TV Archives - Page 18 of 19 - Jonathan's Blog From The Source

Famous for What?

Posted on: 03/26/08 10:12 AM | by Jonathan McKee

I love this little CNN news peice titled, “Famous for what?”

And that’s exactly what it’s about. People who are famous for… what? Think… Paris Hilton. Yeah. Exactly!

CNN’s thoughts on this subject could be summarized with this statement, “It used to be that fame had something to do with talent.”

I think I find it more interesting just observing how much our society values “fame” at all.

Here’s their two cents.

“Back in Hollywood in the golden era, celebrities knew that they should be famous for what they were actually good at which was acting, performing. They knew that less was more. When it came to their private lives, they only gave us a little bit of a glimpse. So they remained mysterious and they became icons. I don’t think we’re going to be looking at Cary Grant and Paris Hilton in the same way in generations to come.”

Click here for the whole video.

My two cents: Fame definately has changed along with everything else in this culture. Reality TV has probably lowered the bar, changing the old criteria for who can and can not be famous. Is this a bad thing?

What qualities do our kids perceive as valuable: beauty, money, or dare I say… scandal? (in the times where a sex tape or a viral nude photo can springboard someone to stardom?) What message is this communicating to our kids? (Read David’s youth culture window article this week to see one effect this is having on young girls.)

Hmmmmm.

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Kids Multi-tasking Internet & TV

Posted on: 03/12/08 8:29 AM | by Jonathan McKee

Any youth worker or parent who has read anything about this young generation has frequently seen the word “multi-tasking.” Today’s kids can multi-task like no generation before them.

Media Life came out with an article yesterday about kids browsing the internet WHILE watching TV and how marketers are using this opportunity. TV watchers have probably noticed this phenomenon in the last year. You can’t watch American Idol or even a football game without being repeatedly pitched to jump on their web site and vote or participate in a poll. You might not be responding to these plea’s… but our kids are.

According to the above article:

overall 64 percent of kids go online while watching TV. Just under half do so frequently, between three times a week and several times a day.

It also found that 73 percent of those who are watching TV while online are engaged in active multitasking. That’s up dramatically from the 55 percent of kids who said they had engaged in active multitasking back in 2002.

Some 50 percent said they had visited a web site in direct response to something they’d seen while watching TV. That’s up from 41 percent.

Some 35 percent said they had sent an email or instant message to someone who was watching the same TV show, compared to 18 percent in 2002.

Further, one third said they went online to participate in polls, contests or games after television programs have directed them to while still watching the tube. That’s up from 21 percent.

Another interesting thing to come out in the study is that when kids are on the internet while watching TV, it’s the internet that tends to hold their attention as the primary medium.

I found that last fact fascinating– when in comes to engaging in internet and TV simultaneously, the internet wins in the fight for attention. Perhaps because it is “interactive” by definition.

More on this research in this article. (thanks for this one Anastasia)

Today’s teenagers have never known the world without the internet. That, combined with all the other gadgets readily available to them has created a generation of media junkies who can handle more than a couple mediums at once. I talk about this in Chapter Four (click here for that chapter in article form on our web site) in my book THE NEW BREED, describing how to recruit today’s young professional as a volunteer.

Years ago every report was about the effects of TV– families who leave the TV on during homework or during dinner. Now we’re seeing a shift to people doing everything “while browsing the internet.”

Hmmmmmmm.

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TV Pilots Going Too Far

Posted on: 03/11/08 10:46 AM | by Jonathan McKee

Is it just me, or is the trash we see on that screen in our living room getting a little trashier?

Wow… it’s been hard to find clean television entertainment lately. My wife Lori and I tried some more new TV pilots lately. We’ve noticed something: every pilot had a sex scene. The new show “Unhitched” included a monkey watching two people having sex. The monkey pulled down its pants and jumped on them to join in. In the next scene we see a proctologist examining the guy’s butt assessing the damage. (Yes… this was on Fox)

USA Today’s Bill Keveney puts it this way.

