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Choose the New PBS Science Show
chinmay7 writes "PBS has posted three different pilots for a new science show, and they want viewers to weigh in and help choose one as the regular science feature. All three pilots are viewable as vodcasts. Wired Science aired on January 3rd. The pilot certainly is polished, as one might expect from Wired Magazine, and deals with interesting topics: 'Meet rocket-belt inventors, stem cell explorers and meteorite hunters.' Science Investigators (air date: January 10) seems to be the most 'science' show: 'The investigators examine 30,000-year-old Neanderthal DNA, vanishing frogs, mind-boggling baseball pitches and more.' 22nd Century (air date: January 17) is pretty gimmicky and loud for my taste, but delivers interesting content — 'In the coming decades will all our brains be wired together like networked computers?' So watch and vote."
All of these programs utilize the newsmagazine format, with three or four 15 - 20 minute minidocumentaries per program. Unfortunately, this is not enough time to delve into a subject indepth. Hell, an hour isn't enough time either. Nova is falling into the same trap, with their ScienceNOW programming. Is Nature and Frontline the last bastion of serious documentary programming on PBS?
is it too much to have hosts that are not 30 something smart asses? or better yet, science stories that are not ubiquitous in the media already. or even better, shows dedicated to one topic rather than 4 or 5 so we can get some real information involved? or at best. . just redirect the funding to NOVA.
For the browser-plugin challenged:
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22nd Century
mplayer mms://wm.z1.mii-streaming.net/media/pbs/windows/g
(you'll have to remove a gap as entered by
While I'm watching that, anyone else feel like digging through the source for the others?
My poetry site welcomes the unusual.
. .
How are these shows substantially different or improved from Nova ScienceNOW and Scientific American Frontiers? (Speaking of which, having Alan Alda as the host of that show made it palatable for some older people who wouldn't otherwise look at science stories.)
If they really want a new show, they need a resurrection of Newton's Apple, and target younger audiences. For that matter, they should resurrect 3-2-1 Contact, too. If they need to find a free slot, they could get rid of Cyberchase, one of the lamest shows pretending to be educational I've seen, besides some emo girl clown sitting on a couch.
I am tired of all the "science" shows out there that are more flash and gimmick then cold-facts.
ie.
Naked Science
Nova Now
MythBusters
EVERYTHING on Discovery & TLC
I yearn for impartial & unbiased educational programming that I enjoyed in my youth. Now-a-days it seems that if they don't "wow" you in the first 10 seconds they think they have failed.
An excellent example is Nature shows.
Old goodness:
Lorne Greens New Wilderness, Nature, Undersea Adventures of Jacques Cousteau *, Profiles of Nature.
New Badness:
Croc Hunter**, Fox Special "Worlds most Amazing/Dangerous Animals", etc.
* Jacques Cousteau was Very preachy but (a) it was needed at that time, and (b) it was the first of it's kind.
** I loved how passionate Steve Irwin was about animals, and the first Season of Croc Hunter was awesome. But IMHO I think the show got too much attention and turned into a Jerry Springer of Nature shows and lost it's credibility.
I do not have the attention span of a flea on crack. Take your time and explain the science behind what you are trying to show. I donate to PBS, but only on the 'heavy-science' shows. Alas it seems they don't get the message.
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
You sir take that back! I've only seen every episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus twice...TWICE! That is unacceptible! Unexpectidly unacceptible. As unexpected as...
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
I watched all of "22nd Century" and "Wired Science", and the first half of "Science Investigators". I thought "22nd Century" had interesting topics, but the "hosts" were utterly condescending, biased and overtly scripted, almost to the point of being insulting. I liked the topics in "Science Investigators" too, but the "this is like, way cool, man" approach of the first male host made me gag, so I turned it off after about 15-20 minutes. "Wired Science" was the best for me. I guess the other two shows would have broader appeal to a younger set of viewers than me (40 yrs and one day), but they can vote on their own... :-)
Why not just make more original episodes of Nova, dangit!
OTOH, there's tons of coverage of natural science, physics, applied science and anthropology, but in general not many shows on IT; this is remarkable considering how unlikely it is for the average person to see the Tevatron, but that person probably deals with computer viruses, data encryption and slow internets on a daily basis. There should be a Secret Life of Machines for computers. You could have:
And so on. I don't think Hunkin would do it, so we'd have to find someone suitably cheeky but computer-friendly and having an artistic streak. Maybe Woz.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
Vodcasts? Seriously?
Is it really so incredibly unhip to just say "video files"?
