Three bloggers could do a better Hour

If you took three bloggers and put them on national television hosting an hour-long show every night for months and years, they would get better ratings than The Hour.
Is that fair to say?
It seems obvious.
How hard is it to host a television show?
It isn’t for everyone, true, but there are teenagers at Much Music today who are doing it very skilfully.
Bloggers are inherently exhibitionists, who crave attention. They already think they’re special and have so little to be ashamed of.
Does it matter if the host is fat and balding? Or if the host looks like Jennifer Hollitt?
Isn’t it the content, most of all, and the “character” of the show, whether serious or wacky, that is ultimately, basically, largely what people tune in to enjoy?

Consider this.
Do you think that between Ouimet, PoonGirl and I, we could come up with a better show for an Hour than what you are going to be stuck with watching tonight?
Do you think we could get David Suzuki, Matthew Good, George Strombo, Jian Ghomeshi, David Miller, Ben Mulroney, Tom Green, Toller Cranston, Adrainne Clarkson .. this list goes on forever … to come in and talk with us?
Do you think we could get “stars” to give us the time of day? Perhaps Green Day if we went to the trouble of going to them when they’re in town.
And reminding their publicists that, love us or hate us, we reach a national audience.
And would we not be more likely to be more innovative than the Hour, interested in trying new things, and broadening the variety of topics that are brought up?
And are we not keenly interested in having fun? You betcha!
Could we not get a hundred thousand people tuning in each night just to see PoonGirl?
A guest appearance by Raymi The Minx would draw 10,000 alone, Tod Maffin could bring in 4 more. Richard Stursberg and Carol McNiel together at last, a few hundred. Antonia Zerbisias, a thousand.
The only problem with using locals is that they might one day want to be paid.
Better to go with celebrities who need the publicity more than the money.
Michael Moore would talk with us just as readily as he has with George. And we’d want to go after “Bruno” too.
Interviews are easy, and the audience doesn’t really care who’s asking the questions, as long as they are questions that a reasonable person would ask.
And hey, we can do stupid skits too. Again, how hard is that?
We can walk backwards while spouting metaphors.
We can find a theme song that’s just as dumb as George’s, or maybe find one that’s not quite so dumb.
So how much could we really screw this up? Even a train wreck would be more fascinating than the current Hour.

No matter how you look at it really, we, three bloggers, could do a better Hour.
In fact, after only a few years on the air, I’d venture to project …

28 Comments

  • Allan says:

    of all the blogs in the world, you chose to come into this one

  • Anonymous says:

    Allan .. no one gives a shit about your crap anymore. Get a life.

  • PoonGirl says:

    George is no establishment ! I don’t really get what you’re saying. Unless you’re dissing him, then I’m with you all the way.

    For those of you who think George is working hard to “entertain” us – right about now he’s chillin’ with his feet up. http://twitpic.com/y2lto

    • Anonymous says:

      “The Establishment” is what rebels fight against. Cozily putting feet up on a table at a Crown Corporation (i.e. The Establishment) is NOT what rebels do. Rebellious feet wouldn’t be there.

  • Anonymous says:

    George promotes himself (and his brand) as an “anti-Establishment” rebel hero. Actually, he IS The Establishment.

  • Slapchop says:

    Dude let’s talk more about your show, meet me at the corner of Fantasy and Delusion.

    • Allan says:

      You’re probably not alone in your belief that The Hour has set the bar too high for anyone to think of being able to compete with it.
      That to consider alternatives is an exercise in futility.
      The CBC and The Hour are relying on people like you to help re-enforce that belief.
      Makes their job so much easier if everyone would just take what they dish out and not ask questions.

