarity—and loads of truly abysmal writing.

Yesterday, Lainey Gossip pointed out an awfully close resemblance between one of Preserve's phrases and a paragraph from a 2012 Examiner.com article. Exhibit A, from Preserve:

The term "Southern Belle" came to fruition during the Antebellum period (prior to the Civil War), acknowledging women with an inherent social distinction who set the standards for style and appearance. These women epitomized Southern hospitality with a cultivation of beauty and grace, but even more with a captivatingand magnetic sensibility. While at times depicted as coy, these belles of the ball, in actuality could command attention with the ease of a hummingbird relishing a pastoral bloom.

Compare that (seriously, so badly written) final phrase to the conclusion of this paragraph, from "Southern belles: a beautiful part of southern culture."

Southern belles were not considered chosen "items," such as the precious porcelain dolls that sometimes lined her parlor. She was smart, articulate, and very choosy on how things were to be handled in her home. From the cut of fine fabrics in the curtains in herliving room to the smallest detail in her kitchen, the southern belle of the 1800's knew how to relegate authority and tasks with the ease of a hummingbird enjoying a rose bloom.

It's that last phrase that really raises eyebrows. As imagery goes, hummingbirds are awfully specific.

So we ran the rest of the site through a plagiarism tracker, and we spotted one additional instance of shadiness—this fitness article, which supposedly provides workout guidance from trainer Dan Saladino. Take a look at the dumbbell exercises, specifically:

- Choose a flat bench to begin the workout. Place a dumbbell on each side of the bench.

- Place the right leg on top of the end of the bench, bend your torso forward from the waist until your upper body is parallel to the floor, and place your right hand on the other end of the bench for support.

- Pull the dumbbell straight up to the side of your chest, keeping your upper arm close to your side and keeping the torso stationary. Breathe out as you perform this step.

- Lower the resistance straight down to the starting position. Breathe in as you lower the dumbbell.

- Repeat the movement for the specified amount of repetitions.

- Switch sides and repeat again with the other arm.

Now, look at these instructions from About-Muscle.com (I've trimmed out a couple of irrelevant sections in the middle):

1. Choose a flat bench and place a dumbbell on each side of it.

2. Place the right leg on top of the end of the bench, bend your torso forward from the waist until your upper body is parallel to the floor, and place your right hand on the other end of the bench for support....

4. Pull the resistance straight up to the side of your chest, keeping your upper arm close to your side and keeping the torso stationary. Breathe out as you perform this step....

5. Lower the resistance straight down to the starting position. Breathe in as you perform this step.

6. Repeat the movement for the specified amount of repetitions.

7. Switch sides and repeat again with the other arm.

These same instructions appear damn near verbatim at BodyBuilding.com and this Flashcards site as well; this particular smattering of text appears in multiple places across the Internet. Now, there are only so many ways to describe exercises. But parts of this are word for word. Also: About-Muscle and Bodybuilding.com are essentially content farms. What does that make Preserve?

In a particularly rich note, Lively's recent baby announcement contains the warning: "All photos are property of Preserve. Any reuse of these photos without prior written consent is illegal and will be prosecuted."

But after combing through numerous Preserve posts, what I found myself thinking was that they ought to plagiarize more. Fashion writing is often... well, quirky. But trying to make sense of Preserve is like trying to reorganize your closets stone drunk on hipster-made faux moonshine. In the dark. That post about Southern belles was just flat badly written. (A term can't "come to fruition," for fuck's sake.) And here is Lively Herself on boldness, or something:

If you wear risk, the world will notice your clothing first, not you. You are the character behind it and thus you get to adopt all of its eccentricities, all of its detail, all of its courage, even if those aren't the threads you feel naturally woven of. And soon, all that rubs off, it feels as though it weaves itself within you. The courage of the piece becomes your own. You, the wearer, become the eye catcher, even in the most simple of designs. For it was never the clothing at all, but the confidence in the statement. It was you all along that had the power. The clothes were simply the mask which let your cajones arise.

