View From the Phlipside - Online Privacy, Social Revolution and Super Bowl Silliness

 "The View From the Phlipside" is a media commentary program airing on WRFA-LP, Jamestown NY.  It can be heard Tuesday through Friday just after 8 AM and 5 PM.  The following are scripts which may not exactly match the aired version of the program.  Mostly because the host may suddenly choose to add or subtract words at a moments notice.  WRFA-LP is not responsible for any such silliness or the opinions expressed.  You can listen to a live stream of WRFA or find a podcast of this program at wrfalp.com

Program scripts from week of February 20, 2012

Online Privacy

There’s a lot of talk about privacy online these days.  It often results in people running in all directions like their hair is on fire.  Sadly this isn’t really helpful or even necessary.  On the other hand being aware of the issues is probably not a bad idea.

The conversation tends to break down into two discussions.  One is more probably described as confidentiality.  And that one is simple.  There isn’t any confidentiality online.  If you put up a comment or an update let alone a picture or video in all likelihood it can be viewed by pretty much anyone if they really want to see it.  The only option is to simply treat the Internet like what it is.  A public forum.

On the other hand we have the question of your privacy versus various companies keeping track of where you go and what you do.  This has become a major issue over the last couple years.  Google, Facebook, Apple plus nearly a dozen publishers including Rodale, Conde Nast, Time, Inc. and Hearst Communications have run afoul of some level of privacy rules.  The truth of the matter is that they don’t particularly where you have been, at least not in the sense that worries most people.  What they want to do is sell that information to advertisers who will use it to target advertising toward you.

The real problem here is that no one is clear on just how your individual privacy is affected.  While the data clearly has value since it is sold the courts have also ruled that web users are not injured by that sale.  The bottom line is that most people feel that their business is their business and no one should be using that to create a profit for some other business.  In the end it would be great if all web sites and services had specific opt in options for this kind of tracking.  It would be even better if that option,either opt in or opt out, was clearly labeled and easy to find.

In the end the reality is that we are responsible for ourselves.  And just like the real world the online world can be a difficult place if you don’t take some precautions.

**********************************

Social Revolution

The universe of the social media is still very much in a state of flux.  Now you may think that as Facebook becomes more a mainstay of our lives that it’s been pretty much settled right?  Let’s be honest, aren’t you a little surprised when you find one of your friends or associates that ISN’T on Facebook?  Plus it seems like huge numbers of people are on Twitter or LinkedIn or any of a dozen other social media sites.  So social media is pretty much mainstream right?

Well maybe not.  While it’s a fun thing for lots of us there are still a lot of questions about what the future of social media looks like.  Turns out that advertisers still have questions about whether this media can be used effectively long term.  And that means that the long term viability of even behemoths like Facebook remains in question.  Yes the massive initial public offering of stock looks great but with any investment there is always some risk lurking out there.  Remember Facebook has really only been BIG for about 4 years.

All of which brings me to a couple stories that bring a whole new aspect of social media.  Two stories that show social media making a real difference in the lives of users.  

Late last year a Utah woman used Facebook to get help when she and her 19 month old child were held hostage by an abusive boyfriend.  They had been held for 5 days when the woman got on Facebook and posted that she thought she and the child would be dead by morning.  Friends contacted police who arrived and rescued her.

On the other side of the planet a village chief in Kenya called his village to action when he received word that criminals had invaded the house of a neighbor.  The village uses Twitter to stay in touch.  The chief sent out a tweet calling for help.  Villagers surrounded the house and drove the criminals off.

In the end it’s just one more example of the still growing utility of social media.  Yes it’s a regular part of the lives of a great many of us.  At the same time we are only beginning to scratch the surface of what social media might mean in the future.

The only thing that’s guaranteed is that things will change.
************************************

Super Bowl Silliness


I actually commented on today’s topic a couple weeks ago during my post Super Bowl commentaries.  At the time I gave it very little attention because, well, that’s what I thought it deserved.  But we are now several weeks post Super Bowl and I’m still seeing some folks weeping and wailing about it.  So maybe I need to give it a little more attention.

In this case it’s the hand gesture from British recording artist M.I.A.  It’s the most recent of what might be called the “Super Bowl Half Time Show Outrages”.  You’ve probably heard about it by now.  At one point during Madonna’s show (which as a fellow 50 year old I found a little embarrassing for the world’s senior female pop star.  The choreography was pretty clearly toned down for an aging body) anyway at one point M.I.A. flipped the bird while on worldwide television.  And the talking heads of the world promptly lost their marbles.

Now I want to be clear about this.  Just like the Janet Jackson “Wardrobe Malfunction” of 2004 I was watching the half time show.  I was specifically watching both shows at the moments in question.  And didn’t see anything either time.  Both “event” took place in such a short period of time that literally if you blinked or turned away to get another nacho you could miss it.  Now this year there was the added furor because NBC had the show on delay so they could edit out just this kind of, um, spontaneous displays.  Here’s my bet.  It happened so fast and for such a short period of time that the delay operator just missed it.  Maybe he blinked at the wrong second.  I think we can assume there were no nachos in the control booth.  

