Don't you think this would become just like the interpretation of the Bible by your typical U.S. looney christian, where they quote sections out of context to justify their whacko views.
Just look at what the NRA does with the "right to bear arms" amendment. Imagine the political fights over the texts to be taught in schools. Even here we are seeing a fight about the religious beliefs of the founding fathers which would clearly lead to conflicting interpretations of the meaning of the constitution.
Also, George Bush presents himself as a Christian, as does Clinton. Is churchgoing for the cameras such a new phenomenon ? If they really are religious then it could be overrated as a leadership quality.
This reminds me of a TV documentary on ADD which showed a terribly overweight kid with ADD. I remember watching him play Nintendo expertly and thinking, he can obviously pay attention when he's motivated.
Before I get flamed, I would not claim that ADD does not exist. At the very least it is misunderstood and misnamed. Maybe Interest Deficit Disorder is more appropriate. Perhaps ADD diagnosed kids are perfect candidates for alternative schooling methods which focus on tapping their interests.
As an aside, I always performed well as school and I put it down to an uncanny knack to force myself to pay attention to things even when they bored me utterly and I can easily appreciate that for some kids this would be impossible.
What is new is the attention crisis, which is due to attention being a limited resource, analogous to network endpoint bandwidth if you like.
The problem is that the channels for delivering information have exploded, as has the content to be delivered over the channels. Advertisers are competing with media which are not effective vehicles for propaganda delivery. It seems like the old etablished "effective" channels are becoming increasingly less cost effective ( and probably less effective in absolute terms ), and there don't seem to be any new channels showing more promise.
I am sure some psychologist has come up with a theory about fragmentation of attention. It would be something akin to the theories that we can only hold seven distinct pieces of information in our brain at one time. The constant bombardment and overarousal of our senses and base drives is causing us to turn down the volume.
I also think the advertisers are reaching the point where they can't up the ante any more. I would imagine that when a chewing gum manufacturer grabs your attention by showing perfect male and female bodies half naked in a state of high sexual arousal, this will detract from the impact and attention grabbing value of the moisturizer add which just flashes parts of an ideal female form ( how tame ! ).
Totally agree - in the new attention economy the object is to grab and hold the attention of the consumer. If that means providing information in familiar, easy-to-swallow, bite sized chunks, then the writer needs to do just that.
I need to print out a few Katz articles to read when I am having trouble dropping off.
I guess the object of his articles is to provoke response by throwing sh**t at the wall and seeing what sticks. Does Mr Katz consider himself a journalist ? If he does, he needs to run his articles through some kind of review process before publishing.
There are some interesting developments which might be worth discussing but they are lost in muddle of Katz's scribblings. It's as though he has ADD as well. He can't seem to focus on and illuminate one idea before being distracted and flitting to another one.
I have to admit that I have been musing on my own recent lack of focus and productivity in life and hadn't stopped to consider the possibility that I am basically frazzled due to information overload.
I am also conscious of my resentment of the ever lower blows uses by the advertising industry to grab my attention and manipulate my emotions.
I think people are becoming very resentful of the intrusiveness of advertising. Apparently, the advertisers have a new weapon to combat Tivo and its ilk, which allows viewers to skip the ads. The advertisers are upping the ante with "virtual ads" which are to be inserted seamlessly into the programming, supposedly in a more subtle, surreptitious and ultimately underhanded way than the product placements seen in the cinema. It's a war !
I would disagree with you.
Their business is providing you with a vehicle in exchange for payment. The customer's only obligation should be return the vehicle in an unchanged condition other than a few more miles on the clock.
I think any of us who live in the U.S. know how predatory and deceitful businesses can be - it really is an economic jungle here, much more so than in any other developed country. Mind you, most of the major global car hire companies are US based and I have been screwed royally countless times in the UK by Avis, Budget and Hertz.