“Take a couple having sex, add an aroused orangutan, and you’ve got an opening scene worthy of a Farrelly Brothers film. That it’s in a network TV comedy, ‘Unhitched,’ might raise some eyebrows.”

You can read more about the show here.

Now I haven’t seen every pilot, but of the four we’ve watched in the last month, four had sex scenes.

Hmmmmmm.

Wow! We’ve come a long way since Gilligan’s Island.

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A Dab of News to Know

Posted on: 03/4/08 10:34 AM | by Jonathan McKee

Surfing, Kid Rock arrested, American Idol contestant a stripper, new iPod technology, Moses and the Israelites stoned??? What do these have to do with each other?

Blogs are short and sparse of late… I’m on vacation with my wife Lori celebrating 17 years of marriage (Wow, I sound old!). We’re having a blast in a tropical getaway, our first time really away for a week in a spot like this (it seems like so many of our vacations are attached to a speaking trip to save money, travel, etc. This vacation is truly 100% VACATION. Wow!) My parents are taking care of our three kiddos (learning what it’s like to taxi three kids to different activities… they’ll sleep well when we’re back), so very cool of them.

I am very excited about today. This morning I talked Lori into going surfing. No, we don’t surf. But we’re going this morning. It’s amazing because all my wife talks about is sharks and somehow I still convinced her to go. I’ll report back about that. The vacation is a nice break.

Anyway… back to blogging- some quick random news for you to know. (I always like to keep you updated with the stuff your kids might be talking about… or stuff that’s just interesting to me. Hey… it’s my blog!)

In the media, all the talk is about American Idol contestant David Hernandez who used to strip for a living a Phoenix… at a male strip club. CNN reports:

The 24-year-old finalist from Glendale, Arizona, once worked as a stripper at Dick’s Cabaret, appearing fully nude and performing lap dances for the club’s “mostly male” clientele, club manager Gordy Bryan said Monday.

“He had the look and the type that people like, so he made pretty good money here,” Bryan said.

It’s not clear whether a history as a stripper could disqualify Hernandez from the competition. In 2003, finalist Frenchie Davis was dismissed because of her appearance on an adult Web site; but last year, Antonella Barba remained in the competition after racy photos of her surfaced on the Internet.

(updated)TV Guide spoke with Idol’s executive producer about the situation in this interview. Here’s a snippet:

TVGuide.com: Will the revelations about David’s stripper past have any impact on whether he stays on the show?

Ken Warwick: No, it won’t make any difference. The truth is, we’re never judgmental about what people do to earn a living. They’ve got to put food in people’s mouths. We’ve had strippers on the show before. Nikki McKibbon was one in [Season] 1. We’re never judgmental about people who do things like that. If it were some sort of heavy porn, then maybe we’d have to take action. But certainly not on this.

TVGuide.com: Were you aware of his past before it was reported?

Warwick: No, I wasn’t. [Laughs] But the truth of the matter is, it wouldn’t have made any difference. There are a lot of people I know who’d love to have the opportunity just to make a better living by taking their clothes off.

Sigh.

And another celeb in trouble. Outspoken musician Kid Rock got himself arrested for punching, kicking and hitting a victom with a chair in a Waffle House. Do I need to even say anything further about this?

The techno side of me just collided with my interest in working out in this news piece. Nike and Apple are working together to make the iPod compatable with gym equipment. I’ve been keeping my eyes open for anything iPod of late with the launch of our new podcast for teenagers. But this side article caught my attention:

The companies announced Tuesday that they are working with gym equipment manufacturers and health clubs to allow members to plug their iPod Nano into cardio equipment to track workouts, set goals and upload the information to a Nike Web site.

And in ludicrous news, I sure hope no one believes this:

The biblical Israelites may have been high on a hallucinogenic plant when Moses brought the Ten Commandments down from Mount Sinai, according to a new study by an Israeli psychology professor.

