Quotulatiousness

November 2, 2009

Is the printed book nearing end-of-life?

Filed under: Books, Media, Technology — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 08:59

Terry Teachout considers the wonders of the printed book and contemplates its looming obsolescence:

Regular readers of this blog know that I believe the printed book to be well on its way to ultimate extinction. As I put it in a “Sightings” column written in 2006, a year before the introduction of the Kindle:

The printed book is a beautiful object, “elegant” in both the aesthetic and mathematical senses of the word, and its invention was a pivotal moment in the history of Western culture. But it is also a technology — a means, not an end. Like all technologies, it has a finite lifespan, and its time is almost up.

On the other hand, I have yet to buy a Kindle, and at the moment I have no plans to do so. This is partly because I prefer to wait until the kinks are ironed out (I’ve never been a truly early adopter) and partly because, like most middle-aged authors, I remain enamored of the sheer physicality of the old-fashioned printed book.

[. . .]

So am I really a closet Luddite, a technological Moses who can’t bring himself to enter the promised land of the e-book? Maybe. Six years ago I declared myself to be “open, at least in theory, to the possibility of abandoning the book-as-art-object.” Now that technology has finally caught up with me, I find myself unexpectedly unwilling to put my money where my mouth is. Yet I believe no less firmly than ever that the printed book is a technology whose time has come and gone. Am I, then, a hypocrite? Or merely a middle-aged man who, like most middle-aged men, is reluctant to put aside the youthful things that remind me of myself when young?

I find myself in the same position as Terry . . . I’m not a leading edge early adopter, but I’ve been eager to “get to the future faster” for most of my life. I still remember Usenet when it was “the internet” as far as most people were concerned. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t consider my email far more important and urgent than “snail mail”, and I was a fan of “telecommuting” back when 2400 baud was “high speed”.

And yet . . . I don’t want to give up the book. I just got back from a book-buying spree in Stratford over the weekend, and don’t plan on buying a Kindle any time soon. I’ve got ebooks on my iPhone, but I consider them “emergency” reading material . . . when I don’t have a physical book to hand.

Am I also a luddite?

I hasten to point out that I no longer own any long-playing records or cassettes, and that I spend more time listening to music on my MacBook and iPod than on my CD player. No doubt the time will also come when I spend more time reading books on a Kindle, or something like it, than reading the handsomely bound volumes shelved in my living room. Not for me the self-conscious posturing of those curmudgeonly poseurs who wail Change and decay in all around I see! at every opportunity.

I had largely gotten out of the habit of listening to music until I got my iPhone last year. Since then, I’ve bought more CDs and MP3s than in the ten years before. I’ve still got a few vinyl LPs and a large collection of cassettes, but they’re just gathering dust.

October 29, 2009

Rand’s cultural impact

Filed under: Economics, Liberty, Media — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 14:31

Andrew Corsello tries to exorcise the ghost of Ayn Rand:

A weirdly specific thing happens with the books of Ayn Rand. It’s not just the what of the books, but when a reader discovers them — almost always during the first or second year of college. Rand grabs a reader at a time of maximum vulnerability and malleability, when he’s getting his first accurate sense of how he measures up in the world in terms of intellect and talent. The longing to regard oneself as misunderstood and underrated can be powerful; the temptation to project oneself as such, irresistible. But how? How to stand above and apart?

Enter Howard Roark, the heroic and misunderstood architect, square of jaw and Asperger-ish of mien, who at the end of The Fountainhead blows up his own masterpiece after a bunch of sniveling “parasites” and “second-handers” tinker with the blueprints.

GODDAMN!

Then enter Atlas Shrugged‘s John Galt, the heroic and misunderstood engineer, square of jaw and Asperger-ish of mien, who, after persuading “men of talent” to retreat to his Colorado aerie while the country goes to seed (in order to show the “mediocrities” left behind what life is like without their betters), delivers a 35,000-word speech decrying bureaucrats and regulators.

SIXTY PAGES, BITCHES!

Finally, enter Objectivism, the name Rand gave to her moral defense of “reason,” individualism, and unfettered capitalism.

SCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!

