Bling Can't Buy Class

I'm not even trying to be a hipster archetype by saying this, but it's been a while since I've sat through the MTV Video Music Awards. It's not that I'm too cool for them or anything. The last one I can really remember watching was when Chris Rock hosted in, what, 1999 or 2000? He was funny, threw out some pretty good lines, and I laughed. I'm ashamed to admit that, because if I'm watching the Video Music Awards, shouldn't I be watching because of the music? If I want to see comedy, there are plenty of channels that offer that.

Truth is, I don't even know if they play videos on MTV anymore, it's been so long since I've watched. It used to be getting-ready-in-the-morning filler material on TV when the news was uninteresting. Ever since MTV became a mélange of genres I don't give a tenth of a care about, I've had no burning need to check in. Actually, I didn't even know the VMAs were tonight until I saw an ad for it on MySpace (yeah, don't ask why I picked today to peek at my neglected and unnecessary MySpace account).

So why am I writing about it? I've been in for the night, and next thing I knew, everyone's Facebook status was abuzz with something Kanye West did. I guess that, in itself, isn't news. We're talking about the guy who took advantage of some airtime on MTV to once claim that President Bush didn't like black people. I don't know if one incident an attention whore makes, but it'll do in this case.

I'd have let it go, but then I saw the video from the award ceremony, before it was removed from YouTube. (I'm sure there'll be other copies in the coming days, popping up faster than Viacom can submit a copyright claim.)

For those who haven't seen it, Taylor Swift is on stage, accepting her award for "Best Female Video." I have no idea which of her songs was up for the award, but from what I've heard of her music (okay, so that's limited to a ballad titled "Teardrops On My Guitar"), she's pretty likely to be, thematically, worlds apart from her competition in the category. So here's this cute country gal, all of nineteen, winning a rather unexpected award - as she started to say, "I sing country music, so thank you all for giving me a chance to win this award."

Started to say. Enter Kanye West, stage left. In a classy move, Kanye commandeered the mic and declared, "Taylor, I'm gonna let you finish, but Beyoncé [Knowles] had maybe one of the best videos ever! Just sayin'." He hands the mic back to a speechless Taylor Swift and exits stage left, while Taylor just stands there, kind of shocked, finally gathering it back up to wave to the crowd, ending her abbreviated acceptance speech. Cut to commercial, or the next segment, or whatever they do.

Where do you even begin? I mean, you're a guest or whatever at an awards ceremony. An award is given to someone whose music pretty much isn't on your genre's radar; I mean, unless it's a radio-driven show like the KISS Concert, I'm guessing that no one will be booking Taylor Swift to open for Beyoncé Knowles anytime soon. It's not like this is some kind of rivalry; diehard country fans probably don't care what happens in the world of R&B and hip-hop, and R&B/hip-hop fans probably don't care about the country music scene, either. It's not like Kanye was on stage for an award, or as a presenter, or anything really. So what was the purpose of all that? It sure didn't make me think anything good about Beyoncé, I'll say that for sure. Moreover, whoever votes on the VMAs apparently they didn't think Beyoncé's video was as amazing as Kanye felt, either. If you've got to comment, there's sure to be plenty of press to cover the "I think we got ignored" angle later on. And come on, it's not like Beyoncé or Destiny's Child had any shortage of awards years ago.

What it did accomplish was it ruined an evening. Taylor Swift managed to say that she'd always dreamed of winning an MTV Video Music Award, and that she never thought she would. (Standard, but believable...over the years, it seemed that MTV had become the home of hard rock and rap music while top-40 and crossover country were relegated to VH1, with "real" country only inhabiting the specialty annex of CMT.) Here she was, accepting that award that, as a kid, she probably thought it would be cool to win. Awards are a fickle kind of thing; you can quantify album sales and downloads, but no matter how good you are or how hard you work, you can't guarantee voted awards. If you're lucky enough to win one, you might never be fortunate enough to win another.

And then, two sentences into a speech she'd probably rehearsed in a mirror but never knew if she'd get to say on stage, some dude from another musical world entirely takes the mic from her, basically disses her award on stage (indirectly, of course...but indirect insults are sometimes even more harsh than a petty "you suck"), then gives the mic back to her. She's left speechless. What would you say? What could you say, in her position, to follow that up? The rehearsed speech and the grateful thank-yous and the moment in the limelight were all gone at that point. From the video I saw, she looked totally deflated. Taylor Swift will surely win plenty of awards if she hasn't already; there are the Teen Choice awards, and I'm sure there's plenty of genre-specific celebration where she'll surely get recognition for her music. But to Taylor Swift, I'll bet that VMA - an award voted on against stars of all other backgrounds - had a certain special meaning. She didn't disrespect any genre or any musician, she simply won.

Kanye West ruined that moment of recognition for her, and that's something no pile of money or double-platinum album can buy back.

This shouldn't bother me, but it does. I'm not a country fan...I have a weak spot for cute girls with lovely voices, but I can take or leave country music. It doesn't really make a difference if it was Taylor Swift winning that award, or Lady GaGa, or Kylie Minogue. What Kanye West did tonight was completely tasteless and disrespectful, no matter who he disrespected. I guess I wouldn't care so much if someone like Kylie or Madonna were snubbed, because they'd have the grace of years in the business to shake it off and put Kanye in his place. Maybe it is more tasteless that he disrespected someone as new to the business as Taylor.

Before tonight, I'd acknowledged his past transgressions, but Kanye West was never really on my radar, musically or for his extracurricular pursuits. After tonight, I'll rank him right up there with Perez Hilton on the douchebag scale. And that's some pretty dubious company.

Put Down Your Remote Control, Throw Out That TV Guide

I don't tend to watch a lot of TV. Admittedly, that's because there's nothing on. Adam, my roommate, vehemently disagrees, but then, he enjoys "Mythbusters" and the sci-fi fare that hasn't yet been excised from the recently-renamed Syfy. All the same, we just have basic cable; why would we need anything more? I'd rather have a fast Internet connection.

So tonight, Adam discovered we have a new channel on our package. It's not really a new channel, per se, and I knew my parents got it, but my parents have two HD boxes with a couple packages that ensure they'll have HBO for "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and Speed for NASCAR coverage. Anyway, Adam discovered tonight that we now get RTV, the Retro Television Network. Much in the vein of what TV Land does, RTV broadcasts series from the '50s through to the '80s. In the background, I hear commercials, but I was just treated to the theme song of "The A-Team." This after Adam watched David Hasselhoff in "Knight Rider." And as I mentioned to Adam, RTV also shows episodes of "Airwolf," which he and Carmine adore with a sort of fanaticism.

For us here in Manchester, RTV resides at Channel 20 on the Comcast package. Not thinking, I did some research on Wikipedia. It's then that I determined RTV is indeed tied to the most awesome semi-independent TV channel in Boston.

When I grew up, in addition to our local ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX affiliates, we also had some independent channels. There were WNDS-TV 50, WGOT-60, little stations like that. The days of those stations and callsigns have long since passed, but many of them live on, broadcasting for networks like MyTV and formerly the PAX network. A bunch of them used to show shopping channels, too, or Univision.

One of these was WMFP-TV out of Lawrence, MA. WMFP-TV actually broadcast the Shop At Home Network for a bunch of years, relegated to flashing its callsign once an hour between shows. If you're morbidly curious like I was, the full story on WMFP-TV is here on Wikipedia, which we know is 100% factual and correct. Anyway, after SAH went under in 2006, the station was sold to Multicultural Television, and showed some other jewelry shopping channels for a couple years before they picked up the Retro Television Network feed in 2009.