      But your real point appears to be that it’s unrealistic to think that you can take ordinary people and expect extraordinary results.
      You missed the interview Barbara did with George. She was able to draw things out of him that he wasn’t prepared for. She asked real questions, almost all of them submitted by others, and it made for something far more interesting than an interview with Nickelback.
      George is afraid to ask critical questions because he knows, as do most entertainment reporters, that this is a game of one-hand-washes-the-other.
      To state that George is a “journalist”, let alone “respected” as such, let alone “one of the most respected” is to be living at the corner where you want to meet up. Also, it demeans the profession of journalism.
      We all know The Hour is trying to pretend it can be The Tonight Show AND Nightline all in one.
      These days, the writers appear to have been given directions to make George more opinionated, as if he could take the stage with Bill Maker and Jon Stewart. You don’t see that it’s an act?

      Harrison Ford doesn’t watch The Hour, and it’s a safe bet that he doesn’t go home to see it on YouTube either. He takes the word of the local publicist that being a guest on the show is going to be easy, and worth his time.
      And soon after, he finds himself sitting across from a guy who wears an unbuttoned shirt with his T-shirt showing.
      What’s the message he’s supposed to take from this?
      That George is down-to-earth? Informal? Rebelling against conformity?
      Or that Canadians are still evolving, and aspire to one day be as good as Carson Daly?
      George is the best you can come up with? It says a lot not only about the CBC, but all of us.

  • PoonGirl says:

    Someone actually complemented George in the real world ? Like the one out the window I’m peering at right now ?

  • cbc ottawa says:

    Okay what is the Blog etiquette concerning loggin in and commenting under someone else’s nom de plume? I no I’m not the only person from CBC Ottawa reading this blog but I WAS the only one signing in that way!

    I DID NOT WRITE:

    cbc ottawa says:
    January 11, 2010 at 9:46 pm
    George’™s lack of audience appeal is quite extraordinary. It’™s like the CBC found the one person that possessed all the qualities that turn audiences off in droves and gave him his own show as an experiment in failure.

    • cbc ottawa says:

      Further more just last night I was talking with a “real” person in the real world (ie: outside CBC Toronto ) about the CBC . He turned the conversation to CBC TV and completely unbidden extolled the virtues of The Hour and George S.!

      Have any of you watched other late-night talk shows? Have you seen the guests and listened to the quality of conversation?

      PS: Whoever logged in as CBC Ottawa pick a new name please!

  • Anon says:

    Your ignorance is showing again. There is no way the three bloggers mentioned could find their way out of a paper bag let along put a talk show together. Their bland hypocritical writing barely translate to cyberspace, let alone on television.

    Get off your collective jealous asses and actually do something productive.

    Seriously. We get. You HATE The Hour and you HATE George Stroumboulopoulos. We get. You have wet dreams trying to figure out a new way to attack him and his show. If you actually took all this wasted energy attacking someone and put it towards doing something productive, you might be able to make one little corner of the world a better place.

    Get a clue. Change the channel if you hate the show so much. Stop the juvenile attacks. When you have a legitimate critism come back to the game.

    • Allan says:

      So you don’t think much of our abilities. That’s fair comment.
      Nor do you think much of your own abilities.
      “I could never do what George is doing. That Hour show is such a complex gig. How do they do it.?Boggles the mind.”
      The CBC welcomes you with open arms. They have no respect for you, but you’re the ideal viewer, taking whatever they dish out, no questions asked.
      But let’s put that aside and pose a few questions to you.
      Now which part or element of The Hour do you find most impressive and beyond the average human mind to achieve?
      The graphics?
      The wardrobe, the staging, the lighting, the crane shots? They require trained professionals, to be sure.
      What about the content itself and the host?

      Let’s review.
      Say, tonight the author of “The Book of Negroes” will be appearing at Indigo downtown.
      George and I both go down there to see if we can get a brief interview with him.
      George brings a handheld recording device, perhaps an iPhone.
      I bring an expensive video camera and tripod and cameraman, a sound engineer with a boom mic, and, just for the hell of it, a well groomed young woman holding a clipboard.
      Assuming it can’t be both, which one of us gets the interview?
      George says “I’m with the Tea Makers blog, and would like to ask you a few questions.”
      I say “I’m with the CBC and would also like to ask you a few questions.”
      Which one of us is going to get the interview?
      My point here is that George has very little to do with it.

