According to a Newsweek piece, a North Carolina Girl Scout named Wild Freeborn got the idea to sell cookies over the internet from her web designer dad, Bryan's, work, and asked for his help in earning her troop a trip to Scout Camp.

In late January, they posted a YouTube video, starring Freeborn in Girl Scout gear, touting her straightforward sales pitch. "Buy cookies! And they're yummy!" Soon after, they set up an online order system that was limited to customers within their local area (so Freeborn could personally deliver them). While her online sales strategy took hold, she continued peddling cookies the traditional way-going door to door and working booths at the local grocery store. Within two weeks, more than 700 orders for Thin Mints, Caramel DeLites and Peanut Butter Patties reached the Freeborns solely through the online form.

Freeborn's success quickly raised the hackles of some parents in the community, who complained that the web pitch gave her troupe an unfair advantage, and brought the site to the attention of Girl Scouts. While the objection may seem purely curmudgeonly in these tech-savvy times, and "safety" concerns may seem disingenuous when the alternative is interacting with strangers, there were real issues: in rural North Carolina, not every family can afford a computer. As such, Freeborn's troupe did have a genuine advantage.

However, the fracas, and the subsequent shut-down, have spurred discussion that maybe Girl Scouts need to get with the times, integrating technology in an organized way. After all, if the goal is business savvy, then the internet's a pretty necessary area of study. And in general, many feel that the Scouts haven't embraced the tech age fully.

On the girls' level, few of the badges that scouts can earn involve technology, and of those that do, the requirements are paltry: the "Computer Smarts" requirement for young girls (or "Brownies") only requires that they visit three Web sites. For older girls, the CyberGirl Scout badge is earned in part by sending an e-mail. "These skills are at a level I'm sure many girls can already surpass," [says one expert]

Girl Scout cookies are an emotionally-charged issue, rooted in tradition and nostalgia. According to a new helpful timeline on MentalFloss, Scouts started selling sugar cookies at bake sales in 1917; soon cookies had become a major fundraiser, a tradition that was broken only during World War II, when rationing forces the Scouts to vend calendars instead. Today the cookies, which are Kosher, are made by only two bakeries. For many families, the door-to-door sales ritual is not merely a good social exercise, but a connection to history.

While Wild's dad feels they've done nothing wrong - "We had to talk with Wild about the ethics of cookie sales, what you can and cannot do...We decided that as long as we weren't taking money over the Internet, we weren't doing anything wrong" - others describe her high-tech pitch as creating "the perception of unfairness" that's antithetical to the Girl Scout mission and want the issue addressed formally. And given that it's something which obviously isn't going away, that seems logical. To our minds, it seems like this is something that wouldn't be that hard to deal with - couldn't troops collaborate with local libraries to ensure internet access? Or get this dad to give a tutorial, sit-com working-together-style? Resenting the interference of web designer parents in a community where some can't afford computers is one issue - and a valid one. But prohibiting the use of the internet is simply out-of-touch. Besides which, if scouts are going to be taking to the web, it seems imperative that the organization make web safety, and the accompanying guidelines, as high a priority as the strictures that govern door-to-door sales. Because anything that gets more Thin Mints from factory to face - and, ahem, more funds for the Scouts - is a Good Thing.

P.S. Anyone know where can we put in an order?

The Quick 10: 10 Girl Scout Cookie Crumbs [MentalFloss]
The Cookie Crumbles [Newsweek]

As children's lives get increasingly complicated and their schedules increasingly packed, many simply don't have the time to peddle Thin Mints door-to-door. As a result, their parents do the dirty work for them, forcing coworkers to buy them at the office — or, even worse, bringing their Girl Scout along to work so the grown-ups are forced into buying (not, mind you, that we'd require much urging). Some offices have apparently instituted a "no solicitations" policy.

One mom makes the point that, for those folks who don't have a local troop, providing a Samoa hookup is really a service. Also, she adds, it's "dangerous" nowadays for her daughter to peddle door-to-door. While no one wants safety compromised,the issue, for the Scouts, is that it's not just about the sales: the whole point of the fundraising is that the girls do it themselves, and "because the interactions boost their confidence and help them learn basic skills like making correct change." Then there are the prizes for big sellers: obviously with a parent involved, the waters are muddied.

