We here at Off the Press pride ourselves on our immaculate journalism, our commitment to reporting the truth no matter how improbable it may seem, and our rigorous drive to keep everyone informed of the goings-on around campus. It is with a heavy heart today that I, the chief editor of Off the Press, inform you that the writer for this week’s article was caught searching headlines of theonion.com for material to write about. At this time we would like to assure you that we have never taken inspiration from any satirical new site and absolutely all of our journalism is based on hard facts and questions that we have discovered for asked experts and eyewitnesses about. In other words, we have never been making this up as we go along two hours before The Stute requires our submissions.
As a result of this discovery, Off the Press is taking two important steps to ensure no incident like this happens again. First, we are conducting a comprehensive overhaul of our writing process and undergoing a thorough review of past material to make sure it is completely onion-less. All references to onions—the food—will also be removed with a special exception for this article. Second, we are doing interviews with all of our writers and editors to determine who the snitch was that provided the anonymous tip so they can be removed from our organization. As the sharpie right below the Ducks Don’t Haze poster in our office says, “Ducks don’t reveal someone else’s epic bit either.”
Anyone who knows someone who might have thought it was cute or funny to end someone else’s hilarious bit before they were ready is encouraged to come forward with information. It goes without saying that if our whistleblower was doing an amusing bit of their own, it would be pretty rude to reveal it was them if they don’t want you to, and we would certainly not condone giving us that information we asked for.
Normally we don’t publicize our scandals, we simply write a quick summary and then stuff it in a now overflowing filing cabinet labeled “Super Secret Stuff” and hope nobody finds out about it. In this case, we decided it would be cool if we opted for transparency every now and again. Hopefully it doesn’t completely upend our pristine reputation as the arbiters of truth and fact. We really like it when people take whatever we say as gospel and don’t cross reference it with any of the hundreds of contradictory Wikipedia articles because it makes us seem a lot smarter.
At Off the Press we look forward to your continued readership and we will uphold our commitment to being the most reliable source of news on campus. We’re so reliable in fact you might as well not read literally anything else. In fact, as I continue my stream of consciousness rant disguised as a formal message, I’m going to officially announce Off the Press’s campaign to eliminate all forms of competing journalism. You can make donations to my personal Venmo, or write me a check. We do not accept credit cards because we don’t understand compound interest and we think credit cards are decidedly uninteresting. I can’t wait to forget I announced this and start getting mystery transactions sent to me by the entire school. I promise to use all of it to further the noble cause of Off the Press and none of it for personal expenses.
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