Adele
Laura Rosenfeld, managing editor
Music in 2011 was all about Adele. Last year, she proved that you don’t need electro dance beats and over-the-top theatrics to be commercially and critically successful in today’s world of pop music. All you need is pure talent.
Adele kicked off this year in music with the release of her sophomore album 21 in February. With songs inspired by the singer’s real-life break-up, 21 explores the emotions felt at the end of a relationship. From the bitter “Rolling in the Deep” to the surrendering “Turning Tables” to the forgiving “Someone Like You,” Adele’s raw, soulful voice knocks you down, picks you up and leaves you wanting more.
21 shattered records as the best-selling album of the year, setting an all-time industry record for digital album sales and earning the title as the biggest-selling album of the 21st century in the United Kingdom. The lead single from the album, “Rolling in the Deep,” is the most popular single of the year, claiming the top spot on Billboard’s year-end Hot 100 list. The song also inspired countless covers from artists like John Legend, Linkin Park, the cast of Glee and basically anyone with a YouTube account. Adele has also made Billboard history as the first female singer to top the artist, album and singles list in the same year. Not bad for a 23-year-old.
It seemed like she was going to be unstoppable this year, but Adele’s greatest asset – her voice – would eventually let her down. The singer experienced vocal problems beginning in January and had to reschedule a string of shows on the spring North American leg of her tour for the fall. After being diagnosed with a vocal hemorrhage, Adele cancelled the rescheduled tour dates and announced on her website on October 4 that she would be taking a long break from singing to fully recover from her repeat vocal problems. Still, it speaks volumes that an artist can be so successful in the United States with little to no live appearances. 21 is really that good on its own.
Unsurprisingly, Adele is up for six awards at the 2012 Grammys, leading the nominations, which include Record and Song of the Year for “Rolling in the Deep” and Album of the Year for 21. With the massive success Adele has had this year, you can bet she will earn a major haul at the awards show. More than that, if Adele recovers enough to attend, the Grammys will be her welcome return to the spotlight. We probably won’t see much of Adele until that night in February, but it will certainly be worth the wait.
Adam Scott
Shaunacy Ferro, assistant managing editor
2011 was the year I fell in love with Adam Scott. I didn’t know what I was doing when I blindly chose to watch Party Down on Netflix. But within a matter of hours, I had watched all that was available, and I was obsessed. I don’t often go looking for content outside of legal channels, but this I hunted down and patiently waited to be able to watch more and more Megavideo files. When it was over, I felt empty. How could I get more Henry Pollard?
And then he returned to Parks and Recreation as the sexiest nice guy on television, Ben Wyatt. And with it Adam Scott went from “that one actor dude” to a comedic force. He’s had roles in Step Brothers, Knocked Up, The Aviator, Leap Year, even Boy Meets World, back in the day. But even more than Party Down, a regular stint on Parks and Rec has given him a chance to shine.
He and Leslie Knope shared the most agonizing – and yet nearly drama-free — will-they-won’t-they story arc, bringing back those long cameraward looks of secret love that were so awesome in the pre-Pam-and-Jim-relationship stage of The Office. Rarely has a couple so genuinely sweet and caring been interesting on television.
Of course, that’s not exactly the reason that I find myself more interested in small town government budgets and PowerPoints than I’ve ever been before. The pompadour! That wry smile! Those perfectly shaped eyebrows! In his skinny ties and buttondowns, Ben Wyatt brings hipster style to a government job, even as Tom Haverford (Aziz Ansari) lambasts his fashion sense. It’s no wonder he’s a favorite of the experts at GQ. He even managed to rock a Batsuit, which is hard to do when the biggest crime you’re fighting is overspending in the Parks Department.
So let it be said: 2011 was the year “sexy” and “assistant city manager” were combined in one man, and that man was Adam Scott.
The Last Harry Potter Movie
Megan Suckut, entertainment writer
Of the many things my English teacher told me during my senior year of high school, what stuck with me the most was her remark that just as Harry Potter had begun his life at Hogwarts when we entered elementary school, he completed his education just as we started to enter adulthood ourselves.
It was with a bittersweet heart that I got all dressed up and waited in line for the midnight premiere of the final installment of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 with hundreds of other teenagers dressed up and speaking the jargon, waving their wands and ready for an epic battle scene. And while this premiere was a big deal in my small Wisconsin hometown, millions of fans around the world packed theaters during that opening weekend to watch their favorite wizard finally conquer Voldemort.
The movie brought us into Hogwarts, Hogsmeade and even into Snape’s memories. We were with Harry as he destroyed those last remaining Horcruxes, watched several of his friends die and travel into limbo during the duel. And we knew Harry would defeat Voldemort in the end, but seeing that scene on the big screen allowed us to feel the same euphoria as Harry felt when the dark wizard erupted into ashes before the student body of Hogwarts.
Even though we all knew that this movie was the end of it all, it was easy to pretend it was any other Harry Potter movie – or at least it was easy until that final scene. Seeing Harry and Ginny as proud parents sending their children off on the Hogwarts Express confirmed that, yes, this was the last scene of any Harry Potter movie ever. While pretending this was any other movie, you could laugh at Neville and sneer at the Death Eaters, but that last scene takes us out of the traditional fantasy of the movies and offers us a dose of adulthood.
Having grown up with Harry and his friends, we got to see them finally accept adulthood. So while some of us wept at the fact that this was the final scene and some of us laughed at bald, chubby Ron, we could all acknowledge that just as Harry Potter grows up in the end, so too will all of us.
The Royal Wedding
Emily Ferber, executive editor
It’s 4 a.m. when my alarm goes off. Notwithstanding the fact that I had gone to bed two hours earlier, I literally heave myself out of bed, throw on clothes in the dark and stumble out of my dorm, with pillow in hand. The day of the royal wedding seemed of the utmost importance to my friends and me, so we had planned a little get-together, complete with cinnamon rolls and coffee. About seven of us pile in a room, clad in sweatshirts, looking like hell, and so commences our participation in one of the most talked about social events of the past century. Four in the morning, you ask, when the wedding procession didn’t start until 5 a.m. CST? Well, of course we scheduled in time to watch the televised pre-game.
And as sort of sad and oddball this activity may sound, we were not the only ones. Students around Northwestern joined in with the world as they watched commoner Kate Middleton marry Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and become Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. According to Livestream, who partnered with the Associated Press, CBS and Entertainment Tonight to broadcast the festivities, there were at least 300,000 concurrent viewers during the simulcast and at least 2 million unique viewers by the time the broadcast was over. Not the most watched event in history by any stretch, but add the 911,000 tweets in the month gearing up for the wedding (which rounds out to about 30,000 tweets per day), 145,000 cumulative blog posts, and 217,000 Facebook status updates regarding the wedding reported by Webtrends and you start to get a true sense at the sheer magnitude of this media blitz. Was it the culmination of our generation’s fairytale wedding childhood dream, something we had heard about and seen in movies, but never in real life? Perhaps it was the many comparisons and mentions of the late Princess Diana that drew so much attention, everyone anxious to see if this wedding would bear any resemblance to hers. Or maybe everyone just loves a big white wedding, no matter the circumstances.
