Medialoper

We're Not Who You Think We Are

Archives for May 2006

Upfronts: CBS? More Like CBZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

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The original plan for this week’s look at the upfronts was to single out a single interesting thing that each network was doing with one of its more interesting shows.

That plan worked out fine for NBC, who are pinning their hopes on Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, and ABC, who have responded to rerun-crazed Losties by putting the kibosh on repeats.

But when I got to CBS, I realized that from where I sit, they really don’t have any interesting shows.

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Hillary Rosen vs. the RIAA

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According to today’s LA Times the RIAA is suing XM over it’s new device which allows subscribers to record up to 50 hours of XM broadcast on a portable player. It’s sort of like TiVo for radio, but it’s also the digital equivalent of what many of us did as kids back in the pre-digital era.

You’d think that the battle against taping music off of the radio would have been settled long ago but, as we all know, content is so much more valuable once it’s been digitized. Apparently all pre-existing licensing and copyright law must be abandoned in an effort to save content from pirates consumers who simply want to time-shift and consume content on their own schedule.

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See You Next Year!

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Probably one of the quaintest holdovers in television history is Season Finale Season. You know, that point in time when all series wind down and head off on summer vacation. See you in the Fall and all that.

Possibly, and I’m not one for apocryphal thinking (ha!), this could turn out to be the worst year ever for the major networks to take a summer vacation. Think about it — the general public is thinking, “Hmm, I’ve been hearing good things about that YouTube. Now might be the time to become addicted.”

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The Daily Loper – May 17, 2006

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Today’s links of interest:

Upfronts: I Was Lost And Now I Am Found

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ABC, who once was blind, now can see.

ABC has announced that Lost, a show that is either (take your pick):

  • intricately plotted by insidious masterminds
  • completely cobbled together by panic-stricken monkeys
  • both

will air next season with no repeats, the plethora of which this season has taken some of the wind from its sails.

Good! Of course, FOX has been doing this with 24 for a couple of seasons now. However, unlike 24 — which derives at least part of its adrenaline rush from the fact that the airing of its episodes is as relentless as the beep-boop! beep-boop! beep-boop! beep-boop! that powers it — next season of Lost will air in two disparate chunks.

Some people see that as a problem. I don’t.

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The Daily Loper – May 16, 2006

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Today’s links of interest:

Upfronts: Will Studio 60 Be The Greatest Thing Ever?

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It’s a rhetorical question, I know, but has any TV program in the history of Television been so overly publicized six months prior to its debut than Studio 60? Yeah, I’m looking forward to it, too, but this Wall St Journal headline might be a bit too much:

Can ‘Studio 60’ Save NBC?

No! No single show can save any network!! Period!! Well, except for Veronica Mars, that might save the CW . . . OK, that was just plain wishful thinking, which is what this is.

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The Daily Loper – May 15, 2006

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Today’s links of interest:

Serve This!!

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If you click on the links over to the right of this site, you’ve probably come across this page at some point:

Help Us Serve You Better.

These pages — which stand between you and the article you really want to read — ask you for three things:

I dunno about you, but I always lie. Every single time. I type any five numbers in as a ZIP code; I use 1965 as my year of birth (because it is their example); and I say that my gender is “female.”

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The Daily Loper – May 14, 2006

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[Special “Hi Mom!! edition]

Today’s links of interest:

  • "West Wing" Terms Out
    Seven seasons, and only a single crap one: Season 5, right after Sorkin was shown the door. Those of you who checked out at that time missed the rebirth of a slightly different show — call it "The Campaign Trail" — which never hit the previous heights, but was a pretty damn compelling show in and of its own self. And in a 2 for 1 nod to the ‘shippers gave us Josh & Donna and Danny & CJ. Though not enough John Spencer. Never enough John Spencer.
  • Breaking the PC/TV Barrier
    Yet another reason to love TiVo: they are working with a company called Brightcove to converge Web and TV video.
  • Ruling near on ban of video game sales to minors
    Is the ban an infringement on free speech or necessary forrrr theeeee chillldreeennnnn? A Federal judge will rule soon.

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