The question I have -- and it's not one that I can find an answer to -- is this: did WalMart indeed "spam the world" with their Black Friday prices before Black Friday?
Or did -- as I suspect -- WalMart make an effort to keep their information private but found that the information was nonetheless made public?
It's easy to dump on the corporations -- and, in general, I'm no fan of corporations -- but I'm reading a lot of "WalMart bad, DMCA bad, therefore FatWallet good" type responses, but I'm not sure that's the case here.
A collection of prices could be seen as a "creative expression" in much the same way a battle plan is a carefully designed, very creative strategic document. In fact, I'd wager that most battle plans are very *creative* -- and it's the idea of "creativity" that oftentimes makes the difference between a plan that succeeds and one that fails. (In 1991, for example, the idea of outflanking the Iraqis in the desert -- swinging wide to one side and then doubling back to squeeze their cowardly asses -- was an amazingly creative, perhaps even daring maneuver. It worked, worked well, but had it failed, it would most certainly have failed "big time".)
Now, I'll agree that the DMCA has turned into a weird "catch-all" for anything that corporations don't like. This isn't a good thing. And I'm not sure WalMart should have embarked on this particular battle. I suspect they might -- might -- be guilty of not picking and choosing their battles carefully. Clearly, they think this is a worthwhile battle, but it would seem to me (Joe Consumer) that this is a battle that could backfire miserably. It certainly doesn't make me want to go to WalMart and spend my money and add to their 1.43 billion dollar "take" on Black Friday.
I suspect WalMart didn't take adequate precautions to protect their senstive data. Ditto for Staples and Best Buy. If retailing can, in fact, be likened to modern warfare, then the retailers have to rethink their planning and execution. If some geek can simply swipe the so-called "battle plans" from a mid-level manager's desk (or website) then better precautions need to be taken.
In fact, if I were a lawyer, I'd probably chide WalMart for not taking adequate precautions to match the sensitivity of the information. If this shit is super-secret, then WalMart should make sure their security is super-tight. Obviously, that can't guarantee the data won't fall into the wrong hands, but it'll most likely keep the 14 year old interns with bad zits from socially-engingeering high-level intelligence.
Or, failing that, at least keep the 14 years olds who think that FatWallet or Anandtech's 'Hot Deal Forums' is the 'crackerjack cool mondo spot on the web for trading retailing information' on their toes. (I read a post on Anand's forum the other day about a guy fired from Circuit City for pilfering price info and then posting it. What's odd isn't that Circuit City fired him but that these 16 year olds think that their "posting rep" on a forum is worth getting fired for.)
But that's my point. Everybody is griping about the "prices" but the prices -- I suspect -- aren't the issue.
The issue is the overall pricing strategy. The prices are part of that strategy -- part of the big picture. No one's pissed at the free advertising, but the fact is that the so-called "free advertisting" when combined with other "free advertising" from competitiors may, in fact, work *against* WalMart. (But this gets into the so-called "legality" of comparison shopping which is, I think, a terrible, terrible argument -- and one that, I hope, WalMart doesn't try and pursue.)
It's similar to, say, a general planning for a war. Everybody knows artillery will be used. Everybody knows bombs will be dropped. Everybody knows troops will be involved. In fact, everybody might know that 20,000 troops are stationed in country A, 5,000 troops plus mobile artillery are in country B, and 300 special forces are in country C.
But what everybody *doesn't* know is how, when, and exactly where all these *individual elements* will swing into gear and bear down on the evil-doers still harboring chemical warheads from a decade ago and plotting regional domination.
Moreover, if the specific strategic plans for the actual battle are pilfered or stolen, then, sure, that's cause for some serious butt-kicking or, in the case of Wal-Mart, some major litigation.
Again, I'm not defending this particular tactic on the part of WalMart, but I think I can understand their rage. Someone pilfered private plans and made them public. The prices are part of a larger strategy which is -- and which should be -- private until it's explicitly made public.
Now, if WalMart made the error of putting the so-called "private" plans on a "public" webserver -- and simply didn't link to it -- that's a whole other issue. Obviously, they're at fault and can't much blame someone (no matter how hard they try) for tinkering around with URL combinations. (I think the analogy here might be if a general or a president had war plans on, say, an unprotected, public computer so that any Tom, Dick, or Swinin' Harry could log in, check 'em out, and do with them whatever he or she wanted to do.)
IANAL, of course, but I'm sure WalMart sees prices not as "prices" but as notices of "strategic intent."
The prices themselves aren't copyrightable I suppose, but the fact that the prices -- in the case of Black Friday, in particular -- are part of a larger strategy.
In other words, WalMart probably doesn't care that that XBOX is ten dollars off -- or whatever -- but they do care that the fact of discounting that specific item at that specific pricing level is, in fact, a strategic bid to gain an advantage over shoppers at a specific place and a specific time.
Now, before you flame, I'm not saying that WalMart is justified in what it's doing, but I do think that the idea of "prices-as-strategy" -- or better yet, Black-Friday-as-the-core-of-our-strategy-to-gain-a dvantage-over-our-competitors -- is something that's not been discussed much.
I suspect they view the overall prices as a kind of "war document" -- much like any war plans that cross the president's desk. There will be a multititude of plans, of course, but part of the tactical decision making process is to sign off on a particular set of a plans, at a specific time, based on specific intelligence.
Retailers, I'm sure, view Black Friday in very much the same way.
My question -- similar to yours, I think is this -- do deadtree magazines rack up similar debt?
In other words, is the absence of paper -- and a physical object -- less profitable than if you do what Salon is doing and go 100% electronic?
I seem to remember that Slate.com tried the deadtree thing -- along with their website -- and I remember that the Slate magazine was available in Starbucks. I actually *liked* the magazine -- as opposed to the annoying site (with its reader letters back and forth -- which strike me as the absolute height of pomposity and "in-joke-ness". If you just try to browse Slate, you're hit with all these things referencing other things -- and if you don't know what the "Fray" is and if you haven't been following all the oh-so-elegantly written missives between experts, you're lost. Salon *isn't* this way -- thank god. So I'm digressing, but everytime I think of Salon, I think of Slate and how annoying it is. Michael Kinsley is (was?) bad enough, but now that he's departed, the whiff of pomposity is still there.)
Anyway, I know Salon at one time had some pretty good writers writing for it. I was always fond of Camille Paglia's stuff. But apparently they shit-canned her and a bunch of other writers a year (two years?) ago. Hasn't been the same since.
The problem with missing out on the "next big thing" is that, well, if you're not into music or film, there's no reason to worry about missing the "next big thing."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the idea of the DMCA-capable OS to provide a secure "bed" for media? And if you're really not doing too much with "media" on your computer -- on whatever platform you have -- then what's the big deal?
I'm wring a novel. I could give a shit about whether or not I have a DMCA-capable OS. And when I want music, I have my Ipod. Yeah, I ripped my stuff into the Ipod, but they're my CDs, and I did the ripping. What's the big deal? And what does this have to with my DMCA-incapable OS?
Nothing.
Microsoft looks to be pursuing "media on the pc" in all its guts and glory. They've invested their billions into developing a secure infrastructure so that Hillary and Jack can rest easy at night. Problem with this is that if I'm a user who doesn't use the "media" options on a PC much -- if at all -- then these DMCA-capable OS have nothing to offer me because I'm not breaking any laws. I'm simply writing my papers, writing my novel, writing my short stories. I read email, browse websites, and grab whatever porn I need to get myself excited with I'm sad.
What I need is a box that lets me word process, balance my checkbook, and ignite my rocks when the rocks need igniting. None of this -- even the dumb porn -- has anything to do with Hillary or Jack or the RIAA or the MPAA.
