Category Archives: Post

This is not one of my better days…

Well, as far as days go all is fine, but in terms of computers…

Okay, the deal is that by Tuesday I have to have the new myBrandeis look up. But just recently we found a bunch of bugs in the Netscape 4 rendering of the page, which means lots of overtime for me. So how does one do this sort of thing? Why, from a computer, of course! So I have three, count ’em, three computers. A PC for testing the design in Windows on Netscape, IE, and Opera, my Mac desktop, and my Mac laptop. Well, now I have one. The PC. The laptop mysteriously died, and Apple is making me send it back, again, for the third time, to check it out.

The C-Store is out of all water but Brandeis water, which is terrible, and the water in the pipes here is even worse, so I did something I’ve never done before, I bought a Coke. And then I spilled said Coke all over my desktop’s keyboard. And now nothing works there…

So my desktop is temporarily fried, my laptop is quite dead, and this PC is not the ideal working environment, not to mention that the loudness of the keyboard keeps my roommate awake, and isn’t very nice. So I guess I’ll go to bed now, and tomorrow perhaps spend the day in the Feldberg computer cluster trying to get this darn site finished. Sigh.

Clone Wars

Okay, I just watched the trailers for Star Wars: Episode II on Apple’s site and, although a lot of the dialogue is spotty, I have much higher hopes for this movie then the last one. And no Jar-Jar to be seen anywhere, which is a major plus! I just remember back in the interviews for the video release when George Lucas pontificated about computer graphics as one tool that can only supplement a good story, not substitute for one. And then I look at ep 2, and gee if there are not CG effects in every single scene. He just can’t resist every opportunity to make pretty computer stuff, and I really hope that it doesn’t happen at the cost of the story, as it did in the last movie.

Depressing

Read no further if you don’t want to hear what my take is on the end of this season’s Buffy. You could consider it spoilers, if I knew what it was, but I don’t. But I think I’m right.

1) The Legion of Dim is doing something big. I don’t know what, but it will be incredibly impossibly hackneyed as ever, and the gang will have to stop them from gaining world domination.
2) Tara will get caught in the crossfire. Yes, I am predicting that my favoriteist character is going to die tragically, and I have a feeling its really going to annoy me.
3) Willow, in retaliation, will go back to her magicky ways and launch a counter-offensive, and I have had a spoiler on how it goes down, and I’ll just say it’ll be quite cool, but very painful for the LoD.
4) However, there will have to be grave consequences for Willow coming back on magic. This I’m not sure about. Are they going to continue to go with the pointless addiction storyline? Or retcon a better explanation? I dunno, but I think Will will end up in the hospital one way or another.
5) The Xanya things confuses me – will Anya become a vengence demon again? I don’t think so, but she will try to inflict some terrible vengence on Xander, then she’ll end up hurting him just as he’s apologizing and confessing his true love and she’ll be all sad. He won’t die, but she’ll find it hard to forgive herself, at least until next season.

So those are my predictions. If I’m remotely closs, maybe I’ll have to go into entertainment writing. Won’t that be a sad day…

One Very Long Night

I got back here Sunday evening. When I flew in at seven the sun was still up, and I was able to see Boston from the air during the day for the first time. It was cool, would have been cooler if I’d had a window seat. To get on the plane and jump four hours (three time zones plus daylight savings) I had to wake up very early, but I went to bed really late. I got a max of 4 hours of sleep, then I slept on the first leg of the plane flight, but for no more then 2 hours. I got to school and wasn’t tired, I finally went to sleep at 4AM and woke up in time for class at ten. I got tired again in the afternoon but, after lying down for a bit on my bed and watching the conclusion of The Prime Gig I had come back to life and was able to finish the day. I went to bed Monday night at two, and slept in until two the next afternoon, missing two classes, being somewhat upset, but oddly feeling refreshed. This is not good, my sleeping schedule is very confused.

So tonight…err…last night, I decided to do better. But at midnight I wasn’t tired and I was getting a lot done on myBrandeis. At one, then at two I was not tired. So around this time I decided to turn off all the lights and meditate on my bed. Just as I was centering my leg cramped. Alas, it was not to be. I sprung up, and meditation ended quite abruptly.

