Singapore fans stand up and be counted

Hey guys, how do you guys watch Serie A?

Is there another channel showing it cause Supersports doesn't have it anymore.

Originally Posted by Muppy

Hey guys, how do you guys watch Serie A?

Is there another channel showing it cause Supersports doesn't have it anymore.

Good question..... Basically no way
The best is get connected here during the match where some fortunate posters will be updating the match. Maybe streaming.

Did any of you realised that channel 5 broadcast Inter-Lazio LIVE!
I was kinda shocked at first...but it's true.
Great to see the match though rather than no serie A matches at all.

This article was in The New Paper yesterday...'Classic Hollywood Trilogy'??!! and we're deprived from watching it's release!!

THE BOY WITH BIG BOOTS TO FILL
Will Paolo's son Christian one day wear the No. 3?
JUST like a classic Hollywood trilogy, the Maldini drama is preparing its third release.

09 November 2005

JUST like a classic Hollywood trilogy, the Maldini drama is preparing its third release.

After Cesare and Paolo, a new Maldini generation is starting to train in AC Milan's youth teams.

Like all the other youngsters, little Christian - son of current Milan captain Paolo Maldini - was nervous and edgy when he arrived for his first practice session for the youth side in late September.

And like so many of the others, Christian was also accompanied by his father and grandfather. The difference with the rest of the children was, of course, his surname - one that already shapes part of the history of one of the world's biggest clubs.

With Paolo, now 37, not far from hanging up his boots, the directors of the 'Rossonero' (Red and Blacks) wonder if young Christian will play his own part in the club's future.

The vice president, Adriano Galliani, has already announced that the No.3 shirt Paolo has worn for the past 21 years is awaiting an up-and-coming Maldini from the youth team.

As yet, no one knows if that No. 3 shirt - likely to be retired when Paolo retires - will one day be claimed by Christian if he does make it to the first team.


It is still impossible to know if the youngster will have the same sporting maturity that his father and grandfather had in such abundance, although some kind of genetic inheritance seems certain.

However, being a Maldini can also be a hefty burden.

'I am worried about the pressure that his name will create for him. It can cause some problems at an age when he should just be enjoying himself,' said Paolo, who was at the practice with his father, Cesare, and his wife, former Venezuelan model Adriana Fossa.

Paolo insisted that for now, he is holding off giving his son advice.

'For now, he just should be out there having a good time,' he said. 'I was anxious and couldn't say anything (to him) on the way here, except that it's just a game and it's important that he has fun. Even after all these years,' added the Rossonero skipper.

'I continue seeing football as a game.

'He reminded me so much of myself when I went along to my first practice, a bundle of nerves. They put me on the right and my nerves just ate me alive,' said the Milan defender who went on to play more than 800 games for the club.

Like his father, Christian is right-footed, but where his natural position turns out to be, is as yet unclear.

'We don't give the children a set position at the start. That is something that will come,' said Angelo Colombo, head of Milan's youth sector.

Colombo will no doubt pay close attention to the progress of the young Maldini, who for now will play in the 'pulcini' (chicklets) team, the most junior of the youth sides.

The history of the Maldinis is virtually synonymous with the story of AC Milan and it's a family drama virtually unmatched in football history.

Cesare lifted the European Cup with Milan in Wembley in 1963.

Forty years later, Paolo did the same at Old Trafford in England, as he collected his fourth winners' medal in European football's most important competition.

That is a record only beaten by Spain's Francisco Gento, who won the competition six times with Real Madrid.

Cesare was 31 when, as Milan's captain on 22 May 1963, he became the first Italian to lift the now famous silver trophy toward the heavens after Milan's defeat of Benfica.

Later, the elegant defender went on to become a famously stern manager of Milan, the Italian side and Paraguay's national team.

Paolo, as Sigmund Freud would put it, managed to 'kill off' his father's image through his own achievements.

The Milan captain became the most capped player in Serie A history, and one of Italy's most successful ever.

He made his debut with Milan on 20 Jan 1985, aged 17, and remained faithful to the club from there on.

He won seven League titles, four European Cups, four Supercups, two Intercontinental Cups, an Italian Cup and five Italian Supercups.

Although he won 126 caps for Italy, it was in the international arena where complete success eluded him.

FIRST GAME

He played his first game for the Azurra (The Blues) in March 1988, aged just 19, and remained a fixture in the side until his retirement after Italy were surprisingly knocked out by South Korea in the 2002 World Cup in Japan and Korea.

Paolo played in two top international finals: in the World Cup in the United States in 1994 and a second time, versus France, in the European Championships in Belgium/Holland in 2000. Both times he was on the losing side.

Of course, his son still has so many years ahead of him but if he achieves even half of what his father has, the continuity of the Maldini family drama will be assured. - EPA.

Other than that...I so happened to read this in TNP too.An article about fan power....we're mentioned in it

Don't DROP this ratings FLOP

Some shows abruptly killed because of bad ratings are revived on TV and DVDs, thanks to fans who put up ads, hold charity drives and, of course, write petitions

By Ho Lian-Yi

November 09, 2005

SERENITY is a movie that almost never was - if not for fan power.


Revived and retired: Family Guy (above) was brought back on popular demand, while Farscape (below left) stays canned.
'Failed TV shows don't get made into major motion pictures - unless the creator, the cast, and the fans believe beyond reason,' creator Joss Whedon of Buffy The Vampire Slayer fame said.

Serenity - which was released in the US on 30 Sep - is actually a feature-length adaptation of Whedon's 2002 TV series Firefly.

Unfortunately, distributor United International Pictures has confirmed that Serenity won't be making it to big screens here.

Despite good reviews, the film has spent only two weeks among the Top 10 box office movies.

So far, the US$40 million ($68 million) film, which has no recognisable names in the cast line-up, has made US$25 million.

