Astronaut charged with attempted murder

ORLANDO, Fla. - She was the Robochick. He was Billy-O. According to police, her obsession with him led her to drive 900 miles from Houston to Orlando, bringing with her a trenchcoat and wig, armed with a BB gun and pepper spray, and wearing a diaper to avoid bathroom breaks on the arduous drive.



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Life 2.0, Part 4

Take it another step and we have total integration of the Internet into all our devices. Broadband cable and WiFi in every part of the home, why not? It’s just about possible now. There really is no reason my set top box, DVD player, Computer, and even my refrigerator can’t be all networked on a WiFi so that I can access information about everyone of them on a LAN or out to the World Wide Web. And why not?

I want the smart house. I want my refrigerator to send me an email when the filter in the water dispenser is low. Better yet, I want to set the preferences on my refrigerator to order me a new filter when it needs to be replaced and then email me an alert to expect the filter to arrive in the mail by UPS and by the way here’s the tracking number and here is where that package is in transit right now. Same for the air filters in my forced hot air system. What about my light bulbs in my recessed lighting?

I ask this question of myself all the time: Why do I have to stick my DVD into my computer to access the web content? With WiFi technology and a simple operating system loaded with a browser interface, my DVD player can show me the content right after I watch the movie. (Advertisers are you listening because then you know exactly my tastes by what DVD I was watching and can target those banner ads accordingly.)

Here’s another question I ask myself: Why can’t my stove give me access to the latest recipes when I am feeling inspired to cook like Emeril while watching the show on TV? I can tell my stove to access one of many websites where I can find recipes and then get a list of ingredients emailed to me or better yet WiFi the information to the printer directly. That way I can run out and get exactly what I need. There’s probably a thousand brands out there who would love to be the exclusive sponsor so when my list prints it doesn’t simply say to buy butter but Land O’ Lakes butter.

Some say this is evil. It’s like movie product placement but in your real life. And when is it too much networking? Does my lamp or my cheese grater really need a WiFi connection? Probably not. But there are major appliances that are missing an opportunity here. And the advertising reduces the cost of the actual item then so be it. Already we are getting immune to ads blasting at us on billboards, phone ads, commercials on radio and television, free websites and Google Ad Sense is everywhere, even your Aunt Tilly’s blog. But this kind of thing allows it to be free to blog, share photos and upload videos of teenagers blowing up Coke bottles.

In the next step, the web will not only be pervasive but invisible. We know it is beginning when our phones and our computers and our iPods all are coming together. When telephones and televisions started invading our homes the world became smaller and more connected. The Internet increased that networking of people across countries. Someday we’ll be talking worlds or stations in space or on the moon. If you think I am being grandiose just remember that as little as twenty years ago CDs were an extremely expensive option to cassette tape and people still bought 45RPM singles.

Some of you knew I was going to get to this eventually: The Singularity.

If anyone has been reading or listening to the theoretical talk in technology lately you might have heard of a concept called the Singularity. This idea is explained, as the time in the future when the exponential increase of technology is so fast we cannot imagine it. In Moore’s Law, the processing speed of computers will keep expanding exponentially. In the future, Artificial Intelligence, because of this infinite increase in technology, will be smarter than humans. Either the collective of computers networked throughout the world (or solar system!) will surpassed the collective human intelligence or AI will be the only way to capture this increase of technological computing power in any meaningful way. Some profess that this is the natural evolution of the universe, from organic to artificial intelligence. Of course we can also rely of biological enhancements to our own intelligence, the seeds of which we see in medical science today.

Personally I do not have that sense of impending doom regarding the advance of technology. It does make humans more dependant and somewhat lazy but it has so much going for it. I think the major debate is: What is life? Will computers and machinery ever live? Will they question their own existence? Will they have wants, needs and desires like us? Will they love? Hate?

Even if the computers can process so quickly they can network together and imitate life, the beauty of life (biological, life as we know it) is that each of us, you and me encompass a whole host of emotions, ideas, potential that I think a machine can't have. It can't grow like us. Growing, struggling, surviving despite all odds, that is what makes a being eligible to be considered alive.

Each of us in our journey from birth to death grows and learns so much that we are different from each other as can be. My universe is not your universe even though we live together. Even though we share the same space. Machines cannot live if they merely download the information they've learned from generation to generation. We have to learn it all in a unique and personal way every time, except the most basic biological functions.

In life, we must earn our way. Life is precious. Life is tragic. How concerned can I be with a machine whose whole existence is backed up on a server? You and I are not "backed up." We exist once and then as unfair as it seems, in a brief time we disappear, never to exist again. Never to occupy the same space again. Never to "be" again. That is the essence of life. It only happens once and it is beautiful and fragile. It is not a series of codes that can be copied from drive to drive. That is just data back up.

Vernor Vinge and Ray Kurzweil promote the Singularity concept, derived from the Singularity in Physics where Gravity is so strong that it verges on infinite strength. In Kurzweil’s Law of Accelerating Returns he describes exponential growth much like Moore’s Law but applies it generally to include technology from before the computing circuit.

Some have debated the idea that our technology may surpass us and lead to us becoming less and less necessary in the paradigm. Can machines overtake their maker and become the dominant intelligence force in the universe? Is that progress? If that happens will we be in a better position where the machines will strive for our well-being and general comfort like a direct intervention from a deity? Or will they adopt our power corrupting ideals, enslaving or eliminating us from the equation. Science Fiction has made much hay of this concept.

Can we avoid our own destruction not by War or Disease or Famine but by the very thing we have relied on so much to make life more and more comfortable, accessible and safe: Technology.

I think we will continue to reach to that future time as we come closer to the event horizon of the technological singularity and try to understand its implications but like the unfathomable idea of the physical singularity the singularity of the computing world may just be a possibility, ever out of reach of true understanding and conception.

In the meantime, I’m going to watch that video of a monkey peeing off a branch on YouTube again.

End.

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Life 2.0, Part 3

I am waiting for Web 3.0, which will ingrain itself into my real world in such a way that it will be virtually inseparable from my environment and approach a certain Artificial Intelligence aspect.

The Web 3.0 thing is a definite. I see it as the collective consciousness of all the information you can find on the Internet combined with your personal profile put through marketing and modeling software (algorithms?) to make predictions on behavior or even suggestions.

