Movies, schmoovies.
For years I have been hearing the claptrap about how the experience of watching a first-run movie in a theatre is going away and how sad that is.  The most recent paen to this idea is in the NYT today:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/05/movies/redcarpet/05darg.html?8dpc
You know, for as long as I can remember (a long time, since the release of Clockwork Orange, at least),  the experience of watching a first run movie in a theatre as been the torture of waiting in line, uncomfortable "plush" seating, smelly disgusting theatres, loud and boorish fellow movie watchers, slimy and overpriced food.  Not a real draw for me.

So what's to miss?  The big screen and amazing sound!  And now, with the advent of wall-sized screens for the livingroom, I can watch the best of the best without feeling like I need to take a shower when I'm done.  

The only exception to this is watching "second run" movies as they come through the smaller classic venues (like the Cabot Theatre in Beverly, MA).  Now, that's a cinematic experience.

Interesting article about Sillerman's plans for Graceland and the Elvis image in the NYT today:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/05/business/yourmoney/05elvis.html

Makes one think about how the Elvis charm is wrapped around a kind of seedy kitsch - and whether the corporatization of it will make Elvis something other than what he is today.  Like, turning Elvis into Mickey Mouse.

Just testing the Google widget for Blogger posting...

My Cities in 2005

Hannah and Jason Kotke have each started a "My Cities in 2005" meme... seems like fun. The rules are - you had to spend at least one night there. Here's my list:

New York
Lisbon
Paris
Boston
San Fransisco
Los Angeles
Las Vegas
Birmingham, AL
Atlanta, GA
Sarasota, FL
Miami
Philadelphia
Dallas
Houston
New Orleans
Washington

And - we've started the year right with Las Vegas, Birmingham and Dallas on the list already (in addition to Washington and Boston, where I split most of my "down time.")

Broadcast Flag

It's after 5 and I have a flight to catch, so this will be short - but it seems like this latest attack on the limitation of the reach of government is a blatant attempt by an industry that has no clue to subvert the powers of the governement for purposes they are not intended for.

Having the FCC regulate portable media devices? Are you kidding??? The purpose of the FCC is to make sure that we have a reliable communications system in this country so that, in the case of emergency, we can communicate with each other without interference. Anything else goes way beyond the powers that we should be giving this body.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has an item on this that you should read. And, then, write your congressperson!

More on the Amtrak Regional "Express"

Now it's getting ridiculous. It is so cold in this car that we have to put on our winter coats to stay warm. I wonder if we can sue Amtrak for getting sick?

At least there's power for the computer. And - through the kind auspices of T-Mobile, a cell-phone based internet connection (which I pay for, of course, and it's really slow, but it's better than nothing!).

Stuck on Amtrak

Normally, I am pretty happy with Amtrak. But, tonight is a BIG exception. We left Boston on the Acela, bound for Baltimore. About a mile before 128 station, the train started having problems. Seemed like a breaker was repeatedly resetting or something. Anyway, this continued over and over, all the way to Providence, RI (about 45-50 miles). When we got to Providence, they decided to move us all off the Acela and on to an Amtrak Regional train, which is where we are now. We are stopping at every podunk stop along the Amtrak route to NY - and I suppose we will do the same thing from NY to Baltimore!

Now, I called Amtrak at 800-USA-RAIL and the operators had no idea there was a problem. She was nice enough, but had no clue. At least she checked and found out that the customer service department will be open on Monday (why wouldn't they be???).

It will be interesting to see how Amtrak deals with this when I call them tomorrow. I will hold off my flame until then - maybe I'll be surprised. But, I am pretty pissed off now.

By the way, we are now literally travelling backwards!!! Got to Bridgeport, loaded those people on, and now we are going backwards, away from NY and our final destination!!

Our rail system sucks.

Jason Calacanis

OK, so I know nothing about the celebrities of Web 2.0. And, I really feel like an idiot because I did not draw the connection between Jason Calacanis of Silicon Alley Reporter fame and the Jason Calacanis of Weblogs, Inc. fame. Duh! Until I read the Wired article. And then it hit me.... Jason Calacanis was the guy who opened the conference with his keynote that basically said... don't expect to make money with Podcasting! Very inspiring, we all thought. Well, then I looked back at the PME website and saw his photo. Quite a bit different than Wired's (obviously taken some time ago). Anyway, now that I read the piece in Wired, I understand a bit more where Jason was coming from in the keynote.

What if...

Thoughts and Musings: INFANT DISCOVERED IN BARN, CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES LAUNCH PROBE

Cheney's Ipod

This article popped up today...

Cheney's iPod Takes Top Priority on Extended Flight
. . . .Reporters Wait to File Stories as VP's MP3 Player Charges

J thing he is listening to Soccergirl Inc. and Dawn and Drew!

Steve Rivers has the right idea about iPods

A couple of guys from musicbiz.com did an interesting piece -sort of a two-way diaogue in print. One of them is Steve Rivers, the former director of programming for Infinity. He's got more smarts than most... and here are some comments he made about the iPod and some recent discussion about "iPod fatigue:"

Riv: I love Rick, and highly respect him, but "iPod fatigue" seems to be something he's put on his Santa wish list. Just as Bill Gates turned Microsoft on a dime and centered on its success being Internet-driven, Steve Jobs has pulled another rabbit out of his hat with the iPod, and even renaming all the Apple stores as the iTunes stores. And the Apple hits just keep comin�. The new iPod, with the ability to view videos that the geeks are calling the viPod, now opens up another new way for Apple to compete. With Disney/ABC and NBC signing up to allow their content on iTunes, and Fox and ESPN about to join in, it's refreshing to see the television industry come to the party early rather than late. There was a time when they stood their ground and allowed cable TV to seize market share; this time they seem to be saying, "We're ready to put one foot in this pool."

