Getting a little political today - I'm looking at putting a top 50 countdown list together (maybe to run over a week) of the reasons we need a little regime change in this country.
So far I'm thinking in broad brushstrokes but want to get more specific
I'm looking at:
Toadying (to big business and Dubya)
Divisiveness
Too little too late on Climate change
Meanness of spirit
Excessive nationalism
Racism
Politicisation of public bodies - the public service in particular
Lack of vision
Anti-union fanaticism
Attacks on education
Making Australia an international embarrassment
Woeful broadband
Luck rather than skill with the economy
Bloated foreign debt
Supporting the payment of bribes to Saddam Hussein by the AWB
Driving to work this morning I came up against a situation I'd never before experienced on the roads - arriving at a roundabout at exactly the same time as cars coming from each direction.
This put me and the other drivers in the position of all having to give way to the driver on our right but also having the right of way over the drivers on our left.
I was happy to see that there was a moment where everybody waited instead of some jerk just barging through regardless and ignoring the right of way principle (which seems to be the case increasingly here I'm noticing).
After an awkward half-moment, my gaming honed twitch reflexes kicked in, I summed it up the situation and made my way through. This might seem like a minor thing perhaps but I've often been a bit backwards in asserting myself and it felt like I was making some kind of progress. So, you know, yay for me I guess :)
Here's a selection of some of the tunes that I'll be playing on Lost Highway tonight on 2XXfm (98.3) between 9.30pm and 11. (Hope you didn't miss it :)
The Rooster Moans Iron & Wine 3:24 The Creek Drank The Cradle I Am A Man Of Constant Sorrow The Soggy Bottom Boys 4:17 O Brother, Where Art Thou? Up Against The Wall Redneck Mothers Cracker 4:09 Countrysides No place to fall (Townes Van Zandt) Lisa Miller 3:19 Car tape Wedding vows Sam Evans 2:53 Brown Couch Soundtrack Tale Of The Bull The Spoils 3:48 Hurtsville Trip To Kalu-Ki-Bar Louis Tillett & Charlie Owen 3:45 The Ugly Truth Dirty Water Randall Blair And The Wedded Bliss 4:46 Tattoos And Taillights One Cowboy Junkies 5:11 Early 21st Century Blues California Jay Farrar 4:46 Stone, Steel & Bright Lights Quick Way To Hell The Fuelers 3:42 Hot Dang Make it Count Barb Waters & Kim Salmon 3:35 Rosa Duets Way Over Yonder In The Minor Key Billy Bragg & Wilco 4:06 Mermaid Avenue Postcards Goldentone 4:33 Blood Red Earth Not Even Stevie Nicks... Calexico 2:43 Feast Of Wire This Is Not The Way Home The Cruel Sea 4:06 This Is Not The Way Home Talking Talking Lion Blues Mick Thomas 3:45 Under Starter's Orders - Live At The Continental I see a darkness Johnny Cash 3:42 American III : Solitary Man A Good Soundtrack (Pushin' Fear) Ed Kuepper 3:36 Death To The Howdy-Doody Brigade Roscoe Midlake 4:49 The Trials Of Van Occupanther
The second season of Twin Peaks was released on DVD a couple of months ago, smack dab in the middle of my studies (why they couldn't just ask me when to release it I'll never know) so I've only now been able to revisit one of my favourite shows of all time.
Given the mysterious lag between the release of the first season (around 2003) and this baby, it's been quite a wait but as soon as I flicked it on last night I knew that it had been worth it.
For those who came in late, Twin Peaks was a David Lynch tv series in the early 1990s which earned something of a cult following for it's style, playful reinterpretation of the soap opera genre and moments of out and out surreality.
It was set in smallish logging town in the middle of a something's-not-right forest and (initially) centred around an FBI led investigation into the killing of a local girl, Laura Palmer.
Of course, being grounded in the soap genre, this was far from all that was going on in town and a diverse cohort of locals added interwoven tales of crime, love, treachery and all the other good things you would expect in Lynch's idealised 50's looking town.
Season two kicks off with a bang, following up from a massive cliffhanger episode that saw show hero Special Agent Cooper shot, local thug Leo Johnson shot, town beauty Shelley Johnson and mill owner Catherine Martell trapped in a burning sawmill and Laura's shrink Dr Jacoby attacked in a park.
As the show centres around Cooper and this first episode back was written and directed by David Lynch himself, there is some amazingly surreal stuff with Cooper lying shot on the ground in his hotel room dealing with visitations from the worlds most oblivious and decrepit room-service waiter and then a mystical giant.
Here's a glimpse - even though the quality is no match for the beautiful film clarity of the dvd, you'll get the gist.