@MayorEmanuel
Robinson Meyer, news editor
Taken a tweet at a time, @MayorEmanuel seemed frivolous. Here was a one-liner about Carol Moseley Braun; here were 140 characters brimming with 28 f-words.
But a love song to Chicago emerged from the stream. Individual tweets attained poesy, like when (since the distinction must be made, fake) Mayor Daley summarized, in a single tweet, the entirety of the recipe for celery salt, the crucial ingredient in a Chicago-style hot dog. An epic poem emerged, too. After it looked (in real Chicago) like Emanuel would be barred from the ballot, @MayorEmanuel destroyed his office, wandered the streets, slept under a bridge on Cortland Street and discovered a mustachioed duck, whom he dubbed Quaxelrod.
@MayorEmanuel, too, aligned form and function: it was a 24/7 satire running adjacent to our own dyspeptic 24/7 news cycle. The Atlantic's Alexis Madrigal compared the feed to the Russian theorist Bakhtin's idea of the carnival, in which "normal hierarchies are suspended" and folks can intermingle as they please.
"Normal hierarchies [were] suspended" partly because, for the story's entire telling, we had no idea as to its author. The fake mayor's number of followers often dwarfed the real candidate's, and the real Emanuel offered to donate his own money if @MayorEmanuel's writer would reveal him or herself. But when the last tweet came, and, suspiciously, an enormous thunderclap sounded over campus, we had no idea that @MayorEmanuel's author was just a few blocks away.
For the humorist himself, Dan Sinker, was an Evanstonian. He joins cartoonist Lynda Barry and folk singer Steve Goodman on the list of great Chicagoan artists who were actually on the Purple Line. And when the Tribune canonized the feed as Chicago literature, equal to Studs Terkel or Lenny Bruce, it chose Bill Savage, one of Northwestern's own, to write the review. @MayorEmanuel even once mentions Northwestern Nobelist Dale Mortensen. If ever you need proof of Northwestern and Evanston's symbiotic relationship with the metropolis of broad shoulders, look no further than @MayorEmanuel.
In 2011, middle eastern governments toppled and American citizens occupied their own cities. Stymied by financial mismanagement, the Enlightened governments of the United States and Europe looked awfully feeble. And don't even mention literature: Facebook, the fever-dream of a college drop-out, declared itself capable of telling "the story of your life."
But from this anarchic atomization came a rebellion and a certain kind of hope. Protestors in the Middle East asserted the primacy of the citizen. Economically-despondent Americans joined them. And storytelling held strong, for even in 140-character bursts, we learned from @MayorEmanuel that literature‚ free-style, world-making, lavish and obscene‚ could flourish.
The New York Times Paywall
Emily Ferber, executive editor
The New York Times paywall may not have changed how you view news. Without a subscription, readers are now limited to 20 free articles a month, after which they are asked to pony up a little cash to get the news of the world. Sure, there are plenty of ways around it – maybe you piggyback off your parents’ subscription to get “all the news that’s fit to print” on your laptop screen. These things, which I admit I am guilty of, are far less significant than the introduction of a subscription fee for one of the most read news sources on the World Wide Web. Its significance is wrapped in its inevitability and its contribution to the conversation that’s been on journo-type minds: what news are people willing to pay for and how much are they willing to pay for it?
As unanswerable as that question sounds, the paywall says more than what it presents at face value. Rather than seeing the ways around the paywall as some sort of fatal flaw, view it as a nuanced answer to a complicated question. Instead of a cyber-Berlin Wall of sorts, it’s a permeable border (you will never hit the paywall following links to nytimes.com from sites or articles like this). So, instead of creating something elite and therefore unsavory for a great deal of the public, the people at the New York Times have created a product that is open and inviting, but also obviously valued – and it’s pretty hard to argue with the numbers: in the past year, the Times has increased online readers by about 2.3 percent.
With the paywall, the people at the New York Times managed to skirt away from public scorn and avoid something far more frightening: obsoleteness. And they are well on their way to redefining how we the consumer see news in the digital, and too-free, age.
Breaking the Osama bin Laden News
Lydia Belanger, life & style editor
On the evening of May 1, I had logged out of all social networking sites, vowing to stay away until I finished my homework. But my mind inevitably scanned for an alternative way to slack off, and I decided to return a pair of shoes that a friend down the hall had let me borrow the previous night.
As I knocked on the door, a guy from the adjacent suite turned the corner and told me “Osama bin Laden is dead” in a skeptical tone. “It’s on Twitter as of six minutes ago.” He wasn’t sure if he bought it.
I broke my promise to myself, checking Facebook, Twitter and some major news sites. Within five minutes, it exploded. My roommate and I called our less-wired parents. YouTube links of Miley Cyrus’ “Party and the U.S.A.” and “Trey Parker’s “America - Fuck Yeah,” memes and even Photoshopped corpses flooded feeds. The Huffington Post posted the headline “DEAD” with a photo of bin Laden beneath it.
At Northwestern, some students met at the Rock to sing patriotic anthems, ran flags down Sheridan Road and declared it a drinking night, despite morning classes and midterms. Firecrackers sounded on North Campus.
Meanwhile, bit.ly URLs directed followers to a live statement by President Obama. A solemn warning was soon quoted among the hashtags:
“There's no doubt that al Qaeda will continue to pursue attacks against us. We must – and we will – remain vigilant at home and abroad.”
Fear and uncertainty added to the collective emotion that spread upon impact, but not in the same manner as on 9/11. Society had since invented a new mass-messaging medium that simultaneously informed people of the monumental event, allowed them to participate in it and recorded it. When Obama spoke, major news agencies and journalists had been covering the story for more than an hour, making the speech seem like a formality or afterthought.
On my fifth day of fourth grade, September 11, the teacher finally decided to tell us the “news” at 2:30 p.m. so that sixth graders on the bus wouldn’t confuse us. Back then, I had to wait until I got home for mom, dad and NBC to explain the rest.
Everyone has their own story of where they were on 9/11. But nearly ten years later, upon the death of the man behind the attack, millions shared an identical experience from behind their glowing computer screens, engaged in a global conversation.
Justin Verlander
Dan Camponovo, staff writer
This past baseball season, Justin Verlander of the Detroit Tigers became the first starting pitcher to win the American League Most Valuable Player award since Roger Clemens won for the Boston Red Sox 25 years ago. Verlander rode a late surge of Internet press to his award, with the Twitterverse firmly proclaiming his dominance and ultimately swaying the voting parties to recognize his remarkable season.
What's astonishing is the fact that in the olden, glory days of baseball, back before the sports writers of America had anything remotely like Twitter to rapidly share news across the country, starting pitchers like Sandy Koufax and Bob Gibson won MVP awards all the time. It took the steroids era of the late 90s and early 2000s to shift the game's (and the MVP award's) focus away from pitching and toward home runs and RBIs, and, ironically enough, it took a 21st century technology and new form of media and communication to bring the game full circle back to its roots and usher in a new golden age of baseball.
