Why is it so difficult to understand that the one-button default is great for those older new-computer-users (I deal with my 75 year old aunt on the phone and my near-60 parents as their computer phone-support all the time)? And then what is so tough about figuring out that if you aren't one of those new users, you can pick up a 5 dollar multi-button mouse? That is if you don't already have one from your old computer.
The one-button mouse complaint isn't a valid complaint. Period. Get a life, move on, worry about things that actually are broken. This whole thing has got to be the least educated, most moronic complaint about a computer manufacturer I have ever heard.
Forcing developers to actually think about their UI and streamline it is brilliant. It's actually considered a design imperative by anyone who knows anything about design. I wish other companies took a lesson from Apple in this respect.
Bah... We already have AM, FM, TV, and all other sorts of signals going through us... we arent seeing any adverse side-effects, are we?
Not unless you count the positively MASSIVE increase in cancer in the 20th Century. According to NIH, the rate of cancer increased 64% just between 1970 and 1997.
Granted, it's pretty hard to tell whether that's from all the e-m waves flying through the air (or through our walls and under the ground we walk and live on) or from the pesticides and chemical additives (e.g., sacharine, aspartame, etc.) in our food, a change to an unhealthy meat/fat-laden diet, a rise in tobacco use or industrial poisons spewed into the air. But if you think the rise in incedence of such diseases and the increase in pollution (including e-m pollution) across the spectrum is purely coincidental, I have a bridge to sell you.
Thank you for showing me the light with your incredible brilliance and your amazing anonymous bravery. If only the world were made up of more people like yourself, we wouldn't have to worry about challenging any of our beliefs.
Mostly because no one would be able to read past a 3rd grade level.
Yeah, I was toying with the idea of throwing in ST: Firefly as a title, but figured I'd just leave it wide open to see what kind of responses I got.
Seriously, though, what a god-damned crime that Firefly was canned and Enterprise manages to stay afloat with garbage ratings. I'm gussing Paramount is probably subsidizing the loss somehow to keep from being embarrassed.
Have it be about a shipful of smugglers and people on the run from the authorities, focus on the characterizations and the stories rather than the dumb-ass tech that's supposed to be so whiz-bang, and set it in a system with an old West feel to it.
We shouldn't forget that there was a time that Americans competed fiercely in both this style of racing as well as in the groundbreaking engineering aspect. Nobody typified both traits as much as Jim Hall. After he introduced high wings to devastating effect, they were banned. Then he introduced something else:
The 2J was as radical as the 2E and 2H had been. Maybe more so. The car looked like a white brick. A very fast white brick. The car carried two motors. A 465 cubic inch Chevy V8 powered the rear wheels and a 274 cc Rockwell snowmobile engine powered a pair of "sucker" fans in the rear bodywork. The fans sucked air out from under the car, creating a vacuum that held the 2J on the track. Sliding Lexan skirts were placed around the bottom edge of the body to seal the "plenum" area under the car. Enough suction could be generated to hold the car upside down on the ceiling of a room! Where a wing generates downforce (good) it also generates drag (bad). The suction device generated downforce with no drag loss.
Reigning F1 World Driving Champion Jackie Stewart qualified the 2J third at Watkins Glen and drove the race's fastest lap, but his race was cut short by brake problems. The Chaparral team missed the next three races but returned to competition in September at Road Atlanta. They also brought a new driver with them, Vic Elford. Elford drove the 2J in three of the remaining four races. (The team would miss one more race.)
Elford was fastest qualifier in all three of those races but he only finished one (sixth at Road Atlanta). Something always broke. But the competition felt that, with a year of experience under their belt, the Chaparral team would bury them in 1971. Competitors were always lobbying the SCCA to ban the 2J. At the end of the season it was. The sliding Lexan skirts were said to have violated the "moveable aerodynamic device" ban. With that, Jim Hall closed up shop. An era in international autoracing had come to a close.
Also, there is another type of racing that approaches the excitement and sheer driving skill of F1, and that would be Rally. The control those guys evince under such conditions is truly mind-boggling. Beyond that, for pure joy of automotive race, it's hard to beat the beauty of GT. The cars, the tracks. Not the same rush as F1, but for a car lover it's heaven.
