Thursday, January 31, 2008
Anyone hiring?
If anyone's keeping their ear to the ground about jobs I might be able to do, please forward leads.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Pre-chewed T.V.
This concerned member of the audience would very much like to know what the hell's going on. Also, he doesn't remember anything that happened yesterday.pic by: Duchamp
I'm watching Lost. Well, I suppose that's an interesting side-effect too, but the one I'm talking about is the crap at the bottom of the screen.
ABC is providing Cliff's notes for T.V. - probably because they figure it's been such a long time since we last saw this episode that we've forgotten a) what's going on and b) how to parse basic T.V.
In college I felt Cliff's notes were less a disservice to professors and more to those who used them. I avoided them because I felt that, you know, the point is not to get the right answer on the test, but to learn how to parse a narrative for its themes.
Call me pointy-headed, but I cling to the hope that a story can be more than either a delicious vector for otherwise insulting commercials or even a convenient space of time during which you may stare slack-jawed into the middle distance.
Now I've known people (generally not liberal arts majors) who won't allow me to watch T.V. with them. It's partially because I'm processing the meta-data of a show (like the foreshadowing, the thematic tone, which members of the away-team are wearing red shirts, which guest actors are known stars, etc.) and partially because I'm a dick. I can tell you within a fairly short amount of time which "suspect" on CSI did it, and I will (It's the person the bug-guy picks or the person who at any time went to an adult book store for any reason other than to expostulate on how sad an adult book store is).
However, even those folks who think I'm a dick because I'll watch the first 10 minutes of Law and Order before surmising what's up can look at a scene on T.V. and work out which of the dozen T.V. tropes is being executed. Is that Hobbit on Lost closing himself in an airlock as the music swells and the slow-mo kicks in? I guess, as if his hell-for-leather emoting isn't giving it away, that he's sacrificing himself for someone. If I'd missed that though, there's now a little snarky bit of text at the bottom to tell me.
Chee-rist! Seriously?
What's going on here? Does the network think I'm a complete fucking git? I resent that. Do the writers think their work here on T.V. is so subtle I'm likely to miss the meaning of it? Get over yourselves. Shakespeare didn't footnote his own plays you jackasses (by the way, it's a pun on phallus if you're wondering); where do you get off?
Did I seriously write a whole post about how T.V. may not be a smart medium? Actually no. I wrote a post about the end of days. If we're getting to the point in our culture's decline that someone's decided most of our country can't process T.V. shows unassisted, we've become the Eloi.
ZING! DANIEL JUST LIT INTO ABC. HIS POINT IS THAT DESPITE CATERING TO THE LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR, ABC STILL THINKS IT'S SHOOTING OVER THE HEADS OF A SIGNIFICANT PROPORTION OF ITS VIEWERS (See. Insulting isn't it?)
Monday, January 28, 2008
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
I dig these photos
While some of my recent posts are either practicing for future freelance writing or just sort of personal stuff that I don't care if other people look at, this is for friends and family.I came across this artist, Julie Blackmon's, site and I really like her photographs.
You should look at them.
Private? Public? no idea.
It's sort of old news now, but here are some thoughts on the changing face of digital privacy. I would have posted this last week but I fell asleep and then I forgot and so on and so forth.
So recently there's been all this mishagos about folks whose previous jobs have gotten them in trouble at their current jobs. First, and most delightfully, there's the story of "Militia" who is an American Gladiator. P.S.: He also did gay porn (I should mention here that I take the controversial stance that gay people are no more or less awful than straight folk, but the gayness of the porn is probably of material interest to the ostensibly family friendly NBC - and in the interest of full disclosure I should add that I hope one day to freelance for NBC and that while I'm straight, I have to admit that Johnny Depp's a pretty good looking chick for a dude).
The easy joke here is that the real tragedy for that guy is that now he's been outed as a Gladiator he probably won't be able to get back to the relatively highbrow fields of gay porn. And after all, how much life does American Gladiator really have in it? It's only up to #2 because of the writers' strike. No way it'll make it to American Gladiator 14.
The other story is of Ms. Greene, an English teacher (she's in England. I don't know about teaching English) who - before becoming a teacher - acted in a risqué, but award winning, ad for work clothing.
Now the standard advice offered by parents everywhere and my buddy Helen here, is not to put your stupid shit up on the Internet in the first place, Dumbass! However, in these cases that advice doesn't apply well. In both cases it wasn't them who put stuff on the Internet (I don't know if it was or wasn't with the Gladiator (which, in a parenthetical comment inside a parenthetical comment is a pretty gay name to begin with), but that's immaterial since porn is always posted on the Internet and whether Militia (Good grief!) did or not, it would have gotten there eventually).