What's more, though the lay baseball fan was not a member of the Baseball Writers of America (BBWA) and therefore had no vote, anybody could tweet at or direct message somebody like ESPN's Jayson Stark or Tim Kurkjian and have their voices heard and reflected in the votes. In a year where twitter helped shape (political) democratic transitions and revolutions across the globe, we saw a similar effect in an admittedly smaller, less important scale, with #Verlander and #NoHitter trending nearly each of the 38 times he took the mound in the 2011 season.
Rebecca Black
Krislyn Placide, senior editor of North by Northwestern magazine
There’s a new pubescent rising star on the scene, and I’m not talking about J-Biebs.
Rebecca Black, the teen who took the YouTube world by storm with her awesomely bad single, is infamous for a few reasons. These include, but aren’t limited to, singing a heavily auto-tuned song written by the two shady-looking middle aged black dudes who work for Ark Music Factory, being rejected by Bieber himself when she publicly requested a duet with him and doing a cameo appearance in Katy Perry’s music video for “Last Friday Night."
Black’s song “Friday” is only surpassed in dislikes by Rick Perry’s commercial for How the Gays Stole Christmas. When there’s such a thing as iCal, a song like “Friday” is quite a redundancy. Furthermore, the sound of Black’s voice in the song is anything but pleasing, reminiscent of the cadence of shower curtains enthusiastically rubbing together.
Black got a lot of hate for her song, possibly more than she deserved. As enjoyable as it is to sing along to the nasal melodies and mindless lyrics, at the end of the day, Rebecca Black is just another teenager who wanted to be famous and trusted a couple of shady dudes to get her there. In August she announced that she left high school to be homeschooled because she couldn’t take the bullying.
There’s no sense in hating Rebecca Black, especially considering the fact that her song, along the idiotic spinoff brought to you by Katy Perry, have brought us hours and hours of entertainment. I’ll be the first to admit that I know all the words to the song, and I doubt I’m the only one. Every time I get out of my last class for the week, you know what I’m thinking: We we we so excited. We gonna have a ball today.
Tebowing
Kalyn Kahler, staff writer
No matter how the season concludes, the 2011 NFL season will be remembered as the year of Tim Tebow’s rise to success. Never mind his miraculous clutch performances and 7-1 record since starting as quarterback of the Denver Broncos – Tebow will be remembered as the quarterback whose last name doubles as a verb. Each NFL player has his own unique and over-the-top end zone celebration, from Aaron Rodger’s championship belt to Chad Ochocinco’s ridiculous dances. From the moment Tebow first celebrated in the end zone with a solemn prayer, “Tebowing” immediately became a nation wide phenomenon. Taking cues from other pointless 2011 fads like “planking” and “owling,” Tebowing is just something to take pictures of and post on the Internet.
According to the unofficial Tebowing website, the definition of Tebowing is “to get down on a knee and start praying, even if everyone else around you is doing something completely different” and has over 100 pages of people Tebowing in every way imaginable: with cows (Tecowing), while scuba diving (Deepseabowing) and even Christmas-style (Christmas Treebowing). Heck, even fetuses are Tebowing.
The greatest Tebowing connoisseurs are the ones who’ll risk everything to Tebow. Recently, a group of high school students in Long Island, NY were suspended for spontaneously breaking out in a group Tebow in the middle of the hallway and refusing to move.
Why does Tebow “Tebow”? Though it may be incomprehensible to some, Tebow doesn’t “Tebow” for attention or to look fierce in the end zone. As the son of missionaries, Tebow is a devout Christian, unafraid to use his influential status to share his passion for Christianity. Tebow’s infusion of Christianity into sports offers a refreshing dose of innocence and optimism. We should be the ones thanking God for Tim Tebow, a shining light among the Jerry Sanduskys and Sam Hurds of the sports world. In 2011, a God-fearing, warm-hearted quarterback like Tim Tebow was just what the sports world desperately needed this year.
The Occupy Movement
Erin Kron, staff writer
The Occupy movement first marched into our lives when the Occupy Wall Street protests took over New York’s financial district, protesting the insurance and finance moguls who were bailed out in the 2008 financial crisis they were responsible for and demanding…. well, we’re still not quite sure.
It all started when Canadian activist magazine “Adbusters” (known for, you got it, not printing ads) called in a July 13 blog post for “a shift in revolutionary tactics,” taking a cue from the Arab Spring. Their graphic sang a tune to our generation of quasi-hippies and the unemployed alike, reading “#OccupyWallStreet” and “Are you ready for a Tahir moment? On Sep. 17th flood into lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street.”
And the flood certainly came in biblical proportions. 1,462 cities worldwide united through social media to campaign as the “99 percent” rising up against the “1 percent” of the world who they say is “foreclosing on their future.” This is the message behind the newest offshoot of the Occupy Movement called “Occupy Our Homes” in response to the increased housing foreclosures.
Needless to say, the MSNBCers were considerably more enthusiastic about the protests than the FOXies. Pundit Ann Coulter had almost nothing nice to say about the movement, commenting that the only thing she liked about it was that it “had no point” and “It just took a few shootings at Kent State to shut that down for good."
The media circus around the movement created several humorous responses, including several SNL skits as well as Occupy Narnia and Occupy Sesame Street.
But despite the jokes, the movement’s message, if muddled, seems particularly relevant in a country where the Census now reports one in two Americans are living below the poverty line.
DC comics
Christian Holub, staff writer
Since Superman was first introduced in 1939, in Issue One of Action Comics, he’s accumulated decades of adventures, villains and supporting characters. So have all the other characters in the DC Comics universe. But this fall, in an attempt to attract new readers, DC executives wiped out that history. Every DC title was canceled and replaced with 52 new series that all started with Issue One. This seems unimpressive until you realize that Action Comics recently released its 900th issue, having run continuously all the way from 1939 with tales of Superman’s adventures. This renumbering is a powerful marker of the new start for DC’s trademark heroes.
So is the complete lack of external underwear. Superman’s infamous over-the-pants undies, a look originally adopted from circus strongmen, are completely absent from the reinvented DC Universe. In fact, the new, renumbered Action Comics portrays a Superman with pants and boots, as the costume of legend is reduced to an ‘S’-emblazoned T-shirt.
Going along with these new looks are new attitudes and atmospheres. Gone is the Daily Planet’s ace reporter Clark Kent, happily married to Lois Lane, fighting aliens and supervillains as a majestic, godlike Superman. Action Comics now chronicles a single Clark Kent who lives in a dingy Metropolis apartment, splitting his time between writing for a small blog and fighting corrupt politicians as a Superman who would feel right at home in Zuccotti Park.