And for god sake, I don't need to spend $199 every year for a new operating system just so Hillary and Jack can be assured by the pinhead suits at Microsofts that if I try to rip a fucking Justin Timberlake CD, I'll get all sorts of errors and skips and I'll be forced to chuck out more money for another CD.
Well, fuck Jack, fuck Hilary, and fuck Justin Timerberlake. I will not purchase new CDs -- ever. Ever again. And if I buy a CD -- and I just bought the new collection by Chris Whitley -- I'm gonna buy it used and on ebay. Sure, it's already been bought once, but I'll be goddamned if I'm gonna buy another CD when I *know* I can the damn thing for five bucks used -- and I know that the money I spend to buy it used, won't be paying for Valenti to go out and golf with my congressperson.
Here's a news flash to Microsoft. Your next big thing is not my next big thing. I got a housefull of deadtree books -- thousands of 'em -- and when I want a goddamn big thing I sit down, grab one off the shelf, and read the latest from Cormac McCarthy or dig up my ratty copy of 'Nostromo' or find that kickass new translation of the 'Iliad' that sounds like something Quentin Tarantino might have translated.
My goddamn big things don't have to do with cutesy boy-bands or stupid movies. If I want to see a movie, I'll go and see a movie. I'll actually get away from my computer, drive in my car, and pay my six bucks or whatever I need to pay to see Eminem do his thing or Johnny Knoxville and Wee Man do there's. I don't need a goddamn DMCA-capable OS to do this, and while I abhor the idea of giving Valenti any more cash to line his pockets, I *do* like movies, and I'm not gonna let the aged Valenti put a kink in my fucking lifestyle.
So take your goddamn "big things" and stuff 'em. I don't need 'em, don't want 'em. I'll figure them out for myself, thank you.
Is this flame-bait? Off-topic? I dunno. Mods have a way of not liking much of what I say when I say it like this.
I'm no technology expert, but it would seem to me that the wheelchair -- not this scooter -- is the more important invention.
60 Minutes did a profile on Kamen and his inventions last week, and while the scooter looks cool -- and fat guys are able to navigate pretty nimbly so long as they don't lean too far forward -- the wheelchair can climb stairs, climb curbs, move on two wheels, four, or one.
What? Maybe he *does* mean a nobhead. A nob on a head. So chill your know-it-all spew unless you really do know it all.
Which you don't.
That said, I'll say this: this Moxi stuff means nothing -- nothing -- until the product is shipping from cable companies, folks actually have it in their house, or you can buy it in Best Buy.
How many stories is Slashdot gonna run about some new whiz-bang PVR with Linux?
*cough* Indrema *cough* *cough*
Tivo is the king, has been the king, and will remain the king. Everything is a wanna-be. (At least until it's sitting on a Best Buy shelf beside a Tivo and I can actually buy it and take it home.
Before modding this off-topic, read the whole post:
Quick, any fans of Cormac McCarthy out there?
What book of his set in the 19th century prominently features the Leonids in the first few paragraphs?
Answer: Blood Meridian.
Quite possibly the best American novel written in the second half of the 20th century. It's about a band of American mercenaries who go into Mexico to hunt up scalps for pay.
(It's also one of the eeriest and most violent American novels written -- heads getting lopped off, horses getting slaughtered, and a very weird, Ahab-like character called 'The Judge' presiding over everything.)
Anyway, the main character -- the Kid -- is born beneath the Leonids, and the infrequent meteor shower during the night of The Kid's birth makes for a very strange sense of forboding. That, and the fact that the Leonids come every 33 years -- very Christ-like, I suppose -- so the kid gets marked with this odd mixture of innocence, wisdom, and violence.
So I had no idea what the Leonids were, and after reading Blood Meridian, I thought it was something McCarthy made up. But a little research, of course, proved otherwise.
The strange thing about the Leonids -- and about the cycle of Halley's (sp?) comet (Mark Twain was born when the comet appeared, died when the comet next appeared) -- makes for some interesting moments in American literature.
My question -- finally get back on topic -- is this: when all these meteors are shooting through the sky, do they burn up in the atmosphere? Do some make it through? You'd think if there were that many, one or two would cause some serious damage.
Well, my CD price point is about 10 minutes of my time.
Currently my time -- my personal time -- is valued around $50 an hour. My professional time is much more -- at least that's what I get pimped out for when I go and pretend I'm the consultant-ho come to fix your oh-so-important IT problem -- but my personal time is my own, and goddammit if it's not worth at least $50. (And I'm still a whipper-snapper, but I've heard stories of the dot-com boom and bust from the Elders, so I anticipate that this personal hourly fee of mine is pretty fair.)
I charge my personal time at fifty bucks an hour to friends and family who say, um, Didion, I can't get my Tivo working, can you come fix it?
Or: Um, Didion, I need to install a wireless network, can you come and do it?
Or, um, Didion, there are so many computers out there, can you advise me on what I should by?
Or, um, Didion, I want to hook up a DVD to my television, can you come and do it?
So I say, sure, I'll come, buy whatever you want me to, install it, and even offer very personal assistance (especially if you have foxy friends) to get it up and working, but you'll pay me for the price of the gadget -- router, DVD, Tivo, cabling, whatever -- plus fifty bucks an hour.
They look at me like I'm a heartless shit and yell and complain and tell me I'm a little whore, but they always call back and say, um, okay, you've got a deal.
So having said that, my deal is this: it takes me about 10-15 minutes to burn a CD. Sure, it takes less, but I like to double-check stuff and make sure the tracks sound good and the error-correction didn't get all wonky. So basically I spend 15 minutes burning it.
Now, according to my hourly rate, that's about $12.50 of my time, give or take. So my personal theory on all this is this: that if the price of CDs was *less* than the amount of time it takes me to burn my own from Kazaa or make my own compilation (which takes considerably longer) I'd *think* about starting to buy CDs again.
$12.50 is still steep, so I'd say $8.99 or even $9.99 is the price that would persuade me.
I mean, if I could walk into one of those yucky mall stores when I was in the mall and actually had the taste for some new-ass mojo hip-hop crackerjack and wanted it RIGHT then and RIGHT now -- if I could walk into Sam Goody or Musicland or any of those chain stores run by the skanks with the skunk hair and single rusty earing who looks like she (or he) hasn't washed their hands for weeks and had forgotten basic personal hygeine -- if when I got the pulse for crackerjack and I could pick up that crackerjack for $8.99 wherever and whenever and didn't have to wait for some lameass SALE or some stupid CLEARANCE -- then and only then would I abandon my current status (code red: "NEVER AGAIN TO PURCHASE NEW CD") and would re-slot myself to a new status -- (code yellow: I STILL THINK THE RIAA SUCKS BALLS, BUT AT LEAST I CAN GET A BRAND NEW CD THAT RUNS IN WHATEVER I WANT IT TO RUN IN AT THIS STUPID MALL MUSICSTORE BECAUSE I AM A MAN OF IMPULSE AND IMPULSE GUIDED ME TO BUY THE NEWEST JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE BECAUSE I LIKE HIS VIBE ON THAT NEW SONG EVEN THOUGH THE ALBUM SOUNDS LIKE A PRE-NOSEJOB MICHAEL JACKSON") then I might reconsider things.
And I warned folks to watch out for fat dictators in one piece jumpsuits. Of course, no one listened.
Now, our new threat is a fat dictator in a one-piece jumpsuit with a zipper up the front.
