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Are Young People Killing the Movie Industry? The Out-of-Touch Adults’ Guide to Kid Culture

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Teenagers used to be considered the life-blood of the movie industry, but judging by the terrible box office returns on Memorial Day weekend, they don’t seem to care that much anymore. They do care about impassioned, four-hour long YouTube videos, cringe-y crush tales, and how to get very, extremely high, though.

The movie business’ very bad weekend

This Memorial Day weekend was a box office disaster for the movie industry, the worst in nearly 30 years (adjusted for COVID). Neither of the tentpole weekend releases (Fury Road prequel Furiosa and Garfield) returned more than $30 million, largely because younger people just don’t care about movies like they used to.

There are any number of theories for the epically bad weekend—tickets are too expensive; we’re seeing the result of the actors’ strike; this is part of “sequel fatigue;” neither Garfield nor Furiosa are very good—but here’s my opinion: This is part of a generational shift away from movies altogether that’s partly due to the industry, and partly due to larger cultural forces.

As of 2019, the 18-24 demographic still made up the largest share of moviegoers, and Hollywood really missed that mark this weekend. Furiosa features a teenage hero and bankable star Chris Hemsworth, which should appeal to younger people, but it’s also based on a series that started back in the 1970s. Another key demographic that Hollywood seemed to have missed this weekend: little kids who badger their parents into taking them to movies. Garfield, based on an ancient comic strip, doesn’t seem to have caught their imagination.

In a broader sense, no matter what you put on screen, I don’t think most younger people get the cultural reinforcement vibe out of movies that they used to. Instead, it comes from their peers online, a much faster and more relatable form of feedback. In the U.S., moviegoing is down across the board, and the convenience and low cost of watching movies at home seems to be no match for hassle and expense of the local multiplex.

What does “egg blinker” mean?

The term “egg blinker” is trending this week among the druggier corners of TikTok. It refers to a method for smoking weed out of vape pen (aka “dabbing”). “Blinker” is slang for inhaling on a vape pen long enough that it starts to blink, indicating a stronger than expected pull. “Egg blinker,” a term coined by TikToker 448smokes in this video, is hitting the pen for five seconds, then taking a quick break, then inhaling for four seconds, quick break, another four seconds, quick break, four seconds more, quick break, four seconds more, then hold everything in for eight seconds. This is a lot to remember for someone who is stoned, but it supposedly produces the feeling of an egg in one’s throat, and, presumably, gets one very, very high. I know there is no lethal dose of marijuana, but if I were to try this, I would definitely die, or at least have to watch the video below a few times.

TikTok’s #lostmymind trend: What did you do for your crush?

Remember actually caring about another person enough to have a crush on them? Me neither! But TikTok’s young romantics are sharing the cringe-worthy, embarrassing things they’ve done to impress their crushes in a series of videos that might melt your icicle heart. Examples include putting a love spell on ’em, having your dad take paparazzi-style photos of you, trying to slam-dunk at beer pong, pretending to like anime, or Bruno Mars. I admire the courage it takes to post these videos, because they really are embarrassing, but they’re heartwarming, too. If you want to enjoy, just check out the videos that use this sound clip.

Google’s AI delights internet with misinformation, than disappears

Google rolled out AI-assisted search this month, with the search engine often returning results culled from its Gemini AI instead of just the links people expected. To call it unsuccessful is an understatement. Users quickly noticed that Google’s AI was giving some severely unhinged answers. It told users to glue the cheese onto pizza, suggested eating rocks every day, claimed that dogs play professional sports, and that a cure for depression is “jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge.” Google’s response has reportedly been to manually take down answers to these specific questions, and they seem to be cutting back on how often AI results appear on searches. (I say they “seem” to be cutting back because if you search “Did Google turn off its AI search results?” you will not return the answer to that question.)

Viral video of the week: The Spectacular Failure of the Star Wars Hotel

This week’s viral video highlights the power that fans can have over huge corporations. YouTuber Jenny Nicholson recently posted a video describing her experience at Disney’s Star Wars hotel, the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser, in great detail. Over the course of more than four hours, Nicholson describes and shows footage of every facet of the experience and concludes that it was pretty bad, and that the price tag of around $6,000 for a weekend was way too high. (This tracks with Lifehacker’s review.)

