Posted 5:58 PM by Gene

If it's Sunday it must be Big Double-A-Scribble Time:

1. "A former network executive" burps:

The first decade of the 2000s has been dubbed "The Reality Era," but it was really an era of choice. If you want serious drama, there's "Mad Men," "Six Feet Under" or "The Wire"; if it's intelligent comedy try "The Daily Show"or "Curb Your Enthusiasm"; if it's tightly plotted thrillers, how about "True Blood" or "Damages?" If you prefer to not be sure what you're watching, try "Carnivale." [Only $110 for ALL THREE SETS!] And, of course, "reality" shows of every stripe filled the screen -- some being high-quality efforts such as "The Amazing Race" and "American Idol" and others that were just -- well -- odd. Whole networks are now devoted to the genre. If Newton Minow couldn't find something to like in this plethora of choice, tailored to so many tastes -- highbrow and low-brow -- perhaps he'd need to rethink his definition of a "wasteland." It's been a storm-tossed journey, but we've come a long way from "Gilligan's Island." [Links added]

Just one problem -- people now have to pay hundreds of dollars for what by rights the networks should have delivered for free. Their dropping the ball helped lead to "57 CHANNELS AND NOTHIN' ON", a number that threatens to approach 57,000. We might add "CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED" does NOT equal GOOD. We might further add if searching for quality television is now a full-time occupation in its own right what's the point?

And we would not have gone to the trouble of collecting links for these MASTERPIECES' ratings if people watched them. They are old but generally the numbers top out at 4 million -- 1.3 percent of the current U. S population. And they are frequently much lower. But then we do expect TV executives, present or former, to be IGNORAMUSES.

2. The CRAINIACS try to get their clients in gear by boasting that SOCIAL MEDIA LEAD TO APPOINTMENT VIEWING!!!!! Well when you see a buzzword you know it can't be long in the article before its authors contradict themselves:

[C]hatter doesn't always translate to ratings. Digital agency Wiredset recently launched social-media tracker Trendrr.TV to rank TV shows based on full-week volume of tweets, Facebook posts and check-ins for GetGlue and Miso, two mobile startups that aim to corral TV chatter. On that chart, for the same week, "Idol" and "Dancing with the Stars" are top-three social-media shows; they also top Nielsen's list for most viewers. However, "Glee," while No. 2 on Trendrr.TV, was No. 77 on Nielsen's top-watched broadcast prime-time list for the same week.

TRANSLATION: Faddish social media won't help programs with "huge" audiences because they don't need it, and they won't help CULT PROGRAMS because their audiences are too small.

3. Brian -- who can always be counted on to assume the missionary position with potential advertisers -- says someday we'll get to see ANYTHING ON TV!!!!!!!!!! We would remind this DIMWIT that typical ratings for most TV shows are single-digit -- and sometimes not even that, which you'll get when your first order of business is to prod us to see ANYTHING ON TV!!!!!!!!!!

And judging from 16,800 Google links we'd say DOC-TOR PONDILLO is yearning to be the next PERFESSER THOMPSON -- that is to say, a complete ALWAYS-ON JERK.

P. S. Hmmm, six months ago the BLITHERING JACKASS BRIAN was saying, "[A]s TV becomes much more disparate and personal, thanks to new technology, family-friendly content may have more sway." I guess the pimps sang a different tune last week.



A NEUHARTHISM OF THE MONTH AWARD TO BRIAN!