Celebrity Sleepovers with Mark Malkoff!

The King And I: The Irreplaceable Howard Stern

Like millions of us, my stepmom is a lifelong Howard Stern fan. She just sent this photo taken off of Howard TV, airing our in-studio interview from earlier this week. I had the honor of being Howard Stern's guest on his Tuesday, 420 show (scroll to 840a).

Response is coming into My Damn Channel via email, phones, video views, comments, new subscribers, tweets, wall postings, and even a live spotting this afternoon in a clothing store (to complete the surreality). The influx of intense energy all flows back to a man undeniably uniquely qualified to hold the heavyweight title: "King of All Media."

Howard endures as one of the most talented and honest souls alive. He embodies the freedom of speech with every breath. For all who've been fired, laid off, downsized, pink slipped, discharged, axed, or job eliminated...it's hard to imagine speaking truth to power on a live microphone the way Howard has done it for decades.

I first followed Howard Stern on a carrier current, college radio station, 64 WTBU at Boston University. (There's a great scene depicting TBU in "Private Parts.")

If you've ever chased a radio dream, then your college years are likely the last time and place you ever experienced the fear and thrill of exercising your freedom of speech over a live mic.

Primordial FM rock radio stations were created in the late 1960's. Early heroes like Harry Shearer and Steven Clean were blowing minds at places like KPPC in Pasadena, California (which eventually became the world famous KROQ).

The combined forces of original radio talents and pre-corporate rock music created stations throughout the 70s powerful enough to infect audiences with a sense of community, purpose, passion, sex and fun that began to hit the wall around 1980.

I was sitting on the front steps of my apartment on Beacon Street in Boston with Steven Clean and my best friend, Mike Isabella the night Ronald Reagan was elected President. I was 20. I was about to drop out of college and take a full-time job as a rock radio jock at WAAF out in Worcester, Mass. One year later, I had the only radio thrill that came closest to being on Howard's show this week. Lightning struck and we convinced the Rolling Stones to do a private show for our station's fans in 1981 to start up the "Tattoo You" tour.

But, back to Mr. Clean. I'd been Steven's intern for a time at WCOZ in Boston. At that point in his career, Clean had been fired by many of the best radio stations in the country. He was a real life inspiration for the Dr. Johnny Fever character in "WKRP in Cincinnati." Steven was incredibly talented, brilliant, a true music expert and fan...and he was rebellious enough to drive the most patient souls to the edge of their sanity.

Considering the nation's new President, Steven held a joint firmly in my face and said, "See this? This is OVER!"
By the time of Reagan's second term, most radio station managers had a "Just Say No" policy for disc jockeys expressing free thoughts on mic, or taking free reign over any music playlist.

A small number of former radio station program directors shaved their beards, cut their hair, bought expensive suits, and armed themselves with halliburton briefcases filled with blow and bullshit designed to convince every fearful radio exec that they had the only secrets to ratings success, fortune and fame.

Conformity soon became the norm. Tighter playlists made stations sound the same from city-to-city. The job of disc jockey was transforming free thinkers into people paid to read positioning slogans, timechecks and weather forecasts.

In the midst of all this unholy homogenization, Howard Stern began to build a radio show free from the constraints put on most of his competitors. His talent grew on the radio and expanded with every carefully planned new project he launched.

Superfans know that Howard pays homage to legends who came before him like Lenny Bruce and George Carlin. I can't think of another entertainer who has more succesfully won battles with corporate brass than Howard. One of the many surprises about the real man to outsiders is how he maintains his position with grace and wisdom.

No one knows what the next chapter will be for the Stern show in 2011. Assume Howard can see the possible moves on the chess board more clearly than most. As a fan, I'll be following as I have since the beginning. As a business owner, My Damn Channel stands ready to serve The King anytime he calls. 

A "WHAT IF" QUESTION

If you're a co-con, a regular to "The Night Feed," or a fan of Damn, we're sharing a brand new idea - before it's even half-baked - for your brains to help bake it better.

We're getting a ton of pitches for new channels, new web series every week.

We're doing an honest job getting through all of it & giving back answers a thousand times more quickly than yer typical old media response.



Problem is - we're saying NO - a lot more than we're saying YES.

Reason is - we started My Damn Channel with the idea that less could be more.

We never attempted to be the site with the most videos - we keep working to make sure that if we're putting care & coin behind something - we're doing it because we're giving you the better stuff - consistently.

WHAT IF we started giving more series a shot by creating a channel that featured the pilot episodes for potential new series on My Damn Channel.

We're not going after a "Funny or Die" approach - we're not opening up another "American Idol." But we would start a new way to give more creators a chance to reach millions.

We'd option your work for a chunk of months - after that - we'd either say YES to more & pony up -- or NO -- & you're free to move on.

