The Way You Look Tonight

As I was flipping through the channels on my TV the other night, my family stopped to watch a press conference with President Obama about the ebola crisis in the United States.  As we watched him speak on the subject, I noticed just how tired he looked.  I remember canvasing for Obama back in 2008, and the now worn and tired president is not the same young and spirited man he was when he first ran for office. 

 I thought back to many history classes that I have taken in which we discussed the question whether or not Franklin Delano Roosevelt would be elected for office if he ran today.  If we think of solely his politics, it is easy to think that he would still be voted into office by Americans today.  However, we must also consider his physical condition.  A victim of polio as a child, FDR was weak in his lower body and used crutches and a wheelchair.  When he gave speeches, he leaned against the podium for support.  If television had prevalent in American homes at this time, would people have still voted for him, seeing that he was physically weak?

                








 Personally, I do not think that America would have elected FDR into office.  This was an era before television, an era before the majority of Americans could judge a public official based on their physical characteristics.  The first television was introduced to the American public at the 1939 World's Fair at which FDR gave a speech to welcome all of those in attendance.  It wasn’t until the early 1950s, however, that more than fifty percent of Americans owned TVs.

                 
  Television has influenced politics and increased the importance of the public image.  Before television, people could listen to politicians on the radio or read about them in the news, but there was no way in which the masses could observe the actions and the physical appearance of a person and make judgements about him.  With the invention of the television came the importance of having a presentable image.  Politicians are constantly under public scrutiny, for there are always fans, interviewers, or paparazzi waiting to film or take a picture of a public personality.   The public image has become so important in today’s society.  The body language and physical appearance of a politician suddenly became much more important to the public once the masses were able to watch a public figure live on TV.

                                                                               
                                                                              VS.

The importance of the public image adds a whole new element to politics.  Because of the influence of television, politics are no longer mainly based on what the politicians believe or what they promise their constituents, but instead on the way a politician looks.  America aims to vote for someone who looks strong, friendly, trustworthy, and like they will be able to protect America in a time of crisis. 

Controversy amongst the 4th Estate

For those of you who don't know, here is a quick lesson on our government in the U.S. as it pertains to the topic of discussion. As some of you may know, our democratic government runs on a series of checks and balances through different branches of government. We have the Judicial, Executive, and Administrative branches constantly trying to keep each other in line while maintaining different powers. Although we have these three estates watching over each other, we have developed the mainstream media as a 4th estate to really make sure things are being run legally, ethically, and morally. The three branches are controversial enough as it is on how they run things sometimes so we trust the media to subside some of those dilemmas with they're exposing of the truth. But what if the 4th estate was manipulated by the government, what if these news networks were not exposing the truth the way they should? Where would that leave us?

Well, I bring this all up as CBS is in a pretty sticky situation with their News president David Rhodes. David Rhodes happens to be brother with Ben Rhodes, the White House deputy national security adviser. It has been brought to light that CBS may have been going soft on the report about the recent Benghazi, Libya attacks in 2012 due to the close ties between the two Rhodes brothers. In defense of the matter, CBS has here been having current discussions about the attacks without David Rhodes being present.

It is scary to think that the White House has such close ties to such a major news network. It makes you wonder if there is more to the stories that are being reported by CBS and any other news network for that matter. Personally, I feel it is highly unethical to have the deputy adviser for the president have family relations with the President of a major news network whether they are in close contact or not. If you're brother asked you to cover something up to protect his job, would you? Something should be done about this controversial issue fast or else may be continued to get a government edited version of the news.

Comcast and Time Warner Merger

Two of the largest US TV providers are planning on forming a merger that seems a bit... illegal? Comcast a proposed to purchase Time Warner for a staggering $45.2 billion making it the largest network TV provider in the US. It sounds an awful lot like a monopoly is being formed yet for some reason the deal is going through. It really makes you wonder if this is actually a fair merger or if politics are involved. It leads one to wonder who is getting a nice paid vacation to allow for this to happen. At the same time there may be an angle of this that I'm overlooking and this agreement is perfectly savvy.
 This new conglomerate would allow for Comcast to hold a lot of power amongst any media contract that could be formed. Comcast seems to believe this merger will prove beneficial to the customers in that it will allow for them to impliment their new cloud system and faster broadband speeds. Personally I could live with out these new benefits if that means not increasing my monthly cable fee but I don't think that really matters. It seems that anything really is possible in this country if you have enough money and power. This isn't the first time Comcast has pulled a stunt like this. A few years ago they ventured to purchase NBC for $17 billion dollars and were successful. Where is the line drawn? When it comes to this kind of control it's not just about the the viewers but also the advertisers. I'm assuming you understand that by practically having a monopoly Comcast can charge advertisers virtually any price they want to be on their programs (or as much as the law allows). In conclusion it I am not a fan of this acquisition and hope that someone puts a stop to it. An example needs to be made showing that there is a limit to how large a market an individual business can control.

