By the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century,
the impact of computer technology on television was already promising to be
nothing short of revolutionary. Yet people seemed only able to grasp the contours
of an upcoming basic shift both in how television would come to be delivered
and how programming would be financed and presented. Young adults were on the
leading crest of the wave. Even by 2012, they typically watched television programming
from laptops and even ipads rather than television sets. Meanwhile, an older
demographic was learning how to integrate television screens with the internet
such that movies could be downloaded on a laptop and shown on a larger screen,
completely bypassing commercial television even stored on “tibo” from interlarding
the home. The full essay is at "Commercial Breaks as Antiquated?"
In the European singing contest/show in which Susan Boyle competed, she lost the top spot to a teenage rap group. The method of selection made all the difference. Rather than having a three-judge panel of experts on singing determine the winner, the general public could “text” via cell phone or other device to vote. That one of the judges explicitly advocated for Boyle after her final performance (just before the voting) was no never mind to the general public that submitted a majority of the votes. To be sure, there were certainly non-music reasons to vote against her. Most notably, the suggestive comments she made on stage just before her first performance, including, “I’m 48, and that’s not my other half” (as she was swinging her hips as if she were sexy), were downright emetic, if not utterly bizarre. So it is possible that the voters put her personality defect above her excellent singing. It is also possible that the “texters” responsible for a majority of the votes simply preferred rap music. I do not like rap “songs” that include shouting and swearing; I do not even regard such “songs” as music. Otherwise, I could sing a song simply by yelling at you. From what I saw, the rap group in the competition was not swearing, but the “singing” did sound at times like shouting to me. Moreover, the group members seemed more oriented to dancing than singing. It is possible that the votes for that group went for any of the fads being represented rather than to singing per se.
Regarding the Chinese
government’s attempts to rein in microblogging and television programming, the New York Times observed in 2011,
“Political censorship in this authoritarian state remains absolute.” It is
therefore perhaps all the more surprising that bloggers in China have been able
to post “whistle-blowing” reports at the expense (and embarrassment) of the
political elite. That this has occurred at all suggests that once a Jennie gets
out of its bottle, it is difficult to reverse course. This is the traditional
Western view. Using television programming as a case study, I submit that the
picture is actually more complex than the antiquated "black and
white" version may suggest.
In the weeks leading us to watch the
Olympics, I suspect I was not alone in thinking, “I just don't like what I see
here." Why wasI resisting paying even scant attention to the pre-Olympics "coverage" (a.k.a. advertising) as NBC, the American broadcast network covering the games, was getting rather publicly revved up on the upcoming media event. In this essay, I briefly survey the external stimuli, leaving the self-analysis to the analyst’s couch.[1]
First, as the American press reported
before NBC began promoting the games in earnest (hmm), there is the “whole gay
thing” and Putin. I really think that's a non-issue with regard to the Olympics,
given the uniqueness of the Olympic Village. I would not be surprised were the
Russian police of the mind that “What goes on in Vegas stays in Vegas,” at
least as far as vacations are concerned.
Now, the "not fit for primetime
viewing" conditions of some of the hotels putting up the foreign press
strikes me as more substantive because of the implicit and likely even explicit
rudeness does not go down well, even at a distance. Relatedly, I suspect, the
sheer amount of money "padded" into the construction projects, including
hotel construction, for kick-backs undoubtedly directed to Putin's major
political supporters eviscerates any possible excuse in the tardiness.
In fact, associating Putin at all with the
Olympics comes off to me like associating liver with dinner; I instinctively
spit out immediately any hint of liver-taste. I must admit I am glad the U.S.
State Department put out a travel warning for Americans going to the games. I
was also amused to read of the low numbers of non-Russians arriving from abroad
in Sochi as of the first day of games.[2]
Of course, the modern Olympics hinges on the broadcasts around the world, rather
than attendance numbers.
Even though NBC's studio in the Olympic Village is transparent, the network's tactics may be anything but. (Image Source: David Johnson)
Interestingly, as part of its rather
obvious devices to remind/manipulate its general viewership to watch the
approaching games (including inserting reporters live from Sochi into CNBC's
coverage of the financial markets), NBC strategists may actually have been
fomenting the security story in order to draw viewers' attention to the fact
that the games would soon begin. Stirring up fear and the hope of visual
voyeurism of others’ tragedies is a sure bet for news reporting as advertising. However, overdoing it can be counterproductive
if too much of the ploy is visible on the surface as a duplicitous, otherwise stealth
agenda. Yearning to turn the subtropical town on the Black Sea into an
international resort, Putin could not have been very happy about the coverage,
though may have realized the importance of a huge broadcast viewership even for
himself, not to mention covering some of the kick-backs.
Finally, starting particular events
including skating the day before the
OPENING ceremony may stand out among the various points of smoke above in being
indicative of fire skipping fire lines below. Even though Chris Chase of USA Today concludes “it’s a small price
to pay for the overall improvement of the Winter Games,” he admits “it still
feels strange to start the Olympics before the Olympics technically start.”[3]
In the film, Inglourious Basterds,
Lt. Aldo Raine wryly clarifies the matter of something seeming odd (or strange).
