tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61222037897743421432024-02-20T13:09:09.567-08:00AM Shull - WorksA BlogAM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-14208105337966790102021-02-22T18:55:00.000-08:002021-02-22T18:55:10.396-08:00Daft Punk, 1993 – 2021<p>I’ve been listening to Daft Punk for a while. I don’t remember the first time I heard their songs, but it was either “Da Funk” or “Around the World,” but it was certainly on MTV’s late-night show <em>Amp</em><a href="#fn:1" id="fnref:1" title="see footnote" class="footnote"><sup>1</sup></a>. I never went to raves, not even in college. It’s rural West Tennessee, and I’m a homebody—what can I say? I loved their music, I suppose, because the melodies, beats, and repetition were closest to the video game music I grew up on. So perhaps my first awareness was through those videos: the surreality and playfulness of Spike Jonze’s “Da Funk” or Michel Gondry’s “Around the World.” (My apologies, Mr. Jonze, but Gondry’s video is the masterpiece.) Whichever came first, after the second I bought the CD, <em>Homework</em>. I can’t tell how many times I listened to it. Hundreds, probably. The edge, the groove, the pauses. The illicit escape of “Revolution 909,” the brightness of “Phoenix” the sharpness of “Rollin' & Scratchin'” and “Indo Silver Club,” the glimpses into the larger world I saw on TV through “WDPK 83.7 FM” and “Teachers.” “Alive,” which is what it is. For crying out loud, ending with a fade-out inversion of their big hit “Da Funk” as “Funk Ad.” It endures because it has that glitzy roar of mid-90s electronic music.</p>
<p>(I remember also loving Stardust’s “Music Sounds Better with You” and its playfully surreal Gondry video, though I didn’t realize Stardust’s connection to Daft Punk, which is obvious in retrospect.)</p>
<p>I remember ripping the CD to MP3 and listening to it on Winamp. I remember thudding it with maximum bass in my parents' '88 Camry on the way home from school. I remember learning, on the turn-of-the century web, that they had an online fanclub, “Daft Club,” but somehow—it feels like the pre-Napster days—I got a copy of their song “Musique.” A new Daft Punk track, not on any album. Bear with me, folks, it took me a long while to realize that singles had B-sides. I remember working at my college radio station and having just enough persuation to start a late-night electronic music show in the summers before new management shut it down in the fall. I was able to luck out when <em>Alive 1997</em> was shipped to the radio station. When my program was canceled, what happened the the promos? Nobody told me what to do with anything, and I had no listeners, so, well, I still have the copy. For whatever reason, it took me longer to get to <em>Discovery</em>.</p>
<p>I can’t say anything about <em>Discovery</em> that hasn’t been said a thousand times. Here they became robots. How often is a first album as good as <em>Homework</em>, makes such a lasting impact on the world, only to be so utterly eclipsed by the second album that people even forget the first existed? It’s a bad metaphor for multiple reasons, but imagine if <em>Thriller</em> was so big that people forgot about the existence of the Jackson 5. It’s so light and airy, so deep and intense, so effervescent. It’s a complete concept. It’s <em>Discovery</em>.</p>
<p>And of course the videos. I confess I still haven’t seen <em>Interstella 5555</em>, though. Always something more to do. At this time, I don’t know, I got distracted. I didn’t listen to <em>Human After All</em> until after <em>Alive 2007</em>. <em>Human After All</em> is Daft Punk at their least commercial, even with “Technologic” taking over the internet. It’s more like <em>Homework</em> than <em>Discovery</em>. But, man, “Human After All” and “Robot Rock” and “Steam Machine” and “Television Rules the Nation” are all good tracks! It’s like what appeared as a return to form was a sophomore slump. It’s not <em>Discovery</em>. The moon can’t hope to be the sun. I’ll tell you what, though, <em>Alive 2007</em> really is something else—mixing three albums together, a great quilt. DJs at their height, to be sure.</p>
<p>Can you believe they did the soundtrack to <em>Tron: Legacy</em>? I mean, that’s not a bad movie, but it’s a little forgettable, let’s face it. But I still remember being blown away by the <em>trailer</em> let alone the movie. I saw it in the theater, for them. I remember the miserable conundrum of getting it on either iTunes or Amazon because each came with extra tracks. In those days, the bonus tracks were album-only purchases for iTunes but not Amazon, so today I have “Sea of Simulation” in my Amazon purchase history. And I’m so glad that they rereleased the complete album just a few months ago.<a href="#fn:2" id="fnref:2" title="see footnote" class="footnote"><sup>2</sup></a> I’m sure this entire album has been played by humans more than any of their other albums, because it’s perfect background music for working.</p>
<p>It felt like forever before <em>Random Access Memories</em>. Looking back today, someone on Twitter said that it’s been eight years since then. It was only three years after <em>Tron</em>; it was eight years after <em>Human After All</em>, but with the collective amnesia around it, it just felt like forever between <em>RAM</em> and <em>Discovery</em>. I liked it, but, well, it’s not my thing. Slick, collaborative, fun, but (Zoomers beware) I’ve listened to to maybe five times—less than <em>Human After All</em>. I know “Get Lucky” was the sound of the summer that year. It just to me sounds more like a Pharrell or Nile Rodgers song than theirs. I like their collaborations with The Weeknd, too—but too much “f. ⸻.” But of course at this point they were pop-culture legends. The album cover, eschewing their logo trend of the first three albums. In retrospect, it feels like a swan-song, the completion of “Teachers”—“Giorgio by Moroder” is that, transitioning from callouts to storytelling (with that click!). But if I say “It doesn’t feel enough like Daft Punk,” what does that mean? <em>Discovery</em>? <em>Homework</em>? <em>Human After All</em>? <em>Alive 2007</em><a href="#fn:3" id="fnref:3" title="see footnote" class="footnote"><sup>3</sup></a>?</p>
<p>Any artist chafes against being put in a box. We all want to grow and change. We want to look backwards and we want to look forwards. I know that Bangalter and Homem-Christo have been doing different things for a while. And it doesn’t seem as if they like Lennon and McCartney can’t stand each other. They were here, and now they aren’t. For a while, it was great, and when they didn’t want to do it any more, they didn’t. They left us some really great albums. Thanks, Daft Punk.</p>
<div class="footnotes">
<hr />
<ol>
<li id="fn:1">
<p>This is also what first introduced me to, in increasing magnitude of personal import, Moby, the Chemical Brothers, Air, [large gap] Kraftwerk, and [larger gap still] Aphex Twin. <a href="#fnref:1" title="return to body" class="reversefootnote"> ↩</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:2">
<p>Where would soundtracks be today without this and Reznor/Ross's <em>The Social Network</em>, both in 2010? <a href="#fnref:2" title="return to body" class="reversefootnote"> ↩</a></p>
</li>
<li id="fn:3">
<p>And what happened to <em>Alive 2017</em> <a href="#fnref:3" title="return to body" class="reversefootnote"> ↩</a></p>
</li>
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AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-34092773179465251532017-09-11T05:58:00.000-07:002017-09-11T08:14:52.504-07:00Reputation and Judgment<p>Apparently yesterday morning several older ladies were talking about how brave and strong my wife was for bringing the kids to church after I had abandoned her and left the church.</p><p>At the time, I was in the sound booth in the back. I made the PowerPoint song service go.</p><p>Of course, part of me felt hurt—did they really think of me like that?—until I realized that these older ladies had seen generation after generation of people disappoint them. Not just that, but they had seen generation after generation of surprises in general. Some stuff just happens. Certainly it made me want to judge other people.</p><p>Mostly, it made me aware of myself: my own reputation and how jealous I am of keeping it. Reputation is a tenuous thing, and when I was younger I arrogantly rebuffed people who wanted to pin their expectations on me. But this is merely how all human society acts—to be, is to be regarded, conceived, imagined, and judged by others. That is what makes society society. If I want to walk upright, blameless before God and Man, then I must accept the judgment of others especially those older and more experienced.</p><p>Per Lamentation 3.40, 1 Corinthians 11.28, 2 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 13.5, and Galatians 6.4, my responsibility is to test myself. Per Imlac in Samuel Johnson's <em>Rasselas</em>, “Every man may by examining his own mind guess what passes in the minds of others”: it is no shame that in my own awareness of my frailty and human frailty, others are likewise aware of frailty enough to see it in me: truth is by its very nature objective and self-evident. People judge me, just like I judge other people, so I must first judge myself, as is normal and expected and built-in. But as a result, I must judge myself more strictly.<sup id="fnref1"><a href="#fn1" rel="footnote">1</a></sup></p><p>There's nothing wrong with those older ladies. They're keeping me on my toes and trying to show love to my wife and children. They thought they saw a bad situation and wanted to wrap my family up in their love. They didn't even mention my “sin” to her out of their sensitivity! I thank God that he has molded me to consider my own flaws during a time like this rather than, as I would have in years past, felt indignant or angry. I thank God all the more for such love in our congregation. They loved me and my family, and felt sad, and wanted to help. In this very real world where people have very real problems, that help is the model of service. If I see someone suffering, loudly or quietly, I want to be as loving as those wonderful Christian ladies, those pillars of faith.</p><div class="footnotes"><hr /><ol><li id="fn1"><p>For example, before publishing this, I must agonize over every word to make sure I don't offend or cause someone to stumble. If I can't avoid those, I should scrap the whole thing. <a href="#fnref1" rev="footnote">↩</a></p></li>
</ol></div>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-1505569871097414312017-03-07T12:03:00.001-08:002017-03-07T12:03:26.654-08:00Edges and CoveringsThe book of <em>Ruth</em> is truly amazing. There’s no part of this story that doesn’t impress me. Most of my life I thought of it in the standard Sunday-school way we know much of the Old Testament: a person went somewhere and did something, which shows <em>God takes care of us</em>. This is not wrong. However, when it came my turn to be the volunteer Bible class teacher for the week, we’d been going through <em>Ruth</em>, and chapter four was on the docket. In my studies, I’ve found this little book to be deeper by far than I once thought.<br />
<br />
<h2 id="background">
Background</h2>
First, “levirate marriage” from <em>Deuteronomy</em> 25.5–10:<br />
<blockquote>
If brothers dwell together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the dead man shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband’s brother shall go in to her and take her as his wife and perform the duty of a husband’s brother to her. And the first son whom she bears shall succeed to the name of his dead brother, that his name may not be blotted out of Israel. And if the man does not wish to take his brother’s wife, then his brother’s wife shall go up to the gate to the elders and say, “My husband’s brother refuses to perpetuate his brother’s name in Israel; he will not perform the duty of a husband’s brother to me.” Then the elders of his city shall call him and speak to him, and if he persists, saying, ‘I do not wish to take her,’ then his brother’s wife shall go up to him in the presence of the elders and pull his sandal off his foot and spit in his face. And she shall answer and say, “So shall it be done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house.” And the name of his house shall be called in Israel, “The house of him who had his sandal pulled off.”</blockquote>