Mena Trott's speech was controversial????

OK - I am a relative innocent in this world of blogging. I post a few thoughts, then go away for a while, post some more. So - I may lack some of the passion that others have about this medium. But this one got me...

I am struggling to see how anything in Mena Trott's speech to the Les Blogs conference could be even termed remotely controversial. Someone who could theoretically benefit from incivility (increased sales of six apart products in an ever-escalating arms race) in the blogosphere asking for civility is about as controversial as asking someone not to sneeze on you during cold and flu season.

Give me a break - there really are some people out there who need to reassess their perspectives on things. I noted the linkback about "Currygate" on Nicholas Carr's blog and I have to concur... people are taking this way to seriously. Just deal with it. Grow up. Geesh.

To badly paraphrase Rick, in Casablanca, "none of us amount to a hill of beans on this old web..."

The Grateful Dead and Archive.org

Disappointing to hear about the challenge that archive.org is having keeping Grateful Dead content online. Cory Doctorow had a post about it on Boing Boing. Indeed, the Dead were the most "Open Source" band that we have ever seen... maybe John Perry Barlow could get the EFF to fight the "good fight" with this.

After Jerry Garcia passed away, I noticed that there were suddenly a lot more Jerry Garcia ties in the stores... I always wondered what the deal was , and now I think that maybe his estate is a bit greedy and released a bunch of designs that he wouldn't have released had he survived.

Chickens to humans....

I love the day after Thanksgiving... it's like a gift -a totally free day on which we can suffer the indignities of the mall or spend time on things we would never otherwise do., like researching the chicken populations of the US and China.

While reading a blurb in Time Magazine, quoting Zhou Liwei, a provincial spokesman of Liaoning, China, I noticed that Time was saying that China has a chicken population of 5.2 billion. It struck me that - given the human population of China - this was not an extremely large number of chickens. So, I delved a bit into USDA data (2004 domestic US chicken and broiler production and global broiler statistics) and came up with some numbers that I think are pretty amazing...

Country	People	Chickens	Ratio
China	1,300,000,000	5,843,394,740	4.49
US	296,000,000	8,934,000,000	30.18

This means that - in China - there are 4.49 chickens in every pot. In the US, there are 30.18 chickens in every pot (assuming that every man, woman and child has a pot)!

Puts a new perspective on things, doesn't it? I mean - abstract statistics about hunger and all of that are pretty boring... but when you think about the implications of each person in the US being represented by 30 chickens - versus only 4 in China - it is pretty mind-boggling.

Opening Day - Afternoon Sessions

Starting with the "Secrets of iTunes and the iPod" session. Paul Griffin (Griffin Technology), Chris Breen (Playlist), Leo Laporte and Dan Frakes.

Pretty interesting group.

Opening Day

Well, it has kicked off nicely here at the Portable Media Expo (aka Podcast Expo) today. Definitely crowded, but not so much that it's a problem.

Leo Laporte and the guy from enGadget did a good couple of keynotes this morning... basically the message was stay out of the infrastructure part of this business and do the content.

Two of the sessions this morning were so packed that if you were late - you were out of luck.

This is an amazing thing...

I had heard about the windmills east of LA... but nothing prepares you for the pure other-worldliness of it. It is like being on a science-fiction movie. These photos give you a small idea of the scale - there are hundreds, if not thousands of them. But, until you actually see them all turning at the same time in the incredibly strong wind that blows up the canyon from San Bernadino to Palm Springs, you can't truly "get it."

Portable Media Expo - Podcast Conference

Made it out here for the first Podcast expo - and what a kick-off night it was! It started kinda slow, with a few folks floating through the bar at the Marriott and having a little drink and maybe some sustenance before the show began.

Then, around 9PM, the show kicked off in a function room at the Marriott with some pretty decent music - Podsafe, I am sure.

A few digs at the big bad "traditional" radio biz, but for the most part a real upbeat time.

Adam Curry and friends showed up - with a special appearance by Madge Weinstein!!

Reminded me of the days of '70s progressive radio.

One of the coolest things was seeing the new celebrities, like Brian Ibbott, get their props. Quite nice.

On to the opening of the conference itself... tomorrow morning, bright and early!!

RFID article in Globe

Great article in the Boston Globe today by Hiawatha Bray on the subject of RFID tags called, "You Need not be Paranoid to Fear RFID."

It is clear that we should have no expectation of privacy as we move into the future. I wrote a paper in college on this subject in the '70s. My conclusion then is the same as it is today... there will be no privacy, so therefore everyone must have access to all information for society to work. At the time, I envisioned pay terminals (much like pay telephones) in public areas for people to use to access databases... but, as it turns out, we have realtively ubiquitous access to the network today, so at least that won't be necessary. But in order to provide checks and balances against abuse of this data by large corporations and the government, we must make it available to all so that everyone can by spied on by everyone. Not because this is a good thing, but because being spied on is inevitable.

If the spy knows that she can be exposed, she is less likely to expose others. Awful situation for a society to be in, but here we are.