This is all dependant on our use of the Internet, which is becoming more and more prevalent. Web based applications are replacing locally run software. This idea gets us back to the mainframe model where your computer is simply a terminal slave for a larger, smarter, central computer. (Ever see Wargames?) But the larger smarter central computer in this case is replaced by a smudge of information across geographic and electronic areas.

Of course there will always be customization and personalization because that is what we demand but imagine a world where instead of choosing a system platform to run, you choose what site you will log into to do all your computing. Google seems to be heading in that direction and they aren’t the only ones who get it. In all honesty, I shiver at the idea of giving up my individuality to buy and pick and choose my software as I like for my own system that resides on my own hard drive locally instead of having an internet box that gets me access to a remote server that only looks like its mine.

This has been tried before but not too much success. Now with online video and photo sharing, blogging, and services like Gmail, this is becoming a reality. All a large company like Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Apple or someone else has to do is start acquiring all the little websites and making them their own. Oh wait! This is already happening. More and more, the graphical interface of the web is replacing what lies beneath.

Bit Torrent is a file sharing protocol where multiple computers that hold the same file speed up uploading requests and limit bandwidth consumption by sending bits of data over a wider distribution of files across multiple sources. That’s my understanding of the technology. As more people pick up the file the faster the download time since there are more bits out there to take from simultaneously. With technology like that and an ever increasing bandwidth, it will not be long before we can seamlessly share all kinds of data and files no matter how large, further allowing remote accessing and increasing the ability of storage space to become almost infinite.

If I have a virtual hard drive but the files I keep are merely images of what I want instead of the actual file, every time I want to access it (lets say it’s my favorite movie or album) the file is sent to me by this distribution protocol instantly. Would I know the difference between actually owning a file and just having immediate access to it whenever I want?

Is the next evolution a model where my children buy dumb boxes and the internet makes available for free, powerful applications and services like Photoshop, Microsoft Excel, Gmail and Youtube all for the simple price of having to look at some pop up ads? Or a small subscription fee? Perhaps the ISPs will start offering subscription packages to online software apps ala the current model for cable offerings.

Even better I choose a menu of items I want to access for a price per month that I can change month to month as my needs change. Do I need to retouch photos this month? Order Photoshop. Is it tax season? Order Turbo Tax. Is my child going back to school in September? Time to reorder my favorite word processing software. For a couple of dollars per month I always have the most updated and latest software version instead of paying hundreds ever time I want one or have to upgrade.

The software companies make out because distribution costs and packaging is eliminated in favor of allowing more users access to their software. Lower price points may translate into exponentially larger subscribers and legal subscribers, at that. How much does Adobe loose on all those pirated and copied versions of Photoshop? Or how many people don’t use it because the price point is too high but they’d love to have it?

Take a $500 program and charge $10 per month for it. Then offer it so that you are always able to use the most updated and latest version if I so choose (or I can continue using the previous version I am used to until I want to switch up.) I’d do it so that I never have to mail in a registration card again or worry that in a few years I have to fork out another $200 to upgrade to the version that everyone else is using or that runs on the latest operating system.

Do you want the basic broadband subscription with channels like Google and Yahoo along with basic photo editing, word processing, email software and the 500 Terabytes of storage? Or do you want the Silver package where you get all the search engines plus the Microsoft Office Suite and Adobe package of application subscriptions and the 1 Petabyte of storage space? Great, now wait while we scan all your appliances and stereo equipment for integration into our control panel web page. What’s that madam? Sure, you can control everything when you are on vacation or at work, just log into your account. Your kids will get the PG-13 version access as well.

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Life 2.0, Part 2

The personal web log, otherwise known as a Blog, has exploded over the last few years. The average web surfer can now access hundreds of site that allow them to set up a their own blog for free. Anyone with a connection to the Internet can be a content producer. Blogs can be rarely updated, extremely personal diaries or professionally run, frequently updated, journalistic reports on the world, politics or culture.

Wikis are the public sites where anyone can contribute and edit content. The most famous, Wikipedia.com allows anyone who registers to alter the encyclopedic content of the site on everything from politics to comic books. I think of it as the collective consciousness of the web.

Podcasting takes things a step higher. It is a natural evolution of the blogging phenom where a person (and usually more than one) takes their blog ideas and records them by voice. Think AM Talk Radio.

In addition more technologies like social networking sites that let you post your own profile and photo sharing site that allow you to upload and post your own photos for public viewing can be rolled into the Web 2.0 movement.

On MySpace millions of posters keep a running list of interests, connections, bulletins and news. They post photos and connect with old or new friends. The teenage market seems to be a high user base and indie rock bands seem to proliferate MySpace with their profiles. The ability to modulate the site with art, music and video adds to the appeal. Of course the real value in the site is for the advertisers to put their message in front of the millions of users that visit the site everyday. MySpace has minimal interactivity. It allows you to post your personal information and connect to others but it does not allow for anything close to real time feeding of information and on the fly changes. It’s pretty much a dinosaur that is a victim of its own massive popularity.

Digg.com is a site where users pick up articles off the web and link to them. Then other users vote up or down the article or story. It can be anything and of almost any subject although technology news seems to get the most “DIGGS” as they are called. The popular items are then talked about on a podcast. If you can imagine that this site draws in thousands of users every day and none of them are paid to search and post their favorite stories. It seems almost a badge of honor to be a newshound for Digg.com and then have your picks become popular. While great for disseminating information that a group might find useful and share with each other it also could provide a boost for an otherwise not-so-popular blog or news site that gets a story or post DUGG and becomes popular.

This brings us to a term that even I just learned but have been experiencing and using for a long time now: Folksonomy, better known as Tagging. On the web, people use tags to describe a created object or piece of information. The difference between Folksonomy and Taxonomy is that Folksonomy is an organic, user created system that has no formal rules and Taxonomy follows strict guidelines. So when I post by picture on Flicker for the world to see, I apply search tags to it myself based on what I feel best describes the image. The same idea applies to my blog posts, sound bites, video uploads and all other user created content. When you add a tag to your information and it is picked up by other sites it will then be grouped with other pieces of information that are similarly tagged.

