Face Off

My days aren't all about wasting time getting into arguments on internet forums or playing online scrabble - I do actually like to do something useful every now and again. Take facebook for instance, you know you can spend hours in that joint only to leave with nothing more than the knowledge that you have successfully blocked your stalkerish ex-boyfriend and that challenge games are crap.

One of the areas of great interest to me though are the groups. Pick a topic, any topic and there's bound to be a facebook group dedicated to celebrating or denigrating it.

Triple M's Get This has motivated plenty of action in the groups area. Below are a list of just some of the groups you can join.

Global Movement to Save Get This: 937 members

This is brought to you by the same people who coordinated a rally in Melbourne on 05 November and are planning a farewell party on the day of final broadcast on 23 November. There is even a rally planned for this Saturday in London - I'm sure 50 Aussies toting green and gold backpacks will have the Austereo management reversing their decision immediately. You can jump on one of the discussion boards where folks chat about torrents and seeding - I don't know if they are discussing IVF, equine flu or their own l33t skilz.

They also offer a link to the online petition with over 7600 signatures to date. With comments like this:

MATT FROM MARSLAND
DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE WOMAN THAT WENT FISHING WITH 5 GUYS.... SHE WENT HOME WITH A RED SNAPPER!!!

and signatures from Steven Seagal, Harry Manbag and Bob Franklin's mother who "suggested he should go back to England you boring little knob" I can't see this one being enough to sway our truly favourite knob, Guy Dobson.

Stop MMM Axing Get This: 391 members

Maybe these guys organised the rally - if not they certainly have photos of it.

GET THIS '07: Save 'Get This'!!!! Common Triple M... move to Drive time!!! 304 members

This is the group you join if you like exclamation points!!!!!! or can't spell come on!!!!!!!!!!!

and then there's:

Save TripleM's 'Get This' : 682 members

Tony Martin;s 'Get This' is bloody awesome: 770 members

Get This - Tony Martin, Ed Kavalee and Richard Marsland Appreciation Society: 404 members

Ed Kavalee is a Spunk: 103 members

Get This Appreciation Society: 134 members

SAVE GET THIS: 59 members

The Get This fanclub: 23 members

Don't let Triple M axe Get This: 23 members

Save Triple M's Get This: 12 members

and the Newcastle team have the Triple M's 'Get This' Appreciation: 16 members on this one they note the show is hosted by Tony "Saprano" Martin [these guys should be whacked just for that]

In the meantime I have enjoyed sending friend requests to any Australian minor celebrity I can find and thought you may like to know the results:

Ernie Sigley added me no questions asked.

Yahoo Serious sent me a question: "who are you?" Well Yahoo, millions of people are wondering the same of you.

Warwick Capper, Derryn Hinch and someone else I have forgotten are yet to respond.

But the highlight of this experience came just this week when I received this message:

Tom Piotrowski has just compared you with one of his friends and thinks you have a better sense of humor.

If you have any suggestions for other celebs I should hassle please let me know, otherwise I'll be online creating the Guy Dobson facebook group.

Weekend Wrap Up

The end-of-season radio moves are on, like a jigsaw where the pieces are being rearranged to fit back together, we are seeing some personalities slide over to another station and others hanging up the headphones for other reasons.

Triple M's Melbourne breakfast radio team The Cage is retiring And is to be replaced by ruddy-faced Fat Controller Peter Helliar. Triple J breakfast co-host and Spicks and Specks team leader Myf Warhurst is to join Helliar. Rumours of who would share space with Helliar were wafting around the ether for the last few weeks and the names Petty, Zemiro and Bickmore were bandied around. One thing was always going to be certain - Helliar would not be sharing the airspace with any female who got more laughs than him. Is Helliar the new Daryl Somers of Australian entertainment? You decide?

It was interesting to note that Helliar is looking "forward to putting together a great team over the coming months..." so don't get ahead of yourself Myf - this is Pete's gig and you'll be joining him and Strauchnie for the ride. What will the show be called?

"I plan to call it Peter Helliar's Breakfast Bonanza, Myf's name will appear on the website and of course listeners will hear her voice, most likely cracking up over my jokes." Peter Helliar*

Over at Vega Denise Scott and Shaun Micallef are heading off to pursue other interests. The always likable and versatile Scott has a book deal and Micallef will concentrate on his very promising new satirical television show Newstopia. Unbelievably there have been reports that Grubby and DeeDee are rumoured to slip over to Vega. The sound of another nail is heard being banged into Vega's coffin.

