Archives for December 2012
огни гирлянд
25 December 2012 | Art | No Comments
к слову о Рождестве.
о вкусах
25 December 2012 | Literature | No Comments
первый раз встретил человека, который а) утверждает, что любит научную фантастику и б) не считает книги Филипа К. Дика и роман Нила Стивенсона “Алмазный век, или Букварь для благородных девиц” хоть чем-то значительным и интересным.
so refreshing.
when the light hits him a certain way…
24 December 2012 | Cinematograph | 1 Comment
а вот две чудесные роли Питера О’Тула — сперва “What’s New Pussycat?” с великолепной Роми Шнайдер, исключительной Капучине, с гениальным Питером Селлерсом и молодым волшебником Вуди Алленом по сценарию последнего же[1]:
Michael James: In Britain, we have a national therapy, we call it cricket. Unlike other sports, it doesn’t involve anxieties or pressures. It’s leisurely and lyrical. It’s the song of willow on leather.
или даже так:
Liz: Would you excuse me for a minute? I’m going into the bathroom to take an overdose of sleeping pills.
Michael James: I like you. You’re a nice stable girl.
и, да, разумеется, я люблю все эти старые комедии, в них черезчур много среди просто шуток, где-то между первым и вторым тортом в лицо:
Doctor: Mademoiselle, the boys at the Emergency Suicide ward have voted to give you this gold watch for unusual devotion.
как раз о подобном рвении и другой фильм, “Wings of Fame”, — о том вновь, как слова и глупости окружают нас бесконечными лабиринтами — навсегда, или только вместо смерти:
Brian Smith: Will you be showing this film again?
Projectionist: No, that was the last copy.
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и, к удивлению, в “Midnight in Paris” 55 лет спустя он во многом снова играет по тем же французским нотам. ↩
отныне и повсеместно
23 December 2012 | Google, Privacy | 1 Comment
очередная разработка:
Without much fanfare, Google announced news this week of a new advertising project, Conversions API, that will let businesses build all-encompassing user profiles based off of not just what users search for on the Web, but what they purchase outside of the home.
In a blog post this week on Google’s DoubleClick Search site, the Silicon Valley giant says that targeting consumers based off online information only allows advertisers to learn so much. “Conversions,” tech-speak for the digital metric made by every action a user makes online, are incomplete until coupled with real life data, Google says.
кто бы сомневался:
The blog goes on to explain that in-store transactions, call-tracking and other online activities can be inputted into Google to be combined with other information “to optimize your campaigns based on even more of your business data.”
the stars my destination
23 December 2012 | Science | No Comments
электронная книга “Hubble Space Telescope Discoveries”:
Soar through the universe with the Hubble Space Telescope, exploring discoveries from dark energy to colliding galaxies. This highly interactive eBook features video, image galleries and more to reveal the record of scientific breakthroughs behind Hubble’s stunning images of the cosmos.
For more than two decades, Hubble has had a front-row seat for cosmic events: comets plunging into Jupiter, the explosive death of stars, the birth of new solar systems, and more. In the process, it has changed the face of astronomy. Learn about Hubble’s revelations and take a tour of the history and technology of the telescope.
available on iPad.
под прикрытием
22 December 2012 | Censorship, Internet, Politics | No Comments
журнал Wired, между прочим, включил Евгения Касперского в список 15 самых опасных людей на планете — не без доли иронии, разумеется, но все же:
A longtime ally of Russia’s secret security services, Kaspersky supplies technical expertise to the FSB, the successor to the KGB. His researchers train their agents in computer forensics. And when Kaspersky’s son was kidnapped, FSB agents came to his rescue. Not long after that, Kaspersky complained publicly that there was “too much freedom” online and pushed for additional government controls over social networks, which he blamed in part for his son’s abduction. A few months later, Moscow passed a new bill banning wide categories of websites and introducing new surveillance techniques to Russian telecom firms.
casualties of war
22 December 2012 | Art, Culturology | No Comments
немножко другие игрушечные солдатики. жаль, что в детстве мы играем не с такими.
о силе
22 December 2012 | Censorship, Politics | 2 Comments
Aliaa Magda Elmahdy is an Egyptian internet activist and women’s rights advocate. Elmahdy publicly challenged Egypt’s social structures. Elmahdy became known for publishing a nude photo in her Blogspot blog, which she described in Facebook as “screams against a society of violence, racism, sexism, sexual harassment and hypocrisy”. Since then she became a subject of several death threats.
ей 21 год. а что сделали вы?
If we use violence against those who demand to be heard and respected, those who demand an end to violence against them, when we go ahead and use violence, what does that make us as a nation?
мыши и кактусы
21 December 2012 | Facebook, Internet, Software | No Comments
Look, at the end of the day all you have to think about is this: do you believe the services you’re using are out to exploit you? If so, don’t use them. Sure, a good TOS may be able to protect you from some of that, but hardly from all of it. If a company wants to fuck you, they’re going to figure out a way to fuck you. You shouldn’t be using a service that you think is trying to fuck you.
I don’t believe Instagram is that service. Nor do I believe Facebook is. But if you do, it’s simple: don’t use them.
overcoming natural limits
21 December 2012 | Literature | No Comments
изумительное эссе “How Authors Write”:
Egan, Gould, Sebald, Kerouac, and Baker were all writing in eras when new media were everywhere, but what computer scientists call “platform shift” did not get their juices going. The technologies of composition did. Why this should be so is not mysterious. The explanation is that literary writers are solitary creatures: their days are spent alone, with keyboards and pens under their fingers and a humming photocopying machine down the road at the university. Those things are real, and what one can do with them exciting, while websites, e-readers, and even books seem abstractions, mere mechanisms of distribution.