So all I need to do is apply a group of generic tags to my Flicker photo and when a user comes on to search for all tags related to “Ford Mustang” the picture of my classic car may show up. The downside is that there is no subsystem in this type of classification so if I only tag my image as a “Ford Mustang” then there is no central database that will also group all “Ford Mustang” searches under “Automobile” as well. The benefit is that I can add as many tags as I wish and require to my information and am not beholden to a committee defined classification system. In this iteration of the Web, users are defining the content themselves or it could be said that the lunatics have taken over the asylum.

In addition I would categorize the Massively Multiplayer Online Games like World of Warcraft in this category. People are living, fighting, socializing and bartering (and even making a profit) off of this virtual world. Second Life is another wildly popular site where people create alternate personalities and basically live a second life online. This is attracting real businesses to set up shop in the Second Life virtual universe.

As a side note, Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash featured a virtual world where players immersed themselves in a total virtual reality. The author coined the popular term for an online personality that is called an Avatar. Though the virtual computer world in the book was more extensive and visceral than current virtual reality experiences online it was a very good prediction of the direction we are heading.

This has made us a culture of writers, performers and consumers of media in a fashion never predicted. I profess that technology is making us more literate and expressive and less apt to being swayed by the old paradigm of Mass Media.

The diversity of the information that real people share is amazing. I ran across a blog that someone was running where they documented their experience dealing with being a single father trying to gain custody of his children. Where can someone with that specific interest go to find support and companionship but in this arena?

Narrowcasting to niche interest groups is where the future lies. Sure, we may still have the need for a big media companies to handle the large stories, the ones that require a behemoth to get done but within that is a splintering of interest groups. A picking and choosing of what I want rather than having to wait for someone to discover my demographic needs to be fed.

No matter how you slice it, no matter how popular it becomes, sites like MySpace are ugly, tacky and virtually non-functioning. Ever notice how slow it is to load a MySpace page or navigate. The access and networking it allows outstrips its flaws for most teenagers and they probably never even notice. MySpace probably has a few good years left (if that) and it will die a painful death. Or has no one learned the lesson of AOL yet?

Is there an uglier side to all this beyond aesthetics? Of course. The access and networking has allowed many people to do evil to other people, take advantage of unfortunate souls and commit crimes and scams. But this is a facet of human nature not the technology. To change this we must change. In the meantime a democratic and uncensored Internet is a good thing. The censoring and protection has to happen at the nodal level, within the home and at the points of access. Am I sounding a little idealistic, a little liberal? Then let me take the extra step and quote Stewart Brand: “Information wants to be free.” Not that it should not cost anything but that it should be available for those who want it.

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The British Are Coming! The British Are Coming!

OK. So they aren't really coming, but I went to them and guess what? They like me in jolly ole England. So much so that I write regularly for the British Science Fiction Writer's Association. They have a few magazines.

Check out my latest article here.

Subscribe to the magazine here.

See a picture of a Claudia Christian.

See a picture of me.

See me and Claudia Christian. (You have to do that yourself, I do.)

L.S.C.

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Black Hole Eats Big Star. Sounds Dirty But It's Not.

Before the story remember to Click here to take my survey. Thanks!

NASA telescope sees Black Hole gulping remote star.

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A giant Black Hole displaying horrifying table manners has been caught in the act of guzzling a star in a galaxy 4 billion light-years away, scientists using an orbiting NASA telescope said on Tuesday.

To read the rest click here.

This is too cool. The amount of energy and power it takes for a Black Hole to rip apart and swallow a star is unimaginable. Think of an elephant being ripped apart and sucked down into a tiny pinprick and you get the idea. That is probably not really even a close analogy but I like it all the same.

For the uninitiated, a Black Hole is the remnant of a collapsed star of a certain, large, size. After the star swells it then collapses on itself. A few things can happen.

One, it can grow to a Red Giant and then puff off its outer layer leaving a charred cinder called a Brown Dwarf. It may glow for a while as a White Dwarf but eventually it dies a slow death, like the campfire burning out but not of fire but of nuclear energy fading. The ejected gas is a mixture of elements called a Nebula. Eventually the Nebula will feed a new star's material. This is how the universe was built when Hydrogen stars coalesced and then exploded over billions of years, each time the Gravity caused Hydrogen atoms to fuse into ever more complex molecules. Eventually the stuff of life was the result. (Or God make the whole shebang in seven days, whatever.) The Brown Dwarf is like a very, very large Jupiter that barley emits energy or light. Many think that Brown Dwarf stars may be part of the dark matter we can't find in the universe, along with Black Holes and other Baryonic stuff.

Another possibility is that in a larger star, the star explodes in a Supernova and then what's left collapses back on itself and compresses so tight that the electron-proton pairs become pushed together to form Neutrons. The Neutrons are strong enough to resist further condensing so the result is called a Neutron Star. This is the heaviest mass object in the universe. From the NASA website: According to astronomer and author Frank Shu, "A sugar cube of Neutron Star stuff on Earth would weigh as much as all of humanity!" The reason the star goes Supernova is that in the Neutron state the outer layer "bounces" off the hard surface and shoots back outward. The only thing that stops the star from continuing to collapse is that the Neutron material is strong enough to resist it's own Gravity. The resulting object is a mere few miles wide but incredibly dense! Neutron Stars are sometimes called Pulsars when they spin because they emit an Electromagnetic emission in a regular pulse.

The final result is a Black Hole. Really massive stars collapse and because the core is so heavy it can't resist it's own Gravity. (No will power I guess.) The result is that the matter continues to fall in on itself until everything is sucked into what's called a Singularity. A Singularity is a point in space where Gravity is infinite and the point has zero volume. And weird crap happens. Like the Gravity is so strong that light can't even go fast enough to escape so it is trapped in to an endless revolution around the Black Hole. Pretty much breaking the established laws of physics that light is the speed limit of the universe. The Black Hole is the end point of a star's life but also can be seen as an endpoint to reality as we know it to exist in our "normal" functioning universe. That's why the Black Hole is a wired object. It is something that is so small and dense it can't exist in our universe, yet, there it is! Contrary to popular belief, a Black Hole doesn't suck thinks into it. You can safely revolve around a Black Hole forever if you are far enough away. The point of no return is the Event Horizon or the radius from the center (if we could find the damn center since it is of zero volume!) called the Schwartzschild Radius. At this point the escape velocity is the speed of light and since nothing goes faster than light, well...

