Most of you will know that Barney is a kid's TV icon and also a likely US presidential candidate in 2008, wowing the primaries with his simple, repetitive style and "mad cow" eyes. George W Bush took a lot of leaves out of the Barney handbook in his two campaigns, except that George has difficulty pronouncing a lot of the simple words which Barney helps the kids with. A Microsoft interactive version, released about 10 years ago to eat America's young, is being groomed as an ideal running mate for the Vice-Presidential ticket (with the emphasis on vice).
Anyway, the latest news on Barney is that Lyons Partnership, the owners of Barney, have agreed to withdraw their legal threats against a website publisher, Stuart Frankel, who has a Barney parody website and to compensate Frankel for fees expended in defending himself. Amen to that, but how absolutely extraordinary that a pisstake of a kid's TV character could face legal action in this way. How long before humour becomes a crime?
I must ask Woolly-Woolly if he ever followed up on his idea of putting Microsoft Interactive Barney in the microwave, pressing "start", and filming the results. That would be a good one for Youtube.
2 comments:
I use to do an great X-rated Barney at parties. Eventually he lost his fame over here and no one knew who the fuck I was doing.
Sorry to hear that! I think Barney was always a bit second division in the UK. People with young kids would know who he was but not many others really. And maybe that's just as well.
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