By Kate O’Hare
For six seasons on Discovery Channel, “Dirty Jobs” has sent host Mike Rowe — who originally came up with the idea of a show about grimy but necessary occupations — down many unpleasant holes, through amazingly nasty passages and into the bowels of any number of greasy machines desperately in need of cleaning.
One place Rowe has not yet gone is the executive producer seat of his very own show (at least it will be cleaner).
This past weekend, he attended Maker Faire Bay Area in San Mateo, Calif., an event that brings together thousands of people who share a love of creating and making things, from robots to rockets and DIY biology.
Rowe was there at the invitation of TechShop, a membership-based DIY workshop and fabrication studio that charges “makers” of all skill levels a monthly fee to use its high-tech equipment and instruction to turn their fanciful notions into hard reality (probably delighting a few spouses who no longer have to wake up on Saturday mornings to the sound of a circular saw out in the garage or down in the basement).
Fascinated by the idea of TechShop and some of the creations that have come out of it, Rowe started to mull over how it could be turned into a TV show.
“All of this [about TechShop] I knew a year ago,” says Rowe, calling into Zap2it shortly after landing in Dallas, his next stop after Maker Faire on Sunday, May 22. “I just wasn’t sure what to do with it. I don’t really want to impersonate an executive producer of a TV show unless I’m really committed to doing it.
“We really wound up liking the guys who founded the whole enterprise. We just told them, ‘No guarantees, but I’m not going to just hand you over to a production company that throws lots and lots of mud against the wall just to see what sticks.
“I want to give it the most honest shot I can and find the right home for it.”
Rowe is still thinking about what the format would be.
“I’m not really sure what the show is,” he says. “It doesn’t have to all be in the TechShop. I want to go find these people at home, meet them. What’s the idea? Where’s all this passion coming from?
“Frankly, if I were king of the world and had my own network, I’d have a show called ‘Shut Up and Make it,’ and it would celebrate the business of getting around R&D and getting around all the endless detours of getting a good idea into the marketplace, but not in a competition model, not with a lot of manufactured music, not with a lot of bulls–t and drama and all that other stuff.”
Rowe sees this as the logical next step from “‘Dirty Jobs” and his website, www.mikeroweWORKS.com, which is billed as “A PR Campaign for Hard Work.”
“In the same way that the definition of a good job is up for grabs over the last few years,” says Rowe, “I think the definition of an entrepreneur is about to change, too. It’s one of the things I saw on ‘Dirty Jobs’ years ago, but we didn’t hit it too hard.
“The truth is, if you look at ‘Dirty Jobs,’ so many people think it’s just about workers out there making little rocks out of big rocks…. If you look at that show, how many people are working for themselves or started a small business? The answer is, the majority of them.
“The willingness to get dirty and take risks is the thing, in my opinion, anyway, that makes ‘Dirty Jobs’ interesting and is the thing that’s worth celebrating.
“I bet those two basic themes also exist in TechShop, or ‘Shut Up and Make it,’ or whatever it is. You like it? I kind of like it, too.
“We’re just sniffing around. I don’t know where it should be, where it should air.”
View the original article – HERE
Find more good reads ~ Kate O’Hare’s Hot Cuppa TV HERE
Forbes
By: Brian Caulfield ~ Shiny Objects
Mike Rowe, star of the Discovery Channel’s ‘Dirty Jobs,’ and Adam Savage, co-star of the Discovery Channel’s ‘Mythbusters’ were interrogated by a mob of geeks, tinkerers, makers, fans, and curious children at the Maker Faire in San Mateo Sunday before being placed in a metal cage between a pair of Tesla coils that burped out lightning bolts and the theme songs from “The Legend Of Zelda” and “Doctor Who.”
After being ritually electrocuted, Rowe told the crowd “you’ll be hearing from my lawyers” (he was joking — probably). Savage danced the robot as electricity arced around him.
