"Heidi" Joins "Days of our Lives"
I and two billion of my closest friends tuned in as Al Gore presided over the Live Earth concerts on NBC.
All of us were asked to sign up by text or online for a pledge to plant trees and vote for green-minded politicians and nowhere in the fine print were any petitions nominating “Al Gore for President”.
I was struck by how all this came together. I’ve helped put together enough conventions to know that if anything can go wrong, it will. Microphones and air conditioners fail and third-tier politicians scheduled to keynote fail to show. Yet, here were satellite feeds from seven continents featuring super-rich rock stars with no sense of accountability who through some miracle showed up and performed when and where they were supposed to and between songs said all the right things about the desperate need to conserve energy and protect forests.
Political consultants had to be salivating at the stage this gave Al Gore. Had he been a serious candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008, those same consultants never would have allowed him to share a platform with out of control entertainers who at any moment may grab a crotch or shout obscenities.
What is even more remarkable is that Live Earth was telecast by NBC. This is the same network that earlier in the week cut away from an epic quarter-final tennis match at Wimbledon between Justine Henin and Serena Williams.
The two tennis icons were tied at one match apiece when NBC told viewers the network would now join the soap “Days of Our Lives.” This is the same network that in 1968 cut away from a New York Jets-Oakland Raiders game with the Jets leading 32-29 with only 65 seconds to play, so that viewers could see the TV version of the classic children’s story “Heidi”.
In those 65 seconds, the Raiders scored 14 points to win, 43-32 and the millions of fans who missed it raised such a ruckus that never again would any network make such a decision. The fact is that the NFL has clout and uses it to bludgeon networks into submission.
By contrast, professional tennis, even with its charismatic stars and enthusiastic fan following, is constantly bullied by networks and sponsors, even during its biggest grand slam events. Can you imagine a World Series or Super Bowl where the network is still in commercials when play on the field has resumed?
Happens to tennis all the time.
All of us were asked to sign up by text or online for a pledge to plant trees and vote for green-minded politicians and nowhere in the fine print were any petitions nominating “Al Gore for President”.
I was struck by how all this came together. I’ve helped put together enough conventions to know that if anything can go wrong, it will. Microphones and air conditioners fail and third-tier politicians scheduled to keynote fail to show. Yet, here were satellite feeds from seven continents featuring super-rich rock stars with no sense of accountability who through some miracle showed up and performed when and where they were supposed to and between songs said all the right things about the desperate need to conserve energy and protect forests.
Political consultants had to be salivating at the stage this gave Al Gore. Had he been a serious candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008, those same consultants never would have allowed him to share a platform with out of control entertainers who at any moment may grab a crotch or shout obscenities.
What is even more remarkable is that Live Earth was telecast by NBC. This is the same network that earlier in the week cut away from an epic quarter-final tennis match at Wimbledon between Justine Henin and Serena Williams.
The two tennis icons were tied at one match apiece when NBC told viewers the network would now join the soap “Days of Our Lives.” This is the same network that in 1968 cut away from a New York Jets-Oakland Raiders game with the Jets leading 32-29 with only 65 seconds to play, so that viewers could see the TV version of the classic children’s story “Heidi”.
In those 65 seconds, the Raiders scored 14 points to win, 43-32 and the millions of fans who missed it raised such a ruckus that never again would any network make such a decision. The fact is that the NFL has clout and uses it to bludgeon networks into submission.
By contrast, professional tennis, even with its charismatic stars and enthusiastic fan following, is constantly bullied by networks and sponsors, even during its biggest grand slam events. Can you imagine a World Series or Super Bowl where the network is still in commercials when play on the field has resumed?
Happens to tennis all the time.
posted by Victor Kamber | 1:21 PM
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