At this point I had a strange longing to hear Anthony Stewart Head sing That Town In the Rain. Pulling out my iPod I called up the song, and, to the depressing words of Los Angeles in Spring I looked out the window and realized that the rain was in fact real, here, and now. So I went for a walk.

I wandered. No place in mind, just started walking. Eventually I ended up at the new student center, still under construction. A bit later, on the other side, I ended up…well, I’ll leave out this next bit for legal reasons.

The new student center cannot be seen from the inside because it is a dangerous construction area that is fenced off. Luckily, there are blueprints on public display occasionally. So lets just say that I looked at the blueprints. Yeah…

So I checked out all four floors of the blueprints and I realized that the place is incredibly cool, and I can’t wait for it to open. The soft rain outside was a perfect complement to my calm, peaceful mood as I toured the blueprints and checked out the various rooms. The theater looks awesome, with big ceilings for the drop curtains or whatever they’re called and a complete tech booth in the back. There is plenty of office space, but I was unable to locate anything that resembled a bathroom.

Leaving behind the very cool blueprints, I trudged back to my room, to find out that the time was 3:15 and I still wasn’t tired!!!. What does one do? I’d already watched an episode of Farscape, so no more TV was needed…

Brandeis must love my log sheets for my Web Services work. Three hours: 3:15AM – 6:15AM. Heh. But I got some stuff cleaned up and am getting more ready to launch the new site design, so all is good. 🙂

Corporations Are Not Evil

Short version, cause my ranting mood is not occurring in all its glory presently:

America exists as a delicate balance of two forces (and I’m taking this from Tocqueville here): equality and liberty. The trick is the even application of equality for all people (socialism) and the safeguarding of fundamental freedoms (libertarianism, capitalism) that we hold dear. Either one by itself is morally wrong – socialism with its restrictions on freedom and unbridled greed with its decimation of the fabric of society (eg, our living environment).

But can we blame the massive corporations for the ills of our markets? I used to say yes, and say it strongly, but now my opinion is changing. Seeing AOL/Time Warner in financial trouble, seeing Microsoft struggle to gain staying power in diverse markets, watching Enron collapse, I realize that corporations are not the pure evil. Yes, what they do for the sake of profit is often morally bankrupt according to my set of morals, but it is certainly not bad according to theirs. Corporations rise and fall based on profit. Based on crushing competition. Based on advantage, mostly short-term, sometimes long-term. We have created these beasts. We, as a society, have made them, and we are responsible for them.

Having to take Microsoft to federal court to stop their stifling of innovation is sad. Why? Because we are applying laws of trusts that were put on the books 100 years ago. We’re trying to shoehorn odd, outdated legislation into new arenas of global business. We, as a society, have to legislate, through our government bodies, to make it clear when consolidation and monopolization is good and when it is bad. I often see it as bad, but not always. I think it makes more sense, if managed correctly, to have only one set of water pipes going to my house, not three, from three different companies. So the water company is a state-run monopoly. We make these decisions all the time, or at least we used to. Now it is the businesses that make the decisions for us, because we have created a system in which they are given the most power over our supposed democracy. But again, is it their fault for embracing any competitive advantage they can? No. It is the system we’ve made.

The reason for my talking about this now is because I’ve been given the opportunity to potentially do some kind of internship for Vivendi/Universal, one of the big media companies for which I have in the past stated my disgust. Could I justify a job with an evil, anti-choice corporation? Is this any way to justify it? I still lead towards “no.” Even believing that corporations and expansion and consolidation and monopolization are tactics that are not in and of themselves bad, can I morally support a company that I consider morally bankrupt? What if I am working in a role that has no relation to the ongoing legal disputes over online music content? What about the fact that most of that war has been fought, and won, by the Big 5, and the independents on the web are dead anyway? Because my logic could be similar to that of MP3.com, which eventually, seeing that it had lost, did what any good business would do – found an exit strategy; sold out to Vivendi, keeping the company alive, even if it meant that its independent (greedy, money-grubbing, corporate) spirit would die off, absorbed into a larger corporation.

