My mother once picked up a book called From a Certain Point of View, as a Christmas gift for me. It’s a collection of short stories set in the Star Wars universe. The book’s short stories tell the plot of Star Wars from the point of view of minor characters. For example, in the first story in the book, the captain of the escape brigade gets the point of view, which is neither the droids C-3P0’s or R2-D2’s, nor Princess Leia’s. It is the same plot as the first scene of the film.
The book is celebrating Star Wars‘ fortieth anniversary, so I am taking the understanding that the book is a 2017 volume. 2017 was the year of Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi.
The Last Jedi took a different point of view that was a departure from styles of the previous Star Wars films. It recreated Luke Skywalker as a figure afflicted with existential angst. The book only contains scenes from the 1977 Star Wars film with a yowl from Rogue One to begin the book.
I don’t know why I haven’t read it sooner. I think the interest in Star Wars for me returned with the Disney+ series The Book of Boba Fett. Thinking about the desert planet of Tatooine through the eyes of Boba Fett got me feeling good again about Star Wars. Boba Fett’s the character whom Lord Vader used to freeze and transport Han Solo back to Tatooine, to the palace of Jabba the Hutt in the second and third movies of the original trilogy.
Star Wars is an unusual fantasy. With the film, picturing each second from these brief tales ought to be a breeze.
I am blogging the month of January with inspiration from WordPress writing prompts. I am pleased that they have been supportive.
Something people rail against is the cumulative onset of time. There is seldom enough time. Time is scarce. Sometimes time is money. Sometimes we lose track of time.
I wish I knew how to turn back time. I wish it was no more difficult than, say, picking out clothes from the rack. This one, that one, this one, that one.
The Man of Steel turns back time at the end of the 1978 blockbuster, the one titled Superman. It’s the Richard Donner-directed special effects bonanza with Christopher Reeve in the cast as Superman and Margot Kidder as Lois Lane. In the movie, Superman’s asked to choose between keeping a promise or saving Lois. In his anger, Superman challenges the authority of his father and turns back the Earth’s rotation, turning back time, so that he has more time to rescue Lois before she meets her end.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
I am not angry that the time is beginning to run long behind me. That said, I wish there was a little longer left to perfect a few more things before the eventuality that possibly the best I’ll have done is behind me. That is an uncomfortable thought, and while perhaps ability is not yet lost, I am not sure I will have much time left for holding onto the passions of youth.
There could be mercy, that ambition dulls with time, the self-same progress, and satisfaction emerges from what mastery was achieved. It’s important to understand that there are many more young people. There is nothing terrible about having mellowed. I wish for it, as opposed to being irate that there wasn’t additional time. Every person has the same chances, give or take. Some people are lucky, and some are not.
There is a ton of rivalry. Maple Lawn Cemetery has a Facebook page that I appreciate keeping up with, and I discover things to put on it.
Facebook is going through a lot of change, as you probably know. They are challenged repeatedly about how they handle their users’ privacy. I’ve been happy to take the understanding that its objectives may bode well. https://www.facebook.com/LouthUnited/
I’m not sure my dad sees my ability, such as with our riding mower, as all that “expert.” The work I do with it is adequate when I cut the grass when the weather is good. I mulch leaves in the fall, and I can tow a cart.
It is normal to expect some criticism, but I don’t invite it. I accept that I’m an imperfect person.
Yesterday, my dad and my brother Josh and me set up for two funerals, as there had been two people who passed. The first of them was Mrs. Marilyn Bowslaugh, who visited the cemetery to do gardening around her family lots. Mrs. Bowslaugh was kind, and she had advice and feedback for me on Facebook, which I was able to apply to do a better job.
Like I say, I enjoy keeping at it. Facebook is becoming, by many accounts, a “metaverse,” a virtual world to live inside.
Mrs. Bowslaugh encouraged me to give the Facebook page for the cemetery the air of being by churchgoing folk, and she told me that she enjoyed feel-good stories (not unlike what goes into Reader’s Digest). Although my dad and I have a designated day of the week, Wednesday, the day we most often are there, I have the luxury to work at my own pace, although it’s understood the expectation I should get work done.
I also take photographs around the graveyard. I don’t take shots with huge insight, just impulse, and the training I’ve done myself, pointing and shooting. I like to experiment a little with the camera while taking pictures that represent something tangible, rather than obscured tones or something to that effect, which may look pretty but are difficult to decipher.
My cover image for this blog is simple lines, blue and green, expressionism roused by Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Bluebeard, the tale of a character who’s a now-weak craftsman, whose workmanship is expressionist painting. It’s a book worth reading.
September is World Candle Month. Established in 2013, World Candle Month joins candle devotees around the planet. I think this year it is helping to remember September 11, as today is Patriot Day in the USA.