Everything about this dvd worked for me - the image quality and sound were spectacular, the writing and performances brilliant and my concerns that the show might have been better in memory than reality were blown away within moments.
Whether you've never seen the show before or you've seen it a dozen times, do yourself a favour and make the time to check it out.
Yep, no points for subtlety today - two of my favourite things (trivia and 2XXfm) are coming together and by golly I'm going to let you know.
Actually, most of the details are in the flyer itself - just know that 2XXfm (98.3) is a fantastic radio station that lets you hear the music, ideas and voices that you don't get anywhere else on the airwaves and we rely on your support to keep running.
If you believe in independent media (or even if you don't, I guess), come along and have some fun.
When: 7pm Friday 29th June Where: Theo Notaras Multicultural Centre, Civic Square (opposite Legislative Assembly), Civic (Canberra) How much: $25 per person (tables of 10) - ($20 for 2XXfm subscribers)
Bookings: email trivia(at)2xxfm.org.au or call 62 300 100 (10-3 Mon-Fri)
Canberra is known in Australia for the three p's - politics, porn and pyrotechnics.
While I (reluctantly) admit that a political career is somewhat unlikely at this point (you generally have to be able to pretend to like people who suck) and my porn career is limited to applying for a job copying videos for a distributor in Fyshwick (my uni hours didn't quite suit their needs), I have at least now managed to indulge a little in the third.
Fireworks are legal in Canberra over the Queen's Birthday long weekend and this year I decided to put aside my feelings that it was all a bit juvenile or bogany/chav/white-trash or something and embrace the whole thing.
I'm really not sure what my problem was, it was great. (Possibly still slightly juvenile but what the hey.)
Step 1 was buying them - it's an odd little cottage industry that seems to spring up around Canberra at this time of year - empty shops, scout halls, pretty much any space you can think of gets rented out and there are (generally) hand-made signs all over the place advertising FIREWORKS!!!
Fyshwick is one of Canberra's industrial areas (as well as the home of porn and brothels) and the place to go for pyrotechnics.
Pussycat (who was a little dubious about the whole excursion and was heard to mutter from time to time about people blowing their hands off) came along with me and before long we found out that the leading adult shops were doing half price fireworks.
Given that everyone seemed to have sourced their gear from the same location (the packs were exactly the same everywhere you went), this seemed the logical option. (They turned out to be cheaper but I wouldn't say 50% cheaper on the whole).
Unsurprisingly, these places were crammed to the rafters - and there did seem to be a lot of the "oh well, we're here now - strictly for fireworks mind you - so we might as well browse the strap-ons, blow-ups, extenders, expanders, vibrators, mags and other things that I couldn't actually figure out."
People were walking out with armfuls of packs that would have put them out hundreds of dollars (which of course would all be used this weekend and not at any other time) and they ranged in size from suitcase-ish to the somewhat more handbag sized pack that I picked up. (It was also coloured a particularly garish and girly pink, as if to say - "no real man would be seen dead with such a small (fireworks) package").
Thriftiness (and a slight apprehension at hand-blowing-up) won out though and we exited with our pack.
Step 2 was, well basically, blowing them up. After seeing how it was done at a friend's party (hey - they were basically just tubes from what I could see) and wanting the house to share the joy, we headed out to the local park.
Here are some of the results - being the cheap pack, there were a few big bang in the sky ones but photographing those didn't quite pan out. (Although there is a pretty cool shot of one sky firework launching)
There were a few slightly scary moments - such as when the rocket type fireworks fell over half way through their burst and started shooting them horizontally instead of up into the air - and we didn't work out until half way that the stick of incense that was included was actually meant to be used as a lighter but all in all it was a bunch of good blowing stuff up fun.
No major injuries I'm happy to say although (some might say slightly ironically) the Pussycat's hand was slightly scorched by a few sparks from one of the fuses. (She's ok.)
Click on the pics for the full sized view.
(Not entirely sure what this one is but it looks kind of cool anyway)
Update: Apparently this has now been posted on The RiotACT, a Canberra news blog. G'day RiotACTers (Rioters?)
This is a short film I made in 2005 for the Lights Canberra Action film competition - it pays affectionate tribute to the Public Service culture of Canberra, Australia's capital.
The competition is set up so that you have 10 days to make a film up to 7 minutes long which incorporates 10 events and/or locations that are given to you on the first day, kind of a treasure hunt in some ways.
This was my first attempt at animation and all things considered, it came up reasonably well. (imho)
Yes, it falls out of sync a little as it goes - this I can put down as much to the difficulties of converting something from Flash to a format of video suitable for YouTube.
