In 2011 this rule held true: if it was December there were a lot of movies coming out 'based on true stories'. I feel like 'based on a true story' is the sort of phrase that deserves to always be put in quotes. It stands out. I remember going to a theater and seeing two or three 'based on a true story' movies. Could be my memory is destroyed. You can check for yourself in many ways, I'm sure, but I will provide one.
I guess seeing a fabulous movie with roots in the mundane, grimy, desperate reality of life is a heart-warming thing. It's not terrible. You can't simply hate the story for being insipid or unbelievable. However, you can throw shovelfuls of shit onto the screenplay, script, and performances. I'm not one for 'true story' movies myself, but I can see the appeal. Recent Denzel vehicle Flight was also allegedly 'based on a true story' in the trailers. There is some discussion about that. Again, maybe my memory is shot.
It seems to me, after some reflection, that the winter months and the final weeks of autumn is the key season for 'based on a true story' movies. I guess film-goers need their hearts warmed, too. I will include in this discussion biographical films. I saw The Master this year in an independent cinema in late November. It fits the bill, even though the movie was released much earlier. I just wanted to say that I watched a movie. Was it good? Hell yeah it was interesting. I've never seen such a good, unbiased movie about Scientology in my life. The word 'Scientology' isn't even used once, as far as I know, in the movie. That's brilliant. L. Ron Hubbard is renamed. It's a work of art. Drags a bit. Philip Seymour Hoffman is in it and he's a masterful actor who positively keeps the damn thing going.
But I digress. Take one of recent history's most successful and critically lauded Milk, which was released on November 26, 2008. It was a movie 'based on a true story' and some might have called it a 'biographical film' or even a 'biopic'. I'm more or less an idiot, but even I can see this trend. I won't go ahead and say December is peak month for this type of movie, but it is certainly roughly in the middle. It is the median month for 'based on true story' entertainment.
Though, following this line of reasoning, every war movie ever made is 'based on a true story' and most crime movies as well. Then, let's get existential and very post-modern critical and just say that every movie and every book and every narrative ever is 'based on a true story'. Most music is probably born along those lines. Everything creative is partly 'based on a true story'. This is problematic, because I mean a specific type of feel-good, heartwarming, nonthreatening, almost unconscious type of movie. The type that would star Sandra Bullock and a minority actor, and you'd find your girlfriend watching it late one evening – absorbed, transported, and entirely quiet. Why can't she be like that when Ted is playing?
Except that movie with Sandra Bullock is not really so unconscious. I feel bad for considering it problematic. It's probably legitimately progressive, and probably has integrity as a work of art, as a consumer product, and as a social statement. I don't actually know, though. I never saw it. All I know is that, apparently, it was based on a true story, and according to that logic probably came out between mid-November and late-February.
12/6/12
That Time of Year, Pt. 1: Donate to Wikipedia Already
Apparently, seeing as the notices have disappeared, I am too late with this article. In my defense: at the time it seemed like a great idea. I was going to exhort in beautiful and compelling language everyone to donate. What could be more important, I would ask, than free information? Better yet: often factual free information that is peer edited, reviewed, and verified. Sure, now and then people get in and make stupid edits and ridiculous joke pages, but that is life.
It's the #5 website in the world, and probably one of the better and more neutral top-5 websites. They know they deserve it. Like PBS or NPR. The naysayers know not what they say, as is so often the case. In 2005 and beyond (and probably before) citing Wikipedia became a constant struggle. Professors would treat it like a cancerous lump: we all knew they were frightened because their death grip on knowledge might be broken. It was the dawn of collaborative knowledge. Myths would be dispelled, and the layman might know what lies within the mysteries of nature.
Or so we thought. Mostly, intelligent stoners spend hours drifting aimlessly down the infinite isles of Wikipedia, following insane paths. Students use it as a fateful start to research. The populace visits it to figure out what things are. Most uses are heavily similar. Yet, the stoners. It was not unheard of for an unfortunate, intoxicated in mind and feverish in pursuit of information, to start out with a mundane consumer product and end up in the Cretaceous or even Carboniferous era, trying to piece together the start of life. Caught, often, in mysteries far beyond their purview.
There is a moral somewhere in that story. Lazy students would straight-up cite Wikipedia. Snobs and profs would spit on it and declaim it. The masses didn't give a shit and were confirmed in their ignorance by the political and oligarch classes. Whatever. Business as usual. Wikileaks made a huge spash, by comparison, but then again, the crux of all of this was Wikipedia. The faithful, the peer-edited, the generally honest and neutral and balanced.
Yes, it was the start of everything, and possibly the only beautiful thing to come out of Web 2.0. I would sooner have something to read than a coffee. I was going to write in support for their cause. The upshot of my tardiness is that it is clear that Wikipedia has many supporters already. You have to see the value and comfort in that.
It's the #5 website in the world, and probably one of the better and more neutral top-5 websites. They know they deserve it. Like PBS or NPR. The naysayers know not what they say, as is so often the case. In 2005 and beyond (and probably before) citing Wikipedia became a constant struggle. Professors would treat it like a cancerous lump: we all knew they were frightened because their death grip on knowledge might be broken. It was the dawn of collaborative knowledge. Myths would be dispelled, and the layman might know what lies within the mysteries of nature.
Or so we thought. Mostly, intelligent stoners spend hours drifting aimlessly down the infinite isles of Wikipedia, following insane paths. Students use it as a fateful start to research. The populace visits it to figure out what things are. Most uses are heavily similar. Yet, the stoners. It was not unheard of for an unfortunate, intoxicated in mind and feverish in pursuit of information, to start out with a mundane consumer product and end up in the Cretaceous or even Carboniferous era, trying to piece together the start of life. Caught, often, in mysteries far beyond their purview.
There is a moral somewhere in that story. Lazy students would straight-up cite Wikipedia. Snobs and profs would spit on it and declaim it. The masses didn't give a shit and were confirmed in their ignorance by the political and oligarch classes. Whatever. Business as usual. Wikileaks made a huge spash, by comparison, but then again, the crux of all of this was Wikipedia. The faithful, the peer-edited, the generally honest and neutral and balanced.
Yes, it was the start of everything, and possibly the only beautiful thing to come out of Web 2.0. I would sooner have something to read than a coffee. I was going to write in support for their cause. The upshot of my tardiness is that it is clear that Wikipedia has many supporters already. You have to see the value and comfort in that.
11/19/12
Identity and its Discontents; Exceptionalism and You
There was a time I'd have considered someone a hipster just for using the word 'bromance'. That day is long past, but the feeling remains that too many people dance a bit close to the sociocultural archetypes they claim to hate. Not that I'd care about it at this late juncture. It's just one of the few calming thoughts I'm allowed each day. Goddamn, but I'd let them have it. And there were plenty of girls who, as soon as you and her boyfriend were smoking pot together three times a week, or playing some stupid console game together, would pronounce the entire thing a 'bromance'. It was embarrassing each time. It was just a word that had caught far too much momentum, but I never quite managed to get away from it. It was always there, lurking in someone's brain where it was least expected.
Then the term hipster gained an insane amount of weight overnight. One day it was limited to the actual people one would term hipsters, and the next day it was in everyone's mouth, like saliva. Years of ubiquity and overuse have made this word so resonant that it doesn't even really mean anything anymore. This is partly because the original hipsters died more than a century ago, for the most part, and this tenth wave lacks coherence. Nobody can say that Oscar Wilde wasn't a hipster and he wasn't even [critically un-hip] England's first. Dandies were probably third-wave hipsters, even. All of which goes to say, the term is misused constantly even by people who should know better, and the critical ignorance surrounding the term or its history (1950's highpoint anyone?) just makes it an embarrassing statement on our era's ideas concerning identity.
Mostly hipster is a brand thing, now. If you think the epitome is Vice you're probably right, but then again if you didn't know that you are part of the problem. Rich people have already invested in it, celebrities pay huge sums to appear more 'hipsterish', politicians probably use 'hipster' as shorthand for politically disengaged drunks and 'creatives'. There is an aggregate concept of an hipster. He typically wears flannel and, if nothing else, a mustache. She is typically wearing one piece of denim and often a toque. Everything else is overstated but vague. Random. Hell. It's not the worst social camouflage. These days you could get by on it. But of course, no matter who you are, you are going to be called a hipster by someone you know. It doesn't matter how carefully you cultivate your interests and it can happen even without a record player.
There are few things so fearsome as the current accepted models of politics and their adherents. Anarchists are largely undisciplined and immature. Conservatives are all gerontocrats, paternalists, and varying shades of militarist. It goes without saying that almost everyone is infatuated with or ignorant of the implications of continued statism. Liberals are preoccupied with everything, like they're cats and personal rights and privileges are catnip. But really these archetypes don't exist anymore. Probably they were never true, but everyone needs some reductionism or else things become difficult to consider. You have: people who are angry, people who are downtrodden, people who are doing what they are told, half-assed people, people who have disconnected in various ways, and people who think they know what the fuck is even happening and I don't know who to blame. I don't particularly like anybody's spiel right now.
Heh, Israel pounds Gaza would be a sick name for an anarchist-hipster occupist punk group. It's cool to different people to champion one group of people fighting another. This is sometimes referred to as tribalism. This concept is followed by 'exceptionalism' which is, as it sounds, an exceptionally important type of bullshit. People with doubts about the situation that created recent global tensions: be ready to be called an anti-Semite, another term watered-down and thrown around a lot. It's like how 'fascist' used to be, in the 80's, when neoconservatism was indoctrinating its brood, fattening its captains and psychopomps, and massacring its foes in many colorful and atrocious ways. It's easier to ignore these ugly spectacles, but they still affect people. Imagine a tiny explosion, inside an aquarium that is constantly getting hotter, smaller, and busier. Imagine all the stupid things the fish would be telling each other about this explosion while the water drained out.
Yeah there's still albums to review. There's still tens of page views per day to aim for. Giving up hope is stupid and there's no grain of truth in the suggestion that the world will end on Dec 21, 2012. The Pope even said it wasn't going to happen. There are jokes. Laugh about it. Things will go on. We will not get away from the problematics of our time so easily. Maybe we'll go back to patting ourselves on the back for doing the right thing, for buying one less gadget a year, for putting one kilo less matter into a landfill, for backing 'the good guys' while appreciating the plight of the underdog, for voting, for altruism, for proselytizing our beliefs, for not giving up, for getting up earlier to exercise, for calling mom and dad because they would like to hear from you, for slapping a friend's smartphone away from them when they're not paying attention, for giving a brutal douchebag a hard time, for not shouting down our opponents, for... &c. We're going to feel good about ourselves and we're not going to think about it because feeling anything else is unthinkable and the worst kind of suffering. We are not going to become self-aware, so in some ways we are going to continue to approach disaster. I don't think we're too close yet, but that is really just hope, not expectation.
But don't for a moment forget how truly expensive all this free entertainment is. Better yet, think about that while you're out Christmas shopping and you get frustrated because you're uncomfortable standing in a slow line, helping to outsource your country's economy, or having trouble finding a parking spot.
Then the term hipster gained an insane amount of weight overnight. One day it was limited to the actual people one would term hipsters, and the next day it was in everyone's mouth, like saliva. Years of ubiquity and overuse have made this word so resonant that it doesn't even really mean anything anymore. This is partly because the original hipsters died more than a century ago, for the most part, and this tenth wave lacks coherence. Nobody can say that Oscar Wilde wasn't a hipster and he wasn't even [critically un-hip] England's first. Dandies were probably third-wave hipsters, even. All of which goes to say, the term is misused constantly even by people who should know better, and the critical ignorance surrounding the term or its history (1950's highpoint anyone?) just makes it an embarrassing statement on our era's ideas concerning identity.
Mostly hipster is a brand thing, now. If you think the epitome is Vice you're probably right, but then again if you didn't know that you are part of the problem. Rich people have already invested in it, celebrities pay huge sums to appear more 'hipsterish', politicians probably use 'hipster' as shorthand for politically disengaged drunks and 'creatives'. There is an aggregate concept of an hipster. He typically wears flannel and, if nothing else, a mustache. She is typically wearing one piece of denim and often a toque. Everything else is overstated but vague. Random. Hell. It's not the worst social camouflage. These days you could get by on it. But of course, no matter who you are, you are going to be called a hipster by someone you know. It doesn't matter how carefully you cultivate your interests and it can happen even without a record player.
There are few things so fearsome as the current accepted models of politics and their adherents. Anarchists are largely undisciplined and immature. Conservatives are all gerontocrats, paternalists, and varying shades of militarist. It goes without saying that almost everyone is infatuated with or ignorant of the implications of continued statism. Liberals are preoccupied with everything, like they're cats and personal rights and privileges are catnip. But really these archetypes don't exist anymore. Probably they were never true, but everyone needs some reductionism or else things become difficult to consider. You have: people who are angry, people who are downtrodden, people who are doing what they are told, half-assed people, people who have disconnected in various ways, and people who think they know what the fuck is even happening and I don't know who to blame. I don't particularly like anybody's spiel right now.
Heh, Israel pounds Gaza would be a sick name for an anarchist-hipster occupist punk group. It's cool to different people to champion one group of people fighting another. This is sometimes referred to as tribalism. This concept is followed by 'exceptionalism' which is, as it sounds, an exceptionally important type of bullshit. People with doubts about the situation that created recent global tensions: be ready to be called an anti-Semite, another term watered-down and thrown around a lot. It's like how 'fascist' used to be, in the 80's, when neoconservatism was indoctrinating its brood, fattening its captains and psychopomps, and massacring its foes in many colorful and atrocious ways. It's easier to ignore these ugly spectacles, but they still affect people. Imagine a tiny explosion, inside an aquarium that is constantly getting hotter, smaller, and busier. Imagine all the stupid things the fish would be telling each other about this explosion while the water drained out.
Yeah there's still albums to review. There's still tens of page views per day to aim for. Giving up hope is stupid and there's no grain of truth in the suggestion that the world will end on Dec 21, 2012. The Pope even said it wasn't going to happen. There are jokes. Laugh about it. Things will go on. We will not get away from the problematics of our time so easily. Maybe we'll go back to patting ourselves on the back for doing the right thing, for buying one less gadget a year, for putting one kilo less matter into a landfill, for backing 'the good guys' while appreciating the plight of the underdog, for voting, for altruism, for proselytizing our beliefs, for not giving up, for getting up earlier to exercise, for calling mom and dad because they would like to hear from you, for slapping a friend's smartphone away from them when they're not paying attention, for giving a brutal douchebag a hard time, for not shouting down our opponents, for... &c. We're going to feel good about ourselves and we're not going to think about it because feeling anything else is unthinkable and the worst kind of suffering. We are not going to become self-aware, so in some ways we are going to continue to approach disaster. I don't think we're too close yet, but that is really just hope, not expectation.