Well, let’s get out from under that debris.
In other parts of America, Nashville Tennessee author Jeff Goins retired at the end of the summer this year, having for ten years presented courses online, to get writers blogging. Books by Jeff Goins include his 2015 bestseller, The Art of Work. That book explains many expressions of work, by which to inspire readers.
While I didn’t officially join up with his courses, it is almost ten years now since I partook in the some of the free advice he proffered, like how to brainstorm ideas for your blog. Some of Goins’ blogging strategies I, in fact, applied. I have never made blogging anything other than a hobby, but when I read on Facebook Jeff’s retirement announcement, I was again interested to read what he had to say.
The agreeableness Mr. Goins has fits a way of composing books that is both unique and open. His books include The In-Between and his first book, in 2014, You are a Writer. The title of his first book reminds me of adventure books where the reader assumes the identity of someone else (here it would be… a writer).
Goins was a musician who worked in marketing, before he realized that he wanted to be a writer.
Since 2012, the work I have done has been assisting with the upkeep on the grounds of a cemetery. For years, my father, whose business it is to operate this cemetery, would bring around breakfast, a Cinnabon and coffee. https://www.facebook.com/LouthUnited/
Why Cleanliness’s are More Tempting than a Cinnabon
With autumn here I have opted to reflect on different kinds of cleanliness. Seeing the world for its contrasts is a twisted conviction. There are shades of dark in pretty much every circumstance.
Why would I think about cleanliness in the autumn time this year? While usually it is spring when people turn their attention to cleaning, like the contrast of light and dark, autumn needs some cleaning off, too.
Likewise, many people choose cleanliness in some areas and not others. Some people have a knack for cleanliness in most areas; some people have cleanliness in only a few (or even none). I found, on insider.com, an article by a Zoë Ettinger, whom I suspect is very clean.
In case she were to at any point know about me, I am simply attempting to communicate her recommendations.
1
“Fade cleans, without question, everything.” Don’t let the dirt settle. That resembles life settled to pieces, just space-separated. If you sit in the dust, you become it.
2
“Quill dusters eliminate dust.” Let the quill remain, but don’t make it your only tool. My, you could add a candle.
3
“Paper gives the glass without a streak sparkle.” You can’t wipe an unstreaked sparkle on glass. Therefore, why not let the sparkle streak?
4
“Vinegar is a generally useful cleaner.” Vinegar is best for fish and chips, and not for cleaning the table.
5
“Hairspray can be utilized to eliminate ink stains.” Hairspray can make or break a good time! Ink will set unless you take measures to remove it.
6
A candle will melt if you leave it lit. Let the ink stain, perhaps, become found art.
“You should wash everything on cold.” To remove a stain, start with cold water.
Boiling water can set stains, like milk, egg, or blood. It cooks the protein. Boiling water works best on slick stains, like mayonnaise.
8
“Deodorizer helps clean the air,” an aroma. Lighting a candle would achieve the same end.
9
“String mops are the best approach.” If it is not too evident to say here, a string mop requires a bucket.
10
“You should finish wood regularly.” Finishes shield wooden surfaces and show up more.
Wood finish is not the same as painting, for painting subtly conceals a wooden surface while a finish completes it. Philosophical point.
11
“Vacuum, then, at that point, dust.” The vacuum will contaminate considerably more than you.
12
“You can wash your sheets like clockwork.” A more natural routine can deliver better results.
13
“Your dishwasher cleans itself.” Plain and simple, it doesn’t.
14
“Your clothes washer cleans itself.” It doesn’t.
15
“All green cleaning items are protected to utilize.” You need green cleaning as much as on all the other things you ensure.
From the standpoint of being a professional, in being green for your buyers and representatives, and also when creating your business’ impression, green cleaning is held to decrease contaminations. It doesn’t always cause the same medical issues brought about by non-green cleaning.
16
“Using more laundry detergent is always better.” An excess of cleanser will leave buildup.
You’re welcome to like the post, to follow, or to comment.
I am ending with the band Deerhunter’s video for their 2018 LP Why Hasn’t Everything Already Disappeared? That’s Bradford Cox singing, with very few close-ups in the presentation. Reputable indie rock. Enjoy World Candle Month.
“Most of us really aren’t horribly unique. There are 6 billion of us.
“Put ’em all in one room and very few would stand out as individuals. So maybe we ought to think of worth in terms of our ability to get along as a part of nature, rather than being the lords over nature.”
–Herbert Simon, 1916–2001, market analyst
Simon was an American financial expert who won the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 1978 for his commitments to financial matters. Simon set the “bottleneck,” which limits both what we can see, and what we can do. Current financial matters are generally founded on Simon’s thoughts.
