Rhodes University to shorten semesters to two weeks

Rhodes University has this morning announced its decision to shorten the duration of a semester to just two weeks.

The decision comes in light of developments leading into the notorious alcohol-free cram-fest that is SWOT week and also of studies into students' behaviour over the last five years.

"Our meticulous research has shown that people don't do any readings the whole semester, and just pull the last few essays out of thin air in the last few hours before a deadline - kind of like an exam," said research manager and clinical behaviourist Howie Euaktin.

He pointed out that they've had to contend with public perceptions that University should take many months out of your year in its transfer of knowledge.

"We've tried to get them more critically engaged and involved by saying that 'this essay/dissertation/thesis is not something that you can do the night or day before', but we're not fooling anyone," he said. "Especially when they basically have to do exactly that during exams, several times in quick succession. For years now, we've had people thinking that it should take months to learn all the important bits, but really this can be done in mere hours between lunch and back-to-back episodes of Community or Suits.

Rhodes students will now be given their year's coursework two weeks before a series of exams, thus eliminating the need for weeks of essays and practicals. It is a move that has been met with mixed reactions.

"I think it's great!" said third-year BCom student Carrie Balance. "This means I'll won't have to spend as much time pretending I'm doing work and complaining about the workload that I invariably leave until the last minute before telling every goddamn person on Facebook."

Others, however, have not been so happy.

"It's a load of garbage," said fourth-year Mark Reader. "Now how am I supposed to convince my dad that I need R1500 a month for 'printing', 'stationary' and 'sundry costs'?"

The move mirrors similar changes in the Education Sector by Minister for Basic Education Angie Motshekga, who recently changed the system of seven years of schooling to just a 'Yes or No' style multiple choice exam at the end of a three-day seminar.

Archive footage proves cricket once contained sport

Fans of going to stadia to get drunk, wear colourful gear and ogle the dancing cheerleaders were left in speechless shock today, after Television Sports Channel directors announced this week their discovery of stunning proof that Cricket once actually contained elements of sport.

"It's definitely proof," said DSTV Sport Channel Director Hyle Eiyts. "We have found video evidence that proves once and for all those claims that we all found so ridiculous: that cricket once actually had scores and players and teams and stuff."

Many fans, however, are staunchly disbelieving, saying that it's impossible.

"We all know and love Cricket. The colours, the flags, the beer, the dancing chicks, cheering every once in a while because someone in the middle of the field where we all go to celebrate the festival hits a ball over the fence dividing us from the VIP members in pads and helmets. I just can't believe that such a wonderful thing would have come from a such a blatant snooze-fest."

However, sports historians say the discovery is a real eye-opener.

“Watching the footage, we finally have some idea of how exciting, how truly riveting this sport once was,” said sports footage curator and discoverer Shu-Tsin Slomo. “In fact, it was considered TOO exciting. They had to control, limit, the sport to stop people descending into mad chaos caused by the sheer adrenaline flood that inevitably stems from watching a bunch of men standing on a field of grass for hours on end while pairs of them run up and down a short stretch of dirt, every once in a while doing something you can actually see from the stands.”

Slomo outlined the changes they were forced to make to conserve the fabric of social integrity.

"The sport was so exciting, so mind-bogglingly brain-blowing that they had to shorten games to just one day instead of five days," he explained. "It was so breath-takingly intense, so life-alteringly incredible, that they had to cut the sport from 50 awe-inspiring 'overs' to just 20. It was that hectic."

Since the discovery, many historians have stepped forward with corroborating evidence, showing how these massive changes were just not enough to stop fans rioting out of sheer, psyche-destroying ecstacy.

"The changes they made were big, but not big enough," they said in a joint collaborative report. "They soon realised that this day-long drama was too dangerously moving to intense states of interest and euphoria that they had to alter it even more."

They explained in more depth.

"After television was invented, they had to limit the damage. They cut out vast tracts of the sport, showing just highlights and replays of single interesting aspects - like a hit, or a catch, or a wicket being blown out of the ground. They would water down these images with what were then frivolous distractions and add-ons: the drinking, the wild fans, the bright colours, the crying spectators, the batsman making a religious sign after hitting a ball, the dancing girls. It is from this tradition that our modern Cricket originates."

