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In the early 1990s, local television network affiliates across North America aired this promotional advertisement for The Next Generation, featuring a song sung to the tune of Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire":

Jean-Luc, Geordi's specs
Mysteries on the holodecks
Asteroids, triple droids
Telepathic Betazoids
Transporter, deadly claw
Visitor from L.A. Law
Photons, no Kirk
Captain has gone berserk

Shuttlecraft, Counselor Troi
Doctor Crusher's little boy
Klingon rites, parasites
New heights, phaser fights
Data's head, Tasha's dead
Riker's hangin' by a thread
Celebration, transformation
Everyone to battle stations

We didn't start the series
It's the Next Generation on your favourite station
We didn't start the series
But when we are gone it will still be on and on and on...

Who performed this song?

I haven't been able to find a web site or other source with this information.

(Bonus: Who wrote the lyrics?)

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  • Googled some of the lyrics, found this!
    – Rand al'Thor ♦
    Commented Mar 12, 2016 at 0:34
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    It's intercut with a station logo for en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WXXA-TV
    – Valorum
    Commented Mar 12, 2016 at 0:38
  • @Richard : That's just one affiliate. There were literally hundreds of copies of this advert airing, each with a different station logo at the end depending the town.
    – Praxis
    Commented Mar 12, 2016 at 0:47
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    They should have an option on the Blu-Ray to use that as alternative opening credits.
    – Paul D. Waite
    Commented Mar 12, 2016 at 0:53
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    @Praxis, aren't you supposed to answer this type of question, not ask it?
    – ThePopMachine
    Commented Mar 12, 2016 at 7:32

2 Answers 2

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Found another YouTube upload with the following information:

old commercial from the early 90s for local tv spots running syndicated TNG

I couldn't find this anywhere on the internet, so i emailed my local Fox station, and it took him a week to find it but he sent it to me.

thanks to joe walsh, and an un-named cbs producer for coming up with it

Sorry this doesn't exactly answer your question, but based on this it seems the poster is suggesting Joe Walsh (of Eagles fame??) had a hand in putting the bit together in collaboration with some unknown producer from CBS.

Sadly, after some extensive searching, this is the best I could pull together. Nobody really seems to know much, and there's a number of cheesy local-station advertisements like this that were used here and there throughout the 90s. Your best bet to get to more information might be to reach out to your own local Fox affiliate and see what they can dig up in their archives.

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Sadly don't think you will get any details. I saw this at a Promotion convention in USa in 1991. Loved it. Tried to get the rights to reproduce it for a Network I was working with. Was told by rights holder they never approved or authorised any use and would not do so. Personally I loved the use in promotion. A network producer would have put it together and there may not even be a record unless you try the old BPME. Or now PROMAX organisation they might hold production details. PROMAX. USA.

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