No Videos! er, Yes Videos! well, actually...

I can't decide. Flickr have started letting 'pro' users upload 90second videos. This is causing a HUGE controversy amongst the people who care. There's the NO VIDEO ON FLICKR!!! group (currently 12,908 members)and the We Say NO to Videos on Flickr group (30,118) and the We say YES to Videos on Flickr group (260)... apart from feeling like the opening sequence for Battlestar Galactica I don't think this does anything useful. My first thought was, "Of course no videos on Flickr. that's what YouTube and stuff are there for. Flickr does all it needs to do!" But then it occurred to me that video is art (well, it can be) and that perhaps video has it's place on Flickr too. Except. Well, firstly the videos in question can only be up to 90seconds which, to me, is more restrictive than useful. Second, there are already an unending stream of video hosting sites. Each uses a slightly different encoding or has a new interpretation on the 'standard' player thing, so they're horrendously annoying at times. Third, this is just asking for a never ending stream of wedding videos, holiday videos, children-running-around-in-the-garden-aren't-they-so-ADORABLE videos... Oh god please no... Most importantly, of course, one needs the latest Flash player to make it work, which fucks it all up for anyone who might want to do anything in a restrictive work environment or who for any other reason can't get it. At least YouTube and Google Video are a bit behind the technology. So, really, I'm in favour of Flickr Video in principle but in actuality am horribly opposed. We have video sites multiplying like bacteria for video, places like abinoblacksheep etc. for animation, deviantart for, er, art, and Picasa and Flickr for photos. Generally. So I'd like to keep them a bit separated please. Please?

Photos? You must be kidding, mate!

Ahahaha! Terrorism! Photos? In public? You must be about to destroy the planet, I'm afraid I'll have to stop you... Best to let the BBC summarize the situation. If you're worried, this might be useful.

My metacortex

I was recently accused of knowing about modes through the use of Google. While I wouldn't claim extensive knowledge of the subject, I'm not completely clueless and had not, in this case, resorted to everyone's favourite source of quiz answers. However, why on earth not? It's now quite routine for people to use a calculator/phone/spreadsheet to carry out the most routine calculations, when even ten years ago it was seen as a bit lazy, and people would complain that the Youth of Today are Not Getting a Proper Education etc. Similarly, there are still a few holdouts who have not placed their lives in the hands of mobile phones and bemoan the modern lack of memorised phone numbers, while the rest of us are relying on the things to store fifteen numbers, addresses and email addresses just for Mum. I, and many other I know, see t'internet as an extension of myself. It's reached a point where there is little that I can't find at least something about using my Special Search Superpowers, so I regularly pull up a Google or Wikipedia search, perhaps popping into the BBC News pages, in order to clarify something I may have heard in passing or seen on a headline. And really, why not? If it's there, and reliable most of the time, and easily accessed (thanks to the ubiquity of broadband and an unlimited data tariff - see how important mobiles are!?) then why on earth shouldn't I use a vast source of knowledge rather than relying on my puny brain? My ideal state, I think, is Charles Stross's character Manfred Macx in his delightful novel Accelerando (available to buy or for FREE download). In chapter 3 he loses his connection to the electronic world and in the process is so cut off from his resources that he is almost lobotomised. I'm not saying that I want an electronic lobotomy, but I long for a state where I can be that connected, nay integrated. The follow-on from this is my disgust at the idea of closed-book exams. A woman at my work is doing an HNC in administration stuff, pretty much just getting her up to date in MS Office. Now, when at work, everyone and I do mean EVERYONE has at some point or another come to me for advice on Word, Excel, Outlook, the printers... most offices have a resident Chris of one form or another. This woman has come up to me a few times for advice on her coursework, since the teaching standards are less high than the testing standards. I know from experience that these softwares are best learned through practical experimentation and experience, but these people are being given the teaching without the practice. I've become a great fan of the Help function in Excel, whenever I can't think of how do do anything, and there's also an extensive online help and advice system. In the Real World you have access to all of these systems: Help, t'internet, Chris... and yet for their exams they have to hold it all in their heads. What use is that!? It's not a useful exam, it's a test of memory. What they should be testing is the ability to learn how to find out! To know how best to use Help, where to look online, who to talk to. This is another area in which the System cannot keep up with the pace of technological change. Welcome to the Singularity.

Southland Tales

While wandering around in HIV HMV with Ben at the weekend we came across a new DVD that caught the eye: On investigation it transpired that this was a new film from the mind responsible for Donnie Darko, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar (aka Buffy), Dwayne Johnson (aka The Rock), Seann William Scott (two of him) and even Miranda Richardson! While I went and asked a friendly member of staff about it, Ben sneakily bought the thing and gave it to me as a late extra birthday present. Awww.

So off to Ollie's house where we ended up not watching in as it's LONG and Ben had to get home.

Of course, I had to see it.

The reviews all said it was a bit confusing. Apparently it had been slated at Cannes a few years ago and completely recut before being released late last year. It's still confusing, but with the same tone as Donnie Darko, where you feel like perhaps you're just not intelligent enough to Get It until you realise that actually it's just very silly.

It's good. I enjoyed it. Even Justin Timberlake was good, in fact it's probably the best thing he's ever done. But it really made no sense. And, as it turns out, that's no surprise since I was only getting the second half of the story! Richard Kelly, writer/director, planned the story as a multimedia extravaganza with back story in comc form and a lot of web content - not all of which came to fruition as dreamed.

So now I have to find and read the comics, then go back to the film and see if I can probe the depths of the subplots. I'm quite happy to watch it again, it's very nicely done and has a couple of satisfying musical-esque moments. Perhaps I will inflict it upon someone else as well this time...

In the meantime, here is my favourite bit of the film. Which has now led to me listening to The Killers.

Oh. Right. Of course.

Overheard at a busstop

"Yeah, if I get my DLA I'm gonna go blonde again."

La Siv has vocal sex partners

"He sexes me then he eats my crunchy nut," quoth she.

New Deven Green w00t!