"This is historic news," Maussan told reporters. "Hundreds of videos (of UFOs) exist, but none had the backing of the armed forces of any country.... The armed forces don't perpetuate frauds."
Yes! Exactly. When I first watched that episode years back, I instantly thought, "Wow, they're doing a Turing riff. How cool is that?" Granted, maybe it was a riff on some intervening riff (not exactly an untapped story concept in sci fi), but as far as I can tell it all traces back to Turing. Like Aasimov taking R.U.R. and running with it.
Among other things he 'invented' the concept of digital recording of data. More interesting, the reason behind it (supposedly) was that he and his true love at school used to talk about death and the soul, and Turing was intrigued with discovering a way to record the information he felt made up the human soul, so that death would lose its sting and they would never have to be parted (mind being more important than body to him).
Definitely one of the handful of brightest minds of the 20th Century and one of the people most individually responsible for the victory of the Allies after WWII. His subsequent treatment was vile and deplorable, but hey, how is that new in the military? Check out those prisoners... mmm, mmm, mmm... that's some good stuff. Considering the hypocrisy involved in the British Military going after a homosexual for being a security risk, well, I'll just leave off here.
Turing's work on AI was so revolutionary that the entire field pretty much languished for a couple decades after his death until people finally started to pick up where he left off.
Atlantis was mentioned by more than Plato. It was in Herodotus' writings as well, and he claimed the Egyptians recorded its existence (he studied in Egypt). Among the description given was that it was populated by pygmy elephants. Surprise, surprise, but the remains of pygmy elephants have been discovered on several Cycladean islands.
The island in the Mediterranean (and, btw, Cyprus is an island in the Mediterranean) that an earlier poster referred to is the modern island of Santorini.
Santorini/Fira was part of the Minoan civilization. The volcanoic eruption there that buried the city on the island and likely destroyed the Minoan civilization was far larger than Krakatoa, in fact one of the largest eruptions ever. The Minoans were contemporaries of the ancient Egyptians, and had a marvelous culture. They had little in the way of barriers or fortifications or, as far as we can tell today, much of a military presence. Of course it's hard to be sure, but they seemed to have focused mostly on trade, and their the remains of their language Linear B as found on tablets seems to have been used for inventory records and transactions. They had lively and beautiful arts, their women went around with bustiers showing off their uncovered breasts, and they had bull-dancers who, instead of slaughtering a bull with shaven horns by wearing him down with picodrs and men on armored horses with spears before allowing the 'brave' torero into the ring, performed gymnastics over and on top of the wild bulls. They also had indoor plumbing, including toilets.
What Atlantis is represented as today is a myth. That doesn't mean it wasn't originally routed in what most people at the time would have found to be a balmy paradise.
Not only is the G5 a beaut, but the upcoming fabrications, expecte to hit.65 by next year, are supposedly dazzling. With massive heat/energy savings over Intel's competition. Not to mention the predictive gushing over the subsequent G6s, G7s, etc. (yeah, yeah, I know... believe it when it's in front of me).
Looks like the massive investment Big Blue made in their fab plant is going to be a wise and profitable one. Not only are they producing their own stellar chips, but they're producing for AMD, they just signed a huge deal to produce for Sony, and they're going to be supplying Microsoft.
My guess is that Intel is sweating.
MORE about as good as animation gets.
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Despairing of Pixar
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· Score: 2, Informative
I got this on the Utopia collection of independent shorts a few years back, and all I have to say is that it's simply one of the finest pieces of animation ever done. And watching it on in a small, low-res QT window is not the best way to check out the amazing texture brought about by it's Wide Format (aka IMAX) filming.
This guy is fantastic, and I hope he gets some great funding because I can't wait to see what he does next.
It seemed like I was being pulled into the point from the get go, but if I misunderstood I apologize.
I also didn't intend to be insulting, but was trying to reflect some of the same sentences you used in your original post. Thus the 'you, sir, are blah blah blah', etc.
Re:META: Please someone explain to me . . .
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More E-Voting SNAFUs
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· Score: 1
Gee, maybe because it's only the single most important tech-related story facing America right now. And one that will face the rest of the world (the places that aren't already facing it, that is) soon.
