NBC makes a mistake by pulling the Plug on "The Office".

I watched much less of NBC's Thursday Night Line-up once CBS's Person of Interest burst onto the scene in the beginning of 2011. Factor in that Third Rock got off to a late start that season due to Tina Fey's pregnancy, and NBC's presumed ratings drop was a sure thing.

Last night I watched the Office, Primarily because of the promo's for the show. It was an hour long episode, and I was absolutely delighted at the twists and turns that Andy put us through when he decided to fight back over the loss of his doting girlfriend, Erin.

I found the entire plot line comically profound on many levels. 

Just a couple of months earlier I watched as Erin and Andy formed what looked like a lifetime bond after Andy finally broke up with his girlfriend Jessica in front of Jessica's family and friends. 

Andy and Erin have to make a mad dash for the car and escape as projectiles pelt the windows. At this point, Erin gives Andy a look, the kind of look a girl gives a guy that says, this is it, we're together for life. It kind of reminded me of the final scene from "The Graduate".

Of course I have missed several episodes in between and suddenly I see that Erin wants to move on, and the entire office is against Andy. Andy fights back and says many poignant things, even using the word empathy, or the Office's lack of it towards Andy, to make his point.

In the middle of his own crazy behavior, Andy says some solid stuff. I find this type of comedy spellbinding, crazy behavior mixed with extremely deep and coherent analysis of the present situation.

One of my favorite lines from Andy, "So you all want me to just move on, yet, where were you when I wasn't here and Erin and Pete were getting together"?

And there it is. 

A punch out condemnation of present day society's fickle set of values. The Office "group" tells Andy he is supposed to respect and accept romantic decisions made by others, and be decent about it, yet that same society shamelessly witnessed the erosion of Andy and Erin's relationship for their own amusement.

Where was the Office's moral compass when Andy was slowly losing Erin because he was not there for a few weeks? The same group mindset that wants Andy to take a chill pill now is the same group that probably got the giggles watching Erin slip away from Andy while Andy was away.

And after Erin and Pete tell Andy to just be an adult and deal with it, Andy rises up to the challenge and is able to show both Erin and Pete just how it feels.

This is really deep stuff because there are no crazed gunman scenes, no slasher response, but rather a wickedly proper way to show Erin and Pete that it is easier said than done when it comes to letting go and moving on.

Which brings me to NBC and the cancellation of The Office. 

Maybe somebody should tell NBC that the Office has morphed into it's own version of Saturday Night live, in which slowly the cast members change as the seasons wear on, but the popularity of the show still rings through.

Unfortunately, there appears to be an unwritten rule among the major networds, "You don't mess with my reality TV primetime programming by putting real shows with real actors against it, and I don't mess with your reality TV programming either".

Even if the Office has declined in ratings, it could easily improve if it were just put opposite prime time reality television. Apparently, the  actors vs Reality TV battle is one duel the major networks are reluctant to parry on. 

If you are planning on creating or broadcasting a commercial and want an objective, outsiders point of view about your commercial, contact Alessandro Machi about his consulting services at...

info at alexlogic.com

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by Alessandro Machi at

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I was fooled into thinking I was talking to a human being when it was just a pre-recorded human voice able to respond to my responses.

Edit update, April 10, 2019 3:59pm. Just wanted to point out that this Article about fake real voice sounding phone call solicitations was was written and posted eight months before Time Magazine covered the issue. end of update.

I was called by a company out of Minnesota called Stepping Stones Entertainment. They wanted to know if I was interested in supporting family entertainment films.

The person who originally called me said they would be less than a minute and asked me three yes or no questions. I then agreed to a call back the next day so that a representative could give me more information about their quality family entertainment films. 

Just as promised, I received a call the very next day. After a couple of minutes of conversation, I realized I was interacting with a cleverly constructed human voice that had been pre-recorded and was simply recognizing my yes and no responses and moving on to the next pre-recorded sales pitch, but all done in a very convincing interactive tone.

After I had my Soylent Green, "oh my gosh, its pre-recorded people talking to me," moment, I paid extra close attention to make sure my suspicion was correct. When the pre-recorded human "voice" heard me answer "no" to their final offer, I wanted to test my hypothesis that I was indeed talking to a human recorded voice. 

I asked the human recorded voice what they thought of the super bowl. The voice did not have an answer and simply responded, "What did you say"?

I asked again in as clear and concise voice as I could muster, "What did you think of the Super Bowl", and the voice still did not understand, and then quickly said goodbye and the line disconnected.

The rammifications of this pre-recorded human sales voice technology are damming beyond initial comprehension. 

It is one thing to have "Siri", a computer generated voice, respond to a human being. It is quite another to have one's time occupied by a pre-recorded human voice pretending to be a real human, and getting away with it and actually generating credit card sales!

Most Ponzie schemes eminate from the concept of, "If we could only ask enough people to purchase our product or service, and have it cost us as little as possible to communicate with them, we win".  

As bad as ponzie schemes can be at times, when one adds in that the product being pitched is digitally replicable at pennies per copy, it becomes a ponzie schemer's ultimate wet dream if they can digitally generate tens of thousands of sales call interactions automatically, by paying a human being to record their voice reading various script response combinations, once.

In the next few years there could be literally hundreds of thousands of actual living, breathing telephones sales people being replaced by  pre-recorded interactive human voices. 

Many times phone sales jobs can be so stressful to have that at first glance it might look like not such a bad idea to take the human being out of the equation, unless you happen to be that human being and like your job.

However, the bigger victims are going to be the american consumer, and eventually the worldwide consumer, who will have to wade through never ending and ever increasing pre-recorded interactive sales calls while the actual company spends virtually no money per call hawking their product or service. We will be fooled, and deluged, whether we like or not.

If you recently made fun of Notre Dame football player Manti Te'o for being tricked into a relationship with a fake girlfriend who didn't actually exist, your karma points may soon expire and you could find yourself being tricked by a real human voice.

Another few hundred thumbtacks thrown in front of the consumer in the ever cluttering freeway of life.

Please Consider signing the Debt Neutrality Petition I started on Change Dot Org. This petition gives millions of consumers a fair chance to pay down their debts by freezing the interest rate charges, penalties and fees once an alleged credit card or student loan default has occurred.

If you are planning on creating or broadcasting a commercial and want an objective, outsiders point of view about your commercial, contact Alessandro Machi about his consulting services at...

info at alexlogic.com

You can also view more

commercial critiques

by Alessandro Machi at

Super Bowl Consulting

Important Breaking News scoop to the first media outlet that contacts me and uses the story.

I (Alessandro Machi), recently discovered something that could have major job loss implications for the american workforce. But rather than break the story here, I would be willing to trade my information to a major news show (Including local television news) as long as AlexLOGIC.com is credited during the on air piece.

First to request the rather shocking, breaking news story will probably get first dibs. I will be willing to give the lead out to more than one entity, however, the first news entity that requests it will get a window of time to produce the piece. 

I'm not looking for financial compensation, just on air credit. You can email via my bio located to the left of this article.

If you are planning on creating or broadcasting a commercial and want an objective, outsiders point of view about your commercial, contact Alessandro Machi about his consulting services at...

info at alexlogic.com

You can also view more

commercial critiques

by Alessandro Machi at

Super Bowl Consulting