CBS today fired four staffers after an independent study found that they had a 'myopic zeal' to put forward those dubious National Guard documents detailing Bush's service.

It's interesting to me that this issue has resulted in the end of five careers (including Dan Rather's), but the Nigerian Yellowcake forgery fallout only resulted in Valarie Plame getting outed as a CIA operative, an incident seemingly perpetrated by two White House officials, and which still hasn't been fully investigated or persecuted.

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Playing poker and talking about TV on Tuesday night, I came to the conclusion that Stargate is the opposite of Gilligan's Island.

Though they frequently find themselves on an 'uncharted desert isle' the one thing you can be sure of is that at the end of every story the group makes it back home every single time.

I think this is a broader pattern in TV. I think that most TV shows either fall into the category of 'Every week they need to achieve this same goal and they come perilously close to achieving it' (aka 'Damn!' shows like Gilligan's Island) or 'every week they need to achieve this same goal and come perilously close to not achieving it.' (aka 'Phew!' shows like Stargate)

Then there are a few outliers like Quantum Leap and Sliders, where it's all about the local 'Phew!' and the greater 'Damn!'

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Everyone's been posting Jim Louderback's premonition of TiVo's death like it's the Gospel, and so I feel compelled to tell you exactly why Jim (a reporter who's been naysaying the TiVo for years) is wrong, and that punchy three-word headlines don't equate to a balanced market analysis.

The simple reason TiVo will live is because TV is intimate. People want ownership of their experience, and they want ownership of the resulting media. This is exactly the opposite of what cable and satellite companies want.

Of course TiVo as a standalone appliance will fade away as Decoder-PVRs become common, but they'll grow into three other markets: The referenced cable/satellite set-top boxes, DVD-R burning hybrids, and as an integrated component of television sets. Two of these hybrids are already on the market (DirecTiVo and two different DVDiVos) and the third, Toshiba and Phillips TVs with integrated free 'tivo lite' will be here by Christmas.

Saying that Cable-PVRs will squash TiVo is like saying that cable squashed the VCR, when in reality it made it much stronger. For all the benefits that a cable PVR has (that it seems cheaper because the cost is built into your monthly charge), there's no content provider in the world who would ship a device that would record to DVD, and no network that would deign to be included in a service that did.

Recording to a DVD isn't as easy as recording to a tape, and this is where an integrated 'export this show to that disc' solution really shines. If you're going to buy a DVD anyhow, the incremental cost of adding PVR functionality is a gimmie. And yes, within the next 4 years it will be an incremental cost.

TiVo is source independent. Cable, satellite, bunny ears or closed-circuit TV, TiVo is your box. As each content provider has their own proprietary system, if you change providers, you have to change systems, a shift as big as switching from Mac to Windows. Oh yeah, and your shows are gone, too. It's content lock-in, and it's one of the big reasons Dish Networks wants you to use their box, so leaving their fold is more painful, even when they suddenly drop CBS, MTV, Comedy Central and Nickelodeon because of a contract dispute.

As long as content providers carry copyrighted material on their networds, they'll be hobbled by the demands of organizations like the MPAA and Viacom who will use all the leverage they have to inhibit the end user's ability to export to any portable digital media. Standalone PVRs and in-TV PVRs are farther outside their control, and as that control is flexed, PVR customers will flock to these options.

TiVo-in-TV, which Sony plans to market later this year, is another gimmie. It will provide a free 3-day window to the future, with an inexpensive up-sell to season pass functionality. The TV-TiVo-DVR box is probably about 24 months away.

Jim's main point is that TiVo will fail because the costs of enteing the market and delivering product are dropping rapidly, but this is likely why they'll succeed. TiVo will never be a Yahoo or other conglomorate, but they will become a platform standard with a steady revenue stream. When prices fall uniformly, users flock to the best solution, not the cheapest. Getting PVRs into peoples hands cheaply, on the backs of other products is exactly why the market will succeed, and when the market succeeds, TiVo will likely be at the top of it, based on product quality.

True, you won't have to buy a $299 box for your parents to bring them the light, but when you see the glow in their eyes, talking about the magic recording TV they bought at Best Buy last month, you can bet it'll have a little guy with two antennae and no arms stickered onto the remote.

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SFGate has a fascinating article on the Medicare press materials given to television stations by the Bush administration. The packages come readymade with cheering actors portraying reporters witnessing the signing of the bill, and scripts for 'real' reporters to use when introducing pre-prepared news segments from 'field reporters' who are actually actors using scripts provided by the government, portraying reporters while interviewing administration officials.

This comes at the same time that the Republican National Committee is sending hundreds of threatening letters to TV stations fraudulently threatening that they're violating campaign finance law if they accept money to air comemrcials from MoveOn.org.

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Because Rachel demands more Piggies:

Do you have any stories about Giant Pig?

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If you could 'uncancel' any 5 TV shows of all time, assuming that the show would come back today with the original cast and writing, all at their original ages, which shows would you most want to resuccitate?

I'm still working on my list. Right now the only three I'm pretty certain of are Firefly (duh), Babylon 5, and La Femme Nikita.

What would you save?

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Heya, sorry for the lack of posting. Google's annual ski trip was Thursday and Friday, and Trisha, Benjy, Karen, Crystal, Rachel and I all went to my Uncle's place on the North Shore for Friday through Sunday.

Between us we went snowboarding, skiing, sledding, hiking, and more, and all told we had a really good time. I'm certain that photos will ensue soon.

We took the Prius up to Tahoe, despite my fears of snow that would require me to shackle my new baby in chains. As it turned out, we got through Donner Pass yesterday when chains were still imminent, but not required. It was a real joy to drive the 80 miles from the peak of Donner Pass to Sacramento on a single gallon of gas, the fuel economy graph maxing out at 99.9 MPG for most of the downhill ride.

Thanks to the Superbowl we made better time into the Bay Area than one could reasonably expect on a Sunday afternoon, but I forgot to have Tivo record it. While we missed almost all of the game itself, thanks to my media-equipped friends I got to see the Timberlake/Jackson incident ('wardrobe malfunction' my ass (warning: NSFW)).