Funny, I thought you started off your post with this:
'you, sir zeus, are the epitome of what has become the cynical entertainment audience.'
I have thought for a moment. I stick by my statement.
If you had responded with, "I disagree with your opinion of Shrek because of blah, blah, blah, and I think he'll do a great job", there would be no problem. I might not agree, but that's life. Instead, you went on a general, unrelated tear and you definitely included me in it with your opening statement.
Man, why is it people can no longer seem to read English? At no point did I say I 'hate' Shrek. I just didn't like it. I like good animation, both 2D and 3D, and I found the art sorely lacking. Same with the story. As opposed to something like A Bug's Life, which was beautiful in craft and content. And far more timeless with the humor over all.
I also can't stand the preponderence of ignorant assumptions that the moment someone expresses displeasure with something popular, they must be some kind of Grinch. Pardon me for having standards... I guess I should just roll along, likeing and dislinking things based on what everyone else thinks.
You sir, are the epitome of an ignorant, defensive whatever the whatever. Instead of being hurt that I don't agree with you and trying desperately to just slash my intentions rather than actually discuss them.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying that you have to be any other way. I'm just saying your opinion as expressed here really isn't worth squat to me. What you say about the trend to disparage past works may or may not be correct in general, but it has nothing to do with my opinion. I tend not to feel so insecure I need to look to others' opinions to validate my own.
I have absolutely no opinion one way or another on Harry Potter, and I though the first two LotR movies were decent, and very pretty. I'll be seeing the new one soon. By no means are they among the greatest movies ever for me, but that's largely because of the source material I'd say. I still enjoyed them for what they are.
And I still think that the choice of Shrek director for Narnia makes little sense in respect to a quality adaptation. In terms of making something filled with low, modern humor that might make some bucks... well, that's something else. Pardon me for not being enthused about that, though.
I may be a lonely voice here, but I didn't care for Shrek in the least. Ugly art direction (it resembled nothing so much as a poorly executed video game to me) and stale, juvenile humor. Hearing that the director is doing these films doesn't exactly fill me with unbounded joy. Why not someone with a more literary bent?
Anyone else remember that Hillary Rosen, late of RIAA fame, has been helping draft Iraq's new Copyright law, despite the fact that there's been a very servicable one since 1971?
If Halliburton can get away charging treble the market rate for delivering oil, I seriously doubt there won't be any corporate skullduggery involved in the framing of government contracts for something like computing.
Re:China Mieville is one of SF's new wonders
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The Scar
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· Score: 1
No problems here with your posts. I definitely respect diversity of tastes and I don't mind people not agreeing with me. I just wanted to put my two cents in as a dissenting opinion, but then was amazed that some people just wanted to discount it as some kind of sour grapes that must come from an underdeveloped brain. Hell, I've been known to watch pro wrestling at times, so I'm definitely not one to cast aspersions on the quality of other people's taste.
Belittle the debate? I took you to task for condescension. Which you still haven't validated, since your only real arguments are that a) you don't agree with my assessment of the quality of the language and b) that fantasy shouldn't be expected to be realistic, which is a complete straw horse since I never said that..
As for the extreme language you don't like, I'll repeat one more time: I hated the book. I thought it was grade F horrible. I don't say that to be contrarian. I say it because I believe it. Once again, you are making jackass assumptions of my intent and using that as your argument. If you want to debate the language, the structure, the characterization... fine. But don't give me this crap and then try to make out like you're taking some high road or that you are possessed of superior critical skills when you couldn't even read a simple sentence like 'the characters don't ring true' and then perverted that into me saying the book wasn't realistic to try and make your irrelevant point.
I didn't attack anyone for liking the book. I simply said I hated it and explained why.