More to say - but starting the earliest thinking here - for your comments in public, or private to: Rob@MyDamnChannel.com

THE COUNCIL OF CO-CONS

We just completed the first, unofficial, official, virtual meeting of the newly-formed COUNCIL OF CO-CONS.

Thank yous to our first victims: Miss Malevolent, ZehnKatzen, Jason Elliot, Ryan Hunter.

Maria Diokno from My Damn Channel is reaching out to a rotating group of humanoids who've contributed to the building of our baby so far with comments, feedback, emails, video uploads, hate mail n' flowers.

As we head past our first 21 million views into phase 2 of DAMN - we're recommitting to opening up more access, control, and LIVE interaction into your heads and hands.

Feedback from Friday:

- overall site navigation scored as high as 9 on the 10 scale, but one neg called it a "shrinking violet" ? have to revisit the notes to ponder?

- Home Page scorecard gets a 7.5 on the 10 scale with requests for a bit more about WHO WE ARE & WHAT WE DO to be added for the uninitiated

- this Blog (The Night Feed) & the Damn, News items are lost to many since they sit at the bottom of the home page, better placement needed & their text makes them look like google ads

- predictable mega great grades for YSAP & for the brand new Big Fat Brain series: SNATCHBUCKLER's SECOND CHANCE

- surprisingly good grades for the new experimental home page feature: DAILY GRACE from Grace Helbig....they like you! they really like you! - cautions for us not to overproduce or muck it up were heard

- lower grades for Andy Milonakis....hey Andy: the peops want MORE !

- suggestions went round a bit about a 'point system' for 'super-users' (more later)

- DEMAND FOR BETTER BRANDED USER PROFILES

- asks for more 'behind the scenes' with our artists/channels & a PRIVATE PHOTOSHOP LESSON WITH DONNIE HOYLE if he ever comes back

- more later> THANKS as well to My Damn Channel humans: Paul Gallagher, Kim Brannon, Brad O'Farrell for making this happen

- Commercialus Interruptus gets pretty good grades with most able to swallow the new Google Adsense for Video for its relevance to the video you're watching & for your ease at swatting away the flies for good with just one X off the ad.

- these lower third ads scored better than pre-roll - of course - but some are open to the reality of bringing in a few bucks this way - IF - the pre-rolls are no longer than :15 - and - if there's a frequency cap so the same damn ad doesn't keep returning during the same visit to our site

- email Maria@MyDamnChannel.com if you wanna be a future CO-CON

HEADLINING VEGAS

Thanks to the NAB and especially to Ashley Howell, Chris Marlowe, and Rochelle Winters for inviting us to present in Vegas yesterday. Thanks to Jon Healey from the LA Times for moderating - and to Harry Shearer & Andy Milonakis for making the trip.

We filled a room of about 350-400 humans and started by showing a few of our original videos. Fun seeing hundreds LOL at YSAP - up on a huge megascreen - and cool to see a crowd feel the bass of music produced by Don Was.

Harry Shearer made news - announcing "THE ALPHAS" - a project he's been developing for 10 years - and the most ambitious new work making its way to My Damn Channel.

"THE ALPHAS" is motion-capture animation of the highest quality (Beowulf) - done in the fastest turnaround ever achieved (less than 5 day production cycles). Here's more:

Imagine seeing the best-known people in politics and the media, every week, in hilariously private situations. Not actors in makeup, but what looks and sounds like the real President, candidates, anchors, and the rest. That’s the idea behind “The Alphas”, a revolutionary new concept in topical sketch comedy. Written and performed by Harry Shearer, who’s notched more than two decades as a creator of topical satire on his weekly public radio broadcast, “Le Show”, along with two memorable seasons on “Saturday Night Live”, “The Alphas” includes no makeup, no celebrity cameos. Instead, utlizing a trio of cutting-edge motion-capture technologies--harnessed for the first time to a “week-of-air” production schedule, “The Alphas” features startlingly realistic computer-animated versions of the movers, shakers and yakkers. They’re not lifelike--thanks to the technology and Shearer’s performances, they’re alive. And every week, they’re deftly and drolly revealed for all their pretensions, resentments, jealousies and anxieties--all the good stuff, online just days after production.

Here's the first news coverage from the LA Times and the Digital Content Producer Magazine with thanks for the 'ink' & correction to Michael Goldman.

THE FILTER

Peter Gabriel's filter

The rock star hopes to shock Amazon with a new web-based recommendation service.

(Fortune) -- There's a reason Peter Gabriel is a household name. One of the founders of the super-group Genesis, the British rock star went on to have great success as a solo artist known for his outlandish costumes, his cutting edge music videos, and of course, his '80s hits like "Sledgehammer" and "Shock The Monkey," which were both artistic and commercial milestones.

What's less known is that the 58-year-old Gabriel has done rather well since then as a digital media entrepreneur. In 2000, he co-founded OD2, which quickly became the leading European digital music provider with clients like Nokia and MSN. OD2's owners reportedly later sold the company for an estimated $20 million.

