Program scripts from week of June 4, 2012
My name is Jay Phillippi and I've spent my life in and around the media. TV, radio, the movies and more. I love them, and I hate them and I always have an opinion. Call this the View from the Phlipside.
Bad Reality
I have watched a lot of reality TV shows. I’ve watched ones about cooking and losing weight and shooting and being left to scheme your way off a desert island. People locked into a room and people wandering the world.
Despite that I have to admit that I was probably NOT going to watch the new American Ninja Warrior on NBC. My taste for Reality TV has begun to fade. The real allure for programs like this these days seems be hoping to see contestants perform the most spectacular face plants possible. The reason for me tuning in last week was that the son of a friend would be competing. So I tuned in especially to see one Arthur Skov compete. Remember that name it’ll be back around in a minute.
What I got was quite possibly the stupidest example of Reality TV I have ever seen. The basic format of the show is fine. The contestants have to get through a physically challenging obstacle course that requires strength, agility, speed, endurance and timing. Fine so far.
The problem was that NBC had 30 contestants to get through the course in an hour. Given that most of them were taking at least 3 minutes the network had a problem. Add in the features stories on some of the contestants and the number game really started working against them. Solution? Simply don’t show all the contestants runs.
Now this was NOT a live event. It was taped months ago so they knew who would get through and who wouldn’t. So instead of seeing all the folks who completed the course, like Arthur Skov, we saw lots of, well, face plants. Skov finished fourth overall and got about 4 seconds of recognition.
Here’s what really stinks. The feature stories were mostly about folks who finished well down in the standings including at least one who didn’t even finish the course! The final field was filled out based on who made it the farthest. So here’s my cycnical thinking. I think the show has already picked out who we’re supposed to be rooting for and setting them up despite their poor performance. That they tipped their hand quite so blatantly is really astounding.
The end result was a totally unsatisfying TV experience. So American Ninja Warrior can count on me NOT becoming a regular viewer. I’ll tune in the next time my friend’s son is competing. But I’m betting I already know the outcome on that score.
Oprah Cynicism
I’m going to give you permission right up front to call me cynical at the end of this program. I’ve been hanging around the media for over 30 years and I think I only have one or two remaining illusions about the media left. And they are pretty well tattered and torn at this point as well.
So maybe I’m just letting my cynicism get the best of me when I hear the latest news out of the Media Empire of Empress Oprah. Yes this week Oprah has announced that after a two year hiatus she is bringing back the Oprah Book Club. Lady O claims that she’s doing it because she came across a book that was so good that she just wanted to share it the way she had before. And that would be a really lovely idea if it’s true. I’m not about to call Oprah a liar but I’m thinking that perhaps that’s not the only reason to resurrect the book. Even worse my inner cynic is pretty sure it’s certainly not the most important reason.
A quick review of two items. Item number the first is that for 15 years Oprah turned the publishing industry on its ear with her book recommendations. It was pretty simple. If you could get the Queen of daytime TV to pick your book you were made. Over the years she chose about 70 titles and they sold a total of some 55 million copies. And Oprah wasn’t choosing the easy winners like a James Patterson. At times she was choosing complete unknowns. And making them best sellers.
Item number the second is what we’ve reported here before. OWN, the Oprah Winfrey Network, has been laying a fairly large egg. It’s been losing money at prodigious rates and some of the folks who bankrolled it aren’t very happy about that.
So perhaps it is just coincidence that at a moment when things aren’t going well Oprah suddenly decides to relaunch one of her most successful program elements. Sure it was just that for two years she hadn’t really found any books that thrilled her. But now, suddenly, the book just popped up. And this very week Oprah’s Book Club version two gets launched.
Only a terminally cynical person would think that Oprah is getting a little desperate. Only a profoundly cynical person would think that the network and their glorious leader are grasping for anything to help them pull out from the nosedive they find themselves in at the moment.
Like I told you at the beginning, you can call me cynical now
On Newspapers
Time to talk about newspapers again I think. We haven’t mentioned them in a little while and they are suddenly back in the news themselves again. As always these days the news is challenging at best.
First lets start with the really bad news. The city of New Orleans recently woke up to discover that they were a major city without a daily major newspaper. The Times-Picayune, a highly respected paper and an institution in the Big Easy, announced that it was moving to a three day only print schedule. The online news product would be there on a daily basis but the hard copy version would only come out Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. While there have been newspapers that have completely disappeared this one was rather shocking because of the tight bond between the city and the paper. It was a shock when even that relationship couldn’t save the Times-Picayune.
The question remains what does the future of the newspaper really look like? A lot of folks say it’s just a matter of making the shift to a digital delivery system. The problem is that when you look at the places that have gone that route like Seattle’s Post-Intelligencer the outlook isn’t all that great. Sure the P-I has cut costs and is money making enterprise again. Unfortunately folks will tell you that it’s no longer the comprehensive, award winning news source it once was. And that means it loses a lot of influence in the community it serves.
The Chicago Sun-Times has announced that they are no longer a newspaper company but a technology company that happens to publish a newspaper. The other phrase they use is they are content providers.
All of which offers a lovely 21st century high tech kind of feel to it. My question is has the function of the fourth estate been forgotten. That’s the role of shining lights into dark corners, of asking the questions that the Powers That Be don’t want asked. It is a certain watch dog function that the media has done with a less than perfect record over the years. The advantage that print media has always had is the ability to examine these questions with a little greater depth than the electronic media can.
If all we’re left with are dumbed down, low impact news institutions who will snap at the heels of the powerful? If the answer is no one what kind of world do we end up with?
Call that the View From the Phlipside.
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