Tag: Random Linkage

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“People Are Always Scared of New Technology”

We don’t go through life talking in text speak, just like in the age of the telegraph people didn’t talk like telegrams. Some of it makes its way into the language like “OMG,” but we saw the same thing with proofreading terms like “stet” and “ibid” or things like that.

People are always scared of new technology. On the first trains, people had nervous breakdowns, because they were going too fast. When the first bicycles came out, people were warned about getting “bicycle face.” [Atwood pulls back the skin on her face to demonstrate, looking like the victim of a bad plastic surgeon.]

What people were really worried about was that it could enable sex, because you could get away from the home and parental control. There were similar concerns about the automobile. And a similar uproar was caused by the zipper. People preached sermons about the dangers of zippers. And now we have velcro! That’s even easier.

From here. Margaret Atwood is awesome.

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“This Is No Longer An Industry That Rewards Working-Class Values, In Other Words”

To be a writer in this market requires not only money, but a concept of “work” that is most easily gained from privilege. It requires a sense of entitlement, the ability to network and self-promote without seeing yourself as an arrogant, schmoozing blowhard. And it requires you to think of working for free—at an internship, say, or on one of those gratis assignments that seem to be everywhere now—as an opportunity rather than an insult or a scam.

This is no longer an industry that rewards working-class values, in other words, and I underestimated how hard it would be to shuck them. It still seems strange to me that people work, unpaid, without a guaranteed job at the end. And I haven’t reconciled myself with the central irony here: that journalism, ostensibly a populist endeavour, is becoming a rarefied practice best suited, both financially and psychologically, to the well-off.

From here. Well worth reading, and lots of food for thought that I am still chewing, to extend metaphors past their original comfort zone.

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“Positive Believability Ratings”

For the second time in a decade, the believability ratings for major news organizations have suffered broad-based declines. In the new survey, positive believability ratings have fallen significantly for nine of 13 news organizations tested. This follows a similar downturn in positive believability ratings that occurred between 2002 and 2004.

The falloff in credibility affects news organizations in most sectors: national newspapers, such as the New York Times and USA Today, all three cable news outlets, as well as the broadcast TV networks and NPR.

From here.

The one comfort I take from this is that Fox News’ ratings are pretty much the worst on the survey.

 

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“I Ended Up Having A Minor Nervous Breakdown From The Schedule”

I didn’t have any help for a long time, so I was doing 20-30 posts a day trying to keep up. I was so stressed my body was pretty much perpetually contorted in pain, making it nearly impossible to sleep. I put on about 30 pounds from shoveling in Chinese delivery at my desk. I ended up having a minor nervous breakdown from the schedule and what seemed like a lack of a future.

The series of interviews with Gizmodo writers and editors from the past decade to celebrate the site’s 10th anniversary is interesting – and, with people talking about nervous breakdowns or having “a complicated relationship” with the site –  although I’m not sure if it’s supposed to come from some kind of place of “Look what we used to be like, but we’re not like that anymore!” or not. I wonder if io9 will do one for their tenth anniversary (I’ve just realized io9 is five in January. Holy crap)?

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“A Missing Image or Text, That Implies Something”

I love this list of the “20 irrefutable theories of book cover design” from the Guardian:

11. Unheimlich theory
This theory takes a familiar image or symbol and makes it strange or unsettling. One cover of Lolita uses the image of a girl’s bedroom wall to represent a girl’s legs and underwear.

12. Absent presence theory
A gap is left on the cover, a missing image or text, that implies something. By having this space, the reader is forced to fill the gap with their imagination in order to understand the meaning.

13. Ju Jitsu theory
The opponent, the cover, forces a view or conception upon the defender, the reader, such as the bloody, violent implications on the cover of Anthony McGowan’s love story Stag Hunt.

It speaks to the former graphic designer in me, as well as the lover of seeing trends and movements that may not really be there yet, drawing on threads to bring them together. Plus, you know, “Unheimlich theory” is just a great name for anything.

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“So What Went Right?”