Thankfully, we got to watch the last 10 minutes of the game, which were the most exciting by all accounts. It sounds like even the ads mostly sucked, though I was glad to see the Pepsi-iTunes ad hosted at Apple.

Now it's Monday again, start of another week. This week looks to be pretty dance-heavy, with hip-hop class on Wednesday, our last Waltz class (Redowa!) on Thursday, and Friday Night Waltz the day after that.

And, of course, tons to do here where, once again, I'm thankful to have the best job in the world.

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Saturday was the Firefly Farewell party. A little over a year after Fox cancelled the show, twelve of us got together and watched the three unaired episodes that were released with the DVD box-set of the first (and only) season.

Leave it to Fox to cancel a show that's popular enough to justify a DVD release, and to do it when there are still completed episodes in the can.

At any rate, the party was great. The episodes were teriffic. We're all hoping the rumors that Joss is writing a movie script for Firefly are true.

Before the party a handfull of us had a TiVo Upgrade Party, replete with a trip to Fry's and subsequent sortie to Radio Shack. Paul and Karen now have 139-hour TiVos where before they had only 14 hours. Quite a difference I imagine.

Me, I was planning on upping my 80-hour to 200 hours, but talking with Ammy and Rachel the night before, I realized that about 80% of the space on my current TiVo is being used to hold shows I want to save, some of them over a year old. If I upgraded to 200 hours, eventually I'd be in the same position, effectively having a 15-hour TiVo with an additional 185 hours of online saved content.

Rather than spend money to upgrade the TiVo as a stopgap, I decided to give a DVD-Recorder a try. With the ability to offload my shows to DVD, I could again have a true 80-hour TiVo, as well as a way to offload and distribute shows to those who missed them, like when the cast of The Simpsons was on Inside the Actor's Studio.

Much of yesterday was spent rewiring all the AV equipment in the living room (Cable box, TV, TiVo, DVD-R, VCR (Don't ask the obvious question, please. I'm a geek. That's why.), Stereo Receiver and 5.1 decoder, Playstation 2, Gamecube), and going to dinner with Rachel.

Rachel and I celebrated our 1-year anniversary yesterday. One year ago we met for the first time when she picked me up at the Pittsburgh airport, coming home from winter break. A year later and we're going stronger than ever, and celebrated this by having wonderful French cuisine at Cafe Brioche, capped by an absolutely amazing chocolate souffle and blackberry cobbler a la mode.

This week is going to be all about rearranging furniture upstairs and redefining mental spaces. In medieval europe it was customary for neighbors to periodically walk their borders together, to establish in their head exactly where they agreed one property ended and the other began. Forget about GPS; back then not even good fences made good neighbors, because fencing off a 500-acre plot was an unheard-of amount of labor just to define a boundary, hence the walking of the lines.

Every once in a while it's good to walk the lines in several areas of life. It's annual review time at work, a walking of the lines, a defining of workplace scopes and boundaries. 1099s and W-4s are flying through the mail, to help us walk the lines with our government. I want to make a point of spending more 1-on-1 time with my close friends, walking those lines, touring their properties to see how their mental estates have flourished since the last time.

But right now it's work time, and I've got to get to it.

Happy Monday!

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It's official! As of this morning, Amazon is taking confirmed preorders on the full series of Joss Whedon's Firefly on DVD.

Release date is December 9th. I'm making an evite now for a Firefly party the following weekend.

Woot!

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Posit: Gilmore Girls is the unspoken Buffy substitute.

Yes? No? Discuss!

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Britney Spears gets front page billing for a stage-kiss with Madonna. For all the attention you'd think she was having her baby. Apparently though, Papa don't preach.

Johnny Depp speaks against the US, saying it's a "dumb puppy with big teeth"* and, after backlash, has to recant.

Meanwhile, girlkissy Britney swears she wouldn't kiss a girl again, unless it was Madonna. Then she goes on to wax political, saying, "Honestly, I think we should just trust our president in every decision that he makes and we should just support that."

Heaven forbid we should think twice about politi-media fabrications like the Jessica Lynch story.

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Boy for a series that never received widespread acclaim there sure are a lot of Buffy farewell stories in the press today.

I know where I'll be at 8pm Eastern (5 Pacific. Nyah, nyah!). Sniff.

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Facing dim potential for an animated series or a spinoff with Faith, Joss Whedon speaks about closure and his 7 year Buffy experience.

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Is it any wonder that 'TV Turnoff Week' is the week before sweeps, when it's mostly reruns? It's like refusing to eat meat when there's none to be had.

On that note, am I observing TV turnoff week if I don't watch TV, but let TiVo store it for next week? What if I only watch TiVo'ed shows that were harvested last week?

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I've watched this at least once a day for the last week. I just can't help it.

And the most amazing part is that they actually did it. No trick photography was used, and it was one clean take. It took four months to set up, and 606 tries over 4 days to get everything working just once on film, but it makes such a nice little video...

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Okay, now that we're rid of those people who haven't lifted Buffy off their TiVo or VCR yet, let me just say:

Oh my freakin' god: Malcolm Reynolds as the Ultimate Agent of the Ultimate Evil???

That, and: "It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye. Then it's just the apocalypse."

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Soo happy.

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Pittsburgh is a sad place today, with flags at half-mast all around. Mr. Rogers lived in shadyside, and it was his neighborhood.

There's a memorial service on campus tonight, and the local station is airing a 3-hour retrospective...

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My friend Frances was in a skit on yesterday's Saturday Night Live, only I didn't know, and she doesn't have a tape of it. Did anyone happen to tape/tivo it?

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So after being put on hiatus by Fox, the news is now that Firefly has been cancelled. Despite the fact that they will still be running next week's new two-hour episode, which is actually the original pilot, it seems that the first shall be last, and Friday will be Firefly's last huzzah at Fox.

While things don't look good, there's still the possibility that UPN, WB, or one of a handful of cable stations (SciFi and FX come to mind) might make a bid to pick the series up. Nobody was saying it's a bad show, just that the ratings aren't up to the standards Fox has set for that time slot.