      So what then of the end result? The quality of the content that each of us are able to gather when given the opportunity to speak with this author.
      Whose interview will be judged the better?
      Who produces a better interview, Jian or George?
      That’s tough call for some people.
      What about three unknowns, like the bloggers referred to in the post?
      Do you think George just breezes in a few minutes before each show, hits the make-up room, and then takes a seat to glance over a paper that tells him whose on the show tonight?

      I’m working as member of the production crew for The Hour. I pick up the phone and it’s an agent for Michael Douglas saying he’d like to be on the show to talk about his new movie. He’s one of the producers, an investor. And plays the lead. It’s in his interest to promote the show to as many people as possible, in as short a time as possible. The agent and I both know one thing. They have something we want, and we have something they want.
      I lean back in my chair and think “I wish every job I ever had was this easy. I want to work at the CBC forever.”

      • PoonGirl says:

        K Allan, what about when he has authors on ? Then he has to skim through the book and read the ciff notes his writers give him, not that easy then !

        • Allan says:

          A failed radio performer who found that he had a knack for appearing to behave “naturally” in front of a camera.
          With a limited education, and with no journalism background of any substance apart from short interviews with punk rock bands, George took it upon himself to say to a national audience that he was going to “explain the news” to them. Right after someone explains the news to him.
          Has anyone ever seen a full paragraph written by George himself?

  • cbc ottawa says:

    George’s lack of audience appeal is quite extraordinary. It’s like the CBC found the one person that possessed all the qualities that turn audiences off in droves and gave him his own show as an experiment in failure.

    • Anonymous says:

      You hit the nail on the head. There’s so many things that are a turn off about George Strombolopowhatever.

      He’s a hipster doofus….he talks like Sylvester The Cat on speed…..he’s in his late 30’s and trying so hard to appeal to teenagers…..he wears the same clothes all the time making the show look like a rerun or an infomercial…..all that wiggling around in his chair that he does…..and on and on….

  • PoonGirl says:

    I wonder if they filled The Hour’s time slot with those coloured bars the block the screen when there’s technical problems if it would get around the same ratings ?

  • Anonymous says:

    Some of us are wise enough to know our limitations, some of us force our limitations on others….swan or shark?

  • cbc ottawa says:

    Who are all these bashers and whiners and have any one of them actualy made a programme that anyone has heard or seen? I’m sure the inside-insiders know who Alan, PoonGirl et.al are but the res tof us do not!

    I started checking in on this blog to see what other CBC employees and fans across the country had to say about various issues facing the Corp. The entire blog now reads like some 17 year olds Facebook site.

    What a waste of time and energy.

    • Allan says:

      (a) then you’ll want to check out http://www.insidethecbc.com/, where one comment reads “When did this site become The Tea Makers?”
      (b) you’re free to bring up any subject you wish, even compose your own headline, at our Truth Farm section. It’s very easy. Always seems a truism that when people drop by to complain that the content here is not relevant enough, invariably they never specify what issues are so much more important. Apparently, they’re most interested in telling us what NOT to write.
      (c) the three bloggers referred to here are merely used as examples because they’re familiar to this audience. Amber McArthur, Jesse Hirsh, Micheal Geist, Matthew Good, Marc Weisblott and many more could also certainly do the trick. A couple of notable Twitterers also – petermansbridg could handle federal politics, and Hobo entertainment.
      In truth, Bubbles alone could carry The Hour, without once peeing his pants – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgfu8iz_o5U

    • Anonymous says:

      But you read the AND commented on it, anyway, didn’t you? Thou dost protest too much.

  • Simon says:

    George’s ABC show “The One: Making a Music Star” was a ratings disaster too. It is the lowest rated show in the history of ABC.

    It is an unarguable fact that George Stroumboulopoulos = low ratings.

  • Anonymous says:

    How about a show that interviews people in the military? They are far more interesting than “celebrities”.

  • Anonymous says:

    The most interesting people in Canada are ignored by the media because they are too intimidating for the meek interviewers. The CBC is full of cowards who are just collecting a paycheck.

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