SINGAPORE: It’s no secret. Thanks to the advanced algorithms of societal evolution, wired-up is the new muscle-bound. Slogan T-shirts are the new tuxedos. Black-rimmed glasses are the new Ray-Bans. Technobabble is the new talking dirty.

We could go on, but you get the pixels.

That’s right. Geeks are cool. And they have really big megabytes.

As if you needed more proof than Christopher Lee’s glasses - remember, he got the girl - just take a look around TV-land.

The quartet of hilarious geeks from The Big Bang Theory (which is available through SingTel mio TV’s Season Pass) probably take the cake, with their Flash Halloween costumes, their periodic table shower curtain and their Friday night Klingon Boggle games.

Each adorned with a PhD but no social skills to speak of, one wonders how these geeks, who are so archetypal that it’s refreshing, manage to exist in the real world outside of the comics store - much less carry on a tension-fraught relationship with the cute blonde across the hall (Kaley Cuoco).

But there are many other rising geekazoids who, by virtue of their collective technological prowess, have the ability to engineer a takeover of your television.

Just as Hercules gave way to McDreamy, so shall McDreamy give way to Dilbert. So watch out, Jack Bauers and Michael Scofields. In a couple of years, you just might be rendered obsolete.

30 ROCK

Ask any straight guy, and they’ll probably confess they think of Tina Fey in a “hot librarian” kind of way.

In the new third season of 30 Rock, Liz Lemon, the girl with the tortoiseshell glasses, continues to fumble her awkward way through life while juggling her career as the head writer of a hit television sketch comedy show.

Tina showed us that women can wear glasses - and wear them as a proud symbol of their geekiness, too.

After all, she did grace the cover of Geek Monthly magazine, and she did tell Conan O’Brien on his Late Night show that as a youngster, she was the editor of the school newspaper and part of the drama club.

She’d be at home taking care of her Star Wars action figure collection while other kids were out on dates. She also said that she wanted to dress her daughter in a Princess Leia costume for Halloween. That definitely sounds freaky and geeky to us.

Maybe she’s no longer so much of a nerd in real life, what with motherhood and all - but she’s still a geek icon, which is even better.

Catch the third season of 30 Rock on Mondays at 10pm on Star World.

THE IT CROWD

This Bafta award-winning sitcom is produced by Ash Atalla, the man behind the success of The Office.

In this office, the IT support team, consisting of Roy (Chris O’Dowd) and Moss (Richard Ayoade), are relegated to a dinghy basement, content two spend their socially inept lives asking callers: “Have you tried switching it off and on?” and being shunned by humanity, until Jen (Katherine Parkinson), their new boss, arrives. The very presence of a woman is enough to throw the geeky duo off .

When we think “socially-awkward office drone”, we think Dilbert. The cartoon character with the kink in his tie was arguably the first geek to make it big, making him the Father of Chic Geekdom.

Dilbert gets props because his geeky foibles were an existential reflection on all our lives. And he made self-reflexive digs at pocket protectors and calculator watches.

The IT Crowd can do this, too. Soon, the huddled masses will cry: “Are you sure it’s plugged in?”

Catch The IT Crowd at 9.40pm, every Monday on Star World (StarHub TV Channel 18).

MYTHBUSTERS

You want to know if talking to your plants really makes them grow better, or exactly how impossible it is to find a needle in a haystack. Who you gonna call? Mythbusters!

Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage are the resident geeks who design scientific experiments to prove or disprove popular myths, urban legends, and grandmothers’ tales.

When they first tried out for the hosting gig in 2002, producer Peter Rees reportedly said: You’re just the geeks we’re looking for.” With their backgrounds in special effects, they also recreate explosions, movie stunts, and test myths inspired by James Bond. How cool is that?

Forget Greek mythology. Let them investigate Geek mythology. They could bust or confirm the myth that no geek can look a woman in the eye. Or the one that every geek’s thumbs are blistered from pushing the buttons on his Xbox controller ... The possibilities are asymptotic.

Catch the fifth season of Mythbusters on June 15 on weekdays at 1pm on the Discovery Channel (StarHub TV Channel 12).
- TODAY/yb