It must be August – the dog days of summer – when our supposed mainstream media have nothing to report so we get stories right out of the old “True Crime” magazine. Just like the obsession on the Scott Peterson case, or the missing co-end in Aruba, the media seem to obsess about scandalous stuff.
For example on the same day the suspect in JonBenet’s murder was arrested, a federal judge in Detroit ruled President Bush’s warrantless wiretapping was unconstitutional. I have news alerts setup with my local media and news sources like Google and Yahoo. I got 2 alerts for the wiretapping announcement. I got 4 alerts for the murder case.
Which one do you think I think is more important?
If you said the wiretapping case you win.
Don’t get me wrong. I do think it is good that it seems they solved the murder case, but when an entertainment news show like Access Hollywood does a feature on the arrest – you know there are problems with decisions on what is news.
A murder occurs somewhere in the world every day. For example in the year of JonBenet’s death in 1996, Washington, DC reported 400 murders. Covering just one murder with so many resources, the media is pandering to the salacious side of people. It also seems a bit bigoted. The cases that seem to be focused on involve the death or kidnapping of white females.
At 12:01 am on August 1st 1981 Music Television – MTV for short – signed on the air. The cable channel changed the cultural landscape in many ways – not all of them positive. MTV made style more important than talent. It opened up the Reality TV genera. It lowered the collective attention span of a generation. Back in 1981 it was new and fresh and something we had to have. It also started the trend of music video channels not showing videos.
Ironically the 25th anniversary of MTV is being celebrated on the sister channel VH1 Classic, which includes the demographic that was around when MTV started. Officials at MTV didn’t think kids today would care about the start of the channel since it pre-dated their own birth.
VH1 Classic will broadcast the entire first day of MTV starting at 12:01 am August 1st until August 2nd.
Recently VH1 Classic has been showing the videos from the 1st hour of the 1st day of MTV as a taste of the special broadcast. The only one well known today as a trivia answer is “Video Killed the Radio Star” from the band The Buggles. It was the very first video played. There is also 2 videos from groups who I never heard of before seeing their clips. Here is a list of the videos played in the first hour:
1. Video Killed the Radio Star – The Buggles
2. You Better Run – Pat Benatar
3. She Won’t Dance With Me – Rod Stewart
4. You better you bet – The Who
5. Little Suzi’s on the Up – Ph.D
6. We don’t talk anymore – Cliff Richard
7. Brass in Pocket – The Pretenders
8. Time Heals – Todd Rundgren
9. Take it on the run – REO Speedwagon
10. Rockin’ the Paradise – Styx
11. When Things Go Wrong – Robin Lane and the Chartbusters
12. History Never Repeats – Split Enz
13. Hold on Loosley – .38 Special
Another trivia note – MTV evolved from the program “Sight and Sound” on the experimental interactive cable channel Qube that was based here in Columbus, Ohio back in the late 70’s.
The “face” of ABC News died today and I really miss him.
I was a Cronkite kid, growing up with Uncle Walter who I trusted as much as my mom. Then when he retired and Dan Rather took over I was a bit lost. For some reason I just never cared for Dan.
Then I found Peter on ABC’s World News Tonight. His confident delivery and focus on World news fit in with my needs at the time. I wanted to know and felt I needed to know about the world outside the US. In the days before cable news and the Internet, the main source of world news was one of the nightly newscasts.
I was alone in my love of World News Tonight. My Mom was a stick in the mud CBS News viewer and we use to have arguments over watching Rather or Jennings. I lost those battles but when she would be napping after work or wasn’t home, the TV was on Jennings.
Peter Jennings reminded me of Peter Mansbridge on the CBC and if you squinted they looked like twins. I also liked Jennings Canadian accent as it gave him a non-US allure like the presenters on the BBC.
Reality TV is a fact of life currently. It is a way for TV networks to avoid producing actual programing and it is cheap for them as well.
I admit that I do watch a couple of the shows. One is The Amazing Race and the other is Survivor. The rest of the crop is either all about desperate dating or making someone with no real talent famous for 15 minutes.
The largest unkept secret is that reality TV is not unscripted as they advertise. Most are taped weeks before you see them and themes or story lines are worked out either in general before the show tapes or as the show is produced. The editing process then creates the drama from what is really a boring thing to watch in the raw. In some cases the participants are “guided” into doing what the producers think will make good TV.
Case in point is the show Big Brother on CBS. Unlike most of the reality shows, it is live one night a week and the 13 week season is in real time – that is what you watch in the taped segments happened since the last live show. The show is aired 3 nights a week so two showings (Tuesday and Saturday) are clip shows from the few days before the show.
Logically, one would assume the highlights you see and the drama you conclude from what you see is what is really happening. With Big Brother that is not the case.
How do I know?
