In the week of November 6, 2009, Antenna published its first posts, by Matt Sienkiewicz, Josh Jackson, Nick Marx, Sreya Mitra, myself, Erin Copple Smith, Liz Ellcessor, and Kyra Hunting. I was a new faculty member at UW-Madison, and all these other writers were grad students, as Antenna was an experiment in group-blogging by the Media and Cultural Studies graduate program here.

We had been inspired especially by UT-Austin’s Flow, the preeminent media studies group blog. However, where Flow had more of a schedule, and worked with a columnist model, we hoped to create a system wherein people could write when they wanted to do so, thereby enabling timely responses to current events. The hope was that if there were enough people involved, nobody would need to promise to write much, as the system would carry itself in aggregate. We’d thereby aim to join and complement Flow, not compete with it.

It worked, and quite beautifully so. Those listed above, alongside Germaine Halegoua, Lindsay Hogan, Megan Biddinger, and Megan Sapnar Ankerson kept it stocked with content for the first month. Then, a month later, we had our first post by a non-UW grad student or instructor, when Amanda Lotz wrote for us. Within the next few months, many more wrote for us. Just over six years later, we’ve posted the words of 320 authors, with comments from many more. This is the 1229^th post, which means we’ve averaged 3.85 posts a week for our lifetime. And Google Analytics suggest we’ve had a healthy readership throughout, with readership from 222 countries (even one read from Antarctica!) and about 400-600 reads daily (spiking when Myles McNutt wrote something, when Avi Santo pissed off some Whedon fans, or when we apparently hit a deep nerve of the Internet, as with posts on River Monsters or Hit Girl).

A lot of invisible labor went into this. To readers, it may’ve seemed as though posts just magically appeared, but there were always editors behind them, encouraging others to write, helping them understand Word Press, tagging and editing and polishing up posts when necessary, adding photos, organizing columns and series, and more. Those first voices on Antenna all finished up and moved on elsewhere, and were replaced by yet more amazing editors. Andrew Bottomley and Chris Cwynar were here from the start (and alongside me are now the greybeards), as were Mary Beltrán and Danny Kimball, and were joined in time as editors by the likes of Myles McNutt, Nora Patterson, Evan Elkins, Kit Hughes, Jennifer Smith, Alyxandra Vesey, Sarah Murray, Taylor Cole Miller, Drew Zolides, Tony Tran, Caroline Leader, Nicholas Benson, Jenna Stoeber, and April Bethea. Jeremy Morris and Derek Johnson also worked with us behind the scenes after their arrivals in the department, and Eric Hoyt offered background support. Throughout, Comm Arts’ fantastic staff, first Joel Ninmann, and then Pete Sengstock and Michael Trevis, have made it all possible by working the back-end.

But the gas tank is empty. We’re tired. That invisible labor has to come from somewhere, and it’s become hard to keep finding ways to gas up when we have other things going on. Roaming around for content has proven harder and harder a task with each semester. Academic blogging in media studies in general seems to have hit peak then started to decline. Many conversations are happening on Medium, Facebook, Twitter, or elsewhere instead. And so we find ourselves at a point where it’s time to take down the rabbit ears and press the off button.

There are so many people to thank. I list the key grad students, UW faculty, and staff above (and picture the editors below). Andrew Bottomley, Kyra Hunting, Myles McNutt, Taylor Miller, and Alyx Vesey deserve particular commendation for regularly doing way, way more as editors than could ever fairly be expected of mere human beings. I highlight their superhuman efforts not to diminish others’, but because they’ve been especially tireless. And as writers, all hail Myles McNutt for his 52 posts. Other MCSers who’ve spilled more than their fair share of online ink are Erin Copple Smith with 27 posts, Drew Zolides with 23, Kyra Hunting with 19, Matt Sienkiewicz with 16, Andrew Bottomley with 15, Chris Cwynar with 14, Nora Patterson and Nick Marx with 13 apiece, Alyx Vesey with 11, Danny Kimball and Jennifer Smith with 10 each, and Liz Ellcessor and Lindsay Hogan with 9 each. Liz also made it all technically possible in the early days, while Megan Sapnar Ankerson made our little antenna.