This doesn’t apply <em>directly</em>, but it’s good to keep in mind. Also, as a brief summary of <em>Ruth</em> to this point, Naomi and her husband Elimelech moved to Moab during a famine and married their two sons Mahlon and Chilion to two Moabite women, Ruth and Orpah, but then Elimelech, Mahlon, and Chilion all die. Naomi can’t take care of her daughters-in-law, and as both the brothers and their father are dead, there’s no levirate marriage to be had, so she sends them back to their families. Ruth won’t go: apparently, Naomi has made a good enough impression that Ruth pledges to follow her in that most famous passage, <em>Ruth</em> 1.16–17:<br />
<blockquote>
Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.</blockquote>
They both go back to Naomi and Elimelech’s hometown of Bethlehem in the territory of Judah, and (chapter 2) as they’re gleaning<a class="footnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fn:1" id="fnref:1" title="see footnote">[1]</a> the fields, this man Boaz is nice to her. He tells Ruth that everything will be okay, and if she wants to gather grain, that his servants will take care of her and protect her. In chapter 3, Naomi tells Ruth to approach Boaz about this protection. He offers to protect her, but he says that he can’t do anything official because, as per verse 12, “there is a redeemer nearer than” him. So even though Boaz has been set up by 2.1 and 2.20 as a close relative of Naomi’s husband Elimelech, 3.12 clearly shows that even though Boaz is a prominent man in Bethlehem, a man who has a field big enough to employ multiple young men and young women as reapers and gatherers, he is not the closest relative, and Boaz is either so well-connected or had been thinking about this beforehand so much that knows who that man is.<a class="footnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fn:2" id="fnref:2" title="see footnote">[2]</a> That’s what brings us to chapter 4.<br />
<br />
<h2 id="text">
Text</h2>
In 4.1–8, Boaz meets with the kinsman<a class="footnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fn:3" id="fnref:3" title="see footnote">[3]</a>. He does it in the open, at the city gate, in front of the elders of the city. This shows just one aspect of Boaz’s virtue: there is a law, and he does things by the book, in the open, with witnesses. Now, <em>Deuteronomy</em> 25 doesn’t apply directly in this case, because it’s only about brothers, not cousins, but because there are strong parallels, we can infer that even if Deuteronomy 25 isn’t an applicable law, Boaz is acting in his present murky case using it as a precedent. Again, Boaz doesn’t just go and do whatever he wants—he wants to rest his actions on something solid. Notice what happens:<br />
<blockquote>
Now Boaz had gone up to the gate and sat down there. And behold, the redeemer, of whom Boaz had spoken, came by. So Boaz said, “Turn aside, friend; sit down here.” And he turned aside and sat down. And he took ten men of the elders of the city and said, “Sit down here.” So they sat down. Then he said to the redeemer, “Naomi, who has come back from the country of Moab, is selling the parcel of land that belonged to our relative Elimelech. So I thought I would tell you of it and say, ‘Buy it in the presence of those sitting here and in the presence of the elders of my people.’ If you will redeem it, redeem it. But if you will not, tell me, that I may know, for there is no one besides you to redeem it, and I come after you.” And he said, “I will redeem it.” Then Boaz said, “The day you buy the field from the hand of Naomi, you also acquire Ruth the Moabite, the widow of the dead, in order to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance.” Then the redeemer said, “I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I impair my own inheritance. Take my right of redemption yourself, for I cannot redeem it.” Now this was the custom in former times in Israel concerning redeeming and exchanging: to confirm a transaction, the one drew off his sandal and gave it to the other, and this was the manner of attesting in Israel. So when the redeemer said to Boaz, “Buy it for yourself,” he drew off his sandal.</blockquote>
Note how Boaz crafts his words carefully to see the kinsman’s interests: “do you want to buy a parcel of land?”” “Sure,” he says. But there’s a catch: it comes with a wife. “Maybe not,” the kinsman says, “lest I impair my own inheritance.” What does that mean? I’ll tell you, I had to re-read this section several times and think on it a bit. He was willing to buy land, but it’s a risky investment if it comes with a wife? Here’s my guess: he would have marry Ruth, take care of her as a wife, father a child with her, and, if Boaz is using <em>Deut</em>. 25 as a precedent in front of witnesses, if that child would be legally considered the heir of Mahlon and then Elimelech, so the property that the kinsman buys from Naomi for would then go to that child rather than to him. Here’s the deal: get married to a woman, take care of her mother-in-law and her land, and let it pass to her child, not any of your other children or your own family. Use your own resources to tend it for her as a custodian, not an owner. And because it was done (per <em>Deut</em>. 25) in front of the city elders, he has to take the deal all-or-nothing, with no cover for weaseling out of it later. So we get verses 6–8: “Too rich for my blood.“ But also note that this is done without any malice or anger! Ruth isn’t spitting in anybody’s face (per <em>Deut</em>. 25), and it looks like the sandal business is less a sign of theft or inappropriate action than just signing on the dotted line.<br />
<br />
Done and done. Now what? Verses 9–12:<br />
<blockquote>
Then Boaz said to the elders and all the people, “You are witnesses this day that I have bought from the hand of Naomi all that belonged to Elimelech and all that belonged to Chilion and to Mahlon. Also Ruth the Moabite, the widow of Mahlon, I have bought to be my wife, to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance, that the name of the dead may not be cut off from among his brothers and from the gate of his native place. You are witnesses this day.” Then all the people who were at the gate and the elders said, “We are witnesses. May the Lord make the woman, who is coming into your house, like Rachel and Leah, who together built up the house of Israel. May you act worthily in Ephrathah and be renowned in Bethlehem, and may your house be like the house of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah, because of the offspring that the Lord will give you by this young woman.”</blockquote>
Boaz marries Ruth in the presence of witnesses—not just the ten elders, but “all the people,” and they make some specific references in their blessings:<br />
<ol>
<li>“May she be like Rachel and Leah,” that is, may she have a whole mess of kids to establish a major dynasty, in a way that connects her to the matriarchs of the entire land of Israel.</li>
<li>“May you act worthily”: of course, sure.</li>
<li>“May your house be like Perez’s”: May your son have a big family himself, yes, but as we welcome you in, let’s connect you with Tamar, the wife of Boaz and Elimelech’s ancestor Judah in a not-exactly-by-the-books levirate marriage</li>
</ol>
That last one is kind of an embarrassing story for their patriarch Judah, but here’s what’s happening. First, yes, it’s from <em>Genesis</em> 38, the most famous levirate marriage in the Bible: Judah marries Tamar to one son, who dies, then to another son, who God kills for avoiding fathering a child, and then with two dead sons and only one left, Judah tells Tamar “wait until he grows up a bit.” Tamar waits on her thumbs for a few years, and after it’s clear that Son 3 is really truly grown up, she pretends to be a prostitute, gets Judah to sleep with her in exchange for his signet ring, then later when he gets mad that this woman “intended” for his son seems to be pregnant on her own, Judah accuses her, only to be presented with the ring. Judah says, “She is more righteous than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah” (<em>Gen</em>. 38.26) praising her and disclosing his own dishonor—after all, Tamar earnestly strived for a place within Judah’s family when he wanted to send her back to her father. This is kind of an awkward story—and I can only imagine it would be more awkward in a time when, as per verse 24, she would have been burned to death for adultery. <strong>But this is the story that the people of Bethlehem dredge up to emphasize the worthiness of Ruth</strong>. Yes, she’s a foreigner in an very exclusive ethno-religious part of the world. But the people welcome her in and knit her into their community. Ruth isn’t a Moabite woman who married an Israelite when he was traveling abroad. She’s in the family of Naomi, of Boaz, of Bethlehem Ephathrah, of Tamar and Judah and Rachel and Leah. Ruth will be a Fine Upstanding Member of the Community, not just some dead man’s Gentile wife. Ruth wants to be with them, and they want Ruth right back.<br />
<br />
<h2 id="message">
Message</h2>
Throughout the whole book, I see <strong>edges</strong> and <strong>coverings</strong> everywhere. Ruth begins her story on the edge of Israel, on the edge of a family, but she hangs on to Naomi and to God, who cover her in protection and help. Ruth returns with Naomi, who has no husband and is herself on the edge of society, as a single older woman with no husband or sons to protect her. Only Boaz, a relative of Elimelech, is there: but Boaz is a distant enough relative for the nature of their connection to be unclear: not Elimelech’s brother, for instance, but more distant—on the edge of Elimelech’s family. Ruth gathers from the edge of the field, from the leftovers provided by the kindness of Boaz and the laws of God.<a class="footnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fn:4" id="fnref:4" title="see footnote">[4]</a> Ruth gathers at the edge of a group of other young men and women, but Boaz’s commands and Naomi’s advice cover her in protection. Ruth comes in to the edge of Boaz’s bed, an act that is on the edge of propriety, but under the cover of night she finds the protection of Boaz as he covers her in his robe. When he sends her home, he even covers her in barley! Even then, another kinsman is closer, but he himself doesn’t wish to risk himself by extending protection to her, highlighting Boaz. In the end, Ruth is brought back into society by Boaz, by the elders and all the people, covered in their love and protection. She and Naomi are given a son, further cementing them within the society.<br />
<br />
In sum, then, Ruth’s story is about how the people at the very edges of God’s earthly kingdom are welcomed, taken care of, redeemed, blessed, and secured. What a message for us all today!<br />
<br />
<div class="footnotes">
<hr />
<ol>
<li id="fn:1">That is, picking up leftover grain in other people’s fields because they have no other way to get food for themselves. They aren’t in the best of situations. <a class="reversefootnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fnref:1" title="return to article"> ↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:2">Though the author doesn’t tell us that name <a class="reversefootnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fnref:2" title="return to article"> ↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:3"><em>Ruth</em> uses the term “redeemer” in accordance with the language of Deuteronomy, but I’ll use “kinsman” to emphasize his familial order of preference <a class="reversefootnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fnref:3" title="return to article"> ↩</a></li>
<li id="fn:4">Leviticus 19.9–10: “When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, neither shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. And you shall not strip your vineyard bare, neither shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner: I am the Lord your God.” <a class="reversefootnote" href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6122203789774342143#fnref:4" title="return to article"> ↩</a></li>
</ol>
