The Voluptuous Horror of Morgan Webb

Just to show that it's not all nihlistic doom and gloom and Star Wars geekdom around these parts, I'd like to comment on the sad state of geek television and the whoring of TechTV geek babes, Cat Schwartz and Morgan Webb.

Once upon a time, there was a channel on DirectTV called ZDTV. It was an offshoot of Ziff-Davis, the publishers of PC Magazine. It was a little low-rent and cable-access-ish at times, but for wireheads like moi, it was pretty cool. (Another pseudo-channel was C|Net on, I believe Sci-Fi Channel - that's where I first saw Half-Life.) They had a shows like "Gamespot TV" (based on the game site) , "Silicon Spin" w/John C. (C is for Cranky) Dvorak and the original "Screen Savers" with Leo LaPorte and Kate Botello. "Amaze yourself" was their slogan and I even designed a desktop for them to show on-air in 1999:

After a couple of years, they changed the name to TechTV and the shows evolved for better and worse. "Gamespot TV" became "Extended Play" and eventually "X-Play"; Screen Savers shed Kate (sent to languish on Extended Play and then exiled) and picked up tubby Patrick Norton and a crew of Gen Y-ers that I suppose was meant to keep the vibe hippenwiddet. Among the sidekicks was Morgan Webb, who at the time was sporting blonde hair and weirdly low boobs:



Hermione used to always comment about how her breasts sat in the middle of her chest. Whatever. Chicks are catty like that.

As time went on, her hair started getting darker:



No problem, but as she crossed over to "X-Play", she seemed to let it all go to hell with stringy black hair and becoming more rectangular to the point that Herm started calling her the "Goth lesbian". (Saucer of milk for one - pick it up!)

Over the summer, suddenly word came that Comcast - owners of whack-ass gamer channel G4 - was buying TechTV and damn near everyone was getting sacked. Across the Interweb, message boards filled with worry about the fates of everyone's fave hosts and shows. Months of reruns filled the airwaves and it seems like they're still trying to get production up to speed as year-old games are being reviewed on the old sets. The vast majority of G4 shows are hosted by young, annoying twits who remind me too much of Riley from Buffy TVS. Production values suck and the whole vibe is kindergarten compared to the glory days of TechTV.

Anyhoo..."Unscrewed with Martin Sargent" and hottie sidekick Laura Swisher seem the same, but I caught the new Screen Savers and IT SUCKS!!!!!!! OMFG, IT'S UNWATCHABLE!!!! Anyone out there who has the ear of GeeWeF*ckedUpTechTV muckymucks needs to let them know that they've pooched it royally!!!

Leo? Gone. Fat Patrick? Gone! In there place are old sidekicks Kevin Rose and his girlfriend Sarah Somethingwhocaresshe'sannoying. Girlfriend?!?! Who leaves the show when that couple breaks up? They also added some screaming Mimi guy who you'd swear was too ghey for Will & Grace, but that's not the problem, his problem is that HE SUCKS!!!! The first time I saw this debacle, they nattered on like bozos for 15 minutes before answering a call - in fact, Call For Help didn't survive the merger - and the other times I've peeked in, it's been insufferable. About all that's left to watch is Unscrewed and X-Play.

Which brings us back to Morgan. On a recent episode of X-Play, I noticed that she was looking a bit less rectangular and with a bit of nosing around, discovered why

That's right, kiddies! Morgan's not just a geek girl, former programmer and TV host. Nonononono....she's a BIMBO in a lad mag!!!! Woohoo!!!!

Puh-leeze....

Cruise over to the FHM site and check out her cagey self-exploitation and demeanal. (Is that a word?) Momma would be so proud.

What about Cat? Well, she's not much better as she's now doing a "Sex and the Geek Girl " type column in Stuff lad mag and it's too cloying for words. (For kicks, do a Google on "cat schwartz nude" and see what comes up and the story behind it. Heh.)

Enough trivial ranting for now. Tomorrow: Back to the gloom and doom! (Or maybe not. We'll see, won't we?)