Antenna has had some great friends from elsewhere along the way, too. Avi Santo, Jason Mittell, Amanda Lotz, Kristina Busse, and Jeffrey Jones were all supremely helpful in talking through what it could and should be before and after it went live. When we’ve threatened to pull the plug before, Amanda, Jason, and Kristina in particular gave me the pep talks I needed to keep going on, as they often do. All five of them produced content for us like bosses too. Jason’s written 34 posts, Amanda 20, Kristina 17, Jeff 14, and they’re joined in the 10-and-above club by Matt Hills with 21, Kristina Busse with 17, Martha Nochimson with 16, Melissa Click with 13, Brad Schauer with 12, Ben Aslinger, Allison McCracken, and Louisa Stein with 11 each, and Tim Anderson, Bill Kirkpatrick, and Elana Levine with 10 each. Especially amazing was Chris Becker with 70 posts (!!), many (but not all) from her “What Are You Missing?” column. Many more wrote multiples less than 10. And of late our great colleagues at University of Nottingham, led by the formidable Mark Gallagher and Roberta Pearson, have often held us up with their posts.

Thanks to all our readers too for reading, commenting, sharing, “liking” on Facebook, retweeting on Twitter, citing, and so forth.

We debated whether to end with a “best of” series of posts, but partly because the possibilities of the site and the day-to-day-ness of it – what it represented, and what it did in aggregate – were its greatest offerings, and partly to avoid serenading ourselves, instead let’s just end it here. In television finale terms, we couldn’t script something as emotionally satisfying as the Justified finale, and feared the mis-steps of so many other finales, so instead we thought we’d follow Cheers’ lead and say, “sorry, we’re closed,” adjust a picture on the wall, and walk off-stage, leaving a darkened set behind us. As with Cheers in reruns, we’ll keep the site up and running as long as possible so that you can still read past articles, but this will be Antenna’s last post.

With thanks to the editors who made it happen:

And a thank you to everyone who has written for us (with apologies for anyone we’ve missed. Tell me and I’ll add you):