That's not the cool part. It dawned on me that, while clicking channels, I'd seen the channel number for WMFP-TV. It may show up as Channel 20, but if you'd had to tune it in via rabbit ears, WMFP-TV was...Channel 62. In fact, while they've discontinued analog UHF and now broadcast solely on digital UHF channel 18, they still use virtual channel 62.1.

Nerds will recognize the significance of this. For those who don't, "Weird Al" Yankovic released a movie in 1989 titled "UHF," starring himself as a big dreamer who inherits control of a failing TV station and gets to make his imagination reality. After opening against a litany of summer blockbusters, the movie tanked, becoming a cult classic years later on DVD. If you haven't seen "UHF," you're failing yourself; it's a great period piece, box-office numbers be damned. Anyway, in the movie, Al's character George took control of none other than UHF Channel 62.

So, greater-Boston-area TV viewers, there you have it. WMFP-TV 62, your local carrier for Retro Television, is indeed UHF Channel 62, "The Reason Television Was Invented!"

Now, they just need to pick up Wheel Of Fish and Raul's Wild Kingdom, and I'll be pleased.

Cellular Dissonance

I had a scare this weekend. Nothing along the lines of a full-scale panic attack, mind you, and years ago I'd never think I would succumb to this. But as we were playing pool Saturday evening, between attempts at shots and lucky breaks, I'd peek at the screen of my cell phone, hoping it would offer up something more than illuminated white pixels.

Nope. Just more white, mocking me. Good luck reading those text messages, sucker! I mean, it was Saturday night, so it's not like I was in high demand by any stretch, but there's a disturbing feeling about being off the grid. Much as white people need to be prepared by wearing their performance outerwear, you never know when someone's going to try and get ahold of you to tell you something totally awesome is happening, worth dropping whatever you're doing at the moment.

It's funny enough I'd be so concerned over a phone, anyway. The only reason I got a cell phone in the first place was because my parents wanted me to have that safety net once I had a car. I'd told myself I wasn't important enough that I really needed to be accessible by phone all the time. I had a dorm phone, I had my parents' phone, and if I wasn't near one of those and wasn't online somehow, then anyone who would call me was probably already with me. Eventually, I started talking with a girl or two who had an affinity for the phone over online communiqués, and so I realized that, being one who likes to talk in real life, I didn't mind talking on the phone, either. I still didn't need text-messaging, until I got involved on the McCain campaign and everyone was just texting in lieu of making phone calls. After racking up $50 or $60 in pay-by-the-text messages in a month, I added texting to my phone.

And so, here I was, balancing a pool cue in one hand, flipping my ailing LG VX5400 open and shut, hoping for a different answer each time. Actually, as timing goes, Saturday night isn't really a bad night for a phone to die. What had my mind racing was the question I've been trying not to answer for quite a few months.

Is it time for the smartphone yet?

I'm odd as far as nerds go. I have two computers in my room, a laptop in a case not too far away, and more computers in the garage than I've had girlfriends in my life. My license plate is a geek reference that's lost on everyone else. I speak in memes, I gawk at Apple notebooks in libraries and coffee shops. And yet, I can be a stubborn laggard when new tech-toys emerge. Part of it is thrift, and part of it is an inexplicable hipster-like tendency to not want to be the bandwagon-jumper. Maybe I don't want to be associated with failure, who knows?

And so the guy most people assume is a slave to his CrackBerry or iPhone is a nerd who sends and receives 800 texts a month off a phone with a numeric keypad, hammering the keys the prescribed number of times to get full sentences under that 160-character limit. With apologies to Chamillionaire, they see me textin', they hatin', T9-ing and trying to catch me writing QWERTY.

The last time I upgraded my phone through Verizon, it wasn't much of an upgrade. That was sort of by design. I can text plenty fast on a numeric keypad, so I don't need a phone with a keyboard. If I got a phone with a keyboard, I would have to get a BlackBerry or something requiring a data plan, something I didn't really think was worth the cost. And ever since I broke that first Palm IIIxe back in high school, I've been leery of trying to tote something with a good-sized screen in a pocket like that. My sister can stow her Voyager and my mom can stow her enV2 in their respective purses, but except in the J. Peterman catalog, purses just haven't caught on among men.

The other thing was, I keep feeling like I'm not important to need a BlackBerry. I've got this stigma about the things, that they're tools not for personal use, but for the businessperson who can't or doesn't want to break away from work. If I got one, I know I'd tie it to my work e-mail account. I'm always thinking about work already; I don't need to make it any easier. And yet, that's exactly what I'd do. I'm already doing it in other ways. Part of me feels it's expected, not by my company, but by the customers. It's the one e-mail that comes in after you've left the office for the weekend that makes you feel like you should have been checking e-mails all the while. I don't want a smartphone to turn me into one of those work zombies who never unplugs, but then, the device doesn't turn you, you turn yourself.

And so I can't help but think that my next phone has to be a smartphone. From a work standpoint, I could tether my e-mail to my smartphone, I could check drivers through Field Force Manager's Web portal, I could install Skype Mobile to keep in touch. From a personal standpoint, hell, it'd be cool to be permanently wired. Gmail and Wikipedia access at a moment's notice are worth a glance, for sure. I'd finally have an excuse to join Twitter, too, though that's hardly a motivating factor to buy a smartphone.

As it turned out, it was a non-question in the end. To my surprise, my phone was covered under warranty (I figured they sold insurance so they didn't have to provide warranty coverage), and so I walked out of the Verizon store with a new, identical phone sans the paint chip sustained when I dropped the phone on a stone walkway doing door-to-doors in Wolfeboro. (The bastards gave me back my old, worn battery cover, though.) I kept my contacts, not that I couldn't have recreated them, and I walked out without spending an extra dime.

And yet, as I sat in the car, I felt a little bummed out, because in a moment of weakness, I was warming to the smartphone. Not to the slave-to-work element of it, but just the coolness factor of having the world at my fingertips, like just about everyone else, none of whom are concerned over how important they are and whether they actually warrant having a BlackBerry or not. I'm still a little lukewarm on the whole thing, like even though my new phone still works just wonderfully, I'd consider upgrading to a BlackBerry or a Windows Mobile phone tomorrow.

At least this week, I'm hanging onto this old-school phone. But I can't help but wonder when I'm finally going to decide this is one upgrade I can't keep avoiding.

School Daze

One of my friends just started her last semester of law school. She's hardly the only one; I've seen from plenty of Facebook status updates that people are going back to school, starting classes again, or teaching if they're in that line of work. At first, it seemed so early, but then, last Monday was August 24th, and now I'm staring September down the barrel already, wondering where the hell summer went so fast when it barely showed up a month ago.

But this isn't about fleeting time; that's for another day. Rather, it's about those people going back to school.

I'm not going back to school. I admit there's a certain attraction to being a career student, but I've already accumulated my fill of student loans, and I frankly have no idea what I'd do if I were to go to graduate school, other than to say "I'd go get my MBA" with the same awareness I had when I asserted I wanted to be a marine biologist when I was six. I have a mailing from RPI that reminds me when Homecoming Week is (October) and subtly hints at this fall being our five-year college reunion, which also means I'm only halfway to that ten-year benchmark most of our professors discussed when pointing out how many high-tech entrepreneurs had taken ten years between achieving their undergrad and graduate degrees.

And yet, something makes me wish I could go back to college. Not with the pressure of taking classes, of course. I'm just talking about loading my life into the back of my dad's blue Dodge pickup, driving three hours west on winding mountain highways, and pulling into the crowded fire lane behind the Quadrangle to unload boxes into a vacant dorm room. I'm talking about getting everything unpacked, and taking in the calm before the storm, where everyone settles back into a life they put on the shelf for a few months, acclimating to the campus network and off-campus weekend dinners and apartment living without doors and with friendly neighbors. I already had a dream this summer where I moved back into college only to discover I'd somehow been entirely unprepared for any of the classes I somehow hadn't registered for. I think "nightmare" would be a better term if I hadn't woken realizing college was way past tense by now.

