Chalk one up for Steven Colbert, kind of.
NASA announced Friday afternoon that astronaut Sunita Williams will appear Tuesday on "The Colbert Report" to unveil the name of the newest node for the International Space Station.
(Credit:
NASA)
From everything NASA has indicated, the node probably won't be named for the comedian. It likely will be dubbed "Serenity," based on the official voting results on NASA's site.
NASA ran an online contest earlier this year to name the node. The agency's official suggestions: Earthrise, Serenity, Venture, and Legacy. But NASA also (naively, perhaps) stated that the public could offer write-in votes.
Colbert is known for using his show's wildly dedicated fanbase and online social media to rally support for such acts as repeatedly altering Wikipedia's entry on elephants and running for president. And he decided to rally his fans to name the node for him.
Write-in votes for Colbert eclipsed all others, which NASA does acknowledge. But his entry falls under only the Top 10 suggestions list.
"We received more than a million entries, in large part because social media Web sites and television programs, such as 'The Colbert Report,' took an interest. This spread overall awareness of the International Space Station," Bill Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for space operations at NASA headquarters, said in a statement.
"I certainly hope NASA does the right thing," Colbert has said. "Just kidding, I hope they name it after me."
According to NASA, Node 3 is a "pressurized module that will provide room for many of the space station's life support systems." Those include oxygen generation, temperature and pressure controls, oh-so delightful urine reclamation, and shower and toilet facilities. Node 3 is set to launch in late 2009.
Considering NASA has chosen to unveil the name on Colbert's show, there must be some twist to it all. Comedy Central itself is playing with the idea that NASA will name a space toilet for Colbert.
So either Jon Stewart is really on to something with his mad-as-hell crusade against financial hypocrisy and stupidity, or there are a lot of unemployed people watching Comedy Central clips to pass the time.
Either way, an on-air freakout by CNBC reporter Rick Santelli may have been one of the best things to happen to Comedy Central in months: Fake-news pundits Stewart (of "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart") and Stephen Colbert (of "The Colbert Report") have seen traffic to their Web sites and online video clips soar after the two went on mocking vendettas against Santelli, fellow CNBC personality Jim Cramer, and the NBC Universal-owned business network in general.
Traffic to the shows' Web sites has been at its highest of the year so far in the past week, at over 60 percent their weekly average for 2009. ComedyCentral.com, which hosts video clips of both programs, also had its best traffic of the year, and the digital version of a viciously funny clip called "CNBC Gives Financial Advice" logged over 1.3 million views in a week, the sort of numbers usually reserved for grainy videos of cats behaving unnaturally.
Here's the back story: Santelli was supposed to appear on "The Daily Show" after his tirade about the federal government's economic bailout, but backed out abruptly. That's when Stewart and Colbert--but especially Stewart--turned up the heat. Stewart went on the aforementioned anti-CNBC rant on March 5, putting "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer squarely in his crosshairs. Cramer appeared on "The Colbert Report" the following night.
Now, Cramer is scheduled to make a "Daily Show" appearance on Thursday night.
Stewart and Colbert have been two of the most visible figures in cable television's slow crawl onto the Web. Not only are they wildly popular with young and tech-savvy audiences, but the segmented format of their talk shows lends itself well to being split into short clips and swapped via video-sharing sites, which meant that unauthorized clips of the two were some of YouTube's earliest hits. That's what indirectly led to Comedy Central parent company Viacom's massive copyright lawsuit against YouTube owner Google.
Later on, the full archives of both shows were made available on Comedy Central's Web site, and recent episodes are available in full on Hulu (as well as iTunes and Xbox Live).
Colbert, who started out as a commentator on "The Daily Show" before spinning off his blowhard persona into his own talk show, also owes a big chunk of his notoriety to the Web. Video of C-SPAN's coverage of the White House Press Correspondents' dinner three years ago, in which Colbert performed a shockingly blunt comedy routine that skewered then-President George W. Bush, was a huge hit on the Web among those who wouldn't have considered actually watching C-SPAN in the first place.
Last year, Colbert was honored by the annual Webby Awards as "Person of the Year." Take that, nonbelievers!
Proceeds from the sale of Colbert's Christmas album on iTunes will go to the charity Feeding America, and the DVD of the special is for sale at www.colbertnation.com.
(Credit: ColbertNation)Comedian Stephen Colbert has an army and I'm in it. Together, we got a bridge in Hungary named after him (though to be honest, I didn't actually vote; I helped my team in spirit from the comfort of my couch). Colbert had an eagle named after him. He's helped countless candidates for office with his undeniable "Colbert Bump." He even got Apple to send him an iPhone simply by holding out his hand to the camera screen day after day and saying, "I want."
But now Colbert wants something else, and as a die-hard fan I am worried he might not get it. How would our beloved leader handle defeat? I'm not sure.
If you caught his show on Monday or Tuesday you know he is asking for the Colbert Nation to go on iTunes today at exactly 5 p.m. EST to purchase his album, A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All. Currently, Kanye West has the No. 1 album on iTunes and Colbert is peeved. (His is No. 15.) Thus, he wants us all, at one moment, to collectively catapult his album to the top. It's not to help Colbert, he insists, but to humble Kanye.
He said, "I want boots on the ground, and do your Twitter blogging to each other and get it all together--whatever you kids do. It's important."
Now, here's the thing: I adore this man, but I also watched his Christmas special, and as much as I love Fountains of Wayne (bassist Adam Schlesinger composed the songs for the show), I found it rather, well, OK. Jon Stewart's song was hilarious, but the rest? Maybe not worth staying up for, especially not a whole month before Christmas.
So, as much as I want to do my part, I'm really not sure I can throw down any money to buy this DRM-laden album I'm sure I'll never play. I mean, we're in a recession--we're lucky to have the stolen music we already downloaded.
My question to you is: Are you going to log on to iTunes today to help Colbert catapult his album to No. 1? Or are you, like me, just going to hope it happens without you actually having to purchase, yes, a Christmas album on which Willie Nelson sings to the baby Jesus about the joys of weed?
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