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Posts Tagged 'Technology'
Author Interview: Nick Harkaway
Posted: June 7, 2012 in Guest Posts & Interviews, Political Wrangling
Tags: Angelmaker, Author Interview, Being Human In A Digital World, Culture, Deindividuation, Digital, Digital Hearth, Fiction, Hearth, Interview, Locked In, Nick Harkaway, Non Fiction, Society, Systems, Technology, The Blind Giant, The Gone-Away World, World
Back in 2008, I found myself somewhat hilariously fired by humourless bureaucrats for, among other things, daring to read Nick Harkaway's debut novel, The Gone-Away World, by the photocopier. The fact that TGAW is merciless in its mockery of, among other things, humourless bureaucrats only added to the delightful, ironic savour of the experience. More recently – which is to say, this year – Nick has released two more books: fiction/SFF work Angelmaker, which is a sort of blackly comedic gangster-spy-steampunk novel set alternately in the modern day and WWII, and non-fiction work The Blind Giant: Being Human in a Digital World, an exploration of the many intersections between digital culture and human life – which, quite coincidentally, the wonderful Nick has consented to discuss with me, despite my tendency to ramble. So, without further ado: Nick Harkaway on The Blind Giant!
Given its subtitle – Being Human in a Digital World – the casual observer could be forgiven for assuming that The Blind Giant focusses more on technology than it does on being human. In fact, I'd contend, the opposite is true: rather than using the digital world as a lens through which to view social issues, it instead uses humanity and the human condition as a means of analysing what part digital culture plays in society.
I think that's exactly right – when I did an event at the School of Life the other day, one of the people there described the book as 'a call to active citizenship'. So much of the digital debate is actually a cipher for debates we should be having about our culture, so a lot of what I'm doing is teasing out technological strands from cultural ones…
At the very least, it alternates between these perspectives in a way that makes the technological elements easily comprehensible to the layperson. Being of the geekish persuasion yourself, and given also the book's iteration of the importance of constant engagement with the world, was it difficult to keep to a particular structural path and within the intended scope?
The aim was to produce a book with a very wide possible readership – something which would be readable whether you were an absolute blazing Luddite or a grade 1 digiphile. My hope is that there's something of interest for everyone, that the book can be appreciated at a number of levels, but obviously there are limits on that. Staying within scope was relatively easy, because the idea was to go as broad as possible, to show the top metre of the ocean over a wide area rather than attempt to follow a single narrow fishing line down to the bottom – but staying coherent was harder. I was writing fast and sucking in information as I went along, organising it in Scrivener, trying out pathways. It was genuinely an iterative writing process and I could easily still be doing it. My ideas have evolved since the book came out, largely through dialogues with readers and with fascinating people like Anab Jain, Simon Ings and Andrew Keen. But seriously: the contract and the software kept me sane. I didn't have time to write Gödel, Escher, and Bach.
Early in the book, you talk about the importance of the digital hearth, deliberately choosing a word with ancient, preindustrial connotations. This is a particularly effective image for many reasons, but chief among them – for me, at least – is the simultaneous invocation of the mythic: of the idea of lares and penates, those minor household deities who were honoured as being integral to hearth and home. In our current world, where both the fluidity of texts and the hearth-extending properties of social media have allowed us to define our digital homes through endless recombinations of the ideological, the sacred and the personal, what sort of figures – whether real or imagined, familiar or unknown – do you think have taken on the equivalent roles of our guardian household gods?
That's part of our problem, in a sense – they've faded into us and we haven't entirely realised it yet. We're still looking for external sources of influence and protection – we blame the phone for ringing, the Internet for serving up information, the TV for strobing ads at us. And that's ridiculous. If we ever make self-aware appliances with volition of their own, we can come back to that, but right now we're alone with ourselves and if something happens it happens because we did it. We allowed it. I think the alienation comes from the metaphor of cyberspace, which proposed a foreign country behind the screen, and I think that's breaking down now – thank God – as a consequence of the arrival of the touchscreen. When you can drag data around with your finger, it's no longer other, it's immediate. Things are not emerging from a TRON landscape in a subatomic alien world, they're coming from other people using technology. We don't need household gods in a literal sense – we need to understand that they were always reflections, and accept the role we took from them.
You talk, too, about the problem of 'locked in' systems, which – to quote the book – are defined as such 'because while we might wish to break out of [the system], we cannot do so without also unravelling everything that has been constructed on top of it, and many of those things are hugely profitable and hence powerful and able to defend themselves. They refuse to be undermined, even while the individuals within them might privately recognise the need.' This is a very apt description, and one which fits a distressingly large number of systems and institutions. I'm especially concerned about its application to our current educational frameworks; secondary school in particular. Given the myriad disconnects between the old world our educational systems were originally built to support and the worlds – both digital and tangible – that exist now, do you think it's possible that part of what you describe as 'the growing sense of abandonment and contempt' that fuelled the anger of youthful participants in the UK riots could stem, however subconsciously, from the awareness that they're being trained to enter a society that no longer exists?
I think there's an element of that. They were told they'd always get richer, that that was the natural state of being in an information economy (which we don't have, by the way, as Ha Joon observes in 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism). They can see in front of them that the pathways they're on don't lead anywhere very cool, and that was fine so long as the economy was on the up and they could still expect a rising standard of living. Not any more. Alexis Tsipras told the Guardian the Greek financial situation was part of a war between the people and capitalism. I think he's almost right: it's a struggle between sanity and a particular style of finance-based fairydust capitalism which is a bit stupid, a bad iteration which consumes too much fuel and throws up too much waste and benefits a very, very few in the short term. But look, all the rioters knew was that they were getting screwed, and they didn't like it. That's what revolutions are in the first place: a sense that you have to push back even if it kills you.
Which locked in system would you most wish to see torn down, and why?
I can't pick just one. There are simply too many. Gender inequality has to be the most wasteful human-aspected one one. Petroleum is probably the most interconnected, along with beef farming, which results in famine, soil erosion, environmental damage, poor health in the industrialised world, and economic shenanigans around subsidies. The reason to tear them down is the same throughout: they don't do what they're supposed to do. They're aberrant. They cause problems rather than creating solutions. I'm not saying "no oil" and "no beef" – I'm saying that the entrenched systems around those commodities are obnoxious.
Midway through the book, you make a fascinating and deeply significant point about the correlation between the preservation of online privacy on the one hand, and the retention of intellectual property rights on the other. To quote again, 'You can't trash privacy and hope to retain a sense of respect for IP.' Bearing in mind that this is an enormously complex issue, if you woke up tomorrow as King of Earth, what measurements would you enact to try and foster a united sense of ownership and privacy in the digital sphere?
Well, I'd have anyone who pulled what the FBI just did in the Megaupload case tarred and feathered. To clarify: they took a bunch of data they may not have had a right to from New Zealand and are now defending the action on the ironic basis that because it's non-physical the law does not apply. I mean, seriously? In a copyright infringement case, this is your position. It's insane. You can't respect IP if that's how it is defended.
More seriously: I think I'd legalise encryption globally and institute powerful protections for keys under – at the moment, in the UK, you can go to prison for refusing to hand yours over. In Russia you can go to prison for just possessing encrypted data. Personal data should have the same robust protections as personal space. I'd need to find a balance between powerful protections for the individual and the rights of a free press, but I'm not sure that's as tricky as people make out. I'd also require a new policy of reasonable enforcement from content owners, since we're making me dictator. The problem is that they've already gone so far down the bad road that it's going to be really hard to establish a proper social contract again – but it's the only way they can go, in the end. The alternative is slow exsanguination.
The notion of deindividuation through adherence to impersonal systems is a terrifying one, particularly as exemplified through experiments like those conducted by Zimbardo and Milgram. It's also a significant theme in both your novels: The Gone-Away World and, more recently, Angelmaker. In the former, it appears as a chilling warning about unyielding and ultimately sadistic bureaucracies, while in the latter, it comes across in the comparison of personal, 'friendly' gangster crime, with its weirdly chivalric rules and its black sense of humour, with the impersonal, devouring autocracy of greed and mechanisation. Despite – because of? – being fictional, these stories seem to treat the deindividuation problem as much more of a binary issue than The Blind Giant, which appears to be more optimistic about the possibility of a viable middle path; perhaps because fiction provides the luxury of usurping such locked in systems as would otherwise prove intractable. Even so, the introduction to Giant, wherein you posit both a dystopian and a utopian future as a starting point for discussion, is still titled Dreams and Nightmares – one of the most archetypal binaries of all. How optimistic are you about our ability to change problematic systems without wholly uprooting them?
I know more about deindividuation now than I did when I wrote TGAW, so inevitably there's more nuance. I still don't know nearly enough to answer that question. I tend to think the only way it comes right is at a micro-level: citizen action to rehumanise everyone's relationships. It's a big ask, but a necessary one if we want a friendly society. It can start small. Smile at the irritating person on the other side of the ticket office glass, say. Get them to smile back if you can. And so on. Day by day, inch by inch, we inhabit a less divided society. It only works bottom up, though.
On a more positive note, something you blogged about recently was the verisimilitude of coincidence in writing. 'In the small world of the novel, coincidences can multiply. The people about whom you're telling the story are the people to whom significant events occur, otherwise you'd be telling the story about other people… We recognise the level of connectedness in the world, and we want it to be appropriate.' This is definitely something I've noticed and appreciated in your fiction, but it also seems a fitting description of the way in which you've coherently united disparate (or seemingly disparate) ideas in The Blind Giant. Interconnectedness is obviously relevant to the digital world – arguably, in fact, it's what it does best. Do you think this has changed or is changing the stories we tell about ourselves and our interactions with the world, and if so, how?
I think we've become increasingly aware of our connectedness over the last century. Chains, the story by Frigyes Karinthy which began the 'six degrees' discussion, was published in 1929. The mathematics of (pre-digital) social networks became apparent before digitisation really took off, though of course the Internet made the connections more discoverable and concrete. So the answer is probably part of the history of 20th Century storytelling, but I don't know what it is. The stories we tell about ourselves change constantly, and stay the same.
One final query about informed behaviour: you end the book on what is arguably a cautionary note, exhorting the reader to engage with the world, and to be particularly aware, not only of the choices they make, but the many opportunities they have to make them, and of the idea that being the person we want to be 'is a matter of constant effort rather than attaining a given state and then forgetting about it.' This is a timely piece of advice, and one that applies just as significantly to our relationships with equality, privilege, politics and popular culture as to our use of technology and the digital world. With this in mind, how best would you advise people only newly aware of the fluidity of our culture to engage with it critically?
The important thing is to ask questions. That is, after all, the heart of the critical process: you ask what a thing is, whether it is what it appears to be. One of the simplest and most effective tricks in a political or a social context is to ask, of any phenomenon, whether it's really a noun or a fixed situation, or whether it's created, constructed, and held in place by a continuing action. Mostly, things are the latter, and when you see how they're held in place you also see in whose interest it is to maintain that they're part of the natural order of things. Then it becomes a question of what to do next…
Nick Harkaway can be found online at his blog, on tumblr and on Twitter. The Blind Giant is available in both ebook and hardcopy formats.
Posted: December 19, 2010 in Critical Hit
Tags: Alice in Wonderland, Appleseed, Astro Boy, Austin Powers, Batman, Children, Clu, Dresden Codak, Fantasy, Film, Film Review, Inkheart, Jeff Bridges, Luke Skywalker, Maverick, Movie, National Treasure, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Review, Sci-Fi, Science, SF, Technology, Tony Stark, Tron, Tron: Legacy, Tropes
A lot has been happening recently, what with the upcoming move to Scotland, our recent trip to Sydney and the general madness of the season, but I'm not going to blog about that, partly because it was exhausting the first time around, but mostly because writing about packing boxes is only slightly less interesting than reading about packing boxes. So! Instead, you get a long, spoilery review of Tron: Legacy, which we saw this evening, because unpacking the weirdness of Hollywood cinema is like candy unto my soul, with the added bonus of not involving boxes of any kind.
It is worth noting from the outset that I am yet to see the original Tron. Saying so out loud, where "out loud" can be read as "on the internet", makes me feel something of a traitor to my own geekhood. More importantly, this means that, while there were clearly a multitude of references to the first film in Legacy, I was in no position to gauge how faithful they were, or how meaningful: instead, I can simply vouch that they were there, and didn't appear to add much.
The main gambit of Legacy – wherein a technological/scientific maverick father either dies, vanishes mysteriously, becomes a crazy recluse or is killed along with his equally brilliant wife (assuming she hadn't already died of unspecified causes some years previous), leaving their genius offspring to grow up in isolation from the grand and noble calling that is their birthright until such time as Our Story Starts – is a stalwart backbone of the SF/F genre. This is where Batman, Tony Stark, Astro Boy and Luke Skywalker all got their motivation, and as such, I'm not about to knock it as a premise. However! It is also, as such, a plotline that comes with baggage. Either the Absentee Maverick Dad serves as a key-but-background motivator for the protagonist, or Uncovering What Really Happened That Fateful Night is the driving force behind the story. That's a black and white way of doing disservice to a complex and potentially powerful plot device: what I mean to say is, movies have time limits. Unlike in TV shows, serial comics or novels, films have a very limited space in which to disseminate key information, particularly as regards backstory, and unless an extremely cunning and original scriptwriter/director team is at the wheel – or possibly unless they have the well-defined space of a trilogy in which to operate – it behoves moviemakers to pick one version or the other and then stick with it.
Legacy does not do this, which is why a comparatively simple three-act narrative has ended up with a runtime of just over two hours. We begin with the traditional Bedtime Story scene, wherein the Maverick Parent – here computing legend Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) – imparts the Secret Of What Is To Come in the form of a fairytale to his wide-eyed, cherubic spawn. Then, of course, he ups and vanishes, leaving us to watch as the Company That Was His Brainchild Is Taken Over By Unscrupulous Businessmen Who Do Not Share His Dream. In fairness, these early scenes were some of the best in the film: they did a good job of introducing us to protagonist Sam Flynn (Garrett Hedlund) and created a strong build-up to the main event. Unfortunately, once Sam enters the world of Tron – emphasis on world, for reasons that will hopefully become apparent – this tension is soon lost.
