Lights. Camera. Drama.

Before I talk about my main topic, I would like to promote a good online friend of mine, Ron Calonje. He helped me promote my Alice in Twitterland article for the 2010 Talent Buzz Contest and I want to turn the favor by promoting his two Oakland rock bands, Dial 911 and Shinoco. If you are into indie rock and alternative rock music, these are bands for you. Sign up on those websites, listen to the songs, and help spread the word!

Anyway, let's get back to the program.

I am very excited for two particular TV shows this summer. The first one that I will discuss first is Aaron McGruder's The Boondocks. Many people do not like the show because of its excessive use of the n-word, violence, and its stereotypical portrayal of African-American urban culture. But if you were smart enough, you can pass the superficial imagery and get the real messages McGruder tries to convey in his show such as race, racism, and political/social satire. I personally take some meaningful philosophies from the cartoon, although I sometimes do not agree with him. Everyone has their own opinion about race, including myself.

On one hand, May 2th starts the end of the controversial cartoon series. On the other hand, I am particularly enthusiastic for this season because the last season aired before the 2008 U.S presidential elections, so I want to see how McGruder fits President Obama's controversial win into the discourse. Uncle Ruckus, the self-hating "black" male character on the TV series hates "black people" period, so it would be amazing to hear what he has to say about electing our first "black" president.

I also want to learn what McGruder thinks of the Tiger Woods sex scandal, the health care and financial reform debates, Wall Street's involvement with the economic recession, the GOP, and the Tea Party movement. I know he will address and attack some of these issues creatively and constructively. So, if you love political engagement, amazing martial-arts fights, Japanese anime, and leetness, watch the final season starting May 2, 2010 at 11:30pm on Cartoon Network. The trailer itself is so mind-bottling that McGruder will leave TV programming with a bang!

 When I was a senior at Smith College, I took a Sociology of Rock Music class. The last paper of my undergraduate career was all dedicated to the death of the cultural global brand that once was Music Television (MTV). My professor was a bit skeptical about the whole ordeal, you know. MTV was still around, even though YouTube and Myspace continued to dominate the online entertainment space. A year has passed. I could not have predicted such a catastrophe, if it was written across my forehead.

No more TRL. No more music. No more iconic MTV logo. Do not get me started on these dumb reality shows! Do you want to know why I will only watch MTV for the awards shows now? When I heard that the cast members of Real World: Jersey Shore were given $10,000 per episode contracts to produce a second season! Oh my fucking god. MTV, what have you done? You substituted a generation of wonderful music shows such as TRL, Diary, Fanatic, and MTV Jams for a bunch of tasteless, attention whores? MTV is like Tiger Woods. It was married to popular music and well-respected by celebrities who acknowledged it as the catalyst that launched their music careers. But it ended up sleeping with Snookie instead. (Thank god I do not watch Jersey Shore!). MTV has clearly lost its morals and is only here to cash in on the latest reality show craze it helped generate in the early 1990s instead of being relevant again.

YouTube could end up on the same path to self-destruction. Unlike MTV, I will continue to use YouTube to watch videos because it is still relevant to me. After reading Wired Magazine's "5 Secrets to YouTube Success" article, I realized that YouTube has come a long way since its founding in 2005. YouTube has transformed average people and local bands into semi-famous individuals overnight and I hope that the exchange of communication and ideas continues to thrive between YouTube vloggers and their followers.

But after playing around with the new YouTube layout, I learned that YouTube needs to rethink its website design strategy. I initially thought the new video page was a April Fool's joke. However, when I realized it wasn't, I spammed Twitter, tweeting that YouTube needs to figure out who is on its user-experience team before it makes another decision because the homepage is horrendous. It may have taken YouTube ten months to listen to user feedback to create this new layout, but it needs to reconsider this disaster. First of all, I do not like this thumbs up, thumbs down policy that YouTube implemented to replace the five-star system. What if I like a video, but think it is not worthy enough of a thumbs up? So, the rating of the video is somewhere down the middle. With the new system, there is no middle ground. With the old system, I could have easily graded the video with three stars.

Secondly, I hate the excess of white space on the left side of every page. I think the font size and columns (ie. related videos) were rearranged to give the users a more "user-friendly environment". Despite the influx of spam and racist comments, I personally like the old layout a lot better. This is coming from someone who is a YouTube consumer, not a vlogger. I knew where to go, which buttons to press. Now each page looks bare and out of place. The only new feature that I like is the you can now easily share your favorite YouTube videos with your Facebook friends. Other than that, nothing.

I am glad that the people that I have talked to in person and on Twitter about this issue agree with me 100%. We as fans should contact YouTube and demand the old video page back somehow because I do not want YouTube to be the next MTV. If more fans complain about it, then YouTube will get the message. If they don't, YouTube might continue to develop new design changes without our opinions and eventually go downhill, allowing another online video-sharing website will take its place.

What are your thoughts on the new YouTube video page? What should YouTube do next? Is MTV a has been?

LadyMel had a spectacular time partying hard at an exclusive New Years party in Miami. Before she departed the sinful city to NYC, she asked your favorite and most admired celebrities their New Years plans. Disclaimer: You would not believe what some said.

Every online website and cable news network from Time Magazine to CNBC has shared their own lists of  the best and worst celebrity scandals or ideas of the last decade. And now I am going to give you my rundown of the lessons that I have learned since the year 2000. I still cannot believe it has been ten years already since the start of the twenty-first century. I am getting old.