And here she is on "the eve of Pandora," whatever the hell that means:

As the leaves loosen and the air sharpens, the environment becomes more dense. Not only dense with piles of foliage on the ground, extra coatings of clothing atop previously bare skin, and more substantial meals on the stove, but dense with expression. Trees that were a uniform green begin to explode into fiery tones. Dinners that were light and crisp become blanketed in béchamel, honeys, or the comfort of cinnamon. The way we decorate ourselves veers from airy and minimal, to complex cloakings. The fall season is a time of "more"—more expression, more opportunity, more experimentation, more fun. So, as you embark on this new season, let your curiosity guide you. Explore. Repurpose the old, and discover the new. Mix, match, make mistakes, and make statements—in your home, in your kitchen, and in your closet. Let curiosity guide your expression.

Read that again. It is criminally bad writing.

Obviously, the whole point of Lively's website is to a) display pretty pictures and b) move product. It's not like Preserve set out to be some bastion of journalistic integrity and craftsmanship—it's basically advertorial, a less-charming Internet version of the J. Peterman catalog. Nobody expected finely wrought prose, and it's clear copy ranks a distant last place on their list of priorities. But I will say this for Gwyneth and her Goopy empire: They do the work. The words add up to sensical sentences, and they produce these words themselves. It takes the unhinged laziness of Preserve's writing to make you grateful for those very basic necessities.

Image via Getty.

Formerly known as naysayer Andrea on The Walking Dead, actress Laurie Holden also happens to participate in undercover sting operations by a human rights organization called Operation Underground Railroad, run by a former CIA Agent, Homeland Security Investigator, and Navy SEAL. In this week's Nightline, you can see her in action, taking down monsters way worse than comic book zombies.

During a recent sting involving the trafficking of 55 underage sex slaves in Cartagena, Colombia, a bewigged Holden, in a shiny wig, distracts the expats and kiddie-pervs out by the pool as the rest of OUR goes into action. Watch her in here, after the raid:

[Image and video via ABC]

Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. Follow @GawkerMA and read more about it here.

The corporate clown car that is LivingSocial faced another meltdown yesterday. According to the Washington Post, the daily deal site's Chief Marketing Officer was convicted of assaulting a woman in a D.C. Four Seasons bar. The 52-year-old executive, Barry Judge, faces up to 180 days in jail.

Prosecutors said Judge reached over and grabbed a woman under her skirt as the woman walked past him on the evening of June 22, 2013, at the Bourbon Steak lounge within the hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue in Northwest. Prosecutors agreed to dismiss the sex-abuse charge against him. [...]

The 39-year-old woman, who was in the courtroom, emerged from the audience and told Senior Judge Susan Winfield she was "completely humiliated and degraded" by Judge.

A Washington Post profile of Judge published in May indicates he was still at the company earlier this year. However, that no longer seems to be the case: the 404 error page at the location of Judge's former LivingSocial corporate bio reads "Don't panic, we'll get through this together. Let's explore our options here."http://valleywag.gawker.com/livingsocials-...

To contact the author of this post, please email kevin@valleywag.com.

Screenshot: Best Buy

Three schools in Texas and two in Ohio have opted to shut down to be disinfected after learning that their students or staff were either on the same Cleveland-to-Dallas flight or aircraft as Amber Joy Vinson, the nurse who tested positive for Ebola yesterday.

Belton Independent School District Superintendent Susan Kincannon announced today that a student at Sparta Elementary School and a student at North Belton Middle School were on the same flight as Vinson and attended classes Tuesday and Wednesday.

Both schools and the district's Belton Early Childhood School will be closed to be properly cleaned. The parents of the students who flew with Vinson on Frontier Airlines have decided to keep them home from school for 21 days (the maximum incubation period for Ebola), the New York Times reports.

Although Vinson's fellow passengers have been deemed by CDC director Dr. Thomas R. Frieden as having an "extremely low" chance of contracting the virus, school districts choosing to close schools have said they are doing so as purely precautionary measures. "The health and safety of our students is my first priority," Kincannon said in the statement.http://gawker.com/the-cdc-gave-n...

Solon Middle School and Parkside Elementary School in Solon, Ohio will be closed Thursday as "a willing precaution" after the district learned that a staffer at the middle school flew on the same aircraft, but not the same flight, as Vinson.

