I am currently cooped up in my house with a bad fever. I just spent 13 hours in bed tossing and turning and sleeping and having those fever dreams.

Luckily, being a workaholic, three of these fever dreams had relevance to my job, and I thought I’d share them with you.

First, I had a dream about Jennifer Aniston and her agent bickering about whether or not she should attend a launch party for one of our sites. Her agent didn’t want her to do it – he thought it was beneath her her. But Jennifer tried to explain that this wasn’t just a normal PR party, it was a PR party for a website, so the potential audience was increased by the potential online viewership. She told her agent she had to keep her “ladyviews” up. “Ladyviews,” apparently, is something like a Q Score, – which all celebrities compete against each other for. Jennifer started rambling on about how her ladyviews were down 10% in the last month, and this was not good, damn it. Somehow, in my dream, I knew that ladyview meant one lady viewing one female celebrity one time. Sorta like an all lady, celebrity banner click.

Next, I had an incredibly complicated dream where I was part of a team at a secret startup who was trying to integrate the nation’s power grid with Twitter. This seems kinda pointless now, but when you’re lying in bed with your iPhone and a fever, the thought of being able to tweet to your thermostat to turn it up or down seems kind of wonderful. Everyone talks about Twitter like it’s maybe the next phone system or utility, but I like the idea of it being integrated with the power grid. I think this came from those GE ads during the superbowl.

Finally, my last dream involved me being an intrepid Daschiel Hammett-like reporter who was working on a conspiracy case involving the selection of which iPhone apps appeared in TBWA/Chiat Day’s commercials. There are like ten Taxi applications, and there are like many Tip calculating applications. One of the last things I saw before I went to bed last night was one of those ads, and I remember wondering idly how they chose which tip calculator app to feature. In my dream, it transpired that I uncovered a kickback conspiracy between TBWA and the creators of specific Taxi and Tip applications. Then they show me dead, in an all blue and glass computer room, much like the one in Antitrust. I had been offed by the nefarious assasins of TBWA. (please note: this is fiction. TBWA don’t sue me)

OKAY, so the other thing I’ve been thinking a lot about in my fever is last night’s episode of Gossip Girl. First off, if you’re a fan, OMG BEST EPISODE EVER, RIGHT? But let’s keep to the subject of the internet here, otherwise I should be posting this in my Livejournal.

- * SPOILER ALERT * -

In this week’s episode, cell phones are banned from the school, and one character uses the phone to text a website (Gossip Girl) a tip about a student and a teacher having a potentially inappropriate relationship. Ultimately, the student gets disciplined for this, though they have no evidence other than another student’s word it was their doing.

Now, this is where I think it gets interesting and relevant to us here on the internet. First, there was one scene where all the parents, at the PTA meeting, briefly contemplated suing and shutting down Gossip Girl. Though in the end, one parent rightly pointed out that even if they succeeded (there was brief talk of subpoenaing the ISP), a million more would crop in its place.

I thought this was kind of awesome, and I applaud the Gossip Girl writers for being more forward thinking than the RIAA on this front. Additionally, Serena routinely says that “the only thing you can do about gossip websites is to not let it get to you.” This, of course, is advice that those in our good metropolis of NY could probably take to heart a bit more.

Additionally, there was one more interesting thing on Gossip Girl regarding the internet last night. So, as far as anyone can tell, Gossip Girl is a tip-driven blog, with a single editor who takes the tips, and writes stories around them. This, it should be noted, is intrinsic in the show’s plot. They often talk about wondering who Gossip Girl is (his/her identity is secret), and Gossip Girl narrates the show in a commentary-style voice. This is important. Gossip Girl is not a user-generated community, and Gossip Girl is not a forum site. This becomes important in this episode because the teachers and parents routinely refer to the student “posting” “slanderous material” to a website.

But in fact the student did no such thing. She sent a text tip. The tip was like five words. With a question mark. She passed on a rumor to one person, and that person elected to turn it into a innuendo-laden (though still not slanderous if you listen to the actual text) blog post.

So where does the truth lie? Where does responsibility lie? The student tells her dad that she “may have sent a tip in” and the dad elects to defend her against the PTA, but later learns that she essentially knew what was going to happen, though she did not, in fact, lie to her dad.

Is the student guilty? And is the lack of comprehension between texting a tip to an individual and posting on a forum intentional? Is it important? Did the teachers and PTA confuse the two to the detriment of the student? At the very least, the lack of technically correct terminology irked me.

Damn good episode, though. Last ten minutes? Best they’ve ever had.

N.B. I apologize for ending at least one sentence with a preposition and combining two topics into one, but when you have a fever, you can get away with stuff like that.