Schreiner’s Media Landscape

September 28, 2009

Most Popular TV Shows Have Most Skipped Ads: Yet Another Nail in Corporate TV’s Coffin

Filed under: media, television, video — Ken Schreiner @ 2:16 pm

Seeking and sharing answers to life’s persistent questions, as Garrison Keillor’s Guy Noir would put it, is more than a reason I blog. It’s a reason I go on living. Not relying on the Bible, Bill O’Reilly or America’s other traditional sources of “wisdom”, I must constantly search, dig, and confirm. And watch TV commercials.

Admission: I’ve always believed that commercials were the best thing about television. Even though I was in the TV news business for more than 30 years, I always thought it was deficient and often destructive- except for the weather. Commercials had long since evolved from being useful and instructional vehicles to being little movies, comedy routines and self-contained entertainment programs.

The continuing misfortunes of corporate television as an industry are sinking all ships and sadly taking commercials with them. Evidence of that is this bit from NYT about how TiVo stats show ad viewing in hit TV shows is lower than other programs. This is even worse news for the TV industry because high ratings allow them to charge more for the commercials on those shows. But if viewers aren’t watching the ads in those shows, it’s all a waste. Which most TV is anyway but that’s another story.

I hope the critics are wrong and the 30-second commercial is not doomed. I’d rather watch 200 good commercials in a row than an episode of “Two and a Half Men.” Similarly, I’d rather be hit by the Space Shuttle then shove a knitting needle through my temples.

September 27, 2009

MTV/VMA Awards: Kanye West Aside, Not As Bad But as Stupid as I Thought

Filed under: Hollywood, Internet, media, television, video — Ken Schreiner @ 12:14 am

My oldest friends will tell you I’m a sucker for awards shows. Mostly because you get to see the biggest stars actually perform. But I can’t remember the last time I watched one. Why? I’m not sure. Probably because there’s usually a rerun of Scrubs on which I prefer. But I had the HD to myself Saturday night and nothing else was on so I spun the remote and landed on one of my favorite channels: Palladium. They were replaying the MTV Awards show. I’d read about the Kanye West incident so I watched.

First, Russell Brand, the host, was not nearly as much of a tool as I’d heard. I blame his strident north London pitch on the tightness of his trousers. The great Michael Jackson tribute opener was great especially with Janet Jackson’s appearance. But Kanye West’s inexplicable and unforgiveable intrusion on Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech for Best Something really was a downer for the entire evening. The only redemption was that he left the building immediately after and we didn’t have to see or hear from him again. His “apology” on Jay Leno a couple of nights later was lame and obviously insincere. What a putz.

The rest of it was actually tolerable. Pink’s performance from a trapeze was laughable- which I assume was the desire effect. Britney Spears winning anything was a joke and, again, this is all about entertainment. Beyonce was the most amusing act of the evening with Green Day a close second. The videos were disappointing not in their cinematic quality (they’re the best video being produced besides the endangered 30-second commercial) but because we didn’t see more than five seconds of one. The producers assumed we’ve seen them on-line or on a phone.

Overall, it was an excellently produced show especially the live segments with Taylor Swift and Muse. Knowing that the audience for it are people twenty years younger than I am, I’m proud that I was able to watch the whole thing without flipping to a rerun of Monk. It’s all eye candy, sure. But if idiots like Kanye West would just realize that it’s all just that it would be fun for everyone, not just for some.

One word of advice for the 2010 show: more Shakira.

September 25, 2009

Utah Solar Tour 2009: Lots of Interest, But Where are the Buyers?

Filed under: Bush, Cheney, Power Grid, Salt Lake, Schreiner Productions, Solar, Utah, conservation, geothermal, politics, renewable, video, water, wind — Ken Schreiner @ 3:59 pm

Just like other segments of the economy, renewable energy is struggling right now. Thanks to the reckless and ignorant policies of the Reagan and Bush(es) administrations, America is now so far behind in developing renewable energy products- solar, wind, geothermal, you name it- that we’ll probably eventually be burning cow dung for heat while the rest of the planet watches their HDTV’s using solar and wind power, bathes and cooks with solar-heated water, and heats with geothermal energy from the ground.

One of the encouraging moments for renewable energy this year was turnout for the annual Utah Solar Tour. This was my first chance to do a video about it because my home was featured on the tour for the last two years. The organization’s come a long way and there’s a long way to go. But as solar becomes mainstream, there’s more interest. Someday soon, there’ll be money as well.

September 21, 2009

Wave Hello to the Microvideo and Robo.to

Filed under: Internet, media, video — Ken Schreiner @ 11:21 am

We used to say in TV news that the difference between us and newspapers was that you could see what everyone else was merely talking about. To a great extent, blogging, Twitter and Facebook are more like newspapers in that most people (me included) simply write about stuff instead of showing it- the reason not so much not having video but having time to do shoot, edit and upload it.

