There have been a number of people who have refused to upgrade - like they got the best of whatever it was and refused to get more. There’s a cult of people who refused to leave MS Office 5.1. It was small, effective, perfect, light. Not many people could say that about Office anymore. Those who refuse to upgrade are called “refuseniks”.
A similar cult: WordStar
When I’m somewhere and young teenage-girls start laughing I worry that they’re laughing at me. I don’t think I soiled myself, is there a snot-cicle hanging out my nose? WHAT IN GOD’S NAME IS IT YOU HARPIES?
For all I know they are laughing at the sill nonsense girls laugh at all the time.
Yet still I worry.
I think all men are with me on this. We suspect they’re laughing at us, and I think they would admit that they are, if we had incontrovertible evidence of it.
It makes me consider the famous Jethro Tull line “Eyeing girls with bad intent” to bond the “bad intent” to the girls, not the viewer.
Boy it’s been a lot of posting today….
As I mentioned elsewhere, I finished The World is Flat.
First things first, I must call this a Whiggish [1] interpretation of the globalization of the world. There’s definitely a na?ve belief that things are getting better and will continue to do so, and, quite necessarily, they must continue to do so. Whether you will like this book hinges on your ability to tolerate such a perspective.
Whiggish attitude aside, what’s Friedman on about? Well, Friedman notices that during the years after 9/11 we may have missed the fact that it’s now incredibly easy to get data across the globe. For all intents and purposes data may be considered as equivalent to highly-liquid wealth, malleable power structures, and influence.
The first section denotes ten forces, foundation behaviours or technologies, that enabled a unique event: the triple convergence. Examples of ten forces would be: release of Windows as a standard platform, ubiquity of MS Office, the Open Source model of collaboration, global decision to pursue capitalism, etc.
This triple convergence is characterized by a single global playing field, business re-aligned to reap productivity benefits from technology, and more players than ever entered this singular playing space (from India, ex-USSR, China).
This makes for confusing times and we’re living through a sorting-out. Friedman gives a series of anecdotes that describe situations where “sorting out” is very difficult. A primary example was in Indiana where an Indian firm came in cheaper to implement the state’s unemployment (the irony gods are cruel and swift) program (an IT project). When the political fortunes shifted, the cheaper bid and the Indian company was kicked off in favor of a local firm. “Sorting out” who’s exploiting, who’s winning, and who’s losing is quite messy. The taxpayers lost (by paying more), the unemployed lost because additional services funding was allocated into a more expensive solution (versus community college stipend, say), the politicians seem to have won, but at what cost? These questions are bonded to the “sorting out”.
Friedman then tracks the relations to key players to this converged world. How will America, developing countries, companies, the aggregate global community relate to this space? Alternatively, it could be seen as how will these large institutions “sort themselves out” against the triple-converged world.
What drove me to buy the book was in an interview Friedman made a very interesting equivalence between disparate institutions. The collapse of geographic space makes it possible for IBM to sell its entire personal computer operation (Lenovo); Dell to pull parts from Israel, Malaysia, and China for a computer built and shipped in Taiwan; and Osama bin Laden to harvest capital from Saudi / American / Jordanian / Syrian backers while sitting in a cave. Friedman notes that an incredibly powerful genie is out, but which way it will steer: to our end or to our transcendence, is yet to be determined.
Friedman also asserts that the US had done a piss-poor job of growing its bench strength or building a culture where intellectual achievement is celebrated: “In China, Bill Gates is Britney Spears, in America Britney Spears is Britney Spears.” I’m no Indian culture specialist, but when I think about the yoga (discipline) of acting with “proper intention” in one’s work as a cultural foundation, I have no doubt their culture produces more people focused on others’ success (key in a services-based economy) and their personal improvement than we do here.
Friedman also makes an assertion that I would not have associated with a Whiggish, pro-capitalist author. He rightly gives Marx credit for foreseeing globalization’s net effect: everyone turns into a wage-slave in the factory. Marx was only wrong in pinning phenomenon to the factory age versus the information age.
By ‘blessing’ Marx’s (arguably Hegel’s) working of history, Friedman gives credence to the central theses of Hardt and Negri’s Empire, which predicts that after corporations supersede nation-states in right to sovereignty ( and to what extent is Microsoft an American company versus American politicians beholden to Microsoft?) and everyone becomes a wage-slave, then the time is right for The Communist Revolution.
