Jon Stewart Gets Serious

Last night, I saw an episode of The Daily Show that really wasn’t that funny. (I think it originally aired on the 12th, but since this is Canada, maybe it was delayed?)

Jon Stewart let 'er tip on Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s Mad Money, calling out the host, the show, and the entire company for not doing what they’re supposed to be doing as, 1) a news network,and 2) a news network that markets itself as having trustworthy answers to people's financial worries.

The best part was that Cramer couldn’t do or say anything about it other than shrug his shoulders and act like a suck-up. So I guess it was funny in an I-don’t-believe-this-is-actually-happening kind of way.





I can see the headlines now:

“Money Matters Fails: Jon Stewart Takes Down Another Mainstream News Program”


Go here to watch the full episode: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Colbert wins NASA Room-Naming Contest!

Congrats, NASA.

You opened a write-in poll to name a new room in your famous space station only to get the result you least wanted: Colbert (as in the host of Comedy Central's Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert).

That’s right! Colbert!


Only question is: Will they use it?

Obama's "Special" Comment

Last Thursday when Barack Obama appeared on The Tonight Show, he said something he probably shouldn’t have.



What a lot of the criticism seems to be (from YouTube comments anyway) is that if Bush had said what Obama said about the Special Olympics, there would be so many complaints and he would be impeached and blah blah blah.

Well, guess what? Obama isn’t Bush and people are still complaining. And considering the things Bush has done and said during his 8 year reign, what’s a comment like that gonna do? Besides, there’s a reason we know exactly what Bushisms are.

Oddly enough, it looks like Obama fans don’t really care about his Special Olympics comment, whereas Obama haters (and who I think must be Bush lovers) do - not to mention everyone involved with the Special Olympics.

Let me just get it out there so there's no confusion: I'm a way bigger fan of Obama than Bush, so I'm going to defend Obama now by saying he made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes, right? (It's not like he invaded a country or anything.)

Then again, I guess not everyone says insulting, prejudiced things on Leno, and obviously not everyone is the President of the United States - who based his entire campaign on Change no less. But Obama’s strategy from the beginning was to present himself as this regular, everyday person in America who everday people could identify with.

Is he just continuing on with that strategy, acting like the average Joe by unwittingly saying things that could offend people? (One of the big ones that comes to mind, and one I’m sure most of us has said at least once and heard at least a hundred times, is “that’s so gay.”) That said, is he just making an example out of himself?

Do you think the Special Olympics comment will affect Obama’s image?
Were you upset by his comment?
Do you even think it’s a big deal?

Will “Obamaisms” become the new thing? (If they do, I bet one of them would be, "We are facing a time of crisis." Not that he's wrong; he just seems to say it a lot.)

City in the Sea: The Venus Project

The future is sea bound!


The Venus Project, founded nearly 50 years ago by 93-year-old social engineer, futurist, architect, and idealist Jacque Fresco, is still one of the coolest (and dare I say, best) ideas for the future of human life.

This is what it's about:

The Venus Project presents a vision not of what the future will be, but what it can be if we apply what we already know in order to achieve a sustainable new world civilization.

It calls for a straightforward redesign of our culture in which the age-old problems of war, poverty, hunger, debt, and unnecessary human suffering are viewed not only as avoidable, but as totally unacceptable.

Anything less will result in a continuation of the same catalog of problems found in today’s world.”





That's some good theorizing. But how long do you think it would take for it to become a reality?

Warning: No Journalists Allowed

A Canadian journalist who was kidnapped in Pakistan last November, and is still being held hostage for US $375,000 (although some reports say $2 million), said this is a new video made by her captors:

"I am going to be beheaded just like the Polish engineer [Peter Stanczak], probably by the end of the month. The deadline is by the end of March, and that's basically, I don't know, 18 days or 16 days.”

"I'm not quite sure how long that is but the time is very short and my life is going to end."

Beverly Giesbrecht converted to Islam after the 9/11 attacks and now runs Jihad Unspun, a website which claims to provide "a clear view of the U.S. war on 'terrorism'" and information that is "devoid of the constraints of mainstream media." She now prefers to be called Khadija Abdul Qahaar (although many of the articles on her kidnapping use her former name).


These are some of the harsh comments from a CTV article and a Globe and Mail article on the video’s release. There weren’t many on each (only 10 comments all together), but there seemed to be a trend towards blaming Qahaar for her own kidnapping:


George
As a journalist she put herself in harms way in order to obtain a story that would be considered a scoop. She knew the risks that she was taking what the consequences would be should she be captured, hoping that she could beat the odds, and collect a sizeable payment for doing so. Now that she has been kidnapped the expectation is for our federal government to come to the rescue at great expense to the taxpayers and to negotiate with her captors for her release. She took her chances and lost,end of story. it was her own doing.

GDR
As a journalist, she has put herself in harms way and has become an author of her own misfortune. I would not pay any ransom as that encourages other pseudo journalists to act so irresponsibly.

Alysha
…this woman put herself in harms way for the sake of writing a story and being a journalist! Actions like this sometimes have consequences and now the people are expected to bail her by paying a ransom. Another load unto the taxpayers!

Eat Your Weedies
I am sad for her. It's tough to watch someone plead for their life. However, it's also sad to watch a fool make foolhardy decisions. She had no business going there in the first place. Whatever her name, she's a blond Canadian dealing with illiterate, ignorant, hot heads.

