Are you trying to watch any of the skateboarding commercials and other media flotsam and jetsam that we posted? My user account has been unceremoniously and permanently disabled. The only notice I got was something about the Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation complaining about the clip I had posted titled T Bag gets hit with a skateboard. It was about 15 seconds of the character T Bag from the Show Prison Break, getting hit in the head with a skateboard. I can understand how Fox or anyone else wouldn’t want entire episodes of their intellectual property put online where people can watch it for free and Fox doesn’t get the ad revenue. However, short clips? Why not? It doesn’t cost them any lost revenue, and it generates publicity for the show. I suspect that particular offense had less to do with copyright infringement and “the suits not getting it” than it did with the fact that Fox owns the YouTube competitor MySpaceTV.

Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. I think I only had one other incident where a video was removed, and it was for reposting our appearance on Attack of the Show. They must have actually looked at the rest of the commercials and out takes I had uploaded. Users with suspended or terminated accounts are prohibited from creating new accounts so I guess my double secret probation is over. What I need is a good video hosting solution out in Sweden or wherever it is that they don’t get bent out of shape about this, a Pirate Bay equivalent of YouTube. Am I a hypocrite? By the strictest interpretations, yes. But I never posted entire episodes of anything, and I don’t think it’s the same thing to use it editorially. Of course, doesn’t matter what I think. GVK‘s are unaffected as Grover posted them under his account.

I got a tip about this Cisco advert and managed to catch it on my DVR without realizing it, but I accidentally deleted it before I could digitize it. I was waiting to catch it again but it seems like it only aired on one week. Cisco commercials show up, but it’s always a different one. Since then, discussions have popped up all over. So I finally decided to pull it of the Cisco web site. There are additional spots that didn’t air on TV. I’ve put them all together in one vid so you don’t need to wait through the intermissions. Where to start on this… it’s too easy. The main thing they are trying to sell is the fact that with Cisco Networks you can be in touch with everyone on a project almost instantly, no matter where they are. Ironically, the ad agency who put his together couldn’t have been more out of touch with skateboarding culture or history. – Thanks to Tracy Sigler and Paige for the tip.

Skateboarding must be dead or dying. What else would explain the drought of marketing tie-ins for a major Hallmark holiday like Valentines Day. In 2008 my son got one lousy sticker of a tiger wearing hearts and riding a skateboard. What about all the Extreme™ valentines of the not too distant past? I feel like Charlie Brown. Here’s hoping for a more Extreme™ Easter.

Yeah, it’s got nothing to do with skateboarding, other than a few incidental shots each episode, but as far as mindless entertainment goes, it’s regularly good for a few laughs, so I guess I was wrong about the Rob and Big show. Plus I always liked the theme song from the Courtship of Eddies Father. Or maybe I had a crush on Mrs. Livingston. Hello, Mr Eddie’s father. Let the hate mail commence.

Worn Free will sell you a reproduction of t-shirts worn by famous rock ‘n’ roll personalities including this rad shirt worn by Joey Ramone The website has notes for each of the shirts which make interesting reading if you are into punk rock trivia. Some of the shirts are cool but forty bucks seems kind of steep. I’m tempted to make my own personal bootleg transfer.

OK, Officer Salvatore Rivieri doesn’t just hate skateboarders. He hates radio controlled cars, or maybe street artists or most likely himself, because he’s been driving that ridiculous go-cart police car for at least a year. Another video has surfaced of officer Rivieri serving and protecting. Apparently this guy has a very short fuse. Here’s hoping he gets an attitude adjustment via painfully boring and embarrassing anger management counseling, or better yet, an old fashioned pink slip. What a dick. – Thanks to Eric Cherry for the tip.

John Aguilar’s sister went to South Africa and all she brought him was a lousy newspaper. There’s an article from the December 1st 2007 edition of the Weekend Argus titled Flying high on the vision of one man. It’s about Dallas Oberholzer’s mission to bring skateboarding to rural South Africa. Our interview with Dallas was published in 2005. Looks like he’s still at it. Unfortunately, you need a subscription to read the article online. It’s a very positive story. You can read the scan after the jump. Hey James… Stuff it!

I think I heard that goat just yell “Draa-aa-aa-aa-aapping in!”

Finally got a decent capture of this old Wonder Woman episode. I’m distilling most of the non-skateboarding parts out of edit. There are bits out there on the Interwebs&trade, but this will be the most complete. Wait for it. It’s worth it.

Green skateboards and now green skateparks? In Portland there are two new skateparks breaking ground in 2008. Both proposals mentioned a need to minimize the environmental impact, mostly concentrating on water runoff. Seems like a minor part of the project to me, as none of these parks are located near waterways. But what do I know? I’m not one of those science doohickeys. Coincidentally, Airspeed Skateparks has the contract for one of those new parks and they are also featured in the newest issue of Concrete Wave Magazine. The article titled The New
Cooldown – Skate Green: Design and Build Smart is available as a PDF download. There’s more to this green skatepark than you might imagine. Aside from skateparks the article also talks about sustainability in skateboards, clothing and shoes.

– Thanks to Don Whitaker for the tip.

There are quite a few bamboo based boards out there. According to some sources (more on that in a few) the skateboard industry has surpassed the hardwood floor industry as the number one world consumer of hard maple trees. lets put that into perspective. If properly cared for, a hardwood floor can last 100 plus years in house, while a skateboard isn’t going to last a year unless you’re just using it for transportation. Now consider that a maple tree takes 28 years to mature for use commercially. Sustainability is big in industry right now. It’s even creeping into skateboarding, mostly through the red headed stepchild of skateboarding, longboarding. I’ve seen a few of them up close and they don’t look quite ready for prime time, at least as far as short boards go. It sure would be great if a decent shortboard could be made out of bamboo. There’s a TV program on the Science Channel called Invention Nation where a bunch of hippies the show’s hosts travel the country in a biodiesel powered van and investigate cottage industry inventors of green technologies. It’s a short bus, but it’s green, not yellow. Comet Skateboards was featured on the Less Landfill episode for work on a bamboo composite board. It doesn’t air again until March 17, but you can watch it here.