Sad to see that two of the YouTube Channels that I really enjoy watching will be closing up shop

Both MatPat (The Food Theorist) and Tom Scott (TomScottGo) will no longer be producing and making new YouTube Videos going forward. Both creators posted on YouTube that the time has come to move on (MatPat after 13 years, Tom after 10 Years) and do something different. Both explained that the time and work required to produce the best videos possible finally caught up with them and they needed a step away and spend more time with family and friends. 

The Videos posted on their YouTube Channels were always entertaining as well as educational. I learned a lot of great things from their channels and will miss watching to see what new and exciting things they got to do and talk about. Here are their farewell videos — Subscribe and Check them out (as well as all their old videos)

Just when you think you have seen and heard something crazy, something crazier comes along.

ESPN busted by Emmys for using fake names to get awards

According to this article, ESPN was submitting fake names of associate producers involved in shows like College Game Day, and then re-engraving them with the names of the studio hosts (who were ineligible to win). Then they would present them to the hosts as an actual winner.

College GameDay won the Emmy for Outstanding Weekly Studio Show seven times in the last 15 years: 2010, 2011, and every year from 2014 to 2018. The Athletic identified that in each of those years, associate producers with identical initials to the show’s on-air personalities were listed in the credits. For example, Kirk Henry and Lee Clark were listed as associate producers to stand in for Kirk Herbstreit and Lee Corso. The outlet also reported that there were fake names in the College GameDay Emmy submission credits as recently as 2020.

While no real harm was done other that skirting the eligibility rules, and getting some extra Emmy statues, I do have some observations; One is why ESPN would go to this length to supposedly boost the egos of the studio hosts and a few other employees. Wouldn’t, just telling the studio hosts that their production crew won an EMMY, but they themselves were not eligible to be included be OK. Another is how nobody involved with this plan questioned what they were doing. If someone handed you an Emmy Award and told you to re-engrave it with a different name, wouldn’t you at least ask why? 

As for the EMMYs, I guess you can just list as many people you want on the application and if you win, EMMYs for everybody. They must of at least looked at the list of people on the application since they put in rules on who is eligible. (Or maybe not)

Now ESPN has to go to the people they gave the re-engraved EMMYs to and say, “Sorry, you really didn’t win an EMMY so give it back” What a mess. 

But these are the times we live in now. Nobody cares about rules, or integrity. Just saw another story where a couple won a $3,000,000 suite from EBay when the top executives at EBay got mad at them for writing a newsletter about Devin Wenigs’ (eBay’s CEO at the time) annual pay. The company’s chief communications officer, Steve Wymer, responded: “We are going to crush this lady.” They put a plan in place to harass the couple by harassing them and sending them packages of bugs.

Of course, Devin Wenigs said he had no idea what was going on, and would have stopped it if he knew (He resigned from eBay in September 2019 with a $57 million exit package.). You think he really cared what happened to this couple, or of any harm EBay may have caused

I had a discussion with a coworker about how the penalties for a lot of laws have stayed constant (and mostly monetary), while the wealth of many people has increased to the point where it is no longer a deterrent for those making a lot of money. Fining someone $5000.00 who takes home a million dollars a year is a .005% fine But fining somebody who’s making minimum wage $5000.00 is a .16% fine. 

The only way to put a stop to al lot of the craziness is to make fines and penalties more of a deterrent. This can be done by making fines a set percentage instead of a fixed amount — If found guilty, everyone should have to pay 10% of their own income, plus 25% of their stake in the companies yearly income for the next 2 years.

As Eddie Murphy (as Billy Ray Valentine ) says in “Trading Places”: “You know, it occurs to me that the best way you hurt rich people is by turning them into poor people.”

Until we make the penalties sting, people will continue to do whatever they want, pretend to be sorry, and then go on with their life.

I finished reading “Holly” by Stephen KIng — I haven’t read much of his work lately, and really liked it. Started “The Bad Weather Friend” by the great Dean Koontz. Added a goal of reading at least 12 books in 2024 and am off to a good start. Reading also helps to reduce the time I spend watching TV or using the internet. This is also another reason I want to be a contestant on @Survivor. Being forced to go 26 days with no access to the internet sounds like an awesome idea to me

Went off on a little tangent, and hope you were able to stick with me

Another of my 2024 goals is to write more often, and expand my writing and grammar skills

So I promise to write some more soon

PEACE

AverageAndy