by Christopher Paul on November 26, 2012 Just days after I linked to an opinion from Shawn Blanc comes a quick piece from Andrew Lapin from The Atlantic. He’s noticed a shift in cinematography from the grainy, sloppy-looking movies from the past few years to artfully created films that give people like Shawn hope the easy-to-produce, lower budget pop movies are a dead fad replaced with something more timeless. He writes:
It’s true that movies tend to look a bit more polished come holiday season, but there’s something especially nice about seeing such exceptional images arriving at a moment when the rest of the industry seems to care so little about looks. These films and their visuals are so important because they reclaim our concept of a movie as a series of meticulously orchestrated images, not merely as whatever happens to flitter past a fast-moving lens. The former is an art form; the latter is any idiot with a camera.
In addition to Lincoln, he calls out Life of Pi and Skyfall as the more popular but masterfully created movies of this season. And there are a few indie and less publicized films he mentions that continue to bring back storytelling in cinema. It’s good to believe we could be witnessing classic movies being made that will stand the test of time.
by Christopher Paul on November 23, 2012 The Verge and so many others are reporting that Microsoft will try it’s hand at an Apple TV competitor using the Xbox brand.
I tried this very device many years ago when it was called Windows XP Media Center Edition. From what I recall it was a huge success – that is, if you define success to be abysmal failure. Everything from the interface, to the media, to the buggy software, and to the DRM’d store which was shut down a year or two later making everything you “bought” useless.
Let’s not count Microsoft out just yet, though. Google TV is, uh, doing something, right? Just call me skeptical. Even Apple TV is just a “hobby” and this announcement just smells of defensive reaction to rumors of Apple launching a full TV or some other set top box with more power than what they’re currently producing.
via The Loop
by Christopher Paul on November 22, 2012 Sara Lacy asks if Mobile Thursday, like Black Friday or Cyber-Monday, is a thing – a special shopping day where people shop online with their mobile device because they are either traveling or away from their regular computers.
I happen to think so. After everyone gets iPads for the holidays, next year’s shopping will be even more mobile.
by Christopher Paul on November 21, 2012 Shawn Blanc saw the movie Lincoln recently and it moved him quite a bit. He mostly talks about the man, how he’s portrayed, and the emotions, power, and responsibility one has as President of the United States. Read his brief thoughts on it because it made me think about people who serve their countries – regardless of position or title. However, the thing he wrote about movies is something I want to focus on.
He writes:
The art and craft of storytelling through film seems to be more and more rare these days. In Lincoln, all the components of a movie – acting, cinematography, writing, costume and set design, editing, etc. – come together into a single, cohesive work of moving art. It is moving to watch, moving to hear, and once taken in, it lodges itself in your heart and mind for a while.
I agree with his thoughts on the rarity of such good storytelling in cinema. I can’t remember when I went to a movie theater last. I don’t remember what movie I saw. But I do remember all the films that I didn’t want to invest my time seeing because, in the past, the combination of those arts have not yielded an emotional response.
I hadn’t planned on seeing Lincoln in the theaters but I might revisit that decision. But however I decide to watch the film, I wish more (or all) movies were compelling enough for someone like Shawn to write about the way he did.
by Christopher Paul on November 21, 2012 Kyle Baxter gave some thought to how robots and computers will continue to perform tasks – both simple and complex – in place of humans in the future. In particular, he focuses on how computers, at some point, will be able to perform subjective analysis on data like x-ray, CT, and MRI scans as well as basic research and analysis work that typically involves highly paid workers:
Is there any reason to think that computers will never be able to do this kind of basic research and summarization? I don’t think so. What this suggests is that automation will challenge many kinds of knowledge work just as much as low and semi-skilled work. Indeed, companies will have even more reason to automate these kinds of jobs, because they are generally very well-paid jobs.
Manufacturing and retail job elimination, then, is just the first wave of many to come. The question, though, is not how to get those jobs back and protect the ones that still exist. That isn’t going to happen, is counter-productive and a waste of time. The question to ask is, when many of the jobs people depend on our automated, what kind of jobs will they do instead?
It’s a good question to ask – and one we should start to answer now – because as we move closer to all jobs being automated, what’s left for humans to do?