Imagine waking up to find that the electricity in your neighborhood is gone. Not just gone - very gone, with an estimated two week period of absolutely no juice. No ifs, buts or anything - it's just gone. And you are now in a position of having to deal with it.
What do you do?
Depending on where you live, the alternative "talking to your neighbors" might be or not be on that list of things to do. Which makes a difference. The same difference that can be seen when comparing the statements "my problem" and "our problem". The former is personal, the latter is political.
Power outage is a situation that could happen. With brutal ramifications for whatever you might be doing right now. Political outrage is also a situation that could happen, with equally brutal ramifications for the local community.
Personal, political.
Who would have thought the dividing line would be as simple as talking to people?
This was inspired by this tweet.
Thursday, August 30, 2012
It was a dark and stormy night...
The first line of everything is an excuse. Mostly to continue with whatever that first line has started - a text, a talk, a conversation, a music piece, a heroic epic, a lifelong love commitment, a [something]. Whatever it starts, that first line is not it. It's just the declaration that discourse has begun, and that a proper response is in order.
Beowulf starts out with the word "hwat!", which I can just imagine being used to make the very rambunctious contemporary audiences hark and listen. The function is not so much semantic as social - listen up, everyone!
Everything needs that "hwat!". No matter if it's a blog post, a novel, a twitter conversation, a complicated orchestral piece or an international diplomatic conference. That first statement will always serve as an excuse to keep going, no matter what the keeping and going is about.
Which is why "it was a dark and stormy night" is not such a bad way to go about it. It sure beats that feeling of staring at a blank page not knowing where to go - not having an excuse to continue, as it were.
So. It was a dark and stormy night...
Beowulf starts out with the word "hwat!", which I can just imagine being used to make the very rambunctious contemporary audiences hark and listen. The function is not so much semantic as social - listen up, everyone!
Everything needs that "hwat!". No matter if it's a blog post, a novel, a twitter conversation, a complicated orchestral piece or an international diplomatic conference. That first statement will always serve as an excuse to keep going, no matter what the keeping and going is about.
Which is why "it was a dark and stormy night" is not such a bad way to go about it. It sure beats that feeling of staring at a blank page not knowing where to go - not having an excuse to continue, as it were.
So. It was a dark and stormy night...
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Why DRM is a satanic hellspawn that needs to be purged
A scourge has struck the world. This scourge is known as DRM, or Digital Rights Management as it is sometimes called. And it seems to be here to stay.
DRM is not only a scourge. It is also an accepted business practice, and thus something many comes into contact with in everyday life. But it is not the intended victims that are struck the hardest by it; rather, it is the innocent everymen who only try to do the right thing who takes the full brunt of it.
The short definition of DRM would be that it's different ways of making sure copyrights are not infringed. Like, say, by online pirates. These ways can be a CD that can't be played in a computer (and the content thus cannot be converted into MP3's), or a computer game that only works when connected to certain servers (which, in theory, only accepts legit users). The general thrust of it is to build in obstacles into the usability of things, so they can only be used in some ways and not others.
The brutal definition would be that it is about selling intentionally crippled products.
The second biggest problem with DRM is of course that those who are tech savvy can break through the so called protection in about five minutes. And after those five minutes, whatever was supposed to be protected is now up for grabs on the Pirate Bay or wherever. Which is the exact opposite of what the whole purpose of DRM is.
The biggest problem is that these things continue to be broken, even when the purpose for them being broken is nulled. Which means that those honest consumers who want to listen to a CD in their computer can't do that, and that you have to watch those unskippable anti-piracy ads every time you load that DVD into the player.
Those who pirate the movie don't have to put up with such bullshit. And when the pirated version is better that the legit copy, then it's not the pirated version that's the inferior one.
In no other industry would this type of practice be tolerated. What if IKEA sold kitchen tables where one leg was missing, stating that someone might copy the design if they gave you the full version? No one would take that seriously, and the PR department would have to expand rapidly in order to cope with the newfound customer interest. But when it comes to culture, this same course of action is suddenly okay - in fact, it is so okay that no one even notices that no one notices anymore.
The comparison to IKEA won't work if we take it too far, though. Not including a table leg per table would, after all, result in a lot of legs not shipped out, which can be translated into saved money. When it comes to DRM, though, it's not something removed. It's something added. And at a cost, at that. Which is the opposite of saving money, and the one who has to pay for this is you, the consumer. Every time you buy their broken products.
As you can see, DRM is a scourge that needs to be purged. It makes things more expensive than they need to be, they make them harder to use, and they do it without a good reason.
Common sense dictates that we stop this madness at once. For the benefit of everyone in general, and the honest consumer in particular.
