BobHarris.com - NBC craftily slips product placement into complete horseshit

Books! Actual books!

"A rollicking ride of intellectual discovery and emotional growth... his comic timing never fails"

-- The Wall Street Journal

"Pulls you in like a good sports story"

-- The New York Times Book Review

"Endearingly frank... jubilant... lighthearted and fast-paced"

-- New York Newsday

"A surprisingly touching memoir"

-- Entertainment Weekly

"Snappy and informative"

-- Associated Press

"Effortlessly funny and informative... tender, human, and very wise... A must for anyone who loves Jeopardy!, or has ever seen it, or is breathing."

-- Joss Whedon, creator, Buffy the Vampire Slayer

"I haven't seen Jeopardy! since I was a kid, and yet I was charmed and amused by Bob Harris's fascinating and surprisingly suspenseful book. Through sheer force of personality, he takes this brainy TV show and makes it funny and easy to relate to."

-- Ira Glass, creator and host, This American Life

"A surprisingly intimate, entertaining book."

-- Orson Scott Card, 4-time Hugo Award winner, author of Ender's Game

"Funny, enlightening -- and just might help you win a million bucks on Jeopardy!"

-- A. J. Jacobs, author of The Know-It-All

"A masterful job of describing the feel of Jeopardy! in the heat of battle... I knew Bob was a great guy and a fantastic Jeopardy! player. Now I've found that he's also a wonderful writer. I think I'm starting to hate him."

-- Brad Rutter, top money-winner in Jeopardy! history

Books I'm Getting

Who Hates Whom:
Well-Armed Fanatics, Intractable Conflicts,
and Various Things Blowing Up —
A Woefully Incomplete Guide™

“Revelatory... Harris's sly wit and infectious curiosity make understanding world chaos fascinating... witty, horrific, and necessary.”

— Boston Globe

"Brave... irreverent... charges into the thick of the globe's myriad simmering wars... hilariously relaxed."

— New York Observer

"Only Bob could make a user’s guide to our increasingly hostile world this absorbing, this breezy, and—ultimately—this hopeful.”

— Ken Jennings, author of Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs

“Fascinating, enlightening, and surprisingly: NOT TOTALLY DEPRESSING. A gimlet-eyed look at the world we endure that’s also suitable for enjoying with a gimlet.”

— John Hodgman, author of The Areas of My Expertise
and correspondent for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

"All three [presidential] candidates should read all three of these [recommended] books, but McCain gets first crack at Bob Harris's "Who Hates Whom“... a lighthearted overview of the insurrections and civil wars in the world today."

— Steven Pinker, author of The Stuff of Thought, in the New York Times Book Review

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NBC craftily slips product placement into complete horseshit

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Monday, 28 November 2005

Emo, great friend of this site, informs us of a particularly icky moment from last week's broadcast of "Medium," an NBC drama in which a psychic helps the police by talking with dead people.

(Yes, something even ickier than basing an entire TV series on galling blatant bullshit.)

The characters in the program suddenly begin talking about a new, real-life Sony movie. Moments later, the network runs an ad for the same real-life Sony movie. The moment of "drama" was not only bought and paid for, but almost palpably proud in its utter sellout.

Ick.

Now, don't get me wrong. It's not that I'm arguing for the integrity of a TV show which popularizes horseshit, reinforcing superstition while doing a gross disservice to science and reason, degrading the level of discourse in an already-irrational culture capable of terrifying and deadly bursts of mass illogic. Plainly not.

Nor am I holding myself up as any beacon of reason. After all, I am weirdly pleased at owning a Salad Spinner which once belonged to Farrah Fawcett, as noted below. Also, I'm apparently willing to say so out loud, which is probably even less rational. So Wittgenstein I ain't.

Just, um... ick.

Ick, because preserving some distinction between expression and commerce is fundamental to any free society. While the two have intermingled for centuries -- heck, early spear-makers probably wanted cave paintings to feature their distinctive weapons -- maintaining a general awareness of the distinction is vital, and now the line is blurred even further. Public discourse is incrementally more a mere product whored off to the highest bidder.

Stuff like this is exactly how our political system slips further into dysfunction. When everything is for sale, people stop expecting any other motive for human behavior, and corruption becomes the operating moral standard.

And ick even more, because if our dear buddy Emo was actually watching "Medium" -- instead of just noticing the above while clicking around -- then I suddenly realize he must be either gravely injured or just too damn depressed to change the channel.

Geez. Now I'm getting worried. I better get over there. Maybe I should call 911.

And, um, this could have happened to anybody. We will never speak of this again.

I wonder if a Salad Spinner would help cheer him up.