If you've watched the show and liked it, then I heartily recommend contributing to the letter-writing campaign targeting UPN and suggesting they be a suitor to take over the show.

While I don't think anyone is expecting verbosity on a postcard, here's my letter:

While so much new TV gravitates to the lowest (and widest) common denominator, Firefly represents a new calibre of show that has keen intelligence and great depth, while still remaining highly accessible and viscerally pleasurable to the larger audiences.

It saddens me that Fox has given the show such short shrift, but it is my hope that UPN will recognize this as an opportunity to add another jewel to its crown.

Please consider acquiring Firefly, the smartest and most promising new show of the last two years.

Sincerely, Kevin Fox, 29, San Francisco

Here's hoping...

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I only wish I was making this up, or that it was in The Onion... Apparently, swayed by Johnny Cochran's statement that he's "90% sure" that OJ is innocent of the murder of his ex-wife and her lover, the seeds of doubt have been planted in OJ's own fertile mind.

"For years I've been pretty sure that I did not murder my wife,” Simpson said today at a golf course in Boca Raton, Fla., where he was taking a rare break from searching for the real killers of his wife. “But if Johnnie’s not 100 percent sure, I’m like, hey, maybe I better take another look at this."

“Look, you’re talking about a guy, Johnnie Cochran, who is a pretty smart guy,” Simpson said. “If he said maybe I did it, then maybe I did it.”

When asked about his unrelenting manhunt for the 'real killers,' OJ revealed, “If it turns out that I’m actually the one who did it, then looking for the real killers would be a big old waste of time.”

Sounds like someone needs to make a call to the Psychic Friends Network to get this thing settled once and for all. Then maybe we'll learn the truth; that the whole thing: murder, flight from prosection, and neverending trials, was just a test balloon being raised by the folks at Fox to see whether the world was ready for reality TV. It looks like we were, and still are...

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So for those of you who have been watching Firefly, I feel your withdrawl pains this week as it's preempted by Major League Baseball (though I can't mind TOO much, as the Giants look to be headed to the World Series). For those of you who haven't watched Firefly yet: you really, really should.

So, in lieu of watching tonight's (non-existant) Firefly, I recommend visiting the Official Firefly Website. Like verything Joss touches, this is pretty remarkable. It's far more than just a cast gallery, episode guide, and screensaver distribution point.

Of course it has all that stuff, but the high point is that they really let you in to the production process, showing the life-cycle of episodes, from initial script drafts to special effect comp quicktimes, to changelogs, and more.

The high point is a weblog maintained by Kelly, one of the production assistants (yes, a real person). The whole thing really has the buy-in from the cast and crew, and they're smart enough to realize that letting devotees behind the curtain is vital for the initial kick the show will need to make it through the difficult first season.

So go check it out, have fun, root for the Giants while muttering under your breath that two weeks is too long to go without a joss fix, then guiltily remember that Angel is on Sunday, and Buffy is on Tuesday, so there's always some joss around the corner...

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So the Buffy premiere was last night, and naturally I have to post about it.

The episode seems pretty self-explanatory, except for the end, but I'll just take this chance to say again: Spike's human now. He's lost the vampy pallor, and you don't try to claw into your chest to get a soul out.

Last season finale, Spike asked the demon to "make me like I was," meaning, before the chip was implanted in his head. He wants this "to give Buffy what's coming to her."

So the demon gives him back his soul and instantly he's knocked unconscious, end of episode, end of season.

Only Spike was never a vampire with a soul. That's not making him like he was, and it certainly isn't what will give Buffy what's coming to her: Is another tortured love-affair with a look-don't-touch-fragile vampire with a side of soul what anyone thinks Buffy deserves?

Nope. Spike's human, no two ways about it. I mean really, what is a vampire Spike with a soul? Pretty much the same as the vampire Spike we've seen these last two semesters: tortured, not all bad, and in love. Add a soul with only dubious distinctions from the soul-on-chip he already has and you have a rehash of both first and last seasons, this time with extra apathy. No. This is something new. It also sets up the inevitable Spike/Halfrek romance we all know is coming...

All in all a reasonably good ep. I've got to say I must be pretty addicted to this show, because at the end, with the shifting evil, each incarnation sent a new and different shiver down my spine. I do have to say though that Bad Angel should have been one of the incarnations (Hello? Second Season? Finale?)

Still, a good start. I'm not quite sure why, but I was really struck by how perfect Adam's makeup was.

Oh, and a word about Firefly: Loved it, great potential, clearly a middle-of-season non-arc episode thrown in to lead the show off, but entertaining nonetheless. Watching it for the second time last night, I have two bits to add:

First, way to go on the universe layout. I didn't catch it at first, but the Firefly-verse takes place all in a single solar system, but one that happens to have hundreds of planets, some naturally beautiful, others terraformed. This finally does away with the whole warp-drive problem, weird aliens everywhere you turn, and space-time anomalies. An efficient reaction drive and great energy source could create a ship that's reasonably good at interplanetary travel. The only suspension of disbelief here is the luck in finding a solar system that has such a plethora of planets. I can live with that.

Basically, this is a middle-step between 'in-home-system' sets (like Heinlein's belter books, 2001, etc.), and the 'every star is nearby' space-jockey universes (Star Trek, Star Wars, B5, and almost everything else). It's got good potential.

Second, 'Hook', Niska's enforcer, mysteriously lost his heavy German accent and turned white-trash/stick-jock at the end. What's up with that?

Okay. Done now. All you Non-Joss folk can come back now...

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A 9/11 memorial tribute took a turn for the tasteless metaphorical when 80 birds released from a tower didn't, in fact, know how to fly, and fell to the ground.

It turns out that the planners, upon discovering that all the companies offering trained dove and homing pigeon services were booked up, went to the livestock market and bought 80 squab.

The squab, bred for the soul purpose of becoming soup, had never been out of their cages in their brief lives, and knew as much about flying as a rock knows about floating.

In reaction to the mishap, one of the planners qupped that he saved the birds from a better fate than they would otherwise have had, but vets at the animal clinic, treating some of the birds who managed non-fatal landings, if not soft ones (some on people's heads), would beg to differ.