But don't for a moment forget how truly expensive all this free entertainment is. Better yet, think about that while you're out Christmas shopping and you get frustrated because you're uncomfortable standing in a slow line, helping to outsource your country's economy, or having trouble finding a parking spot.
11/15/12
Come on, YouTube.
You used to be a place where I could sensibly browse for videos. Now you offer me a few topics and "Recommended for You" shit. I loved when there were 15 pages of 'most viewed today' videos, and you didn't creep my video history to tell me what to watch. Every one-off video I watch when I'm logged in now means I get a bunch more recommended and have to go all over the place in search of something original.
"Most viewed" is too archaic, apparently. I can only watch what you want. Sure, there used to be all kinds of segregated sections of videos, and lots of things were hard to find, and there was pretty much always a bunch of bullshit. You always hyped the worst things based on the metric of how popular they were. I didn't care. I knew there was always an unbiased list of worldwide views. People gamed that system all the time but it generally brought me joy and decent videos. There used to be a front page where unsorted videos could be browsed according to whether they were recently posted, most views, most liked, most subscriptions. Y'all remember that? That was awesome. There was a 50/50 chance, every day, of finding something new and either interesting or funny, or just completely strange – no searching, just actual, lazy, unguided browsing.
You still got the search bar. If you got rid of it you'd be Web 3.0, of course: the era in which all the internet, like a modern game, plays itself. You redesigned a bunch of times. I never saw the reason for it, but I'm not a capitalist so my opinion doesn't matter for shit. I realize people need money to make things 'better' and the internet is hugely profitable. But your reconstruction wasn't for the better. If I can't see ~100 of the day's most viewed videos then what's the point? You want me to play the game your way, but there's not that many channels worth subscribing to, no matter how many of them can waste my time more or less enjoyably.
It's not about me anymore, it's about You. I understand why I can't find any television show ever made anymore. That was never going to last. I just want to actually browse. I mean I want to see a large variety of things in one place arranged logically, not according to metaterms or what's trending or what you think I should watch. I used to be able to do this, to find new, unlisted, unhyped things every day, but now I feel blind. I get 'trending' instead of 'most viewed' and it's just plain frustrating that there's no way to arrange things logically anymore.
You're like a giant focus group now, YouTube. Except they're all yes-men and cronies, and they're crowding me into a small room, and there's no window, so all I smell is their terrible coffee breath, and all I hear is their terrible opinions about what's good, and it's dark, and I don't want to have Minecraft videos recommended to me. 2010 is over, YouTube.
Maybe I'm a bad internet browser. Maybe I get frustrated about nothing, and I just don't know how to navigate your many avenues properly, and you still offer a 'most views' section, and I'm just crazy for not getting to it. I hope that's the case, because then I'd have a reason to have a bit of faith in you, and it would have been me who was blind. Not you blinding me. I don't think I'm crazy. I think you changed for the lamest, like you've always been doing, and if this is the future of the internet then good luck with it. We both know I'm not the center of the universe, and playing some terrible algorithmic joke to make it seem so is unimpressive and creepy. I want options, and less of this Mickey Mouse horse shit.
I know that much of the internet wants to know every last thing about what I do so they can further reduce my purview and essentially control what I see, do, and buy. Nationalism online is already an old story. I don't want or need that kind of reduced outlook, and their methods are increasingly obvious. The worst part is that I couldn't even put a date on YouTube's last upgrade, but essentially it was the day the videos died. At least there's still a search bar.
 |
| Oh, for Me? |
"Most viewed" is too archaic, apparently. I can only watch what you want. Sure, there used to be all kinds of segregated sections of videos, and lots of things were hard to find, and there was pretty much always a bunch of bullshit. You always hyped the worst things based on the metric of how popular they were. I didn't care. I knew there was always an unbiased list of worldwide views. People gamed that system all the time but it generally brought me joy and decent videos. There used to be a front page where unsorted videos could be browsed according to whether they were recently posted, most views, most liked, most subscriptions. Y'all remember that? That was awesome. There was a 50/50 chance, every day, of finding something new and either interesting or funny, or just completely strange – no searching, just actual, lazy, unguided browsing.
You still got the search bar. If you got rid of it you'd be Web 3.0, of course: the era in which all the internet, like a modern game, plays itself. You redesigned a bunch of times. I never saw the reason for it, but I'm not a capitalist so my opinion doesn't matter for shit. I realize people need money to make things 'better' and the internet is hugely profitable. But your reconstruction wasn't for the better. If I can't see ~100 of the day's most viewed videos then what's the point? You want me to play the game your way, but there's not that many channels worth subscribing to, no matter how many of them can waste my time more or less enjoyably.
It's not about me anymore, it's about You. I understand why I can't find any television show ever made anymore. That was never going to last. I just want to actually browse. I mean I want to see a large variety of things in one place arranged logically, not according to metaterms or what's trending or what you think I should watch. I used to be able to do this, to find new, unlisted, unhyped things every day, but now I feel blind. I get 'trending' instead of 'most viewed' and it's just plain frustrating that there's no way to arrange things logically anymore.
You're like a giant focus group now, YouTube. Except they're all yes-men and cronies, and they're crowding me into a small room, and there's no window, so all I smell is their terrible coffee breath, and all I hear is their terrible opinions about what's good, and it's dark, and I don't want to have Minecraft videos recommended to me. 2010 is over, YouTube.
Maybe I'm a bad internet browser. Maybe I get frustrated about nothing, and I just don't know how to navigate your many avenues properly, and you still offer a 'most views' section, and I'm just crazy for not getting to it. I hope that's the case, because then I'd have a reason to have a bit of faith in you, and it would have been me who was blind. Not you blinding me. I don't think I'm crazy. I think you changed for the lamest, like you've always been doing, and if this is the future of the internet then good luck with it. We both know I'm not the center of the universe, and playing some terrible algorithmic joke to make it seem so is unimpressive and creepy. I want options, and less of this Mickey Mouse horse shit.
11/13/12
User Comment Rodeo: Inexplicable News Mess
I'm going to ask you to look closely at the thumbs-up/thumbs-down ratings closely for this article. Then, if you're interested in seeing cultural relativity destroy the world, check the number of comments and comment ratings on your favourite news website, but only from more serious stories. I'd like to know how this skews, because I personally got bad, bad vibes from this particular UCR.
There's a particular show called Here Comes Honey Boo Boo that is on 'The Learning Channel' and originates from one of America's numerous sweaty armpits. Piecing together what I know of this show is it follows a family of small-town/rural, southern Americans as they go about being consumers, being a loving family, and systematically destroying their health with energy drinks. It's probably just a fever dream from a febrile and dying era, but it has the sort of mass appeal that can only come from TLC shows post-2000. To be very honest, it's probably just another disposable momentary cultural flashpoint.
Stumbling across the story itself was as bizarre as it was concerning. Why would PETA care about a snowballing television program. Why would they make a bigger deal out of one ironically named chicken than out of the millions packed into shitty chicken barns, pumped with medicine and hormones, and generally grown in as unappetizing and unethical a manner as possible? I might never know. I guess PETA watches a lot of TV, even more than about 80% of people I know, who also don't know or care about this cringeworthy Honey Boo Boo business.
I found out that a chicken named Nugget is more important than the economy, and that the public finds it PETA's attitude towards this chicken more important than even the failing economy or rumors of a vague, oppressive, and menacing oligarchy. I found out that this silly chicken named Nugget was a lightning rod for opinions. And people hate, I mean Hate, PETA. It's crazy. This rodeo is going to be tame, but holy hell was I taken aback. And the numbers of votes. Staggering. And people missing the point. The best part was the big numbers, though, all for these great internet comics who really got a chance to shine:
There's a particular show called Here Comes Honey Boo Boo that is on 'The Learning Channel' and originates from one of America's numerous sweaty armpits. Piecing together what I know of this show is it follows a family of small-town/rural, southern Americans as they go about being consumers, being a loving family, and systematically destroying their health with energy drinks. It's probably just a fever dream from a febrile and dying era, but it has the sort of mass appeal that can only come from TLC shows post-2000. To be very honest, it's probably just another disposable momentary cultural flashpoint.
Stumbling across the story itself was as bizarre as it was concerning. Why would PETA care about a snowballing television program. Why would they make a bigger deal out of one ironically named chicken than out of the millions packed into shitty chicken barns, pumped with medicine and hormones, and generally grown in as unappetizing and unethical a manner as possible? I might never know. I guess PETA watches a lot of TV, even more than about 80% of people I know, who also don't know or care about this cringeworthy Honey Boo Boo business.
I found out that a chicken named Nugget is more important than the economy, and that the public finds it PETA's attitude towards this chicken more important than even the failing economy or rumors of a vague, oppressive, and menacing oligarchy. I found out that this silly chicken named Nugget was a lightning rod for opinions. And people hate, I mean Hate, PETA. It's crazy. This rodeo is going to be tame, but holy hell was I taken aback. And the numbers of votes. Staggering. And people missing the point. The best part was the big numbers, though, all for these great internet comics who really got a chance to shine:
11/9/12
The Coup & Assorted Criticism, Hypery, Links
I feel like the world is generally ignorant of legendary marxist rap crew The Coup, or even worse, is actively skeptical or unreceptive to mentions of that group. I understand perfectly how people can be political, but I personally hold music to be much more honorable than politics, so the general lack of knowledge or enthusiasm about The Coup is baffling. It's understandable. I'm sure smug white people aren't The Coup's ideal audience, so lots of the people I most often deal with have nothing to say when I bring up The Coup.
Shamefully, I never really bring up The Coup at all when people ask me what I like to listen to. The near mythical production of Pam the Funkstress and Boots Riley's cutting rhymes. There was an awareness of the wrongness of things that should speak to anyone, at times. It's not particularly comfortable music, I suppose. It's a little incendiary, even. Revolutionary talk, whether posturing or not, is completely out of favor right now. It's seen something for teenagers, for the mentally unfit, or Russians, terrorists and other people we disagree with and distrust. Anywhere you look in the world, people will call revolutionaries dangerous, misguided, lazy, out-of-touch – generally before revealing their own lack of comprehension about the basic concepts of socialism or Marxism, whenever socialism is brought up. If you can't revolt and can't hold government to account, why pretend to be happy or enfranchised?
So, if you'd ask me, I'd say The Coup is important, brutally honest, unique, and unabashedly political. Music with a message is nothing new, but it is the nature of popular music to be inherently pro-capitalist or at least ignore the issue or posture about it. The status quo is referenced to establish a lack of privilege and it's on to fun verses about partying, women, crime, or drugs. Hip hop and rap are often maligned for being empty-headed and consumerist by the very people who understand or identify with it the least, and The Coup in particular would serve as an amazing rejoinder. For those reasons and more, I want to pay homage, and celebrate the release of a new album!
Shamefully, I never really bring up The Coup at all when people ask me what I like to listen to. The near mythical production of Pam the Funkstress and Boots Riley's cutting rhymes. There was an awareness of the wrongness of things that should speak to anyone, at times. It's not particularly comfortable music, I suppose. It's a little incendiary, even. Revolutionary talk, whether posturing or not, is completely out of favor right now. It's seen something for teenagers, for the mentally unfit, or Russians, terrorists and other people we disagree with and distrust. Anywhere you look in the world, people will call revolutionaries dangerous, misguided, lazy, out-of-touch – generally before revealing their own lack of comprehension about the basic concepts of socialism or Marxism, whenever socialism is brought up. If you can't revolt and can't hold government to account, why pretend to be happy or enfranchised?
So, if you'd ask me, I'd say The Coup is important, brutally honest, unique, and unabashedly political. Music with a message is nothing new, but it is the nature of popular music to be inherently pro-capitalist or at least ignore the issue or posture about it. The status quo is referenced to establish a lack of privilege and it's on to fun verses about partying, women, crime, or drugs. Hip hop and rap are often maligned for being empty-headed and consumerist by the very people who understand or identify with it the least, and The Coup in particular would serve as an amazing rejoinder. For those reasons and more, I want to pay homage, and celebrate the release of a new album!
11/7/12
Definitely a Big Deal
Oh certainly the election in the United States of America is a big deal. It's a big deal, alright? I wasn't really following it like some others, but I hear it was a close race. Congratulations to the candidates, both of them, for not going too low. For not spending too much corporate monies, you know? I'm sure things will be better from here on out.
For one thing, every newscast is going to have to find something else important to report on every day without pause during breakfast, lunch, and dinner. 24 hour news cycles are going to have to wait for the first big event. Basically, the media needs to find the next thing to drive into the ground/beat like a dead horse. Don't worry, news junkies! The media is good at finding something else.
I for one am happy that I won't have to hear about the election anymore. I was thoroughly tired of it. I was tired of people asking why, in my country, we should still care so much about the Emperor of the United States of America. Sorry. Wait... I'm leaving that terrible joke in there, as chastisement for all the hours and minutes I've had to spend listening to dummies talk about how politics are going to play out. Everyone who said, "Listen to these economic woes, this territorial instability, or that ongoing war" – bless you. Nobody listened, unfortunately, because big money was rolling around and two titanic monopolies were fighting about the 'future'. I took notice, but alas, I rarely take notice of the news.
I was tired of being asked who I thought I would win. I was tired of the sharp sensation that Romney might have an edge, even though it was all optics. Madmen would vote Romney into power. Madmen would suggest that one candidate was more Reaganific than the other (they were both equals in that regard). Oh there were so many 'experts' and talking heads, and dumb quacks, and vicious moments. I really wondered about it. So many Jon Stewart quips and bits some good, some bad, some reused by Colbert or improved by him... All for what? Yea, the elections here are less exciting. Our government's fist is empillowed and our people are indolent and selfish. It is like any other country, but our politicians have less money and less power than a Goddamn President, baby!
The president, be he a wise man or a fool, cannot by himself fix the job market. Even his policies cannot undo what was done or enacted by his predecessors. The president's foreign policies, no matter how balanced or cautious or brutal cannot end foreign grief and heartbreak and vengeance. The president, male or female, is no magician. The president, honorable or despicable, is not a coat-hook for your dreams, your identity, or your aspirations. So be thankful that someone got the job, and that you don't have to hear about campaigns for another few months (the joke is that some kind of politic is going to be news in about six hours, let alone six months or four years). Work on developing your own person. Work on developing your own community, think on what your country really means to you. Wherever you are, think on who really owns it, and who suffers for it and who pays for what – and above all, who spends the money.