It is to our benefit that this company has been reined in. Even though their practice was eventually deemed to be illegal, they should have felt themselves ethically obliged to verbally spell this practice out and have the customer tick and sign a specific section of the contract ( perhaps with the incentive a discount for doing so - I know I'm hallucinating ).
Summary:
French hacker discovers problem, decides it's no big deal since the internal IP address cannot be accessed from outside service provider network.
US/Japanese "celeb" hacker seizes opportunity to make a publicity splash and flouts security etiquette by going very public and exaggerating severity of problem.
There are serious hackers discovering much more perilous security holes all the time which are quietly reported to manifacturers.
What I see here is a culture of self-obsession, violence and of bullying.
Gun owners won't give up guns.
"It's my right, my freedom and by golly I don't care if those kids got shot because guns are freely available, I'm keeping mine."
The U.S. is the world bully.
It has Mexicans and Haitians doing its bidding here on slave wages. It steals valuable resources from 3rd world countries ( with the collusion of the elite in those countries ) - I am thinking specifically of oil in Latin America. It exploits workers across the globe. It stamps all over local culture foisting McDonalds, Coke, Blockbuster upon the gullible. It tries to dictate to everyone and will not accept an alternative world view. The basic ethos here would be "If your bigger, tougher and can get away with, go right ahead.."
I also wonder if part of the problem is not that the kids who commit suicide or commit school shootings are not also totally self obsessed. I am not wanting to blame the individual kids just question whether the prevailing mindset contributes to their unhappiness. Sometimes life sucks and its better not to dwell on it too much.
Somewhere between the Japanese capitulation to the good of the collective and the unbridled individualism of the U.S. there lies a balance.
However, the culture is what makes America great in its own rather sick way - I don't know if Americans would be willing to change.
I really wish you guys would grow up and stop using the "Right to Bear Arms" boloney as an excuse. Just own up - you like having guns.
You are a U.S. citizen, thus the notion of making any kind of sacrifice of your personal freedom for the good of others is utterly alien. Even if it could be unequivocally proved that gun ownership was a bad thing for society in general you would still harp on about the Constitution and fight to the bitter end.
Based on your logic, I'll be starting a movement to bring back the "Right to Burn Catholics and Royalists at the Stake" in the UK, since they were a threat to our democracy in 1643.
Yes you are right, people here who don't carry guns are subject to the intimidation of knowing that the irritating nut at the next table may be packing a Glock, so they'd better just hunker down and ignore his boorish behaviour.
That's freedom US style - 1% Guns'n'Ammo boneheads free to purchase hand guns, 99% free to worry about it.
The last thing the U.S. needs is another pretext for suing and more lawyers.
I can just see the adds..
"If you have been a victim of personal injury, dog bites, Jimmy next door making fun of your new sneakers..
call me Scheister Lawyer..."
People here need to grow up and stop taking everyone to court - it's one of the major problems in your society.
I actually joked to my teenage daughter as we drove past her High School on Monday, calling it Sanataluces Pentitentiary for Young People.
The size and architecture are dehumanizing. The race dynamics are pretty similar and guarantee the continuation of racial tension among future generations of US adults.
It also feels pretty much as though kids are just trying to get through this time as though it were a prison term. Certainly here in Florida, the educational standards are so low that I am already expecting that my kids will have to got to Community College to learn what they can't seem to learn in Middle and High school.
All in all, school here seems to fail kids utterly. I am amazed at how low a priority education is in the Federal Governments plans.
I am the only guy who didn't know that Northpoint is going away ?
I have ADSL from a Florida ISP ( Durocom, formerly MPINet ). I have a measly 144kbps downstream but it still beats dial-up. I prefer to imagine that I am a long way from the Central Office rather than that I am being ripped off.
It's all moot now - since my ISP uses the Northpoint infrastructure. Northpoint has announced that it is going out of business and my ISP has pulled all mention of DSL from its website.
