I blame Facebook. There was a time when I could just talk to someone naturally about their life. Now I steer the conversation toward getting them to friend me. This makes it a lot easier to find out everything about them or at least everything they want the world to know. Some call this creepy. That is silly of them. Why do you create a page and upload pictures in the first place? Because yo don't want people to look at them? Give me a break.
I kind of miss the good old days sometimes. But alas, if I were to live as I did in San Diego, I probably wouldn't be in good shape to say the least. Vague like a Facebook status.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The Music Industry
CDs are over-priced. That is why not one wants to but them. Also major music corporations never release all of the best content available for any given band. Music fans would rather download live concerts, radio performances, bootleg rarities etc. I hope the music industry fails I really do. If I never have to hear Lady Gaga or Justin Beiber or the Pussycat Dolls or Beyonce or Rihanna or Gansta Rap in general, then my quality of life will exponentially improve. Everything, everywhere ends. Hopefully the music industry does sooner than later.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Online Gaming: So Awesome it's Not
When I was born, the world was a far simpler place. Video games were played on a console you purchased at somewhere like Toys R US. The game were simple and usually 2D. This is not to say they were not challenging, because they sure as hell were. A controller only has four buttons and two shoulder buttons. Games were relatively easy to pick up and play. The controls were highly intuitve.
Fast forward to the present day. Game controllers for an X-BOX 360 are highly complicated. Games tend to be extremely complex to the point where you need ten minutes of instruction before you can even attempt to play them. Most games have gone online as well. This is a problem. Kids who play online seem to practice roughly ten hours per day until they develop godlike skills.
Apply this ten hour rule to anything else. Guitar? Practice guitar ten hours a day and you know who you might sound like? Jimmy Page. Well not really, but pretty close. I'm not insulting video games. They are awesome. They stimulate the senses and the imagination. They give children a reason to stay off the streets and out of the pool halls.
This post is kind of like existence. It has no intrinsic purpose. But anyway I was just reflecting on my childhood. I'm glad I got to play video games, but I wish I were moderated more. I should have been forced to go outside more and socialize and experience the world. I should have gone outside and ate steaks so I didn't look like the next child Angelina Jolie is waiting to adopt. Maybe she'll adopt me now, since I haven't really changed much. Now that video games are online people are going to spend even more time wasting time. If you were to videotape someone playing for hours, then you would see a person staring a screen moving there thumbs and occasionally getting up to eat and move the washroom. I feel rather unproductive in that state.
Thanks for reading my preachy Public Service Announcement.
Fast forward to the present day. Game controllers for an X-BOX 360 are highly complicated. Games tend to be extremely complex to the point where you need ten minutes of instruction before you can even attempt to play them. Most games have gone online as well. This is a problem. Kids who play online seem to practice roughly ten hours per day until they develop godlike skills.
Apply this ten hour rule to anything else. Guitar? Practice guitar ten hours a day and you know who you might sound like? Jimmy Page. Well not really, but pretty close. I'm not insulting video games. They are awesome. They stimulate the senses and the imagination. They give children a reason to stay off the streets and out of the pool halls.
This post is kind of like existence. It has no intrinsic purpose. But anyway I was just reflecting on my childhood. I'm glad I got to play video games, but I wish I were moderated more. I should have been forced to go outside more and socialize and experience the world. I should have gone outside and ate steaks so I didn't look like the next child Angelina Jolie is waiting to adopt. Maybe she'll adopt me now, since I haven't really changed much. Now that video games are online people are going to spend even more time wasting time. If you were to videotape someone playing for hours, then you would see a person staring a screen moving there thumbs and occasionally getting up to eat and move the washroom. I feel rather unproductive in that state.
Thanks for reading my preachy Public Service Announcement.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Choose anew, please evolve, take flight.
Yes. It that's time in space time. Time for the human race to disregard this self-imposed failed asceticism and and pseudo-puritanical fake morality. Yes I went there. Every time we face a major paradigm shift people all over the planet panic for no logical reason. This is a problem. We live in a culture predicated upon a set of false assumptions. When Elvis danced on the Ed Sullivan Show it did not promote anarchy. There were not wild copulations in the streets of Chicago... at least to my knowledge.
When it comes to this youth generation's media fixation people are up in arms. Children are living increasingly sedentary lives which lead to childhood obesity. Youths no longer know how to properly socialize because they spend all their time in Facebook. What has technology done to us, made us into a bunch of mindless cyborgs? NO.
Let me tell everyone who isn't down with progress a little something. Rockefeller, literally the richest man in the world at one point, had toothaches because he couldn't get anesthesia at the dentist. That's right... Let that sink in. A common person now has a higher quality of life than Rockefeller in some respects thanks to progress. What a terrible world we've created for ourselves... not. P.S. We literally need to advance enough as a species to escape this planet or we'll be none to happy when our sun explodes. True story.
Parents need to take some responsibility. If your child is addicted to media, then set some limitations. Take your child outside exercise with you. Your child with base his or her entire ontological framework on how you act as a parent. My parents fed me fruit rolls ups and Mountain Dew when I was a child. Whose fault would it be if I had high blood sugar? Parents obviously. No child is going to innately know how to or have any desire to moderate himself. Youth is all about the id, parents have to be the rational mediator.