And hats off to Nick Gillespie for the best quote in the article:

“In terms of literary influence, only Kerouac compares,” says Nick Gillespie, editor-in-chief of Reason.com and Reason.tv (offshoots of Reason, the libertarian magazine founded in 1968 by a Randian). Pointing out that Atlas Shrugged and On the Road were both published in 1957, he adds, “Kerouac has had a more diffuse influence on American culture. He created a broad-based conception of what was cool and hip. Rand hasn’t brushed the culture as widely. She touches individuals — immensely and deeply. It’s useful to think about her impact in terms of Catcher in the Rye, another novel of individuation. Everyone agrees it’s beautifully written, but it’s losing its grasp on the public imagination. Same with Catch-22. Yossarian was a perfect antihero for the ’60s generation, but does anybody give a shit about him now? Or about Portnoy? A few days ago, I was watching an old clip of Andrew Dice Clay’s stand-up act from 1987. He made a joke about jerking off into a liver, and no one in the audience knew what he was talking about. Think about that. You can still make Howard Roark jokes that play, but it’s been at least twenty years since you could do that with Portnoy. Portnoy’s dead. Philip Roth is a great writer, but his signature character has had far less purchase on the collective imagination than Galt or Roark. No matter what you think of Rand, there’s no denying that the woman just swings a really big dick.”

An appreciation of Norm Abrams . . . and a hearty damnation of ‘Reality TV’

Filed under: Media, Woodworking — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:19

By way of a Twitter update from Gerard van der Leun, an entertaining post from Sippican that combines a farewell to TV woodworking great Norm Abrams and a nicely judged condemnation of that modern atrocity called “Reality Television”.

Norm Abram is the penultimate example of true “Reality TV.” He made real things, and encouraged others to do so. No pretense. Not a scam. The balloon boy’s father will get his 15 minutes, but being part of Katie Couric’s nightly geeks and freaks sideshow act is a virtual reality, it’s not real real. He’ll get a book deal or an ankle bracelet, maybe both, but he literally contributes nothing to the sum total of the world’s worth. If you count up just the Twitter time he wasted, which is all waste anyway, he was the most destructive force on planet Earth for a week. But you didn’t have to look. I didn’t. You can’t even dissect him as an example of a media frenzy, because there’s no rhyme or reason to it. It’s all just stupid.

“Reality TV” is an absurd concept to people that live in the real world of work and worry. They get reality every day, they don’t need a faux one to amuse themselves. Cubicle-bound endomorphs think a contest that looks like figuring out a subway map, a bus schedule, and an airport tote board is an “Amazing Race.” Catching a trolley is not a bloodsport, no matter how heavy your backpack full of energy bars is. Adults going camping while participating in activities too silly and sedentary for an overweight child’s summer camp, with office politics thrown in, hardly makes them a “Survivor.” I’m told that when you’re all done watching all this onTV, you’re going to weave your own clothes and barter with your next-door neighbor, the grizzly bear, with Kruggerands. Sure you are.

There actually is one hint of unreality to Norm. The workshop isn’t his; not many people know that. It belongs to the producer of the show. Norm, as successful as he is, has been dragging his ass to the factory every day as if he was just another schlub.

October 26, 2009

QotD: Neither full veritas nor much lux

Filed under: Media, Quotations, Religion — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 00:37

Notwithstanding all this, The Cartoons That Shook the World is an informative read. But you won’t find the actual cartoons in it. There’s a cartoon mocking George W. Bush; there’s a death threat against the cartoonists. But Yale University Press refused to publish Klausen’s book as she submitted it — with the 12 Danish cartoons. Yale ordered her to remove the cartoons, citing unnamed “experts” who claimed the book “ran a serious risk of instigating violence.” Several American newspapers, like The Philadelphia Inquirer, published the cartoons without incident. Yale has had no actual threats, but it pre-emptively surrendered. If Klausen wanted to live up to Yale’s motto — “light and truth” — she would have done what the entire editorial staff of the New York Press did in 2006 when their publisher vetoed their reprinting of the cartoons: They resigned en masse.

Given Klausen’s burning derision for Fogh Rasmussen’s decision to stand for freedom, it’s no surprise she collapsed immediately herself, academic integrity be damned. Her surrender — and Yale’s — is not a detail but a central part of the story, for it is exactly the outcome desired by the Danish imams, the Saudi diplomats and their chorus of rioters.

Ezra Levant, “Review: The Cartoons that Shook the World, by Jytte Klausen Cartoon logic”, The Globe and Mail, 2009-10-24

October 24, 2009

The oddity of PJTV, Bloggingheads, etc.

Filed under: Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:19

Chris Taylor asks a question that has bothered me too:

Why would you duplicate the worst aspects of the medium?