Even to moviegoers completely lacking in narrative presience, it should be obvious that any danger faced by the protagonist before the halfway point will not – cannot – prove fatal, and instead must only serve to move the plot forward. Under those circumstances, only secondary characters are at risk, and at this point in Legacy, there were none. So when Sam is instantly thrust into the gladiatorial games portion of the Tronverse, it is very, very hard to feel anything even vaguely like apprehension. Yes, those scenes looked lovely in 3D, but twenty minutes later, the only thing to have been achieved was, finally, the introduction of Clu, aka Evil Jeff Bridges, whose next move as the villain – having first decided not to execute Sam in order to talk at him for a bit – was to send him back into the games so that the two of them could fight, on bikes, with matched teams of Nameless Dudes. At which point, I started to hear Scott Evil yelling in my head about how stupid Doctor Evil is for repeatedly trying to kill Austin Powers using a ridiculously slow-moving torture device instead of just shooting him on the spot. But, whatever. It's not like Legacy is alone in having this fault, and it's certainly never stopped me from enjoying James Bond. I dealt with it and moved on.
Not unsurprisingly, the following action scene involves the glittery, exploding-into-pixels deaths of all Sam's fellow bike-riding Namless Dudes, about which I did not care because they were henchmen written into the plot for the sole purpose of being rent asunder. And then – lo! – we have the introduction of Hot Chick, aka Quorra (Olivia Wilde), who performs the ever-so-textbook Heroine Rescuing A Hero Only He Doesn't Know She's A Girl Yet Because She Is Mysterious And Wearing A Helmet shtick by driving her all-terrain quad-jeep-bike-thing into the grid and yanking him out of harm's way. Once they've put some distance between them and the bad guys, she takes off her voice-distorting helmet (which we never see again) and reveals herself, to the requisite jaw-dropped approval of our hero.
It is at this point, gentle reader, that we start to run into difficulties.
You see, when Sam looks back over his shoulder and remarks on the fact that Evil Jeff Bridges and his Orange Evil Henchmen are not following, Quorra replies that this because they can't – unlike their own vehicle, which has special grippy tyres for traversing rocky terrain, the bikes used by their enemies won't work off grid. Which would be fine and dandy, if they were not actually inside a digital environment where tyres do not matter, and even if there was a good reason for this to be so, Evil Jeff Bridges totally has like a million badass flying devices, surely he can chase them somehow, etc. But again, whatevs, let us move forward to the bit where Sam has a Touching Reunion With The Real Jeff Bridges, his dad who has been trapped in the Tronverse for quite a while now, and who is all zen and hippyish and continually refers to his own son by saying things like, 'listen, man' and using the word 'jazzed' unironically. At this point, my inner movie-referencing monologue switched from Austin Powers to Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, because there is something decidedly chessboard about the Tronverse. It's not just the Colours As Alignments thing or the fact that, ultimately, we are meant to be in a gamespace: it's that Maverick Dad, dressed in yogic white and living in a totally white house, likes to stand on his balcony and stare wistfully at the Dark And Brooding Lair of the Evil Jeff Bridges while espousing a theory of passive non-violence a la Anne Hathaway's White Queen. Which is, if you dwell on it for too long, a deeply weird comparison to make.
And then they all have dinner.
There are so many problems with this.
Now, I get the point of this scene. I do! It is cute and unexpected and sort of sweetly awkward while also providing a striking contrast between the stark, futuristic decor and the homeliness of three people sitting down to a medieval meal of roast suckling pig. (Seriously.) But again, as with the tyres: we are in a computer world. Admittedly, it is a sketchily defined computer world into which the physical bodies (rather than just the minds) of Maverick Dad and Sam have been magically transported, but given that the only other occupants of said world are computer programs, and given also that the world itself appears to be restricted to a nebulously defined cityspace surrounded by blank rock and deep water, and given again that Maverick Dad's powers in this world are limited to the ability to manipulate what he himself has created, and given finally that any food made in this world must be made of code, which is presumably ill-suited as a form of human nourishment, then where did the goddam pig come from and why the hell can they eat it?
And then, then we have the explanation of what Maverick Dad was so excited about all those years ago: within this digital realm, a race of sentient computer-beings called isos had spontaneously came into being, creatures whose very existence would have changed the face of absolutely everything ever if not for the fact that Evil Jeff Bridges, who was originally designed as a program-copy of Maverick Dad to run the world of Tron, viewed them as a chaotic threat to his perfect order and wiped them all out in a hideous genocide known as the Purge. (Anyone who does not instantly recognise that Quorra must be the sole surviving iso gets a smack on the wrist, for that is how this story goes, forever and ever, amen.) Timewise, we are now at about the halfway point – that is to say, about an hour or so in – when we finally learn what is meant to be happening. Evil Jeff Bridges paged someone in the real world so that Sam would come to Tron, which was the only way of opening the portal to the outside world. There is, of course, an ever-narrowing window before the portal closes again, prior to which Sam wants to take Dad and Quorra and get the hell out of Dodge. But! If they use the roads that lead to the portal, Evil Jeff Bridges will catch them and steal Maverick Dad's disc, which contains all his knowledge on how to operate the Tronverse, thus allowing him to escape into the real world and wreak havoc (think the end of The Lawnmower Man, but in reverse). Dad is also unwilling to try and reprogram his evil twin, because this will result in both their deaths. For some reason. So instead, he wants to sit tight until – wait for it! – the native programs revolt and overthrow the government.
It is one thing to rely on traditional plots and narrative devices to bump your story along and bulk out your characterisation. Indeed, in action movies, it's sort of the point, because of that whole lack-of-time thing we talked about earlier. But a complete abandonment of causal, emotional and narrative logic? Is not even in the same ballpark.
How about this for a suggestion: Maverick Dad destroys his disc, on account of how he doesn't need it to live or utilise his awesome powers or remember anything about the Tronverse, whips up a goddamed super-speed plane seeing as how he is sort of the god of this universe and also a kickass engineer, flies all three of them to the portal, and then deletes Evil Jeff Bridges from the outside as Sam keeps suggesting they do? This is not so hard. Instead, he refuses to do anything, which is the cue for Quorra to sneakily help Sam by giving him the coordinates needed to find a rabble-rousing program named Zeus who can help him get to the portal. Maybe. If anyone can. (Dramatic chord.) So Sam steals his dad's Awesome Grid Bike and rides it straight down the road that connects their hideout to the centre of the city, seriously you would think the bad guys might have noticed that before getting scared away by their lack of grippy tyres. And then? Then he trades the bike for a cloak so he can escape detection by going into a fashionable club where the first thing Zeus does is identify him loudly in front of everyone.
A moment of pause, dear readers! Because my constant use of italics might be leading you to suspect that I was sitting in my cinema seat, teeth clenched and frothing at the mouth with every successive outrage. In fact, this was not so. Yes, I spotted these things, and yes, they irked me. But despite its complete and utter lack of sense, there was something sort of charming about the plot, and after so much drifty, father-and-son-reuniony chat, it finally felt like we were getting somewhere. I have a very high threshold for bullshit in my cinema. Specifically, I do not care how ridiculous a plot might be, provided it is not endeavouring to take itself too seriously. This tends to make me a very charitable watcher of trash, and a very scatching watcher of anything intellectual, because if you are going to make a film whose sole purpose is to try and wring me out emotionally so as to Connect With The Big Issues Of Our Times, you had damned well better not go and break the logic which sustains your heartfelt premise by, say, setting a snake on fire. All of which is a long way of saying that, up until this point, I had been relatively on board with the whole (as my husband dubbed it afterwards) electro-opera thing.
Then the bad guys found the Awesome Grid Bike, and announced that now, finally, at long last, they could trace it back to its point of origin – the hidden lair of Maverick Dad.
Early on in Legacy, there was a scene where Evil Jeff Bridges steepled his fingers and expressed a desire for Maverick Dad to make the next move, as though the two of them were perennially locked in a game of wits over dominion of the Tronverse – not an unreasonable supposition, given that Maverick was trapped there for twenty years with only Quorra for company. What with the grid-bike road leading right to his house, the Evil Citadel being visible from the Maverick's balcony and the fact that the whole point of bringing Sam to the Tronverse was to simultaneously open the portal while luring Maverick into the open, I'd sort of assumed that the bad guys knew where he was, but couldn't penetrate his defences, given that creators tend to be fairly good at defending their home turf in a hostile universe which also they made themselves.
He was hidden! All this time! Just a short ride – or, presumably, walk – away! In a straight line! Down a road! With no defences whatsoever! Holding the one thing that Evil Jeff Bridges really wants! With nobody looking for him! Ever!
UNTIL THEY TOTALLY FOUND HIS BIKE AND SOMEHOW COULD TELL WHERE IT CAME FROM, EVEN THOUGH THAT MAKES NO SENSE AT ALL.
A lot happens after this. By which I mean, not a lot happens at all, only it takes another hour. The bad guys go to the hidden lair and poke around only to find that (duh) Maverick Dad and Quorra have already gone to go help Sam, which results in Quorra getting part of her arm cut off, Maverick's disc being stolen and the supposedly good rabble-rouser guy being revealed as TOTALLY A VILLAIN SURPRISE! (Hint: this was not a surprise.) And then they all hitch a lift on a magic goods train, which goes through the sky looking pretty and glowy for about a bajillion years while Sam catches his dad up on the war in Iraq and wifi and is in turn told that yes, Quorra is an iso who has never seen a sunrise ever and it is at this point, dear reader, that I realised exactly what was causing Legacy's problems, viz: it is an epic fantasy movie in every important respect and not, in fact, sci-fi, because while even soft SF and space opera dignify their worldbuilding by saying, 'Alien technology!' or 'Telekenesis!' or 'Unobtanium!' or 'Lightsabres!', Legacy was basically just shouting, 'Magic!', but without anything that backs it up.
Take a moment to consider the plot thus far in terms of fantasy tropes. You have a Maverick Dad who, in the Time of Backstory, discovered a portal to another world, one where a rigidly enforced class divide between the rulers and ruled had resulted in a tradition of violent gladiatorial games for the amusement of the masses. Befriending a sympathetic fighter, the two of them overthrew the regime and installed a democracy, with the Maverick's trusted lieutenant left in charge while he commuted between worlds. But then, a coup! The lieutenant went insane and ordered the genocide of hundreds of thousands of innocent newcomers to their territory, crowning himself king. Appalled and with no means of escape, the Maverick turned to mystical contemplation and confinement in an ivory tower, until the imminent fruition of the Evil King's plans caused his now-grown son to reopen the portal. Stranded in a world whose rules he knew from the fairytales and bedtime stories of his childhood, the son did battle in the gladiatorial games of old, fell in love with the last survivor of the genocide and, together with his father, plotted the downfall of the Evil King, who – we are about to find out – has built an army of drones with which to invade Earth. Having finally captured the magic secrets of the Maverick in the previous battle, the enemy is now on the brink of success. Only by exploiting his mystical bond with the Evil King – the destruction of which results in both their deaths – is the Maverick finally able to save both his son and female protege, who return to our world as guardians of the secrets of this second, magic realm, and who will totally have makeouts in the not-too-distant future after she sees her first Earth sunrise.
Also, yes: that is bascially how the film ends.
There's still some other random silliness packed into that scenario, the chief insult being that Quorra inexplicably decides to throw herself at the enemy to … do something. We're not quite sure what, because the enemy hasn't spotted their group, nobody else knows she's an iso yet and she's not trying to heroically distract the guards so the menfolk can sneak by (or at least, if she is, it's not explained as such). So far as I can tell, the only point of this scene is to stretch the film out by another fifteen minutes with damsel-rescuing, ensuring that Quorra's introduction as a Kickass SF Chick is completely undermined by the end of the film. Because after that first rescue scene, where she's all awesome and mysterious? No skills whatsoever. Even the scene where her arm gets snapped off contrives to make her a damsel rather than a fallen warrior, and only seems to happen so that Maverick Dad could regrow it while she slept and thereby demonstrate her magical iso-ness to Sam. Plus and also: the genocide timeline is screwy. Only a day passes on Earth after Maverick Dad first discovers the isos before Evil Jeff Bridges kills them all, but when Quorra tells the story, she'd been living in a city for some time when it happened, and had to flee her home as everyone she knew was killed around her, at which point Maverick effected a Miraculous And Poorly-Explained Rescue That Makes No Sense.
So, yes. Tron: Legacy is a fantasy film in denial, which, given the SF context, becomes very problematic very quickly. Take that as you will. There's a few nice moments packed in there amidst all the senseless plotting, and a weird consistency in the background details that belies the total lack of logic elsewhere. These include: fireworks that explode in geometric pixel designs rather than soft circles; the Maverick Dad's use of 80s slang, which, while naff, makes sense when you consider that he's been in a computer for twenty years reading zen texts and therefore hasn't had cause to update his argot; and an enemy program picking up one of the Maverick's books by the corner and then flipping through it sideways, because he's obviously never seen one before. The 3D is nice, but only really gets a workout during the action scenes, which are surprisingly few and far between. The bulk of the film is dialogue, with not a lot going on and not a lot of sense to string it together. But, as has been mentioned previously, I have low standards. It was fun. The music was truly awesome. And at least it gave me a lot to think about.
Also, as a bonus for those who are curious, I started thinking about stories where the genius child of the absentee Maverick Parent is a daughter rather than a son, and was able to come up with three examples: Ritsuko from Neon Genesis Evangelion; Kimiko Sarai Kusanagi, aka Kim Ross from the webcomic Dresden Codak, and Deunan Knute from Appleseed. The two other uses of the bedtime story technique which sprang to mind are Inkheart and National Treasure. If you can think of any others in either case, I'd be interested in hearing about them!
Posted: October 16, 2009 in Political Wrangling, UK - 2009
Tags: Childhood, Children, Context, Internet, Men, News, Politics, Pornography, Rights, Sexuality, Social, Social Behaviour, Society, Technology, Women
Here's an uncontroversial statement: different people find different things sexy, just as different people find different things repulsive, outrageous, risque or tawdry. This is why so much of the porn industry nowadays is devoted to kink and specialisation. People are weird, and so, quite often, are our fantasies. It's a thing.
When I walk into a newsagency and glance at the lads' magazine section – Zoo and Maxim and so on – I'm usually blinded by a sea of very large bosoms in very small bikinis, hoisted proudly on the torsos of half a dozen tanned and pouting women. These mags are sold over the counter, but while I'm not grossly offended by the sight of mostly bare women, I tend to think the content is more pornographic than not. That's less a moral judgement than it is a statement of fact: no matter how much skin they may or may not be showing compared to their hardcore counterparts, the models are there to be looked at in a lustful context.