There are lots of issues in play here. First, is sex shameful, de facto? It certainly is in America, but I was surprised by the case of Ms. Greene because European ads have always flirted with the naughty and no one gives a rat's ass. Over there they recollect that lots of people have a bit of a slap and a tickle now and then and somehow find their way to enjoying it without becoming . . . . I'm honestly not sure what the moral majority is worried will happen if the public acknowledges that folks have sex for fun. You'd think that Ms. Greene, employed at an English school, would get off with a serious tsk-ing and be back to her adoring students in no time flat. It was them who found the vid on YouTube in the first place.
And actually, that's a handy second issue. Just who is in danger here? Her students weren't over on GodTube searching for "Jesus loves me" when they found her video. The parents are making some noise about dismissing her, but it's totally beyond me. She wasn't doing anything illegal or even naked. As a rep from the clothing company that made the ad said, she was just doing her job as a model and actress. As for the gay porn. Man, that just makes me laugh. Actually, it appears that NBC is taking the high road and not firing him. After a little revisionist history (they're saying that Alex Castro, a.k.a. Militia, only posed nude for a few shots - but anyone with an internet and a passing knowledge of Google can learn otherwise) they're going to let the whole thing blow over.
The facts of all this are that stuff on the Internet has a half-life of forever and it knows where you live - or more accurately work. And what's on the Internet? Everything. Or close enough. Have you ever done anything you're not proud of? It could show up.
I think we may be seeing the beginning of a change in the fabric of public life. It turns out that Paris Hilton was sort of a visionary - and believe me I don't throw praise for Paris Hilton around just willy nilly. When she got caught on tape in flagrente delicto, her response was "Yeah? And?" Now at the time she thought she was a sure bet for the gazillions of her grandpa so her livelihood wasn't on the line. But as parents everywhere will tell you, only you have power over you. If you refuse to be embarrassed (particularly by doing a job that society condones enough to pay you for it and buy the proceeds - porn - or the advertised wears - you know, advertising) no one can embarrass you.
I think, and sort of hope, that we will have to start talking our walk. Do you ever go to the men's bathroom in a Minnesota airport and look for gay sex? You probably shouldn't publicly condemn gays then. Have you watched risqué ads on T.V. without exploding and/or calling your elected officials full of outrage? Stop being a hypocrite about Ms. Green then. Your laundry is potentially out there as well.
There's a lot more to be said about the fading line between public and private lives, but I'm lazy for the time being.
So recently there's been all this mishagos about folks whose previous jobs have gotten them in trouble at their current jobs. First, and most delightfully, there's the story of "Militia" who is an American Gladiator. P.S.: He also did gay porn (I should mention here that I take the controversial stance that gay people are no more or less awful than straight folk, but the gayness of the porn is probably of material interest to the ostensibly family friendly NBC - and in the interest of full disclosure I should add that I hope one day to freelance for NBC and that while I'm straight, I have to admit that Johnny Depp's a pretty good looking chick for a dude).
The easy joke here is that the real tragedy for that guy is that now he's been outed as a Gladiator he probably won't be able to get back to the relatively highbrow fields of gay porn. And after all, how much life does American Gladiator really have in it? It's only up to #2 because of the writers' strike. No way it'll make it to American Gladiator 14.
The other story is of Ms. Greene, an English teacher (she's in England. I don't know about teaching English) who - before becoming a teacher - acted in a risqué, but award winning, ad for work clothing.
Now the standard advice offered by parents everywhere and my buddy Helen here, is not to put your stupid shit up on the Internet in the first place, Dumbass! However, in these cases that advice doesn't apply well. In both cases it wasn't them who put stuff on the Internet (I don't know if it was or wasn't with the Gladiator (which, in a parenthetical comment inside a parenthetical comment is a pretty gay name to begin with), but that's immaterial since porn is always posted on the Internet and whether Militia (Good grief!) did or not, it would have gotten there eventually).
There are lots of issues in play here. First, is sex shameful, de facto? It certainly is in America, but I was surprised by the case of Ms. Greene because European ads have always flirted with the naughty and no one gives a rat's ass. Over there they recollect that lots of people have a bit of a slap and a tickle now and then and somehow find their way to enjoying it without becoming . . . . I'm honestly not sure what the moral majority is worried will happen if the public acknowledges that folks have sex for fun. You'd think that Ms. Greene, employed at an English school, would get off with a serious tsk-ing and be back to her adoring students in no time flat. It was them who found the vid on YouTube in the first place.
