Category: Technology

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Short of Short

Is Martin Short really a comic genius?  I had had him pegged as a very weak Jerry Lewis wannabe.  And that is a very low bar.  But Vanity Fair says he’s fabulous: he’s the funniest guy at the party.   He is well-liked by the comedy establishment in Hollywood and New York.   Talk show hosts can’t wait to have him: he makes it easy for them, taking on the entire burden of being witty and funny and entertaining.

Am I missing something?   Other than those parties?

The comedy I remember from Martin Short always resembled the stuff your older, untalented brother would do to taunt you, and the biggest hits from Oasis.    That whining, sneering, wildly effeminate voice and dippy moronic body language.    All of it modeled– disgustingly– on the gestures of a person with a mental and physical disability.  I have always found that kind of humor repellent, for obvious reasons.  It’s broad and offensive.  It’s the Gomer Pyle of stand-up comedy.

Short seemed unusually taken with deformity and otherness, with lots of wonky eyes, oddly recessed hairlines, and androgyny.

Decent human beings do not mock or ridicule people who were born with disabilities or defects.  You just don’t.   First of all, it’s not really funny.  If you can’t help but fail, and it’s not your fault, it’s not funny.

What is funny is, for example, a capable person thrust into challenging circumstances through his own fault– a character flaw– and then failing to keep his dignity.

Secondly, it’s an affront to human dignity.  We all know that– you don’t laugh at other peoples’ misfortunes.  But because Jerry Lewis did not have a disability– other than bad taste– people thought it was okay to laugh at him when he imitated people with disabilities, some of the very people his famous annual telethon was supposed to help.

When he’s not making fun of people with disabilities, Short sometimes plays a more complex character, Jiminy Glick, a talk-show host.   Short does the sleaze part fairly well, but where is the humor exactly?  It’s mostly humor about the humorists– narcissistic comedy.  I feel the same way about it that I feel about a mediocre novel about a novelist, or a mediocre movie about Hollywood, or a mediocre  song about a singer.  It’s not that they are bad novels or movies or songs– even if they are– it’s that these artists have chosen to make an artwork about themselves.  With a few exceptions, these works are boring.

Oh, but there’s more:  there’s bodily function and sex jokes.

There’s not much real political or social commentary: Short doesn’t want to offend half of his audience.  In an interview on PBS (where he was accompanied by Steve Martin, with whom he is touring), he was clearly a bit discomfited by the idea of political humor, probably because he knows the most respected  comics out there are political but the most commercially successful are not.

Short is personally popular– I have no problem believing that he is a nice guy.  He will get monuments and awards and banquets and honors, because he has quietly carved out an undistinguished but visible profile among establishment entertainers in Hollywood– the kind of elite that give each other prizes while they are alive.

Now, you might expect a tail here: but the real edgy comedians don’t get awards until they are dead.  It’s a little strange to me, but a few years ago George Carlin was honored at the Kennedy Center with the “Mark Twain” prize.   George Carlin himself must have read the invitation and checked his own pulse before accepting.

 

 

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Biological Annihilation

This sneaky little article in the New York Times seem to come out of nowhere– as the authors observed.  No one’s paying attention.  We better start.

It begins with observable detail.  If you are old enough, you will remember the annoying task of cleaning bugs off the windshield of your car after a drive in the country.  I remember it.  I remember how hard it was to get those messy little splatters off the glass, even if you used Windex or windshield washer.  You’d always had to take a second run at it to get the most persistent little blotches.

If you rode motorcycles, like I did for a time, you knew the experience of getting bugs into your eyes and mouth while racing along in the countryside.  Constantly.  There was no escape.

It turns out that we might be headed for a big, big problem.  Where are the bugs?

I look forward to the pesticide industry– which is surely studing the brilliant success of the oil (carbon) industry in sewing doubt about climate change — starting a campaign to try to convince people that 1) there are really more bugs than ever before,  2) pesticides do not harm bugs (except when they do, as advertised, and 3) suburban home-owners use more pesticides than farmers.  After a few years, and after these theories have been debunked, the arguments will become:  1) yes, there are fewer bugs, but the bats are to blame and 2) what’s the problem?  Do you like bugs?  3) pesticides actually eliminate predators of bugs.