When trying to determine whether something is pornographic, it's certainly logical to consider why it was created in the first place, and for what audience. In many respects, I'd argue, this is actually more important than what is (or isn't) on display, but there's always going to be dissonance between the reaction an image is intended to provoke and the reactions is actually provokes. Because people, as has been mentioned, are weird. We get turned on by weird and unexpected and – sometimes – terrible things. And that's what throws a spanner in the works when it comes to the current debate on child pornography.
Paedophilia is an awful thing, one that leads to awful crimes and ruined lives. It is a violation of trust and a sexual circumstance in which it is actually impossible for one of the parties to consent, meaning that it should never be condoned or legitimised. We have a social responsibility to protect children from sexual predators. And yet, in trying to do this, we have managed to paint ourselves into a legislative corner, one in which any image of a child becomes pornographic, regardless of the context in which it was taken.
Because children – and children's bodies – aren't the problem. Taking a photo of a child is no more synonomous with making child pornography than being a child is synonomous with being a sexual creature. This is an instance where only two things are capable of making an image pornographic: the perspective of the viewer, which is entirely removed from the original context of the photo, and those disgusting occasions on which an abuser has recorded images of their crime. The latter instance is both vile and undeniably sexualised. But the former is where we hit a snag: because it forces people to be concerned, not with the content of a given picture, but the likelihood that someone will view it in a sexual context.
At the moment, in our zeal to protect children, we are dangerously close to smothering them. It is no longer acceptable to show up to your child's school sports day and take photos: parents are concerned with how the images might be viewed later. But do we stop the sports day entirely for fear of what perverts on the sidelines might take away in their memories? No: and yet, this is exactly the same logic used to justify the current stance on photographing children. The more we behave as though the general populace cannot be trusted to be in the same room with our children on the offchance of what they might be thinking, the more we buy into the mindset that children need to be locked up, protected, sheltered, kept from the public eye.
On the surface, that might not sound so bad. But take that last sentence and replace the word 'children' with the 'women', and you have a viable description of the logic behind societies whose female populations are required to stay covered up at all times. Men cannot be trusted in the presence of women, this argument goes: it is futile to pretend otherwise, and much easier to make the women invisible than it is to change the attitudes of the men. This is a mentality which ultimately punnishes those whom it claims to protect, by restricting their actions and, by default, assuming that they exist in a constant sexual context. For many reasons, this is not a perfect analogy, but given our current social struggle to decide how much freedom children should have online, outside the home and in their decision-making, it strikes me that our debate over the definition of child pornography stands as a parallel issue.
Ultimately, we live in a changing world. We worry about online predators grooming or luring children away; we worry about the digial distribution of photos of children, and how our knowledge of their possible misuse might taint our perception of their contents; we worry about stranger danger, and whether it's better to let our kids walk home by themselves and gain a bit of independence, or whether we should constantly be holding their hand. We are making decisions with the best of intentions, but I also worry that we are approaching things the wrong way. Life will always hold dangers, no matter how effectively we seek to curb them: nothing will ever be entirely safe. With new technology opening up the world in an unprecedented way, our instinct has been to clutch tightly at what we hold most dear, trying to protect it from these new, expanded threats. But the more we grip and shelter, the harder it eventually becomes to let go, and the more difficult it is for children to grow up into confident, capable adults. There is both nobility and necessity in our desire to preserve the sanctity of childhood, but in so doing, we should never forget that childhood is something to eventually be outgrown. The real world never goes away, and the more fearful we are of its dangers, the closer we come to never understanding it at all.
Tweeting vs The Media
Posted: September 19, 2009 in Political Wrangling, UK - 2009
Tags: Debate, Kyle Sandilands, Mia Freedman, News, Opinion, Politics, Public vs Private, Social Networking, Social Networking Sites, Society, Technology, Trespass Magazine, Twitter
The following was written as a comment in response to this article in Trespass Magazine, wherein Lyrian Fleming postulates that the number of gaffes made by public figures on Twitter will eventually prove to be its undoing.
While I agree that celebrities and other public figures are currently struggling to walk a fine line with emergent digital media like Twitter, I don't think their turmoil will kill the oeuvre. On the contrary, there's few things our rubbernecking media machine enjoys more than a good old-fashioned gaffe, and in a culture where the cult of celebrity requires an almost non-stop stream of updates about its beloved stars, there's nothing quite like Twitter for providing insight into the daily lives of the rich and famous. Those are both fairly cynical examples, but in broader terms, I'd contend that all the current spotlighting of public figures who dare to express a personal opinion are part of a bigger, currently unanswered question, viz: where do we draw the line between public and private in an age of instant media, and under what circumstances?
It's not just about celebrities and Twitter; it's about employees being fired because of content on their social networking pages, cyberbullying in schools, videos on YouTube – even the debate over the street-level images of private homes in Google Maps. These are all disparate examples, each of which has different quirks, different potential solutions, but what they all have in common is our need to establish etiquette for the use of technology whose rate of developmental progress has far outstripped the speed at which we are constructing rules around it. Twitter will eventually be superceded by something new, yes, but only because the next leap forward in virtual communication will replace it as a matter of course, and not because its existence has contributed to an already ongoing debate about public vs. private in the digital landscape.
Quite simply, I'd be extraordinarily worried if we, as a society, saw Twitter collapse simply because it forced us to reexamine our behaviour. The issues it's raised – or rather, which have arisen as a result of its use – aren't bad questions to be asking. With or without Twitter, we need to know how to live with technology. The Freedman case is a good example of this, whereas I'd argue that Kyle Sandilands acting like Kyle Sandilands is less an issue of his choice of media than it is a question of his being an obnoxious tool who perhaps shouldn't be paid obscene amounts of money to abuse people on air.
Should public figures have the luxury of private opinions in a public forum, or not – that's the real question underlying these examples. Conventional wisdom seem to say 'Yes, but ony for so long as they don't say something offensive.' However, given the level of media scrutiny currently attached to any gaffe, regardless of its objective severity – Freedman deserves no heat compared to Sandilands – I'd suggest a case-by-case policy of caveat orator. Let the speaker, whoever they are, beware. Because if they weren't before, the world and his wife are certainly watching now.
The Vogon Poetry Of Voice Recognition Software
Posted: August 19, 2009 in Life/Stuff
Tags: Existential, Frege, Humor, Humour, Laptop, Life, Poetry, Random, Technology, Text To Speech, Vogon Poetry, Voice Recognition Software
Our flight to London leaves tomorrow afternoon, which means that today has been spent, by and large, in a haze of Doing Things: wrapping gifts, packing bags, putting bikes in storage, sewing the ends into Toby's new Dr Who scarf, doing tax, buying travel insurance, finalising the return of our bond, photocopying passports, purchasing books and so on. One might reasonably expect that this anticipatory bustle was the highlight – and, indeed, the be-all, end-all – of the day.
One would, however, be wrong.
In the course of stumbling upon my computer's text-to-speech function and making it say swear words (which was a subset of recalibrating my cursor speed, which was a corollary of trying to fix my recalcitrant USB ports) , my loving husband discovered a similar facility in his own laptop: viz, its voice recognition software. Had this program been given a more specific nomenclature – such as word recognition or sentence construction software – I would be perfectly poised to denounce these labels as both false and misleading. However, after listening to almost two hours of a grown man patiently endeavouring to coax sense from a machine, I may safely vouch that the voice recognition software does, indeed, interpret his voice – albeit with a complete and utter lack of accuracy.
Fixing these many defects is an ongoing process: for one thing, the software seems categorically incapable of comprehending Toby's pronunciation of the letter F, with humerous results, while attempts at associative spelling (C for Clive) have frequently devolved along the lines of P for Pisshead, F for Fuck, and S for Stupid. Nonetheless, he persists. Fifteen minutes alone were dedicated to teaching it the name Frege, which his laptop interpreted as 'radio' – an amusing misapprehension which Frege himself would have doubtless been well-placed to appreciate. With each sternly reiterated command (Go To End Of Document!), I find myself envisaging his computer as a disobedient puppy or head-tilting parrot. Bad software – go to your cage!
In which context, I am delighted to offer the following garbage – a word for word transcript of today's efforts at voice recognition turned into existential poetry by judicious use of the space key (Toby's doing). I can't provide a comparative record of what was actually said to elicit such nonsense, but I can assure you that it in no way resembled what here follows. It's my belief that his laptop has a secret penchant for Vogon poetry. I'll let you judge for yourselves.
Vogon Voice Recognition Poetry
Gus that it is now a girl
from what you're doing
what you listen to
what lined up
can't say how your right mind dog
could revenge on his knees and at least try another
down missing so I cent gas
is now back
is no gas
there is now a girl
what my now can't say how
your right mind goal remains
them unused needs at least try another her and her are
How hotels urinal I give you
realise that your hotel one listening
usually listening to them
in writing things down
Maxwell's quoted no
and what was that I can do little
but not mostly to what I'm saying
issue a real Secretary
are beginning very angry
that it can honestly start looking
at receiving the and the long-haul dark
or her who are already
some other blacks were not mostly
to what I'm saying usual real secretaries
bearing a finger again
reader can honestly start looking at receiving B
and a long haul are all looks a Milan
to have a better known by her
you are oracle is our way
and I for every year
you will rely on they are there is a
Up, you are knew what you're talking about
his a limousine as growing very room,
and only three creating
I'll walk towards more on her
who are all middle of his indulging
quite the here and there are other people on,
and already some other blacks were not mostly
to what I'm saying usual real job
has bearing asking you again readers are,
they start looking at receiving B
ally our phones and other nine
took them known by her
you want oracle is it,
why and I walked in reunion
will run like one day I'll bet he is
the in up of I-the the who had.
Talking 'Bout A Revolution
Posted: April 17, 2009 in Good News Week
Tags: #amazonfail, Amazon, Audiobook Rights, Blog, Blogging, Blogsphere, Books, CD Key Encryption, Clay Shirky, Copyright Protection, Crowdsourcing, Digital Culture, Digital Rights Management, Digital Technology, DRM, Exclusivity, Facebook, Flashmob, Future, Games, Ghost in the Shell, Good News Week, Hivemind, Hyperlocal, Hyperlocal News, Ideas, Internet, iTunes, Journalism, Kindle, Linus Torvalds, Motoko Kusanagi, Natalia Morar, News, Newspapers, Open Source, Oprah, Pirate, Revolution, Social Networking Sites, Technology, Thoughts, Twitter, Viral, Viral News, Wikipedia, Writing, YouTube
First, some links:
Clay Shirky on the collapse of traditional newspapers and the need to find alternative means of journalism;
Natalia Morar, who organised an anti-government flashmob on Twitter and is now hiding from arrest;
Oprah and other celebrities battling to be the first on Twitter with a million followers; and
SR7, a company for hire that specialises in digging up dirt on employees for other companies.
Now, some thoughts, in no particular order:
1. Journalism is essential. People both like and need to know what's going on. However, journalism is not a naturally occuring resource. People must go out, obtain information, then analyse, write and relay it, a time-consuming process traditionally deemed deserving of monetary compensation. No matter how easy it is to copy an existing source online, that source first needs to come from somewhere; and before that, someone must decide that the source itself is newsworthy.
2. As has always been true of all creative endeavours (singing, painting, dancing), there are vastly more people who participate in these activities than are paid to do so. Largely, this is a question of enjoyment, creative expression and ease. Blogs have tapped into this in a big way. Most bloggers make no money. Many blogs are read by only a tiny handful of people known to the writer, or not at all. And yet, they are prolific, because even without monetary compensation, the vast majority of people simply enjoy writing them. Many readers employ a similar logic.
3. Despite having been around for a number of years, Twitter has only just hit the collective journalistic hivemind. Recent weeks have seen an explosion of articles on how it is being used, why it is damaging people, whether the concept is utterly pointless, and the implications of its ongoing development. Diverse examples of all these include:
– the now-notorious #amazonfail incident and its aftermath;
– the Times bemoaning Twitter as a 'rolling news service of the ego' and then promptly signing up;
– a warning that social networking sites are damaging kids' brains at the same time Twitter is being added to the Brittish school curriculum; and
– the use of Twitter in both the Mumbai bombings and hyperlocal news sites.
4. Writing on the collapse of newspapers as we know them, Clay Shirky sums up the process of social revolutions thusly: "The old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place. The importance of any given experiment isn't apparent at the moment it appears; big changes stall, small changes spread. Even the revolutionaries can't predict what will happen." He concludes by saying that what we need is a "collection of new experiments" to help us figure out how journalism – as distinct from newspapers – can keep working.
5. TV news isn't going anywhere. Neither is radio, which has survived bigger technological upheavals. Print journalism is failing because the internet has ruined its monopoly on exclusive media. Unlike free-to-air radio and television, which have always had to contend with the notion that a majority of listeners won't be paying directly for their content, newspapers have thrived as a one-to-one exchange: a set amount of money per customer per paper, with very few exceptions. It's not that the internet devalues the written word, or that making journalism freely available is inimical to notions of profit: it's that, without being able to charge on that one-to-one basis, newspapers cannot command anything like their previous volume of revenue. They've simply never had to compete with a medium that could do the same thing, better, for a fraction of the cost. And now they're floundering.
6. Spare a moment to consider the notion of Digital Rights Management – DRM – and its relationship to the newspaper fiasco. Although concerned parimarily with digital music copyright, the ongoing debate about encryption for games and, with the advent of the Kindle and other such devices, the pirateability of digital books and audiobook rights, the underlying problem is the same in both instances: defining notions of ownership for both users and creators in an era where digital copies are readily available. Books in particular have always been subject to the whims of borrowing and lending without falling apart, but might their new digital formats change that? Or are they an exception to the rule? For long stints of time, it's nicer to read on a page than a screen, but what if screens are improved, or some other technology developed that is just as comfortable to use as paper? Will we still crave tactile connections?
