This thing is hosted by Tony. I like Tony. He looks at them as they speak. He's not constantly checking his notes. He's a good broadcaster. Kudos to Artist Direct for snaring this guy.

Artist Direct? The same people who sell NSYNC boxers and Cher sweatsuits? God. I'm impressed! At least they don't scrimp in the journalistic dept.

He welcomes them to the conference. They cheer. Morons. That's right, boys. Applaud your own loser selves. Clap clap clap.

Okay, that's really nerdy. It's like...cheerleader-like. Ugh. Props to Tony for not hauling off with a few right hands.

NSYNC fidgets and looks bored as he talks about how the show is going to work. This fidgeting/bored look is to become a recurring theme throughout the webcast.

Wow! God, what a departure from all of their other interviews! Jesus, I swear, you get like...motion sickness watching them. BSB doesn't fidget during interviews. But, I watched them on SNL yesterday, and they did I Want It That Way on stools (and Brian and AJ's feet couldn't touch the ground, GOD, I had a field day) and Nick, AJ, and Brian had their knees bouncing insanely. Like, Nick was making up his own rhythm that was totally off while he was singing. I was impressed that he could do that, although it was distracting. Anyway. So they're partial fidgeters.

Joey: jeans, red t-shirt, backwards red cap. Like all of them, he looks good in red. He looks a little chunky, though. Survey says? Goodsync.
Chris: brown pants, black t-shirt, olive green shirt over that. He's wearing a tan visor. His hair is cute and spiky. Survey says? Goodsync.
Justin: jeans, a maroon A&F sleevless hoodie over a yellow t, and a camel cap. Survey says? Goodsync.
JC: black jeans, a white tank, and weird shirt with short sleeves worn open over it. It's like a bowling shirt. But made out of denim. And about three sizes too big. It's very geeky, Homer Simpson, Danny from Full House. His pants are rolled up. Survey says? Badsync.
Lance: looks cute. His hair is fabulous. I hate him. He's wearing the Big Giant Cross.

I wonder if he's knocked someone in the teeth with that thing. Ow Ow Ow. I just had a thought of "Poor Topanga." Then I thought..."Ew." You know, he bought her her own ten foot cross. It was smaller. But still large. When we're bored at school and watch repeats on the Disney Channel, we can date the episodes as to if she's wearing the cross or not.

Wait, wait- you think he wears it during the act? Dude, that could be dangerous. Of course, it would depend on the actual mechanics of-

Ew.

Ew.

Ew.

Moving on.

Lance also keeps looking off-camera to someone and grinning. Guess he brought his boyf. God. His hair is perfect. I can't stand it. He's wearing a tightish black t-shirt and jeans with rhinestones down the sideseams. For some reason it looks good on him. Survey says? Very, very Goodsync.

Isn't it sickening? I want to play dress up with him.

Tony mentions that they're going global. Chris says he's nervous. Tony asks about NSA. Chris takes the question. Chris says that Justin did a track on the song. People mock him. Then Chris stops and stares into the camera for a second past the comfort zone, without expression.

"You know what I meant," he says. "You were there." He's psycho, dude. His eyes were dead.

It's so....Night of the Living Popstar.

Justin takes the next question. Chris won't let him speak. Tony asks if they ever hit Chris. Chris offers to show us the marks. Justin finally gets to speak. He says "I think Chris hit-hit-hit the nail on the head-"

JC interrupts him. "Harp harp harp!"

They all laugh. Someone says it's an inside joke. Okay then.

Aha. Okay. A dig at Wade? Dude, even the inside jokes are nerdy.

But of course. JC brought it up. He isn't allowed to be funny. It's in his contract. When he makes a good, non-nerdy joke, Johnny calls him up after the show or whatever airs.

"Now, listen, Jayce. You know I love you. But you can't be doin' this no more. You're the serious one, man. "

Aside- am I the only one who thinks of Johnny Wright as basically a Johnny Cochran clone? I have visions of him being like: "Put on the glove, Justin! Put it on! Now show the jury! If the glove don't fit- you must acquit! Look at this boy! Look at his golden curls! You believe he verbally assaults girls?" Or something.

Back at artistdirect, Chris points out that the Internet is cool, but that if your connection is slow, it looks all choppy. To prove his point, he starts jerking around. Moron. No one laughs. He takes the joke about two seconds too long.

