From woke to broke

Being one of the Normals, I admit I don't know exactly how corporate culture operates. Clearly the one marketing chick was a True Believer. To her, everything you said applies. She was on a mission to save the world from the Normals and make it safe for the Weirdos.

That much is clear. What is not clear is just what the other executives (marketing or otherwise) think about all this Weirdo stuff. Some are probably True Believers but I suspect that most blow with the wind. And the few apostates remain silent for fear of their jobs.

As I've surmised before, I find it likely that many of the elder statesmen see this new Weirdo Zeitgeist and figure "What do I know? It seems to be the way the world works now." They did nothing. And apparently from what I recently read, Anheuser-Busch supported some Weirdo thing in Canada. So that idea that "they learned their lesson" clearly is laughable and doesn't apply.

So what's going on? I think such people are caught between a rock and a Weirdo place. They definitely see that they have harmed their base but they are committed to making the world safe for Weirdos. So how do you do that?

One reason those executives were "on leave" instead of being fired was surely because Anheuser-Busch did not want to go on record as clearly and unambiguously being against Weirdo rights. It would seem the recent status change from "on vacation" to "you're fired" was caused by pressure form wholesalers.

So it's a muddle. They are trying to have their cake and eat it too. For various reasons (none of them good or honest), they want to stay on the good side of the Weirdos while keeping Bubba happy. Not even Solomon could split this baby.

This jerk should be the next to get the boot at Anheuser-Busch. Sounds like typical corporate-office scumbag who lies or says nothing using lots of meaningless words.  

Our employees are our priority  

Clearly, he needs to get his priorities in order. Selling horse-piss beer should be on the top of the list. 

I don't see Fox News going broke, but their recent actions have certainly hit their numbers. Good.

Fox News stock downgraded

Worth a read: www.breitbart.com/entertainment/2023/07/29/nolte-6-reasons-hollywoods-in-real-trouble-this-time/

Yep. That's what first came to mind.

I saw this as a general criticism of cable TV, not just movies and such. I cut my cable ten years ago, but even then I wondered how most of those 1-or-200 channels which were on offer could survive. I watched about 5 or 6 channels regularly.

Only later did I find out that regardless of their product, each of these channels received a certain amount of money from the cable companies just for being part of the cable package. That meant each of these channels had a regular cash flow regardless how many people watched them. And even the channels which were not watched were kept as part of the package as sort of a marketing gimmick. "See! We can offer you 250 different channels." The trick for these "content makers" was to come to some sort of deal with the cable providers.

As to the question of whether or not this will decrease the junk being sprayed over us....I think it will in the sense that small channels which few watch will disappear. I have no doubt that some of these channels have had a greater influence culturally than the number of their actual viewers would suggest. I believe these outliers have been used as instruments to spread cultural rot more quickly and widely than might otherwise have been the case. 

The larger channels can reference and lift content from these outliers as social indicators and push the garbage produced by the outliers into the mainstream. They can be used much like the phony footnotes in Wikipedia which are meant to give the reader the idea that what is written is factual and authoritative when in fact they are generally just some journalist's opinion. In such ways do we get the mainstreaming of the Drag Queen rubbish. 

If that's the case, good riddance. But what tends to happen is that those small specialty channels are the ones I like. Think of the island (or it used to be) of Masterpiece Theatre in the ocean of floating garbage on the rest of over-the-air TV.

Also, what used to be a quality channel (The History Channel is the textbook example) has been Slobocracied into complete junk, featuring pseudo-science quackery. This has become very common for channels that used to be good. It's as if, surrounded by the rest of the swill, the are playing out the truism, "Lie down with dogs and get up with fleas."

One of the channels I used to like (haven't watched it in years) was the Home and Garden channel. They did some fun, informative, and creative stuff. I hope they still do.

Trying to think of what isn't junk. I suppose there are a couple classic movie subscription channels out there...or used to be. The problem with Turner Classic Movies is that (I think) it comes only as part of a bloated cable package. The Criterion Channel (at $10.99/month) is another option. I subscribed to it for a while. And although I like old movies, their content ranged way too far into the artsy-fartsy and obscure.

I'm still on the lookout for a good classic movies channel. I just took a quick search and it seems that The Criterion Channel is still the only game in town. Amazon Prime has its share. Even Max has a pretty good collection. But most I've seen and their catalog doesn't seem to change that often and/or include a bit of the esoteric, foreign, or at least slightly artsy-fartsy. A little artsy-fartsy, if fine. But a little can go a long way.

But here's one I found called Flixfling. Now here's the typical problem. I browsed through some of its offerings and it seems exactly like the same pop junk you find on Max. The catalog sounds impressive. "Over 5000 films." But the reality is you're talking probably 99% junk. And I do mean junk. I honestly don't know how or why most of these movies get made.

This one looks a little more interesting: Classix. There's even a free tier. The problem is, you can watch it via your tablet only. There's no Roku channel. So, I say, what's the point?

Perhaps try Cineverse. I browsed its "Western" section which included "Frankenstein's Daughter" (there is a skull wearing a cowboy hat on the cover graphic), "Alien Showdown" (with some predator-looking alien on the cover...not sure what the Western angle could be), and "Billy the Kid vs. Dracula."

More junk. These streaming services are absolutely filled with the stuff. And with the ability to literally be able to make a movie via the technology of the iPhone these days, don't look for quality to improve anytime soon. What is cheap is not valued.

A classic movie service that looks like it could be an alternative to The Criterion Channel is BFI Player (as in "British Film Institute"). I mean, at first glance it does include "The Third Man," It's available on the Roku but I can't browse the catalog. I don't know if it's eclectic (in the good sense) or just junk with a well-known movie thrown in on the front page of the web site.

I downloaded the channel on the Roku which then let me browse the catalog. Some junk. Some eclectic. Some classics. 14 day free trial and $5.99 a month. I might give it a try. If I do, I'll report back. I could probably mine this for watchable movies for three months or so.

If you have Amazon Prime, I see that you can add MGM+ for $5.99 month extra. It looks like they have a very few classic movies and oodles of junk. Beware any streaming service with an "LGBTQ Pride" tab prominently displayed. And there's another one called "Black Voices." Still waiting for the "White Voices" category to pop up. They have a few good movies in the Western category. But I imagine the "+" to "MGM+" means you're not getting most of the good stuff. And it sure doesn't look like it.

This is quite clever. It will take only a few wins for many companies to take note and clean up their acts to some degree or other. It is not a perfect solution, but it helps Musk and the public.