A flight in a B-17 (5x8 - 5/31/11)
Posted at 7:15 AM on May 31, 2011
by Bob Collins
(16 Comments)
Filed under: Five by 8
The Monday Morning Rouser, special there-are-only-four-days-left-in-the-workweek edition...
1) FLYING THE LIBERTY BELLE
Residents of the St. Paul area might have seen the B-17 flying around downtown on Monday afternoon; it's a hard aircraft to miss. The Liberty Foundation tours the country with Liberty Belle; it spends very little time at its home base in Georgia because it has to earn its keep by giving rides. Next weekend, it will provide those out of the downtown airport. Yesterday, it took media people for a flight.
2) THE CURE FOR THE HIGHWAY 10 BLUES
That's one way to fly; here's another. A few years ago, I posted about the Martin Jetpack, which seemed like a nice way for some chap in New Zealand to lose his life's savings. Update: It flew over the weekend, setting a record height of 5,000 feet.
Who wants one? Did I mention the jetpack sustained some damage on impact, err, landing?
3) WORLD OF MARRIAGECRAFT
Are video games really a leading cause of divorce. The assertion is getting some nationwide attention today after a warmed-over story that Facebook is being cited in one in five divorce filings and World of Warcraft is more alluring to men, was served up by the Daily Mail.
'When it became serious he was playing up to eight hours a day. I was constantly trying to get him to cut back but he didn't think he had a problem until I told him I wanted to leave. But by that time it was too late.'
Ryan G Van Cleave, an expert on video game addiction, said many partners were unaware that gaming can become an addiction.
He said: 'The problem spouses encounter with video game addiction is that the non-gamer doesn't appreciate that it's an addiction. This means it's not a choice to spend so much time in a virtual environment versus time with the spouse and family. It's a compulsion.
The Daily Mail quoted a divorce Web site that said about 15 percent of couples are affected. But this morning, Computer World points out the flaw...
The Mail reveals (in paragraph 13 of its story - what's it doing down there?), that Divorce Online's 'study' was based on just 200 "unreasonable behaviour petitions filed by women".
Not exactly a fair cross section of divorcees up and down the land, when you consider that 113,949 UK married couples split in 2009 (the last full year on record at the Office For National Statistics).
Another possibility, according to Computer World: More men are escaping unhappy marriages with computer games.
4) THE CAPITOL MESS: WHO'S TO BLAME?
Over the weekend, the Star Tribune printed a story about Northfield residents being upset at the lack of compromise at the Capitol...
The voters are cranky in Minnesota House District 25B. And they aren't shy about saying so.
In a strip of the state defined as much by its political diversity and tight legislative races as it is by its mix of college campuses, rich farmland and exurban neighborhoods, the budget impasse and prospect of a state government shutdown this summer has struck a nerve.
Who's to blame for this? In this case, the voters of District 25B, writes Griff Wrigley today in Locally Grown Northfield...
Northfield's liberal voters rejected this moderate Republican and instead voted for Dahle in large numbers. Likewise, Cox was not enough of a social conservative for a large number of voters in the western part of the district and so they didn't vote in large enough numbers to offset the liberal vote in Northfield.
Northfield's liberals won the battle of 2008 but they lost the war in 2010 when the Republicans fielded much more conservative candidates in Al DeKruif and Kelby Woodard who were able to get out the D-25 conservative vote in big numbers.
So for 25B voters to now complain about extremes, partisanship, and gridlock seems a little disingenuous. Al and Kelby and the rest of the freshman Republicans know who and what got them there. Why compromise with Gov. Dayton until you have to?
We'll be hearing more of these "what's the matter with them?" stories as we head for a state shutdown at the end of next month. The question is off by one pronoun.
5) TORNADO VS. SOCCER
Don't "cheese off" soccer fans. That's the lesson Fox9 may consider after a weekend dust-up between its news staff and fans of the UEFA Champions League Final. The station broke into the action to report a tornado warning had been issued, relegating the game to a small box in the corner of the picture.