OK, so that's weird, right. Here’s the weirdest thing. Einstein's General Theory of Relativity predicted Black Holes and by God there they are. But since Time and Space are all dimensions affected by Gravity, a Black Hole will also cause time to slow down to a stop. In fact, any Gravity field will cause time to slow by a small amount but it takes a super-massive one to make time slow down significantly. Go live in the orbit of a Black Hole and you can watch the universe speed up around you. Since Einstein said we can't distinguish between a Gravity field and an accelerating object, the faster you go, time also will slow down until you get to the impossible-to-attain, speed of light. So in essence, photons, the carriers of the EM force (which light is a part of) have no sense of time since they are always flying around at the speed of themselves. Photons are not affected by time. Since they are massless, they can do that. To speed even a pebble of sand to the speed of light the mass would increase (to make up for time and space dilation) and the pebble would become infinitely massive and require infinite energy to push. Not happening anytime soon.

As related to this story above, a star that finds itself on a trajectory towards a Black Hole will eventually become trapped by the Black Hole's Gravity. It will become ripped apart literally from one end to the other and then if on an angular path, the resulting gas will accrete in a disk and become "swallowed" by the Black Hole. We can see this happening because as the "stuff" of the star breaks apart and speeds up in the gravitational pull it gets heated and emits energy in the X-Ray and Gamma-Ray spectrum of the EM scale. This is obviously before it crosses the event horizon where nothing can escape. Just like in a good detective story or piece of abstract art, it is what is not there that defines a Black Hole rather than what is there. But we know it is there from its effect on matter or how things act within its gravitational pull around it.

L.S.C.

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Cohenside Survey

I have generated a survey to collect some information on my readers. I appreciate the time you all take to read my blog and comment to me. I will be giving away a free copy of my book, Erosion, to one random survey taker so good luck and thanks.

Click here to take survey.

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HD-DVD versus Blu Ray

I am referring to the article that I blogged below about HD-DVD versus Blu Ray.

Personally, I will not be switching to either format any time soon. I will be one of those who waits until I can download the movie and then archive it on a Hard Drive. But I think Sean Cooper is missing one piece of the puzzle. I would want a format that I could save a movie on portable media (HD-DVD probably) and archive it or take it with me so I can watch it on my TV.

I do not think that "On-Demand" or Movie Rental Downloading to a set top box (like what Netflix is proposing to do) are anywhere near ready. I guess I will have a long time to wait. Maybe it's a generational thing but I like the feeling of actually owning the physical movie rather than the "file" on a hard drive only. Or worse yet, the ability to watch a movie anytime from my TV just because I bought the viewing rights. Perhaps a backlog of older movies can be sold on a subscription basis like where you can buy the right to view any movie from Paramount or MGM's library of movies from before 10 years ago for a fee per month, I might try that. Or If Netflix can make it so that I can have the movie and access it anytime until I choose another movie similar to the current DVD service if their library is as extensive as it is now, I might buy into that. But download times for HD movies have to become faster or it will not be worth it.

Basically if I buy the latest Star Wars movie, I want to watch it anytime I want unrestricted like I do now. I don't want network logjams, server outages or corrupted files to get in the way. When my popcorn is ready my movie better be ready.

L.S.C.

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4 Reasons why HD-DVD and Blu-ray are dead on arrival

A good analysis of why both HD-DVD and Blu-ray formats will ultimately fail.

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Fox News' Bill O'Reilly: iPods Are Endangering America

O'Reilly proclaims, "I would never wear an iPod," and says, "I really fear for the United States" because "jihadists aren't playing video games." O'Reilly doesn't mention that his own show offers a whole series of podcasts.

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How to write for Slate Magazine

Warning: This essay is meant to be sarcastic and funny. Which didn’t make it in the top ten but is a close #11.

Slate is the online political and cultural magazine begun about ten years ago as a magazine that would only be produced for the web. In those ten years all but a few have been for free. I found Slate when I began my podcast listening over a year ago. I love the short podcast essays and the weekly political gabfest where three Slate editors discuss current events. I am a big fan. So big, in fact that I decided that I had to write for them. I dreamed of hearing Andy Bowers read my piece on the podcast as I listened in my car or on the john at work.

I went off and submitted articles to Slate and got every one rejected. Now what was I doing wrong? I thought. What is the secret to getting a byline on Slate? In retrospect I see that my writing just wasn’t Slate-worthy. It did not fit the guidelines. No, I didn’t find a secret web page with the secret handshake. No style guide telling me how exactly to dot my I’s and cross my T’s in such a way as to make the editors look at me as a “real Slate writer.”

All I did was listen.

After a few months of daily essays and news from Slate on my iPod I think I know a thing or two about what Slate looks for in a writer. Sorry, I know that you don’t need an iPod to listen to a podcast but I prefer one. And that leads me into my first of ten requirements to write for Slate:

#1. You must be cool.

Slate likes cool people. Not Fonzi cool, but just cool. People who are in the know or who get the joke. Sure Slate doesn’t necessarily make you listen to their podcasts on a slick new colorful iPod. But they prefer it. Just like they prefer you not drive a Hummer or live in a Mc Mansion. Even if you do drive a Hummer, live in a Mc Mansion and listen on some other portable MP3 device, they know that you know better. And it’s not even the cool where you can work in a 1970s or 1980s pop culture reference. It’s more obscure than that. Cool is very hard to define and means different things to different people. Let’s just call it “Slate Cool.” If you got it, you got it. If you don’t, well…

#2. Snark is key.

Andy Bowers has a great voice for podcasting. He makes you feel comfortable with the material. He reads every essay and conducts every interview as if he has a personal stake in it. You would never know Andy himself did not craft the words. Andy has snark down pat. Whenever I hear a snarky comment from him about the current administration or people who pick apples I know that he is enjoying the hell out of it. He’s shaking his head behind the microphone commiserating with the writer. Yes, we hate those guys too.

#3. Blame Bush.

If there’s a hangnail epidemic sweeping Europe, the safe bet is to blame Bush. If you can’t pin Bush then put the onus on Rumsfeld or better yet Karl Rove. I agree with this requirement. I blame the current administration for everything from white washing the actual “war on terror” to my teenager’s obnoxious attitude during dinner conversations. Try it, it works.

