Posts filed under 'TV/Radio/Media'
I love stories I can tie in with previous posts!
You may recall that a couple weeks ago I declared that City News is the worst newspaper in the country, and then regular commenter John B1_B5 noticed that they were using a picture containing some unknown model to promote a theatrical presentation (albeit supplied by The Canberra Theatre Company and not checked by City News).
Well this week they have a picture on the cover of “The Canberra Review” which promotes a new presentation of Romeo & Juliet and others by the Russian Ballet (you may recall from a previous post that some of this will be “the most captivating and sensual nude scenes ever”). On this occasion they appear to have the picture correct, which suggests to me that The Canberra Theatre took notice of John B1_B5’s phone call and/or City News want to retain at least one shred of credibility.
The real estate section, “City Property” is interesting this week. A quarter page ad semi-formatted as an article on page two, a quarter page article on page 16, an almost half page opinion piece on page 17…and the rest? You guessed it…Ads!
August 27th, 2005 at 06:37pm
In a previous post about a sleepless night and a call to a talk radio show, I mentioned a lateral thinking question which was asked on that particular show. Since that time there has been at least one person type that question into google and land on this blog (and probably end up very disappointed that I talked about it and didn’t have an answer for them). Over the weekend I heard the answer and promptly forgot to post it, so here it is.
Firstly, to recap the question:
In the 1960’s an East German woman swam the 100M freestyle in a record time of 59.(something, forgot exact number) seconds, but it was never officially recognised, why?
Well, as it turns out, she was naked and disqualified as a result.
Does this mean that our swimmers would be better off abandoning the watery-aerodynamic suits and swimming without clothing? I don’t know, and I don’t think the TV stations would be allowed to show us! (well, not without blurring/blocking of images anyway)
Samuel
August 26th, 2005 at 12:31am
Despite the fact I didn’t post it last night, I was watching World Sport and noticed that they changed the question. As you may recall from the previous post on the matter, SBS World Sport asked
Were you surprised by the doping allegations against Lance Armstrong or have they proven your suspicions?
but by the time they went to air last night with the results of the poll they had changed the question to
Does the EPO claim by L’Equipe confirm your belief that Lance Armstrong was not clean when winning the 1999 Tour De France?
So SBS changed the question overnight without telling anyone and then published the results.
The results show that people were confused, SBS World Sport polls are almost always 70%-30% one way or the other, but last night they were
Congratulations SBS, you sure do know how to make a mess and pretend you didn’t.
To change the subject, this post is officially the first one to have a samuelgordonstewart.com picture.
Samuel
August 25th, 2005 at 07:18pm
I don’t know how many of you watch the SBS program, World Sport, but I do on occasion, and I was doing so tonight. They had a story about doping allegations and cyclist Lance Armstrong, apparently it has been semi-proven that he is a drug cheat. SBS then followed that story with their nightly “World Sport SMS Poll”. I don’t remember the exact question, but it was something along these lines:
“Were you surprised by the doping allegations against Lance Armstrong or have they proven your suspicions?”
After this, viewers are invited to send an SMS containing “Yes” or “No” to some phone number that I don’t remember.
But hang on a moment, can you repeat the question?
“Were you surprised by the doping allegations against Lance Armstrong or have they proven your suspicions?”
Errr, isn’t that actually two questions? Which one do you want an answer to? I could quite happily say “No” the allegations didn’t surprise me, and “Yes” they have proven my suspicions…but I can’t send “No Yes” and expect my vote to be counted.
I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but World Sport recently changed their wallpaper to a rather eye-exploding “semi-return to the mid 80’s tango redish orange desert pattern safari”, looks worse when they show the set from a distance too, it looks like a few cans of paint exploded.
Is it just me, or are SBS trying to dumb down their usage of the English language in an attempt to avoid alienating the mainstream commercial television audience?
For example, they have introduced a new name for an existing show, which to me at least, appears to be an oxymoron.
“World News Australia”
Excuse me? Whatever happened to “World News” & “World News Tonight”? Why has our multicultural broadcaster suddenly decided that all news in the world revolves around Australia? Perhaps it is half of a badly edited statement:
“Good evening and welcome to the world news, Australia.”
Perhaps SBS think that more people want to watch a news that has the word “Australia” in the title. (Well, check the ratings, people seem to like it if it says “Seven” or “Nine”).