Here's a hint from your friendly neighborhood dictator-dress-code-fashion-review-squad: if you're a dictator, and you're an evil sonofabitch, do a couple things:
a) Lose weight.
b) Don't wear jumpsuit that make you look like a child molester.
AdAge -- probably run by a majority of old, white men in expensive suits who drive Lexus', who "drop in" the AdAge offices every so often in their pink golf shirts to see what's going on and to tell everybody that they can't really stay long because they have a "ten o'clock" and then a 2:15 tee-time -- will post lower-than-expected quarterly results in the coming months.
Didion Sprague also predicts that many of these silver-haired white guys in expensive suits will (a) cheat on their significant others, (b) buy expensive scotch and pretend to appreciate it, (c) wonder if it's time to retire because they'd like to "watch their grandchildren grow up", and (d) suffer the "old white guy" indignity of having their affairs rumored throughout the office on AIM and MSN Messenger yet will continue to pursue "face time" with young women like Alyssa, the cute young intern on the fourth floor who "has this weird thing" for older men and who -- after her older man decides to quietly call it off over braised salmon one afternoon in a quiet, little, out-of-way place in TriBeCa -- decides to pack it up and call it quits and head back to graduate school because all the (older) guys she dated in Manhattan were such gutless pimps and heartless shits.
Yet at the very moment that young women like Alyssa are on the United flights back to places like Ames, Iowa and Normal, Illinois and Duluth, Minnesota, the old white guys will be back on the golf courses yukking it up and talking about birdies and eagles and wondering if they oughta hire some more interns like that Alyssa on the fourth floor and then laugh about it and then put it out of their heads until they come home, sit down at dinner in their big houses and remind themselves that they really don't like their wives and wonder how in the world they can be old enough to have a son off at Michigan and a daughter about to head to Boston.
Then they'll schedule more tee-times, "drop in" the AdAge offices yet again and talk about their "ten o'clocks" and "two o'clocks" and whisper their stock trades into their StarTacs, all the while oggling the latest intern who just got hired and needs someone to show them around the offices and get them situated on their first day.
Guys like these will volunteer, of course, and then take Britney around to all their guy buddies and ask Britney how's she's holding up what with meeting all these new people and experiencing the rush of business in a place like AdAge where everything is snap, snap, snap and if you can't deal with snap, snap, snap then you'll probably want to head back to Nebraska where life is a little less hectic but, by the way, are you doing anything for lunch because there's this nice little place in TriBeCa where they make wonderful braised salmon, I haven't tried it but I've heard about, would you be interested?
And golden haired Britney, understanding that life on Madison Avenue is pretty cool and exciting just nods and says, yeah, I'd love it, I love salmon. My mom likes salmon, too!
Well, it *is* pretty interesting to watch the record companies sabotage themselves.
I suspect they're engaged on some wacko conspiracy: "Do as much as we can to lose money and then blame it on customers. And then, once we've reached bottom, we'll... um... well, we haven't figured that part out yet. Our goal is to simply piss off consumers, hit bottom, and then blame folks."
What's interesting is that three years ago I was an active CD buyer. I was constantly buying stuff at Best Buy, was a member of all the CD clubs (even though that wasn't making anyone much money), and buying CDs on-line weekly.
Now, I've stopped. I won't buy another CD because I have no idea whether or not it will play in what I want to play it in, and I have absolutely no desire to try to bring it back to a place like Best Buy or send it back to a place like CDNOW or Amazon.com.
Instead, I'm enjoying my "old" CDs, installed my old Technics phonograph, and actively search out obscure stuff -- mostly CDs, some vinyl -- in local record stores. My music listening experience has gone way, way up, and I'm spending less than ever -- but finding stuff I like.
And I'll occasionally drop into Kazaa to listen to new stuff and try and determine, say, why Justine Timberlake is putting out new albums that sound like vintage Michael Jackson or why U2 and Aerosmith insist on putting out a new greatest hits album every other week or why Bob Dylan's *old* stuff is far and away better than anything he's put out since Infidels (which was, IMHO, the last good Dylan album). But that's about it.
So, yes, to the RIAA I say this: if your goal is to piss-off customers and lose them permanently -- congratulations!
Critical thinking is what contributes to problem solving. But remember, the best problem solvers are creative thinkers.
Call it creative thinking, critical thinking -- whatever floats your boat. But until you learn to see both the big picture and the little picture, you're stuck in a rut.
And reading -- wide, hungry, voracious reading -- is usually the key to getting the noggin' in gear.
There is only one culture, and if you can't discourse on the structure of a sonnet and the second law of thermodynamics with equal ease, then you're uncultured, period.
Interesting. I agree with your notion about a single culture.
But the idea that you -- or anyone -- picks a single thing out of the culture and says, well, if you don't know this thing, you're uncultured -- well, this is bad. I agree, though, in an ideal world we should be able to discourse on the structure of a sonnet and the second law of thermodynamics. But I disagree with the idea that if you don't know these two things, you're uncultured.
This reminds me of the so-called 'culture wars' that went on several years ago. Roger Shattuck, Dinish D'Souza (sp?), Roger Kimball -- everybody was chiming in with lists of stuff. You gotta know about the Spanish Armada, about Amerigo Vespucci. You gotta know what country wrote the 'Lusiads' and why, in the history of poetry (and exploration) why the Lusiads are important.
My concern with all this -- and I haven't yet made up my mind how best to approach it -- is that when we start talking about "lists" or about "stuff we need to know, or else", we're often blindsided by a kind of subconscious -- or silent -- xenophobia. The stuff we need to know is largely "Western" -- both in its cultural orientation and in its... well, in its hegemonic stature. Edward Said -- much as I find his 'Orientalism' shrill and oftentimes difficult to read -- has (I think) some valid concerns about the 'Westernization' of cultural ideas and the dangers of unbidden (or uncritical) hegemony.
So as not to venture too far off-topic, I'd say that while I agree with your general idea of diversity among the disciplines, I'd like to see it pushed even farther -- but not too far, not so far that, suddenly, the same ol' moral relativism looms and threatens to say, well, everybody's right, no one's right, and the oppressed are *really* right. I'm not sure where to draw the line.
But I think in addition to science and math, most students (IMHO) simply need to READ more. Novels, poetry, biography. Read, read, read. Whatever. But be unrelenting in your reading. Pursue stuff in college that you never thought you'd read.
If you're a reader, you learn how to become a critical thinker -- and this skill -- critical thinking -- is equally important across all disciplines: math, science, literature, philosophy, you name it.
It's nice to know stuff. And it's nice to think that you know the right stuff. But unless you're equipped to think about what you know -- and play the complex game of mental-connect-the-dots -- it's easy enough to discourse on the sonnet, discourse on the second law of thermodynamics, discourse on the mystical nature of the Kaballah and not realize that all three of things and more -- you name it -- are all, somehow, somewhere connected.
This is indeed a far more interesting -- and potentially more controversial -- story than the original topic (a Gartner suvey? BFD. Why is this siginificant?)
I'm not sure why Slashdot has rejected all the submissions for this link, its pictures, and the overall debate information.
I'm actually surprised that Hilary participated. The single photograph shows Hilary as being (apparently) a bit sullen and -- perhaps -- in a hurry to depart the debate. (I'm not sure where the photographer gets the idea that she's reading the guy's shirt. She's standing next to him, yes, but it looks like she's concentrating on getting her shit together in her purse -- not reading the tall guy's shirt.)
Anyway, as much as I despise the RIAA's tactics lately, a tentative hats off to Hilary et al. for their participation.
I'd like to hear both sides of the story, though. I'd be interested to read an RIAA write-up of the debate. I suspect they think they scored many talking posts -- despite the vote loss.