What’s even more impressive is that while high unemployment is driving the national labor-force participation rate down, the Portland area’s participation rate is now growing. In the aggregate, Texas is where people have been moving to get jobs, but if you like overcast weather and independent coffee shops, greater Portland’s not a bad alternative.

So what went right? To an extent, Portland’s benefitted from the fact that some of its local enthusiasms—bicycles, food trucks, microbrews, artisanal whatnot—have become more popular nationally, giving a boost to some growing local companies. The Portland area has also benefitted from the region’s green proclivities. Renewable energy has been a growth industry nationwide, and Portland is home to the North American base of Germany’s SolarWorld and Denmark’s Vestas, one of the world’s largest wind-turbine manufacturers.

Way to go, my home town. From here.

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Greatest Banner Ad Ever?

Very possibly.

Why the freaky CGI baby? What does that have to do with being a social worker or working full-time while earning your degree? I have no idea. But am I almost tempted to click through to find out? You bet I am.

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“If You Go Into Those Internet Worlds… That Will Drive You Off Your Rocker”

I don’t go on the Internet. I never go on the Internet. I don’t go on Twitter. I’m not on Facebook. I’ve seen friends go into dark, dark holes of sadness because of that. Frankly, I don’t have the time or the attention span for it. I would rather go to a movie with my free time than be on the Internet. To me the computer is still where I type my script and that’s it. My whole thing about Facebook is I don’t understand, you have email. Friends are like, “Yeah, but I want to send you pictures of my kids.” And I’m like, “I don’t want pictures of your kids! I don’t want to see what your children look like, ever.” I don’t care about that. I just want to send you a nice message saying, “Hey, want to have dinner on Friday?” and I would like you to respond. That’s all I want! My life is very simple.The thing is, if you go into those Internet worlds, if you’re going to believe the good feedback, you have to believe the bad feedback, and that will drive you off your rocker. If you don’t internally have a feel for the show and have a feel for what you like and where you want to go, then you shouldn’t be doing the show. You can’t look for people to vindicate you, or then when the people go, “You actually suck,” you’re going to sit there and go, “Yeah, I actually suck.” And I’m really not emotionally stable enough for that. I cannot hang with that.

That’s Amy Sherman-Palladino, creator of Gilmore Girls and the sneaky-secret show of the summer, Bunheads, talking.

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“Even the Music has got a Serious Hygiene Problem”

Tonight, the city wears dirty slut perfume and matching outfit. The rain has stopped, leaving the streets with wet greasy hair, strands of pulp blocking the drainage. All the flyers of every party of all time have gathered at the plughole of life. I’m standing on the balcony of Dubtek’s nightclub, holding my hand over my mouth. High above me, projected from the roof, lasers paint a dark cloud with colour, chameleon to the beat. I’ve come out for some air, but even the music has got a serious hygiene problem and there’s no escaping it. It’s my first ever gig in Manchester, and the place is one giant filthy arse-wipe loudspeaker, zero panache. There’s no sign of my challenger. When I walk to the edge, look down, I can see waves of people streaming out of the club, lit by stuttering lights. A purified canal runs back of the club. Some tables, chairs, a couple of sun umbrellas, all wet and soggy but no matter; it’s the small gaps between the rain that count, and learning how to live amongst them. Clouds of cheap shop-bought hormones lift from the young bodies.

From here, an excerpt of “Homo Karaoke” from Pixel Juice by Jeff Noon.

Noon was one of those writers whom I was madly in love with, back in the late ’90s, when I was also mainlining Philip K. Dick, The Invisibles and Bill Drummond like there was no tomorrow. Weirdly – perhaps because he kind of dropped off the face of the world? – I ended up entirely forgetting about him until he recently re-appeared on Twitter to promote the re-releases of his earlier work and his first new novel in over a decade. When remembering him, I had one of those How could I have forgotten? moments; Noon’s use of language and literal metaphor – for want of a better way of putting it; lines like “clouds of cheap shop-bought hormones” to describe perfume, and the like – were amazingly influential to me, shaping the way I wrote back then. Noon was amazingly important to me as a writer, although you can’t see it now. I’m glad he’s back, and I’m embarrassed that I forgot about him for so long.

(I should find some of that earlier writing for this site, sometime.)