Friedman doesn’t envision the future in his book as much as explain “up to this point”. After all, the man is a journalist, not a philosopher or an economist. I should think it a worthwhile experience for him, or some other writer, to take his book as foundation and then ask. I see Empire as a pro-Marxist interpretation of “What happens after the world goes flat”; the side of capital needs to explain how it proceeds.
And speaking of “foundation” - it’s fascinating to me that all these realities of supply lines, cultural imperialism, etc. were all worked out in science fiction a half-century ago by Isaac Asimov in his brilliant Foundation short stories. Asimov said all these concepts were obvious is reading Gibbon’s Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire. If we know our history, we’ll know where we’re going.
Nevertheless, the book was accessible, macroeconomic, and cogent. I’d highly recommend reading it.
Here are some key quotes I scribbled in the book notebook:
- Government funding for science via the NSF has fallen 37% between 70-04 thus requiring us to import engineers from India, China, etc. Why does the government not consider a strong scientific bench important?
- Chinese leadership is made of engineers, not lawyers. They do not seek the embarrassment line to get a one-up on the other guy. They are united in the pursuit of Chinese ascension. (Do the Chinese spin? Is that possible or necessary w/o a free press?)
- Mexico and Egypt (huge unemployment, cheap mfg.) are getting undercut by CHINA. The virgin of Guadalupe statuettes for sale on the side of the road in the barrio were born in China.
- Countries w/o natural resources are more likely to flourish, because they must! (cf. Asimov’s Foundation) Taiwan, HK, S. Korea, China
- China is not focused on beating Mexico, they’re focused on beating America
- “The question is not why am I selling X to my competitor so he can sell me higher-value Y which uses X as a component, but how can I sell more X to him? - Modeled on a quote by E. Zedillo
- Out of clutter, find simplicity / From discord, find harmony / In the middle of difficulty, find opportunity - Einstein
- The Islamic dissonance:
- We practice the true faith
- The infidels’ lands prosper, we are poor, unemployed
- Which to choose? Either Allah is not great, or we’re being punished
- Spain’s GDP > Sum GDPs of the Middle East
- Ironically the West’s success is rooted in the tolerant, scientific, trade based model begotten by Muslim Spain. Go OPEN!
- The hijackers saw the tall buildings of NYC and wanted to knock them down because they could not be tall themselves
- No Indian Muslims in Guantanamo, part of 9/11 - India is highly prosperous in comparison to ME, no coincidence
Here are some thoughts I had:
In capital’s eyes, all boundaries are inefficiencies: paying duty, weigh-in, sorting, filing, religious proscription of stem-cells. It is the codex of the boundaries that creates the non-flat world. Ultimately the question is which inefficiencies - cultural, religious, etc. will we choose to prune. In a world with non-standard morals, those that refrain from moving to the profit maximizing opportunity will have their financial backs broken. Ultimately immorality will be encouraged, or moral convenience will be celebrated for the sake of the bottom line. Europeans are forced to modify their work week to American (better, Indian) model. If you make Rome hustle and bustle like NYC, is it still Rome, is it still Italian? Will some places profit by saying “here we are inefficient” - will those be our vacation spots?
There is schizophrenia in the Republican party. Which values must be forsaken. It’s possible to see the teamsters and the evangelicals teaming together for a ‘small worlder’ party. Jesus and jobs are more important than…. The ‘big world’ party. The .com liberals of Silicon Valley join with the Free Market ideologues of the Libertarian-ish Republicans…. Where is the left’s schizophrenia? Has it already been forced historically or is it yet-to be forced?
1. By Whiggish I mean in the sense of Herbert Butterfield’s The Whig Interpretation of History which is marked (chiefly) by it’s tendency to see all of history unfolding as a necessary series of improvements to society. BACK
I always liked Rob Morrow on “Northern Exposure” and I thought David Krumholtz was great in “The Slums of Beverly Hills”.
I would describe the show as CSI, but instead of shamefully titillating the audience by carving up buxom Vegas girls with scalpels, it entertains by encouraging us to use our minds and follow the mental acrobatics of a “math consultant (Krumholtz)” in his advisling his FBI-agent brother (Morrow).
Invariably Charlie (a prodigy, and prof. at the fictitious “Cal-Sci” can bring his mathematical acumen to a case a bring it to resolution.
