Who knew that the names of nearly obsolete file-sharing services were considered dirty words by the bigwigs at MTV? Well, "Weird Al" Yankovic does now, thanks to the version of his Bill Plympton-penned video for "Don't Download This Song" that's on MTV's new video-only site MTVMusic.com having the words "Morpheus," "Grokster," "Limewire," and "KaZaA" dropped out of its lyrics. The bigger insult? MTV's online standards and practices department didn't even go the "dropping the vocal track when the offending words hit" route that has turned so many other pop songs into stutterfests—they actually stick in answering-machine-quality BEEPs, so you know something's being blocked from sensitive ears. I think this might be the first time that's ever happened to the stringently PG-rated Yankovic. Yay, Internet? [TechDirt via Artists Paid]

Today's TRL had at No. 7 My Chemical Romance's "Teenagers," a track that we've sung the praises of in the past. But as is the case with much of the music that sees actual airtime on MTV, the song was pockmarked with bleeps. While some of the x-ed-out words were to be expected, tallying up which words were and weren't blocked by MTV's standards and practices department led to some odd results:

BLEEPED:
• murder
• shit
• "your shirt"
• pay

NOT BLEEPED:
• bleed
• violent

Now, it's understandable—sort of!—why "your shirt" and "pay" were bleeped; the verse in question is about whipping out a concealed weapon as revenge for high school kids' cruelty. But if you're going to get rid of those words and not also ding words that actually conjure up violent imagery, what's the point? As Dan pointed out over IM, MTV's bleeping of "shirt" may actually be a sop to the less-literate, more-reactionary audience members who watch TRL on mute:

GuestDan: sounds like shit
GuestDan: you can never be too sure
GuestDan: could be a close captioning nightmare

Which leaves us with only one conclusion: Watch out, "this." You're next.

My Chemical Romance Teenagers Lyrics [metrolyrics.com]