Tales from the Technoverse

Commentary on social networking, technology, movies, society, and random musings

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The Lives of Others (2006)

August 22nd, 2009 · movies

In December, 1975, I was one of a group of young political and civic leaders on a State Department sponsored visit to Europe. One of the places we visited was pre-unification Berlin.

The initial visit to East Berlin was sobering. On the West Berlin side, the Christmas season lead to brightly colored decorations, shoppers, and a great deal of activity both day and night. I remember that when we were in East Berlin one evening, it was almost as if we were in The Wizard of Oz, going back to Kansas, from color to black and white film.

There were literally no bright lights at all in East Berlin. Well, except for, of all things, a Diners Club sign in a bar that was near the wall on the East side. This blue blinking sign stood out in the grays and whites of everything else.

A discussion of the Berlin wall and the movie after the jump … [Read more →]

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So How Do You Start The Darn Thing

August 12th, 2009 · government business, travel

After staying in a hotel in Sacramento where the air conditioning broke and where there were no other rooms free, I flew down to Los Angeles this morning for the second of my two stops in California.

The plane flight was uneventful, I was able to get tomorrow’s boarding pass before leaving the airport, and then went outside to catch the rental car shuttle.

After waiting for what seemed a VERY long time for the shuttle for my unnamed rental car company to come, whose name rhymed with Mudget, I arrived to get my rental car. The guy at the counter told me it was in C-8 around the building to the back, the list location near the road. [Read more →]

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I’m Still Big, It’s the Pictures That Got Small

August 5th, 2009 · Entertainment

So says Norma Desmond, the iconic former silent movie star who is the focus of Sunset Boulevard.

Considered by many to be the iconic film noir about the vacuity of Hollywood, it is well worth seeing. Norma Desmond was played by Gloria Swanson, who herself had been a star in silent films and didn’t make the transition to ‘talkies’, her young lover was played by William Holden. Neither was the first choice for their respective parts but they each played them well.

Characters in the film include Cecil B DeMille, Buster Keaton, and Hedda Hopper all playing themselves. Desmond’s driver and 1st husband, Max, was played by Gloria Swanson’s real-life silent film director, Erich von Stroheim. The movie was directed by Billy Wilder and was rated in the top 20 films in history by AFI. [Read more →]

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Evidently Someone Finds Me Fascinating

August 3rd, 2009 · government business

In the July 28th edition of govfresh, Goldy Kamali wrote a column entitled the Top 25 Most Fascinating Communicators in Government IT.

 

Goldy evidently needs to get out more since she was kind enough to include me on the list.

http://govfresh.com/2009/07/top-25-most-fascinating-communicators-in-government-it/

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A Solar Eclipse Is Much More Than Just A Visual Experience

July 23rd, 2009 · 2009 china solar eclipse, travel

“First Contact!” 

 

The shout came from the group of professional astronomers and experienced amateurs who were collected at the edge of the plaza at the local Wuhan University which our group had reserved to watch the eclipse. 

 

Excitement increased among the crowd of ninety Eclipse Chasers who had traveled from all over the United States, Venezuela, Columbia, England, and Canada. The noise level from the nearly 1000 local citizens mostly standing on the edge or the plaza rose also though it was obvious they were less clear on what was happening. 

 

First Contact refers to the first moment that the edge of the moon touches the disk of the Sun. From that point on begins what is both the longest and shortest periods of time that any of the observers will experience. First Contact in Wuhan was called out at around 8:15 am, three hours after our bus left the hotel and five hours after the first of the three buses had left the hotel; that first bus carrying those people with telescopes and specialized photographic equipment. 

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Serenity On The Yangtze

July 21st, 2009 · 2009 china solar eclipse, Firefly, Serenity, travel

For those who have come in late to the story, I am a member of what some might call a cult that worships Firefly and Serenity. 

Firefly was a TV show created by Joss Whedon, who among other things was the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which lasted less than one season. It was shown on the Fox Network who evidently weren’t exactly clear on what to do with a quirky, character driven, space western whose principals ran around in a spaceship, used six-shooters, rustled cattle, and whenever feeling strong emotions would rattle off a phrase or two in Chinese. 

The end result is that only 11 of the 14 filmed episodes were ever shown on TV and the show was canceled. 