Once again you drip with condescenscion as you state that I must be some imagineless slave to archetypes for not getting into the bug-headed woman. Once again you show what a small mind and a thin skin you have. Characters and situations like that are scattered over the net, wherever collections of fan fic can be found. The fact is that I read so little fantasy now because I'm too busy with actually challengin literature, and the examples of those in modern fantasy are few and far between. You want true originality? You want ecstatic writing that actually stimulates the brain? Go and pick up almost anything Joyce, Nabokov, Lethem, Morrow, Vonnegut, Heller, Borges, and a thousand other authors have put out. You want radical? Try Jeffrey Eugenides Middlesex. These are books that defy (or set) the conventions that less inspired writers have to resort to. They play with language in incredible ways, challenging ways and present characters far, far from 'normal' life, yet they elucidate feelings and problems and issues that 'normal' humans have. Thankfully, they also do it in incredibly fascinating and original ways.
My own opinion, which isn't forced on anyone else and which still hasn't been used to attack anyone who likes the book (my attack on you is for your asinine, unprovoked behavior), is that Perdido is a hack job. What you call wanting to see things His way is what I (and a hell of a lot of truly great authors, including the folks I listed above) call Bad Writing. It's cheap, manipulative and shows a distinct/lack/ of imagination and writing skills. It's vomiting on the page.
But please, tell me once again how I simply don't have the imagination or the faculties to read this book. Make yet more assumptions about how I must just want to drive people crazy, something rich coming from a guy who took a critique on a book (and only that) and turned it into an ad hominem assault on my intentions and my ability to read very simple writing. It's doing such a great job convincing me just how wrong I am.
Re:The city was the main character (you idiot)
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The Scar
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· Score: 0, Flamebait
Weird Fiction. Whatever. Call it by any name, it still smelled of crap to me. And I -know- the City was the main character. You idiot. I just thought his descriptions were stultifying. Clumsy prose and no poetry to it at all.
Read whatever you want, but get a grip. Just because you cream over something doesn't mean everyone else has to. And if they don't agree, it doesn't make them morons.
Sorry to say I didn't think it matched up. Not that it was bad, mind you. Just not Altered Carbon good. You may like it more, I dunno. But you may want to keep your expectations a bit lower, so it doesn't come off as a disappointment. Second novels seem to have difficulty following first ones it seems.
But another one you may really like is Jonathon Lethem's first, 'Gun, With Occasional Music.' Very similar in certain ways (gritty future, hard-boiled styled detective story). Not as exciting, but even more creative. Certain elements feel like Morgan, and others like Dick, and some like Chandler. But Lethem's a genuine monstrous talent on his own. Here's what Kirkus had to say:
Conrad Metcalf is a p.i. (Private Inquisitor) with more than the usual problems: he's switched nerve endings in his sex organs with his absent girlfriend; he's running low on the karma points that keep him out of the state-ordained deep-freeze; and he keeps asking questions in a futuristic world in which mind-numbing drugs are pandemic and curiosity is rude at best. When Dr. Maynard Stanhurt, the Oakland urologist who'd recently hired Metcalf to tail his wife Celeste, is killed, the postmodern p.i. fights to clear karma-poor Orton Angwine, brother of Celeste's housemate Pansy Greenleaf, from the freezer as well. Slinging cyberspeak and tags from Raymond Chandler with equal panache, waggish Metcalf holds his own against a pair of tough Public Inquisitors, babyhead Barry Greenleaf, and a variety of genetically enhanced rabbits, kittens, dogs, and a kangaroo enforcer named Joey Castle. But it isn't until after his own karma runs out and he emerges from a six-year freeze to an incomparably bleaker world--memory is now illegal--that Metcalf finally puts the pieces together. A first novel whose mix of genres and voices (``Tell him next time he wants to talk to me, don't send a marsupial'') comically focuses a nightmare hash of yesterday, today, and tomorrow
When I first discovered Banks, I went on a huge jag, reading all his sci fi books. Some of them are really great. I think Excession is truly fantastic Sci-Fi. Player of Games is a great read as well, if not quite as creative in my opinion.
If you like Consider Phlebas a lot, I'd recommend the first book by a fairly new author. It's called Altered Carbon, by Richard K. Morgan. Great hard-boiled style. In fact it's the book I picked up when I put Perdido down, and it washed the taste right out.
My bad. I thought you said Melville in your last sentence. As in the Moby Dick guy. Though I may not think all that much of LotR, I think it was a hell of a lot more compelling story than what I found in Perdido. Just my opinion.
