This is great. Every month Mr. Biffo contributes the wonderful Biffovision column in Edge magazine. Oh, except next month. Next month's column has been pulled by Edge and won't appear in the next issue because "it was felt to be too much of a personal attack on a certain individual". Certain individual being Phil Harrison.

Now, having read the column, which is up on Mr. Biffo's site, I can't see the personal attack. Just because Harrison's involved doesn't make it personal. But man oh man, it's fantastic stuff. Basically, both Harrison and Mr. Biffo were at a weekend-long Marillion gig in Amsterdam. At one point during proceedings, someone in the crowd won a signed t-shirt, but rather than keeping it got up and auctioned it off for charity instead. Things go downhill from there.

I can't summarise it better than Mr. Biffo can, so here's the gist:

Mid-auction, the band's keyboard player put an impromptu shout out to one "Phil Harrison". Turns out that this was the Phil Harrison you and I know as the president of Sony Computer Entertainment's Worldwide Studios. I'd heard rumours that he's a friend of the band, and something of a fan of their music, but I hadn't realised he was at the convention.

Rather than bid, Harrison offered to auction a brand new PS3, paid for from his "own pocket". The band's keyboard player duly started the bidding at around 100 euros, getting a couple of incremental increases from interested - but slightly bemused - fans.

However, before you could say "Fake blog fiasco", Harrison materialised on stage to commandeer both the auction, and the microphone. Realising that this was another solid gold opportunity to promote his floundering device, he blurted out the launch date, probably mumbled something about "a new dawn of interactive entertainment", and inexplicably re-booted the auction with a fresh starting price of 600 euros.

With this following on from an extremely generous and selfless act by one of the fans, you could clearly see the band and their representatives crying slightly. Indeed, a couple of them shuffled off into the wings, presumably to acquire a large pillow with which to smother this ghastly suit.

What next ensued was the one lowlight of an otherwise well-intentioned, and extremely excellent weekend. For several minutes Harrison attempted to cajole an entirely silent crowd of several thousand people into bidding for his console. Terribly, but somehow inevitably, the bidding never moved beyond Harrison's starting price. Indeed, he became increasingly desperate as it grew clear that everyone just wanted him to go away, and nobody was going to indulge his tasteless attempt at publicity.

Ouch. Just...ungh, so awkward. It's awful just thinking about it. Please, hit up Mr. Biffo's blog at the link below and read the full account. Oh, and try not to forget Edge are being complet shits in pulling the column. Luke Plunkett

Spiked! [Mr. Biffo's Blog, via Evil Avatar]