Originally published February 10, 2012
DRM is not only a scourge. It is also an accepted business practice, and thus something many comes into contact with in everyday life. But it is not the intended victims that are struck the hardest by it; rather, it is the innocent everymen who only try to do the right thing who takes the full brunt of it.The short definition of DRM would be that it's different ways of making sure copyrights are not infringed. Like, say, by online pirates. These ways can be a CD that can't be played in a computer (and the content thus cannot be converted into MP3's), or a computer game that only works when connected to certain servers (which, in theory, only accepts legit users). The general thrust of it is to build in obstacles into the usability of things, so they can only be used in some ways and not others.
The brutal definition would be that it is about selling intentionally crippled products.
The second biggest problem with DRM is of course that those who are tech savvy can break through the so called protection in about five minutes. And after those five minutes, whatever was supposed to be protected is now up for grabs on the Pirate Bay or wherever. Which is the exact opposite of what the whole purpose of DRM is.
The biggest problem is that these things continue to be broken, even when the purpose for them being broken is nulled. Which means that those honest consumers who want to listen to a CD in their computer can't do that, and that you have to watch those unskippable anti-piracy ads every time you load that DVD into the player.
Those who pirate the movie don't have to put up with such bullshit. And when the pirated version is better that the legit copy, then it's not the pirated version that's the inferior one.
In no other industry would this type of practice be tolerated. What if IKEA sold kitchen tables where one leg was missing, stating that someone might copy the design if they gave you the full version? No one would take that seriously, and the PR department would have to expand rapidly in order to cope with the newfound customer interest. But when it comes to culture, this same course of action is suddenly okay - in fact, it is so okay that no one even notices that no one notices anymore.
The comparison to IKEA won't work if we take it too far, though. Not including a table leg per table would, after all, result in a lot of legs not shipped out, which can be translated into saved money. When it comes to DRM, though, it's not something removed. It's something added. And at a cost, at that. Which is the opposite of saving money, and the one who has to pay for this is you, the consumer. Every time you buy their broken products.
As you can see, DRM is a scourge that needs to be purged. It makes things more expensive than they need to be, they make them harder to use, and they do it without a good reason.
Common sense dictates that we stop this madness at once. For the benefit of everyone in general, and the honest consumer in particular.
Originally published February 10, 2012
Electrocrime!
Every period has its word. When electricity was the brand new thing, the use of the word "electric" was at an all time high. Especially as a prefix, electro. It was everywhere!
There's really no need to say that the whole "electro" craze toned down over the years. Electricity has become somewhat of a given, and that something is electric doesn't make it into an object of curiosity as it once were.
Over time, various other words have come to fill the electrifying role of electro. One might say that while electro became that much less important, the need for other buzzwords didn't.
One of the recent ones is "cyber", which thankfully is no longer in frequent use. That quarter century of being around really did put a damper on it. And in those rare cases when it didn't, it is either compensated for in terms of diehard enthusiasm or hardnecked moneymaking ambitions.
Or, as in the case of those talking about tougher measures against cybercrime or hardening our defenses in the ongoing cyberwar - by the discursive lag endemic to all political propaganda. You get a lot further by invoking the cyberghost than by saying that economic fraud and systemic domestic infrastructural weaknesses are problems that needs to be dealt with. And it's too much work to invent a new buzzword when that old one still works.
What I like to do is to replace [buzzword] with the good old electro, just to see what happens. If the sentence still makes sense after it's electrified, then it's probably fluff. (Electrocrime!) If, on the other hand, the sentence runs into semantic difficulties when the buzzword is buzzed out, then you might want to look closer at it. Because it actually tries to say something about the subject matter, rather than just invoking it for your marketable mind's eye.
Thus, looking forward, we are on the constant lookout for new creative solutions to the unique challenges posed by the digital cyberenvironment, and are proud in our resolve to electro electro electro -
There's really no need to say that the whole "electro" craze toned down over the years. Electricity has become somewhat of a given, and that something is electric doesn't make it into an object of curiosity as it once were.
Over time, various other words have come to fill the electrifying role of electro. One might say that while electro became that much less important, the need for other buzzwords didn't.
One of the recent ones is "cyber", which thankfully is no longer in frequent use. That quarter century of being around really did put a damper on it. And in those rare cases when it didn't, it is either compensated for in terms of diehard enthusiasm or hardnecked moneymaking ambitions.
Or, as in the case of those talking about tougher measures against cybercrime or hardening our defenses in the ongoing cyberwar - by the discursive lag endemic to all political propaganda. You get a lot further by invoking the cyberghost than by saying that economic fraud and systemic domestic infrastructural weaknesses are problems that needs to be dealt with. And it's too much work to invent a new buzzword when that old one still works.