#4. If it’s a popular movement, go against the grain.

I’ve heard essays deriding everything from marathon racers to birthday gift giving. One of the editors at the political gabfest eschews birthday gift giving for a sort of library-esque book exchange program at her child’s birthday parties. So pick a subject that a lot of people do (like say jogging) and then be extremely snarky about it. (See #2)

#5 Be Jewish, but not too Jewish.

For example, don’t be like my Aunt Phyllis. She’s a real, New York City, grew-up-in-the-Bronx-during-the-1950s, pinch-your-cheeks, spouts Yiddish and talks about how much jewelry her neighbor wears, Jew. And don’t be militant-Jewish. Or Seinfeld-Jewish. There’s nothing wrong with those types of Jewish but that’s not exactly what they want. Be irreverently Jewish. If you’re not Jewish then be like Alan Alda. He’s not Jewish, but he comes across like he is. I’m Jewish like that, so I’m good there. At least I’m on the radar.

#6 Don’t be a Republican.

Whatever you do. Don’t be a Republican. Be fair and balanced, but just not that kind of fair and balanced. You know, the Fox News kind where you’re not really fair and balanced. Sure, the occasional Republican idea gets its time on the podcast but really, see #4. It’s really just to set the center a little straighter. And it’s not all Republicans, really. It’s more like the real right wing guys. The ones who send dirty text messages to teenage congressional pages. Those guys need not apply. Again, I happen to agree with this one so I’ve got the right party and religious affiliations down.

#7 Pick on celebrities. Especially when they really deserve it.

I think more news organizations need to follow this rule. Pick a celebrity who has screwed up royally and then write about it. This is a surefire way to get to the top of the slush pile. Slate loves celebrity faux pas. I do not mean that you need to write a snarky essay on how Jennifer Lopez wore the wrong haute couture dress on the red carpet. Leave that stuff for Joan Rivers. Slate deals with Mel Gibson-type screw-ups. Major, upsetting, scandalous ones that stray into the political arena. Like Tom Cruise soiling Oprah’s furniture or claiming that he knows more about psychotherapy than Matt Lauer. That stuff is just made for Slate. You may even get a follow up essay assigned to see how that celebrity has dealt with his initial screw-up.

#8 Be pre-trend.

If you can spot a trend before it gets out into the popular media then you’re guaranteed the podcast feature. If you have knowledge of a local trend that has all the markings of a honest-to-goodness, soon-to-be national, craze, then by all means write it up and send it to them. Like, if Bull Frog Stir Fry is the latest thing in Bismarck, North Dakota and all the college kids say BSFS in their IM messages as a euphemism for getting plastered which in itself is a euphemism for getting drunk, let Slate know about it. They eat that insider stuff up.

#9 Be literary.

A good idea in life too. Be as literary as possible when writing your stories. You have to either be well read or try to come across as well read in every essay. Being snarky helps others think that you are well read, even if you are not.

#10 Make lists.

This one escapes me. A large percentage of the essays read on Slate follow a list format. Slate Heart Lists.

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PodioBooks.com Serves 1 Million Downloads

A free site that serves up podcasted novels hit a milestone the other day, it passed the 1 million download mark! Its good to see the worlds of audiobooks and podcasting starting to make some traction out there.

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CBGB

After more than thirty years as a punk rock venue that began the careers of legends like Blondie and the Ramones, CGBG is closing its doors on October 15th. A moment of silence for this New York City institution that will probably become a Starbucks or a Gap. It’s a shame. I think that those who made their fortunes starting out in this place should take on the new lease and at least convert it into a cool museum slash used record shop, if they must they can serve coffee in the front.

Started in 1977 by Hilly Kristal CBGB became the place to go for new, live music. In the early Seventies, believe it or not, there were few venues for new bands to go on stage and just do their thing. CBGC filled that gap. Now music proliferates the scene but it was a dark time in New York back then with Middle Class flight and the degradation of the inner cities. (Good time to buy Real Estate though if you could wait long enough.)

Through the years bands like the Agnostic Front to Talking Heads, Police and The Dead Boys to Urge Overkill and almost everyone in between have played at CBGB.

From the CBGB website:

“The question most often asked of me is, "What does CBGB stand for?" I reply, "It stands for the kind of music I intended to have, but not the kind that we became famous for: COUNTRY BLUEGRASS BLUES." The next question is always, "but what does OMFUG stand for?" and I say "That's more of what we do, It means OTHER MUSIC FOR UPLIFTING GORMANDIZERS." And what is a gormandizer? It's a voracious eater of, in this case, MUSIC.” – Hilly Kristal.

Hilly is moving everything from the walls to the urinals to a new location in Las Vegas. Anything he can’t move he expects to sell on eBay.

CBGB 1973-2006.

L.S.C.

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Billion. Nine Zeros, Many Heroes.

Look down at your computer after you read this sentence. What kind of computer are you using? Unless you are me, it’s most likely a PC of some brand or another. These days, it most likely to be a Dell. When you look back up, you are probably using a Windows Operating System. No matter what program you are running or website you are searching, in all likelihood, odds-on, in all probability, nine time out of ten, you are running some version of Windows.

Now if you go to the Forbes website and look at the new Forbes 400 list, take a gander at who’s number one. That’s right, William Henry Gates III, age 50. He has an estimated fortune of Fifty-Three Billion Dollars. That is a five and then a three and then put nine zeros after it. Then if you want to really cry, stick a decimal and two more zeros. BHG3, as I like to refer to him, is a Billionaire fifty-three times over. $53,000,000,000.

Let’s savor that number: $53,000,000,000.

I’m sure there are website out there that can tell you how much he makes per second, per hour, all that jazz. It’s most likely a little bit more than you do.

One of the reasons BHG3 is worth $53,000,000,000 (All those zeros!!!) is that when you look at your computer screen, you are looking at a program being run on Windows. That’s it. Most computers in the world run on Windows. That is why the guy is filthy rich.

Let’s compare that to your cable company or your cell phone service provider. Most homes in America do not use the same exact services for any utility or entertainment except their computer's OS. As a matter of fact, Ma Bell was broken up because it was too big. It was a monopoly. Most people used their service and that meant they had too much power for the government’s taste.

