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Apparently I've been an avid, and I dare say astute, media watcher from an early age. My family is finally selling the empty nest so today we filled a dumpster with the things families accumulate. I turned up my media journal from Mr. Crowther's Media class in grade 11 at Lawrence Park Collegiate Institute.

Seriously Bouche you're kidding right? This shit has always gone on, Letterman pilloried the fuck out of NBC all the time. It's that whole divide between NBC corporate and entertainment like The Insider situation with CBS corporate and 60 Minutes. There was an odd moment a few nights ago where they came back from commercial and the NBC logo was cycling like an Apple waiting logo. I realized a day later it was a massive headfuck a la Phish. There's no tape delay or whatever, it's not live, it's been edited- the only reason there would be a gaffe like that coming out of commercial was if it was from Conan's own control room.

I think we should all make preserves and mar-ma-lades, our own bitters, and preserved lemons and serve them with Moroccan cous cous and braised lamb and take pictures of it and talk about how cool we are.

"Everyday" by Vetiver off Tight Knit.

Didn't Kimmel do '10 at 10' on Leno's show last night and unexpectedly burned the fuck out of him. The Star was saying it was tonight but a friend told me clearly as if he'd seen it.

Conan underscored my remarks from yesterday in a fairly emotional yet characteristically upbeat monologue. Also later in the broadcast the writers underscored Bouche's point that many staffers uprooted their families and their lives in NY to follow their's and Conan's dreams. Max Weinberg had to relocate his family AND his secret family.

As a serious TV addict and particularly late night TV, I'm fascinated by comedy writing, the nuances of conversation, set up and delivery, I'm honestly thinking that this debacle with Conan may cause me to simply do the unthinkable: turn off the TV (at least after 11:30). I understand people saying how is this news (the entire island of Haiti was demolished yesterday and likely hundreds of thousands are dead) and agree that it is at very least entertainment news. As someone mentioned the human element is what I think is really engaging people. I rarely watch Letterman but switched back and forth last night to see what kind of mileage he was getting out of this. Quoting Martin Mull and encapsulating this entire scenario he said 'show business is high school plus money'. He was literally in a state of glee, because as I mentioned in an earlier post, this is exactly what happened to him at the hands of NBC. I should say a truly, truly heartbreaking episode in his own life. Here's the rub folks. People like David Letterman and Conan O'Brien realized at a very early age (for Letterman it was 10 yrs. old) that they wanted to be the host of The Tonight Show. Perhaps Conan came to that realization a bit later in life but think about the work that he put into that life goal. He hosted 2,725 episodes of Late Night after inheriting it from Letterman, that's just an unbelievable amount of the daily drudgery that goes into producing a telecast of that standard and nature. And as he's made clear for the last 6 years he's had it contractually in place that he was in fact going to inherit The Tonight Show (I'm fairly certain he actually took the helm later than was initially negotiated as well). The situation is analogous to the recent revelations made in the book Game Change that Hilary Clinton was so certain she would win the democratic nomination and presidency she had actually begun planning her transition. Except Conan didn't have a Democratic Convention and general election to contend with- the job was his. Referencing another presidential election Paul Shaffer quipped last night that as with Al Gore's recount 'The Tonight Show has no president'. So what makes this so heartbreaking, and I'm not really embarassed to say I'm actually choked as I write this, is that this incredibly likeable, intelligent, diligent man finally realized his life's goal and then the rug was pulled out from underneath him. Having been through the exact same struggle and having rightfully earned The Tonight Show desk people are asking themselves how can this man who's already had his moment in the sun steal this opportunity back from such a worthwhile successor. Everyone is asking as the unnamed former longtime network programmer quoted in todays NYTimes (O'Brien Rejects NBC Shift: Set To Say Goodnight)) whether “you have to wonder if Jay is damaged goods after all this". Taking the political analogy a step further the RNC and DNC respectively start planning potential candidates and transition strategies as soon as the last election cycle has ended (only elections happen every four years, The Tonight Show's 'election' cycles are much longer). In this respect NBC is being entirely disingenuous when they try to put Conan's early ratings to blame for this imbroglio. They have been grooming him for this job for at least a decade only to brutally handicap him at the last moment in a misguided effort to hold onto (what has proved to be a failing commodity) Jay Leno. Letterman's remarks today are illustrative that "this whole mistake over there at NBC has cost them hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions and millions of dollars". This issue has gone well beyond Conan's potential settlement to the point that it affects NBC's entire financial picture and the only thing NBC does well (at least financially) late night television. Letterman has sagely and correctly interpreted Conan's last salvo: "they just want Conan to quit and go away and for Conan to do a show in his basement. That's what they want. That's exactly what they want. But he's a smart kid. He's not gonna do that. He's in there for the cash." What David leaves out is that as much as this is about money, money is just the means of compensating individuals with incredible life gifts and work ethics who would likely work for free at their life's aspiration. At bottom this is about the hopes and dreams of young men named Jay, David and Conan tirelessly working towards their dreams against the shifting currents of fiscal treachery and feckless bureaucracy.