Rebecca Adelman

Pablo Alonso González

Hector Amaya

Robin Andersen

Bailey Anderson

John Anderson

Tim Anderson

Mark Andrejevic

Megan Sapnar Ankerson

Melissa Aronczyk

Robert Asen

Ben Aslinger

Jennifer Stephens Aubrey

Jane Banks

Miranda Banks

Corey Barker

Kyle Barnett

Kathleen Battles

Geoffrey Baym

Nancy Baym

Christine Becker

Ron Becker

Mary Beltrán

James Bennett

Nicholas Benson

Megan Biddinger

Jonathan Bignell

Trevor J. Blank

Anthony Bleach

Aniko Bodroghkozy

Paul Booth

David Bordwell

Nandana Bose

Andrew Bottomley

Maria Suzanne Boyd

Miranda Brady

Lauren Bratslavsky

Piers Britton

Will Brooker

Robert Brookey

Bill Brown

Blanka Brzozowska

Chiara Bucaria

Chelsea Bullock

Colin Burnett

Kristina Busse

Nick Camfield

Karma Chávez

Aleena Chia

Mike Chopra-Gant

Yiu Fai Chow

Cynthia Chris

Yiu-Wai Chu

Jennifer Clark

Melissa Click

Norma Coates

D. Elizabeth Cohen

Brandon Colvin

Andrea Comiskey

Cindy Conaway

Matthew Connolly

Kyle Conway

Li Cornfeld

David Crider

Phillip Lamarr Cunningham

Michael Curtin

Christopher Cwynar

Shilpa Davé

Evan Davis

Max Dawson

Amber Day

Jeroen de Kloet

Rayna Denison

Brian DeShazor

Matthew Dewey

Camilo Diaz Pino

Eric Dienstfrey

Courtney Brannon Donoghue

Bonnie Dow

Jimmy Draper

Brooke Erin Duffy

Sean Duncan

Christina Dunbar-Hester

Amanda Nell Edgar

Kate Egan

Liora Elias

Evan Elkins

Liz Ellcessor

Tarik Ahmed Elseewi

Elizabeth Evans

Anna Everett

Nicky Falkof

Brian Faucette

Brian Fauteux

Laura Felschow

Terry Flew

Sam Ford

Matthew Freeman

Kathy Fuller-Seeley

Joy V. Fuqua

Hiroko Furukawa

Mark Gallagher

Patryk Galuszka

Racquel Gates

Kamille Gentles-Peart

Lincoln Geraghty

Lindsay Giggey

Anne Gilbert

Colleen Glenn

Kevin Glynn

Keara Goin

Ian Gordon

Paul Grainge

Jonathan Gray

Brian Gregory

Hollis Griffin

Sabine Gruffat

Leora Hadas

Germaine Halegoua

Erin Hanna

Mary Beth Haralovich

C. Lee Harrington

Nate Harrison

John Hartley

Mobina Hashmi

Dan Hassoun

Timothy Havens

Mark Hayward

Heather Hendershot

Brian Herrera

Richard Hewett

Matt Hills

Michele Hilmes

Ashley Hinck

Lindsay Hogan

Lisa Hollenbach

Su Holmes

Chris Holmlund

Noel Holston

Jennifer Holt

Jonah Horwitz

Robert Glenn Howard

Charlotte Howell

Eric Hoyt

Kit Hughes

Kyra Hunting

Eleanor Huntington

Nina Huntemann

Kiranmayi Indraganti

Josh Jackson

Jason Jacobs

Deborah Jaramillo

Sarah Jedd

Catherine Johnson

Derek Johnson

Jenell Johnson

Jeffrey P. Jones

Jennifer Jones

Liew Kai Khiun

Carolyn Kane

Katie Karpuch

Mary Celeste Kearney

Amanda Keeler

Jen Kelly

Kelly Kessler

Dina Khdair

Danny Kimball

Bill Kirkpatrick

Amanda Ann Klein

Simone Knox

Carly Kocurek

Melanie Kohnen

Derek Kompare

Jon Kraszewski

Shanti Kumar

Katariina Kyrölö

Jorie Lagerwey

Laura LaPlaca

Mark Lashley

Caroline Ferris Leader

Tama Leaver

Bruce Lenthall

Suzanne Leonard

Elana Levine

Julia Leyda

Chris Lippard

Derek Long

Lori Kido Lopez

Alexis Lothian

Amanda Lotz

Jason Loviglio

Madhavi Mallapragada

Daniel Marcus

Stefania Marghitu

Kelli Marshall

Alfred Martin

Nick Marx

Catherine Martin

Ernest Mathijs

Vicki Mayer

Allison McCracken

Chelsea McCracken

Paul McDonald

Alan McKee

John McMurria

Myles McNutt

Ritesh Mehta

Ross Melnick

Cynthia B. Meyers

Brandon Miller

Taylor Cole Miller

Sreya Mitra

Jason Mittell

Kelsey Moore

Chris Moreh

Jeremy Morris

Caryn Murphy

Daniel Murphy

Sarah Murray

Susan Murray

Linde Murugan

Philip Napoli

Elizabeth Nathanson

Diane Negra

Michael Z. Newman

Jack Newsinger

Darrell Newton

LeiLani Nishime

Martha Nochimson

Andrew Owens

Kathryn Palmer

Eleanor Patterson

Roberta Pearson

Reece Peck

Allison Perlman

Alisa Perren

Anne Helen Petersen

Jennifer Petersen

Karen Petruska

Devon Powers

William Proctor

Aswin Punathambekar

Debra Ramsay

Sripana Ray

Mike Rennett

Maureen Rogers

Sharon Marie Ross

Meagan Rothschild

Leo Rubinkowski

Judd Ethan Ruggill

Alexander Russo

Maureen Ryan

Mark Sample

Rossend Sanchez Baro

Cornel Sandvoss

Kevin Sanson

Avi Santo

Stephanie Sapienza

Emily Sauter

Bradley Schauer

Philip Scepanski

Peter Schaefer

