Randy Pausch
Pausch delivered his "Last Lecture", titled "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams", at CMU on September 18, 2007. He gave an abridged version of his speech on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in October 2007. The talk was modeled after an ongoing series of lectures where top academics are asked to think deeply about what matters to them, and then give a hypothetical "final talk", with a topic such as "what wisdom would you try to impart to the world if you knew it was your last chance?" Before speaking, Pausch received a long standing ovation from a large crowd of over 400 colleagues and students. When he motioned them to sit down, saying, "Make me earn it", someone in the audience shouted back, "You did!"
Todd Manning and Marty Saybrooke rape storylines
Questions regarding the number of female "One Life to Live" viewers who have been raped and what kind of message "One Life to Live" was sending to their tween-girl demographic, a demographic they ranked #1 in, was noted. Lynn Parrish, a RAINN (Rape, Abuse, & Incest National Network) spokesperson for America’s largest anti-sexual assault organization, said that she had never heard of a rapist and his victim falling in love and that if people are to believe a medium watched primarily by women and written for women, it is "as common as the winter cold". Parrish stated that "One Life to Live" did not contact RAINN before telling the 2008 Todd and Marty storyline, but that ABC agreed to air a rape-themed PSA in the near future. Parish spoke of her feelings about the pairing. "There is nothing romantic about rape," she said. "Whoever writes a romance between a rapist and its victim under any circumstances clearly doesn’t understand rape nor violence — and probably shouldn’t be writing about it."