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This is not a review, but more of a series of comments about this book. I may write a view at some stage, but I haven’t yet finished it, so I’ll wait until then. The premise of this book is that instead of, as popular wisdom determined, popular culture being the basest form of thought, it’s actually making us more intelligent. Johnson (link points to his blog) puts forward a couple of cases, and then submits some evidence to support them. Firstly, there is a general thought that video games' only redeeming feature is that it improves hand-eye coordination. In fact, modern video games provide more than this, they actually improve our ability to solve problems, by virtue of the commonality of having to ‘figure out’ the rules from within the game. Secondly, popular television also improves various skills. Whereas in days gone by television programs spoon-fed the audience, nowadays the most popular programs actually engage us more than the ‘arty’ programs used to. Watching a program like 24 (which I don’t incidentally), or even The Apprentice, forces us to be active participants. We need to think much more to continue to be aware of the connections between the different characters, and we are task-switching between the various sub-plots. Johnson provides a series of reasons why he thinks these have taken off, and I must say, so far I’ve agreed with pretty much all of what he’s said. I’m not going to just repeat what he said (I’m not sure I’d want to try – the evidence does take a bit of work to get across, and I’d rather you just buy the book, and read it yourself), but I did want to add some of my own comments. I’ve been watching two SciFi programs since starting to read the book. One of them is the new BattleStar Galactica, the other V. I’m noticing lots of similarities between the two, and I’m finding I want to re-watch them to analyse the ‘thought content’ requirements of them. Notably, both of them have a female character who is thrown into power, and one of the major plots is about her coming to grips with the role and responsibilities that ensue. Both programs also have an ‘alien’ race who is keen on wiping out humanity, although for different reasons. They are both about the human race, on the run, and it’s attempt to survive. Perhaps a better comparison would be to compare the older series of BattleStar Galactica with the new one. Perhaps that will be a new project of mine. Compare the two from a perspective of cognitive demands. After all, the plots are pretty much the same, so any differences should reflect the complexity that modern TV audiences demand.

Crazy Little Thing Called Love • Michael Bublé • Michael Bublé ★½

I remember reading somewhere about a trick to view how fast iTunes is downloading a file. Click on the Downloads source item, and then click on the time remaining text for a downloading file. It changes to display a speed: However, the savvy amongst you may realise this is pretty fast. Especially since my connection is a sloppy 256kbps (kilobits per second) – the fastest I can really download at is around 26 kilo_bytes_ per second. iTunes must really be measuring the speed in kilobits per second.

Sweater • Eskimo Joe • Triple J Hottest 100 – Volume 6 ★★½

For my daily commuting, which recently has been almost entirely on bicycle, I subscribe to a series of podcasts. These are mainly from the ABC in Australia, but thrown into the mix is the NewScientist podcast. Back when I was on dialup, I used a neato trick to download podcasts using wget, and then import them from the local machine when they were fully downloaded. This was mainly because wget is better at resuming downloads than iTunes was then, and to a certain extent still is. At least now you can pause and resume some downloads, but iTunes still times out long before wget does. I used this same trick a couple of weeks ago when the NewScientist server had some sort of an issue, and the long and the short of that was that I had some entries in the NetInfo database, and I still had a couple for the NewScientist servers. And because of that, wasn’t actually downloading the newer podcasts since then. I fixed that problem, but now I’ve come across another. Two podcasts are missing from the list – the two most recent. I know iTunes tried to download them a couple of times, but it’s like I clicked on them and pressed Delete. And then, I wasn’t able to get them to come back. I tried unsubscribing, and then resubscribing, but no joy. And then I happened across a hint on MacOSXHints.com (Re-download podcasts without subscribing again):

After that, I collapsed the podcast series by clicking the triangle, and then expanded it again while holding the option key

Bingo. This has apparently fixed it all up.

Well, this is a new experience. I’m writing this very blog post with a Wacom graphics tablet. It’s taking me a while to get the hang of Mac OS’s handwriting recognition software, Ink, and I’m not yet sure how to edit words after I’ve Started writing them, but ‘it’s working, and that’s a start. Some tips for setting it up. I’ve got the Intuos 3 version, which has four buttons and a scroller in the top left and right corners. I’ve set one button up to switch between Ink and Mouse, and another for backspace, leaving the bottom one as space. My biggest hassle is that I’ve got some serious muscle memory issues going on – I’m treating it like it’s my Palm Zire, which means I do a backwards dash to delete a character. And it keeps picking up my ’S’s as upper case. If they are at the start of a word, anyway. It’s not really that useful for me, for data entry, anyway, as I can type much faster than I can write. And my hand gets sore because of the way I hold a pen. I’m going to have a bit of a play in Photoshop, since the one I have is Pressure Sensitive, so that might be fun. And, I do have to give it back tomorrow, which is a bit of a bugger.