In addition to the school closures, a number of hospitals in Ohio have placed members of their staff who flew with Vinson on her initial flight from Cleveland to Dallas on paid leave. From the Times:

And officials of two major health systems in Cleveland — the Cleveland Clinic and MetroHealth — said that a group of nurses had been placed on leave because they were aboard Ms. Vinson's first flight, from Dallas to Ohio, on Friday.

"The decision to put those nurses on paid leave really has to do with decreasing anxiety," Dr. Jennifer Hanrahan, the chairwoman of MetroHealth's infectious disease control committee, said at a news conference. "It's not because of any perceived risk to them or to anyone."

Aultman Hospital in Canton, which had five nurses aboard the flight, said it would also place employees on leave. "As a further precaution, we have reviewed the assignments of those five nurses and identified the patients in their direct care," the hospital said in a statement. "We are in the process of contacting those patients to make sure they are fully informed."

Vinson was among the staff at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital to treat Ebola-stricken Liberian citizen Thomas Eric Duncan, who died from the virus last week.

[Image via WKYC]

Alice Walton, an heir to the Walmart fortune, is worth $35 billion. Today, a lot of poor people stood outside her house and yelled at her.

Those poor people were Walmart employees from across America, and dozens of their shouting union supporters. The house was 515 Park Avenue, a towering three-tiered apartment building at 60th St. in midtown Manhattan. Walton purchased the 30th and 31st floors of the building earlier this summer for $25 million. It's a bit misleading to call it her house—her primary home is a ranch in Texas, where she breeds horses. This duplex is just a place she pops into from time to time, to avoid the hassle of luxury hotels.

Although Alice Walton has gotten $100 million richer this year, she does not have a job, per se. She is sometimes referred to as a "billionaire philanthropist." That's a bit misleading, too. Despite being the single richest family in the world, the Waltons have famously never been too big on philanthropy, except to the extent that it can be used to minimize their taxes. Alice Walton's main personal work of philanthropy is Crystal Bridges, the billion-dollar art museum in Bentonville, Arkansas, where Walmart's headquarters are located. Whether you consider this a work of charity or a work of corporate and family image-buffing depends on your perspective, I guess.

Alice Walton has more money than she could ever possibly spend, even with the occasional $25 million apartment and billion-dollar art museum purchase. All of her money comes from her ownership of a piece of Walmart. Walmart employs two million workers, who make the company go, and who allow Alice Walton to earn all of that absurdly huge pile of money that she has. The employees of Walmart are generally paid very little. Working at Walmart, most agree, is not a good job.

These two facts—Alice Walton's leisurely life of great wealth, and Walmart employees' great poverty—understandably make Walmart employees upset. It is not hard to see why. So today, a crowd of dozens of Walmart employees, accompanied by sign-waving union organizers and grandparents and grad students and a little marching band with two trombones, two drums, cymbals, a clarinet, a recorder, and a trumpet turned the corner of 59th St. and Park Avenue this afternoon at 1:11 p.m. NYPD officers, lining the entire block at evenly spaced intervals, were waiting for them. Before the marchers arrived, well-dressed midtown women with no apparent jobs had been wandering up the cops, one after another: "What's going on here? A protest? Of Walmart? Here?" They'd glance suspiciously at 515 Park Avenue's clean entrance, guarded by several doormen and white-shirted officers, then walk off, hustling.

"Alice, Alice, you can't hide, we can see your greedy side!" the protesters chanted as they filled up the sidewalk in front of the building. They'd come to deliver a petition from thousands of Walmart workers asking for higher wages. At 515 Park Avenue, though, there was no one to accept it, except the building manager. Fortunately, they had also come to be arrested. There was an absolute army of cops ready to accept that.

