Piers Morgan to be replaced by... nobody

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Kevin M.

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Apr 16, 2014, 1:18:44 AM4/16/14
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At least no single individual will take over the timeslot. CNN execs are hoping a random mish-mash of "documentaries" and "specials" (those were airquotes, by the way) from the likes of Anthony Bourdain and John Walsh will lead to ratings success.

Adam Bowie

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Apr 16, 2014, 2:33:35 AM4/16/14
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I guess it'd be totally out of the question to just run a news hour? I mean it's not as though actual news (rather than comment) is available to any massive extent at 9pm. I see that they're doing precisely than at 10pm. I guess I'm just used to a world in which BBC News Channel (the UK version) and Sky News both just run news bulletins in rotation with only a hint of personality shows. Indeed their big fights tend to be over who gets the next days papers first to review.

Incidentally, I'm just about to return to the UK after a month of watching much less television than usual while I travelled around the US. I have two key observations:

1. Barely any hotel or motel has any kind of understanding of aspect rations. They all have widescreen TVs, but mostly they're somehow stretching the picture wrongly even though it too is widescreen. And this has very little bearing on how expensive or not the room is. The best adjusted TV I came across was in a dirt cheap motel. (I'd have a moan about HD downgraded to analogue SD before it gets delivered to the room's HD TV, but that'd be too easy).

2, For the entire 29 days of my trip, I don't think I've seen CNN cover anything apart from that Malaysian plane. Right now, Anderson Cooper is probably bored to tears as he conducts yet another feature on it. They were showing how they found the Titanic earlier because that's relevant... Sometimes, they just make it easy for Fox to make fun of the "Plane Channel",


Adam


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Kevin M.

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Apr 16, 2014, 3:02:49 AM4/16/14
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On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 11:33 PM, Adam Bowie <ad...@adambowie.co.uk> wrote:
I guess it'd be totally out of the question to just run a news hour?

There's no money in straight news. I may have my chronology wrong, but I think the last prime time cable news show that wasn't personality-driven was the one Brian Williams anchored before switching to NBC. 
 
1. Barely any hotel or motel has any kind of understanding of aspect rations. They all have widescreen TVs, but mostly they're somehow stretching the picture wrongly even though it too is widescreen. And this has very little bearing on how expensive or not the room is. The best adjusted TV I came across was in a dirt cheap motel. (I'd have a moan about HD downgraded to analogue SD before it gets delivered to the room's HD TV, but that'd be too easy).

This has to do with the type of feed the cable companies sell to hotels and motels. Because they have to run through internal distribution amplifiers, they aren't typically sent the latest and greatest signals because hotel systems have to rescramble them to send to individual rooms. In all likelihood, the cheap motel where you experienced decent TV was probably due to them being too cheap to have their own dist. amps. so they just paid for standard cable for each room.  

2, For the entire 29 days of my trip, I don't think I've seen CNN cover anything apart from that Malaysian plane. Right now, Anderson Cooper is probably bored to tears as he conducts yet another feature on it. They were showing how they found the Titanic earlier because that's relevant... Sometimes, they just make it easy for Fox to make fun of the "Plane Channel",

Best Tweet I saw today was something along the lines of, "CNN has renewed the search for Flight 370 for a second season." 


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Kevin M. (RPCV)

Adam Bowie

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Apr 16, 2014, 3:18:37 AM4/16/14
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On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 11:02 PM, Kevin M. <drunkba...@gmail.com> wrote:

On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 11:33 PM, Adam Bowie <ad...@adambowie.co.uk> wrote:
I guess it'd be totally out of the question to just run a news hour?

There's no money in straight news. I may have my chronology wrong, but I think the last prime time cable news show that wasn't personality-driven was the one Brian Williams anchored before switching to NBC. 

Yet the Weather Channel does actually show the weather around the clock. Sure it has other stuff, but I reckon most people tuning in are looking at the bottom third of the screen. Call me an old romantic, but perhaps if someone tried...?
 
 
1. Barely any hotel or motel has any kind of understanding of aspect rations. They all have widescreen TVs, but mostly they're somehow stretching the picture wrongly even though it too is widescreen. And this has very little bearing on how expensive or not the room is. The best adjusted TV I came across was in a dirt cheap motel. (I'd have a moan about HD downgraded to analogue SD before it gets delivered to the room's HD TV, but that'd be too easy).

This has to do with the type of feed the cable companies sell to hotels and motels. Because they have to run through internal distribution amplifiers, they aren't typically sent the latest and greatest signals because hotel systems have to rescramble them to send to individual rooms. In all likelihood, the cheap motel where you experienced decent TV was probably due to them being too cheap to have their own dist. amps. so they just paid for standard cable for each room.  

I pretty much thought that was the case. Most hotels are too cheap to put new systems in that handle things like aspect ratio correctly. Even quite big ones. 