Microsoft controls about everything you do on your computer. The basic platform is based on its software. Millions upon Millions of people use Windows and therefore use Internet Explorer to surf the web. Face it, not everyone is as good as you. They do not know that Internet Explorer is like the Swiss cheese of software. It’s a hacker’s dream. They do not know to download Firefox or some other browser. (Oh yeah, there are those who use the AOL browser still. Forgot about those people.)

Despite bug, errors, holes, security risks and just about everything else that makes a program a dud, Windows and IE are chugging along, making BHG3 richer and richer. Despite a large monopoly and subclass software, the company still goes like the Energizer Bunny. And they are not stopping. Next Microsoft is planning to have software in Television set top boxes, cell phones, more games, toasters, catalytic converters and vibrators. (O.K. I made some up but the Television set top boxes, cell phones and more games are true.)

But with growth opportunity like that, BHG3 can give away money to half of Africa and still be on top of the list next year.

I say, good for ole BHG3. Good for him. People probably made fun of him in high school and he never even finished college. But he’s a billionaire. He’s a role model for teenagers everywhere who tell their parents that they don’t need to go to college because BHG3 didn’t and he’s a billionaire. Thanks BHG3.

What does any of this have to do with either entertainment or Science Fiction, you say. Well, Steve Jobs of course. I use a Mac. So my guy is Steve Jobs. But he is only ranked #49 with a paltry 4.9 Billion. Jeeze talk about betting on a bum. He had to have two companies, Apple and Pixar to make his little bitty stash.

Still not enough, well, Science Fiction Hall of Fame founder Paul Allen is #5 with 16 Billion, which is down slightly from last year. I bet he’s running out to get those florescent light bulbs to save a few bucks because of it too.

But in all honesty those guys are not the real heros of this list. The real hero is Mr. H Ty Warner. His company produces and sells Beanie Babies. He made 4.5 Billion dollars selling Beanie Babies. They are the ridiculous plush toys that people go crazy collecting and use to line car dashboards. Yes. That guy’s a billionaire. Yes. A billionaire. Beanie Babies. Yes.

L.S.C.

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New Planet: It Floats!

Some planets are light that they could float in a giant tub of water. A recent discovery by Smithsonian astronomers has resulted in a very unusual find. Known as HAT-P-1 a new planet that is about 1.38 the size of Jupiter has a mass that is less than half that of Jupiter.

Astronomers found the planet by using a process in which they observe a distant star and measure its light. At regular intervals, a large planet will obstruct the face of the star directed at earth and lower its brightness as it passes by in its orbit around the star. This particular planet (HAT-P-1) goes around its sun every four and one-half days. Amazingly the planet is only one-twentieth the distance to its star as earth is to our own sun. This planet is light and it’s fast.

According to scientists this planet has a density that is lighter than a giant ball of cork, about ¼ that of water. It is about 24 percent larger than theories expect a planet to be for its mass.

In our own solar system, Saturn has similar properties. Saturn is almost as large as Jupiter yet it has a much lower density. Saturn can also float in water. The ringed planet also spins very fast. Combine a fast rotation and a low density and you get an unusual property. Saturn is elongated in shape. It is flattened at the equator. That makes for a very interesting planet, what with its rings, its many moons, its density and its shape.

Because of the newly discovered, “lighter,” planets, scientists will have to rethink current theories of planet formation.

L.S.C.

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Tolkien Rides Again

J.R.R. Tolkien's unfinished work "The Children of Hurin" that he began to write but abandoned in 1918 will be edited by his son Christopher Tolkien and published by Houghton Mifflin in the United States and HarperCollins in England.

As a child, Christopher would read his father’s stories and approve of them. "The Hobbit" was originally written as a story for J.R.R. Tolkien's children but when friend and associate C.S. Lewis insisted that Tolkien send the book to a publisher it became a best seller. This inspired the publisher to ask Tolkien for a sequel, which became "The Lord of The Rings" trilogy.

Christopher Tolkien has a long history of commenting on and editing his father’s work, starting from when he was very young. In the Seventies, he edited "The Silmarillion," a composite of his father’s works and published posthumously. "The Silmarillion" is a five-part book that was written as separate works but compiled by Christopher Tolkien. Missing parts were filled in by Tolkien's research into his father's notes and some parts were written from scratch.

Tolkien's prolific notes, half-finished works, maps and timelines are a testament to his attention to language and history in his writing. Fantasy writers are unanimous on the fact that J.R.R. Tolkien invented the fantasy genre and almost everything else is honorably derivative. The quest, the creatures, the dark wizard and the king! All of it started with Tolkien.

L.S.C.

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The Disneyfication of ME!

Or How I Stopped Worrying And Learned To Love Disney.

There is a consensus out there that Disney is Evil. Disney = Evil. Anthropomorphic Cartoon Animals in a made-up world called Walt Disney World = Eternity of torture by Anthropomorphic Animals in made-up world called Hell. Get the point? I have friends who would rather have their eyelashes pulled out one-by-one while bamboo chutes are shoved under their fingernails than go to Disneyland or watch a Disney film.

I used to be one of them.

Yes, I admit, I was a Disney hater too. Mostly because of my ignorance. See, I never went to see a Disney movie when I was a kid. I never saw Bambi in my youth. I never watched the Dwarves shack up with Snow White and I never got to see booty-calling Cinderella make it with her babe-a-licious beau, Prince Charming. I blame my parents. They were not very big fans of Disney. Also, the proliferation of VCR movies and more recently DVDs hadn’t come about when I was a lad.

Now if my mother will stop screaming at me I will tell you that once, when I was in third grade my family did make a trip to Walt Disney World in Orlando Florida. I had the time of my life. It was a great fun. All of it. I still remember how it felt to ride in the Haunted Castle or the Pirate’s of the Caribbean ride. I remember the Electric Light Parade and the butter pats shaped like Mickey Mouse. But alas, that was in the Seventies and I should not return to that enchanted land for almost 30 years.