Laura Schnitker

Suzanne Scott

Robert Sevenich

Adrienne Shaw

Josh Shepperd

Shawn Shimpach

Tyler Shores

Matt Sienkiewicz

Anthony Smith

Erin Copple Smith

Iain Robert Smith

Jennifer Smith

Beretta Smith-Shomade

Jason Sperb

Carol Stabile

Matt Stahl

Louisa Stein

Chris Sterling

Jonathan Sterne

Jenna Stoeber

Bärbel Göbel Stolz

Nora Stone

David Suisman

Sylwia Szostak

R. Colin Tait

Lynnell Thomas

Ethan Thompson

Nao Tomabechi

KT Torrey

Tony Tran

Chuck Tryon

Amy Tully

Shawn VanCour

John Vanderhoef

Sonja van Wichelen

Julia Velkova

Neil Verma

Alyxandra Vesey

Travis Vogan

Ira Wagman

Karin Wahl-Jorgensen

Gregory Waller

Sam Ward

Kristen Warner

Amber Watts

Brenda Weber

Ann Werner

Thomas West

Khadijah Costley White

Timeka Williams

Booth Wilson

Joe Wlodarz

Pamela Wojcik

Jennifer Hyland Wong

Faye Woods

Dannagal Goldthwaite Young

Sabrina Q. Yu

Andrea Zeffiro

Andrew Zolides

Our more recent column, The State of Reality TV, has already seen eight posts. Derek Johnson kicked things off by discussing Kid Nation and its “elementary school primer” on the governing logics of reality television. That was followed by Jon Kraszewski’s piece on the pain of watching The Bachelor in a season in which its titular character seems only too aware of the pain of dating, dumping, and being dumped. Myles McNutt then asked “when in the world is Project Runway?,” asking after the “vast proliferation gap between Project Runway and its international adaptations.” Next, Sharon Ross celebrated Joel McHale’s The Soup and Chelsea Handler’s Chelsea Lately as shows that discuss reality television with considerable wit. Max Dawson discussed the reduced production costs of Survivor and the resulting strategy of relying upon Russell Hantz for everything. Jennifer Clark followed this by examining what a Pauly D (Jersey Shore) and Farrah Abraham (Teen Mom) union can tell us about reality television in general. Lest you thought we were done with Jersey Shore, Amanda Ann Klein then analyzed “compulsory masculinity” on the show, a hypermasculinity invited and required by the casting process. Most recently, Erin Copple Smith looked at the production of reality on Joan and Melissa: Joan Knows Best?

Our earlier column, Late to the Party, has sadly attracted less writers (consider this summer homework, everyone, okay?), but yielded three posts this side of New Years, first when Evan Elkins got around to listening to Steve Martin’s classic stand-up comedy albums. Ethan Thompson’s Blackadder-inspired thoughts are discussed below. And Bill Kirkpatrick’s viewing of Dirty Dancing led to a series of thoughts about the framing of working-class masculinity and cringeworthy music. (For those wondering where the discussion of contemporary femininities was to match all this discussion of masculinities, see Louisa Stein’s excellent pair of posts on Pretty Little Liars).

From dirty dancing to dirty politicians, another series of posts was unplanned, when the Governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker, waged war on labor and labor fought back. As the ensuing protests made news around the world, or at least resulted in pizza orders from around the world, some of our local community wrote about various aspects of the protests on Antenna. Jonathan Gray kicked things off with a stub explaining what was happening. Rob Asen and Karma Chávez offered deeper analysis, on embodied voices and public screens respectively. Finally, Amy Tully discussed the construction of collective identity amongst the protesters, and Myles McNutt offered a series of his fantastic photos of the protests.

Before there were protests in Wisconsin, though, there were the protests in Egypt, and Tarik Ahmed Elseewi offered two posts on these, first on Egyptian state television’s role in reporting on them, and then with a reflective piece on why the protests were happening. Elseewi looked to multiple screen narratives to make sense of what’s happening in Egypt, and in this regard echoed Ashley Hinck’s similar interest in how we can use fictional worlds to interpret real ones, expressed in her post on Harry Potter fan activism.