7. People might not like to pay for content, but as Wikipedia, YouTube and Linus Torvalds have already proven, many are ready, willing and able to create content for free. Open source principles clearly predate the current revolution, and consciously or not, they're informing it. Remove money from the equation (or at least, give it a drastically reduced emphasis) and gaze anew at the crisis of print journalism. Blogs, tweets, viral news: many of the new news staples are ungoverned, unruly, disparate products of the hivemind – flashmobs, crowdsourcing – but that doesn't mean they go utterly unpoliced or work without change or criticism. Hey, it's a revolution, folks. We're breaking and making at the speed of thought. Give us time to learn the ropes.
8. Way back in 1995, Major Motoko Kusanagi once mused, "And where does the newborn go from here? The net is vast and infinite." In 2006, she reaffirmed the sentiment. We're not yet ghosts in the shell, but let's keep an open mind. The future rests in us.
Tech Specs: Addendum
Posted: February 25, 2009 in Political Wrangling
Tags: America, Augustus, Blackberry, Congress, Culture, Dana Milbank, Digital, Irony, Nero, Obama, Politicians, Politics, Rome, Society, Technology, Twitter, Youth
Oh noes – politicians have been caught Twittering 'like bored schoolchildren' throughout an address to Congress! Damn those evil youths and their seductive brainwasters for corrupting the attention of America's finest! Calamity! Outrage! Way to lay it on thick, Dana Milbank: truly, anyone caught interacting with technology in such a vile fashion must belong to ' a support group for adults with attention deficit disorder,' thereby invalidating the notion of 'a new age of transparency' in favour of 'Twittering while Rome burns.'
Or, like, not.
Don't get me wrong: I'd much prefer our (or rather, America's) politicans payed attention. That is the ideal scenario. But they are still human, and humans – funnily enough – get bored at inappropriate moments. Our brains are cluttered with odd little thoughts and observations crying to get out. We're a social species. We can't help ourselves. Thus, while Twitter undeniably constitutes a newfangled outlet for such internal deviance, it is not the source, and scary though we might find the thought, politicians have always been like this: picking their nose in the gallery, wondering what's on TV tonight, wishing a hated opponent would get off the podium, watching the clock, perving on their colleagues and generally – gasp! – acting like people.
When, exactly, did we start expecting otherwise normal human beings to stop being human just because the cameras (or teh internets) were rolling? Here's a wacky theory: maybe the only reason we've maintained this crazy notion of political pomp and dignity for so long is because we've had no intimate windows into the mindset of our leaders. And in this instance, it's worth remembering that windows work both ways: just as we can now poke our heads in, metaphorically speaking, so can those on the inside stick an arm out and wave.
So, Mr Milbank, repeat after me: Technology Is My Friend. By the grace of what other agency does your irksome perspective reach Melbourne from Washington with such speed? Through what other medium do I now type this reply? Each new invention changes us, yes, but in most respects, it must first build on what is already there, be it a hitherto unrealised ideal, an untapped market, or the even unvoiced musings of our leaders. If, as per your inflationary grumblings, this new global digital society of ours consitutes a kind of Rome, it doesn't belong to Nero, but to Augustus.
Because while Nero merely fiddled, Augustus found a world of brick and left it clad in marble.
Tags: Adolescents, Adults, Baby Boomers, Behaviour, Builders, Culture, Digital Culture, Digital Natives, Facebook, Generation X, Generation Y, Generation Z, Growing Up, Internet, iPod, Media, Music, Myspace, News, Social Behaviour, Society, Sociology, Technology, Teenagers, Video Games, Youth
Consider the following four articles on the dangers of youth exposure to too much digital culture:
iPod Safety: Preventing Hearing Loss in Teens;
Twittering brains withering, expert warns;
Teens flaunt sex, drugs on MySpace; and
Too much PlayStation causes painful lumps,
all of which cropped up in today's online news. Together, they pretty much exemplify the fears of the Builders, the Baby Boomers and, to a certain extent, the elder members of Generation X, not just as regards their own offspring, but concerning all of modern society. Loud and clear, they've been wringing their hands for the past few years over the perils of digitisation, and every time, I've experienced a disqueting lurch of anger. It's taken today's media quartet for me to understand why this is: after all, cynic though I may be, I still put a certain base faith in the opinions of scientists and sociologists, especially when backed up by established studies. As a member of Generation Y, I'm hardly an impartial observer, and to a large extent, my negative reactions stem from a sense of being personally maligned, even where certain behaviours or criticisms don't apply either to me as I am now, or to my historic teenage self. Rather, I feel outraged on behalf of my generation and those younger: that we are, in some sense, being fundamentally misunderstood. I can hack criticism, yes; but the sheer weight of professional authorities whose time has been purposefully devoted to proving that almost everyone under the age of 25 is steering themselves on a course towards social oblivion has begun to seem less like the amalgamated findings of unbiased research and more like an unconscious desire to demonise technology.
When it comes to growing up, it's human nature to get fixed in whatever era raised us. Modern society is shaped, by and large, to ensure this happens – advertising and television timeslots, for instance, aren't shown at random, but painstakingly catered to particular demographics. Thus, once we lose interests in the trappings of a given age and progress to playing with a new kind of gadget or watching a different kind of film, we effectively graduate from one type of newsfeed to another. Not watching weekend and afterschool cartoons, for example, means that we no longer learn which shows are cancelled and which will replace them, and that certain products, like the latest toys and games, will no longer form part of our daily media experience. Because our interest in such things has waned, we don't notice the dissonance: rather, we assume that things have remained static in our absence, and are often startled in a moment of later nostalgia when, flipping on the TV at 3pm, we recognise none of the cartoon characters, none of the hosts, and none of the merchandise. Such disorientation provokes outrage: who are these strangers, and what have they done with our childhood? This biases our opinion of the new product towards hostility and skepticism from the outset; and even when we take the time to watch these new shows, the magic is missing, because we are no longer children. Wrongheadedly, however, we don't immediately identify this as the problem, and tend to believe, rather, that the product itself is at fault. In fact, it becomes difficult to fathom what kind of person such programmes are catered to, and so, by extension and quite unselfconsciously, we have already taken the first steps towards discrediting the intelligence and taste of the next generation. This outrage slumbers in us, omnipresent but quiescent, until we have children of our own, or are forced to deal with someone else's. Nonetheless, it is there.
Consider, then, that the technological advances of the past few decades have leapt ahead at unprecedented speeds. In the space of twenty years, we have moved from cassette tapes and walkmans to CDs and discmans to the now-ubiquitous mp3s and iPods of the new millenium. For a generation who started out buying their albums on LP, this is triply disconcerting, while for the generation who thought themselves blessed by the miracle of radio, it seems like a kind of magic. This is all common knowledge, of course, and therefore glossed with the shiny patina of frequent repetition: by itself, the comparison doesn't provide an explanation for the hostility of older generations. Until, that is, we combine it with the above example about treasured childhood cartoons, because in this instance, not only are the new characters unrecognisable, but they don't even appear on the same device.
And adults struggle with this. They are disconnected from their offspring, from their students; more important than connectivity and reminiscence, however, is the loss of firsthand advice. They simply cannot guide today's teenagers through the digital world, which leads most youth to discover it on their own. Most of us who grew up with computers and videogames are either several years away from reproducing or blessed with children still in early primary-school: in other words, we are yet to witness what happens when a generation of adolescents is reared by a generation of adults anywhere near as technologically literate as their teenage progeny, who remember what it was like to hang out on Trillian or MSN chat all night, to experiment with cybersex, to write achingly of school crushes in their LiveJournal or to download music at home. Members of Generations Y and Z, in other words, in addition to being burgeoning iFolk, are also a social anomaly: a group whose own adolescence is so far removed from the experience of their caretakers as to prevent their parents and teachers, in many instances, from adequately preparing them for the real (digital) world.
But the gap will close. Already there are children in the world whose parents own game consoles, who will guide them online from a young age, and whose joint mannerisms both in real and virtual company will be drawn from a single parental source. Navigating away from certain parts of the internet will be taught in the same way as stranger danger and the implict lesson to avoid dangerous parts of the local neighbourhood. We teach what we know, after all, and yet large number of commentators seem not to have realised this – which is why I react badly to their writings. They never purport to be talking about teenagers now so much as teenagers always, or from this point on, a frustrating alarmism that takes no account of what will happen when such adolescents leave home, stumble into the bright sunlight, go to university, get jobs, fall in love and maybe have children of their own. In short, they have no sense of the future, or if so, they picture a world populated by antisocial digital natives, uprooting the fruits of their hard labour out of ignorance, apathy and poor management. Either they can't imagine us growing up, or fear what we'll turn into.
I'm speaking here in broad-brush terms. Obviously, the distinction between those who are technologically literate and those who aren't can't simply be reduced to their year of birth. Every generation has its Luddites (and, if we remember the political motivations of those original iconoclasts, this is often a good thing) as well as its innovators, its geeks and scientists. And many such worried articles, irksome though I may find their tone, are still correct: listening to your iPod on full volume will probably damage your hearing, just as it's not a wise idea to post intimate details of your sex life on MySpace. The latter concern is markedly new, and something teens certainly need to be made aware of – indeed, professionals new to Facebook are still themselves figuring out whether to friend coworkers or employers, thereby allowing them to view the results of various drunken nights out, or to keep a low digital profile. Such wisdom is new all round, and deeply appreciated. On the other hand, parents have been telling their kids to turn down their damn music in one form or another ever since Elvis Presley first picked up a guitar, and while the technology might've become more powerful in the intervening decades and the studies into auditory damage more accurate, the warning remains identical (as does the inter-generational eye-roll with which it tends to be received).
In short, the world is changing, and people are changing with it, teachers, teens and parents alike. And I cannot help, in my own curious optimism, to see this as a positive thing: that in a world where technology moves so swiftly, older generations must constantly remain open to the idea of learning from their younger counterparts, while those in the know must become teachers earlier. There is so much to be gained in the coming years, and so many problems, both great and small, to be solved. The gap between adults and adolescents has never been so large, but while it always behooves those in the former category to teach and aid the latter, this should never be at the expense of at least trying to understand their point of view. And this, ultimately, is what causes me to bristle: whether playing videogames can hurt your hands or spending too much time online can damage your real world social skills, such passtimes aren't going anywhere. Rather than condemning or sneering at such things outright or tutting sadly, the more productive path is to consider how best they can be incorporated into modern life without causing harm, or to study how they work in confluence with real-world interactions, and not just fret about what happens if they're used exclusively.
Because technology – and future generations – aren't going anywhere. We might not look like Inspector Gadget, but baby, we're his heirs. Or rather, Penny's. You get the idea.
Xbox to Atari
Posted: January 22, 2009 in Political Wrangling
Tags: Atari, Bill Burton, CIA, Geek, Guantanamo Bay, Inauguration, News, Obama, Politics, Presidency, Technology, White House, Xbox
Barack Obama has been inagurated as President of the United States. Already, he's signed an order to close Guantanamo Bay within a year and another to prevent the CIA from using illegal interrogation techniques. Innumerable stories of goodwill, tolerance and humanity have bloomed into the media since election day, and are yet to cease. Even for those of us overseas, there is a sense of hope: that something, finally, somewhere, is being done.
And yet, in the midst of all these history-making declarations, powerful speeches and political events, what's really brought home the Obama win to me is a single line, delivered by new Presidential spokesman, Bill Burton, on the technological inadequacies of the White House.
'It's like going from an Xbox to an Atari,' he said.
And the fact, the glorious, stupid, wonderful, geeky fact that someone in the White House actually knows what an Atari is, makes me grin like a damnfool yokel.
Bring on the revolution, guys. We're with you.
HarperCollins: Authonomy
Posted: January 21, 2009 in Ink & Feather
Tags: Authonomy, Author, Digital, Editing, Editor, Feedback, Forum, Genre, Hardcopy, HarperCollins, Online, Publisher, Publishing, Site, Slushpile, Submission, Technology, Unsolicited Submission, Would-Be Author
Since discovering it yesterday, I've been ceaselessly intrigued by Authonomy, an online forum created by HarperCollins. According to boingboing, it's been up and running since September '08, and is currently still in beta; nonetheless, there are already hundreds of contributors. The premise is simple: aspiring writers upload their unpublished novels using a shiny new interface, tag the relevant genre/s, and let other site members promote their favourite books. Despite the sophistication of the website, the mechanism itself is nothing new; the real innovation is in holding a monthly top ten, wherein HarperCollins editors will read, comment on and – potentially – publish those books which get the most votes. They'll also be looking for trendspotters: site members who consistently reccommend good or popular books ahead of the curve, thus strengthening the incentive for writers to spruik work other than their own. In the words of its creators, it's a search for new talent: filtering the dross through howevermany pairs of eyes and seeing what floats to the top.
Conceptually, it's a brilliant embodiment of killing two birds with one stone. For the publisher, it decreases the dreaded slushpile: by providing a sanctioned, online outlet for new submissions, they will likely cut down on receipt of unsolicited hardcopy, while simultaneously gaining a free, enthusiastic, slushpile-reading committee. For the aspiring authors, there is a drastically increased chance of receiving feedback or being published, plus a chance to participate in what is, essentially, a mammoth (but extremely well-executed) writing group. And for passive members like myself, there's the fun of talent-trawling: reading free books, picking the best and pimping them.
Authonomy is such a deviously simple, workable, natural idea that I'm stunned nobody thought of it before; and if HarperCollins really does sign some new talent this way, it could revolutionise the publishing industry, particularly if other companies pick up on the concept. Especially for smaller, more specialised houses, it could be a fantastic way to expand the business without excessive outlay; and thinking of the local Australian market, where there are few dedicated genre publishers, it could help to demonstrate both the presence of new writers and a viable audience for their work. Even more importantly, allowing digital submission erases the barrier of distance: whereas UK-based writers might baulk at submitting hardcopy to a New York firm, there can be no such qualms about uploading to an internationally accessible website run by an internationally recognised publisher.
One of the biggest hindrances as a writer is the dearth of authoritative feedback: without an agent (or even with), it's frequently impossible to learn why a manuscript was rejected by a given editor, or what might be done to improve it. While amateur criticism is sometimes unhelpful, creating a resource for such is nonetheless positive, especially where levened by the potential for more measured, professional commentary with an eye to commercial success.
In short, I'm excited by Authonomy and what it might achieve – and if its expanding membership is anything to go by, I'm not the only one.