Savage talked to a crowd at the event about being a father, breaking his neck, and why he walked away from a career in special effects with Industrial Light & Magic to do a television show that involves testing urban myths — like the one about a maniac who attached a rocket to the top of a sedan and died driving it into a cliff.
After filming more than 300 episodes of “Dirty Jobs,” Mike Rowe told event-goers his best job was replacing the water tanks atop New York City apartment buildings, his dirtiest job involved cleaning the pumps at the bottom of an urban sewer system filled with poop, and his latest job involved finding dinosaur bones, preserving them in plaster, and then hauling them back to civilization. Rowe will be wandering around the Faire Sunday looking for material for a new series he is developing, tentatively dubbed “Shut Up And Make It.”
View the original article at Forbes here
Behind the Scenes with Mike Rowe at Maker Faire 2011
Mike dropped by the CNN studios in San Francisco on May 20, 2011, to talk more about how there are jobs, right now, in a down economy.
SPOILER ALERT – the jobs he’s talking about are not in law, accounting or medicine. (No offense or anything.) What are those jobs? Heck, you’ll have to check it out cuz this is as far as we go with the spoiler deal. The rest you have to do on your own. Just click, listen, read, comprehend, comment… Click here to view the video.
Watch Mike on CNNMoney – TV’s ‘Dirty Jobs’ host on PR duty
Watch CNN video – A day in the life: ‘Dirty Jobs’ host Mike Rowe goes to Washington.
View Mike’s CNN I-Report video – America Has a Dysfunctional Relationship
Read CNN Interview – Cleaning up ‘Dirty Jobs’
by Shannon Dunn, May 20, 2011, Baltimore Fish Bowl
Yet another Baltimore boy is wearing his heart on his sleeves, then rolling them up to make a film set in his hometown. The Tradesmen: Making an Art of Work a new documentary by 26 year-old Parkville-native-turned-LA-filmster Richard Yeagley explores the modern role of working professionals –hard working professionals: plumbers, painters, stone masons, carpenters, auto mechanics, and numerous other craftsmen. Filmed entirely on location in Baltimore, The Tradesmen opens a powerful discussion about the meaning and definition of work.
The doc features another Baltimorean, star and creator of Discovery Channel’s Dirty Jobs, Mike Rowe, who had to miss the Baltimore premier on May 12, at the Charles Theater, because he was testifying before the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation about many of the exact issues that are raised in Yeagley’s film. From Rowe’s testimony:
“Right now, American manufacturing is struggling to fill 200,000 vacant positions. There are 450,000 openings in trades, transportation and utilities. The skills gap is real, and it’s getting wider. In Alabama, a third of all skilled tradesmen are over 55. They’re retiring fast, and no one is there to replace them…
In a hundred different ways, we have slowly marginalized an entire category of critical professions, reshaping our expectations of a ‘good job’ into something that no longer looks like work. A few years from now, an hour with a good plumber—if you can find one—is going to cost more than an hour with a good psychiatrist. At which point we’ll all be in need of both.”
Johns Hopkins Office of Cultural Affairs will present one more public—and FREE!—screening on June 2 at 7:15p.m. in the Mountcastle Auditorium (725 N. Wolfe Street). Yeagley and several of the film subjects will be in attendance for a discussion after the film.
Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions (JHMI) hosting free screening of “The Tradesmen: Making an Art of Work” June 2, 7:15pm, Mountcastle Auditorium, Baltimore. Followed by panel discussion with director Richard Yeagley and Judith Lombardi, Ph. D.
To watch Mike’s introduction to the film, click HERE.
Check out The Tradesmen Doc FaceBook page for the latest news.
The Baltimore Sun article - Learning the tricks of the Baltimore’s ‘Tradesmen’
Mike talks about the PR Campaign for skilled trades and how white collar and blue collar jobs are just the opposite sides of the same coin when comes to importance.
Click here to watch the video.
