Jon Stewart. Jimmy Fallon. Dave Attel. Jim Breuer. Dave Chappelle. These were the names that were dropped.

“The Daily Show.” “Saturday Night Live.” “Half-Baked.” “Insomniac.” These were the titles that were dropped.

Chris Rock’s little brother. The guy from the morgue scenes in those “Men in Black” movies. Clearly something else was dropped here, too — the ball.

The ball was dropped because students were promised something big. Something grand. Something so wonderful that the entire campus would come together for an evening of laughter and joy and walk away feeling as if we were a community. We were promised “top name comedians and performers” on GSB’s flashy Flash presentation on www.gsb.iastate.edu.

Instead we got Tony Rock and David Cross. The latter has proven himself with stylish wit and clever performances in HBO’s “Mr. Show” and some guest spots in other programs and flick, but he’s still an “oh, THAT guy” name, not a “top name.” The former is … well, he’s the reason GSB hasn’t stopped the name-dropping yet — he’s still being sold as being Chris Rock’s brother.

The idea was great, GSB. The effort was impressive, too. No marks off there. But it seems apparent that with the rushed time frame on this project, we weren’t going to get the names that were flashed in front of students in the publicity you provided to this event before the big announcement came a week ago. Even with the $40,000 allotted to the project, and even with the needed cooperation of the Lectures Program, it should have been clear that nobody big was going to drop into Ames with only a few weeks’ notice and less than $50,000 to tempt them.

Speaking of dollars, only $28,000 is being spent to draw these two comedians, but students will still be charged admission. Schneider has said he doesn’t want to turn a profit from students, and Darr has said he wants this event to bring the campus together, but it seems the $12,000 should be enough to build up this event for next year — when we hope to see more recognizable names.

Good hustle and good effort. Predictable outcome, though. It’s not so much that Rock and Cross won’t be able to entertain for a few hours, but how exactly will community be built? Where is the $12,000 surplus going? Why did anyone think we’d get huge names with such a limited time frame?

Too many questions. And too many pretty names being thrown about. All that name-dropping and we got “that guy from TV” and “the guy related to a famous comedian.” The effort was noble. The result is laughable.

Editorial Board:Cavan Reagan, Amber Billings, Rachel Faber Machacha, Charlie Weaver, Zach Calef, Ayrel Clark.