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AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-75819202122272609332014-06-02T18:43:00.002-07:002014-09-08T13:00:33.886-07:00Transitions and Questions: iCloud Drive, Compared<p>I’ve paid $20 a year for the past two years for iCloud storage. I have a 32 GB 5th-gen iPod touch and a 32 GB iPad 2, and between backup space and iCloud documents (including a lot of Keynote presentations for school), I would laugh at 5 GB of free space. Many have noted how ridiculous it is to sell 128 GB iPads when only 5 GB of backup space is free.</p><p>Today, Apple introduced Mac OSX <a href="http://www.apple.com/osx/preview/">Yosemite</a>, which among its rather high number of new features, includes an expansion of the old app-silo iCloud to the new <a href="http://www.apple.com/icloud/preview/">iCloud Drive</a>. The new plan has higher storage capacities and lower prices throughout.</p><h4>Old <em>(Current)</em> iCloud Pricing Model:</h4><p>Free 5 GB, plus:</p><code>$20 / 15 GB = $1.33 per GB<br />
$40 / 25 GB = $1.60 per GB<br />
$100 / 55 GB = $1.82 per GB</code><br />
<p>As you can see, each Tier is more expensive per gigabyte than the last. If you pay Apple less money, you get a better deal. Talkin’ fancy, there’s a financial <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incentive">disincentive</a> for more engagement. Not only do you pay more money ($40 > $20), but you’re paying at a higher <em>rate</em>, making the cost hurt even more. Given two extremes, Apple hewed much closer to “Buzz off, I don’t want your money” than “Give me all your dough.” I cannot fathom why the rate goes up as the price goes up, unless Apple wanted to stop people from giving them money–given the iCloud congestion we often <a href="http://atp.fm/episodes/6-live-like-other-people">hear</a> <a href="http://atp.fm/episodes/7-the-forecast-for-icloud">about</a> As Apple <a href="http://investor.apple.com/common/download/download.cfm?companyid=AAPL&fileid=746779&filekey=1c04cdf4-a39c-48f9-87d5-19617313f297&filename=">prides themselves on being a profitable company</a>, I’m not surprised they decided to try and make more money in the new model:</p><h4>New iCloud Drive Pricing Model:</h4><p>Free 5 GB, plus:</p><code>$(0.99 × 12) / 20 GB = $0.59 per GB<br />
$(3.99 × 12) / 200 GB = $0.24 per GB</code><br />
<p>Things are less expensive across the board—the new <em>most</em> expensive-per-gigabyte plan is less than half the price than the old <em>least</em> expensive-per-gigabyte plan. What’s more, each tier is now less expensive per gigabyte than the last, a financial incentive to buying more space, just like those three-gallon jars of mayonnaise at Sam’s or Costco. It’s also scaled by month, not year, like most in-app purchases, and like Beats Music they recently acquired.</p><p>Now, we don’t yet know the pricing of all tiers. We’re told that tiers will go up to 1 TB. If the tiers don’t get any less expensive per gigabyte (which I would recommend against), 1 TB would cost $20 per month and $120 a year (or $19.99 in Apple pricing)</p><code>(1024 GB × $0.24) / 12 = $20</code><br />
<p>Alternately, if Apple wanted to price-match Google on the 1 TB plan (shown below), it would cost $10 a year:</p><code>(1024 GB × $0.12) / 12 = $10</code><br />
<p>Either way, it’s cheaper by an astounding level compared to old iCloud pricing.</p><h2 id="thecompetition">The Competition</h2><p>Because iCloud Drive, unlike iCloud is a more direct analog to other online file-storage services, two built by Apple’s direct competitors, it’s useful to compere them: <a href="https://support.google.com/drive/answer/2375123?hl=en">Google Drive</a>, <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/about/en-us/plans/">Microsoft OneDrive</a>, and the independent favorite <a href="https://www.dropbox.com/upgrade">Dropbox</a>. Certainly they won’t integrate as seamlessly with Apple devices as iCloud Drive will, much like Google Drive on Android and Chrome devices and OneDrive on Windows devices.</p><h4>Google Drive</h4><p>Free 15 GB, plus:</p><code>($1.99 × 12) / 100 GB = $0.24 per GB<br />
($9.99 × 12) / 1024 GB = $0.12 per GB<br />
($99.99 × 12) / 10240 GB = $0.12 per GB</code><br />
<p>At $0.24 per gigabyte, Apple’s new second-tier plan matches Google’s first-tier plan exactly. Of course, Google gives 15 GB free from the start, three times as much as Apple’s 5 GB free plan, so once you start paying, $11.88 a year to Apple gives you 25 GB, but the lowest you can pay Google is $23.88 a year for 115 GB.</p><p>I included a tier above what Apple offers to show that the progression after that point is flat—that is, there’s no financial incentive per gigabyte to buying in bulk. Going by the earlier language of financial incentive and disincentive, Google gives you an incentive to upgrade your account from 100 GB to 1 TB, but they don’t incentivize it further. Reading the numbers, they want you to get 1 TB, but they could care less about getting 10 TB.</p><h4>Microsoft OneDrive</h4><p>7 GB free (expandable to 15 GB through referrals and bonuses)</p><code>$25 / 50 GB = $0.50 per GB<br />
$50 / 100 GB = $0.50 per GB<br />
$100 / 200 GB = $0.50 per GB</code><br />
<p>Flat progression: all $0.50 per gigabyte. OneDrive is cheaper per unit than the most expensive (lowest-tier) new iCloud Drive and <em>any</em> Dropbox plan, but it’s far more expensive than all other iCloud Drive plans and certainly than Google Drive. They, along with Dropbox (below) don’t seem to want to incentivize higher-tier plans. I guess they only want you to buy as much as you need, neutral to incentive-based rates. This is the one service I have no personal experience with, so I don’t have much to say. Their pricing isn’t as bad as Dropbox, but not as good as Google Drive, either.</p><h4>Dropbox</h4><p>2 GB free (expandable to 18 GB through the referrals and bonuses they’re famous for)</p><code>$99 / 100 GB = $1 per GB<br />
$199 / 200 GB = $1 per GB<br />
$499 / 500 GB = $1 per GB</code><br />
<p>Flat progression: all $1 per gigabyte. Dropbox is older and more popular (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dropbox_(storage_provider)#cite_note-dropbox200-26">200m users,</a> to Google Drive’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Drive#cite_note-4">150m</a>), so perhaps they have coasted for a while–they last updated their price per gigabyte <a href="http://cloudstoragebuzz.com/dropbox/dropbox-announces-new-storage-plans/">almost two years ago</a>. They’ve got the install base now, and there’s nothing to stop users from doubling up (note: I use Dropbox and Google Drive regularly), but I can’t see a reason to <em>pay</em> for Dropbox over another service. Most 3rd party apps support Google Drive now, after all.</p><p>For those who look at Google and think Apple’s gouging their customers—and I’m not disagreeing outright—look at Dropbox’s pricing plan. Ever since Google <a href="http://googledrive.blogspot.com/2014/03/save-more-with-google-drive.html">lowered their Drive storage recently</a>, people have been saying that they’re too expensive. Now, they’re almost twice as expensive as Apple’s most expensive per-gigabyte plan. The writing’s on the wall, and <strong>I anticipate a change in Dropbox sooner rather than later</strong>, just to stay afloat. Finally, note the minimum charges you’ll pay for all services: $25 for a year of 50 GB OneDrive, $9.99 for a month of 100 GB Dropbox, $1.99 for a month of 100 GB Google Drive, or $0.99 for a month of 20 GB iCloud Drive. Once you decide you want to pay some money for some storage, Apple doesn’t make it most worth your while, but it lowers the bar about as low as it can go.</p><h2 id="conclusionsandquestionsgoingforward">Conclusions and Questions Going Forward</h2><p>As I’m currently paying $20 for 15 GB of iCloud, of course I’m going to opt to pay less money for more storage. I don’t know if I’ll pay for 200 GB, though, barring some amazing change (see #4 below). But, as with many things in life, one answer provokes many new questions:</p><ol><li>How much will the iCloud Drive tiers be above 200 GB, and how many of them will there be? Will there be any tier between 20 and 200 GB?</li>
<li>How much will other services change before the Fall release of iCloud Drive—DropBox and OneDrive in particular?</li>
<li>How well will iCloud Drive work on Windows and the Web? (For a crazy thought, will we ever have third-party iCloud apps?)</li>
<li>What does this mean for Time Machine? Will we be allowed to use Time Machine to an iCloud Drive? Will higher-tier iCloud Drive plans obviate the need for Time Machine? Could you put your entire computer (or at least the entire home directory) on iCloud Drive?</li>
<li>Will there be any discount from monthly to yearly? If not, how long does iTunes Match stay exclusively a yearly subscription?</li>
</ol><h2 id="update">Update:</h2><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>With the Apple event tomorrow, let’s hope they change the embarrassing iCloud Drive pricing: <a href="http://t.co/2rzD600qVf">pic.twitter.com/2rzD600qVf</a></p>— Allen Shull (@allenshull) <a href="https://twitter.com/allenshull/status/509067011876343808">September 8, 2014</a></blockquote><script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script><ol><li>Dropbox is still mostly forgettable, despite the improvement</li>
<li>OneDrive is now <em>very interesting</em> compared with Google. Parity or better.</li>
<li>Ignore Box unless your workplace uses it</li>
<li>iCloud Drive is only available on Apple products. Online does not count. It's far too expensive, and downright old-fashioned when it's free. Should we be happy it works at all, or should they try to wow us on the price to overcome bad PR?</li></ol>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-84804674748558489392014-02-06T16:22:00.001-08:002014-02-06T16:22:00.264-08:00On Wistfulness: Final Fantasy VI for iOS<div style="font-family: UICTFontTextStyleBody; font-size: 14px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><p><em>Final Fantasy VI</em> has just arrived on the <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/final-fantasy-vi/id719401490?mt=8">iOS App Store</a>, and I'm thrilled. There's been a lot of hubbub over the graphical changes, and, playing it on my 5th generation iPod touch, I can see a few problems already–namely that the sprite colors have too much low-contrast pastel, the “high-res” graphics are still pixelly on retina screens that were introduced four and a half years ago with the barely-supported iPhone 4, and, most egregious, the graphics seem noticeably stretched on my wider 4-inch screen from what I've seen in screenshots (especially when the background graphics don't seem stretched at all). The last problem will probably be fixed in a coming release, my other two observations just the price of expediency and taste.</p><p>There's been a lot of complaining that the graphics are upscaled at all, but really, that doesn't bother me. I'd have loved to see retina-level graphics based on the original character art, but I know that the sprites I'm used to were only <em>based on</em> the original art, not downscaled from them. That's not how pixel art works. I've been playing a lot of <a href="http://store.steampowered.com/app/200900/">Cave Story+</a> lately, and I feel a similar vibe: the new graphics are higher-resolution from the original, but still pixelly enough to try to satisfy “old school” purists. Of course, those people can never be satisfied, but I'm not complaining. The original release had bugs and the PS and GBA rereleases had bugs, and our notion of perfect art is clouded with <a href="http://static2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080618075630/marvel_dc/images/2/2e/Watchmen_9.jpg">nostalgia</a>, that most dangerous of drugs.</p><p>But they didn't mess with the music. <em>They didn't mess with the music</em>. Back in 1997 or 1998 I imported the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Final-Fantasy-VI-Nobuo-Uematsu/dp/B00066VUUM/">soundtrack</a> from Japan. I love it. It remains one of the best pieces of game music to this day because it is both beautiful and appropriate to the world. Most video-game music is one or the other. I love <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keiichi_Suzuki_(composer">Keiichi Suzuki</a>)'s <em>Earthbound</em> soundtrack too, but I don't know if I'd use the word “beautiful” to describe it. