Too Much Character for Twitter 2

We all know Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift at the MTV Music Video Awards. Now I'm not gonna complain about how those awards are given out by a network that doesn't play music videos anymore or that just about every single nominated video could be described as "phoned in". I do, however, want to discuss the response of the POTUS to this event.

Now I don't want to talk about how ABC prematurely tweeted this "off the record" conversation, on which they were eavesdropping. Nor do I want to discuss Obama calling out a powerful member of the Celebrity Lobby, one of the most powerful lobby groups in the Obama White House (come on...they got you elected, show some respect.)

What I am miffed about is how easily the President answered. There is a war in Afghanistan, a global economic crisis and he's trying to revolutionize the american health care system. I can't imagine he has much leisure time on his hands to watch a little MTV with the family. I know he doesn't have email and had to give up his blackberry. Does he even have internet access to find this stuff on YouTube? Did one of his aides brief him on the subject? I think I would have preferred it if he responded the same way my father (happy birthday) probably did. "Kanye Who? Taylor Who? No, I didn't hear about that...who cares?" end of discussion. I'm pretty sure that Stephen Harper has no clue what happened at the MTV music video awards (possibly because he doesn't get that channel). The same could be said for most top Canadian Politicians. I doubt any of them get briefed about what happened on prime time TV last night. This is probably because prime time is after 5pm when all the civil servants are off the clock. But I digress.

We usually laugh and cringe when aloof politicians attempt to butcher pop culture in an attempt to sound like they are "with it", but doesn't that just mean that they are focusing on other things...more important things. Jeers, Preisdent Obama. Next time some one asks for your opinion on award shows or reality TV you respond "Come on guys, I'm working here". Leave the pointless commentary to the blog-o-sphere. This obviously doesn't apply to the sports world. You must be ready for a fantasy draft, to fill out a bracket or make your sunday picks on demand or risk impeachment.

The Economy Will Never Be That Bad!

In times of trouble like this people have to start cutting costs.  I just watched a story on CNN about Mrs. Obama's England wardrobe being almost entirely from J. Crew (Oh Jeanie Moos will you ever become a real journalist...honestly, she didn't actually go to journalism school did she?).  It is a nice gesture by Mrs. Obama to say that she isn't wasting taxpayer money on her wardrobe.  But will the economy ever be bad enough to warrant Re-Gifting!  The Obama's presented the Queen of England with an iPod Nano!  Now I seem to remember the good people at CBC sending Obama a thoughtful playlist.  It is pretty obvious that the Obama's simply erased those 49 songs and filled it with pictures and video's of the queen's 2007 American visit.  We should send our Ambassador to the U.S. over to the white house to snoop around for the iPod...it'll be just like that Seinfeld episode except with the possibility of an international incident and guaranteed to be hilarious!  We have to stop him now otherwise next thing you know he'll be giving the Statue of Liberty to Mexico.

The New Prez is obviously letting his daughters do all the gift selection. 

"When British Prime Minister Gordon Brown visited the White House in March, the British press panned Obama's presentation of DVDs of Hollywood films as declasse.  It didn't help that the DVDs didn't work in European players."

Can you imagine the look on Brown's face.  Especially because he obviously put so much thought into his gift for Obama: "a pen holder carved from the timbers of the sister ship ofthe one the White House desk is made from and a first edition of a seven-volume biography of Winston Churchill"

This post is SOOO Last Week

Hi there,

I just found two links that are pretty neat but they are about a news story that is...well, old news.

There are some interesting things going on out there with photos.  With the ubiquity of cell phone cameras and digital cameras a small unknown company has a cool little program that might make all of it useable.  Microsoft has bought a company that developed a computer program that is able to recognize structures in pictures and match them to  structures in other pictures.  The comptuer then makes a few calculations and figures out where the two photographers were, relative to one another, when they took these pictures of the same building.  For instance millions pictures are taken every year of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.  This program, Photosynth, can match the Catherdral in all of these pictures and place them in a 3-d map around Notre Dame.  It can then stich them together and give you 3D environment for looking through photos.  It really gives you a sense of swimming through a scene.  I got my friend Blaise to put together a video for your viewing pleasure.  If you fast forward to the 4:00 mark he gets into it.  If you visit the website there are a few more examples.

So a historic moment occured last month and about 2 million people all had there cameras pointed in at this event.  CNN has partnered with Photosynth and is asking for everyone who was there to send in their pictures of Obama's inauguration and they are gonna piece together a massive 3D Collage.  You can see it here. I don't think they have the response they were hoping for but it is a cool idea...and hopefully awarness can be raised and people can participate in something like this the next time there is another gathering like this....maybe next week or the week after that?  

