Something a little fancy for you this week. Evan Pederson from the FancyPantsGangsters.com podcasting network in Minneapolis sits in with us via Skype. And what a show he chose to join us for. This week's presentation of our podcast is probably the closest -- to date -- that we've ever/will come to a full-on political discussion. As you can probably guess, it revolves around SOPA and PIPA, the 2 anti-piracy bills now shelved in the US Congress. Evan chose to make his site go dark on January 18th along with thousands of others as part of the largest online protest ever. As I mentioned in a SOPA rant posted that same day, we at Who Asked You? stayed online mainly because I didn't want to break our site in fear of not being able to fix it. You'll hear the wildely different approaches Evan and I had to accomplishing the black-out. His was far less extreme and overall, smarter than the way I wouldn've done it. So it's a good thing I declined to participate.
The SOPA story starts in the form of a Chase-rant. Those role around on occasion. In an attempt to keep my blood pressure in check, I don't go too crazy and in an attempt to keep you awake, I don't go to in-depth with political jargon. Charlie is also grateful for this. He proclaims on the show that we shouldn't get any more political than we do with this SOPA thing. As we've always maintained on Who Asked You? we try and limit our conversations on politics and religion because those "cans of worms" are a slippery slope for us and you listeners. They can result in shouting, bad feelings and overall butt hurt. Unlike today's movies or someone named Zopittybop-Bop-Bop getting arrested for drug possession, which we can all joke about. But something like SOPA directly affects our website, so it feels like a requirement to at least acknowledge it. Charlie again pitches the idea of doing a serious show where these topics can reside, after all, just 10-minutes earlier we were talking about the Squatty Potty. What do you think? Should we have a separate show for serious/political topics... please say no. Another show is more work for me. And in all honesty, that's what makes Who Asked You? the show that it is; being able to simply go from a product that makes you squat on the toilet to legislation that could terminate our show as we know it.
Once DE-FACE THE NATION ends, we move onto more of what makes our show great... Vince Shlomi for example! He's the ShamWow guy. Vince has once again straped on his little headset and is hawkin' made-for-TV gizmos at you like his life depended on it. And it probably does. I'm sure he needs the commissions to pay off his attorney fees. If you don't remember what he got arrested for, I explain it on today's show. Or if you want to hear the original story, check out EPISODE 63. What's funny is that in his infomercial, he's more than happy to poke fun at himself and includes plenty of inuendo relating to his arrest.
Do to time constraints we skip 2 stories and head straight into Breaking News. Once again, Taco Bell makes our radar. If you frequent the web, you've probably seen a joke where Taco Bell is the punchline. The mystery as to how digestible their food is still remains. Also, whether it's actually food or not. See, there was another one. It seems the fast-food giant has heard one to many riffs and is starting a test market on a new menu featuring fresh ingredients... as apposed to...? See Taco Bell, you bring it on yourselves! The idea is to compete with shops like Chipotle and Q'doba. Offering the same "quality" (in quotations) but for a cheaper price. If you live in Louisville, KY or Bakersfield, CA... please let us know how it goes. Those are the first test markets for "Cantina Bell" as they're calling it. If it proves a success, they'll role it out nationwide. Call me skeptical on this one. A fast-food joint with taco shells made out of Doritos can use "authentic" and "fresh" in their menu vocabulary about as convincingly as we can "serious" and "political" in our show's.