Maybe this is a dumb question, but I'll ask it anyway.
Is the only "trusted" source going to be Microsoft?
And if that's not the case -- if there are other trusted sources -- then what's to prevent someone from setting themselves up as a trusted source and signing all sorts of drivers as "trusted?"
Actually, this wasn't flamebait.
Whoever mod'd me down was mistaken.
The screen readers *do* need to keep pace with technology. I'm not sure why that's flamebait.
Or fining a state's highway commission for putting curves in highways, thus making it difficult if not impossible for blind folks to drive successfully.
Tsk. Tsk. So tasteless.
But I *do* wonder if the ADA problems vis a vis the web have more to do with the inability of screen readers to successfully parse complex pages than with "defiant" pages that refuse to limit themselves to simple "See Bob run. Bob runs fast" type text.
Who the fuck made text-based browsers king? Who the fuck says it *has* to be displayed on Lynx?
Why aren't people bitching at JAWS and other screen reading software to fucking GET WITH IT and understand that technology is a complex beast.
I sure as heck know that "lynx" compatibility is not the end-goal of any of the web's future vectors...
Well, I've found -- for me, at least -- that if I can make a good GUI if I stick my pinky up my ass.
It's quick, simple, and gets the job done.
Be warned, however, that if you plan any serious gooey ass exploration, don't go smoking any Madagascar Robusto cigarillos. My mom's boyfriend brought some of those home from Bermuda and those things *require* an industrial air mover near any bathroom.
Yes, this is sick and disgusting -- and will most certainly be mod'd off-topic by the do-good-imps, but sweet mother of god, sometimes the truth needs to be spoken. Even if it is poopee humor.
Well, if these new formats mean that the MP3 files available on Kazaa sound better with the usual, crappy encoding, then I'm all for it.
But unless a new format means that my normal routine of Kazaa'ing files will be enhanced, then I see no purpose of a new format.
Even if artists decide -- either by themselves or by pressure from their management -- that they'll release their new albums on these new formats, then I'll just wait for the MP3s to appear on Kazaa.
The RIAA is dead. Move along. No one will admit -- and you get the do-gooders accusing us of being thieves -- but it's true. It's time people just admit: physical media is dead. Filesharing is where it's at.
What I'd like to know is what Jefferson might have thought about filesharing. I'd bet they'd see it as a way to enrich the public domain instead of the fat punks at the RIAA.
That's right. *Fat punks*. That needs to be said, too. The RIAA is a bunch of fat, fucking punks. We don't like these people. No one likes these people. They're too lame to embrace the edge and figure out what needs to be done. But what needs to be done involves looking forward, not protecting the moola stash in the compost bin like Tony Soprano.
Me, Winky, Drummer Todd put our stuff up on MP3.com. (Look for the band called 'Pink Eye' on account Drummer Todd had pink eye not long ago and we needed a name for the band. In fact, we've been working on a song called 'Jack Valenti.' And, yes, we know Maddog Jack is MPAA not RIAA, but he's got a cooler name than Hilary Rosen. Plus, the thought of Hilary reminds me of that psycho in the Stephen King movie who decides she needs to hobble James Caan to get him to write a new installment of his book. That's some sick shit, but I do believe a metaphoric parallel can be drawn between the hobbling of James Caan and the hobbling of the on-line music industry. It's a pretty common trope, I'd wager, and I'd bet even good ol' Professor Harold Bloom could find some more parallels in his beloved Kaballah if he looked hard enough or in some esoteric Gnostic doctrine that only Bloom could figure out. If you don't know Harold Bloom, he's a Falstaff-like tragic figure who teaches poetry, literature, and criticism at Yale. He's one wacky thinker, but as Drummer Todd and Winky always say [in unison when we're all smoking our Russian 'Dneiper Robusto' cigarettes that Frederico imports from a girl he knows in Moscow] everybody needs a healthy dose of Plotinus/neo-Platonic mysticism now and then.]
We went to see XXX not long ago and a couple of losers sat down in front of us with an infant. The kid mighta been six, eight months old. An infant.
He/She -- whatever -- cried through the whole first part of the movie. Then something weird happened. Some noob in the projector booth flipped the volume switch up -- way up.
The move was painfully loud. My buddy Winky, ordinarily not a do-gooder, started mumbling about the annoyingly loud sound and wondering if it's actually *safe* for the baby to be there.
My other buddy, Drummer Todd, said it wasn't our business and we should just sit back and chill. In the Impala on the way over, we *did* say that we wanted a loud fucking movie with a lot of explosions.
Well, with the sound jacked, it was a loud fucking movie.
So Winky actually got up, went out into the lobby, and -- we learned all this later -- told one of the people at the popcorn booth that there was an infant in the movie and that with the sound as loud as it was, it might be a good idea to (a) turn down the sound, and (b) eject the infant.
So a few minutes later Winky comes back, sits down, and a few moments after *that*, a manager and a little guy in a red vest come looking for the info. They're shining their little light sticks all over the place trying to figure out where Winky was sitting.
Drummer Todd is telling all of us to shut the fuck up and chill, that the sound's fine, that the baby's not our business. Winky starts signalling for the ushers and a guy two rows behind us tells Winky to sit the fuck down.
Winky ignores him and nearly trips over Drummer Todd trying to get out in the aisle to flag the ushers. The couple in front of us -- the couple with the crying baby -- actually turn around to see what's going on and tell me -- me! -- to quiet down.
All this is going on while Vin Diesel has just let on that he really *is* a secret agent to the hot Russian chick while they're sitting in the cafe. She's explaining to him that there's a sniper outside and is about to cap him when he walks out. So they get up, walk over to the waiter, and whack the silver tray out of his hand. Now, it's a fine scene -- a pivotal scene in the movie -- but imagine this scene with the sound turn up so fucking loud you can't really hear anything. And then imagine a metal tray clattering and bullets flying -- all in 6.1 DTS -- or whatever they have. It was absolutely mind-numbingly loud. Truly, the single loudest experience I have *ever* had in my sixteen years of life.
Anyway, the ushers locate Winky, head on over to us, and ask the couple with the infant to please leave. They don't want to leave and it looks like a confrontation is gonna happen. All the while they're arguing with the ushers, the kid -- the fucking infant -- is balling his/her -- whatever -- head off. Balling and balling.
Finally, common sense prevails. The couple get up, glare at Winky, and -- with the infant in tow -- leave the theater. The ushers nod toward Winky, Winky nods back, and Drummer Todd tells him to sit the fuck down.
And a few moments later, the sound drops back down to normal.
And that was that. Very weird.
But I agree: forget the camcorders. Turn off the mobile phones.
And for the love of god: don't bring infants into films like XXX. It's insane.
What I'd like to know is what the fuck is up with guys who step waaaaay back from the urinal and then whip-whacks the drips off so everybody and his brother (a) gets a unpleasant glimpse of limp pecker and (b) gets an ass-spatter if they're standing in the wrong place.
Cripes.
But to answer your question: I, too, recommend a digital camera. I use a Nikon Coolpix 900 and it focusses just fine on text. I have to steady myself with my elbows, but 95% of the shots are at least legible.
OCR is a good idea.
Me, I just use the camera technique for getting free porn from the library when I go up to the periodical desk, request the latest Playboy, and then go find a carrol that's out of the way so I can start snapping.
Slashdot Mirror
The question I have -- and it's not one that I can find an answer to -- is this: did WalMart indeed "spam the world" with their Black Friday prices before Black Friday?
Or did -- as I suspect -- WalMart make an effort to keep their information private but found that the information was nonetheless made public?
