Hogan's Heroes Popularity, Over-the-Air Television Standards
The 1960s sitcom Hogan's Heroes has seen a resurgence in popularity among younger viewers due to syndication on MeTV and free-to-air television. The show, produced by Bing Crosby and DesiLu Productions, was considered controversial at its launch in 1965 for its mockery of Nazis. Discussion shifts to the technical standards of Over-the-Air (OTA) television, including the lack of 4K broadcasting and the potential for interactive streaming features in future standards.
hogan's heroes· me tv· bing crosby· desi arnax· ota· 4k broadcasting
00:00 You're the one that's all lockstep with Fox News. Swiss cheese and broadcasting live from the heart of the Texas Hill Country here in FEMA Region number 6. In the morning everybody, I'm Adam Curry. And from Northern Silicon Valley where I'm still counting the SVB jokes in the Oscars. Can't find one yet. I'm John C. Dvorak. It's Crackpot and Buzzkill. In the morning. Alright, you win a dollar, but you don't just win one dollar, you win two dollars.
00:39 Two dollars! Hooooooogaaaaaannnnn! Because I was wrong on everything the last show. Everything. What was the other one? Well, besides there not being a single Silicon Valley bank joke in the Oscars, besides that... Hooooooogaannnnn! I have 50, count them, 50 detailed emails of No Agenda producers under the age of 40 who are very familiar with Hogan's Heroes. Well you are too. Well, I was wrong. You're not under 40, sorry. No, but neither are you. Neither are you. I want to thank, I want to thank, now I do suspect there was some rigging going on. Not by me. No, no, no, not by you. And the reason why is a lot of people said this same line. I'm in the same boat at like maybe 10 of the 50. And I went back and looked at the transcript. You never mentioned boat at all. So I'm wondering if there could have been some spiking.
01:40 by the Hogan's Heroes fan club. A massive Hogan's Heroes fan base. I'm thinking now that there actually may be a massive Hogan's Heroes fan base. I was surprised. Now a lot of the producers who wrote in. They had grown up with Hogan's Heroes. Dad or brother, older brother may have been watching. But I mean, we had, here's one, I'll just pick one or two out here. I liked how this one started. Hey, hello, Mr. Producer man. I don't know how that sounds funny. My name is Brian I'm from Liberty Lake, Washington in your last two episodes you talked about Hogan's heroes I'm 23 and I've seen the show do it to it being rerun on me TV, which is exactly what you said John
02:29 Then he goes on, what you guys have failed to mention about Hogan's heroes is how they showed swastikas and had people going Heil Hitler on national television, yet everyone knew it was a joke. You could not get away with such a show like that today. Well wait a minute, isn't it on, unedited? Yeah. Oh we should have this show cancelled. They're a bunch of Nazis. I'm telling you. The show was, when I remember when the show came out, it was very controversial. And it was Bing Crosby who pushed, and with Desi Lu, those are the two people behind it. Really? Desi Lu, Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, they were behind Hogan's Heroes? Really? Yeah, yeah, that meant BC and Bing Crosby Productions. And Bing Crosby didn't do that many things, but they're always winners. And so they teamed up with Desi Lu and they did this show.
03:21 And it was a hit right off the bat because it was high mockery. It was fun. Now when did this start in the 50s or 60s? I think 65. It shows me something else. First of all, there's a lot of people who I think are watching Free-to-Air TV, which is very good. I encourage that. I think we have a lot of cord cutters and that the cord cutters are bored and searching for something and then they find Hogan's Heroes and something is attractive about it. Because probably in general we just like Nazis, it's kind of fun. But also, you know, we're in the second generation of this show. I mean, if you take into account seven years as kind of a cycle, you know, we're now 15 years. We've dragged a whole new generation into this nonsense. Which I'm pretty proud of. We've got 20 year olds listening to the show and they're hip to the heroes. I mean... Oh God! Thank you, Fletcher. It's really cool.
04:25 I'm surprised by that. I've come to the conclusion that you don't get OTA. No, I don't and just as this was coming in over the past couple of days in between shows, I started to look up OTA sets because I think I should get on the bandwagon. This is where you have an OTA set. Well, it's built into the television, but I want to get, you know, one that like one of those new ones, the OTA three that has this new, you know, they have the new like 28 K whatever's going on. They've got something going on with it. There's no, those don't bother, but okay. Yeah. But okay. Cara fine. Yeah, it's fine. There is a new standard that's floating around that nobody has used. They're not even broadcasting in four K yet unless you're, you know,
05:14 streaming. Fox will be the first to do 4k over the air. And I think that this actually will be interactive that you somehow what I've been reading you can stream over the air you will be able to do things on demand somehow I'm not sure exactly how it works have you looked into this? I wouldn't get my hopes up. Okay. Believe me, I'm not basing my happiness on OTA streaming. Just get a cheap antenna, a good antenna. Although I don't know where you're brought, where you're... My stations are? San Antonio probably. Maybe Kerrville. I can get Kerrville. Are they all in the same direction? You're going to have to get an antenna with a motor on it? A motor? You mean a rotator?