Harry wasn’t the only Brit making a guest appearance on Antenna recently, as Brit-American televisual commerce has also been in the air. Eleanor Seitz wrote about brit-lit fantasies and their American fans, asking “why do these fantasies of bygone eras continue to capture our imagination?” Ethan Thompson asked why American television hasn’t followed Brit television’s lead in developing many period sitcoms. Anne Helen Petersen and Faye Woods wrote a pair of posts on Misfits, the first on the experience of watching the British show in the US, and of needing to watch through a lack of knowledge of cultural and industrial context, the latter providing some of this context. Kristina Busse insisted that we think about time and timing in adaptation, with reference to Queer as Folk and Being Human. Kyra Glass von der Osten examined the hoopla and controversy surrounding the American version of Skins. Myles McNutt examined another controversy resulting from something wicked and British this way come — Ricky Gervais and his hosting of the Golden Globes — in a post that opened up into a wider discussion of the role of the Globes. And, unless all these posts had you thinking media only moves from British television to American television, Erin Copple Smith discussed an “internal” move, looking at The Game’s move from The CW to BET and what this means for the future of “diversity” on broadcast television, while Chiara Bucaria wrote a pair of posts on Glee’s move to Italy and its new paratextual entourage.

Granted, Ricky Gervais may’ve ruffled some feathers, but it’s not as though we shouldn’t have seen it coming. Jennifer Smith, however, examined the news media’s inability to let comic book fans be blindsided by character deaths, as she discussed its spoiling of the Human Torch’s death. The news’ reporting of flaming death of another sort was on discussion in Trevor Blank’s retrospective of the Challenger Disaster (yeah, I went there with that segue. Sorry. I’m a bad human) on the event of its 25^th anniversary.

1986 transports us back in time to a period of time that’s relevant for two other posts. The mid-80s were, for one, when television studies was born, or at least according to a forthcoming book by Amanda Lotz and Jonathan Gray. But what is television studies? Lotz and Gray discuss in their joint post. The mid-80s were also the heyday of Donkey Kong, another ordeal involving giant apes and ladders that must be climbed. But it’s still going, and Amber Watts discussed Steve Wiebe’s 2011 defense of his Donkey Kong hi-score, and Wiebe’s many fans.

Going further back in time yet still, Bradley Schauer examined contemporary fandom and appreciation for the infamous Charlie Chan films, reviewing Yunte Huang’s book on Chan. For all those other fans of the 20s and 30s, Antenna also included a piece from Matt Stahl examining Boardwalk Empire’s use of media artifacts.

And last, but certainly not least, you could go back or forward in time again and again, but nobody would be a better guide to what you missed in media news than Christine Becker, whose What Are You Missing columns here, here, here, and here were all wonderful, including even more links than this current post.

To quote the recaps for Glee, “and that’s what you missed.”

During 2010, Antenna published 303 posts. These hailed from a collective of 98 writers or writer teams, based out of 56 different universities in 8 countries.

Obviously, therefore, a large number of people have made Antenna work. Indeed, the above numbers only reflect people who have written posts, not those who have commented upon them, and hence added their voice to the site that way. And though Google Analytics wasn’t installed until mid-February, stats since then suggest that we have had a very healthy readership, from 164 countries no less.

A few special thanks must be extended to those who have gone above and beyond.

First, thanks to our frequent posters. We’re thankful for each and every post, whether from frequent posters or one-offs, but I’d like to acknowledge here those who’ve continually provided content for us:

• Christine Becker’s “What Are You Missing?” posts are a wonderful addition to the site, and they make Chris our most frequent poster, with 22 posts in 2010. We heart Chris Becker.
• Jason Mittell comes in at second due to his weekly Lost column that attracted some of our highest reader numbers and that also launched the idea of weekly columns in general, so thanks so much Jason.
• Jonathan Gray offered 13 posts.
• Jeffrey Jones was a supporter of Antenna before it even began, and continued his sterling support in the form of offering 11 posts in 2010.
• Kristina Busse, Erin Copple Smith, and Kyra Glass von der Osten each wrote 8 posts during the year.
• Ben Aslinger, Christopher Cwynar, Amanda Lotz, Myles McNutt, and Anne Helen Petersen wrote 7 apiece.
• Lindsay Garrison and Matt Sienkiewicz each wrote 6 posts.
• Colin Burnett, Derek Johnson, Nick Marx, and Bradley Schauer wrote 5 apiece.
• and a further 35 people have written 2 or more.