In between I was rarely exposed to anything Disney-like. There was a dry spell in the eighties of animated Disney films. Or at least very good films. The kind that harkens back to the golden age when they produced Cinderella and Snow White and Bambi. Then in the early Nineties they came out with The Little Mermaid. A musical based on the Hans Christian Anderson tale. It was a great little movie. A friend of mine had a sister who watched it on a daily basis when she finally scored the VCR tape. By that time, thought, I was a jaded art student just discovering my inner Goth. Despite the fact that the bad guy in the movie was a dark, octopus like creature who wanted to steal the beautiful voices of the Mer-People, it still didn’t go far enough for my brash, young, self.

I raised the banner with the best of them as to how bad it was that Disney took stories and themes and simplified them, making happy endings out of them. “The original fairy tales were cautionary tales that rarely had happy endings,” I’d explain. It was a bad thing to take the world and candy coat it into something sweet and fluffy and good. The real world is full of darkness, evil and rarely do things work out. Besides, if the Walt Disney Company had its way we’ all be strolling down fake, cobbled stoned streets, hanging onto white picket fences, Zipadeedodaing all around town like a nation of Stepfords.

A relentless litany of animated films came out in the Nineties. The Little Mermaid followed up with Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), The Lion King (1993), Pocahontas (1995), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Mulan (1998), Tarzan (1999). Along with 3-D animation company, Pixar, a former Lucasfilm Company bought by Steve Jobs of Apple fame, (and if you know me at all you know how giddy this makes me!) Disney distributed the Toy Story movies (19995 & 1999) and A Bug’s Life (1998). Then there was the Tim Burton classic, The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993).

Since then the studio has produced or distributed many other animated films although they have not reached the renaissance of animated musicals that they achieved in the 1990s. Disney and Pixar produced a slew of new films together ushering in a new age of animation where 3-D ruled. With the success of Finding Nemo and The Incredibles, Disney announced that they were giving up on 2-D (traditional) animated movies and called the format dead. But after purchasing Pixar as a wholly owned subsidiary in 2005, Disney has rediscovered a commitment to 2-D cartoons and is producing them again.

When I had children of my own, they demanded that I put on Disney films. My wife sent me out at ungodly hours to buy Limited Edition DVDs that peeked out of the Disney Vault but might disappear for another fifty years if we didn’t hurry and buy them all up.

Through repeated viewings and osmosis, the fairy tales began to seep in and I admit to now having the soundtrack to Aladdin on my iPod. (Love that Robin Williams!) And for the first time in 30 years the gates of the magic kingdom opened and I strode the clean streets while men and women dressed like a Technicolorized version of the late nineteenth century descended on us.

If you’ve ever been, you know what I mean. At a moment’s notice a band of happy characters dressed like they stepped off a paddleboat on the sparkling Mississippi River will roll through the streets dancing and singing a happy tune. There’s a candy store on the corner and a bunch of places that will sell you everything that you ever wanted, with Mickey Mouse slapped on it. Any true ex-Industrial-Goth would just melt into a black puddle right there, the sticky sweetness shooting holes into my old black combat boots.

Truth is, I enjoyed it. A lot. And I traded combat boots for Docksiders years ago.

There is something innocent and nostalgic about the park. Perhaps because the last time I was there I was just an eight-year-old boy. Perhaps it’s just because Disney gets it right. You heard me. They get it right.

Kids will always be kids. They love cartoons, they love candy and they love music they can sing along to. If you combine them all together well, Jackpot! That’s what Disney World is in a nutshell. It is like actually stepping into one of Walt Disney’s animated films. Judging from all the historical information you can get on the man while touring the park, this is exactly what he intended.

Disney is not an enigma. It is not complicated or deceitful. No matter what happens behind the scenes in the corporate world, the face of Disney is a cartoon wonderland full of wonder and magic and history. History that might be its own, self-referential history, but by now, after all these years, it’s true history. It’s magical.

If you don’t dig too deep you can find a naïve, simplicity in Disney. The cartoons always have a happy ending, they always teach some lesson and they are usually so well done you can’t help but get sucked into the story, the music, the images or all of the above.

Even Tomorrowland still looks like the wide-eyed version of the future that Walt Disney himself tried to promote. I feel like I stepped into a realm created thirty, forty, fifty years ago and nothing has changed since.

But there’s more to it than just some silly old rides and cotton candy. The movies that Disney puts out for the children of America today are not your father’s Disney flick.

I should have known that all along.

Case in point: Nightmare Before Christmas. I loved this movie so much when it first came out I went and bought all the watches at Burger King. I saw it in the movie theater twice. This is not your typical Disney film yet Disney distributed it. Also, Tim Burton, one of my favorite directors, was employed at Disney as an artist for a time. Disney studio is where he first began thinking up the characters for Nightmare and he directed and wrote a short film called Vincent there, though the film was never released.

Burton originally pitched this film to Disney while working there but they turned him down because it was too dark. After meeting with success, he finally was able to create his masterpiece but Disney still thought it was too dark. They released it under their Touchtone studio releases. At the time the movie was released, I had no idea it had roots in the Disney studio.

Since then, after years of building momentum, Nightmare Before Christmas has become one of Disney’s greatest marketing movies, selling characters and merchandise inspired by the movie year after year. On October 20, 2006, Disney plans to release a 3-D version of the film in limited release.

So among the Mickey Mouse ears and Goofy hats are Jack Skelington snow globes.

Disney has even conquered Broadway. At the center of the Times Square redevelopment project was Disney’s purchase and restoration of the New Amsterdam Theater. Currently a very impressive performance of Disney’s The Lion King is playing there. If you go expecting a rehash of a cartoon with fuzzy costumed characters playing the central role, be prepared for disappointment. The Broadway version of this musical is impressive and beautiful in it’s own right. The production design and costuming are brilliant as is the casting. This is another good example of Disney getting it right.

Recently, Disney hit gold with a live action film done right, Pirates of the Caribbean. This movie had it all: Costumes, effects, beautiful sets, dialogue and superb performances by the four main stars, Johnny Depp (brilliantly playing Captain Jack Sparrow as one half-drunk, one half-mad, one half-Keith Richards), Geoffrey Rush (always a pleasure!), Orlando Bloom (playing the anti-Legolas) and beautiful and talented Keira Knightly (did I mention beautiful and talented?). This movie redefines the swashbuckling adventure like I only pray that Indiana Jones part four will come close to. Besides that, it single handedly brought back the Pirate craze. (When did the pirate craze end, I say!)

