Good morning, Zoners! And welcome to the first official No Fact Zone Weekend Brunch. Grab your Mimosa and your Eggs Benedict and your fruit salad (with lots of honeydew), and settle in so that we can get all caught up for the week.
First of all, this new feature is actually going to be replacing the Friday Free-For-All. With my new schedule, it’s going to be hard to fit in a good post late Thursday or early Friday, but I’ve always enjoyed our once-weekly chance to get to catch up with each other on both site news as well as things that are going on in our personal lives. I seem to be free most Saturday or Sunday mornings, however, or at least early afternoons, hence the birth of our new Weekend Brunch posts. These posts will be very much like Brunch – I’ll post when I wake up and am working on having a leisurely morning on the weekends, and it will give the Zoners an opportunity to relax and just talk for a while. Plus they’re always good with a Bloody Mary.
Click through to hear our latest State of the Union, and learn about all of the new features that we’ll be bringing you very soon here at No Fact Zone.
First, a little history lesson and a layout of the direction I’d like to take No Fact Zone. When I started this site, there was very little in the way of Colbert fandom on the web, and there was no community of fans anywhere that I could join to chat about the shows and Stephen. ColbertNation.com had very little unique content, and there wasn’t even the Colboards. I did my best to provide all the news that I could find, and give Colbert fans a place to be able to express their fandom.
With the redesign of ColbertNation.com, the game plan totally changed. The fans now had full access to every show, every sketch, and the ColbertNation.com forums have become an excellent centralized location to talk about Stephen. So the question becomes this – what value does No Fact Zone add to the fandom?
It’s still my humble opinion that this is and will continue to be the best site on the net for news about Stephen Colbert and “The Colbert Report”. But we have something else that is much more valuable – we the fans have built a strong and welcoming community of Colbert enthusiasts. We have always been a Labor of Love here, with 100% fan-driven content, and a 100% volunteer staff of Completists – this autonomy allows us to feature our passion and enthusiasm in a truly unique way. Our community is our #1 asset, and we are going to focus on building and strengthening that community. To do this, we are going to be doing some shifting of duties and adding of features that will help bring back people day after day, and encourage them to participate in the comments and as contributors to the blog.
We’re going to be bringing some new Completists on staff to help with the blogging so that we continue to provide the best Colbert web site out there. The beauty of No Fact Zone is that it’s always been community-driven. The more help we have, the richer our content. And the more fun it is to participate. We had a Completist staff meeting last night to discuss some upcoming changes and new features for the site, so I thought I’d bring you all into some of the changes you will be seeing here at No Fact Zone.
Episode Guides
The nature of the Episode Guides is going to change a bit. The original idea behind the guides was to give a searchable page for all information about the shows. When we started doing the guides, the videos at ColbertNation.com were very difficult to watch and there was no embed feature. We were the only site keeping the records about the show with that kind of detail.
Before Jenny with a Y started her R.A.P.S. posts, MsInterpreted, Kinaesthesia, and I (as well as a few other helpers like Jennie and TheLakeEffect) worked very hard to keep up with the guides. However, with the start of the R.A.P.S. posts, we got a bit lax in our duties and got very behind on the traditional guides because the fans now had a spot to talk about the show, which was a huge part of the original mission of the guides.
With the new ColbertNation.com revamp, the extreme detail that we were transcribing is not as necessary since we now have easy access to all videos. And with the R.A.P.S. posts, we are able to get a good amount of quotes up on the site almost immediately after the show goes live. So we’re going to make a slight change to the way that we publish show information. Going forward, I am going to type a hybrid of the R.A.P.S. post and the older traditional Episode Guides. I’ll put some basic information about the show in the header, as well as quotes from the show. I’ll also continue to put in commentary about what I thought about the show in the body of the post, and of course we’ll continue the polls. I really like being able to contribute commentary to the site in that way, and I really think that it’s helped facilitate a larger amount of comments about each show. I’ll also make sure to link to that day’s videos as soon as they are available, so that we’ll have that resource. You’ll see the new format in action starting tomorrow night.
