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Apparently immune to self-inflicted irony, BusinessWeek's online division has launched an Orwellian campaign to catch an internal leaker, while publishing a Halloween-themed article entitled "Scary Co-Workers." After all, "who hasn't indulged in the guilty pleasure of office scuttlebutt with a Gossip, or been marginally entertained by The Pessimist's conspiracy theories?" BW management has done neither, apparently. The personhunt has been launched to track down who leaked internal emails relating to speculation about the identity of a commenter ("Martin Smithers") who habitually and suspiciously praises the mag to the heavens. We hear that a "forensic audit" of emails has been ordered to figure out whence the leak sprung, and all IMs will now be surveilled. An even stranger rumor has boss Kathy Rebello hiring some sort of prose expert to compare the writing of employees versus that of the leaker, thus snaring the perpetrator in some kind of Da Vinci Code literary trap. Perhaps now is the time to report to the public square for a voluntary self-criticism session, before it becomes mandatory.

Earlier: BusinessWeek's "Martin Smithers": Sock Puppet, or Satirical Genius?