Jerry Cohen will have a field day.

Is the White House covering up that it was molding foreign policy as well as energy policy to suit Enron? Did the Bush Administration know that Enron’s collapse was coming as early as August? If any of these is true, the largest bankruptcy in American history may well connect with the greatest political scandal in American history.

AlterNet

fanatic
adj : marked by excessive enthusiasm for and intense
devotion to a cause or idea; “rabid isolationist” [syn:
fanatical, overzealous, rabid]

One thing that I haven’t really been able to understand is the star worship and idolization of sports stars, actors, etc. I mean, in theory yeah, but not in real life, I just don’t get it.

There are several television and movie stars that I appreciate the work of, but reading some message board postings lately about what one would do upon meeting has caused me to get a little…worried.

People would break down in tears, faint, stutter, go crazy. I mean, yeah, I understand that. People can through themselves or their roles change you and your outlook on life. But if I were to meet some great movie star, I can’t really think of anything terribly interesting that I would do. I mean, I’ve seen or been in physical proximity to a few prominent stars at various times, but I’ve never felt any kind of crazy urging or longing to approach them. I just can’t think what I would do.

If I were to meet my current television obsession (whom I will not name here, because I’m not a crazy obsessed person, just moderately obsessed, and I don’t want people to start making fun of me… 😛 ) I would probably stand in the back of the room, think to myself, “ah yes self, that is indeed the person. I know who she is,” and then sulk off. Because I’d feel bad invading her space just to fawn. I mean, yeah, telling people you like their work is always nice, but at some point it feels, at least to me, to be unfair. When I give a speech, or act, or whatever, and then people come up to me and congratulate me, I feel awkward and embarrassed. Maybe its just me, but I don’t want to risk that other people might feel that way.

If I do end up with any sort of Hollywood internship, I’m sure I’ll be left with lots of fun stories and experiences, but none of them will involve breaking down in tears upon seeing a celebrity. Because that would just be really weird…

I like it a lot better when someone comes up out of the blue and recognizes me and tells me that I’ve affected them in some way, even if it is only through their use of my search engine or one of my writings or whatever. That is cool. I mean, I’m still embarrassed, but that is cool. But only when its heartfelt, occasional, and, well….

I dunno, I can’t really describe the difference. Sometimes a person can be having a not-so-good day, and something like that could cheer said person up. But when its excessive, it seems like it would lose some of its charm and appeal.

Wow…I’ve really gone on for a whole page about this. I should really go take a shower now.

In other news: my laptop has finally gotten back to me. The screen is fixed, but the Ethernet port is broken, so I can no longer get online. Someone at Apple is going to (metaphorically) DIE!!!

Samantha Ketchum (11:12 PM): erm
Danny Silverman (11:12 PM): I’m hangin’ in the Cable ‘hood with all my homies. Buzz me and I’ll dish with y’all later, coo?
Samantha Ketchum (11:12 PM): oh GOD
Samantha Ketchum (11:13 PM): tell me that is SO not your away message

The taxi driver on the way back from the play gave me his philosophy. Its the same with the Arabs and the Jews, the Bosnians, the Yugoslavians. None of ’em have jobs, so they all kill each other. Here in America, we all have jobs, so we don’t have terrorism. Them, they buy American guns and toys, and then they go and kill themselves.

Hmm.

My AP English teacher Mrs. Kasper derided my belief that television and movies can convey the same rich symbolism and metaphor that books do. I never said all television, and I never said all the time, but, just like books, audio-visual entertainment sometimes has great ways of opening one’s mind.

Of course my example here is from where you know it will be from: Buffy. I didn’t expect this, I didn’t go looking for it, I just happened to watch the season 4 finale today and I was just blown away. In it the four main characters, suffering the after effects of calling forth the great primal force of the slayer to defeat their unkillable enemy, each have linked dreams, haunted by the force of the “First Slayer,” that reveals their fears, insecurities, and doubts about the future.

Three times through Xander’s dream he finds himself back in his basement: a place of non-existence for him with no way out and no future. When he tries to venture out he finds himself facing things he could never achieve. He finds Giles and Spike in a playground where Spike is becoming the Jr. Watcher he could have been. Buffy calls him ‘big brother,’ eluding to the fact he could never achieve a romantic involvement with her. His endless list of futureless jobs. What is critical in this scene is Xander, in the ice cream truck, looking out on Xander standing in the playground. He and Buffy are completely still, not moving and we hold on this as Giles and Spike clime ever higher in their swings.

