From Collector’s Weekly, via Boing Boing.
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David (@ng_dave) is Faculty at the Michael Smith Labs. His writing has appeared in places such as McSweeney's, The Walrus, and also as an occasional blogger at boingboing.net. He plans on using Terry as another place to highlight the mostly science-y links he appreciates. In fact, if you liked this one, you might also like his main site generally - this can be found at popperfont.net.
00by Nick Thornton
“Engage or die.” That’s the kind of line we’re fed everyday, those of us attending or anyway attached to social media. An upcoming local education technology conference brazenly uses the same slogan to entice participants into shelling out nearly $500 to join a collective start-up self congratulatory affair. Don’t get me wrong, my friends run start-ups, work at start-ups and wax poetic about their next great idea. And I believe in what they do. Hell, I do what they do. We all want a hand up, a neck out and a dollar in.
I’m a cynical person and even I can find value in conferences. I love talking to professors, students, administrators, engineers, scientists and people just interested enough to give a damn about what the niche-marketers are up to. Coming together to share knowledge and ideas is an age old tradition I hope never dies. But something worries me: the increasingly high price paid by start-ups for simply attending one of these conferences, regardless of whether or not there is any direct pay off to the person registering.
We are told social media is king. But is it? What does 200 Facebook likes mean? What does 2,000 followers mean? Do any of those people buy anything? We all know how many self-appointed “social media experts” there are on Twitter. And sure, they may have 15,000 followers but do any of those “followers” ever buy something, do they leave a comment, do they even visit the person’s site?
I’ve spent around $150 this summer on Facebook ads for my start-up (which is a considerable sum for a poor student start-up such as mine) and I have found something out. People are sweet. I have punks from Pakistan, disenchanted youth and business people from Mexico, academics from the UK, Argentina and Chile and young people far more media savvy than my own country from Iraq and Afghanistan following me on Twitter and Facebook and yes, they do “engage.” They challenge what I post. And what I do is better for it. And you know what? I learned a lot more from them than I’d ever learn from a conference that would charge me $500 just to show up. Your audience is waiting; if your product sucks, they will let you know.
We don’t need conferences. We don’t need “experts.” We need people. Anyway, anyhow, they will change your life. And isn’t that why we do this, not to change lives but to have our lives changed?
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Gustavo Sousa “uses the five colorful rings, representing each of the five continents taking part in the games every four years, to display a series of informative graphs about the world we live in today. The topics range from general facts like the world’s population to staggering statistics that reveal the ratio of people living with HIV, as symbolized by the size of the circle representing their continental location. Key: Blue is Oceania (Australia and its proximate islands); Yellow is Africa; Black is Europe; Green is Asia; Red is the Americas.”
By Gustavo Sousa, text via My Modern Met.
00So true.
By Fake Science.
How much time do you spend on a computer/cell phone/tablet each day? I’ll start – I’m probably close to at least 5 hours I figure. Yikes! That’s kind of sad actually, even if a lot of it is work related.
+20We know propaganda exists, but we tend to think of it coming from the other guys. Sometimes it’s a tricky thing to spot in our society, but it’s certainly there. As Charles Baudelair said of the devil, “the finest trick of the devil is to persuade you that he does not exist,” propaganda has been so spectacularly successful for the very same reason. Of course, there’s more of it today than ever. Beer ads, reality TV, and all sorts of mediums serve propaganda functions: from convincing you that this drink will make you happy, in the case of beer ads; or that people (usually, women) are spiteful and small, in the case of reality TV. This is of course much more insidious and corrupting than totalitarian propaganda; totalitarian propaganda, like the North Korea link above, is outlandish and easy to dismiss.
However, sometimes we too create outlandish and easy to dismiss propaganda. Case in point America’s Army, the videogame created by the US military. Well, they took it a step further. America’s Army now has a comic book:
According to Wired’s Danger Room, it just sucks:
The plot is rote, the bad guys are generic to the point of being invisible and the McGuffin — the WMD — is an almost laughable apology for George W. Bush-era warmongering. But, yes, the Army uniforms, firearms, helicopters and vehicles are portrayed very realistically, down to the buckles on the combat vests and the sound of an M4 carbine firing.
In short, America’s Army shoots for ultrarealism for all the things that don’t really matter, and glosses over the stuff that counts. Like, you know, believable emotions, real countries and conflicts, enemies with actual personalities and any admission at all that the good guys aren’t perfect and even the U.S. Army fights bad wars.
