Those of you who are interested have probably already seen these, but just in case... Recently KMSP's replaced their primary antenna on their Shoreview tower (the taller single tower, not the twin Telefarm towers). They switched from circular to horizontal polarization. Between that and the reduced strength required for DTV (plus not running two signals after the switch), they're going to save a ton of power (88% less on the main amps, probably 90% less than the transition power). I have some other info, but I'm not sure if it should be posted on the web, so I'm not doing that for now. In any case, of course local techs/hams took a bunch of pictures of the process, and those are posted online.
Last July I started on the first season of 24, and have watched seasons in alternating months since (wasn't the plan, just how it worked out). In the last week I watched most of season 4 (all but the last disc which should arrive late this week), and Sunday night was the premier episodes of season 5.
I definitely have mixed thoughts on the show. On the one hand, it's sorta cool with lots of shooting and things blowing up and stuff. Basically the same attraction the action movies with no plot have. It also has a "high tech" piece which could be interesting. As for plot it moves in some points, but is horrible in others. The real-time aspect could be interesting, but they seem to break it whenever convenient so it doesn't hold much value.
It's an interesting show if you're willing and able to continue suspending disbelief. This has gotten harder to the point of being nearly impossible with the latest stuff. If you don't want spoilers, you probably should stop reading now.
As far as tech stuff goes, the first season was pretty much as expected for TV/movies. Everyone who knows how stuff works has pretty much needed to learn to live with this by now. Shows like 24 and Alias have somewhat prided themselves in being at least half rooted in truth, which makes it a bit easier to play along. What I mean by that is they get general ideas close, and tend to use real terms when it exists rather than making up stuff. Of course it's not always true, and I'm definitely not saying they're completely accurate. In this regard the first season was actually pretty decent. A few locations, spent the season tracking down locations. Waiting for info, etc. Since then it's definitely suffered the "throw more tech at it" trend which is way too popular. Season 2 started throwing more locations, and more JIT tracking stuff. Still couldn't always find people though. Season 3 there was heavy use of cell phone and other tracking, satellite data is almost always instantly available, and CTU has instant complete control over seemingly every system in the area. Find a phone, track numbers called, track them, pull up real-time satellite, catch bad guys. Season 4 they seem to have so much they can't keep track of it. It's a big deal they find a guy's cell phone and track activity to some other remote player. Then they find the phone of the guy who was just talking to the primary guy and they mention the phone, but apparently don't bother to check activity. Then they have a hard time getting satellite time for major investigations, but it's no problem for someone else to grab and hold onto it for long times for some secret task they're not supposed to be doing anyways. Season 5 is barely started, but so far we have can't get some info unless they go to a lab, but can pull up the entire agent deployment real-time from the laptop over Wifi.
Another major thing is the plot. You gotta wonder how many times people can get themselves on multi-year personal leaves, fired for insubordination, convicted of treason, officially dead, etc. and still come back in to work for the government in a core position. The issue of not being able to work with the same people has come up, but then of course the next season most of the rest of the staff has turned over so it's not an issue for them to come back. Also the amount of control CTU LA has over the entire country is sorta funny at times too. Travel times have also become skewed to enhance suspense or allow more things to be added.
It seems the show has fallen into the trap of trying to jam more excitement into a given time to keep the interest of more people. Unfortunately it seems to have gotten to the point of having issues telling the story. I think they either need to let up less-essential details and drop a lot of subplots, tell less complex stories, or drop the real-time thing. At this point I'll probably keep watching as it's still somewhat interesting. Unfortunately it's not only rather hard to suspend disbelief, but there doesn't seem to be any real building suspense anymore. Hopefully season 5 will improve things.
As a somewhat side note, but advertised locally during the thing, Fox 9's investigative reporters are hyped up about something that cops get away with all over the metro area but the average person would be ticketed. There's comments about "do as I say, not as I do", and my favorite "is there a double standard?" It's on Monday night after 24. I have a feeling this one will be as good as when they uncovered that underage hockey players drink. When will they learn?
Copyright ©2000-2008 Jeremy Mooney (jeremy-at-qux-dot-net)