Unfortunately for those of you on a higher plain of existence...this might not work on your Mac.  Find one of your stupid friends still using a PC and explain it to them really slowly and i'm sure they will let you take a look.  A quick reminder for those who haven't been on a PC in a while...it will probably freeze CTRL + ALT + DELETE will fix it.  Call it a "cute quirk" so that you don't upset your PC friend.  Try it on your mac first.  The Microsoft driver says it will work on Intel based Macs but you know microsoft...not very reliable. 

The second item is also photographic in nature and it is also inaugural in nature.  It Is called Gigapan.  These guys use massive cameras and construct huge panoramas that you can zoom in on.  They are really high resolution.  The gigapan taken at the Inaguaration is made up of 1600 pictures and has around 1.5 GIGApixels.  Thats like 150x the resolution of my camera...or 1000x the resolution of my cell phone camera.

Click here and see if you can find Yo Yo Ma, Oprah and Dick Cheney who seriously looks like he was the really evil SS agent in Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark.  Can you make out what the band is playing?  Can you see the boredom on Bill Clinton's face? Can you see the disappointment on Hilary's face? on Al Gore's face?  Can you see how far away MSNBC's booth is?  Can you imagine how many of these people will show up when Sarah Palin is sworn in in 8 years?

There are all sorts of other gigapans on the site... like London, Boston, San Francisco, Air Show, Burning Man, Full 360s of stores, Beaches, Airports, Mountains...all sorts.

What is a four letter word for Diatribe? I have BL_G so far.

I have been waking up to the dulcet tones of CBC Radio 2 for the past several weeks. Half the time they play good stuff have the time it is in french and the other half is Anne Murray. I like this mix because I have found it really hard to get out of bed when there is nothing but good songs (you just want to hear one more song) and it just ruins my morning when I hear awful songs. It seems to work out that I am awoken by a decent song and then forced from bed by either annoying chatter or even worse...Anne Murray. So I wake up on the right side then am out of bed fairly quickly.  In the past two weeks they have been yammering on about the "Barack Obama Playlist". We the listeners are going to select the top 49 songs that define Canada and send it to Obama so that he might have a deeper and richer understanding of the people inhabiting the top bunk of North America.  As if this might somehow change his mind about NAFTA or that maybe Canada might get a shout out in a future speech. Far be it from me to pass judgement on online polls. My mother always says "if you can't say anything nice don't say anything at all"...wait a minute I have a BLOG. Its my responsibility to get on this soap box and preach to the fringes. I wasn't given this outlet by the good people at the internet so I could keep my opinions to myself!

Now I love playlists and I think they are an excellent way for someone with no discernible artistic talent to be artistic and use other peoples art to send a message. I fancy myself a bit of an expert at this particular faux-art but the more faux-artists that are involved in making a playlist the harder it is to see/hear the message. This CBC playlist (Warning: I am making all of these arguments based on the top 100 list.  The final 49 might not include some or all of the songs I am about to complain about) will inevitably have songs from bands that I hate and am kind of embarrassed about their Canadian citizenship (BTO, The Rankin Family, Trooper, The Guess Who...If I could vote Bauchman off the Island I would).  It will also have songs that should never be used to represent our country or any country for that matter (Crabukit (sp?), Let Your Back Bone Slide, 7 Day Fool...not to be 'hating' on the hip hop crowd but there are probably better songs from each of those artists that could go).  Do you think if America was making a playlist for us (a laughable concept) they would include "MotownPhilly" by Boys II Men or "I Was Made For Loving You" by KISS (only if they were trying to get us on the dance floor at their wicked awesome Retro dance party)? There will also be a few strange songs, for example "Hallelujah" by KD Lang...the song was written and performed by Leonard Cohen...why not just put the original on there? I'm sure it is better and I'm sure Obama is a huge Leonard Cohen fan.   Also, "One Great City" by The Weakerthans is a great song but it is kinda about how Winnipeg sucks (I know someone from Manitoba and he told me so).  And there is gonna be a bunch of french songs.  Thats like getting one of those tattoos in Chinese letters and having the artist assure me it means "Strength and Wisdom" and not "Stupid Tattoo".  Also I don't think Obama speaks french so he'll probably skip them (I'm getting an image of Obama sitting down in the White House after a tough first week with his iPod on and a warm cup of Hot Chocolate or a herbal tea and just diving right into the playlist.  Thinking about each song, taking notes. "Apparently, if Canada had a million dollars they would buy me a fur coat...but not a real fur coat that is cruel...they sound like they need the cash" and "You know what...Superman never made any money...I never thought of it like that...cancel that cheque for 1 million dollars").

