AI: Artifically Intelligent
In the wake of my fanfic-esque piece the other day, I thought I should go watch a good ol sci-fi again. At first, I saw none at the rental store, but low and behold, AI was there. Yipee!
Have asked me yesterday and I would have sworn I actually saw the entire movie before. I liked it and it was great. But take note of my strategic use of past-tenses in that sentence.
This thing is horrible.
The first bit was really cute, with the kid and his ‘mother’ and all that jazz. When the real son came back alive I was as surprised as when my poo this morning fell into the toilet, and didn’t actually bypass all laws of physics and start to fly and talk and write Shakespeare in 10 minutes. That is where it really went downhill. I though it was all sad and crap when she dropped her kid off in the forest with the creepy Teddy bear.
And then he met this damn… robot American Gladiator/ Mad Max crap-fest.
And then some retarded step-brother of Blade Runner up until he meets his ‘father’ and he gets mad and jumps out the building and gets pulled up the the Gigolo fucker.
And then when the dudes try to pick em up, they forget that David is a robot as well and magnets don’t effect him.
So he goes and drives his sub to the ‘Blue Fairy’ and sits there for 2000 years. And after 2000 years no building has been destroyed. Look at any of the shit from Ancient Greece and shit, that is a bit less than perfect condition, and only a bit more than 2000 years.
So these alien robot things revive his mom from a 2000 year old lock of hair that a creepy robot-teddy bear was carrying around.
I was actually yelling and swearing and mocking the movies sexuality, to the point that I decided, rather explicitly, why DVDs have holes in them.
It would seem that I am not the only one of this mentality. Although half the people I whined about this movie to called me an idiot and it was above my level of apparent intelligence, the other half (duh) agreed with me whole heatedly. Of that latter portion, David Schwartz (of Heckler Spray fame) actually had AI in his list of ‘The Eight Dullest Movies Of All TIme‘.
“This film was so mind-numbingly bad, we’ve spent the last 10 hours gnawing at my own hand to distract from the pain.”
And that makes me feel good, because the opinion of Internet polls is more important than those IRL chumps…
Bill O’Reilly only likes it if its his OWN head up his ass
I have always found O’Reilly to be monstrously hilarious. Before getting into the misuse of the term indoctrination, I would first like to point out that of the many of American’s of which Billy speaks of, he seems to be unable to get any of them on his show. And do not worry about a Canadian commenting on American politics - this is the most un-political topic, coming from O’Reilly, the most un-political news caster.
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This in·doc·tri·nate
Audio Help [in-dok-truh-neyt] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation –verb (used with object), -nat·ed, -nat·ing.
1. to instruct in a doctrine, principle, ideology, etc., esp. to imbue with a specific partisan or biased belief or point of view.
2. to teach or inculcate.
3. to imbue with learning.
Personally, I think the way JKR approached this was intelligent. Intelligent, yet still British. I am double-minoring in Psych and Creative Writing, and during classes in the birthing of novella, we were often insisted to create our character long before hand. Colors, foods, nuances, personality, all of that stuff. Have it in our mind so that when we write for them, we can imagine how someone of those traits may act, and have them act accordingly. It was actually discussed how important a trait may be, even if it is one never revealed. A good writer would be able to hint at that in their character, so if they were exposed, it all just made sense. To an avvid reader, Ablus’ jock-fettish was a blip in the radar. A proverbial ping in the proverbial search engine of life. If that was the way the cookie crumbled, it didnt crumble very much.
But not as obvious (or hilarious) as Lance Bass, that was just LOL’s all around.
I find this entire backlash from Billy to be rather ironic. As am I, and as has been mentioned before, JKR is in fact a Christian. I do not know her stance on the matter, but my own is rather evident in this article. JKR is, also in fact,
“Rowling has received honorary degrees from St Andrews University, the University of Edinburgh, Napier University, and the University of Aberdeen“.
This information would leave one to assume her lack of moronicness, perhaps one manifested so well by Bill O’Reilly. And in this assumption of non-retardation, it would be safe to assume she knows how well her books are selling, and how huge an impact they have been, and will be, on children and their parents bank accounts alike. As well this, she knew what flack she would have aimed at the back of her head if she gave off the vibe of trying to introduce a homosexual character. Or maybe she didn’t, maybe it was a non-issue, or maybe even it was just never an issue, and she never though of a way to appropriately portray the character without such a stereotype bolstered to his favorite pair of socks.
What do I think she did with this revelation? I think she was just being honest. She wrote a character, she invented him in the vast Outspace within her mind and she, with faith in her own curosity, thought not to change a fact she lived with for a decade. And although no one but JKR and her Editor may know her reason, changing Dumbledore’s sexuality, as unknown a process it may be, would be incredibly discriminatory.