Do we really have a moral imperative to create as many buzzwords as possible?
'Software EXchange and Viruses, the Inside Story'?
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
We all had a chance to put our votes for the best science show in the sidebar just a few weeks ago ;-)
I want them to bring back Bill Nye!
Better yet, turn the TV off, and read something like Wolfram's "A New Kind of Science", Dawkins "The God Delusion" or even something off the wall like McCutcheon's "The Final Theory", which will make you at least re-think what you know, though in the end you'll probably come to the same conclusion I did, which is, he's a crackpot. But a really clever one, especially if you read the whole book! :)
PBS... well, it isn't going to teach you any significant amount of science. It's 99.9% a complete waste of time, just like all the other pre-digested gee-whiz shows. If you want entertainment, by all means, head for the TV. But don't kid yourself that a TV show split over multiple subjects is going to be illuminating. It's just drool-fodder.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Future episodes will cover:
"Nobody expects the White House Inquisition!"
I'm sure this has been said already, but why not just reinvest all that funding into Nova? It has truely been one of the best science shows on PBS today.
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Cosmos, the Carl Sagan documentary series from the 80's, has been airing on the Discovery channel this past month. If you want an example of what a science documentary should be this is it. In depth an yet presented in a way that is understandable. Not that I have a problem with the news magazine format but we could really use more programming like Cosmos and more people like Dr. Sagan
PBS has been struggling for years to figure out how to compete against the Discovery nonfiction channels (TLC, Animal Planet, Discovery Channel, and their lesser siblings) in science programming, and to a lesser extent, National Geographic and other comers. PBS has also struggled to see how the long-form documentary can continue to hold market share in a world that won't watch YouTube videos that run longer than two minutes.
The old guard in television cannot fully grok the mindset of those who've come of age during the internet age and its panoply of media choices. But they do understand that without adaptation, they will die. So they tend to focus on acquiring the look-and-feel of new media (but not the vital essences), hoping that will make them seem relevant to new-media users. Lipstick on a pig, and all that. Very nice lipstick, sometimes, but....
NOVA wisely invested early in web programming, and their science websites are superb examples of what can be done with Web 1.0. (Heh heh, I should disclose I wrote one of those to go along with the film I made. You can see it here. Check out the "Dispatches" section for some old-skool science blogging.)
NOVA on television has resisted surrendering its brand identity against immense financial pressure, as well as cultural pressure to "liven up," "get hip," and other assorted me-too thinking that says no one will sit and watch a quality hour anymore. NOVA hasn't quite caved, but you can see the difference when comparing latest product against films from earlier years. Still, once you see what they've been up against, NOVA is still a marvel of principle and plain old stubbornness.
As for the purported modern lack of an audience for high-quality single-subject programs...I don't buy it.
I'm part of the PBS advisory panel that's "focus-grouping" these new shows. (They don't even know I'm one of their past producers...and I ain't sayin'.) Trust me, PBS has marshaled extraordinary user input throughout the development of this new programming. They have done their homework. Nonetheless, I've been thinking it was the wrong homework assignment.
IMO, focus-group design by consensus can yield good quality, but not brilliance. Can anyone imagine focus-grouping The Secret Life of Machines? The Day the Universe Changed? (Or to stretch it a bit, even Mystery Science Theater 3000?) Those shows, and other greats, rely on irrepressible characters who, like the author of a great book, slowly but surely make you realize they're in on a great secret. And that they want to let you in on it.
Ok, some of these people are not poster children for The Seven Habits of Successful People, and could probably use a better haircut, but you just know they'd be doing this show for free (or maybe they did). It's not their panache but their passion that infects you like a Russian hacker's virus and absorbs you into their conspiracy. Their world is more full of dynamite and diamond pipes and Tesla coils and grizzly bears taking sunbaths and...and...they seem to have figured out how one thing connects to another. Their world is equal parts revealed truth and grand fun. Maybe even more grand fun than revealed truth. They make you realize the riches of the world lie around your feet like November leaves in such abundance that you haven't even noticed them as you kick your way forward each day.
They open your eyes. They make you stay awake in your bed way too late and dream about the places you really can't wait any longer to go...and damn it, someday you will...then you fall asleep.
I love Wired magazine, and have all kinds of cool electronica, and download books off Demonoid while I'm TiVoing BBC docs while I'm walking the stacks at the library while I'm listening to a podcast. But that doesn't mean I want a science show modeled on Entertainment Tonight's magazine format. I don't want hip poseurs, even if they've been coached not to seem like poseurs. I don't want beautiful people