Entertainment/Culture – Page 3 – Geoff Fox: My Permanent Record

How Facebook And Twitter Differ For Me

I use Twitter and Facebook differently. Facebook has conversations. Twitter is more a shout into the darkness.

I follow interesting people on Twitter. Some are funny. Some are profane. A few are silly.

Each describes himself in a self written mini bio.

@KevinSpacey
Former shoe salesman now making a go at film and theater. Wish me luck…

@TheEllenShow
Comedian, talk show host and ice road trucker. My tweets are real, and they’re spectacular.

@pattonoswalt
Mr. Oswalt is a former wedding deejay from Northern Virginia.

@ElaineStritch
Legend, Hat aficionado, Lady who Lunched

@bobsaget
I like long walks on the beach…and then to be dragged through the sand by an off-road vehicle, and then hurled off a catapult.

@StephenKing
Author

@HillaryClinton
Wife, mom, lawyer, women & kids advocate, FLOAR, FLOTUS, US Senator, SecState, author, dog owner, hair icon, pantsuit aficionado, glass ceiling cracker, TBD…

@jeffgarlin
comedic person of some notoriety

@Jeff_Daniels
Professional Pretender

Not all of them are active tweeters. I just like them in my eclectic mix. Clever people. The world in 140 characters.

Breaking news shows up on Twitter faster than any other source. That’s correct whether the rumor is true or false!

The response I get on Facebook dwarfs what I get from Twitter. Still learning.

Malaysian Airlines News And Speculation At CNN

I have to hand it to CNN. There’s no story I’m interested in as much as the Malaysian Airlines disappearance. They’re pouring everything they’ve got on it. That’s the good news.

The bad news is, with little new info or new info fragments, CNN has turned to speculating. I’ve heard Wolf Blitzer try and pin the rumors on others, but when it’s your megaphone that’s giving voice to these rumors you inherit responsibility. You can’t just attribute it away.

If I was in charge of CNN what would I do? I don’t know. The audience gains from all this wall-to-wall theory porn are appealing. CNN needs to stay profitable. So much temptation.

This is very similar to the steps that moved local TV news away from difficult-to-report issue stories to the crime/anecdote stories which now dominate.

CNN is seeing short term gain, but what is the long term price?

Hal Douglas: You’ll Know The Voice

I got an email from Rick Allison this morning. It was an email forward from his voiceover agent, forwarding an email from Sarah Douglas.

Dear friends and family,

I want to share with you that Hal moved on from this life last night.
He died just as he lived- with grace, courage, and tranquility. My mother and I were by his side.

If you are so moved, join us in thought and prayer as we surround his soul with love and peace for the next stage of his journey.

Onward Hal!

With warmth and gratitude,
Sarah

The name Hal Douglas probably doesn’t mean anything to you, but you know his voice. You’ve heard it a thousand times. He voiced everything!

How was it possible to have a voice so rough and simultaneously so clear? That was Hal’s gift. There’s really nothing more you could do than marvel at it. Certainly no one could compete with it!

The New York Times wrote about Hal five years ago.

Mr. Douglas says he can’t keep track of what trailers he recorded yesterday, much less over the almost 60 years he’s been behind a mike. He did “Philadelphia” and “Forrest Gump,” “Men in Black” and “Coneheads,” “Stranger Than Fiction” and “Marley and Me.” He recorded a voice-over for the Broadway play “Equus,” narrated programs on the History Channel (in the days before “Ice Road Truckers”), and served as the voice of the WB network.

“The fact is, my voice has been out there,” he said. “And it hangs out there. You sit down in the theater and sometimes in three out of four trailers I’d be on them.” – NYTimes.com

Hal’s name came up often in my conversations with Rick. We’re grownups. We discussed Hal like we’d discussed Mantle or Mays as kids. He was larger than life. A certain part of both of us wanted to grow up and be Hal, if only in front of a microphone.

There are other deep throated, beautifully phrased v/o guys. There was only one Hal. He will be missed.

Busy Tuesday (As Told Late Wednesday)

Busy Tuesday. Part planned. Part surprise.

Up the 5 in traffic. That’s the norm.

We’re 45 miles from Los Angeles. An hour without traffic. Hours with. Plan on an hour and a half, then pray.

I met Gary Brown on the edge of Beverly Hills at a Starbucks. Gary was news director at Channel 3 in Hartford. Friendly competitors.

He and I are both fascinated by the inner workings of television and television news. We had a lot to talk about.

Gary’s an agent. Not mine.

It was a sunny, mild day. We agreed coffee and a window seat at Doheny and West Olympic is great for people watching.

Next stop Sherman Oaks. My friend Howard Lapides… my best man Howard Lapides… manages acts and puts deals together. I can’t explain it. He probably can’t either.

