Fox: Infested by Idiots

I have long considered the people at Fox News to be a bunch of idiots. However, I've never really had a problem with the folks at the regular Fox network.... Until now.

Last week they did something so incredibly stupid that it diefies the imagination: They allowed the 8 PM live broadcast of American Idol to go into overtime. Now normally this wouldn't bother me. I'm not a fan of the show, I've never watched, and for all I care, Simon Cowell can go jump in a lake.

However, I am a huge fan of Fringe, which comes on at 9 PM. Or at least it's supposed to come on at 9. However, that's dependent on the people at Fox being reasonably competent.

So when Idol ran seven minutes over, that meant Fringe didn't start until 9:07. And since it's an hour long show, it also means that Fringe didn't end until 10:07. If you're sitting there actually watching the broadcast as it airs, that's no big deal.

But if you're relying on a DVR to record the show for later viewing, it means that you're gonna get screwed when you finally do sit down to watch it. And in this particular case, you get as far as Agent Dunham getting jumped by the bad guy, losing her gun, and.... Nothing. End of story. It's 10 PM, so your DVR just stopped recording and left you twisting in the wind.

And you really can't blame the DVR. After all, it's just a piece of electronic equipment that's doing what it's told to do. Unfortunately that includes making the assemption that the people running the Fox network have an IQ higher than that of a gnat.

Granted, you can change your TiVo settings to record longer than the scheduled time. I've learned to do that whenever Obamaa has one of his press conferences. But as a general rule I avoid the practice because the extra time can create conflicts if you also have something scheduled to record in the following time slot.

Why don't I just go to Hulu and catch the ending there? Quite frankly, the very thought of that scares the piss out of me. I've heard rumors that Hulu is run by aliens, and they'll suck your brains out. Hell, they're probably in a conspiracy with Fox and deliberately arranged to have Idol run over just to increase their pool of victims.