Many thanks once again to the stars of the show - Leonard Low as Oliver le Grad, Kate Thomas as Millie Tante, Matt Thornton for the artwork and, well, me as Syd Cardigan.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy it - cheers
Tomorrow - blowing shit up - Canberra and fireworks
It's been a big week for awesome entertainment - I finally managed to watch the first season of Wilfred and just like The Host, this has found a place in my all time top 10 tv shows. (Ok, so with The Host it was movies but you know what I mean).
For those who came in late, Wilfred is a comedy based around the simple idea that Adam, Sarah's new boyfriend, can understand every word that her somewhat possessive and all too human dog Wilfred says. It appears that only Adam has this skill but rather than being amazed by it, he just takes it in his stride. He realises though that it is unusual enough not to let on about it.
Anyway, it's really not a show about the fact that Adam can understand Wilfred, that's just taken as a given. It's really all about the comings and goings in this three-way relationship.
Sarah has had a rough time with her love-life and Wilfred has been there for all of it. It's a little unclear where Wilfred's protectiveness ends and something a little odder begins but they are inseparable and it's up to Adam to work his way around this.
Wilfred himself, unsurprisingly, is the star of the show. All of the characters are well defined and have a good amount of substance but Wilfred is just perfect.
He draws on all of the qualities of dogs - loyalty, a degree of aggression/menace, a big dollop of charm and a base of stupidity and mashes them up to produce the kind of guy that you might meet at the pub on any given night. Wilfred acts like a dog - he has issues with the postman, sprays to mark his territory, loves to chase a ball (to a point - he's not a fanatic), digs holes in the backyard and he's fine with rooting the odd leg but he also loves watching dvds, eating pizza and nachos, drinking beer, smoking bongs and swearing like a trooper.
Wilfred is unequivocally Australian but I think he also embodies characteristics that are entirely universal. We all know someone like Wilfred. The relationships that exist in this world all ring true as well. Adam is lucky to be with Sarah and he knows it and the luck often extends to the interpretations Sarah manages to attach to some of Adam's actions, which can be hilariously questionable but entirely understandable given the trials Wilfred puts him through in their battle of wills.
It's well worth making the effort to track down this series on dvd - I've seen it in JB Hifi and I'm sure it's around other places. See what happens when Wilfred gets out, when Sarah's ex and his tougher dog come to visit, when Adam calls in a TV vet to help with Wilfred's behaviour and much more.
The performances are all spot on, the writing is superb and it's beautifully made. This is gold.
It all came about from a shortfilm for Tropfest in 2002 as well - which I loved when I first saw it and I'm glad that it got picked up from there. Well done guys.
The Host is an exciting, funny, intelligent, subversive and at times scary Korean monster movie. I sat in awe at some points and happily place it somewhere in my all-time personal top 10. (Which I really keep meaning to get around putting together). I'm pretty keen now to check out other work from its director Joon-ho Bong as well.
It embraces its role as a monster flick, acknowledging the rules of the game and playing by them most of the time but bending or outright flouting them at others. It also crosses genres with such grace that calling it a monster movie seems to diminish it unfairly. (Would you call Jaws a monster movie for example?)(The direct translation from Korean is apparently The Monster as well, which I think works just fine as a title)
I'm quite loathe to reveal too much of the story as there are elements that keep you hanging on in suspense to the very end and I personally hate to go to a film knowing too much about what is going to happen.
In short, a big T-Rex sized razor toothed mutated fish/eel/axolotl looking beasty is spawned in the Han River in Seoul as a result of a U.S military scientist ordering his Korean underling to pour hundreds of bottles of old formaldehyde down the drain.
This part - not the monster obviously, well as far as we know - is based on a true story from 2000 which outraged South Korea, particularly given that the US never gave the guy up for trial.
The action revolves around a slightly slow witted but decent man Gang-du, who runs a food stand on the banks of the river with his daughter Hyun-seo and father Hie-bong. Rounding out the Park family are national archery champion Nam-joo and drunken unemployed grad Nam-il.
Naturally enough, the monster first appears not far from the Park family food stand and Gang-du is soon in the thick of it as the monster rampages through the picturesque riverside area gobbling down locals left right and centre. Well, some get gobbled down and some are carried off to the monsters lair for later. No surprises that this sets up the motivation of the Park family for the rest of the film.
This scene for me really highlighted that we were getting into something special. The opening scenes were stylish and moved well but this is where things really got moving, for a few reasons.
You see the whole monster, in broad daylight, early in the film. There's no lurking in the dark, only revealing a shadow here, a scary extreme closeup of a fanged mouth there, trying to build the horror of a beast that ultimately isn't that flash anyway. There are no disposable individuals getting picked off one by one while an innocent town moseys along in blissful ignorance. Right from the outset, it's on.