I need somebody to explain the appeal of PJTV and Bloggingheads.tv. I thought this whole “citizen journalism” thing was about bringing greater depth, detail and context to the news the major media cranks out into the airwaves. Taking the time to write from a specialist’s perspective, to fill in the background that a beat reporter would not even realise they are missing. And all of that married to the ability to receive and remark upon news stories and opinion, anywhere there is a wired or wireless net connection.

The move to try and push this discourse into video from text is ridiculously misguided. The most compelling video isn’t watching two talking heads debate the issues of the day; if it were, the local candidates debates during elections would rival strip clubs for popularity and revenue-generating possibilities. Compelling video is watching the events occur, unfiltered; not having a vacuous talking head try to interpret the events long after they have actually occurred.

Exactly. I rarely watch online videos of the PJTV/Bloggingheads type, partly because I find them generally boring and partly because they take up too much of my time. If I’m web surfing on my lunch break, I don’t want to devote ten or twenty minutes to watching talking heads . . . I’ve got limited time, and the spoken word is far slower than reading the same information in text form.

Worse, sometimes the talking head is someone whose writing I appreciate . . . but their onscreen personality detracts from the message they’re trying to communicate. There’s a reason the mainstream media have tended to feature certain kinds of presenters for their news and opinion programs: they’re able to communicate in pleasant well-modulated voices, they appear dignified on camera, and dress well. They don’t fidget, they don’t twitch or scratch their noses . . . they’re performers in a specific kind of professional performance. Bloggers generally do not fit this profile at all: they’re writers and thinkers, not performers. And it shows.

October 22, 2009

It’s not a clever satire

Filed under: Liberty, Media, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 07:58

John Dvorak thought that this was “meant to be satire or commentary (or is it?) on where London is heading with it’s multiple cameras on every street and where the former East Germany was. And were we could eventually go if we aren’t vigilant.” I don’t think so:

The link provided goes to the LAPD website. Creepy.

October 21, 2009

Canadian press freedoms slip a few notches

Filed under: Cancon, Liberty, Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:12

Reporters Without Borders (known by their French initials, RSF) show Canada’s press is less free this year, compared to other countries:

Canada fell to 19th place this year from 13th last year on Reporters Without Borders’ index of freedom of the press. The analysis covers print, broadcast and online journalism in 175 countries.

The Paris-based group, also known by its French acronym RSF, says court challenges to journalists’ rights to protect their sources precipitated Canada’s drop six spots from last year’s ranking.

Lawsuits intended to silence critics under the weight of the hefty cost of a legal defence — known as strategic lawsuits against public participation, or SLAPP suits — also factored into the drop, said Dennis Trudeau, a spokesman for Reporters Without Borders’ Canadian chapter.

“There are issues like real protection of sources,” he said.

“Where a reporter could theoretically face jail or a fine for not revealing his sources is in our view, especially when we’re dealing with public issues, a unreasonable restriction on freedom of the press.”

October 20, 2009

FTC guidelines require me to inform you that . . .

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Media, Politics — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 17:46

. . . I have received no free materials, no payment, and no promised service in exchange for blogging. Others, like Daniel Kalder may end up having to splash nonsense like the start of this post across all their book reviews posted online:

In a fascinating interview conducted with Richard Cleland of the FTC, books blogger Edward Champion exposed the manifold incoherencies in the guidelines. Read the whole thing, for yea verily, it abounds in absurdity. What leapt out at me was the blanket assertion made by Cleland that “when a publisher sends a book to a blogger, there is the expectation of a good review”.

To which Champion replies: “I informed him that this was not always the case and observed that some bloggers often receive 20 to 50 books a week. In such cases, the publisher hopes for a review, good or bad. Cleland didn’t see it that way.”

“If a blogger received enough books,” said Cleland, “he could open up a used bookstore.”

Got that? Good Lord, the man’s a genius! I never realised this criticism lark could be so lucrative! Yes indeed, in Cleland’s brave new world a review copy is compensation, and a review from a blogger is a priori an endorsement, even if negative. Mysteriously the FTC does not require newspapers to disclose how they come by the books they review, or any other freebies their journalists might receive. And yet to pick one obvious example, almost all travel journalism actually is built on the kind of payola/payback system Cleland ascribes to book reviewing, so I can’t see why not.

