Conan Sticks It To NBC

In a really unnecessary battle for who will take over NBC late night television, Conan O’Brien was asked to move his show back to 12:05 to accomodate Jay Leno’s new show. Standing up for the tradition of the Tonight Show, here was his response:

People of Earth:

In the last few days, I’ve been getting a lot of sympathy calls, and I want to start by making it clear that no one should waste a second feeling sorry for me. For 17 years, I’ve been getting paid to do what I love most and, in a world with real problems, I’ve been absurdly lucky. That said, I’ve been suddenly put in a very public predicament and my bosses are demanding an immediate decision.

Six years ago, I signed a contract with NBC to take over The Tonight Show in June of 2009. Like a lot of us, I grew up watching Johnny Carson every night and the chance to one day sit in that chair has meant everything to me. I worked long and hard to get that opportunity, passed up far more lucrative offers, and since 2004 I have spent literally hundreds of hours thinking of ways to extend the franchise long into the future. It was my mistaken belief that, like my predecessor, I would have the benefit of some time and, just as important, some degree of ratings support from the prime-time schedule. Building a lasting audience at 11:30 is impossible without both.

But sadly, we were never given that chance. After only seven months, with my Tonight Show in its infancy, NBC has decided to react to their terrible difficulties in prime-time by making a change in their long-established late night schedule.

Last Thursday, NBC executives told me they intended to move the Tonight Show to 12:05 to accommodate the Jay Leno Show at 11:35. For 60 years the Tonight Show has aired immediately following the late local news. I sincerely believe that delaying the Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting. The Tonight Show at 12:05 simply isn’t the Tonight Show. Also, if I accept this move I will be knocking the Late Night show, which I inherited from David Letterman and passed on to Jimmy Fallon, out of its long-held time slot. That would hurt the other NBC franchise that I love, and it would be unfair to Jimmy.

So it has come to this: I cannot express in words how much I enjoy hosting this program and what an enormous personal disappointment it is for me to consider losing it. My staff and I have worked unbelievably hard and we are very proud of our contribution to the legacy of The Tonight Show. But I cannot participate in what I honestly believe is its destruction. Some people will make the argument that with DVRs and the Internet a time slot doesn’t matter. But with the Tonight Show, I believe nothing could matter more.

There has been speculation about my going to another network but, to set the record straight, I currently have no other offer and honestly have no idea what happens next. My hope is that NBC and I can resolve this quickly so that my staff, crew, and I can do a show we can be proud of, for a company that values our work.

Have a great day and, for the record, I am truly sorry about my hair; it’s always been that way.

Yours,

Conan

What do you all think? I love Jay Leno but I believe the future of late night in the long run will be Conan. Jay should have stepped down and retired while he was still on top and preserved his late night legacy. I think if NBC sticks with this decision, they will one day wind up regretting this.

Dissing David Archuleta?

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If you told me when I woke up this morning that I was going to personally cause an uproar among several die-hard David Archuleta fans today, I would have laughed.

However, the story of how my day started is one you really don’t make up. Currently nominations for the Shorty Awards are taking place: awards for best tweeters in certain categories (humor, cooking, nonprofit, life, business,etc). I skimmed through the current nomination leaders and noticed that David Archuleta’s Twitter account was one of the top five nominations for many categories. Categories that were completely unrelated (i.e. Customer Service?). Seeing how Twitter and online voting has a tendency sometimes to be more of a popularity than a content contest, I posted my observation on his pending success in the awards:

“Looking at the Shorty Award leaderboard, either David Archuleta’s votes are inflated or he is the most well-rounded tweeter ever”- @drewhawkins

Just an observation I had about the current award list. In my opinion, a fairly objective one. However, I didn’t expect the firestorm to come. Obviously he has a strong Twitter fan following and a few high-spirited fans immediately went to his “defense.” Below are some of the responses I had sent my way:

@pam05: FYI David Archuleta @DavidArchie he tweets about food, exercise, family, charity & has good morals & values. Great role model.

@pam05: Have you heard him sing? He can actually sing, no auto tone needed!

It was good to learn why he may be popular. I appreciated the positive reinforcement. Then it got interesting.

@maxie2g0: what the…it’s obvious u know nothing about @DavidArchie. He just happens to have a fan base that luvs him as a whole

@maxie2g0: and shows it. I assure u only a portion of his base is reg. here so even voting in the #Shorty’s. What’s wrong with you?

Trying to put out a potentially absurd fire, I re-instated that I wasn’t dissing Mr. Archuleta personally or his craft. I have nothing against the guy at all, no reason for disrespect. Just making a casual observation about a contest. This somewhat resolved things…sorta.

@maxie2g0: if no dissing of David was meant then we’ll accept ur word. We don’t lie to David about our feelings regarding him or his work.

Fortunately, there was another normal Archuleta fan that came to my defense!

@andreaonFOD I can assure you what you said about David was not out of line. Sorry for some of those comments to u from DA fans.

Thanks @andreaonFOD for the positive reinforcement. Also thanks for thanking my mom for voting for him on American Idol. Thanks to @pam05 for keeping a positive spin on her defenses. Finally, thanks to @maxie2g0 for making my day that much more entertaining.

Weird how fast the internet carries information right? This is a good example of how fast information can get around, even if you have no real intent. There were several other responses but these were a few. With this loyal of a fan base, I reckon he’s doing something right.

Learning To Appreciate Technology

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When it comes to technology, my generation is insanely spoiled. I’m no exception. When things break down or something is not moving as fast as I would like it to, I become extremely put out. However, after listening to this guy, I am taking a step back and appreciating what technology does for me and how lucky we are to have the tools available that we do.

So You Think I Can’t Dance?

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Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Columbus Day? Really?

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Every year on October 12, ever since it became a federal holiday in 1934, we Americans celebrate (though not all necessarily observe) Columbus Day. As most people know, it’s to honor Christopher Columbus’s discovery of the New World in 1492. However, if we were to step back and really think about it, would we honor a man like this today?

Let’s start off with Chris’s (can I call him Chris?) original intent: to find an all water route to India. I’m not a geography scholar but he kinda got that one wrong. To his defense, nobody else had made an water-only trip to India so it’s not like he had a TomTom to help him out. However, when he finally landed in the “New World,” he still thought he was in India. He named the islands he landed on the West Indies thinking simply if he named a place after India, it automatically made it that place. If we all played by those rules, I live in Buckingham Palace.

The New World. Let’s break that down. It wasn’t a New World. Just new to Europeans. There had been people living there all along. However, I don’t believe that counted in Chris’s eyes. He enslaved and/or killed many of the indigenous people there and forced them into Catholicism.

Chris didn’t do a whole lot for Italian explorers either. Marco Polo (in my opinion) had a greater impact on world culture and did more for Italian exploration. He brought noodles back from Asia to Italy and “Voila!” Now we have spaghetti and Olive Gardens everywhere.

That’s something worth celebrating.

So let’s raise our glasses to running three boats into an unnamed continent and ruining indigenous people’s lives. Let’s celebrate Columbus…the only man honored for getting lost.

The Most Inspiring Thing Ever Said

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Words to live by.

Random is Good

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I like random things and Conan is good for that. How people come up with this type of thing I have no idea. Last night walking home I heard Billy Joel playing a concert with Elton John at Wrigley Field so I felt some sort of tribute was appropriate.