And actually, that's a handy second issue. Just who is in danger here? Her students weren't over on GodTube searching for "Jesus loves me" when they found her video. The parents are making some noise about dismissing her, but it's totally beyond me. She wasn't doing anything illegal or even naked. As a rep from the clothing company that made the ad said, she was just doing her job as a model and actress. As for the gay porn. Man, that just makes me laugh. Actually, it appears that NBC is taking the high road and not firing him. After a little revisionist history (they're saying that Alex Castro, a.k.a. Militia, only posed nude for a few shots - but anyone with an internet and a passing knowledge of Google can learn otherwise) they're going to let the whole thing blow over.
The facts of all this are that stuff on the Internet has a half-life of forever and it knows where you live - or more accurately work. And what's on the Internet? Everything. Or close enough. Have you ever done anything you're not proud of? It could show up.
I think we may be seeing the beginning of a change in the fabric of public life. It turns out that Paris Hilton was sort of a visionary - and believe me I don't throw praise for Paris Hilton around just willy nilly. When she got caught on tape in flagrente delicto, her response was "Yeah? And?" Now at the time she thought she was a sure bet for the gazillions of her grandpa so her livelihood wasn't on the line. But as parents everywhere will tell you, only you have power over you. If you refuse to be embarrassed (particularly by doing a job that society condones enough to pay you for it and buy the proceeds - porn - or the advertised wears - you know, advertising) no one can embarrass you.
I think, and sort of hope, that we will have to start talking our walk. Do you ever go to the men's bathroom in a Minnesota airport and look for gay sex? You probably shouldn't publicly condemn gays then. Have you watched risqué ads on T.V. without exploding and/or calling your elected officials full of outrage? Stop being a hypocrite about Ms. Green then. Your laundry is potentially out there as well.
There's a lot more to be said about the fading line between public and private lives, but I'm lazy for the time being.
Digital piracy
I'm getting on the bandwagon to react to this nonsense that AT&T is proposing vis-a-vis filtering the Internet traffic on their network. I'm agin it because it's bad for everyone. However, I'm going to give the folks at AT&T the benefit of the doubt and say they're not stupid. So, that being the case, what's their angle?
Here's the story: At CES in a panel discussion, a rep from AT&T said that AT&T was considering how they could filter traffic carried by their network for copyrighted work. Here's a better write-up of it than I can provide at the NY Times.
Now the thing about this is that it works for no one. Tim Wu (who's apparently a Columbia Law School prof.) gives a good account here on Slate. To sum up:
At B-school I sometimes get the impression that they give you the option of having your social and moral conscience excised early, but that generally doesn't end up removing your sense of self-interest in your private life. Corporations do bad things all the time, but usually that means mining the skulls of African babies for profitable Chlorofluorocarbons. It's reprehensible, but the people who greenlight the idea are fairly secure they're not African. Or babies.
In this case though, the execs and their friends and families will be using the network. Do they want it to go slower? Do they want to have their teenager dragged off to jail for illegal copying? Or worse, what if (and I know this kind of thing never happens) this test for internet crime turns up a few false positives?
So again, what's the damn angle? Are the mega-corporations circling the wagons to protect against digital piracy? Is this the wedge that AT&T uses to defeat net neutrality once and for all? The only way that works is if we see some real oligopoly-type behavior.
If you can figure this out, leave a comment, because to me it just seems crazy. My best guess so far is that AT&T is trying to drive Apple away in the next round of contract renewal over the iPhone. Apple's notoriously difficult to work with, so maybe they hope to become anathema to Apple's geeky fanbase. See, pretty crappy guess that.
pic by: Here's the story: At CES in a panel discussion, a rep from AT&T said that AT&T was considering how they could filter traffic carried by their network for copyrighted work. Here's a better write-up of it than I can provide at the NY Times.
Now the thing about this is that it works for no one. Tim Wu (who's apparently a Columbia Law School prof.) gives a good account here on Slate. To sum up:
- Bad for the customer - who wants Big Brother snooping in your internet requests?
- Bad for the network (and the customer) - looking at each individual packet will slow down the network considerably.
- Bad for AT&T - Looking at the traffic on their network makes AT&T potentially liable for anything illegal happening on their network. A whole new business model could spring up that revolves around fishing for law suits against AT&T - a deep pocketed and suddenly unprotected cash cow.
- Bad for AT&T - it's a PR nightmare for all the reasons above, but particularly 1 and 2. Given the increasing competition in this field you'd think AT&T would be interested in keeping customer satisfaction high.