Superstylin' • Groove Armada • Goodbye Country (Hello Nightclub) ★★

Pina Colada [Jazz Mix] • Digby Jones • Café Del Mar • Volume 8

What a cool Mum! (from xkcd)

Worthless • Dido • Café Del Mar • Volume 8

I’m yet to find a suitable method of syncing my Palm Zire with my Google Calendars, at least one that allows syncing both ways. I’m not really ready to start having my Zire with me until I can do this – I’d also like to be able to sync my PalmOS contacts with the GMail contacts, but that might never occur. I did discover something cool today, however. Google Calendar supports SMS reminders. Including to Australian phones. Now, this might not seem like much, but in Australia, we don’t pay to receive SMS messages, only to send them. Thus, I can set up Google SMS reminders at no cost to myself. Whoops, there goes a reminder. It’s lunch time, according to that message…

It’s not been a good year to be a celebrity in Australia. With several high-profile Australians lives coming to abrubt ends, we also say goodbye to Belinda Emmett, who was married to Rove McManus. Rove is one of the best known faces on Australian TV, and his wife was at one stage a member of the cast of Home and Away. I’ve never seen this show, nor much of Emmett, but it’s always sad when a young person dies. I think the key difference between Belinda’s death and that of Brocky and the Crocodile Hunter was that these two popular Australians were actively doing something dangerous, which they did as a career, when they were killed. Irwin was filming underwater animals when he was struck through the chest by a stingray’s barb, whilst Brock collided with a tree when racing a motor vehicle. If you like, they chose to participate in dangerous activities, and ultimately eventually paid the price. Belinda did not have a choice. Several years ago Belinda was diagnosed with breast cancer, and had struggled with it, somewhat publicly since then. It was always sad to see her at various functions, a skeletal figure, with only a hint of her beauty still visible. Breast cancer is still a major killer of Australians (including some men, as it turns out), but unlike some other cancers, it’s hard to find a particular cause. Lung cancer is often caused by smoking, asbestos or other contaminants, but breast cancer, like leukemia, appears to strike somewhat randomly. Rove has stated he will not produce another episode of his popular variety program, Rove Live, for the forseeable future.

Every now and then, a movie comes along which keeps you enthralled from the first minute right up until the end credits roll. Children Of Men does this, and keeps you thinking, well after you leave the cinema.

From the starting sequence, where we see the result of a society where no children have been born in just over 18 years. The death of the “youngest person alive,” juxtaposed with the terrorist attack which narrowly misses the hero, Theo, (“If you took cream and sugar, my friend, you might not be here now”), and the dystopian London that we see glimpses of demonstrate how bad a world without the voices of children would be.

I didn’t really know what I was expecting going into this film, I had some visions of a Science Fiction feature, but wasn’t really ready for what ensued. Future Britain (2027) has become the last bastion of civilisation. America and Europe have both fallen into disarray, and with a huge influx of Fugees (refugees), the Department of Homeland Security (UK) have taken to incarcerating, and perhaps terminating all of the illegal immigrants.

The beauty of this film is that it is an entirely plausible future. The culture of fear that the Western Governments are already peddling regarding different people and their status as terrorists has in some places already resulted in riots where the dominant culture has actively sought out people from a particular ethnic background and targeted them with violence.

When Theo goes to meet with his cousin, who lives in the secure, gated section of London, we are exposed to the hypocrisy that is already present in our cultures. Whilst in Greater London, and the rest of Britain, foreigners are quickly caged, removed and shipped off to somewhere else, the parklands in the inner sanctum have Zebras and Camels, led and ridden by people of non-anglo background. Similar to how in the days immediately following September 11th 2001, when the rich oil sheiks were permitted to fly out of the USA, even though it was their cousin that was the mastermind behind the attacks.

Without spoiling too much, Theo, excellently portrayed by Clive Owen, has a somewhat shadowy background. His ex-wife, an American and therefore an illegal immigrant, is the head of a terrorist group, and kidnaps him to ask him transport a young woman, Kee, to the coast. It’s pretty evident she is the first pregnant woman in over 18 years, and when the transport goes pear-shaped, Theo and Kee are on the run.