I am glad you think so, but I used the word 'horribe' because that's exactly what I meant. I'm entitled to my opinion and to not having assumptions made that I'm completely uneducated. I hated the book, and that's pretty rare for me. I honestly felt it was extremely manipulative and poorly written. Thanks so much for your condescension, by the way. My imagination's just great, thanks. That's why I love so many great authors who actually challenge said imagination instead of trying to flood it with an overload of uninspired, clumsy prose. Perdido didn't challenge me in the least. It wasn't imaginative. It wasn't original. Not for me, at least. To me the writing was utterly sophomoric.
As for the issue of 'real', what I said was that it didn't ring true. Even fantasy stories need to have elements of truth to how the characters feel, otherwise there's no way to begin to associate with them (or against them) in any serious manner.
Don't get so huffy because I think something you cherish is crap. I'm sure there are examples that go the other way. If you were secure in how truly great Perdido is, you wouldn't be so sensitive.
And try reading anything by Joyce, Nabakov, Burgess or even Philip K. Dick if you want to see how fantastical environments and unconventional writing can be suffused with meaningful truth. Even Tolkien managed some of that, although I think the LoTR is largelybloated and boring, with it's reams and reams of gratuitous Norse-style histories. I completely agree that Melville was a far greater author. The Hobbit, however, was a beautiful, tightly written and compelling children's story. And there are a number of fantasy writers (though far fewer than 'straight' fiction I'd say, and I grey up reading the stuff 24/7) who manage to pull it off as well. Try Lethem if you don't believe me.
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Why is it so difficult to understand that the one-button default is great for those older new-computer-users (I deal with my 75 year old aunt on the phone and my near-60 parents as their computer phone-support all the time)? And then what is so tough about figuring out that if you aren't one of those new users, you can pick up a 5 dollar multi-button mouse? That is if you don't already have one from your old computer. The one-button mouse complaint isn't a valid complaint. Period. Get a life, move on, worry about things that actually are broken. This whole thing has got to be the least educated, most moronic complaint about a computer manufacturer I have ever heard. Forcing developers to actually think about their UI and streamline it is brilliant. It's actually considered a design imperative by anyone who knows anything about design. I wish other companies took a lesson from Apple in this respect.
Not unless you count the positively MASSIVE increase in cancer in the 20th Century. According to NIH, the rate of cancer increased 64% just between 1970 and 1997.
Granted, it's pretty hard to tell whether that's from all the e-m waves flying through the air (or through our walls and under the ground we walk and live on) or from the pesticides and chemical additives (e.g., sacharine, aspartame, etc.) in our food, a change to an unhealthy meat/fat-laden diet, a rise in tobacco use or industrial poisons spewed into the air. But if you think the rise in incedence of such diseases and the increase in pollution (including e-m pollution) across the spectrum is purely coincidental, I have a bridge to sell you.
God DAMN the Anonymous COWARDS are getting soooooo creative. How long did it take you to think that up? Weeks? Months? Man, it was worth it, though. It sure showed me. I was obviously so wrong for loving Roger & Me, Bowling For Columbine, TV Nation, the The Awful Truth, Stupid White Men, Dude Where's My Country? and now Farenheit 9/11
Thank you for showing me the light with your incredible brilliance and your amazing anonymous bravery. If only the world were made up of more people like yourself, we wouldn't have to worry about challenging any of our beliefs.
Mostly because no one would be able to read past a 3rd grade level.
Seriously, though, what a god-damned crime that Firefly was canned and Enterprise manages to stay afloat with garbage ratings. I'm gussing Paramount is probably subsidizing the loss somehow to keep from being embarrassed.
Just don't let Fox have the rights to air it.
The 2J was as radical as the 2E and 2H had been. Maybe more so. The car looked like a white brick. A very fast white brick. The car carried two motors. A 465 cubic inch Chevy V8 powered the rear wheels and a 274 cc Rockwell snowmobile engine powered a pair of "sucker" fans in the rear bodywork. The fans sucked air out from under the car, creating a vacuum that held the 2J on the track. Sliding Lexan skirts were placed around the bottom edge of the body to seal the "plenum" area under the car. Enough suction could be generated to hold the car upside down on the ceiling of a room! Where a wing generates downforce (good) it also generates drag (bad). The suction device generated downforce with no drag loss.