The irony becomes even more palpable when we consider that a memorial statue of a nude, falling woman was draped and removed from Rockefeller Center for being in poor taste.

Now that the anniversary's past, a lot of people feel that the the mourning period is over, and about time, while others throw political correctness to the wind and share their real thoughts about September 11th.

This last link I find really interesting, because the most disturbing thing for me about 9/11 was the dichotomy between horror and fascination. Movies and TV haven't acclimated me to things like murders and violence, but cinema is the thing that's prepared me for such extreme devastation, and so watching TV on 9/11 last year, it was easy to fall into a mode of "What's the next plot-point?" The scariest part was that there was a next plot point, and another, and another, each hit, each collapse perfectly timed to keep us entranced.

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Err, I mean the Mole in The Weakest Link.

After appearing on the show last week (to be aired in several months) he posted an exposé on just what it's like to film a half-hour game show.

Really interesting stuff. It reminds me of Jepoardy, where they instruct the audience to 'fast-clap' so it sounds like they have more people there...

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Good Luck to:

Ernie who's a contestant on The Weakest Link (now in syndication)! He's not allowed to tell us how he does, lest he be liable for a hunk of a million dollars in penalties, but Go Ernie! All that time waiting in line like a dork has finally paid off!

The Cal Bears who broke a year and a half home losing streak on Saturday to stuff Baylor's Bears 70 to something-a-lot-less-than-70! Let's hope it's not a fluke. I gotta say, though: I knew Ernie was perfect for this game from the start. (specifically this)

The Oakland A's, who've won 19 games in a row. The only times a team has doen better than that was back when they'd play all their home games at once, then go on the road and play. Not bad for a team with 1/3 the salary budget of the Yankees. Will this be the third year in a row that they face each other in the pennant race?

Me. There's God's own thunderstorm going on outside right now, and I can feel the ground shake betweenthe flash and the thunder. I love weather.

Someone who doesn't need luck is Kristin, kicker of asses and taker of names.

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I've been wrestling with a moral dilemma for the last several days, tying me up in little knots, getting to the core of who I am both personally and professionally.

At last week's Macworld Expo, Steve Jobs announce the .mac ('dot-mac') initiative, essentially taking the functionality of iTools, adding a few other features, and packaging it as a $100/yr subscription package.

There's some nice functionality in it, but at the same time they're also discontinuing iTools itself. Hundreds of thousands of Apple users who have been using the service, and using their mac.com email addresses will now lose those addresses unless they agree to pay $100 a year. There is no free version, and there is no announced forwarding policy.

As a user experience designer, this irritates me to no end. An Apple executive has been quoted in a News.com article as saying they anticipate that only 10% of the users will actually migrate to the paid service, meaning that 90% will lose their email addresses. Permanently.

Having worked at Yahoo for the last year, I'm no stranger to the push for subscription-based premium services, but Yahoo and most companies that are still in business have done it right: Charge for enhanced services and new services. when you can't do that, charge for those services which were free but are still ancillary, like POP mail access, but don't take a free service and tell your users 'tough. Fish or cut bait.'

So what did I do? I made a commercial. In the 'switch' style, but using no Apple logos or implied consent, I voiced my own opinion on Apple's new policy, and frankly I'm pretty proud of the result.

And herein lies the problem: Once I finish my HCI masters at Carnegie Mellon next year, Apple is very high on the list of companies where I would like to work. Knowing that a video/protest like this could come back to haunt me, I decided to make a pixelated version, hoping to obscure my identity. Still, I couldn't post it here, as people who know me personally would still recognize me and the cat would be out of the bag.

I showed the video to a lot of friends, and received positive feedback, but still I was torn:

When user experience design is my vocation, not just my job, what do I do when doing the right thing from a user experience perspective (on behalf of Mac users everywhere, my constituency in this case) can endanger my chances of getting a job as an experience and interface designer at the very company whose policies I'm calling into question?

Very frustrating indeed, but after a few days I have finally decided that if Apple wouldn't hire me because I stood up for the users in opposition to an Apple policy while I wasn't in their employ, then it's not a place I would want to work in the first place. As I mentioned to one of my former Yahoo coworkers: Yahoo would have hired me even if I was a vocal opponent of a Yahoo business practice before starting there, and I wouldn't want to work someplace less cool than yahoo. Let's hope that the people within Apple are more circumspect than Apple-the-company's recent business decisions.

So, without further ado, I give you:

Bait and Switch

There's being snubbed, and then there's being slamed against a wall head-first.

Buffy, always a bastion of exceptional writing and in a genre of its own, usually has one exceptional episode per season, pushing its own bar even higher. In 1999 that episode was "Hush" which was quite justifiably nominated for the 'Best Writing in a Drama' Emmy award, remarkable because over 75% of the episode took place with no dialog at all. It didn't win, but it's an honor just to be nominated.

In 2000, the breakout episode was "The Body," detailing the aftermath of the death of Buffy's mom. Sadly it didn't get the nomination which, in my opinion, it richly deserved.

That's fine though. Votes are votes; democracy in action.

Last year, "Once More, With Feeling!" was absolutely outstanding. In my mind, and in the minds of many others I've talked to, the best Buffy episode ever, and very possibly the best hour on TV in 2001.

People were talking about Buffy's first 'real' (read: not in makeup or music) Emmy with confidence. UPN was so proud of its new acquisition (having taken over the series from WB just that season) that they spared no expense in including, along with the customary 'for your consideration' ad in industry-mag Variety, a complimentary DVD of the episode. The DVDs sold on eBay for prices ranging from $120 to upwards of $600 just for that episode.

Emmy nomination forms went out to voters earlier this month, with a list of the episodes being put forward for nomination in each category, and inexplicably "Once More, With Feeling" wasn't on the list.

This isn't sour grapes or whining: Each show on television gets to put forward what they feel is their strongest episode and that gets presented to voters for conideration. OMWF was supposed to be on the list, and the Emmy coordinators made a typographical error.