What’s fantastic, even though there is a significant amount of violence, is how gripping this film is. You don’t realise until after the movie finishes just how involved in this film you have become. As Theo wanders around miraculously avoiding bullets, you are literally on the edge of you seat. Ignoring the deep political, philosophical and social statements, the action and tension in this film will keep you entranced and enthralled for the full 109 minutes. If you only see one film this year, make sure it is Children of Men.

Dub In Ya Mind [Beach Club Mix] • Afterlife • Café Del Mar • Volume 6

Back when I first got bought a CD burner, a clunky 4x SCSI internal model for our PowerMac 8600, I went through a phase of making bootleg CDs. Not pirating CDs, but recording from the radio – mainly from Triple J’s Live at the Wireless program that was running at the time, and apparently still is. I obviously haven’t ripped any of those CDs to my iTunes, as there aren’t any there. One other CD I made was from Merrick and Rosso. They had a group of well-known Australian Artists cover other Australian Artists' classic songs. There were some brilliant covers, but the two that stick in my memory were You Am I doing a Paul Kelly track (When I First Met Your Ma), and then Paul Kelly returning the favour with Heavy Heart. This was a turning point in my musical taste, with me then purchasing every You Am I, and every Paul Kelly album. I went into Like a Version Two with a similar hope. That these covers might reflect some of the class, and fun, that Merrick and Rosso had back in November 99 or 2000. Since this is a Triple J release, I was counting on some cool stuff. And was not totally disappointed. Whilst about the only track from this album I had heard before was the Herd’s sacrilegious butchering of the old Redgum classic I Was Only 19, Sophie Koh managed to improve upon the Radiohead track Creep. Her vocal style and husky voice suit the track, and, since I was never that much of a Radiohead fan, I think this one track might make it into my regular rotation. Sarah Blasko reminded me of why I love her music – with Goodbye Yellow Brick Road now vying for her cover of Flame Trees, perhaps Cold Chisel’s greatest song, as my favourite of her songs. The Eels covered a Prince track passably, but the Drones droned on for 3:00 too long on a 3:24 Beasts of Bourbon song. Bourbon still reminds me of Wild Turkey, and the night before AFL Grand Final 1993, when I made an absolute mess of myself on a whole bottle of this nasty liquor. So, that wasn’t a good connection for starters. Crooked Fingers have a faithful reproduction of Johnny Cash, complete with strumming guitar and gravelly voice. And I thought the point of a reinterpretation was to make it your own. It’s not that it’s bad, but it just isn’t different enough. Dancing in the Dark, however, shows how a song can be altered by arrangement. Tegan and Sara’s interpretation of the Springsteen hit make it sound much more like a thinking song than the Rock-y original. This one might be worth another listen or two. Evermore bravely take on a modern-ish track: Relapse, originally by Little Birdy. It’s a satisfactory song, but I’ll take the original over it any day. 67 Special repeated the risk with a cover of Missy Higgins' Scar; this one is vastly different. Without knowing that it was the same song, I probably wouldn’t have picked it. Having said that, Jaq did, but she listens to stuff better than I do. I do like how the tempo changes to a more jazzy version about two-thirds of the way through. Another album out in the wild at the moment is She Will Have Her Way, a collection of female artists reinterpreting classic songs by the Brothers Finn. My Mistake wasn’t on that album, and The Panda Band sound more like the Beatles than anyone else with their cover of this. Much better than Wild World, by the Mountain Goats, which sounds amateurish and weak. Funnily enough, this was a track some other listeners actually liked most on the album… Much of the remainder of the album, however, is neither outstanding nor vile. Spoon stumble through Upwards at 45 Degrees, originally by Julian Cope. Since I’ve heard of neither the artist or the track, it didn’t do a lot for me. Lior’s cover of Neil Young’s Needle and the Damage Done was better than anything I’ve seen on Idol recently, but that’s more of a reflection on that fantastic program. Sarcasm intended. So does it get the thumbs up? Not really. Thank got for iTunes, and iPod, as I can just scrape the cream off the top of this one, and drop the remainder into digital oblivion. Of course, those of you who know me will realise that this won’t happen. All tracks stay in the Library, just get a poor rating.

Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood • New Buffalo • Like A Version Two