Appelt, C.W., L.C. Ward, C. Bender, J. Fasenella, B.J. Van Vossen, and L. Knight. 2016. Examining potential relationships between exotic monk parakeets (Myiopsitta monachus) and avian communities in an urban environment. Wilson Journal of Ornithology 128: 556-566.
Bucher, E.H., and R.M. Aramburú. 2014. Land-use changes and monk parakeet expansion in the Pampas grasslands of Argentina. Journal of Biogeography in press.
Hobson, E.A., M.L. Avery, and T.F. Wright. 2014. The socioecology of Monk Parakeets: insights into parrot social complexity. Auk 131: 756-775.


We learn emission shader settings in Daz Studio Iray by applying it to hair. Light emitting surfaces are fun, add spice to our compositions, and help create dramatic lighting effects.
In this tutorial we explore Daz Studio Iray human skin settings. In particular, we focus on how to emphasize differences in skin hues, so that we may accentuate body shape and definition.


Phase 1 of the Hill Head Coastal Protection Project is underway with contractors already on the site.
As a part of the Phase 1 of the Hill Head project, re-nourishment of historically low beach levels at the beach will take place, protecting the promenade from further exposure to wave damage.
The works, funded by FBC, involve bringing in approximately 3,000m³ of beach material by road to top up the beach in the first 5 groyne bays from the car park. The beach material being used for Phase 1 will be dredged from the Solent and then bought ashore in Portsmouth for processing and transportation.
Works on the Phase 1 are due for completion on 30th September 2016.
Posted on September 1, 2016 with tags beach renourishment, coastal protection, dredge, Fareham, sea defenses.


