Pop Culture Comes in Time to All Things
08/26/2008 (Changing times, Social commentary)
No, no, not the Tibetan Book of the Dead as a comic. No. No …. Yes. The Preamble is below.
Click here to take the whole ride, so to speak.
Archive for the 'Changing times' Category
The Best of Times? The Worst of Times?
07/23/2008 (Changing times, Politics, The return of the commons)
Whether we live in the best of times or the worst of times (or both), no doubt we do live in both the blessing and curse of exceedingly interesting times. At the “worst of times” end of the scale, we find the “shock doctrine” and the rise of “disaster capitalism” as promulgated by Naomi Klein. [...]
I’m Not Getting Older, I’m Getting Googler
06/24/2008 (Aging, Changing times, Uncategorized)
Has your reading changed since spending 10 years with the Web? Mine has. Age? Or the Age of Google? Oddly, I read more books now than I have in the past few years. Giving up cable TV helps. But I admit that long, dense reads are a tougher go. In any event, the article below [...]
At $500 Per Ad Maybe I’ll Run For Office Again
06/22/2008 (Changing times, Politics, Uncategorized)
I guess it had to happen: prefabricated, easily personalized digital ads. And it’s happened for political as well as commercial ads. Check out this video from SlateV.
Why an Obama Landslide?
06/17/2008 (Changing times, Politics, Uncategorized)
Why a landslide for Obama? That can be a long conversation, and I write short posts. So I point, first, to Frank Rich’s column in last Sunday’s NY Times. He provides a good and readable analysis for the forthcoming tsunami (switching to an oceanic metaphor). Rich also notes the mainstream media will not cover this [...]
The Counting is Over and the Shouting Has Quieted
06/09/2008 (Changing times, Politics)
Obama has achieved the nomination, “presumptively” of course. And Clinton, after her evening of “deranged narcissism,”* saw the handwriting all over the wall of the Media and Internet saying that her historic run had ended. What a bummer to go from candidate assured of being anointed to also ran…and also ran to such an upstart.
So [...]
“The Fall of American Conservatism”
05/23/2008 (Changing times, Politics)
“Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.” Eric Hoffer as quoted n the article that gave this post its title. The article is long, informative, and most readable. Written by George Packer, it can be found in the New Yorker at the link below.
The fate Republican [...]
The Ecstasy of Influence
04/24/2008 (Changing times, The return of the commons, Web 2.0)
Earlier in these posts I’ve noted the rise of the Creative Commons and Open Source software movements as indications of how the understanding of creativity (and ownership of creative works) is changing in a larger context that I call “the return of the commons.”
For the viewpoint of a well-known novelist, Jonathan Lethem (b. 1964) [...]
I’m Not a Senior Yet
03/18/2008 (Changing times, Social commentary, The return of the commons)
Back in November I wrote about becoming a senior and some of what that entailed. I wrote too soon.
No I haven’t reversed the aging process, nor have I succumbed to the tranquilizing motto that “60 is the new 40.” Rather I heard Marc Freedman talking about his book Encore: Finding Work that Matters in [...]
It’s All Over but the Counting
02/24/2008 (Changing times, Politics, Social commentary, The return of the commons)
After the Texas debate with Hilary testing a gracious exit from her hopes of the presidency, not to mention the delegate totals and the virtual impossibility of her catching Obama, it’s all over but the counting. I predict that Obama will win the Democratic nomination and then the general election.
What’s happening here? The pundits for [...]
Watching the Political Discourse Change
01/21/2008 (Changing times, Politics, The return of the commons)
More than 20 years ago Ronald Reagan shifted the dominant political discourse in America. Today it looks like it may be Obama’s time. His campaign for president continues on a visionary path. Odd it is to see a communitarian vision poised against the backdrop of the every capitalist for himself theater of the past 20 [...]
Politics and Presence
01/05/2008 (Changing times, Politics, The return of the commons)
After 20 years in the wilderness, political, that is, it’s good to have called an election, even if it’s only the Iowa Democratic caucuses. Obama won. Given the size of his victory and his flourishing rhetorical skills (see the video below) I predict victory for him in New Hampshire.
In regard to the title of this [...]
Women for Obama
12/06/2007 (Changing times, Politics)
Another video. This one is by the Obama campaign and is designed for women. It’s “long,” 20 minutes. But with the soundtrack, the editing, and overall production, it’s also easy to watch.
The video is instructive in a couple of ways. One goes to the question of how does a male candidate run against a female [...]
Google Zeitgeist
11/30/2007 (Changing times, The return of the commons)
Google is one of the forces shaping the world. [Something of an understatement.] Putting human faces to Google, in the simplest way, is to name founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page (and CEO Eric Schmidt). This October at the Google Zeitgeist Conference, the two founders were interviewed by heavyweight journalist James Fallows. The YouTube video [...]
The Prince of Silicon Valley Urges its Citizens to Do More to Fight Global Warming
09/27/2007 (Changing times, The return of the commons)
Legendary venture capitalist John Doerr (aka “The Prince…) told members of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group that they must do much more about climate change. The report of his talk from the San Jose Mercury is reproduced below. Click here for the article at the Merc’s website.
VC John Doerr presses Silicon Valley to fight climate [...]
If You Can’t Fight ‘Em, Join ‘Em: The New York Times Shuts Down Times Select
09/21/2007 (Changing times, The return of the commons)
The Times has killed the subscription based Times Select. It’s columnists and the last 20 years of its archives are now free. Given the Times’s cultural position, this is a mildly historical marker for both Internet journalism and the Creative Commons intellectual property movements.
For the Times’s announcement, click here.
For Dan Gilmor’s commentary on this [...]
Global Retribalization and the Balkanization of Everywhere
09/20/2007 (Changing times, Politics)
Let’s see, we (America) are trying to keep together an artificial, European invented, multi-ethnic and religious state in Iraq while Belgium is splitting apart along cultural and linguistic lines. What, as the phrase goes, is wrong with this picture? The title of this post comes from the work of Marshall McLuhan.
“There are two extremes, some [...]
Infidelity Like Email, is Now Forever
09/15/2007 (Changing times, Reflections on living)
Mix together our inability to live together with openness and trust with computer technology and what do you get? Among other things, an explosion of juicy (and sad) divorces. Now the record of infidelity, and not the engagement diamond, is forever.
From the New York Times:
The age-old business of breaking up has taken a [...]
A Good Introduction to Creative Commons Licensing
06/23/2007 (Changing times, The return of the commons)
I’ve read a fair amount about this, but a good, brief (8 minutes) introduction can be had in the video below, “Prof. Lawrence Lessig Explains Creative Commons Licensing.” Lessig has been the leading speaker and one of the key inventors of the Creative Commons movement that is challenging the current copyright regime.
Don’t be put off [...]
The (Bio) DaVersity Code
04/19/2007 (Changing times, The return of the commons, Web 2.0)
That we as a society are now aware of our interconnectedness with the environment (the “tipping point” being Al Gore’s Oscar for “An Inconvenient Truth”) goes hand in hand with the rise of video. Young “boomers” raised on television began the environmental movement; “generation next” holds the promise of fulfilling it.