All of the workers who'd come to be arrested were designated by the green cloths tied around their arms, and by the fact that many of them had emergency phone numbers written down their forearms in bold black marker. As the police looked on patiently, an organizer instructed them on exactly how the arrests would proceed. "They'll be using zip ties today," she told them, in the manner of a waiter explaining the day's special. About two dozen of them walked out into the intersection of Park Avenue and 60th street, sat down in a semicircle, and locked arms. The group was far outnumbered by police, most of whom were standing around with nothing to do. One officer took up a bullhorn and read a script informing them that they would be arrested if they didn't leave. Then the officers went down the line, one by one, helping the protesters to their feet, and taking their IDs, which they had ready, and pulling zip ties on their wrists, and leading them to waiting paddy wagons. It was all very polite. Several elderly women were participating in the sit-in, and the cops helped them each up graciously. The small core of demonstrators was surrounded by a layer of police, then a layer of organizers and legal observers, then a layer of reporters and cameramen, then fellow protesters and bystanders, like an Everlasting Gobstopper of civil disobedience. "Have fun in The Tombs! You're cut pal, they'll like you!" yelled one onlooker, who was sporting a "Colorado Volleyball" backpack. An internet commenter in the flesh. He gestured to the nearest cop—"You know I'm with you guys. I hate these fucking hippies." The cop did not respond.

After everyone from the intersection has been loaded up, the organizers move everyone back onto the curb in front of the building. Some words of encouragement are spoken by the organizers, and the milling reporters grab their last interviews, the police begin waving traffic down the street again, and the whole thing winds down with a few last chants.

"We believe that we will win! We believe that we will win!" Thirty floors above, Alice Walton's $25 million apartment sits empty. Walton is, by most accounts, a nice woman. It would be nice if she would listen to all of these nice people, who have made her rich, but who are themselves poor. But I don't believe she will. No matter how nice she may appear to be to those who admire her pretty horses and beautiful art museum, she is, in fact, a villain.

[Pic via]

For the first time since early in the morning on February 11, no thunderstorms are predicted anywhere in the United States tomorrow.

As we cover the weather both quiet and active—even though the former is killing us over here—here's your lack-of-weather update. The calm conditions are thanks to a couple of areas of high pressure that built in across most of the country behind that strong cold front that swept through earlier this week. Here's a look at the mean sea level pressure map tomorrow afternoon, showing the quiet weather across most of the country:

The only active weather in the United States will be some rain in the Pacific Northwest associated with a low moving into southeastern Alaska. Very heavy rainfall is expected in the region, with 11+ inches falling near the highest peaks in coastal British Columbia. More than 5 inches of rain is possible along the northwest Washington coast.

Elsewhere, heavy rain will be limited to the Texas/Mexico border near Brownsville and southern Florida. The bullseye of heavy rain in New England is from today's ongoing heavy rain.

Meanwhile in the Atlantic, Hurricane Gonzalo is once again a category four hurricane with 145 MPH winds as of the latest advisory. The NHC will release a new advisory at 5:00 PM, but if the last forecast holds up, the hurricane will make a direct landfall on Bermuda as a strong category three. This storm could be devastating for the small island and its 60,000+ inhabitants.

The Vane will have more coverage of Gonzalo at its next advisory in about an hour, as well as through the day tomorrow as it approaches Bermuda.

[Images: SPC, WeatherBELL]

You can follow the author on Twitter or send him an email.

Yesterday, we brought you the story of Sean Johnson, a 19-year-old Floridian who was caught taking a stuffed horse off of a shelf at Walmart, masturbating with it in the bedding department, then returning it, covered in semen, to the shelf. Today, police released a photo of his equine paramour.

Good-looking stuffed horse! Nicely done, Sean.

We've also learned a few more details about Johnson's afternoon of passion. A report from a Brooksville, Fla., police officer, for instance, contains the tidbit that Johnson utilized "short fast movements" to bring himself to fruition, and that his ejaculate ended up mostly on the stuffed animal's "chest area." In a statement given to police, Johnson admitted that he had committed a "horrible act" and that he is "extremely sorry."

[Image via The Smoking Gun]

Handsome actor Channing Tatum has been blessed with many things: cartoon-like abs, dancing ability, a Magic Mike sequel. But according to Tatum himself, one thing our Lord above did not grant him was brains. "I have never considered myself a very smart person," he tells T magazine this week.

Tatum elaborates:

I have never considered myself a very smart person, for a lot of reasons. Not having early success on that one path messes with you. You get lumped in classes with kids with autism and Down Syndrome, and you look around and say, Okay, so this is where I'm at. Or you get put in the typical classes and you say, All right, I'm obviously not like these kids either. So you're kind of nowhere. You're just different. The system is broken. If we can streamline a multibillion-dollar company, we should be able to help kids who struggle the way I did.