Fans who have heard about the news, however, say that the changes to Cricket will no revert anytime soon.

"The world has changed," one said. "To go back to long so-called games and these weird Five-Day-Internationals with 50 overs and multiple innings - why would we do that? That would be like reading a long, boring news story in a newspaper when you could just read the tweet online."

Readers wanting to know more about this but, like, TLDR, can just read the tweet on @WheresMattyNow.

Emergency services send teen girl help

NetCare24 has released a statement this morning, telling of their decision to send an ambulance to a 15-year-old girl's house, shortly after they realised that she hadn't updated her status in the last 5 minutes.

"We were just sitting there, minding our own newsfeeds, when we suddenly realised that we hadn't read anything about her totz amazeballs trip with her gorjus frenz xoxoxox to Balito bay last weekend," said head of the Help Centre Tay Kincalls. "We thought nothing of it for a while - sometimes these lapses happen."

However, they immediately flew into action when they realised there was something serious going on.

"That was when her best friend Kelly, who just left her asshole boyfriend Jake and she totally deserves a better guy a guy hu will make her feel special and we neva liked him anyway cos of his weird eyebrows, posted 184 photos of herself on Facebook," said Net24 social media watchdog, Julia Henderson.

When the girl hadn't liked a single one after a whole eight seconds, the emergency services flew into action.

"She just doesn't possess that kind of social media network selfcontrol that most normal fucking people have," said Henderson.

Normal Facebook users who don't post statuses about every goddamn thing that happens in their life who see these kinds of people suddenly falling silent can call the NetCare 24-hour emergency line at 1-800-UNFRIEND.

Makana launch probe into unbroken pipe

Makana Municipality has announced their intention to launch a series of in-depth investigations and reports into the water pipe running up High Street, saying that there has got to be some insidious reason it hasn't broken yet.

The pipe, located on the corner of High Street, has apparently not leaked once since its installation in 1989.

"The pipes of Grahamstown have been incorporated into the ground to naturally, automatically and eventually convert into fountains, free car-washes, and small rivers," said Mayor of the City of Saints, Jake Kalimba. "This pipe, this one is a whole different story."

According to the Municipality, all the pipe does all day is merely transport water from A to B.

"It has not served all the other functions that we equate with Gtown water pipes," he said.

Grahamstonians have been equally mystified.

"We just don't get it," said Fingo resident Rob Dabiedamuni. "Raglan Road, New Street, the higher suburbs... they are all broken. What makes this one pipe so special?"

Many local residents have applauded the Municipality's decision, but have said that there is still much more that needs similar investigation.

"It's a step in the right direction, but the Mayor needs to look into other things, like the small section of road at the bottom of my driveway, and the electricity supply at my neighbour's house," said resident John Tom. "These two have been respectively pothole-free and uninterrupted since we came here."

The Mayor has promised action.

"We will get to the bottom of this, even if we have to dig all day," he said

Skrillex now most highly paid, decorated Solitaire player

In a report by competitive solitaire ranking organisation Card Sharks International (CSI), part-time button pusher and mouse-clicker, Apple-product whore and full-time solitaire aficionado Skrillex has trumped other part-time phase/volume knob spinners and soundboard dial turners to win the prestigious title of International Man of Solitaire.

"When it came to picking a champion, someone who utterly defined the lifelong commitment to the game of Solitaire, there really was no other choice," said head of the awards selection committee Dubs Teip. "I mean, his Solitaire skills are off the charts. He jets around the world, practicing and competing almost every night in front of crowds of thousands of screaming fans, even going so far to play the game until the wee hours of the morning, in clubs and festivals filled with hundreds of distracting bright lights, laser displays and loud music, winning game after game after game, even in face of endless high-pace wub wub sounds mixed with recordings of breaking appliances."

Skrillex will now join the ranks of some of the greatest and much-loved Solitaire players in history, such as Deadmau5, Aviici and the Friar's DJ.