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Mar 19, 2015 . Joined: Jan 2, 2008. Messages: 9,646. Likes Received: 35. 8ft is quite compound like in appearance, especially the vinyl ones. Staggered 6ft cedar boards with lattice would look a lot more homely. Hopefully you didn't put a privacy fence around your entire property, to the furthest extent. You need to have..
Board & Lattice - Wood Fence Installation - Fence Installation Boston .
A vinyl lattice fence is preferable over a wooden fence because of its maintenance-free characteristic. . Vinyl lattice fence comes in easy to install 4 x 8 feet panels. . If your ground pitch is 4 inches, the next post should be 4 inches shallower into the ground and the next panel should be secured at a height 4 inches less..
Sep 26, 2017 . Vinyl lattice fencing is made of poly vinyl chloride. . Vinyl lattice fencing panels are sold ready to install, and come in pre-fabricated 4 x 8 foot panels. Vinyl . The framework of the fence is created by attaching 2 x 6 inch pressure treated rails between the posts using fence rail mounts (inexpensive hardware..


This leaflet answers some common questions about INTEGRILIN.
It does not take the place of talking to your doctor or hospital pharmacist.
All medicines have risks and benefits. Your doctor has weighed the risks of you taking INTEGRILIN against the benefits it is expected to have for you.
If you have any concerns about using this medicine, ask your doctor or hospital pharmacist.
INTEGRILIN works by helping to prevent blood clots by stopping the platelets in the blood from sticking together.
INTEGRILIN is used in people with unstable angina (chest pain) to help prevent heart attack and possible death.
Angina is a pain or uncomfortable feeling in the chest, often spreading to the arms or neck and sometimes to the shoulders and back. This may be caused by too little blood and oxygen getting to the heart.
INTEGRILIN is also used to prevent the formation of blood clots when people have a surgical procedure (percutaneous coronary intervention) to open an artery and insert a tube (stent).
Your doctor, however, may prescribe INTEGRILIN for another purpose.
Ask your doctor if you have any questions about why INTEGRILIN has been prescribed for you.
There is no evidence that INTEGRILIN is addictive.
1. you are allergic to any ingredients listed at the end of this leaflet.
INTEGRILIN should not be used in children.
If you are not sure if you should use INTEGRILIN, contact your doctor or hospital pharmacist.
you have any other medical conditions including liver or kidney problems or problems with bleeding or blood clots.
Do not use INTEGRILIN if you are pregnant unless you and your doctor have discussed the risks and benefits involved.
If you are breastfeeding, stop breastfeeding while you are being treated with INTEGRILIN.
Tell your doctor if you are taking any medicines to thin your blood, to prevent blood clots or to dissolve clots.
Tell your doctor if you are taking any other medicines, including aspirin or other medicines that you buy without a prescription from a pharmacy, supermarket or health food shop.
Your doctor will usually give you aspirin or heparin at the same time as INTEGRILIN.
INTEGRILIN is given in hospital by an injection into a vein followed by an intravenous drip (infusion). The infusion usually lasts for up to 3 or 4 days.
The dose given is based on your weight. Your doctor or hospital pharmacist will work out the correct dose for you.
You may also be given aspirin and heparin.
If you get too much INTEGRILIN, it could cause bleeding. If this happens the intravenous drip may need to be stopped. Usually, this will be enough to handle the overdose. However, if necessary, a blood transfusion may be given.
Contact the Poisons Information Centre for advice regarding management of overdose. In Australia telephone 13 11 26. In New Zealand telephone 0800 POISON or 0800 764 766.
Tell your doctor, nurse or hospital pharmacist as soon as possible if you do not feel well while you are being given INTEGRILIN.
Like other medicines, INTEGRILIN may cause some side effects. Although not all of these side effects may occur, if they do occur they may need medical attention.
While INTEGRILIN is being used, you will be checked for any signs of unusual or unexpected bleeding.
INTEGRILIN may also cause stinging or redness at the site of injection.
It is not possible to know whether these effects are related to INTEGRILIN or to the condition INTEGRILIN is used to treat. However, these effects can occur in this condition even without the use of INTEGRILIN.
If you notice any other effects, check with your doctor.
Ask your doctor or hospital pharmacist any questions you may have.
INTEGRILIN is stored in a hospital.
It should be stored refrigerated at 2°C to 8°C. Do not freeze. It should be protected from light until administration.