Cheerleader pay . . . is about the market rate

Filed under: Economics, Football, Media — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 12:26

In last week’s Tuesday Morning Quarterback column, Gregg Easterbrook made a pitch for NFL cheerleaders being underpaid. Not so fast there, Gregg says Steve Czaban (Czabe):

Easterbook is brilliant 90% of the time, but this one is the equivalent of a pick-6 the other way. In fact, it sounds a lot like a deep and repressed liberal urge gurgling forth against the tide of his otherwise sensible, free market intellect.

NFL cheerleaders are paid exactly what they are worth. They may even be over-paid. How do I know this? Because the NFL has had no problem filling their cheer squads for this price. Ergo: the price is right. The market has spoken.

Trying to staff a cheer squad for a much lesser league at this price, would likely run you into personnel shortages or weight issues. The National Football League, however, carries tremendous resume value for these ladies. It carries community status, it carries secondary value that far exceeds the $100 bucks a game.

If this was not true, then you wouldn’t need tryouts. You would just take the first 12 who volunteered.

It’s quite true, despite the earnest appeal for higher pay from last week’s TMQ, cheerleaders are — on the evidence of the current market conditions — overpaid. Some jobs pay high wages because of the unpleasant working conditions or the need for extensive prior training (like garbage collectors and doctors, respectively), while others pay low wages because the job requires no unusual skills or provides non-cash benefits so that there are always more applicants than jobs.

H/T to Mises Economic Blog for the link.

Only in America? Yup.

Filed under: Media, USA — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 12:18

Colby Cosh makes a convincing case that “the hoax apparently cooked up by world’s-worst-dad frontrunner Richard Heene” could only have happened in America:

Richard Heene obviously wanted to be an experimenter-entertainer in this American, Edison-meets-Barnum tradition. He was, allegedly, willing to embroil his family in a criminal conspiracy to advance the cause. His determination was so total, he doesn’t seem to have given any thought to the possibility that the suspected domestic-violence complaint recently investigated at his residence might be revealed. What sealed his fate, though, was a near-total lack of genuine scientific knowledge or understanding.

When it comes to detecting folderol, television networks have a poor track record, but even the suits at ABC detected the stench of flim-flam on Heene, who had been a success on their series Wife Swap. His pitch to the network consists of a mix of tiresomely familiar classroom experiments, untrue folkloric claims he obviously didn’t bother to double-check, plain nonsense and furiously-brainstormed wackiness (“How long can we drive before having to pee?”). Even an explicitly stupid show made by a presenter who still thinks of lasers as enticingly novel would surely be unlikely to succeed as entertainment. There are fools all over the world, but the awesome chasm between Heene’s ambitions and his actual abilities — and the sheer disrespect he had for his own limitations — that, I think, could only be found in today’s America.

More “tech the tech” talk from J.J. Abrams

Filed under: Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:37

You felt that the “chance” meeting between the new Kirk and the old Spock was more like a run through the infinite improbability drive than a sensible plot point? Wait . . . it gets more improbable:

When Star Trek arrives on Blu-ray and DVD Nov. 17, extras like deleted scenes and commentary will answer some lingering questions. Abrams said the DVD includes a scene cut from the film that features Spock Prime (Nimoy) dropping some logic about the unlikely chance meeting.

“In the scene, Spock explains that (the encounter of Kirk and Spock Prime) is a result of the universe trying to restore balance after the time line is changed,” Abrams said. “They acknowledged the coincidence as a function of the universe to heal itself.”

Abrams said he cut that scene because he liked the mystery the chance meeting provided — and the idea that Kirk and Spock are destined to be friends. (Another DVD mini-feature, titled “The Shatner Conundrum,” will tackle the absence of William Shatner, the original Captain Kirk, from Abrams’ movie, according to io9.com.)

October 19, 2009

The fantasy economic world of Star Trek

Filed under: Economics, Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 07:32

Dmitry Chernikov looks at the nonsensical economic “system” of the Star Trek universe:

Similarly, we never see Quark, who owns a bar on the space station, get paid for dispensing his drinks; at least, I don’t recall ever seeing that. For a guy obsessed with latinum (now there’s your sound money—latinum-standard; and in another episode we learn that gold is worthless compared to latinum) this is a problem, especially given that the Federation military employees on the station don’t receive any wages. Once again, the necessary obscurity of how Quark’s business worked (because it obviously cannot work) seems rather annoying. So the conundrum remains. And even for the Ferengi, all business and consumer transactions appear to be performed with cash, that is, actual bars of latinum. They apparently have no stock market (the litmus test for whether a society is capitalist or socialist), no electronic asset transfers, no banking system (banks have two distinct roles, often unfortunately confused under the present fiat money regime: they are (1) warehouses storing valuable property, such as gold coins, a function called deposit banking; and (2) intermediaries between lenders and borrowers, called loan banking), no insurance companies, nothing. There are no big corporations, no brand names, no advertising (on the absence of any kind of commercial mass media see below), no private retail outlets, no Internet shopping. There aren’t even latinum coins, for goodness’ sake! And if not the Ferengi, then who else?

