Attention devoted reader(s?):
As many of you know, I’m headed to London on Friday. Presuming I’m not deported for certain acts of debauchery I may or may not partake in, I should be out of the country until early August.
For those unaware, London is five hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time. Put simply, midnight in Lansing is 5am in London. So I’m unlikely to be online at the same times as a lot of you. Also, I’ll presumably be gallivanting across Britian and have no time for idle internet chatter, so I may not be online much regardless.
The best way to reach me is probably by email. I won’t have my cell phone, but I should be on Skype when I’m online(check my facebook for it if you don’t know it). Otherwise, just post a comment on the blog.
I’ll try to update the blog regularly, and I’ll post any photos to Flickr when I upload them.
Until then, I hope you all can be entertained without my ever-awesome presence. It’ll be hard, but I believe in you.
I came across a tool called “Woordle,” which takes a document and makes a word cloud out of it. Words more frequently used are larger, with common words like “a,” “the,” and the like removed. Unable to resist, I copy/pasted the notepad file where I keep various lyrics for songs I’ve toyed around with.
Most of these aren’t from finished songs, but rather unfinished verses that I never put to music, polished, or got close to finishing.
Here it is(click to go to the site, with a larger image):
Apparently I have a fascination with time. I’m not surprised “back” is on there. I have two(unfinished) songs that play around with that word a little. Maybe I should finish one of them…
Either way, I found it amusing, and thought I’d share. If I had it in a text file, I’d probably get a kick out of doing this with some old poetry, or maybe my old LiveJournal. I’m curious how large certain curse words would be on that one…
(Found via JoCo’s blog)
An interesting headline just caught my eye on Google News:
Judge wants panel to investigate his porn postings
Quote from the article: “[Judge Kozinski’s] computerized cache included a picture of two nude women on all fours painted to look like Holstein dairy cows, images of masturbation, a video of a man being pursued by a sexually aroused donkey and a slide show featuring a striptease with a transsexual.”
Now, I’m all for sexual freedom, and you have a right to your fetishes, but seriously: why would a public figure post these things on their personal domain? There are so many ways to hide your tracks, and it seems a Judge that was considered to have Supreme Court potential would be more careful about that.
Somebody teach this guy about encryption. Or hosting on a domain not directly linked to you. Or just, you know, keeping the stuff on your own private Five Terabyte server .
Not that I do that. That was… some other guy. Stop looking at me.
I have a confession to make. Despite my hard core, Guitar Hero-formed rock star persona, I have a soft spot for drama. A soft spot that often shows through in the voyeuristic reading of the blogged confessions of someone I’ve never met, or the lurking of relationship advice threads on random forums. But a while back, I found another release: Quarterlife.
Some of you have probably already seen the show. It ran from November ‘07 to March ‘08, and apparently had a decent following. I came across the show via StumbleUpon, and managed to get through all of season one in a matter of days.
Wikipedia sums up the premise as “a group of twenty-something artists, who are coming of age in the digital generation.” It’s a simple concept, but it works really well. Oh, and Debra’s totally hot.
This series of five to ten minute microepisodes is probably one of the better internet series out there. It has professional production, solid acting, and (mostly) good writing. It managed to consistently evoke that “one-more-episode” desire, which then of course leads to watching two hours straight.
I hope more creative minds attempt to do shows in similar made-for-internet formats. Many online shows - while still pretty well done - suffer from very small budgets, often being created with just a camera and a few friends. Monetizing such ventures isn’t easy, but the potential for great material that would never be put on television is too great to ignore.
Bottom line: The pilot episode’s less than ten minutes long. You’ll probably like it if your love for angst is half as great as mine. Give it a watch, and let me know in the comments if there’s anything else out there like it that I’m missing.
Controversial personality Bill Maher apparently has decided that his talents at pissing people off should not be reserved for HBO, and is planning to release a film titled Religulous. It looks to expand Maher’s horizons, going from angering viewers of extended cable to enraging all followers of organized religion. Ballsy, if nothing else.
Now, I have no problem with critics of organized religion- I’m often among their ranks. But this movie looks to me to be going in the wrong direction. Regardless of how it turns out, a majority of people are just going to see this as a movie that is an insult to everything they believe in. And people don’t listen to those sort of messages.
This seems to be a movie that will have the same problem that Ben Stein’s Expelled had: the only people who would watch the film are the ones who already believe in its message. Granted, Ben Stein’s movie was a lie-filled panderfest, but it wasn’t made to convert as much as it was to reassure. It pats its supporters on the back and reassures them that what they believe in is right.
Regardless of how accurate what Religulous may or may not be, the trailer makes it out to basically be saying: “People actually believe the stuff in the Bible actually happened? How stupid!” And that’s not a message that’s going to reach out to people. It’ll just make them mad, or get you banned from Kansas.
Atheists often argue that true, open debate about religion is pointless, and it deserves ridicule. Their reasoning is that one would not argue with a man who believed there was an invisible teacup orbiting the planet, because the idea in itself is far too absurd. But regardless of how you feel about it, Christianity is an invisible teacup that most Americans believe in.
I don’t have an answer for people who believe all people should be atheists. I don’t think people like Maher will change any minds, and there’s really no way to do it. Religion is what it is. Maybe people will change their minds in time, maybe they won’t.
People will protest this movie. Fox News will tell you how horrible and hateful it is. I’ll probably see it, and I’ll probably enjoy it. The studio will make some money and move on to its next project. And the world will go on, unchanged.
God Bless America