I never saw Firefly on TV during that season.  [Read more →]

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Our Time In Shanghai

July 21st, 2009 · 2009 china solar eclipse, travel

Chaos. Traffic, Construction. Heat. Really, really bad drivers. Financial transformation. New York with a lot more Chinese Restaurants. Western.

Some of my quick reactions to Shanghai in our 2.5 days here. Home to over 13 million people, it is hard to describe the sense of change and transformation that is happening. One of our guides mentioned that over 20% of China’s GDP is generated here. Construction is going on everywhere, the traffic is awful, and the driver’s make Boston driver’s seem tame.

Traffic signals are evidently suggestions, often ignored. Vehicles make left turns across multiple lanes in front of cars and trucks rushing toward them, each daring the other to stop or not. Pedestrians do not have the right of way our guides emphasize over and over.

What to make of a society that has an enormous complete model of every building in Shanghai at the Urban Planning Exhibition Center, updated a few times each year. Perhaps one that also has beautiful exhibits of ancient ceramics and jade and furniture at the Shanghai museum, and notes the existence of the various ‘concessions’, which are where Western powers carved out areas under their control within Shanghai in years past.

Our 90 fellow eclipse chasers are divided into three buses; called sun, moon, and stars. My family is on the stars bus.

Our guide in Shanghai was a lovely young woman, Jin Jing, who provided us with much information an entertaining stories about herself and China.

Here is her name in Chinese:

Jin Jing's Name In Chinese

One of the stories she told involved the head of the United States, the head of Russia, and Deng Xiaoping riding in a bus.

The bus driver asked the head of the United States which direction to take at an intersection, and he answered turn right since we support capitalism.

The bus driver then asked the head of Russia which direction to take, and he said turn left since we support socialism.

Worried at what to do, the bus driver asked Deng Xiaoping what he should do. Deng said turn the turn signal so that it signals left, but turn right. We will call this Socialism but with Chinese characteristics.

My take is that the people of Shanghai have embraced this approach completely.

 

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CIO Magazine Article On Cybersecurity

July 16th, 2009 · cyber-security

The lead story in the July 1, 2009 issue of CIO Magazine deals with cyber-security.

The Editor’s Letter headline is:

“Whac-A-Mole” Approach to Security

and contains the following paragraph:

“It’s hard to imagine more appropriate imagery for our cover story (“Moving Target”) about the widespread frustration with mounting cybersecurity threats and the lack of an effective U.S. government response. CTO Daniel Mintz of consulting firm CSC aptly describes the feds’ “Whac-A-Mole security” approach as one where long-term strategy takes a back seat to daily tactical responses.”

http://www.cio.com/article/495811/A_Whac_A_Mole_Approach_to_Security

I appreciate the mention and anyone who has heard me talk about cyber-security will know I use that term a lot. My one question is whether it should be “whack” or whac” …

The full article is located here:
http://www.cio.com/article/496125/Obama_s_Cybersecurity_Push_What_It_Means_for_CIOs

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Shanghaied

July 14th, 2009 · 2009 china solar eclipse

I am sure no-one is particularly interested in the trip details from Washington DC to Shanghai, assuming anyone is interested in what I am writing at all, so will keep this short.

 

We were up by 4am to leave by 5am to pick up my younger daughter, Tamar, at 5:30am, to get to Dulles airport at 6am, where we got through the entire ticketing process and security within 30 minutes so were way early for our 8am flight. I can never get the timing of these things right.

 

We had two flights to take us to Shanghai, the first to Chicago and the second from Chicago to Shanghai. The second which was scheduled to take off a little after 10:30 was about ½ hour late due to debris on the runway, a new reason, at least for me, for a delay, and took just under 14 hours; the longest flight I have ever had.

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WHAT I DID FOR MY SUMMER VACATION

July 12th, 2009 · travel

On Monday, July 13th at 8am, my wife Ellen and my two daughters, Miriam and Tamar, and I are getting on a plane at Dulles Airport.  Approximately 18 hours later, we land in Shanghai, China at 1:55pm, July 14th.

Eight days later we hope to see the longest total solar eclipse in this century, slightly less than six minutes long at Wuhan, China. Regardless of the viewing conditions that morning,  we will get an all too short glimpse of this still controversially emerging global super-power between July 14th and July 27th when we leave Beijing to return home.

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