You know how on Hulu they have that nifty little button that pops up when you're watching an ad? The one that says, "Is this ad relevant to you?" Lately I've been wishing Yahoo did the same thing with all the news articles it inflicts on me whenever I open my email. Surely the media would benefit from knowing exactly what I don't care about reading. I know old-school media might not have cared---the news is the news is the news!---but today's media is clearly counting hits per article and searching out ways to capitalize on popular topics.

I know that I send a vague message by simply refusing to click on all those articles about Snooki, the LA porn industry, the Broadway box office post-hurricane, etc., but I can't help feeling that perhaps the media is a little confused. Shouldn't they know that I'm not clicking on that article because I'm not interested...and not because I don't have enough time or haven't updated my browser or any number of other reasons I might have for not clicking on it?

It's not as though there's a shortage of news. I could clearly forgo all the articles I find tedious or irritating and still have plenty of news to explore. Articles on science, for instance. Or that new Muppet album. Or what's hot in fashion. I don't have high-brow news tastes; I love pop culture. But there really ought to be a way to choose the types of pop culture I'm exposed to every time I open my email.

'Cuz Lady Gaga's weirdo behavior at the VMAs? I. Don't. Care.

(...Not unless it's packaged like this.)