I still remember that first weekend, maybe not as vividly as I wish I could, but there are the details that stand out more than others. I remember one spot in the triple already being occupied when I got there, as Liam had been on campus for Air Force ROTC orientation. Greg had gotten there just as I did, and we'd all accepted the furniture layout of the room as it was, because with the space we had in our forced triple, there weren't any other alternatives. I was the only one who'd brought a computer along, as I had my old Power Mac G3 when we would all be receiving our laptops before long. Part of the day was spent doing orientation activities, much as we'd done when we visited the campus for freshman orientation in mid-summer. When I was able to get online, I immediately logged into Napster and downloaded Nina Gordon's "Tonight And The Rest Of My Life," because I'd heard the song on the radio a couple times during the drive over. I'd been hopeful to catch the Bristol NASCAR race that evening, but we were committed to a so-called "Communiversity" event in scenic downtown Troy, somewhere along the Hudson that I can't even recall exactly where something quite so picturesque would be, though Google Maps would probably help. I don't recall how I got back, either, because I doubt I stayed for the whole thing, and I know Liam and Greg didn't, because they'd brought Rollerblades to expedite their escape. We got our new laptops sometime Sunday morning, but in between there, I'd allowed a few people to check their e-mail on my Mac.

What was my first class of the week? I'm sure I have a schedule sitting somewhere, but in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter what it was. There were greater things happening, greater things to be remembered, than class.

It's hard to accept that was nine years ago. It dawned on me last spring, though. In a way, we had our reunion, sort of coming full-circle. Carmine's brother Chris and Joe's brother Jason were graduating, so Carmine asked if I'd want to come out for the festivities. We left after work on Friday, meeting the Sarnos in Troy. After dinner, we ventured to Hattie's for mojitos, wandering the Saratoga streets like the Broken Lizard actors in "Beerfest," finding a bar I couldn't take you to without walking the steps myself. The next afternoon, as we broke down the dorm room Chris and Jason shared that Carmine, Joe and I had shared in 2001 and 2002, we admitted that while we'd graduated four years before, we'd actually moved to campus eight years prior. Eight is a pretty small number, but when you're twenty-six, eight years seems like an awfully long time. The world was a pretty different place then.

And we were pretty different people then, too.

I mean, it's romantic to suggest how great it would be to go back to school again. Not as a twenty-eight-year-old with something resembling perspective and life experience, but as a largely-naïve twenty-year-old whose biggest taste of freedom was the lofted bed in Hunt III 1004, the option of choosing whether to go to Sage for dinner or venture to the Union for a grilled chicken-and-cheese sub or just call Hao Wei for takeout. I guess lots of things in life are like that; I started writing a book about the great experiences of my high-school career, but some of the luster wore thin when I realized how much more amazing college was. I'd venture to say my adult-life experiences have been richer and deeper still, but partially because in college, I was still measuring myself against others' expectations instead of living for myself. Those who know me know my fascination with "The Butterfly Effect" and the notion of how one change in the timeline can change everything down the timeline. And so if I sent myself back to college, I'd go as that twenty-year-old armed with just enough advance knowledge to make decisions a little differently. Part of me wants to relive all the good times, just to reinforce the details. Part of me wants to go back and make a few changes, maybe out of greed, because I'd love to have seen how both sides played out.

It'd be nice to go back, but somehow, the prospect of work tomorrow isn't quite as daunting as the prospect of class.

The Price Of Entertainment (Or, Keeping Butts Out Of The Stands)

Last night, I spent a couple hours at Starbucks. Remember that episode of "Family Guy" where they make fun of those people who go to Starbucks with a laptop to be noticed as writers? Yeah, I was one of those. Nothing says wannabe writer like a person at a table for two with an Apple laptop and an overpriced coffee beverage...except maybe being a barista at said overpriced coffee chain.

Originally, I'd been flirting with something I haven't done in several years; a trip to one of the local race tracks. Those who don't follow auto racing (stock car racing, particularly) often don't realize that the big NASCAR shows aren't the be-all and end-all of stock car racing. (More accurately, they aren't aware of it, much as someone indifferent to baseball might not be aware that there's a middle ground between Little League and the major leagues.) Thanks to NASCAR's marketing approach, I'm not so sure a lot of casual new-age viewers realize there's a world of racing in their backyard. But it's there. On Friday and Saturday nights (and Sunday afternoons when the weather gets too cold...in October), or Thursdays if you live in northern Vermont, little quarter- and third-mile oval tracks put on their own racing shows. My grandfather used to pooh-pooh the short-track atmosphere as "where they race the jalopies," and while there are still entry-level classes with first-time racers running resurrected junkyard beaters, there are also prepared divisions shaking the grandstands every week.

In my neighborhood, there are a few options. Closer to the seacoast, there's Lee USA Speedway on Route 125, a third-mile oval. A little closer to Route 101 in Epping, there's a quarter-mile oval called All-Star Speedway. When my dad and I went, it was called Star Speedway, but the ownership of the track changed hands a few years back, in the midst of a track closing due to, shall we say, poor grounds conditions. We always considered ourselves fortunate that we didn't fall through the grandstands at least once. We were never weekly regulars, but we'd catch the special shows, when the regular weekly divisions were joined by the Busch North or the Featherlite Modified touring series. There are those who go weekly; they're mostly the diehards, rooting for someone they know or someone they've followed forever.

I can't be sure, but the last time I went to Lee might have been the Busch North opener in 2000. The series (and track) opener were held on a chilly Sunday in April, so after 2000, I couldn't be home for the opening race. Not long after that, my dad fell ill, and he can't negotiate those old-style wooden bleachers anymore. It's been a while. But I've wanted to get back to the track, maybe with someone who would enjoy it. I know drivers have come and gone, but it doesn't matter who's driving if the racing is good, right?

Last night was a special race at Lee, featuring the International SuperModified Association. The SuperModifieds are open-wheel cars, loud and light alcohol-burners with wings that zip around the track faster than a heavy stock car could dream of. The local tracks run so-called "small-block" SuperModifieds as a weekly division, but the touring ISMA cars are a bigger deal. I figured it would be a fun way to blow a Friday night.

Then I saw the ticket prices. $30 for an adult admission ticket. I'm no stranger to that; we used to pay $25-30 to go see the Busch North cars at Lee or Star. But that was a major NASCAR touring division, a 150-lap feature race plus all the local divisions. This was for a race half that length, plus the weekly stuff. If a ticket was closer to $20, I could have rationalized it; I think weekly admission is around $10 or $12. But $30 for an ISMA show seemed a bit steep. I talked to two of my co-workers Friday; both had considered going to Lee themselves, but the ticket prices were a turnoff for a short race.

The reasons for high ticket prices are many, and I could burn another blog post that'd be interesting to about three people considering the high price of motorsports, making up for lagging attendance and not being able to gouge the teams to pay their own purse, and so on. But especially in this economy, it seems like it would be better to charge a little less, and maybe entice more people to show up, than to turn people away. Friday-night racing isn't the only option out there. You can pick up good seats at a Fisher Cats minor-league baseball game for $15. An evening showing of a movie at a good theater is $10, and if you're up for a second-run flick, the Hooksett theater has prices lower than that. If you have a good stereo system and a nice TV, Redbox rentals are a buck a night. Or, if you're a nerd, you can get a venti Mocha Frappuccino (with whipped cream) for $5, and sit in an air-conditioned Starbucks for a couple hours slaving over your PowerBook.