Fangirl Suit Report and Apopcalypse posts
Doing this new Guide format is great in the fact that it will be much easier to maintain each episode in the long run. However, there are unique elements of the old Guides that we don’t want to lose. Plus we also had recruited a whole slew of SCribes ready to help with the old guides, so we’re bringing them in now as full-fledged Completists to help fill a couple of these voids.
- Fangirl Suit Report
This will be a weekly feature discussing the wardrobe, costume, and possibly even props of Stephen during the week. This is for all you fangirls who love discussing the stripes of Stephen’s tie, the amount of gel in Stephen’s hair, and how adorable Stephen was in that pirate hat. VebalTypo will be contributing these posts each week, most probably on Friday or Saturday. - Four Horsemen of the Apopcalypse – Pop culture references in ‘The Colbert Report’
One of the benefits of the old guides is that the Completists would hunt down those obscure Nordic god references, those translation of French phrases, and find the YouTube vids of those lyrics paraphrased in the intros. It helps to have those collections of references to explain some of the more obscure jokes. Wren will be posting a weekly wrap-up of some of the more obscure references each Friday, so we can relive some of those jokes and actually understand them the second time around.
Stephen T. Colbert Award for the Literary Excellence Book Club
One of the features that has been asked for on numerous occasions is an opportunity for the Zoners to have talks on a more intellectual level about the books or topics that were brought up on the show. At our meeting, Val and MsInterpreted suggested a Book Club of sorts for the Zoners to participate and discuss some of the more interesting books and media that were featured on the show.
This is how it would work: We’ll keep track of the guests and books that people find most interesting in the comments. A couple of weeks before a show break, we’ll have a poll containing a few of these books for everyone to vote on. Once we decide on a book we’d like to discuss, we’ll post the book in the sidebar and set a date for the discussion during the show break. We’ll post plenty of reminders, and make sure that everyone has a couple of weekends to discuss the books before we have our book club post.
We’ll do our best to find books that are already in paperback and super-cheap on Amazon, or that are available in libraries, so no one goes broke to participate. We’ll also offer things to discuss like movies that have been featured (like “Man On Wire”, for example), or possibly even newspaper articles, like Fareed Zakaria’s Newsweek articles that are available online.
Does this sound like something that any of you would like to participate in? Please let me know in the poll below, and leave comments about your thoughts on the club so that we can gauge an interest in the feature and start planning.
We’ve got more on our plate for discussion amongst the Completists, and we’ll tell you about each of these changes each week as they come up. We’re going to do our best to continue to make this the best Stephen Colbert fan site on the web. If you have any ideas of features you might like to see here at No Fact Zone, please feel free to leave them in the comments as well, and we’ll put them under consideration.
Also, as this is an off-topic post, feel free to talk about your week or any topic you’d like to share with the Zoners. I look forward to hearing from all of you!
The Weekend Brunch idea is fantastic, DB! The community you have created here is highly intelligent, curious, and kind. Not surprising given our inspiration, but truly refreshing nonetheless. I learn something new from someone here all the time and do not feel afraid to share my thoughts.
The book club should be a fantastic extension for the NFZ community.
The sheer amount of work you and the Completists put in is amazing, but know it’s appreciated. Oh, and congrats on the new job!
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woooo! 11 yes votes to 0 no votes! what a bunch of bookworms we’ve got here!
here is a story to share:
last night I had a dream that I was selected to write up a paper about how natural selection worked to make people named Stephen better than all others, and then send it to the Report. in the dream, I was most concerned about how lots of people named Stephen live in different environments, so how could I possibly find some sort of common force that would select for the name?
this dream clearly means two things. first, that TCR and/or state of the union talk were permeating my brain. and second, that academics and/or assignments I need to do right now are trying to get a foothold in my brain as well!
anyway, I woke up and this seemed like the most hilarious thing to come out of my subconscious in weeks!