Find news and more videos at CNN HERE
TV’s ‘Dirty Jobs’ host on PR duty HERE
A day in the life: ‘Dirty Jobs’ host Mike Rowe goes to Washington HERE
America Has a Dysfunctional Relationship HERE
OK, well, maybe more than one dysfunctional relationship but regarding its relationship with hard work? Well, as part of his interviews with CNN and CNN I-report today, Mike Rowe has something to say about that and goes on to talk about how skilled labor doesn’t get the respect it deserves.
Can we get an amen?
Read More...
Mike Rowe is on a mission to change America’s perceptions of blue collar work.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Since 2005, “Dirty Jobs” host Mike Rowe has shown Discovery Channel viewers some of the worst — albeit essential — jobs needed to keep America running.
Three years into the show, however, Rowe realized just getting dirty wasn’t enough. So he launched a web site called “mikeroweWORKS” in the hopes that Americans would get over the apparent rift between white collar and blue collar workers.
“We are at war with work,” he says on a video that is still visible on the site.
Rowe continues to lobby for skilled labor — including testifying before a Senate committee last week. America needs to support skilled labor, Rowe says, first because America’s infrastructure needs welders, pavers, electricians and the like. And second, because Rowe believes there are millions of ‘shovel ready’ jobs that could bolster the American economy.
Finally, Rowe supports this thing called the American Work Ethic. “Dirt,” he tells CNN’s Stephen Samaniego, “is not a demon.”
CNN: What has hosting “Dirty Jobs” taught you about the state of the ‘blue-collar economy?’
ROWE: We found humor where we expected to find drudgery, [and that] the perception of what work is today is so upside down. We have this idea that adversity and pain and misery live over here, in this set of jobs, and prosperity and wealth and success live over here in these kinds of jobs. And we’ve got this great rift in between blue and white collar.
CNN: What’s really behind the rift?
ROWE: Well, if I had a theory, and I kinda do, I would just say that our society is waged to a sort of cold war on work. You know? Not a hot war — nobody hates skilled tradesmen. Nobody’s affirmatively against the farmer. But look at the way those industries are portrayed in pop culture. Show me a plumber, and I’ll show you a 300-pound guy with a giant butt crack and a tool belt. He’s a punch line.
CNN: Yet the American Dream has always been about wanting better for your kids — and that usually meant going to college.
ROWE: Mathematically, that scenario just doesn’t work. I mean, it works for a few generations, but in a society that’s moving forward — that’s no longer driven by manufacturing, but by financial services and technology — we’re now defined by our ability to be efficient — to work less. … I just know that in the end, there’s a list of jobs that are non-negotiable, absolutely essential. Who’s keeping the lights on? Who’s making indoor plumbing a reality? Who’s keeping the roads smooth? Who’s keeping the runways well-paved? Those jobs are no less important today than they were 50 years ago. They’re just not celebrated in the same way. We’ve just shifted our focus a little bit and looked at a new type of career and said, ‘Ok, that’s aspirational. These other things — let somebody else do it.’
CNN: How did you get interested in these dirty jobs initially?
ROWE: My mother’s dad dropped out of the eighth grade to work. He had to. By the time he was 30, he was a master electrician, plumber, carpenter, mason, mechanic. That guy was, to me, a magician. Anything that was broken he could fix. Anybody anywhere in our community knew that if there was a problem, Carl was there to fix it. He was heroic, he was a legend, and he was that guy. Hard-wired from birth — never read a direction or a blue print in his life. He just knew. So, I wanted to be him, and I didn’t get the gene. “Dirty Jobs” is a tribute to guys like that.”
CNN: You have “Dirty Jobs.” Why start “mikeroweWORKS?”
ROWE: I wanted to have an opportunity to talk about the changing face of the modern day proletariat vis-à-vis the digital divide, or some crazy stuff. I just think it’s interesting. I couldn’t do it on “Dirty Jobs,” so “mikeroweWORKS” was simply a conversation. I wanted the fans of the show to help me build a trade resource center that people could go to who wanted to genuinely explore a career in the trades. I wanted them to have a place where work wasn’t the enemy.
