You Tube XL, the merging of the living room set with the Oh wait, that’s not at all what it is. It’s a skin that looks pretty when shown on a large screen. Yes it shows You Tube content on a large screen, like having a really big monitor.
Shame the compressed video and even worse audio depredations on most of the content make this a non starter. Small crap x screen size = larger crap.
The digital TV transition has been “traumatic” enough for people but I’d like to see it go further.There’s a lot of spectrum going to waste,off hours, 24-7 on religious channels, and I am wondering why we can’t use that as a channel to record our programs in advance for later watching. Yep it’s Tivo but not as we know it.Seems odd to limit the transmission to real time recording for most content that really [...]
Category Archives: Culture-internet
You Tube XL. eXtremely Laughable. Pay no attention to the pixelated man, with out of sync sound , on the screen
April and Changing minds.
It’s been rather quiet around here lately. I admit that my formal ahderence to grammar has been quixotic, at best, my attempts to rectifying this situation results in posts that sound like material I want to read. Maybe that’s why so many people vlog?
The differences between UK and US grammar are apparently slight enough to not catch the same break that people learning English as a second language are allowed.I’m realistic enough to know that it will have a nominal effect on the reason that I began which neatly segues into my next point.
Is anyone still naive enough to believe that the powers that be just need a well crafted note pointing out were they are deficient and how they are hurting people will change their way? Hardly. In short they are not your audience.
Unfortunately that leaves the public.
Oh wait Is anyone still naive enough to believe that the public just need a well crafted sitcom showing were they are deficient and how they are hurting people by refusing to take ownership of their lives? Hardly.
In short they are not your audience.
Much easier to remain quiet.
A new entry to my cynics dictionary. locavore
Locavore: food so expensive that you can’t afford private transportation.
Shazam at the good old hockey game while performing as a cellular wizard
We’re all wizards now. A C Clarke’s often cited,paraphrased or mangle quote is appropriate for many of the daily tasks we take for granted.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’ 1972 A. C. Clarke Lost Worlds
Over the last couple of weeks I’ve found that walk up magic and showing people how to get the most out of a cell phone leads to the same reaction. ( the latter is far less likely to get you burned as a witch in some of our undeveloped 3g areas)
Shazam is one of those apps that is cooler than a cold man’s cold bits during an Alaskan Mr Ice Pants festival. For the last few months I’ve been trying to find out the names of a couple of songs that are played at the good old hockey game. Both tracks have no music , have really short hooks and one could safely classify them as being graduates from the " bleep bleep thump" school.
I’d sat with an iPhone in my pocket game after game while forgetting I had the means to do so with me. Loaded the shazam app from the stadium wifi, awaited the song to come on and set it to capture. This is not an easy capture. That’s a PA with cheering and pervasive clapping but Shazam was able to determine most of the songs under these conditions. Just load, lift and listen and it does the rest on your iPhone or Android device and you can save it for later, or buy it now. My god a business model on the mobile web what a wondrous age we live in!
That’s still not the interesting part. Why did it take so long to put this 2+2 together? Turns out it was an ambiguity that I could live with but my wife always kept asking about.. "what song’s that" is a problem that’s harder to live with.
Locating the good apps quickly then finding out what is, and isn’t useful , could be a second career, a really badly remunerated second career. So best make it a hobbyto find out what your friends regularly overlook when relating to the net and with your best Carnac the magnificient impression hold the phone to your head and proceed to amaze.
Why spend the time? Most of the coolest apps work when you have an audience, heck in that stadium of 11,000 people only 2 were logged in on the two presence services I use. In general I feel like a "boy and his iPod dog" wandering the desert , Phoenix looks pretty much looks like distopic sci fi anyway so it’s not too hard to play along.
December Round up Go Daddy party, blogging and moobies!
My Personal blogging has been quite light over the past months. I’ve found that most of the items I want to “chip in” is sated by commenting on them via Google Reader and quite frankly there are better written blogs on every subject apart from that niche category.. “what does an internal exile that escaped Scotland to come to the USA think about the weird customs ,practices and beliefs of his adopted nation” which is , regardless of grammatical heresies , the authoritative source for what I believe that I believe at the moment. It may look like a list of things Hal thinks are stupid especially when voted upon but I assure you that the 18 , 26, and 30 year old me didn’t keep the same list so the next time you batter someone on the head with an opinion keep it around a decade or two and see if that idea really stands up. Where I am not in error, though these are rare and happy events, relates to illogical ideas. E.g when people ask me to keep something the same but change it I don’t see how any restatement of their request can lead to a “happy” answer.