Listening to the DJ on Radio 2 gush about the diversity of the talent that Canada produces is beginning to sound like that I AM CANADIAN beer commercial or that Toronto commercial they used to play at Blue Jay games.  Its kinda like when the CFL season starts and TSN is hyping this season as the one when everyone will start recognizing that the Canadain Football League is one of the premier leagues in the world.  You can proclaim yourself the greatest country in the history of civilization for only so long until it sounds like some sort of a government sponsored ego boost meant to compensate for some sort of an inferiority complex. America pats itself on the back a lot but they have been legitimately labeled a super power for about a half century...they can back up the claim.  I'm not saying that Canada doesn't have some really good qualities or that our music scene sucks (There is A LOT of great canadian music and most of it sponsored by the government...unless you have an explitive in your name)  What I am saying is that I really don't like it when patriotism gets all up in your face (unless it is shortly after Team Canada wins a gold medal in some sort of a hockey tournament and especially if they just beat the hatable Americans).  You should be able to come to the conclusion that Canada rocks on your own.  I try to listen to only good music and I am astonished by how much of it is Canadian.  If I listened to only Canadian music (specifically the CBC/Obama playlist) and the only thing I need to know about a song was that it was Canadian, I would probably come to the conclusion that Canadian music is not all that great.

Sometimes you start with a great idea...like a playlist for Obama (ha ha...its still a funny idea to me) and it ends up getting watered down (by other peoples suggestions) and the message gets murkier and murkier until its lost all meaning.  This Blog post is an incredible example of that (medium=message? Canada = #1!).

I just saw a Canadian Independent Film that, in my mind, did patriotism the right way!  The movie is called One Week.  It tells the story of a failed author now english teacher (played by Pacey from Dawson's Creek (Played by Charlie from The Mighty Ducks Quadrilogy (Canada's Joshua Jackson))) who is diagnosed with a very aggressive form of cancer and is given a slim chance of survival.  In search of one final adventure before he becomes a "patient" he buys a motorcycle and leaves his family and fiance and heads west from Toronto (he also had some time to kill because he was put on waiting list for a hospital bed).  All along the way he stops at every "Worlds Biggest" that he can find.  Considering the subject matter, the movie was fairly light hearted until the end when they really start pulling on the heart strings.  Canada was not the subject of the movie but it was a superb back drop.  The scenic shots, the soundtrack and the cameos were all great and distinctively Canadian. I would entice you with the names of the cameos but the surprise was half the fun.  I will say that they were all playing characters and it was not like "Wow, David Suzuki!  What are you doing here at the worlds largest hockey stick?  Would you like a double-double?".  The whole Canada thing was on the verge of subtle until some German tourists tell the main character, while surfing in Victoria, that Canada is the most beautiful country in the world.  Why don't they come here to Charlottetown in January and say the same thing when the wind chill is running around -35?!?!  That was the only part that didn't quite sit right with me.  It felt tacked on.  Like the government said we'll only give you the funding but you have to get someone to say that Canada is great.  I was convinced...I didn't need some jerk German telling me that.  They didn't need anyone to come in at the end and say: "Road trips on motorcycles are awesome!". I was planning on going on to tell you whether I am pro or con when it comes to motorcycles but I should stop here with this.  I thought the movie was pretty good and made Canada look pretty fantastic (everything west of Toronto at least) and it did it in such a way that I didn't feel like I was watching a propaganda video or a tourism commercial.

After searching for more info I discovered that it does not get released across Canada until March 6th.  I guess Charlottetown is one of those "select cities" I keep hearing so much about.

Next week I will explain why watching Sports Centre's beautifully metric Top Ten plays (decaplay?) every morning makes me a better Canadian and a helps me fully appreciate the virtue of socialized health care

TIME for a Change

When I was in third year university TIME magazine started showing up on our door step with a mysterious name on it.  After a few weeks they started to pile up, I gave in and started reading them.  I look back on this time in life as the time when I was most informed about the world at large (read: America, Iraq, Social Security and The Bush Doctrine and only these topics because that is all they focused on).  Recently I decided that I was out of touch and had to get back in the loop.  I ran back to the tried and true.  I am now 6 issues into my TIME Subscription (with my name on it) and have noticed some changes to the format.  They are using the same philosophy that drives O magazine.  Why put different things on the cover if you can just put the same person on week after week.  Barack Obama is on all 6 covers.

This fact has lead me to the conclusion that Barack Obama will probably be named TIME magazine's Person Of The Year.  I guess he is a worthy choice.  He has accomplished quite a bit in the last year and made a total of 13 covers of the 48 published this year.  With 8 issues left this year I am guessing that, your boy, Barack will be on atleast one more cover (but probably 3 more).  He will join a list that includes some of History's Greatest Monsters.  Some of the highlights from the list include:

Adolph Hitler (1938)

Joseph Stalin (1939 & 1942)

The Baby Boomers (1966)

Richard Nixon (1971 & 1972)

The Computer (1982)

The Endangered Earth (1988...what a scam that was...20 years later and look at it now! Never been better)

Vladimir Putin (2007)

and

You! (2006)

Oh no.  All this talk of Person of the Year just reminded me that I have to do a best '08 list.  Its the most important job any blogger has.  I'm gonna have to start studying now.

