Al Queda Delivers Tape with Hostage Footage and Unrealistic Demands, Presumably

BAGHDAD - Arabic news organization Al-Jazeera reports the receipt of a VHS tape early Wednesday morning from an anonymous Al Queda courier. According to newsroom sources, the tape likely contains footage of one or more kidnap victims and the subsequent threats of his or her captors. Analysts are struggling to verify the message content, however, as the media format requires equipment virtually extinct in the twenty-first century.

To display the VHS tape, technicians require a VCR device -- or Videocassette Recorder -- which translates the data from a spooled magnetic ribbon into synchronized video and audio data. As no such device is known to exist within the offices of Reuters, AP International, or the BBC, American authorities are undertaking a massive equipment search -- reaching even the antiquated newsrooms of the rural United States.

"We had a VCR until about a year ago," said Mulga, Alabama station engineer Darryl Logan. "Every summer, a group of punk junior high kids would come in here to learn how a newsroom works, and we'd let them do their own remotes using our old VHS-compatible gear. But even those clumsy little sh*ts have their own mini-DV cams nowadays, so we tossed it all. Have you guys maybe tried the community access channel with that Dungeons & Dragons guy?"

Government authorities acknowledge the urgency of the pursuit, but admit that few archiac technologies are withstanding the relentless march of progress.

"Who uses VHS nowadays? Digital video cameras go for maybe two hundred bucks on Iraq's black market," commented CIA foreign communications analyst Ted Guerro. "Listen, I'll give Al Queda two hundred bucks if it'll keep me from having to work weekends."