For the record, I think both candidates had fair points to make. I think Romney was interested in making his points very badly, and Obama was a touch more eloquent and balanced in his point-making. I don't think either had valid platforms for fixing real issues, and I think their parties are at fault. I think this campaign, whatever else, should teach people that simple, dumbed-down, mass democracy built around polarized 'hot-topics' and sub-human 'brand politics' creates the America poor Obama has to continue running. A country, mind you, filled with partisan hatred, fear, poverty, ignorance, racism, problems... upon problems... upon problems, and then inequality, and then all the other petty possibilities that come from a populace which follows such a dreamlike, expensive, overblown and maniacal 'campaign season' to their (I stress 'their') own cost.
To which I say, excellent. You paid for it, you enjoy it. I wish I'd seen less of it, so the result would be more of a surprise. Lovely Americans, have a great second Obamian Term, and stop bitching about it so much. Romney shouldn't have sourced his logoed garbage from China, and if the results of the election anger you in any way, you should think on that point very carefully. Hopefully you realize the point.
In the meantime, everyone, search for your heart's content for the overblown, ridiculous, and spiteful American Response. We are in for social media's darkest, stupidest hour. And let us not forget, as well, that broadcast television newscasts will probably STILL take a full week to shut up about the events of the last twenty-four hours.
For one thing, every newscast is going to have to find something else important to report on every day without pause during breakfast, lunch, and dinner. 24 hour news cycles are going to have to wait for the first big event. Basically, the media needs to find the next thing to drive into the ground/beat like a dead horse. Don't worry, news junkies! The media is good at finding something else.
I for one am happy that I won't have to hear about the election anymore. I was thoroughly tired of it. I was tired of people asking why, in my country, we should still care so much about the Emperor of the United States of America. Sorry. Wait... I'm leaving that terrible joke in there, as chastisement for all the hours and minutes I've had to spend listening to dummies talk about how politics are going to play out. Everyone who said, "Listen to these economic woes, this territorial instability, or that ongoing war" – bless you. Nobody listened, unfortunately, because big money was rolling around and two titanic monopolies were fighting about the 'future'. I took notice, but alas, I rarely take notice of the news.
I was tired of being asked who I thought I would win. I was tired of the sharp sensation that Romney might have an edge, even though it was all optics. Madmen would vote Romney into power. Madmen would suggest that one candidate was more Reaganific than the other (they were both equals in that regard). Oh there were so many 'experts' and talking heads, and dumb quacks, and vicious moments. I really wondered about it. So many Jon Stewart quips and bits some good, some bad, some reused by Colbert or improved by him... All for what? Yea, the elections here are less exciting. Our government's fist is empillowed and our people are indolent and selfish. It is like any other country, but our politicians have less money and less power than a Goddamn President, baby!
The president, be he a wise man or a fool, cannot by himself fix the job market. Even his policies cannot undo what was done or enacted by his predecessors. The president's foreign policies, no matter how balanced or cautious or brutal cannot end foreign grief and heartbreak and vengeance. The president, male or female, is no magician. The president, honorable or despicable, is not a coat-hook for your dreams, your identity, or your aspirations. So be thankful that someone got the job, and that you don't have to hear about campaigns for another few months (the joke is that some kind of politic is going to be news in about six hours, let alone six months or four years). Work on developing your own person. Work on developing your own community, think on what your country really means to you. Wherever you are, think on who really owns it, and who suffers for it and who pays for what – and above all, who spends the money.
For the record, I think both candidates had fair points to make. I think Romney was interested in making his points very badly, and Obama was a touch more eloquent and balanced in his point-making. I don't think either had valid platforms for fixing real issues, and I think their parties are at fault. I think this campaign, whatever else, should teach people that simple, dumbed-down, mass democracy built around polarized 'hot-topics' and sub-human 'brand politics' creates the America poor Obama has to continue running. A country, mind you, filled with partisan hatred, fear, poverty, ignorance, racism, problems... upon problems... upon problems, and then inequality, and then all the other petty possibilities that come from a populace which follows such a dreamlike, expensive, overblown and maniacal 'campaign season' to their (I stress 'their') own cost.
To which I say, excellent. You paid for it, you enjoy it. I wish I'd seen less of it, so the result would be more of a surprise. Lovely Americans, have a great second Obamian Term, and stop bitching about it so much. Romney shouldn't have sourced his logoed garbage from China, and if the results of the election anger you in any way, you should think on that point very carefully. Hopefully you realize the point.
In the meantime, everyone, search for your heart's content for the overblown, ridiculous, and spiteful American Response. We are in for social media's darkest, stupidest hour. And let us not forget, as well, that broadcast television newscasts will probably STILL take a full week to shut up about the events of the last twenty-four hours.
10/29/12
Twitter Strategies for Journalists: An Existential User Comment Rodeo
CJR posted a great bit about getting Twitter followers that almost makes me want to dust off my twitter account and make it live. I used to try to follow twitter. Now I mostly blog lackadaisically in order to tell myself I am doing productive writing. I see people tweeting and they repost their tweets to facebook and I think, "Goddamn that's insane." but on the other hand they sometimes get 100 or so impressions. Which is generally still pretty insane. They are engaging with the imaginary yet somehow relevant aimless messaging system. Some people who have encouraged me to join actually have audiences and purposes for tweeting – which, in a fast-moving, egalitarian telegraph machine, are the most difficult things to achieve and understand.
I might be biased. I see every twitter account as the equivalent of a Minecraft video on YouTube. It does not inspire me. I see tweets in various news media and have to restrain myself. Jimmy Fallon uses twitter in cool ways, though, and the service has been used for all kinds of mischief so it can't be all bad. But on the other hand, the volume of tweets alone is a barrier to entry. The slavishness of hashtag culture, the ruthless advertising. Twitter has as much of a mercenary heart as facebook. But who cares what I have to think or say. I still have to think or say it if it's not broadcast.
Still, I do my best, despite having posted legitimately cringe-worthy abominations, to say interesting or informative things in a neutral language which does not rest on lazy assumptions, fallacies, or promote negative patterns of thinking. I try to do my best, on the internet or at least this blog, at least sometimes but it can be so hopeless and tiring. The internet, used anonymously, has a tendency to communicate the worst aspects of individuals and their cultures. There are heartbreaking stories about these kinds of problems and what their fallout is. Unless you're not paying attention, you have probably heard one.
Probably you came here to add followers to facebook and increase your clout score or whatever. I already linked to it at the top. The specifics of the linked article are great and all, but there was one user comment that was essentially critical of Twitter, but also probably uncomfortably accurate:
The flood of user-generated everything, from literature to the internet to economics, is an incredible problem that is both happening and waiting-to-happen. An unthinkable volume of information is kind of awesome, but also kind of terrifying. This brave new world is, after all, the kind of world that spawned the hollow 'expert culture' – an institution that is essentially quackery in all but name. The fact that the article shows at least one case of people forced to contribute to twitter against their will is equal parts hilarious and sad.
I might be biased. I see every twitter account as the equivalent of a Minecraft video on YouTube. It does not inspire me. I see tweets in various news media and have to restrain myself. Jimmy Fallon uses twitter in cool ways, though, and the service has been used for all kinds of mischief so it can't be all bad. But on the other hand, the volume of tweets alone is a barrier to entry. The slavishness of hashtag culture, the ruthless advertising. Twitter has as much of a mercenary heart as facebook. But who cares what I have to think or say. I still have to think or say it if it's not broadcast.
Still, I do my best, despite having posted legitimately cringe-worthy abominations, to say interesting or informative things in a neutral language which does not rest on lazy assumptions, fallacies, or promote negative patterns of thinking. I try to do my best, on the internet or at least this blog, at least sometimes but it can be so hopeless and tiring. The internet, used anonymously, has a tendency to communicate the worst aspects of individuals and their cultures. There are heartbreaking stories about these kinds of problems and what their fallout is. Unless you're not paying attention, you have probably heard one.
Probably you came here to add followers to facebook and increase your clout score or whatever. I already linked to it at the top. The specifics of the linked article are great and all, but there was one user comment that was essentially critical of Twitter, but also probably uncomfortably accurate:
The flood of user-generated everything, from literature to the internet to economics, is an incredible problem that is both happening and waiting-to-happen. An unthinkable volume of information is kind of awesome, but also kind of terrifying. This brave new world is, after all, the kind of world that spawned the hollow 'expert culture' – an institution that is essentially quackery in all but name. The fact that the article shows at least one case of people forced to contribute to twitter against their will is equal parts hilarious and sad.
10/18/12
Bookishness Reloaded
50 Shades of Grey and its ilk have been on the bestseller lists all year. Really long now and I'm wondering about it. They've basically made it a place for them to hang out. I don't know how any serious watchers of the bestseller list feel about it. I don't even know if there are serious watchers of the bestseller lists. I suppose, ultimately, there should be a few, and none of them should be surprised by what generally hangs out there. Not that there's anything inherently wrong with what hangs out there.
The whole 50 Shades debacle is the latest of an entire series of its kind. The ecosystem of modern publishing doesn't strike one as exclusively healthy – but there's nothing wrong with it, per se. Or so one thinks, ultimately the nonfiction lists aren't really super hopeful either. But there's also sometimes interesting stuff. Whether or not it's brewed by committee, exploits the zeitgeist, and has 'buzz' and 'word of mouth' and 'traction' are the great indicators of sales. Commercial success nullifies critical success and proves the naysayers wrong, inept, and out of touch. Or it should/might/doesn't, depending on how you feel about unlimited free market, incorporated.
The funny thing is, in this era dictionaries have actually created entries on mots célèbre that have no longevity or ultimate worth. I'm looking at you, 'frenemy'. The news crowed joyously about frenemy and friends getting into Webster and Oxford for the better part of a week, probably more than 12 months ago now. What increases the hilarity factor is that the conservative book set (most publishers, consumers, etc) actually sees the potential for twitter literature as a good thing. They might shit if it was considered to switch to a pure paperless market (which is sort of a scary idea when one considers it), but they will fill their own pages with the sort of meaningless colloquial twaddle that has no fundamental role in language. The white noise of language and of literature, and the much hyped 'echo chamber' effect of Twitter is involved somehow. Publishers bank on books that are too big to fail and they go to town whenever some book becomes so important that everyone needs a copy right now. They aim to remain relevant as opposed to fundamental. Language skills and general output are fucked enough without a neoliberal approach to neologisms.
So if you really think about the situation as it stands, the publishing ecosystem is a bit like every other large-scale market ecosystem: some smaller companies, independent organizations, and identities cling to the vestiges with varying success; by and large it consists of gigantic entities producing essentially a monoculture. So what? The incredible size and awesome power of these entities is something that should inspire us, their offerings are delivered with unthinkable force to vast numbers, on a scale that was relatively recently unthinkable. This is no minor business, even this allegedly 'dying' publishing industry.
There exists more written word than can be reliably processed by any one person. This condition is hardly new or revelatory, but it seems worth mentioning no matter how many thousands of years it's been true. Seeing as the human world still exists, and written word is still very essential to its development and even survival, the immense pile of written work should not merely be considered refuse. Some of it obviously stinks, but it's necessary.
Still. At this advanced stage the offerings aren't always on the level. The fact that one book hangs onto a bestseller list for months, in one country, means that not enough books are being shared, or that the market isn't dynamic enough, or anything because its actual value cannot be the ultimate monetary sum represented by its time on the bestseller lists. All of which is beside the point, I know.
The whole 50 Shades debacle is the latest of an entire series of its kind. The ecosystem of modern publishing doesn't strike one as exclusively healthy – but there's nothing wrong with it, per se. Or so one thinks, ultimately the nonfiction lists aren't really super hopeful either. But there's also sometimes interesting stuff. Whether or not it's brewed by committee, exploits the zeitgeist, and has 'buzz' and 'word of mouth' and 'traction' are the great indicators of sales. Commercial success nullifies critical success and proves the naysayers wrong, inept, and out of touch. Or it should/might/doesn't, depending on how you feel about unlimited free market, incorporated.
The funny thing is, in this era dictionaries have actually created entries on mots célèbre that have no longevity or ultimate worth. I'm looking at you, 'frenemy'. The news crowed joyously about frenemy and friends getting into Webster and Oxford for the better part of a week, probably more than 12 months ago now. What increases the hilarity factor is that the conservative book set (most publishers, consumers, etc) actually sees the potential for twitter literature as a good thing. They might shit if it was considered to switch to a pure paperless market (which is sort of a scary idea when one considers it), but they will fill their own pages with the sort of meaningless colloquial twaddle that has no fundamental role in language. The white noise of language and of literature, and the much hyped 'echo chamber' effect of Twitter is involved somehow. Publishers bank on books that are too big to fail and they go to town whenever some book becomes so important that everyone needs a copy right now. They aim to remain relevant as opposed to fundamental. Language skills and general output are fucked enough without a neoliberal approach to neologisms.
So if you really think about the situation as it stands, the publishing ecosystem is a bit like every other large-scale market ecosystem: some smaller companies, independent organizations, and identities cling to the vestiges with varying success; by and large it consists of gigantic entities producing essentially a monoculture. So what? The incredible size and awesome power of these entities is something that should inspire us, their offerings are delivered with unthinkable force to vast numbers, on a scale that was relatively recently unthinkable. This is no minor business, even this allegedly 'dying' publishing industry.
There exists more written word than can be reliably processed by any one person. This condition is hardly new or revelatory, but it seems worth mentioning no matter how many thousands of years it's been true. Seeing as the human world still exists, and written word is still very essential to its development and even survival, the immense pile of written work should not merely be considered refuse. Some of it obviously stinks, but it's necessary.
Still. At this advanced stage the offerings aren't always on the level. The fact that one book hangs onto a bestseller list for months, in one country, means that not enough books are being shared, or that the market isn't dynamic enough, or anything because its actual value cannot be the ultimate monetary sum represented by its time on the bestseller lists. All of which is beside the point, I know.
9/27/12
Pay Before You Pump
About a week ago there was a fairly big story about a malicious death (essentially a murder, technically a hit-and-run) in Toronto, caused by $112 worth of gas. The victim was the clerk, fearful about having a day's wages garnished because of theft. The manager of the location, and the industry itself, which likely institutes and enforces pay-for-theft measures (like many service industries – remember, if you don't want to tip, at least pay), criticized the entire incident but itself did little. I am no customer-service scientist, but I have a feeling that franchise owners and employers weren't ever truly warned against garnishing wages for fees.
Just ask a bartender or, especially, a waiter at your next time out. They'll tell you that for dine-and-dashers, or drink-and-stumblers, they are held responsible for the lost money. They buy it. They pay for theft. It's a stupid, malicious business, but it is rational in that it makes sense. That's business – if an employee can't keep profits then the employee is punished for that. Fine.