Now there are any number of reasons why monster movies have conventionally taken this approach but at the top of the list, you always suspect that it's because the monsters just don't look that impressive. This one though, brought to life by the good folks at Peter Jackson's Weta, is the goods. It looks credible and seems to actually exist in its environment, it seems to have weight.
From here the story moves on, still paying respect to the genre but maintaining its own approach. You get the military taking over the area, the plucky family on the run from the government, the whole "I know something really important but noone believes me" thing, a little trapped in hospital by the man horror, it's all there and it's all gold.
The film maker also has a clear appreciation of these conventions - there's a couple of beautiful moments in the mass memorial service / evacuation hall that sum this up. (And incidentally, how often do you see the whole grieving mourners thing when a monster rampages through a city?). A bio-hazard suited official enters the hall and is met with a hail of demands to know what is going on. He says that rather than tell them, he's sure there is a report on the tv news which will explain everything (a hallmark of lazy story telling in movies) and flicks it on. Nothing, it's all just standard programming. Oh, I guess the news isn't on yet is his response.
The dynamics of the family are what really make this film work - it just feels real and right and this strong emotional core props up the rest of the story. Everyone seems to act credibly as well - there are no "why would you do that" moments at all.
I guess it's hard to judge the acting when something is in another language - although they say that only 7% of communication is verbal anyway but again it all seemed strong and I felt connected with all of the main characters.
I took a quick squiz at some of the posts on IMDB about this film afterwards and it was interesting to see that some people felt that it got "all Michael Moore" and political. Sure, the Americans (and to an extent the Korean government as well) were the bad guys to some extent (concocting a virus/contagion threat to cover up for the formaldehyde thing) but I didn't see anything different in this to that which film makers in this genre have been doing for the last 30 years or more.
Perhaps it's taken more personally when it's not American film makers using the US Government as the bad guy.
Anyway, I'll spare you my fanboy-esque ranting for now and just urge you to get out and see it if you're not averse to this kind of thing. As far as gore goes, there's nothing overly confronting - a fantastic scene involving lots of bones and some surgical ickyness but there's almost no blood and/or guts in this at all when I think about it.
I should just mention the dynamism of this film as well - it has any number of moments that take you from genuine hilarity to biting social comment to worrying about the characters and back again in the space of moments, all happeningly seamlessly.
Here's the trailer - it's the U.K version and I don't think it does it justice and it's interesting that they spin it so heavily for it's scary/horror elements when it is a much more well-rounded thing. Focus groups I guess.
Here's the Korean one by way of comparison - it lacks subtitles but really does seem to capture the spirit and drama of the film much better
I read this story on Gaming News site Gamasutra the other day and I'm still trying to figure out exactly how a game movie based on The Sims might all play out. (Damn it, hoist by my own pedantic petard, thanks for the tip Shane)
According to a new report, Electronic Arts' best-selling franchise The Sims will be getting a live action film treatment from 20th Century Fox, with Eragon and Norbit producer John Davis at the helm.
Variety's website is reporting that the Fox has picked up the feature rights to Will Wright's massive hit franchise, and will be producing the live action film under producer Davis and screenwriter Brian Lynch.
Lynch has previously scripted his own feature length film, Big Helium Dog, which has yet to see release, and was the writer for the Spike:Asylum series of comic books based on Buffy the Vampire Slayer spinoff TV series Angel.
Electronic Arts' Sims studio head Rod Humble is said to be managing the conversion. He told Variety, " The Sims has done an interactive version of an old story, which is what it's like to have infinite power and how do you deal with it. Given that that's an old story, you can imagine how easily that would translate to traditional story telling."
Nothing further of the film has yet been announced, including plot details or any proposed cast.
Given that there is no story to The Sims - beyond that of living, consuming, breeding and dying - how exactly is this going to work. It doesn't worry me that the scriptwriter has worked on comic books primarily, they offer some of the most sophisticated forms of story telling around at the moment although these at least had some kind of character history and language to go on. The writer also wrote Scary Movie 3 (I'm not sure what that means but at least they are taking the project seriously)
I have thought that it might make an interesting story to look at life from the perspective of a character in a game - particularly if they aren't the player character but someone incidental - and their relationship with the game controller so that might be an angle they will take here.
I can see this possibly working as some kind of quirky comedy (or perhaps, given the irresistable urge this game seems to spark at one point or another to "torture" your characters by putting them in rooms without toilets or doors and getting a little Gitmo (Guantanamo) on their arses it could be a horror film)
Or apparently you could just drop a whole bunch of satellites on the characters all at once. (You really can find everything on YouTube)
It's World Environment Day today (I feel a little bad now that I overslept and decided it was too cold without gloves to ride to work) so I thought it might be good to take a quick squiz at a couple of rather cool options for transport.