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshitaka_Amano">Yoshitaka Amano</a>'s art is the star of the show, but <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobuo_Uematsu">Nobuo Uematsu</a>'s score is its soul.</p><p>At the heart of <em>Final Fantasy VI</em> is the opera scene. It's poignant, but it's really great because the entire game is an opera. There is a large cast of characters, each with their own motivation. Strong characters with strong personalities and strong motivations go throughout. <a href="http://thegamedesignforum.com/features/reverse_design_ff6_1.html">Much has been written</a> that Kefka, the main villain, acts more like a protagonist than many of the playable characters. Even characters without personalities have backgrounds (Gogo), and characters without backgrounds have personalities (Mog). The stories are epic, not in that bland, overdone “we have to save the world” variety, but “we have to save each other.” The story is epic not in the way that <em>Final Fantasy</em>, say, is epic, but in the way that the <em>Ring Cycle</em> is epic, the way that the <em>Iliad</em> and <em>Odyssey</em> and <em>Aeneid</em> are epic. Even the townspeople, easy to underrepresent as cardboard cutouts, <a href="http://thegamedesignforum.com/features/reverse_design_ff6_5.html">change</a> from moment to moment as the world changes politically, ecologically, and geographically around them. The music is operatic from the notes of the chorale prelude and opening background scene. Then a windy silence, as we overlook a hill, then the opening credits, with a fuller overture of the main theme, Terra's personal theme, and the overworld theme. You can't skip past this section or speed through it, ostensibly so you can appreciate the nice people who made the game, but also so you must soak up every bit of the score as the three soldiers trek slowly through the blizzard. The blizzard is the game.</p><p>The main emotion of <em>Final Fantasy VI</em> is wistfulness, as seen in its perfect score, but also in its story. The world is destroyed. Evil is defeated, but lives are still changed, in many cases ruined. People gain redemption and struggle for hope, but it is a ruined world they struggle in, and the memory of a world forever lost is what gives them hope for the future. The world is never remade, just improved. The cataclysm is never undone, merely mitigated. When characters die, we feel for them, but others fight on, make lives for themselves, and care for the next generations.</p><p>I can tell why so many people complain about the sprites. The game is amazing, and playing through it the first time changed how its players saw the genre and the medium. The wistfulness that the game employs is close to nostalgia, but what we once felt is gone. Those of us that played it as teenagers or young adults back on the SNES were changed by it. Those that first played on the PlayStation or GameBoy Advance or in emulation feel a pull back to that earlier time, but those of us who played it back in the mid 90s feel something greater–its original North American release was 20 years ago this year, and we are all different people now, with jobs and spouses and kids. We might not be as idealistic as we were in our teens, and the world has changed around us. Yet, transported back to that time, we shouldn't long for those romantic days gone by, but embrace the new world we live in. The World of Balance is a memory, but not all hope is lost.</p></div>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-10467304826922884682013-08-03T04:40:00.001-07:002017-03-07T12:12:48.762-08:00My Week with Green DotThis week I was in in Martin doing <a href="http://www.livethegreendot.com/" title="Green Dot">Green Dot</a> training. Honestly, I wasn't really looking forward to it. I'm away from my wife and kids and it's a week out of my summer. I know that Green Dot's mission to prevent personal violence is a good one, but what could I really do?<br />
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It's crazy how I played directly into their hands.<br />
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Before coming, it seemed like a <em>program</em>. I don't really like <em>programs</em>. <em>Programs</em> are zombies: thoughtless, moving only under momentum, slowly, and certainly dangerous in their unfeeling mass. Unfortunately, people act in groups, and if we can emphasize the personal relationships we all have, we can help.<br />
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Green Dot focuses on proactive things, not reactive--healing the wounded is good, but preventing wounds is better. Along those lines, Green Dot hinges on two things. First, it doesn't ask us to identify as a potential victim in need of defense or a potential aggressor in need of restraint, but a bystander who needs to act. It's easier to identify as a bystander than either of the other groups, so it's easier to prepare to act before an emergent situation. Next, Green Dot emphasized the dilemma of a bystander's action/inaction, excluding any middle neutral path. We don't all do the best, but, as Yoda says, we do or do not, although in this case trying is rounded up, not down.<br />
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It's a program, yeah. It has a brand--it even has a logo, the eponymous Green Dot. But it focuses on on action more than "activism"; us ourselves rather than "community." I was afraid of a program that focused on keeping women from getting hurt and keeping men from doing horrible things. I discovered a conversation about how bad things happen to all sorts of people, but primarily how all sorts of people can help each other stay safe--most directly, it's about how we protect other people.<br />
We good people outnumber the bad people, and the only way to stop bad actions is to replace them with good actions--interpersonal violence hurts too many people, so we the majority needs to act in each other's lives, to help each other out, even to look out for chances to help.AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-25234237804513231502013-02-10T08:59:00.001-08:002013-02-10T08:59:44.113-08:00The Gods of Our AmoritesSome hold that the Reformation held within it the germ of modern atheism, as the emphasis on personal choice for God also must allow for the personal choice against God. On a long view, however, that must have been the point from the beginning. God desires that nobody would fall, but desire implies a lack of domination, an acceptance of the possibility or even probability of rejection. In all, we know that the straight path is narrow and the wayward path is wide.<br />
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This is what Joshua told the people of Israel. We concentrate on the "choose this day who you will serve," but there's more there. Joshua emphasized choice in serving God, but in particular he was speaking to those who did not want to serve God, those who in his words found serving God "evil" in [their] eyes." Joshua emphasized his own choice of God, but confronted the rebellious, disgruntled Israelites with a dilemma: either serve their fathers' God, or serve the Amorites' God. There are only two paths, after all, and either we must choose to submit to the God who loves us, or submit to the gods of those who hate us and want us dead.<br />
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For our Amorites, whether philosophically atheist or simply uncaring, want not to glorify us but to glorify themselves. They don't want to save us eternally, but to prolong the suffering of this world under the guise of "preserving life." Our Amorites praise the man as opposed to the God who has brought us this far. Our Amorites praise the seemingly immortal god Mammon, who shall be destroyed with his gold in the fires that end the world, as our God and his faithful look on, sad for the great loss but safe eternally. Our Amorites worship science but not the Creator of nature, asking questions of the universe that provoke more questions, not seeking solace in the God who satisfies fully in the waters that satiate all thirst.<br />
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Our God made this world for us, and brought us into it, but we are here because of him and the service he asks of us. While in this world, it tries to distract, distort, taint, and corrupt, and destroy us. The gods of the Amorites demand death and blood unending, while our God desires clean hearts and loving service. The King of all that is came to us as a pauper, serving us to his own death, and begs us to let him in to our hearts, knowing that he has made the rock he cannot lift: he has given us the keys to our own hearts.<br />
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A beast, a monster, a demon might compel us to be his slaves. Our God asks us quietly, in hopeful patience, and the only time limit is our own.AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-9225948318766930322012-09-06T23:58:00.001-07:002012-09-06T23:59:02.661-07:00Busyness as UsualAt the beginning of the semester I have everything to do. And right now, a week in, is when it hits me: until December, I won't not be busy. Every second of every day, I've got something to do—something I could be doing. As I write this, I could be grading essays or working on my conference paper or finishing my gradebook or preparing for next week's classes or smoothing out Blackboard. <br />
<br />
I'm wasting my time writing all this.<br />
<br />
But no, I'm not. It's not because it's almost 2 am and past time when I can competently grade. It's not because this is a form of mental work and mental work is good. It's not so I can build up a body of blog posts or even for me to look back on when I'm feeling the squeeze at the first of next semester or next year.<br />
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I'm doing this because I want to, because I find it rewarding. Writing down my thoughts makes me feel good, right now, and feeling good, though it is a tautology, *makes me feel good*.<br />
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I'm not getting behind every second I sleep instead of grade. I'm not getting behind every time I watch an episode of Doctor Who instead of grade. I'll get my work done, but what makes me good at my job—if I am—is that I am human, and being human means caring about stuff, doing things because they make me feel good. <br />
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It also means not watching *another* episode of Doctor Who, or fussing with my gradebook instead of grading essays, let alone checking Twitter again. Tomorrow, I need to grade a bunch of essays. And really, I'll enjoy it, and feel better with it done than I did before. And then I'll work some more.<br />
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But right now, I wanted this time to write.AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-45520155936113020752012-08-19T08:52:00.001-07:002012-08-19T09:20:41.490-07:00The MinorityWe know, because Jesus says so, that the only path to Heaven is a narrow one. This can only mean that the minority of humans will be in Heaven, and that the minority of humans at any given time will be faithful—do we expect that this minority is 49%, or much, much less?<br />
<br />
In our society, in our world, majority rules. The government is run on elections more than inheritance or appointment, and the popular mob dominates culture, and so we faithful must always expect that the government will be outside us. Some governments value protecting minorities, but that's never something we or any other minority can depend on or put our trust in. We are aliens in a foreign land, our king ever-present but seemingly distant.<br />
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We are the minority in a sinful world; by very nature of a narrow path this is so. Luke 6 holds us to bless those who hold themselves as our enemies, not to gain power over them, to force them to obey in body but not in spirit, but rather to allow them to boss us around and dominate us, and to serve them lovingly. Our subservience is our mission technique; our oppressors are our mission field.<br />