Second, I want to thank all of the fantastic colleagues I have here at UW who have edited Antenna during 2010. Editorship requires signing part of one’s life away for a month, with little public recognition for significant labor, and so I have great admiration and thanks for: Mary Beltrán, Megan Biddinger, Andrew Bottomley, Christopher Cwynar, Evan Elkins, Liz Ellcessor, Lindsay Garrison, Kyra Glass von der Osten, Germaine Halegoua, Josh Jackson, Danny Kimball, Nick Marx, Myles McNutt, and Erin Copple Smith.

Finally, thanks to those who’ve kept our antenna up and running: Joel Ninmann, Pete Sengstock, and Liz Ellcessor.

And now, onward into 2011 …

In pursuit of this goal, Antenna will be clearing its schedule for the next week in order to cover all of the new network shows. Starting tomorrow, our contributors will be posting their first impressions and responses to the new shows, sorted into separate posts for each network. Two days following the premiere of each subsequent show, a set of posts responding to it will be added to its respective network post. These will be updated throughout the week, and into next week, until all the premiere week shows have been covered! Tomorrow will also include posts on the shows that have already premiered on the CW and NBC.

Please join us for this very special Antenna event and put in your two cents on the new shows that are vying for our attention in an ever-crowded media landscape. Let us know what you love, what you hate, and what you are secretly ashamed to want to watch. Place your bets on what will or will not be successful in the year to come. Tell us what you think is showing us something truly new, reviving old tropes, and that media scholars should really care about. Tune in to premiere week with Antenna, and we hope you enjoy this very special time of year.

At the same time, we welcome six UW graduate students who will be stepping in as new Antenna editors over the next few months – Evan Elkins, Kit Hughes, Myles McNutt, Nora Seitz, Jennifer Smith, and Adrian Sullivan. Here, a few words from each of them about their current interests.

Evan Elkins:
I anticipate eagerly the latest expansion of the Ricky Gervais/Stephen Merchant/Karl Pilkington empire, Sky1’s An Idiot Abroad. Since my research interests include comedy’s relationship to global media systems, nationhood/nationality, and transnational reception, I hope this travelogue comedy proves to be both hilarious and illuminating.

Kit Hughes:
An avid viewer of Top Chef and Top Chef Masters, I’m looking forward to the latest addition to the series, Top Chef Just Desserts. I’ll be watching to see how chefs and judges critique and discuss sweet treats and tartes tatin, which meant certain failure in other iterations of TC.

Myles McNutt:
While I’m looking forward to the new fall season, I’ll admit that I remain a wee bit obsessed with the flawed genius of Bravo’s Work of Art: The Next Great Artist and the surprising depth of ABC Family’s Huge.

Nora Seitz:
I am curious to see the reception of the new NBC comedy Outsourced. Initially excited by reports of this new show and its unique potential as a site of recession-era/globalization satire, I am slightly dubious because the show’s trailers invite spectators to revel in the tired and age old East-meets-West racialized “otherness” tropes.

Jennifer Smith:
I haven’t always been a fan of Brian K. Vaughan’s self-contained comic book series Ex Machina, but since its final issue hit stands last month I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. When the final volume of the collected edition is released in November, I look forward to seeing the broader critical reaction to the conclusion of a comic that has always thought deeply about the intersection of real-world politics and superhero-based science fiction, as well as the perils of 9/11 representation and the meaning of tragedy in fiction.

Adrian Sullivan:
Zombies! The Walking Dead is a show that might actually drag me out of the land of DVDs and back to broadcast TV. AMC has decided to run with the award-winning Image Comic, and “do for zombies what Mad Men did for advertising”. With Frank Darabont at the helm, great source material, a serious tone (BSG by way of Romero), and AMC fully behind it, I don’t know if it will be possible for me to wait for DVD on this one.