NBC and NPR feature iPhone humor
Thank goodness that mainstream comedians have jumped in with bits on the iPhone introduction; us funny geeks are deeply grateful that the cavalry has arrived. While CBS's Craig Ferguson weighed in with an iPhone/Zune comparison, the competition at Late Night with Conan O'Brien gave us Thursday's slightly risque iPhone advertisement above (it's a sonogram! It's a prophylactic! It's Mace!).
Today, NPR's tongue-in-cheek news quiz Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me! featured an impression of Steve Jobs' now-legendary prank call to Starbucks (4,000 lattes) by newscaster Carl Kassel. The coffee quote comes in the show intro and again in the "Who's Carl This Time" segment (about 45 minutes in) -- too bad the player misidentified it as the launch of the "Microsoft Phone." Host Peter Sagal suggested that the second version of the iPhone needs to come with a vital nerd-friendly feature: a woman who would be really, really impressed with it.
Sagal also asked the panelists how cell companies would compete with the iPhone: best answer was from Adam Felber, who suggested that Verizon would introduce a new music player where you could play your favorite song "by pressing only a dozen buttons, and get to listen to almost half of it before it drops out." Wait Wait is a personal favorite of some TUAW team members (we love panelists Felber and Paula Poundstone), so check the schedules page for your local broadcast time or haul down the podcast from iTunes.
Thanks, Eric!
_thumbnail.jpg "Take a stroll down memory lane")
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Joel said 3:06PM on 1-13-2007
If you're ever in Chicago, go see Wait Wait in person (tapes Thursday nights). The best stuff never makes it to air.
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Billy K said 3:48PM on 1-13-2007
Don't believe the iPhone is a prophylactic. That's what they said about the 4th gen iPod, and I can tell you from personal experience, it is not.
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bard said 4:36PM on 1-13-2007
thanks for this information
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Jon said 4:39PM on 1-13-2007
Ha ha, that was brilliant.
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icruise said 5:02PM on 1-13-2007
I think it's kind of ironic that the idea behind that video is that the iPhone does a bunch of things but isn't a good cell phone, since that's exactly the kind of thing that Apple is trying to get away from. And as a matter of fact, I think the iPhone probably has fewer "features" than many other phones -- the reason it's good is that the features it does have work so well, are easy to use, and are integrated with one another.
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Laurie said 6:40PM on 1-13-2007
I'm the other TUAW team member who is a Wait Wait fan :) I'd have no reason to ever wake up on the weekends were it not for Wait Wait and This American Life (another Chicago-based NPR show), and a little Car Talk thrown in for good measure.
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Churry said 7:08PM on 1-13-2007
Thank you for writing about the show! Wait Wait is a prime example of the quality programs produced by NPR, which everyone should support. My favorite panelist combination is Paula Poundstone, Adam Felber, and Roy Blount Jr.
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Mike Rose said 7:53PM on 1-13-2007
Churry -- that's the all-star "DaVinci Code" panel lineup, featured the week Tom Hanks was the celebrity guest.
One of my favorite one-word punchlines was from that episode, from Paula. On the question of where Errol Flynn met his third wife; one of the answers was "She was selling refreshments at the courthouse while he on trial for statutory rape." Tom Hanks wondered aloud, "Do they even sell refreshments in courthouses?" and was interrupted by Paula's curt "Yes."
It took a second for the crowd and panelists to connect Paula's comment with her past legal & parenting difficulties, but once they did it was a good twenty seconds before anyone could speak, they were laughing so hard. Pure comic gold. You can listen here: http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=35&prgDate=05-13-2006&view=storyview
I have to say that Adam is my favorite, in part because I've studied with him in New York and we have mutual friends in the improv & comedy community; however, Paula is a very close second.
Another weird six degrees of "Wait Wait" fact: Peter Sagal's brother Doug is my friend Leah's boss. Strange but true.
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jason said 8:00PM on 1-13-2007
I am already subscribed to the podcast of Wait, Wait, Dont Tell Me.
I love that show.
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Sean Finn said 10:37PM on 1-13-2007
I was at that taping! I haven't listened to the broadcast yet, but when the caller said "Microsoft's new phone" the whole audience was in an uproar. Lots of Apple fans among the cultural elite, I guess ;)
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Matt said 6:05AM on 1-14-2007
Here's a funny spoof on the iphone
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kr0QWFr64WU
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Steve Rhodes said 7:06AM on 1-14-2007
On the Media has an interesting piece on the iphone coverage
http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/2007/01/12/01
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spil said 7:07PM on 1-14-2007
Wait, they got one of the iPhone's features confused with one of the power mac G5/mac pro's features: the cheese grater.
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