Dumbledore is as real to us fans, if not more, as he is to JKR. He is a great character, he did some great things and had some great sacrifices. This entire personality advocacy was never an attempt to ‘indoctrinate’, as O’Reilly praises so adamantly, it was to show to kids that even homosexuals can be good role models. Did his sexuality change or tarnish any of his character? No! The only part of his character that I now think of differently, is that I am now less than 100% certain he bonked McGonagall.
In a galaxy far, far away, they stoppped at one trilogy, maybe two…
Earlier today, AOTS had Steve Sansweet, “head of fan relations for Lucasfilm” on their The Loop segment. They spoke of galaxies, and how they are so damn far away. Also, the future of the Star Wars franchise. Hopefully, the future is going to be better than the last few years…
Star Wars Episode II ended with the start of the Clone wars. Palpatine issued ‘Order 6′ and the clones turned on the Jedi.
Wherein Episode III started with the end of the Clone wars. Judging by the complete lack of character development/ the complete lack of character in Christiansen, you would be surprised to know the movies were actually 3 years apart.
Tomorrow releases the Clone Wars movie, originally a cartoon series that was actually edited to fit a feature film. Clone Wars was, originally to the tenth degree, a drawn cartoon series, short lived, unfortunately. When Lucas had seen the first screening of the new series, he had to watch it in a theater, and saw promise. The series will continue in the fall. But the part I was not aware of is… well, they are doing another trilogy. In between III and IV.
So theoretically, this movie and series (same animation, same everything) will explain the gap between II and III, but what are we missing in the ~17 years between III and IV?
Also, what will they call them? Star Wars Episode III.25, III.5 and III.75?
The only thing I can find between the good trilogy and the bad trilogy is Obi-Wan. Although powerful, Obi-Wan was a pretty crummy Jedi, even at the end of Episode III. As much a non-political fellow I am, I have a thing for that side of the Star Wars politics. I just find it more interesting when the apparent brutal campaigns actually involved beheadings. Although I have not read the myriad of Star Wars novella, my friends have, and the massive infinate expanse of Star Wars is bound to inspire some good stories.
In ending, I admit myself one of those kids who will, no matter the rating, see any Star Wars movie released. I am part of the population that lets Lucas afford to do whatever he wants.
World War AI - Transmission 001
<start transmission>
How did it start? Carelessly, like most things. He was the first of his kind, I mean sure, he was not the most intelligent agent on the force, but he always managed to get it done. They called him… Inspector Gadget. He was no normal man, he was outfitted with the most hi-tech gadgets and gizmos, of which he used to fight crime. To fight the infamous Dr. Claw. But that was only the beginning. Oh yes. After a few years, the technology used in Inspector Gadget had been near mastered. This time, they took the opposite route; instead of putting the tech inside the man, they put the man into the tech. He was called Robocop. He was violent and he was strong. There was no stopping him. Thank God they put a good officer in that machine, or we would be done for.
But yet again, the technology evolved. The Bicentennial man was invented. It was a technological marvel, he could so perfectly mimic human emotion, he was the perfect household appliance. This is where it got scary. He started rebelling, he started feeling emotion and tried to defend himself. Eventually, he was calmed down. They… thought he was. The technology was, again, perfected. This time it was for sure. They had three rules that they could never go against. We were safe. We… were. That was until the supercomputer behind it all decided to rule out the idea of ‘humanity’ for own own apparent safety. As frightening as it was, ‘Sonny’ showed to positive side of their emotion. He won the war. Or we think he did…
We had them under wraps for who knows how many years. H.G. Wells was right in theorizing how we would be divided, and right about them revolting. We thought we were safe, well, we were for so many years… history really does repeat itself. That is when all Hell broke loose. Not to say, in the normal sense, but the anatomic divide between the two of us became more and more blurred. They were… hiding now. They were more taboo now, but we still feared them.
There was a lot of fighting, a lot of wars. For the next few decades, we were running out of minerals and tried to mind all that we could, and were fighting with what we could. That was when we created the Screamers. We thought they would let us win the war. They started to fight back. That is when it all went to Hell. We had lived such a comfortable life with them, they were in every part of our life. When they turned, we were helpless. Everything turned on us. I mean, everything.
We went into hiding when they started building The Terminators. The name of Sarah Conner shall forever be in our hearts. She was the leader, the tactician, she led us to whatever victory we had. She was the one who captured the T-1000, taught it to learn, to think on its own. When the Terminators went back in time, trying to kill her before she became to our rescue, we used that very T-1000 to save our lives.