Hmmmmmmm…

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Miley Cyrus is like… so popular!

Posted on: 02/6/08 10:14 AM | by Jonathan McKee

If you’re a parent of girls… you know the name.

If you work with junior high girls… they know the name.

If you work with high school girls… they still know the name, but are pretty hush, hush about it.

Miley Cyrus is the hottest thing since the Rubik’s cube! (wow… where did that obscure 80’s reference come from?)

For those of you who don’t know… Miley’s show Hanna Montana dominates the number one spot on TV for kids, at times keeping up with the big boys. Her concerts sell out in minutes. Her new concert film just set a web tickets sales record.

As a parent of 10 and 12-year-old girls, I’ve kept my eye on her show. It’s actually pretty good. Most of all- it’s clean.

In this CNN article she was just interviewed about her success. Here’s “like” a snippet:

Q: Your tour was one of the highest-grossing tours, right up there with the Police and Justin Timberlake. What do you think about that?

MILEY: Sometimes, “It’s like wow, I really have to be good.” Especially when you hear what people are doing for tickets. It’s like this is their one chance to see the show and it’s the one night I’m going to be here so it has to be perfect.

Q: Do the problems of other young stars, like Jamie Lynn Spears’ pregnancy, put more pressure on you to set a better example for kids?

MILEY: It does, but I mean those persons don’t have anything to do with me either. So it’s like you just have your own heart and you have your own soul to kind of help you through life.

Q: Do you ever wish that you could just be a regular 15-year-old instead of a teen phenom?

MILEY: I do sometimes, but then again it definitely is fun and it’s been really nice because having my uncle as like my bodyguard and my mom with me and my dad, working with him. My family wants the best for me so they try to find a way so that I can still go out and hang with my friends and also have a normal life of my own.

She’s one to watch. She is by far THE biggest role model in the lives of young American girls today.

She’s had some people trying to pin some garbage on her, but it seems like she’s kept a pretty clean slate.

I admit, I was a little bit discouraged with the dress she wore to the 2007 Teen Choice Awards last year. But, in her defense, that is the way this generation is dressing. And if no one is teaching her differently…

Sigh.

I just know as a dad of little girls… my girls aren’t going out in dresses that advertise that much realestate. (And the guys they date are gonna have a little “sit down” talk with me while I’m cleaning my 12 gage!)

Keep Miley in your prayers. It can’t be easy to be in the limelight like this. But at the same time, I hope she realizes that she’s being watched. With fame comes great responsibility.

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17 Million Kids Will Be Watching…

Posted on: 02/3/08 9:17 AM | by Jonathan McKee

17 Million.. that’s a lot of kids!

Yes, 17 million kids are watching the Superbowl game this year… AND the commercials. I don’t know about you, but this three hour slot of TV is the one time I actually enjoy the commercials. But that doesn’t stop me from using my TiVo to start the game about 45 minutes late so I have the freedom to skip certain ads (Remember the two girls wrestling in the fountain a couple years ago? That ad had a bunch of parents across the country frantically searching for the remote control!).

Apparantly I’m not the only one concerned. Marin Institute, an “alcohol watchdog group” out of San Rafeal, California, is very concerned, specifically about all the beer commercials. Media Life magazine reports in this article:

Seventeen million kids will be watching Sunday’s game, according to Marin, and alcohol advertising has been tied to increased underage drinking. Considering Budweiser annually produces the funniest, most well-received ads, Marin believes the ads put kids at risk.

“The NFL identifies the Super Bowl as a family-friendly televised sporting event, so their opinion of what family-friendly is is clearly not the same as ours,” says Michael J. Scippa, Marin Institute’s advocacy director. “Nearly 17 million youth watch that every year, and they’re being exposed to very clever, very funny, very powerful brand messaging – and clearly there are strong links between exposure and usage, especially in underage drinkers.”

