In case you haven’t heard already, Ed McMahon passed away today (read a short story from his nephew). While I remember him fondly as Johnny Carson’s partner in crime on the Tonight Show, this generation probably only knows him as the old guy in this modern (albeit funny) commercial:
Category: Sad
Pixar is Awesome
Not only do they make great movies, but they do good deeds.
HUNTINGTON BEACH – Colby Curtin, a 10-year-old with a rare form of cancer, was staying alive for one thing — a movie.
From the minute Colby saw the previews to the Disney-Pixar movie Up, she was desperate to see it. Colby had been diagnosed with vascular cancer about three years ago, said her mother, Lisa Curtin, and at the beginning of this month it became apparent that she would die soon and was too ill to be moved to a theater to see the film.
After a family friend made frantic calls to Pixar to help grant Colby her dying wish, Pixar came to the rescue.
The company flew an employee with a DVD of Up, which is only in theaters, to the Curtins’ Huntington Beach home on June 10 for a private viewing of the movie.
[…]
Colby died about seven hours after seeing the film.
Up was a great movie — I saw it last week. This story, and that movie, brought a little tear to my eye.
The Folks At PETA Are Crazy
To this day, one of the most-commented-on entries is this site is an old post about the crackpots at PETA. I’m sure this entry will get some anti-PETA commentary as well.
PETA‘s latest escapade? They’re getting on President Obama for killing a fly during a televised interview. Instead, PETA wished the Prez would’ve used a humane bug catcher.
Personally, I prefer the old fashioned method.
Oregon Media Insiders Is Done
Oregon Media Insiders will cease to operate (at least under Lynn) as of tomorrow.
I lost a friend today over this site–a good friend, one of my best friends. Losing friends was always a risk of doing this site, and in a way I’m surprised it hasn’t happened sooner. I don’t think I can get this friend back; I’ve been told not to respond to the email, though I’m going to try anyway.
I’ve never liked running uncivil websites, ever. In fact, I’ve never run one, other than OMI. I’ve never had a website quite like it. The problem with OMI has always been that the more I censored, the more open to lawsuits I was. And I have no legal defense team, no corporate owner with big pockets to rescue me. There’s only me. I know this is a concept that’s really weird-sounding to some of you, but I’m telling you, that’s the way the legal precedents stand now.
Moving to accounts-only posting has helped a great deal with the nasty drive-by posting. But I can’t do this any more. A broken heart can do what a purple-faced news director or corporate lawyer cannot.
So I have to stop doing this. End of day tomorrow (when the current ads expire) I’m taking the site offline. I would like very much for someone to take over OMI. I think it’s important that a site like this continue, but I don’t have it in me any more.
I really hope somebody picks up the slack and carries the site further, as I think it was a good blog for junkies like me who have worked in the very same kinds of places that are talked about on that site. I’ve linked there a few times in the past, and I think that media commentary that that site provides is sorely needed.
More commentary here and here.
Honestly, if I knew more about the Portland-area media, I’d offer to at least help take over the site, but I already have very little free time as it is.
Update: Folks are trying to keep up the discussion elsewhere.
He Probably Had The Three Wolf Moon Shirt On
Ten Twenty (sorry, brain fart) years later, have things really changed in China? Nope.
There’s a great Frontline piece on Tank Man and some great stories from photographers who were there have been posted on the NYT Lens blog. I would love to know what happened to that guy, as would many, I’m sure.
(And if you don’t understand the joke in the headline, read up.)
Update on 6/8: The NYT Lens blog has another never-before-seen angle of the events.
Hear That? That’s The Sound Of Nobody Giving A Rip
Aston Kutcher might stop twittering Everybody panic!!!1!1!!eleven!!!
Piracy Isn’t Killing The Movie Studios
It’s really bad movie ideas that are killing Hollywood:
Peter Berg may be crying out “You sank my battleship!”
The filmmaker is in talks to direct a big-screen version of the Hasbro board game for Universal. Brothers Jon and Erich Hoeber have signed on to write the script.
[…]
Universal has several board game titles in development as part of its six-year deal with Hasbro. “Ouija Board” is being produced by Michael Bay’s Platinum Dunes shingle, “Candy Land” has Kevin Lima attached to direct with Etan Cohen writing the script, and Ridley Scott is developing a project based on “Monopoly.”
Mr. Thomas can finally move to The Bahamas and open up a moped lot…
…as it looks like his dealership isn’t going to sell Chryslers anymore (if you don’t get the joke in the headline you’re obviously not local nor listen to local radio).
TS&S still sells Subarus here in Bend (they used to sell Hyundai’s, too, but that’s now a Jim Smolich thing) so they’ll still be around focusing on Subarus — which seem to be really popular around here, so I’m sure they’ll be fine. I’d just have any repair work done somewhere else.
The MPAA Has Lost Their Mind
You just can’t make this stuff up….
The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Fred von Lohmann sez, “Hearings for the DMCA triennial rulemaking are going on this week in DC, where the educational community is asking for an exemption to rip DVDs to take clips for classroom use. The MPAA responded with a video showing how to camcord (!) movies from a flat screen monitor, arguing that educators and students should do this instead of ripping DVDs. In the words of media literacy researcher Martine Courant Rife, that’s like typing up a quote from a book, taking it outside, chiseling the words in a rock, photographing the rock, scanning the photo, and running OCR on it. And for what?”
There’s even a video of the MPAA showing how to record a TV.
Engadget also has some hilarious comments
It should also be noted that they are allowing audio to be used in the classroom so long as it is recorded from another source using a Talkboy.
If you don’t remember what a Talkboy was, read up.
Seriously, these guys are nuts.