His office sits above Ventura Blvd. with a picture postcard view of the San Fernando Valley and mountains to the north. A little hazy this day.

Hollywood is unusual because so many people work short term jobs. Once production’s done, next. In most case a new employer. A new everything. Howard assembles the deals that put all those non-connected people together… I think.

We’ve been friends over 2/3 of our lives.

He had an appointment at 6:00. I asked if I could tag along. We went to Louise Palanker’s home not far away.

Louise Palanker is a writer, producer and performer in radio, television, stage and stand-up comedy. As Senior VP of Creative and co-founder of Premiere Radio Networks, she wrote, produced and performed in over 20 programs for the network. – Wikipedia

The Showtime documentary, “Family Band: The Cowsills Story,” was “a film by Louise Palanker.”

Today she was sitting in a former bedroom, now an acoustically treated podcast studio. With her, a gaggle of teens.

Louise and crew were about to go live on “Our Place Network,” a website and podcast for teens. In the center of the room, a handful of inexpensive security cameras on tripods.

The equipment is of the “We’ve got a barn, let’s put on a show” variety, but the content was great. Louise was the conductor, but it was the teens who gave advice. Good advice.

It has to have more weight coming from a peer.

The questions I heard all related to the inherent awkwardness of being a teen. They are trying to find their way. They are unsure.

I have no idea how many people watch, but it makes no difference. This is proof-of-concept. What the podcast is isn’t as important as what it can become.

I said goodnight and headed to the 101. Through the valley, past Hollywood and Downtown, then south via the 5 past the mouse and home.

About an hour.

Dinner at In-N-Out. Double double.

The Oscars As A Synergistic Social Media Triumph

Did you watch the Oscars? We did. I suspect numbers will be up this year. It has little to do with Ellen’s performance or anything on-the-show, though she and it were very entertaining.

The Oscars has written the playbook on leveraging social media. It is the synergistic wunderkind! Truly a two screen show.

If you’re on Twitter you can’t not watch the Academy Awards. It our common experience. We’re watching TV together as a family. Welcome back to the sixties.

Of course the Oscar telecast has to bring something to this stew. It’s live. It’s unpredictable. It’s enthusiastically embraced its marriage with the second screen.

Don’t underestimate that last move. Few have done it as effectively or with the ease shown by Ellen tonight.

There were Twitter references everywhere. Ellen set up the selfie you see atop this entry during the show.

Long before midnight Sunday, the photo had been retweeted more than 2 million times, breaking a record set by President Barack Obama with the picture of him hugging First Lady Michelle Obama after his re-election in 2012. Twitter also sent out an apology because all of the retweeting disrupted service for more than 20 minutes after 10 p.m. ET. – AP via npr.org

She took another with Liza Minnelli. And then there was the (real) pizza delivery guy. It’s a good night to be @BigMamasNPapas.

My last few years in TV saw a push to engage viewers via social media. We were trying to make you more ‘sticky.’

The fact I have so many followers on Facebook and Twitter speaks to my belief in that. We never did it this effectively.

Has anyone?

Sounds Like A Job For Tech Support Man!

An email from one of my Irvine cousins was waiting when I woke up today. There was a problem.

I have pop up ads, inline text ads and my back up won’t work. I have tried everything to remove this crap but I can’t

Sounds like a job for Tech Support Man!

He’s your cousin, your brother, your co-worker, your neighborly geek, until your computer starts throwing fits. All of a sudden he’s indispensable. He’s Tech Support Man!

No wonder IT guys always have ‘tude!

This problem was mean. Pop-ups. Ad insertions in websites. Linkjacking.

The computer felt digitally unclean. It was. Strangers had usurped some control. Who knows what they were doing that you couldn’t see?

The main miscreant was “SavingsBull.” It’s supposed to bring coupons and deals. It brings ads. Lots. Few would click to install it knowingly.

It is socially engineered onto your system. It comes packaged with something you want, like a nice piece of software. Its presence is hidden in the click agreements most folks speed through.

Someone said “Yes,” to installing it, but without knowing what they were agreeing to.

We Tech Support Men have a secret. We really don’t know how to fix everything. We just know how to find the answer. Usually the solution is laid out, A, B, C, etc.

SavingsBull is a new arrival to the pain-in-the-ass scene based on the dates of tech bulletins about it.

I used a few malware scanners to hunt down the pesky files and zap them away. It’s like fighting cancer. If you don’t get it all they can sometimes replicate itself and spread! The programs look to be fully removed and the patient should recover.

There are loads of good anti-everything programs. They’re ineffective. Most of this crap is carried in by the computer users themselves. We have been conditioned to click and say yes.

Be careful. Tech Support Man, out.