Was the move stupid and juvenile?  Yes it was.  In fact both of M.I.A.’s fellow performers on stage at that point of the show have said exactly that.  Both Madonna and Nikki Minaj have criticized the move as being inappropriate.  And when you step over the line for those two you know you’ve wandered where you don’t need to be.

I have no argument that M.I.A. needs to grow up a little.  But the level of hysteria that follows these kinds of minor kerfluffles leads me to believe that maybe some of the rest of us need to do likewise.


Call that the View From the Phlipside.

Book review - Love Thy Neighbor

When I grab a first novel from a writer there's a little extra excitement for me.  There's always that hope that you're about to be excited and grabbed by a new talent.  Of course I also know that the book could leave me flat or even let me down big time.

Mark Gilleo's first novel leaves me in that middle ground.  Starting with a great idea (and a really cool place to find it) he manages to dribble away the impact of the idea through some poor writing decisions.  The story concept is simple - a woman thinks she's seen a terrorist group in her neighborhood.  She calls the C.I.A. and isn't believed.  Shortly thereafter her son moves home to help with her increasing dementia and begins to see signs that this may not be a result of her mental decline.  The story will put the son's life in danger and the lives of tens of thousands of citizens in our nation's capitol.  This is a solid concept for a thriller.

The problem is that Gilleo's writing makes me think of a moderately talented college student.  There's plenty of  "who cares?" information that doesn't move the story forward.  While there are times when Gilleo shows he has the skills too often there is feeling of trying too hard to be clever.  It's a form of author intrusion that is annoying.

Speaking of author intrusion it becomes pretty clear that the author doesn't have much respect for Islam or the Roman Catholic church and he doesn't think much of our government either.  Gilleo is entitled to those opinions but they don't advance the story either.  And the book gives a very clear idea that all Muslims are terrorists.  There's a weak stab at the end to try and back away from that by making a character who sacrifices thier life for the USA a Muslim.  It came  off as shallow and simplistic to me.

The greatest shortcomings of the book are the characters.  There's no depth to any of them.  We know very little about either the hero or the villain at any point in the book.  These cardboard cutouts spend their time doing illogical things.  The son ends up using his girlfriend to commit a federal crime without her knowledge or consent thereby jeopardizing her career.  While she finds this irritating it's not enough to break off the relationship.  Really?  The terrorists don't make a whole lot more sense either.  While their leader keeps talking about not drawing attention to themselves she dresses in ways guaranteed to draw male attention and kills several people for no particularly compelling reason.

In the end a good concept expires under the weight of characters you can't care about and their illogical actions.  Add in the uneven writing and this one just doesn't make the cut.  Is it the worst book of the year?  No.  But unless you have a weekend where you have nothing better to do there are a lot of books more deserving of your time.

Rating - ** Not Impressed

The View From the Phlipside - Oscar Movies, the Dark Side of George and Tweet Reviews

(Starting this week I am combining my three scripts into a single blog post.  The task of creating multiple posts to be published on different days and then trying to remember to link them on my Facebook page is just more than I want to deal with any more.  I've inserted breaks so you can scan quickly for each topic) 

 "The View From the Phlipside" is a media commentary program airing on WRFA-LP, Jamestown NY.  It can be heard Tuesday through Friday just after 8 AM and 5 PM.  The following are scripts which may not exactly match the aired version of the program.  Mostly because the host may suddenly choose to add or subtract words at a moments notice.  WRFA-LP is not responsible for any such silliness or the opinions expressed.  You can listen to a live stream of WRFA or find a podcast of this program at wrfalp.com

Oscar Movies

Sadly over the last couple years I have not been able to see as many of the Oscar nominated movies as I’d like.  In fact prior to last week I hadn’t seen ANY of this years nominees.  Then in the span of about 6 days I saw two of them.  I was struck by them both, their similarities and their very profound differences.

The two that I saw were Terrence Malick’s “Tree of Life” and the black and white mostly silent film “The Artist”.  There was no plan to seeing these two virtually back to back but it created an interesting comparison.

Both movies are homages to the art of movie making.  And both are brilliantly executed.  At that point however the two movies take off in radically different directions.

The Tree of Life is obscure, symbol filled, visually stunning and did I mention obscure?  This is more of contemplation of opposing forces in life than a traditional movie.  The movie that keeps springing to mind for me as a comparison is Kubrick’s “2001 - A Space Odyssey”.  Except that 2001 actually has a story that you can mostly follow.  After 2 plus hours of watching the movie you’ll have an experience at the movies you’ll never forget.  And quite possibly never understand.

On the other hand “The Artist” pays tribute to the early days of the movies, the days before sound when actors had completely different challenges in bringing their stories to the big screen.  It is the story of a silent movie star faced with the arrival of talkies and his star being eclipsed by an actor that he had discovered and launched.  Plenty of people will hear “black and white” and “silent” and decide not to see the movie.  That would be a shame.  The cast is exceptional and they bring the story very much alive on the screen.  There are in fact two very short sections with audio other than the traditional music score.  If you love the movies especially the early days of the industry you should make this a must see.  If you know nothing about those days you should see it to better understand and love the movies of today.  Some folks are amazed this one got a nod for Best Movie but it’s nice to see a movie that takes a risk to tell the story.