“Yeah, we got a word for that in
English. It’s called suspicious.”
In spite of his conclusion (i.e., small price to pay), Chase provides a credible case for suspicion. “Television rules all." he states up front as if it were a natural law. "Adding another day
of Olympic competition means adding another day of Olympic telecasts. Thursday
is traditionally one of the biggest television nights (along with Sunday). With
all the money being paid to cover the games by networks across the world,
turning 17 days of Olympic coverage into 18 days is a nice bonus.”[4]
Regarding the addition of a program of skating, Chase points to a five day
interim within the two weeks without any skating scheduled.
In closing, I must let the philosopher in
me have a few words (no philosopher ever has just a few words, so please take a bathroom break if you need to). From sheer logic, to begin something before it has begun
is a blatant contradiction. As per his categorical imperative, Kant would call
the practice unethical. Were everyone to adopt the maxim, “I will start
activities before the start time,” it would not make sense to have a start time
for anything. The maxim is thus self-contradictory if it (like reason itself)
is universalized.
Hume would point out that Kant relies too
much on logic and reason more generally in assessing whether a given practice
is ethical. A person reading U.N.’s condemnation of the Vatican in February
2014 for having been more concerned
about the reputation of the Church as a whole than children’s welfare—a priority
that Rev. Joe Ratzinger, or Benedict XVI, put in a letter while archbishop of
Munich—may think through the theological implications of priests covering for
each other. However, the sentiment of disapprobation (think of my expression as
I spit out odious liver) is likely, excepting sociopaths, to be the principal
reaction. Emotive rather than of Reason.
When I read of the sports beginning a day before the opening ceremony, I felt a
sentiment of disapprobation well up inside me. Because I had been feeling that
something just isn’t right about the upcoming games, especially from an vague
intuitive sense of NBC’s manipulative tactics as over-reaching at best, I suspected that the rather odd placement
of some events before the ceremony also came from the mentality that wants
incessantly to squeeze out a few more drops of lemon juice from lemon that has
already shed enough. The sight of this childish demeanor in action is
enough for any non-manipulative person to resist going where the manipulations
point.
[1] I
have in mind here Nietzsche’s thesis that reasoning is really a person’s instinctual
urges tussling for dominance—that which overcomes the others (here as
obstacles) reaches the surface of consciousness as an idea. I do think about
this point regarding philosophy (and particular philosophical systems) in
general and how my own psychological background fuels or is otherwise expressed
in the ideas and related theories I “intuit” and “create.”
Hitting record-low ratings
among total viewers and in the 25-54 age demographic, CNN had its overall
lowest-rated month in April 2012 since August 2001. In May 2012, the network
hit a 20-year low for total viewers during primetime viewing.[1] Something had
gone seriously wrong. Perhaps the easiest move when a company takes a nose-dive
is to fire the top. Accordingly, Time Warner executives were thinking of
replacing the president of CNN Worldwide.[2] While taking off the top might make
sense in government because the entire administration is apt to change,
business firms tend to be more entrenched even when under new management.
Sometimes I
think the human mind is like a train in being limited to the tracks that have
already been laid. We are habituated to think it sufficient that we can turn
off the main line on to another at the next signal. We think this is change
because it involves turning onto a different
track, but is it really change if the train is still on track?
By 1997, “after three years of strong profits for LTCM, the opportunities were drying up. There was too much money chasing the same investments. . . . In early 1998, LTMC decided to give a large portion of its capital back to its original investors because profitable opportunities were so hard to find. At the end of 1997, LTCM had nearly $7.5 billion under management, compared to $1 billion when it started, and it now returned $2.7 billion of that to investors. The partners also figured that they could, if necessary, simply leverage their portfolio further to compensate for the loss of capital, which would compound their personal gains. Greed was at the heart of what turned out to be a disastrous decision. . . . Unable to reproduce the returns of the first three years, LTCM took increasingly more risk, abandoning its purer arbitrage for the kinds of ‘directional’ investments Soros made and LTCM had so long disdained—such as trying to forecast interest rate and currency movements. More and more of these trades were unhedged.”[1] Furthermore, “LTCM’s risk models—VAR and related statistical tools . . . –were misleading.”[2] For example, diversification was little protection if there was a run on the banks. When Russia defaulted on August 17, 1997, LTCM’s hedges against its Russian investments were worthless. Furthermore, because all fixed income assets fell sharply in value, “diversification, it turned out, did not matter. The finely calculated relationships on which LTCM was built and which the firm always believed would hold started to come apart. VAR couldnot account for such an unlikely but sweeping event—an event in which everyone wanted out at the same time and almost all investments fell significantly in price. The use of VAR itself precipitated much of the selling. Commercial banks under the jurisdiction of the Basel Agreements, which . . . set capital requirements based on the level of VAR (the lower the VAR, the lower the capital required), were forced to sell assets to raise capital.”[3] LTCM lost $1.9 billion that August. Eventually, fourteen banks, organized by the Fed, put together loans of more than $3.5 billion to purchase 90 percent of the firm.” LTCM “did manage to sell down assets in an orderly fashion and by early 2000 it was essentially out of business”[4]