“It all started with a mouse.”

Continually throughout a visit to Disney World you are reminded by enormous graffiti and the voice of the man himself that Disney all started with a mouse. That’s only partly true. It started with a dream. The mouse came second.

Walt Disney and his brother Roy Disney started Disney Studios way back in the 1920s. Originally they began with short animated films staring Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. (Who looked very much like Mickey Mouse with long ears.) When Walt lost the rights to Oswald to another production studio he had to come up with another character to star in his cartoons. Mickey Mouse was created and stared in one of the first popular cartoons that also featured a soundtrack called Steamboat Willie.

Not one to rest, after gaining popularity, fame and money with his Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphony cartoons Walt decided he wanted to do a feature length cartoon. Other thought he was crazy but he pushed on and when Snow White came out, it was a smash.

From then on Walt expanded his empire from short cartoons to great big theme parks in California and then Orlando. These parks were going to be like stepping out of real life and into a fantasy. Just like most other things he dreamed up, Walt succeeded in this endeavor too.

At the core of it all is a basic premise: Tell a good story and tell it right. That has been the cornerstone of the Disney legacy. Walt Disney was a perfectionist. Snow White took longer and cost more money than originally planned because of his detailed personality. In the end it was all worth it. Meticulous detailing and an uplifting, well-told tale are what made Disney a great man and a great movie company. Over the years, Disney has had its ups and downs. It has fallen in and out of the public’s favor but all in all, we can’t imagine a world without Walt Disney’s fantasies. And we would not want to either.

L.S.C.

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Achtung!

It’s a miracle! A true sighting caught on tape in Germany!

Check it out!

L.S.C.

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Yikes!

Apparently not everyone is mourning Steve Irwin’s death. Germaine Greer, academic and writer known for her book, The Female Eunuch, published in the early 1970s, commented in UK’s The Guardian that, “The animal world has finally taken its revenge on Irwin, but probably not before a whole generation of kids in shorts seven sizes too small has learned to shout in the ears of animals with hearing 10 times more acute than theirs, determined to become millionaire animal-loving zoo-owners in their turn.”

Not sure why she has such a beef with him and sees fit to criticize the man so soon after his death but there you go.

Check out the entire article here.

The article has not gone by without a backlash from the Australian website news.com.au. Check out the reaction here.

L.S.C.

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CRIKEY!

Steve Irwin, Croc Hunter and self proclaimed Wildlife Warrior, dies at 44.

I heard the news almost immediately after it happened. My wife and my brother and I were out at a bar having a rare opportunity to get away from the house. We came home close to 1:40 am on Monday morning, New York time, and my brother jumped on the computer to check news and email while we wound down from the night. Curiously he said, “The Crocodile Hunter died?” It was a matter of fact way to say it. I don’t think he knew that he was getting the news almost in real time.

At first I didn’t believe him; I thought it was a mistake. But it was true. The lovable, khaki wearing, “Aussie,” who got way too close to danger while clowning around with deadly animals, promoting his sincere agenda of raising awareness for nature, had died. Ironically, the animal that caused his death was not known to be very dangerous. The stingray’s tail, a defensive mechanism, while containing a poison, generally does not cause death in humans. According to reports, it was the bleeding that led to his death because the barb pierced his heart.

As the news sunk in, I became upset. I watched his shows and really liked him as a television personality. My children all watched him as well. He even starred with the Wiggles in a Croc Hunter special! Perhaps it was my inner child that mourned him. He was a very real guy. Even if he wasn’t really like his exuberant T.V. personality in real life, you go the sense that what you saw was the person he was. I expected that if I ever met him, I’d really like him, a lot. Also, he was star to children and the saddest thing is the fact that my kids would soon learn that their beloved “Croc Hunter” was dead.

The next day, I was with a few friends and the talk was not only of how sad it was to loose such an amazing personality but the fact that no one wanted to tell their children. At a barbeque that following day, a friend whispered to his wife, “Don’t talk about what we heard this morning on T.V.” Of course I knew exactly what he was talking about and I commiserated with them about how regretful it was to loose a guy like Steve Irwin.

So far I’ve not heard anyone say that he knew the risks, it was always a danger working with those animals. I wondered about that, because although it will come up, the initial reaction is total shock and loss. He seemed indestructible, invisible because he had such a connection, such respect, for the animals he worked with. He loved them and you sort of felt in some strange, childish way, that they knew it too and would never let harm come to such an advocate and friend.

The world of nature is cruel and unforgiving. That is the lesson we must take from this tragic event. It’s a lesson I’d rather forget. I’d rather live in a world where a guy like Steve Irwin goes into the deep jungle, wrestles with terrible beasts and survives every time, as happy-go-lucky as ever. But it is not true. Perhaps that is the thing I failed to capture when I first heard the news. The reason I grieved for him was not just a loss to the world, but a personal loss as well. Not that I knew the man, but I knew what he represented, what he meant to me. He symbolized the imaginary, the fantastic aspect of the real world of nature. He brought things to my home, my children, myself that I’d never have seen if he’d not been there to do it. And in such a way that made it easy, casual, funny and true.

The kids I spoke with, the ones old enough to have grown up watching him on T.V. but not too young to hear the news, all said the same thing. They feel for his wife and kids. My son, a very typical thirteen year old, who generally doesn’t think of anything but what affects his person, was the first to bring up the fact that he had two very young children. He felt bad for them.

This is another thing that we learned from Steve Irwin. He taught us compassion for others. These kids could have said, they miss him, or they can’t believe they won’t see him on T.V. anymore. The one thing they always worried about was his family. He was a superhero to these kids and they wondered what it would be like for his children to grow up without him around. You have to admit, he was a pretty cool Dad.

His great advocacy and respect for animals, despite their brutal nature showed us to respect the world. It showed our kids that you must think of things other than yourself. He brought out the best of us.

The people of Australia lost a great hero. The people of the world lost a great entertainer. Nature lost a great advocate. The self-proclaimed “Wildlife Warrior” has passed and I hope that we all can learn as much from his death as we did his life.

For more information on the man and his accomplishments see the Wikipedia entry on Steve Irwin, the official homepage of the Crocodile Hunter, his IMDB page, or various articles about him on the web.

The Sydney Morning Herald has an article here.

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