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If we seek to be the majority instead of seeking to minoritize its members, we seek the trappings of this world and their impermanence. If we seek thrones rather than to serve at God's throne, we seek revolution and strife, not the peace of service—service as loved sons and daughters. We are salt and light, and salt and light are very small things, things that project their flavor, their radiance, far outward. That is our mission, our goal, our path in this lost world.AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-19826707729662984422012-06-14T08:00:00.000-07:002012-08-19T09:21:55.682-07:00Adventures and Quests<p>One of the things that regularly irks me is the use of the word “adventure” in general culture, and roleplaying culture in particular. Yes, as a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_description">descriptivist</a>, I admit that definitions change and that they’re ad hoc at best: if people at large use a word to mean X when I alone think it means Y, I’m wrong and they’re right, because words are not eternal, but only for shared meaning. Still. The original idea for adventure was caught up in the idea of randomness: it’s from the French <em><a href="http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/aventure#Old_French">aventure</a></em>, or “at random” or “by chance.” A knight on the Platonic ideal of an adventure mounts his horse and goads him on without touching the reins. Whatever happens, happens, and he surrenders control over the situation. When a person sets off on an adventure, he’s saying from the outset, “I have no idea what’s going to happen. In fact, I’m planning to make sure.”</p><p>By stark contrast, questing has a purpose. The most famous quest literature affords us, the quest for the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_grail">Grail</a>, has a set beginning, middle, and end. While an adventure is a serial story, a quest has the beginnings of something greater: a <em><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plot_(narrative)">plot</a></em>.</p><p>Both have their advantages, but again, I want to turn my attention to words and definitions, because I believe that this differentiation between adventure and quest—the de-synonymization—doesn’t limit us, but instead opens up our expression. Did you have a plan that turned out differently? That quest became an adventure. Did you just do whatever came into your head, only later realizing that it all linked together and set up a <em>conclusion</em>, not just an end? That adventure turned into a quest.</p><p>Through this terminology, we can even describe many smaller quests as part of a larger adventure through life, or many episodic adventures as part of a greater destined quest. When a person organizes a game (such as my friend Ian <a href="http://www.ianwheat.net/2012/06/how-big-is-your-sandbox-aka-player.html">has been theorizing</a> about), differentiating between the two is helpful. After all, if you want to set off into the unknown, or if you want to pursue a set goal, isn't it nice that we have specific words to mean each concept?</p>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-75331910282916951032011-11-09T15:10:00.000-08:002011-11-09T15:15:35.259-08:00On Stealing Ideas<style type="text/css">
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<p><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I like art and literature, and therefore I also like remixes and adaptation. I've been hearing a lot of </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: line-through;">Picasso's</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> T.S. Eliot's "good artists borrow, great artists steal" maxim. Also, I've been teaching Milton, who in Paradise Lost not only adapted Genesis but also blatantly stole from Ariosto.</span>
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<p><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">The problem with that quote is that "borrow" seems good, and "steal" seems bad. The quote makes it sound as if the True Geniuses of Mankind are all jerks, and that only by being jerks can they exert their Geniusness.</span></p>
<p><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">That's missing the point entirely. Stealing ideas is better than borrowing ideas. If I borrow a book, I have to give it back. If I steal a book, it's mine. However, like Cory Doctorow on "buying" </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;">licenses</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> to DRM'd digital works vs stealing those digital works—the one you steal will never get arbitrarily deleted if the DRM company goes bankrupt—borrowing and stealing </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;">ideas</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> is different. Contrary to public opinion, there is no shortage on ideas. There is no idea deficit. Ideas come out of the ether, they sublime from books and movies and human interactions. They just pop in your head and you can't control them. That's ideas for you. If I use your idea, you aren't suddenly </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;">without</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> it any more. No, now we </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;">both</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> have it. Ideas are not zero-sum.</span></p>
<p><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">So how do "borrow" and "steal" even apply? OK, here we go. If I "borrow" an idea, just like when I borrow a book, I know in every waking moment that it's not mine. It's not a part of me, and I'll be very careful around it because I see it chained to someone else. Whenever I talk about that idea, I'll reference someone else not simply to preserve attribution and good faith and all that, but because </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;">I'm uneasy around that idea</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">. It's not </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px; text-decoration: underline;">mine</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">, in the same way that to me a given funny story will never be mine, but always my father's. If I tell my daughter, though, she'll assume it's mine unless I tell her where it came from. I do that now, with my students. I tell them where I get a lot of stuff, because I'm uncomfortable claiming any (fleeting, transitory, meaningless) honor of "I came up with that."</span></p>
<p><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">When I get beyond that, if I get beyond that—when I realize that ideas and apothegms and proverbs and metaphors are just floating around, I can get it and use it. That's not your book, that's my book—I borrowed it years ago, but I've possessed it ten times as long as you did, and it has my notes in it and it's been a major part of my life, not yours. Those creases in the spine are mine, not yours. If you want it back, my duty is not to return it but to buy you another copy.</span></p>
<p><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">This works not only horizontally across friendship, but vertically, across generations. I have some books that are mine that used to be my dad's. They're mine in a way they never were his. He gave me ideas that live in my head, ideas that he tossed off one day that will stick with me forever. In a sense, I've stolen myself from him. I was his son, and now I'm my own man. In a non-zero-sum world, relationships don't change, information doesn't abandon its source—it just finds a new place. If I steal it, I make that place a home.</span></p>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-23537315424947422902011-06-17T13:55:00.000-07:002011-11-09T15:16:05.980-08:00Why I'm Excited about OSX Lion<p>I’ve been excited about Lion for a while, partially just because I like new OS versions, but when I talked about my excitement with one of my friends last week, he said that the whole thing seemed unimpressive. Let’s face it: this is not the same as the shift from DOS to Windows, Pre-Ubuntu-Linux to Ubuntu, or System 9 to OS X<sup>[<a href=#1>1</a>]</sup>. I was and am really excited about Lion, and couldn’t imagine a person who wasn’t. Of course, as a contrarian, I’m excited for subtle reasons<sup>[<a href=#2>2</a>]</sup>: I’m not excited about all of Apple’s big bullet points, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing to be excited about.</p><br /><p>I’m excited in four basic areas:</p><br /><ol><li>Apple tried to make it look pretty</li><br /><li>Apple tried to make it like iOS</li><br /><li>Apple tried to make it unbreakable</li><br /><li>Apple tried to extend its awesomeness</li></ol><br /><h2>1. Looking Pretty</h2><br /><p>Here’s what looks better in Lion:</p><br /><ul><li>Textedit: the icons more integrated with titlebar. Since I hardly ever ⌘Q this application, this is big for me.</li><br /><li>iCal and Address Book are <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skeumorph">skeuomorphic</a>. Since I like actual things (as opposed to virtual things), this is nice. If you don’t like skeuomorphism, I understand, but I think it looks pretty.</li><br /><li>Full screen apps everywhere. While I don’t always like this (right now I’ve got <a href="http://notational.net">Notational Velocity</a> opened in a window and TextEdit in another), I can’t deny the appeal of the <em>ability</em> to run an app full-screen at <em>some</em> point. Running Preview, iCal, Mail, Terminal, and TextEdit full-screen (with a system-wide API and keyboard shortcut) seems like an obvious good thing. I love the full-screen mode in the latest iPhoto</li><br /><li>iCal Heat Map: There’s a new year view (!), and iCal will show via colorized heat map which days and weeks are most and least busy. Instant information, at a glance. BusyCal, plz reproplicate.</li></ul><br /><h2>2. Just Like iOS</h2><br /><p>Here’s what’s (wonderfully) iOS-like in Lion:</p><br /><ul><li>The scrollbars. Hail iOS-like scrollbars. In a year we’ll all wonder what we did without them. “How can I tell how far I am in a document? That doesn’t matter as much as being constantly forcefully reminded how far you are in a document. I’m in TextEdit now and even though I haven’t finished a full page, I see a greyed-out space for a scroll bar. Honestly, this should have come years ago.</li><br /><li>Menubar notification for location services. Hear me out on this one. I know we all have too many icons in our menubars already, but this one just pops up every now and then. Now, Google or Facebook or whatever can request our physical location from a browser. Like most of us, the first time it happened I clicked “OK and stop bugging me.” Now I have no idea when it happens, and honestly I don’t want a giant pop-up each time. A transitory menubar icon seems right, and after using iOS a lot, the little purple ➤ jumps out at me.</li><br /><li>Color (!) Emoji font system-wide. I can’t wait to start using this with Typinator, even if it’s just for personal usage. I expect it to be standard on Windows 8 (or maybe Win8 SP1) after Apple takes the lead. Potentially annoying, yes, but must-need for mobile/desktop compatibility.</li><br /><li>Character-picker: Hold down a key and instead of getting “nooooooooooooo” you get “n+[oóòôøõö].” If this does not seem cool to you, then either A) you type “nooooooooooo” too much, B), you only ever type in English, or A+B. </li><br /><li>Auto-correction: If the word is misspelled (or potentially misspelled), you’ll get a pop-up with a little X next to hit. Click X to keep the current spelling. If this also works with doublespace → period-space, I’ll be in love.</li></ul><br /><h2>3. More Unbreakable</h2><br /><p>I don’t want my anything to break, but I know it will eventually. Here’s what mitigates that:</p><br /><ul><li>Time Machine works on the go, away from a backup drive. Blink, take a drink of water, go for a walk. Blink. Scream as loud as you can. Yeah, it’s like that.</li><br /><li>If you have to restart your system (admittedly rare in Mac compared to Windows already), you <em>don’t have to close your apps</em>. As far as I can tell, even the ones with unsaved files. They’ll be there after you restart—same window positions, same highlighting, same cursor and mouse position. Again, feel free to scream a bit.