Because unlike other reality shows, CBS allows you to view the house guests (aka Hamsters) via a live video stream. Now the video feed isn’t always available. It is shut down when crucial segments of the show are taped – like a competition or if important information is talked about. You also don’t get to see the hamsters diary remarks until they show up in the show. You do get to see and hear a good portion of what passes for life in the house. You find out what the actual story line is and when you compare to the clip shows on the network, one can tell quickly what the producers are doing.
The prime example is how the two main factions in the house are portrayed. This was particularly evident in Week 5 with the eviction of Kaysar.
One faction led by Maggie included April, Ivette, Beau, and Jennifer. In week 5 James and Sarah double crossed Kaysar and joined Maggie’s group.
The second faction was led by Kaysar and included Howie, Janelle, and Rachel..
If you watched only the network version one would think that the Kaysar group were nasty people, that Kaysar had broken promises, and the Maggie group were the good guys needing the audience support. The main reason for this view is that the founder of the group Eric, voted off the previous week, is getting the royal treatment by CBS. They decided to pick him as their champion or main story of the season.
If you had the video feed you would be able to tell that the CBS version was a complete lie.
Maggie’s group are the nasty ones. While they sat around all week talking smack about the other side, Kaysar and his group were not doing that. They were trying to have some fun while he was still in the house. Maggie picked Kaysar out of revenge while letting the real enemy James off the hook. In fact, this week, Maggie and company now know that James is the real enemy.
April and Ivette are two of the worst people I have ever met. They never have anything nice to say about anyone and a lot of the comments Ivette said about Kaysar in the feeds were about as racist as one can get.
The network audience is never given a clue how the real dynamic in the house works or how real the hamsters are.
So much for reality.
P. S. A site that summarizes the live BB feed and offers commentary is Dingo’s Hamster Watch
If you enjoy life then you like to laugh at the absurd. I got a couple for you today from the past week.
Item 1
Finish this line:
“Guess what? I’ve got a fever. And the only prescription is… “
If you shouted “More cowbell!” then you too remember the sketch on Saturday Night Live 5 years ago.
“More cowbell” is the punch line to a “Saturday Night Live” skit that originally aired five years ago this month (April). The guest host was Christopher Walken, and one of the skits spoofed VH1’s “Behind the Music” by imagining what happened when the 1970s band Blue Oyster Cult went into the studio to cut “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper,” its best-known song.
Walken plays producer Bruce Dickinson, a preening rock “legend” who turns hacks into hit-makers. Will Ferrell, who wrote the sketch, plays pseudo-Cult member Gene Frenkle, whose sole talent consists of beating on a cowbell with enough force to stun a bull elephant. Real-life BOC members are portrayed by SNL’s Jimmy Fallon, Chris Parnell, Horatio Sanz, and Chris Kattan, none of whom can keep a straight face as Ferrell maniacally pounds away while prancing around with his belly hanging out of his shirt.
It’s Walken, though, who steals the show by uttering the phrase that’s achieved cult-worship status. “I gotta have more cowbell!” he pleads when annoyed bandmates complain that enough is enough. In a bit of lunacy that would do “This Is Spinal Tap” proud, a crazed Walken exclaims, “Guess what? I’ve got a fever. And the only prescription is more cowbell.”
I saw the sketch 5 years ago and several times since then and it cracks me up everytime.
Will Ferrell has been the best SNL cast member since Eddie Murphy in the 1980’s. I believe he is the only one to have a 2 volume DVD set in the “Best of SNL” collection.
Christopher Walken as host is always a hoot because he seems so mental in real life that seeing him do comedy is really funny. The other Walken bits I love is where he is a smarmy lech trying to seduce a woman and we see the sketch from the POV of the woman (a cameraman with a dress glove on). The other is when his character can see into the future of anyone he touches and the future has nothing to do with the person.
Item 2
Fun with the Queen
This week Queen Elizabeth and The Duke of Edinburgh are on a state visit of Saskatchewan and Alberta (Canada), as part of the celebration marking the centennial of these provinces’ entry into Confederation.
They have the itinerary for May 18th posted on a website about the visit and while browsing it – one of the items cracked me up:
11:35
The Duke of Edinburgh arrives at the site and acknowledges War Memorial Fund Raising Committee and assembled veterans.
The Duke of Edinburgh, accompanied by Mr. Jones, proceeds to the site of the sod-turning.
The Duke of Edinburgh turns the sod.
The Duke of Edinburgh unveils a plaque, commemorating the sod-turning on the occasion of the 2005 visit of Her Majesty and His Royal Highness.
En route, The Duke of Edinburgh views the adjacent World War I Memorial.
The Duke of Edinburgh views the sign depicting the future Saskatchewan War Memorial.
Brigadier-General Walker, Mr. Lyons, Mr. Harasen, and Mr. Jones say goodbye to His Royal Highness.