"I'm proud," said the Friar's DJ, who took time out of his busy schedule asking if there were any first-years in the club to speak to reporters. "He's finally rolling in the big leagues. Oh, and ten minutes until the Russian Bear special ends, make some fucking nooooooiiise!"

Tiep agreed wholeheartedly.

"The fact that he consistently lights up that MacBook screen with badly pixellated victory fireworks even when he's pretending to actively make music that isn't all premixed and prerecorded is just an incredible testament to his skill as a card sharp."

While many might consider Solitaire a silly waste of time to dabble with because you're desperately lonely, bored, and don't know how to play Minesweeper or have a laptop that can't run a real game, CSI says otherwise.

"It's a bold and world-reknowned game going back thousands of years," said Tiep. "It requires skill and determination. There might be prerecording, shuffling, crossfading and auto-equalising apps for music, but Solitaire is something that you have to do yourself."

Fans of the game should be sure to attend this month's current league Championships, which are being hosted in nightclubs and at trance festivals across the country. Entry is between R10 and R50.

God personally awards ManU with win over Arsenal

Thousands of Manchester United fans took to the streets in celebration last weekend, after God took time out of his busy schedule of ignoring starvation, racial discrimination, poverty and war to give the Red Devils a clean 4 - 0 win against rivals Arsenal.

According to the best-selling author and divine creator, he was ignoring a three-year-old paraplegic and blind wheelchair-bound boy's cry for help when he decided to get involved in the hotly-contested and "far more important" 90 minute period of a bunch of millionaires kicking a plastic sphere of air around a patch of grass.

"St Peter and Jesus and I were kicking it in my pearly crib, when J-C said that Christianity has been getting a really bad rap these days. We spoke about how best to make an impact, you know, really reconnect with our fanbase. We could have solved hunger or saved a dying baby or something, but no one posts about that shit on Facebook and Twitter every day. It's just not popular," said the divine being of unknowable age.

Then Jesus remembered how football was, like, everywhere: in slow motion replays, dedicated sports channels and packed bars.

"It's basically its own religion," said Our Lord and Saviour. "It quickly became apparent that we could look really good by doing something that takes really no effort at all. I mean, I once fed thousands of people with just a few fish and a loaf of bread. I think I can put a plastic ball into a net. Come on."

The Almighty and Heavenly Father's religion, Christianity, is now the second-most popular in England (home of Premier League Football), with almost 23 followers.

The miraculous four last-minute goals mark one of the Holy Father's most widely praised miracles in almost 2000 years. Religious and political analysts have since been debating the divine appearance in great depth.

Other critics have, however, defended the Holy Father's decision, saying that it was a fresh new take on world problems.

"We see pictures of starving children with distended bellies and sawn-off or blown-off limbs everyday," said media analyst Mizrep Risent. "It's just getting stale. So when we saw pictures in the paper of a young boy in a football stadium with that wonderful smile on his face, shining tears of joy streaking his face after his Football team had scored a point, I immediately felt the old heart strings tug. It's a bold new take on an age-old problem."

However, some have critisised the miracle, saying that the match had been looking pretty much dead even up until the intervention.

"In terms of miraculousness, it was about a 4 out of 10," said Cardinal Archie Bishup, "and so it falls somewhere between a plague of frogs and a turning water to wine. Man-U has had a great season, and so some say that they didn't really need the extra help. Hell, they're already ahead on the log. It would have been impressive if it had been 4 - 0 to Everton."

Arsenal fans and players alike have since expressed their displeasure at God's action, saying that they, too, prayed for victory. Notable examples include ex-defender and current multimillionaire Hover Payd."I would like to blame God for the loss," he said. "Without, him, we might have actually won. Thanks a lot. Now all I have is my incredible pile of money to wallow inconsolably in for the rest of the day. You know how many strippers and cocaine i'm going to have to go through to recover from this?"

God, however, personally defended his actions, saying that there was a "special place reserved in hell" for those "festering rectal sores" who support anyone else.