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LOL! that’s an awesome dream/topic for a paper. :)
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Haha! I love dream stories! Thanks for sharing! Well, I think the rest of the Stephens of the world still haven’t evolved to the level of our Stephen;)
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I LOVE the book club idea! Your example of Man On Wire is perfect. I watched it on netflix almost immediately after Petit was on the show, and was stunned by how wonderful it was. I totally wanted other people around to talk to who also knew how wonderful it was, and how wacky he had been on the show.
There is often a lot of interesting idea content floating around in the interviews, that just can’t be completely delved into because the Report’s not really that kind of show. It will be really great to be able to take a deeper look into some of these.
Also, I love the plans for the fangirl suit report and apopcalypse report. (lol, spellcheck doesn’t recognize “apopcalypse”! why ever not?!) I think weekly will be a fine way to address these. I do love a thorough link on an obscure reference that I might know enough about to recognize, but not enough about to fully appreciate. (ie: Ragnarok in the recent Viking bit) And I do love the stripes on Stephen’s ties! :)
Also, I just noticed those’ll both happen on Friday or Saturdays, which seems like a great way to extend the Stephen content further into the week after episodes are over!
Thanks so much Completists for all you do to make this so fun! (and my family and friends thank you too, I’m sure, for they would be sorely inundated with Stephen trivia and references if it wasn’t for this site to use as an outlet. Even more inundated than now, that is.)
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These are all stellar ideas and the book club sounds like a great way to further the excellent community feeling here.
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I am very excited to see enthusiasm in the polls for a book club/intellectual discussion. Holly – your mention of a discussion of topics related to interviews is also a great idea seeing as how it’s free to acquire that information for discussion.
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i think the book idea is fantastic!! keep up the great work Completists!
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The more times I visit the site, the more I am impressed! Thank you all for your tireless effort to make this such a wonderful community. I look forward to checking the site before work and again later in the day and though I am relatively new around here and don’t always post, I have always felt comfortable doing so and have enjoyed reading everyone’s thoughts, ideas and stories!
I find it quite coincidental that you bring up the book club the day after I was talking with my sister on the phone while at Barnes and Noble. She happened to call me and we were both in Barnes and Noble–in different states discussing what we have recently read or heard about. As we mentioned possibilities we came to the realization that a majority of the titles we had seen or heard about was due to The Daily Show or Colbert Report. We joked that there should be a sign under the Best Sellers that read, “As seen on” or “Brought to you by the Colbert Bump”
Needless to say (after that long story!) I am looking forward to the book club!
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I’m very excited about the book club! I had been wanting to start something like it for a long time, but I never knew exactly how to make it happen or whether I should meet with people in my local area or do it online. Of course, time was also an issue… Discussing books with my fellow Zoners is the perfect way to go! I will definitely participate.
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Looking forward to the book club, DB. Yay, I get to unleash my inner grad lit geek. :) As always, thanks to you and to all the other Zoners for all your hard work on this lovely community.
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Ooh, Weekend Brunch – lovely!
I think the book club is a really good idea! I don’t know that I’ll have enough free time to participate but, for the record, I think it’s a really good idea!
Also – I definitely think is the definitive site for all things Colbert. It’s comprehensive, it’s a nice environment, it reports the news timely! I’ll always be indebted to your TiVo alerts! This is the only place I’ll go for my Colbert news. =D
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hi everyone. it’s funny you should talk about this. i was watching the last guest from this past week, when he was talking about how people in the 18th century used to cut down their trees because they thought they caused pollution ha! i was thinking i would really like to start reading the books of some of the more provocative guests.
it’s good at every age to stay curious and interested, and tcr offers such a wide array of topics.
so, let us swill our cheap white wine, at about 7:30 on a friday night. and invite khaled hosseini to join us while we are at it:)
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I think we should only read books made from paper made from trees near houses.
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working in a big and bureaucratic company, they dedicate resources to block any kind of “entertainment” sites including Colbertnation. I am so glad that nofactzone is not (knock-on wood) on that list yet.
