Monday, March 18, 2024

Clearly pointless!

Sometimes I think we're on the wrong track about the parts of the future that are worth inventing, do you know what I mean? Huh? No? Yeah, that was rather vague.
Above: our grim future...today!
Pictured: a transparent screen.
Not pictured: why.
What I'm talking about is this. And I know you're not going to click on the link, but last month the computer manufacturer Lenovo showed off a transparent laptop at the Mobile World Conference in Barcelona. It is, by all accounts, exactly what it sounds like: a laptop with a clear plastic panel in place of a traditional screen, and your browser window and apps or whatever are displayed on that. Cool looking, yes, but it does beg the question: why would anyone want this. 

Um, ow? Did nobody ever
think this all the way through?
Because the future, that's why. In the same way that playing Glenn Miller's "In the Mood" lets an audience know that a scene is set in the 1940's or blimps hanging over a contemporary city means parallel universe, clear computer screens are a visual cue that establish the future. And since hover cars and jet packs have their own practicality problems--namely three dimensional car accidents and setting one's ass on fire--clear computer screens do, I suppose, suggest the future, right?

Look at that expression of hard work and
creativity, obscured by some primitive, non-
transparent laptop screen. What a waste.
But are they a good idea? Everything I've read about them boils down to "neat, but weird." It seems like it'd be hard to read anything on it, and gone is any semblance of privacy. I mean, obviously one shouldn't be looking up objectionable material in public or at work, and this thing would make it even harder to get away with, but that's basically it. Like, other than giving everyone at the coffee shop a clearer view of your face as you pretend to do work, this doesn't bring much to the table.

It's cool, and that's all. I'm not criticizing, I'm just suggesting that of all the things science fiction uses to tell us it's the future, this is probably the laziest. Don't get me wrong, parts of the 21st century have been spot on. The deteriorating climate, the casually totalitarian political figures, it's a dystopia to be sure. I just wish they'd hurry up with cold fusion and replicators, you know what I mean?
What I'm saying is: get on this.



Friday, March 15, 2024

Adventures in flat-pack

Above: not my apartment, but it
kinda looks like this right now.
What do you mean where’ve you been? I told you, I’m moving. But I’m doing it like ripping off a band-aid. That is, slowly so as to maximize the pain. I’m going over to the old place everyday after work, ostensibly to clean, but mostly I sort of stand there, surrounded by things I don’t need, but for whatever reason can’t throw away. Unnervingly, the psychology of hoarding starts to make sense. Well, after say, forty-five minutes or an hour, I say to myself: job well done get back in my car and leave.

It's best just not to think about it.
The last time I moved, I swore to myself that I would never again buy flat pack furniture. It’s universally junk. It's made from trees that have been cut down, ground up, glued under intense pressure and shaped into boards only to have wood grain painted onto it, it’s the chicken McNugget of lumber and I won’t have it. I’m forty-cough-hrrehww years old, and I am past the flat-pack stage of life. No longer will I endure the ignominy of vague instructions, missing parts, and styrofoam packing material.

They’re cheap, poorly made, and weigh forty times what they’d way if they were just made of, you know, wood. And they’re also shipped here via diesel container ship from China, so in many ways they’re everything wrong with everything.
Sorry about the planet, future generations, but the savings...the savings!
Pfft...who needs craftspeople who
know what they're doing? This particle
board nonsense will last for months. 
Where was I? Oh, right, so after not really accomplishing anything at the old apartment--but making definite, iron-clad plans to absolutely tackle it tomorrow, which is a kind of accomplishment--I go to Target where I buy more flat pack furniture. Yeah, I know what I just said, but we are all of us living in an end-stage capitalist nightmare where "manufactured wood" bookcases are the only option if we want to display all the books we’d like guests to think we’ve read as long as they don’t ask any questions about the content, so Room Essentials 11” 6-Cube organizer it is. May God have mercy on my soul. 

Anyway, all this to say, I’m sure when I’m all settled in, I can get back to voicing my opinions on video games, or Dune or whatever I use this thing for. 
On the upside, Denis Villeneuve downplayed the homophobic characterization
of Barron Harkonnen from the novel. Fat-shaming, however, is on the table, I guess...

Sunday, March 10, 2024

The day I became "that guy."