Which just makes it bad propaganda:
The good news, for anyone wary of the military buying its way into publishing and the arts, is that America’s Army probably won’t influence very many people as long as its characters are flat, its antagonists even flatter and its stories clichéd.
What other examples of bad propaganda are there?
Gordon Katic (@gord_katic) is a student coordinator for the Terry Project, co-host of the Terry Project Podcast on CiTR 101.9FM, columnist for The Ubyssey, as well as a student of philosophy and political science at the University of British Columbia. He's mostly into sharing quirky links, but sometime he'll try to provoking meaningful discussion about international politics, economics, climate change, and the UBC experience. For a bio, see here: http://www.terry.ubc.ca/index.php/2011/06/09/meet-gordon-katic-a-new-student-staff-member/
+10Last week, I shared a link of conservative icon William F. Buckley interviewing the poet Allen Ginsberg.
I am very amused by these sorts of interviews — ones where a strange or bohemian artist speaks to an ordinary talk show host. It’s a lot like the “the straight man” comedy routine, where you contrast “the funny man,” with the ordinary “straight man.”
David Letterman probably does this better than anyone. Check out these very strange interviews…
From Open Culture, Tom Waits.
In 1986, Letterman introduced Waits as “probably the only guest we’ve had on this program who was born in the back of a taxi,” which I assume still holds true. Just above, we’ve embedded his 1983 Christmastime sit-down, which Waits’ fans seem to regard with special fondness, and in which Letterman first learns this choice fact. Beyond that, Waits sings two songs and discusses his various unorthodox residences (motel, trailer, car), the use of brake drums as percussive drums on his then-latest album, and how he intervened when a schoolboy was suspended for bringing one of Waits’ records to show-and-tell. In Waits, we have the prime living exemplar of a certain particularly American style of performing and songwriting, and in Letterman, we have the prime living exemplar of a certain particularly American style of simultaneously silly and self-aware humor. What luck for the country that these two can get together as often as they do.
via Cracked,
Harmony Korine is the heroin-chic avant garde writer/director who helped bring us Kids and Gummo, two mock-documentaries about how terrible stuff can be if youre poor, HIV-positive, addicted to drugs, or just leading a miserable, fucked up life. I know what youre thinking: laughs ahoy!
The famous Madonna interview,
The all time best, also from Cracked, Crispin Glover
Twenty years later, debate still rages in the lamer corners of the Internet as to whether this is footage of Crispin Glover, worlds best actor, or Crispin Glover, worlds highest man. Fake or real, its worth watching if only to see Paul Shaffer with slightly more hair.
What are your favorite awkward interviews with artists? Share in the comments!
From Andy Holloway, a delightfully bizarre interview Bob Dylan did with Playboy.
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About
How to be a Useful Cynic
by Nick Thornton
I will start right off the bat by saying that on the surface and perhaps a little deeper, I myself am a cynic. It’s not that I necessarily want to be but I have a ready disposition to point out what I don’t like about something. But being critical doesn’t mean you have to be a jerk; here’s a few lessons I’ve learned along the way that will help people see you as a critical thinker and boundary pusher rather than just an a negative ass.
1. Be Critical, Not Negative.
Having an opinion is cheap, so have an informed opinion. Ask questions rather than statements about how much you dislike something. Ask people why they believe something, where they came by their information and then propose another possible interpretation. Just saying you disagree or that you don’t like something before someone has even explained their position means you aren’t listening, you’re just waiting for your turn to speak.
2. Timing
Be bold and assertive but recognize not everyone else has the same way of dealing with issues or problems. Maybe you can take heavy-handed criticism but it doesn’t mean that everyone can. I often run into this dilemma as people sometimes think I’m being overly critical of something because I don’t like it when in fact, they are making me think so my criticism is meant as a compliment. Make sure you know when and if your expert in depth criticism is called for.
3. Offer Solutions
Pointing out a problem is a pretty easy thing to do. Offering up a viable, positive solution is much harder. People will value your criticism much more if you are able to suggest an alternative (and better) solution. I sometimes frame it like this for people: don’t tell me that it sucks, tell me why it sucks and how to make it better.
Nick is a 4th year History major at UBC, as well as the CEO (and sole employee) of Unboring Learning.com, a free online learning site. His 5th grade report card said: "Nick is a conscientious student but distracts his classmates." You can follow him on Twitter: @unboringlearn