Poor Chris. That's the worst. I'm sure he's used to it, however.

JC natters on about their Internet fanbase and how cool it is that the Internet is cheap as fuck. He mentions money about three or four times.

Fuck off JC. Just fuck off. I bet he saves plastic ziplock bags and washes them out and stuff. That fucker.

I bet he does! He probably saves the little soaps they give you in hotels, too. And like for Christmas he uses them as stocking-stuffers.

They take a caller. She wants to know if they get nervous when they go onstage.

Joey says that they don't now, but they did at the beginning of the tour. They take another question. There's no one on the other side. Dead air, people. Chris says: "Good question."

And "Right. Yeah. Uh, it's a Dodge viper."

They mock her. Finally, she asks her question. "What's the worst thing about always being in the spotlight?"

Without missing a beat, Chris says "The heat". No one laughs. I think it's hilarious.

AHAHAHA! Okay, so none of them have senses of humor except Chris. It's decided.

JC gives one of those well-balanced answers like "Well, it's hard that you can't even have dinner with your family, but on the other hand you're grateful you're employed."

Yawn.

God. It's hard to think of something like this as employment. I call it a privilege that you are able to sit around and be boring and people still lap it up.

Stephanie from Canada wants to know how they last through the entire concert, since it's so high energy and all.

Justin explains that he has eight cups of coffee before he goes on. Tony doesn't believe him. Justin deadpans.

Joey says he's pants are getting a little looser. Chris says that's because he's getting bigger pants.

Joe looks sad. Tony mocks him. Bastard.

The next question is about whom they'd kick off the Survivor island first.

JC apparently watches it. He knows all about it.

…sigh. Loser.

Justin has no clue what it is.

He's been too busy chasing after Brit all summer.

Chris suggests Lance. JC keeps talking about challenges and voting. He's very serious. No one listens to him. Chris wants some gourmet bark. They vote. They all vote for Lance. Lance votes for himself.

I find this hilarious. Was it? Or was it overkill? I feel bad for lance. He always is putting himself down.

It was amusing. Lance voted for himself because he didn't want to be out in the bush, I think. Lance isn't really Nature Boy. I bet he's scared of spiders. And anyway, he had his boyfriend with him to cheer him up after the show.

Ana Buckwild from Canada calls in. NSYNC goes nuts over her last name.

AHAHAHAH! Somehow, I knew they would. They're so juvenile.

She wants to know if they believe in the concept of soulmates.

FUCK! FUCK! Can just see JC going on and on and on and on.

You got the picture. He waffles on, uberseriously, about there being someone out there for everyone. Geez… can he at least smile once in a while as he says this kind of stuff? It's giving me the creeps. Justin interrupts and offers to have a whole deep conversation with her about the soulmate thing, but decides against it for unclear reasons. I am properly grateful.

Chris wants to talk about Soul Glo instead. So do I.

Jesus. He's just a one man joke machine today. I want to hang out with him now.

So do I. Of course, the others make him look good. They're dumb and unfunny, so Chris is a pearl among… sow's ears? That's not right. Mixing my metaphors again.

Tony wonders how hard it is to date.

Lance says it's hard to find the time to date at all. Of course, he brought his boyfriend, so he doesn't really have that problem anymore. Joey pretends to ask a girl out. "Hey, you wanna go out? I got five minutes. Let's go get some fries." No one laughs. That's because they know that really is Joe's macking style.

They discuss who gets a solo when and how that works out.

Chris says they vote Lance off the island. Tony wonders if Lance makes all these decisions from some kind of Wizard of Oz type place. They agree. Lance says: "It's all about the feeling."

Feeling? The "there is no me without you kind?" Fuck.

Joey says he wants Lance to sing a solo.

Justin tells him to shut up because Joe got a solo on the second album. Hastily, he adds that he's kidding. Uhuh.

Testy little bitch.

Natalie is on the phone now, and she wants to know which charity they'd pick.

Justin screams CFTC. Lance talks about it. Justin says he has a foundation. They don't let him speak.

"Fuck you Timberlake! You talk about your stupid charity in your goddamn sleep!"

Lance says he doesn't know how to play basketball. Tony laughs loudly.

I hate Tony. Poor kid. Everyone picks on him.