A few years later and the strategy becomes, 1) all right, so we are causing the bugs to die, but you can’t sacrifice good farm jobs just to save a mosquito or two.   2)  it’s too late to do anything anyway.  3) don’t worry– by the time we die because the food chain is disrupted by the annihilation of insects, we’ll already have been killed by global warming.

At not point will anyone in the pesticide or farming industries admit that they were wrong.

 

 

 

 

Re. Noah’s Ark:

There 400,000 species of beetles
12,000 types of ants
20,000 of bees

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Autotune Your Brain

David Draiman is a classically trained singer and has an amazing sound and range. Disturbed is a phenomenal metal band. Really enjoyed your take on his performance. David was actually under the weather for this performance and yes the producers added autotune without him wanting it. He never uses it. He was irked.

The above comment appears below a lovely Youtube video of vocal coach Tara Simon analyzing Disturb’s performance of “The Sound of Silence” on Conan.

I naturally suspect Draiman’s comments a little– who wants it to be known that they asked for Autotune– but it’s believable, and his performance is extraordinary.  And Tara Simon’s skill is extraordinary: she spotted the Autotune immediately.

Why would anyone enjoy listening to a performer who cheats?

Well, why do San Francisco Giant fans still lionize Barry Bonds?  Because humans have an endless capacity for self-delusion.  We love what we see and hear and we want to believe it is real and we really don’t want to know if it’s not.

That why we would not enjoy a race between a motorcyclist and a bicyclist.  Not because we’re smart enough to realize that it isn’t a real race: but because it is obvious that it is not.  We can’t pretend the motorcyclist won because he was more fit, or more beautiful, or more virtuous: we cannot pretend that he didn’t cheat.

But if we saw a race between two bicyclists and one of them crushed the other, we wouldn’t want to know that he had an electronic motor and batteries hidden in the bike’s frame.

Did Dolores O’Riordan know about Autotune?  Her live performances with the Cranberries are among the worst I’ve ever seen of a well-known band.  That said, I would still rather watch her blunder her way through “Linger” honestly than hear a pristine, perfect fake version with Autotune.

Do you listen to CBC radio in the afternoon on your way home from work?  Virtually everything they play now is what I call factory-pop.  Fake beat, fake tone, fake instruments, and fake (Autotuned) voice.   It is shit.

 

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Lenovos

Someone recently asked me for advice on purchasing a refurbished laptops, a Lenovo t450s vs. a Lenovo T440.

That first one with the 12 GB of RAM and the i7 processor is a nice little powerhouse. For most of day-to-day computing needs, it’s overkill, but the two applications that love lots of memory and the SSD card are Photoshop and any video-editing software– and recording software. #1 also has a higher resolution screen, which, again, is useful for Photoshop and video. That said, #2 is also pretty good– 8 GB is generally the benchmark for Photoshop, and the SSD will help a lot. (memory is upgradable to 12 GB if desired). I’m not a fan of touchscreen, so I’d almost prefer #2 which doesn’t seem to have it. The i5 is slower than the i7 by today’s standards, but if you’re used to an i5 you probably won’t feel like it’s slow.

The i5 model actually does not have the fastest i5 processor– another factor, so the i7 model has a not insubstantial speed advantage. (You would notice it if you used an i5 for a few weeks and then moved to an i7). Both have bluetooth and wifi.

For recording, that might be a factor in latency– that lag between the music and what you hear back in your headphone or speakers. If you plan to do a fair bit of recording, using a DAW, Reaper, or whatever, that might be a factor.

