Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
This forum is in permanent archive mode. Our new active community can be found here.
MMA live on primetime network TV tonight.
I suspect the vast majority of this forum doesn't care about mixed martial arts. I know Scrym don't. But I've always felt that this was a sport that geeks could/should be into (geeks like martial arts, right?), and this is a huge step for the sport. Also, turning people on to MMA is a minor mission of mine.
Tonight (Saturday, May 31), CBS will air the first ever live MMA card on network TV at 9pm ET. The undercard will stream starting at 7pm ET.
This card even has minor geek significance, because "internet legend" (youtube legend is probably more accurate) Kimbo Slice is headlining. There's also a middleweight title fight that should be very solid, and even a good women's bout. For those who don't like the ground fighting in MMA, the matchups on this card promise a lot of slugging.
If you have any interest in watching highly trained people try to hurt each other, especially if you haven't seen MMA before or (or especially, haven't seen it since the barbarism and hilarity of the early days), definitely check this out.
Of course it'll also be on the bittorrents if you miss it.
Tonight (Saturday, May 31), CBS will air the first ever live MMA card on network TV at 9pm ET. The undercard will stream starting at 7pm ET.
This card even has minor geek significance, because "internet legend" (youtube legend is probably more accurate) Kimbo Slice is headlining. There's also a middleweight title fight that should be very solid, and even a good women's bout. For those who don't like the ground fighting in MMA, the matchups on this card promise a lot of slugging.
If you have any interest in watching highly trained people try to hurt each other, especially if you haven't seen MMA before or (or especially, haven't seen it since the barbarism and hilarity of the early days), definitely check this out.
Of course it'll also be on the bittorrents if you miss it.
Comments
I would like to give the all of the TV networks a collective kick in the ass.
Edit: No offense to the fans of this stuff. I don't think you are vegetables. I just get sick and tired of the way TV works. There are only two currently running shows I like: Doctor Who and House (which I usually watch on Hulu). The only other shows I watch on TV: M.A.S.H. and Courage The Cowardly Dog. The quality of TV has been going downhill for years. I blame reality shows.
If you don't like any sports, fine. I never watched sports until I got into MMA. I still don't watch any sports that aren't some kind of one-on-one combat. I'm a fight fan. I used to train, myself, until I no longer had the time. Fighting and martial arts are interesting to me. This doesn't have anything to do with your "thinking for yourself is evil, shut up and watch American Idol" scenario.
BTW, Dr. Who sucks ass. Yes, I said it.
(I highly recommend http://eztv.it/frontpage.php)
I have RSS feeds set up to automatically start downloading shows.
It's far superior to watching TV here in Australia because
1) It isn't 6 months behind the U.S. on a good day.
2) It allows me to seperate out good shows easily.
Didn't Clay Shirky work out that 100 million hours has gone into making Wikipedia, and that each weekend the population of the USA spends 300 million hours, not just watching TV but watching the commercials on TV! Every weekend 3 Wikipedia sized projects could be created in that time. Anyone who would rather spend time creating something, no matter how bad, is a better person that someone who would choose to watch TV instead.
My List:- Lost
- Doctor Who
- Battlestar Galactica
- The Office
- My Name is Earl
I admit that time spent reading can be spent doing other things too, but TV watching and book reading is not a true comparison so my argument stands. Also I highly doubt the people of the USA spend 300 million hours each weekend reading adverts in books and newspapers. My point was that even if TV watching wasn't bad, what good can come from watching adverts?
Finally, gaining knowledge from books is far more efficient than watching TV. I've seen many documentaries that, while looking great, give me only as much information as a 1000 word wikipedia article. It is possible to cram in much more, but TV shows rarely do this as the audience for hardcore lectures on specific topics just isn't there.
If the population of the USA spent a collective 300 million hours each weekend reading instead of watching TV adverts, I'd like to think the world would be a better place.
I also agree that reading is certainly better than watching TV in some sense at least.
However, you seemed to emphasize only "creating something", so I felt obliged to counter.
If you just turn on the TV and watch what they're showing you, then yes, that is a worthless activity for the most part.
However, there are some shows that are really quite good, and I can't agree that they are also worthless.
1. "90% of everything is crap." This goes for books and TV. However, so much of TV is live, unedited drivel, commercials, reality TV, "news" and analysis, talk shows, etc. Books, by their very nature, are written with thought and planning, go through many rounds of editing, cost money to buy rather than being provided for free. If all books and TV were put into to the same pile, the top 10% that isn't crap would be 99% books and maybe less than 1% TV.
2. TV is push media. The networks have a LOT of time to fill, and the emphasis is on new content, regardless of the quality. Some channels show only repeats of "quality" programming, but this isn't what advertisers want. New trumps quality, because new is cheap and quality is expensive.
3. Books, on the other hand, are paid for by the consumer. Which means readers try to buy books that they know will be worth their investment, both in terms of money and time. It is also worth publishers time and money to seek out the best books they can and discard the bad quality.
4. Many bad quality books are published, but these will not have a long shelf life. Go into any bookshop and you'll see shelves and shelves full of the classics. It is worth the publishers time to keep pushing old as well as new because, in the end, quality of writing is more important than age. Buy a book written and published in 2008 and there will be a good chance it falls outside of the top 10%. Buy a book written in 1950, first published in 1951 and STILL published in 2008 and the chances are good it is in the top 1%. This control is missing from TV. You get what you are given.
I'm sure I could go on, but I think my points are clear enough.
As for "really quite good" TV shows, could you name some so I have an idea of what TV you are talking about?