This isn’t my analysis. It comes, believe it or not, from a complete dream analysis site set up by another fan. Wow. 🙂

I tailed my web logs and found out that someone in the Japanese military seems to be visiting. Cool.

The father and myself spent a day on the town Friday before I had to come back to school. It was a good opportunity to see all the things that I, as a person of the LA-area, am supposed to be able to say I have seen. So where did we go? And where have I been? Well, apparently I’ve been more places then I realized. Santa Monica…check. Pasadena? Yeah, been there a few times. Used to live in Irvine. Have seen Hollywood and Century City and Universal City and all that. Have been by some studios, not that that means anything, since there is nothing to see outside. I’ve been dragged kicking and screaming to a few beaches in my time. On this excursion we checked out the Venice Beach area, and had a look at some shops and such. What else? Hmm…not really sure. Perhaps dad can comment and remind me, so that my checklist can be completed.

I have certainly done a complete 180 in the past year or so with respect to my appreciation, or lack thereof, for Hollywood. For some reason I am really excited now at the prospect of working somewhere in the ‘biz over the summer. If I have my schedules right, (and I’m usually wrong with schedules, but alas…) TV shows should be finishing up filming in the next month or so and then taking a few off before beginning again in, oh, I would estimate, May or June. But apparently new shows in development are starting to shoot now, so who knows…point is, there should be something interesting for me to do over the summer. Now if only I had remember to bring all of my resume material back to school with me…

As soon as it gets Fedexed, I’ll send out the main load of my resume/cover letter/application things. Wish me luck. And cross your fingers with me that the job I get does not end up involving filing. Not that I don’t like filing, it’s just that I don’t like filing, and also, I want to do something INTERESTING. Speaking of interesting, I should probably move on to some of my masses of reading now. Not that I will…but I should.

“What is that, and why do you wear it?” is the question I plan on getting a lot of. Here is the answer. Now we’ll see who really reads this thing.

This article in Time talks at length about the technological and legal problems reaching the fore with regard to illegally duplicating and distributing television broadcasts. What it does not talk about is why.

Why would I want to spend all day finding a few episodes of Angel: The Series on Morpheus, download them, play them at low quality on a computer monitor, burn them to disk, and share them with friends? Well, that is just what I’ve done. While at home this week I have downloaded most of season 1 and a substantial chunk of season 2. Why? Because I want to watch the show. Because I want to see it from the beginning, and it is not being shown from the beginning. I download Angel for the same reason that I use my TiVo: for the convenience. I don’t want to watch The Daily Show at 11 pm, and I usually miss the repeat in the afternoon. The simple solution is for TiVo to grab it for me, and I can watch it at my leisure.

There is a whole massive industry devoted to giving us entertainment, but what if we don’t want it? I have written previously about my dream cable TV system, wherein I can choose the 10 channels I want and pay for only them. Well, now I say dump that, I want to just see the shows I want, I’ll pay for them, and drop the ads.

If UPN is giving the folks at Buffy $1.6 million per episode, why not just charge $1 each to the 1.6 million viewers? Right now they have, by some estimates, over 4 million, so it seems like a good idea. Of course it is very unlikely that anywhere near that number of people will pay to watch the episode, even if it is commercial free, at least not until micropayments, video-on-demand, and pay-per-play media becomes mainstream. I really don’t see the problem if it does.

I hate the recording industry. I hate the system as it stands, whereby bands have to get signed, get promoted, get radio play, sell a certain number of copies, at a certain price, and get a certain cut. The system itself is flawed. Bands should not need the power of a label behind them. They should be able to independently hire promoters. There should be no cost or risk to putting an album out – it should all be digital, we should be able to pay two cents per play or a buck-fifty a song and keep it forever.

I hate the recording industry, and so I don’t buy albums. And yet, I don’t like pirating and breaking the law. So I try to buy albums direct from the artists. Or I try to support them by paying them directly using MP3.com’s Back the Band feature. Or whatever.

