A newspaper columnist walks into a bar...

One of the lost arts in newspaperin' is what used to be called "paragraphing," a column composed of short, pithy comments. It was exemplified by Bill Vaughn, whose "Starbeams" column ran for many years in The Kansas City Star. Here's a sample from a 1962 Time magazine profile of Vaughn:

"I am not an extreme rightist," Walter Tippy shouted at a late-evening political discussion. "But I am extremely right."

Meet internet denizen Mike Berger, who calls his paragraphs "Newsbreaks:"

After discovering that many of their stadiums do not come up to code, Italian soccer officials have announced that several upcoming games will be played in front of no spectators. That's too bad...Still, it's nice to see after years of trying to convince us to play their type of football, they've given in and started to play our type of soccer.

The genre may owe as much to Saturday Night Live as it does Bill Vaughn, but that's one of the great things about the internet tubes: creativity and experimentation can be rewarded.

Have a safe and wonderful tomorrow.