Simon was granted the prize in financial matters for his examination into the interaction inside monetary associations. Fast forward to 2021, and the Internet is sometimes summed up as a whole with the phrase attention economy, and the expression arguably was begotten by therapist, market analyst, and Nobel Laureate, Herbert Simon. In a compelling book, Administrative Behavior (1947), Simon tried to supplant tradition, demonstrating—in an idea—a methodology that perceived different components.
As I understand the industry of Big Tech, in 2021, web designers often work on websites that advertise banners for revenue.
A phone call this week, the two of us in a small Canadian town, surprised me with the news that a downtown building, closed since 2018, had burned to street-level. An active Internet user, who has a blog that shows ads to readers, recounted what happened in his blog.
I am sorry that the building burned down, but that I was quickly clued up by social media, I am happy to indulge in feeling is the bee’s knees.
If you don’t know a lot about data privacy, and you wonder how your web searches seem to translate into similar ads on websites you use, it is because you have been observed searching, and advertisers wish to help you spend your money. There are steps you can take to reclaim data privacy, but you should be aware of where and what you do on the Internet, so that you can own your progress, if you liken browsing the Internet to, say, an adventure game.
I’ve thought about data privacy before. Facebook has had a scandalous history of data privacy betrayals, as when they employed Cambridge Analytica to help them unfairly sway the result of the 2016 run for the White House. The effort to cheat didn’t succeed, but the vote was a very narrow divide.
The deceit delivered by Cambridge Analytica led a giant blow to Facebook’s reputation, and was very hard on Facebook users. Cambridge Analytica had been trying to manipulate voters into thinking as the manipulative computer firm was paid to lead people to think.
Many computer users, you probably know, use VPN technology to disguise their location, by relaying their decisions on the Internet through a route that presents a fake location that an uninformed spy might take as your actual physical location (and not the location that you have).
Another retrofitting solution is to use a software scan, like Superantispyware, to detect tracking cookies, which show you ads that have targetted your behaviour on the Internet. Superantispyware deletes those cookies and shakes that control the advertisers have on you.
⦁ Getting personal
Something as simple as resolving to speak honestly can have profound and upbeat results. Herbert Simon was a therapist–I spoke with more than one caseworker when I was living out my twenties, and what guidance they provided, I still remember things they said to me, to this day, years later.
Inspired by those, like Rick and Tony and Pam, I am for this post listing what might help “counsel” individuals who are perhaps new to the attention economy, so they are not shorted by their own expectations.
⦁ Observations about the world (propelled by Herbert Simon)
Nature is flourishing
We have enhancements in medication
Significant development is happening all the time
Expanded digitalization is happening just as fast
Distant, working, is a clear reality
Enhancements in instruction abound
Another gander, at the powerless and oppressed individuals from our general public, needn’t give us pause
Promising circumstances favour us
Co-operation and social support enable us
Co-activity and social help assist us
Picking who is imperative to us is a potential reality
Working on psychological wellness through helping other people is good for your wellbeing
Collaborations between regular citizens (not government nor police) is becoming a mainstay
Feeling of appreciation might be a new unique norm
Discovering delight has never been more possible
Having an effect is, straight up, a reality
The world is a strange and wonderful place. When you consider, for example, co-activity, you might reflect that every person is truly an individual, and many people have talents that really help highlight other people’s strengths. While there are of course powerless and oppressed individuals, if you can get a smartphone and learn how to effectively use it, you are as powerful an individual as ever walked the Earth, in some regards.
Even with only a few social accounts, your potential is rather excellent. A philosophy of industry isn’t always discussed with words you could charactertize as “holistic,” but someone with an adequate command of many many realities about life, and how to do right, for both themselves and others, can be completely excellent.
Check out Canadian musician and recording artist Rick White’s new album Where it’s fine
⦁ Contrarily bound by confusion (to contrast)
My pinned tweet describes how AI has become an excellent tool, in many applications, for providing useful content recommendations. AI can look at what you’ve done before, on a specific service, and can guide you to more good content, to be enjoyed, and that you want to share.
My aim in circling data is to be helpful, to arrive at information relevant to what you might be searching for now, and I am additionally marginally important for my dad’s business, the Maple Lawn burial ground he focuses on all year, with some assistance from family and friends.
Good hobbies should be cultivated. I feel the attention economy is awesome. In particular, video, both big-budget presentations and little user videos, is widely available. A little music can help, too.
When AI is employed for reasons that include helping to provide good content recommendations, as, for example, when you are on YouTube, quality YouTube videos, though controlled with measures that can feel extreme, are recommended to viewers, by an AI algorithm.
YouTube launched in February 2005.