It's easy to dump on the corporations -- and, in general, I'm no fan of corporations -- but I'm reading a lot of "WalMart bad, DMCA bad, therefore FatWallet good" type responses, but I'm not sure that's the case here.
A collection of prices could be seen as a "creative expression" in much the same way a battle plan is a carefully designed, very creative strategic document. In fact, I'd wager that most battle plans are very *creative* -- and it's the idea of "creativity" that oftentimes makes the difference between a plan that succeeds and one that fails. (In 1991, for example, the idea of outflanking the Iraqis in the desert -- swinging wide to one side and then doubling back to squeeze their cowardly asses -- was an amazingly creative, perhaps even daring maneuver. It worked, worked well, but had it failed, it would most certainly have failed "big time".)
Now, I'll agree that the DMCA has turned into a weird "catch-all" for anything that corporations don't like. This isn't a good thing. And I'm not sure WalMart should have embarked on this particular battle. I suspect they might -- might -- be guilty of not picking and choosing their battles carefully. Clearly, they think this is a worthwhile battle, but it would seem to me (Joe Consumer) that this is a battle that could backfire miserably. It certainly doesn't make me want to go to WalMart and spend my money and add to their 1.43 billion dollar "take" on Black Friday.
I suspect WalMart didn't take adequate precautions to protect their senstive data. Ditto for Staples and Best Buy. If retailing can, in fact, be likened to modern warfare, then the retailers have to rethink their planning and execution. If some geek can simply swipe the so-called "battle plans" from a mid-level manager's desk (or website) then better precautions need to be taken.
In fact, if I were a lawyer, I'd probably chide WalMart for not taking adequate precautions to match the sensitivity of the information. If this shit is super-secret, then WalMart should make sure their security is super-tight. Obviously, that can't guarantee the data won't fall into the wrong hands, but it'll most likely keep the 14 year old interns with bad zits from socially-engingeering high-level intelligence.
Or, failing that, at least keep the 14 years olds who think that FatWallet or Anandtech's 'Hot Deal Forums' is the 'crackerjack cool mondo spot on the web for trading retailing information' on their toes. (I read a post on Anand's forum the other day about a guy fired from Circuit City for pilfering price info and then posting it. What's odd isn't that Circuit City fired him but that these 16 year olds think that their "posting rep" on a forum is worth getting fired for.)
But that's my point. Everybody is griping about the "prices" but the prices -- I suspect -- aren't the issue.
The issue is the overall pricing strategy. The prices are part of that strategy -- part of the big picture. No one's pissed at the free advertising, but the fact is that the so-called "free advertisting" when combined with other "free advertising" from competitiors may, in fact, work *against* WalMart. (But this gets into the so-called "legality" of comparison shopping which is, I think, a terrible, terrible argument -- and one that, I hope, WalMart doesn't try and pursue.)
It's similar to, say, a general planning for a war. Everybody knows artillery will be used. Everybody knows bombs will be dropped. Everybody knows troops will be involved. In fact, everybody might know that 20,000 troops are stationed in country A, 5,000 troops plus mobile artillery are in country B, and 300 special forces are in country C.
But what everybody *doesn't* know is how, when, and exactly where all these *individual elements* will swing into gear and bear down on the evil-doers still harboring chemical warheads from a decade ago and plotting regional domination.
Moreover, if the specific strategic plans for the actual battle are pilfered or stolen, then, sure, that's cause for some serious butt-kicking or, in the case of Wal-Mart, some major litigation.
Again, I'm not defending this particular tactic on the part of WalMart, but I think I can understand their rage. Someone pilfered private plans and made them public. The prices are part of a larger strategy which is -- and which should be -- private until it's explicitly made public.
Now, if WalMart made the error of putting the so-called "private" plans on a "public" webserver -- and simply didn't link to it -- that's a whole other issue. Obviously, they're at fault and can't much blame someone (no matter how hard they try) for tinkering around with URL combinations. (I think the analogy here might be if a general or a president had war plans on, say, an unprotected, public computer so that any Tom, Dick, or Swinin' Harry could log in, check 'em out, and do with them whatever he or she wanted to do.)
IANAL, of course, but I'm sure WalMart sees prices not as "prices" but as notices of "strategic intent."
a dvantage-over-our-competitors -- is something that's not been discussed much.
The prices themselves aren't copyrightable I suppose, but the fact that the prices -- in the case of Black Friday, in particular -- are part of a larger strategy.
In other words, WalMart probably doesn't care that that XBOX is ten dollars off -- or whatever -- but they do care that the fact of discounting that specific item at that specific pricing level is, in fact, a strategic bid to gain an advantage over shoppers at a specific place and a specific time.
Now, before you flame, I'm not saying that WalMart is justified in what it's doing, but I do think that the idea of "prices-as-strategy" -- or better yet, Black-Friday-as-the-core-of-our-strategy-to-gain-
I suspect they view the overall prices as a kind of "war document" -- much like any war plans that cross the president's desk. There will be a multititude of plans, of course, but part of the tactical decision making process is to sign off on a particular set of a plans, at a specific time, based on specific intelligence.
Retailers, I'm sure, view Black Friday in very much the same way.
My question -- similar to yours, I think is this -- do deadtree magazines rack up similar debt?
In other words, is the absence of paper -- and a physical object -- less profitable than if you do what Salon is doing and go 100% electronic?
I seem to remember that Slate.com tried the deadtree thing -- along with their website -- and I remember that the Slate magazine was available in Starbucks. I actually *liked* the magazine -- as opposed to the annoying site (with its reader letters back and forth -- which strike me as the absolute height of pomposity and "in-joke-ness". If you just try to browse Slate, you're hit with all these things referencing other things -- and if you don't know what the "Fray" is and if you haven't been following all the oh-so-elegantly written missives between experts, you're lost. Salon *isn't* this way -- thank god. So I'm digressing, but everytime I think of Salon, I think of Slate and how annoying it is. Michael Kinsley is (was?) bad enough, but now that he's departed, the whiff of pomposity is still there.)
Anyway, I know Salon at one time had some pretty good writers writing for it. I was always fond of Camille Paglia's stuff. But apparently they shit-canned her and a bunch of other writers a year (two years?) ago. Hasn't been the same since.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the idea of the DMCA-capable OS to provide a secure "bed" for media? And if you're really not doing too much with "media" on your computer -- on whatever platform you have -- then what's the big deal?
I'm wring a novel. I could give a shit about whether or not I have a DMCA-capable OS. And when I want music, I have my Ipod. Yeah, I ripped my stuff into the Ipod, but they're my CDs, and I did the ripping. What's the big deal? And what does this have to with my DMCA-incapable OS?
Nothing.
Microsoft looks to be pursuing "media on the pc" in all its guts and glory. They've invested their billions into developing a secure infrastructure so that Hillary and Jack can rest easy at night. Problem with this is that if I'm a user who doesn't use the "media" options on a PC much -- if at all -- then these DMCA-capable OS have nothing to offer me because I'm not breaking any laws. I'm simply writing my papers, writing my novel, writing my short stories. I read email, browse websites, and grab whatever porn I need to get myself excited with I'm sad.
What I need is a box that lets me word process, balance my checkbook, and ignite my rocks when the rocks need igniting. None of this -- even the dumb porn -- has anything to do with Hillary or Jack or the RIAA or the MPAA.
And for god sake, I don't need to spend $199 every year for a new operating system just so Hillary and Jack can be assured by the pinhead suits at Microsofts that if I try to rip a fucking Justin Timberlake CD, I'll get all sorts of errors and skips and I'll be forced to chuck out more money for another CD.