As DC’s flagship hero, Superman is the most representative of the new changes, but he isn’t the only one looking and acting a little different. The heroes of the Justice League now find themselves face-to-face with rampant anti-superhero paranoia, and a pink-skinned alien named Sinestro has replaced Hal Jordan as Green Lantern.
Why the reinvention? Well, the comics industry has never exactly been robust. You’d think that the pop culture prevalence of superheroes would help ailing sales numbers, but it actually hurts. These days, if you’re a Spider-Man fan in need of a fix, you have a lot of options. You can scour the Internet for trailers of next year’s movie or boot up the Spider-Man game “Shattered Dimensions” on your XBox. What’s the point of reading comics? Marvel and DC are struggling with that question, and DC came up with a desperate solution. Their thinking seems to be that their decades of character history is a turn-off to new readers, so they’ve erased that history and started from the beginning again.
The Muppets
Julie Kliegman, staff writer
2011, like every other year in recent memory, saw a boatload of movie ideas that were in some way recycled – either from books, previous films or Broadway shows. But even among serious competitors like The Help and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, The Muppets, directed by James Bobin, stood out in all its furry, upbeat, musical glory.
The funny thing about children’s movies is that the best ones often don’t appeal most to the generation they claim to. Think hidden jokes in films like Toy Story and Shrek that make parents want to drag their kids along.
The Muppets is no different, especially since many kids might not be familiar with faces like The Swedish Chef or Gonzo the Great. Their heyday was ages ago, with the Muppet Show running from 1976 to 1981. Films, shows and dots of remembrance popped up here and there over the years, like the Muppets Inside CD-ROM game I cherished as a child.
Kermit, Miss Piggy and the gang brought joy to 2011 for people of all ages, as much as that sounds like nothing more than a cheesy tagline. There’s no better way to end a year than with a healthy dose of Neil Patrick Harris, Zach Galifianakis, John Krasinski and countless others alongside the Muppets.
Jason Segel’s dominating presence as a writer and actor didn’t hurt either. Although I’ll never appreciate his work as much as I did when he played lovable stoner Nick Andopolis in Freaks and Geeks, his dedication to doing The Muppets justice really shows. It’s no secret that he’s obsessed with Muppeteering, given his role in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. There was no better man for the job.
Overall, the movie, along with a few others this year, serves as proof that Hollywood remakes, sequels and recycled ideas aren’t all boring and washed up. Segel revived the Muppets in a refreshing way that introduced a whole new generation to the colorful, amiable creatures. In an era where retro, but not necessarily well-executed retro, is in style, The Muppets hits the spot.
More importantly, the movie left the following message on young, impressionable viewers: “Life’s a filet of fish!”
The Republican Debates
Emma Rabinovich, entertainment writer
Though each race is distinct, none in recent memory has been as entertaining or as colorful as the race for the Republican ticket that dominated much of the political sphere in 2011. The Republican primary does not officially get under way until early 2012 with the Iowa caucus on January 3, but the intense media coverage of the Republican debates this year has already seen the rise and fall of at least three Republican hopefuls thus far. And that’s not including Donald Trump, who reveled in the media circus just long enough to scare some conservatives into momentarily liking Mitt Romney.
The debates, often littered with political gaffes, filled newspapers and enriched late night political satire, all the while climbing in ratings. ABC News’ coverage of the debate on December 10 brought in the highest numbers for a debate so far. In November, Texas Governor Rick Perry, at the top of the polls when he first entered the race this summer as a staunch Christian and fiscal conservative, made a memorable appearance at a CNBC debate, vowing to dismantle three government agencies, “Commerce, Education, and, uh, let’s see, what’s the third one there?” The headline-grabbing “Oops” running a total of 53 uncomfortable seconds was replayed ad nauseam in the media, sparking both serious considerations regarding the competency of the Republican candidates and jokes about Perry’s apparent lack of sense.
Another candidate whose campaign suffered significantly from poor showings at primary debates is Michele Bachmann. The Minnesota congresswoman continually exaggerated facts during debates, relinquishing her lead and fading in the polls. Her charge against Perry’s HPV vaccine mandate in Texas was ultimately overshadowed by unsubstantiated claims that the drug causes mental retardation.
Herman Cain became the latest frontrunner to sink in the polls toward the end of the year, falling victim to what’s becoming something of an American tradition. While his simplistic (but catchy!) 9-9-9 plan was not off-putting to Republican voters, persistent allegations of sexual misconduct finally sidelined his campaign. But not before media pundits happily made the most of his frequent use of lines from a Pokémon movie, which he first attributed to “a poet” in a Fox News debate in August. Happily, legions of Pokémon fans were waiting in the wings, ready to make videos like this. Jon Stewart probably put it best when he expressed his sincere disappointment in seeing Herman Cain suspend his campaign: “I’m going to miss him so much.”
In searching for a deeper meaning in the millions of campaign dollars spent for primary debates last year, I see the vindication a complex political process driven by an odd symbiotic relationship between the candidates and the press, weeding out the outlandish and prodding the uncertain. Now who’s ready for Round Two?
Animals on the Internet
Nolan Feeney, editor-in-chief
Remember when Justin Timberlake brought the sexy back in 2004, confusing listeners everywhere who weren't sure the sexy had ever been missing? Well, saying the animal kingdom had a great year in 2011 is a lot like that. When were animals not cool? Never, of course, and oggling at cute animals on the Internet is nothing new, either – remember the puppy cam?. But this year, the Internet made appreciating each and every beast inhabiting this earth a little easier and a lot more fun.
Most recent in our memories, at least for those of us who had papers to write last quarter, is Written? Kitten!, a website motivating the writers’ block-afflicted everywhere with digital feline rewards. Whenever you complete your goal of say, writing another 100 words, Written? Kitten! displays a cute cat picture to give you a paw on the back. But what about those times when you do need a distraction? YouTube has us covered, bestowing on our eyes and ears this year the sassy honey badger and this mariachi band casually serenading a beluga whale.
Much credit for this year’s online animal funfest goes to tumblr, the multimedia-friendly blog platform, usually a breeding ground of memes and flashing .gifs, but now also a hotbed of digital to shrines to the animal kingdom. Type in fuckyeah + animal of choice + .tumblr.com into your web browser and you're bound to stumble on an random community of fans swapping pics and reblogging elephant after elephant or sloth after sloth. This year, the real treasure of the tumblrsphere was ANIMALS TALKING IN ALL CAPS, a website that is exactly what it says it is, though that description doesn’t do justice the creativity of its founder, Justin.
How do you make sense of all these cute faces? Does the number of ways to distract ourselves with critters mean we’re losing out in the Internet’s assault on our attention spans? Is it a victory for journalism or infotaiment when a Politico staffer becomes editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed, a social news site with an entire page dedicated to treasures like somersaulting pandas and Vladimir Putin swimming with dolphins? And does such a high exchange of cute animals on the Internet dilute what it means to go viral on the Internet? 2011 may have been the year when revolutions unfolded digitally and social media scooped the regular media, but these adorable pugs in clothes suggest the Internet’s least important function – a source of procrastination, a gateway to leisure time – has never been a more essential part of our daily leaves.