When I called Tech Support because of a temporary outage yesterday, they transferred me to Customer Service who were supposedly going to give me some bad news. Of course all I got was 20 minutes of music on hold before I hung up.
I have to imagine that many others will be affected by this.
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Don't you think this would become just like the interpretation of the Bible by your typical U.S. looney christian, where they quote sections out of context to justify their whacko views.
Just look at what the NRA does with the "right to bear arms" amendment. Imagine the political fights over the texts to be taught in schools. Even here we are seeing a fight about the religious beliefs of the founding fathers which would clearly lead to conflicting interpretations of the meaning of the constitution.
Also, George Bush presents himself as a Christian, as does Clinton. Is churchgoing for the cameras such a new phenomenon ? If they really are religious then it could be overrated as a leadership quality.
Before I get flamed, I would not claim that ADD does not exist. At the very least it is misunderstood and misnamed. Maybe Interest Deficit Disorder is more appropriate. Perhaps ADD diagnosed kids are perfect candidates for alternative schooling methods which focus on tapping their interests.
As an aside, I always performed well as school and I put it down to an uncanny knack to force myself to pay attention to things even when they bored me utterly and I can easily appreciate that for some kids this would be impossible.
What is new is the attention crisis, which is due to attention being a limited resource, analogous to network endpoint bandwidth if you like.
The problem is that the channels for delivering information have exploded, as has the content to be delivered over the channels. Advertisers are competing with media which are not effective vehicles for propaganda delivery. It seems like the old etablished "effective" channels are becoming increasingly less cost effective ( and probably less effective in absolute terms ), and there don't seem to be any new channels showing more promise.
I am sure some psychologist has come up with a theory about fragmentation of attention. It would be something akin to the theories that we can only hold seven distinct pieces of information in our brain at one time. The constant bombardment and overarousal of our senses and base drives is causing us to turn down the volume.
I also think the advertisers are reaching the point where they can't up the ante any more. I would imagine that when a chewing gum manufacturer grabs your attention by showing perfect male and female bodies half naked in a state of high sexual arousal, this will detract from the impact and attention grabbing value of the moisturizer add which just flashes parts of an ideal female form ( how tame ! ).
I need to print out a few Katz articles to read when I am having trouble dropping off.
I guess the object of his articles is to provoke response by throwing sh**t at the wall and seeing what sticks. Does Mr Katz consider himself a journalist ? If he does, he needs to run his articles through some kind of review process before publishing.
There are some interesting developments which might be worth discussing but they are lost in muddle of Katz's scribblings. It's as though he has ADD as well. He can't seem to focus on and illuminate one idea before being distracted and flitting to another one.
I have to admit that I have been musing on my own recent lack of focus and productivity in life and hadn't stopped to consider the possibility that I am basically frazzled due to information overload.
I am also conscious of my resentment of the ever lower blows uses by the advertising industry to grab my attention and manipulate my emotions.
I think people are becoming very resentful of the intrusiveness of advertising. Apparently, the advertisers have a new weapon to combat Tivo and its ilk, which allows viewers to skip the ads. The advertisers are upping the ante with "virtual ads" which are to be inserted seamlessly into the programming, supposedly in a more subtle, surreptitious and ultimately underhanded way than the product placements seen in the cinema. It's a war !
I would disagree with you. Their business is providing you with a vehicle in exchange for payment. The customer's only obligation should be return the vehicle in an unchanged condition other than a few more miles on the clock. I think any of us who live in the U.S. know how predatory and deceitful businesses can be - it really is an economic jungle here, much more so than in any other developed country. Mind you, most of the major global car hire companies are US based and I have been screwed royally countless times in the UK by Avis, Budget and Hertz. It is to our benefit that this company has been reined in. Even though their practice was eventually deemed to be illegal, they should have felt themselves ethically obliged to verbally spell this practice out and have the customer tick and sign a specific section of the contract ( perhaps with the incentive a discount for doing so - I know I'm hallucinating ).