"Every time I see a player from any other team putting his hands together and looking up, or kissing the silver cross around their neck, or genuflecting after scoring a goal, it gets my tits in a twist," he said, snapping a vuvuzela in two. "Obviously it's not me - why would I rob the Devils by having some fancy-haired idiot from another team scoring against us? It just makes no sense."

Longevity, healthy lifestyle potentially fatal – study

The news got scarier and the world a considerably more bleak, depressing place to live this morning, after doctors working in conjunction with medical researchers at the Institute for The Study of Dangerous and Inevitable Illnesses announced yet another way you are probably going to die.

“The first few symptoms of this disease are iniquitous and dangerous because you feel normal, like a normal, healthy sixty-to-seventy-year-old,” said Dr Koff Formiplese. “And then BOOM: you’ve got it.”

The so-called Old Age Syndrome (OAS) has been shown to affect nearly one in a thousand people, mostly senior citizens between the ages of 60 and 90. The disease has a mortality rate of 100%, and is likely to affect you or someone you know at least once in your or his or her lifetime.

“This rare medical condition has diverse and wide-ranging symptoms,” said Formiplese, “such as hair loss, flaccid and weathered skin, brittle bones, arthritis and an increased susceptibility to infection from cuts and bruises. Also, it massively degrades their driving skills, and makes them give really strange birthday presents to people. The people who have this disease carry an unacceptably elevated risk of dying and they have a much higher than ordinary chance of developing cancers, lung, bone and liver diseases, and usually have a much poorer immune system. We need to find out what is causing this terrible affliction and end it once and for all.”

To deal with the disease, many people now resort to lumping all the infected into one huge Hospice Village, where activities like tennis, water aerobics and increasingly infrequent family visits are used to provide some relief from the condition.

However, there is a silver lining.

“Though everyone who catches the disease eventually and inevitably dies, many of them live for a very long time with the disease,” said Formiplese. “You could say it’s a manageable condition. And many studies show that simply smoking a few packs of cigarettes a day, taking high doses of illegal narcotics, avoiding the gym, eating deep-fried butter... these are all proved methods for guaranteeing you don't catch OAS.”

In light of many diagnoses like these by healthcare specialists, lawyers and legal representatives now believe they have identified two of the most leading causes of OAS, and are now gathering cases and names to back up what is set to be one of the largest a class action lawsuits in the history of the world, eclipsing the comparatively meagre settlements won from tobacco giants and poisoned water suppliers.

“We now know that statistically if you spend time in a gym or in the vegetable section of a supermarket, you’re more likely to develop symptoms,” said legal professional Claus Akshin. “as such, we’re preparing litigation against the Health Industry – places like Virgin Active and other gyms – and against fruit producers, farmers and grocers who stock produce that is dangerously high in vitamins, minerals and fibre, all of which are proven to directly contribute towards OAS.”

He went on to say how these insidious farmers were exacerbating and already out-of-control problem.

“There’s apparently a greenish sticky thing called celery that actually has a negative calorie count,” said a legal expert. “What kind of sick bastard would force his clients to burn energy to eat his food?”

They are also considering the Home Shopping Network and other infomercial channels, but proving causation will be tough if not impossible.

“They say ‘Guaranteed Results’ and ‘Money-back Guarantee’ and stuff like ‘get the abs you always wanted in no time’ but we can’t really find a single example where these products have actually inflicted one of our unfortunate victims with the kinds of Body and Muscle Mass changes that indicate the onset of OAS.”

However, Virgin Active CEO and farmers everywhere have been staunchly defensive.

“We’ll defend ourselves to the last,” said Virgin Active CEO Richard Branson. “I’m not even sure if the research is sound: in fact, most of the people who come to our gyms don’t end up being healthy and ripped anyway. Hell, the largest percentage of our subscribers is Guilty New Year’s Resolution folk, and they all quit almost immediately after Day One.”

Farmers, too, have defended their actions.

“Eating our produce might bring you OAS, sure,” said murder carrots and grim reaper corn grower Moor Talitie, “But eating alternative foods – fatty foods and carbohydrates – is clinically proven to give you higher cholesterol, excess adipose tissue and heart conditions: what doctors are now calling Fat Fuck Syndrome. I mean, I know it’s choosing between two evils, but ours is definitely the lesser of the two.”