When the fans complained, EPL Talk reports, an anchor warned the fans not "cheese us off."
It's one thing to keep viewers safe, but what FOX 9 News did was on the verge of weather porn. KMSP-TV FOX 9 decided to show weather news instead of the half-time show, but was it really necessary to continue the weather coverage for the last 40 minutes of the game? Would FOX 9 News have done the same thing if it was a NFL or college football game?
A similar situation happened a few years ago when someone complained that WCCO's Paul Douglas was spending too much on tornado coverage. "We're saving lives here, ma'am," Douglas intones.
Discussion point: What's the proper balance between regular programming and weather coverage?
TODAY'S QUESTION
One of the founders of PayPal is giving 24 people under age 20 $100,000 to skip or quit college and start a business instead. Today's Question: Would you take $100,000 to forgo college?
WHAT WE'RE DOING
Midmorning (9-11 a.m.) - First hour: Aptitude testing.
Second hour: The uncertainty facing baby boomers is more pronounced than ever, from job transitions to empty nesting to retirement worries. But is there a new way to live and grow professionally beyond midlife?
Midday (11 a.m. - 1 p.m.) - First hour: Planetary scientist Robert Pepin, on the 50 years since President Kennedy sought to land a man on the moon.
Second hour: An America Abroad series, a discussion in Washington and Kabul, "Joined By War: Women's Rights in Today's Afghanistan."
Talk of the Nation (1-3 p.m.) - First hour: What it takes to turn around institutions.
Second hour: Ellis Cose joins host Neal Conan for a look at race and rage.
Comments (16)
The TV stations do tend to spend too much time covering the weather with their radar porn. It seems especially blatant when the storm in question covers a small portion of the station's viewing area.
Since the HD transition, most broadcast stations have two channels now, (9-1, 9-2), they should make better use of the secondary channel for the weather porn. Break in occasionally, run a crawl and a box, but then put the radar and rambling weather person on the secondary channel. This should hold especially true during live sporting events (except golf, it needs whatever help it can get).
Seriously some TV program or a possible deadly storm.
I'm waiting for Tivo and other streaming (netflix) to have a weather alert feature. We live about 2 miles from the MPLS site and didn't know anything about the bad weather til we heard the siren.
Why cant they just have a ticker or a voice-over? Radio programs cut out all the time and no one complains that they just missed their favorite part of their favorite song. Also, I feel that with the internet there are plenty of other ways of watching a game than on a local station.
I agree with Justin. Both FOX9 and KARE11 were using both of their stations for weather forecasts. It was a little over the top if you ask me. Put the weather alerts on the secondary channel and have a ticker on the main channel directing people to 9-2 if they want more info.
Also why were they telling people to go and make sure shut-ins were alright? Don't shut-ins just sit around and watch TV since they are shut-in?
The same thing happened in South Bend during the finish of the Indy 500 this weekend. Even worse, considering the location, the relative number of racing vs. soccer fans in the US, and that I don't believe they used the double box format to at least keep an eye on the racing action.
http://www.sbnation.com/2011/5/29/2196379/indy-500-finish-abc-57-indianapolis
Everybody should go buy a radio with the weather alert feature. They're not very expensive and you can't miss the blaring when a warning is issued. Much better than sirens which aren't designed to be heard by people inside (especially once air conditioning season kicks in).
Last night was a good example. The severe storms -- had they hit the TC -- would have done so around 2 or 3 in the morning, I believe. You're not going to hear a siren, you're obviously not going to be watching TV. A weather radio on an alarm clock is really the only thing that would give people enough notice to get to the basement.
It's cheap insurance.
Here endeth today's sermon.
"What's the proper balance between regular programming and weather coverage?"