Aristolindiquinone (1), a novel natural compound possibly: possessing anti-fertility activity, was synthesized via two independent routes. First, a Stobbe reaction unambiguously gave the naphthalene nucleus with the required substitution pattern (3,8-dioxygenated-2,5-dimethyl naphthalene), starting from 2-hydroxy-5-methylbenzaldehyde (31). Second, a general synthesis, of substituted C-5 oxygenated- 1,4-naphthoquinones is applied to the synthesis of (1). The critical step in the synthesis is the reaction of the novel Diels-Alder partners, dienophile (90), synthesized from 2,6-dihydroxytoluene (56), and diene (109).
Botha, M. 1986. The total synthesis of aristolindiquinone. University of Cape Town.


Multiple sclerosis (MS) research at the University of Manitoba got a shot in the arm earlier this month with a $2-million investment from the Waugh Family Foundation.
In collaboration with the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada, the U of M will use the funds to develop a research program in the university's faculty of health sciences and plans to create a new endowed research chair in MS, named after the Waugh family. The school intends to increase the endowment to $5 million by leveraging the Waugh donation, according to a release.
Expected to be recruited in 2016, the chair will lead a team of internationally recognized MS specialists and work to advance understanding and treatment of the disease.
MS is a chronic disease of the brain and spinal cord characterized by changes in sensation, visual problems, weakness, depression, difficulties with coordination and speech, impaired mobility, and disability.
Yves Savoie, president and CEO of the MS Society of Canada, noted in the release that Canada has the highest rate of MS in the world, calling it "Canada's disease." It is estimated to affect more than 3,400 Manitobans and 100,000 Canadians, commonly young adults between the ages of 15 and 40 years old.
Digvir Jayas, vice-president of research international at the U of M, told the Manitoban the school has contributed immensely to MS research, noting the university is home to internationally recognized researchers in the field.
"In the last several years, the University of Manitoba has transformed its MS clinical and research programs, obtaining more than $13 million from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and other national and international organizations, including the MS Society," he said.
Jayas highlighted the efforts of clinical scientist James Marriott – co-principal investigator on the mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) clinical trials at two sites in Canada.
The funds were received as part of the U of M Front and Centre campaign, which aims to raise $500 million over three years.


How to change the color of Devlin dropdown menus?
The catch is that the navigation background is transparent - when you hover over a folder and you get the dropdown menu is there a possible css solution to have a colored dropdown and a transparent top bar?
I found code similar to this that doesn't quite work..


FILTER BY NEW LED TITLE TITLE 0 COLOR SPEC SHEETS. Maybe you would like to learn more about one of these?
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text:
Q: Failing to start an activity with an implicit intent I am a little confused why the implicit intent call is failing.  When trying to start an intent I keep getting the following error:
    android.content.ActivityNotFoundException: No Activity found to handle Intent { act=android.intent.action.VIEW dat=content://org.chrisolsen.crossfit.providers.WorkoutProvider/workouts typ=vnd.android.cursor.dir/vnd.chrisolsen.crossfit.workout }

AndroidManifest
    <activity android:name=".activities.WorkoutsActivity"
        android:label="@string/title_workouts" >
        <intent-filter>
            <action android:name="android.intent.action.VIEW" />
            <data android:mimeType="vnd.android.cursor.dir/vnd.chrisolsen.crossfit.workout"/>
        </intent-filter>
    </activity>

    <provider
      android:name=".providers.WorkoutProvider"
      android:authorities="org.chrisolsen.crossfit.providers.WorkoutProvider" />

Calling activity (dashboard)
    Intent intent = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_VIEW);
    intent.setDataAndType(WorkoutProvider.CONTENT_URI, "vnd.android.cursor.dir/vnd.chrisolsen.crossfit.workout");
    startActivity(intent);

Called activity (workouts). It doesn't make it here
    Uri uri = getIntent().getData();
    ...

It seems like it should be simple, but I am confused to why it says there is no activity found.
Any ideas?

A: In order to be started with implicit intents, An activity must declare
<category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" />

A: Also, make sure you are using startActivity instead of sendBroadcast.  There is a difference between these methods.  A broadcast will not be received by an activity's intent filter.  You must use a BroadcastReceiver for that.

Note that, although the Intent class is used for sending and receiving these broadcasts, the Intent broadcast mechanism here is completely separate from Intents that are used to start Activities with Context.startActivity(). There is no way for a BroadcastReceiver to see or capture Intents used with startActivity(); likewise, when you broadcast an Intent, you will never find or start an Activity. These two operations are semantically very different: starting an Activity with an Intent is a foreground operation that modifies what the user is currently interacting with; broadcasting an Intent is a background operation that the user is not normally aware of.

Source: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/content/BroadcastReceiver.html
Android docs: sendBroadcast
Android docs: startActivity

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


A SAS 70 Type II Audit provides independent verification of a company's infrastructure, applications, and processes to ensure that they have controls that are necessary for effectively hosting and securing data. BenTek complies to industry standard best practices when it comes to the safety and security of your data. Since 2009, BenTek performs annual SAS 70 audits using an independent auditor to ensure that all security controls related to the development and operations of our services meet or exceed industry standards..
The HIPAA Privacy Rule provides federal protections for personal health information (PHI) held by covered entities and gives patients an array of rights with respect to that information. BenTek maintains full compliance with all Federal regulations regarding PHI. Users' session information is encrypted via SSL using a 256-bit Thawte security certificate with 128-bit step down. BenTek® logs and monitors all transactions in the event of accidental, malicious, or criminal activity. All BenTek® systems are protected via multiple layers of security including perimeter firewalls, host firewalls, anti-virus applications, and other intrusion detection and prevention systems. Routine updates are performed on all servers to maintain the latest security patches and updates. BenTek® encrypts all data stored and replicated to preserve privacy, authenticity, and integrity of client data.
BenTek® data and applications are housed on Amazon Web Services (AWS) facilities and automatically distributed across a national network of tier-4 data centers built to withstand flooding and category 5 storms. BenTek also subscribes to Amazon's Elastic Computing service which allows BenTek to automatically scale up the number of server processors and in-line application memory to support near-infinite load balancing needs by our customers. All technical activities such as application hosting, data storage, and site maintenance are performed by the BenTek® support staff. Clients are not required to purchase hardware or software licenses to use BenTek®..


text:
Okres Domažlice (deutsch: Bezirk Taus) ist ein Bezirk im Grenzgebiet des westböhmischen Plzeňský kraj in Tschechien. Auf 1.123 km² leben etwa 60.000 Einwohner. Hauptort ist die Stadt Domažlice. Der Okres besteht aus 85 Gemeinden und 244 Ortsteilen.

Der größte Teil des Bezirks, in dem sich 12 Naturreservate und 13 Naturdenkmäler befinden, liegt in einer Meereshöhe von 450 Metern. Zu den wertvollsten gehören die Urwälder Čerchovské hvozdy (Schwarzkopfer Wälder), Bystřice, Pleš, Starý Hirštejn und Überreste der Moor- und Feuchtwiesengebiete Louka u Šnajberského rybníka, Postřekovské rybníky, Hvožďanská louka sowie die Naturparks Zelenov, Sedmihoří und Český les. Der Bezirk ist Mitglied in der Euroregion Šumava.