Of course, parental meddling is probably as old as parenthood itself, and even in the halcyon days of the trans-fattened Lorna Doone there must surely have been a little pull used to bring in the big prizes. There's a lot right with selling Girl Scout cookies as many places as possible and in as great a quantity as possible on grounds of extreme deliciousness and good works, so from an office standpoint it's hard to see where the problem of having a sign-up sheet in the kitchen lies (although if the "solicitations" ban extends to pleas from triathletes on other floors whom one doesn't know we can kind of see the issue.) The thing is, doesn't it ruin it for the kids? Not just in a "they're not learning" way, but in that way that only a meddling parent can ruin something? Safety aside, there's a lot to be said for letting kids have a project that's just theirs, and unless your mom is a troupe leader, wouldn't it feel a lot more fun and a lot more important to go it alone? No one in the article asks the kids how they feel about it, but I'd be willing to bet a few would like their folks to butt out.

Girl Scout Cookie-Pushing Ethics At The Office [CNN]

Journalists boost brothel business in Sydney during the Pope's visit. • Women over 16 near Teesside beach in the UK can pay 5 pounds and don a bikini to set a new world record on Sunday. There is "no upper age limit." • Hundreds of angry pregnant women in Australia plan to "storm" a hospital that is shutting down its maternity unit per the government's instructions. • Showjumpers in England make a "desperate" attempt to drum up publicity for their sport by having two young female showjumpers pose without their pants. • A nurse in England gave the wrong woman an abortion after she failed to do a background identity check and followed anonymity rules at the clinic to protect women seeking the procedure (the two patients shared the same first name). • Former Olympic track star Marion Jones applied for a federal commute of her six-month prison sentence after she was convicted of lying to federal agents about her performance-enhancing drug use. • The latest strange female aphrodisiac out there? Donkey skin. • It is serious puppy face time!

So like, this site. Do you sometimes feel like it's the only place you can have a frank discussion about...well, basically anything...with numerous other females at the same time? Because I sort of do. It's cliche to point out, but most females' approach to dealing with large packs of other females is to 1. avoid and 2. adopt the "bar bathroom line" approach, whereby everyone sort of drunkenly love bombs one another with support and compliments while they wait for their really drunk friend to finish puking and in the meantime, check on their makeup. Maybe the bar bathroom line is the only place girls are forced to confront their shared agenda, which is to 1. find someone to go home with and 2. avoid the gross spectacle of all those girls trying to find someone to go home with. Yeah yeah yeah, okay, I am exaggerating. A lot. But not, I dunno. I feel this way most of the time I spend participating in collective girl-swarm activities such as shopping, or going to loud bars, or whatever else women do together. (Exercise classes? Yeah, no. But the point holds.) Anyway, so like: I can't help sometimes that I had spent more time camping and selling cookies that I had adamantly not baked at home in the company of other females as a youth because now my idea of a good time is generally drinking and I would in no way ever want to bring a daughter into this world kthanxbai.

Girl Scouts Seeks An Image Makeover [WSJ]
Related (Well not really, but kind of weird) Living Lord Of The Rings At A Girl Scout Camp In New Jersey [Wired]

• Oscar winner Marion Cotillard has conspiracy theories! She questions the attack on the World Trade Center towers: "We see other towers of the same kind being hit by planes. There was a tower, I believe it was in Spain, which burned for 24 hours. It never collapsed. None of these towers collapsed. And there (in New York), in a few minutes, the whole thing collapsed." Plus! She doubts Neil Armstrong! "Did a man really walk on the moon? I saw plenty of documentaries on it, and I really wondered," she says. "I don't believe all they tell me, that's for sure." [Variety]
  
• Are Britney and Adnan Ghalin dunzo? Did she throw his iPhone into the pool after finding "saucy" texts from another woman? [The Sun]
  
• Jennifer Lopez has indeed, as previously reported, named her twins Max and Emme. A reader points out that those were the names of the kids in the cartoon Dragon Tales. WTF? [CNN, YouTube]
  
• Colin Farrell is hooked on Russian steam baths. "There's something very basic about rubbing honey on your skin and going steaming with a bunch of strange Russian men," he says. Well, it's healthier than drugs and alcohol, for sure. [UPI]

