Monthly Archives: April 2014

More Than a Little Art, A Call to Action for Net Neutrality, Some New Entertainment, and Awesome Science

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This entry is part 17 of 100 in the series Today's Tidbits

I often say that I’m not a music person–mainly because I’m not… at least not like a lot of other people I know how eat, breath, sleep, and generally live music. I enjoy music, but I don’t particularly seek it out or obsess over it.

What I do like, though, is a solid performance. Of anything. Regardless of whether I like the song or not, if the performer gives it their all and really puts themselves out there… well, the audience gets something special. Whether that “something” is what the performer intended is another story altogether (see: William Hung or, for that matter, Ed Wood when it comes to film making). In the feed today, right near the end, were three impressive musical bits. Two of them involved real singing, the third was pure performance (lip synching). All of them have impact and meaning beyond just the words or humor.

I dig that.

Same is true of anything where someone is putting themselves out there. It’s most obvious in performing or visual arts, but it’s also true of writing–both fiction and non-fiction. There’s another story in the feed that illustrates how you can’t just shut down people’s love for a story they relate to… and, more importantly, how absolutely backward the attempt to do so can go.

And wish science… well, science is an adventure all its own. You want risks and rewards, science has those in spades. Pursuing a line of questioning that no one else has–maybe that no one else even thinks has any value–that’s a committed act of will equal to anything else out there. Actually succeeding and seeing what you thought could be done become reality? Elation better than anything else.

I envy that kind of drive. I really can’t find it in myself. This is a problem. I’m working on it. Until I succeed, I just take solace and inspiration in those who do have it.

Some History, Some Politics, Some Fun, and a Few Other Things

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This entry is part 16 of 100 in the series Today's Tidbits

I (semi-unexpectedly) spent a lot of time over the weekend catching up on TV shows and playing video games. There was also some reading involved. Yeah, I’d had other plans, but was far too wiped out from the week to actually follow through on any of them. So, a couch weekend it was.

During that time, I was happy to notice a distinct lack of consistent formula in a lot of shows I’m currently watching. Sure, they draw on all the typical tropes of their respective genres, but they also play with them a bit at times. Every episode, though, is different enough that I don’t get bored watching more than two or three episodes in a row (which is something I can’t say about shows like House or, sometimes, NCIS… both shows I love, but can’t do marathons of). It was also a pleasant surprise to see some mediocre shows take a step up in quality (The 100 and Star Crossed are notable here)… and some really good shows (like Arrow and Hannibal) just take things to entirely new levels of awesome.

In a not unrelated vein, I also finished re-reading Clive Barker’s The Great and Secret Show. It’s the first time I’ve read the whole thing since I first tore through it around 1990. I’d forgotten how truly poetic Barker’s work can be and that, even among the horror, violence, and gore of a world in upheaval, there’s still a solid note of hope and clear examples of love and faith throughout. I was also reminded just how influential his work is to my worldview.

Birds, Bionics, reBoots, Balls, Batgirl, and a Bunch of things that don’t start with B

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This entry is part 15 of 100 in the series Today's Tidbits

What’s sure to eventually be the big news is that it’s been clearly stated now that the decades worth of stories, characters, and places built up in the Star Wars Extended Universe is not at all cannon. (Oh, but, Lucasfilm says, they’ll happily pillage what they want from it as they’re building their new continuity.)

This isn’t at all a big deal for me. I’ve read, I think, two of the Han Solo books and a few issues of the comic from the 80s. I know a whole lot of E.U. stuff, but only because so many people I know dig it so much. So, I’m not going to miss it at all.

I do, however, expect there to be raging battles in various geek circles about this. Maybe not quite on Jar Jar Binks level when it comes to vitriolic hate, but it’s going to be a rough road.

The other big (and more important to some) news is that Catholics are about to get two new saints… both former popes, including John Paul II, who is just shy of being the most fast-tracked saint ever (I think). It’s kind of neat to think that I now grew up during the same span of years that a couple of saints walked the earth. It has a bit of an anachronistic feel to it. Modern saints don’t seem as flashy or awe-inspiringly amazing as the old ones do. Miracles are more subtle things now than they are in the Bible and the “amazing” life is often equally subtle. A steady push to be better, to do better, to put oneself out there and bear the ridicule and hardship of others as your own. In some ways, it makes sainthood seem just that much more attainable. Which, I think, is a good thing… maybe more people will work toward it.

Political Drift, Questionable Communications Decisions, A Classic Clip, History Online, Seal Snuggles, and Some SciFi Short Goodness

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This entry is part 14 of 100 in the series Today's Tidbits

The situation with Cliven Bundy (the man who’s been grazing his cattle illegally for years on federal land) continues to get more surreal. Now that he’s got a speaking stump, all sorts of things are coming out of his mouth that are being made a big deal of. In some cases, like his recent musings on whether blacks were better off as actual slaves than as a bunch of people on public assistance now, possibly more of a big deal than they should be.

The problematic thing is, there seem to be some questions at the root of this story that are very worthy of discussion. Like bringing into question how much “public” land the federal government owns and what can (or should) be allowed to go on with it. Or how we should all feel about federal officials, working well within existing law, can be dissuaded from carrying out their duties by a group of ornery and armed citizens. Or how the media is actually covering this story–what gets hyped where, what details get lost, what words quoted out of context.

All fascinating and important things that will likely be swept away under the torrent of “Crazy Racist Guy Pulls a Gun on the Government” spin. (Well… it’s not completely spin, which is part of the problem with Bundy being at the center of this.)

The other big news is the FCC’s decision to more or less throw the concept of Net Neutrality under the bus. With the potential merger of Comcast and Time-Warner cable providers on the horizon, there’s no more important time to ensure that the Internet stay as low a barrier to entry as possible. With what the FCC just did, though, carriers like Comcast can (and will–it’s already started with Netflix) give preferential treatment to some businesses, putting them in a beneficial spot for getting their content to customers. The new ruling does include provisions that theoretically prevent an actual “fast lane” where data transfer rates could be modified based on business agreements… but those safeguards only work if the FCC enforces them in a meaningful way… and I haven’t seen a lot to indicate the FCC will do anything in a meaningful way when it comes to this issue. This is the second time they’ve dropped the ball–the first being when the poorly worded, but generally accepted, net neutrality ruling failed to be defensible in court because of that poor wording.

Nail in the Net Neutrality Coffin, We Can Be Martians, Inside Mummies, American Dream Evaporated, and Pop Nightmares

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This entry is part 13 of 100 in the series Today's Tidbits

The big discussion thread today was all about Avril Lavigne’s new video, which was pretty universally panned by my friends (and me). The meat of the discussion, though centered around a minor dust up over what “art” is for and how dedicated one should be to avoiding “fluff” in life. Really fascinating stuff… and a clear example of how most people I know can be completely passionate about their points of view, yet still clearly communicate their positions.

The other two important things, neither of which FB seems to have decided to really push in front of people all that much just yet, were the FCC decision about Net Neutrality and an hour-long podcast about the 60-word sentence that opened up the can of worms we’ve been dealing with when it comes to our response to the 9-11 attacks way back when. It’s that whole “by any means necessary” and “affiliated entities” bit that’s really the problem. I highly recommend everyone take the time to listen to it (links in the stream below).