Reigning F1 World Driving Champion Jackie Stewart qualified the 2J third at Watkins Glen and drove the race's fastest lap, but his race was cut short by brake problems. The Chaparral team missed the next three races but returned to competition in September at Road Atlanta. They also brought a new driver with them, Vic Elford. Elford drove the 2J in three of the remaining four races. (The team would miss one more race.)
Elford was fastest qualifier in all three of those races but he only finished one (sixth at Road Atlanta). Something always broke. But the competition felt that, with a year of experience under their belt, the Chaparral team would bury them in 1971. Competitors were always lobbying the SCCA to ban the 2J. At the end of the season it was. The sliding Lexan skirts were said to have violated the "moveable aerodynamic device" ban. With that, Jim Hall closed up shop. An era in international autoracing had come to a close.
Also, there is another type of racing that approaches the excitement and sheer driving skill of F1, and that would be Rally. The control those guys evince under such conditions is truly mind-boggling. Beyond that, for pure joy of automotive race, it's hard to beat the beauty of GT. The cars, the tracks. Not the same rush as F1, but for a car lover it's heaven.
"This is historic news," Maussan told reporters. "Hundreds of videos (of UFOs) exist, but none had the backing of the armed forces of any country.... The armed forces don't perpetuate frauds."
Now that is humor.
Yes! Exactly. When I first watched that episode years back, I instantly thought, "Wow, they're doing a Turing riff. How cool is that?" Granted, maybe it was a riff on some intervening riff (not exactly an untapped story concept in sci fi), but as far as I can tell it all traces back to Turing. Like Aasimov taking R.U.R. and running with it.
Definitely one of the handful of brightest minds of the 20th Century and one of the people most individually responsible for the victory of the Allies after WWII. His subsequent treatment was vile and deplorable, but hey, how is that new in the military? Check out those prisoners... mmm, mmm, mmm... that's some good stuff. Considering the hypocrisy involved in the British Military going after a homosexual for being a security risk, well, I'll just leave off here.
Turing's work on AI was so revolutionary that the entire field pretty much languished for a couple decades after his death until people finally started to pick up where he left off.
Atlantis was mentioned by more than Plato. It was in Herodotus' writings as well, and he claimed the Egyptians recorded its existence (he studied in Egypt). Among the description given was that it was populated by pygmy elephants. Surprise, surprise, but the remains of pygmy elephants have been discovered on several Cycladean islands.
The island in the Mediterranean (and, btw, Cyprus is an island in the Mediterranean) that an earlier poster referred to is the modern island of Santorini.
Santorini/Fira was part of the Minoan civilization. The volcanoic eruption there that buried the city on the island and likely destroyed the Minoan civilization was far larger than Krakatoa, in fact one of the largest eruptions ever. The Minoans were contemporaries of the ancient Egyptians, and had a marvelous culture. They had little in the way of barriers or fortifications or, as far as we can tell today, much of a military presence. Of course it's hard to be sure, but they seemed to have focused mostly on trade, and their the remains of their language Linear B as found on tablets seems to have been used for inventory records and transactions. They had lively and beautiful arts, their women went around with bustiers showing off their uncovered breasts, and they had bull-dancers who, instead of slaughtering a bull with shaven horns by wearing him down with picodrs and men on armored horses with spears before allowing the 'brave' torero into the ring, performed gymnastics over and on top of the wild bulls. They also had indoor plumbing, including toilets.
What Atlantis is represented as today is a myth. That doesn't mean it wasn't originally routed in what most people at the time would have found to be a balmy paradise.
Looks like the massive investment Big Blue made in their fab plant is going to be a wise and profitable one. Not only are they producing their own stellar chips, but they're producing for AMD, they just signed a huge deal to produce for Sony, and they're going to be supplying Microsoft.
My guess is that Intel is sweating.
I got this on the Utopia collection of independent shorts a few years back, and all I have to say is that it's simply one of the finest pieces of animation ever done. And watching it on in a small, low-res QT window is not the best way to check out the amazing texture brought about by it's Wide Format (aka IMAX) filming. This guy is fantastic, and I hope he gets some great funding because I can't wait to see what he does next.