• Jamie Lynn Spears' unborn kid is prolly a boy. Hopefully we won't be named Casey Lynn. [MSNBC]
• A new photography show features the tattoos of Lindsay Lohan. Highbrow! [Page Six]
• Family drama! Atonement star James McAvoy hasn't spoken to his father, James McAvoy Senior, in 21 years. And his 18-year-old half-brother, Donald, is in the clink for stabbing a man eight times. [Daily Mail]
• Simon Cowell doesn't believe in marriage, for financial reasons. "The truth is that you get married and in a year or two they clean you out! We have contracts with artists that are 120 pages long and last five years. Then you go into marriage with no contract and the laws are a thousand years old." [Mirror]
• Oh, and Simon was offered a million dollar deal to be the "face" of Viagra. His response: "Sorry, but that has to be a fucking insult." [The Sun]
• What??? A plot to kill Mick Jagger??? Oh... In 1969. [USA Today]
• Aussie model Gemma Ward, who was linked to Heath Ledger, says, "He told me to always be a punk and 'stand up for yourself.'" [Sydney Morning Herald]
• One of Paris Hilton's dogs is "mating" with the Yorkie of Johnson & Johnson heiress Casey Johnson. [Gatecrasher]
• While filming The Other Boleyn Girl, Scarlett Johansson was voted the world's sexiest woman by a men's mag. Some of the crew said she looked more like a grungy teenager; Scarlett heard and "lost her temper." Who could blame her? [UPI]
• Meanwhile, Scarlett is offering herself up on eBay; a night with her is being auctioned off for Oxfam. [Mirror]
• Paris Hilton has been seen hanging out with a "bearded guru." [Mirror]
• The spirit guide blessed a necklace Paris was wearing and then advised her to give it away, so some chick at Urth Cafe was the lucky recipient. [TMZ]
• Blind item! "Which single-ish A-list actor is back to his old ways since splitting with his wife? He was seen handing off a suspicious-looking vial to a hard-partying TV thesp who is about to hit the big screen." [Gatecrasher]
• Fall Out Boy Pete Wentz is opening a punk-themed unisex beauty parlor in his native Chicago, so everyone can be flatironed into oblivion. Joy! [Rush & Molloy]
• Jason Davis, brother of Mischa Barton's ex, Brandon Davis, was arrested for cocaine possession over the weekend. [TMZ]
• Mark Ronson is DJing Suri Cruises' 2nd birthday party? Seriously? [TMZ]
• Sophie Monk has released a statement: "Benji Madden did not leave me for Paris Hilton." Hmm, we never thought that, but whatever. Also: Paris has a new ring on her "engagement finger," is it from Benji? [People]
• Now that the writers' strike is over, Eva Longoria-Parker is getting back in shape, because apparently the pregnancy rumors stemmed from her gaining weight. Except she is plenty thin! What is wrong with people? [People]
• Prince Harry, back home from Afghanistan: "I wouldn't say I'm a hero. here were two injured guys who came back on the plane with us who were essentially comatose throughout the whole way. One had lost two limbs — a left arm and a right leg — and another guy who was saved by his mate's body being in the way but took shrapnel to the neck. Those are the heroes. Those were guys who had been blown up by a mine that they had no idea about, serving their country, doing a normal patrol." [People]
• Rapper Juvenile is "shocked and devastated" after learning that his 4-year-old daughter, her mother and another child were shot dead in their home in Lawrenceville, GA. [MTV News]
• Miley Cyrus and her dad are on the cover of a magazine called Cowboys & Indians. [ONTD]
• A judge dismissed part of actress Hunter Tylo's lawsuit against her late son's therapist. Her 19-year-old son drowned last October and Tylo sued the therapist, who had counseled the family. [UPI]
• Vanessa Williams and ex-husband Rick Fox were making the rounds Saturday, helping their daughter sell Girl Scout Cookies. [Concrete Loop]
• American Idol reject Robbie Carrico swears his hair is not a wig or weave. "I've been growing this hair for a very long time," Carrico says. Perhaps it's time to cut it off? [People]
• Mariah Carey on the cover of Allure! [The.Life Files]
• Will Ferrell's new flick was a dud at the box office, making a mere $15.3 million. [Reuters]