Progress is going to happen whether we like it or not. There is nothing "unnatural" about any of it. Everything that exists in this universe is by definition a part of the natural world. We're just an extension of the laws and processes set forth by the Big Bang. I want to see how far we can take it. Come one everyone, let's create something better than ourselves and escape this dust rock in a billion or so years. Look at the bigger picture. We can do so much more if we stop holding ourselves back.
Forsan et haec olim meninisse iuvabit.
When it comes to this youth generation's media fixation people are up in arms. Children are living increasingly sedentary lives which lead to childhood obesity. Youths no longer know how to properly socialize because they spend all their time in Facebook. What has technology done to us, made us into a bunch of mindless cyborgs? NO.
Let me tell everyone who isn't down with progress a little something. Rockefeller, literally the richest man in the world at one point, had toothaches because he couldn't get anesthesia at the dentist. That's right... Let that sink in. A common person now has a higher quality of life than Rockefeller in some respects thanks to progress. What a terrible world we've created for ourselves... not. P.S. We literally need to advance enough as a species to escape this planet or we'll be none to happy when our sun explodes. True story.
Parents need to take some responsibility. If your child is addicted to media, then set some limitations. Take your child outside exercise with you. Your child with base his or her entire ontological framework on how you act as a parent. My parents fed me fruit rolls ups and Mountain Dew when I was a child. Whose fault would it be if I had high blood sugar? Parents obviously. No child is going to innately know how to or have any desire to moderate himself. Youth is all about the id, parents have to be the rational mediator.
Progress is going to happen whether we like it or not. There is nothing "unnatural" about any of it. Everything that exists in this universe is by definition a part of the natural world. We're just an extension of the laws and processes set forth by the Big Bang. I want to see how far we can take it. Come one everyone, let's create something better than ourselves and escape this dust rock in a billion or so years. Look at the bigger picture. We can do so much more if we stop holding ourselves back.
Forsan et haec olim meninisse iuvabit.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Extra Credit: New Media Presentation
During the last two weeks of class I attended a total of three presentations about New Media for extra credit opportunities. I have to say that all three presentations were impressive. I do have a personal favorite, but I won't talk about that on the internet.
The third presentation I saw was by a professor whose last name I believe was Dorsten. The main focus of the presentation was the manner in which public relations have been changing due to new media. We watched a video in which Charmin set up deluxe bathrooms somewhere around Times Square New York. This was incredibly strange, but also a good way to generate buzz for their products at the same time. I personally would feel highly uncomfortable going to bathrooms filled with tourists, but then again, I am not the average consumer.
Anyway I would be interested in taking a course along these lines. I don't even want to think about the future, but a job in public relations would most certainly not be the worst case scenario for my one and only existence. It was informative. She engaged the students. It was an effective presentation. I will be interested to see what the Speech Department decides upon after seeing all three presentations. Even though it won't affect my future, I have my fingers crossed my candidate gets picked. It's kind of like survivor, except without an internet forum of people who take satellite photos to try and determine what is going to happen.
The third presentation I saw was by a professor whose last name I believe was Dorsten. The main focus of the presentation was the manner in which public relations have been changing due to new media. We watched a video in which Charmin set up deluxe bathrooms somewhere around Times Square New York. This was incredibly strange, but also a good way to generate buzz for their products at the same time. I personally would feel highly uncomfortable going to bathrooms filled with tourists, but then again, I am not the average consumer.
Anyway I would be interested in taking a course along these lines. I don't even want to think about the future, but a job in public relations would most certainly not be the worst case scenario for my one and only existence. It was informative. She engaged the students. It was an effective presentation. I will be interested to see what the Speech Department decides upon after seeing all three presentations. Even though it won't affect my future, I have my fingers crossed my candidate gets picked. It's kind of like survivor, except without an internet forum of people who take satellite photos to try and determine what is going to happen.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
HUGE CARS and the reason they are destroying civilized life as we know it.
Today I saw a girl, who I am going to guess was roughly 18, driving a Hummer through the streets of Naperville. Nothing about this scenario is even remotely acceptable.
1,745,289- That is the number of parking spots wasted during one year in Naperville due to two interesting societal phenomena.
1. The majority of people cannot parallel park.
2. People insist on having these massive SUV's
Granted I understand some people have a legitimate reason to have such massive vehicles, but seriously? Tomorrow morning I will likely see a plethora of individuals drinking lattes, while talking on cellphones, while putting in their Top 40 cd's, while loading How to Train Your Dragon into their overhead blu ray players for their kids, while parallel parking. This type of convergence will have an interesting outcome no theorist has yet written about to my knowledge... I will see this and develop an ulcer.
1,745,289- That is the number of parking spots wasted during one year in Naperville due to two interesting societal phenomena.
1. The majority of people cannot parallel park.
2. People insist on having these massive SUV's
Granted I understand some people have a legitimate reason to have such massive vehicles, but seriously? Tomorrow morning I will likely see a plethora of individuals drinking lattes, while talking on cellphones, while putting in their Top 40 cd's, while loading How to Train Your Dragon into their overhead blu ray players for their kids, while parallel parking. This type of convergence will have an interesting outcome no theorist has yet written about to my knowledge... I will see this and develop an ulcer.
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