FRONTLINE: the pbs documentary series not the flea medicine

PBS has an appleTV app now that's changing my life

well, next week's episode is probably going to be really good:

In Secret State of North Korea, FRONTLINE shines a light on the hidden world of the North Korean people, drawing on undercover footage from inside the country as well as interviews with defectors—including a former top official—who are working to try to chisel away at the regime’s influence.

I wonder if they interviewed Djong Yun?!

the older one on the battle over teaching evolution vs. creationism in... I think... Pennsylvania, was truly great. I always forget to watch these when they are first on, but catch up with them later and am rarely disappointed. they tend to be really bracing; they shake me up. can't say that about much--or perhaps any other--TV.

I finally watched the Death in St Augustine episode - sad/great stuff

The one about insider trading/SAC was good but kind of light on the major revelations.

I could only take about half of the North Korea one that premiered last night. I think I have to let it sink in a little before I watch the rest. It has been with me awake and asleep since I saw it. The courage it took to get that footage is just totally beyond my grasp.

lol/sob

PRESS RELEASE: FRONTLINE PRESENTS “GENERATION LIKE”

Tuesday, February 18, 2014, at 10 p.m. on PBS (check local listings)
www.facebook.com/frontline | Twitter: @frontlinepbs #GenLike
Instagram: @frontlinepbs #GenLike
http://www.pbs.org/frontline/generation-like/

Whether they’re getting retweeted by members of One Direction, or liking the Hunger Games Facebook page for a chance to be included in the movie’s credits, today’s teens are directly interacting with pop culture — celebrities, movies, music, and, increasingly, brands — in ways never before possible.

Tweet pictures of yourself at a Lady Gaga concert, and maybe she’ll call you from the stage — a moment sponsored by the cell phone company Virgin Mobile.

Send Beyonce your selfie, and maybe it’ll be included in the Pepsi-sponsored intro to her Super Bowl halftime show.

Do kids think they’re being used to promote these brands? Do they care? Or in a new teenage reality where being Internet famous seems to be just a click or a post away, does the perceived chance to be the next big star make it all worth it?

In Generation Like, an eye-opening follow-up to FRONTLINE’s 2001 documentary The Merchants of Cool, author Douglas Rushkoff returns to the world of youth culture to explore how the perennial teen quest for identity and connection has migrated to social media — and how big brands are increasingly co-opting young consumers’ digital presences.

“Today’s teens don’t need to be chased down by corporations,” Rushkoff says. “They’re putting themselves online for anyone to see. They tell the world what they think is cool—starting with their own online profiles. Likes, follows, retweets, and favorites are the social currency of this generation.”

And they’re a very real currency for marketers: instead of selling the product to the teenage audience, the idea is to get the teenage audience to sell the product to itself — and for corporations to collect big data in the process.

“Companies know how to take that data, and turn it into money,” one marketer tells FRONTLINE. “The people who are handing over the data — because they’re hitting, ‘I like this’ or ‘I like that,’ or they’re telling all their friends, ‘Will you please come like me? — they have no idea what the value of that is.”

From the agency that’s leveraging the Twitter followers of celebrities like Ian Somerhalder (The Vampire Diaries) to make lucrative product endorsement deals, to the “grassroots” social media campaign behind the Hollywood blockbuster The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, Generation Like explores how companies are increasingly enlisting kids as willing foot soldiers in their marketing machines.

In the social media age, does the division between marketing and authenticity still exist? What’s the hidden alchemy that brands are using to capture Generation Like? And who are the people behind the curtain making it all happen?

Generation Like is a powerful examination of the evolving and complicated relationship between young consumers and the companies that are increasingly working to target them – and their fans, friends, and followers.

And who are the people behind the curtain making it all happen?
i can't wait to see the human donut holes who do this.

human donut holes lol

And who are the people behind the curtain making it all happen?

http://cdn-static.denofgeek.com/sites/denofgeek/files/styles/gallery/public/images/27186.jpg

Oh man I still think abt bits from merchants of cool. The Mook and the Midriff.

A new two-parter

Witnessing Syria’s War Through the Eyes Of Its Children
February 11, 2014, 10:40 am ET by Jason M. Breslow

The findings of a recent United Nations report cataloging the toll of Syria’s civil war on children are stark. Nearly three years into the fighting, more than 10,000 children have been killed, 3 million have been displaced from their homes, and another 1.1 million now live as refugees.