The annual promoters' workshops in Daytona used to say the same thing; that you're competing against a lot of different options for entertainment dollars. It's even more important now, when people have less money to spend. Thirty dollars wouldn't have set me back too badly, but if I'd wanted to invite Jess and Mark (if they were here), they'd have passed at that price. My roommate Adam probably would have. I can't blame them. Hey, last weekend, after shopping and dinner, we retired to my apartment for hours of playing Rock Band 2 and the Forza demo. If you leave dinner out, and ignore the video games Adam bought on impulse, we had a pretty cheap night and still had a great time.

The same thing crossed my mind earlier this year, when the staff at Yankee Stadium decided to keep ticket prices in a sort of prestige bracket even though they weren't selling out games. Yes, I understand it's the Yankees. But wouldn't it be better to cut prices a bit, if it meant bringing in a few more butts to sit in the seats? People don't go to games alone. They bring friends, family, kids, so right off the bat, if you're selling one ticket, you're probably selling two. When we went to Loudon as a family, that was four tickets at nearly $90 a piece. That's a $360 day in tickets alone, never mind the other expenses of entertainment. A family can't do that more than once or twice a year. My parents rarely went to professional hockey games for that reason. A pair of good Bruins tickets could cost maybe $200, I have no idea what they were running at face value when my parents used to go. But for the same $200, you can get five pairs of minor-league tickets to see the Manchester Monarchs. The name's not the same, but the entertainment value certainly is. For that matter, a family can afford four tickets to see the Monarchs. And they can probably afford four tickets a few times a year, versus one special event. My dad got to enjoy ten or so Monarchs games last year.

You could say the same for concert tickets. I skipped out on the Fleetwood Mac show this spring, partly because I had no one to join me, but partly because the prices for good seats were a bit steep. I'm sure Fleetwood Mac was good, but not $90-100 good. Sure, I could have grabbed cheap seats somewhere, but I'm a bit of a seat snob. I admit that I did pay $190 to see The Eagles last year. Steep, but it was worth every penny, and I don't recall seeing many empty seats. I guess the best price is whatever the market will bear, and there are always plenty of wealthy parents to bankroll their kids' attendance at *NSYNC or Backstreet Boys or (more recently) Hannah Montana and Jonas Brothers concerts, but those are more the exception than the rule.

I guess someone has to have done the math, but from where I sit, without a sports-marketing background (but with two first-place trophies in some DECA roleplays on the subject!), it just seems like it'd be better to fill seats and earn on the volume than to gouge those who really, really, really want to go and leave those on the fence feeling like they're getting ripped off. Entertainment doesn't have to be a charity, but it doesn't have to be a luxury, either.

ISMA's supposed to be coming to All-Star Speedway in September. I wonder what ticket prices will be like for that show, though something tells me I'll be choosing Starbucks over All-Star.

Shop 'Til Your Packets Drop

This is starting to become a habit.

Just yesterday, I was musing on the questionable future of a particular retailer, and how they've somehow clung to life like a cockroach after World War III. I also hinted (yes, foreshadowing in a blog entry) that I'd touch on this on a macro scale. Well, here I am, following through on promises made.

The store I'd pointed out in particular was RadioShack, a chain in the midst of a new branding approach (according to Engadget, the chain seems poised for a branding shift to "The Shack"). Ironically, a few nights before this article appeared on Fark, my roommate Adam and I made the offhand remark, "[We] wonder how they're still around." I'm not old enough to appreciate everything RadioShack once was. But I do remember the days of store-branded Realistic stereo equipment and home electronics, of radio-control cars, bins of electronic components, musical instruments. There were days when one had a reason to go to RadioShack. (In those days, there was a space between the two words, before the InterCaps trend caught on with all things electronic.)

I've seen an evolution away from that, but then I walked into the store at the Mall of New Hampshire just yesterday. Compared to the RadioShack with a space, it's like a different store. I'm not even talking about the evolution of technologies themselves. The second-rate home-theater equipment was nowhere near the front of the store, but I could find all manner of cell phones and iPod accessories. It's a small-format store anyway, but this isn't your father's RadioShack, seriously.

Of course, I pondered that for the $3 and change I paid for my coax coupler, I could have found one on some Web site for a fraction of that (plus shipping and handling, of course). And that's what got me thinking that maybe I needed to put this to hypertext, because I've wondered it more than a few times.

Those who read Freakonomics will recall the chapter in which Levitt and Dubner discussed how the Internet affected the term life insurance market by making information (quotes) accessible, and making it harder for third-party insurance brokers to charge more than the price the market would bear. Surely, the Internet's affected all forms of commerce like that. I remember standing in Best Buy with Carmine and Adam, frustrated that we couldn't access Circuit City's Web site for a price check (and trying to find a Web-based VNC client so we could skirt the firewall). More than just disseminating information, though, the Web has driven a new model of purchasing and distribution. You can't think about that without wondering how much responsibility it held for the closing of electronics chains like Tweeter and Circuit City, among others in all segments of retail.

I admit, I'm old-fashioned and still driven by instant gratification. There's something to be said of the tactile nature of taking a package off the shelf and paying for it. It makes cognitive dissonance more tangible, at least! I still go to the bookstore to buy a book, but if they don't have it, I rarely get on Amazon to place an order when I get home. I buy my electronics in person so I can play with them right away. I buy clothes in person...well, that's obvious. Also, I don't like shipping things to the apartment, where I don't know if someone will help themselves to my parcels if I don't get right home after work.

But there's not that much, aside from maybe groceries, that I can't buy online. If I weren't so enthralled by the act of getting out and spending money in the real world, I'd easily never have to set foot in a mall again. I have plenty of friends who do all their shopping with their fingers and a credit-card number. Even my mother buys most of our gifts online, and she's mildly technophobic. My dad's new camera was ordered through some Amazon-affiliated retailer for about $75 less (shipped!) than the store price at Best Buy. Most of my computer parts have been ordered through NewEgg, whose prices are way more competitive than Best Buy (or formerly Circuit City) could dream of being.

But where would that leave retailers?

I guess part of growing up is all about paradigm shifts. Evolution is survival, and clinging to the past is the most direct route to failure. Look at the RIAA; when potential customers embraced file sharing as a way to obtain music, instead of finding a way to fulfill and profit on a new market demand, they clung tightly to the old way of doing business, and used litigation to discourage the new technology. It's certainly done no favors for goodwill toward the RIAA. The news media is in the same boat now; newspaper subscriptions are dwindling among a younger demographic, but people still demand news. Some media companies found ways to embrace the new technology; others simply cried that subscriptions were falling short, and eventually closed the doors. More will close with time.

Such is the problem with retail. Since college, if I've needed something for my computer and didn't need it immediately, I'd order it from NewEgg. Service was fast, and the shipped price was better than any brick-and-mortar store. Plus, NewEgg had plenty of things (OEM drives and processors, anyone?) that the physical stores simply don't stock. Physical space is limited at a store. A warehouse outside LA is a little more accommodating. NewEgg has facilities in New Jersey now, and who knows where else. But the upkeep on those, say, five or six warehouses is far less than the capital expense of every Best Buy store and distribution center, never mind the floor employees necessary for each store and the staff that operates their Web site. It's obvious that Best Buy is going to have a lot more expenses to move the same product.

That's fine if you can provide some kind of added value. Store retail has an obvious value; you can see and try the product before you buy. For some lines of merchandise, that's more important than others. If I'm buying clothes, I want to try things on, match colors, and feel fabric. You can't do that effectively through a catalog or through the Web. So fashion retail may never entirely die. Electronics, on the other hand...I find it beneficial to try out a camera or a laptop, but if I'm going to go home and order it online, I've just made Best Buy's showroom my bitch, for lack of a better term. Then there's book and music shopping. With music and movies, if you know what you're looking for, it's not as if you're passing up the chance to try before you buy if you order online. Same if I know I'm looking for Dennis Lehane's new book; I don't need to see it to know I want it. But if I've never heard of Dennis Lehane and I'm just browsing the Mystery section at Barnes & Noble, then I think having the book on a shelf would be appealing.

