Don't make me laugh!

The report this morning that Walmart will sell us not only the television but the programming we'll see on it raises a subject I've been mulling over lately.

The laugh track -- you know, the recorded chuckles producers have used almost since the invention of the sitcom. For a long time I thought the laugh track was a cheap trick to make us think the material was funny. I still think that may be true for some of the inane shows airing these days, but I've come to realize the reaction is also necessary for timing.

As I've said before, the kind of humor I recommend in most presentations is more apt to elicit a smile than a guffaw. But when an audience does break in to laughter, the speaker is well advised to pause and let the response play out.

Some of the better TV shows are taped in front of live audiences but what about movies? Even if you laugh, watching alone in your home theater, so what? That's like one hand clapping. Even with an HD set, surround sound and everyhing, it can't duplicate the experience you get in a moviehouse when the audience erupts in laughter, applause or gasps.

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This leads me to another subject (okay, lousy segue but I couldn't think of a better one):

People who call in to a talk show and begin, "How y'all doing?" Sometimes the host compounds the problem with, "Fine, how are you?"

Look, folks, we can hear the show hosts and their guests talking so we know they're well enough to sit upright in front of the mic. And the callers apparently had the strength to dial the phone. Besides --

Who cares?

If we can keep our tweets to 140 characters we can keep our call-in questions and comments to a couple minutes or so. Stick to the subject.