I like to say I have bought a CD, but I don’t like paying full price. I have bought several used CDs in the last year, and now I am wondering why. After all, I am not helping the bands at all. I am really doing them no better than if I were to download their songs from the net.

The fact is, music is intellectual property, and should be treated as such. My opinion on this has really changed as I’ve taken some serious time to think about it, and what I’ve come up with is this: the medium is not the point, the point is the music. Well, duh. So the right of first sale, the ability to resell something you’ve bought, should not apply here, because what you are buying isn’t physical. You are buying a “license.” Now here is where it gets evil, not inherantly, but because licenses can get evil. Microsoft wants to charge us a yearly subscription fee for Windows – that is okay, it is their license. They do not have to grant us perpetual use of their software. I thuroughly believe that. However, once the copyrights and patents expire, their software MUST be open and accessible to all. Furthermore, those copyrights should be set for reasonable limits, which, in the computer field, should be no more than 10 years.

But I get off track. The system needs radical change, and the reason why is because when you produce a work, a non-tangible, information work, you should get paid for eveyr person who uses it. Buying a book used is not the right way to do it, because the author gets nothing. Every time someone wants to read the book, they should have to read it according to the license. They should pay for either a non-revocable lifetime license to read/keep the book, or a pay-per-read. Same with music. Same with movies. The property here is not the physical video tape, it is what is on it. And by giving people the right to first sale, you are hurting the incentive to create that is supposed to be inherant in the copyright system.

The point of the system is to encourage people to create while benefitting the public as a whole. Therefore, patents, copyright, etc. should be as short as possible while fulfilling these two obligations. I think it follows logically, then, that music should get 10 years of copyright, and in exchange, artists get to use whatever contract they want. Let the market decide – if people think the pay-per-play cost is too high, they won’t pay the song, and the cost will go down. If MS makes their Windows only available on a yearly subscription plan, and people don’t like it, they’ll stop buying, and MS will get the message. Does this make sense to no one but me? What am I missing here?

People need to be compensated fairly for their work, and at the same time, their work must be open in such a way that, when it becomes public domain, as it should relatively quickly, it is easily accessible to all. The tool is right here in front of us: the internet, micropayments, open standards. We just need to do it. And don’t count on Congress or the RIAA or the MPAA working towards anything workable any time soon….

I have commented in the past about my quuest to find a spiritual path. I have made it clear, I believe, that I am not looking for the “right” path, but rather the path that is right for me. In fact, I disdain anyone who believes that their spiritual path is the only way.

I found Wicca to be a good starting point because it is a highly decentralized (in terms of authority structure) Earth-centered religion that is based on seeing the energy in all things. Similar to Buddhism and other religions that keep meditation as a central tenant, Wicca calls on the individual to get in touch with his or her own inner spirit and emotions.

Every descriptioin I read of Wicca, however, gives a different account of what it means to believe in the Goddess, to cast spells, to practice “magick.” Today I found a very good overview of the Craft that I find very satisfying.

My chief concerns with Wicca are that:
a) The role of technology and progress within the belief system is unclear to me. Some people who are concerned about nature and life cycles see technology as alienating and destructive, while I do not. I see technology, in fact, as a great unifying force, and as a reflection of the human values put into it by its human creators.
b) The role of extraterrestrial living is not adequately expressed. I have not found any Wicca literature that deals with worship and practice when living on, say, the moon. As the religion is very Earth-centered, it focuses on the “Sabbats,” days of seasonal significance. The same Sabbats do not hold true on, say, Mars. Does Wicca require that believers, who believe in the power of Nature and the Earth, stay here? Because I would like to leave if given the opportunity. How does Wicca deal with other worlds?

Of course this problem exists for all religions. Many of the ancient and modern laws of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, to name the big three, require certain Earth-bound objects, symbols, and events to be recognized. It might be hard to find Mecca, or to bow to it, in the zero-gravity conditions of space. How can you take a day off from work on the Sabbath when there is no Sabbath, there is, in fact, no system of time, of days, of weeks?

The only religious system I have found that relates to what I am interested in and also takes into account some of these views in technopaganism, a belief set that is quite ill-defined and very rare. So I am at a bit of a loss. I can declare myself a Wicca with technopagan tendancies, and practice the Craft as I believe it should be, which would certainly not be untraditional (err…would be perfectly all right and normal), or I can keep searching for what I really am. Or, of course, I could just invent my own belief system. Or follow Bokononism.