Okay, so Sammy Hagar reportedly sold a majority stake in his tequila business for four times that amount last year. But now Gabriel has a new business that's potentially much bigger. On Tuesday, he and a new group of partners launch the private-beta version of a web-based service called The Filter that will sort through the vast inventory of content on the Internet and recommend songs, movies, television show and web videos to its users. In May, The Filter website will be open to the public.

Ultimately, Gabriel and his partners in his Bath, England-based company have a grander vision for the Filter than telling you that if you like Sammy Hager, you might also like Van Halen's earlier stuff with David Lee Roth. They hope you'll one day be able to log in and find the perfect place to dine on your upcoming trip to, say, Barcelona -- and a suggestion for the right clothes to wear on your night out. Now that sounds like something an art rocker like Peter Gabriel would go for --- as opposed to a night of tequila swilling at Hagar's nightclub in Mexico.

Gabriel put up $8.5 million along with England's Eden Ventures to start The Filter because he fears that people are being overwhelmed by the web. "Everyone got really excited about the concept of infinite choice through the Internet," he says. "The reality is a little like getting a sore thumb with your remote on your television. Too much choice is not always a good thing."

He describes the solution to this machine-age dilemma in the sort of terms you might expect from a thinking man's rock star. "My friend [recording studio guru to Talking Heads, U2 and Coldplay] Brian Eno has been going on for some time about the increasingly important role of the curator over the creator," Gabriel explains. "In many ways, the disc jockey has become as important as the musician, which is one of the best illustrations of that. I would like a life jockey as well as a disc jockey."

The Filter's founders say their service could play that role nicely, claiming its recommendation engine is more sophisticated than anything else on the market. Unlike competing services, the Filter doesn't rely on the ratings that people assign to songs or movies online. It determines its users tastes by observing what they actually do with these items on the Internet.

The engine is particularly interested if someone buys a song, streams it or clicks on a related link. "We like to get real evidence of people's tastes," says Martin Hopkins, co-founder of The Filter and creator of its recommendation technology.

Hopkins also notes that The Filter's engine doesn't push people choices based on what they bought years ago. It slowly forgets what it learned because peoples' tastes change. Don't you wish Amazon's (AMZN, Fortune 500) service did the same?

Gabriel and his partners hope to generate revenue at The Filter by selling advertising. They also hope to license their technology to other digital media companies. The company already provides recommendations to the users of its former OD2 customers like MSN (MSFT, Fortune 500) and Nokia (NOK). That's why the service launches with a database of over 50 million transactions from which to make suggestions.

It's a long leap from recommending music to choosing their restaurants in foreign cities. Still, the idea is intriguing. Gabriel isn't just taking about this either. He's putting up a lot of money to make it happen. "This is definitely something that's worth watching," says Gartner analyst Mike McGuire who, like Fortune, was briefed by The Filter before the private beta launch.

As you might expect, Gabriel is in the studio working on new music, too. He owes one more album to EMI. After that, he plans to release his music on his own a la Radiohead. The graying rocker is thrilled that the Internet is giving artists a new means of distributing their music -- especially the ones who couldn't get a record deal even in the industry's better days. "I like it that the inmates are running the asylum,' says Gabriel.

This, of course means more choices for those overwhelmed consumers that Gabriel is so concerned about. All the more reason for his new company, right? No wonder he's so pleased.

First Published: April 15, 2008: 4:21 AM EDT\

"THE WORLD'S GREATEST ROCK & ROLL BAND"

A few other living rock bands have chased "the title" - but when those contenders take a private look in the mirror, they all know the championship belt still belongs to The Rolling Stones.

Their iconic stature is so immense that it's become too easy to take the Stones for granted. They've toured endlessly, touching millions - but if you've never seen the Rolling Stones in concert, you've missed the chance to inhale the primordial goo that led you to every rock band you ever worshipped.

I was 21 in '81, when I had my first close encounter of the mystical kind. A series of amazing coincidences put me in a position to dream up an impossible night of music. I co-created a secret Stones club gig with the band which put them on a tiny stage at Sir Morgan's Cove in Worcester, Massachusetts. We filled the club with over 300 fans of our radio station, WAAF. It's one thing to see the world's best band in a football stadium - it's another thing to see them five feet in front of your face.





The band continued the tradition of doing secret warmup gigs in small clubs over the years. On rare occasions, they've played small theatres like the Beacon in NY. In the fall of 2006, Martin Scorsese documented the Stones there. The result is a new film called, SHINE A LIGHT which opens tomorrow.

We've got 5 clips up now on our PromoSexual channel to drive you to the movie and to get you one step closer to feeling what all the fuss has been about since 1962.

When real rock becomes dangerously rare, authenticity annhiliates cynicism.