More Important

I had intended to say something about Comcast Corporation (Dow Ticker: CMCSA = $16.13)'s announcement yesterday that it intends to purchase 51% of NBC/Universal from General Electric Corp. (Dow Ticker: GE = $16.20).

If the sale is approved (no reason to believe it would be held up, kids; remember, It's Chinatown), it will make Comcast a larger media company even than Old Rupert's Media Corp. -- the largest in the Western Hemisphere, in fact. And, there will of course follow an inevitable "restructuring", and X number of current NBC "personnel" will "become redundant".

Only the "Useless Boomers" -- as that Peet's Coffee employee once described my generation to me -- might remember that American Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) and Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) were once giant corporations in their own right, not just more chips on the table in the game the Big Boys play.

It was only with the rise of cable television from the 60's through the 90's (which Comcast helped to bring about) that Networks lost market share, and were eventually sold -- ABC to Disney Corp.; CBS to Westinghouse; and NBC to General Electric.

Comcast is owned by the Roberts family of Philidelphia, which also owns just about every major League sports franchise in the city, and lots of other stuff. They're doing very very well.

I was going to write a great deal more than that; I still have The Cold Which Will Not Leave, and was revving myself up for a serious tirade on accumulated wealth... then, I came across this photo of the Himalayan Range at dawn.

That's Everest, highlighted in the center; K2 is hidden by the scarp to the right. Just sit and look at it for a while. It's been pretty cold here in The City By The Bay™ recently, but it's even colder at 18,000 feet. And it would be quiet -- the kind of silence which would let you feel, for a moment, of the relative timelessness of a view like that... almost, that you weren't even there any longer.

I sat looking at it -- and for a while, Comcast, and cable teevee, and the Roberts' of Philidelphia were in their proper perspective.

For a while.

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