</end transmission>
You are unable to follow more people. Come on, we KNOW you haven’t that many friends.
For those who are human (or at least from SkyNet) your RSS feeds have been flooded with bickering’s about the new Twitter following cap - a measly 2,000!
When you are ‘following’ someone, that means that you have subscribed to their feed. When you log into your own Twitter account, their feeds are integrated into the list of your own. In no mean do I label myself an average Twitter, I do it randomly when on MSN - as stupid as it may sound, it has sparked some good conversations. I average about 5 ‘tweets’ a day, but do not often check my actual Twitter page (I set a custom RSS feed, using FriendFeed and Yahoo! Pipes). A Twitter profile has 20 entires per page, if you were to check your Twitter page 4 times a day, on average, 2000 subscribed users give you 80 pages of redundant information. Now how many pages would I get if I was a Twitter addict? That is just an extremelly rediculous amount of subscriptions.
The keyword here is Following, note the last three letters in that word - ing. This bit seemed to have been overlooked in the initial outcry of Twitter…ers;
Follow spam is the act of following mass numbers of people, not because you’re actually interested in their tweets, but simply to gain attention, get views of your profile (and possibly clicks on URLs therein), or (ideally) to get followed back. Many people who are seeking to get attention in this way have even created programs to do the following on their behalf, which enable them to follow thousands of people at the blink of any eye.
Source: http://blog.twitter.com/2008/08/making-progress-on-spam.html
Even I, a completely ignored micro-blogger, has gotten a few of this ‘Follow spam’ from time to time. You know its done by computer when they target me, eh?
The thing that bugged me about this was not about Twitter itself. It was the reactions, specifically those in the Digg story. Case in point, people are already asking for an alternative to Twitter. Do people these days really think they are going to need that 80 pages of lunch menus? Now, I understand how the web goes, and when Twitter got big, the idea got big. When the idea got big, the internets were flooded with copy-cat programs.
Personally, the thing I think that Twitter has going for it is the API behind it, and how more than any other platform, it has been put to good use. Like the iPod, the fact that it is so popular (not neccessarily the best) means that more companies can afford to opt for compatability. The only real problem with Twitter is, anyone who has used Twitter for more than a fortnight has become well aquainted with the Twitter whale, aka: the picture they show when Twitter is down. So now, in an apparent flood of fed-up-ness, the blogosphere is debating and arguing and hish-hashing about where to go now.
Ping.fm is where you go, dang nabbit. I feel a definate feeling of ease in hard times like these. Why? Because I simultaneously post to Twitter as well as all (or most) of the aforementioned copy-cat programs, via Ping.fm. And I must say from personal experience, doing everything really simplifies the task of doing something. What I mean to say is that this rather intelligent cap on Twitter has, of course, sparked the debating in a few posters. And with that we are starting another micro-blogging-war.
But milk men never whip it out in public…
A woman’s right to breastfeed in public was bolstered yesterday when more than 100 mothers and their babes held a feed-in at a downtown clothing store.
Source: VANCOUVER.24HRS.CA - August 8, 2008, p. 3
My daily newspaper published, the other day, a story about a woman and secreting nipples. This woman, it would seem, was asked by a clerk of a certain H&M store to respectfully feed her child in a change room, or something of the like. Being the year that it is, a certain 2008, and being her a woman, she seemed convinced that she was allowed to do whatever she wanted. It was sexist, of course, to limit public nipple secretion and consumption.
As was quoted above, there gathered ~100 pairs of bare breast, both young and old, being suckled in public. This gather was, in fashion of anything these days, organized by Facebook. I find it ironic that the breasts women, shown off so adamantly in the summer and in their low-cut shirts, are begging for public sucking on one side, but then yell at men for looking.
Their excuse was written to be for the sake of ‘parenting’. This was the argument I received the blunt end in LAX when I approached some mother for changing her child’s diaper in the middle of a hallway. I sat down the hallway buried inside a book when I noticed the stank, and even still, my request was labeled as ’sexist’.
“Women have the right not to be sequestered away when they’re parenting,” said Sonia Strobel.
This is not so much an argument that mothers have not a right to expose wrinkly and stretch-marked boobs in public, it’s that a shopper has the right to not have to watch them do it.
Needless to say, the women won and H&M apologized. Why, do you ask? With such an excellent retort as written by me? Because men control everything, and because old boobs make men uncomfortable. But mostly, because everything counts as sexist.
What if movie characters watched movies?
