Back in 2002, I was invited as one of the special guests for the 100th episode of MuchMusic's show MuchOnDemand, a live show tailored to the after-school crowd. The show, which was hosted by VJs Rick Campanelli and Jennifer Hollett at the time, is an hour long and features some entertainment news, a couple of videos, the occasional interview with a rock/pop star and the usual talk show "filler activities", all in front of a live audience of mostly teens. It takes place in a studio whose garage-door walls are opened so that passers-by and fans can get a look. If you're familiar with MTV, MuchOnDemand's format is a clone of TRL, right down to the way they refer to it as "MOD".

They show videos in between live segments on MuchOnDemand. During the videos, the cameras are off and the hosts have a chance to either take a little breather, get prepped by the director or chat up the audience.

The differences between guys and girls really manifest themselves in the audience during the lull. The guys remain fairly silent, preferring to express their hots for Jenn through sly whispers. The girls, on the other hand, aren't as quiet about their celeb-crushes on Rick.

"Oh, hold on," said the director while we were in mid-conversation. "You need to see this."

He pointed at a pow-wow of girls in the audience. Their leader said "Okay, on the count of three. One...two...three..."

"RICK, YOU'RE HOT!" exclaimed a dozen of them in unison. This call was followed by a bunch of embarrassed giggles.

"Nice job you've got here, Rick," I said to him.

"It's one of the perks," he replied.

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A couple of weeks ago, I attended the TechTV meetup at No Regrets, a resto-bar just a block away from the Tucows office. The place was packed literally hundreds of geeks; at least 300 had RSVP'd for the meetup.

Perhaps some of the geeks were there to see G4TechTv Canada's Call for Help's Leo LaPorte, some were fans of excellent Techphile podcast and some were there to the first diggnation shoot in Canada.

But let's face it: the real most of the geeks were there is the leftmost person in the shot below.



They were there for Amber MacArthur, host on G4TechTV Canada's Call for Help and geek's dream dare.

"Accordion Guy!" a number of people would ask after handing me their cameras, "could you please get a shot of me and Amber?" I'd gladly oblige, and like Rick from MuchMusic, Amber was very good about indulging her fans.

"Hey, Accordion Guy," said Amber, "d'you wanna be on TV? Come over here and let's shoot a promo spot for Call for Help with you and the accordion and me and Leo."

As I walked over, I heard a mumbled "I hate you" from some guy behind me. Heh.

The deja vu moment of the evening came as I was talking with Ray "iPodderX" Slakinski. Behind us, about ten guys had formed a line and were following the lead of a guy who was saying "Okay...here goes...three...two...one..."

"AMBER, YOU ROCK!" they yelled in unison, followed by some laughter and high-fives amongst themselves.

"That was odd," said Ray.

"Not really," I said. "They're just in touch with their inner teenage girl."