Surely such an intersting blend of intellect and entertainment is doomed for the first season scrap heap, no? Much to my surprise CBS has picked it up for another season. I’d wager that the fact that Ridley “I-can’t-hold-the-camera-still-for-less-than-6-seconds” Scott and his brother, Tony, has something to do with the show getting renewed. Fortunately the show doesn’t suffer under the weight of Scott’s hyperkinetic camerawork; however, it does implement flights of mental fancy: after inducing a particularly interesting idea, the camera will enter a chalkboard like space where diagrams and similar mock-ups can be presented for the (quite possibly) lay audience.
I feel a bit sorry for Morrow as it usually falls to him to re-package the insights his brother presents. It’s usuall y something on the par of:
CHARLIE: “So you see, by absorbing all frequencies of visible radiation, it is not easily seen” DON: “So it’s black?” CHARLIE: Right.
I worry about it’s timeslot though - Friday night? Allegedly there’s not a huge market of eyes out about that time.
Over at the geomblog, one commenter took the opportunity to have fun with the show’s premise by imagining what would happen if the anti-science and progress contingent of our political spectrum were to get the next show of this nature:
Thursday, May 19, 2005 Numb3rs renewed I got review fatigue and stopped posting Numb3rs reviews (I haven’t even finished watching the episodes saved up), but I do like the series, and now news comes that CBS is renewing it for this fall. What’s even more interesting is that Law and Order: Trial by Jury, that was up against it in the same time slot, was cancelled. posted by Suresh at 5/19/2005 03:13:00 PM 2 Comments: [Colorization mine - sg ] Of course, NBC is going to run in this slot a new series about a police investigator that solves murders using intelligent design. Posted by Anonymous 5/19/2005 05:35:46 PM
“Intelligent Design” for those of you not keeping score at home is the religious right’s attemt to make sure that American students fill their heads with idiocy and superstition instead of good scientific principles. It also has the fringe benefit of making sure that American science based-disciplines like genetic research, medicine, and other hard-to-outsource capabilites will be outpaced by South Korea, China and India faster. Whee! I’m so glad an invisible, non-personal force’s interests are guiding our educational policy.
I suppose I have such a dislike for Intelligent Design because I wrote against the use of Anthropic Principles in my university days. It’s nonsense, it’s not science.g
After 4 days of having to wake up at 0530 to make the train up to the city my internal clock finally adapted and this morning I found myself fully awake at that dreadful hour. To be fair, I had turned in at 10 due to “It’s friday and I’m out of training but I still have a bus ride and a long train ride and i just want to go home”, but that was no consolation when I couldn’t go back to sleep.
Fortunately I had ordered some books from Amazon earlier this week. The Japanese House (because I like to look at nice plates of houses using a lot of negative space) and Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta.
My attention was originally drawn to this graphic novel due to the question of: “How is the rest of the world viewing America’s move to the right, embracing of non-scientific pseudoscience as policy, and proto-Fascist sloganeering.”
Here is the inspirational entry [LINK].
The backstory is this. A modern-day Guy Fawkes exists in the UK in a totalitarian right-ist 1984 world. A classic anti-hero, V (his sole name), visits (and dispatches) those in the establishment that made him who he is, and who prop up the tyrannical machine. No mere blood-score this: V is on a war of liberation of those desperate souls living desperate lives in the wake of this horrific social machinery.
Let’s just say this, Alan Moore, is God’s Gift to comics writing. His works were critical in moving comics from Ka-Pow and the superhero conceits into something powerful, dramatic, philosophical, and moving.
V’s first act is to model himself after Guy Fawkes and succeeds where Mr Fawkes failed some 300 years ago. Fawkes’ effigy is burnt on thee 5th of November in the UK (and elsewhere in the Commonwealth).
{ If you get a bit worried when you see masses of citizens burning any effigy, then this book might well be for you on that principle alone. }
The Fawkes pedigree in V’s nature was another strong attracting factor for me. Fawkes is a character similar to the USA’s own John Dillinger. While there is no doubt that he was a criminal, the question his life lessons taught the middle class to act have not faded from memory. Namely: Is the government we know and love and its judicial system really right? Or do we give up questioning it out of convenience? And what is the line that you cross before you pick up a gun and say no?
The fact that our fathers took up arms in open revolt to their government burns in the medulla oblongata of the American mind:
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government
We can see a parallel to this thought in Revenge of the Sith
AMIDALA: This is how liberty dies — to thunderous applause AMIDALA: Did you ever think we may be on the wrong side? [i.e. the force of peace, order, and supression of terrorists - The Galactic Empire ]
I guess what I’m trying to say is “Say Guy Fawkes, and I’ll read it.”
