McLuhan

Been going over Mark Federman's doctoral thesis on Valence Theory and just thought I'd share a part of McLuhan's Understanding Media that he quotes with you all.

In a culture like ours, long accustomed to splitting and dividing all things as a means of control, it is sometimes a bit of a shock to be reminded that, in operational and practical fact, the medium is the message. That is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology.... Many people would be disposed to say that it was not the machine, but what one did with the machine, that was its meaning or message. In terms of the ways in which the machine altered our relations to one another and to ourselves, it mattered not in the least whether it turned out cornflakes or Cadillacs. The restructuring of human work and association was shaped by the technique of fragmentation that is the essence of machine technology. The essence of automation technology is the opposite. It is integral and decentralist in depth, just as the machine was fragmentary, centralist, and superficial in its patterning of human relationships.

I recommend reading Federman's Valance Theory. It has brought me many new ideas for Civico (Civiko). Let us see what tmrw brings.

Dear Oscar, get fucked

havent blogged in a long time. Just though i'd comment on how shitty the oscars were. First off I didn't watch the entire thing, but I did watch most of it. Yes i'm wasting my time cause the oscars suck but..... a few things:

-Why bother showing it live at all if the entire spectacle is for tv viewers? just tell us its live and properly edit the thing (like saturday night live/talk shows, etc..). That way you can cut short shitty speeches, and keep the good ones. Do multiple takes if things get fucked up, and so on. ITS A ROOM FULL OF ACTORS FOR FUCKS SAKE, they are used to this kind of thing.

- Why pretend to enforce a 45 second speech rule, when you clearly are just going to ignore it for the bigger awards.

- Why talk about award ceremonies that have already happened (technical awards)? You ignored them in the first place, why balk now?

- this idea of giving people oscars cause they deserve it for their entire body of work, rather then what they are nominated for is retarded. aka Jeff Bridges. Crazy Heart was ok, he was great in it, but it pales in comparison to countless other performances that he has given. They do this for pretty much every Leading Role award, every year.

- The Blind Side is a fucking awful movie, I dont care how good someone is in a film, if the movie itself sucks, no oscar.

- Why the christ do you have a group of actors taking turns, talking about a person nominated for film, name the movie for which they are nominated, have 10 seconds of music, bring out another person, and then have them rush through repeating the same information we just heard about?

- The oscars are too long?? Why not get rid of or at least have short commercials? and why aren't they of superbowl-esque quality?

- The whole thing is a crock of shit. Fuck the oscars.

- Avatar is infinitely better film making then the fucking hurt locker. Both are solid B+ movies at best.

- I love the medium of film, the industry, and those who profit off of it have turned a beautiful art form into a waste of time.