Even if it was free and worked perfectly, staying at the Star Wars hotel sounds like a nightmare to me, but Jenny is coming at it from the opposite point-of-view: she’s a 100% fangirl. She paid for this as a vacation, and she desperately wanted what Disney promised—a fully immersive Star Wars weekend—but was thwarted seemingly at every turn. She’s exactly the kind of person who should come away from this experience delighted, but instead of a galaxy-spanning LARP, according to Nicholson, guests are nickled-and-dimed for “add-ons” at every turn, and little about it actually works.

Her disappointment is genuine and her logic flawless. As a result, the video has been viewed millions of times and was picked up by CNN, NPR, and other news sources. The Star Wars hotel is already closed, but you’d hope Disney and other owners of beloved intellectual property will spare a few hours to consider what happens when you do a bad job of stewarding the creative output that fans love.





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For sale: A piece of California’s country music history

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The famed Buck Owens Crystal Palace, where music legends including Willie Nelson, Dwight Yoakam, Garth Brooks and a young Taylor Swift have played, is up for sale, with the foundation that runs the Bakersfield venue planning to list it for $7 million on Monday.

The nightclub, museum and steakhouse was owned by its namesake Buck Owens, the country music trailblazer who bucked the slick commercial melodies of Nashville for a distinctly West Coast twang. Owens opened the Crystal Palace in 1996, watching it become a premier venue for the biggest names in country music, including himself. Buck and the Buckaroos played there every Friday and Saturday night until his death in 2006.

Jim Shaw, a member of the Buckaroos and a director of the Buck Owens Private Foundation, said that after 28 years of running the famed venue, the Owens family plans to step back and find new owners amid a challenging business climate. The foundation said in a statement that “since Buck’s passing in 2006, we’ve tried to maintain the excellence that he expected, even as it became more and more difficult during these challenging times of increasing food and labor costs.”

The venue is not closing and scheduled events will continue as planned, Shaw said.

“It’s business as usual for now,” Shaw said. “Ideally, someone who wants to keep it exactly as it is will come forward.”

Owens’ youngest son, Johnny Owens, wrote on Facebook that the family’s hope “is that a buyer steps forward with a vision for the future and a reverence” for his father and the Bakersfield Sound.

The Crystal Palace, located on Buck Owens Boulevard, is a major tourism staple for Bakersfield. The 18,000-square-foot venue is next to the city’s downtown entrance.

“It’s the No. 1 tourist attraction in Bakersfield,” Shaw said. “There are people stepping forward and we are waiting to see what happens. I am getting a lot of phone calls. I’m anxious to see what happens.”



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2nd local radio host says they were given questions ahead of Biden interview

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A second local radio host on Saturday told ABC News that he was provided a list of questions in advance of his interview with President Joe Biden this week.

“Yes, I was given some questions for Biden,” Earl Ingram of CivicMedia told ABC News. Ingram, a prominent host of a Wisconsin radio station, interviewed Biden this week in the wake of his debate performance.

Ingram said he was given five questions and ended up asking four of them.

“I didn’t get a chance to ask him all the things I wanted to ask,” he said.

Ingram is the second interviewer who now says they were provided questions by Biden aides to ask the president this week. Earlier today, another local radio host who interviewed Biden this week told CNN she was given questions to ask Biden before the interview.

PHOTO: President Joe Biden speaks to supporters during a campaign rally at Sherman Middle School, on July 5, 2024, in Madison, Wisconsin.  (Scott Olson/Getty Images)PHOTO: President Joe Biden speaks to supporters during a campaign rally at Sherman Middle School, on July 5, 2024, in Madison, Wisconsin.  (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

PHOTO: President Joe Biden speaks to supporters during a campaign rally at Sherman Middle School, on July 5, 2024, in Madison, Wisconsin. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

“We do not condition interviews on acceptance of these questions, and hosts are always free to ask the questions they think will best inform their listeners,” the Biden campaign told ABC News on Saturday.

Ingram told ABC he didn’t see anything necessarily wrong with the practice. “To think that I was gonna get an opportunity to ask any question to the President of the United States, I think, is a bit more than anybody should expect,” he said.

He continued that he was grateful for the opportunity to interview Biden at all.

“Certainly the fact that they gave me this opportunity … meant a lot to me,” Ingram said.

MORE: Wealthy Democratic donors sound alarm over Biden staying in race

On CNN earlier today, Andrea Lawful-Sanders, the host of WURD’s “The Source,” said Biden officials provided her with a list of eight questions ahead of their interview with Biden.