Pizza: the food you eat with your
grubby hands, like a barbarian!
I think I mentioned recently that I'm moving. Moving from the mountain wilderness into civilization and yesterday, sitting in the new place without food, dishes to put food on, and utensils to eat food with, I found myself wanting, you know, food. So I ordered a pizza as is tradition. And I was dimly aware that apps had replaced delivery as a thing. In the last eight years, I think I ordered in exactly twice at my mountain abode. It's hard to find, and at some point it was just easier to go get it myself. Which wasn't really an option last night.

Five or six more days and
I'll think about saying something.
You see, my new apartment has a parking spot, but like, nothing to stop randos from parking in it other than common decency and a vague letter "B" stenciled on it. And that should be enough, but people are the worst, and there's been a Jeep Compass there for two days. I've been formulating a carefully worded passive aggressive note, but haven't quite worked up sufficient frustration to stick it under the windshield wiper. 

Legend has it,* it's actually a Canadian
invention, making it the pizza of my people.
So I ordered a small Hawaiian--the correct pizza, and I will fight you on this--and waited. The app texted me that it was on its way and would I like to track it? Why, of course! So I spent the next few minutes watching as the little car icon wended its way towards me, stopping at my building. "Apartment?" came a text from Everett he driver. "Why, 11 good sir." Said I. But then nothing. No knock, no shout. Just a follow up text saying that my order had been delivered. Which, I mean, it had not.

Thanks Everett...ok, this is not
actually Everett, but you get the idea.
I texted Everett, but no response. I called the restaurant who, despite the din of a very busy night very kindly took the time to inform me that I'd have to take it up with Door Dash. "But it wasn't DoorDash who delivered, and the order tracking screen says to call the restaurant if there's an issue." "That's so weird. Welp, there's nothing we can do, you'll have to take it up with DoorDash." Which, I mean, I could take it up with DoorDash, but I hardly think they'll be able to help since, as I previously indicated, it wasn't DoorDash who didn't deliver the pizza.

And "there's nothing we can do?" Sure there is. They could, I don't know, give me a refund or send another pizza or write an existentialist one act about the futility of life. My point is it's not so much that they can't do anything, it's that they don't feel like doing anything.
Pictured: a pizza chef making what I am given
to understand is a very rude gesture.
"What ever happened to the customer is always
right
? And how come kids swear so much?"
-noted that guy, Andy Rooney
To say there's nothing they could do was a bit of an overstatement. And I don't want to be that guy. That guy being an old who complains about how things were better in the past which is far from true. The past had polio and no internet, but I mean, some things were better, right? Like, traditionally, when one ordered pizza delivery, said pizza would arrive eventually. And if it didn't, they'd at least give you a refund or something. I'm just not sure that throwing one's hands up and saying "that's DoorDash for ya..." and then keeping the money, is the best customer service. Oh god...I'm that guy, aren't I? 



*legend being my word for I think I saw a YouTube about it once. Also, I'm only a quarter Canadian, so I guess 

Tuesday, March 5, 2024

Mountain folk no more!

Pictured: the stunning natural
beauty I'm so sick of.
So I'm moving to Santa Cruz, which, if you recall, is where I've been saying I live, but it's not, it's a lie. You see, this area is, for reasons passing understanding expensive. Like, New York City expensive, but without all the character, energy, and cool things to do. Don't get me wrong, Santa Cruz is perfectly lovely, it's just that due to exorbitantly hight rents, I have to live twenty minutes outside town in the Santa Cruz mountains which is...well it's nature. And I'm not a particular fan of nature. Like, I would prefer that it exists, I just don't want to live in it. 

Yeah, I'm the worst. Anyway, after nine years of power outages, insect bites, and tree limbs crashing down from above, I'm out of here and into Santa Cruz proper. 
Pictured: the aforementioned natural beauty, seen here taking
out the power lines and blocking the only way out of our street.
Above: unmitigated gall.
It's not like they're making more coast.But then an apartment cropped up that costs more or less what I'm overpaying now, but has a room for food preparation that's separate from where I sleep. In my hunt for a new place to live, I encountered a shocking number of places where the owner threw a mini fridge and a microwave into a closet and called it a kitchen. They then had to unmitigated gall to ask two thousand dollars a month. Can you imagine? The cheek ofit. But that's scarcity for you. Everyone want's to live by the sea and it's not like they're making more coastline. 

Oh, sorry, I'm getting tedious again. Blaming everything on capitalism, but in my defense, it is capitalism's fault. Oh well. I shouldn't be complaining. Railing against the evils of the unfettered capitalism that's been destroying the country for the past forty years, and ensuring that mine and every generation to come will be crushed by corporate feudalism, sure, but not complaining. Anyway, if you're free on Saturday, want to help me move?
Pictured: that time Reagan ruined everything forever.

