billpalmer.net

Some folks have interpreted my "I've given up on television" post of a week ago to mean that I'll no longer be tuning in for any episodic TV. I haven't given up on watching, I've merely given up on the idea that I need to make a point of tuning in at any given time for any specific show. The real world just keeps getting increasingly in the way, and because the real world is more interesting, the real world keeps winning. It's not that I don't miss a few shows that I'm missing. The show I've regretted missing the most this season has been The Office, whose first two episodes I missed due to professional obligations, and if not for NBC shows having disappeared iTunes, I would likely have downloaded both of them by now.

In any case I haven't seen the first two episodes but thought I might tune in earlier this evening because it was the first night this week where there weren't any real world events to say otherwise. You can't go out every night, even when the goings-on are mostly professional, even when you live in LA. And tonight was my night to stay home. So when my evening walk / iPod touch armband testing session concluded shortly before 9pm, I actually went so far as to tune in to The Office on my television. And I almost made it through the opening credits.

One last quick glance at Twitter to make sure I wasn't missing anything before I closed the lid on my MacBook and committed to watching The Office for an hour, and I see a post saying that Cali Lewis was going to be live-streaming the taping of the latest episode of GeekBrief. Cali co-hosted iProng Radio last week (was that only a week ago?) and I watch her show every day, so I figured here was a neat opportunity to see what goes on behind the scenes of her show, which being a video podcast, is a wee bit more intricate than my audio-only show. So I figured I'd drop in and say hi, watch a bit of the live stream, and then get back to The Office by the time the initial post-opening-credits commercial break was over.

Next thing I know it's an hour and change later, The Office is long since over, and I didn't even really miss it. The live stream was simply more interesting. The fact that real people were involved had something to do with it. Okay, so Cali is sorta kinda playing a character in her show, and "Cali Lewis" isn't even her real name, but it's still her. And when you're watching The Office, does Steve Carell drop out of character during commercial breaks and chat with the audience about what's going on behind the scenes?

Jason Tucker from OC Podcasters and Craig Patchett from San Diego Podcasters were in on the live chat as well, and at one point I think I heard Jason offer to help host Cali's meetup the next time she makes it out to the west coast. You get the idea. Real interaction with real people. The fact that the previous two nights involved me meeting with real people face to face, and tonight involved me meeting with real people over a chat room and video stream, doesn't matter so much. Face to face meetings with people aren't always possible, and certainly can't be as frequent as we'd all like, and to me that's what all this Twitter and Facebook and uStream stuff is all about.

Cali let the cat out of the bag tonight as far as the future of iProng Radio (or I should say she let roughly one-fifth of the cat out of the bag), but you had to be watching the live stream to catch it. The rest of you will just have to wait another week to find out :-)