I'll spare you my rants and sprays about the obstinancy of the climate change deniers - or realists/pragmatists as our glorious Prime Miniature would term it - and their insistence that a 10000:1 level of acceptance of this issue requires lengthy debate (a.k.a stalling). If you've never read Andrew Bolt's thoughts on this and feel like getting riled up, check him out here.
Ok, so option one is a very cool tool that has been added to a handful of the maps in Google Maps, a little something called Street View.
(Click for full sized view)
The Google team has taken 360 degree photos at what seems to be about 10m intervals on every street in large chunks of major U.S cities including San Francisco, New York, Las Vegas, Miami, and Denver. The detail isn't crystal clear but good enough and it has raised some issues around privacy but all in all, it's a pretty amazing thing. I just spent a good 20 mins wandering around New York City, which looks much more samey in terms of architecture than I was expecting.
This video explains the whole thing fairly well - the orange superhero suit is a little disturbing though.
Your second option, if you find you actually need to go places in a physical sense, is to offset your person carbon emissions through an organsation like Greenfleet.
For $40 they will plant 17 native trees, which should be enough to absorb the 4.3 tonnes of CO2 emitted by a standard family car in a year.
Now I realise that it's easy to feel that this is such a trivial drop in the ocean that it's barely worth doing but it's as much about taking a degree of personal responsibility and picking a side. It's about having a positive attitude that by using our collective numbers we can form a groundswell that a government in the thrall of its megacorporate mates can't ignore. (Try as they might)
I submitted my final assignment for the semester (or "session" as they somewhat strangely call them) at 11.58pm on Friday night (which registered on their system as 0.03am Saturday, damn it). It was a website with a list of annotated references to articles and papers about using games in education. Check it out here if you like. (It's basic but there are a few interesting papers)
It's been a fairly intense couple of weeks - all my own fault, can't start working without a looming deadline, you know the drill - and so the sense of not having a stack of work to do on Saturday was entirely welcome.
I've crammed so much reading and so many ideas, all of a relatively serious nature, into my brain in the last few weeks that I decided to try an off-line (no computer) day on Saturday. I had a nice bike ride to brekky at a vego cafe (beautiful black rice porridge), made a massive pot of soup, cleaned up a little around the house and played a little guitar (my poor neglected guitar).
It was only when I got into the guitar that I succumbed and powered the Black Beast up, so that I could record my playing. (Yes, I truly am that awesome that my every note - including an extended time tuning up - should be saved for posterity. Well it sounded cool at the time and in that particular state of mind. Honest. I did also have the thought that even though much of it could well suck, it might be handy for sampling and remixing.) Recording through the microphone of a $10 headset wasn't as bad as I'd thought/hoped. Moved the computer off the desk as well after realising that it really is quite noisy and am now loving the extra space.
We had a bunch of people over for dinner and I rounded up the night watching the first 4 episodes of Wilfred (more on this later but it's one of the best comedies I have EVERRR seen).
More chilling on Sunday - reading the papers, getting ever closer to 100% completion on GTA: Vice City Stories (2 unique stunts and 1 rampage to go) and a little more pottering on the 'puter and then had a little much delayed quality time with the Pussycat, who'd been off surveying birds for work.
Wrapped it all up picking tunes for the radio show today, one of which will unfortunately not be Nina Gordon's snaggarific take on Straight Outta Compton (language issues) but tune in to Lost Highway (take 2) this Thursday and you might hear it. (Hip new Gippsland band The Negotiators have made the playlist however with the track Weeds)
It's so nice to have time to get stuck into all my left by the roadside projects.
Ok so maybe this is a good time to begin a new concept in this blog, forgiveness Friday.
After my big spiel yesterday about the new radio show and its numerous levels of awesomeness (well I wasn't that o.t.t but you get the picture), I flicked on the wireless (as in radio) last night to hear a decidedly rock sounding track.
Interesting, I thought. Given that we are still in the progress of defining the show I waited to hear what came next or to see what Jerry had to say about the track but it was just followed by rock track after rock track. (With no talking at all - which as a side note I think is fairly poor radio).
Now the apparently completely finished and abandoned timeslot that we filled was previously The Rock Show so I'm assuming that word hadn't actually filtered down to all the presenters that the show was/is no more. Presumably after some fisticuffs in the foyer of the Griffin Centre, Jerry was felled and the Rock Show DJs took to the studio in triumph. So yes, sorry if you tuned in expecting one thing and got another (though in fairness, there was some ok stuff being played) and also apologies to Jerry for not being there (I'm sure we could have taken them :)
While I'm on a roll, I've been reading like a mad - uh - reader in the last few weeks for study type stuff (my brain actually feels a little tired with all this thinking) and this may have raised my pedantry levels a little high as far as people's writing online goes.