Will either one claim the Oscar?  Hard to say.  Tree of Life probably has the better chance because it can be seen as intellectual rather than popular choice.  But Oscar ends up in some peculiar hands some years so we’ll have to wait and see.  Still time for me to see a few more nominees too.

****************************************
The Dark Side of George Lucas 
Well the day long expected has arrived and now all good people must make their decision and choose their sides.  Will you remain on the side of good, virtue and righteousness or will you descend to the Dark Side?  There can be no middle ground when it comes to the latest money grab by George Lucas in the Star Wars franchise.  Where do you stand on the new 3-D version of Episode 1?

Not surprisingly this is a hot button topic among the faithful of the Jedi cult.  But it’s not simply the question of 3-D or even the question of whether or not George Lucas has completely slipped a gear with a never ending refurbishment of his signature series.  It never is with the Star Wars faithful.

Let’s begin with the return of the argument around Jar Jar Binks.  Episode 1 returns the almost universally despised alien character.  Jar Jar is accused of being a racist stereotype, profoundly annoying and just unforgivably stupid.  Then you add in the controversy of whether Han Solo shot first in the bar scene where he kills the character Greedo.  Yes, I know that’s in a completely different movie but you need to understand that any time a new version is released ALL the theological arguments immediately are revived.  Lucas maintains that Han didn’t shoot first.  Which is just patently ridiculous.  And I can’t believe we are still having this conversation.  But that’s George’s fault as well.

For me the choice is clear.  I will not be seeing the newest version of these movies.  The second trilogy is decidedly the weaker anyway so it’s a somewhat simpler decision.  I’ll even grant the Episode 1 contains scenes that might be elevated by 3-D (the racing scenes spring instantly to mind).  The problem is that if we keep showing up and shelling out our Galactic Credits to watch his latest demented meddlings he’ll just keep on doing it.  And we must do everything we can to make him stop.



****************************************************
Tweet Reviews

 Caught this story on NPR the other day and the more I thought about the more I struggled with it.  Spin Magazine, one of the premier music magazines of the day, has announced that they intend to review around 15 hundred new music releases in 2012 in the form of a Tweet.  This apparently will include traditional album releases, EPs and even Hip Hop mix tapes.  The idea is that the old music review has outlived its usefulness and needs to be upgraded.  Given some of the truly awful offerings I’ve read over the last 4 decades I probably can’t argue that.  Music reviews can be arbitrary and didactic.  Maybe that comes from too many years in radio but I’ve had my fill of poly-syllabic polemics extolling the extended artistic values of some band who made noises that one person in a thousand might want to listen to for more than a minute.  I always preferred reviews that were more descriptive than those that tried to pass judgement on the artistic merits.

But can we really get any kind of value from a review that is constrained to just 140 characters?  Remember it’s 140 CHARACTERS not words.  So spaces between words count right along with letters.  To be honest Spin editor Christopher Weingarten sounded awfully smug as he described doing about 240 extended reviews this year compared to 6 times that many Tweet reviews.  Pretty clearly he has decided that this is what’s cool whether it’s useful or not.  Of course Weingarten apparently also happily proclaims himself a troll.  A troll is generally regarded as the lowest form of online virtual life.

It all smacks of hipster posing to me.  I will be the first to acknowledge that a huge percentage of musical releases each year are trash.  Yet out of that musical mosh pit emerges some great bands each year as they grow in their art.  My question is will they get the hearing they may need to succeed if we are reduced review as blurb.  In the end most of us make our minds up on music based on what we hear rather than what we read.  But once upon a time a very long time ago music criticism was an art form and some of its practitioners were musically knowledgeable AND wonderful writers.  The folks at Spin claim that this new review format will make them the go to source for music information.  I think it’s far more likely that by offering less information they might just write themselves completely out of this story.

Book Review - Gods and Fathers

Got a chance to read another great book from the folks at The Story Plant.  My travels have kept me from following up with a review.  So getting caught up now.

Gods and Fathers - James Lepore  A District Attorney is faced with a chillinig challenge - proving that his estranged son didn't kill the boy's girlfriend.  The path he will follow will require him to put his entire life on the line and take him places that he can't even imagine.

Lepore is a solid writer and shows his chops in this story.  The plot is carefully crafted and will take you deep into the psyches of the characters.  The story will surprise you, puzzle you, challenge you and simply refuse to let you go.  This isn't just another easy thriller.  Main character Matt DeMarco must deal with his divorce, his ex-wife's re-marriage, his non-existent relationship with his son, his own internal defeat and the fact that two good friends are the police officers investigating the allegations against his son.  Along the way Lepore gives us a very human hero fighting himself and powers that he didn't believe really existed.  The answers he finds aren't easy and that's what makes this such a compelling story.

It just hit the shelf last week.  Well worth grabbing a copy.

Rating - **** Recommended Read.