Now, after being made aware of their error, the Television Academy has sent out postcards letting constituents know the procedure for retroactively changing their vote, but the process is considerably more difficult than the original voting, and industry experts forsee that a reasonable percentage of those who would otherwise have voted for OMWF won't bother to change it after the fact, if they even take notice of the junkmail-like postcard.

Losing in a fair vote is one thing. Losing because your show just doesn't have enough visibility is another, but both are par for the awards course. Being left off a ballot by a clerical error, though: that's simply fucked up. It's 2002, and voting still sucks. What will it take to have a peer review be a standard step in the ballot creation and certification process?

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Props to Robert for coming through with today's Buffy Tidbit: Apparently, for those too impatient to wait three years for Season Six to come out on DVD, you can plug that burning hole in your pocket and bid for a few rare DVD copies of "Once More, With Feeling" on eBay.

It seems that (quite rightly) Joss has chosen this episode as one of the two each series is permitted to send out to TV notables, hoping for Emmy nominations. As a result, hundreds of copies are out there, and naturally some of them have made their way to the common market.

On a parallel tangent, I've been TiVo-ing the late night and early morning reruns of Mad About You. I've got a jonesing to catch "Met Someone," the flashback episode where Paul and Jamie meet for the first time. Checking out the schedule of shows for the next two weeks, I came across another M.A.Y. episode entitled "Once More, With Feeling." Is this a trend, or an homage?

PS: for those non-Buffy fans out there, give it a try. You've probably noticed that your friends who rave about Buffy aren't those who you'd think would go for cheezy stupid TV like Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and you're right, they don't. The show's a wonder, and I really truly hope OMWF gets an Emmy because honestly, it so richly deserves it.

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Best. Poster. Ever.

(thanks Leia!)

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Okay, rather than write a long critique/rant/rave about the finale (which some of my fellow timeshifters haven't watched yet), I'll point you to the post I made this morning on MetaFilter.

The rest of the thread is pretty insightful (well, some of it is) as well...

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(notes: Most of this was written before 'Evil Will goes on a Rampage' aired. It's also rather randomly put together, but I've too much of a backlog to go editing and rewriting this into a term paper. :-)

I love Buffy. Along with The West Wing, it's my favorite show on TV.

But lately Buffy's been pissing me off.

Sure, there have been compelling storylines, and as far as the master-arc goes, I couldn't be more impressed with all the changes. Nevertheless, I don't feel like I'm watching anymore, but instead being manipulated.

The Buffy writers know the success they have on their hands. They know their rapt audience, lusting for their weekly fix, pushing the story along. They know that there are basically only two ways to lose this momentum.

The first way is to pull a Moonlighting or X-Files. For one reason or another the master-arc progressions stalls completely. You don't have to lose a main character to stop the arc-train. Sometimes it happens because the producers give too many opportunities to too many writers, making it nearly impossible to maintain a cohesive arc, resulting in a string of interchangeable capsulated episodes (again, X-Files pre-Duchovny's departure is a good example).

A lot of producers fear significant cast and focus changes. Some of that fear is nested with the worry about becoming a soap opera, where implausibility rules, and storyline shock is used for shock's sake. This kind of turn is rapidly followed by a 'who cares'-manship of the audience. When anything can happen at any time, what does it matter what the characters do? This is the second way to lose the golden eye of the viewer.

Granted, some shows thrive by exploiting both of these: Creating a world where outlandish things happen all the time, yet nothing ever sticks. This is usually the domain of animated shows. The Simpsons, Futurama, and South Park live and thrive in this world. This is not a suggested area for live-action shows, unless you're The Tick.

But back my Buffy Beef...

Buffy neatly avoids both these problems, but at the risk of finding a third problem. While the first few seasons had season or half-season arcs (The Master, Good Angel, Bad Angel, Dead Angel, Good Angel, etc.) for the most part the Scooby Gang remained constant, not rocking the boat until Joss proved to the network and the sponsors that she was seaworthy.

Soon characters were being added, relationships formed, were broken, twisted. Dawn was added, forever imprinted on the Summers household like a big 'CHA' half-etched on the surface of the moon. Plotline floatsam.

The true strokes of genius on the show is when the unexpected but believable happens. In 'The Body' where Buffy's mom is dead (not 'dies' but is just found dead, in the most honest post-mortem portrayal I'd ever care to see) we felt for the characters. It's not like she was murdered by her own lovechild who was kidnapped as a baby and returns from an evil dimension to hunt her down for her wrongs (ahem). No, it was a good example of life. Nobody expects an aneurism, and Joss didn't try to prepare us for one.

Granted, too much of that sort of thing and it becomes unbelievable, but in the right dose, it's honest life. When was the last time someone got in a car accident in a show, right in the middle of a totally unrelated storyline, and the accident becomes the new line? It happens all the time in real life, but on TV? Only on the soaps. Or ER, which is a perfect example of life-events pushing a storyline.

So I've written over 600 words. What am I getting at?

Buffy's in danger of turning to crap.

There are legitimate ways to foreshadow: Buffy the Musical was great because it revealed people's secrets. It didn't spell out what was going to happen, because often times actual events are the result of more than just innermost character desires. Contrived? Perhaps. But it was honest. It didn't declare what would happen, it was just a domesday book of where everyone was at at the given time.

Now, though, in recent episodes, the foreshadowing isn't at the character level, but at the omniscient level. When Willow and Tara get back together so fast and so passionately, Joss is tying on little heartstrings to pull a week later, when he kills her with a random bullet through the heart. When Spike has to leave for the sake of the story, we have to feel good about it, so he has to try to rape Buffy so he's the bad guy again.

Back to 'The Body', It was powerful because it was plausible, indefensible, and random. Shooting Tara through the heart just after her reconciliation is soap-operatic at best, predictable at worst.

Joss is telling me how to feel, so he can pull me like a puppet. "See? Spike is good deep down. Trust us; he doesn't have a soul, but you want to like him like he has one anyhow. Okay, do you feel for him yet? No? Then let's make him a little more sincere and a little more abused. Yet? Okay. Now let's show you how you were wrong when he slams Buffy's head to the porcelain.