Summary: French hacker discovers problem, decides it's no big deal since the internal IP address cannot be accessed from outside service provider network. US/Japanese "celeb" hacker seizes opportunity to make a publicity splash and flouts security etiquette by going very public and exaggerating severity of problem. There are serious hackers discovering much more perilous security holes all the time which are quietly reported to manifacturers.
Users should not have to know about this stuff. Not knowing what a subnet mask does not make me a bad human being.
What I see here is a culture of self-obsession, violence and of bullying.
Gun owners won't give up guns.
"It's my right, my freedom and by golly I don't care if those kids got shot because guns are freely available, I'm keeping mine."
The U.S. is the world bully.
It has Mexicans and Haitians doing its bidding here on slave wages. It steals valuable resources from 3rd world countries ( with the collusion of the elite in those countries ) - I am thinking specifically of oil in Latin America. It exploits workers across the globe. It stamps all over local culture foisting McDonalds, Coke, Blockbuster upon the gullible. It tries to dictate to everyone and will not accept an alternative world view. The basic ethos here would be "If your bigger, tougher and can get away with, go right ahead.."
I also wonder if part of the problem is not that the kids who commit suicide or commit school shootings are not also totally self obsessed. I am not wanting to blame the individual kids just question whether the prevailing mindset contributes to their unhappiness. Sometimes life sucks and its better not to dwell on it too much.
Somewhere between the Japanese capitulation to the good of the collective and the unbridled individualism of the U.S. there lies a balance.
However, the culture is what makes America great in its own rather sick way - I don't know if Americans would be willing to change.
I really wish you guys would grow up and stop using the "Right to Bear Arms" boloney as an excuse. Just own up - you like having guns.
You are a U.S. citizen, thus the notion of making any kind of sacrifice of your personal freedom for the good of others is utterly alien. Even if it could be unequivocally proved that gun ownership was a bad thing for society in general you would still harp on about the Constitution and fight to the bitter end.
Based on your logic, I'll be starting a movement to bring back the "Right to Burn Catholics and Royalists at the Stake" in the UK, since they were a threat to our democracy in 1643.
Yes you are right, people here who don't carry guns are subject to the intimidation of knowing that the irritating nut at the next table may be packing a Glock, so they'd better just hunker down and ignore his boorish behaviour.
That's freedom US style - 1% Guns'n'Ammo boneheads free to purchase hand guns, 99% free to worry about it.
The last thing the U.S. needs is another pretext for suing and more lawyers. I can just see the adds.. "If you have been a victim of personal injury, dog bites, Jimmy next door making fun of your new sneakers.. call me Scheister Lawyer..." People here need to grow up and stop taking everyone to court - it's one of the major problems in your society.
I actually joked to my teenage daughter as we drove past her High School on Monday, calling it Sanataluces Pentitentiary for Young People.
The size and architecture are dehumanizing. The race dynamics are pretty similar and guarantee the continuation of racial tension among future generations of US adults.
It also feels pretty much as though kids are just trying to get through this time as though it were a prison term. Certainly here in Florida, the educational standards are so low that I am already expecting that my kids will have to got to Community College to learn what they can't seem to learn in Middle and High school.
All in all, school here seems to fail kids utterly. I am amazed at how low a priority education is in the Federal Governments plans.
I am the only guy who didn't know that Northpoint is going away ?
I have ADSL from a Florida ISP ( Durocom, formerly MPINet ). I have a measly 144kbps downstream but it still beats dial-up. I prefer to imagine that I am a long way from the Central Office rather than that I am being ripped off.
It's all moot now - since my ISP uses the Northpoint infrastructure. Northpoint has announced that it is going out of business and my ISP has pulled all mention of DSL from its website.
When I called Tech Support because of a temporary outage yesterday, they transferred me to Customer Service who were supposedly going to give me some bad news. Of course all I got was 20 minutes of music on hold before I hung up.
I have to imagine that many others will be affected by this.