That last point is a good one. And don't worry—despite America's broken educational system, Chan has still learned a lot throughout his life. He has his own system, kind of like learning by osmosis. He gets into people's brains: "I can look at a person and say, They've got something that I want up there in their head. I'm going to do my best to get in there and absorb it. My mom said, 'Be a sponge.' And so I've learned more from people than I have from school or from books."

Recently, Tatum's wife Jenna Dewan bought him sculpting lessons from a classical teacher, which he is enjoying.

[Photo via AP]

Hurricane Gonzalo further strengthened into a 145 MPH monster today as it moves north towards Bermuda. Forecasters are confident that the hurricane will make a direct strike on the small island on Friday, potentially producing horrific damage as it moves through.

Last night, Gonzalo had 130 MPH winds and was expected to gradually weaken as it made its way towards Bermuda, home to about 64,000 people and thousands more tourists. Thanks to warm sea surface temperatures and light wind shear, the storm was able to strengthen into a very strong category four with 145 MPH winds.

Gonzalo is now the strongest hurricane to form in the Atlantic since Hurricane Igor in September 2010. Igor also struck Bermuda, producing sustained winds of 90 MPH in some spots.

The storm is now expected to hit Bermuda as a strong category three with sustained winds of 125 MPH with stronger gusts. The current projected path has the center of the eye skirting by the western side of the island, which puts Bermuda in the most dangerous spot of the hurricane—the right-front quadrant of the eyewall. In addition to winds well over 100 MPH, this will produce a "dangerous and life-threatening" storm surge on southern facing shores and inlets, accompanied by waves of 35 to 40 feet above sea level.

In anticipation of Gonzalo's arrival, all government offices and schools on Bermuda are closed during the day tomorrow. The causeway—which is where all four fatalities in 2003's Hurricane Fabian occurred—will close at 10:00 AM tomorrow. The causeway's low elevation makes it particularly susceptible to storm surge and destructive waves. USA Today reports that the island's international airport—the vast majority of its flights come from the U.S.—will close tonight and remain closed through Saturday.

Bernews and the Royal Gazette will continue to provide news updates through the storm. The Bermuda Weather Service provides local weather forecasts, observations, and radar data, while the National Hurricane Center issues forecasts every three hours until the storm clears the island to the north.

[Images: NASA, author]

You can follow the author on Twitter or send him an email.

The Boston Marathon bombing had the mysterious man on the roof. Sandy Hook had multiple shooters. 9/11 had...actually, nevermind. And yesterday, the Great Ebola Panic of 2014 debuted its own mysterious man photographed from a distance: Clipboard guy, who was spotted on the Tarmac without a hazmat suit when Ebola patient Amber Vinson was transported into an airplane.

You can see the man in the video above: He's holding some materials in his hand and looks on as Vinson is helped into a waiting plane by healthcare workers in hazmat suits. Though the man doesn't touch Vinson or come within the "splash zone" in which he could conceivably be splattered by Vinson's bodily fluids. He is perhaps uncomfortably close to Vinson, but that is a personal measure.

But the man, who has still not been named, also helped the hazmat team with its clean up:

He also boarded the plane after Vinson:

The reaction was about what you would expect: 'Who's the idiot with the clipboard?' Disbelief and panic as mystery man WITHOUT a hazmat suit helps second Ebola nurse board her plane to Atlanta, disposes waste and then climbs aboard" read the Daily Mail's headline. "Why No Protective Gear For Man With Dallas Ebola Patient?" asked Dallas' CBS station. He even got his own name: "Clipboard Guy."

Phoenix Air, the company that transported Vinson, debunked the mystery today, saying that the man was specifically supposed to be in plainclothes.

"His role is to oversee the process of transport including on the tarmac," Randy Davis, vice president at Phoenix Air, told NBC News. "Part of our protocol is to have 1 person NOT in a bio-Hazard suit. "

Davis said the man, who he did not name, is the team's medical safety coordinator. Standard protocol is for him to wear street clothes, Davis said, because the suits can block field of vision and hearing. Davis said the man has been trained on keeping safe distance from patients and is ready to "suit up" if needed.

