writers to turn down such requests as a matter of policy. For example, Gary Shteyngart announced in The New Yorker that he would no longer write blurbs, except for certain writers with whom he had a professional or personal connection. Neil Gaiman reports that "Every now and again, I stop doing blurbs.... The hiatus lasts for a year or two, and then I feel guilty or someone asks me at the right time, and I relent." Jacob M. Appel reports that he received fifteen to twenty blurb requests per week and tackles "as many as I can." Parody blurbs Many humorous books and films parody blurbs that deliver exaggerated praise by unlikely people and insults disguised as praise. Monty Python and the Holy Grail – "Makes Ben Hur look like an Epic" 1066 and All That – "We look forward keenly to the appearance of their last work" The Harvard Lampoon satire of The Lord of the Rings, titled Bored of the Rings, deliberately used fake blurbs by deceased authors on the inside cover. One of the blurbs stated "One of the two or three books ...", and nothing else. Film Movie blurbs are part of the promotional campaign for films, and usually consist of positive, colorful extracts from published reviews. Movie blurbs have often been faulted for taking words out of context. The New York Times reported that "the blurbing game is also evolving as newspaper film critics disappear and studios become more comfortable quoting Internet bloggers and movie Web sites in their ads, a practice that still leaves plenty of potential for filmgoers to be bamboozled. Luckily for consumers, there is a cavalry: blurb watchdog sites have sprung up and the number of Web sites that aggregate reviews by established critics is steadily climbing. ... Helping to keep studios in line these days are watchdog sites like eFilmCritic.com and The Blurbs, a Web column for Gelf magazine written by Carl Bialik of The Wall Street Journal." Slate wrote in an "Explainer" column: "How much latitude do movie studios have in writing blurbs? A fair amount. There's no official check on running a misleading movie blurb, aside from the usual laws against false advertising. Studios do have to submit advertising materials like newspaper ads and trailers to the Motion Picture Association of America for approval. But the MPAA reviews the ads for their tone and content, not for the