Apple has had my iBook for 5 days and, despite the almost-promised 24 to 48 hour turn around, it looks like they haven’t even gotten around to opening the box yet. Grr. I’ve told them to escalate it and ship it to me at home, I hope they get around to it in the next week so that I am not computerless….

Now how do I watch DVDs on my flight home? Oh, the humanity!

This probably doesn’t warrant an entry, but I just found it amusing. Pricing on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 1 DVD set (some of which say they have all 12 eps, some say they have all 24, all of which contain 3 DVDs and all of which, I would think, have the twelve)

Blockbuster: $39.99
Amazon.com: $29.99
Buy.com: $28.88 (Lowest prices on earth, they say, but also on backorder)
Costco: $24.99, and at least the Waltham store has about 10 of them. So why did I listen to Kelson and not buy it? Grr.

I have just posted my final Conspiracy paper in the Essays section. It is a bit lengthy, but I am quite proud of it. The paper, titled From The X-Files To Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Changing Notions of Conspiracy in American Culture, incorporates elements from my journalism, media, and AMST classes. Special thanks go to Prof. Socolow for providing a lot of the inspiration behind some of my information arguments.

Perhaps Buffy’s philosophy is better then Mulder’s.  Perhaps her decision not to let paranoia take over her life results in a more positive living experience.  Mulder is obsessed with the elusive truth, with a truth that, by all indications, cannot be obtained. Buffy’s job is simple.  She finds the bad guy, she kills the bad guy… Sure strange things happen, sure the unexplained may be common place, sure coincidences may seem much too coincidental, but all in all, it’s a pretty good place, and you deal with it as much as you can.  This seems like a pretty balanced worldview.

Read it, you might find it interesting.

This isn’t incredibly fitting after the last few meaningful entries, but I have a few tidbits that need throwing in for posterity.

Music: I am completely enthralled by the wonderful musical stylings of Dashboard Confessional. Thanks, Jess, for lending me that CD. They ROCK! 😉

Readings: I have a LOT of things I need to catch up on, but I’m going to try to get through Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle and possibly Daniel Schorr’s memoir Staying Tuned either on the plane ride home and back or sometime over break.

Summer: I have found a heck of a lot of promising internships. I am meeting with the career counselor lady today, and I really really have made a commitment to get all of my resumes and such out by the end of the week long February break. Possibilities that look appealing so far are Wired Magazine in San Francisco, the Pew Internet and American Life think tank in DC, National Public Radio, also in DC, or one of the film/production/radio/broadcast places in LA, of which there are quite a few, some with better opportunities than others. Of course, there is always the Jay Leno Show, which has 10 or so positions open, but they really are looking for Juniors and Seniors, so… 😉

I hate that I’m even writing this, because non-poetic words can do little to express what I am feeling, and such writings always sound cheesy, but alas, even my reason cannot stop me.

Everyone has yearnings, and dreams, and wishes. Some people are in better positions then others to fulfill them. What really matters is that you find happiness. But sometimes, happiness is a struggle, and happiness is short-lived, and happiness is fleeting.

I am so, so happy, after watching The Prom, that Buffy finally received one night of real happiness. I’m doing the tearing thing and living vicariously through my favorite fictional vampire-battling hero, and I can only hope that we all can experience this time of happiness, and that it lasts long beyond what our heroine was allowed.

We’re not good friends. Most of us never found the time to get to know you. But that doesn’t mean we haven’t noticed you.

We don’t talk about it much, but it’s not secret that Sunnydale High isn’t really like other high schools. A lot of weird stuff happens here. But whenever there was a problem or something creepy happened, you seemed to show up and stop it. Most of the people here have been saved by you. Or helped by you at one time or another.

We’re proud to say that the class of ’99 has the lowest mortality rate of any graduating class in Sunnydale history. (Laughter) And we know that at least part of that is because of you. So the senior class offers it’s thanks and gives you, uh… this. (He hands her a sparkling umbrella trophy) It’s from all of us. And it has written here, Buffy Summers- Class Protector.

