Damn Channel Ten and what they’re doing to my TV!

THE HORROR!!! (Clicky!)

First off, let’s start with what the actual issue presented in the article. Channel Ten is removing The Simpsons altogether and replacing it with The Bold and the Beautiful. So, this means that The Simpsons is out and B&B is taking over the 6:00 pm time slot (with Judge Judy taking over 4:30 pm and repeats of Everybody loves Raymond taking over at 3:00 pm).

So, what prompted this sudden change in schedule? At first, I thought it might be because of ratings–how, I had no idea, since I would have thought The Simpsons was doing better than B&B, even with the declining quality of the recent seasons. After all, the Ten website said that, “The Bold and the Beautiful delivered higher ratings worldwide in 2006 than any other daily drama series.” Well, really? Good for them. Still, that was in 2006 and this is the end of 2008, so things might have changed.

Now, according to Wikipedia, B&B “has become the most-watched soap in the world with an audience of an estimated 26.2 million viewers in more than 110 countries worldwide.“ On August 3, 2007, B&B experienced its lowest ever number of viewers in America, 3,048,000. If we compare that to The Simpsons, maybe we can discover why it is that Ten is making this change.

But hold on… Wikipedia says that “the nineteenth season [of The Simpsons] had an average of 7.7 million viewers.” (Note that the twentieth season aired in America in September this year, so the nineteenth is one of those ‘poorer quality’ seasons). So if The Simpsons is a higher rated show, why is Ten replacing it? It must be said, of course, that these ratings are for American TV, so may not be accurate for Australia. So perhaps the ratings on our stations are vastly different and B&B is more popular. Perhaps.

My next thought was that maybe Ten is under the impression that B&B will gain a larger audience at the new timeslot. But surely that can’t be right either. Wouldn’t most of the viewers be from the older generations? And don’t older generations tend to watch the news? And isn’t the news usually on (on other channels) at 6:00 pm? So HOW is Ten going to drag them away from their news to watch a really, really old soap with repeating plot lines and incest (though, this IS another matter…)? I don’t think they are.

Besides, The Simpsons is something that parents can sit their kids in front of (depending on age and show rating, of course) while dinner is being prepared or eaten. It’s the kind of show that keeps the kids away while parents are watching the news (yes, the news again!). Couldn’t it therefore be said that axing The Simpsons and replacing it with a show that kids will find completely boring is a very impractical move? I’d say so. I am saying so.

So, maybe Ten’s motives aren’t for either of those reasons? Maybe they just thought that The Simpsons has been around for many many years and it’s just time for it to go. No, that can’t be the reason! After all, The Simpsons has been on television since December 1989, and B&B has been on since March 1987. So really, if Ten was removing The Simpsons for that reason, wouldn’t cutting B&B be a much better idea?

So, why is Ten doing this, again?

Anyway, let’s move on to the next issue, something that’s less of a dramatic and confusing one and more of a really irritating one to me on a personal level, not so much public. Supernatural. Where the crap did it go? I came home from schoolies pumped to watch the next episode and I find out that it’s not even on. What’s it being replaced with? The Ex-List. Hey, I can move past that! Just chuck it on at 8:30, since Good News Week is finished for the year. Oh wait, what?! No, they can’t do that either, because of some show called Army Wives (likely to just be some stupid show about controlling wives who force their husbands to get out of bed on a Saturday morning and do star jumps or mow the lawn–oh, the horror!).

I’m angry. I think Ten is making a few very stupid decisions with their schedule and are likely to lose far more viewers than they gain. I never thought I’d say it, but I might have to start looking for programs on Channel 7 to start wasting my time with. Ten’s only redeeming quality is that they tend to give us reasonable weekend movies. Well great, that’s going to keep me there in the long run! </sarcasm>

MSN CLOSING DOWN?! (*laughing*)

EDIT (5th April ‘09): Wow, I don’t know HOW people are still finding this post, but it’s come to my attention that these emails are STILL circulating! Lol whut? I’m still laughing. People are stupid. XD

Yes, we’ve all got the emails from a mass of people under the impression that MSN is closing down. I’m here to complain about them and point out the many reasons why I doubt (very much) that it’s ever going to happen.