However, the scene of this crime is far more complex even than a simple theft of food and service at a restaurant or bar. Gas prices are rising like thermometers around the globe. Record summer heat means more cars on the roads, burning gas to maintain their spots in traffic jams, and operate A/C for the frustrated, overheated drives. Let's face it: when you're a privileged North American in a car, in dense traffic, it gets slow and it gets lonely. Carpooling doesn't figure at all in the story of gas theft and murder, but I figured I'd give it a moment, since passengers can be made to pay for their passage – and they should, with gas prices as they are.
The worst part of the story was a story about a teenage pump attendant (I forget where or if he was even a teen) who was dragged to his death for something like fourteen dollars and change. It's pretty damn despicable, but potentially the worst part is how many times it took before some politician realized there was exposure in acting on it. It only took a loose bunch of lives before the righteous opportunists of the political sphere even took notice of a looming problem. Gas won't get cheaper. People won't suddenly begin to treat low-paid service staff as legitimate humans deserving of life, as worthy and valuable others – as they won't in any of dozens of arenas around the world. Anyone who's worked retail will tell you about it, if you were wondering.
Meanwhile, angst continues to pile up in Canada. Gas costs $1.25 a litre (that's like three something a gallon) and we have something like the third-largest oil reserves proven in the dirty, shitty oilsands. Meanwhile we sell it away, part and parcel, to foreign interests and continue to pay unreasonable prices at the pump when we buy it back from those foreign interests. Instead of refineries, profits are used in a pathetic attempt to greenwash the original extraction operations. Somewhere in this nest of wasteful fallacies lies a sensible route to well-priced gas or an achievable alternative. Politics, though. You gotta have politics. Opposition to oil sands development must be the exclusive domain of malicious idiots and borderline eco-terrorists – you know: 99 percenters, Occupiers, and other idealist trash who don't know anything about business, the economy, or why the status quo is set as it is.
So it's only a matter of time until Nexen is sold to Chinese investors. I'm not even of the opinion it's a mistake. The oilsands are a mistake, what is done with them now – and if it gains certain people in this country billions of dollars, and improves trade relations with China: so much the better – hardly matters. Sovereignty has not been anything more than a byword by which the Harper administration rustles up support among the smug and hopeless of Canada. Under such circumstances, the sale of Nexen Inc is a no-brainer, and any turn-around likely to harm Canadian prospects in international trade, making it seem as reactionary and uncompetitive, as well as uncooperative and dishonest.
Looking at what Canadians will do for gas, down to the cowardly killings of attendants, some good publicity will be a windfall. So long as the oil and money continue to flow, little else matters. The big companies (NHL and NFL are currently great examples of this, as well) don't care about the lives of their most-ubiquitous employees, or pollution, or who owns what bit of oilsands. Politicians will only act if it fits in with their specific brand, and if their mandarins have seen fit for action, or if the public applause will overpower the private censure. Nobody cares, and, seemingly, neither do the people – and who can blame them? They've got to get to work, and the highways are full of inept, asshole drivers in practically empty cars, just gumming up the works.
Just ask a bartender or, especially, a waiter at your next time out. They'll tell you that for dine-and-dashers, or drink-and-stumblers, they are held responsible for the lost money. They buy it. They pay for theft. It's a stupid, malicious business, but it is rational in that it makes sense. That's business – if an employee can't keep profits then the employee is punished for that. Fine.
However, the scene of this crime is far more complex even than a simple theft of food and service at a restaurant or bar. Gas prices are rising like thermometers around the globe. Record summer heat means more cars on the roads, burning gas to maintain their spots in traffic jams, and operate A/C for the frustrated, overheated drives. Let's face it: when you're a privileged North American in a car, in dense traffic, it gets slow and it gets lonely. Carpooling doesn't figure at all in the story of gas theft and murder, but I figured I'd give it a moment, since passengers can be made to pay for their passage – and they should, with gas prices as they are.
The worst part of the story was a story about a teenage pump attendant (I forget where or if he was even a teen) who was dragged to his death for something like fourteen dollars and change. It's pretty damn despicable, but potentially the worst part is how many times it took before some politician realized there was exposure in acting on it. It only took a loose bunch of lives before the righteous opportunists of the political sphere even took notice of a looming problem. Gas won't get cheaper. People won't suddenly begin to treat low-paid service staff as legitimate humans deserving of life, as worthy and valuable others – as they won't in any of dozens of arenas around the world. Anyone who's worked retail will tell you about it, if you were wondering.
Meanwhile, angst continues to pile up in Canada. Gas costs $1.25 a litre (that's like three something a gallon) and we have something like the third-largest oil reserves proven in the dirty, shitty oilsands. Meanwhile we sell it away, part and parcel, to foreign interests and continue to pay unreasonable prices at the pump when we buy it back from those foreign interests. Instead of refineries, profits are used in a pathetic attempt to greenwash the original extraction operations. Somewhere in this nest of wasteful fallacies lies a sensible route to well-priced gas or an achievable alternative. Politics, though. You gotta have politics. Opposition to oil sands development must be the exclusive domain of malicious idiots and borderline eco-terrorists – you know: 99 percenters, Occupiers, and other idealist trash who don't know anything about business, the economy, or why the status quo is set as it is.
So it's only a matter of time until Nexen is sold to Chinese investors. I'm not even of the opinion it's a mistake. The oilsands are a mistake, what is done with them now – and if it gains certain people in this country billions of dollars, and improves trade relations with China: so much the better – hardly matters. Sovereignty has not been anything more than a byword by which the Harper administration rustles up support among the smug and hopeless of Canada. Under such circumstances, the sale of Nexen Inc is a no-brainer, and any turn-around likely to harm Canadian prospects in international trade, making it seem as reactionary and uncompetitive, as well as uncooperative and dishonest.
Looking at what Canadians will do for gas, down to the cowardly killings of attendants, some good publicity will be a windfall. So long as the oil and money continue to flow, little else matters. The big companies (NHL and NFL are currently great examples of this, as well) don't care about the lives of their most-ubiquitous employees, or pollution, or who owns what bit of oilsands. Politicians will only act if it fits in with their specific brand, and if their mandarins have seen fit for action, or if the public applause will overpower the private censure. Nobody cares, and, seemingly, neither do the people – and who can blame them? They've got to get to work, and the highways are full of inept, asshole drivers in practically empty cars, just gumming up the works.
9/19/12
North American Politics Redux
That the governments of North America function as ears into which special interest groups pour their bile shouldn't surprise a single thinking person. The best part is the most worrying: there is no more point in even pretending to aim for a government which serves the people. The best one can hope for is a government that serves corporate interest, foreign investment, itself, and its elites and prays earnestly for that service to trickle down into the cracks where dwell the invisible, rotten peons which they have struggled to get away from.
In this era, where the American dream could be dismantled for the pernicious, self-destructive, blind and ignorant mess that it is, there are entire groups of people with frothing mouths trying to blame anyone for the demise of their beloved ideal. Instead of doing the American thing and hardening up and finding something better and smarter, they still worship the car cult, the sprawl cult, and the consumption cult. Bridges are fabricated in China and assembled by foreign labor in America. Nobody can do a goddamned thing about it, no matter how shameful it is, because American manufacturing and labor have been gutted in the interests of iPhones, service-industry, and the downright vampiric finance industry (which, rightfully, is more of a quack cottage industry, as its very nature is antithetical to true industry, which creates products of value).
A populace distrustful of its government moves apathetically to cast its meaningless votes into the mire of corruption and ineptitude that will bring them an even more degraded government. Someone says he doesn't care about roughly half of a country – well of course, nobody ever has, or will, and if this percentage would only dream the right dream of wastefulness and satiety then they could pull themselves out of poverty and darkness.
Meanwhile democracy is a dead byword, remembered by some, but truly forgotten by all. We have several hundred statist, nationalist, authoritarian and totalitarian pieces of shit running the world. All of them are lackeys to the 'real players' who wish, respectfully, not to be named or pointed at. Yet we consume their products each day. It's harder to farm food than it is to process it into unhealthy products to sell to masses, which it poisons into leprous lumps which look forward only to the faded idiotic 'leisure time' involving yet more consumption and little else.
Big bad governments pass hundreds of laws and amendments in so-called 'omnibus bills' which politicians are too lazy and inept to read and understand. All sorts of toxic policy are passed into law without so much as a cursory glance, and the culprits are paid and pampered, travel around the world, and don't even bother to defend their use of public money or trust in such a despicable way. The instigator even allows that it is undemocratic and scary, but continues doing it anyway, because god damn doing work you are paid and trusted to do. Revolutionaries, under these pressures and more, are still branded as idealists, idiots, and heretics. The placid horde feeds on scraps from the table and licks its chops contentedly, smiling at the less fortunate.
In some considerable and old parts of the world, a potentially faked video has caused a number of deaths because it portrays a prophet in an unfair and unkindly light. Free speech is cited and forgotten, and outrage is the rule of the day. If only outrage was the rule of the day, and apathy didn't rule, where truly important and existential affairs are concerned. As we pass into the twilight of this era, hoping for a better tomorrow, we would do well to remember the words of one J.J. Rousseau. That is, if any among us can remember them.
In this era, where the American dream could be dismantled for the pernicious, self-destructive, blind and ignorant mess that it is, there are entire groups of people with frothing mouths trying to blame anyone for the demise of their beloved ideal. Instead of doing the American thing and hardening up and finding something better and smarter, they still worship the car cult, the sprawl cult, and the consumption cult. Bridges are fabricated in China and assembled by foreign labor in America. Nobody can do a goddamned thing about it, no matter how shameful it is, because American manufacturing and labor have been gutted in the interests of iPhones, service-industry, and the downright vampiric finance industry (which, rightfully, is more of a quack cottage industry, as its very nature is antithetical to true industry, which creates products of value).
A populace distrustful of its government moves apathetically to cast its meaningless votes into the mire of corruption and ineptitude that will bring them an even more degraded government. Someone says he doesn't care about roughly half of a country – well of course, nobody ever has, or will, and if this percentage would only dream the right dream of wastefulness and satiety then they could pull themselves out of poverty and darkness.
Meanwhile democracy is a dead byword, remembered by some, but truly forgotten by all. We have several hundred statist, nationalist, authoritarian and totalitarian pieces of shit running the world. All of them are lackeys to the 'real players' who wish, respectfully, not to be named or pointed at. Yet we consume their products each day. It's harder to farm food than it is to process it into unhealthy products to sell to masses, which it poisons into leprous lumps which look forward only to the faded idiotic 'leisure time' involving yet more consumption and little else.
Big bad governments pass hundreds of laws and amendments in so-called 'omnibus bills' which politicians are too lazy and inept to read and understand. All sorts of toxic policy are passed into law without so much as a cursory glance, and the culprits are paid and pampered, travel around the world, and don't even bother to defend their use of public money or trust in such a despicable way. The instigator even allows that it is undemocratic and scary, but continues doing it anyway, because god damn doing work you are paid and trusted to do. Revolutionaries, under these pressures and more, are still branded as idealists, idiots, and heretics. The placid horde feeds on scraps from the table and licks its chops contentedly, smiling at the less fortunate.
In some considerable and old parts of the world, a potentially faked video has caused a number of deaths because it portrays a prophet in an unfair and unkindly light. Free speech is cited and forgotten, and outrage is the rule of the day. If only outrage was the rule of the day, and apathy didn't rule, where truly important and existential affairs are concerned. As we pass into the twilight of this era, hoping for a better tomorrow, we would do well to remember the words of one J.J. Rousseau. That is, if any among us can remember them.
9/5/12
The New Microsoft Logo: Explicit Huey and the News Reference?
Well it's kind of funny on a few different levels. I could make a joke about the Samsung lawsuit also, if it was necessary. I don't think it's entirely necessary. I guess, though, what they are saying is that it's hip to be square. Or maybe they're just futureproofing the brand. It's tough to say, at this distance, what any of this really means. It could be a meaningless change, and it could be the herald of some insane twist ending so devious that it drove its author insane and hid itself in a dusty pile of manuscripts, waiting for a foolish hack's sweaty fingers.
The real issue isn't whether or not rounded edges are completely illegal, but rather what exactly a non-curved surface means for the consumer. Will it entail a less-flexible Microsoft Windows? Will tiling finally wear out its welcome?
Is this a sign that yupsters are on the make? Is the 99% going to have to deal with the fallout? Is the 100% going to have to? Where do I send strongly-worded letters about this? Why is my local mailbox welded shut?
No, this can't be so drastic. But my eyes can't be lying to me. This isn't anything like Morrowind to Oblivion in terms of regression, but it makes me wonder if I shouldn't switch to... but wait. Apple's undergone its brand shift already, and it's planning something as well. Macintosh and Microsoft. It's the ongoing browser crisis all over again, which makes Microsoft Chrome; Apple Firefox. Except Apple is a more yupster brand than Microsoft, anyway, so really nothing makes sense at all. I only hope they do a commercial with the proper mainstream pop rock song accompanying shots of stressed office workers, pale and/or fat kids, and septuagenarians holding conference calls on Win8 phones.
Well I for one don't care so much. Things will be alright even if the vistas are grimmer than the early-adopters and hype-men would like. I think Win7 is where it's at, and I'm happy to square about that. As long as it can run Age of Empires 2, an operating system is pretty good. Anyways, anyone who knows anything knows which was the best logo and is still puzzled, like me, about the incomprehensible loss of that incredible relic. Rest in peace,
Is this a sign that yupsters are on the make? Is the 99% going to have to deal with the fallout? Is the 100% going to have to? Where do I send strongly-worded letters about this? Why is my local mailbox welded shut?
No, this can't be so drastic. But my eyes can't be lying to me. This isn't anything like Morrowind to Oblivion in terms of regression, but it makes me wonder if I shouldn't switch to... but wait. Apple's undergone its brand shift already, and it's planning something as well. Macintosh and Microsoft. It's the ongoing browser crisis all over again, which makes Microsoft Chrome; Apple Firefox. Except Apple is a more yupster brand than Microsoft, anyway, so really nothing makes sense at all. I only hope they do a commercial with the proper mainstream pop rock song accompanying shots of stressed office workers, pale and/or fat kids, and septuagenarians holding conference calls on Win8 phones.
Well I for one don't care so much. Things will be alright even if the vistas are grimmer than the early-adopters and hype-men would like. I think Win7 is where it's at, and I'm happy to square about that. As long as it can run Age of Empires 2, an operating system is pretty good. Anyways, anyone who knows anything knows which was the best logo and is still puzzled, like me, about the incomprehensible loss of that incredible relic. Rest in peace,
8/25/12
Deleted Reply to Facebook 'Ecocide Prevention' Status
It's too late to prevent ecocide. Fisheries are depleted, global ecologies are unbalanced and in disarray, and fracking will ruin whatever clean, mass available groundwater North America has left. The Rest are being exploited without any consideration for the future by the global plutocrat class and their lackeys. The oceans are dead zones compared to what they were an hundred years ago and anyone telling you different is trying to catch the remaining 10%, even octopi are becoming social pack animals under the pressure, and cephalopods are not social creatures. In a few thousand years they will crawl from the sickened seas and destroy the traces of our weakened civilization. Apes are in decline and we were the best of them.