Thursday, February 29, 2024

Death before recliners!

So I went and saw a play the other night, and some things struck me. About the experience, that is. Like, nobody threw anything at me. Anyway, first, I want to make it clear that I'm not reviewing this play. I don't review things. You didn't ask me what I thought, and that's fine. I'm bringing this up because it's a thing I did, and we're friends. Right? ...right? I mean, at best we're friendly acquaintances? No? Wow...well, I appreciate you're honesty...I guess.
In fact, you'd be surprised by how disinterested everyone is in
my thoughts about the play. Or in theatre in general for that matter.
Someday I'll stop kicking it while
it's down. That day is not today.
Anyway, you probably don't know this about me (after all, we're sub-acquaintances), but I like theatre. Spelled "re," you know, the pretentious way? Like throwing a "u" into colour or favourite. Oh, and doughnut. Going to see theatre, yes, but also like, doing theatre. Community theatre. Yeah, I'm one of those. "But uh...why?" You might ask? I don't know, because it's a growth industry. Like newspapers and video rentals. And yes, I totally get that theatre, as a form of entertainment, is not exactly on fire right now. I'm fine with that.

To a point. So the show I saw, a production of James Goldman's The Lion in Winter, was good. I, in no way, want to suggest that this show or the theatre company that produced it, didn't put on a perfectly good production of one of my favorite plays.
Also, you've got to admire a regional theater company that takes on a play most
people know from a movie starring Katherine Hepburn and Peter O'Toole.
Above: this, but with old people.
That said, as I sat in my seat in row H (they went up to J) watching the audience file in, I was struck by the fact that until about five minutes before curtain, I was the youngest person seeing the show that night. And I'm not particularly young. The average age was, and I'm giving you my best estimate here, seventy? And with a hundred and eighty seats in the theatre, that works out to roughly twelve thousand, six hundred years of life experience in that room. An ice age of theatre goers would perhaps be the collective noun the for the audience that night. 

I wonder if DJ's would be surprised
to know how disinterested everyone
else is in what they do...
And that's great. I have no beef with the seventy-plus crowd. I'm delighting that they're attending live theatre, it was just a little disheartening to me that that was the overwhelming demographic last night. That's not to say young people didn't attend. A whole--what's the collective noun for zoomers? A rizz? Sure, let's say a rizz of zoomers sat next to me talking loudly about their DJ gigs and marveling that the show wasn't by Shakespeare. Which, fine. Not everyone has a bachelors in theatre, many people chose to get real degrees. 

Dank? Really kids?
Anyway, it was around the moment that the twenty-something--let's call him Aiden--next to me nodded off about ten minutes into act I that it occurred to me that not everybody is into it. Theatre, I mean. The youths just aren't theatre stans. They just don't find it...uh, dank. Am I using that right? Dank? Look, I'm sorry, I just can't with the internet list of Gen Z slang, my point is while me and the ice age were super into Henry and Eleanor sniping at each other for two and a half hours, the kids were not.

That's not to say all the youths, surely there are still theatre kids out there. But for some reason, it's mostly for the olds...huh? What? Oh, did it sound like I was setting up some kind of solution? Because I wasn't. I mean, I wish I knew how to fill seats, I just, don't. I'm open, you know, if you have any ideas.
Movie theatres have resorted to food service at your seat and chairs that recline
almost horizontally. But I think theatre, as an art form, would rather die before 
letting audiences lounge their way through Clybourne Park or whatever.

Sunday, February 25, 2024

Mars Needs Data

I don't want to tell gross tech companies how to conduct their illegal, covert data collection, but I mean, rule one is maybe don't label the app "FacialRecognitionApp.exe." You know? 
C'mon, it's like big brother 101.
I'm having trouble thinking of a
non-sinister use of the technology. 
I mention this because a student at University of Waterloo was clued into the fact that the M&M vending machines on campus were secretly collecting facial recognition data when the machine glitched and displayed an error message referencing the application. "hey so why do the stupid m&m machines have facial recognition?" SquidKid47 asked. The unsatisfying answer? So they can sell you M&M's. You know, better.

Methinks something sinister lies behind
all the fondue and army knives...
Another undergrad who writes for the school student news site reached out to the Switzerland-based company that manufactures them, Invenda Group AG. They told them that the machines collect age and gender information without the customers consent of knowledge so as to better provide them with targeted ads. They also insist that the data is anonymous, that is, the machine knows someone whom it has identified as a particular gender and age bought a whatever. The data is collected locally and not shared with any centralized database. 