I have a bit of a bugbear about nice formatting of text onscreen - I like it to be broken up into digestible chunks, one idea to a paragraph and breaks between them that allow you breathing space to take the idea in before moving on. It's kind of like taking a pause while talking to make sure your listener is following.
Anyway, that's my issue and I should probably just as well keep it to myself but on occasion, it gets the better of me and I try to suggest my approach to people online which invariably seems to offend. I did this the other day and I'm sorry.
Forgiveness Friday does have its flaws though - I'm not quite ready to forgive Neighbours "star" Alan (Dr. Karl) Fletcher, an apparently dedicated unionist, for this story.
I'll let The Age explain:
Fletcher, the federal vice-president of the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance — the union representing Australian actors, journalists and cultural workers — provided the voiceover for radio and TV advertisements launched last week which promote the Government's workplace information line.
He's a senior unionist and he takes on a gig in the Howard Governments multimillion dollar pre-election propaganda spending spree because
The workplace relations ad appeared to me to be a non-political commercial that advertised changes to the law and how to get information about those changes.
The ad offered no endorsement of Government policy on workplace relations and, as such, did not conflict with my personal principles
Funnily enough, the first thing Employment Minister Evil Joe Hockey said about the matter was:
We have no objection to people being members of a union, and appreciate his whole-hearted endorsement of the government's workplace industrial relations reforms
Gosh, didn't see that coming. What are you, simple?. Does Neighbours not provide a decent living?
As to the argument that it was just a job and thus separate from personal politics, I'm going to have to let Dante and Randall (from Clerks) field that one.
Now (and I address this to Dr. Karl, well aware that you are just a fictional character on a soap opera) I have gone into bat for you more than a number of times, backing you up against the cruel jibes and insinuations of my Dr Karl hating friends.
I thought it was quirky when you went all "The Good Life" and did the whole home farm sustainability thing. I backed you when you botched the paternity test on Skye's bogan baby and threw Dylan and Stingray's lives into turmoil. I took it on the chin when you went to London and bumped into every halfarsed Aussie expat celebrity Neighbours could fling at you and Susan. I flinched when you took on a job as a pharmaceutical sales rep but your adventures with hair dye redeemed you for a while.
But this, Dr Karl, is too much. You're dead to me Karl Kennedy-Kinski. It's going to take some pretty goddamned fancy footwork to get out of this one and frankly I'm not sure that you - even you and Susan combined - have it in you. Shame Dr Karl Shame.
So I didn't mention this last week (couldn't stand the pressure of thousands and thousands of extra people tuning in I suppose ;) but last Thursday night my mate Jerry and I kicked off our new latenight radio show, Lost Highway. I mentioned it in passing last Wednesday but from there gears and wheels started turning rapidly in the 2XXfm behemoth and before we knew it we were being parachuted in to the slot.
I have to say, it was a lot of fun. Jerry has a phenomenal knowledge of music in this genre (primarily the North American stuff not surprisingly as a Canuck, but still...) and an enthusiasm to match and in many ways it was just like an extended chat which just happened to involve playing a whole bunch of music in a "have you heard much of these guys" kind of way.
Co-presenting was pretty cool, it can get a little boring sometimes doing a radio show ( for those who came in late, I also present Monday Sunset on 2XXfm - 4 to 6pm) but having someone to chat to during tracks - particularly when you're able to share a bit of info about a new artist - is great.
(Incidentally, I was chatting to the Pussycat last night about the possibility of some kind of weekly radio serial for Sunset, stay tuned for more on that down the road.)
The response to the debut show was encouraging - well Pussycat said she really liked it - and it was fun (and my musical repertoire is slowly growing) so it's all good.
We haven't entirely worked out who will be on when - Jerry is out of town a bit and I've been caught up with the joys of study (2 down and 1 to go :) but we'll either alternate or co-present when possible.
I can't remember what Jerry played - I don't think I'd really heard much of many of the artists (there was some Neko Case I'm pretty sure and a bit of Lucinda Williams) but my contributions included:
Woke up this morning(acoustic)-Alabama 3 (the opening track for the show)
Shark Fin Blues - The Drones
Chinito Chinito - Ry Cooder
My Tennessee Mountain Home - Dolly Parton
Make it count - Barb Waters and Kim Salmon
Ramblin' Man - The Beasts of Bourbon
California Stars - Billy Bragg and Wilco
Smokin' Johnny Cash - The Black Eyed Susans
My Margherita - The Cruel Sea
Ring of fire - Ed Kuepper
If you like your tunes with a little twang (or blues/roots/etc - probably not a lot of synth or sampling) then why don't you flick on the wireless tonight and check it out. (No streaming as yet I'm afraid - one day though I'm assured)
I used a nifty software package called FPS Creator (short for first person shooter) a little while ago to build a 3D game as a learning resource. (You may have read about it previously here, here and uh here).