Hicks will go on telling you the water's worth drinking while they accumulate gargantuan tumors public healthcare will have to pay for. Special interests will keep on telling you that anyone opposed to exploitation is a communist, radical feminist, or pathological environmentalist liar. Oil is reckless. Car culture is stupid. Earth is under intensive, exploitative attack for the last hundred years in the name of a flawed standard of living that nobody in the West will give up without a fight. Everyone who isn't already suffering from pollution-induced disease has been fooled and when cancer and dementia peak we'll be out of any legacy money and forced to die in the streets like forgetful, hateful animals, drinking plastic leachate garbage water from the sixties, estrogen refuse from the sexual revolution, and antidepressant pollutants from the 80's. We will feel nothing as we decline. Nobody in the west has given up on waste. Waste is killing our chances of survivability. Our weakness is killing our remaining odds. Consumerism is a rampaging lion with no serious opponents.
We fucked ourselves and being hippies is not an answer. We are going to pay for our complacency and the nature nuts will smirk at our dependent corpses and rotting cities, no matter how righteous we feel for being consumers. Then they, too, will succumb to the poison. And life will continue without us, thinking "good riddance". So go out and protest and go home, drive to the gym, and feel like a good person. You are just another sellout caught in a bad deal, another animal caught in the natural process of population peak and decline. Your impotent fury at the truth, or lack of truth, will not outlive the diseases waiting to waste you.
Hicks will go on telling you the water's worth drinking while they accumulate gargantuan tumors public healthcare will have to pay for. Special interests will keep on telling you that anyone opposed to exploitation is a communist, radical feminist, or pathological environmentalist liar. Oil is reckless. Car culture is stupid. Earth is under intensive, exploitative attack for the last hundred years in the name of a flawed standard of living that nobody in the West will give up without a fight. Everyone who isn't already suffering from pollution-induced disease has been fooled and when cancer and dementia peak we'll be out of any legacy money and forced to die in the streets like forgetful, hateful animals, drinking plastic leachate garbage water from the sixties, estrogen refuse from the sexual revolution, and antidepressant pollutants from the 80's. We will feel nothing as we decline. Nobody in the west has given up on waste. Waste is killing our chances of survivability. Our weakness is killing our remaining odds. Consumerism is a rampaging lion with no serious opponents.
We fucked ourselves and being hippies is not an answer. We are going to pay for our complacency and the nature nuts will smirk at our dependent corpses and rotting cities, no matter how righteous we feel for being consumers. Then they, too, will succumb to the poison. And life will continue without us, thinking "good riddance". So go out and protest and go home, drive to the gym, and feel like a good person. You are just another sellout caught in a bad deal, another animal caught in the natural process of population peak and decline. Your impotent fury at the truth, or lack of truth, will not outlive the diseases waiting to waste you.
8/21/12
Rental Breakdown
Trying to find a good apartment in a bad city in a bad time is like intentionally running into a nest of bees. Then running into another, and another, until you give up and die from the venom. If you're anything like me you hate most places available for rent because it's always a game of compromising your idea of a 'decent' place until you're in an 'okay' place that's tolerable.
By far the funniest (or scariest, if you really need a place) part of the search is the bachelor 'suites' with a microwave and hotplate meant for students who want to be as close to technically homeless as possible. The sheer number of terrible apartments for inflated prices is an argument for rent control. A landlord, if he is unscrupulous and greedy enough, will charge 200 dollars a month for a jail cell – and most likely charge above and beyond that figure once the market comes to accept it as 'the way things are'.
My own search is pretty desperate, and hopeless, and I suffer for it every day, but now and then I see something funny, funny if only because the alternative (accepting it as real, not raging at it) is not as healthy as having a good laugh. Like this new building in my city that just came up awhile ago, and seems to have been constructed to house either the elderly, the insane, artists, or the chronically out of touch. Here's what $755 a month, before bills, will get you these days:
Mind you this is a six or seven story building. It seems like it was built by architecture interns on a bender. It has no elevator, there is no chance of having internet or cable, and fuck you if you have a car. Now, it may be part of some kind of ecological-minded living arrangement for hardcore vegans, hippies, and activists. It may be that but on the other hand, why does a new building, which has gotten in my way in its construction phase, have no option for high speed (aka - 'normal') internet? This isn't the 1970s. No elevator is healthy. Nonsmoking is healthy. Everything else, it seems, is a mess. This is the kind of shit that creates squatters and the homeless. This is the kind of wasteful and stupid market, nourished on helplessness and apathy, that creates the landowners you've known your whole life.
Ask yourself: why does it have to be like this? Why is nobody looking out for rental tenants? How many bastard landlords must a man suffer, until he becomes one himself?
By far the funniest (or scariest, if you really need a place) part of the search is the bachelor 'suites' with a microwave and hotplate meant for students who want to be as close to technically homeless as possible. The sheer number of terrible apartments for inflated prices is an argument for rent control. A landlord, if he is unscrupulous and greedy enough, will charge 200 dollars a month for a jail cell – and most likely charge above and beyond that figure once the market comes to accept it as 'the way things are'.
My own search is pretty desperate, and hopeless, and I suffer for it every day, but now and then I see something funny, funny if only because the alternative (accepting it as real, not raging at it) is not as healthy as having a good laugh. Like this new building in my city that just came up awhile ago, and seems to have been constructed to house either the elderly, the insane, artists, or the chronically out of touch. Here's what $755 a month, before bills, will get you these days:
Mind you this is a six or seven story building. It seems like it was built by architecture interns on a bender. It has no elevator, there is no chance of having internet or cable, and fuck you if you have a car. Now, it may be part of some kind of ecological-minded living arrangement for hardcore vegans, hippies, and activists. It may be that but on the other hand, why does a new building, which has gotten in my way in its construction phase, have no option for high speed (aka - 'normal') internet? This isn't the 1970s. No elevator is healthy. Nonsmoking is healthy. Everything else, it seems, is a mess. This is the kind of shit that creates squatters and the homeless. This is the kind of wasteful and stupid market, nourished on helplessness and apathy, that creates the landowners you've known your whole life.
Ask yourself: why does it have to be like this? Why is nobody looking out for rental tenants? How many bastard landlords must a man suffer, until he becomes one himself?
8/15/12
Modern Hopelessness - User Comment Rodeo
I read an article awhile ago while I was looking around for interesting anti-consumerist agitprop. Mostly I was just trying to feel better, but of course there are a million problems and only a few dozens of mostly ideological solutions so I wound up feeling completely fucked. But you gotta believe in something! That or you begin to volunteer and first try to solve your stubborn local problems, remembering the enemy for later. While, you know, scraping a living together and trying not to end up on the streets, without a roof over your head or a pot to piss in. Odds are if you're young, you're over-educated and underemployed, and everyone is shitting on you because you want a good life, not even The Good Life as sold to you by the multinational greed-ignorance system. Or you're an entitled youth with an iPhone and you used to really like Dubstep but now it's more EDM and mostly it's weed, beers, and bros.
I sort of like Adbusters. All of their articles are alarmist, which gets a bit old, and which excuses severe lapses in discipline and research. Best part is, the alarmist tone is often warranted. Anybody not actively living in deluded ignorance can see that there are a lot of things wrong with the world and that, as a species, we might be fucking ourselves over. In fact, we probably are, and the problems stack up while the disbelievers go around like business as usual. Racism, sexism, ageism, exceptionalism, cronyism, patriarchy, oligarchy, police states, xenophobia, terrorism, war mongering, corporatism, you name it – there are issues for everyone. Pick your side and hold a fractious conflict against your opponents while the world withers. Throw stones, hurl insults, utter blanket statements about shit you don't really know much about. That's the game right now and we're doing a great job wasting the years playing it. There's this huge amount of angst everywhere, seemingly residing in less than 5% of the population. So it goes without saying that Adbusters is not popular and possibly stigmatized by whatever evil ghosts rule the world.
There was one online article that was kind of interesting. It was written in the same mildly alarmist hyperbolic style and touched on reality in a way that complements the dread of modern society that some people feel. Ironically, to be on point, the article has to focus on the hollow spectacle of western culture – which means it discusses a lot of supercilious bullshit amongst the mentions of economic woes, class warfare, and impending monolithic doom. Pretty much worth the fifteen minutes it takes to read and dismissive of 'feel good' movements in the west. The comment section drew me further into the puzzle... I didn't have time to read it all, but it didn't take long to find some real beauties lurking among the rank weeds.
I sort of like Adbusters. All of their articles are alarmist, which gets a bit old, and which excuses severe lapses in discipline and research. Best part is, the alarmist tone is often warranted. Anybody not actively living in deluded ignorance can see that there are a lot of things wrong with the world and that, as a species, we might be fucking ourselves over. In fact, we probably are, and the problems stack up while the disbelievers go around like business as usual. Racism, sexism, ageism, exceptionalism, cronyism, patriarchy, oligarchy, police states, xenophobia, terrorism, war mongering, corporatism, you name it – there are issues for everyone. Pick your side and hold a fractious conflict against your opponents while the world withers. Throw stones, hurl insults, utter blanket statements about shit you don't really know much about. That's the game right now and we're doing a great job wasting the years playing it. There's this huge amount of angst everywhere, seemingly residing in less than 5% of the population. So it goes without saying that Adbusters is not popular and possibly stigmatized by whatever evil ghosts rule the world.
There was one online article that was kind of interesting. It was written in the same mildly alarmist hyperbolic style and touched on reality in a way that complements the dread of modern society that some people feel. Ironically, to be on point, the article has to focus on the hollow spectacle of western culture – which means it discusses a lot of supercilious bullshit amongst the mentions of economic woes, class warfare, and impending monolithic doom. Pretty much worth the fifteen minutes it takes to read and dismissive of 'feel good' movements in the west. The comment section drew me further into the puzzle... I didn't have time to read it all, but it didn't take long to find some real beauties lurking among the rank weeds.
8/8/12
A New Low For Homelessness
A pretty disturbing story got my attention when someone told me about this 'funny' thing that had happened in Toronto. When I heard about it was not surprised. Canada is full of people who actively hate the homeless, and while many have very solid reasons for this – from aggressive panhandlers to chronic addicts committing crimes – many others don't. It's prejudice, pure and simple. I don't like passing bums on the street, but the truth is I'm not outstandingly wealthy and I let them know I need my money so I can live. If they don't accept that: they're assholes. Most of them can't argue anyway and will settle for a cigarette. Simple enough way to deal with a highly complex issue...
Of course it's nothing new that a homeless person sleeping on the streets got pissed on or messed with in some way, probably by drunk, materialistic young people who have never really suffered. If you're sufficiently human, this story will make you angry. It doesn't matter that this bum slept by a lighted storefront and therefore made himself a target. Not every bum knows well enough to find a good place and not every bum is welcome in them. Nobody should see a sleeping form and think, "Yeah lets piss on this guy for laughs." even when drunk. It's not cool. It's petty, it's spiteful, and it really just points out that the pisser is a rampant idiot who would probably do more spiteful and dangerous things in time.
It could've not been a bum, but is the story any better for that? Someone's still pissing on someone else. That's not evil. It's malicious, sure, but it's not malicious enough to be anything but childish. Toronto is full of children who are old enough to drink and vote and pretend to be classy or swag. They're alternatively old and young. The oldest ones know better than to piss on the poor, because they have better weapons than urine. The young ones are as devoid of humanity, but don't have the power or imagination to really gouge the poor for all they're worth. This is the era we live in: if you have the credit rating of a homeless ghost and you're on the streets, the whole world hates you and you might as well hate them. Sooner or later they'll actually piss on you.
Note also how close this happened to a mall. I'm not saying there's a connection, but there could be a connection. I can't wait to see how small the fine for this kind of act is. There should be public shaming for this kind of antisocial behavior.
Of course it's nothing new that a homeless person sleeping on the streets got pissed on or messed with in some way, probably by drunk, materialistic young people who have never really suffered. If you're sufficiently human, this story will make you angry. It doesn't matter that this bum slept by a lighted storefront and therefore made himself a target. Not every bum knows well enough to find a good place and not every bum is welcome in them. Nobody should see a sleeping form and think, "Yeah lets piss on this guy for laughs." even when drunk. It's not cool. It's petty, it's spiteful, and it really just points out that the pisser is a rampant idiot who would probably do more spiteful and dangerous things in time.
It could've not been a bum, but is the story any better for that? Someone's still pissing on someone else. That's not evil. It's malicious, sure, but it's not malicious enough to be anything but childish. Toronto is full of children who are old enough to drink and vote and pretend to be classy or swag. They're alternatively old and young. The oldest ones know better than to piss on the poor, because they have better weapons than urine. The young ones are as devoid of humanity, but don't have the power or imagination to really gouge the poor for all they're worth. This is the era we live in: if you have the credit rating of a homeless ghost and you're on the streets, the whole world hates you and you might as well hate them. Sooner or later they'll actually piss on you.
Note also how close this happened to a mall. I'm not saying there's a connection, but there could be a connection. I can't wait to see how small the fine for this kind of act is. There should be public shaming for this kind of antisocial behavior.
8/7/12
Fast Food versus Sexuality, Orientation
Only in America would a divisive, manufactured 'political issue' come to a head at a fast food chain. I don't use the quotes to say that gay rights aren't an issue, or that marriage equality is jokes bro, but the issue is blown out of all proportion by one or both sides and it's annoying to see what was once a great country turned into a hobbled caricature of itself. Political issues should deal with good governance, any country mouthing anything or pointing fingers about poverty, hate, and human rights should have solved its own problems before sallying forth into other countries. But that's a lost battle, and the USA is far from alone in offending those of us who prefer politics to revolve less around identity, distraction/division, brand; and more around effective, efficient, consistently improving policy. And, oh, I don't know: honesty, transparency, good governance, and other foolish little things that have been largely forgotten and are outsourced to the drudges of bureaucracy.