</li><li>Auto-save and Versions: “Microsoft Word already auto-saves. Time Machine already stores backup versions.” This is true. But this adds A) system-wide APIs for auto-save that every application can use, and B) non having to go <em>through</em> Time Machine to get to the previous version of <em>just one file</em>. Have you ever used Time Machine to go eight directories deep to check on one odd file? Either you haven’t and you’re confused or you have and you’re excited about Lion.</li></ul><br /><h2>4. Extra Awesome on Top</h2><br /><p>I think Mac OS X 10.5 & 10.6 are the best operating systems ever, for the same reason I think the SNES controller is the best ever. Think of slider bars that feature “functionality,” “beauty,” and “ease”—every time you adjust one, the others move two. 10.5 and 10.6 have those bars pushed up farther than I knew they could go after 10 years of Windows experience and 4 years of Linux experience. There are tradeoffs, but they’re small. 10.7 Lion only adds to the awesome:</p><br /><ul><li><p>Preview is the best Mac app, and it’s now even better:</p><br /><ul><li>Add signature to PDF documents. Hold some paper with your signature up to the iSight/Facetime camera, and Preview captures it and puts it on a PDF. Boom.</li><br /><li>Preview supports iWork and Office. Concerning system resources, Office » iWork » Preview—that is, iWork for me starts twice (or more) as fast as Office, and Preview feels like I’m on an SSD. Unless I want to edit a file, I’m going to want everything to open in Preview from now on.</li></ul></li><br /><li><p>Quick Look, my 2nd favorite part of Mac, after Preview. As much as I talked about Preview, I think I’ll be living even more in Quick Look, although I almost include them as the same app. Here’s what’s new:</p><br /><ul><li>Now it’ll support addresses (through Google Maps), Address Book contacts, and more.</li><br /><li>In Finder, less-focused on popovers, but now actual windows. “Open in…” buttons.</li><br /><li>Everywhere else (Spotlight, Mail, and other places you don’t want full windows) using popovers. Definitions included. Wikipedia included.</li><br /><li>3-finger double-tap to look up a word in Dictionary/Thesaurus/Wikipedia, just like the ⌃⌘D of 10.5-10.6.</li></ul></li><br /></ul><br /><h2>Bottom Line</h2><br /><p>Okay, that’s a lot of stuff. Mind-blowing? It’s not as cool as a new iTunes that allows you to read your iBooks on a Mac would be. It’s not as cool as AirPlay to the Mac would be. It’s not as cool as the revolutionary 10.5 Leopard (Time Machine, Spaces, Boot Camp, Preview, prettification), or even 10.4 Tiger (Spotlight, Automator), but it has a few distinct benefits:</p><br /><ul><li>Cost: It’s $30. Yes, this is obvious—Paying over $150 for Leopard is one thing, but isn’t <em>⅕ the price</em> worth these things? I’ve covered 18 things, which comes out to $1⅔ each. Just buying single-use apps to do that stuff would cost at least twice as much, and I haven’t even covered AirDrop, FaceTime, gesture customization, iChat unification, Launchpad, Mail Conversations, Mission Control (each desktop can have its own wallpaper!), QuickTime can rotate video or export audio only, Drag-and-drop from Spotlight, system-wide vertical text support, or being able to play albums from the iTunes album art-tile screensaver. $30. $30. $30.</li><br /><li>Access: It’s not just $30, but $30 no matter how many machines you run. My wife and I have two laptops using the same iTunes Apple ID, but Snow Leopard cost us $50 for the multi-user pack. For us, to upgrade two computers, Lion will essentially cost us $15 each.</li></ul><br /><hr><br /><p><ol><li id=1>The relative importance of all of these shifts, and others I haven’t mentioned, are arguments all to themselves—arguments I’m not going to address right now.</li><br /><li id=2>Everything from the main Lion features page <a href="http://www.apple.com/macosx/whats-new/features.html">here</a></li></ol></p>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-20061878032197662222011-05-05T06:51:00.000-07:002011-11-09T15:35:38.701-08:00Section 31, Osama Bin Laden, and ChristI’ve been watching a lot of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_Deep_Space_Nine">Star Trek: Deep Space Nine</a> with my wife. It’s pretty awesome, I’ll tell you. It’s all that I like about Star Trek—Klingons, Vulcans, Romulans, character studies, diplomacy—infused with dire seriousness. Characters fall in love, get married, and die. People change. Religion matters. And at its center is a war that actually threatens the Federation, the eternal goody-two-shoes of the galaxy. And here, in the last season, is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_31">Section 31</a>, an off-the-books Federation Intelligence agency, acting with the tacit non-disapproval of Federation authority, assassinating leaders and leaving potential friends to suffer to help conceal Section 31’s double-agents. Introduced in a sixth-season episode, Section 31 comes in and darkens the show considerably. <br />
<br />
Many Star Trek fans since the sixties hate Section 31, because the original idea of the Federation was an organization of peace and tranquility. Gene Roddenberry created the show at the height of the Cold War to show humans from different ethnic and regional backgrounds working together, black and white, American and Russian. The idea that the Federation leaders were more or less okay with covert assassinations of foreign political leaders—of erstwhile allies, no less—struck many as being to its very core anti-Federation. And it is. I love DS9, and part of what I love is not the concept that the ends justify the means, but that <em>we should think about whether the ends justify the means</em>. We should meditate. We should argue. We should lose sleep at night. We should pray. We should worry. Regardless of whatever decision is reached, we should know that it’s a hard decision and a decision we didn’t want to make in the first place. We know that even if we have to make the decision again in the future—again, whichever way we decide—it will never free us from the burden of torturing ourselves about it.<br />
<br />
I write this as Osama Bin Laden is dead. Our President, the leader of the free world, and his military, have caused it to happen. Bin Laden, who chose to murder thousands of Americans and would have murdered even more given the chance, is dead. His chapter in history is over, and now we can officially start arguing over the minutiae. The very first issue under discussion is proof. A week after Obama finally caved and gave the nation his long-form birth certificate (ignoring, of course, that even if he were born in Moscow he would be an American by virtue of his mother’s citizenship), many are calling on him to release evidence showing that Bin Laden really really really was the one shot. I get it—some people don’t like Obama and therefore don’t trust him (or the other way around—your choice). But to demand the release of photographs that show a human being’s head exploded is something else entirely.<br />
<br />
Obama has thought it over and decided to not release the photos. Of course they’ll pop up in a FOIA request years from now, but I’m glad they’re not being released now. Partially, I agree with the <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/05/04/60minutes/main20059768.shtml">President</a> on his first point: the photos may be “an incitement to additional violence…a propaganda tool.” But I wholeheartedly agree with him on his second point: “That’s not who we are. You know, we don’t trot out this stuff as trophies.”<br />
<br />
Sarah Palin disagrees. That’s no surprise. If Obama said he loved vanilla ice cream, Palin would campaign on a pro-chocolate ticket. <a href="http://twitter.com/#!/SarahPalinUSA/status/65839327837569024">She</a> wants us to “Show [the] photo as [a] warning to others seeking America’s destruction.” Palin argues that although it <em>may</em> incite violence or serve as an anti-American propaganda tool, it’s most effective as a head on a pike, a horrible, bloody “Look what we did. Don’t mess with us.” I think it would work. I think that Guantanamo Bay may lead some to dislike America, but it has probably also lead many more to fear us. In the pale moonlight, we may be safer because of doing scary things—or even being suspected of doing scary things. If we show the pictures to the world, many will rally against us. But many more will certainly see that we are scary and will choose not to mess with us.<br />
<br />
But that is exactly what I don’t want America to be. If we aren’t that yet, I don’t want us to become that. If we are that already, I want us to back off from it. I don’t want us to be feared around the world. I don’t want our enemies cowed into submission. Honestly, and I know this is naïve, I want people to love us. We have problems, yes, but our founding document, before we got serious and hammered out a code of laws, was a simple Declaration:
<br />
<blockquote>
<a href="http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_Declaration_of_Independence">We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.</a></blockquote>
This does not apply exclusively to Americans. This applies to <em>human beings</em>. If we ever discover aliens with bumpy foreheads or pointy ears, it’ll apply to them, too. The Constitution and Bill of Rights merely say, “Although all that stuff in the Declaration is true, we can only <em>legally guarantee</em> it for American citizens.” That certainly doesn’t mean that we should give up entirely, or that we should ever allow this, our guiding light, to dim. We are a city set on a hill, and like Jesus meant it, we should do everything in our power to help each other. We Americans should do everything to help everyone else in the world, not out of guilt or fear but out of love. As Jesus came to seek and eternally save the lost we as Americans must hope to preach <em>our</em> gospel of temporal human rights to the world. It’s a very different gospel, yes, but it’s a gospel nonetheless, and if we no longer preach it, we no longer deserve to call the Declaration of Independence our own.
I don’t want other nations to fear us. I don’t want other <em>people</em> to fear us. Anybody who says “it is better to be feared than loved” is both accurate and a jerk. It may be safer. It may be healthier. It may be stronger. But that’s not the person I want to be to my friends or my students or my wife or my daughter. It’s not who I want to be to strangers. It’s not who I want to be to the people who already call me an enemy. It’s not who I want to be to people who haven’t made up their minds.<br />
<br />
I’ll share something with you. I’ve only shared this with two human beings before now, an ex-girlfriend and my wife. I know how it may sound, but it’s personal, and it’s true. On September 11th, 2001, I prayed to God that he would spare the life of whoever was responsible for the attacks. First, I wanted to give whoever it was a chance to repent, to ask for forgiveness, and if at all costs, to change his life. As a Christian, if the perpetrator of even such an attack would come to Christ, I would accept him. It would not be easy, I admit, but Christ demands that I try. Second, I did not want what happened to Mussolini to happen to him. In Wikipedia’s words, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mussolini#Mussolini.27s_body">“After being shot, kicked, and spat upon, the bodies [Mussolini and his compatriots] were hung upside down on meathooks from the roof of an Esso gas station. The bodies were then stoned by civilians from below.”</a> I prayed that day, raw and shaking, that Mussolini’s fate would not befall whoever orchestrated those attacks. No human deserves that, whether or not his soul has left his body.
Again, yes, I am naïve. But I think that’s part of being an American, and I certainly think that’s part of being a Christian. We’re not supposed to be stupid or foolish, but we’re supposed to be guileless, innocent, optimistic. We should not rejoice in the suffering of others. We should pray for our enemies. We should be people of peace, people of love. God gave Osama Bin Laden a soul, and Jesus died for him, and if he was my brother, I would not want his body displayed to the world. I see no reason, no matter how feasible, no matter how practically-minded, no matter how effective, that we should do it.
