Captain Digital

Random musings on politics, society, and pop culture from the Internet's marketing curmudgeon.

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The (Un)importance of Being Oscar

Oscar

I skipped the Oscar broadcast Sunday. I’m not alone. So did millions of other Americans. From what I hear, the ratings were off 10% from last year, which were down significantly from the year before. In fact, Uncle Oscar’s been slipping quite a bit in recent years. For the life of them, Hollywood can’t seem to figure out why.

I think I know.

I’m a red-stater. Proud of it. I’m one of the ones with which George Clooney admits to being “out-of-touch.” At one time, Hollywood proudly made movies that I was interested in seeing. Star Wars (the first one…you know…episode IV), Patton, Young Frankenstein. Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Big budget – small budget – I didn’t care. As long as it was entertaining, I didn’t care if it was a war picture, a western, a comedy, even a love story. Along the way, though, Hollywood forgot about entertaining me, and decided their mission was to indoctrinate me into their cause célèbres.
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Insane-O!

Calypso Harry!Why is anybody taking this guy seriously?

If this country had any cojones left, we’d either put him in a home for the mentally unstable, or we’d be prosecuting him for treason. But noooooo…he marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was a pal of Paul Robeson. He Speaks Out For the Oppressed!

Give me strength. And while you’re at it, gimme a couple of aspirin… [Read more…] about Insane-O!

Devaluing Entertainment.

I watched a little bit of Dr. No on TV tonight.

That, in and of itself, is certainly unremarkable. But stay with me for a sec. I think I’m on to something.

When I was a kid, there were three channels on the (black and white) TV. There were, I think, two or three movie theatres in my hometown (Shreveport, LA) and probably a bunch of drive-ins. If you wanted to see a movie, you waited until it was released in your area, then you went to the theatre to see it. You probably went right after it opened, because there was no way to know how long a flick would play at the local (single-screen) theatre. If you didn’t catch it in the theatre, you MIGHT be able to see it at a drive-in – they largely subsisted on second-run and B-movie fare. [Read more…] about Devaluing Entertainment.

SEX. (Now that I have your attention…)

slut-puppy-BarbieI had to go on a casting call for a client a week or so ago. We were casting for a female role in an online tutorial. Through a mis-communication with the talent agency, instead of 30- and 40-year-old women showing up for the call, we saw teenagers and 20-year-olds. Now understand, I’m a 40-something-year-old (very) married male. We saw model after model show up that looked as if they were in their 20’s. When I asked about their age and experience (auditions are possibly the only profession where you can legitimately ask a woman her age without violating a social taboo), I heard things like “Oh, I’m 17 years old, and I’ve been modeling for…oh…two months.”

Pause with me for a nanosecond.

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Yelling “Movie!” in a crowed firehouse.

How Weird, Stern.In January 2006, The “King of All Media” (a.k.a. Howard Stern) moves his blue humor act from terrestrial radio to Sirius satellite radio.

Yawn.

I don’t know about you, but I’m not going to hold my breath that Sirius is going to see some huge uptick in sales, as Stern-iacs sign up for satelite radio to get their daily fix. (A) I don’t care, and (B) I know something Sirius doesn’t.

Consider parents with a youngster who suddenly discovers that he can get a rise out of his parents when he uses a “bad” word. What happens? Well, in my family, the child is told “we don’t approve of that kind of language.” If the language persists, the punishment begins. Eventually (even in families that equate a lack of discipline with “loving” the child) the novelty of the bad word wears off. Eventually, the child must either give up, or look for an even more shocking word. Eventually, even that falls flat, and the child has nothing left to do for an encore.

Pause with me for a nanosecond.

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The Five Nines.

phone
Back when you could get any kind of phone you liked, as long as it was connected to a wall and was provided by Ma Bell, phone service was simple. It just always worked. The industry calls it “the 5 nines,” meaning your POTS (Plain Old Phone System) line is expected to work 99.999% of the time. Through power outages. Through storms. Through just about anything. And if it DID go down, you could be sure that it would be working again ASAP. Those boys didn’t fool around. [Read more…] about The Five Nines.

Who is Captain Digital?

What is this all about? Simple. I’m a marketing guy/graphic designer/copywriter/animator/whatever. As you might expect with all those “/” in my vocations, I have a lot of opinions on a lot of things. Mostly marketing and advertising, but we may wander ocasionally. Check back here for random thoughts on the state of marketing, advertising, politics, pop culture, and (un)common sense.