The question is what that added value is worth. In the case of RadioShack, the added value used to be knowledgeable staff. The Fark play on the store's motto was "You've got questions, we've got blank stares." Part of keeping costs down means hiring employees who work for less, and the knowledgeable people will avoid that retail hell, leaving "associate" jobs to kids who know nothing but how to parrot back "Do you need any batteries today?" Was it worth $75 more to my dad to be able to touch the camera in person? Not when he had the tools to order it another way cheaper. On the other hand, my friend Erin paid the premium but walked out of the store with the camera that afternoon. Sometimes, you need it now. Newbury Comics was one store that did have the advantage of knowledgeable staff, but when their CD prices soared to FYE-level, that's when I stopped going in. I love music, but knowledgeable staff and buying local isn't worth a $5 premium on a CD I can buy for $10 at Best Buy.

This is a rambling entry, I know, but I just often wonder at what point we'll outgrow the very notion of brick-and-mortar retail. I'd like to hope we never do. There are two things retail has going for it. One is the showroom aspect. The other is the shopping aspect. Shopping online has never felt as natural for me. I'll stare at Web sites for twenty hours of the day, but aimlessly browsing a store isn't done online, it's done walking through aisles and touching shelves and looking at packages. TigerDirect, another electronics e-tailer like NewEgg, acquired the CompUSA brand through their parent Systemax, and is retaining some of the physical CompUSA stores as a sort of test approach. Some products will never translate to the digital realm. Plenty will, though. And so I can't help but wonder if, at some point, it'll simply be too costly to operate those big-box stores when a company could transition from retailer to e-tailer.

There's another element to this, too. Maybe I'm just not the typical retail customer. Let's look at my recent purchase of my pocket camera. I made probably three visits to Best Buy to look at the camera I ended up buying. I wasn't going to save a ton of money over the Best Buy price buying it online, and I had a gift card to use up, so I bought the camera there. But then, I said no to the extended service plan they wanted me to buy. They say that restaurants break even on the food and make their money at the bar. I've heard similar said about retailers, that they make the money off the service contracts and extended warranties they sell. And Lord knows you can't buy anything more than a CD at Best Buy without being offered an extended warranty. Here's one from real life: after my mom ordered my dad's new camera from that Amazon affiliate, they called with a post-sale confirmation call to confirm the order. They also recommended the purchase of rechargeable batteries, as "Canon strongly recommends against using conventional AA batteries in their cameras." Seeing as the camera is designed to work with AA cells and even ships with conventional batteries, we laughed this one off. My dad's theory was they sold the camera at a loss, hoping to profit on the accessories.

What I'm getting at is that the saving grace of the retailer isn't the savvy shopper who does his or her homework, uses the store to test the product in person, then makes a calculated buy. The saving grace is the impulse buyer who has no idea what they're really shopping for, and can easily be steered one way or the other. Or they know what they want, but they need that service contract to avoid problems in the future. I'm actually guilty of this myself; when I went shopping with my friend for a laptop, I was all for her getting an extended contract on it. It's a laptop; things are bound to happen, and while it's no big concern for me to swap a laptop hard drive and reinstall Windows, we both know that's outside her scope of ability or interest, and she can't always count on me being within a few miles with time to bail her out. I'd rather she have that line of defense. When I get my new MacBook Pro this fall, I'd like to say I'll opt out of the AppleCare coverage. But I'll bet I get the laptop at the store so I can play with it in a half-hour instead of a few days.

And if the paradigm of retail does change as we know it, where does that leave our malls? Where will kids shop? Hell, where will they hang out? "Oh, let's go to the food court, then go shopping for clothes and looking at blank storefronts!" Part of the evolution of retail may have to be toward a service orientation. That's one thing I'd thought about in the conversations about the desolate Bedford Mall. The Bedford Mall, of course, has about 20 slots for retailers, and maybe six or seven occupied. The end unit where Alexander's (and later the Drug Emporium and MVP Sports) was has been vacant since MVP/Decathlon moved out, and the Chinese buffet is gone next to it. The movie theater is long gone. With the closing of Linens 'n' Things, that leaves Staples, Marshall's, Papa Gino's, Bob's Stores, a couple one-off merchants and Michael's School of Hair Design. What retailers are you going to invite? The obvious candidates would rather be at the more-accessible Mall of New Hampshire. The Gap left the Bedford Mall for greener pastures years before, and other stores followed. But what can't be replicated at the big mall are local service businesses. It makes little sense to have another Old Navy in the Bedford Mall, but an optician's office would be a good fit. Maybe that's the shift we'll see with retail in general. You can't shove services down a fiber-optic backbone, and convenience will win out if you can put them all in one place.

I can't imagine how hard it will be for retailers to make money the old way, but I can't imagine it dying out altogether, either. But hey, as long as I die before Starbucks becomes a brothel and coffee shop, I'll be okay.

Musings At The Mall

So today after work, I took a spin by the Mall of New Hampshire. I needed shampoo and a coax adapter, and so both of these could be had in one place. Two birds, one stone, right? Now, while I am a shopper, there are days where I'm in no great rush, and I'll let myself stroll around the mall, maybe make a lap, more to people-watch than anything. God knows I don't stop to windowlick or anything. I actually made a couple observations, and thought, wouldn't it be cool if there were a place I could share this?

Yeah, you did get back into this blogging thing for a reason, remember?

So anyway, here are the things that came to mind.

I really am not sure how RadioShack is still in business. Saturday night, at our rapidly-becoming-weekly Starbucks gathering, Adam and I questioned the existence of RadioShack. We acknowledged it as the place that's often the only place to go for some random electronic thing that you need now. Then, this morning I came across a Fark link to an article about the chain. Apparently, RadioShack is going to rebrand its stores as The Shack, and it also seems that the stores will increase their focus on cell-phone sales, now bringing T-Mobile to their service line. The Fark thread was amusing, a catalog of anecdotes from people who remembered when you could get decent stuff there, and how now it's regarded as a last resort for immediate purchases (how Adam and I recognized it), a haven for hard-sell and clueless salespeople and also dependent on selling you batteries.

Now, before I came across this article, I'd planned to hit Radio...er, The Shack today anyway. So maybe I went in with this negative prejudice already. But I set foot in an empty store with three guys hovering around the counter in conversation. The first half of the store, once the display center for televisions, store-branded home theater junk and radio-control cars, was pretty much devoid of gondola shelves, the walls lined with cell phones and iPod accessories. I felt a salesman's eyes on me immediately, so I did my usual thing—I made a beeline for the electronics at the back of the store, looking like I was assured of what I needed. (Some Farker mentioned this strategy too.) I found something that'll work, and while checking out, the guy behind the counter immediately asked, "Do you need anything else, maybe batteries?"

Self-fulfilling prophecy? Maybe. I attributed my negativity to that. But the people who came in the store after me hardly made it three feet inside before being pounced by a "helpful" salesman. Even The Onion had an article about this phenomenon...with a store that seems to offer so little and have so little firm direction (do we really need another cell phone middleman?), how is RadioShack still around? At least Circuit City knew what it was. Then again, we knew how crappy it was, too. That's more an indictment of the retail paradigm in a digital age. But that's for another blog entry.

