As someone who has always been skeptical of "AI," I definitely hope corporations dial back their enthusiasm on it; but I think its value has never been commercial, but industrial.
"AI" was not designed so consumers could see what it would look like to have Abraham Lincoln fighting a T-Rex without having to pay artists for their time. "AI" was designed so that could happen on a much larger enterprise scale (though it would probably be stock images of technology or happy people using technology instead).
With this in mind, I think "AI" being a money pit won't dissuade corporations since they want the technology to be effective for themselves, they just want consumers to offset costs.
It's a bit of a long read, but I thought it was interesting what a mess the Marvel production was.
Marvel Studios has always had a tough relationship with TV cough Inhumans cough. I think Agents of SHEILD being their only successful non-Netflix show before launching a plethora of shows on Disney+ (and even that one was a little rough around the edges).
Since launching Disney+, I have personally found the Marvel TV quality to consistently hit C+/B- quality, with occasional highlights (the first half of Wandavision, most of Loki); which surprised me since I felt the movies hit higher quality more consistently.
It makes sense the TV landscape has been hard with Marvel after reading this article, though. Committing to a whole season/ series with no pilot seems risky enough, but combine that with no show-runner and a fix-it-in-post attitude, and it's a shock the shows came out as passable as they did.
It sounds like Disney is planning to change that, but I'm not sure how much I believe that to be honest.
Oh, exactly. I've hit a point where I could buy nice clothes on occasion if I had a reason too, but with expensive clothes being just as quality errant as low end brands, I find myself having very little reason to upgrade my wardrobe.
If I could find a reliably quality brand, I'd certainly be more inclined to start changing out my closet.
As it stands right now: I can basically throw out any polyester clothes because I never wear them, even if I like the pattern.
I think a lot of people have noticed clothing quality going down for a while, especially if shopping fast fashion brands; but I thought it was especially interesting how the decline in quality permeated through the high end brands as well.
When I saw the Ben Schwartz photo referenced in the article, I had assumed it looked worse since it was probably not as nice a brand as Billy Crystal's sweater. I was surprised to see it was likely a 400USD sweater that looked like that.
As the article notes at the end, it is still possible to find fully natural clothes, but I wish they were easier to locate.
When it comes to taste in entertainment, there is very little that can be considered objective. I, myself, know several of these shows by reputation as being great but have no interest in watching them. (For example, I've heard Peep Show is phenomenal, but I do not enjoy cringe humor; and I've never been able to get into Game of Thrones.)
Based on what you've watched in the past, I might recommend South Side or Insecure off the list. They're both classic sitcoms with South Side reminding me a lot of Parks and Rec (it is not a mockumentary, though). Insecure feels more like the evolution of spiritual sequel to Girlfriends. Insecure is a little further from your previously watched list than South Side, but they're both pretty solid sitcoms.
I have also heard recommendations for Fleabag and Broad City as comedies but I haven't seen enough of them to confirm if they'd work for you.
In terms of prestige dramas, I've heard great things about I May Destroy You but I have not watched it since I'm not personally huge on dramas.
There definitely seems to be some recency bias in the shows that were picked, and I certainly don't agree with the placement on most of the shows on the list; but I think it goes without saying these are all strong shows.
The shows I was personally happy to see get a shout out were South Side, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, and Atlanta. Though I was not surprised to see Atlanta get recognized, I was surprised to see the other three get the recognition they deserve.
I never kept up too closely with the Jeopardy situation, but my (limited) understanding was that the EP deliberately set Burton up to fail; giving him only one week (instead of the two weeks that other hosts were given) and making his week during the Olympics.
Only having one week instead of two meant that he was only actually filming for a day or two and likely didn't have a chance to really find his footing. And of course, being during the Olympics hurt his ratings.
Now, were those two issues the some cause of all of his problems? Probably not; but it definitely feels like they were never intending to give him the job.
As you said, though, it all worked out in the end anyways; and I'm hoping it all works out for Roy Wood Jr as well.
I haven't watched The Daily Show in a long time, so I don't have much of a horse in this race; but I could tell a lot of people were really hopeful that Roy Wood Jr would get the host role.
Hearing about the guest host roster and the entire process definitely is reminiscent of when Jeopardy short changed Levar Burton for the host position. It was later revealed to have been a play by the (former) executive producer to give himself the host position; but by the time Jeopardy got its house in order, Levar Burton had already been given his own show to host.
I think a lot of times studios aren't really as in touch with what people want as they think and they can easily overlook a crowd favorite. I'm hoping that similar to the Levar Burton Jeopardy situation, this will reveal Roy Wood Jr's popularity to allow him his own show as well.
While season 3 did not feel as strong as season 2 to me, I'm definitely bummed about this news. It's especially a bummer since they ended on a cliffhanger.
I thought the new additions to the cast (Harper and Millicent) were both great actors and I hope to see them in new projects following iCarly's cancellation.
A couple of key highlights:
The proposal is a gambit by Meta to navigate European Union rules that threaten to restrict its ability to show users personalized ads without first seeking user consent—jeopardizing its main source of revenue.
It would give users the choice between continuing to access Instagram and Facebook free with personalized ads, or paying for versions of the services without any ads, people familiar with the proposal said.
Under the plan, Meta has told regulators it would charge users roughly €10 a month, equivalent to about $10.50, on desktop on a Facebook or Instagram account, and roughly €6 for each additional linked account, the people said. On mobile devices the price would jump to roughly €13 a month because Meta would factor in commissions charged by Apple’s and Google’s app stores on in-app payments.
Privacy-conscious users in the U.S. shouldn’t expect to be offered the option to pay for ad-free Instagram or Facebook soon. Meta’s proposals have been pitched specifically as a way to navigate demands by EU regulators to seek consent before crunching user data to select highly personalized ads.
It isn’t clear if regulators in Ireland or Brussels will deem the new plan compliant with EU laws, or whether they will insist Meta offer cheaper or even free versions with ads that aren’t personalized based on a user’s digital activity.
This feels like Meta is just attempting to play at Malicious Compliance. There's no way they make that much off each user per month, this feels like they are intentionally making it cost-prohibitive to have the ad-free version just so they can say they are meeting EU regulations. I certainly cannot see many users shelling out ~€17 a month for Instagram and Facebook.
As noted, though, this may not be enough to pass the EU regulations.
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