…”In an information-rich world, the wealth of information means a dearth of something else: a scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”
–‘Designing Organizations for an Information-Rich World’ in Martin Greenberger (ed.) Computers, Communications, and the Public Interest (1971), 315 pages, index, sources
For Jim Adams’ blog bounce, for Sunday, January 10, 2021, Jim has requested MA, meaning a tune with a title that begins with either the letter M or with the letter A.
I thought of a song with an unusual title, that begins with A.
“And Then (The Hexx)” is a song by Pavement, a b-side on Pavement’s “Spit on a Stranger” single in May 1999, I read somewhere. It sort of provides a conclusion to the 1997 Pavement album Brighten the Corners. Quietly now, that’s the Pavement record where the entire quintet is performing–it’s sometimes known as “dream pop.”
A second version of the song “And Then (The Hexx)” is again the conclusion to the next, and last, Pavement album, Terror Twilight. Strictly speaking, to the best of my understanding, the song is “And Then (The Hexx)” for the Brighten the Corners b-side, and simply “The Hexx” for Terror Twilight.
Rock musician Steve Malkmus, who around the year 1990 put together ideas for what became a classic all-American rock record, Slanted & Enchanted, while the young man was in high school in Stockton, California. Nice work if you can get it.
“And Then (The Hexx)” is eerie, and it has happiness to it as well.
Malkmus has reinvented himself twice since Pavement folded. First he played as Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, and more recently, since 2018, just Stephen Malkmus. I’ve seen video of Malkmus performing his songs by himself for the groove denied tour.
Terror Twilight producer Nigel Godrich was keeping active on Twitter in December 2020, when he tweeted on the thirteenth of December, 2020, that, despite what Godrich called “the dark” of December, Godrich preferred the advice,”get your SAD lamp out and party!” SAD indicates seasonal affective disorder, mild depression brought about by lack of sunlight, in a cold climate.
The feeling echoes what Steve Malkmus said for the 2002 documentary Slow Century. Godrich’s observation is certainly deliberate.
“Get your handkerchiefs out,” Malkmus says, “and party.”
Writing for a Chicago online mag highlighting music, motion pictures, and TV, consequence of sound’s DAN CAFFREY says, “‘Spit on a Stranger’ looks back on a relationship that’s gone kaput — maybe a relationship with a band.”
I have the impression that, of the five band members in the band in 1999, that other than Steve Malkmus, they wanted to hang it up.
When touring the Terror Twilight record, Malkmus often hung a pair of handcuffs on stage, from his mic stand, to illustrate how he felt making a living in a rock band.
Dissected: Pavement BY DAN CAFFREY ON AUGUST 11, 2015, 3:00PM
“Terror Twilight,” Caffrey writes, “has a reputation of being Pavement’s tamest album, and that’s true, musically speaking — the tempos are sturdier and there’s much less yowling, despite a ripping harmonica solo (?!) from Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood.” Wikipedia says Jonny Greenwood, from Radiohead, played harmonica both for “Platform Blues,” and for “Billie,” both of which are Terror Twilight songs, Billie penned about Billy Graham.
Whether the various elements of Terror Twilight, Caffrey says for consequence of sound, scare the shit out of you or not, the lyrics prove that, even when they had run out of momentum and had to be practically forced by Godrich to come up with new material (the band reportedly was more concerned with playing Scrabble than recording) — even when music didn’t sound quite like itself, Pavement was still Pavement.
I saw in a more recent interview, it is somewhat eluding me where I heard this (I think it was organized by Vanity Fair for Seattle radio not too long ago), when Malkmus was talking about getting ready to play shows with Pavement, Malkmus said that to this day he enjoys the game of Scrabble.
I presume that’s Pavement fandom knowledge. Malkmus has said publicly he got really quite good. In a round of Scrabble, you make words on the game board utilizing letters, which add to the score.
Anyway, some fans consider “And Then (The Hexx)” to be a Brighten the Corners song, because of the 2009 rerelease of Brighten the Corners with the second CD with “And Then (The Hexx).” It is also the conclusion to Terror Twilight, which when discussed is usually just called “The Hexx.”
I still like to think of “The Hexx” as “And Then (The Hexx),” and that’s why it fits into Jim’s MA prompt challenge. However, the true release date of “And Then (The Hexx)” should be 1997, not 1999.
Pavement And Then (the Hexx) Composed by Stephen Malkmus
No. As the Pyramids are understood by many, trembling and fearful ranks of Egyptian slave men pushed and hauled giant blocks to mark tremendous points of energy on Earth, triangle-shaped tombs for departed leaders. We can imagine slave girls in leather brassieres and skirts of bird-feather and twine, Egyptian beauties shimmering with flesh soaked by the never-shrinking sun, drunk on wine, a vision of an apparatus with no more technology than what could float a raft in the river or raise a shelter in the vast desert.