Odd Future
Eric Brown, managing editor
As hip-hop nears its thirtieth birthday it’s skewing in more directions than ever before. Jay-Z and Kanye West have become the genre’s decadent champions, but rap has become an umbrella term for many niche styles. There’s politically affluent jazz rap (The Roots, MF DOOM), commercialized radio rap (Eminem, Lil’ Wayne) and even college rap (Mac Miller, Chiddy Bang). In the 2011 world where much of hip-hop has become stratified and content with the status quo, the young rap collective Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All made waves by fighting against the norm with vulgarity, immediacy to their fans and a penchant for producing copious amounts of high quality hip-hop.
The group – hailing from Los Angeles and led by their dynamic frontman Tyler, the Creator – began 2011 as little more than an obscure Internet sensation, but quickly exploded in popularity. Millions were exposed to Odd Future in February, when the group scored a musical appearance on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon; Tyler, the Creator and fellow crewmember Hodgy Beats brought a memorably freakish performance to the stage that quickly went viral. Within weeks Tyler released his single “Yonkers” and the accompanying video – the MC now claims the whole concept was meant as a gag – which featured twisted lyrics, stark black and white photography and concluded with the rapper’s suicide. “Yonkers” became a YouTube sensation and fans who began to research the collective found that Odd Future had been releasing high quality mixtapes through their Tumblr since 2009.
Although Tyler’s 2009 album Bastard has become a cult favorite, the crew’s discography has also featured full lengths by Domo Genesis, Mike G, MellowHype (Hodgy Beats’ collaboration with resident producer LeftBrain) and Earl Sweatshirt. Even with Odd Future’s propensity for graphic rhymes Sweatshirt’s visceral recording Earl stands out as gruesome; in fact, after Earl’s release the MC’s mom sent the rapper – still under 18 – to boarding school in Samoa. That decision spurred chants of “Free Earl!” at Odd Future shows across the country.
Tyler’s star power has brought widespread scrutiny to Odd Future, but he emphasizes the importance of his peers. The group’s best work can be found on 2010’s Radical, which features everymember of the collective contributing their bestwork. In stark contrast with Jay-Z and Kanye West’s opulentWatch the Throne, Odd Future brought a do-it-yourself attitude to hip-hop in 2011, encountering true success through Tumblr rather than major label approval. In the new decade’s schizophrenic hip-hop landscape Odd Future galvanized fans of the genre by denying conformity.
Community
Jordyn Wolking, assistant managing editor
NBC announced in November that Community, known for amazing paintballepisodes and Christmas quirkiness, would be benched this winter to make way for 30 Rock’s return in January. As a huge fan of 30 Rock, I rejoiced – Tina Fey returning to one of her best roles to entertain me every week? I’m on board. But as a recently converted Community follower, I was disappointed that this beloved show, well into its third season, would be put on hold while the likes of Whitney remains on air.
While NBC officials have assured fans that the show is not canceled and will return at an undetermined date, the almost cult-like following Community has gathered is not taking its chances. Instead, it’s taking the social media world by storm.
The announcement spawned a Twitter frenzy, with the hashtag #sixseasonsandamovie, and a petition with almost 90,000 followers as of Dec. 15. There are Facebook pages, and even a trend of pasting a cutout of a goatee from episode 304, "Remedial Chaos Theory," on one’s face in profile pictures (or in real life).
Fans’ biggest accomplishment, however, is voting for TV Guide’s Fan Favorites Award, which won the show the magazine’s cover after it was benched. Community even beat out popular shows like Chuck, Vampire Diaries and Dexter.
To many, including myself, Community is a mostly lighthearted show with a bit of a dark edge that reminds us all about friendship, the power of imagination and just how utterly ridiculous people are in general. I want all the zany characters to return for long enough to see them finally graduate from the wonderfully horrible Greendale Community College. I want to see someone finally end up with Joel McHale’s Jeff (although I still remain unsure as to whether that should be Gillian Jacobs’s Britta or Alison Brie’s Annie). I would like another claymation masterpiece, courtesy of Danny Pudi’s Abed. And, most of all, the world could use another paintball episode.
The Arab Spring
Stanley Kay, staff writer
From the moment Mohamed Bouazizi self-immolated in protest of the Tunisian government’s action against his livelihood, revolution has spread like wildfire in the Arab world.
Bouazizi sparked the Tunisian uprising, which began in December 2010 before finally toppling the government on Jan. 14 of this past year. But the fireworks in the region were just beginning. Taking a cue from Tunisia’s protests, Egypt exploded into mass protest of longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak later in January. Cairo’s Tahrir Square was filled with protesters angry at Mubarak’s limitations on civil liberties, government corruption, official brutality and the lack of political freedom. The dictator, who had ruled since 1981 and who had been an ally of the United States and Israel, announced his resignation on Feb. 11. Jubilation followed in Egypt, and across the Middle East ruling governments everywhere from Saudi Arabia to Israel began to grow nervous over rapidly changing regional politics.
Massive protests and government counterattacks followed in a number of countries across the region, including Bahrain, Yemen, Syria and Libya. Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi – the “Brotherly Leader and Guide of the Revolution” – fiercely proclaimed that he would hunt down protesters “inch by inch” before the country split into a civil war, the capital city Tripoli was captured in August and Gaddafi was killed in October. In Syria, mass protests began in March as President (and dictator) Bashar as-Assad remained firm and refused to step down. His counterrevolutionary tactics have been brutal: killing peaceful demonstrators, torturing children and expressing no regard for human rights. Syria remains in chaos, with al-Assad still in power and the death toll over 5,000 and rising.
Clearly the Arab Spring is far from over, but perhaps the most unique aspect of the Arab Spring has been the role of social media and the Internet in the protests. In Egypt, protesters used Facebook and Twitter to organize demonstrations. Videos and images from revolutions across the region went viral, giving the rest of the world a glimpse at the action. The role of the Internet became so great in Egypt that the government turned it off at one point, hoping to quell the protests. While some Western news agencies played up the role of social media in Mubarak’s eventual ouster, it’s also important to note that it was the courage of protesters that achieved regime change – not Facebook updates and tweets.
No Strings Attached and Friends with Benefits
Vince FitzPatrick, opinion editor
In 50 years, there will probably be a film history textbook that mentions 2011 as the year that major studios released not one, but two movies that captured an unusual trend in the sexual behavior of young American heterosexuals. Yes, that’s right. No Strings Attached and Friends with Benefits have a good shot at becoming a part of cinema history.
That is not to say that the concept of close friends participating in casual, non-romantic sex is anything new. Yet the practice is definitely becoming more common, and in many circles, more accepted. In 2004, the New York Times ran an investigative piece into the sexual lives of teenagers that highlighted the trend. In 2005’s 40 Year Old Virgin, we got to watch Jane Lynch ask Steve Carrell to be her “fuck buddy,” and this year we watched Kristen Wiig roll around in bed with a non-committal Jon Hamm in Bridesmaids. And while the phrase “friends with benefits” is rarely delivered without a smirk, many of us have friends whose sexual partners seem to fit the bill.