There are studies to back up that point. A study in the January 2006 edition of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine found that youth who saw more alcohol advertisements on average drank more.

Studies are revealing that people are drinking at increasingly younger ages, according to this UK article, fueling violence and anti-social behavior.

So I guess it comes down to what’s more important… the health and safety of our kids… or a whole lot of freaking money!

Hmmmmmm.

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MTV Top 10 Artists… Not quite Role Models

Posted on: 01/31/08 9:16 AM | by Jonathan McKee

MTV’s front page features their list of Most Popular Artists. (And let me assure you… regardless where MTV gets that list from, it is a self fulfilling prophecy. Sad fact, but MTV is youth culture today.) The question is… how many of these artist would you want mentoring your kids?

Probably very few of them.

But the “artists” on this list are the people kids are listening to. Let’s take a peek at some of them.

The list features Li’l Wayne in the #1 spot. Little Wayne was in the news again this week when he was booked on three felony drug charges in Yuma, AZ on Jan. 23.

Britney Spears is #2 on the list. She was rushed to the hospital this morning (Thursday, January 31) on another “5150” hold for mental-health evaluation. Her song Peice of Me is currently #18 on Billboard’s Hot 100 right now, and the #9 most downloaded song on iTunes. Her risque music video is the sixth most downloaded music video on iTunes right now.

Soulja Boy Tell’em has the #4 spot. Check out my blog a couple days ago for more about how schools are inadvertantly helping him become a role model for your elementry school kids.

Akon was in the news again last year when he was charged for tossing a 15-year-old fan into the crowd. Akon has had numerous hits, one of the most popular being Smack That. Hmmmmmm. Earlier in 2007 Akon got himself into trouble in Trinidad when he pulled a girl onto the stage and proceeded to simulate sex with her as well as a few minutes of other crude dancing. The young girl was only 15 years old.

This list of artists goes on.

The interesting fact is that today’s kids don’t seemed worried about song lyrics or the character of the person singing the song. I think a 14-year-old girl summed up this generation’s feeling well in her blog when she heard what Soulja Boy’s “Superman” song meant.

I love this song, and i dont really care what the lyrics mean. 😛

Hmmmmmm.

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Poor Taste on TV

Posted on: 01/24/08 11:50 AM | by Jonathan McKee

Last night another new show launched on TV, one that is a pretty good reflection of what America wants to see: scandal, deep dark secrets, controversy… and a whole lot of money at stake.

The show is called The Moment of Truth. It’s like Springer meets Deal or No Deal. The challenge is simple: answer 21 increasingly personal questions honestly, as determined by a polygraph, and win up to $500,000.

Media Life Magazine online described the show like this:

Before the episodes are taped, contestants are hooked to a polygraph machine–a lie detector–and asked 50 to 75 questions, like “Have you ever made a sexy video and uploaded to the internet?,” “Would you cheat on your spouse if you knew you wouldn’t get caught?,” and “Have you ever touched a female co-worker inappropriately?”

The contestants are told 21 of those questions will be asked again on the air but are not told which ones nor how they fared on the polygraph.

They’re free to change their answers the day of the show’s taping, but to win the money the players must tell the truth in front of the camera. The polygraph results serve as a guide.

Surprise surprise. The show did fantastic. Although Media Life didn’t exactly predict a great response… the mid season premier kept 94% of the American Idol audience, becoming the highest rated new show of the season.

I’m not shocked. The more controversy and smut the better the show seems to do. Just look at what Tila Tequila did on MTV last year.

TV seems to provide far less family appropriate shows of late. This year I tried to watch a good amount of the new TV Pilots (I always like to see what teenagers are watching). I saw VERY FEW pilots without at least some sexual content, some very strong sexual content.

In a 2005 Kaiser report, they reported an 10% increase of sexual content in prime time shows from just 1998 to 2005. That doesn’t surprise me at all.

