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} [TV screen shows the logo: ONN Headline News]
}
} James Earl Jones' voiceover: *This* is ONN.
}
} [Screen: FACTOID--only 5 people in the entire U.S. actually like
} Funions, as compared to 7 in Argentina.]
}
} [Cut to anchor]
}
} Anchor: I'm Charles Zewe, and this is the Oracular News Network. Today
} on lifestyles: why are candy vending machines so confusing? I mean,
} look at soda machines. Each button has the logo of the corresponding
} drink. You just push...
}
} James Earl Jones' voice: That's enough, Chuck. Just go to Wolf.
}
} Anchor: [visibly shaken] We now go to Wolf Blitzer, who is at the
} Vendabar corporation headquarters, to get some answers.
}
} [cut to Wolf, wearing a flak jacket. He is standing in a plush
} office.]
}
} Wolf: Man, being a reporter sucks when there's no war on.
}
} JEJ: Would you like to know what will really 'suck'? Your
} next paycheck!
}
} Wolf: Ulp, are we on? I'm here with the vice-president of marketing
} of Vendabar, George Conrad. Mr. Conrad, why all the difficult
} lettered buttons on candy vending machines? Why not just use
} the product logo, like on the soda machines made by...
}
} VP: Silence! Do not speak the name of our heathen competitors in
} here!
}
} Wolf: Sorry.
}
} VP: To answer your question: look at soda cans. They're done in
} beautiful reds, blues, whites, and greens. You can show those logos
} anywhere and people would by the product, no matter what it was.
} Now look at candy bar wrappers. Browns and yellows. Maybe some
} grey, if someone felt creative. You can't sell anything with those
} colors! Obviously we can't put those on our buttons. If *I* were
} in charge of marketing the candy bars, they'd have beautiful colors.
} But we don't make the candy here, we just vend it.
}
} Wolf: OK, I guess. But why the weird letter combinations?
}
} VP: Well, it started out logically enough. M for Milky Way. MM for
} M&Ms. N for Nutrageous. B for Butterfinger. But then we started
} running out of letters, so we had to get creative. NN for Bar None,
} for the two n's in the name. Similarly, EE for Nestle's Crunch.
}
} JEJ: I *like* Bar None.
}
} Wolf: Er, yes. Anyway, Mr. Conrad, how did you ever get E for
} Funions?
}
} VP: Well, F was already taken. In fact, almost all the letters and
} double letters were already taken. But there was E, sitting right
} next to F, and E kind of looks like F too.
}
} Wolf: [thinks for a second] There aren't any candy bars that begin
} with F.
}
} VP: Well, no. But around the time we were assigning the letters,
} Hershey's decided to branch out. They started selling fruitcake.
}
} Wolf: Fruitcake???!!!
}
} VP: Yes. Their reasoning was that while candy bars might start
} growing moldy after sitting in vending machines for 5 years,
} fruitcake would not. Anyway, our market research amazingly
} showed that the American people loathed fruitcake slightly
} less than they loathed Funions. So fruitcake got F and
} Funions were relegated to E. Soon thereafter Hershey's dropped
} the fruitcake line, but we thought it would confuse people if
} we moved Funions to F after they had already become accustomed to
} seeing it at E.
}
} Wolf: There you have it, Chuck.
}
} [cut back to anchor]
}
} Anchor: Thanks Wolf. Up on the next half-hour of ONN Headline
} News: scientists are genetically altering woodchucks so they
} *can* chuck wood, hoping to solve an age-old problem.
}
} [fade to ONN logo]
}
} JEJ: *This* is ONN.
}
} [cut to commercial]
}
} You owe the Oracle James Earl Jones' voice without Darth
} Vader's personality.
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