It works essentially as a glorified multichoice quiz, giving the learner a choice of three doors to go through representing the answers to a question. There is a "pain zone" behind two of the doors which reduces the player's health, makes an unpleasant noise and flashes red when they pass over it. Behind the door with the right answer, any lost health is restored and my charmingly reassuring and encouraging voice tells them - "That's right, well done".
I finally used this game in a workshop on using video today and it was really interesting to see how learners responded.
I had a group of five women, aged between their twenties and fifties, none familiar with playing 3D games.
While there are instructions at the beginning explaining that users can use the W,A,S and D keys to move around and the mouse to look around, nobody realised that you need to (or can) use both simultaneously. As someone who has played 3D games for the odd hour or ten thousand, navigating an environment in this way seems self evident and so it was very useful to see this from the perspective of a newby.
A couple of them even said that moving through the space made them feel slightly sick - probably not the best outcome for learning but again something to take into consideration.
A learner who had the sound turned off didn't realise that the "pain zone" with the redness and decreasing health score (which is not necessarily something that you would notice) was a bad thing.
Watching the users with the game confirmed a few concerns that I have had with the design - notably the fact that you only get to read/hear the question once. If you forget the question or the answers, you don't really know where to go. This might be resolved by having the question and answers appear physically in the 3D space (on the walls and doors?).
While I thought that the direction players/learners have to move was clear (always up the stairs), it became obvious that when players became disoriented (unfamiliar with navigating 3D space), they could go backward, down to areas that they had already been. Signage on the walls (arrows) might help in this regard.
It may well be that the use of this kind of environment for learning might be better suited to people more accustomed to 3D games or it might be useful to include an introductory level in a simple open space that introduces new players more effectively to the control system.
All agreed that it looked impressive at least but I don't think there was a lot of enthusiasm for this approach in general. (Which isn't to say that it isn't worthwhile, just in need of tweaking.)
Update - fixed the link to the essay now - I hadn't published it as a post, only saved it as a draft. Shows how tech-savvy I am :)
I've been doing a little research about the possible implications of the Net Generation (a.k.a Gen Y a.k.a the Millennials a.k.a the iGeneration etc) on the design of interactive multimedia learning resources (as everyone does in their idle moments I'm sure) and it's actually been quite interesting.
(Hope you don't mind the extraordinarily dorky Gen Y image I found online - when you search, you either just get pictures of freshfaced young'uns or (for the most part) marketing oriented crap like this. (I thought about looking for a nice freshly scarred emo kid hopped up on Ritalin but this is funnier)
In summary, the NetGen/Gen Y/Millennials are the children of the Information Age and were born between around 1980 to around 2000. (There's a bit of debate as to start and end dates but roughly then.)
Rather than rewriting what I've already had to say, I might just quote myself. (Is that wrong?)
The so-called Net Generation (Net-Gen) are the first generation to grow up knowing nothing other than this highly connected, information rich world. As “digital natives”, they “think and process information fundamentally differently.” (Prensky 2002). Their use of ICT and attitudes toward ICT and information in general offer us a set of ideas for a new approach to education which embraces the information age. Among these are an emphasis on collaboration, connectivity, flexibility and experiential learning.
Who are the Net Generation?
Alan Kay, a member of the 1970’s Xerox PARC team, has described technology as “anything that wasn’t around when you were born” (Frand, 2000). This means that for much of the Net-Gen, personal computers, mobile phones, digital audio, sophisticated computer graphics and even the Internet aren’t considered technology, they are simply a fact of life.
While it is obviously simplistic to ascribe any characteristic to a large group of individuals, there are a number of traits which appear common to many members of the Net-Gen.
Interested in technology: Having grown up with technology, Net-Gen students consider themselves far more Internet savvy than their teachers and report seeing better ways to use technology than they are offered in the classroom.(Oblinger 2003) “Every time I go to school I have to power down”, complains one student according to Prensky. (2001)
Emphasis on collaboration: They gravitate toward group work (Howe & Strauss, 2000) and want to work with people they click with. (Raines 2003) . Massively multiplayer online games popular with the Net-Gen such as World of Warcraft and Starcraft are strongly based on collaboration.