Maybe SBS think the world is too big for one half hour.
Or maybe, just maybe, SBS have gone mad.
Whatever the reason is, SBS do seem to be going downhill.
I blame it all (mostly) on the fact that they are cost cutting. They cut those fantastic movie intros from their (then) movie buffs David & Margaret. SBS had themes for each night of the week, and a different presenter for that night’s movie, somebody who specialised in that particular genre of movie. It wasn’t just David & Margaret either, they had a rather talented bunch. I will always remember those Saturday night cult movies, they were often pretty bad sci-fi/fantasy combinations, but they did have a certain charm to them after an intro from the cult movie presenter. One of the many movie series’ I will remember is Gamera, the Japanese lizard dragon monster thing (possibly a copy of Godzilla) which could never seem to make up it’s mind whether it was helping or destroying the humans, but it always had a small boy as a friend and always seemed to encounter a “Toy monster Vs Model boat” scene.
I also remember a time when SBS was the central repository for the cream of international (mainly European) primetime entertainment, buying the rights to many varied and interesting TV shows. It would be common place to get strange looks for talking about that “fantastic Norwegian show that aired every week” but everybody, it seemed, had a guilty pleasure in watching at least one of those shows.
Those days are gone however, and now SBS try to style themselves on the ABC “Tonight, lots of documentaries” and the generic SBS “Let’s throw in some more soccer, inane shows with explosions (ooooh, ratings) and adult programming from sweeden”.
It is unfortunate to see SBS degenerate to such forms of entertainment, and I fear they are producing further cost cutting by buying the rights to the cricket. Seven could have continued the cricket, they did a good job (apart from Tony Squires), or the ABC, but not SBS. The shoestring budget has been stretched, and I fear SBS are going to continue to show programs filled with lunatics blowing stuff up just to prove they can’t do what you saw in that movie, more of those drastic wallpaper changes on the local shows, more documentaries that nobody is really interested in seeing, and more of those Swedish/German/somewhere late night adult programs.
I say bring back the gold old SBS that we had years ago…and scrap The Movie Show, the idiots on there now wouldn’t know a film from a canary.
Anyway, to get back to the main topic of discussion, I will be making sure that I record World Sport tomorrow night to see two things:
1. Will they reword the question and make a nonsense of the answers between now and then?
2. What will the ultimate confused outcome of this ludicrous poll be?
After recording I will take a screenshot and post it here for you all to admire!
Samuel
August 23rd, 2005 at 09:39pm
I am now working with Australian Independent Radio News (AIR News), presenting news bulletins on Saturdays. I presented my first three bulletins yesterday (11am-1pm) and will now be presenting the 11am-5pm bulletins on Saturdays.
I’m not going to put any of my bulletins online at the momentbecause
A) I haven’t got anywhere to put a file at the moment
B) A isn’t exactly true, I could fill up servers I’m not supposed to fill, but I won’t
C) Copyright issues are funny little tricky things to work with
D) I don’t want to be unfair on AIR News member stations who have paid for these bulletins
I will put ONE bulletin online eventually, but it will be at least a week after it airs, and will be after I have bought some webspace. If you want to hear one of my bulletins before then, tune in to one of the member stations, or, if you are out of their coverage area, email me.
Anyway, I’m enjoying it. It is an interesting and valuable experience, and I hope to be doing it for some time to come.
While I’m at it, if you know of any Australian community or blackspot commercial radio stations that could use a reliable and cost-effective hourly news service, then let them know about AIR News, it has, in at least one circumstance, prompted people to join as members of the radio stations. AIR News offers a free trial so there really isn’t anything to lose.
You could call this shameless self promotion, but that is not my motive. I’m just trying to spread the word about a quality service.
Also while I’m at it, a very big thankyou to Artie Stevens, manager of AIR News, is in order, as he has provided me with this fantastic opportunity, thanks Artie!
Samuel
August 21st, 2005 at 07:13pm
Radio 3AW’s Kelly Underwood became the first female footbal caller in the country today after co-commentating the last quarter of the Essendon V Carlton AFL match this afternoon. It wasn’t exactly an exciting match, with Essendon beating Carlton 28.14.182 to 11.17.83 (If you’re not Australian that probably doesn’t mean much to you, but it is a huge win), but Kelly still did a fantastic job and deserves her place in history.