Russian hard diplomacy could threaten illegal downloads, mail order brides – America Political Analysts

Thousands of anxious Americans packed the streets across the state capital this morning in an act of widespread protest against hard-ball diplomacy against Russian leaders, after Political Analysts realised how this kind of foreign diplomacy could influence their ability to illegally download the latest episode of Game of Thrones or order a wife over the internet.

“We’re all worried,” said local placard-waver John Wilken. “This move by our government has us all worried about far-reaching political and social repercussions, like how I’m supposed to get my next fix of medieval porn-drama-fantasy that is filled with absurd amounts of characters, strange made-up languages and full-frontal nudity.”

He added that “I just really need to know when that piece of shit Joffrey is going to die. I’m not an HBO subscriber, and if Obama’s policies cut me off… well, I don’t know what I’ll do. Lose my mind and shoot up a school most likely. At least it’s still easy to buy a gun, Praise Jesus.”

However, protesters said that these worries were “among the most trivial and smallest”.

“The real issue here isn’t as flippant as downloading HBO episodes of fantasy dark-ages political murder porn,” said protest organiser Jerry Halfords, “but rather about what is going to happen in the new season of Suits, or Homeland.”

Political experts have agreed that the protest’s worries are valid.

“Most seeders and film-rippers and camcord owners are Russian,” said Head of the Department of Politics at Rhodes Unversity Dr Mally Satthews. “Just think how this will affect the supply of hot, sex-hungry young brides, or people to screw with on public DOTA 2 servers? If relations between these two powerhouses – East and West - become any more tense, Americans might be forced to marry each other, or yell hateful diatribes about being ‘Feeder noobs’ at Spanish or Chinese people.”

The international Russian Brides industry, which is reportedly worth over four billion dollars globally, has in the past taken massive knocks due to internet paranoia, and industry experts are now worried that the trade might be stopped entirely.

"Last year bride suppliers in Russia reported stunning financial losses," said Industry analyst and Economics lecturer Prof Eits Ahndloss. "If the same happens this year, we might see a future where women aren't shipped around the world and sold like animals into church-sanctioned indentured servitude. God forbid that dark day should come."

In spite of all this, Obama remained steadfast in his attitude toward the “commie pricks”.

“I urge all Americans to support me and your country in this endeavour,” he said, before adding that if you wanted to know what’s going to happen in GOT, you should just read the book or something.

"I mean, would paying for a song in the iTunes store every once in a while really kill you?”

Peace, security would “cripple” South African economy

Economic and financial experts have today blasted various religious and political parties’ calls for “peace and non-violence between South Africans and an end to rampant theft, rape and murder rates”, saying that such an outcome would “utterly devastate” the South African economy.

“South Africa does have massive multi-million rand industries like agriculture and mining to buff up its GDP,” said Editor of The Financial Times magazine Ray Zintaxes, “but our biggest industry by far is the multi-billion-rand-a-year industry centred mostly on paranoid white people and combating crime. Without crime, our economy would fall to shambles.”

Many other experts and politicians have agreed with this assessment, saying that the calls for peace and safety for all in South Africa are “too rash, too hasty [and] totally short sighted.”

“If we look at projects like Nkandla, you can easily see how the economy would be affected,” said ANC spokesperson, Chi Fwip. “If Zuma didn’t fear for his life and safety, hundreds of security contractors, many of them my personal friends and family, would be homeless, broke, unemployed and destitute. We need crime now more than ever.”

Fwip added that without the constant fear of murder, rape, robbery, assault, farm killings, mugging, gang violence, grand theft auto and petty larceny, many thousands of South Africans would immediately lose their jobs as policemen, car guards, security guards, night-watchmen, private security company employees and security installation and maintenance professionals.

“It would decimate employment,” said Fwip. “And since ‘decimate’ means ‘to reduce by a tenth’ it would probably decimate it more than once.”

Fwip added that crime was the only source of income for many poor families and crack addicts in South Africa.