All false, and hung on a myth that keeps humans organizing themselves like a slave assembly, where all power and competence are enacted as though by the living hand of God–it is a design conceived with the Pharaohs’ tombs in the mind’s eye.
Photographer: The Lazy Artist Gallery
As Ancient Egypt exerted its dominance, so too did reigning attitudes about a solidarity of people which became absolutely entrenched by the Pyramid’s sway, infiltrating the essence of the civilized world, as many understand it, an effort of many slaves.
The most earnest high school history teacher, the librarian who holds a catalog of records in disruptively accurate bookshelves, the Egyptian fantasist with his movie monster posters; all three present the mythology that the Pyramids were built with an outpouring of sweat and single-mindedness, the impossible, expansive tombs built from heavy rocks in cubes, hoisted by rope and ancient pulleys. Into the shape of three-dimensional Pyramids were constructed elaborate tombs, laid for departed Pharaohs of renown. Gizeh is the best-known.
It is the same will to organization and legacy throughout the Western world in the twenty-first century, where gentlemen in running shoes or luxury cars or perhaps dining in a capacity to manage what others might characterize as savage, to have plates and pints brought round by pleasant servers, the bosom and the heart. Gizeh’s tomb marked the first wine-and-dine.
Where will it end? As long as there are workers who are unsung, the dominion of the ancient Pharaohs will maintain its control. Update your browser.
The above is intended as an aside only. The International Day of Charity is observed annually on 5 September.
Bruce Wayne decided as a boy that he would honour the memory of his mother and father by inventing himself as Batman and challenging many criminals in Gotham City.
I watched Justice League when it went to Netflix this month and I enjoyed it. The camaraderie between the members of the Justice League comes off as solid and the plot of the film is enjoyable. It is curious to see Superman return to life.
Some of the cool moments from my life were opportunities to see films, in movie theaters. In 1989, cinema fans filled movie houses to see the DC superhero Batman on the silver screen.
Photographer:
Bruce Mars
I had a good time. Actor Michael Keaton’s role as Bruce Wayne, with its heroism, detachment from wealth, and indifference to romance makes the character of Batman a reinvention. I suppose Keaton was a surprise star turn, and the subplot of Gotham City TV news anchors unable to appear beautiful on television, owing to poison in beauty products deliverered by The Joker, is clever.
Jack Napier’s transition to The Joker is memorable. In other scenes from Batman, Billy Dee Williams of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back and subsequently in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, appears as Harvey Dent.
The climactic confrontation of the film, at the Gotham City parade beneath a cathedral with the height of a skyscraper, is wonderful.
Photographer: Yi Ling Tan
When the creepy little video store in the shopping plaza near my home began renting to customers Batman, the store displayed tapes of the film like a phenomenon. Shelf after shelf were full of the Batman video. The format was VHS, the cassette for running a film with a VHS player.
I’d been to see it, but I wanted that VHS. Christmas came, and family placed hand-wrapped videotape-shaped objects under the holiday tree.
They were VHS tapes, but what titles were they? Us kids wouldn’t know until Christmas morning. At the appointed time, I opened mine, and to my delight, the tape inside was Batman.
As the family opened our presents, a second tape of Batman under the Christmas tree emerged. My mother’s brother and his wife had arranged for the gift of the movie Batman as well. Two VHS tapes of the same film–a double.
What did my dear mother decide, you might ask? This was a bummer. She would quietly return a copy of the film to its retail store.
As a twelve-year-old, the price of a brand-new edition of a blockbuster film must be extravagant, I reasoned. The VHS copy of Batman we had would belong to us all.
I suppose that taught me a lesson, like not to count your chickens before they hatch. It was as if my uncle and aunt had felt I deserved my own copy of Batman, and Santa Claus did not. The VHS tape of Batman was a gift, what I wanted and what I was losing.
In 1989, fate unfolded for Batman mobster Jack Napier. The criminal mastermind falls into a vat of burning acid. He loses the pigment of his skin and becomes molded with a permanent smile on his face.
I hadn’t earned my own copy of Batman, and I suppose the real lesson was that I should share. It is a state of becoming tantalized by the promise of something gold and being humbled by the requirement to give it up. Maybe we didn’t know that doubles of the Batman film were under the tree, but no contingency plan was in place.
I was cheesed.
Batman fans typically embrace the trilogy of Batman movies years later directed by Christopher Nolan, but I didn’t get interested in them.
You’re welcome to like, comment, or follow if my recollection of dealing with a hot trendy thing like the above resonates with you.
By video research, I mean watching video content to gain information about a topic. To render the inscrutable meaningful, I am trying to re-envision specific ideas I have about video research. To try to make this fun, I am re-envisioning 15 ways that the progress I try to make utilizing video research actually makes an impact (for me).
This will include examples of why it is I am conjecturing the phrase video research isn’t dropped onto the page constantly.