Well, fuck Jack, fuck Hilary, and fuck Justin Timerberlake. I will not purchase new CDs -- ever. Ever again. And if I buy a CD -- and I just bought the new collection by Chris Whitley -- I'm gonna buy it used and on ebay. Sure, it's already been bought once, but I'll be goddamned if I'm gonna buy another CD when I *know* I can the damn thing for five bucks used -- and I know that the money I spend to buy it used, won't be paying for Valenti to go out and golf with my congressperson.
Here's a news flash to Microsoft. Your next big thing is not my next big thing. I got a housefull of deadtree books -- thousands of 'em -- and when I want a goddamn big thing I sit down, grab one off the shelf, and read the latest from Cormac McCarthy or dig up my ratty copy of 'Nostromo' or find that kickass new translation of the 'Iliad' that sounds like something Quentin Tarantino might have translated.
My goddamn big things don't have to do with cutesy boy-bands or stupid movies. If I want to see a movie, I'll go and see a movie. I'll actually get away from my computer, drive in my car, and pay my six bucks or whatever I need to pay to see Eminem do his thing or Johnny Knoxville and Wee Man do there's. I don't need a goddamn DMCA-capable OS to do this, and while I abhor the idea of giving Valenti any more cash to line his pockets, I *do* like movies, and I'm not gonna let the aged Valenti put a kink in my fucking lifestyle.
So take your goddamn "big things" and stuff 'em. I don't need 'em, don't want 'em. I'll figure them out for myself, thank you.
Is this flame-bait? Off-topic? I dunno. Mods have a way of not liking much of what I say when I say it like this.
Whatever.
I'm no technology expert, but it would seem to me that the wheelchair -- not this scooter -- is the more important invention.
60 Minutes did a profile on Kamen and his inventions last week, and while the scooter looks cool -- and fat guys are able to navigate pretty nimbly so long as they don't lean too far forward -- the wheelchair can climb stairs, climb curbs, move on two wheels, four, or one.
Now *that's* cool.
Which you don't.
That said, I'll say this: this Moxi stuff means nothing -- nothing -- until the product is shipping from cable companies, folks actually have it in their house, or you can buy it in Best Buy.
How many stories is Slashdot gonna run about some new whiz-bang PVR with Linux?
*cough* Indrema *cough* *cough*
Tivo is the king, has been the king, and will remain the king. Everything is a wanna-be. (At least until it's sitting on a Best Buy shelf beside a Tivo and I can actually buy it and take it home.
I mean, I'm not sure why (in theory, at least) all these copyprotected CDs will run fine on my component player but fail in my computer.
And -- if this is truly the case -- then:
(a) why don't manufacturers make internal CD players that are identical to component players?
(b) why I don't just use the digital out my component player to create a copy of the CD?
(c) does this copy protection shut off the digital out my component player?
This one 76 *real* arcade games inside of it.
Before modding this off-topic, read the whole post:
Quick, any fans of Cormac McCarthy out there?
What book of his set in the 19th century prominently features the Leonids in the first few paragraphs?
Answer: Blood Meridian.
Quite possibly the best American novel written in the second half of the 20th century. It's about a band of American mercenaries who go into Mexico to hunt up scalps for pay.
(It's also one of the eeriest and most violent American novels written -- heads getting lopped off, horses getting slaughtered, and a very weird, Ahab-like character called 'The Judge' presiding over everything.)
Anyway, the main character -- the Kid -- is born beneath the Leonids, and the infrequent meteor shower during the night of The Kid's birth makes for a very strange sense of forboding. That, and the fact that the Leonids come every 33 years -- very Christ-like, I suppose -- so the kid gets marked with this odd mixture of innocence, wisdom, and violence.
So I had no idea what the Leonids were, and after reading Blood Meridian, I thought it was something McCarthy made up. But a little research, of course, proved otherwise.
The strange thing about the Leonids -- and about the cycle of Halley's (sp?) comet (Mark Twain was born when the comet appeared, died when the comet next appeared) -- makes for some interesting moments in American literature.
My question -- finally get back on topic -- is this: when all these meteors are shooting through the sky, do they burn up in the atmosphere? Do some make it through? You'd think if there were that many, one or two would cause some serious damage.
Well, my CD price point is about 10 minutes of my time.
Currently my time -- my personal time -- is valued around $50 an hour. My professional time is much more -- at least that's what I get pimped out for when I go and pretend I'm the consultant-ho come to fix your oh-so-important IT problem -- but my personal time is my own, and goddammit if it's not worth at least $50. (And I'm still a whipper-snapper, but I've heard stories of the dot-com boom and bust from the Elders, so I anticipate that this personal hourly fee of mine is pretty fair.)
I charge my personal time at fifty bucks an hour to friends and family who say, um, Didion, I can't get my Tivo working, can you come fix it?
Or: Um, Didion, I need to install a wireless network, can you come and do it?
Or, um, Didion, there are so many computers out there, can you advise me on what I should by?
Or, um, Didion, I want to hook up a DVD to my television, can you come and do it?
So I say, sure, I'll come, buy whatever you want me to, install it, and even offer very personal assistance (especially if you have foxy friends) to get it up and working, but you'll pay me for the price of the gadget -- router, DVD, Tivo, cabling, whatever -- plus fifty bucks an hour.
They look at me like I'm a heartless shit and yell and complain and tell me I'm a little whore, but they always call back and say, um, okay, you've got a deal.
So having said that, my deal is this: it takes me about 10-15 minutes to burn a CD. Sure, it takes less, but I like to double-check stuff and make sure the tracks sound good and the error-correction didn't get all wonky. So basically I spend 15 minutes burning it.
Now, according to my hourly rate, that's about $12.50 of my time, give or take. So my personal theory on all this is this: that if the price of CDs was *less* than the amount of time it takes me to burn my own from Kazaa or make my own compilation (which takes considerably longer) I'd *think* about starting to buy CDs again.
$12.50 is still steep, so I'd say $8.99 or even $9.99 is the price that would persuade me.
I mean, if I could walk into one of those yucky mall stores when I was in the mall and actually had the taste for some new-ass mojo hip-hop crackerjack and wanted it RIGHT then and RIGHT now -- if I could walk into Sam Goody or Musicland or any of those chain stores run by the skanks with the skunk hair and single rusty earing who looks like she (or he) hasn't washed their hands for weeks and had forgotten basic personal hygeine -- if when I got the pulse for crackerjack and I could pick up that crackerjack for $8.99 wherever and whenever and didn't have to wait for some lameass SALE or some stupid CLEARANCE -- then and only then would I abandon my current status (code red: "NEVER AGAIN TO PURCHASE NEW CD") and would re-slot myself to a new status -- (code yellow: I STILL THINK THE RIAA SUCKS BALLS, BUT AT LEAST I CAN GET A BRAND NEW CD THAT RUNS IN WHATEVER I WANT IT TO RUN IN AT THIS STUPID MALL MUSICSTORE BECAUSE I AM A MAN OF IMPULSE AND IMPULSE GUIDED ME TO BUY THE NEWEST JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE BECAUSE I LIKE HIS VIBE ON THAT NEW SONG EVEN THOUGH THE ALBUM SOUNDS LIKE A PRE-NOSEJOB MICHAEL JACKSON") then I might reconsider things.
But until then, no.
Sorry, dude.
SALT = Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty
I know, because I was there. I brokered it.
And I warned folks to watch out for fat dictators in one piece jumpsuits. Of course, no one listened.
Now, our new threat is a fat dictator in a one-piece jumpsuit with a zipper up the front.