Fireworks At Disney

We did a bunch of stuff today, culminating in dinner with my sister and brother-in-law, plus Cousins Michael, Melissa and Max.

We ate at Downtown Disney with a plan. After our meal we’d move to the Disney parking garage and watch the fireworks from an upper floor!

Perfect.

BBC World News Comes To My TV

BBC world News HD has been added to our cable lineup on Uverse in Irvine. I’ve spent the last few weeks bathing in its deep pool of content. This is not another CNN, Fox News, MSNBC. No! This is real news.

A friend of mine who’s roamed the globe the last few decades says the Beeb has its biases. No doubt. I’ll take that in return for actual news content.

For much of America the unrest in Kiev, Ukraine has just become visible. It’s been front-and-center on BBC since I’ve been watching. So have protests in Thailand and Argentina.

The unrest in all three of these Second World nations threatens to topple their governments or at the least remove their effectiveness to actually control what’s going on.

These are important stories, but stories not heard here where the conventional wisdom says viewers don’t give a crap about foreign news. That’s how you’re viewed–disinterested in anything outside the states.

Shouldn’t we know what’s going on around us? Can’t we be trusted to view stories which give the news context?

Getting the BBC is good news and bad news. The good news is I have less Benghazi, Bridgegate and Piers Morgan. The bad news is, real news is still thinly watched in America.

Dinner At Pink’s

Helaine and I drove to Hollywood last night. Helaine had some goodies for Stef. It’s a 55 mile drive. An hour and a half last night. LA traffic is as advertised.

Stef met us after work.

She’s been to the Golden Globes, SAG and Grammys. She’ll be on the Red Carpet at the Oscars too. Stef’s part of the team that produces the ‘pre-game’ and ‘post-game’ shows on E!. They’ll be live seven hours at the Oscars.

OK, I’m her father. I’m biased. It sounds like a pretty cool job.

I’m especially glad she’s involved in live TV. It’s a rush when you’re on and there’s no turning back. I tried to explain the feeling before she started. Alas, you can’t properly describe an experience.

We brought Doppler along, which limits where we can go. Who cares? She’s an excellent traveler.

We ended up at Pink’s on La Brea. It’s a hot dog stand, built in 1946, still rocking it’s 1946 style. Pink’s is a reflection of LA’s early adoption of cars versus public transport. You could drive up, get out of your car and get a dog!

I had the “HUELL HOWSER DOG – 2 hot dogs in ONE bun – mustard, chili, cheese & onions.” Huell was a well known TV personality whose segments on LA’s quirky native culture are still played, long after his death.

I also had a Dr. Brown’s Cherry. That brings me back to Flushing, as a kid. The taste hasn’t changed. It was magical.

Pink’s no Glenwood! Will someone please tell Rob I said that.

Our drive home was much faster–a little less than an hour.

We’re very lucky to live so close to Stef. It’s a trip we enjoy taking.

On The Red Carpet With Stef

At its heart Los Angeles is built on entertainment. This is ground zero for TV, movies and music. It all gets concentrated this time of year. In LA, this is award season.

We’ve already had the Golden Globe and SAG Awards. The Oscars are still to come. Tonight, it’s the Grammys.

Awards are big business, as are the shows that flank the awards. Think NFL pre and post-game shows. The depth of coverage is crazy. Tonight it’s four hours live before the Grammys and another hour after, all on E!.

That’s where you’ll find our child. Stef has been working for E! during awards season. She’s on the Red Carpet again tonight.

Like coverage of any live event, these shows include set-up packages for context and depth (and to fill time between the star sightings). Stef’s been involved in those as well.

Until now she’d had been involved in reality. This is Stef’s first time working live shows. Live TV was my crack cocaine. Hopefully, she’s feeling that same excitement.

The hours are very long, but she’s in the middle of events everyone talks about with the world’s biggest celebs. It’s a pretty cool job and we’re happy for our child.

Of course this does oblige us to watch five hours of E! today.

Bieber, Mitchell And Davos

Thursday afternoon. TV on. MSNBC.

Used to watch them a lot more.

Andrea Mitchell was interviewing a congresswoman or former congresswoman who was in Davos, Switzerland. The World Economic Summit is happening there. Jon Stewart calls it the ‘money prom!’

Then, without warning, Mitchell stopped the interview for Breaking News.

Justin Bieber being arraigned. Live video. Justin in jail scrubs.

There are certain moments in life which are gut-checks. Make the right decision regardless of the cost.

I’m not saying disregard Bieber, but it could wait. Few already watching the weighty interview in progress gave a damn about Justin Bieber. Cutting away was the wrong choice.

I feel bad for Andrea Mitchell. She is the public face of what was a producer’s choice.

Addendum: Mediaite has the actual video.