Both have USB 3.0, but the i5 (T450s) has two ports while the i7 model as 3. Might be a factor if you are connecting a microphone, a keyboard, and a mouse, and who knows what else…

It’s kind of a 4 cylinder vs. a 6. Here’s a bit of my logic: the Lenovos are durable, reliable machines. The extra $250 now might buy you a laptop that will age a bit better, process video and audio faster, and maybe give you a few more years of viability– saving you $$ from upgrading sooner– while the i5 (T440) will be a solid, reliable machine. I’ve had Reaper (a DAW) running on the i5 for a while and it seems to handle it nicely, especially with 8GB of RAM and an SSD for storage.

I like the Lenovos– that’s our default machine in our office. Durable, reliable, and good features. I have an older T61 here that has been a rock for me. That’s quite a compliment actually– it’s quite “old” by laptop standards but I never sit there and think, “gee, it’s slow– I should replace it”.

One last left-field comment: I have Windows 7 on all my home machines– I’m not real fond of Windows 10. Microsoft really wants to shove updates down your throat now and it’s hard to prevent Windows 10 from suddenly going off to la-la land and downloading a massive patch without asking you. If they offered Windows 7 instead, I’d take it myself, but they probably won’t. And, unfortunately, everyone will eventually have to upgrade anyway to keep up with drivers and applications and such…

Bill.

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Free Enterprise is For Suckers

I guess I need some basic economic lessons again. Not sure I understand “free enterprise”. When a single mother with five children gets a small amount of money from the government, it’s a handout and builds an unhealthy dependency. When a extremely profitable multi-billion dollar corporation gets $1.2 billion in government handouts, it’s an “investment”.  Bombardier and Chrysler accepted billions in government “investment”, money that went to wealthy shareholders and top executives.  Most, if not all, of that money will never be repaid.  In fact, Bombardier just completely torpedoed the one semi-legitimate argument for that investment by laying off 5,000 workers.

Amazon and Foxconn have received even more lavish deals from the U.S. government, as does every major sports franchise in America.   As does every major defense contractor– these are for-profit companies, you know– not state-owned enterprises.   They don’t just sell their weapons to the United States.

So that single mom should just incorporate herself and ask for an “investment”.  She just needs better pr. She should maybe hold a competition among cities: who wants to get my “headquarters”.

As Charlie Chaplin said in “Monsieur Verdoux”– truly one of the most non-conformist films ever made– , about serial killers vs. generals: “numbers sanctify”.

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The Cowardly New World

China has embarked on an extraordinary program of continuous mass surveillance.

Yes, we are actually beginning to see the realization of George Orwell’s worst nightmare, not just in China, but everywhere.

Here it is.  No surprise, not anymore.  It is actually here.  It happened.  There is, probably, no going back, because, unfortunately, humans are really not very smart.  Would you rather have safety and security or privacy?   You can’t have both.  We believe them when they tell us that.  We invariably choose safety because when it comes right down to it we humans are very, very easily frightened.

Of course it’s a false choice.  We will not be safer if we give up our privacy and we will not not have privacy if we give up our safety.  The question is, how much do you want to give up?  And do you really, truly, seriously trust the government with the level of intrusive surveillance they are going to have?

China is moving faster than we are only because they have a dictatorial government that can do whatever it wants.  Ideologically, are they really all that different?  Their public reasons might sound different, but are they substantively different from “we must protect our citizens from terror” and “law-abiding citizens have nothing to fear”?

They even boast to their citizens that we can watch you all the time.  They scan faces in crowds at train stations and public squares looking for “criminals”, which often means people who dissent.

When we all read “1984” years ago most of us probably thought it would never happen here. Because we all read the book and we were all outraged and we all knew why it would be so bad.  Surely no democratic government would dare impose any practices that evoke visions of “Big Brother”.  But, especially since 9/11, they have gone right ahead and done it.  The U.S. government gave itself the right to examine all of your e-mails and all of your calling records essentially without warrant.  The Obama administration went right ahead and launched drone attacks on enemy targets without any real accountability.  And the hugely disappointing civil libertarian contingent in the U.S. has quietly rolled over in acquiescence.