The first thing that I am focusing on is when I actively became aware of the possibility of video research. You might say the stars aligned (nearly) and I think it was when I was compelled by my younger friend B. pointing out that I could listen to youths crying out with the Internet. This is so sensitive. In my defense, I both saw I could get into hard-to-tackle specifics with a computer, and also I discarded the idea to pursue B.’s style of research, which is a misnomer, as it wasn’t video being researched, it was more like gamer hack-and-slash. In B.’s defense, he became a teacher for a living. [I hope he is still doing that. He dropped off Facebook a long time ago (without an explanation).]
With an awareness like that, it has to be tempered with the recognition that humans require respect. Interesting uses of Internet video express things which are unfathomable and also perhaps too sensitive to extrapolate. The very most interesting experiences with the Internet, I think, and when outside elements of the world beyond the Internet enter and, I suppose, reflect the viewer experiencing the video, which is hard to concisely explain. If there is a simple explanation for this, perhaps from lecture halls or elsewhere, and you know of such a thing, forgive me. Leave me a comment if you like. On the simplest level, people can leave user comments for a creator who responds. I am pretty sure I have a few variations of that straightforward element of the Internet.
I think in 2018 WordPress turned 15 years old, didn’t it? A technique for growing your blog readership, if you’re on WordPress, is to leave user comments on other bloggers’ work. The point is that if you do this respectfully and consistently, eventually sympathetic or otherwise interested bloggers who you have contacted will reciprocate by interacting with you. Now you may ask me, and I am prepared for this in the eventuality it happens, “How do you know that? You don’t seem to have much readership of note.” “Yes,” I will reply, not impudently, “but I simply have not devoted the focus to constantly read blogs and interact with them. My blog, as yet, is an amateur effort.” At that point, I hope you do not disappear abruptly, although if this is the case, that is fine, as I hope to better strategize in 2019 than I have in the past.
I hope to pursue this as long as it is a possibility. What I’ve observed is that WordPress techniques are not the same as those on a more characteristically “social” platform. I would argue that during what I’ve learned, I’ve enjoyed the process. I am tempted to leave this point there and then, but even with confirmation bias indicating that if I am predisposed to a set of beliefs that highly values an “art for art’s sake” attitude, the argument I want to make is that this specific confirmation bias is perfectly fine and I want to run with it in 2019. How then, what can you, you might ask, do to make your blog more readable? Well, you can take it on Facebook and ask people you’ve met to read it. That’s a tactic that can help you start a blog and potentially get results that are interesting for you.
We’re beginning to talk about video research, but the first thing I think of trying to approach something that’s sensitive is some obvious problems coming up right away. These fifteen points are geared to getting your attention away from what you should do with the video you watch, and what you are already doing with your blog, or how it is you could start a blog. The conclusion that can be drawn, and it’s not science, but a method, is that you can draw on video research to formulate something that you’d like people to read and you can put it on WordPress.
I had quite a bit to say just to introduce this, so I am ending this post shortly below and picking up in the next blog post.
This first part of the 15 ways has been about a few generalities that have worked for me and a few tips that could apply to what you are doing.
These first five points are trying to get to the point, saying you can take video, turn it into blog content, get a running start with your blog, and go from there. I am going to return with what shall be two more posts, aiming to illustrate ten more ways that you can do something more with video than just watch it.
Thanks for reading.
When I last asked my niece to let me have a photo, she was in high gear to play a frivolous game of Candy Land. She suggested I show her in the midst of unpacking the enduring board game. My niece is in the third grade.
I think of The Beatles being a radical success in music history, given the enormity of their popularity, even decades later.However, how does that view of The Beatles relate to contemporary ideas about success, and how it is won?
I have ten reasons I’m suggesting that success like what The Beatles enjoyed is actually a weak link in terms of what it means for the individual to pursue preconceived notions of success and how it is misleading. The first four were presented in a previous blog post. The remaining six are presented here.
Streaming services
Netflix is the leader of the pack, I believe, for video streaming. They devote an enormous budget to original content and their selection of existing content is good. That said, Disney is in the streaming video service market. Netflix in my region is compatible with my Tivo, as are other video streaming services. The selection of videos on Netflix is good. I want to step out of the chain of logic to ask if that implies that Tubi, a free video streaming service also compatible with my Tivo is a weak link. Netflix is a completely enjoyable experience and Tubi is likewise an extra addition to the Tivo I use. It isn’t too hard to say which could be better assessed to be a radical success, in the future. That said, while Netflix has been successful remaining ahead of the curve, Tubi is probably under far less pressure. Does Tubi’s relative weak link status mean that it isn’t a success? It is free to use.