Bill Williams
Bye Bye Babe. You made the decision to go there, now suffer the consequences. Bad choice on your part, but, hey, that's the type of decisions idealist bleeding hearts make. Why should the rest of us be responsible for her well being.


Of course the woman had a choice not to go to such a dangerous area, but blaming her for getting herself kidnapped just for a story isn’t only an insult to her, but to journalists who actually are willing to report from such dangerous areas, Stanczak, the engineer who was kidnapped for ransom in September 2008 and murdered by Pakistani Taliban last month (the key word here is engineer, not journalist), and the area's citizens, who are also victims of these kidnappings and executions.

Blaming Qahaar for going somewhere she knew was dangerous also ignores the idea that because it is so dangerous it almost necessitates journalists going there to expose exactly what’s happening.

Isn’t that was journalists do?

When a firefighter is killed on the job, no one says, “Oh well, he knew what he was getting into.” Definitely not. I realize there might be more of an immediate need to put out fires, but why is it different for journalists when they're harmed or killed for doing their job? Isn't the truth important too?

As some of the commentators already mentioned, Qahaar knew the stakes and is now asking for help from them, which I guess seems contradictory.

But to just say the hell with her doesn’t make us (“the innocent taxpayers”) any less “ignorant” or criminal than those who are literally holding her life in their hands. It also gives me a sick feeling in my stomach.

UFOs over Big Ben...or Trick of Light?

A picture of 4 UFOs flying over London, published yesterday in the UK’s Telegraph, has already gotten a lot of people (meaning bloggers) talking about the photo’s authenticity.


Derek Burdon, who took the photo from the roof top of Orion House in Covent Garden, said he didn’t even notice the shapes while he was taking it. It was only after, when he was looking through his camera, that he saw them. For the skeptics, Burdon was sure to make that clear:

"I have not tampered with it and you would not be able to fake it. It was taken on my mobile and I guess I am just lucky to have it. These shapes were not visible to the naked eye so it's not as if I was looking for them."

What quite a few people – but especially UFO believers – are saying is that the “UFOs” in this photo are just reflections of the room lights against the window.

I don’t really know what to think about this one. I believe in UFOs, but I also believe in Photoshop and other possible explanations. Still, I can’t picture someone doctoring a UFO photo and giving it to a newspaper with their name unless they actually believed it was real. People do it though. Damn you photo pranksters!

But, oddly enough, London is a hotspot for UFO sightings anyway. According to the BBC, the number of reported UFO sightings in 2008 had almost doubled since the year before.

Another UFO photo (new word: UFOtograph?), this one from a year ago and published in The Sun – and referred to in my post, “There’s No Such Thing as a UFO” – is so clear that it looks like a movie still or something.


I don’t know if that makes the photo less believable or the movies more accurate.

New SciFi Name is Lame, Angers Twitterers

This just in: the SciFi Channel is changing its name.

It still sounds exactly the same, but the boring I's have been replaced by more trendy Y’s, making it...SyFy.

Why, you may ask, is the brilliant reason behind this change?

“The name Sci Fi has been associated with geeks and dysfunctional, antisocial boys in their basements with video games and stuff like that, as opposed to the general public and the female audience in particular...

We spent a lot of time in the ’90s trying to distance the network from science fiction, which is largely why it’s called Sci-Fi."


(Yeah, because “Sci-Fi” sounds nothing like a shorter version of “Science Fiction,” and “Syfy” sounds nothing like “Sci-Fi.”)


“We [the mega-corporation that owns this channel] really do want to own the imagination space. We want to get the credit for the range of content that we already have on our air and that we’ll be doing more of in the future.

When we tested this new name, the thing that we got back from our 18-to-34 techno-savvy crowd, which is quite a lot of our audience, is actually this is how you’d text it...

We’ll get the heritage and the track record of success, and we’ll build off of that to build a broader, more open and accessible and relatable and human-friendly brand.”


Hey, I’m a human! I’ll definitely start watching SyFy!

By taking the science fiction out of Sci-Fi NBC Universal hopes to broaden its brand to appeal to greater audiences, while simultaneously insulting all of its original fans.

It looks like Twitterers aren’t too happy about the name change either. (Twitterers: the “techno-savvy” demographic that supposedly influenced the name change in the first place.)


tewha: BREAKING NEWS: Sci Fi to skip SyFy name, go directly to "Channel nobody watches."

mebobyounot: Sci Fi channel is now SyFy? Sounds way to close to Syfylis/syhphilis

sebFlyte: SyFy = Fail. That is all. (This one's my favourite.)

stitzelj: How long do you think it'll be before the SciFi Channel decides to do away with their new 'SyFy' brand due to the general outcry against it?

VoltjanStevens: SciFi Channel is changing their name to Syfy? That is TERRIBLE. That is SO. STUPIDLY. AWFUL.

jenn2d2: The day that the Sci-Fi Channel becomes "SyFy" is when I stop consuming their content. I guess they don't need geeks with disposable income.


What's my take? Seems to be another example of a corporation trying to own the rights to everything, even creating their own unlikable word to claim an entire genre as their own brand.

Dumb? Yes...but not surprising.