What I like to do is to replace [buzzword] with the good old electro, just to see what happens. If the sentence still makes sense after it's electrified, then it's probably fluff. (Electrocrime!) If, on the other hand, the sentence runs into semantic difficulties when the buzzword is buzzed out, then you might want to look closer at it. Because it actually tries to say something about the subject matter, rather than just invoking it for your marketable mind's eye.
Thus, looking forward, we are on the constant lookout for new creative solutions to the unique challenges posed by the digital cyberenvironment, and are proud in our resolve to electro electro electro -
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
There is no I in writing
Writing is hard.
It all comes down to the difference between what you want to say and what they need to read. And how much of the one you need to sacrifice in order to achieve the other.
Let's say you are angry at something. The natural response is to write about how angry you are at this thing. The less uncertain terms the better, right?
The thing is that the readers don't need to know how angry you are. They rather need to know why you are angry, and they moreover need to read something that will make them just as mad about it as you are.
These are two different texts, and you need to employ different writing techniques in order to write them.
This is what makes writing so hard. Because no matter how angry you might be at something, that text does not care. And the reader won't have a reason to care until the text provides it. Which means that you, the writer, will have to place yourself in the rear view mirror and look straight ahead at the reader.
Do you read me?
It all comes down to the difference between what you want to say and what they need to read. And how much of the one you need to sacrifice in order to achieve the other.
Let's say you are angry at something. The natural response is to write about how angry you are at this thing. The less uncertain terms the better, right?
The thing is that the readers don't need to know how angry you are. They rather need to know why you are angry, and they moreover need to read something that will make them just as mad about it as you are.
These are two different texts, and you need to employ different writing techniques in order to write them.
This is what makes writing so hard. Because no matter how angry you might be at something, that text does not care. And the reader won't have a reason to care until the text provides it. Which means that you, the writer, will have to place yourself in the rear view mirror and look straight ahead at the reader.
Do you read me?
Monday, August 27, 2012
Alien priorities
There's one thing I've always wondered about Neil Armstrong, and that is how he and Buzz came to the decision that Neil got to go first.
Was it predefined by impersonal procedures, imposed from the bureaucratic context by cold discursive logic?
Was it a team effort among the whole organization, where the discussion rolled back and forth between all those other things that had to be done? How did these discussions go? What did the two have to say about it?
Did they do a rock-paper-scissors on the descent?
These are the kinds of things I think about. Sometimes in greater detail than at other times. Sometimes to the exclusion of other things.
The moon, you say?
Was it predefined by impersonal procedures, imposed from the bureaucratic context by cold discursive logic?
Was it a team effort among the whole organization, where the discussion rolled back and forth between all those other things that had to be done? How did these discussions go? What did the two have to say about it?
Did they do a rock-paper-scissors on the descent?
These are the kinds of things I think about. Sometimes in greater detail than at other times. Sometimes to the exclusion of other things.
The moon, you say?
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Let's friendzone!
There are people in our lives who we talk to. Who we really don't need to talk to. Who we can poke and prod without having a particular reason for doing so. Who know our faces (or avatars) and will wave at us if they see us from a distance. Who just hang around in our social vicinity and shares their random thoughts and impressions with us. Who have accepted us into their lives and like what they've done.
People who, for a variety of reasons, have Friend Zoned us.
There is somewhat of a movement among young confused males to turn the phrase "friend zone" into something pejorative, into something that unthankful females do to nice guys. Which is kind of a shame, for two reasons. The first being that they are wrong, and the second that it's way to useful a term to be wasted on resentful confusion.
Think about it - what other term do we have for people who just exist in a positive way in our general vicinity?
There's somewhat of a shortage of words when it comes to these kinds of things. And here we have a couple of words that's ready to be used, and which furthermore don't need that much of an explanation in order to convey that sense of general friendly coexistence we all know and need.
It would be a waste indeed to let it sink into misuse. So let's go ahead and start using it. Just like that.
People who, for a variety of reasons, have Friend Zoned us.
There is somewhat of a movement among young confused males to turn the phrase "friend zone" into something pejorative, into something that unthankful females do to nice guys. Which is kind of a shame, for two reasons. The first being that they are wrong, and the second that it's way to useful a term to be wasted on resentful confusion.
Think about it - what other term do we have for people who just exist in a positive way in our general vicinity?
There's somewhat of a shortage of words when it comes to these kinds of things. And here we have a couple of words that's ready to be used, and which furthermore don't need that much of an explanation in order to convey that sense of general friendly coexistence we all know and need.
It would be a waste indeed to let it sink into misuse. So let's go ahead and start using it. Just like that.
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