“The questions were sent to me for approval; I approved of them,” she said.

“I got several questions — eight of them,” she continued. “And the four that were chosen were the ones that I approved.”

Responding to Lawful-Sanders, Biden campaign spokesperson Lauren Hitt said in a statement that it’s not “uncommon” for interviewees to share topics they would prefer. She noted that Lawful-Sanders was “free” to ask any questions she saw fit. She also noted that it was the campaign who sent over the questions and not the White House as other reports claim.

Lawful-Sanders did note in her interview with CNN that she ultimately “approved” the questions provided.

“It’s not at all an uncommon practice for interviewees to share topics they would prefer. These questions were relevant to news of the day – the president was asked about this debate performance as well as what he’d delivered for black Americans,” the statement said.

“We do not condition interviews on acceptance of these questions, and hosts are always free to ask the questions they think will best inform their listeners. In addition to these interviews, the President also participated in a press gaggle yesterday as well as an interview with ABC. Americans have had several opportunities to see him unscripted since the debate.”

A source familiar with the Biden booking operation told ABC News that moving forward they will “refrain” from offering suggested questions to interviewers.

“While interview hosts have always been free to ask whatever questions they please, moving forward we will refrain from offering suggested questions.”

2nd local radio host says they were given questions ahead of Biden interview originally appeared on abcnews.go.com



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President George W. Bush turns 78 years old

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George W. Bush, born on July 6, 1946, in New Haven, Connecticut, was the 43rd President of the United States.

Bush was born to parents Barbara Bush and former President George H. W. Bush. He has five siblings; Jeb Bush, Marvin Bush, Neil Bush, Dorothy Bush Koch and Pauline Robinson Bush. Pauline was diagnosed with leukemia and passed away at age three.

He was formerly the Republican Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.

WHY FORMER PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH IS WINNING … THE POST-PRESIDENCY

Bush was first elected to the White House in November 2000, and officially began his first term as president in January 2001, after he defeated Democrat Al Gore during the presidential election. Bush was reelected to his second term as the incumbent in November 2004, when he prevailed over Democrat John Kerry, and led the United States until January 2009 before handing over his torch to former President Barack Obama.

Bush married Laura Bush on November 5, 1977, the day after her 31st birthday, in her hometown of Midland, Texas. The couple were engaged in September 1977, and married less than two months later in a Methodist church. Bush and Laura met at a barbecue, and he took her to play mini-golf on their first date. 

The Bush’s share twin daughters, Barbara Pierce Bush and Jenna Bush Hager, born on November 25, 1981. Today, the couple also share four grandchildren; Mila, Poppy, Hal and Cora.

GEORGE BUSH, FORMER FIRST LADY ISSUE STATEMENT ON AFGHANISTAN WITH MESSAGE TO US TROOPS, VETERANS

During his presidency, Bush cared for his English springer spaniel, Spot Fetcher, who accompanied him to meetings in the Oval Office and on adventures throughout the White House. The dog was born to his parent’s dog, Millie.

On September 11, 2001, less than one year into Bush’s presidency, the Twin Towers in New York City were attacked by terrorists when airplanes hit both buildings, causing a collapse and thousands of lives lost. At the time, Bush was reading to elementary-aged children at a school in Sarasota, Florida. He was calmly and quietly advised of the attacks and quickly returned to Washington, where he was briefed alongside Vice President Dick Cheney.

Bush was regarded highly for his poise while learning of the attacks and for his demonstration of patriotism and leadership in the uncertain days and weeks following the hijackings of multiple planes on the day that shook America to her core.

SADDAM CAPTURED ‘LIKE A RAT’ IN RAID

On December 30, 2003, during Bush’s first term as POTUS, Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi leader and executor of the 9/11 attacks on the U.S., was captured by the American military

In the early morning of December 30, 2006, during Bush’s presidency, Hussein was hanged and executed for his crimes against humanity. Americans across the nation celebrated the death of Hussein and applauded Bush for promising the country he would take him out and following through.

While Bush was regarded for his dealings with the terrorist attacks, the signing of No Child Left Behind Act and the Patriot Act and the creation of the United States Department of Homeland Security, many Americans were unhappy with the sanctions of interrogation techniques, the war in Iraq and taxes while he was president.

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