During last Sunday's tornado we were flipping channels. Fox, CCO & KARE had live coverage while the tornado was on the ground & threatening north/northeast neighborhoods & suburbs. 5 continued to show NASCAR, with a crawl on the screen. Seems to me that when there's a tornado on the ground in a major population area, programming should be interupted to ensure viewers know how serious the risk is.
It seems fairly simple: only break into regular programming to give useful information that can't be conveyed on a ticker with a mini weather map in the corner of the screen, and only do so for as long as is necessary.
The non-stop radar porn, completing with babbling weatherpeople, added nothing that couldn't have been said much more quickly and much less intrusively.
It's time for the cell service providers (Spring, Verizon, ATT...) to implement text warnings based on cell tower location. The technology is already available - If you were near a tower that was in a warning zone, it would automatically text you a weather warning. Simple.
//that can't be conveyed on a ticker with a mini weather map in the corner of the screen,
The problem I have with the little map at the bottom of the screen is it's a BIG state and that's a small map. Quite often -- especially when there are numerous storms -- I can't figure anything out on that map....and that's after getting off the couch and pressing my face against the screen trying to figure out what county that flashing indicates.
I also like the "live" programming when they put up the expected arrival times at specific locations of a given storm.
/The non-stop radar porn, completing with babbling weatherpeople,
yep, it IS becoming more and more theatrical.
Fascinating discussions here. I bet if you did a formal poll, the majority would prefer to watch severe weather updates, or even underwater basket-weaving, rather than Mexico versus Portugal in who can kick a ball farther. Just a hunch.
I was watching the game (and it was the equivalent of the final game of the World Series, Disco, if you are soccer illiterate). The entire second half was muted and you couldn't even read the score, the box was so small, while the weather people repeated the same message for half an hour: "There is a bad storm and it's coming this way!" No touchdowns were reported; it was much like many other bad weather alerts that don't get similar treatment. While I appreciate their concern, most of what they were saying could have been just as effectively communicated with the crawl and a few brief interruptions. They were nervous because of the previous tornado's damage, that's understandable, but they have the capability to break in if the situation gets worse.
I HATE how the local stations cover severe and other weather. They just repeat themselves over and over again, and babble on about things that we don't need to know about, like meteorological deepness that doesn't serve to inform us one single bit about the storm!
I say "and other weather" because they often keep blabbing long after the storms have past. And all four local stations don't need to break into their regular programming to do this constant, often meaningless blabbing. They should agree ahead of every storm season to take turns, develop a schedule.
They could break into programming every 15 or 20 minutes to give us just the necessary information and updates (a few minutes would be enough), and then continue to have a crawl and maybe an occasional alert sound.
I've been trying to figure out what they GET for these hours-long weather blabbings. They must GET something for them or they wouldn't do it. The best answer I've come up with is that they're just puffing up their egos.
Oh, and those little maps on the bottom of the screen: useless! Not only can you not see what counties/cities they're showing, but there's no context, so you can't tell how it relates to any other part of the state. But somehow, some of them still manage to take up about a third or more of the screen!
And, Paul Douglas: You're not saving lives by babbling on and on about things that don't matter to non-meteorologists. You don't need to pre-empt whole hour-long programs in order to tell some of us that we might need to get to the basement.
My beef with Fox 9 comes from the inaccuracies that were made during the course of the broadcast.
1) Tim Blotz referred to the game as the World Cup. Umm, sorry but it was the UFEA Cup Final.
2) When Ian Leonard mentioned the southern suburbs that could be hit, somehow Burnsville became Blaine.
3) Similar vein, western suburbs. Last time I looked, Mounds View was in the northern suburbs. I think Ian meant Mound.
So - if they are so concerned about the viewers taking cover in the appropriate area - please at least identify the correct cities.
Yes, I understand that they were tired of taking the phone calls and slams on the web. However, they could have handled it in a much more professional manner - tell the viewers during the game where it can be found on cable, not after it was over. Seems to me that WCCO usually tells the viewers that they will rebroadcast whatever show is being interrupted later that night.
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