When you think about it, any major corporation could by these standards be considered “evil.” Any company that exports labor to cheap lesser-developed nations is doing something morally wrong. But something that is keeping it in business. Everyone who works today must acknowledge that they are but one cog, one tooth in one cog, of one wheel, in one vast machine. And if everyone else can work understanding that some part of their company or a company it works with, owns, supports, subsidizes, lobbies, controls, or does business with, is evil, then why can’t I?

Brave New Unwired World

Most buildings and many outdoor areas at UCSD were wired for 802.11b. FIrst off, UCSD would be San Diego, not, as some television shows would have you believe, Sunnydale. Second, it is a campus I’ve visited a few times, as it was one of my potential college choices. I must say that in some areas they really have it together. Food services is one, as is their well-stocked bookstore. Their first-run movie screenings at $2 a ticket are another cool feature, as well as their bus service. All of these things are on the student union/student activites side of things, so I’m going to have to look into how to best influence those systems when I get back to Brandeis. I think I might want to see how hard it would be to expand the reach of the Student Services Bureau (and see how that organization works in the meantime). Also, Student Events might need some revamping as well. Dunno. Have to see how the existing system works.

Where was I? Oh, yes, wireless. Almost the entire campus was blanketed in an 802.11b (AirPort) wireless networks. Gateways in every building and, I have to assume, myriad signal repeaters, made connecting from the grass, the bookstore, or the cafeteria incredibly easy. And the whole experience was quite cool. Now that I’ve experienced it first-hand I am much more anxious to get such a project going at Brandeis. Cause its really cool. And useful!

What else? UCSD has political parties, which is kinda funny. But it does seem like a good way to get more influence. You can vote Action and perhaps elect their whole slate to Associated Students (AS) office, then they are in definite position to make some real reforms in whatever direction it is that you want. But they also have stickers, posters, shirts, etc., meaning that these AS campaigns are being funded, and I wonder by whom. At Deis we have a strict clean-elections policy, with no money spent whatsoever, and limited resources provided to all candidates by the student union. How are they getting T-Shirts? Do they have corporate or community backers who want certain reforms? Dunno, but something to check into further, especially with regard to their union constitution.

Travel Diaries

3:18 pm EST – Logan Airport
I’m laying on the ground near the unused check-in desk, taking advantage of the only working power outlet I’ve been able to find in order to watch some highlights from Moulin Rouge on my laptop, which was returned from the factory (unrepaired, at my request) just in the nic of time, namely 30 minutes before my bus left.

The new deal is that one goes through the metal detector and, if it doesn’t go off, you’re cool, but if it does, they “wand” you. I’ve determined that 90% of alarms are due to metal in shoes, and about half of those are because the person is wearing a toe ring, the other half is because of metal in the shoe itself. Occasionally the under-wire of a bra upsets it. Sometimes its a hand ring. I can only wonder what happens when people choose to wear rings in other — perhaps less accessible — locations.

9:48 pm EST – Midway Airport
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Chicago in the daytime. I mean, all I’ve ever seen of it is out of the plane windows and the terminal windows, and from a plane cities look pretty much the same, and from the terminal all I see is whizzing cars. Anyway, I’m in the middle of a movie called Magnolia, and its very, very interesting. The use of music is for some reason very effective. I think because the mood of the music is often different then the mood I feel from watching what is onscreen, and that causes me to reevaluate what I am seeing and change my perspective. Its kinda cool, getting music that doesn’t seem to fit, and that reinterpreting the scene so that it matches the music. I’m about half way through the (very long) movie, and I still have no idea what’s going on, but its very interesting. I get the feeling that everything will link up in an interesting way.