Simon Properties: We're working hard to not look so bleak. Not surprisingly, we've lost a few small stores to the recession. It's not like JCPenney or Macy's have left anchor slots gaping and dark. If you want to see that, go see the Bedford Mall...Your Neighborhood Ghost Town Since 2001. (Or thereabouts.) But a couple jewelry places have gone out, and a few others here and there. Once upon a time, they'd just put up the metal grate in the door, take the signs off the wall, and leave it. Or maybe they'd put that white partition up that they use when some slot is getting remodeled. But what they've done with some is more subtle. They've put black curtains up in the doorways, and added benches and fake plants to create a sort of sitting area against the wall. It's tasteful, subtle, and it doesn't draw your attention to the blank and empty storefront. A few are serving as display windows for other stores in the mall.

It's not that bad, believe me. But you do notice, if you remember something used to be somewhere, or had been for a while. Like most things, you notice when you look.

Doesn't everyone already have a cell phone? I noticed that there's another cell phone store opening. I think it's a T-Mobile store. Now, T-Mobile has a kiosk in the mall; they had two. Verizon Wireless and AT&T have stores in the mall, too. VZW has two, if you count the GoWireless store that seems to be a Verizon reseller. Plus, you can get phones from almost any provider at the aforementioned RadioShack. So, that said, why do we need so many cell phone stores? I can justify why we need a Starbucks or a Dunkin' Donuts every block; some people will go to the competitor's store a block away because they're too lazy to continue on their way without that venti double nonfat iced mocha latte with whipped cream and served at 140 degrees Fahrenheit. But do we really need eight cell phone kiosks at the mall? Especially when you can find another in the RadioShack at the mall, or standalone retailers in strip malls a mile down South Willow?

(I guess another part of it is that as carriers merge, they inherit each other's stores. But come on, we all have cell phones...so let's get real.)

What's the target demographic of Forever 21? Apparently, Forever 21 is one of the more popular fashion retailers at the mall, since they moved in a few years ago. No, I did not ask this of the female shoppers; you just can't take five steps without seeing a bright yellow bag with "Forever 21" emblazoned on it. Either people are reusing their bags because they're just that good, or lots of girls shop there. Now, I laughed at the name when they first moved in. "Forever" any age implies that you were once that age, and though it may be long past now, damn it, you're going to stay that age no matter how time and fate betray you. Therefore, I imagined what Carmine and Katie did, a bunch of thirty-somethings and MILFs trying to defy time by wearing clothing that would make 1980s Madonna blush.

And instead, most of those yellow bags are in the hands of girls who aren't quite 21 yet, far as I can tell. How can you be "forever 21" if you haven't ever been 21 to begin with? But that brings up another question...

Should I take a seat over there? A few Christmas Eves ago, I was strolling the mall last-minute when I bumped into Isaac. He lamented that he had yet to see an "attractive" woman at the mall that afternoon. I have to assume Isaac was wearing the fidelity-to-his-girlfriend goggles, because I've never found that assessment to be true. The problem is, I don't know if I'm supposed to find these women attractive!

I can't tell age. If I see a cute girl, I can't tell you if she's sixteen or eighteen or twenty-five. Yeah, I can tell if she's 30. But under that can be hard to tell. The girls don't make it any easier. Fashion isn't too revealing, unless you happen to catch a collegiate or high-school athletic t-shirt or sweatshirt. Parents aren't revealing, because what 14-year-old still gets chaperoned around the mall these days? There's just no way to tell from a quick glance. I just do what's safest, and try not to acknowledge any of them. After all, you never know when Chris Hansen is watching you.

Why does techno sell young-adult fashion? Every time you walk past a Hollister, Abercrombie or whatever label, they're blasting techno. I know there's a survey that says why. When the marketing people come forth with The Data, you do what The Data tell you to do. But are people universally driven by techno? I'd think it would make people hyper and leave the store faster.

And yeah, I thought this all up in the span of about twenty-five minutes. Go, me.

The Rickroll Cake: An Explanation

So I turned twenty-eight this week. Monday at 4:43am EST, to be anally precise. As birthdays do when you're not in one of those marquée years, it came, it went. But despite the relative lack of fanfare, Carmine found a way to mark this one like no birthday before. He executed, from afar, the Most Epic Birthday Rickroll Ever.

Now, for some, this requires an explanation. Most of this explanation is relative to the fact that, well, the Rickroll was performed in the presence of my co-workers, who now may or may not think I'm gay. Most will never read this, but I feel compelled to explain the Rickroll for those who aren't already in the know.

It started with a Web site I will not name here, but it's a site known for hatching many of the most popular Internet memes, among them lolcats. One thing they can't take credit for, though, is the hyperlink bait-and-switch. It's all too easy to send someone a link (especially if you can disguise it through HTML code) that looks like pertinent content, but actually directs to something else. For years, people would use this approach to deliver content from a noted "shock site," something like Tubgirl or Goatse (and if you don't know, trust me, you really don't want to know).

This particular site adopted a different approach when they realized every member had seen Tubgirl, Goatse and friends. For some reason, an image of a duck on wheels became popular. Not surprisingly, it was dubbed the "duckroll." This was all well and good. Then, apparently there was some rumored release of a video game preview or a movie trailer preview on YouTube. When the initial servers couldn't handle the load, a forum poster quickly offered a YouTube mirror for everyone to watch.

Those who clicked were treated to...a music video for 1980s pop singer Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up." Surely, you know the song; it's the song that makes you envision a soulful black musician making promises of eternal faithfulness. The video, though, showcases Astley, a slim white British musician, delivering the lyrics. Couple that with the fashion and "dance moves" symbolic of the '80s, and you have a flashback like no other. The variant was labeled a "Rickroll." And with that, the practice grew quickly, even beyond the realm of its originating Web site. Rickrolling was easy to do, relatively harmless, and always good for a laugh. And the more unexpected, the better. Depending on who you ask, the trend peaked or jumped the shark when, at the 2008 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, Astley himself emerged from a parade float and lip-synched "Never Gonna Give You Up," effectively Rickrolling the parade in person. I vote for the former.

Of course, Carmine was quick to embrace the humor inherent in the Rickroll, and he labeled me as his target. The first few Rickrolls were low-key, just disguised links as they used to do things. Then, he left a CD in my car stereo with a single track, so I was greeted to "Never Gonna Give You Up" when I got ready to leave the office. While I was awaiting a call from a guy named Richard in New Jersey, Carmine gave me a message from Rick with a 973 area code. I dialed, only to find that it was Rick Astley at the other end to tell me how he'd never give me up. I've received Rickroll calls on my cell, almost always when my battery's near death. And then, this spring sometime, my friend Ashley e-mailed me a song by a new artist named Reliant Sky. I listened to the MP3, recognized the first couple notes immediately, and learned that Carmine had put Ashley up to forwarding the track along. (He also pointed out that Reliant Sky is an anagram of Rick Astley. He puts time into this.) I figured that was the peak.

Then my birthday. We always do cakes at the office, so when Carmine's mom and two co-workers were at my back with a cake, it wasn't too surprising. Then, I stood up to blow the candles out...

The cake itself was beautiful, though I can't give all the credit to Carmine. Chris had to forward his mother a good still shot of Rick from the iconic video. Stop & Shop crafted the confectionary masterpiece. And Mrs. Sarno simply executed the plan as her boys requested. The result was a flawless Happy Birthday Rickroll. But something this involved could only derive from one mind, and for that, I give mad props to Carmine.

The only problem is, it's much like when Carmine composed "Ode To Counter-Strike" at RPI. How do you top that?

Truth is, I'm a little afraid to find out.

Well, We Asked For It, Right?

So a couple weekends ago, I did something I had yet to do in my life, at least that I can recall. Wait for it, wait for it...