Funnily enough, it seems like places that have DirecTV do the best job. It might be that DirecTV just do most of the work themselves when they sign up a hotel. Needless to say, everyone has remote that mean you can't really fiddle with settings or change aspect ratios.
 

2, For the entire 29 days of my trip, I don't think I've seen CNN cover anything apart from that Malaysian plane. Right now, Anderson Cooper is probably bored to tears as he conducts yet another feature on it. They were showing how they found the Titanic earlier because that's relevant... Sometimes, they just make it easy for Fox to make fun of the "Plane Channel",

Best Tweet I saw today was something along the lines of, "CNN has renewed the search for Flight 370 for a second season." 


 I'm expecting News Specials on the Bermuda Triangle coming soon. And as long as Joel McHale promises not to make fun of it, perhaps they'll start a major search for Big Foot?


Adam

PGage

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Apr 16, 2014, 10:28:17 AM4/16/14
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Jeff Zucker is an asshole.
 
But I begin to see some merit to this approach to CNN (see the two paragraphs from the story Kevin linked to below).
 
I think it would be much better for CNN to have actual non-news programs in its primetime schedule than for it to have nominal news programs that are produced as non-news. Presumably CNN will still have a sizeable news staff and infrastructure, and be ready to break into non-news programs when events warrant. If having entertainment shows in primetime decreases their need to turn news shows into entertainment, it might be a boon.
 

"The seamless integration of original series and live news coverage, which has been on display the last two months, is the foundation of our new prime-time lineup," said Jeff Zucker, CNN Worldwide president.

CNN had been seeing some historically low ratings earlier this year until the Malaysian airliner went missing several weeks ago. Coverage of that story has since dominated the network, dramatically improving the ratings.



On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 11:33 PM, Adam Bowie <ad...@adambowie.co.uk> wrote:

Bob Jersey

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Apr 16, 2014, 10:46:02 AM4/16/14
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Adam Bowie, exchanging with Kevin M., in part:
 
1. Barely any hotel or motel has any kind of understanding of aspect rations. They all have widescreen TVs, but mostly they're somehow stretching the picture wrongly even though it too is widescreen. And this has very little bearing on how expensive or not the room is. The best adjusted TV I came across was in a dirt cheap motel. (I'd have a moan about HD downgraded to analogue SD before it gets delivered to the room's HD TV, but that'd be too easy).

This has to do with the type of feed the cable companies sell to hotels and motels. Because they have to run through internal distribution amplifiers, they aren't typically sent the latest and greatest signals because hotel systems have to rescramble them to send to individual rooms. In all likelihood, the cheap motel where you experienced decent TV was probably due to them being too cheap to have their own dist. amps. so they just paid for standard cable for each room.  

I pretty much thought that was the case. Most hotels are too cheap to put new systems in that handle things like aspect ratio correctly. Even quite big ones. 

Funnily enough, it seems like places that have DirecTV do the best job. It might be that DirecTV just do most of the work themselves when they sign up a hotel. Needless to say, everyone has remote that mean you can't really fiddle with settings or change aspect ratios.

Kev, the cablers, at least big guys like Comcast and TW, have to be working on updating this sitch if they haven't already. They can't value the travelers any less than any other viewer.

B

Kevin M.

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Apr 16, 2014, 12:18:04 PM4/16/14
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On Wed, Apr 16, 2014 at 7:46 AM, Bob Jersey <bob.in...@juno.com> wrote:
 
Kev, the cablers, at least big guys like Comcast and TW, have to be working on updating this sitch if they haven't already. They can't value the travelers any less than any other viewer.

There's no need and no incentive to fix it. Hotel guests are a captive audience to whatever TV service is provided, and as Adam discovered there's no predicting it in advance. Hotels in big cities like New York and Las Vegas exist to make their rooms just nice enough to sleep in, but they really want you out of the room spending money in local businesses. It's like fast-food restaurant chairs... they could be made more comfortable, but then the people who only bought a cheap cup of coffee will linger longer and take up space for some other customer.


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Kevin M. (RPCV)

Joe Hass

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Apr 16, 2014, 1:19:21 PM4/16/14
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Or, as I like to note: it drive me nuts, but my wife doesn't even notice it.

But hey: CNN found *some* breaking news other than the Malaysian jet last night: http://jimromenesko.com/2014/04/16/morning-report-for-april-16-2014/ 

M-D November

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Apr 16, 2014, 1:48:36 PM4/16/14
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Brad Beam

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Apr 16, 2014, 5:44:36 PM4/16/14
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From: tvor...@googlegroups.com [mailto:tvor...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Kevin M.