12:32 pm EST – Somewhere In the Air
Okay, I’ve just finished Magnolia, and it was fucking awesome. I can’t remember if I ever posted a diatribe on language, and I don’t want to get into it now, because I have more important things, but basically it boils down to: I like to know as many words as possible, and use them when it is warranted. “Foul language” is appropriate, to me, when you want to put emphasis or impact on a statement. I could go into a lot about English syntax and expression, but I won’t, cause I’m not a linguist. Moving on.

Fucking awesome movie. I’m still processing it, and I have to definitely sit through it again before I can offer good coherant thoughts, but wow. The computer battery is going to die any minute, and I’m going to try to sleep, but let me try to describe what I’m feeling right now.

Pain, doubt, fear. Hope. Fate. It was like a Vonnegut book without Kilgorne Trout. It was like a Dennis Miller rant with poignancy. It was like…I don’t know, it was like a diary entry of mine, but with a point. And really long. Really, really long. But I was totally engrossed for the whole three hours. And the music. Wow.

Okay, I’m being incoherent, so I’ll stop while I’m already behind. But its a movie about life, about the past, and about dealing with mistakes. And about finding ones own place in the world. And about being open to all people, because everyone is flawed, and everyone is a special case.

And its about keeping pressure away from kids. There is a time for pressure, and it is not childhood. Pressure and pain and hurt on kids really screws you up as an adult. So don’t do it. Just don’t do it. A parent’s job is to shield their kid. Keep them safe. Please.

Eek!

Um…Mr. TiVo? Yeah, hey. You do know that the Oscars never end on time, right? So when they say three hours, they mean four? You do know that, right? So you’re not going to stop recording after only three hours, are you? So that I can’t find out which one got best picture? GRRRRRRR!

Addendum: If you don’t mind some naughty language, read this, probably the best Hollywood-related article this year. And A Beautiful Mind won? Damn! After Lord of the Rings got like 50 other Oscars! Ah, well. At least Randy Newman finally won an award. I mean, geez, the guy has had sixteen nominations. How bad must he have felt the last 15 or so times?

They call me Mr. Tibbs!

Sidney Poitier was given the lifetime achievement award at the Academy Awards, which I just got around to watching now on my TiVo. As I watched the tribute video I realized for the first time that Laurence Fishburne is black. I seriously didn’t notice or think about him being black until I saw him among all the other black people in the tribute video. This is meant as no disrespect to black people or to Laurence Fishburne, but simply as a statement of fact. When nothing is made of color, it is my natural inclination more often then not to completely miss it altogether. Odd. Or, perhaps, cool.

Another question: why when they show everyone in the audience before the Poitier speech they show all black people, except Julia Roberts? Do her big teeth blind people to her skin color? Dunno.

Oh, Woodrow!

I went before the Student Senate tonight (last night) for two club charters, the third and fourth that I’ve participated in so far. Everyone is starting to remember me. 🙂

The Computer Operators Group (COG) was pretty easy. I expected the Societie Chaotique Brandeisienne (SCB) to be much more difficult. Boy was I in for a surprise.

I start off with an actual explanation, instead of my characteristic avoidance. Basically, it was something like this: “I have heard comments so I’d like to dispel some myths right from the start. SCB is not a club devoted to causing famine and strife. The best explanation is to go to the basic question of why bad things happen to good people, or, more specifically, why does shit happen?

“Discordianism recognizes that some things cannot be explained, don’t make sense, don’t have a purpose, and cannot be controlled. The secret is to learn to deal with it. Discordianism can be seen either as a religion disguised as a joke or a joke disguised as a religion. Only the truly enlightened can really tell. The religion was formed in 1958 in a bowling alley by two guys who were discussing order and chaos.

“We would like to form this club in order to spread the philosophy of discord through meetings and such.”

Okay, that was nice. Now questions. First, as a point, someone reminds me that the “S-H-I-T word” shouldn’t be used, as we are being broadcast live on WBRS. Which is cool, cause its the third time I’ve come before the senate and the third time I’ve been chastised for saying something bad on the air (the second time was for calling President Reinharz “Jehuda,” I can’t currently recall what the first transgression was, but I think it might have had to do with speaking out of turn). So, anyway, Josh Peck, student union president, raises his hand. Jon calls on him, and he asks, basically, what I’m doing there. Something along the lines of, “if your club discourages order and planning, why are you coming to us with this constitution?”