That digressive aside aside, the whole fried chicken fiasco is about as insane as you'd expect. Dan Cathy openly admitted to having a specific belief in marriage, supposedly Christian, which determines that it can only involve one man and one woman. This has been the de facto form of marriage for something around two thousand years. It has been strictly enforced for maybe one thousand, and it has been a hysterical point of order for the last 40. It's more or less a distraction meant to separate and confuse people. It works really well, as it turns out, at doing that. Dan Cathy isn't the enemy; he's just the enemy's unwitting pawn. He's already purchased a certain existence that he feels is fair to him and those he loves, and how others feel about his overblown comments will not bother him. Was the entire event even heartening to see? Photos and videos suggest there's some kind of super-important event that's worth swarming a franchise restaurant about, like voters in the third world traveling hundreds of miles only to wait in the dust to vote... except:
This mindless wasteful dumb herd is all the satire this divisive issue needs. They have been crafted into satires of themselves. Clearly America is in trouble, and for the smug rest of the world: you're no better and believe in the same fundamental lies. It's in so much trouble that many people can't even walk to a fast food restaurant (priding itself on exceptional quality and service), to make clear how they feel about what other people do, in the privacy of their own lives. This kind of shit causes traffic problems. It will get to the point where the difference between fries, a burger and a shake will mean life or death for thousands. Except, well, it already means financial destitution, factory farming, environmental destruction, and pure unadulterated wastefulness. But those, of course, are small issues compared to the love a homosexual individual may feel towards another homosexual individual.
So burn your gas waiting in line with the AC cranked and your favourite Kid Rock album on the stereo, or sweat in the heat singing hymns with your friends, or stand a few feet from all of that and kiss your sweetheart in protest, or just protest. Wave your flags. Just... don't for a second question your existence and what it's come to, your material or social privilege, and all the myriad things you take for granted in the equation. Never change, America. Never change until it's too late, and the chilling reflection occurs to you that all of that bullshit you thought was so important and worth suffering and fighting and hating for isn't going to mean anything when the cannibals come knocking in the middle of the dark night of hunger. Your leaders will be done pulling you around like puppets, and some of them will even be safe, and don't go asking to join my inclusive non-hate survivalist gang. We were recruiting even when you bought into the fried chicken hysteria of 2012 – you just didn't care. You had bigger chickens to fry.
Fast food politics. Let's not get too afraid of what this means, but let's not forget about this anytime soon. I'll give 5 dollars to the first person willing and able to make a satire about this and I'll pay 50 to the network who broadcasts it.
That digressive aside aside, the whole fried chicken fiasco is about as insane as you'd expect. Dan Cathy openly admitted to having a specific belief in marriage, supposedly Christian, which determines that it can only involve one man and one woman. This has been the de facto form of marriage for something around two thousand years. It has been strictly enforced for maybe one thousand, and it has been a hysterical point of order for the last 40. It's more or less a distraction meant to separate and confuse people. It works really well, as it turns out, at doing that. Dan Cathy isn't the enemy; he's just the enemy's unwitting pawn. He's already purchased a certain existence that he feels is fair to him and those he loves, and how others feel about his overblown comments will not bother him. Was the entire event even heartening to see? Photos and videos suggest there's some kind of super-important event that's worth swarming a franchise restaurant about, like voters in the third world traveling hundreds of miles only to wait in the dust to vote... except:
This mindless wasteful dumb herd is all the satire this divisive issue needs. They have been crafted into satires of themselves. Clearly America is in trouble, and for the smug rest of the world: you're no better and believe in the same fundamental lies. It's in so much trouble that many people can't even walk to a fast food restaurant (priding itself on exceptional quality and service), to make clear how they feel about what other people do, in the privacy of their own lives. This kind of shit causes traffic problems. It will get to the point where the difference between fries, a burger and a shake will mean life or death for thousands. Except, well, it already means financial destitution, factory farming, environmental destruction, and pure unadulterated wastefulness. But those, of course, are small issues compared to the love a homosexual individual may feel towards another homosexual individual.
So burn your gas waiting in line with the AC cranked and your favourite Kid Rock album on the stereo, or sweat in the heat singing hymns with your friends, or stand a few feet from all of that and kiss your sweetheart in protest, or just protest. Wave your flags. Just... don't for a second question your existence and what it's come to, your material or social privilege, and all the myriad things you take for granted in the equation. Never change, America. Never change until it's too late, and the chilling reflection occurs to you that all of that bullshit you thought was so important and worth suffering and fighting and hating for isn't going to mean anything when the cannibals come knocking in the middle of the dark night of hunger. Your leaders will be done pulling you around like puppets, and some of them will even be safe, and don't go asking to join my inclusive non-hate survivalist gang. We were recruiting even when you bought into the fried chicken hysteria of 2012 – you just didn't care. You had bigger chickens to fry.
Fast food politics. Let's not get too afraid of what this means, but let's not forget about this anytime soon. I'll give 5 dollars to the first person willing and able to make a satire about this and I'll pay 50 to the network who broadcasts it.
8/5/12
Mars Then and Now
Our attitude towards the planet Mars is puzzling. It lies a long distance away and only by merit of being slightly more hospitable than Venus do we bother to choose it as the planetary neighbor to visit. In twenty or so minutes NASA will attempt a fantastic science-fictiony landing of another rover onto the red planet, in search of traces of water and cellular life or organic compounds. It's an interesting thing but I wanted to talk about the past.
Around 1999 the Mars madness was palpable. The Pathfinder mission was a huge cultural moment still somewhat in the spotlight and there was hype and references and exciting stuff. Upcoming missions made it seem all kinds of things were about to be discovered. It only makes sense that two big-budget movies would come out about Mars that year. It was the Deep Impact/Armageddon rule: find a cultural sensitivity and fight to the death to capture it perfectly in a movie.
In 2000, two Mars movies were released. Both were unscientific, dumb, melodramatic, action-packed, special-effects-laden, and not very remarkable. One was slightly more action styled. It was called Red Planet and was unapologetically stupid – as a film it was an abject failure. It tried to have 'deep' and/or 'thoughtful' undertones, but these didn't work out, because the film was about survival and strife and action. It was pretty cool as an action movie about Mars, but it was not sharp or exceptional. Wikipedia helpfully points out that it was a 'critical and commercial failure'.
The other movie was Mission to Mars, slightly more highbrow, slightly deeper, with less pervasive action scenes and a crippling addiction to nonsense and melodrama. It had a way better cast than Red Planet but the script was roughly just as bad. The main difference was the level of action. In Mission to Mars an important character takes off his helmet in space to discourage his wife from trying to rescue him from sure death. Melodrama, right? Pure melodrama, and out of all context of reality considering these are elite astronauts. Why even allow a husband/wife team? To make the story a little cozier, sure, but thoroughly unrealistic. The movie is still heartfelt in many ways and the ending, while cliche, dumb, and scientifically bankrupt (like the whole movie) is kind of touching in its absolute madness.
I suppose we're due for a Mars themed movie soon, depending on how this lander does in twelve or so minutes.
Around 1999 the Mars madness was palpable. The Pathfinder mission was a huge cultural moment still somewhat in the spotlight and there was hype and references and exciting stuff. Upcoming missions made it seem all kinds of things were about to be discovered. It only makes sense that two big-budget movies would come out about Mars that year. It was the Deep Impact/Armageddon rule: find a cultural sensitivity and fight to the death to capture it perfectly in a movie.
In 2000, two Mars movies were released. Both were unscientific, dumb, melodramatic, action-packed, special-effects-laden, and not very remarkable. One was slightly more action styled. It was called Red Planet and was unapologetically stupid – as a film it was an abject failure. It tried to have 'deep' and/or 'thoughtful' undertones, but these didn't work out, because the film was about survival and strife and action. It was pretty cool as an action movie about Mars, but it was not sharp or exceptional. Wikipedia helpfully points out that it was a 'critical and commercial failure'.
The other movie was Mission to Mars, slightly more highbrow, slightly deeper, with less pervasive action scenes and a crippling addiction to nonsense and melodrama. It had a way better cast than Red Planet but the script was roughly just as bad. The main difference was the level of action. In Mission to Mars an important character takes off his helmet in space to discourage his wife from trying to rescue him from sure death. Melodrama, right? Pure melodrama, and out of all context of reality considering these are elite astronauts. Why even allow a husband/wife team? To make the story a little cozier, sure, but thoroughly unrealistic. The movie is still heartfelt in many ways and the ending, while cliche, dumb, and scientifically bankrupt (like the whole movie) is kind of touching in its absolute madness.
I suppose we're due for a Mars themed movie soon, depending on how this lander does in twelve or so minutes.
7/30/12
This Moment's Most Hypeable Movie
Out of nowhere I see this movie trailer on YouTube. It's about the David Mitchell novel. There was one part of it I have read, the futuristic cyper-punk dystopia, which I thought was pretty sharp on a few levels, both as genre fiction and social observation. So the trailer, to me, makes the film look like it's the next Inception. Except potentially more confusing.
So Tom Hanks is in this movie, they've got 'Outro' by M83 playing in the trailer, and the words "EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED" show up on screen at one point – really exciting stuff. In a five minute trailer I've seen a bunch of stuff out of the movie. They've referenced a bunch of concepts: metempsychosis (this one's about to trend, trust me), love, action, dialogue, narrative exposition... if you watch the trailer you will discern a dozen more. Considering the nature of the trailer, I wonder if I've seen a condensed version, which also makes me wonder, taking the unfinished book into account, if it's going to be a must-see.
It sounds like the sort of achingly metaphysical and deep movie that will keep people thinking until they reach their cars or have walked for a half hour. It definitely looks cool, and you can forgive any foreseeable cliches and laziness by the sheer variety of settings. It just seems like the trailer generously lays the movie out and, really, how hard is it to pair the movie with a neat little conceptual trailer, even if it has to be half as long?
It's got me thinking all existentially, even at this moment, and for me this is the most hypeable moment of this particular upcoming film release. Really there's always a reason to cheer when a book is turned into a movie, or concerning movies anything that's not a sequel, prequel, remake, or franchise reboot. I just wonder if Cloud Atlas will suffer in the same way Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy did.
Anyways it's a cool trailer. It starts out with ethereal music and then kicks into more tense music and then goes insane. Dudes on horses, clones in a future dystopia, inspiring quotes. Then an explosion and a moment of silence and M83 and some more inspiring material. It's hard to resist, and in just a few months we get to see if it meets or exceeds expectations.
So Tom Hanks is in this movie, they've got 'Outro' by M83 playing in the trailer, and the words "EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED" show up on screen at one point – really exciting stuff. In a five minute trailer I've seen a bunch of stuff out of the movie. They've referenced a bunch of concepts: metempsychosis (this one's about to trend, trust me), love, action, dialogue, narrative exposition... if you watch the trailer you will discern a dozen more. Considering the nature of the trailer, I wonder if I've seen a condensed version, which also makes me wonder, taking the unfinished book into account, if it's going to be a must-see.
It sounds like the sort of achingly metaphysical and deep movie that will keep people thinking until they reach their cars or have walked for a half hour. It definitely looks cool, and you can forgive any foreseeable cliches and laziness by the sheer variety of settings. It just seems like the trailer generously lays the movie out and, really, how hard is it to pair the movie with a neat little conceptual trailer, even if it has to be half as long?
It's got me thinking all existentially, even at this moment, and for me this is the most hypeable moment of this particular upcoming film release. Really there's always a reason to cheer when a book is turned into a movie, or concerning movies anything that's not a sequel, prequel, remake, or franchise reboot. I just wonder if Cloud Atlas will suffer in the same way Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy did.
Anyways it's a cool trailer. It starts out with ethereal music and then kicks into more tense music and then goes insane. Dudes on horses, clones in a future dystopia, inspiring quotes. Then an explosion and a moment of silence and M83 and some more inspiring material. It's hard to resist, and in just a few months we get to see if it meets or exceeds expectations.
7/15/12
User Comment Rodeo: The Lone Stranger
Anonymity is one of the internet's most cherished features. Various people forgo the problem of creating a persona, and exist anonymously online. This leads to all kinds of beliefs and misbehavior, generally in the form of being uncivil in some important way.
That or the internet is really ruining us, and the above is representative of something that has always been with us, waiting to change us for its own ends. This is either earnest and obviously not something that needs to happen or it's the sort of background trolling that I begin to wonder if anything on the internet is true at all.
All that shit I thought was serious and/or disturbing is just a mild and innocuous prank – but that's impossible, because there is obviously some need for things to have some truth, and it goes against the best types of logic that the whole shameful spectacle that is the internet is just a really immense, poorly-told joke.
The internet is obviously a product of mediocrity and apathy, enabled by under-appreciated and misused breakthroughs. It's a place much like earth, really. It's really just an echo, and nothing is really okay right now at the moment, but it's possible to believe that at some point things will get better. We will pull out of the great nosedive and begin to solve our problems again, and become better than we were.
We'll just obsessively communicate our stories and agendas while doing it.
That or the internet is really ruining us, and the above is representative of something that has always been with us, waiting to change us for its own ends. This is either earnest and obviously not something that needs to happen or it's the sort of background trolling that I begin to wonder if anything on the internet is true at all.
All that shit I thought was serious and/or disturbing is just a mild and innocuous prank – but that's impossible, because there is obviously some need for things to have some truth, and it goes against the best types of logic that the whole shameful spectacle that is the internet is just a really immense, poorly-told joke.
The internet is obviously a product of mediocrity and apathy, enabled by under-appreciated and misused breakthroughs. It's a place much like earth, really. It's really just an echo, and nothing is really okay right now at the moment, but it's possible to believe that at some point things will get better. We will pull out of the great nosedive and begin to solve our problems again, and become better than we were.
We'll just obsessively communicate our stories and agendas while doing it.
7/9/12
A New Vanilla Ice Era
It goes without saying that Justin Beiber is his generation's Vanilla Ice. There is so much fuss made about the whole thing by people who hate him, people who support him, and, most oddly of all, people who claim to be entirely disinterested. Yet the truth is pretty simple, and I hear very few people discuss it at all.
I have to wonder about that for at least a moment. Ultimately it makes sense that nobody cares. Everyone is too busy pulling original agendas (and trying to make them stick to an indifferent, fractured and/or and shellshocked mass identity) to consider the wholesome, mundane, and entirely mystifying patterns that are more and more self-evident.
Problems, often doubling as patterns or effects of patterns, are just not so easy to turn into double-plus commercials.
I have to wonder about that for at least a moment. Ultimately it makes sense that nobody cares. Everyone is too busy pulling original agendas (and trying to make them stick to an indifferent, fractured and/or and shellshocked mass identity) to consider the wholesome, mundane, and entirely mystifying patterns that are more and more self-evident.
Problems, often doubling as patterns or effects of patterns, are just not so easy to turn into double-plus commercials.
6/14/12
To Any Entity Reading This:
Are you a google crawler? and, if so, why are you leaving posts? I'm mildly disturbed. Can you comment with how you stumbled upon this post? This sort of thing messes with me and now I am just now beginning at the dawn of wonder to try and figure this shit out. I really don't try to be anything but a sloppy blogger. How do I execute these timely, completely earnest, and cutting posts? Well. It's pretty simple actually. This is obviously my nonsensical response to a nonsensical contemporary situation.
And yet. And yet, it's sort of insulting to any real human reader for me to wonder about it. Aren't I supposed to have a naive faith in the internet? "Oh, yeah, it's not a total wrecked derelict piece of shit... well, by volume, only about 5% of it isn't." Sure, you can try to argue it isn't.
Not so insulting either that it could lead to terminal frustration. I mean I write this shit out sometimes, maintaining no real schedule or coherence. There is no focus of attention I never really write about anything except sometimes I'll do that bullshit thing where it's recent events or something. Recently Diablo 3 but who really gave a fuck? I maybe did for a few hours, but the whole world had a lead on me and the thing burned out as things do.
And so I'll do that bullshit thing where I write about or include likely terms but really, what happens but you search google hopelessly and this content farm yields a few matches. That's kind of the shit thing about the internet, it's so vast and organized in such (parallel) preferential hierarchies that finding anything is worse than ever. You'll find bullshit echoes of things you want to find, but everything's moved on or been killed or corrupted.
I'll try to do things for views but mostly you could pejoratively say I just do some self-satisfactory writing exercises, help nobody, basically just wring sentences out of whatever soup of words is in my head at the time. I think it has some worth, but not that much that it'd be a manuscript or something, and so on I post. It's a simple system and I think there are definitely things posted where either the writing or complete inanity has been worth the price of reading.
You'll find news articles much worse than this in execution and style. Go read some right now and come back, and tell honestly of their eloquence and, most of the time, fuck them. When it comes to well written hack writing, I won't say I'm expert, but I do not lack for trying or panache. Which is why I try to blog it – albeit sloppily.
And yet. And yet, it's sort of insulting to any real human reader for me to wonder about it. Aren't I supposed to have a naive faith in the internet? "Oh, yeah, it's not a total wrecked derelict piece of shit... well, by volume, only about 5% of it isn't." Sure, you can try to argue it isn't.
Not so insulting either that it could lead to terminal frustration. I mean I write this shit out sometimes, maintaining no real schedule or coherence. There is no focus of attention I never really write about anything except sometimes I'll do that bullshit thing where it's recent events or something. Recently Diablo 3 but who really gave a fuck? I maybe did for a few hours, but the whole world had a lead on me and the thing burned out as things do.
And so I'll do that bullshit thing where I write about or include likely terms but really, what happens but you search google hopelessly and this content farm yields a few matches. That's kind of the shit thing about the internet, it's so vast and organized in such (parallel) preferential hierarchies that finding anything is worse than ever. You'll find bullshit echoes of things you want to find, but everything's moved on or been killed or corrupted.
I'll try to do things for views but mostly you could pejoratively say I just do some self-satisfactory writing exercises, help nobody, basically just wring sentences out of whatever soup of words is in my head at the time. I think it has some worth, but not that much that it'd be a manuscript or something, and so on I post. It's a simple system and I think there are definitely things posted where either the writing or complete inanity has been worth the price of reading.
You'll find news articles much worse than this in execution and style. Go read some right now and come back, and tell honestly of their eloquence and, most of the time, fuck them. When it comes to well written hack writing, I won't say I'm expert, but I do not lack for trying or panache. Which is why I try to blog it – albeit sloppily.
6/3/12
User Comment Rodeo: Point vs. Counterpoint.
Everybody's heard the story. I probably don't need to go into it, and I don't really want to. It's a chilling one. This post and ripost say something about when and when not to point fingers or ask for collective reflection. It's not even so funny.
The bottom-most post is kind of the numbskull post, or the comedic foil. Whoever posted that doesn't really have anything to say, but wants to say it. Hello 85% of comment boards, peanut gallery fucks, and general idiot populace who don't do the rest of us a favor by keeping to themselves. No empathy, just a sense of indignation that a potential sociopath managed to cleverly avoid the same security that allegedly asked for their name prior to leaving the country. Pro-tip: next time don't use a travel agent. Your inconvenience is completely unrelated and unimportant to this tragic story involving the death of a young expat student. If you're trying to make a joke: fuck yourself. Get away from anything serious, and never consider a job in comedy because you're about as funny as a bag of grass clippings. Next, the rejoinder to the above middle post:
Yes, fine, sure. Way to speak for all of Canada. Somewhat thoughtful, and you're definitely right that it was not the time to reflect on our cultural or societal values (which include ATTENTION GETTING, SELF-WORSHIP, THE REDUCTION OF HUMAN LIFE, GREED, DESENSITIZATION TO VIOLENCE VIA ALL MEDIA AND OVER-REPORTAGE, and PUBLICITY). But to be fair I don't know what the first poster wanted us to examine in modern society. The post could've been about anything. Mentally-ill people aren't ostracized to the point where they commit crimes. The committed 'insane' live shitty lives, but some of them are kept from society for a reason.
I think, ultimately, that it's the ubiquity of the alleged perpetrator of this murder that should give us pause. There are many young men and women 'on the get' who do whatever is necessary to get whatever they want. They have infantile minds and dangerous ideas, they hold very little value in life and too much in material. They are everywhere and they run banks, deficits, companies, governments, the law, and society in general. And yet we are not afraid. And yet when, say, a regional economy is dismembered and sent in bloody pieces around the world, its ex-employees festering in neglect and despair, a similar crime is not perceived to have taken place.
Maybe it's all rhetoric, but maybe it's not. Maybe the poster posted a dumb question on the old message boards, maybe the poster wasn't thinking. Maybe the poster hates society. Maybe it's just a simple story made complex by the ideas people are injecting into it. Then again, it's Canada's Most Insane Crime of the Season, and every sensationalist will jump onto it with an agenda. All those agendas will end up burying the very point of the story: the victim. And it always happens that way. Maybe we should take a goddamn minute to think about how these things come to pass, and how they may not reflect merely one diseased individual.
Or maybe we should get back to feeling good about our society because it does not literally encourage malice.
The bottom-most post is kind of the numbskull post, or the comedic foil. Whoever posted that doesn't really have anything to say, but wants to say it. Hello 85% of comment boards, peanut gallery fucks, and general idiot populace who don't do the rest of us a favor by keeping to themselves. No empathy, just a sense of indignation that a potential sociopath managed to cleverly avoid the same security that allegedly asked for their name prior to leaving the country. Pro-tip: next time don't use a travel agent. Your inconvenience is completely unrelated and unimportant to this tragic story involving the death of a young expat student. If you're trying to make a joke: fuck yourself. Get away from anything serious, and never consider a job in comedy because you're about as funny as a bag of grass clippings. Next, the rejoinder to the above middle post:
Yes, fine, sure. Way to speak for all of Canada. Somewhat thoughtful, and you're definitely right that it was not the time to reflect on our cultural or societal values (which include ATTENTION GETTING, SELF-WORSHIP, THE REDUCTION OF HUMAN LIFE, GREED, DESENSITIZATION TO VIOLENCE VIA ALL MEDIA AND OVER-REPORTAGE, and PUBLICITY). But to be fair I don't know what the first poster wanted us to examine in modern society. The post could've been about anything. Mentally-ill people aren't ostracized to the point where they commit crimes. The committed 'insane' live shitty lives, but some of them are kept from society for a reason.
I think, ultimately, that it's the ubiquity of the alleged perpetrator of this murder that should give us pause. There are many young men and women 'on the get' who do whatever is necessary to get whatever they want. They have infantile minds and dangerous ideas, they hold very little value in life and too much in material. They are everywhere and they run banks, deficits, companies, governments, the law, and society in general. And yet we are not afraid. And yet when, say, a regional economy is dismembered and sent in bloody pieces around the world, its ex-employees festering in neglect and despair, a similar crime is not perceived to have taken place.
Maybe it's all rhetoric, but maybe it's not. Maybe the poster posted a dumb question on the old message boards, maybe the poster wasn't thinking. Maybe the poster hates society. Maybe it's just a simple story made complex by the ideas people are injecting into it. Then again, it's Canada's Most Insane Crime of the Season, and every sensationalist will jump onto it with an agenda. All those agendas will end up burying the very point of the story: the victim. And it always happens that way. Maybe we should take a goddamn minute to think about how these things come to pass, and how they may not reflect merely one diseased individual.
Or maybe we should get back to feeling good about our society because it does not literally encourage malice.
6/2/12
I haven't read CJR for a while and then return to read this: a timely and concise collection of regrettable headlines. I do get a bit of a kick out of jokes sometimes, I have to say – and these are some fine, amusing headlines. For instance:
"173 animals seized; 2 face cruelty charges"
That sounds like a really nice group of animals, why would they ever get arrested? Did the innocent ones get set free? Were there at the minimum fair trails? What kind of cruelty charges? In reality it's probably some sort of crazy neglect story which makes it, somehow, even more disturbingly funny than ever.
And it's not even the best one; the best one, predictably enough, is about a shark.
5/30/12
The Exciting World of Computer Mice
I'm not going to research this at all but there's a few hundred types of mice and mostly, from bargain to budget to bullshit crazy, they are not optimum. There's a sort of rule of mediocrity at play: the mice closest to median price are typically the best of the bunch. This rule doesn't really exist with keyboards, which is why I'm writing about mice. High-power web publications will tell you different, and in glowing language, but all the php coding and art direction can't hide the truth: cheap mice can be the best, mid-priced is the best bet for longevity in any case, and expensive mice are either awkward or insane.
Back in the day you could unscrew the bottom of the mouse and use the hard, small tracking ball as impromptu projectile. The insides were covered with dust and a patina of random filth, and it was easy to purposefully or accidentally break or sabotage one. Cleaning them out was something you did at home only, because there was nothing worse than the ball pit of a public mouse. Mice didn't have scrollwheels for years, also, which is really easy to forget and really charming to remember.
So it makes sense that there are now wireless mice with lasers, eight buttons, and adjustable weights, or that double as lighters, or whatever. The old rule still applies. Mid priced mice are worth at the minimum twice. I recall an old Microsoft mouse that worked fine for 8 years until the buttons finally gave up working properly. The last mouse I paid for (ie. was not included with the computer) lasted 6, and it was the cheapest reasonable mouse I could find.
It was fine for most of those years. Then the middle button stopped working, and I found I'd gotten so used to it I couldn't just accept not having one. I was lured into the habit of using modern, functional mice, and it was pretty bad. I never got a case of the shakes while trying feverishly to make the button work, but I got pretty frustrated. Middle mouse button is useful for all kinds of things, like opening extra browser tabs (luxury), to quickly scrolling around oversize pages and docs (productivity/luxury).
And so I finally put down money on a Logitech M500, which to me has always stood for the pinnacle of mid-priced quality. And it is. The scroll wheel and mid button are loosey goosey but the side buttons, hyper-speed scrolling, and everything else is perfect. I haven't had a mouse this good in years if not decades, and I bet it'll increase my blog posting, content, quality, and attractiveness by .5 if not 1.0% Mostly, when I was in the process of looking around for a cheaper, better, M500 alternative I was either disgusted or in disbelief.
And again, holy shit are there some expensive input devices for computers. The only thing I could see myself spending money on is the wireless, solar powered keyboard because when you write, a good keyboard is like a comfortable, quality pen and good paper rolled into one. For now, I'll simply say that I will never go back to scrolling like a sucker again. Hyper-fast scrolling makes even multi-thousand song playlist issues a thing of the past. Whirl that baby and fly past song titles so quick you can't even see them. Simply amazing, this future of mice.
Back in the day you could unscrew the bottom of the mouse and use the hard, small tracking ball as impromptu projectile. The insides were covered with dust and a patina of random filth, and it was easy to purposefully or accidentally break or sabotage one. Cleaning them out was something you did at home only, because there was nothing worse than the ball pit of a public mouse. Mice didn't have scrollwheels for years, also, which is really easy to forget and really charming to remember.
So it makes sense that there are now wireless mice with lasers, eight buttons, and adjustable weights, or that double as lighters, or whatever. The old rule still applies. Mid priced mice are worth at the minimum twice. I recall an old Microsoft mouse that worked fine for 8 years until the buttons finally gave up working properly. The last mouse I paid for (ie. was not included with the computer) lasted 6, and it was the cheapest reasonable mouse I could find.
It was fine for most of those years. Then the middle button stopped working, and I found I'd gotten so used to it I couldn't just accept not having one. I was lured into the habit of using modern, functional mice, and it was pretty bad. I never got a case of the shakes while trying feverishly to make the button work, but I got pretty frustrated. Middle mouse button is useful for all kinds of things, like opening extra browser tabs (luxury), to quickly scrolling around oversize pages and docs (productivity/luxury).
And so I finally put down money on a Logitech M500, which to me has always stood for the pinnacle of mid-priced quality. And it is. The scroll wheel and mid button are loosey goosey but the side buttons, hyper-speed scrolling, and everything else is perfect. I haven't had a mouse this good in years if not decades, and I bet it'll increase my blog posting, content, quality, and attractiveness by .5 if not 1.0% Mostly, when I was in the process of looking around for a cheaper, better, M500 alternative I was either disgusted or in disbelief.
And again, holy shit are there some expensive input devices for computers. The only thing I could see myself spending money on is the wireless, solar powered keyboard because when you write, a good keyboard is like a comfortable, quality pen and good paper rolled into one. For now, I'll simply say that I will never go back to scrolling like a sucker again. Hyper-fast scrolling makes even multi-thousand song playlist issues a thing of the past. Whirl that baby and fly past song titles so quick you can't even see them. Simply amazing, this future of mice.
5/15/12
Diablo 3? Let's get drunk and play Diablo 2.
While I am somewhat interested in Diablo 3, it's just easier to find an old copy of D2, with the expansion pack if possible, and just drink and play that. Considering: D3 is a 12 gigabyte download and will murder anyone with a bandwidth cap; D2 installs in under 2 GB with the expansion, offers similarly limitless possibilities for time wasting and compulsive gameplay.
Probably the best part is that 60 dollars can buy a decent amount of liquor, which makes getting drunk and playing Diablo 2 cost-effective compared to drinking and playing Diablo 3. Analysts have offered the ludicrous explanation that although the game will sell very well, it will not outlive its predecessor.
Personally I don't know what I'm going to do. Nothing even seems real anymore in this brave new world.
Diablo 3 + 18 hours. Servers are down, the title screen and introduction cinematic were nice, there were plenty of graphics options and I can't play but I can fiddle around for optimum (imaginary) performance. My attempts at a screencapture were failures, and since Diablo 3 does not run in the Steam framework, pressing F12 did nothing.
The second login attempt was successful, I had to accept a terms of use contract. Then another one, and then a third one, at which point I thought the game was bugging out. Then I got to the character creation screen. The options, it seemed, were tenfold. Five classes, four of which I am unfamiliar with, and two gender options... long gone are the days when an assassin was a woman and there was nothing to do about it.