CNN: Is work the enemy?
ROWE: This country’s made dirt the enemy. Dirt used to be a badge of honor. Dirt used to look like work. But we’ve scrubbed the dirt off the face of work and consequently we’ve created this suspicion of anything that’s too dirty. I mean, on a very simple level, think about the average kitchen today and how many disinfectants and how many cleaning things are out there — it’s endless.
And so, going back to my granddad, the perception is, the better you do, the cleaner you are. The cleaner you are, the better you’ve done. And so to your point before, we want what’s better for our kids — if that means cleaner, pretty soon we’re gonna be so scrubbed and so sterile. How can you work in such a state of holy cleanliness?
CNN: Sounds like you’re on a mission to change the perceptions of an awful lot of people.
ROWE: If I say anything smart at all, I’d be thrilled if it led to more conversations with parents and kids who are simply looking at viable options. I wouldn’t wish any specific thing for any specific person — it’s none of my business. But the idea that a four-year degree is the only path to worthwhile knowledge is insane. It’s insane.
Fifty years ago, college needed a PR campaign and it got one — it got a good one. But like so many of those attempts, in our effort to build up the value of a college education, we’ve very quietly marginalized all other forms of knowledge. That’s just dumb. So, I’d be happy if people stepped back and looked at education and knowledge as the critical things that they are but weren’t so pushed into that one well-worn path.
Apprenticeships, scholarships, fellowships, on the job training programs — those things are out there, you know? And they’re not vocational cancellation prizes — they’re genuine opportunities for people who might be pre-disposed, you know. What would my grandfather do today? Would he still have the same opportunities? You know, the Germans got it right a long time ago with the guilds — guilds were aspirational. Every bit as aspirational as college. That’s not the case here.
So, that’s just a long way of saying that if “mikeroweWORKS” works, and a lot of other PR campaigns for hard work, then one of the symptoms will be a more open analysis of options for anybody who’s trying to figure out what to do with the rest of their life.
CNN: How might a great appreciation of skilled labor help the American economy?
ROWE: There are 200,000 jobs right now in manufacturing that are vacant. There are 450,000 jobs in utilities, transportation and trades right now — they can’t fill them. You’re talking about half a million well-paying jobs. At the same time, you’ve got 9% unemployment. Most people just can’t get their heads around it, but that’s the way it is. We have a skills gap. Closing the gap — that’s important, but not just for the people who could be hired or for the companies who are desperate to hire them. It’s important for all of us because we all pay the price for bad roads.
CNN: Are retiring baby boomers must be contributing to skills gap as well?
ROWE: I work on this campaign called “Go Build Alabama.” I’ve been their spokesman of sorts for the last year. In Alabama right now, a third of the skilled work force is north of 55. There’s nobody there to replace them. [I know projects] that have been put on hold. Not because of lack of support. Not because of lack of money, but because of a lack of welders. …When people start to realize the list of things that aren’t happening because we don’t have enough people who took the time to learn a skill and master a trade [that] is huge.
CNN: Do you subscribe to the theory that there are jobs Americans simply will not do?
ROWE: I do. … We talk about dirty jobs, clean jobs, good jobs, bad jobs. American jobs. Somebody else’s jobs. It all gets very political, very controversial. …You’ve got a lot of very, very smart people standing by waiting for somebody else to do the work. Not a recipe for long-term solvency in my opinion. To top of page
View the original article -HERE
Watch Mike on CNNMoney – TV’s ‘Dirty Jobs’ host on PR duty – here.
Watch CNN video – A day in the life: ‘Dirty Jobs’ host Mike Rowe goes to Washington.
View Mike’s CNN I-Report video – America Has a Dysfunctional Relationship here .
Mike talks to CNN I-Report
