I was just complaining on Twitter that I feel genuine and physiologically-palpable anxiety over the idea that there are so many Important Books that I’ve never gotten to, and likely never will. (Read more about my struggles with particular aspects of the Western Canon here.) Then Bill Boulden (@Spruke) pointed me to this piece at NPR by Linda Holmes on this very subject. This gist of it is that there’s always too much to get to, and being “well-read” is less... Read more
Thanks to a set of recent patent filings from Apple and Amazon, reports are saying that the two companies are both looking at ways for consumers of their digital products to resell them to other users, in a sense, setting up “used” mp3 and ebook exchanges. Many seem confused about how this would even work, as in, how can the company be sure that once I’ve sold a file to another user that I no longer keep a copy for... Read more
Michael Arrington writes that the old arguments about Apple and Microsoft are missing the obvious: that as the Web became the thing we used computers for, the OS that ran Office the best no longer really mattered: Suddenly computers weren’t entirely about Office, they were now about Office and the Internet. Mac had only a slightly hobbled version of Office, and they had a peachy Internet experience. . . The rise of the Internet and the fall of Office is... Read more
I sometimes think that if you could personify the current state of American society, and “film” our economic situation, it might look kind of like a Baz Luhrmann picture, with throngs of cavorting people all dressed to the nines-to-the-ninth-power, but all rotting on the inside. A glittery, sparkling, hedonistic, gala ball at which everyone secretly had aggressive and incurable syphilis, but couldn’t admit it to anyone else. Anyway, that’s what I thought of when I read this piece by George... Read more
Sean Crist confronts a problem I didn’t even realize existed, but now sticks in one’s literary craw: Why didn’t the eagles just fly Frodo to Mordor, and skip all that unpleasant trudging about through a medieval hellscape and struggling with a demented jewelry addict bent on his demise? Essentially, because Tolkien just kind of screwed up by introducing the eagles in the first place: . . . the strongest argument that there is nothing to rule out the “eagles” plan,... Read more
There’s an interesting article at The Verge on why teenagers seem to be moving away from Facebook, the thing I loathe but feel compelled to use anyway. The takeaway is simply that what makes Facebook Facebook, sharing stuff about your life, is no longer hip. The fad, like so many pet rocks, has died: At some point, adding these details, like hundreds of photos from a recent vacation and status updates about your new job amounted to bragging — force-feeding... Read more
This is the preview ad for Samsung’s coming big unveiling of the Galaxy S IV. It features three happy, rich, white males, and one totally silent servant black guy who is summoned by a finger snap. It’s 30 seconds in. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dIEfNaNCkKM Now, I like a lot of what Samsung is doing in the gadget space. But this makes me cringe. Perhaps some of Samsung’s huge marketing expenditures should be diverted to getting a clue. Read more
A classic idea, might be the way to go. Just a thought. “Find the Pope in the Pizza” from George Nimeh on Vimeo. Read more
Right wingers got all squirrelly in their pants the other day because Secretary of State John Kerry had the audacity to say, while visiting Germany, that in America we have “the right to be stupid.” because, UC, saying something like this obviously means that John Kerry thanks all Americans are stupid. Because he’s French, you see. Or something. (The Breitbart site wrote, ” Portraying Americans as idiots disconnected from the world or reality is a Kerry specialty.” Just as an... Read more
A study from JAMA Psychiatry, as reported in Time, looks at the effects of bullying in school into adulthood, from the perspective of all parties involved, the bullied and the bullies themselves. First, I’ll say that I’m always glad to see any recognition that bullying has long-term effects, as I’ve lived my life being told that “it was all in the past,” that “everyone goes through it,” and that one should just “get over it.” But of course that’s nonsense.... Read more
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