Need Connectivity: In some ways related to their preference for collaboration, the Net-Gen make heavy usage of a plethora of communications tools including SMS, instant messaging, email and particularly online communities such as MySpace to maintain connections with friends and family. This connectivity is 24/7 and the Internet in particular means that it isn’t limited by geography.
Goal oriented: Net-Gen learners are more focused on skills than knowledge. “In many disciplines, the half-life of information is measured in months and years. From this perspective, what a person can do is more important than what degree they obtained”(Frand, 2000 p.17)
Confident and optimistic: The Net-Gen are seen as highly positive, confident and optimistic. They expect respect (Raines, 2002) and, conscious of their power as consumers, will either speak their mind or vote with their feet if they don’t get what they want.
According to Saulwick Muller Social Research (2006): “Not only has this generation been born into a prolonged period of economic growth, but they have come too late to experience the severe economic restructuring brought about by globalisation and the information revolution.
They have grown up understanding and accepting that the future is all about mobility, adaptability and change. For the most part, they are preparing for it and they embrace it.”(p.5)
Seek instant gratification: The combination of a customer service oriented world and the immediacy of digital technology means that members of the Net-Gen are felt to have “zero tolerance for delays”. (Frand, 2000 p.22).
Marc Prensky (2001) sums most of these traits up nicely when he says that “Digital Natives are used to receiving information really fast. They like to parallel process and multi-task. They prefer their graphics before their text rather than the opposite. They prefer random access (like hypertext). They function best when networked. They thrive on instant gratification and frequent rewards. They prefer games to “serious” work.” (p.2)
This of course is all of the nice stuff - it doesn't get into emo (not that there's anything wrong with that, I just find it funny and cute), Ice, Ritalin and Flintstones Chewable Prozac (which has led to another term - the Sad Generation), naivety, fame obsession, excessive trust in authority and so on - but it would be entirely too depressing if they were perfect and besides, any of these are most likely less a generational trait and more a matter of being young.
(For the record, yes I am GenX - although, of course, as a cynical slacker I reject the notion of such marketing generated terms entirely :)
I'm working on a big essay at the moment, which is relatively unstructured but quite interesting and I'd really like to hear any ideas you folks out there have on the subject.
The official topic is
Topic: What are the implications of the ‘Net Generation’ on the design of interactive multimedia learning resources?
This task requires you to submit an essay in which you critically analyse the current debate on the issue of the ‘Net Generation’ and consider what this phenomenon (if it indeed exists) means for those designing interactive multimedia resources.
So it is a fairly interesting subject - there has been so much in the media about the so-called Net-Gen a.k.a Gen Y a.k.a The Millenials etc - often in the context of the "moral panic" about YouTube bullying, MySpace predators, violent video games and the like. This on top of general generational harping about how Gen Ys are spoilt, self-centred, fame obsessed and walk into the workplace expecting to be made manager five minutes later.
These of course are the negatives and I did find a nice quote which pops up from time to time attributed to Socrates (by way of Plato) -
The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.
Apparently this is a bit of a misquote but it's indicative of the fact that perhaps the teens and 20somethings of any generation have always been looked down upon.
As far as technology, multimedia and education go, I think we can look at this generation as different in someways - Marc Prensky refers to them as digital natives (as opposed to digital immigrants) - people who have grown up knowing nothing other than the digital age. This is perhaps more the approach that I'm considering.
The predominance of the social web (MySpace, YouTube etc) as well as Computer mediated communications (Instant Messaging) and the ubiquitous nature of mobile phones will also come into play, I'm just unclear as to what it all means.
What better opportunity that to use the strengths of this social web to pick your brains dear reader and see what you think.
Please feel free to say anything, even (or especially) if you haven't commented before.
Peter Raftos played a beautiful song on 2XX this morning that made me come straight to the computer to google the lyric and find out more. (I waited to see if he was going to back-announce the track but he went into a new one).
It was I like giants by Kimya Dawson (one time Moldy Peach)
I'm not 100% sure what it was about the song that grabbed me - it's a quickly sung anti-folk/punk-folk (remember that movement?) ditty about putting your life into context and it's just so quirky, poetic and thoughtful that I had to share it.
(Of course, the odds are now that I'm actually the last person online to discover this song and everyone else is going - yeah duh :)
Here's the last verse
we all become important when we realize our goal should be to figure out our role within the context of the whole and yeah, rock and roll is fun but if you ever hear someone say you are huge look at the moon, look at the stars, look at the sun look at the ocean and the desert and the mountains and the sky and say i am just a speck of dust inside a giant's eye i am just a speck of dust inside a giant's eye i am just a speck of dust inside a giant's eye and i don't wanna make her cry