Well done Kelly!
3AW’s AFL coverage can be heard on the web from their website, in Melbourne on 3AW (1278 AM), in Canberra on 2CA (1053 AM), and a bunch of other stations right around Australia.
Samuel
August 21st, 2005 at 07:05pm
Welcome fellow 2CC listeners, you will find various comments, drawings and photos from myself and others here. Most of it belongs to me, some of the comments belong to others. And my crocodile writings are below.
In case you were listening to my conversation with Mike Jeffreys this morning and you are wondering what this “riot act” thing is that Mike mentioned, clicking here will take you there.
Enjoy!
Samuel
August 19th, 2005 at 09:43am
Quite possibly the answer is yes.
Without a doubt, City News is the worst newspaper in Canberra. In fact, it is hardly fair on the newspaper industry to call City News a newspaper, in truth it is a glorified freely-distributed glossy advertorial nonsense device.
Lets take a look at a typical City News edition. It is divided into three sections, City News, Canberra Review and City Property.
The news section is really just a bunch of press releases and ads that are presented as news stories. It often features an unimportant story about a beauty competition, the colour of the City Hill flagpole or some other related nonsense, which is almost always derived from a press release. The only semi-substantial component of the news section is the editorial by some anonymous person calling themselves “The Whip”, who “Doesn’t necessarily represent the views of the paper” and generally provides a fairly generic semi-relevant rubbishing of the news.
The second section, “The Canberra Review” is a fairly bland commentary on the upcoming artistic events of the week. It is filled with press releases and reviews by people who really don’t seem to know what they are talking about.
The third section is an upside down (literally) section about Canberra real estate. It contains stories about whatever expensive properties are up for sale in Red Hill and surrounds (which seem to be written by the real estate agents), and a bunch of real estate ads. In this case, “bunch” means multiple pages of nothing but real estate ads.
Over time, City News has had a range of dismal columns by exceptionally boring people on topics that don’t matter or don’t appear to interest the writer, they all seem to have failed, possibly because the writer bored themselves, or City News sold the space to advertisers. Either way, it was dismal.
In fairness, the competition aren’t exactly brilliant either. The Canberra Times has gone downhill since Rural Press bought them. Editor Jack Waterford has tried to maintain some credibility, but has ultimately failed. The Canberra Times has really lost the plot, it’s local news is fairly poor, and it’s coverage of national and international news…well…buy The Australian…you won’t find much of use in The Canberra Times.
For a broadsheet, The Canberra Times is fairly disappointing…so much paper, so little content, what a pity.
The Chronicle is the local tabloid weekly and a subsiduary of The Canberra Times, it is distributed to homes all over Canberra and surrounds for free, and is very good at covering major local stories in detail. Unfortunately, it only covers a handful of newsworthy stories, preferring snippets and “Who won gardener of the week!” type stories. The Chronicle manages to fill most pages with ads, gardening tips, and recipes. Good reading when you are bored, not very good for news though.
I can’t honestly think of a worse newspaper than City News, it doesn’t seem to have any particular purpose. For local news you have The Chronicle, for national and international news you could buy The Canberra Times, but you would be better off with The Australian. If you want to waste time, well, City News is good for that!
City News is without a doubt the worst newspaper in Canberra, and probably the nation.
Now, somebody is surely going to ask me “If you think all these newspapers are bad, then where do you get your news from?”
I’m glad you asked, I generally have the radio tuned to Talk Radio 2CC at various times throughout the day, which provides me with most of my news, I also get some news from The RiotACT, ABC Online and Google News.
Perhaps one day these newspapers will get better, but I’m not holding my breath on that one.
Samuel
August 15th, 2005 at 07:15pm
The Australian Capital City Radio Ratings were released yesterday or the day before, and I am happy to be able to announce that John Laws increased his Sydney market share by 16% (from 9.4% to 10.6%) whilst afternoon presenter John Stanley increased his market share by a whopping 41% (from 8.2% to 10.5%). John Stanley has a very entertaining show, and it is good to see people in Sydney are listening to it.
On a related note, here is a picture of the cake that 2UE presented to John Laws before he went to air on Monday morning, the day of his 70th birthday
Notice the golden candles? Well, it would appear that when 2UE move down the road later this month they will be presenting Lawsie with a new golden studio desk.