What makes this year’s two freakishly similar rom-coms different is their straightforward effort to get to the bottom of this suddenly widespread sexual phenomenon. Essentially, they take the central question of the greatest romantic comedy of all time, When Harry Met Sally (can men and women just be friends?) and add “with benefits?” to the end. It's a clever premise. OK, not that clever. But (SPOILERS) the answer in both movies is decidedly NO. In each, the beautiful non-couples decides they have feelings for each other and eventually end up transitioning into happy monogamous romantic relationships.
Why is this important? Because just like Harry and Sally, Justin and Mila and Ashton and Natalie have the potential become the archetypes for a new generation exploring relationships and sexuality. These movies suggest that friends with benefits are really just a way for friends to transition into loving partners. This could convince secret romantics that becoming someone's fuck buddy is a surefire method to sneak their way into their friend’s heart. Alternatively, it could allow heartless dudes (or dudettes) to play to those expectations and never deliver (again, think Jon Hamm in Bridesmaids).
Then again, the lessons taught by these movies may be soon forgotten. There are some indications that the core message from When Harry Met Sally has not sunk in, at least for certain segments of the population. Perhaps we are forever doomed to repeat the same awkward experiments that our prettier celebrity counterparts already tried out, twice.
Yet even if they're not influential on the sexual landscape of our generation, these films may have taught us an even more important lesson: JT is always better than AK.
The Hunger Games Trailer
Gabe Bergado, life & style assistant editor
When Lionsgate premiered its trailer for The Hunger Games on the morning of Nov. 14, fans got their first look into the post-apocalyptic world created by author Suzanne Collins. The Hunger Games was the latest young adult series to take over the literary world, ranking fourth on Amazon’s top-selling books in 2011 and giving Collins the honor of the first children’s author to become a member of the “Kindle Million Club.” Coming out next year is the movie adaptation of this first book in her widely-popular trilogy.
For those unfamiliar with The Hunger Games, the book is about a yearly tournament organized by the Capitol in which two tributes, one young man and one woman between the ages of 12 and 18 from each of the 12 Districts of Panem, fight to the death until only one victor is standing. When Katniss Everdeen’s younger sister Prim is selected for the morbid game, the older sister volunteers herself instead. Katniss and Peeta Mellark are the two tributes for District 12, and they go on to fight for their survival.
Alongside such established actors as Elizabeth Banks and Stanley Tucci, a flurry of rising stars fills the cast of the movie. Playing Katniss is Jennifer Lawrence, who broke onto the acting scene with Winter’s Bone, a performance that nabbed her an Oscar nomination. And playing Peeta is Josh Hutcherson, who you will probably recognize from The Kids Are All Right. As details of the cast were revealed, fandoms were not afraid to express their opinions via trending topics on Twitter and Tumblr. While some are excited for Lawrence and Hutcherson to be playing the main roles, others are skeptical. They’ll have to wait until the movie is finally released to solidify their opinions.
In a time where many movie adaptations stray from the book, the trailer for The Hunger Games did an excellent job staying true to Collins’ novel. The blue dress Katniss wears to the reaping, Effie Trinket’s eerie pink makeup and the black and red suit Peeta wears to his interview before the Games are all small details that stay consistent with the book. With the conclusion of the Harry Potter series last July and the Twilight saga ending next summer, it seems that The Hunger Games world will be the next book-to-film franchise to look out for. What is especially compelling with this series are the many dark themes and motifs embedded into the fiction. This is no story about a vampire and teenage girl in love, but children forced to kill one another by a twisted society.
Just as the books did, the trailer incited so many emotions in me even within such a short time. Goosebumps took over my skin when Katniss screamed, “I volunteer, I volunteer as tribute,” and the hair on the back of my neck stood up during the final countdown before the start of the Games. It may be a while until the movie is released on Mar. 23rd, but it looks like the odds are definitely in the fans’ favors.
Charlie Sheen's Winning
Saron Strait, life & style staff writer
While tiger blood coursed through his veins and personal goddesses tended to his house, Sheen started 2011 by “winning” as he knows best – in a hospital bed. Trailing a rushed trip to a Los Angeles hospital, the star voluntarily entered a rehabilitation center in late January, instigating a mid-season hiatus for the popular CBS sitcom Two and a Half Men.
Following the incident, media outlets pounced on the celeb with inquiries about his alleged drug and alcohol abuse along with his martial problems concerning his ex-wife Brooke Mueller. Sheen, 0-3 in the wife department, cemented a reputation of erratic behavior with caustic interviews criticizing the reputation of modern celebrities, co-workers and even Alcoholics Anonymous.
“Alcoholics Anonymous reports a five percent success rate,” said Sheen. “My success rate is 100 percent.” Whenever questioned about having an illness, he said, “ I have a disease? Bullshit. I cured it with my brain.”
Lit cigarette in hand, the party animal explained he’s "not bipolar but bi-winning” while interviewing on Good Morning America in late February. The sitcom star confessed, “I am on a drug, it’s called Charlie Sheen,” while later saying, “the only thing I’m addicted to right now is winning.”
With himself as his preferred remedy of choice, on-air drug testing and scathing vocal attacks on Two and a Half Men founder Chuck Lorre, Sheen kicked off 2011 in the spotlight – and jobless. CBS Entertainment and Warner Bros. fired the eight-year employee, terminating his contract mid-season due to Sheen’s misconduct on the airways following the accusations against Lorre. Persistent, Sheen continued his “winning” campaign with interviews on TMZ, 20/20 and the Today Show, all while suing CBS for breach of contract. The campaign extended to Sheen’s personal tour, My Violent Torpedo of Truth/Defeat is Not An Option, where he kindly spread his ideology (and bombed universally).
In the wake of the scornful interviews, Sheen lost custody of his sons Bob and Max in March after Muller filed a restraining order against Sheen. Renouncing their goddess titles, the star’s “two smoking hotties,” Rachel Oberlin and Natalie Kenly, also left Sheen in April and June respectively.
On the bright side, Twitter recently announced that the hash tag “#tigerblood” held the number two slot on their annual “Year in Review.” Despite this minor accomplishment, it’s debatable whether Sheen actually won anything other than a first class ticket to rehab.
Reddit IAMAs
Vince FitzPatrick, opinion editor
It used to be that interviewing celebrities was left to the professionals. A journalist or talk show host would sit down with a famous person (say, Jackie Chan) and lob soft-ball questions at him (besides tuxedos, are you planning on making any other super-powered clothing-based movies?) while you, reading or watching at home, would hope they would surprise the star with that one curve-ball query that had been burning at the back of your head for ages (during episode 12 of Jackie Chan Adventures, when Jackie splits into his light and dark halves, is dark Jackie supposed to represent a “negative” version of Jackie, or are we to understand that Jackie normally carries this “darker half” within him at all times?).