Well, those old excuses are gone now with the invention of Robo.to. Instead of typing in your update on Twitter or Facebook, you can upload a four-second video of what it is you’re doing. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to stop writing and check it out.

September 20, 2009

Party Time in Utah: What the World Doesn’t Know Won’t Hurt Us

Filed under: America, Nature, Salt Lake, Utah, dualism, religion — Ken Schreiner @ 8:50 am

I’ve just come off a week with four parties. One to watch a football game, another a fundraiser for the homeless, the next night’s a welcome to business college students at the U, and Saturday an open house for some friends’ fantastic new pad in the Avenues. Don’t get me wrong: I love parties. It just feels a little strange these days because I spend so much time by myself working at home or going to shoots.

I wasn’t always a party animal. When I was young, I was shy and intimidated by kids who were more naturally fun, outgoing, smarter and great gabbers. When I went away to college was when I developed my attraction to parties. Drinking and smoking pot had a lot to do with it. But I found that I actually liked being around people and that I was naturally gabby, if not fun, outgoing, or smart.

What’s also a little odd about the current spate of partying is that it’s happening in a place not normally known for it: Utah. Say the word to someone outside Salt Lake County and you might as well replace it with the words “prison” or “church.” But our arcane liquor laws and kooky kollection of religious zealots, Nature lovers, motorcycle gangs, top flight academics, and simple lovers of the west (that’s my group) create a lively mix that not only gives every party the feel of drinking beer in the high school parking lot at midnight. It also gives us a LOT to talk about.

The constant controversy but generally peaceful interaction between Utah’s protagonists make it a great place to meet people from all these persuasions. At all these parties, there were representatives of at least one group of “others” who understand that if they weren’t there they would be talked about. And when I’m out shooting, I’m always meeting and working with people who are different from me, speak different languages, worship in different churches, and generally live a life totally different from the one I live just down the street from them.

At a time when civil discourse has degenerated into talk show madness and sign-waving hysteria, it’s great to know that even in a place like UTAH- and perhaps ESPECIALLY in a place like Utah- people mostly respect each others’ opinions, talk about their differences and most importantly don’t try to brand each other as evil or dangerous as we see increasingly in other parts of the country (directly east of here, take a right). I don’t expect the rest of the world outside Utah to understand this or even believe it. All I can tell you is I love it.

September 17, 2009

Lest We Forget: Bush Interior Secretary Gale Norton, Shell Oil Investigated for Corruption

Filed under: Bush, Cheney, Oil, conservation, mining, politics — Ken Schreiner @ 9:02 am

It’s been a long time since I wrote about Gale Norton, the former Colorado state politician who coopted her experience and power over western public lands into a cushy position in George Bush the Younger and Much Stupider’s cabinet as Secretary of the Interior. She then used that post to give away public lands to big oil, mining and timber companies and coopted that into her current job as legal counsel for one of the big oil companies she gave the land away to: Shell.

As I wrote four years ago, this was corruption pure and simple. Now, federal investigators apparently and finally agree. They’ve begun a formal investigation into Norton’s dealings which from the looks of it is pretty much a slam dunk into the slammer. We wish the investigators luck and hope Norton is doing time soon. More than anything, we hope the blueprints for the oil shale projects Norton fast tracked are shredded into her prison toilet paper.

September 16, 2009

Joe Wilson vs. Max Baucus on Health Care: Democrats Are Losers, Republicans Are Jerks

Filed under: America, Bush, Cheney, Children, Congress, Obama, dualism, politics — Ken Schreiner @ 10:09 am

I’ve never been accused of being a nice guy- not to my face, anyway.  Which is interesting because as a child, I was shy, timid, and though I had lots of friends, I preferred to be by myself. That’s still very much the way I am today with one exception: I’m not nearly as shy or timid. In fact, some would say I’m a jerk.

In other words, when I was a child I was a Democrat. As an adult, I’m a Republican. Not politically but emotionally.

The Democrats continue to let themselves be bullied by Republican jerks. The latest cave-in is the elimination of the public option in the health care reform bill. While America in general and Congress specifically decry the Joe Wilson pit bull posing of the Republicans, the country and the Democrats continue to LISTEN to these bozos and even do what they say. This despite 15 years of evidence that the Republicans DON’T KNOW WHAT THEY’RE DOING and have come close several times to destroying the country literally while figuratively continuing their demolition of civil discourse by acting like fools, bullies, clowns and fascists. And those are just their leaders.

If we keep listening to the jerks who lost power because they’re jerks, then we’re losers. Like the Democrats.