It seemed like I was being pulled into the point from the get go, but if I misunderstood I apologize. I also didn't intend to be insulting, but was trying to reflect some of the same sentences you used in your original post. Thus the 'you, sir, are blah blah blah', etc.
Gee, maybe because it's only the single most important tech-related story facing America right now. And one that will face the rest of the world (the places that aren't already facing it, that is) soon.
Funny, I thought you started off your post with this: 'you, sir zeus, are the epitome of what has become the cynical entertainment audience.' I have thought for a moment. I stick by my statement. If you had responded with, "I disagree with your opinion of Shrek because of blah, blah, blah, and I think he'll do a great job", there would be no problem. I might not agree, but that's life. Instead, you went on a general, unrelated tear and you definitely included me in it with your opening statement.
Man, why is it people can no longer seem to read English? At no point did I say I 'hate' Shrek. I just didn't like it. I like good animation, both 2D and 3D, and I found the art sorely lacking. Same with the story. As opposed to something like A Bug's Life, which was beautiful in craft and content. And far more timeless with the humor over all. I also can't stand the preponderence of ignorant assumptions that the moment someone expresses displeasure with something popular, they must be some kind of Grinch. Pardon me for having standards... I guess I should just roll along, likeing and dislinking things based on what everyone else thinks. You sir, are the epitome of an ignorant, defensive whatever the whatever. Instead of being hurt that I don't agree with you and trying desperately to just slash my intentions rather than actually discuss them. Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying that you have to be any other way. I'm just saying your opinion as expressed here really isn't worth squat to me. What you say about the trend to disparage past works may or may not be correct in general, but it has nothing to do with my opinion. I tend not to feel so insecure I need to look to others' opinions to validate my own. I have absolutely no opinion one way or another on Harry Potter, and I though the first two LotR movies were decent, and very pretty. I'll be seeing the new one soon. By no means are they among the greatest movies ever for me, but that's largely because of the source material I'd say. I still enjoyed them for what they are. And I still think that the choice of Shrek director for Narnia makes little sense in respect to a quality adaptation. In terms of making something filled with low, modern humor that might make some bucks... well, that's something else. Pardon me for not being enthused about that, though.
I may be a lonely voice here, but I didn't care for Shrek in the least. Ugly art direction (it resembled nothing so much as a poorly executed video game to me) and stale, juvenile humor. Hearing that the director is doing these films doesn't exactly fill me with unbounded joy. Why not someone with a more literary bent?
Check it out here.
If Halliburton can get away charging treble the market rate for delivering oil, I seriously doubt there won't be any corporate skullduggery involved in the framing of government contracts for something like computing.
No problems here with your posts. I definitely respect diversity of tastes and I don't mind people not agreeing with me. I just wanted to put my two cents in as a dissenting opinion, but then was amazed that some people just wanted to discount it as some kind of sour grapes that must come from an underdeveloped brain. Hell, I've been known to watch pro wrestling at times, so I'm definitely not one to cast aspersions on the quality of other people's taste.
As for the extreme language you don't like, I'll repeat one more time: I hated the book. I thought it was grade F horrible. I don't say that to be contrarian. I say it because I believe it. Once again, you are making jackass assumptions of my intent and using that as your argument. If you want to debate the language, the structure, the characterization... fine. But don't give me this crap and then try to make out like you're taking some high road or that you are possessed of superior critical skills when you couldn't even read a simple sentence like 'the characters don't ring true' and then perverted that into me saying the book wasn't realistic to try and make your irrelevant point.
I didn't attack anyone for liking the book. I simply said I hated it and explained why.
Once again you drip with condescenscion as you state that I must be some imagineless slave to archetypes for not getting into the bug-headed woman. Once again you show what a small mind and a thin skin you have. Characters and situations like that are scattered over the net, wherever collections of fan fic can be found. The fact is that I read so little fantasy now because I'm too busy with actually challengin literature, and the examples of those in modern fantasy are few and far between. You want true originality? You want ecstatic writing that actually stimulates the brain? Go and pick up almost anything Joyce, Nabokov, Lethem, Morrow, Vonnegut, Heller, Borges, and a thousand other authors have put out. You want radical? Try Jeffrey Eugenides Middlesex. These are books that defy (or set) the conventions that less inspired writers have to resort to. They play with language in incredible ways, challenging ways and present characters far, far from 'normal' life, yet they elucidate feelings and problems and issues that 'normal' humans have. Thankfully, they also do it in incredibly fascinating and original ways.