– Jonathan, reading from a prepared speech at the Senior Prom (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

Sometimes, recognition is embarrassing. Sometimes, it is just what you need.

13a. It is an easy power to ridicule everything with sarcasm and irony, anyone can do it. It's much harder to give things a chance and try to understand. As smart as you are, there is always something to learn, and, conversely, always something to unlearn. Stop being afraid of everything.

http://www.blindwino.com/splain.html

I’m not ashamed, nor am I proud, of my financial situation. It is what it is. I am proud of my parents and my grandparents and my Aunt Linda for establishing a business from nothing, for working and expanding the business, for treating employees fairly, and for growing that business into a profitable and substantial enterprise.

I am not ashamed, nor am I proud, of my own financial situation. I did little to earn it, but, like any other child of parents, I inherit my parents successes and failures. I inherit the ability to attend a semi-prestigious east-coast school instead of a prestigious west-coast school at half the price. That is my inheritance.

I am not ashamed, nor am I proud, of my current college situation. I was accepted to University of California Berkeley, a prestigious and highly recognized, and also very large and very anonymous, California school. Being a California resident, I receive discounted tuition to any UC or CalState school. The system on which Berkeley works includes credit for classes I have taken over the summer and AP courses I have completed. It is likely that I would get out of Berkeley with my BA degree in three years. The cost would be, all expenses included, approximately US$20,000 a year, for a total of $60,000. Brandeis University is a small suburban school in Waltham, Mass. It is less well-known, it is more unique, it has a similar activist history to Berkeley. Brandeis is private and offers few non-federal, non-need-based scholarships. My time at Brandeis costs approximately US$35,000 a year. I will spend four whole years here, exploring, learning, growing, with a final price tag of about $140,000.

I am ashamed of the price disparity, and here is why. I pay taxes, as does everyone else in California. Those taxes go to support one of the finest systems of higher education in the world. In exchange for this, I am given discounted tuition. I could go to Berkeley instead of Brandeis, and I would end my first phase of college with an extra $80,000 that I wouldn’t otherwise have. Eighty thousand dollars. I have no real concept of what this figure means, except that it is a lot. It is enough to pay for a few years of law school, or a fine motor vehicle, or a good down-payment on a house, or a wonderful contribution to the United Way.

I am ashamed, because to be ashamed means to feel guilt and remorse, and although I have not done anything wrong, these are things I feel. I think these feelings are justified. So now my question is how to deal with them. Not how to forget them, or overcome them, but how to deal with them. Because I have been given great opportunities, better than I probably deserve, and I am still trying to figure out why.

Sorkin latest attempt to bring his show up to the times seems to be his idea that, since lots of people criticize The West Wing for its sexism, they should just throw that into the next episode and make fun of it. Not sure how well that worked for them.

It saddens me to say that I’m getting tired of this show. Ah, well.

Barry Manilow wrote the State Farm theme, “Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there!” Heh.

On my way back from fencing just now I was thinking about meditation and religion in general, which caused my thoughts to wander to ecology, and furthermore to styrafoam(tm). My question to myself was one of degrees. If I am to say that I follow a spiritual path that reveres the earth (not that I am yet saying such, but if I were), would it be bad that I still consume like every other American, using styrafoam cups and plastic boxes and plasticware and plastic bottles? Most all religions do this to some extent — they sacrifice “raw” religious laws in order to adapt to society. God says don’t wear threads of different animals, but people understand that with today’s manufactured products that is a bit tough. For women to lock themselves away for a week every month during menstruation and not touch or see anyone or anything would be to follow the word of God in the JudeoChristianIslamic doctrine, but it would not be convenient. So I use styrafoam.

All of this made me recall a very interesting thought that I read in something of Neal Stephenson, probably The Diamond Age. The meme was basically that as values shift it becomes increasingly difficult for individuals and societies to agree on what is “right,” and without a common moral ground for everyone to be sufficiently outraged, the only real way to criticize is to expose hypocrisy. I might not believe what you’re saying, but you are the one saying it and for you to act differently then you preach is for you to be bad. That makes it a lot easier.

Every individual, no matter how pure, has some hypocrisy in them, and this is unavoidable. My quest is simply to stay pure enough so that I am satisfied. Do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the law. Figure that one out.