That Vinson caught Ebola only because the CDC bungled protocol implementation—which also allowed her to take a flight from Cleveland to Dallas before being diagnosed—certainly did not help matters, but "Clipboard guy" may never fade away for devoted conspiracy theorists.

Clipboard guy wouldn't have been there looking like a noob if the CDC was taking this seriously.

— Savannah the Bossy (@thesavvy) October 16, 2014

So who is the #clipboardguy in this photo? Keep him away from me. http://t.co/1FEAvSxvHv

— Ken Freestone (@KenFreestone) October 16, 2014

#EbolaQandA Protocol? Ebola Pt heads to Atlanta, everyone suited up except guy with clipboard, is he now quarantined? pic.twitter.com/ExS4ixBERw

— Northlandfox (@northlandfox) October 15, 2014

Uh, hello? Next Ebola victim may be the guy without a hazard suit holding a clipboard while the infected nurse boards the plane #KellyFile

— Grateful Girl (@sbethcarp) October 16, 2014

Someone alert Chris Brown.

Deadspin What It's Like To Be In The Doghouse | Gizmodo The iPad Mini 3 Is a Terrible Deal and You Shouldn't Buy It | Jalopnik Worst Track Video In The Universe Proves Why People Hate GT-R Owners | Kotaku Ask Dr. Nerdlove: Will I Always Be An Overweight Virgin? | Kinja Popular Posts

Good evening and welcome to another in our semi-annual curated "TV-MA Mag" issues, where we curate an entire lifestyle for you out of $600 sweaters and Martha Stewart's scorn. As my marriage deteriorates you may see more of these popping up until you can barely bring yourself to click the email and then we're consciously uncoupled and you're dating Jennifer Lawrence, just kidding, here's what's on TV though.

At 6/5c. Cartoon Network does its usual pre-primetime thing: Teen Titans Go!, Clarence, Steven Universe, Gumball, and Regular Show.

AT 8/7c.

• Grey's Anatomy promises us that "Only Mama Knows," which could apply to almost all the characters right now except of course for Dr. Owen Hunt, who cannot identify with parenting issues due to being a sleep-choker and forever alone.
• The Vampire Diaries continues its whirlwind tour through the '90s historical period with "Welcome to Paradise," in which Damon and Bonnie presumably discover that they are not in paradise, as though the presence of Bonnie wouldn't clue you in right away.
• The Biggest Loser attends a "Tailgate" on NBC, which I feel like implies total barfing no matter how you look at it.
• Bones: Same.

AT 9/8c.

• Bad Judge, which is great, and A to Z, which is not terrible.
• Fox continues to liveblog Broadchurch.
• Lifetime's Project Runway inches and drapes and tucks its way toward the finale.
• On Reign: Not even the mental illness of a slight case of the Hamlets can subtract from King Francis of France's overall thing he's got going on.
• And yes, "Like Father, Like Daughter" actually is the most upsetting thing you could have ever called an episode of Scandal.

AT 10/9c.

• Bite This With Nadia G concludes its first season—an upper-echelon tour of the world's most glamorous, high-class cities—to Reno, where the elite are offered the chance to "bite this," just like some kind of Eudora Welty novel sprung to life.
• Braxton Family Values concludes its fall half-season, while Breaking Amish is still amidships.
• On How to Get Away With Murder, that poor gay dude "gets away" with like one night off from getting constantly nailed from every direction. Just kidding, no he doesn't. Also why would you care, Connor is hot as hell.
• Animal Planet investigates more of the Monsters Inside You, just before bedtime. Nighty-night!
• Parenthood is titled this week "A Potpourri of Freaks," directly referencing their familial taxonomic group noun, a "potpourri" of Bravermans, as well as the fact that they are pretty much all total freaks (except for Haddie and Monica Potter).

At 11/10c., finally, you have either Jean-Claude Van Damme: Behind Closed Doors or Watch What Happens: Live with special guest Dane Cook. Your call, but let me tell you it shouldn't be that hard of a call to make.