So when western countries start following China’s lead and begin monitoring us in every public space with face recognition software to identify us and follow us and record our whereabouts at all times, I’m pretty sure the majority of brave, principled, patriotic citizens will cower in terror and comply fully with the new regime.  And we will have arrived at our nightmare.

[whohit]Cowardly New World[/whohit]

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Decrypt-Kickers

Interesting thought: what if governments hired someone to secretly install ransom-ware software on some computers, demand a payment in Bitcoin, and then very publicly renege on the deals and refuse to decrypt the affected computers?

The CBC would love it and give the story wide exposure.  Anything that scares people is food for thought on the CBC on the afternoon drive home.

Here’s the thing:  the next time you got a virus like that, you would think, why would I pay?  They won’t decrypt my hard drive anyway?  Soon all the hackers trying to extort money would go mad: no one pays anymore!  We’re ruined!

Or would you pay it anyway, on the remote perceived hope that this one would be the exception?  You really, really want those baby pictures back?  There are millions of there out there.  I’ll set up a website for you where they can be shared.

[whohit]Decrypt Kickers[/whohit]

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We Will Never See Another Valerie Bertinelli

I’m a little sad about this: we will probably never see another Valerie Bertinelli.

Valerie Bertinelli was one of the stars of “One Day at a Time”, along with Mackenzie Phillips, Bonnie Franklin and Pat Harrington as “Schneider”.

She did not have large breasts.

There you go.  That’s what you probably won’t see ever again: a major television actress with small boobs.  She was 15 at the start of the show and was supposed to be a kind of tom-boyish character.  In the next season, according to Wikipedia, her character was revised to “be more appealing to a traditional male demographic [citation needed]”.   This is how television, contrary to the fundamental purpose of all artistic endeavors, seeks to affirm what you already are: stupid.

I have no end of disgust for media companies that decide that that the illiterate public should tell them how to write or act or direct.  You like titillating jokes?  Add more and more and more.  You like cleavage?  Let’s increase cleavage 200%.  You like poop jokes?  More poop jokes!  Say, why don’t you write and create your own sitcom?  Oh– you don’t know how?  You can’t?  You’re too illiterate and clueless to do it?  When why are we listening to you?

Valerie Bertinelli married Eddie Van Halen when she was 21.   Do you even have to ask?  They divorced in 2005, probably long after the marriage had actually failed.

She wasn’t much of an actress but she was very cute.  That’s all that’s necessary.

Do a search, I know you want to.  Images.  There she is: she struggled with weight issues all her life but she seems to have had a few victories.  Lately, there are pictures of her looking very svelte in a bikini.  But notice the boobs: they look ample.  They look generous.   They look lavish.

It is easy and cheap to get your breasts augmented nowadays.  And it has a clearly measurable impact on profit.  Even if you are a very good actress if you are competing for a spot on a tv series or movie with numerous actresses (there are millions of them) with ample bosoms, you will not get to do what Valerie Bertinelli did with her remarkably reasonably sized breasts: star in a tv sitcom (which, let’s face it, is the lowest form of drama there is).

In future, I fully expect that the studio that owns the “One Day at a Time” franchise will hire a digital effects company to go back in time and enhance Valerie Bertinelli’s breasts.  It’s inevitable.  It will produce more viewers, more profits, more rebroadcasts!

Enhanced.  Augmented.

In the meantime, I actually enjoyed the rerun.  The characters looked more real then they will ever look again, probably.

[whohit]Valerie Bertinelli[/whohit]

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Oily Bears

I have no doubt that if the oil industry succeeds in wheedling another chunk of Alaskan wilderness from the government to drill and develop and exploit, that they will solemnly insist to everyone that they, more than we could ever imagine, are passionate about preserving some other part of Alaska’s remaining pristine wilderness for generations to come. And then, once they have sucked up all the oil they can, their pimps in the Alaskan state government will once again whine and whimper that it is so unreasonable to insist that this other pristine wilderness area be preserved.