I’m going to wrestle with this, much as for the past five years I’ve wrestles with what I prayed that day. I’m going to wrestle with the fact that God <em>answered</em> my prayer, that Bin Laden’s death, although not peaceful, seems to have been quick. I will continue to worry over every political decision I make, every vote I cast or opinion I voice. I will be—we will be—never free from the burden of torturing ourselves about it.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/" rel="license"><img alt="Creative Commons License" src="http://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/80x15.png" style="border-width: 0;" /></a>This <span dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" href="http://purl.org/dc/dcmitype/Text" rel="dc:type">work</span> is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/" rel="license">Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License</a>.AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-5538610186857721262010-10-09T20:05:00.000-07:002010-10-09T20:12:17.841-07:00DM Dream List<div>I've got a bug in my ear. "Celebrity DM" Chris Perkins was asked an interesting question: "If you could DM anybody, living, dead, or fictitious, who would you choose? He chose <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._p._lovecraft">Lovecraft</a>, Obama, Oprah, his interviewer, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Gygax">Gary Gygax</a>. Sadly, he chose not to elaborate. Intrigued, I decided I'd make my own list, with explanations and apologia. Throughout, I'm choosing them based not on who they are individually as much as who they could be as a roleplaying group. Therefore, any overlap should be strictly synergistic.</div><div><br /></div><div>1. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dante_Alighieri">Dante</a></div><div>I choose Dante because I want someone who pays attention to political maneuverings, and also because I want someone who can completely immerse himself in the game, who could take the threads I'm offering and run with them. Dante demonstrates his ability in the <i>Commedia</i> to incorporate earlier ideas and spin them as his own, something so wholly necessary in roleplaying games that two others on this list will have that feature.</div><div><br /></div><div>2. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shakespeare">Shakespeare</a></div><div>I pick Shakespeare not primarily because of his writing ability or his creation of many characters, though those things are quite helpful. I'd love to play in a game he DMed more than any other person on this list, but that's not what counts here. Many say that what made Shakespeare such a great playwright was that he was first an actor; his plays are still widely loved by actors for the freedom they cede to the performers, the variety of interpretations they allow. I want a player in my game who can fully embody a character, to make it his own--not simply play somebody else's character, but create it on the fly. And, of course, I think he'd like to hang out with Dante, too.</div><div><br /></div><div>3. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_of_the_United_Kingdom">Queen Victoria</a></div><div>Queen Victoria ruled for 63 years as monarch of the United Kingdom and Empress of India, arguably the most powerful person of her day. At the same time she oversaw politics and wars, she managed her family and, when necessary, ceded power to the people. Every group of players needs a leader: someone to organize and strategize. I pick Victoria over either of the Elizabeths for a reason: Elizabeth I was a political actor primarily, even though she fought the Armada she will be remembered primarily for her politics; I've already got Dante for that. Additionally, she was in many ways a tyrant--not someone I want to sit across the DM screen from. For all of Elizabeth II's diplomacy, she doesn't wield enough actual power to be a strong leader. Persuasion and logic, sure, but not muscle. I imagine she would enjoy meeting and spending time with Dante and Shakespeare, to boot.</div><div><br /></div><div>4. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Doctorow">Cory Doctorow</a></div><div>Yes, I know that I'm losing any gusto I have on this one. It's my list, so back off. After such incredible luminaries of the past, my fourth player needs to be Doctorow. For one, he seems like a person I'd just like to hang out with (Shakespeare would be another--but not necessarily Dante or Victoria), but that's only a secondary reason to be on this list. Doctorow is both a writer and a programmer. The writing he's done has been primarily from taking older concepts and spinning them off into completely new ideas. Additionally, he's collaborated with other authors more than occasionally, and is quite vocal in his praise of other authors. He even teaches at the Clarion SF school, showing his dedication to helping others. This should make him great for not only creating and maintaining his own character but also for working with the others in this group. Add to that his programming background, and he could help explain the rules to the others, a thing of no mean importance. As an activist and a contrarian he could also balance Dante and Victoria if power struggles or, with his seemingly limitless cheeriness, hurt feelings. Finally, he's he only person I've mentioned so far who has actually role-played (in the modern sense). I imagine he'd like to meet Shakespeare and Victoria, and also Dante. His directness might rub Victoria the wrong way at first, but if they're on equal footing socially, she'd get the hang of it; she was strong willed, but adaptable.</div><div><br /></div><div>4. Tie: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genghis_Khan">Genghis Khan</a> or my brother Will</div><div>Okay, sure. Have I lost all my street cred? Out of anyone in the world, and I can't choose between Genghis Khan and my own brother? For one: we need someone focused in both tactics and strategy, and could also get along with the people. He also was capable of organizing and getting along with others, which is an important skill. As for my brother, for one, he's my brother, so that's nice: someone I can depend on—not to obey me as DM but someone who's already a known quantity. Furthermore, Will has expertise I've seen in understanding new systems quickly and easily, and often showing off how awesome he could be, both in the rules and in his characterization, as if his single <i>modus operandi </i>was "just be awesome." How would they work with the others? Genghis Khan would get along tolerably well with Dante (a former soldier) and Victoria (a head of state) Of course, depending on which age Victoria would be, he might also hit on her, but she's a girl in a game group, so that's practically a trope, and she could certainly handle rebuffing him. Will, great at just walking up to people and being cool, would get along with everyone, especially as a historian: the guy was a double-major in history and philosophy with an English minor. He would probably embarrass himself less around Doctorow than I would, honestly.</div><div><br /></div><div>Oppose:</div><div><br /></div><div>Of course, there are a few people I'd simply refuse to DM, not for personal reasons, but for gaming reasons.</div><div><br /></div><div>I would never play in a game with I would never play in a game with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niccolo_Machiavelli">Machiavelli</a>. Never. Even with apologists who say that he wasn't horribly ruthless and evil, I think that "not evil" still isn't good enough. When roleplaying, I don't want to have to metagame for control, I just want to play. If Machiavelli were to show up at my table, I'd rather walk away than play with him.</div><div><br /></div><div>Neither would I ever game with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enrico_Dandolo">Enrico Dandolo</a>. While I respect his canniness, he seems like a person who, in a roleplaying setting, will do what's best for his character—not just in spite of party interests, but spitefully in direct opposition to party interests. He seems like one of those players who'd say, "Well, it's just in my character's <i>nature</i> to sell everyone out to the necromancer." Certainly not.</div>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-53996192355636120662010-09-28T14:47:00.000-07:002014-03-21T21:45:47.802-07:00Ignorance<p class="p1">So I took this <a href="http://features.pewforum.org/quiz/us-religious-knowledge/">quiz</a> from the Pew Forum on general religious knowledge. Yes, it is Christian-slanted; no questions about Zoroaster or Sikhs here! Of course, so are the United States, the subject of the survey. Disclosure: I got 15/15 correct, because I’m awesome (Sin of pride).</p> <p class="p1">Anyway, a few things cropped up in the post-quiz results pages. Really interesting things. One of the best statistical tricks I’ve found for ferreting out weird things is reversing a statistic. Take, for example, that 93% of self-described Mormons think that Joseph Smith was a Mormon. It doesn’t seem weird until you realize that 7% of Mormons think that he was either Catholic, Jewish, Buddhist, or Hindu, the other four choices. I guess I hope for Catholic, as it’d be closest for a second choice, but still—seven percent of Mormons didn’t know that the founder of their faith was a member of their faith. Seriously.</p> <p class="p1">Other tidbits:</p> <p class="p1"></p><ul><li>90% of Jews closely associate Moses with the Exodus—10% of Jews associate the Exodus with Abraham, Job, or Elijah.<br><br></li><li>81% of Mormons know that the golden rule isn’t in the 10 commandments, compared with 62% of Jews.<br><br></li><li>6% of Jews don’t think the Sabbath begins on Friday.<br><br></li><li>10% of Jews thought that Ramadan was either the Hindu festival of lights or the Jewish day of Atonement. I’m leaning towards that Jewish 10% mostly thinking Ramadan is Hindu, but one can never tell.<br><br></li><li>Less than half (47%) of Hispanic Catholics think that Catholics think that communion is only a symbol, not the literal body and blood of Christ.<br><br></li><li>Who knows who Job is: 7/10 of all Mormons, almost 6/10 of all White Evangelical Protestants, just over half of all Black Protestants, and just under half of all Jews.<br><br></li><li>Most people know who Mother Theresa is: 85.5% of all people who aren’t Black Protestants or “Nothing in Particular.” Only 66% Black Protestants thought she was Catholic and 77% of the “nothing in particular” crowd. The other choices were Jewish, Buddhist, Mormon, and Hindu.<br><br></li><li>That means, by the way, that 12% of White Catholics and 17% of Hispanic Catholics didn’t know Mother Theresa was Catholic.<br><br></li><li>17% of Hispanic Catholics and Black Protestants think that the Supreme Court allows teachers to lead class prayers. 84% of those two groups also think that teachers are not permitted to read the Bible as literature in schools. Based on my fuzzy math, does that mean that 2.72% of Hispanic Catholics and Black Protestants think that the Supreme Court OK’d prayer BUT NOT Bible as Literature?<br><br></li><li>Non-mormon Christians don’t know much about Pakistan’s religion—an average of 36% don’t think that Pakistan is primarily Muslim.<br><br></li><li>Atheists blow everybody else out of the water when it comes to Buddhist knowledge—62% know that Buddhism focuses on Nirvana, while only 35% of everybody else.<br><br></li><li>Atheists similarly triumph over knowledge of Hinduism, with Jewish knowledge of Hinduism coming close behind (72 and 62%, respectively). Everyone else’s average: 35% Other options: Islam and Taoism (in Taoism’s sole mention. I imagine only 2% across the board would know anything, including connecting it with the Te Ching).<br><br></li><li>Nobody knows anything about Jonathan Edwards. White Evangelical Protestants (15%) and Jews (12%) did best.</li></ul><div>So what is the state of religious knowledge in America? Interesting. If you're a Black Protestant or Hispanic Catholic, though, I'd be concerned. Then again, when Atheists know more than everybody but Jews, it's egg in your face, Christian America. If you want to read Pew's report, check it out <a href="http://pewforum.org/Other-Beliefs-and-Practices/U-S-Religious-Knowledge-Survey.aspx">here</a>.</div><p></p>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-5497084530090933562010-04-13T12:30:00.000-07:002010-04-13T17:15:00.411-07:00Dunnit! and Systemizing the Game<div>I’ve had a long history with to do lists, as I play at productivity. I’ve tried paper lists on tiny post-it pads (sort of a mini-Hipster PDA), lists in my Moleskine, lists on yellow legal pads when I worked as a lawyer’s gofer, and then into computer versions like simple text files, displayed on my monitor with GNU Tomboy or Mac Stickies or Geektool. I’ve used The Hit List, SimpleNote, and Evernote, the latter two I still use for various things. However, none of these note-taking styles have felt, well, sticky. Here’s the problem:</div><div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>1. I forget things.</div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>2. Therefore, I write them down.</div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>3. I forget where I wrote them down (see #1)</div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- or -</div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>3. I forget to check my list (see #1)</div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- or -</div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>3. I just stop caring </div><div><br /></div><div>That’s a vicious circle if I’ve ever heard one. Add to that things like “I just don’t want to right now” or “Maybe this other system will work.” And so, as a result, three quarters through my semester and in the middle of the real grading season, I’ve found a new system. Of course.</div><div><br /></div><div>It’s called “Dunnit!” (obligatory, excessive exclamation point in the title). It’s an iPhone app, and it sits right on my home screen. Weaknesses: no desktop syncing, iPhone OS only. Strengths: Free, with badges that display current tasks, and even (interestingly) Twitter support. Why am I even talking about this? OpenFeint support.</div><div><br /></div><div>Yes, OpenFeint is for games. No, this isn’t a game. Not really, anyway.</div><div><br /></div><div>There’s a well-known concept called “gaming the system.” My brother, for example, is really good at gaming. Not “can play any video game with ease” but “can min/max his way to some crazy hacked-out options in any tabletop RPG or complex board game. He’s good, and he wins, even at games supposedly without winners. I’ve frequently remarked to others that he should have been an accountant or tax attorney, because of his uncanny knack for ferreting out any loophole. He could make someone, and himself, a ton of money. Of course, accounting is boring, and tax law is boring, so the incentives are far off. It just doesn’t matter. And so, accounting never really (to my knowledge) appealed to him. He’s a history major, a nice humanities guy. What motivates him is <i>caring about it</i>. If he doesn’t care, he won’t do it. I have much the same problem with to do lists.