Morning After is a new home for television discussion online, brought to you by Gawker. What are you watching tonight? What are we missing out on? Recommendations and discussions down below.

The Atlantic has embarked on a new quest, dubbed the Silicon Valley Insiders Poll, in which they survey 50 of tech's foremost "executives, innovators, and thinkers." Their findings proved something we already knew: many believe the tech industry is in a bubble.

According to the survey, Twitter and Uber are the foremost overvalued tech companies. In one venture capitalist's view, Twitter's "valuation is far out of alignment with industry norms."

The poll also found that 42 percent of those surveyed believe the next tech bubble is already here:

That's no surprise: even formerly bullish investors are looking at tech's skyrocketing valuations and unsustainable burn rates and wondering how much longer the industry can sustain itself.

Those surveyed tech leaders accidentally explained why startup's burn rates are so high: it costs a fortune to keep up with appearances. When asked "what is Silicon Valley's most coveted status symbol?," 12 percent of respondents said it was owning a Tesla. The LA-esque symbol of success was second place only to "taking a company public or selling it."

However, there was some evidence participants didn't take The Atlantic's survey seriously. When asked "which technology has most changed your family dynamics?," Tumblr's David Karp simply responded, "Grindr."

To contact the author of this post, please email kevin@valleywag.com.

Photo: Getty, Screenshots: The Atlantic, h/t Venture Beat

In Place Vendome, one of Paris's beautiful historic squares, next to a 19th-century column commemorating Napoleon's glory in the Battle of Austerlitz, sits a 24-foot inflatable butt plug. Despite the city's reputation as haven for cosmopolitan artsy types, some Parisians aren't having it.

Paul McCarthy, the artist behind the recently installed public sculpture, will try to tell you that it's a tree. That's even what he called it: Tree. Paul McCarthy's past works include an inflatable pile of poop installed in Hong Kong (called Complex Pile) and a gnome holding a butt plug in Rotterdam (officially titled Santa Claus, but known by residents, appropriately, as Butt Plug Gnome). You should not believe Paul McCarthy for a second. That thing is a butt plug.

The Daily Mail pointed out the backlash to the butt plug in an article today—a backlash, which, to be fair, seems pretty much limited to one anti-gay hate group called Printemps Francais. "This is where your tax dollars are going!" scolds one of the group's tweets.

Tree was installed today as part of FIAC, the city's annual art fair, and will surely continue to court controversy until it is removed November. Hey, the French didn't even like he Eiffel Tower at first.

[Images via Getty]

Earlier this afternoon, Uber driver Christopher J. Ortiz posted the email above informing him that he would be "permanently deactivated" because of a single tweet. "I think that's pretty much fired—for a 'independent contractor,'" Ortiz told Valleywag.

Ortiz, a journalist and startup founder, had driven for Uber in May and June as research for his startup, Newscastic, "which is also in the marketplace space," he said. He was considering starting up again and asked how he could get his account reactivated, which is when he received the email from John Hamby, an Uber operations manager.

If you want to be an Uber driver, don’t say mean things about them on Twitter cc @mcarney @nathanielmott pic.twitter.com/A4GVa75A9u

— Christopher J. Ortiz (@ChrisJOrtiz) October 16, 2014

The odd thing, given prevailing public sentiment about Uber, is that the tweet wasn't hateful, much less mean.

Driving for Uber, not much safer than driving a taxi http://t.co/rEJhvYlK4G

— Christopher J. Ortiz (@ChrisJOrtiz) August 25, 2014

After getting the letter, Ortiz pulled his archive of tweets and found dozens of references to Uber. "90 percent of them are headlines of stories, not my opinions," he said. "I have a bunch of friends who drive and whenever I read a story about Uber, good or bad, I tweet them about it."

Ortiz says he communicated with Hamby before. "Near the end of June, a drunk passenger attacked my car and smashed my rear view mirrors so he knows me from that experience. I had to fight with Uber to pay for the damage and pay me for the days I was unable to drive because of the damage."

Ortiz said Uber ended up paying him about $180 for damges and $250 for time off the road after initially declining. "They made 'an exception' for me."