My own opinion, which isn't forced on anyone else and which still hasn't been used to attack anyone who likes the book (my attack on you is for your asinine, unprovoked behavior), is that Perdido is a hack job. What you call wanting to see things His way is what I (and a hell of a lot of truly great authors, including the folks I listed above) call Bad Writing. It's cheap, manipulative and shows a distinct /lack/ of imagination and writing skills. It's vomiting on the page.
But please, tell me once again how I simply don't have the imagination or the faculties to read this book. Make yet more assumptions about how I must just want to drive people crazy, something rich coming from a guy who took a critique on a book (and only that) and turned it into an ad hominem assault on my intentions and my ability to read very simple writing. It's doing such a great job convincing me just how wrong I am.
Read whatever you want, but get a grip. Just because you cream over something doesn't mean everyone else has to. And if they don't agree, it doesn't make them morons.
But another one you may really like is Jonathon Lethem's first, 'Gun, With Occasional Music.' Very similar in certain ways (gritty future, hard-boiled styled detective story). Not as exciting, but even more creative. Certain elements feel like Morgan, and others like Dick, and some like Chandler. But Lethem's a genuine monstrous talent on his own. Here's what Kirkus had to say:
Conrad Metcalf is a p.i. (Private Inquisitor) with more than the usual problems: he's switched nerve endings in his sex organs with his absent girlfriend; he's running low on the karma points that keep him out of the state-ordained deep-freeze; and he keeps asking questions in a futuristic world in which mind-numbing drugs are pandemic and curiosity is rude at best. When Dr. Maynard Stanhurt, the Oakland urologist who'd recently hired Metcalf to tail his wife Celeste, is killed, the postmodern p.i. fights to clear karma-poor Orton Angwine, brother of Celeste's housemate Pansy Greenleaf, from the freezer as well. Slinging cyberspeak and tags from Raymond Chandler with equal panache, waggish Metcalf holds his own against a pair of tough Public Inquisitors, babyhead Barry Greenleaf, and a variety of genetically enhanced rabbits, kittens, dogs, and a kangaroo enforcer named Joey Castle. But it isn't until after his own karma runs out and he emerges from a six-year freeze to an incomparably bleaker world--memory is now illegal--that Metcalf finally puts the pieces together. A first novel whose mix of genres and voices (``Tell him next time he wants to talk to me, don't send a marsupial'') comically focuses a nightmare hash of yesterday, today, and tomorrow
If you like Consider Phlebas a lot, I'd recommend the first book by a fairly new author. It's called Altered Carbon, by Richard K. Morgan. Great hard-boiled style. In fact it's the book I picked up when I put Perdido down, and it washed the taste right out.
My bad. I thought you said Melville in your last sentence. As in the Moby Dick guy. Though I may not think all that much of LotR, I think it was a hell of a lot more compelling story than what I found in Perdido. Just my opinion.
As for the issue of 'real', what I said was that it didn't ring true. Even fantasy stories need to have elements of truth to how the characters feel, otherwise there's no way to begin to associate with them (or against them) in any serious manner.
Don't get so huffy because I think something you cherish is crap. I'm sure there are examples that go the other way. If you were secure in how truly great Perdido is, you wouldn't be so sensitive.
And try reading anything by Joyce, Nabakov, Burgess or even Philip K. Dick if you want to see how fantastical environments and unconventional writing can be suffused with meaningful truth. Even Tolkien managed some of that, although I think the LoTR is largelybloated and boring, with it's reams and reams of gratuitous Norse-style histories. I completely agree that Melville was a far greater author. The Hobbit, however, was a beautiful, tightly written and compelling children's story. And there are a number of fantasy writers (though far fewer than 'straight' fiction I'd say, and I grey up reading the stuff 24/7) who manage to pull it off as well. Try Lethem if you don't believe me.