The Cheeseburger Show, Ep. 1 from The Cheeseburger Show on Vimeo.

Sure, Chicago has a sky full of bacon, but it does it have enough cheeseburgers to sustain a series of shows on that subject? I’m not sure; most of the really good cheeseburgers I know of in town are referenced in this first episode. All the same, this is a solid effort at expanding one’s personal brand onto video from a ChiTrib food writer, which strikes a nice balance between a Food TV-ish fast pace and actually having some meatiness (pun only marginally intended) in the subject matter. I’m all for it, and more, from our local print folks as their industry transitions into whatever it’s going to become.

P.S. I went to the Cheeseburger Show’s page at Vimeo and this was actually completed in January (but, presumably, kept out of view except for internal Trib purposes). So hopefully more episodes will follow fairly shortly and they’ve been busy all this time. Still, I find it a little old school (and not in a good way) that they did a pilot and then sat on it for 3 months. Get it out to the world and let people see it and comment on it! (Which you actually can’t do anywhere, since the Vimeo page only allows approved contacts to comment and the show’s own site isn’t really up either.) This is what the web is all about, something a newspaper struggling to find new ways to reach its readers ought to be taking advantage of more than anybody.* Throw it out there, fail in public, learn from the reaction to each one as you go— I certainly have. Number 2 and 3 would be better already if we’d all had the chance to comment back in January on this one. Or even to comment now….

* Yes, I know it’s mainly on CLTV. Which is only on Comcast. So for lots of us, it’s only on the web. And that’s how they should be thinking, anyway.

UPDATE: Episode 2 is here, it says it went up 16 days ago.  So it sounds like having shot their 10-minute video for fun in January, it then spent three months being carefully deliberated within the Tribune company before they were given a green light for #2.  As stories of corporate mucketies not getting it goes, maybe not up there with this truly classic one, but still, that’s some pre-Internet lack of speed happening at the Trib tower at a time when they need to be trying lots of things and getting them out as fast as they can. C’mon, well-bonused execs, he’s trying to save your company, cut Kevin and a zillion like him loose.