Now, thanks to the Internet, we can finally launch our questions directly at the source. Networks promote TV shows by letting us chat live with the cast. Twitter lets us tweet @justinbieber and maybe, just maybe, get a response. YouTube is even letting us suggest questions for presidential debates. Yet none of these compare to the intimacy and openness of reddit’s AskMeAnything (AMA).
AMA (also called IAmA, as in I Am A kung fu movie star, ask me anything) has been around for a few years, but the reddit AMAs of 2011 featured higher-profile celebrities and more audience participation than ever before. Comedian Louis CK, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, Jeopardy champion Ken Jennings and even former congressman Anthony Weiner stepped up to field questions from the teeming masses this year. For the most part, we got in-depth looks into the personal and professional lives of some interesting people, and they got a chance to connect directly with their fans. It is just one of many examples of the democratizing power of the web.
Spotify
Denise Lu, entertainment editor
Think back to the last time you bought a CD (or, God forbid, any other physical format of music). For some, that particularalbum may be too old to be openly displayed on your shelf.
This past year, the ever-evolving music consumption business brought the onslaught of game-changing Spotify when the Swedish-based company launched in the U.S. this past July.
The free ad-supported service allows users to stream music online and interact with other users via playlists. Spotify also offers users the option to pay for subscriptions for ad-free offline and mobile listening.
Sean Parker, Spotify board member, hopes to use Spotify to accomplish what his co-founded Napster aimed to create more than a decade ago: “frictionless-free music sharing”.
While Napster was absorbed by Rhapsody in late 2011, Spotify continued to expand as a result of its large platform (Spotify recently relaunched its radio feature, keeping Pandora in check), vast library that rivals those of Rhapsody and Rdio, and partnership with Facebook.
With 10.2 million monthly average users, Spotify’s strategy seems to be working.
The recent wave of online streaming and cloud platforms created ripples in the music industry, garnering reactions from praise that it is saving the business to boycotts claiming that it is destroying it. Supporters of the latter claim Spotify is just another profit-increasing gimmick for major record labels.
Indeed, streaming services, especially Spotify, can dampen the revenue artists receive directly. It takes thousands of times more streams of a track for artists to receive the same amount they would from an MP3 download or CD purchase.
This has led to multiple smaller labels to pull their music from Spotify, in addition to big acts like Coldplay and The Black Keys (not that these groups need the petty cash).
However, merits of Spotify include its agency in the decrease of piracy. While downloading music is sometimes hit-or-miss, Spotify has standardized organization for easy browsing. Additionally, Spotify’s social integration, internally and with Facebook, adds another engaging dimension for users. As social listening gained heavy momentum this past year, platforms like Turntable.fm (or its bro version) were just what consumers wanted. With Spotify, tighter integration meant listening to what your friends are listening to with a click of a button on Facebook.
Thus, whether it is detrimental or beneficial, there’s no doubt Spotify is changing the way people are listening to music in this next step of revolutionized music consumption.
Amy Winehouse
Gideon Resnick, staff writer
Trouble and talent walk hand in hand. In the late afternoon of July 26, British songstress Amy Winehouse was found dead at the age of 27 in her London apartment. In an age where next to nothing of celebrities' private lives are kept sacred, this discovery raised eyebrows, but didn’t shock the public. It came as no surprise that the news focused most heavily on Winehouse´s notorious drug and alcohol addiction. The story also immediately broke on Twitter, with artists like Lady Gaga, Fleet Foxes and Rihanna expressing sadness at Winehouse's passing. Adele, who had arguably the biggest year in music, wrote a blog post about the singer's influence on her success. As her relevance was fading, death made Winehouse a star once again.
When musicians die at such a young age, drugs are commonly a factor. Winehouse was no exception, joining the 27 Club when she died, a group that also contains Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain and Janis Joplin. Throughout her career, Winehouse appealed to people because she so brazenly refused to care about her addiction. Long after she stopped making music, it was still fascinating to see how far Winehouse could fall with her alcoholism and drug problems. And fall she did, literally demonstrated by a widely circulated YouTube video of one of her concerts on an attempted comeback tour.
There was public concern for Winehouse’s welfare, but also a detached fascination with her own demise. As with other celebrities whose lives get consumed by their private issues, people began to perceive Winehouse as more of a joke than anything else. According to an article in the Daily Mail, a website was created in order to guess Winehouse’s date of death, and the prize for the lucky guesser was an iPod Touch.
No one will tell you that Amy Winehouse couldn't belt her lungs out. But at the end of the day, people will think first of her underwear-clad skeleton of a body running in the streets of London at some ungodly hour. That perception isn't necessarily a bad thing. On her recordings Winehouse came off as a take-no-prisoners broad. So what if she didn't behave in real life? Her untimely death may just make her music all the more compelling.
Jerry Sandusky Scandal
Stanley Kay, staff writer
The year 2011 was not a good one for college football. But what happened on the field was nothing in comparison to college football’s list of problems off the field: louder calls for players to be paid, a number of big NCAA rules violations and the downfall of high-profile programs and coaches because of those violations.
But college football’s biggest scandal of the year and perhaps of all-time was criminal in nature, and it eventually claimed a legend: Joe Paterno. At the heart of the scandal was former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky, who was charged with 40 counts of sexual abuse of young boys in early November this year. Much of the abuse, which occurred from around 1994 to 2009, occurred on Penn State grounds, including in the Nittany Lions’ football locker room. Sandusky used his charity for underprivileged kids, The Second Mile, as a way to gain access to boys he eventually sexually abused.
So why was Paterno canned? The coach, who has the most victories in NCAA Division I history, was not directly involved in any criminal action. But in 2002, according to the damning grand jury report, Penn State assistant and former quarterback Mike McQueary saw Sandusky raping a 10-year-old boy in the Penn State locker room. McQueary reported the incident to Paterno, who reported it to Penn State athletic director Tim Curley. While this covered Paterno’s legal obligation, many became outraged this year when they learned that Paterno did not contact the police directly. He was fired on Nov. 8, along with school president Graham Spanier. Paterno, many argued, failed in his “moral obligation.”
On the field, Penn State’s program will likely suffer the consequences of this scandal for years to come. It is impossible to deny the significance of Joe Paterno to the university and its athletics. His shameful exit leaves a college football powerhouse and academic institution without an identity.
Although the scandal will not bring about any NCAA rules violations, it is another large stain on the sport. The fact that Sandusky was apparently protected by the university after committing said crimes on university property reeks of a college football program run wild and the above-the-law attitude of so many programs. Sandusky’s legal process is just beginning, but much of the media coverage seems to have lost focus on those most affected by his actions: the boys he abused.