The details are chilling: The U.N. found that government forces have used children as human shields, shot at children with snipers and detained children as young as 11 for their alleged association with the opposition. In detention, children have been held in the same cells as adults, sexually violated and in some instances tortured:

Ill treatment and acts tantamount to torture reportedly included beatings with metal cables, whips and wooden and metal batons; electric shocks, including to the genitals; the ripping out of fingernails and toenails; sexual violence, including rape or threats of rape; mock executions; cigarette burns; sleep deprivation; solitary confinement; and exposure to the torture of relatives.

Abuses have not been limited to the regime. The report found that armed opposition groups have “engaged in the summary execution of children,” recruited children for combat, and taken children hostage in exchange for ransom or the release of prisoners. And the extremist jihadist group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) “has set up Islamic schools in which children are reportedly indoctrinated to fight for ‘jihad,’” according to the report.

Amid such turmoil, the notion of a normal childhood has all but disappeared for the young bystanders of war featured in tonight’s FRONTLINE investigation, Children of Aleppo. In the film, FRONTLINE returns to Syria’s biggest city for an intimate look at life during wartime through the eyes of children.

One of the characters profiled in the film is Farah, an eight year old who says her favorite activity is helping her father, a rebel commander, build bombs. It’s dangerous work, and Farah knows it. In the following excerpt from Children of Aleppo, she describes the day her father was nearly killed while making a bomb with a fellow fighter.

Generation Like is totally bananas

Did anyone else watch it? I feel the need to double-down on my already rabid distaste for having things sold to me at every turn, but it also verified that this is definitely a generational thing. I think I took "I don't want to buy anything, sell anything, or process anything" super duper seriously when I was 14 and never let go. No so for kids today, that's for sure! I didn't feel old so much as I felt right. Seeing the guy who handles celebrity social media made me sick, he was gross. And that poor Hunger Games girl. I had a student who was like that for Reba McEntire, of all people. Anyway, I recommend this one for a lighter Frontline.

Also I had no idea who Tyler Oakley was before seeing this. Oh and the little girl with braces broke my heart.

There are only 2 ilx posts about Tyler Oakley (one of them is mine) and they both say "I have no idea who this guy is."

I can't stop thinking about this tbh. The whole notion that i should aggressively advertise every aspect of my preferences, opinions, activities, face/body, etc and cultivate a group of people who pay attention to me is so antithetical to the way I've thought for my entire life that it's not exactly surprising that I'm so horrified. Still, maybe this just means that I'm overly modest and old fashioned at best and paranoid about my privacy at worst. Either way, the worldview shown in this doc is powerfully repellent to me atm.

kids who like ian somerhalder like junk food and makeup, whod of thunk it

I'm sad I missed that one!! Is it going to show again?

You can prob watch it online -- all their movies stream on the website, at least most of em do.

the worst part of this was def this kid -https://twitter.com/Babyscummy

the rest - eh

You can want Frontline online, and you have been able to for a long time now! I used to watch it a lot around the time of the Second Iraq War. Here:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/generation-like/

The whole notion that i should aggressively advertise every aspect of my preferences, opinions, activities, face/body, etc and cultivate a group of people who pay attention to me is so antithetical to the way I've thought for my entire life that it's not exactly surprising that I'm so horrified.

OK Cupid makes me really conflicted for this reason, since it necessitates some degree of capitulation to this way of thinking, and encourages you to consider others this way too. Going to watch this as soon as I get the time!

er, watch, as well as want.

A few things that stood out to me about Generation Like
-every time you 'like' something, you're making somebody money.
-the notion that this generation has no idea that they are doing the advertising for companies, that companies plan this in such as way that kids never see that it wasn't their idea. I guess this isn't anything new, but it seems different to me.
-no one understood what selling out could mean.

I loved the sellout thing. I feel like the only period in human history when children (not adults) were invested in the idea of selling out was the 90s. Even in the 90s there were plenty of kids willing to commodify their tastes. The narrative of Little Scumbag neglects to mention that he is part of a tradition of skateboard video clowns. Tyler Oakley could have been on the Mickey Mouse Club. Was it really better when children were being used ... the old fashioned way?

Watching this now (thanks, Roku!) and realizing this generation of kids is pretty much incomprehensible to me.

The girl with braces and the baby scumbag parts were definitely the creepiest for me. Way to celebrate the sexualization of children, Internet.

I dunno...they seem comprehensible to me? Kids want attention and lack the wisdom to choose self-restraint. That's always been the case.