</div><div><br /></div><div>The central idea begin “gaming the system” is that all systems are inherently game-like, from the educational system to the DMV to tax codes to relationships. Call it ruthless or cruel, but it seems to be the case. There are complex systems. They have rules. Those rules are created by humans, and humans are fallible, creating many times when rules can be broken in spirit, but not in law. If I feel like I’m generally productive, but without a list that I’m checking off, I feel okay, because I’m adhering to the spirit of the list, just not the law. However, if I create a list of easy things to do just to check them off, I’m gaming the system, exploiting a loophole in the whole to-do-list business. And it’s what makes Dunnit! fantastic.</div><div><br /></div><div>Dunnit! <i>systemizes the game</i>. It’s basically the opposite of all that. Instead of creating a system that people can ruthlessly exploit, they make the whole system of to do lists into a game. There are points. There are levels. There are rankings. There are <i>achievements</i> for crying out loud, like it’s an XBox game or something. What on earth, right?</div><div><br /></div><div>Well right now, it’s one of the most arresting games I’m playing on my iPod Touch. It’s the ultimate game: get things done in real life, and get points for it. Others like Booyah! (again, obligatory, excessive exclamation point) have dabbled in this in the past. The conceptual world of Foursquare/Gowalla intersects at some points. These systems essentially say to a generation of die-hard gamers “you know how to hack out your games, but you don’t care about life, so here’s a trick: if you imagine your life as a game, you can hack that out too. I don’t know anybody that’s used The Sims to get relationship advice, but that’s the concept.</div><div><br /></div><div>What Dunnit! does by making the whole thing a game is make me care about my score. I want my score to go up, so I get things done. I put everything I want to do in there instead of in The Hit List or a text file, because I never go anywhere without my iPod Touch. So I’ve got a list that follows me everywhere, reminds me constantly, and has made the system of a to do list into a game. Works for me!</div><div><br /></div><div><i>As of the writing of this article, I have 5131 points at level 7, and am ranked #292 on the Dunnit! leaderboard.</i></div><br /><a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/"><img alt="Creative Commons License" style="border-width:0" src="http://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/80x15.png" /></a>This <span dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" href="http://purl.org/dc/dcmitype/Text" rel="dc:type">work</span> is licensed under a <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/">Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License</a>.AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-85690148346139331162009-06-28T13:47:00.000-07:002009-06-28T14:14:26.759-07:00Righteousness and Self-RighteousnessI listened to a story on the radio a few years ago about education in America, particularly about critical thinking. As a teacher of, among other things, critical thinking, the subject always catches my attention. One of the interviewees was recently fired from a Catholic university for daring to read with a critical eye: not the Bible, but the works of Augustine, his <span style="font-style: italic;">Confessions </span>and his <span style="font-style: italic;">City of God</span>. He dared to only view the Bible worthy of reading devotionally—that is, reading it uncritically. Devotional reading can be seen distinct from any other readng, as we do not judge the text, but allow the text to judge us.<br /><br />We discover the worth of scripture in the text itself. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, and I’m sure many could quote it, “<span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.</span>” Job 40:2 shows us something similar, as God rebukes Job, saying, “<span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">Shall he that condends with the Almighty instruct Him? He that reproves God, let him answer it.</span>” The Bible tells us that Job was righteous, but Job, in his misery and arguments with other people, went so far as to demand an answer from God. God is judge <span style="font-style: italic;">of</span> man, not judged <span style="font-style: italic;">by</span> man.<br /><br />However, this talk isn’t about scriptural infallibility. What is the proper mode of man towards God? What one area did Job need help in? Pride. What God showed Job is something he already knew, something each of us knows: we are not God. And so, as Job had to abandon his pride at being right--regardless of whether or not he was right—we must abandon our pride.<br /><br />Self-righteous pride, or intellectual pride, is the pride of knowing that I’m right and being frustrated that everyone else doesn’t realize it. There’s nothing wrong with being right, certainly not, but there is a problem with refusing the possibility that we're wrong, with rubbing people’s noses in it, with demanding that we're above questioning. Ultimately, this kind of pride is the belief that I can do no wrong, which is a problem of a different sort: only God can do no wrong, and I am certainly not God, so whatever I say can easily be wrong. Inspired scripture calls Job a righteous man and he evidently had a problem with this. Surely, then, it is likely that I may have a greater problem.<br /><br />Scripture tells us that we need to be ready to give an answer when people ask us about our faith. Part of this means being able to show people what we believe, using the Bible alone. Others have more to say on this issue. Additionally, with everything in our lives where we don’t depend on the Bible—say, driving directions, but really anything that doesn't concern our souls or others' souls—if I have a desire to impose our view on others, to force it on them, the thing that makes me do that is the sin of pride. As Peter shows us in 1 Peter 5:5, it keeps us from God the same as any other sin, like drunkenness or sexual immorality. Peter writes, “<span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">God resists the proud</span>.” However, Peter also notes something else: the cure for it is the virtue of humility: the realization that I am not only sinful, but also ignorant of a great many things. God “<span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">gives grace to the humble.</span>”<br /><br />Certainly all of us have had problems with pride at some point in our lives. If you have had problems with pride in your life and need the prayers of the church, we are ready to receive you in loving and open arms, whether you know the blessings of being a Christian or have yet to put on our Lord in baptism.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">--All Rights Reserved</span>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-6907637638890707342008-06-20T06:50:00.001-07:002009-06-28T14:14:11.002-07:00Teachers and the Quest for Meaningful PedagogyA fellow student in class just asked me a question in response to a discussion we were having about Kohlberg's Stages of Moral Development. Here is the relevant tail-end of my initial post:<br /><br />"Finally, I think that teachers should emphasize imaginative literature that forces such moral questions upon the characters and upon the reader, so that children can begin to understand what certain choices mean, and can begin to place themselves in others' shoes when viewing moral disagreements."<br /><br />An excerpt from the well-reasoned response I was given is as follows:<br /><br />"...I can appreciate your opinion that students can be presented with imaginative literature that poses moral dilemmas that encourage them to understand consequences of choices and will also help them to learn empathy for the plight of others who have to deal with moral dilemmas. The whole concept of helping students learn to think instead of just presenting a set of facts for them to memorize and pass a test <span style="font-weight: bold;">is certainly a more challenging task for educators, </span>but a concept that will spill over into all areas of learning." [emphasis mine]<br /><br />This got me to thinking. Is it a more challenging task for educators? Learning to teach the high-school way, or, I guess, the education-degree way, has been daunting for me, used to the college way of teaching: lecture, discussion, essay. The repetition, memorization, and testing of material seems so baroque, so antiquated. And, I must admit, I always had the niggling feeling of "college is better," even though college teachers don't for the most part receive actual instruction in, you know, <span style="font-style: italic;">pedagogy</span>. Still, I say, why bother with all that? Aren't US high schools very poorly ranked, and yet US universities very highly ranked? Sure--but if teaching is a skill, it can be taught, it can be learned. As long as we don't get too caught up in the old ways of doing things. And a lot of education theorists we've discussed agree. Here's my response to my classmate:<br /><br />"The thing is, though, that I don't know if it is more of a challenge. We learn easier if we have a meaningful connection to our learning. That "meaningful connection" can be seeing something useful, as we see things in this class that helps us in the classes we teach, but that "meaningful connection" can also be a connection that provides, allows, strengthens <span style="font-weight: bold;">meaning</span>. Across the board you'll find that straight memorization fails most of the time: students commit something to memory, test over it, forget it, and then have nothing to build on for the next test. Because they're not interested, because they aren't forced to think, evaluate, decide, they have no connection to what they're learning. On the other hand, if we can get our students interested in something by showing just how cool or weird or interesting it is, the students on their own look for it.<br /><br />And I don't really think that's challenging for educators. We wouldn't be <span style="font-weight: bold;">doing</span> anything harder. Because this is the way humans naturally learn things for themselves, we don't have to work as hard past the initial point of engagement. The biggest obstacle is getting kids interested in learning in general, and after that, showing them that one particular area, whether it's math or science or 1870s century German poetry, is fascinating when you get right down to it.<br /><br />This style doesn't involve making giant lists of things to discuss. It primarily uses essay questions, not true/false, matching, or fill-in-the-blank. And instead of lecture-response, class discussions often bring about greater truths than one single teacher can provide. The problem with it is that it's anathema, completely the opposite of how a lot of people <span style="font-weight: bold;">think</span> of teaching, of what teaching should be, because with all the subjectivity, there's a certain lack of objectivity, the source of all grading and evaluation. But I would willingly sacrifice easy-to-determine grades for authentic learning any day of the week."<br /><br />I stand by that. We in university need to learn pedagogy--skills to actually help our students learn. <span style="font-style: italic;">Especially in testing methods, for crying out loud</span>--true/false tests are patently lousy, by almost anybody's judgment. But those in high school need to learn as well that some methods don't actually work, and they're only the easiest methods because they're the ones that people already know. Teaching can be easier through guided class discussions, even though testing is harder through grading essays. I'm fine with the tradeoff: less mind-numbing lecture, more exploration of personal relevance and meaning.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">--All Rights Reserved</span>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6122203789774342143.post-41392345718713476582006-12-29T08:49:00.000-08:002009-06-28T14:13:42.322-07:00Preamble: On Writing, Being Read, and CopyrightMy first question to the world: I have no idea what I should do about licensing. Here I plan to write essays on literature, religion, teaching, and other subjects, as well as post my translations of Old English poetry, and I am torn between two principles, and, of course, sub-principles. First I do not want to lend my thoughts to anyone without remuneration, but I know this is selfish. The opposite of course is to give everything I have away freely, but in this too is a little madness--do I disdain myself to the point where I am content as an unknown, writing anonymously and wishing to always be known as such? I do not wish to be anonymous completely, and though it is my pride that tells me this, I listen, knowing that there is sometimes wisdom in dark things. I accept that pride is what motivates me to write, to suggest to the world that a thing that I produce is worth the time to notice, and so I accept the prideful nature of wanting credit, although I deny the idea that credit is due at all points. I ask, but do not demand, because I believe, even if I do not at all times adhere to it, in a polite society, where "demand" is a foreign word when applied anywhere but to the inward self.<br /><br />But still, I desire first of all things that what I write be read, and what I admire be admired in turn. As my desire is to translate Anglo-Saxon poetry, I find my root belief is in the quality, the originality, the <em>goodness</em>, of Anglo-Saxon poetry. That it cannot be easily read by an audience over a thousand years linguistically removed proves a problem, so I wish to translate it so that it can be read, enjoyed, and savored. I want to make it as easy to find and read as possible--not simple, but as far from inaccessible as can be done. This means that I wish to translate into a modern, contemporary language (although not necessarily a contemporary idiom), but that even more I desire my translation to be easily disseminated. As such, I lean towards Public Domain, which is about as free as free gets, copyright-wise. If I publish on the web in Public Domain, theoretically Dover Thrift, Barnes & Noble books, and even you (if you own a publishing company) could publish what I wrote and not give me one fat nickel, and be legally fine.<br /><br />So what do I ask? What are the guidelines of this post, and of others on this blog? My authorial mandate is truth and my authorial request is to be recognized. I ask that anything I post be regarded as All Rights Reserved, in accordance with U.S. law, until I note otherwise. I plan that any translations that I produce be a lesser license, possibly even fully Public Domain, but I will note as such in each entry in the header. For now, the bracketed ARR represents that this entry is All Rights Reserved, and any post marked PD will be immediately and permanently public domain.<br /><br />[6-24-2009 edit--I'm going to rescind on this and remove the bracketed ARR from the title--titles are too serenely simple to muddy with such nonsense. I'll instead use...]<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">--All Rights Reserved</span>AM Shullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13683576189895555016noreply@blogger.com1