Here's a hint from your friendly neighborhood dictator-dress-code-fashion-review-squad: if you're a dictator, and you're an evil sonofabitch, do a couple things:
a) Lose weight.
b) Don't wear jumpsuit that make you look like a child molester.
c) Get a decent pair of sunglasses.
.
Here's Didion Sprague's prediction:
AdAge -- probably run by a majority of old, white men in expensive suits who drive Lexus', who "drop in" the AdAge offices every so often in their pink golf shirts to see what's going on and to tell everybody that they can't really stay long because they have a "ten o'clock" and then a 2:15 tee-time -- will post lower-than-expected quarterly results in the coming months.
Didion Sprague also predicts that many of these silver-haired white guys in expensive suits will (a) cheat on their significant others, (b) buy expensive scotch and pretend to appreciate it, (c) wonder if it's time to retire because they'd like to "watch their grandchildren grow up", and (d) suffer the "old white guy" indignity of having their affairs rumored throughout the office on AIM and MSN Messenger yet will continue to pursue "face time" with young women like Alyssa, the cute young intern on the fourth floor who "has this weird thing" for older men and who -- after her older man decides to quietly call it off over braised salmon one afternoon in a quiet, little, out-of-way place in TriBeCa -- decides to pack it up and call it quits and head back to graduate school because all the (older) guys she dated in Manhattan were such gutless pimps and heartless shits.
Yet at the very moment that young women like Alyssa are on the United flights back to places like Ames, Iowa and Normal, Illinois and Duluth, Minnesota, the old white guys will be back on the golf courses yukking it up and talking about birdies and eagles and wondering if they oughta hire some more interns like that Alyssa on the fourth floor and then laugh about it and then put it out of their heads until they come home, sit down at dinner in their big houses and remind themselves that they really don't like their wives and wonder how in the world they can be old enough to have a son off at Michigan and a daughter about to head to Boston.
Then they'll schedule more tee-times, "drop in" the AdAge offices yet again and talk about their "ten o'clocks" and "two o'clocks" and whisper their stock trades into their StarTacs, all the while oggling the latest intern who just got hired and needs someone to show them around the offices and get them situated on their first day.
Guys like these will volunteer, of course, and then take Britney around to all their guy buddies and ask Britney how's she's holding up what with meeting all these new people and experiencing the rush of business in a place like AdAge where everything is snap, snap, snap and if you can't deal with snap, snap, snap then you'll probably want to head back to Nebraska where life is a little less hectic but, by the way, are you doing anything for lunch because there's this nice little place in TriBeCa where they make wonderful braised salmon, I haven't tried it but I've heard about, would you be interested?
And golden haired Britney, understanding that life on Madison Avenue is pretty cool and exciting just nods and says, yeah, I'd love it, I love salmon. My mom likes salmon, too!
I suspect they're engaged on some wacko conspiracy: "Do as much as we can to lose money and then blame it on customers. And then, once we've reached bottom, we'll ... um ... well, we haven't figured that part out yet. Our goal is to simply piss off consumers, hit bottom, and then blame folks."
What's interesting is that three years ago I was an active CD buyer. I was constantly buying stuff at Best Buy, was a member of all the CD clubs (even though that wasn't making anyone much money), and buying CDs on-line weekly.
Now, I've stopped. I won't buy another CD because I have no idea whether or not it will play in what I want to play it in, and I have absolutely no desire to try to bring it back to a place like Best Buy or send it back to a place like CDNOW or Amazon.com.
Instead, I'm enjoying my "old" CDs, installed my old Technics phonograph, and actively search out obscure stuff -- mostly CDs, some vinyl -- in local record stores. My music listening experience has gone way, way up, and I'm spending less than ever -- but finding stuff I like.
And I'll occasionally drop into Kazaa to listen to new stuff and try and determine, say, why Justine Timberlake is putting out new albums that sound like vintage Michael Jackson or why U2 and Aerosmith insist on putting out a new greatest hits album every other week or why Bob Dylan's *old* stuff is far and away better than anything he's put out since Infidels (which was, IMHO, the last good Dylan album). But that's about it.
So, yes, to the RIAA I say this: if your goal is to piss-off customers and lose them permanently -- congratulations!
Critical thinking is what contributes to problem solving. But remember, the best problem solvers are creative thinkers. Call it creative thinking, critical thinking -- whatever floats your boat. But until you learn to see both the big picture and the little picture, you're stuck in a rut. And reading -- wide, hungry, voracious reading -- is usually the key to getting the noggin' in gear.
Yes, this is exactly the xenophobia I'm talking about.
Of course you should *learn* about them. Learning about something doesn't mean you have to *agree* with it.
You prove my point -- exactly -- about critical thinking. (And the dangers, alas, when it's lacking.)
There is only one culture, and if you can't discourse on the structure of a sonnet and the second law of thermodynamics with equal ease, then you're uncultured, period.
... well, in its hegemonic stature. Edward Said -- much as I find his 'Orientalism' shrill and oftentimes difficult to read -- has (I think) some valid concerns about the 'Westernization' of cultural ideas and the dangers of unbidden (or uncritical) hegemony.
Interesting. I agree with your notion about a single culture.
But the idea that you -- or anyone -- picks a single thing out of the culture and says, well, if you don't know this thing, you're uncultured -- well, this is bad. I agree, though, in an ideal world we should be able to discourse on the structure of a sonnet and the second law of thermodynamics. But I disagree with the idea that if you don't know these two things, you're uncultured.
This reminds me of the so-called 'culture wars' that went on several years ago. Roger Shattuck, Dinish D'Souza (sp?), Roger Kimball -- everybody was chiming in with lists of stuff. You gotta know about the Spanish Armada, about Amerigo Vespucci. You gotta know what country wrote the 'Lusiads' and why, in the history of poetry (and exploration) why the Lusiads are important.
My concern with all this -- and I haven't yet made up my mind how best to approach it -- is that when we start talking about "lists" or about "stuff we need to know, or else", we're often blindsided by a kind of subconscious -- or silent -- xenophobia. The stuff we need to know is largely "Western" -- both in its cultural orientation and in its
So as not to venture too far off-topic, I'd say that while I agree with your general idea of diversity among the disciplines, I'd like to see it pushed even farther -- but not too far, not so far that, suddenly, the same ol' moral relativism looms and threatens to say, well, everybody's right, no one's right, and the oppressed are *really* right. I'm not sure where to draw the line.
But I think in addition to science and math, most students (IMHO) simply need to READ more. Novels, poetry, biography. Read, read, read. Whatever. But be unrelenting in your reading. Pursue stuff in college that you never thought you'd read.
If you're a reader, you learn how to become a critical thinker -- and this skill -- critical thinking -- is equally important across all disciplines: math, science, literature, philosophy, you name it.
It's nice to know stuff. And it's nice to think that you know the right stuff. But unless you're equipped to think about what you know -- and play the complex game of mental-connect-the-dots -- it's easy enough to discourse on the sonnet, discourse on the second law of thermodynamics, discourse on the mystical nature of the Kaballah and not realize that all three of things and more -- you name it -- are all, somehow, somewhere connected.
Thanks.
This is indeed a far more interesting -- and potentially more controversial -- story than the original topic (a Gartner suvey? BFD. Why is this siginificant?)
I'm not sure why Slashdot has rejected all the submissions for this link, its pictures, and the overall debate information.
I'm actually surprised that Hilary participated. The single photograph shows Hilary as being (apparently) a bit sullen and -- perhaps -- in a hurry to depart the debate. (I'm not sure where the photographer gets the idea that she's reading the guy's shirt. She's standing next to him, yes, but it looks like she's concentrating on getting her shit together in her purse -- not reading the tall guy's shirt.)