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I’ll know we’ve really made it big when we get blocked on company work sites. Ah, to have a dream …
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I’m so happy the book club is getting so many positive responses. Since I practically live in the school bookstore lately, maybe I’ll even be able to keep up! =)
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What a fabulous State of the Union Address!
1. Sunday Brunch—Yes! I’ll have more time to post during this time.
2. Fangirl Suit Report–As a NFZ fangirl, this is very exciting.
Er…um…let me know if you ever need any help VerbalTypo. Don’t forget how many posts we received on Stephen’s two dualing hairstyles;)
3. Apopcalypse Report–Nerd that I am, I can’t tell you how often I watch TDS and/or TCR, jot down terms that I am unfamiliar with and then automatically look them up following the shows so I feel that I am in the know. This will be so helpful!
4. I can’t tell you how excited I am about the book club! I’ve been wanting to go out and get these books, but I always thought it would be so much nicer if I could share my thoughts on these books with someone. NFZ is the perfect place!
This is just an idea, but we could use stewartcolbertbooks.com as a starting off-point. I noticed that the list stopped in September 2008, but this may be ideal if we’re looking for books that are available in the library or in paperback form right now. I’ve got to say though…I’m really interested in reading The Invention of Air.
DB (and the Completists), thank you so much for such an amazing community. Everytime I think NFZ can’t get any better, it does.
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I’m really excited about this book club idea! There are so many really interesting books that are introduced to us on The Colbert Report. I always get to thinking how I’d like to read the majority of them, but there just never seems to be enough time! Maybe having a nice little community here will help me get motivated to actually start reading some of these interesting books. It’s always great to read a book, then have others to discuss it with and mention which parts you felt were most important or memorable.
Also, I must say that I am equally excited about the Suit Report. Haha! I sure do love discussing Stephen’s ties.
All of the Completists’ work is most definitely appreciated! This site is so great and I love having this community to discuss our common interest with. I’m pretty sure I would burst into tears if this site ever got blocked on my work computer. The horror!
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I love the idea of the book club…especially considering I update and maintain the Extra Credit Reading List on Colbert University, which lists almost every author and book that’s been featured on the show. I’ve been working pretty hard to go back in time and gather them all up, and if you’d like to peruse some of the older books and authors that have been featured on the show, please check out the list (which is listed by book subject, in alpha order by author).
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Oops! I’m so sorry for mentioning stewartcolbertbooks.com in my post and not recognizing your efforts Lisa! I forgot that CU had such a comprehensive book list. Thank you so much!
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Book club would be great. I’m sure the authors would appreciate it.
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The new features sound fantastic. I’m especially looking forward to the Fangirl Suit reports. DB, your fangirl bulletins always make me laugh.
I think the sense of community on NFZ is amazing and something the Completists and Zoners should be very proud of. I don’t post often, but I always enjoy reading everyone’s comments. As I’ve mentioned before, none of my friends are TCR fans and it’s nice to know that I can log onto NFZ and geek out about all things Stephen.
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Hey, I know this is a break from topic, but I think you might be interested anyway.
Remember that post awhile ago that said Stephen may go to Kansas for a hedgehog story? Well, the University Daily Kansan newspaper has an article today about it all: http://www.kansan.com/stories/2009/mar/09/hedgehog/?news
Enjoy!
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So that’s where the whole honeydew thing came from! I’ve always wondered.
I love the book club idea too! And, obviously, there is still plenty of room for this site in the Colbert fandom. I love this place! There’s no attacking, no flaming, and no creepiness. Keep up the good work guys!
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My favorite online place, The No Fact Zone! DB, what a great job you and the completists do, and are planning to do. I adore the book club idea. I’m always reading something, and I do love to get books written from the guests on the show. I just started “Outliers” by Malcolm Gladwell, and it’s great (I know it’s in hardcover, but I love his stuff).
I definitely have more time on the weekends, so I’ll be able to comment more. And big congrats on your promotion, DB!
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I have “Outliers” too but haven’t started reading it yet. It’s in my que!
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That pirate hat is pretty darn adorable…
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