>There's no need and no incentive to fix it. Hotel guests are a captive audience to whatever TV service is provided, and as Adam discovered there's no predicting it in advance. Hotels in big cities like New York and Las Vegas exist to make their rooms just nice enough to sleep in, but they really want you out of the room spending money in local businesses. It's like fast-food restaurant chairs... they could be made more comfortable, but then the people who only bought a cheap cup of coffee will linger longer and take up space for some other customer.

Besides, if your laptop is Web-capable and the hotel’s WiFi is up to the task, your TV viewing shouldn’t be restricted. (But then as Dad would say, “You don’t go on vacation to watch TV.”)

 

_  _

|_>|_>  Brad Beam- Belle WV

|_>|_>  http://www.facebook.com/74bmw

Jim Ellwanger

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Apr 16, 2014, 6:17:40 PM4/16/14
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Brad Beam wrote:
> (But then as Dad would say, "You don't go on vacation to watch TV.")

"I want to watch TV in a different time zone!" -- Homer Simpson



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Bob Jersey

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Apr 16, 2014, 9:52:29 PM4/16/14
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Kevin M., to moi:
There's no need and no incentive to fix it. Hotel guests are a captive audience to whatever TV service is provided, and as Adam discovered there's no predicting it in advance. Hotels in big cities like New York and Las Vegas exist to make their rooms just nice enough to sleep in, but they really want you out of the room spending money in local businesses. It's like fast-food restaurant chairs... they could be made more comfortable, but then the people who only bought a cheap cup of coffee will linger longer and take up space for some other customer.

I didn't just throw Comcast and TW out there as placeholders. (links to their hospitality-industry offerings)  Kev only wants to look at the dumpwaters; I want to look only at the places (f'rinstance) the effin' District Court suggested to me in the process of harassing me into jury duty last year in the Philly-dilly.

B

Kevin M.

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Apr 17, 2014, 12:37:49 AM4/17/14
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On Wed, Apr 16, 2014 at 6:52 PM, Bob Jersey <bob.in...@juno.com> wrote:

I didn't just throw Comcast and TW out there as placeholders. (links to their hospitality-industry offerings)  Kev only wants to look at the dumpwaters; I want to look only at the places (f'rinstance) the effin' District Court suggested to me in the process of harassing me into jury duty last year in the Philly-dilly.

I don't recall saying that; I said the smaller hotels and motels probably don't bother with the "offerings" such as on-tv games, menus, check-out, and other options, so you'd be more likely to see consumer cable in those. 

A lot of my friends have had jury duty recently. I'm told some of your better jury rooms have free wifi now.  


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Kevin M. (RPCV)

M-D November

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Apr 17, 2014, 12:28:41 PM4/17/14
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Actually even some of the larger hotels I've stayed at recently (Hiltons and the like) have moved away from LodgeNet and toward distribution of a local cable signal. I think with the proliferation of mobile gaming and internet-connected personal devices, in-room games and TV data are past their expiration date as amenities.

Jim Ellwanger

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Apr 17, 2014, 1:08:29 PM4/17/14
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M-D November wrote:
> Actually even some of the larger hotels I've stayed at recently (Hiltons
> and the like) have moved away from LodgeNet and toward distribution of a
> local cable signal. I think with the proliferation of mobile gaming and
> internet-connected personal devices, in-room games and TV data are past
> their expiration date as amenities.

A couple of years ago, I stayed in a Hampton Inn in Oneonta, New York,
that was picking up and redistributing the local cable signal -- and they
had all the channels in alphabetical order, first broadcast (ABC through
PBS) and then cable (A&E through The Weather Channel, if I recall
correctly). I loved the OCD-ness.

Adam Bowie

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Apr 18, 2014, 5:29:09 AM4/18/14
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It's absolutely true that in places like Vegas, they want you out of the room spending money.

And once upon a time I did find it very exciting to see what America was getting months or even years before the UK. Now we get series the same week. Game of Thrones actually simulcast with the Eastern US broadcast (in the small hours).

But a couple of points worth noting:

- Little things like TVs working properly are as important to some guests as a working shower or comfortable mattresses. Why would you get those right and screw up the TV?

- It's a great free trial of a rival service. Thinking about ditching cable for DirecTV? Well you might want to be satisfied with a trial at a Best Western. "I tried DirecTV at a hotel and it was garbage..."

Oh for any kind of EPG on any of these sets. What's on now? What's on next? A TV Guide channel was about the best I got.

Incidentally, it's pretty much as bad in the UK, although the domestic over the air digital service (Freeview) does have an EPG and/or Now/Next service built in.

And if you're not going to offer a PVR facility, fine, but don't supply a remote with buttons that suggest there is one!

Anyway, I must now hope that my PVR which was 33% empty when I left it isn't completely stuffed on my return!