"Remember how strongly people felt when Glory scrambled Tara's mind? Let's do that again! Oh, but we have to get Tara and Willow back together. The happier they are, the better it'll be. It'll be like Romeo and Juliet with kittens!"

Bah. My problem with all this is that Buffy's producers and writers decide where they want the series to go, then they figure out how to get it there. After a large, cycling ensemble cast (Buffy, Giles, Willow, Xander, Angel, Spike, (buffy's mom), Cordelia, Oz, Faith, Wesley, Anya, Riley, Dawn and Tara) (not counting the transient arc(h)-foes: Glory, Ben, the Master, the evil-supervillian-troika, Spike (err, again), Drusilla, Anya (heh), The Mayor, Principal Snyder, the Initiative and Professor Walsh, the Watcher's Council, etc.) they've decided to bring it back to the original foursome, the core Scoobies. Only in Giles's place we get Dawn, the master replaced by the apprentice (and if you think Dawn's not going to be 'let in' and will continue to warm the little-sister bench, then that's exactly what Joss wants you to think. Dawn has a trick up her sleeve that nobody knows yet.

Right, so: Foursome. Gotta get rid of Anya, while not making the viewers hate Xander for it. Have her sleep with Spike and get her vengeance back on. Gotta get rid of Tara without people hating Willow. Kill her off randomly in front of Willow. This also neatly solves the problem of Willow's ride on the wicca wagon, because a wegan Willow is as useful to the scoobies as a stupid Selma. (speaking of which, is it any coincidence that Buffy is reverting to core scoobies at the same time as Sarah Michelle Geller is staring in the Scooby movie?)

We got rid of Spike (but don't worry, "I'll be back, Slayer, and when I do..."), Giles is in England with a new show life, Mom's dead, Riley's married, Angel's on another network, and Oz is still on his wolfsome walkabout. Actually, there are some serious possibilities in the land of Oz. I watched Oz's last visit to Sunnydale last night, and his and Willow's 'wrong time, wrong place, but someday' speech sets the stage for an Oz housekeeping, if Joss can handle it tactfully enough to not raise the potential 'boy saving Willow from her lesbian self' ire.

Funny how there's an order to the randomness. In the words of the Fear Demon, "They're all going to abandon you, you know."

And of course, tonight we'll get to find out "what it really means to be a Slayer." Finally, again.

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A small but important note on the competition between SonicBlue's ReplayTV and TiVo's, err, TiVo: This summer SonicBlue will stop including lifetime service with ReplayTV purchases, and will move to the monthly subscription model.

This is an important factor, considering the lack of service fees was one of the (few) reasons somepeople prefer ReplayTV to TiVo. This is a sort of vindication for TiVo, and also helps the consumer, since it will help to continue lowering the entry costs for digital video recorders.

Meanwhile, Newsforge has a good first look at the TiVo 2 players, and an interview with TiVo's chief evangelist. This article gives a good peek at where TiVo is headed for the rest of the year.

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Just as I'd hoped, the video age is starting to hit its blogger stride.

Witness:

Derek's effigic threat to Ben Brown.

Be amazed amused by:

Ben Brown's retort.

God, but weekends with video cameras are great.

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So I don't talk about my family too often 'round here, but I'd like to say a little about my sister, Susie.

Susie's a teacher in Los Angeles, teaching Biology to 8th graders, and in addition she teaches on the Homework channel, where 70,000 kids see her for about an hour each week. I've seen tapes of her shows and I'm proud and amazed at what she can do, on live TV no less.

Last week she did a 20-minute presentation on using crickets to tell the temperature, or to be more specific, she did a presentation on how the real world differs from the ideal scientific method. I think this is her best episode, and though I don't expect anyone to watch the whole 20 minutes, there are some really funny bits for those of you who do. Enjoy!

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So my camcorder came today, and the building manager signed for it, but he wasn't in when I got home, so I dropped by his office on my way to the Starry Plough at 9, and he was there.

Tromping back up to the top floor with my new tech, I wondered if Sony was cool enough to charge the battery for me. they were, but about half of it had bled off since it left Sony's hands, probably over a month ago.

Still, half a charge was better than none, and I wasted no time (well, maybe a little) getting the beastie to the Plough where I was a wallflower, but a wallflower with a third eye.

Coming home at about 11:30, what else was there to do but fire up iMovie and make my first quicktime? Okay, it's a little rough. I did something wrong when I tried to up the brightness and contrast that resulted in some funky color shifts, but all in all I'm pretty impressed considering the low ambient light and fast action.

I even made you a copy (3 minutes, 4.9 megs). W'hoo!

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In its 33rd season, Sesame Street is being reconstructed, due to a younger demographic.

I'm not sure how I feel about it. Though I haven't been a viewer since I was ten, I liked it for what it was. I've got to think that maybe the reason that it's getting a younger demographic (2-4 year olds), even in a world with Teletubbies and Blue's Clues, is because it doesn't pander.

The concept that a creative work should change itself to 'dumb down' to fit the perceived desires of the demographic drawn to it has created many shameful works, sprung from fine beginnings. Can't people get the concept that the audience was drawn to the existing product? Why second-guess your patrons, and tell them what they really want?

I wonder what these people would think.

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kevin (10:52:46 PM): So I've got this idea for a rockin' game show... Have you seen The Chamber?
Ernie (10:56:19 PM): no, not yet!
Ernie (10:56:22 PM): i want to, however
kevin (10:56:28 PM): You know the premise?
Ernie (10:56:32 PM): yeah.
kevin (10:56:41 PM): Okay, so I got an idea for a new game show:
kevin (10:57:12 PM): It's in two parts. In the first part, you have two litigants, each with a suit and countersuit, presenting their case before Judge Judy.
kevin (10:57:40 PM): When Judy rules, and party A owes party B $8,000, party A goes to The Chamber.
kevin (10:58:34 PM): There they are subjected to hellish conditions while answering trivia questions, trying to work down the amount of money they owe the other person. If they're lucky, they can get off scott free! Otherwise, they have to pay the court winner on the spot.
kevin (10:58:52 PM): I call it "Chamber to Chamber", or just "Chambers"
Ernie (10:58:59 PM): HAHAHAHAHHAHA
Ernie (10:59:15 PM): you win. i can't beat that, dude.
kevin (10:59:38 PM): I'm gonna do a nice little screenshot and write it up tomorrow, I think.
Ernie (10:59:55 PM): just blog this conversation. if you don't, i will, damn you
kevin (11:00:15 PM): Judy: "You're guilty. You're guilty and I'm sending your ass to The Chair. Right now."