Vega was a great idea that never took off and instead of nurturing it management clipped its wings and tried to make it look like every other oldies hits of the 80s, 90s and now station. I had visions of a Triple J morning show circa early 90s with Angela Catterns: weekly regular guests talking dream analysis, television, naturopathy and more I cannot exactly recall. Instead we got a cobbled together breakfast team that were given no direction and a short-lived shot at an alternative talk radio format. Now it's a backannouncer's barnyard with Elton John, Billy Joel and Robbie Williams.

If Vega want to lift their fortunes they should:**

• Hang on to Dave O'Neil and give him a bit of licence to put together his own team. O'Neil has a huge portfolio of Melbourne radio experience including years at Triple R (Cat Corner anyone?), he has loyal fans and doesn't mind acting the dag. If Chris Hatzis could be enticed to join him Vega would be on a definite winner.


• Poach the Martin/Kavalee/Marsland winner Get This from Triple M. Give them three hours from 9-12 and a very loose leash. Martin appears to despise the Triple M playlist so let him pick his own four songs per hour.


• I don't know about the afternoons yet but leave it with me.

In Nation-Watch, Mick Molloy and his show disappeared without a trace. No press releases, no media coverage, it just disappeared. Anthony LaPaglia and his team have been hired to track the shows final movements, when found all episodes will be buried in a time capsule next to the dog-poop zone at the nearest park.

*The recordings were muffled maybe these aren't the EXACT quotes.

**I don't like giving advice all the time.

Extreme Makeover for The Nation

The Nation attracted 363,000 nationally and 109,00 average in Melbourne last week. So they've called me in for an emergency meeting at Channel Nine to discuss how The Nation could be salvaged.

This is my prescription:

1 dose of bad dancing (subtitles optional)



1 drunk crazy-woman (tatts optional)



1 litre of intuition



Liberal amounts of chemistry



A dose of good vox-pops



One decent sketch per night



A killer closing musical act (tatts optional)



Apply immediately, you should notice an improvement within a week.

Martin v Molloy

I know this is last week's news - but I've been busy.







Tony Martin and Mick Molloy have fallen out over a mockumentary made by Martin has not been included in the DVD release of Boytown.











The film was axed from the DVD, with the Molloy camp blaming a lack of time and money to finish it. Martin has told the Herald Sun he was disappointed his 90-minute film was left off. "I do think that it's probably one of the two or three best things I've ever done," he said.











John Molloy, Mick Molloy's brother and producing partner, said the film was scrapped because the team ran out of post-production money and time. "There was amazing raw footage there, absolutely," he said. "But it's a huge process to try and bring something like that to the final product and, unfortunately, we ran out of the time and resources to do it."







But Martin said he offered to pay the estimated $5000 post-production bill himself. He said he was speaking out because so many people knew it was made and were now wondering what happened to it. "Everyone assumes the reason the film wasn't included is it must be terrible," he said. "The exact opposite is true. I'm in the awkward position where possibly the best thing I've done has become a blight on my reputation."







Now I really want to see it and I didn't even bother with Boytown.

Current Favourite Radio Personality - Peter Grace

Peter Grace, the first voice heard on commerical FM radio in Australia and former producer of the Martin Molloy radio show has been popping up as a guest co-host on Get This with Tony Martin on Triple M. Grace has been making quite an impact on youtube with his clips that include some stand-up comedy, some political swipes at the Australian and US government and some intelligent rants against anything else he finds annoying.





His subscriber name is whaddyareckon. I reckon he's alright.

Check out some of his sweet whinges here, or watch below:

Photo of Peter Grace circa 1978 from Debbie Kruger's website

Austereo's Where's Wally Game Promotion

Thanks to our favourite gossip site Defamer for pointing us towards Austereo's latest media campaign. Check it here.

Yes, it is a Where's Wally Game but instead of looking for the bespectacled nerd in a stripey shirt you get to search for their "BIG NAMES". There's even a legend at the bottom just in case you have never heard of their "BIG NAMES".

But surely a golden opportunity was missed when they decided to have the Tony Martin of Get This fame cartoon character dressed in a blue shirt and brown pants - wasn't he a monty for the role of Wally?

Perhaps this is just the first step in Austereo's campaign. Still to come:

• "Where's our ratings?" Pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey style party game.
• "Where's Fifi Box?" Sticker book featuring map of Australian media and 973 stickers of Fifi. Logies, Dancing with the Stars, Thank God You're Here, Mick Molloy's new political panel show - everyone needs a token female - whack a sticker of Fifi anywhere you can!
• "Kyle Sandilands Action Figure" Comes complete with pins and voodoo instruction kit.