House of Cards Kills

After listening to Arturo's such positive comments about the brand new Netflix series "House of Cards", I decided I'd give the first episode a try and see if they held true. 12 episodes later... I concurred that Arturo was right.

House of Cards proved to be a very intelligently written political drama that kept you on the edge of your seat throughout. It was extremely difficult to stop watching once I got started, with the ending of each episode leaving you on even more of a cliffhanger than the last. In addition to the excellent storytelling, the acting was absolutely superb. Kevin Spacey delivers an immaculate performance as Francis Underwood, the ruthless Majority Whip whose hellbent on scheming his way to the Presidency, and not letting anyone get in his way. However he still doesn't outshine his co-stars, with Robin Wright, Kate Mara, and Corey Stoll bringing their A game as well.

This is the second original series Netflix has put out, and this one really knocked it out of the park. Whether or not the show is a success hinges on how many of Netflix's subscribers decided to watch the show and keep watching once they got started. Netflix hasn't released any numbers yet, but the hope is that releasing an entire season all at once will keep viewers hooked given the accessibility of the next episode, as opposed to releasing each one weekly. Essentially, Netflix hopes their original series inspires the "binge watching" in which many customers end up using the service for (especially college students). After my experience, I have no doubt that it will.

Fall Preview: Argo, Moonrise Kingdom, Seven Psychopaths, Looper

Must See Movies For This Fall:
The following is a review of several movies coming out this Fall that already have buzz both with general audiences and critics.

Argo:
The declassified story of a CIA operative who has to infiltrate a hostile Iran in order to save six Americans seeking refuge in the house of a Canadian ambassador. The film is based off of the 1979 Iran hostage crisis, which adds to the intensity of this political thriller.

Moonrise Kingdom:
This film is going to be a serious awards contender because of it's trueness to film form and cinema photography.  The plot is a classic style love story of a young boy and girl who meet, run away together, and fall in love.  However the spin on this movie is that both are begin chased by a ragtag team of campers and camp councilors.  The director Wes Anderson has been on a hot streak with his films and this film seems to continue his run.

Seven Psychopaths:
The story of a man who becomes wrapped up in the crime industry after accidentally kidnapping a dog belonging to gangster.  This star studded cast includes Colin Farrell, Woody Harrelson, Abbie Cornish, Sam Rockwell, Olga Kurylenko, and Tom Waits.  This dark comedy has such a solid cast and such an interesting plot it will be interesting to see how general audiences react to this new take on comedy.

 Looper:
This film so going to be a psychological thriller/action flick to remember.  Staring Bruce Willis and Joseph Gordon-Levitt this movie has the star power and script to be a box office power house.  The story of a future mob that sends enemies into the past (our present) to be executed and eliminated is a fresh new idea with a lot of potential.  Such an interesting concept is sure to insight many plot twists and turns that will surely bring about a lot of buzz.

The Eye Writer

Tempt1

We live in interesting times, no question about that. Plague, famine, kids killing people in remote villages from their drone playstations in Las Vegas, sipping RedBull. It is quite difficult to know how we can provide an ounce of balance to a ton of misery, so that ounce must be something really special to rescue our impossibly damaged spirit.

The influx of very damaged very young humans, the broken byproduct of that biggest business which is war, ends up in the landfills of society, the eternal superfund from which some people pick up the pieces and try to put things back together, albeit in a very different way. A leg here, an arm there, an eye or two, perhaps a brain? Can we pull us back together?

I will call him Luis

While searching for an appropriate picture to help me cut through the fog I had trouble finding one of the millions of miserable children which survive doing such a thing, because Corbis Corporation, the photo "service" owns most of them. I wonder, do those children get a percentage directly deposited to their pig accounts?

I guess you get the point. What triggered all this diatribe was me thinking about what we do on a daily basis, our "job" in other words. Do we really do something useful, something that tips the balance and creates a positive change? I think one of the reasons that the Open Source movement is so important is that it is a sort of groundswell, difficult to perceive because it is so pervasive and widespread.

But this movement, so dangerous to the monopolists of the world will tumble the most arrogant of them. There is no corporation, not even the most technically sophisticated that can evolve as rapidly as thousands or millions of people working together for a common cause.

As a little sample, I offer this movie about such an endeavour, one that ends with a call to hackers all over the world to collaborate, in this and any other way that might become the glue that binds us together again, into our cyborgian future.

The Eyewriter from Evan Roth on Vimeo.

Open Frameworks, F.A.T., Graffiti Research Lab, graffiti legend Tempt1 and of course EyeWriter got together to produce that ounce of energy for each and everyone of us...

Here is the how to and all the good monopoly-breaking stuff for those DIY's among us. Keep on DIYing...!

Congress in Second Life

Back at the end of Jan. someone had posted about Congress in Second Life...
Well, on April 1st another session was held.
Definately read and look at the pictures.
=]