Unfortunately, my respect for Eminem is a big fat zero, so this latest story about him can't make it drop any lower.

Eminem may poke fun at himself in videos, but he doesn't want "Weird Al" Yankovic doing it. Eminem won't give Yankovic permission to shoot a video for his new song, "Couch Potato," a parody of Eminem's Oscar-winning tune "Lose Yourself," Yankovic said.

"The only reason I could glean was that making a Weird Al music video would detract from his legacy as a serious hip-hop artist," Yankovic said Thursday. "It's very disappointing. This could have been my best video ever."

Of course, Weird Al could make the video without permission, probably, but he's always been good about getting permission. But I think that Eminem's starting to take himself a little too seroiusly if he doesn't allow a Weird Al parody.

It's doubly silly because savvy musicians know that a "Weird Al" parody means that you've made it. Two anecdotes I can recall off hand on this topic are: Madonna supposedly remarked after "Like a Virgin" came out that she hoped that Weird Al would do "Like a Surgeon." The story goes that this line from Madonna eventually got to Al and he did it. And I remember from Weird Al's "Behind the Music" that Kurt Cobain was thrilled when Weird Al called him up to ask to do the parody of "Smells Like Teen Spirit."

At any rate, 10 years from now, I'll bet Weird Al is still going strong, while at the mention of Eminem, people will be going "Emma-who?"