Morally Wrong

The 2010 Winter Olympics are now underway in Vancouver Canada. Canada is the perfect place to host the Winter Olympics, due to its cold conditions all year. To prove that they are the ultimate location, they decided to build the biggest, fastest, and longest tracks ever in history. Because the tracks were all new, they had not been tested by the athletes yet. Olympians in the Luge event dove into the track with caution, only to find out that it was not going to be an easy task to finish the course without letting up at least a little bit. Nodar Kumaritashvi, one of the lugers, was one of the first to go in the event. He began very smoothly; everything seemed to be going his way for a great run. After reaching around eighty-eight miles per hour around one of the biggest turns, he came out of it a little sharp. When he over corrected, his body went spinning into the air and hit a metal pole, head first. The scene was tragic. All of the viewers watching it saw a man die on live television. They did not know he was dead until after they showed the medics trying to resuscitate him. At this point, I was wondering why the cameras where still on, and why there wasn't a commercial break? What has happened to the Media today? I really don't understand why a television company feels they have to right to do this. I suppose money just talks that much now days, since I am sure every channel that showed it got higher ratings. I myself found it rather disturbing. I can understand maybe a picture of the incodent being shown, but the video was way too much. They also showed replays of it on news channels. I feel that the media has lost all morals in today's society. Nodar did not diserve to have his death disrespected. Unless he signed a contract that says the media can show his death on television, if it was to happen, then I don't know how these people haven't hot in trouble yet. Coaches, fans, and fellow Olympians showed thier appretiation and respect at Nodar's funeral. I am glad his death was at least respected in that matter, but as far as the media showing it on TV, and Vancouver trying to be the best by creating nearly impossible courses for it's athletes, I am not even close to impressed.

Microsoft Goes Racist?

Recently, Microsoft updated it's web page to show some racial diversity. The large image posted on the screen of their site is that of an Asian man, African American man, and a Caucasian woman. They are sitting at a table smiling with their computers out. This is great for advertisement in our melting pot of a country, but being a global power, Microsoft apparently thinks it needed to change it up a bit for other countries. The Polish version of the site has the African American's head photoshopped out of the picture. It is instead replaced with a white man's head. The pictures are shown side by side on several sites. One ironic part of it, is that the photoshopping job is very poor. Maybe it is because Microsoft used its own product to do it instead of the debatably better version of Photoshop used by Apple products. Anyway, back to the whole racist deal. Microsoft has already appologized for the incodent, claiming that their statistics show having a white person on the site made for sense for Poland's society. Poland has more white and Asian people in their population, so naturally they photoshopped the black man out. Is it really going to make a difference to Poland? Was it really worth it? Poland's population is actually made up of 97% white people with a background of their ancestors living in Poland. Regardless, I still feel that this was a very dumb decision by Microsoft. I can't imagine anyone looking at that picture and saying that they won't buy anymore products because there is a black person in the picture instead of two white people. If it would make a difference, then maybe they should have done a better job of it and actually changed the black man's hand to a white man's, a little part they forgot. I am pretty good with Photoshop, and I guarantee that Microsoft could have paid me half as much as they paid the other guy, and I would have done a better job than him. Overall, I don't feel Microsoft did this because they have something against Black people. They simply wanted to appeal to a different type of society. I didn't see any news out there about Poland complaining, just the United States, who the add doesn't even affect. I feel like Microsoft didn't need to formally apologize, but it was good PR for them to do it. I hope that the advertising world learns from this goof up.

All That Hype... For Nothing

It was somewhat believable when the Minnesota Vikings made it all the way to the NFC Championship game. They had the best runningback in the league (Adrian Peterson), the SAX machine (Jared Allen), the run stopping power (Pat and Kevin Williams) and, maybe the most important, the veteran, retired, not retired, retired, and once again not retired quarterback (Brett Favre). Everything about them in the stat book said, "Super Bowl here we come." Being a Vikings fan, I was very excited! But, being a Vikings fan, I also was ready to expect the worst. Vikings have a way of building up your confidence, and then flushing all of your hopes and dreams down the toilet like they never mattered in the first place. They do it every year, and it just absolutely kills you, but you know when you are a true Viking fan, because you keep coming back.
The 2009-2010 season started out amazing. Brett Favre led the team to a great start, and finished the season with a record of 12-4, earning themselves a bye in the playoffs. Vikings fans were pleased. In fact Prince, the recording artist, who is one of the Vikings biggest fans was seen at their first playoff game against the Dallas Cowboys. He was so inspired by his teams performance, that he wrote a song for them entitled "Purple and Gold". The Vikings went on the beat the Cowboys in a, not even close enough to call it a game, with a score of 34-3. The chances of a Super Bowl appearance was looking great. They just needed to beat the Saints in the NFC Championship game.
It wasn't going to be easy. The Saints began the season 13-0, and Drew Brees (Quarterback of the Saints) was having the season of his life. He was averaging 276.4 passing yards per game this season, ranking second in the league. The game came down to third down and about ten yards with a score of 28-28. The Vikings had the ball, and were in range for a 55 yard field goal. This was not impossible for Ryan Longwell, the veteran kicker for the Vikings. His longest field goal was 55 yards, so the Vikings were in good shape. All they had to do was run one more hand off play up the middle, call a time out, and kick the 55 yard field goal to win. If Longwell were to miss, the worst that would happen is the game would go into overtime, so what did they have to lose? Well, instead of running the ball, Brad Childress decided he would take his chances at throwing a pass with his veteran quarterback, trusting he would throw it away if no one was open. Brett Favre threw an interception on this play and all in all lost the game for the Vikings. The Saints ran down the clock for overtime, won the coin toss, got the ball, and kicked a field goal to win the game. I'll admit that I almost cried, but I suppose we were supposed to lose with 6 fumbles earlier in the game.
This season was a very exciting one, but in the end very disappointing. I have been and for some reason will still be a Vikings fan. When you are a Vikings fan, you tend to get used to a lot of hype for nothing.