There is no end of parts of the world that have been despoiled by the energy or lumber or mining industry, but there are precious few parts that remain pristine wilderness. And they will come after those parts, relentlessly, hurling millions dollars at politicians, begging and pleading, and lying through their teeth: we care about the environment.

If conservatives think liberals are fools for thinking that poor people can be improved with education or opportunities, or that negotiations can lead to peace, or that some black youths are not out to kill police officers, then liberals have a right to think conservatives are absolutely idiotic to think any energy company has the slightest interest in preserving the environment. Industries are driven by profit: they have no conscience. Their PR flacks will say and promise anything to increase profits. Money doesn’t weep: actors do, and the top executives of these corporations are primarily actors.

If you believe them, you seriously have to answer the question, why, do you think, they would keep those promises? What possible incentive do they have? Once they have fully exploited the mineral or energy resources of a given area, they can retire with untold riches. There are no real consequences for a corporation: they can pay any modest fines out of future profits– someone else’s problem.

It’s not like perjury. Standing in front of a TV camera and mellifluously praising the mountains and meadows and creatures of some distant land promising that never, in a million years, would you do anything to harm them, cost nothing. There are no consequences for lying.

In 1994 Verizon promised to lay fibre optic cable to every house in Pennsylvania in exchange for over $2 billion in tax breaks.

Were they laughing even then? 20 years later, they have done nothing to deliver on that promise. Refund the taxpayer’s money? Are you mad? Recall the politicians who made that deal? Can you even remember that they made that deal? Do you care that they sold you down the river? Not enough, apparently, to not re-elect them.

Verizon learned what the oil companies already know: they have immunity. They all know whose side the politicians are really on.

 

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The Toyota Witch

I had been following the story about the alleged Toyota accelerator problems since the very first one about the family in the Lexus with the off-duty police officer. There was audio: a passenger in the car called 911 to report that the car had accelerated to 120 miles per hour and there as nothing they could do to stop it. The car went off the road, crashed, and burned. All four occupants were killed.

The decisive piece of information here was the assertion by the caller that the car seemed to have accelerated all on its own. It was a great story and got enormous play in the national media. And I’m sure all of stories– but especially on CNN and CBC– featured earnest looking young reporters looking into the camera and explaining to the viewer what he or she should do if it happened to them.

If there is a single website somewhere that shows scientific evidence that this problem really exists, I’d like to see it. As it turns out, the car in California that started the whole thing had the wrong floor-mats installed and it is almost certain that the floor mat had bunched up against the gas pedal and jammed it in place. It’s even possible that the driver thought he had his foot on the brake and kept pushing it harder and harder, and the harder he pushed it, the less it worked. But it didn’t matter: a compelling narrative was in place.  Cue the hysteria.

Need more?  Studies were done by reputable journals including The Atlantic.  The overwhelming majority of drivers reporting these problems were over 55.

GM got into trouble as well, for an ignition switch the had a tendency to turn itself off, thereby de-activating the air bags. One woman, whose family sued GM, crashed with twice the legal limit of alcohol in her blood. But, yes, she might have lived if she had had an air bag. All that is needed at that point is for the jury to hear what a wonderful human being she was– she could have been your friend too– you, on the jury– if only she had lived.

Sarcasm aside it is necessary to point out– to those who feel lawsuits are just ruining our world– that juries do in fact allocate portions of blame, and will likely assign her a significant portion of it in this case.

It is not at all unusual to see certain media outlets sensationalize some lawsuit somewhere knowing that a good portion of the audience will derive great satisfaction from reading just how stupid juries are and how greedy those freeloading plaintiffs are. In reality, over and over again, you will find that the details of these cases tell a different story– even of the woman who burned her leg with the McDonald’s coffee– a favorite of the Tort-Reform Cabal in Washington.

[added October 28, 2014] And it does, after all, appear that GM had a real fault in the ignition switch, which it deliberately ignored. There you go!

Kids playing in a river in St. Mary’s, Ontario.