At the moment these are things that interest me.
Mobile web, the kind of world that emerges when resources are too costly to move people to and from places of work,education as a matter of course, educating our toddler, thinking of alternate ways to make a scrapyard profitable and dare I say green? Locating items which are truly innovative and not just this year’s restatement of the past with a couple of features , aka the marketing departments mega pixel effect were more is better, cough bullshit.
Go Daddy Christmas party.
Last night saw Joan Jett at the companies Christmas Party, aka Go Daddy. We got home around 1am and bought her last CD, Sinner by Joan Jett which made up for the other two acts Sinbad , the last syllable is devastatingly accurate, and 38 Special ( I was ignorant of their oeuvre ) and I had to leave my own 38 special at home this being a work event and there being drink and all:)
We also had to forgo hearing Patrick Lauder sing the national anthem at the Coyotes vs Redwings game , for which is were we would have been barring the party, but instead had Lillian Garcia sing which , no offence to Patrick, is physically prettier but he wins out on overall delivery 
Still Lilian was really good and way better than the usual histrionic warbling and 3 or four notes when one would do from singers that may have the impression that singing the song’s more about their performance. Yep I’m glad nowadays when the longest held note contest is a separate event:D.
That’s all very cool but what’s even better is the message given by our CEO, Founder and lover of things two wheeled and European , Bob Parsons who, after riding up to the podium on a Ducati let us know that we had our best year ever, are not an example of the kind of company, institution that promoted dud loans, built too many car or houses. The company gives a lot of time , via staff, and money to charities and this is the annoying part coming up. Since when do you have to justify success in the USA? Understand I am not getting at those justifying but the people asking the question in the first place.
Many companies curtailed their parties because of the business climate and to them , I say hum bloody bollocks bug to you. The number of staff to cater, provide entertainment, services etc that’s money going to real businesses, same with the shoes, clothing and other accessories. The money that the staff won guess were most of that is going too? I don’t often post on work related items because it’s a difficult balance to not come across as a gushing fan boy which as anyone that knows me would find hard to reconcile with my cynical daily demeanor. The latter is a relative scale , seriously in the UK I was pretty much on the optimistic side:) So celebrating two thousand people, their families and the charities, venders and stores that benefit from Go Daddy’s existence is something that should NEVER be apologized for at any time and certainly cheered my holiday up.The laser and fireworks finale would have been perfect toddler material but it pleased my inner toddler greatly will post some pics as they come in.
[The views expressed on this website/weblog are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of Go Daddy Software, Inc.]
Oh I nearly forgot.. moobies!
More crap on the unimportant crap. The e-how rather than the why of Indian terrorist attack
I know the name , least what’s widely believed to be, of the first "murderer" that was outrun by radio Dr Crippen. People like to tie the new with the very very old but usually it’s in the other direction E.g look at how these infernal machines are aiding those with malice in their mainframe to carry out.
Would driving a car get the same attention? How about using a camera? Is it more newsworthy if it’s silver halide or CCD that captures the image? Radio type or something else? Oo let’s scare people with VOIP not only does it not let 911 know where you are (rtfm) it’s now enabling decades old dispute in a new manner that’s just so so so hard to have envisioned prior to its adoption.
VOIP is not the challenge it’s made out to be here. Impossible? Impossible to intercept surely some mistake unless there’s a whole load of forgetting about India’s tussle with Rim. India wanted to monitor the Blackberry network and got that concession.
I’m also rather less impressed with stories on how highly trained they are. I must be missing something here since shooting a passive crowd and lobbing grenades at the same time in different locations doesn’t seem to be on my list of hard to conceive plots.
"Definitely they were trained,” said a masked officer of the force.
”Not everybody can fire AK-series weapons.
”Using such weapons and explosives, it is obvious they were trained somewhere.
Do you have a spare 10 minutes? Ak’s are famous for their robustness when used by irregulars, nades, baseball! as for the explosives I have no idea but they always kept me away from that safe Oddly enough the reporting in realtime that provided this alleged edge is not considered to be an inappropriate use of technology.. weird that.