Note that the Ferengi are, of course, the classic stereotype of the Jews, as propounded by Nazi and Soviet propaganda: ugly; crass, materialistic, and base; grasping and scheming; and treacherous. But, in the case of Quark, not entirely without redeeming qualities, particularly when he cooperates with the ruling regime on the station. That is, quite despite his perverse nature, there exists within Quark’s ignoble little soul a weak aspiration to be like the far more noble humans. What a grotesque and utterly false parody of a typical businessman (and Jews, to boot) within a system of natural liberty and free enterprise! In the unhampered market economy the “superior men,” the better-off, the elite or the society’s “natural aristocracy,” are drawn into service to the common man. Entrepreneurs become rich because the masses, the “poor,” rush to outbid each other on the products offered to them for sale. If they fail to satisfy the consumers’ wants, they will forfeit their wealth and their vocation as entrepreneurs and be demoted into the rank of laborers. Personal wealth in a free society is thus a consequence of previous success in serving consumers.

[. . .]

Now it is obvious that the variety of goods and services available on DS9 is extremely limited. The personnel seem to be, as one, ascetic workaholics. I’ve never seen any character go shopping. I suppose that these guys are supplied with government-made standard-issue everything. This can’t be a lot of fun, don’t you think? Also, don’t misunderstand me, I love classical music, but is that all that the Federation citizens are allowed to listen to (I am referring to ST: The Next Generation, in particular)? In other words, instead of a highly developed commercial culture expected of a sophisticated multi-planet division of labor, we get almost complete conformity and uniformity. To put it another way, the characters “have no life”; they are totally devoted to the welfare of the “collective,” the collective being, of course, their superior officers. I could never understand why the Federation was so contrasted with the Borg. The Borg are very much like the Federation, only perhaps with slightly less individual freedom. (Maybe the difference is that, unlike the Borg captives, the Federation serfs love the Big Brother.)

October 17, 2009

Blogger, know thyself

Filed under: Humour, Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 20:29

Gerard van der Leun knows blogging well. Perhaps a bit too well:

“THE 27 DAILY AFFIRMATIONS FOR BLOGGERS”

  1. When I post under an assumed name, I can get in closer touch with my Inner Sociopath.
  2. Through block-quotes and fisking I have the power to transform even the most harmless statements of my enemies into concrete evidence of their evil plans to enslave mankind and rule the world.
  3. In all humility I do not seek to rule the world. I seek only complete agreement and total capitulation.
  4. I assume full responsibility for my posts, especially the good ones that are just links to someone else’s posts.
  5. If, after publication, one of my posts should appear irresponsible, I will be responsible enough to make it disappear, along with the Google cache of it.
  6. Being more confused about the First Amendment than I am about copyright, I am free to reveal the obscene number of hours I blog at work, and the URL of my secret blog where I post the truth about my coworkers’ hygiene, bodily functions, porn-surfing habits, and gender reassignment surgeries without being fired. I know my rights.

October 15, 2009

Tweet of the day: Bob Dylan’s Christmas album

Filed under: Humour, Media — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 18:17

John Scalzi: Listening to the Bob Dylan Christmas Album, because, honestly, WTF. I think these days Bob’s just screwing with folks for fun.

John Scalzi: To answer the question: The Bob Dylan Christmas album is, in fact, terrifying. As in “stop it, you’re scaring the reindeer.”

Ralph Lauren moves decisively to quash negative press . . .

Filed under: Media — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:30

. . . by allegedly firing the model whose Photoshopped-to-stick-insect proportions drew the criticism in the first place:

The model featured in the Ralph Lauren Photoshop stick insect outrage — in which she was Photoshopped to within an inch of her life — claims she was sacked by the company for being “too fat”.

Filippa Hamilton suffered such an extreme digital makeover in an ad for the fashion company that BoingBoing was prompted to gasp: “Dude, her head’s bigger than her pelvis.”

Ralph Lauren quickly threw DMCA takedown notices at BoingBoing and PhotoshopDisasters for exposing the folly, but subsequently decided to apologise.

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