The microphone on that cake doesn’t look golden, maybe it would have been too obvious what they were planning if they borrowed his microphone just to take a photo of it.
Samuel
August 10th, 2005 at 06:13pm
As you may recall from the last post about Lawsie’s birthday, John Williamson and Pixie Jenkins dropped in to sing happy birthday to Lawsie, you can hear them singing a birthday song and a couple others (Skinny Dingos, Mozzies) for Lawsie as well as having a little chat at http://www.johnlaws.com.au/sound_JL/WILLO.mp3.
Well worth a listen!
Samuel
August 9th, 2005 at 12:54am
Today is Monday the 8th of August, 2005. The day which marks Lawsie’s 70th birthday.
Congratulations Lawsie, I hope you have a fantastic day.
John Williamson dropped into the studio today while Lawsie was on-air to wish him happy birthday and sing for him, it was quite a good moment, and will probably be on Lawsie’s website later today.
I tried to ring his show this morning to wish him a happy birthday, but ringing that show is always difficult as so many people want to talk to him. I ended up leaving a message for him with one of his producers. I also sent him a birthday card.
Happy Birthday Lawsie!
Samuel
August 8th, 2005 at 12:29pm
Last night I found myself having trouble getting to sleep. In fact, I ended up being awake for most of the night and sunlight-free portion of the morning.
One of the many benefits of talk radio is that, when you do have trouble getting to sleep, the radio is capable of keeping you company. Last night I found myself listening to much more of New Day Australia with George Gibson than usual, and eventually became rather intrigued by his lateral thinking question.
I don’t remember all the details of the question, but I do remember this much of it:
In the 1960’s an East German woman swam the 100M freestyle in a record time of 59.(something, forgot exact number) seconds, but it was never officially recognised, why?
At about 3:30am I felt rather compelled to ring and try to answer the question, I thought that perhaps she had been swimming the Australian Crawl before it was officially recognised. (Contrary to popular belief, freestyle allows the swimmer to choose which swimming style they wish to use, the style that you usually see is the Australian Crawl).
unfortunately, my answer was incorrect, but I did manage a couple games of Reversi on the computer while I was waiting on hold. The conversation I had with George Gibson was rather interesting too.
We started by discussing the temperature in Canberra, which was certainly colder than it was in his studio. Then I gave him my answer, the following dialogue is worthy of transcribing.
George: No, that’s not correct.
Samuel: Are you sure?
George: Yes.
Samuel: Well, do you think you could make that the answer?
George: (Laughter), I don’t think anybody’s ever asked me that before!
Nobody was able to answer the lateral thinking question overnight, so it will be there again on Saturday morning from 5 past Midnight when George Gibson present the “Weekend Wireless Show” New Day Australia on 2UE and network stations.
I eventually drifted off to sleep at about 5:15am
Samuel
August 7th, 2005 at 03:17pm
It would appear from the Blog View Stats that every few days, somebody lands on this blog by using the search term “samuel blog 2CC”. This strikes me as a rather odd set of words to combine as a search term, I mean, sure I’m a 2CC listener, but I think you would have to know me or be a regular reader to know that, so I would like to request that the person who is using that search term to please let me know why you use it.
There is nothing wrong with you using it, I’m just curious as to why you use it. Could you please leave a comment or email me?
Samuel
August 3rd, 2005 at 10:01pm
With the extended absence of Paul Vautin due to an injury, Ray Hadley will make a return to Channel Nine’s NRL Footy Show with a guest appearance.
It will be good to have somebody who knows what he is talking about on the Footy Show again, but in my opinion, they should scrap the existing Footy Show and replace it with a new version with the people from 2GB’s Continuous Call Team. It would be much more entertaining and would actually have meaningful discussions about football for a change.
Samuel
July 28th, 2005 at 04:32pm
Good news, Seven have seen common sense and will be replaying the episode of Stargate Atlantis they cut off last week at the usual time on Thursday.
Well done Seven, and thankyou for considering those of us who watch late night sci-fi.
I hear there were a number of angry phone calls to Seven after the debacle they created, so maybe this had something to do with the decision…regardless, Seven have made the right decision. Thankyou Seven.
Samuel
July 24th, 2005 at 12:46pm
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