Alice Ollstein is live tweeting the Senate gun safety hearings, and in this ever-changing world, it’s nice to see that Wayne LaPierre remains a solid touchstone of gun insanity.
Archives for January 2013
The Seniors’ Network
Fox ratings are down across the board in the key 25-54 demographic:
Fox News was down -6% in total viewers and -22% in the key adults 25-54 demo in total day in January, the lowest demo numbers since July 2008. In primetime, the network was down -17% in total viewers and -40% in the demo, posting its lowest demo numbers since May 2006. It is worth noting that January 2012 was a big one in the Republican primary race and FNC hosted two primary debates, but this month was no slouch either, with the inauguration and a number of big political stories.
MSNBC was up 11% with the 25-54 demographic in January. Fox and Friends remains a high point for Fox, though it’s slipping, too:
In the morning, “Fox & Friends” was up +5% in total viewers, but down -17% in the demo. It has been number one on cable news for 135 straight months, drawing more viewers than MSNBC, CNN and HLN combined.
Morning Ho was #2 on the last ratings report I could find, which means the #1 and #2 morning shows on cable are conservative vehicles. I wonder when MSNBC will cancel that sad shitshow and replace it with something that people might want to watch.
Always Scandalized, Rarely Scandalous
It’s always interesting when the mainstream press has to acknowledge the existence of porn or even sex on the Internet. There have been a couple of instances this week, and you don’t need to be a deviated prevert organizing a mutiny of preverts to appreciate the stupidity of a lot of it.
Let’s start with Vine, Twitter’s new video sharing app that allows Twitterers to exchange six second videos. Shock and horror ensued when one of the top-rated homepage videos showed some kind of fucking. Vine responded by banning the account that had submitted the clip, and also banning searches for “#porn”, “#nsfw” and “#boobs”. That’ll fix it.
Either Twitter is incredibly naive or they purposely launched Vine without a few obvious safeguards to get a little free PR, because there’s no use more obvious for a site that shares video clips than “#porn” and “#boobs”. Maybe part of the problem is that Vine is an IOS (Apple) app, and Apple is pretty weird and inconsistent about applying the 21st century’s favorite weasel word, “inappropriate”.
While Vine was continuing to be distributed in the App Store, another app, 500px, which is used to access the popular photography site of the same name, was pulled for “featuring pornographic images and material, a clear violation of our guidelines.” I’m a casual user of 500px and all I’ve ever seen on that site is topless women in artsy, high-gloss photos. Maybe I missed something, but even so, 500px is no kind of real porn site. Apple allowed 500px back into the app store after raising its rating to “17+”, while Vine retained its “12+” rating.
As Josh Topolsky points out, Twitter, another “12+” app in the App Store, has long had a ton of “#porn”, but Apple’s ignored that and continued to support more Twitter functionality in IOS.
I’m not trying to pick on Apple, though I will point out that Google allows its app store to sell porn apps, and they seem to be surviving. Apple’s just mirroring the weird US attitude towards porn and really, sexuality, in general: it’s something everyone knows exists, a lot of people use technology to consume porn and communicate sexual images, but it’s rarely mentioned and almost always tut-tutted in mainstream culture. Forget Vine and 500px, there’s an app called Snapchat that allows sending pictures and video that expire a few seconds after viewing. Just what in the hell do you think the 20 million photos shared every day on that service usually contain? I await the a breathless, scandalized expose of Snapchat sexting as soon as the MSM realizes that it exists.
Open Thread: Mazel Tov, Gomer Pyle!
There’s a ‘semper fi’ joke here somewhere. From the Washington Post:
HONOLULU — The actor best known for playing the TV character Gomer Pyle in the 1960s has married his male partner of 38 years.
Hawaii News Now (http://bit.ly/14tFM3U) reports Jim Nabors and his partner, Stan Cadwallader, traveled from their Honolulu home to Seattle to be married Jan. 15…
The 82-year-old Nabors says you’ve got to solidify something when you’ve been together as long as they have.
They couple met in 1975 when Cadwallader was a Honolulu firefighter. Cadwallader is 64.
Nabors says he’s been open about his homosexuality to co-workers and friends but never acknowledged it to the media before…
Gol-lee, the things we didn’t know in the 1960s. A gay Marine, out of Mayberry! — I wonder whether Andrew Sullivan will rush to claim Nabors for his team? Best wishes to the happy couple, in any case!
On England’s Pleasant Pastures…open thread
Sometimes the internet is a swamp in which time — hell, vast swaths of life — get sucked into oblivion. Sometimes the ‘tubes are merely a crush of blinkered Philistine pig-ignorance. I suppose that for some life online is just one long “kidz theze dayz” lament…
And then one comes across something like this:
This is thanks to my Imperial College science writer and twitter buddy, @AliceBell, who has thus introduced me to the bizarre world of BBC weather report homages — of which, without the ‘net, I would never have had knowledge.
Speak about whatever.
(Because I love you: bonus Monty Python sketch with a connection to the post title.)
On England’s Pleasant Pastures…open threadPost + Comments (41)
Site Rebuild Open Thread
Several of you have asked for the email address for the suggestions for the site rebuild, so here it is again:
The rebuild will not happen until the second week of February, but we will start the fundraiser tonight and end it as soon as possible. To donate to the rebuild, click here:
As soon as we raise enough to pay the designer, I will holler and tell you all to stop.
Have some courtesy, have some sympathy and some taste
Erick Erickson has a thoughtful piece on his time at CNN (via Jim Newell):
I’ve learned that some of the people I grew up thinking were in the enemy’s camp, so to speak, are spectacular people who share many of the same interests and opinions I do.
[….]I learned that I will never be competitive with Roland Martin on the fashion front, but he makes an excellent road trip companion through South Carolina. One of the most formative moments of my career at CNN was standing outside a hotel with Roland Martin and tourists began handing him luggage and keys as if he worked at the hotel — only because he was in a suit. His courteousness to the people when he did not have to be courteous and the fact that in the 21st century that’d happen at all really struck me profoundly.
Because of CNN I’m not just better at my job, but I’m a better person. For all the hate and angst from a lot of folks on the right over me going to CNN, I know many of the contributors I consider good friends were initially skeptical of my hiring. I had to learn an art form too often missing these days in partisan talk — the art of conversation, particularly with those who might disagree with me. I had to learn to be friends with people who I disagreed with. And I leave deeply caring for those people.
Have some courtesy, have some sympathy and some tastePost + Comments (71)