V sports the garb of the 17th century Parliment member, the conical cap, the cape, and a permanently-smiling pap?er-m?ch? mask that, much like the mug of the Joker, is too serene to not be menacing. All said, it’s a pretty cool visual.
Between the Fawkes backstory and these amazing visuals. It was enough to pull me in - so much that I read it straight through.
They’re also making it into a movie based off of a script created by the Matrix auteur brothers Wachowski. Moore, probably bitten once too many by Hollywood butchering the subtleties of his craft has broken all association (after League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, can you blame him?). Filming is underway in Berlin with Huge “Agent Smith” Weaving portraying “V” and Natalie Portman portraying his charge, Eve. I really hope it doesn’t suck.
Remember, remember the fifth of November, Gunpowder, treason and plot. We see no reason Why Gunpowder treason Should ever be forgot.
Some truths are too powerful to be told in any medium save comics.
Today is the 3rd day that I am in training for VMWare’s ESX product.
The class is being held up in the Financial District. It’s odd, I’ve walked among the famed and picturesque skyline buildings of SF many, many times, but I’ve never actually been in one. So, here I am on the third floor off of New Montgomery. I guess you see these buildings and think” “Oh I bet things are different way up on those high floors.” No, it’s just mail runners and cubicle walls just like everywhere else.
I’ve taken the CalTrain “Baby Bullet” express from MV up to downtown, then hopped the #45 Union/Stockton and disembarked on Grant and then moseyed up to Sear’s Fine Food for their amazing (pancakes|french toast|bacon|eggs) these last few days. They’ve remodeled Sear’s. When last I was there, it was older, funkier, and a bit dingy. The carpet was a mottled green and swirl with grime ground in. The seats were pink vinyl and lumpy. It felt like a last holdout from San Francisco’s 1950’s art-deco history. It’s very nice now, the marble countertop where a guy with a shoulderbag, an iPod, and a copy of wired can sit, grab a breakfast and then descend the hill back to training.
In any case, it’s nice to be in the heart of the Financial District. All the office folk in suits and iPods head hither and thither, the art-school-girls with big canvas bags protecting sketches sport their inventive fashions and haircuts, the shorts and sneakers couriers and coffee haulers intermingle, dance, dally with the reception staff, and depart. It’s a small speck of city that’s incredibly alive.
The class I’m taking is lab-intensive. At the moment I’m chewing CPU cycles waiting for my machines to build.
The nice part about coming up to the city is that it allowed me time to finish off The World is Flat. I’ll be posting some thoughts here in a separate post. I recommend you pick it up if you’ve not.
OK OK OK.
The Tivo grabbed ‘insomniac music theater’ last night. During 2 hours they played coldplay’s latest track (I don’t know the title, but it sounds like whining and a piano. You know, like all of them) 3 times.
Is this beyond-super-heavy rotation?
MTV sucks.
Then again, if you were trying to get to sleep, this kind of passionless, blasé, drivel might help. For me though, it inspires “The Big Sleep” and euthanasia by carbon monoxide, not “Time for school already, Ma?”.
Opined Paul Scheer on Best Week Ever (from my memory):
Who knew people wanted to hear a song about bananas and poop?
Who indeed.
The Social Bobcat and I both believe that the synth fills in this song could easily fit into the next Katamari Damacy soundtrack. I think I have an idea for an art project that requires some clips from this video…
(hourglass icon spins)
I was not a fan of The Smiths growing up.
Leigh would wear her “Meat is Murder” shirt and I thought it was a bunch of mopeyness from un-tan people with little perspective on life. This is an accurate assessment, but the music’s quality ought not be undermined by this quality.
Nevertheless, through the efforts of my then-g/f and the gift of one of my dorm-mates I started giving the Smiths Best II many repeated listens. Since that time I’ve come to like lilting Steven’s work rather well.
On The Alternative they showed a current-day Morrissey singing “There Is a Light and it Never Goes Out”. The naïvety and softness were gone and there was a hint of age’s gravel in his voice instead. Nevertheless it was fascinating. A man that’s so self-pitying that it’s nothing but the eloquent vanity of an aging lion asked: “Please remember me when I’m gone.”
Wow.
It was really quite unexpected.
Where’s the self-deprecating humor that usually comes after some Morrissey grandstanding? It wasn’t there. Was it Morrissey being, real? My goodness, things could be getting really interesting now.
“P - U - Ess - Haych - O - double-eff / The table is rumbling…”