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The Ben Brown Show has now lasted for six episodes and, unlike The Tick, Ben is still going strong.

Making up for the lack of crime-fighitng skill with verve, with, and a Fray-annointed iBook, Mr. Brown trudges on, his very persistence an invitation to eat his brand of midwest justice.

Rock on, Ben.

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The newest of the 'New Media':

On one side of the media spectrum we have professionally produced shows like the ABC Nightly News with Tom Brocaw. Towards the middle there's 'The Real World', 'Fear Factor' and 'Blind Date.' All the way at the indie end of the pool is The JenniShow. Now, take another 5 paces past Jenni into the uncharted gurrilla media jungle and you'll find The Ben Brown Show, an entirely independently produced, daily, two-minute quicktime talkshow, featuring Ben Brown. Last Tuesday Ben decided that, now that his wife has a new job and he's the only unemployed one, it was time to make good use of his Sony DV camcorder and iMac.

Be sure to go every day, because there aren't any archives and you wouldn't want to miss an installment!

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Also, the current buzz is that "Ginger" will be unveiled on this morning's Good Morning America. Could be the world's next innovation, could be parp. I'll be on the train, so TiVo will have to watch for me and I'm sure all the pundits will be spinning stories by the time I arrive at work.

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Iron Chef USA is to Iron Chef
as
The XFL is to The NFL

That is just so sad...

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For those of you who missed it, heard from raving fans after the fact, or who just want to see it again, don't forget that Buffy: The Musical is airing again tonight (Friday) at 8 on UPN.

I'm setting up my VCR to make a nice, clean tape of it, and I'm setting it to record Iron Chef USA immediately following, just for the heck of it (and to study).

After watching, don't forget to swing back online to pick up the MP3s and lyrics of all the songs, so you can get them stuck in your head, possibly helping you to deal with relatives next week.

(For those curious, four days of no-Buffy-listening has finally succeeded in getting the songs out of my head, but it did take four days. I'm driving to Lake Tahoe this morning, and I'm pretty sure I'll eventually resort to listening to it on the drive up, as I'm going alone.)

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Buffy: The Musical was amazing. Joss Whedon wrote all the songs himself, and it covered so many Broadway styles from ragtime through swing, 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s (though not much 90s), with what I perceived to be stylistic nods to Les Miz and Into The Woods, and Rent, as well as several others.

An excellently well told story and, unlike so many other 'aberration-style' episodes from other shows ('a very special Blossom', etc.) this one was actually a highly pivotal arc episode, setting the path for huge changes for nearly every person in the show.

After last season's 'Body' episode going without so much as an Emmy nomination, I don't have any expectations, but I do have high hopes for this one come next September. It seems that once a season Joss creates an absolutely amazing work ("Becoming - Part II", "Hush", "Body" and now "Once More, with Feeling").

It just keeps getting better.

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So I watched the Buffy premiere last night, but in so doing missed Enterprise and 'a very special' West Wing, so now I have to be careful not to spoil those by reading the wrong blogs or articles. Ahh, whatever. I can just avert my eyes.

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No, I'm not talking about Brad's initiative, worthy though it is.

Wednesday is my day without weblogs. I may write, but I will not read.

It's not a protest.

It's not a statement.

It's a necessity.

You see, Buffy's much anticipated season premiere aired tonight. I mistakenly thought Gilmore Girls was supposed to have its season premiere tonight, overlapping Buffy, but I was mistaken. Before I realized my error, I made plans to watch Gilmore Girls alone tonight, and head to Emily's tomorrow to watch Buffy. (Emily's TiVo was saving it for her, as she couldn't watch it tonight either.)

So at 8pm instead of finding myself in must-see T-vana, I ditched a television wasteland with nothing to offer me but TBS's ST-TNG: A Five Day Marathon.

So, as the rest of the world has watched this episode and is raving about it (well, those who are Buffy geeks anyhow), I seal myself in an anti-blog bubble for the day, refusing to let the tiniest bit of spoilage mar my timeshifting of bliss for 22 hours.

Just look at all the temptation out there. (I assume there are search results. I refuse to indulge in a glance.)

Clearly, this will be the problem when everyone gets TV on demand. How will people know what to talk about at the watercooler/latte bar/instant messenger?

Here's a final thought for the evening: You can rent DVDs all over the place, but not CDs. If DVDs became readily copyable, do you think they would stop renting them? If CDs became copyproof, do you think they would start?

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In lieu of a full review of last night's pilot for Star Trek: Enterprise, I give you "The Net's First 'Enterprise' Slash Fiction."

(Slash fiction, for those not in tune with the lingo, is fanfic (fanfic is fiction written by fans) with pornographic (pornography is- Ah, forget it...) overtones, usually homosexual).

I'm linking it here because it's timely, funny, and exactly the kind of thing people are probably writing right now in a not-intended-to-be-satirical way.

Oh, on another note, despite the assertion from several comedians that in the wake of 9-11, 'satire is dead,' it's clear that, if this week's Onion is any guide, satire was merely taking a two-week nap. Of course, there are always dissenting opinions, but how many of us are actually old enough to remember when SNL wasn't afraid to use comedy to affect social change, instead of belatedly acknowledge it?

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ARGH! Okay, I know I should have better priorities, and I do, but one thing I've been looking forward to for four months is the season premiere of The West Wing. "Two Cathedrals," last season's cliffhanger, aired on May 16th, and the conclusion, "Manchester, Part I," was scheduled to run last Wednesday, September 19th. For obvious reasons, several of the networks, including NBC, pushed their schedules back one week, and the new air date was September 26th.