I answered, “there was considerable debate about whether we should come forward for approval. SCB does not recognize the power of the student union and we are only coming here to make you feel good. We figured might as well go with the system this time.” To this I got a lot of table banging, the parliamentary way of saying “I agree” or “you go boy!” Heh. I made fun of the Senate and they clapped.

Someone also asked when we planned to have our regularly scheduled meetings, as our constitution didn’t state. I told him that they would be irregular. Someone also wanted to know how we planned to keep order. I suggested that we would be perfectly happy with anarchy.

With that done Justin motioned to go back and vote by unanimous consent, but Wuhzeng “Woodrow” Fan, my arch-nemisis (in a playful way) objected. So they just went back and did a normal vote, and I passed by a vote of everyone (about 20) to 1 (Woodrow) with no abstentions. They didn’t even ask me about the provisions of the constitution that give the Chancellor complete power, allow him to appoint a Viceroy and a Chief Janitor, and remove all democratic process whatsoever from the club. Heh.

After all this I was still in time to catch the last production of How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying, put on by the Undergraduate Theater Collective, which was pretty darn good. Go Brandeis! I love this school!

Mutant X

TiVo decided I might like Mutant X, a TV show about a band of outlaws running away from a secret government genetic engineering operation that is trying to get them back. They each have a crazy power, such as some cool animal agility, lightening bolt control, telekinesis, or whatever. The bigshot is this guy named Adam who apparently is just a normal guy (no superpowers) who is good with computers (go figure) and is keeping all the mutants safe.

First off, the camera work is really cool. They do the whole cutting around, speed up, slow down, Matrix stuff. But other than that, I don’t really see what the appeal of this show is. The romance, in the ep I saw, was farrrrrr overdone, for no real purpose. Also, everyone seems to get along too well. They have a very tricky situation, and yet the writing makes the arguments seem kinda disingenuous. Third: location. They have this secret headquarters that no one is supposed to find, but every time I see it I recognize it as the water treatment facility that they used in The Pretender as the secret base of The Centre. So I get confused. The good guys are the same people who stole Jarod from his parents and forced him to be a Pretender? What is going on here? Oh, and also, it shows that they’re filming in Toronto.

Final strike is the exposition. Its more absurd then West Wing has gotten. Ya know how on West Wing they repeat things over and over and over for no conceivable purpose? Like, someone says a line that you hear just fine, and the character says “what?” and the guy repeats the line….and then Toby says it to C.J. walking down the hallway, then she says it to Rob Lowe as she goes into her office, then he tells Josh, who tells Donna, who tells Charlie. For no real reason. Well, in this show, its different, but just as annoying, in fact more so: you see the fake broadcast, which the bad guys have already said is a fake broadcast, and the good guys go, “ooh, I think its a fake broadcast!” Then they decide to leave their secret water treatment plant and go to the bad guys layer, and even when they get there they just keep expositing. “Okay, we got in, now go get the secret MicroDrive to save our data!” “I got the MicroDrive, let’s go.” “No, first we have to put the virus in their system.” “Oh yeah, the virus.” Its just silly. Silly in a stupid sort of way.

So in summary, one more show that can be avoided, leaving more time for the important things in life.

Like Buffy.

Someone else’s life ruined by the slayer

Thanks to the crazy FX schedule, I was, for a time, trying to catch two Buffy episodes a day. Now that I’m caught up, I have only seen two episodes in the past two weeks. I’m proud of myself. But also kinda sad. This guy over at TeeVee says:

…I’ve been spending two hours every weekday watching this show. If I’d spent that two hours a day doing something useful with my time, I’d be fluent in Japanese by now. I’d like to think that I’m going to do something useful with my time when I no longer have a big section of my dayplanner devoted to “Watch Buffy reruns from years ago,” but I expect I’ll take the opportunity to schedule in some essential lying-around time.

http://www.teevee.org/archive/2002/03/19/index.html