What’s interesting (for a start!) is that they all tend to follow the same general layout: introduction of the ‘MSN directors’, saying straight out that MSN is closing down, AND charging money, then the reason (there’s HOW MANY NAMES LEFT OMG?!) followed by how you can fix it. Don’t worry, you just have to send the message to a certain amount of people on your contact list, fear not!

Anyway–fail. How many of these emails are actually out there? I got another one just today (and if you’ve already seen this one, or any of the others following, forgive me) and again I couldn’t help but laugh. Here, read:

This is Tara and John, the directors of MSN. We would like to sincerely apologize for the interruption, but msn is closing down. We know many of these messages have been sent out lately, and that they wouldn’t be true. However, this one is in fact true, and it will occur soon.
MSN will begin to charge you money soon.

This is due to the fact that too many inconsiderate people are taking up all the names (ie. making up lots of different accounts for just one person). Therefore, we only have 578 names left. If you would like to close your account, DO NOT SEND THIS MESSAGE ON. We would not reccommend this, because if in the future you’d like to use MSN, and you don’t send this message on, you will be CHARGED to use MSN monthly. If you would like to keep your account, then SEND THIS MESSAGE TO EVERYONE ON YOUR CONTACT LIST. As we said this before, this is no joke, and we will be shutting down the servers. Please send it on. We do not want to be receiving phone calls stating that your MSN will not open, or that you are being charged for using it – because this will be your fauly for not sending it on. The estimated cost for MSN monthly will be about ten dollars CAN.

SEND THIS TO EVERYONE ON YOUR CONTACT LIST. NOW YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION. In case you believed this is yet another of those ‘prank’ MSN shut down emails, go to: Address removed. Once you’ve sent this message to at least 18 contacts, your msn icon will become blue.

Regards,
Tara and John
(Directors and Operators of MSN.com, Hotmail, Windows Live Hotmail,etc)

*cough* Um… yeah. Actually, this was one of the better ones I’ve seen. Let me point out the ISSUES, though, in a comprehensive list.

1. The grammar and spelling FAILS. See “this will be your fauly for not” and “We know many of these messages have been sent out lately, and that they wouldn’t be true.”
2. Inconsistencies. See “MSN” and “msn” (repeatedly!).
3. The Canadian money reference. Let’s face it–MSN was and remains American (“MSN [The Microsoft Network] is a collection of Internet services provided by Microsoft.” – Wikipedia), so WHY are the directors talking about Canadian dollars? I’m fairly sure they’d use US dollars and leave us to change it to our own currency.

Now, lets focus on another email, yes? This time I’ve bolded issue areas:

Dear Hotmail User,
Because of the sudden rush of people signing up to Hotmail,it has come to our attention that we are vastly running out of resources. So, within a month’s time, anyone who does not receive this email with the exact subject heading, will be deleted off our server.Please forward this email so that we know you are still using this account.

WARNING WARNING

We want to find out which users are actually using their Hotmail accounts. So if you are using your account, please pass this e-mail to every Hotmail user that you can and if you do not pass this letter to anyone we will delete your account.

From Mr. Jon Henerd
Hotmail Admin. Dept.

Our hotmail system is getting to crowded!! We need you to forward this to at least 20 people. I know this seems like a large number, but we need to find out who is really using their account. If you do not send this to at least 10 Hotmail members, we will delete your account. Sorry for this inconvenience.

Sincerely, Director of Hotmail Services
Aaron Lopez
Please do this! Some of my friends have already gotten deleted and you aren’t allowed to send it back to the person who sent this email to you!!!

MOAR ISSUES!!!