Photographer: Rawpixel.com
Going forward with the theory that radical success means enormous difficulty, consider the contender that could grab much of Netflix’ market share, Disney. Disney is unlikely to be going anywhere, given its weight as an entertainment brand, being known for its films, television, toys and theme parks.
Which of the two, Netflix or Disney, will be more of the radical success–that a good streaming service can be? Or will they both amount to great success? Disney has built in family appeal, given its products are for both adults and kids alike. Netflix has been building that kind of appeal from scratch, but persistently. Will either Netflix or Disney be a weak link? It seems important to me that entertainment be good, when it is accessed, or experienced.
Netflix has a reputation for spending extravagant amounts of money on shows and films. Disney already has an enormous built-in capacity for success in the future, in addition to plans for its video streaming service.
3. I started this post by saying there is a fiftieth-anniversary release of The White Album coming 11/9. From what I understand about music streaming services, Spotify has a great conversion rate bringing customers from free use of Spotify onto the premium version. I would ask, if taken to task, whether Spotify will be a “weak link.”
From everything I can say, music with Spotify is magnificent. It seems to be an awesome service.
It is understood that The Beatles essentially recorded The White Album live to 8-track tape, and for everything they’d done in the name of their music, they were in fact recording music that would be a bit of a farewell to their fans. If less scrutiny was being given to the music emerging on The White Album, would The Beatles have lasted longer? And recorded songs for longer than they did? I think it is possible, for when something is intended to be “perfect,” it is often a departure the way a pinnacle climbed must then be descended.
US Politics
4. If you are following my argument, you might guess that the weak link I’m referring to is the former President of the United States, Donald Trump. An example of someone about who there is much to decry that could be a weak link is the President.
As he is someone who was a TV star, I think it is worth mentioning here the radical success that he is known for enjoying and how at the same time the President has mounting problems that he is both a radical success, being wealthy and commanding power, but also a “weak link” in that he could bring down the whole show if he is not effective. President Trump has a knack for appearing with ferocious emphasis again and again in the news, and yet he faces so much criticism and real-life repercussions and consequences that I think he makes a great example of a “weak link” who is at the same time a radical success.
The President brings to mind so many components and elements of radical success gone wrong that it is becoming clearer all the time that the President of the United States is an extremely divisive man. Donald Trump Says China Remix
Photographer: Diego Jimenez
Motivated to Entrepreneurship
5. The ninth reason I want to assert that a weak link can be very much undermining is the idea that if you begin to succeed as an entrepreneur you can find yourself under more pressure than you ever anticipated facing. Making money is many people’s idea of success, but you usually have to put in years of work to make your dreams come true. And in this scenario, ironically, you yourself could be the weakest link if you don’t meet obstacles well.
Unless you keep improving, day in and day out, you could end up being the weak link in your organization simply owing to the fact that your luck could change. If you have found a strategy that makes you King Midas, turning everything you touch to gold, if all of a sudden your luck changes, you may now be suddenly be faced by weakness. The Secret to Self-Motivation | Gary Vaynerchuk’s GREATEST Motivational Speech Ever!
Aerial view of computer laptop on wooden table
You need to keep improving and being good. Everything that took you somewhere is behind you; you have to continue to make great decisions. I suspect you’ll see for yourself if you falter.
6. The final reason I want to take back to Geeks + Gamers. If you have someone, like Jeremy, who is comfortable discussing games, films, and sports, an articulate individual, who sees success coming from YouTube, from a Facebook group, from Twitch I suppose, who challenges who is at the top, as with The Last Jedi, I think it is a philosophical note to say that if you are at that pinnacle, there is any number of reasons your descent will be hastened by those who come after you. You have to reach that pinnacle in excellent form; and you have to leave it in such a way that it endures, that there could be a fiftieth-anniversary, that there could be another billion-dollar blockbuster, that there could be a second term. This is all vital, from a philosophical standpoint, what must be done if radical success, like the kind that spreads all around the globe, is to be achieved and then preserved. CLICKBAIT : A YOUTUBE STORY
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You’re kind of lucky if life’s been luminescent for you. That’s today WordPress daily prompt, the word luminescent.
Luminescent is a word that has a lot of connotations. I can think of a few with ease.
You’re kind of lucky if life’s been luminescent for you.
Think of the stellar skyscape–the myth that when the moon is full, lunacy runs rampant.
Do you like monster movies? You probably know that the wolfman transforms in the luminescence of the full moon.
This month’s full moon is the twenty-ninth and the thirtieth. Tonight’s moon is a waning crescent.
Belief in the power of the full moon can be a devilish outlook, which I’d assert is unfortunate in the season of Easter. We should be celebrating spring.
I am a Canadian, and while I live in the southern parts of the great nation of Canada, it is here, you might say, a short growing season. I’m certainly envious of the good fortune of people living in more idyllic parts of the world.