Disney Does Fireworks

Even before I woke up today, Helaine was plotting. She was on the phone with Cousin Melissa planning our evening.

“Would you be interested in dinner at Disney, then fireworks,” H asked as I degroggied myself.

Disneyland is in the neighborhood. It’s only 25 minutes away.

Dinner was very nice. The fireworks, even nicer!

I don’t want to take anything away from Disneyland, but if you’ve been to Disneyworld you’ll wonder who shrunk the castle! It’s much smaller here than in Florida.

The fireworks, however, are another story. They are big and perfectly choreographed. We were centered in front of the castle. It was the perfect vantage point.

Here’s the last 45 seconds of tonight’s show. It was shot on my cellphone, handheld. You’ll get a very good idea what the show’s like. It’s Disney. You expect a certain level of ‘special.’

Dear Weather Channel

Dear Weather Channel,

I heard the news. DirecTV is playing hardball. They’ve pulled the plug and covered your old channel with WeatherNation. Harsh.

Here’s the problem. No one will show you sympathy while you make claims that are over-the-top.

The consequences of removing it from 20 million households are detrimental to public safety. That’s why Congress and DIRECTV need to understand the risks to your local community. – KeepTheWeatherChannel.com

You business is weathertainment. That’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s an honorable pursuit.

People don’t watch as much when the weather’s tranquil. Your move to long form reality makes more sense when taken within that context.

You’re spending more on production. You’ve brought in more experts–some excellent. Your travel budget is large. You have carved out your niche.

When weather is the story, you’re America’s number two choice!

Sorry. Local media always covers storms with more specificity and detail. They always do a better job. Always.

Someone recently gave me the TV ratings from the Oklahoma City tornado outbreak. While warnings were in effect, local news received over 90% of the viewers. TWC was down in the weeds somewhere.

The Weather Channel was a great way to follow the storms from Cleveland, Des Moines or Los Angeles. Oklahoma City needed local info in ways you just can’t do.

Even you wouldn’t have the cajones to tell people to turn away from local coverage and follow threatening weather with you.

You do what you do well. It’s time you come to grips with what that is.

All the best,
Geoff

In A Pissing Match Everyone Gets Wet

The Weather Channel and DirecTV have gone past the end of their carriage agreement with no new contract in sight. Let the PR games begin!

It’s only been the last few years that cable companies, satellite providers, stations and networks began airing their disputes in public, asking for your help to make sure channels don’t disappear. That makes me uncomfortable.

From my vantage, this dispute seems the most public and potentially ugliest so far. The Weather Channel is both DirecTV’s supplier and competitor–mostly owned by NBC/Universal, which itself is owned by Comcast! Comcast has to be careful they’re not teaching their suppliers how to beat them at their own game!

The Weather Channel of 2014 isn’t the same service that John Coleman began in 1982. Back then it was 100% weather presented without much sizzle. Today’s TWC is much more slickly packaged with lots of non-weather programming. DirecTV says, “more than 40 percent of The Weather Channel’s programming is dedicated to reality television shows.”

Beyond that, its iconic “Local on-the-8s” forecast is no longer uniformly delivered. In Connecticut, Comcast didn’t provide the local forecast on TWC’s HD channel. The forecast on TWC’s standard def channel was for the shoreline and often inapplicable where I lived a few hundred feet up on Mount Carmel. Here in Irvine, AT&T Uverse doesn’t provide it at all.

It’s also a problem for DirecTV subscribers.

Since we are a national service provider, we’re unable to offer local updates through The Weather Channel the way that local-based companies can.

The Weather Channel is facing a financial reality some all news channels are also facing. People watch when the weather’s compelling and don’t when it isn’t. That’s part of the reason for the move into (easily preempted) unscripted non-fiction.

The wild card in all this is DirecTV’s ace in-the-hole, WeatherNation. A few weeks ago DirecTV began carrying WeatherNation right next to The Weather Channel. Begun by Paul Douglas, a Minneapolis area meteorologist for years and innovator in computer graphics, WN reminds me of the ‘old’ Weather Channel. It’s all weather with clean graphics, nothing fancy. It looks like a lean operation with the on-camera meteorologists acting as their own director, switching the show live on-air.

The Weather Channel is pushing back on-air and on-line. Jim Cantore, their most recognizable meteorologist/personality, has become the company spokesman.

But now DIRECTV is threatening to remove this critical life-saving community resource from 20 million households.

The problem is TWC probably isn’t where you should go when weather is critical. You’re nearly always better served going to a source which specifically concentrates on your specific area.

In the end this dispute isn’t about competition or technology or even “life-saving.” This is about money and power. When an agreement is reached (it will be) both DirecTV and The Weather Channel will shut up and play on.

Today it’s a pissing match and unfortunately, in a pissing match everyone gets wet!

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