@mcarney what’s funny is I was an early supporter and advocate for Uber when they first moved to ABQ.

— Christopher J. Ortiz (@ChrisJOrtiz) October 16, 2014

He supported Uber when they launched in Albuquerque and even now doesn't seem banged up about how they treated him. "It's more funny than anything. And I'm sure they are regretting sending that email now," he said. You can read his write-up about the incident on NewsCastic. All's well that ends startup?

I contacted Uber to verify the information and will update the post if I hear back. To contact the author of this post, please email nitasha@gawker.com.

[Image via @ChrisJOrtiz]

You're welcome. pic.twitter.com/SHFZ8CJOeY

— Kevin D. Williamson (@KevinNR) October 16, 2014

According to the Wall Street Journal, one of Joe Biden's sons was kicked out of the Navy reserves last year after he tested positive for cocaine less than a month after joining.

Hunter Biden—who currently runs an investment firm, sits on the board of a Ukranian gas company, and, occasionally, snorts cocaine—was only doing the military thing one weekend a month. He appears to have made it exactly one month as a commissioned ensign.

Hunter reportedly had to obtain a drug waiver to join the Navy reserves in the first place due to a youthful indiscretion, a preliminary military officers told the Journal is common. Though Hunter did not have a military education, he was fast-tracked for commission through a Navy-civilian program.

Hunter apparently joined up at age 43, officially, to follow in his grandfathers' footsteps. The Journal gently points out other possible motivators:

The vice president and his wife, Jill Biden, speak regularly about the pride they take in being a military family, often referring to son Beau Biden's time in the Delaware Army National Guard and his yearlong deployment to Iraq.

According to the Journal, Biden made a prescient joke about his son's military career at a fundraiser in January, 2013.

"We have a lot of bad judgment in my family," he reportedly said. "My son, who is over 40, just joined the United States Navy."

[h/t WSJ, image via AP]

It must be getting late in the season, because the numbers are counting down: Only four designers are still standing. Only three more auf wiedersehens, two episodes, one runway show, and zero "Tim Gunn saves" are due to occur. Fortunately, hundreds of witty comments remain to be posted in our open thread — so join us!

Here's how it works, if you haven't done this before: Just turn on your TV, watch the show (which airs at 9 Eastern on Lifetime) and, in the process, post witty comments below this post. The rest of us will be doing the same. To get everyone in the right frame of mind, here's a quick sampling of a few of my favorite comments from last week's open thread:

• heavenstomurgatroyd: Emily should have woken everyone up instead of Tim. She looks like a rooster.
• Madincrafts: I think Emily would put a hood on a wedding dress.
• WIncredulous What?! Korina is to help Charkita in this week's challenge? What sorcery is this?
• chatcat2000: This is like a watching a horror movie. "Char, don't go into the basement!"
• otterbird: I keep misreading "button bag shenanigans" as "butter bag shenanigans." Which would take shenanigans to a whole new level.
• YouretheRhoda: Who here does not want to be a flamenco rodeo princess?!

And you know what else was full of great commentary? Last night's season premiere open thread for Top Chef. So here's a quick note to any Top Chef fans out there (or non-fans who just like a good chat party) that I'm hosting that other open thread on Morning After as well, and that you are cordially invited to join us for that on Wednesday nights!

How was that plug? Subtle enough? OK, up next: As we each take a moment to ponder whether we (1) would or (2) would not want to be a flamenco rodeo princess, allow me to run through a few things in store on tonight's episode:

• It's the penultimate episode of the season, which traditionally means that Tim Gunn will travel to the finalists' homes to critique the collections they're making for the N.Y. Fashion Week show that will determine this season's champion. Tim will also be forced to do silly things, because people love seeing Tim do silly things.
• But first, Tim and the designers will fly to Rome. Why Rome? Damned if I know. I've given up trying to figure out anything they're doing on the show this season. It seems like they just post random ideas on a wall and throw darts at them.
• Tim Gunn may not have gotten laid lately, but tonight he'll get lei'd, at least. And then he will perform an exotic hula dance. This portion of the episode does not take place in Rome, by the way.

OK, the minutes are counting down to the start of the show, so I'm about to head down to the comments section. I'll see you there!