I saw a theatrical release of a movie twice. I saw "Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen" in IMAX the second night it was in theaters, but when I got the opportunity to see it a second time...well, the DVD release is going to be a while away, and I wanted to be sure I got my fill of awesomeness.

Of course, I read a fair share of negative reviews, mostly by uptight Farkers who couldn't get over their hatred of Michael Bay's explosion fetishism, Megan Fox's admitted bisexuality, Shia LaBeouf's perceived douchiness, and the many ways in which our childhood was "raped" by not staying in lockstep with the original. I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but I'll hit on a few things here. First, you can't set a movie in the modern day and retain every hallmark of the original. Product placement aside, some of the elements of the cartoon would simply not be realistic or believable for a live-action film. (Thank God they decided on conservation of mass...try imagining a human-sized tape deck transforming into a 30-foot-tall Soundwave.) Second, we're working with a concept that was based upon a half-hour animated commercial designed to sell kids toys! This wasn't fine scripting, it was just a clever marketing vehicle. When a lot of old characters were killed in the animated movie, they brought along new characters...and now, the kids could go buy new toys! (They're not just going to buy a re-released Optimus Prime, now.) The "Transformers" cartoons were certainly influential to our childhood...remember that guy who legally changed his name to Optimus Prime before being shipped off to Iraq? But while they were captivating as children, now we can step back and see what they really were.

I didn't go to "ROTF" to see brilliant scripting and drama as the Autobots adjust to a new home planet. I went to see—holy shit, did six construction vehicles just transform into one giant robot? FUCK! If you grew up watching the Transformers, hell, even if you didn't, that alone was worth the price of admission. You'd have to be really anal-retentive to point out that they weren't all green-and-purple like the original Constructicons, or that Arcee was a bike (or a hive mind of bikes) instead of a car. I'm sure that in the cartoon universe, the world governments just totally overlooked a bunch of sentient alien robots living on their planet and occasionally tearing shit up. In a live-action movie, it makes sense to show that sort of thing, or else why not just go all "Animatrix" or "Final Fantasy" and stage a complete CGI movie?

But this blog entry isn't just about Transformers. It'd be about a month late if that were the case. No, it's because of an article that I read tonight (on Fark, where else?). Now, our generation grew up on these animated toy-centric TV series. "Transformers" was just the first one to be greenlit for a live-action film. Interestingly, it seems that "Transformers" has always had a close link to another animated hit of the time, "G.I. Joe." In fact, both series were supposed to have an animated movie in the late 1980s, but after the poor performance of "Transformers: The Movie," the "G.I. Joe" project was axed. Similarly, some thought the heavy military focus of "Transformers" (the 2007 film) was a reference to a dead-in-the-water "G.I. Joe" movie. Well, in August, there will be a live-action "G.I. Joe" movie released. Lots of people are throwing around the terms "summer bomb" and "cinematic abortion." Personally, while I was never a fan of the series, I'd love it if they work in a Fensler Films reference. Just have one character exclaim "Porkchop sandwiches!" and I'll be happy.

Time will tell how badly the new "G.I. Joe" crashes, if it does at all. But this article I read hinted at another revival of a 1980s classic. Supposedly, a studio is working on a live-action adaptation of the "Voltron" cartoons! You may remember Voltron as the gestalt of five robotic lions all piloted by humans. I never watched the show, but I have a Voltron robot - or most of one - in my bin of Transformers at the parents' house.

This one, I'm not so sure. For one, I doubt "Voltron" had the same popularity or universality as the Transformers. And then, some things don't make sense to film as live-action. Making a live-action "G.I. Joe" movie makes sense, because it's all real people in somewhat real situations. A live-action "Transformers" movie works, because the robots transform into real cars and interact with humans on the planet. But it seems foolish to do a live-action movie about a robot in space, formed of other robot bodies whose pilots will remain unseen in most of the battle scenes. Why not just do an all-CGI movie, with animated human actors? It just sounds less than engaging.

But isn't this what we wanted? We, the nerd collective that grew up indoctrinated in this stuff, called out for a live-action "Transformers" movie, a live-action "G.I. Joe" movie. We all probably considered how cool this would be on-screen, in real life. Some things are like that. Others aren't. They're hard to adapt, so that it's still believable. In the end, we might have asked for it, but did we ask for that treatment? It looks like the live-action "G.I. Joe" turns the characters into extreme warriors, something I never thought they were in the cartoons. We all wanted to see "G.I. Joe," but we didn't want to see a guy with some ultra-futuristic body-accelerator suit, or whatever they have in the trailers. It's "G.I. Joe," not "X-Men."

Maybe the people working on the interpretations treat them with the same reverence that Bonnie Hammer did when she changed SciFi's name to SyFy. The critics seem to have that attitude, the same thing that came up when people felt that "I, Robot" was the cinematic version of pissing on Isaac Asimov's grave. But I think it's something greater.

Remember in "Jurassic Park" (the film adaptation) where a lucid but injured Ian Malcolm laments that scientists get so wrapped up in whether they could, they don't stop to think whether they should? Here's the problem. We're in an age where our special effects are unstoppable. Not only do we have stellar prop and makeup people, but we also can do pretty much anything else we want through CGI. In 1984, "The Terminator" was groundbreaking sci-fi thriller material, but years later, the costuming and stop-motion look dated. Now, we can make a cyborg Terminator so real, you're convinced you can reach your hand into its chest and touch the endoskeleton inside. Add to that that a lot of people in Hollywood are the post-college graphic artists who grew up on the "Transformers" and "Go-Bots" and "He-Man" mythologies, and probably think it'd be cool to bring those to life for real.

But then we're faced with the problem that, while we can create anything we want for the big screen, should we? In some cases, the movies toe the line of gratuitous. I'm afraid a "Voltron" pic would do exactly that. When 90% of the action takes place sans humans or Earth, what's the need for a live-action film? Just shoot explosions and add the robots digitally? Where's the fun in that? Even Christian Bale admitted he didn't want to be in a "Terminator" film if it just meant acting for green-screens. The superhero movies have been made and remade largely because we didn't have the ability to replicate superpowers on the screen so convincingly. But they're also centered around humans. Maybe "Ghost In The Shell" would work in live-action. The Go-Bots? I'd doubt that, though they were just a lame version of the Transformers anyway.

I admit, the movie I would love to see someday would be a live-action adaptation of "M.A.S.K." Few seem to remember this series; Matt Trakker was a wealthy philanthropist who led a sort of task force of people whose vehicles had a combat mode and who wore helmets with some kind of associated power. It was another series built around a large toyline. But in 2009, I doubt there's a following for a cartoon that only ran until 1986. There's no current incarnation of the series, unless they thought they could bring it back for today's kids' enjoyment. Plus, you could never stay totally true to the vehicles. Is 2009 Matt Trakker going to go steal an '85 Camaro from some New Jersey guido to add gullwing doors and thrusters? He'll drive whatever some company offers as product placement. It would have been cool in '87 with today's special effects, but in 2009, it might just seem hopelessly dated. And yet, I still kind of hope they would entertain the thought. Can you imagine the effect of a tractor-trailer turning into an armored half-track tank on screen? Or a Camaro turning into a jet and taking off?

Some may feel they're raping our childhood, but hey, in a way, we sort of asked for it.

Maybe UrbanDictionary Is Onto Something

So earlier tonight, I posted a Facebook status message, suggesting that I was at Starbucks, putting "prose before 'hos." Not surprisingly, it got a couple bemused responses.

What I was really hoping for, though, was for someone to call me out on my use of the word 'ho. Not the fact that I used it, because it's pretty tame in terms of language, and pretty much everyone realizes that a 'ho is not actually a paid prostitute. Well, not all the time, anyway. Hell, these days it's hard to tell how sincere any descriptive title is, seeing as we've appropriated most terms into our vernacular to encompass any close acquaintance or ally. You know the terms I'm talking about.