At B-school I sometimes get the impression that they give you the option of having your social and moral conscience excised early, but that generally doesn't end up removing your sense of self-interest in your private life. Corporations do bad things all the time, but usually that means mining the skulls of African babies for profitable Chlorofluorocarbons. It's reprehensible, but the people who greenlight the idea are fairly secure they're not African. Or babies.
In this case though, the execs and their friends and families will be using the network. Do they want it to go slower? Do they want to have their teenager dragged off to jail for illegal copying? Or worse, what if (and I know this kind of thing never happens) this test for internet crime turns up a few false positives?
So again, what's the damn angle? Are the mega-corporations circling the wagons to protect against digital piracy? Is this the wedge that AT&T uses to defeat net neutrality once and for all? The only way that works is if we see some real oligopoly-type behavior.
If you can figure this out, leave a comment, because to me it just seems crazy. My best guess so far is that AT&T is trying to drive Apple away in the next round of contract renewal over the iPhone. Apple's notoriously difficult to work with, so maybe they hope to become anathema to Apple's geeky fanbase. See, pretty crappy guess that.
Monday, January 21, 2008
Snowboarding makes my legs feel like ouch
pic by:ZenMe
The only way you can tell this isn't me is because I stupidly forgot to take my camera. I'm a jerk.
On the other hand, I take snowboarding on Dr. King's birthday seriously. Why, you might reasonably ask? Is it because I think an expensive, elitist sport is a good way to recollect the remarkable deeds of a remarkable man? Is it because I perversely see echoes of Dr. King's dream in a sport where a large, white, immovable force manages to knock people down based solely on merit, not color? Perhaps. However, the reason I'm copping to is that I got seriously bad news on an MLK weekend two years ago. Let me explain.
I don't believe in Jesus, Santa Claus, the singularity, el chupacabra, or trickle-down-economics. And I particularly don't believe in superstition, so it was with some surprise I acknowledged that I'd arrived at the (fanciful) conclusion that the ghost of Dr. King had killed my father. Dad died over an MLK weekend while I was on a much anticipated ski-weekend with K-- and some friends, but there's probably more explaining to do. I'll go on.
Paola had the use of her mother's cottage near a ski resort, so we shot up on Saturday only to find that there was no snow for miles thanks to all the goddamn rain. Already Dr. King was thwarting us. Overnight, however, it snowed enough that we hopefully called the resort to see if there was enough to ski on.
Oh yeah, snow's great! Grand, we'll pop right over. The electricity's out though. What? Yeah, the electricity is out for miles and the resort's on part of the grid that won't be coming back until the 5th of never. At this point I was joking that Dr. King didn't want us skiing on his day of memorial and maybe we should go look for a local habitat for humanity chapter.
Rather than grumble though, we played cards and I amused the ladies by chopping firewood - something not often seen in Manhattan I guess. Maybe there'd be a chance to ski the next day before driving hours back to NYC. Stupid MLK!
That night was when I got the call about my dad though. Everyone who was there was great (thanks to K--, Paola, Angie, and Peluce, Paola's dog who, almost immediately upon seeing my distress, stopped crapping in the living room).
Obviously, snowboarding wasn't going to happen, nor was it the most important thing at the time by a long shot, but I still added it to the bottom of the list of things I felt the universe owed me. Now every year I try to go snowboarding on the MLK weekend. I don't actually think that Dr. King ruined that weekend and caused my dad to die (that would be certifiably crazy - like believing that God flooded New Orleans to express rage at gay people or something).
Still, I take going skiing/snowboarding seriously each year so far. It occurred to me today as I was driving that perhaps it's because I'm a natural contrarian and I rankle at being compelled in any way.
After all, it's not uncommon after receiving seriously bad news to associate elements of how you receive it or where you are with the news itself. Sort of PTSD light. Your brain connects things with the moment of huge emotional shock just in case it's skiing, or MLK weekends that's really the culprit (your brain sometimes isn't all that smart). I know of at least two people who got late night calls telling them of friends or family dying unexpectedly and for a long time afterwards hearing a phone ring late at night raised heart rates and caused irrational agitas. This even though for years before, a late night call was at worst a wrong number and at best a booty call.
I think perhaps I go skiing now because I'll be damned if I'm going to let bad associations put me off ski-weekends for the rest of my life. See, I'm a stubborn cuss at heart. And actually, it is also a good way to remember my dad. He liked a laugh and was fairly fearless about new experiences, and he would have probably given me a good shake if he thought fear of the new, or travel details, was stopping me from enjoying myself.
Patrick, if you're reading this, I didn't break my arm for the daft sod though.
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