1. Don't Fuck With The Terrorists: I apologize for using the f word, but I had to. With 9/11, this recent attempted Christmas bombing of a commercial airplane heading to Detroit, and the Fort Hood massacre still lingers in the hearts and minds of the American public, I do not want to be in the way of their plans for mass destruction and terrorism. And I am not only talking about Islamic fundamentalists.

I am talking about the seemingly liberal media, government agencies, and other American institutions that continues to undermine the potential and progression of the American people. Not all media people are terrorists. I love NYMag.com, Huffington Post, and other online blogs and websites. But I know when to draw a line between the facts and sensationalism. So do not screw with the terrorists. Learn to overcome their campaigns of fear the best way you can. The politics of fear is the most destructive weapon of all. I've learned to not take every breaking news with a grain of salt. Take control your life or they will.

2. Douchebags Rule the World: If you have not read my wicked Halloween tale yet, I strongly recommend you read it. Douchebags rule the world basically. Jon Gosselin thinks he is a living, breathing male god who is now rumored to have lied about a home invasion only to get publicity. He is a douchebag because he has not grown up to support his eight children. A douchebag would not allow his children to be on television in the first place.

A doucebag could be the nice neighbor, your ex, your psychopathic brother or even you. Stars like Kanye West, Richard Heenes, the White House Crashers, Dave Letterman, Charlie Sheen, and Tiger Woods are just the high-profile ones. The list goes on and on. You can take a douche bag out of Hollywood but you cannot take Hollywood out of the douche bag. The last of the most intelligent people on Earth should reclaim the planet from these people or by December 21, 2012, the world might come to an end. So when you write your New Years Resolutions people, please promise me to either convert the douche bags in your life to reasonable human beings or ignore them altogether.

3. Technology Has Redeemed Itself from the Dark Ages: With the highly-anticipated Google Nexus and the Apple Tablet coming out next year, I am glad that I do not have to use floppy disks and CDs anymore. I am glad that 2010 will bring us closer to the science fiction days of our childhood pasts. I am glad that we are a step closer to artificial intelligence and Star Wars technology. Did anyone notice that in one of my Tech Diva 2010 Prediction post, I predicted that Apple will come up with a new invention before I even knew that Apple was going to premiere the "Apple Tablet" sometime next month to the public. Haha, I'm good. So, Facebook and YouTube are in. Goodbye 20th century garbage. 21st century technology is our future.

4.  Celebrity Deaths Are Overrated: This decade will forever be known as the decade of the Greats. Michael Jackson, Brittany Murphy, Heath Ledger and Anna Nicole Smith all die due to reported drug overdoses and/or long histories of drug addiction. I still remember the day when I heard about MJ's untimely death. I just did not believe it because it's Michael Jackson we are talking about. The Michael Jackson. But there should be a line between at least a few days news coverage to about a year's worth of  untrue stories, fabricated truths, and millions of dollars of unnecessary publicity. Talk about the missing children of this world. I do not want to watch six months worth of the reasons why or maybe why Anne Nicole Smith died. There are other important things that matter to me. End of story.

So before you browse a newspaper or a popular search engine for information, activate your common sense and take yourself on a wild goose chase.

2009 was a very big year for pretty much anything from scandals, the inauguration of this country's first African-American president to the death of the King of Pop and the recently deceased Hollywood actress Brittany Murphy. So as I was planning on Christmas content for this blog, I decided what an unique way to celebrate the holidays and close a year of mayhem by remixing "The Twelve Days of Christmas" my way. It goes a little something like this:

I have been using Twitter on and off for the past year I believe. Many online users tweet about their daily lives in real time communication for the sake of digital contact with the digital world. I sometimes do, but since most of my friends are on Facebook, I do not have the luxury of tweeting each day to friends and family. I use Facebook instead to reach out to my larger audience. On Twitter, I follow industry news, career specialists, and "Hollywood" celebrities to get the latest scoop on finding jobs, career advice, and understanding the seemingly complex celebrity life in cyber space.

But what really, really bothers me is that for some Twitter obsessed celebrities, the only way to communicate to their fans is for their fans to pay them $$$. According to an article I recently read entitled "Want Kim Kardashian To Tweet You? It Will Cost $10,000?", reality-TV star and socialite Kim Kardshian collaborates with in-steam advertising company Ad.ly and through this collaboration, demands $10,000 per tweet. Unfortunately, she is not the only celebrity listed on the company's website. Check it out for yourself.

How nonsensical and pointless can someone get?!  It only goes to show that many celebrities are willing to do almost anything for money and fame these days. That is why I come to hate the Kardashians quite profoundly since Khloe Kardashian got married this past summer after nine days of engagement. They are just greedy, attention-whore douchebags.

I know that celebrities are marketing brands and  the security blankets for many advertising and entertainment companies. Hence why despite Tiger Wood's infidelity scandal on the news, the man virtually owns golf and sports marketing as a whole. I know that social media sites have been used by average Americans and small businesses alike to market their own products and sell their brands to the outside world. We are stilling living in a capitalist, opportunist age even amidst a global recession.

But when you thought celebrities desired to get closer to their fans online because they are so busy running their careers, you have to pay them a certain compensation in order for them to stay in the Hollywood spotlight. Sometimes, I wait for particular celebrities to tweet me back after I tweeted them on their pages and now I know the truth. Therefore, what use does Twitter have for celebrities besides money?