I certainly wouldn't want to be outed as one of
the weirdos who likes the peanut butter kind..
And why would they lie? Like, in fairness, the machines aren't secret. One wouldn't necessarily ask the question "what if my vending machine is spying on me?" but there is a website for the Mars Intelligent Vending Machines which advertises its "[d]irect, targeted marketing point of sale" which, it doesn't explicitly stat that it's snapping pictures of college kids without asking, but it does at least mention the feature. Although it does say that it can "recognize customers" in order to target ads and that sounds like the opposite of anonymous data collection.

Well, marketing people maybe.
But they're not like us.
But aside from the privacy concerns, I have other issues with this. First, I defy them to teach a machine to recognize the complexities and nuances of the human gender spectrum with any accuracy. Humans haven't figured that out yet, and I resent the suggestion that gender identity has any bearing on M&M buying habits or is any of Invenda's business. And secondly, how much data do they really need? Like, nobody's asking vending machines to advertise at them better. Nobody likes targeted ads. 

It's just a grim world we live in where something like this comes to light and rather than an immediate apology and promises to disable the machines, the company behind it just sort of shrugs and says don't worry, we're only violating your privacy and making bold assumptions about you as a person so we can better hone our ability to persuader you to buy things you don't need. I mean, they could at least act contrite and lie to us.
"Now settle down and keep consuming. I'll be here quietly observing
you and thinking of new ways to sell you things you don't need."
-Capitalism


Saturday, February 24, 2024

Today in crushing disappointments:

Like a dagger in the heart you guys, a dagger in the heart. Once again--huh? Oh, sorry, you want context. Well, it's about a video game that is not making it to the U.S. anytime soon, so "crushing disappointment" might be a bit strong. Oh, and brace yourself, this is a nerdy one, so bail out now if you so choose. I won't take it personally. Well, I will but I don't want to make you feel bad, so I won't say anything.
Pictured: you, probably.
The fact that you're probably looking at
this and feeling nothing says a lot about
us, but it's ok, we can still be friends.
Sill there? Super. So, earlier this week, I watched all twenty-five minutes of Nintendo's Partner Direct presentation which, for the uninitiated, is essentially a commercial. A twenty-five minute ad for video games. And I can't stand commercials, but I was willing to watch this one because I was under the impression that Mother 3 was coming to Switch and that it would be announced during this thing. It was not, but why then was I, a grown ass adult, so frustrated this no-show-ery? Because Mother 3.

Although that is the face of the man who
who would have a localized copy of Mother 3
in his desk...I mean, look at that smirk.
Mother 3
 is the sequel to Mother 2, or, as it's known to us United Statesians, Earthbound. A quirky, cult Super NES roleplaying game from the 90's. The third game in the series never got an official, translated release. Instead, it's become something of a white whale for Nintendo-fans. It was like running joke for years that former Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aimé kept it locked in his desk drawer or something. He didn't, but really nobody seems to know exactly what the deal was.

This was, after all, the era of things like 
I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry.
It's possible that the hesitancy to release it outside Japan has to do with some characters called Magypsies...as in magic gypsies. Yikes. In addition to having a pretty offensive name, they're gender non-conforming, which in the less enlightened 2000's may not have been dealt with in a fashion we would be ok with now. But on the other hand, maybe it was? Or maybe the localization could fix it? Or maybe it's not about that at all and everyone's just speculating.

Although hiring that guy to come out
and do "sad trombone" at the end of
the presentation was a bit much.*
Anyway, it wasn't like the presentation was slapped with any kind of tease for the game, I just happened across some reactions online and one of them mentioned Mother 3, so I made an assumption that it was finally coming to the U.S. Disappointing? Sure, but that's on me. But what's really getting to me, apart from the fact that I, a grown-ass adult has been pining away for the release of a twenty year old video game, is that I've never played it. In fact, I never even finished Earthbound. People who've played the unofficial fan translation say it's good, but it's the principle.

It's an unknown quantity and therefore intriguing. And the sense that it's such an arbitrary move to not bring it over. Like, Nintendo was offered the fan translation patch for free, but was just like: naw, we're good. But then weird, baffling decisions are par for the course for that company. And yet I keep giving them my money, so again, a lot of this is on me.
"No, keep your money. We enjoy your frustrated suffering."
-Nintendo



*Ok, they didn't, but might as well have.