No, I'm talking about my actual syntactical (is that a word?) approach to the word 'ho. For whatever reason, I've always felt most appropriate putting an apostrophe at the front of the word. After all, 'ho is essentially a contraction of the word "whore." In the case of a contracted word, an apostrophe denotes the missing component of the word. The apostrophe at the beginning denotes that a "W" should be in its place, but has been dropped. By that logic, I should add an apostrophe to represent the abandoned "RE," similar to the "and" in "rock 'n' roll." The result, 'ho', would look more like I were opting to put the word in single quotes for no good reason.

You could omit the apostrophes and treat it as its own word, ho. However, something looks incomplete about it. Technically, the oft-used plural, hos, would be awkward; one should add an "E" to make it "hoes." Some prefer to use "hoe" as the singular form. However, I avoid these because in the singular form, the "E" looks spurious, and either way "hoe" is a direct replacement for the garden tool. Needless to say, one would not use a garden hoe for the same purposes as a human hoe...however, it's an awkward situation nonetheless.

All this trouble could be avoided by simply using the word whore. After all, there's no confusing a full word for anything else. However, as mentioned before, whore has absolute connotations signifying the flesh trade and the exchange of sex for payment. It also implies promiscuity. The same connotations, interestingly, are not true of the abbreviations of "whore." The only absolute implication of the word 'ho is to indicate possession and superiority, not unlike the origin word itself.

Of course, all this trouble could also be avoided by keeping grammar nerds from using such vernacular. But what fun would that be?

Ignore What BÖC Said...Fear The Reaper

It wasn't a good week to be a celebrity.

For that matter, it's not been a good month for high-profile celebrities. David Carradine died in spectacular fashion at the beginning of June. At least, most celebs don't go down in a blaze of self-gratifying glory. But the second-to-last calendar week of the month gave Death a fourpeat. Ed McMahon one day, then Farrah Fawcett a couple days later. But later Thursday afternoon, word came that of all people, Michael Jackson had been rushed to the hospital. The Fark thread on the incident suggested that Jackson was not breathing when his body was found, and premature word of his death was circulating. By 6:30 that evening, the BBC (you know, as opposed to TMZ) had confirmed the death of a music and pop-culture icon.

Way to steal Farrah's moment, Jacko. But with all respect to Ms. Fawcett, one of these celebrities is not like the others. Farrah Fawcett was a noted and successful actress, to be sure. But Michael Jackson? Sure, we've all exhausted the jokes on the guy. In grade school, it was "I pledge allegiance to the flag, Michael Jackson is a fag." (I can't recall if I actually knew what a fag was, aside from it not being a good thing in grade-school vernacular.) Thursday night, the first greenlit Fark headline was "Michael Jackson begins work on 'Thriller 2.'" Maybe insult is the second-most-sincere form of flattery. All humor aside, Michael Jackson is undoubtedly the biggest pop icon from my lifetime, and the biggest to fall.

The thing is, you can't help but have an opinion on whether or not you'll miss Michael Jackson. I guess that's because he's just a polarizing figure who gave us a lot to talk about. You can't argue that Michael was a gifted performer. For his time, and maybe even transcending his peers, Michael was a talented singer and a stellar dancer. He also had the advantage of skilled songwriters, choreographers and backup dancers (see Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers), but Michael's work was still the cornerstone of all those music videos and live performances and recordings. But in his life off the stage (and sometimes on), Michael was a mess. For that matter, there's still plenty that we'll never know. The liaisons with little boys and even grown men, his marriages, the children, his bankruptcy and the sale of his Neverland estate. Whether he lived or died, I'm not sure we'd ever know the answers or the reasons. And it's sad that a lot of young people never knew Jackson as a young, talented, black singer and dancer on stage. They know a creepy, effeminate white man who might have molested children. What a blow to his legacy, but then, can you really expect an eleven-year-old to know what "Thriller" was without the advantage of YouTube?

I was actually speculating on this tonight, after considering how a co-worker of mine and my grandfather both looked down on Michael Jackson for being despicable in life, regardless of his achievements and talents in performance. It's no secret that Joe Jackson was something of a slavedriver, a stage father with harsh requirements for his children. Michael was a performer from his youth, and had it not been for that steady encouragement and drive, he may not have grown into the performer we knew. But at the same time, what life did Michael Jackson ever have beyond that of a performer? Is it possible that, in retreating into himself to become a better performer, he simply never grew up? Could he have not known how people would view his relationships with children because he legitimately did not understand it was wrong? It's something worth asking.

I wonder if, years later, we'll remember the death of Michael Jackson the way we remember when Princess Diana was killed. My sister was the first to confirm it for me, via text as I was waiting in traffic to get into the new "Transformers" film. (She used TMZ as a source, though.) But while we were watching the preview reels before the movie, they kept playing this one animated music video, sans audio. The song was titled "Michael," by a band called No More Kings. The obvious connection, clearly a coincidence, was a bit chilling.

But wait, there's more! OK, I didn't make up that segué, but it was fitting. Michael Jackson stunned me, but Billy Mays' death shocked me more, if only for the amount of press it got. Billy Mays wasn't a celebrity per se. He was a new version of Ron Popeil. However, in this era of the Internet, somehow the infomercial guys got traction. They became memes, and from that they became celebrities. All of a sudden, Vince, the smarmy pitchman selling ShamWows and Slap Chops and condescension, and Billy Mays, the loud and enthused guy hawking OxiClean and OrangeGlo and all manner of shopping-network and late-night TV retail fare, were household names. Vince's legal battles against the Farrelly brothers and the Church of Scientology became well-known, and he received further notoriety for beating up a prostitute. Billy, meanwhile, had built himself a brand, and even appeared on some new reality show on the famed infomercial names we were coming to love.

Billy Mays was a guy you may know nothing about (I know I sure don't know anything about him), but you know who he is. You recognize the voice, the beard, the exuberance and energy. Now, those commercials for all the stuff he was selling will be eerie reminders that Billy is no longer with us. I guess they can't pull them off the air, but you almost wish they would, that to keep them running would be sort of awkward. And while everyone becomes a saint in death, from reading the over-1000 posts on Fark, quite a few people seem to say they've had pleasant experiences knowing Billy, that he was one of the legitimate good guys out there. (Take that as you will, but they could as easily call him a dick. What's it going to matter?)

The celebrities we follow are kind of a mirror of our own society. Carmine and I were talking about society's obsession with celebrity lives (or the lives of those we deem celebrities), and how we have this increasingly-voyeuristic approach. His thought is that anyone who really cares what's going on in the lives of Jon and Kate (Gosselin, the parents of eight children who are the focus of a TLC reality program and who recently announced their impending divorce) needs to find a hobby. Maybe we find release from our own lives by justifying that others have it worse even though they have it better, that money can't buy happiness or a stable marriage. Maybe we simply don't put that much thought into it. It's just easy to be interested in someone else's situation, and easier to divorce oneself from it emotionally. We can mourn Michael Jackson's death without feeling any real pity or emotion. We can't be so fortunate with those who we really know. And yet, in a sense, don't we really know those faces in the news and on television?

Oh, well. I've already poured out a little for MJ. But I did wear my Kaboom!-colored purple polo shirt Monday, my own sort of tribute to the legacy of Billy Mays. I never bought a product on his recommendation, but it'll be different seeing someone else selling that stuff. It's like Drew Carey stepping into Bob Barker's "The Price Is Right" hostship. Drew will never be Bob Barker, and no one can ever sell the way Billy Mays did. But we'll always remember...until someone supplants these celebrities in a few years.