Now West Wing producer Aaron Sorkin has decided that, in light of the 9-11 events, he wants to create and air a special episode, to keep the show more in line with current events. He feels that it's important to do this before the season premiere, so the episode has been quickly written, and is currently undergoing filming, for a rushed post-production cycle and airing on October 3rd.

"Manchester," meanwhile, has been pushed back to October 10th.

Maybe it's escapism, maybe it's just withdrawal from a truly great television series, but I'm just glad that some new TV is still on the way next week, including Star Trek: Enterprise, and Buffy starts the following week. Maybe to tide myself over, I'll rent the first season of "Sex in the City" and start making up for not having HBO... It's something to do, anyhow.

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I was watching TV this morning and I realized I still had some unwatched shows in my TiVo from Sunday and Monday (all the shows it recorded after that were, unbeknownst to my TiVo, actually continuing news coverage).

I sat down and watched Futurama, the Simpsons, and Angel, prizing each (and especially the newsbreaks during the commercials) as little gems of nostalgia, reminders of 'the way things were' just five long days ago.

I don't want to delete them.

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I'm working on trying to finish Metacookie before Fray Day 5, as well as working on a big ol' headache and some other issues, but I wanted to share an interview with Joss Whedon from this week's Onion (The A/V club part (the part that's not all about fake news)).

The interview was trimmed from 9500 words down to 5500, but the link is to the unedited source, for your reading pleasure. It's quite a long read, so wait till you have time to sit down.

Only a few more weeks 'till things start up again in TV land. I'm thinking about upping my TiVo from 30 hours to 108 by way of a cheap $125 60 gig drive and the glorious TiVo FAQ.

Oh, and I've also let one more show into my television pantheon. I gave Gilmore Girls a try and I'm completely taken with it. I feel like these people have been in my life for ages, though I'm not sure why. But I have a life! Really! Now, to bed, for tomorrow we code.

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While we're all gushing over Ernie's triumph, let us not forget that you heard it here first.

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So I'm going to head off to an open call for The Weakest Link at the Sony Metreon in about an hour. Judging by the 4 or so different ways that I heard about this, I'm guessing half the Bay Area knows and there should be between 2000 and 20000 people there.

why am I going? Well first, it's fun. Ernie's going to be there, along with Ken and possibly Min Jung. I need to get out and shopping anyhow. I have lots to prepare for my trip.

But another reason is just the numbers. Okay, this is scary, but ever since I took a crash course in Econ in high school, this is the way I think: There will be, say, 8,000 people there trying out for what I will conservatively guess will be 20 spots for next season's shows. That leaves a 20/8000, or 1/400 chance of getting onto the show from this call. Now once on the show, only 1 of the 8 people will actually win anything, so make that 1/400 * 1/8, or roughly 1 out of every 3200 people trying out will actually win a game. The prize money is typically anywhere from $40,000 to $100,000 so let's say $70,000. Therefore the opportunity cost of going to the tryout is the material gain divided by the probability of that gain, so $70,000/3200, or around $21. I'm happy to have someone pay me $21 for me to spend a few hours hanging out with friends and taking pictures, therefore it's not a bad idea to go.

Of course reading this, the whole point of this post seems to be that I'm such a geek that I have a higher chance of getting on the show, therefore throwing all this math into the drink. Ah well. What else would I be doing on a Saturday morning?

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So I watched a Friends rerun last night, one of the few I missed the first time around. It's Thanksgiving, Monica's invited her parents, and Rachel makes a torte but, thanks to stuck pages in the magazine, makes a half-torte, half shepard's pie, with banana creme custard and beef and peas.

The expected sitcom wackyness ensues, and when Ross tries to eat it, with only Joey in the room, he chokes and says "It tastes like FEET!" This was also one of the outtakes from the outtake show they did with Conan O'Brien a couple months ago, and I was wondering where that one came from. Now I know.

I mentioned to Emily today, idly wondering how he knows what feet taste like, and she turns right around and says, "Well, we know Rachel had a thing about 'Toes!!!...you know, for some people...'" referencing the episode where Rachel and Monica give chandler sex advice (and detail the seven (or, for Rachel, seventeen) erogenous zones.

Now that's putting two and two together. (Sorry if this doesn't make sense or you're saying 'so?' I found it pretty funny.)

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There was a Jeopardy category last night called 'CRAC', where each of the answers was all or part of a chatroom acronym. They featured such acronyms as "HAND" "TTFN" "RTM" and "IANAL".

Not a single contestant got a single question right.

It's ironic that in the ideal Jeopardy contestant we have a subculture so introverted, reading reference texts and memorizing vice-presidential trivia, that they totally out-dull the geeks who spend their time relating to the world via chat rooms instead of FTF.

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Somebody dies.

Next season (or season finale): They actually live. (Except Mrs. Laningham)

Let's see, that covers Buffy, Angel, Dark Angel, Voyager, West Wing, X-Files, and Simpsons. I haven't watched Ed yet, so I can't say.

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If you watched the season finale of The West Wing last Wednesday, you might have wondered what Bartlet was saying when he was talking to God in Latin. I know I was curious, so I went and found out:

• "Gratias tibi ago domine." -- I give thanks to you, O Lord.
• "Haec credam a deo pio? A deo iusto, a deo scito? Cruciatus in crucem. Tuus in terra servus, nuntius fui. Officium perfeci. Cruciatus in crucem. Eas in crucem." -- Am I really to believe that these are the acts of a loving God? A just God? A wise God? To hell with your punishments. I was your servant here on Earth. And I spread your word and I did your work. To hell with your punishments. To hell with you.

I can't wait until next season...

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That was it. I was having lunch with Ammy, Rick, Karen, Crystal, and Emily on Sunday and I couldn't remember what show William Shatner was going to be hosting, but now I remember. It's the forthcoming American edition of Iron chef.

"Sauteed... Octopus... Tastes.... Sogood."

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Anyone else watch the Friends season cliffhanger last night? Anyone still watch Friends?

I liked it, loved the surprise ending, but this morning I recalled something funny that was probably entirely unintentional. Way earlier in the season, Joey stepped in as minister because Chandler and Monica c