It's fucking heartbreaking (I presume that'd an actual quote not sure why there's no source). Of course it's a completely reasonable stance, heartbreaking nonetheless.

Happy Birthday Broheme.

Stellar.

http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/blogs/thank-you-notes/ (yes, imbed, I'm retarded clearly)

Besides Jimmy Fallon is the one who's really getting screwed on this deal as his Friday night Thank You Notes attest. BradM: Make this fucking work. bouche made it work

I don't doubt John Oliver's standup isn't funny (although his bit about the Bonnaroo audience definitely was funny particularly about the guy in the front row who raised his hand and asked if he'd like to play wiffleball later). I think what I was getting at was that the folks on this board have the attention span of a fucking gnat.

I just saw John Oliver on Jimmy Fallon talking about doing comedy at Bonarroo and how playing to a crowd of Phisheads that have been in the sun for 3 days isn't the best audience. That there's like a 15 second delay from the joke to the 'oh, I see how that could be funny realization'. He said he should have done his bit left the stage and waited for the lag to pick up.

Looks real good actually. Calgary Folk, Edmonton Folk, Hillside and Atlantic Jazz Festival all have a biannual meeting and engage in group buying of acts to help with routing etc.

Holy Fawk this is gonna be one serious mix CD.

Did anyone else scan over this list and download everything except Shainhouse's undoubtedly douchey even louche suggestions?

I'm just following the money trail but it is an odd twist that BlackRock is one of the big holders of equity because China really just did get into the private equity world, bought a huge chunk in BlackRock and then it listed on the NSE (as BLK).

I'm not surprised that BlackRock (no connection to the Black Keys supercollab side project) owns a big chunk - they manage about $3 Trillion (the Chinese also own a good piece of BlackRock - their first massive buy into private equity in the States).

I'm just hurt I didn't get a pat on the back for the due diligence on the GE/Comcast deal. In the back of my mind I keep remembering that of their 49% of NBCU, 10% of GE I believe is owned by a private equity firm (I'm presuming people assume GE is completely publicly held). %10 of a %49 nut gives the private equity alot of say particularly if GE is hamstrung by an imbroglio of financial obligations.

^says the greying man who keeps cats in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

I love most if not all of N.A.S.A., when it really hits it hits. It's arguably a better supercollab than Blakroc. I'm not sure if that Bon Iver albums from '09 officially but that tune re:stacks has been tearing my asshole a new heart for months.

Seriously Kevin Eubanks doesn't need to die but a nice waterboarding spa treatment might do him good.

Fuck man I should have read the douchey original article- is this what you had your panties in a bunch all about. That makes more sense as Jay's dying in his hourlong format and whoever's at the helm NBC's going to go back to churning police procedurals and ER redux's. I think MOST MOST MOST importantly out of all this, and striking a Machiavellian deathblow while the iron is hot seems fitting, what we should get out of this is that Vicki Randle must die. Not get out of Kevin Eubanks ragtag Primetime band or whatever the fuck he calls it, not just stop shimmying her tambourine and catcalling Proud Mary going to commercial, I mean a commercial grade assassin (hell a thickfisted goon would do) should extinguishe her lifeforce permanently. And fuck what that does to Comcast and their whole evisceration of NBCU be damned.

Unfortunately I got to thinking about this as if it were a reality. I still think it's like a Paul (from the Beatles) is dead type hoax. But.... Putting it in the context of the recent GE Comcast merger the situation is telling. Well basically, you know a vodka company (Seagram) that was founded by rich Montreal bootlegging Jews bought a company called Universal and then in some simple twist of fate a French (like France french) water asset (Vivendi) merged with Universal. Now GE bought it's 20% of NBC Universal back off Vivendi and then sold %51 of their whole nut to Comcast. But GE ultimately is trying to get out altogether in seven years and Comcast's butcher's table approach to NBC Universal will be Satriale in it's inspiration. I found a number of in depth articles but this one breaks it down best: I guess what occured to me is that Jay Leno in this context is more than Oprah say in terms of clearly being a global brand. What he adds in terms of value by dint of his further involvement with NBC is not insubstantial. Viewed in the light of the Comcast deal Jay Leno is more than Cheers, The Cosby Show or Seinfeld represented at the time (all of which have floated off to a lucrative and hazy life of syndication). With a rapidly eroding subscriber base for Old TV, the only population still watching likely to use a MedicAlert bracelet, Jay Leno is something more like (my words) 'a demographic and revenue profit cluster'. In terms of what he represents as say a brand category in the selloff of NBC Universal is not insubstantial. The constant paradigm shifts of delivery models and platforms, the rapid disintegration of the network broadcast model of revenue, all of this contributes to an almost patently absurd (like Terry Gilliam's Brazil absurd) fire sale of pre-eminent proportions.