Don't Adjust Your Set

It seems that the USA network is achieving new heights of "brilliance" in gimmicky programming. They are promoting (or perhaps it is better said that they are threatening) that they will show an episode of their inexplicably popular show, Monk, in black and white, followed by the same episode in color. Then, the viewers get to decide which they liked better. If someone likes shows in black and white so much, why don't they just turn the color on their TV off? Voila! Problem solved! Black and white! If they like black and white in the noir style, then turn the brightness down as well. Therefore, airing it in black and white simply annoys the audience members who are sitting at home, staring at a ridiculously expensive plasma TV, whining about a single pixel out of place. As for the people who have a black and white TV... nevermind, they probably don't have basic cable. This whole thing seems to only appeal to a small group of hardcore noir fans who are too lazy to adjust the settings of their television to achieve the desired effect in normal viewing. If a small group of [borderline insane] CBS viewers wanted David Letterman to be green, would CBS screw with the program's tint, or would they just tell the nutjobs to do it at home? Of course, now that I've mentioned that, keep an eye out this spring for The Tonight Show with Purple Jay Leno.
Of course, if anyone was going to pull this black and white stunt, USA would be a likely suspect. They are one of NBC Universal's babies and these are the programming geniuses that made fourteen dozen incarnations of Law and Order and it is believed by some that they once considered creating a new day of the week simply so they could create more Dateline.
I also happen to recall a crazy gimmick NBC threatened their viewers with years ago (and after spending 45 minutes googling, I can't find a single mention of it online, leaving me to believe I may be the only person alive who will actually admit to remembering this). It was way back when The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Blossom held an hour block of prime time ("The Fresh Prince-Blossom Hour"). NBC, citing some ridiculous story about a malfunctioning machine, threatened for a week to show the program(s) (I don't recollect if it was just Fresh Prince or if it was both) upside down. Of course, on the night of the actual broadcast, they copped out, quickly noted that the machine was fixed, and showed everything normally. Ah, bait-and-switch programming. It's really no small wonder that Vinnie Mac's WWE fits in so well in the NBC Universal family.

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Big Cray: Accept No Substitute

Duck and Cover

The little spotlight news topic on the left side of Hotmail this afternoon reads:

"Hot on Hotmail
Gossip: Is Jessica Biel now a Yankees fan?"

Seriously, when did this become news? I've made no secret in the past about my distaste for inane celebrity gossip, but I believe this reaches a new level of useless knowledge. This wasn't someone being dumped via text message. This wasn't a drunken driving incident. This wasn't someone shoplifting. This is a rumor about someone's taste in ball clubs. Excuse me while I change religions and prep the bomb shelter over this Earth-shattering news...
(Yes, I realize the article deals with a possible relationship between her and one of the New York Overpaid Babies, but just let me have my fun ridiculing the teaser.)

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Big Cray: Accept No Substitute

Next-Gen... again

Earlier tonight, I saw two things that got me thinking about "Next-Gen" video game consoles due out shortly. It brought to mind years gone by, and the now-defunct systems that were, in their time, the "Next-Gen" beasts of the future.
One thing I saw was tonight's South Park episode partially revolving around Cartman's desire for a Nintendo Wii. I guess with this, and the PSP episode a while back, the boys behind South Park are going to write episodes endorsing new game systems as a habit. I was surprised by the choice of the Wii however, and not the Playstation 3 as the object of his affections. True, I'm not as plugged into gaming as I was once, but since when did anyone care about Nintendo again? While it is more than capable technically, the Gamecube is a closed architectured, non-versatile heap that you can play games like Pokemon on. Perhaps the Wii is the image revolution Nintendo needs. It seems to be packed with all kinds of gimmick... but so was the Virtual Boy.
The other thing I saw was an extremely creepy ad for the Playstation 3. It has what appears to be a baby doll staring at the shiny new console. The baby doll then goes through a series of emotions (and a possible seizure) which include a tear that goes down its face, while all kinds of funky crap goes on in its eyes. Why are new systems advertised this way? This commercial in no way makes me want to buy a Playstation 3. I'm not sure what the hell I was watching or what the hell it could really motivate me to do. It was just odd. Don't get me wrong. It was a different kind of odd than Sony's "Enos Lives" and "U R Not E" commercials that heralded the original. This was just completely creepy. I hate to say this to Sony, but it reminded me of Sega ads from years gone by. I don't recollect if it was the Dreamcast's "It's thinking" campaign, the Saturn's "We're never going to sell any of these" campaign, or both, but Sega produced some odd ads. Here's a thought: show what the system can do without the theatricals. If Sony starts releasing add-on systems that pile continuously onto the system, start to worry.
Oh, for the days when all it seemed like anybody cared about was the advertised data width.
"Sega Genesis is twice as good as NES because it is 16 bits instead of 8!" the ignorant masses would scream.
It's just too bad that logic (or "math" as they called it) didn't work on people when Atari was trying to sell the 64-bit Jaguar in 1994 when the dominant game systems were 16-bit. I need to stop thinking about all of this. I've got the old "Thirty-two.... X... Welcome to the next level" growl stuck in my head now, and it will potentially give me a bigger headache than thirty minutes of Virtual Boy play. Arrrrggghhh! Red lines!
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Big Cray: Accept No Substitute