Mumbai terrorists’ most powerful weapon: VoIP phones | Computerworld Blogs
The Times reports that the handlers were communicting with the attackers using VoIP phones that made it difficult, if not impossible, for the Indian authorities to intercept the calls, or even know they were taking place.
Here’s how the Times explains it:…
Is it just my memory that lasts longer than 30 second commercials? Bloomberg is vocal the responsibilities of public figures that are not elected:)
Don’t get me wrong there has to be consequences for carrying a loaded firearm into a nightclub that is discharged. Like a hole in the leg, pain and maybe the end of your athletic career. Still that’s not good enough we really have to show em:) Shame that the same zeal doesn’t apply to those that enforce the laws
Hospital suspends worker who failed to report NFL star’s gunshot – CNN.com
Bloomberg, who has long fought against illegal gun ownership, said public figures “make their living because of their visibility. They are the role models for our kids, and if we don’t prosecute them, to the fullest extent of the law, I don’t know who on Earth we would. It makes a sham, a mockery of the law.”
One word answer…..
Spitzer.
Part 3. Further annoyance with "it is what it is"
I posted on the phrase on my other blog that I would like to extirpate this phrase from the English language or at least the workplace. Rather than do an original one I’m running a semi ok off post. I’d prefer people would say ” it’s this way because” which gives an indication that they’ve looked at the issue rather than just accepted it on a prima facie interest.
Today I heard it several more times and it didn’t have a calming effect , quel surprise? I needed to look further into what irks me so much about this new catch all.
It is what it is” means what it means. Depending on context, it can be a statement of resignation or of defiance, but in neither case does it connote the optimistic good humor of “It’s all good.” If anything, it expresses the absence of emotion, the abdication of feeling. Although it seems to imply value-neutrality, that misses the point; it’s not so much that something is neither good nor bad, but rather that its quality simply isn’t relevant, that it’s not worth the energy to make a value judgment.
To put it another way — it doesn’t matter what you think about it because you can’t do anything about it anyway. It was in this spirit that Al Gore invoked the phrase after winning the popular vote and possibly the electoral tally as well: “I strongly disagreed with the Supreme Court decision and the way in which they interpreted and applied the law. But I respect the rule of law, so it is what it is.”
Flak Magazine: It’s All Good vs. It Is What It Is, 06.11.03
and
Radar, Oh really ? It is what it is… Welcome to tautology Thursday.
One of the colloquial phrases, ok maybe it’s not just AZ but I hear it more here, that’s been annoying me is the Popeye school of “it is what it is” as a cover all for ill conceived, poorly implemented or ineffable solutions that have wandered onto the radar.This verbal chaff that’s tossed up in the air , rather than fixing a location onto the problem , obscures the problem and by the time all the flakes have landed , or given up and go home, there’s still the small matter of a missile bearing down on you. As a bonus there’s now less time and fewer options to react with.
tautology – Definitions from Dictionary.com
1. (logic) a statement that is necessarily true; “the statement ‘he is brave or he is not brave’ is a tautology”
Even the good villains get lucky sometime: Eric Doyle aka David Lawrence
I have been pretty good in my reduction of TV over the past two years but then again I always was more in love with the radio. That’s were I first came across David Lawrence, whom I’ve previously said some very nice things about. There’s no need to change that here. What I am happy about is that I get to be some kinda human, how so? Well there’s always these nagging doubts that schadenfreude was an inescapable part of my make up since I really do find other people’s misfortune, specially when it’s heading towards Greek tragedy , amusing. If there’s a church bus and cliff involved I’m set for the day, the driver swerved to avoid a tortilla with the Image of Mary and you may have to medicate me down:) So it’s gratifying to see that three people that I know well enough to have lunch with, occasionally see working ,are doing so well for themselves based on
working at what they love, yeah that old cliché:) . More important though I think about the only sane advice that I regularly hear within new media is nicely laid out here. The source , someone else I admire, seems to have the same qualities which kinda hit me between the “what the hell am I doing and when will I wake up” eyes:) Anyway writing more won’t help, just watch.
From Tim Street
I knew we’ were f’ed but this is ridiculous. Bush will come on economy.
Ouch:)
23 squidoo An 8 armed action hero.
Ok it’s an octopus but you can’t tell your cephalopods from a hole in the ground and your attitude, quick frankly , towards the cuttlefish stinks.