“Without crime, we’re taking away their only form of livelihood,” he said. “Every time a robber breaks into a house and stabs or shoots someone, he is creating employment and wealth not just for himself, but also for police officers, doctors, hospitals, funeral directors and grave diggers. You can see how such a call would create a domino-effect of havoc for our economy.”

This not the first bit of controversy to be raised about South African crime, however, as our Police Services, the SAPS, have been criticised and questioned time and time again, with theorists alternately saying South Africa would be a better place without them or defending the SAPS as “misrepresented by a biased, unfair media”.

Academics are now calling for more “thought and discourse” on the issue before making such rash calls.

“This whole problem is more complex than merely ‘oh, please stop raping and killing and stealing’,” said Securityologist at the Beijing University School of Security Studies, Shu Tsatukyl. “Without crime, there would be no police, and without Police around there would be no one left around to stop criminals. It would be hell. Like a South African Catch-22, but with fewer long words.”

Schools ban "racist, classist" Chess

It has been a fantastic day for equal rights, after schools around the world announced their decision to finally ban the overtly racist and classist piece of offensive intolerance disguised as a board game, Chess.

“Just look at the game,” said Headmaster of Checkerton High School, Chek Mayt, “It’s all about kings and queens forcing the poor proletariat pawns around a board, and about whites fighting blacks to control a limited bit of territory. We’re just glad we can finally throw this Nazi-esque piece of crude pro-supremacy propaganda in the bin.”

Chess, as we all know, was invented by 1623 by Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, who came up with the concept after realising how charred or polished bones of innocent men and women could each be carved into different little figurines for use in board games aimed at whiling away the quiet moments between public executions. Chess was preceded by the far more bigoted Backgammon (a word which derives from the Old Latin, Bacchus Gammonius, meaning “slaughter of innocents”) which involved impaling white and black pieces on different colour spikes, with the winner being the one who can get rid of their particular ethic group the fastest.

Mayt is just one of many Education professionals who stand by the new ban. He added that what made the game even more like a mini Apartheid was how some pieces, like the Bishop, are forced to always remain on their specific coloured area.

“What are we trying to teach our kids? That we are all just expendable, exploited pieces on the board of life, divided up by the colour of our skin and never allowed by society to leave our predefined roles or change our lot in life? What if a rook wants to move in an ‘L’ shape? What if a pawn wants to take a step to the side? What if a king doesn’t want to sacrifice his subjects in a pointless war that has no real purpose or reason except racial hatred and territorial disputes?”

Schools have for a number of years now been trying to slowly marginalise chess out of their hallways through covert operations, but they say that it has not yet proven successful, and that there was finally no other choice than drastic action.

“We used to pay kids to beat up the smaller kids who played this game between AP Maths and Advance Chemistry, calling them ‘nerds’ and ‘dorks’ in the hopes that they would bow to peer pressure and social norms and give up the game, but it’s still played today,” said Mayt. “Extreme measures are necessary. If we want to teach our kids tolerance and acceptance, we have to ban this game and condemn anyone who plays it.”

Some theorists are now trying to work on a “more tolerant, less ethnically charged version” of the game, but say they have encountered some difficulties.

“We first tried to fix it by changing the colours of the pieces, but even this has proven not enough. We tried yellow and red, but now it just looks like we’re trying to portray Asian and Indian ethnic cleansing.” In spite of these difficulties, these hard-working men and women say they are optimistic that they are on the verge of a “much better game”.

“We’re making a new version in which every piece is a mutli-coloured rainbow pawn – so that we’re all equal and racially sensitive – and a new bunch of rules in which your pieces democratically elect a King, and then you spend the rest of the game exercising passive measures instead of violence, equipping your pieces with placards, marijuana, flowers and an iconic soundtrack to stop the pointless violence of war. Sure, there isn’t a winner or loser, and it’s not at all fun – but isn’t that the best way to teach kids the basic lessons of life?”

The game goes on sale next week, alongside the new anti-capitalist version of a popular board game, Marx-nopoly, in which players equally distribute land and spread their Pass-Go-Collect-200-Dollars income evenly among the masses.