In other news, I just watched Quantum of Solace.  If you see one Bond movie this year....Make it this one.  There was almost no dialogue and the story was weak...but man can Paul Hagis write a car chase!  Keep your eye out for the polite Canadian in the denouement.  Way to represent your homeland Paul.  There was that perfect mix of anti-corporation and pro-environment sentiment.  The sort of sentiment that lets you know it was made by a studio that is owned by a multi-national corporation and that the filming of this movie was done all over the world and required explosions and car chases that left a carbon foot print the size of a NASCAR season.

Obama Went Electric and CNN went Holographic!

I convinced myself that I was not going to watch any coverage of the US presidential election.  The 2 year campaign had sapped my strength and I was sick of all the punditry, predictions and pageantry (you find a better p-word).  Shortly after the Leafs lost in overtime I found the Daily Show and half enjoyed their coverage.  At about 12am (local time) they reported that CNN was reporting that the polling stations were reporting that Barack Obama (never heard of him) was the President Elect.  So I flipped over to CNN to see if Larry King was taking calls.  The discussion was focused on the historical implication of this election.  They convinced me to stick around to see what Obama was going to say.  I watched Mccain's concession speech and was left wondering why he hadn't been this eloquent all campaign.  The truth is he probably gave more thought to his concession speech than any other speech he had given in the past 6 months.

CNN cut directly to the Chicago park where hundreds of thousands of people had gathered in anticipation of the Obama victory (how much longer until Obama gets added to my spell check?).  I was not really shocked by the number of people who had shown up.  I was surprised to see Jesse Jackson in the crowd, he looked like he showed up on his own and had no special access to the backstage area.  Then Oprah (seriously, if Oprah is not in spell check I don't think Obama stands achance) showed up, but she may have been a CNN hologram (Help me Obi Won, You are my only hope!  that was pretty messed up!).  The presence of the the (super powerful) Celebrity Lobby was not surprising.  When Obama finally took the stage that is when things got interesting.

 The whole thing seemed more like a rock concert than it did a victory party.  Everyone had this look on their face.  I feel like it was the same look I had when I used to think Gord Downie was the greatest thing ever, thinking to myself this is gonna be the greatest show ever!  Everyone had an Obama T-shirt or button (a major fashion faux-pas: wearing the t-shirt of the band you are going to see?!  I can let it slide because I doubt most of those people have a second favorite politician or have ever been to another political rally).  I can just imagine people telling eachother what big Obamaniacs they are. 

"I saw him when he opened for Kerry in '04"

"My favorite was his speech on race relations in Philly"

"I saw him back when he was running for senate"

"Yeah, he probably sold-out when he refused the public campaign funds but can you blame him?"

"I got to see him back when he toured Europe!"

"I first heard of Obama after i watched the video for "My Humps" on Youtube and I really wanted to know what the Black Eye Peas think about politics.  From that point on I've supported whoever Will.I.Am was supporting"

And they were all thinking: "I hope he plays his hit single, 'Yes We Can'!  I love that song"

When he pulled it out of his bag of tricks the crowed went CRAZY!  Like when a crowd catches the first notes of Yellow at a Coldplay concert....sorry I don't know why I picked such a mediocre song form such a mediocre band....I was stuck on this one for a long time.

Obama conquered the charts and Teusday (man, Teusday isn't even in spell check...oh wait) Tuesday night was his home coming show, after an exhausting American tour and media blitz.  It was his triumphant moment!  It was a really powerful moment.

I've got some bad news for all those Obamaniacs.  He is gonna take a short break and go back into the studio to write a new record!  You might not hear from him for a few weeks or even a month (what is CNN gonna talk about?).  The worst part is...he may retire 'Yes We Can' from his touring repertoire, turning his back on the single that made him famous.  You might hear it again but he is probably tucking it away for a VERY special occasion.  It is a great device and I would hate to see it over played and eventually lose all meaning.  He's gonna return with a new album and his songs (I mean speeches but I'm sticking to my metaphor) will focus on actual issues instead of ideals and hypotheticals.   

And if that is not bad enough...if history has taught me anything...the new album will probably be a letdown.  It is gonna get so over hyped by the blog-0-sphere and the expectations will be so great that there is no chance it will measure up.  As a functioning member of that particular "o-sphere" I feel it is my duty to warn you, but...

I might be wrong...Obama might be that good.  All I know is that the times are a changing and I am audaciously hopeful for the future...Yes We Can Indeed!