So just shut up and enjoy this animated appetizer ink his way into the history books.
Via Found on the web
Guns don’t kill people seemingly videos do . Google tries once again to do no evil while engaging in it.
From the newthink dept over at Google a decision that causes me to laugh , hard. A selective ban on video of weapons that are deemed to be of an intimidating nature. That should read personal weapons since I don’t forsee those that glorify the state’s ability to render large areas hostile will be included within this ban. You Tube is becoming just the kind of "damage" that the Internet is great for routing around and not a concern on its own. Does Google ,which owns You Tube , seriously think they can take into account existing social mores for each culture and apply that sanely? So for most of the world no piss taking of the prophet, no info on biological processes and a myriad of changes keeping up with tin pot edicts of the moment. This is not organizing the world’s info it’s recreating it in your own image.
fifty percent of you will leave this post feeling better. Placebo the anti drug BBC Radio 4 series.
One of the greatest losses of moving to the USA was that of the BBC Radio services. Sadly the BBC is funded by a tax not for using their services but for the gall of operating a TV , Radio or Satellite receiver. Licensing electronic media which is the ONLY practical location were people of limited means could find out what’s up in their society, you know get informed which is what we’re told is crucial to playing the game that is democracy , is a pretty horrible way to behave.
You must pay the $200+ a year to the BBC even if you never use their service. Yet for free I can access this programming over the net. ( odd that but I’m grateful anyway)
I listened to a short series about the placebo effect ,BBC – Radio 4 – Placebo, which goes into depths on just how much ” it’s all in the mind” goes towards reducing the perception of pain, recovery time and general mental well being. Yep sugar pills work , their analogs work ( reiki, reflexology or anything that has a believable story that your culture buys into )
In short
We feel what we expect to find as long as we’re committed to that belief.
Reality can be changed by symbols , yep symbols really are for the symbol minded.
And advertising.. well that’s another story.
brandstreaming yet another nightmare that needs to find a way to Room 101.
Like most things in life, the universe and what’s still being called social media , you can pull up some aphorism from some Greek that’s been dead for over two millenia to anchor your point to. Do no harm isn’t a bad one, and it’s a lot easier to pull off than do no evil yet neither are as compelling , or succinct as Wil Wheaton’s “don’t be a dick” as an almost libertarian reduction of the non aggression principle into the vernacular. (Sadly his writings on politics really don’t ultimately follow this but let’s not get into that)
In short it’s a set of rules for the relationship between creators, promoters and fans around Sci Fi / Fantasy conventions which can be extrapolated to most commercial interactions. E.G Are we customers, consumers, data points or people that want to get things done?
When you have a “voice” for a corporation engaged in social media maybe it’s a good idea to think about the above because the mode of address you choose in 3/4 cases is going to be wrong
Can a corporation really be your friend? Does this construct sound real? X is out buying yummy things his company make , Y is out watching their Movie etc Does this sound remotely like a relationship your engaged in? If it doesn’t it’s for the obvious reason that it ISN’T.
I love dealing with people from companies, hate dealing with company names that have a rotating cast of interchangeable responses that would make Turing dance with glee. I can’t tell them apart from a machine or human either.
Wer in ur boahdroomz wutchin yu wit intrst
*invisible pink unicorn peace be unto her hooves.
The Question I shouldn’t have been trying to ask Penn. ( e.g any;) )
Ah the question.
The James Randi educational foundation are in their own words
The James Randi Educational Foundation is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1996. Its aim is to promote critical thinking by reaching out to the public and media with reliable information about paranormal and supernatural ideas so widespread in our society today.
I’ve been to a TAM , the conference tied to JREF and loved it. I was really shocked by just how many religious skeptics there were though , really amazed. Toss that in with the statists that believe that thinking and research are a government sport and I was a little unsettled that the critical thought movement would align on the democracy YAY! side of things I mean these people are smart Gell Mann smart. Just have to face it classically liberal ( aka libertarian) ideals just don’t fly in this land of the lobbyist. ( I don’t blame them they would not exist if the politicians weren’t corruptible)
Here’s the question as I thought I was going to ask it to Penn after seeing the show in Vegas.
I think Joe Rogan pwned Phil Plait on Penn’s show on more than one occasion how does that bode for his new position as the president of the JREF and how about a rematch moderated by Penn
Here’s what came out:
