PREDICTIONS 2010

2010 Predictions, Not really.

It is time once again to revisit that age old endeavor, predicting what will come to pass in the forth coming year. We've put on our thinking caps, sacrificed some small furry animals to the pagan gods and divined the tea leaves. Here then is our predictions for 2010.

In Hollywood, the arbiters of hype will reinvent the calendar. No longer will there be 52 weeks. Using their vast influence, the movie studios will add 16 new weeks to the year. This will allow them to have 68 #1 films in 2010.

The bean counters in Hollywood will be on the look out for new ways to make money. The success of AVATAR had them drooling for 3D, but it will not become the panacea for Hollywood's domestic box office blues. Looking beyond 3D, they will attempt to make 4D movies. Here Hollywood will go back in time and mine box office gold before TV, cable, DVDs and social networking.

Hollywood continues its mining of old classics for new 're-imaginings'. The latest is Woody Allen's TAKE THE MONEY & RUN. In the new film, Virgil Starwell no longer robs banks but has become the CFO for a small New England Public Radio station where fund raising has more air time than programming by a ratio of 10 to one, but everyone gets a nifty looking tee shirt.

Refuting the popular conception that Congress' ability to act is glacial, bipartisan passage of a bill limiting the number of film festivals in the US to 500 passes swiftly.

Continuing in the area of motion pictures, art house movie theatres will remodel all of their mens and ladies rooms, assuring what they have always felt but never asserted, that their waste products don’t stink.

In a slightly different train of thought, there was was a shocking development that has left Rush Limbaugh speechless and Bill Reilly sputtering. The Cato Institute reported a long gestating research project has ended. It revealed that the much maligned and easy target for conservative pundits, the "liberal media elite" doesn't exist. In actuality, a small group of extreme conservative media company owners control the airwaves. These selfsame movers and shakers also believe the perfect Christmas film is DIE HARD.

In the world of radio, the economy of scales offered by huge networks of stations will lose effectiveness. More and more people will turn their radios off as they go from station to station and only hear the same 20 songs or the same inane patter of the 'morning zoos' where adolescent humor by people who could not get careers as comics try out bad jokes, laugh at themselves and then get self-congratulate themselves on their puerile wit. In 2010 intelligent niche shows, like the Frugal Yankee, will gain ascendancy.

The emergence of male 'body washes' has augmented the 'metrosexual' demographic. Giving the words 'city slicker' a new meaning, this gender redefining revolution will suffer a major setback when men discover what exactly a Brazilian wax job is.

With the economy still sputtering, the National Federation of Retailers will get proactive. They will begin a rebranding advertising campaign. No longer will shoppers be called CON-sumers, but PRO-sumers whose spending habits are considered patriotic, healthy, environmentally friendly and guarantees eternal youth.

Over in the land of social networking, a computer version of STDs will sweep through sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter infecting nearly everything. Conservatives will lay the blame of an unhealthy virtual lifestyles and it is God's will to rid the earth of tweeting blasphemers.

What is a year without a sex scandal? In 2010 Sarah Palin, like Tiger Woods in 2009, will come undone be revelatory gossip. In her case, a scandal will sweep the nation and keep 24 hour news channels overly excited. It will be reported that she has become involved with an out of work newspaper publisher. As with so many other scandals, revealing post coital videos of her reading the New York Times will pop up on YouTube. Being a savvy media person, she will go on all of the nationally syndicated talk shows. With tears n her eyes, she'll ask forgiveness. She will swear never to read another newspaper and reconcile with her husband. Her popularity rises except among Metrosexuals who are still in pain over their wax jobs.

The trend where people create careers for themselves by being life coaches, birth coaches, shopping coaches and more will continue. The new variation will be Heritage Coaches. It will be THE hot job. These coaches will help busy suburbanites grow their own food, raise chickens, can food and chop down trees all in an effort to assist them in living like their great, great grandparents did, most of who were trying to escape a life these suburbanites are now embracing.

In a corollary trend, new magazines will be launched to ride this Heritage Coach wave. Titles like Modern Manure, This Old Chicken Coop, Celebrity Gutting Techniques and Bottomline's Essential Wood Burning will hit the supermarket check out counters.

In a bit of blow back, the raising of chickens in upscale neighborhoods will initially be very hot until the smell and the cleaning up after the animals loses its allure. The local fox and weasel populations will soar and be very happy.

Apple will buy Chrysler and make the first iCar. They will be so cool, the American car industry is revived. China and India will make cheap knock offs, but not in time enough before Apple buys Taiwan and makes it its first iCountry.

Of course, if any of these come to pass, we will disavow any knowledge of this or proclaim ourselves to be geniuses.

Of course if yo have a prediction, we'd love to hear. Leave a comment.