• by George Simpson , Featured Contributor, April 13, 2007

NBC Nightly News anchor and otherwise swell guy Brian Williams spoke to some NYU journalism students recently, offering advice, and at times, rants against various online tragedies such as un-J-schooled bloggers: "You're going to be up against people who have an opinion, a modem, and a bathrobe... all of my life, developing credentials to cover my field of work, and now I'm up against a guy named Vinny in an efficiency apartment in the Bronx who hasn't left the efficiency apartment in two years."

And this: "And now, apparently because encyclopedias were too exact, we have Wikipedia, the inexact encyclopedia. We don't get hung up on facts. In my entry alone there are seven errors, and I'm completely unimportant."

About which an apparently more cyber-savvy youngster later posted: "If there are 7 errors, why doesn't Williams correct them? That's the beauty of Wikipedia, it can be edited by whoever spots the error."

500 Channels and Still, Nothing On...

To assure that their brands are not TiVoed out of consciousness, Gillette is producing an ABC prime-time reality series starring a group of NASCAR drivers who are featured in its TV ads and online. Gillette is a NASCAR sponsor for each driver and his race team. BBDO New York, Gillette's ad agency, apparently came up with the idea for the show.

"We're seeing a blurring between advertising and entertainment. It's a new business model," says Steve Fund, Gillette marketing director--who apparently is too young to remember "Texaco Star Theater" or "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom." But, love the enthusiasm.

And The Winner Is...

Google the word "engagement" and it returns 117,000,000 results. This strikingly low number fails, one safely assumes, to include the vastly higher number of byliners by advertising, marketing and online executives who have provided definitions that skew curiously close to their own business interests.

And The Pope's Second Saint-Qualifying Posthumous Miracle Is...

A recent study from Nielsen Company claims that owners of digital video recorders watch about two-thirds of the commercials during television programming. Which means either their DVR setup documentation came only in Changjng, or the fast-forward button was quality-checked by a Ford Motors systems engineer. Interestingly, about the same time, a Deloitte study claimed that over half of all consumer electronic devices returned to retailers are not broken, but are too difficult for consumers to use.

Maybe It Was Just One Long "Promise Keepers" Meeting...

Gay activist Larry Kramer says that the original Jamestown colony's true sexual nature was gay since there were no women, just guys, a fact that U.S. News apparently left out of its "The Birth of America" cover story on the settlement. Says the magazine's spokesperson: "It turns out we did run the information through fact-checking, and they were unable to verify his claims, they just couldn't find any source to verify it."

"Dude, Call Me Back, I'm On Like, Level 99..."

Millward Brown found that between 10% and 15% of adults 17-35 fall into the category of "ad avoiders"--i.e., folks that don't like advertising, and generally find it "annoying." Which ought to be final and conclusive proof that this cohort has abandoned TV almost entirely.

What Keeps Brian Williams Awake Nights....

The Blog Herald, which claims redundantly to be a "premium source of blog and blogging related news for bloggers," estimates that as of April 2005, there were 50.75 million blogs worldwide. To paraphrase Sir Winston: Never was so much written by so many for so few.

MEMO to Don...

When your own hairstyle makes you look like a late-stage Howard Hughes, you are in no position to comment on anyone else's 'do.