Anyway, as much as I despise the RIAA's tactics lately, a tentative hats off to Hilary et al. for their participation.
I'd like to hear both sides of the story, though. I'd be interested to read an RIAA write-up of the debate. I suspect they think they scored many talking posts -- despite the vote loss.
Maybe this is a dumb question, but I'll ask it anyway.
Is the only "trusted" source going to be Microsoft?
And if that's not the case -- if there are other trusted sources -- then what's to prevent someone from setting themselves up as a trusted source and signing all sorts of drivers as "trusted?"
Apologies, if this is a dumb question.
Actually, this wasn't flamebait. Whoever mod'd me down was mistaken. The screen readers *do* need to keep pace with technology. I'm not sure why that's flamebait.
Or fining a state's highway commission for putting curves in highways, thus making it difficult if not impossible for blind folks to drive successfully.
...
Tsk. Tsk. So tasteless.
But I *do* wonder if the ADA problems vis a vis the web have more to do with the inability of screen readers to successfully parse complex pages than with "defiant" pages that refuse to limit themselves to simple "See Bob run. Bob runs fast" type text.
Who the fuck made text-based browsers king? Who the fuck says it *has* to be displayed on Lynx?
Why aren't people bitching at JAWS and other screen reading software to fucking GET WITH IT and understand that technology is a complex beast.
I sure as heck know that "lynx" compatibility is not the end-goal of any of the web's future vectors
Well, I've found -- for me, at least -- that if I can make a good GUI if I stick my pinky up my ass.
It's quick, simple, and gets the job done.
Be warned, however, that if you plan any serious gooey ass exploration, don't go smoking any Madagascar Robusto cigarillos. My mom's boyfriend brought some of those home from Bermuda and those things *require* an industrial air mover near any bathroom.
Yes, this is sick and disgusting -- and will most certainly be mod'd off-topic by the do-good-imps, but sweet mother of god, sometimes the truth needs to be spoken. Even if it is poopee humor.
Well, if these new formats mean that the MP3 files available on Kazaa sound better with the usual, crappy encoding, then I'm all for it.
But unless a new format means that my normal routine of Kazaa'ing files will be enhanced, then I see no purpose of a new format.
Even if artists decide -- either by themselves or by pressure from their management -- that they'll release their new albums on these new formats, then I'll just wait for the MP3s to appear on Kazaa.
The RIAA is dead. Move along. No one will admit -- and you get the do-gooders accusing us of being thieves -- but it's true. It's time people just admit: physical media is dead. Filesharing is where it's at.
What I'd like to know is what Jefferson might have thought about filesharing. I'd bet they'd see it as a way to enrich the public domain instead of the fat punks at the RIAA.
That's right. *Fat punks*. That needs to be said, too. The RIAA is a bunch of fat, fucking punks. We don't like these people. No one likes these people. They're too lame to embrace the edge and figure out what needs to be done. But what needs to be done involves looking forward, not protecting the moola stash in the compost bin like Tony Soprano.
Me, Winky, Drummer Todd put our stuff up on MP3.com. (Look for the band called 'Pink Eye' on account Drummer Todd had pink eye not long ago and we needed a name for the band. In fact, we've been working on a song called 'Jack Valenti.' And, yes, we know Maddog Jack is MPAA not RIAA, but he's got a cooler name than Hilary Rosen. Plus, the thought of Hilary reminds me of that psycho in the Stephen King movie who decides she needs to hobble James Caan to get him to write a new installment of his book. That's some sick shit, but I do believe a metaphoric parallel can be drawn between the hobbling of James Caan and the hobbling of the on-line music industry. It's a pretty common trope, I'd wager, and I'd bet even good ol' Professor Harold Bloom could find some more parallels in his beloved Kaballah if he looked hard enough or in some esoteric Gnostic doctrine that only Bloom could figure out. If you don't know Harold Bloom, he's a Falstaff-like tragic figure who teaches poetry, literature, and criticism at Yale. He's one wacky thinker, but as Drummer Todd and Winky always say [in unison when we're all smoking our Russian 'Dneiper Robusto' cigarettes that Frederico imports from a girl he knows in Moscow] everybody needs a healthy dose of Plotinus/neo-Platonic mysticism now and then.]
Certainly Valenti and Rosen.
We went to see XXX not long ago and a couple of losers sat down in front of us with an infant. The kid mighta been six, eight months old. An infant.
He/She -- whatever -- cried through the whole first part of the movie. Then something weird happened. Some noob in the projector booth flipped the volume switch up -- way up.
The move was painfully loud. My buddy Winky, ordinarily not a do-gooder, started mumbling about the annoyingly loud sound and wondering if it's actually *safe* for the baby to be there.
My other buddy, Drummer Todd, said it wasn't our business and we should just sit back and chill. In the Impala on the way over, we *did* say that we wanted a loud fucking movie with a lot of explosions.
Well, with the sound jacked, it was a loud fucking movie.
So Winky actually got up, went out into the lobby, and -- we learned all this later -- told one of the people at the popcorn booth that there was an infant in the movie and that with the sound as loud as it was, it might be a good idea to (a) turn down the sound, and (b) eject the infant.
So a few minutes later Winky comes back, sits down, and a few moments after *that*, a manager and a little guy in a red vest come looking for the info. They're shining their little light sticks all over the place trying to figure out where Winky was sitting.
Drummer Todd is telling all of us to shut the fuck up and chill, that the sound's fine, that the baby's not our business. Winky starts signalling for the ushers and a guy two rows behind us tells Winky to sit the fuck down.
Winky ignores him and nearly trips over Drummer Todd trying to get out in the aisle to flag the ushers. The couple in front of us -- the couple with the crying baby -- actually turn around to see what's going on and tell me -- me! -- to quiet down.
All this is going on while Vin Diesel has just let on that he really *is* a secret agent to the hot Russian chick while they're sitting in the cafe. She's explaining to him that there's a sniper outside and is about to cap him when he walks out. So they get up, walk over to the waiter, and whack the silver tray out of his hand. Now, it's a fine scene -- a pivotal scene in the movie -- but imagine this scene with the sound turn up so fucking loud you can't really hear anything. And then imagine a metal tray clattering and bullets flying -- all in 6.1 DTS -- or whatever they have. It was absolutely mind-numbingly loud. Truly, the single loudest experience I have *ever* had in my sixteen years of life.
Anyway, the ushers locate Winky, head on over to us, and ask the couple with the infant to please leave. They don't want to leave and it looks like a confrontation is gonna happen. All the while they're arguing with the ushers, the kid -- the fucking infant -- is balling his/her -- whatever -- head off. Balling and balling.
Finally, common sense prevails. The couple get up, glare at Winky, and -- with the infant in tow -- leave the theater. The ushers nod toward Winky, Winky nods back, and Drummer Todd tells him to sit the fuck down.
And a few moments later, the sound drops back down to normal.
And that was that. Very weird.
But I agree: forget the camcorders. Turn off the mobile phones.
And for the love of god: don't bring infants into films like XXX. It's insane.
What I'd like to know is what the fuck is up with guys who step waaaaay back from the urinal and then whip-whacks the drips off so everybody and his brother (a) gets a unpleasant glimpse of limp pecker and (b) gets an ass-spatter if they're standing in the wrong place.
Cripes.
But to answer your question: I, too, recommend a digital camera. I use a Nikon Coolpix 900 and it focusses just fine on text. I have to steady myself with my elbows, but 95% of the shots are at least legible.
OCR is a good idea.
Me, I just use the camera technique for getting free porn from the library when I go up to the periodical desk, request the latest Playboy, and then go find a carrol that's out of the way so I can start snapping.