But I was pleased to find out that some strides have been made in family viewing times, the Super Bowl for instance. Go Daddy has had two ads rejected so far. No complaints from me.

I continue to urge parents to make use of two great television resources:

The TIVO or DVR. This gives us the flexibility to not only skip commercials, but pause TV when something happens that might be worth discussing.
The OFF button!

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Friday Night Lights On My Mind

Posted on: 01/22/08 8:01 AM | by Jonathan McKee

“I always find it intriguing to catch even a glimpse of how the world views Christians.”

That’s how I started an October 17th EZINE article about NBC’s Friday Night Lights … and so the saga continues.

In review… I loved the show last year. But this year it has seemed to try a little too hard to shock us with murder, backstabbing, and scandal of all shapes and sizes. If anything, the show has lost its realistic feel that it had in Season One.

But one thing has perked my interest- not necessarily in a good way- more like, “Oh no… where are they going with this?!” …that is in the character of Lyla Garrity who accepted Jesus. Since my October article, we have now seen Lyla do some actions that made me cringe, and others that were pretty realistic. A few episodes ago she brought another character (Riggins) to church- a guy that was the last guy you’d expect in church- and we saw something happen to him. It wasn’t vivid, but it was almost as if seeds were planted. Not at all what you’d expect from a TV show!

In the last episode Lyla started working for a Christian radio station hosting a show where Christian young people call in for advice. I looked at my wife Lori when each call came in and said, “Let’s see how they write this Christian answer to a tough question.” Lyla answered “is oral sex okay” (they kind of side-stepped that one), and “should I worry when people make fun of me for praying at school,” etc.

I’m torn. It’s one of the few times I’ve seen a network show have a Christian character that they didn’t seem to mock (Studio 60 might have claimed to do that last year, but… don’t get me started on that one.) Lyla actually is given a good amount of screen time. And even though I don’t agree with everything she’s doing… they seem to be putting her in a positive light.

Well… like it or not, FNL’s attempts to woo audiences haven’t worked.

This New York Times article said yesterday:

All the while, the show is a bona fide washout. Six or so million people watch “Friday Night Lights,” compared with around 13 million for NBC’s hit “Heroes.” No single episode has ever broken the Top 50 most-viewed prime-time shows. In popularity, it lags far behind “Dancing With the Stars,” “Deal or No Deal” and “The Bachelor.” Even now that the Nielsen ratings try to account for viewers who digitally record a show and watch it within a week of its air date (affluent viewers, perhaps?), the show’s numbers are lousy.

So FNL fans should probably prepare themselves… it ain’t gonna last. In the meantime, I’m keeping my eye on the show. I enjoy seeing my favorite characters from last season (Coach, Riggins, and Smash’s mom), and I’m biting my nails as I watch what becomes of the lone Christian Lyla Garrity.

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American Idol

Posted on: 01/21/08 9:11 AM | by Jonathan McKee

Interesting… American Idol has fewer viewers so far this year, but still is beating all the other networks combined whenever it is on.

An article in Media Life Magazine tells us:

And of course there is “Idol.” The show drew its smallest opening-night audience in four years, but it was so far out ahead of the competition that it almost didn’t matter. The first two episodes of the smash singing show have averaged a 13.2 rating, making them the year’s two highest-rated non-sports shows on broadcast, 48 percent better than the No. 3 show, the Sept. 27 premiere of ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy” at an 8.9.

Even if “Idol’s” numbers fall off a bit more, it will still power Fox to an easy No. 1 this season unless one of the other networks’ reality shows really takes off, which seems unlikely.

Also… a little controversy never hurts. (controversy helped Jamie Lynne’s Zoey’s ratings.)

I spoke to kids this weekend and did a little “stand up” bit on American Idol auditions. It’s amazing. Usually when you talk about a show you include a certain chunk of the audience and exclude others… not with Idol. EVERYONE knows… they’ve all seen some of the auditions one year or another.

It will be interesting to see how many teenagers it will keep this season…

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