Wirtschaft
Die Zahl der geförderten Rohstoffe ist gering und beschränkt sich auf Pegmatit, Feldspat, Ziegellehm und Steine. Die Industrie konzentriert sich auf die Gebiete um Domažlice, Kdyně und Klenčí pod Čerchovem. Die wichtigsten Branchen sind Maschinenbau (KDYNIUM, ELITEX MACHINERY, KOVOBEL) sowie Elektrotechnik (STEATIT, KEL – MONTÁŽNÍ TECHNIKA, HAAS – Bohemia), Feinmechanik (GALÍ–Optik), Glasherstellung (Flabeg), Kunststoffverarbeitung (PLASTIK H.T) und der Futtermittelhersteller DOAGRA. In der Holzverarbeitung sind die größten Arbeitgeber Anton Heggenstaller, CHODOVIA CZ, OTM–Möbel, in der Textilverarbeitung HODETA-Hemden, DAMO.

In der Landwirtschaft werden vor allem Getreide, Rüben, Ölpflanzen und Mais angebaut, die Viehhaltung beschäftigt sich mit der Zucht von Rindern, Schweinen und Schafen. Eine wichtige Rolle spielt auch die Forstwirtschaft. Die Arbeitslosigkeit ist die niedrigste im Kreis mit 4,6 %.

Tourismus
Den Touristen werden neben viel Natur auch historische Denkmäler präsentiert.
 Domažlice mit dem denkmalgeschützten Zentrum
 Folkloristische Region Chodsko mit alljährlichen Folklorefestivals
 Burg Chodský hrad mit einem Museum
 Museum von Jindřich Jindřich und Galerie der Brüder Špillar
 Die zum Stadtdenkmal ausgerufene Stadt Horšovský Týn mit einem Renaissanceschloss.
 Klenčí pod Čerchovem in einem romantischen Wald, mit dem Geburtshaus des Schriftstellers Jindřich Šimon Baar
 Trhanov mit dem barocken Schloss
 siehe auch Liste der Steinkreuze im Okres Domažlice
Es gibt die Möglichkeit der Übernachtung in 73 Beherbergungsbetrieben.

Städte und Gemeinden
Babylon – Bělá nad Radbuzou (Weißensulz) – Blížejov (Blisowa) – Brnířov (Premirschen) – Čermná (Tschirm) – Česká Kubice (Böhmisch Kubitzen) – Díly (Neu Possigkau) – Domažlice (Taus) – Drahotín (Trohatin) – Draženov (Trasenau) – Hlohová (Lohowa) – Hlohovčice (Lohowschitz) – Hora Svatého Václava (Berg) – Horšovský Týn (Bischofteinitz) – Hostouň (Hostau) – Hradiště (Hradist) – Hvožďany (Hoslau) – Chocomyšl (Kotzomischl) – Chodov (Meigelshof) – Chodská Lhota (Melhut) – Chrastavice (Chrastawitz) – Kanice (Kanitz) – Kaničky (Kanitschek) – Kdyně (Neugedein) – Klenčí pod Čerchovem (Klentsch) – Koloveč (Kollautschen) – Kout na Šumavě (Kauth) – Křenovy (Kschenowa) – Libkov (Lipkau) – Loučim (Lautschim) – Luženičky (Klein Luschowitz) – Meclov (Metzling) – Mezholezy u Horšovského Týna (Meßhals) – Mezholezy u Černíkova (Meßholz) – Milavče (Milawetsch) – Mířkov (Mirschikau) – Mnichov (Münchsdorf) – Močerady (Motscherad) – Mrákov (Mraken) – Mutěnín (Muttersdorf) – Nemanice (Wassersuppen) – Němčice (Nemtschitz) – Nevolice (Newolitz) – Nová Ves (Neudorf) – Nový Kramolín (Neugramatin) – Osvračín (Wostratschin) – Otov (Wottawa) – Pařezov (Parisau) – Pasečnice (Paschnitz) – Pec (Hochofen) – Pelechy (Pelechen) – Poběžovice (Ronsperg) – Pocinovice (Putzeried) – Poděvousy (Podiefuß) – Postřekov (Pössigkau) – Puclice (Putzlitz) – Rybník (Waier) – Semněvice (Semeschitz) – Spáňov (Spanow) – Srbice (Serbitz) – Srby (Sirb) – Staňkov (Stankau) – Stráž (Hochwarth) – Tlumačov (Tilmitschau) – Trhanov (Chodenschloß) – Úboč (Aubotschen) – Újezd (Aujezd) – Únějovice (Auniowitz) – Úsilov (Ausilau) – Velký Malahov (Großmallowa) – Vidice (Widlitz) – Vlkanov (Wilkenau) – Všepadly (Schepadl) – Všeruby (Neumark) – Zahořany (Sahorschan) – Ždánov (Tannawa)

Am 1. Januar 2007 wurde die Gemeinde Černíkov (Tschernikau) dem Okres Klatovy (Klattau) zugeordnet. Zum 1. Januar 2021 wechselten Bukovec, Čečovice, Černovice, Holýšov, Horní Kamenice, Kvíčovice, Neuměř, Štichov und Všekary in den Okres Plzeň-jih.

Literatur
 Zdeněk Procházka: Putování po zaniklých místech Českého lesa, 1: Domažlicko. Wanderungen durch die verschwundenen Ortschaften des Böhmischen Walds, 1: Kreis Taus, Domažlice 2007.

Weblinks

 Homepage von ePUSA (cz)

Einzelnachweise

Domazlice
Euregio Bayerischer Wald–Böhmerwald

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Welcome University of Oregon academics, students, instructors and researchers as the May 2018 Paradigma Software Outreach program beneficiaries.
This is a school based program allowing academics to receive free academic licenses of key Paradigma Software products to help them achieve more in their computer science and research projects.
During the month of May, 2018, academics, students, instructors and researchers at University of Oregon can get a free license for Valentina Studio Pro Academic (regularly $119.99) using their University of Oregon email address. A single free license is available per person.
More information on the Academic Outreach Program is available through the link below.


text:
UK government publish Clean Maritime Plan to reduce emissions
New centre to run competition for innovative ways to reduce maritime emissions
Companies invited to join new initiative from August
A consortium of British companies, academia and government, have formally established a new national centre for maritime innovation and technology ("MarRI-UK"). The centre, offering exciting development opportunities for the UK's £40bn maritime sector, is based at the University of Strathclyde, with hubs to be announced across the UK. The centre will provide a collaborative innovation vehicle to jointly tackle innovation and technology challenges.
The first area of collaborative focus is Clean Maritime. MarRI-UK will focus on research and innovation within mid TRL (3 – 7) levels to address the opportunities between "discovery and research" and "commercialisation" of maritime technologies and systems. It will develop a structured, coherent, and comprehensive approach leading to national and regional development and economic growth.
A maritime sector strengthened by MarRI-UK will help the co-ordination of research across the maritime sector by giving an understanding of commercial opportunities aligned to a shared roadmap. This will underpin government initiatives and investment and support the wider prosperity agenda linked to innovation.
Eight maritime companies (Babcock, BAE Systems, BMT Group, Cammell Laird, Lloyd's Register, QinetiQ, Rolls-Royce and Shell),supported by the Society of Maritime Industries, and four universities (Newcastle, Southampton, Strathclyde and UCL) have been working to develop MarRI-UK since 2013. Led by Patrick Carnie of Babcock Marine and Technology and Professor Alex Duffy of the University of Strathclyde, the consortium have worked collaboratively with Maritime UK to attain support and secure funding from the UK Government through different streams.
In March 2019, this unique initiative gained government recognition when the Department for Transport (DfT), alongside investment from Babcock and BMT, agreed to fund the establishment of MarRI-UK. MarRI-UK is now launching a £1M competition for innovative ways to reduce maritime emissions on behalf of DfT.
The competition was announced today in London by the Maritime Minister, Nusrat Ghani as part of The Clean Maritime Plan, an ambitious plan set out by the Minister to cut pollution from the country's maritime sector.
MarRI-UK is now at a stage where other organisations are being invited to join as a member and shape the research and innovation agenda. Membership will be opened to all UK industries of different sizes from August.
Sarah Kenny, Vice Chair of Maritime UK and CEO of BMT, said:
"The Clean Maritime Plan is an important step towards achieving a zero-emission future for the UK. Getting to net zero will not be easy, but it will present significant opportunities as well as the obvious challenges for all parts of our £40bn maritime sector. Maritime is already the greenest way of moving freight, but we can and must do more to reduce emissions.
"The good news is that the UK is well-placed to not only decarbonise our own economy, but also to share our expertise and capability with the rest of the world as they, too, embark on this most global of missions.
"For the first time, companies and universities from across the country have come together to collaborate through MarRI-UK, accelerating the UK's maritime technological capabilities, particularly on decarbonisation.
"The key ingredient to realising our clean maritime ambitions is collaboration. Between companies, academia and with government. Today's plan and government's broader Maritime 2050 strategy, crafted with Maritime UK, provides a framework to do just that."
Professor Alex Duffy from the University of Strathclyde, said:
"If you want to remain at the forefront of advancements, benefit from the collaborative network synergy, gain streamlined access to research and innovation expertise across the UK and help set the agenda and influence government policy, then MarRI-UK is for you. We are looking for sector-spanning pioneers to join MarRI-UK and spark change that will lead the way for the maritime sector of the future."
To find out more, contact info@marri-uk.org.
Filed Under: News 2019, Press Release 2019, Uncategorized

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This property is listed with adjacent properties totaling approximately 7.08 acres. It is in a prime location & zoned for Commercial. Surrounding areas include the Outlet Malls at Grand River, Bass Pro, Barber Sports, Hotel, gas station, Leeds High School & more. Come & view the Million $$$ view and envision your dream with this commercial property.