1. Spelling and grammar. AGAIN! Too many exclamation marks, not enough ‘o’s, spaces or commas. Fail.
2. Inconsistencies. AGAIN! If I was someone stupid, I’d be running around tearing my head out, not knowing if I was supposed to send it to 10 or 20 people or simply as many as I could. Uh oh!
3. Another Director. Which one is the real one?! Guess the director!
4. Poor Director Aaron Lopez, his friends got deleted. Wait, what? Why didn’t he tell them it was happening? Bastard, I wouldn’t be HIS friend anymore. And…wait… Is he giving RULES for who I can and can’t send the email to? Jerk!
5. I got this email on Saturday, 8 March 2008 3:04:34 PM. I’m sure you know what the date is (even approximately) now. It’s more than a month after I got the email. Funnily enough, I still have my hotmail AND MSN running.

And there’s MORE. MOAR DIRECTORS! “it is Andy and John the directors of MSN” who have only 578 names left, and are saying MSN will cost 10 POUNDS a month to use. I got that one in December last year. Another one told me it would cost 100.00 (dollars, pounds, yen, it didn’t say…) a month and that would happen by November 2007 (and I got THAT one December ‘07, too!), and there was still ONLY 578 NAMES LEFT! Another one told me “PLEASE DO NOT FORWARD THIS or REPLAY”. Well darn, and I so wanted to replay that wonderful message… -_-

But seriously, the one piece of damning evidence? Windows Live Messenger sends me emails quite frequently. Why wouldn’t they send these emails themselves? And WHY do the forwarded emails not have the

Windows Live Messenger HEADER, people!

usual setup of a Live Messenger, including the HEADER and FOOTER?! I mean, honestly. They’re not very professional, then, are they?

If one bothered to check msn.com and search around a little bit, one might find that “Chat Service will no longer be offered on or after October 16th, 2006″. CURSE YOU! Where was my forwarded email about THAT?! I don’t think I got one, thank heavens.

If I had have been someone in control of MSN or any one of those services, I probably would have shut it down or charged people to stop idiots from using it. THAT would have stopped those emails!

</rant>

Thus, the Beginning… (and Saving the World)

‘Erratic Ramblings’–pretty much exactly what it says there is what I’ll be discussing here. There comes a time in a monkey’s life where they have to have somewhere they can rant and rave and praise and shoot down anything they desire. That’s what I’ll be doing here.

My first post isn’t a rant or anything like that. I bring to you two sites that are working towards VERY good causes simply via trivia and word comprehension. The first one is, by now, commonly known, but I think it’s a good idea to advertise it as much as possible so they get more action over there.

Free Rice is a website that allows you to “Help end world hunger by providing rice to hungry people for free.” You’re doing just that. By playing their online game, a dictionary game in which you select the best meaning out of four for the word you’re provided, you ‘donate’ free rice. For each correct answer you give, you donate 20 grains of rice. It doesn’t seem like much, but in 10 minutes it’s possible to donate about 2000 grains of

Free Rice Main Page

rice and heaps of people around the world are participating at the very same time as you. According to the site, on one day, over 46 MILLION grains of rice were donated. In a month, (in this instance, July ‘08), 2 BILLION grains.

At first one is understandable dubious: ‘I can give free rice by playing a GAME?!’ but from what the website’s FAQ tells us, it actually makes sense. I’ll leave it to you to go and figure out if you think it’s worth it.

Along the same lines is a wonderful little site where you donate free kibble to dogs in need of it–so, neglected dogs and such.

Free Kibble works on much the same basis as Free Rice, with the exception of how much you can donate. Where Free Rice is an unlimited amount, Free Kibble only allows you to donate 20 pieces of kibble each day (although in this case, even if you answer the daily trivia question wrong, you contribution and effort is counted and you’ve donated 20 pieces of kibble as easy as that). Via the Free Kibble site you can access the sister site, Free Kibble Kat, which donates to cats in need rather than dogs.

These two sites (three if you count Free Kibble Kat) I think are wonderful ideas. It’s entertaining, easy, and completely free, and there’s the satisfaction of knowing you’re doing something. Lord knows I can’t donate MONEY (I simply don’t HAVE it), so being able to help out this way is great.

So, now it’s your choice whether or not you visit the sites. Personally, I’d recommend it (or I wouldn’t be rambling about them here), so go for it. Go help save some people!

- Mono.