Lawrence Dai
Shaunacy Ferro, assistant managing editor
On November 30, 2010, then-sophomore Lawrence Dai embarked on an epic quest to blog his way through 365 viewings of the romantic comedy Julie & Julia. The media loved him. Hell, we loved him. NBN covered his journey in February 2011, not even a third of the way finished but already featured on the Huffington Post, The Guardian, NBC and the AV Club. NPR even interviewed him.
Months later, a theater group called Off-Center @ The Jones flew him out to Denver to celebrate his 365th viewing, proclaiming themselves his Dai-hard fans. They even created a cardboard cutout of his image and shot some of the most adorably creepy video footage of the year to welcome him. Again, the media ate it up. The Denver Post, Fox Denver, a CBS affiliate and a PBS show all covered his arrival.
What was it that was so intriguing about Lawrence/Julie & Julia? Was it his endearing renaming of minor characters like Not Mark Ruffalo, Julie’s husband? Was it the time he photoshopped shark fins onto people in the film in honor of Shark Week? Or all of the times he threatened Amy Adams with bodily harm?
Throughout his year of self-imposed hell, Lawrence has maintained a self-depreciating humor and appreciation of his own stupidity that has turned into comic gold. Cue admissions of masturbating to everyone’s favorite Julie Child biopic and writing the blog to impress a girl. We watched his prolonged descent into insanity and were suitably impressed. He managed to prove that he could figure out 365 different ways to blog about a single, kind-of-shitty movie, even being able to tie in major events like Steve Jobs' death. Not many people thought he’d make it to Day 365, but he did.
Rock on, Lawrence. Way to bone the duck of life.
Republican memes
Julia Haskins, opinion section staff writer
It was a rough year to be a Republican presidential candidate, and via the glory of the Internet, we didn’t make it any easier for them. We guffawed at their blunders, cringed at every debate, and those of us who lean to the right desperately tried to convince our friends of their qualifications (Ron Paul’s views on marijuana legalization, anyone? Anyone?). But once those mesmerizing gifs of Michele Bachmann deep-throating a corndog hit BuzzFeed, all credibility was lost. The low blows kept coming for our GOPers, and we fanned the flames with every lame tweet from Newt Gingrich featured on The Colbert Report. We kept pointing and laughing and we kept Googling Santorum. And while Democrats certainly had their own jesters, they weren’t nearly as entertaining. Joe Biden’s dependably headdesk-worthy quips barely made a blip on the hater RADAR. We wanted something fresh and outright bonkers. Herman Cain, Pokémaster, satiated our appetites for batshittery.
I’ll admit, it was harsh for The Roots to play “Lyin’ Ass Bitch” when Bachmann appeared on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, but sometimes the conservative criticism was completely deserved. Take Cain, the pizza king sex addict who cheated with everyone and her mother, then tried to salvage his relationship with lady voters through his very, very sad Women for Herman Cain campaign. See, he really does want to connect with the women of America. With his penis. Or take Rick Perry becoming the most hated man on YouTube with his Strong” commercial, giving Americans the choice between gays and Christmas. As Perry himself would say, “Oops.” In return, our nation’s gaytheists made “Strong” one of the least popular videos on YouTube and created some of the funniest parodies of the year. The real treat, however, will be watching these candidates attempt to bounce back from their associations with crazy eyes and botched retellings of Paul Revere’s ride (Sarah Palin, please come back, if only for the sake of more material for Jon Stewart).
Even though Obama may have felt safe going in for a second term, our GOP candidates definitely came out on top in terms of epic moments that will last an eternity in cyberspace infamy. And that’s something our Commander in Chief can’t touch. Except for Romney ― Damn, he’s boring. Somebody get that guy a gay sex scandal, stat.
NBA lockout
Kim Alters, sports editor
On July 1, 2011, the NBA’s collective bargaining agreement expired and, without a new one in place, the league’s fourth-ever lockout commenced. The dispute between owners and players centered on the division of basketball-related income (revenues from ticket sales, television contracts, concessions and advertising) and the structure of a luxury tax and salary cap. The league, calling for more equality between smaller-market and larger-market teams, proposed a hard salary cap (the highest limit for a team’s payroll before it must pay luxury tax) that would place the maximum payroll at $45 million per team as opposed to the former $58 million cap. It also advocated a reduction in player salaries. Whereas players had been receiving 57 percent of BRI as their salaries, the league wanted to divide revenues more evenly.
While a collective bargaining agreement is obviously integral to the operations of the NBA, the lockout had much wider repercussions. After one of the NBA’s most riveting seasons – the results of a wild summer of free agency, blockbuster trades, playoff surprises and an unexpected champion – the league quickly dissolved into public displays of discord and tarnished its new, exciting image.
Collective bargaining agreement negotiations, at their core, were millionaires arguing with millionaires over how to divide among themselves the millions of dollars at their disposal – not exactly a relatable grievance. What made matters worse, though, was the use of Twitter by those involved, enabling a moment’s thought to be seen by millions. Both the NBA and the opposing National Basketball Players Association created Twitter accounts to outline their versions of the negotiations for fans. Commissioner David Stern took a sometimes publicly hostileapproach, which not only alienated fans but also gave players the opportunity to retaliate. Eventually, the league held a Twitter Q&A, where fans and players alike tweeted questions that were responded to by Stern and Deputy Commissioner Adam Silver in what was perhaps the ultimate acknowledgement of Twitter’s power in negotiations.
Now, after the dissolution and reformation of the NBPA, a threatened lawsuit, several controversial statements and 16 cancelled regular season games, a new agreement was reached and professional basketball finally tipped off on Christmas Day. Teams will play more back-to-back games and the occasional three games in three nights, the quality of play will suffer and injuries will be more likely, but that is only the physical cost of what was already an expensive summer for the league.
The new Samsung Galaxy S2 commercials
Vince FitzPatrick, opinion editor
Never before 2011 had the cult of Apple flown so high. With the passing of Steve Jobs, PC users, Android carriers and even the four remaining Zune owners had to eat their humble Apple pie and admit that Jobs really was a visionary who helped revolutionized everything from personal computing to the entertainment industry. We gritted our teeth, knowing that the same people that we had made fun of just weeks before as members of the “Cult of Steve Jobs” were now convinced, with the departure of their messiah, that the kingdom of Apple would reign forevermore.
Then came the new Galaxy S2 commercials, and they made it OK to make fun of Apple worshippers again. They were not the first to make fun the special breed of iNerds that call in sick each time a new iPhone comes out, but these commercials, now running constantly, are certainly the most widely seen parody to date. The people at Samsung reminded us that, while Jobs may have changed the game, the competitors have caught up. Buying the 4S does not make you creative, or original, or a revolutionary. It just makes you, at best, another guy with an iPhone, and at worst, the sap who bought an inferior smartphone because he was blinded by his love for a half-eaten fruit.
Is the Galaxy S2 a better phone than the iPhone 4S? I have no idea. There is a distinct possibility it is not. Apple still makes high-quality, if pricey, products. But that is not important. In 2011, we needed some one to show us how to make fun of Apple worshipers in a post-Jobs world. Samsung delivered.