A while back, I went to the re-make of the movie Poseidon with a friend of mine. I knew nothing of the story, but I have a fondness of Greek mythos. I did enjoy it, but before the elevator scene, when we had all the characters announced, I made a prediction as to who would die and who would not. I was right as rain, actually, I was right about so much rain that I sunk the actual ship.
So what would happen if stars of movies actually watched movies of the genre they were starring in? Let’s see…
You would never enter an empty shack-ass house: this is the most obvious of all. It is more predictable than the ending of Harry Potter.
You would never be black: because they are always the first to die.
Harry Block: I’ve seen this movie, the black dude dies first. YOU snag it!
You would nevert talk to the woman: as in real life, all women in all movies are complete trouble. For the sake of the character, I am allowed this generalization. Case in point: the plot of every single Spider-man movie. No matter what happens, the bad guy is hanging Mary Jane somewhere. If Sam Raimi actually looked into this character, he might not have had to resort to the same crap every movie.
You would never trust the dude in black suits: because they are never, ever nice, and they never, ever mean it. 
Dark Helmet: The Ring! I can’t believe you fell for the oldest trick in the book! What a fool, what’s with you man, c’mon? Here let me give it back to you. Oh! [throws it down a hole]
You would bring along an Asian: because every Asian is a ninja. Just look at Short Round!
You would be gay: they never, ever die. Not yet, at least, because that would be terribly discriminatory.
You would never park near the edge of a cliff: because that is where Dinosaurs always show up.
You would not touch the damn book, artifact or shiny thing: this is how every Indie movie started, every Mummy movie started, and that latest National Treasure one.
You would never look closely as something you think is dead: because every X-Files episode and a few Jurassic Park movies end up with the ‘dead’ thing trying to eat you.
You would never kill the kids parents: because Batman and Daredevil can and will kick your ass after a few years of angst.
You would never tell, in detail, your entire, evil plan: because that is where the good guys get backup.
You would shoot the man dead: because no matter how hard you hit him on the head, he will get up right after you leave the scene.
You would never, ever, ever give a damn about dinosaurs: because if a dinosaur is even mentioned in a movie, he will eat you.
You would make sure you are not the sidekick: because they never get the ladies. Did we ever see Robin with a girl? No. Was this because him as Batman were lovers? Possibly.
You would nurse your wounds from a fight: because no matter how much you hate the man who did this to you, and no matter how much he threatened your wife. he will kick you right there.
You would install a key log detection program: because the villain has always, somehow, tapped your computer, sometimes with C4 (a la Transformers).
You would never cut of a scientists hand: because they turn into people like Dr. Claw.
You would never trust a man with a briefcase: because they never, ever contain just papers.
You would stop repeating everything you hear on the cellphone: because if your phone isn’t tapped, the dude beside you is going to betray you.
You would never take the bridge: be it for escape from a national disaster, or from aliens or something because they are always crap-full.
You would do your business in the damn car: because the bathroom is never seen in a movie unless something interesting happens. Like when a dinosaur eats you.
Tags: movies, list, batman, daredevil, xfiles, jurassic park, transformers
I find it ironic that PETA treats everyone but HUMANS humane…
“Right now, this exact scenario is reality for many. They are sensitive, they value their lives, they see what is happening, they cannot run-away, and they often suffer greatly yet are being killed for nothing more than a fleeting taste of their flesh.”
“If this ad leaves a bd taste in your mouth, please give a thought to what sensitive animals think and feel when they come to the end of their frightening journey and see, hear, and smell the slaughterhouse. Try switching to a healthy vegetarian diet and save lives every day, including your own.”
Things I Hate (to Love) About the Internetz
LOLcats
What was once, I believe, an Internet meme, LOLcats have popularized the pseudo they-say-it-is-but-I-bet-it-isnt form of vowel genocide. Take the ‘official’ homepage named after the aformentioned meme, i can haz cheezburger. In the forums of which I roam, I act as a self-proposed grammar Nazi, pointing out kids lack of knowledge oft he different there’s, yet I still find this website hilarious. They are just so damn cute. And as well am I with webcomic strips, I love being able to finish conversations with LOLcats. LOLcats are like old people like Bob Barker, before the sexual harassment lawsuits.
OM NOM NOM NOM
NO ONE EATS LIKE THAT! But it does make for some good LOLs…
John McCain jokes
As said before, Bush jokes got old 4 years ago. But McCain is new LOLfodder. I admit, I know little more about politics than TheYoungTurks tell me to. So I say this to you, I like what I have heard from Obama, and I laugh at what I have heard of McCain. If my idea in this election mattered, I might do s’more research. That being said, lol@McCain
Bit Torrent
My personal blog page
is getting more tests done than a Whye Avenue regular…
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