But to satiate local fans, UIP will run a special screening on 21 Nov. Ticketing information will be announced later.

The TV cult space western was a ratings failure in the US, which saw the Fox TV network pulling the plug after just 11 episodes then.

But Firefly's ardent fans, who call themselves the Browncoats, were not going to let their favourite show die a quiet death.


This is not a unique scenario, thanks to the Internet. Nowadays, whenever a show is cancelled, fans start an online campaign to rescue it.

But the Browncoats succeeded because they didn't merely submit a petition or write letters and e-mails to the networks.

Before Firefly was even cancelled, they pooled together enough money to buy an advertisement in industry rag Variety that said: 'You keep flying. We'll keep watching.'

In 2003, after the show was canned, they donated some 1,600 pieces of clothing as part of charity drives for publicity.

They lobbied for the show to be released on DVD - which Fox did, with all 14 filmed episodes.

It sold more than 200,000 copies.

Movie studio Universal approved of a low-budget movie on the basis of strong DVD sales.

'I do feel like Browncoats have made a difference,' one told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

'I think if we hadn't been so vocal about wanting the TV show and wanting the DVDs, the movie wouldn't have been made.'

Cagney And Lacey, The Magnificent Seven, Roswell, Quantum Leap, among others, all have had their lives extended by fan support.

Animated series Family Guy was axed in 2002 after three seasons of poor ratings. But Fox was caught by surprise when the DVD for its first season sold more than 2.2 million copies.

It is now back on TV for another season.

But fan power does not always pack the same punch.

Seth MacFarlane, the creator of Family Guy, has warned fans of other cancelled shows not to be too optimistic.

'For a live-action show to be revived would be a real long shot,' he told the Christian Science Monitor.

'It's much more difficult to get that production back up and running because you need actors who've all gone on to other things.'

While there have been successes because of it, many feel the Internet is a double-edged sword.

'It used to be that only the very special series merited a campaign,' Dorothy Swanson, president and founder of Viewers For Quality Television told Salon.com.

'It's not special anymore. Just about every show that's cancelled gets a 'campaign' because it's the 'favourite' of a group of people. TV critics are jaded about it.'

Just as fans are now quick to come to the rescue, TV show executives are even quicker to cut. A 1998 Salon.com story reported that a TV network typically gives a new series four weeks to get acceptable ratings before it cancels it.

It's even faster now. This year, movie actor Chris O'Donnell's TV debut vehicle, Head Cases, lasted all of two episodes before the axe descended.

Ultimately, shows that have been killed by the networks stay dead, regardless of what fans do.

When Farscape, a sci-fi show about an astronaut who was flung through a wormhole, was cancelled, fans donated thousands of dollars to pay for a 30-second television commercial - to no avail.

FAILED ENTERPRISE

Trekkies - the very fan group that originated the high-profile fan campaign when they extended the original Star Trek by two seasons - raised around US$3 million ($5.1m) to go toward production costs to save Star Trek: Enterprise.

But network UPN was unmoved.

They then targeted Sci-Fi Network to pick up the show. It didn't.

'This sounds cruel, but letters are ultimately meaningless,' Syracuse University professor Robert J Thompson, who is also the director of the Center For The Study Of Popular Television, told The Houston Chronicle.

'They could get 10 billion letters. (But) DVD sales is a number that a TV show executive can respond to.'

But that can also be a blessing for hardcore fans of cult hits.

It used to be that if the ratings for a show doesn't draw in enough advertising revenue, no campaign could suffice.

But DVD sales are now so profitable that networks are malleable to keeping a show with less mass appeal on air if it has a fanatical audience, so to have more episodes to be sold on DVD later.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
S'pore fans much milder

NO one could think of similar fanaticism in Singapore.

Mr Paul Chan, Channel U's vice-president of network programming and promotions, said fans here are pretty mild, and that the most they do is constantly write in to the forums.

'Maybe it's because of culture,' he said.

Ms Huang Shu Yin, StarHub Cable TV's corporate communications executive, told The New Paper the cable broadcaster receives requests from individual cable channel customers to air selected television programmes 'on occasion'.


There was a brouhaha among football fans here when StarHub pulled live telecasts of Italian Serie A matches off our screens, but all they mustered was an online petition.

This was probably the closest they have come to a concerted campaign, but nothing came of it.

A brouhaha...nothing come out of it?!?! They haven't seen the last of us!

Very good... they think just because we've been quiet, it means we're defeated... I love giving surprises...


Check your PMs people.



Edit: Gabrielle, clear your inbox!

you may hv read or heard abt it but rumours reported in 'Controcampo" hv it that hatchet man Materazzi may be a rossonero come January 2006!
I wonder if Pippo will be the first to shake his hand, if it does (unfortunately) happen................

Originally Posted by gila_gila

Very good... they think just because we've been quiet, it means we're defeated... I love giving surprises...

Edit: Gabrielle, clear your inbox!

Sorrryyyyy....inbox full?blame Rachel!

http://www.milanmania.com/forums/showthread.php?t=19858

Helping ilgenio to spread the word. See you guys on Friday

Thanks Gabrielle

For those of who know any Milanista who are not members of internet forums like XT or MM, please invite them to come for the gathering too

hi guys how's the gathering?

btw any gathering to support italy for the coming world cup?

Hey SG milanista, any of you guys resuming lobbying Starhub to telecast the coming Serie A season ?

hi all... just another Singaporean here... =)

Malaysian here...ill count myself in

Count me in too! The club needs support in times like this.

Not really new here, I've been a silent observer since around 2004.

BTW, Real Madrid recently cemented their status as my no.1 hate club. My their season end in catastrophe.

Cool...nice to see more Singaporean around. hope you can keep these place alive