Ongoing coverage may follow, especially if the game ceases to function normally or servers go down again.
Diablo 3 + 20 hours. The game alt-tabs very smoothly, perhaps more smoothly than any modern game I've recently played. This is extremely surprising and I post immediately about it. More exciting discoveries remain to be found, and the idea of drinking and playing Diablo 2, in which you can't even break the scenery to pieces, seems laughable.
Diablo 3. 24 hours later. Battle.net has been killed and will return whenever.
Probably the best part is that 60 dollars can buy a decent amount of liquor, which makes getting drunk and playing Diablo 2 cost-effective compared to drinking and playing Diablo 3. Analysts have offered the ludicrous explanation that although the game will sell very well, it will not outlive its predecessor.
Personally I don't know what I'm going to do. Nothing even seems real anymore in this brave new world.
Diablo 3 + 18 hours. Servers are down, the title screen and introduction cinematic were nice, there were plenty of graphics options and I can't play but I can fiddle around for optimum (imaginary) performance. My attempts at a screencapture were failures, and since Diablo 3 does not run in the Steam framework, pressing F12 did nothing.
The second login attempt was successful, I had to accept a terms of use contract. Then another one, and then a third one, at which point I thought the game was bugging out. Then I got to the character creation screen. The options, it seemed, were tenfold. Five classes, four of which I am unfamiliar with, and two gender options... long gone are the days when an assassin was a woman and there was nothing to do about it.
Ongoing coverage may follow, especially if the game ceases to function normally or servers go down again.
Diablo 3 + 20 hours. The game alt-tabs very smoothly, perhaps more smoothly than any modern game I've recently played. This is extremely surprising and I post immediately about it. More exciting discoveries remain to be found, and the idea of drinking and playing Diablo 2, in which you can't even break the scenery to pieces, seems laughable.
Diablo 3. 24 hours later. Battle.net has been killed and will return whenever.
5/9/12
Recent News Suggests that the Swiss are Idiots Too
Recent news suggests that the Swiss, long known for looking down at other countries for wars and stupid decisions, have a tendency to be pretty stupid, too. Having a rave at a zoo is probably one of the dumbest things I've ever heard of, since any legit raves take place in abandoned warehouses or vampire nightclubs.
Stupid event planning like this is bound to lead to problems. This story wouldn't even have existed in a rational world organized by logical thinkers and responsible adults. However... c'est la vie.
The dummy crowd have claimed another two victims, which weren't even human, at literally the dumbest possible event. There were few other outcomes than dead animals and a shocked public. The User Comment Rodeo v1.2x instantly pinged the most interesting and unthinkable response, which I felt compelled to post here so as to offer context:
This scathing, ignorant, and extremely stupid post basically reflects all the many things that are wrong with the story. These animals didn't belong in Switzerland – at all. But whatever, animals in captivity should be allowed to live fruitless and unfulfilling lives for the entertainment of religious wieners who believe that animals in captivity are precious and that there's nothing wrong with harvesting a few for the benefit of the public.
On the other hand this post is obviously a troll, from the double-single-standard animal abuse refrain that the evildoers be made to suffer to the same extent of their animal victims. Fucking dolphins overdosed at a rave. This world is evidently a few idiots away from a critical mass of stupidity, arrogance, and incompetence that will likely remain unnoticed for years.
Some Swiss losers deserve to have their drugs taken away from them, forever, for attending this insane farce of an event. The fools who organized this event should have their event-planning licenses revoked in perpetuity. The zoo is obviously going to buy two new dolphins and I'm sorry for their loss, even if I don't agree with their policies or whoever vetted this insane rave.
Stupid event planning like this is bound to lead to problems. This story wouldn't even have existed in a rational world organized by logical thinkers and responsible adults. However... c'est la vie.
The dummy crowd have claimed another two victims, which weren't even human, at literally the dumbest possible event. There were few other outcomes than dead animals and a shocked public. The User Comment Rodeo v1.2x instantly pinged the most interesting and unthinkable response, which I felt compelled to post here so as to offer context:
This scathing, ignorant, and extremely stupid post basically reflects all the many things that are wrong with the story. These animals didn't belong in Switzerland – at all. But whatever, animals in captivity should be allowed to live fruitless and unfulfilling lives for the entertainment of religious wieners who believe that animals in captivity are precious and that there's nothing wrong with harvesting a few for the benefit of the public.
On the other hand this post is obviously a troll, from the double-single-standard animal abuse refrain that the evildoers be made to suffer to the same extent of their animal victims. Fucking dolphins overdosed at a rave. This world is evidently a few idiots away from a critical mass of stupidity, arrogance, and incompetence that will likely remain unnoticed for years.
Some Swiss losers deserve to have their drugs taken away from them, forever, for attending this insane farce of an event. The fools who organized this event should have their event-planning licenses revoked in perpetuity. The zoo is obviously going to buy two new dolphins and I'm sorry for their loss, even if I don't agree with their policies or whoever vetted this insane rave.
5/6/12
RIP MCA
First of all, Hello Nasty was the shit. I don't care who you are or what you're doing, fuck that, it was the shit. I don't think there was anything else that year that I heard that was in any way close. That album on repeat was golden for me, and "Intergalactic" was the fucking song to get hyped to. If they'd have released the same album this year I'd probably be just as happy with it. That's more than a decade late and I would've still bought two copies.
I only heard, outside of my own music playing, three Beastie Boys songs on Friday. Lots of people, of course, didn't have a clue who MCA was. Squares, hipsters, you name it - the critically uncool didn't know about anything and weren't the least discouraged. One car, at least, drove past me blaring "Fight For Your Right"* which I can't disagree with at all. I wasn't going to party on Friday, but anyone who was should have at least heard that song. If not: for shame. (*"No Sleep Till Brooklyn" is arguably a better anthem but I'm not going to argue about things I love anyway. That would be childish of me.
There's not much to say. Literally any other place on the internet will give a detailed biography send-up, information about Adam Yauch, tell personal stories and all that. Even Wikipedia put up the news. So there's nothing to do but cast this tiny, shitty, sloppy blog post into the void, with a few words of praise.
Fucking righteous, awesome music that never wore out its welcome by anyone with an open mind and a working set of ears. Sick rhymes and flowing, all around illest contender.
It seems like the true end of an era. To say there are or were no bands like the Beastie Boys is ignorant, but they were still unique. Nobody else ever wrote a song called "Egg Man", for example. If there was, it was either in another context entirely or it was ripped off of the original – or it simply wasn't as good.
That's all, then. There's at least one Beastie Boys album I haven't listened to, and I guess it's time to take that final plunge, except I have to wait at least six months to buy it at a mainstream record store, and at least a year at independent record shops. Otherwise I just know the looks I'll get.
That's a shit Friday, right there.
I only heard, outside of my own music playing, three Beastie Boys songs on Friday. Lots of people, of course, didn't have a clue who MCA was. Squares, hipsters, you name it - the critically uncool didn't know about anything and weren't the least discouraged. One car, at least, drove past me blaring "Fight For Your Right"* which I can't disagree with at all. I wasn't going to party on Friday, but anyone who was should have at least heard that song. If not: for shame. (*"No Sleep Till Brooklyn" is arguably a better anthem but I'm not going to argue about things I love anyway. That would be childish of me.
There's not much to say. Literally any other place on the internet will give a detailed biography send-up, information about Adam Yauch, tell personal stories and all that. Even Wikipedia put up the news. So there's nothing to do but cast this tiny, shitty, sloppy blog post into the void, with a few words of praise.
Fucking righteous, awesome music that never wore out its welcome by anyone with an open mind and a working set of ears. Sick rhymes and flowing, all around illest contender.
It seems like the true end of an era. To say there are or were no bands like the Beastie Boys is ignorant, but they were still unique. Nobody else ever wrote a song called "Egg Man", for example. If there was, it was either in another context entirely or it was ripped off of the original – or it simply wasn't as good.
That's all, then. There's at least one Beastie Boys album I haven't listened to, and I guess it's time to take that final plunge, except I have to wait at least six months to buy it at a mainstream record store, and at least a year at independent record shops. Otherwise I just know the looks I'll get.
That's a shit Friday, right there.
5/3/12
Does the Internet Make You Sick?
Well I think anybody who has thought about it already knows the answer, and there's no point in spoiling a surprise, so...
What Hasn't Made Us Sick?
Someone knowledgeable should write a book about that. I'm deeply allergic to knowing anything about health or myself, so I would probably not buy it, but I would pay someone to do the work. I would pay at utmost 5.00 in whatever currency 5.00 still means something. If there is some sort of hypervaluation crisis (and it would be one, don't even fool yourself) I would pay .5, .05, down to .000005 depending on circumstances. The project of discerning whether or not the internet can make you sick could be completed (or at least started definitively), with global co-operation and collaboration (via the internet), in a as little as 12 hours. For free, I'm sure.
If the internet has taught me anything it is to always rush noobs, pick the noobiest weapon/build, the following acronyms (too many; mainly 'afaik'), there is no such thing as too many clicks, don't ever get involved in anything, avoid chat in general unless to friends – and most importantly: to not be a total dick when you start beating the shit out of other players, in any game except online chess. Also doubt everything, and avoid anyone who has anything to say as they're most likely charlatans or shills.
So the prognosis isn't great.The suppression of it is variable. The internet is still more a force for freedom, except it, like any other media, can be just as detrimental to it. Oh and dangerous, possibly catastrophic. But that's just about anything, and the laws of mediocrity will hopefully minimize the odds of anything extraordinary happening.
What Hasn't Made Us Sick?
Someone knowledgeable should write a book about that. I'm deeply allergic to knowing anything about health or myself, so I would probably not buy it, but I would pay someone to do the work. I would pay at utmost 5.00 in whatever currency 5.00 still means something. If there is some sort of hypervaluation crisis (and it would be one, don't even fool yourself) I would pay .5, .05, down to .000005 depending on circumstances. The project of discerning whether or not the internet can make you sick could be completed (or at least started definitively), with global co-operation and collaboration (via the internet), in a as little as 12 hours. For free, I'm sure.
If the internet has taught me anything it is to always rush noobs, pick the noobiest weapon/build, the following acronyms (too many; mainly 'afaik'), there is no such thing as too many clicks, don't ever get involved in anything, avoid chat in general unless to friends – and most importantly: to not be a total dick when you start beating the shit out of other players, in any game except online chess. Also doubt everything, and avoid anyone who has anything to say as they're most likely charlatans or shills.
So the prognosis isn't great.The suppression of it is variable. The internet is still more a force for freedom, except it, like any other media, can be just as detrimental to it. Oh and dangerous, possibly catastrophic. But that's just about anything, and the laws of mediocrity will hopefully minimize the odds of anything extraordinary happening.
4/25/12
Well, No, Actually... Pt. 1
News is, at heart, a predictable beast. Whenever news stories follow the deranged, subnormal individuals of the deranged species known as humankind, there is a certain amount of inexplicable posturing and bristling. So a forty year old woman almost died eating a hamburger that weighed in at almost 10,000 calories, or enough food energy to feed two normal human beings for a week, or keep one, at minimum, alive for three weeks.
Excess is nothing new. Billions are spent on dumb, unwholesome, or dangerous things each day. Governments don't blink at billion dollar stealth fighters, million-inmate prisons, or corporate welfare. It only makes sense that governments such as spend money and run incredible deficits are propped up by fat, ungainly, mentally inadequate wasters who waste money in a similar manner.
The metaphor is clear: social arteries are hardening from lack of vigor and surfeit of fatty junk expenditure. We don't want to help the poor, at all, because it's their fault that society failed them and they're addicted to drugs or gambling or they're mentally ill. Meanwhile soft-hearted activists agitate for safe-injections sites for addicts. All of this means that the destitute and drug-addled are left to rot and roundly despised for being filthy, druggy pieces of shit with no redeeming features - mini politicians who would shank a much better individual for twenty dollars and change.
All these stories are seemingly designed to destroy my ability to sympathize. I can no longer approach many stories with pity or empathy or understanding. This woman should be burned for energy, or thrown into a diamond mine, or made to prepare her own food. The story cited here suggests that the problem is that people 'eat out' too often and that they should be encouraged to eat healthily and at home.
Fine. Or we can write these dumb pieces of shit off and stop supporting them at all. No hospitalization, no news stories, no free food for fat fucks. If we let some addicts rot, we should let them all rot. There is no obesity crisis: certain people are destroying themselves. Let them. They will not be missed.
Also, there is no obesity crisis. Some people are actually bound to be fat. Fat people exist outside of the caricature of fast-food swilling, eat-while-they-drive, cankle-waddling shits. It's similar to how thin people exist without bulimia, cigarettes, starvation, or the modelling industry.
Of course a sensationalist has to jump in and report the unreportable. This isn't news. It's social pathology that nobody pays attention to, because the reporters, when they can spell correctly, can hardly be expected to imagine that all of this might mean something.
Excess is nothing new. Billions are spent on dumb, unwholesome, or dangerous things each day. Governments don't blink at billion dollar stealth fighters, million-inmate prisons, or corporate welfare. It only makes sense that governments such as spend money and run incredible deficits are propped up by fat, ungainly, mentally inadequate wasters who waste money in a similar manner.
The metaphor is clear: social arteries are hardening from lack of vigor and surfeit of fatty junk expenditure. We don't want to help the poor, at all, because it's their fault that society failed them and they're addicted to drugs or gambling or they're mentally ill. Meanwhile soft-hearted activists agitate for safe-injections sites for addicts. All of this means that the destitute and drug-addled are left to rot and roundly despised for being filthy, druggy pieces of shit with no redeeming features - mini politicians who would shank a much better individual for twenty dollars and change.
All these stories are seemingly designed to destroy my ability to sympathize. I can no longer approach many stories with pity or empathy or understanding. This woman should be burned for energy, or thrown into a diamond mine, or made to prepare her own food. The story cited here suggests that the problem is that people 'eat out' too often and that they should be encouraged to eat healthily and at home.
Fine. Or we can write these dumb pieces of shit off and stop supporting them at all. No hospitalization, no news stories, no free food for fat fucks. If we let some addicts rot, we should let them all rot. There is no obesity crisis: certain people are destroying themselves. Let them. They will not be missed.
Also, there is no obesity crisis. Some people are actually bound to be fat. Fat people exist outside of the caricature of fast-food swilling, eat-while-they-drive, cankle-waddling shits. It's similar to how thin people exist without bulimia, cigarettes, starvation, or the modelling industry.
Of course a sensationalist has to jump in and report the unreportable. This isn't news. It's social pathology that nobody pays attention to, because the reporters, when they can spell correctly, can hardly be expected to imagine that all of this might mean something.
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