The work I do, year-round, is to carry out operations in a small not-for-profit cemetery (in a junior capacity), and at times I see luminescence when I am there (usually accompanied solely by my dad). Effects of that kind can be creepy, but there is often a benign atmosphere there as we care for the grounds and for the church. It is generally serene.
Just past Maple Lawn Cemetery
I’m inclined to see luminescent as peaceful, which is what the cemetery really is. I know about grief and I know people go to cemeteries to pray for the departed, but it doesn’t need to be an uncomfortable experience. When it’s luminescent, I find the ambiance comforting.
You know I’m expected to be solemn. I’m not one for a pint with the lads, shall we say. A stab at art or writing or pastimes of that kind in a state of mind that’s luminescent is apt to be rubbish.
You have to approach creative endeavors from a point of view that’s solid. At least do your editing sober. It is up to you, all the same.
Jackson Pollack, for example, painted while very drunk, I believe. Something he said on the subject is
Bums are the well-to-do of this day. They didn’t have as far to fall.
If I look at something I’ve posted or photographed or the like and it’s terrible, I wonder what my poor beleaguered mind was set upon. It is easily unflattering. More frankly, you can make a fool of yourself quite readily. I know I have.
What I think, though, on whether you’re proven a fool is that mistakes happen–shit happens. One takeaway from college that I have is a theatre axiom.
A little foolishness is genius. Too much foolishness is madness.
I am not sure you should repeat that.
Youngsters if they’re inclined to creativity should have their own time to discover what’s art and what’s merely luminescent. Time really does speed and any sane person should fully know the weight of what’s in store in the decades of adulthood and never worry about how it is luminescence plays on the heart and on the mind.
I know it’s less than profound, but you can get the same impact on yourself from drinking a basic coffee and watching a good film, like The Shawshank Redemption for example. I don’t think it’s any better to probe personal depths and pour it out to feel your art than it is to passively and alertly watch something like a good film bringing with you a philosophical bent.
Don’t tear yourself apart. The full moon will rise every single month of your life.
For the month of April 2020, WordPress has reopened its Discover challenges to help bloggers find ideas to write about. I didn’t see their prompt this morning. I set an alarm to wake me, got myself up and at my computer, with a cup of coffee to start me going, and I simply overlooked the prompt.
I thought to look back at the Discover feed to see if a Discover prompt had finally launched. I was dismayed but had an idea.
I saw the prompt for today is the word “below.” I looked back at my blog, and I saw that five years ago I wrote a post, when I was just setting out on WordPress, that fit the theme. While not changing the title of the post, I decided to update it with the word “below” in mind.
A Douglas Adams joke
My mother’s parents bought me the action game Wings for the family Amiga 500 computer when I was a young teenager. The game grew on me, lending itself to a sense of being more deeply involved in playing games.
Much of Wings consisted of dogfights. The box for the game contained factual information about WWI, and a narrative within the game took you through to victory in the year 1918.
I liked playing the game. I just didn’t like being nailed by enemy fire.
Playing the game required extreme player ability. The dogfights were mad. You flew with a view from over the shoulder of the pilot, in the cockpit of your craft.
Soon the pilot would turn his head. Enemy aircraft was nearing, and the time was then to go in that direction. If bullets hit your plane, you knew you were in trouble.
Then it was time for diving away and getting as far from the dogfight as you could. If you could get an enemy in front of you, firing a volley ahead of him often meant he would fly right into it, and your trouble would be solved.
The gameplay meant that you were likely to get shot up no matter what happened. The game fascinated me, but as soon as your pilot met his end, the game required you to begin the war over. No one would wish for that, particularly with my Amiga computer’s loading time.
There was a workaround that would mean evading death, and hence becoming one of the best pilots of the war, to rival even the famed historical pilot the Red Baron–but it meant cheating, or what you call a “creative workaround.”
I found out by intuition that if enemy aircraft defeated me, I could hit the hard reset command for the computer, and then rebooting the computer would sweep away the game. What was the upshot? The diskette wouldn’t save the destruction of the mission, and I could try again.
With successive missions, your pilot became better at combat. With this method, playing even the hardest missions could be handled with an extraordinary pilot in your control.
Photographer: Snapwire
No one should treat war lightly, and if the game reflected the time in the life of a teenage pilot at the outset of World War I, I would have gone to the grave. I am sorry, of course, not that I would have been shot down, but that I was so insensitive. However, I appreciate that my grandparents’ gave me the gift, and I reason that they had different views on war (and not computers) than someone from my generation.
How NPC is that?
I suppose I’ve done worse. Anytime I’m challenged in a game, I want to play with a competitive spirit–maybe I get that from my father.
The Myth of the Independent Blogger and How I Learned to Love It 