Yeah nothing was shocking to me, just showed me how little involved I am with the internet. I guess it surprises me that people actually become famous by way of youtube, because I've never taken it seriously, I don't think I've ever watched a viral video. I hardly ever use youtube for anything other than occasional music videos. Same with Facebook, which is mostly photos of my daughter. Which is what concerns me about how things are progressing. This will be the world my daughter will grow up involved in, where ads aren't even thought of as ads. I mostly hate ads, companies trying to sell me stuff. I would pay for cable if it had no commercials. I would even pay a lot more for internet service with no ads, that would be a perfect world for me.

that repulsion with advertising/being sold something is the most lingering part of the feeling in the air where/when i grew up. my mom told me in 7th gr that people wear brand names on the outside of their clothing because they're insecure and i have pretty much believed that my entire life. to see brands and brand loyalty (and even personal branding, if i'm going there) become so dominant -- it's just repellent to me, i have no other way to describe my reaction to it.

nah sometimes the shirts look good!

Bumper stickers bother me, particularly the "My child made 17th place at Bumblebee Elementary School" ilk. But I accept certain kinds of commercialization as inevitable, and it's impossible to draw a line. Clothes with brand names on the outside are repellent but Polo or Dior insignias aren't? If he can wear it well, I tend to give him a pass.

polo and dior are repellant tbf

jacob you can install adblocker on almost any web browser, its simple, fast, and free

Ha, I don't use adblocker because I get a perverse thrill out of seeing who advertisers think I am and how absurdly wrong they are.

i can understand that instinct but i get an even bigger thrill out of watching youtube videos whenever i want without waiting 5 seconds to click the "skip" button

that's a really good point
i would like to get rid of that
maybe i don't need that particular annoying pleasure in my life anymore -- it's not like they'll ever get it right anyway

i am the same way with terrible people who mysteriously became my facebook friends! i wont ever hide/de-friend them no matter how terrible their posting is

oh yeah, facebook is the best place for investment-free people watching.

Yeesh that Mini Jackass kid is the monster that this whole "like" economy creates. But at the same time, that kind of sponsorship has been the central goal of skaters/snowboarders/surfers hell, just athletes since the beginning. Plus corporations have been sponsoring (and thus controlling) content since corporations and content first existed so I don't really see this as some kind of new horrible thing (just the same old horrible thing).

Except for the part where huge multi-million dollar corporations are exploiting teens for free labor. That is grosser than gross. Hopefully people will realize eventually that they can't pay off student loans with "sparks" (whatever they are) and things will shift again.

I think the biggest emotion this doc made me feel is relief that I don't give a shit about creating an identity or branding myself and also that I deleted my Facebook page when I did.

I also assume that there is an anti-branding/marketing/liking counter culture out there, plus while there was some ethnic diversity among the kids profiled, it definitely focused on a limited socioeconomic sample. I guess I see this more as a look at the way a certain segment of kids operate as opposed to the way things are universally.

Tyler Oakley looks like somebody I know and it's driving me nuts because I can't figure out who it is.

i couldn't help thinking how the hunger games girl is gonna feel watching this footage of herself in 5-10 years

i really hope rushkoff does another one of these in 2026.

She may not be devoted to The Hunger Games anymore, but that kind of impulse doesn't go away easily. She'll be wrapped up in something else by 2026.

that repulsion with advertising/being sold something is the most lingering part of the feeling in the air where/when i grew up. my mom told me in 7th gr that people wear brand names on the outside of their clothing because they're insecure and i have pretty much believed that my entire life.

I got this line too! Heavily. It's revealing, though, that it convicts obvious, visible advertising, but doesn't address that all choices are products of environment and input. Like, if advertising is bad, and "selling out" is bad, and being swayed by social forces is bad (made to desire products or brands or even desiring of popularity/approval at all), then the ultimate good is "neutrality" or some kind of purity of personal development, as if such a thing is even possible.

When I was in the 4th grade I convinced my grandparents to take me to Lufkin where there was a skate shop to buy clothes and a board. When we were driving back my grandpa said, "you know with all of those t shirts you got you're gonna be a walking advertisement for those companies." I didn't fully get what he was saying, but I felt self conscious. It did soured my excitement at finally having cool skate clothes. I don't think I was aware of it at the time, but most of the things my grandpa lectured me about was preparing me for becoming punk rock and anti-corporate.

lol with skate brands, I was like, fuck u, I'll happily advertise for Vision in contrast to my Guess-obsessed classmates.

grandpa otm.

Advertising gives an identity to people who otherwise would have to go without.

I think choosing who to advertise for is a valid choice. Hopefully our choices aren't and will never be ONLY various corporate giants, I mean every time you wear a BAND T-SHIRT you're "advertising"! It's not a better or worse method of identification than any other.