September 15, 2009

Jay Leno, Cop Shows and Brian Wansink: TV’s Self-Help Campaign

Filed under: Hollywood, Internet, media, television, video — Ken Schreiner @ 8:19 am

I like Jay Leno. His new show is not “new” as everyone at NBC would have you believe. It’s just the Tonight Show without a desk. More significant, it’s a throwback to the variety shows of the 1950s-1970s where massive audiences tuned in to watch singers, sketch comedy, celebrity interviews, plate spinners, animal acts, and other disparate attractions overseen by an amiable host. I hope he succeeds and NBC lives. If not, there will be one less outlet for Dick Wolf’s “Law and Order” product line.

While one old TV staple is resurrected (what happened to comedy in prime time anyway?) another may finally be ending its seemingly endless reign. The cop show is justifiably derided in a great piece in the NYT. Cop shows have become so ubiquitous that we are seeing parodies of cop shows (“Psych”). The NYT article challenges not only the primacy of the cop show but its distortion of reality. I don’t care so much about the second challenge because- hey, it’s TV: the resemblance to reality is merely coincidental. The first one I care about more because cop shows are just cliches and indicative of the TV industry’s lack of imagination. Even the non-cop shows are cop shows (NCIS, House). The only difference between House and Monk is vicadin and a badge. I know- Monk doesn’t have a badge. He lost it after blah, blah, blah…

Which brings us to my friend Brian Wansink, professor at Cornell University and advocate of sensible eating. He’s now appearing in a pilot for a new TV show called “America’s Life Changers.” Like “Biggest Loser” and other self-help programs, this is another of those rare cases where TV is not only interesting and different, it’s helpful. So, good luck Brian. Let us know which network buys it and when it’s on. I’ll also be interested to know if a fast food company sponsors it. That would be more ironic evidence that the more TV changes, the more it stays the same.

September 11, 2009

2009 Utah Solar Tour: Already Underway and Growing

Filed under: Environment, Power Grid, Salt Lake, Schreiner Productions, Solar, Utah, conservation, renewable, video — Ken Schreiner @ 5:53 pm

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

This year’s Utah Solar Tour unofficially began last weekend with Gov. Herbert visiting a home in Kearns being outfitted by graduates of the new solar installation course at Salt Lake Community College. I wasn’t in town to shoot it myself because I was in Montana last weekend. But from KSL’s comparatively comprehensive coverage of the event (2 minutes is great even on a weekend), it at least shows that the new Republican governor is a lot more interested in renewable energy than the other members of his party.

The tour in northern Utah is officially Saturday. By the time you read this it will be too late. But I’ll be out shooting it for the first time this year since my home has been retired after two years on the tour. Hard to believe that after three years, I’m still the world’s only solar-powered video studio. But I look forward to the day when it’s commonplace. And Solarius Precarious has a little company. It gets lonely out there in the backyard.

Republicans Closer to Bottom After Wilson Heckling; Get Ready for the Timothy McVeigh Society

Filed under: America, Congress, Obama, gun, politics — Ken Schreiner @ 8:08 am

“Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or ill it teaches the whole people by its example.”

- Timothy McVeigh

The Joe Wilson (is that his real name?) heckling fallout continues. But regardless of how it changes the debate over health care reform, it again proves The Republican Party or Religious Radical Right-wing Party (RRR) is not interested in governing or doing things for people but merely enjoys destroying things to make everyone else in America and the world as angry as they are.

Maybe it’s their Christian “temperament” (kill everything then sell it). Maybe it’s because they’re all old white guys in the throes of midlife crisis flailing in their final, futile attempts at resurrecting the society they used to control with fists, guns and Bibles. Maybe their hemhorroids are bothering them. Whatever their problem is, the rest of us are sick of it. And I’m not even a Democrat or really much of an Obama supporter. He’s the president. There you go.

Admittedly, the RRR are leading by example. But training a new generation of bigots and domestic terrorists is not going to be difficult where they’ve built their political base- the home of Eric Rudolph and other under-employed but heavily-armed ne’r-do-wells. Unless you forgot because it’s September 11, it’s been almost 15 years since a former military, right-wing religious wacko named Timothy McVeigh killed 168 people, mostly children, in Republican Country: the heart of the Bible Belt in Oklahoma City.

Lest we forget, it was the government that McVeigh says led him to commit the biggest act of domestic terrorism in America’s history. Let’s not forget the Republicans were in control of Congress after a similar wave of anger produced Newt Gingrich’s “Contract on America.” Like Hitler Youth, the angry white people of America’s rural, right-wing outposts are busy training (whether they think they are or not) their little ones to hate and be violent to those who don’t look like or agree with them. Those of us who remember the 1950s remember the John Birch Society.

Welcome to the Timothy McVeigh Society.

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