They're just jealous 'cause he's got the best hair ever.

Tony gives the next email question to Chris. Chris holds it upside down. The question is about snack demands backstage.

They all yell "Twinkies and Pop Tarts." That's so Story Writer. "Before we go on stage, we enjoy all Nabisco products", Chris says. They laugh loudly. They like this idea.

You know what? FUCK them all. Because A) They either got a Nabisco deal out of this or B) They had already gotten the Nabisco deal and this was Chris being "funny" Don't care. I hate spokesman humor. So fuck them.

I think you're right. They laughed as though it were extremely funny, when in actual fact it was only moderately so. Dude. How do they still expect to be taken seriously? No self-respecting band is sponsored by crackers.

Lance talks about hackeysack and group prayer and huddling up.

Blah blah blah. Don't care. You know, I finally got to watch that Tours 2000 thing, and they were showing pre-show rituals. Of course, they showed the hackeysack, with JC talking about how they've done it for years, but still "WE SUCK!" He sounds quite cute. But anyway, they show Limp backstage, and Fred is like "We're going to go out there and do this, because we're Limp Bizkit, and we can." For some reason, I liked it. I think the Limp footage was my favorite of the whole show. They're so amusing. Esp. Fred going on and on about how Scott Sharp is an egomaniac. GOD. Go Fred.

I find that really amusing. Don't know why. I just do. I want Fred to have a public feud with, say, Madonna. I think they'd be well-matched.

Tony says they're going to talk about music videos, right after they show a clip of IGBM.

Cue clip.

They play Justin's verse, by the way.

Figures.

Back in the studio.

"Lookin' good, fellas," Tony says.

"Lookin' good?" "Fellas?!"

Yup. He's been taking notes from that hep cat JC, I guess.

Chris yells that they missed the best part. "Barbies!"

You know, I wonder what JC thinks when he watches the video. I guess he dated one of the Barbies. Does he pick up EVERYONE on video shoots?

Actually, I'm thinking it makes a certain amount of sense. When is JC awake and surrounded by women who are neither underage nor screaming his name loudly? Pretty much only at video shoots.

Tony sniggers about the Barbies.

JC talks about how anally retentive and perfectionistic they are and how they sit around and critique their videos. He doesn't actually use those terms, but the upshot is the same.

Or just how ugly he looks in marionette makeup.

They say it's fun to make videos. Chris suggests making one right now.

He just doesn't stop! God.

He's still bouncing his knee, too.

Joey talks about being in the prosthetic makeup. He says they were in it for 22 hours. Chris laughs at him. "It was 24 hours." Joe is just everybody's bitch today.

I'm telling you. They hate Joe and Lance.

You may be right. Bastards.

JC talks about music videos. I have no idea what he's talking about. "It takes it further than movies in a lot of ways. You have to find a way to- to… it's like concentrate, as opposed to…"

Fuck off, Jayce.

Tony cuts him off and talks about marionettes. Chris says they can't get rid of the theme.

And now those things will haunt them (and me) for the rest of their lives. I hope they're happy.

Lance says the theme goes great with the album. Tony pulls out Joey's marionette. Chris mocks the puppet's pants. Joe remarks that his puppet nose is huge. Tony agrees. Joey plays with his marionette.

That...that's disturbing. I wonder how any of them could have approved those things. They're SO ugly. But I like the Brit dolls the best. The older versions have a HUGE nose. And the newer ones have this little tiny thing. It's great.

Joey says "We're making like-

He pauses. I wait for him to say "Millions off this crap"

But he says "two different versions."

Oh, that's right, they have this little mini-version now too. They're dressed in the patchwork shit.

Tony says they can buy this shit on nsyncdirect.com. We be big pimpin', spendin' gees…

Pimp pimp pimp. Pimpin' all day long!

They should have done that instead of the Eat Eat Eat Song.

Pimp pimp pimp!
All day long!
Pimp pimp pimp!
As we sing this song!
Pimp pimp pimp!
Hope you buy our shit!
Pimp pimp pimp!
'Cause JC needs a hit!

Tony wants to know about the last letters of their first names and if it's really true that that's how they came up with the name NSYNC, but they go to another question instead. Which is good because they were pissing me off. You know how I feel about that SW story.


Onward to part II
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