Adam

Ed Dravecky

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Apr 19, 2014, 8:49:15 AM4/19/14
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Jim Ellwanger <trai...@ellwanger.tv> wrote:
> "I want to watch TV in a different time zone!" -- Homer Simpson

Which reminds me... We mini-binged on the last four "The Crazy Ones"
episodes last night and in one episode Brad Garrett's character notes
a couple of times that "it's 7:55, NCIS is about to start". Sorry,
LA-based writers, but Chicago is in the Central time zone. Thanks for
playing.

--
Ed Dravecky
Dallas, Texas

Brad Beam

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Apr 19, 2014, 9:08:15 AM4/19/14
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-----Original Message-----
From: tvor...@googlegroups.com [mailto:tvor...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Ed Dravecky

>Which reminds me... We mini-binged on the last four "The Crazy Ones" episodes last night and in one episode Brad Garrett's character notes a couple of times that "it's 7:55, NCIS is about to start". Sorry, LA-based writers, but Chicago is in the Central time zone. Thanks for playing.

Check your local listings: Next Saturday (4/26) CBS' Crimetime Saturday will have "NCIS" on at 9, 8 Central/Mountain... and a half-hour later in Newfoundland.

Jon Delfin

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Apr 19, 2014, 9:11:03 AM4/19/14
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Yes, I'm sure that's what the writers had in mind.


Diner

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Apr 20, 2014, 10:44:06 AM4/20/14
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On Saturday, April 19, 2014 9:08:15 AM UTC-4, Brad Beam wrote:
-----Original Message-----
From: tvor...@googlegroups.com [mailto:tvor...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Ed Dravecky

>Which reminds me... We mini-binged on the last four "The Crazy Ones" episodes last night and in one episode Brad Garrett's character notes a couple of times that "it's 7:55, NCIS is about to start". Sorry, LA-based writers, but Chicago is in the Central time zone. Thanks for playing.

Check your local listings: Next Saturday (4/26) CBS' Crimetime Saturday will have "NCIS" on at 9, 8 Central/Mountain... and a half-hour later in Newfoundland.




I'm pretty sure that scene took place on a weeknight, though, given the scenes in the office right before and after it.

That was the first "Crazy Ones" episode I've seen since the pilot - I tuned in to see the Dawber/Williams reunion. Liked that part of it - they still play off each other very well, and the blooper at the end where she laughs at his ad lib was a sweet touch. Still, I started wondering early on when they were going to thrown in a "Mork" reference (and sure enough they did, right before the end). And it was nice to see a guest spot by Sarah Baker, one of the best things about "Go On." (Although I spent the whole episode wondering "Where do I know that woman from?" before I realized, "Oh yes, I know her from that show I watched all 22 episodes of last season." Which tells you how much these shows stick with me.)

Also, the celebrity guest appearance (by David Copperfield) was worked into the story just as awkwardly as it was in the pilot (when Kelly Clarkson was the celeb). I'm glad I didn't see the Brad Paisley episode to see what they put him through.

-Tim

Mark Jeffries

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Apr 20, 2014, 10:53:27 AM4/20/14
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I was surprised to note that Dawber's voice has gotten sexier with age.

I guess time heals all wounds, but I still flash back to a standup gig Williams did at the Park West in Chicago in 1980 or 81 during "Mork"s off-season where he kept referring to her as "Pam Doo Dah."  But it's entirely possible that during that time Williams was trying to avoid getting typecast as Mork for the rest of his career.  I guess he succeeded.

Mark Jeffries
Saints Spotlight Editor
spotl...@gmail.com


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David Bruggeman

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Apr 20, 2014, 1:46:59 PM4/20/14
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You can still catch Dawber's April 8th appearance with Craig on the CBS website or app.

David


From: Mark Jeffries <spotl...@gmail.com>
To: tvor...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, April 20, 2014 10:53 AM
Subject: Re: [TV orNotTV] Piers Morgan to be replaced by... nobody

Doug Eastick

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Apr 20, 2014, 6:24:58 PM4/20/14
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One, I don't think I knew she was married to mark Harmon.

Two, can't believe she hadn't seen robin Williams in person in thirty years. Wow. Talk about removing yourself from the circle, even though your hubby is in it.

She expressed no interest in getting into any sort of biz work. Just that one episode with Robin, she said, was enough.
--
/mobile

David Bruggeman

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Apr 20, 2014, 9:28:24 PM4/20/14
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Harmon rarely, if ever, mentions his wife by name in talk show appearances.  Not that she comes up that often.

I am kind of surprised she did go on with Craig, given how out of the business she's been.  I can see CBS asking, but I could see her thinking it was enough just to do the sitcom episode.

David


From: Doug Eastick <eas...@mcD.on.ca>
To: tvor...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, April 20, 2014 6:24 PM

M-D November

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Apr 20, 2014, 11:31:40 PM4/20/14
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Maybe he MEANT NCIS:LA?
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