Month: December 2010

Wi-Fi Overload at High-Tech Meetings

Wi-Fi Overload at High-Tech Meetings Source: www.nytimes.com Technology conferences would seem to be a natural for great Wi-Fi access, but the technology was not intended for large rooms and crowds.      http://www.nytimes.com/201 0/12/29/technology/29wifi. html?ref=technology     

Source: www.nytimes.com
Technology conferences would seem to be a natural for great Wi-Fi access, but the technology was not intended for large rooms and crowds.

See the original post: Wi-Fi Overload at High-Tech Meetings

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A White Day After Christmas 2010

It’s snowing!  And… I’m probably still going to work tomorrow.

I was watching “Star Trek: The Motion Picture.”  TMP never gets much credit, but the more I watch it, the more I feel sentimental about it.  My comments about it, some years ago now, remain pretty much the same.  However, after watching the end again, I felt moved about (spoiler alert!) Kirk’s declaring Decker and Iliya as “missing” rather than dead.  In a way, they had evolved and V’ger – hopefully! – learned about the concept of love, not just humanity’s unstable emotions and free will.

It’s intriguing that V’ger’s evolution was due to ex-lovers, who regretted not staying together – and who remain together in another way.

Oh, and those elements of The Next Generation:  the theme song and… well, Decker was a lot like Riker (while Kirk is so NOT Picard, he had to accept Decker), not to mention how the Decker-Iliya relationship was the root of the Riker-Troi relationship.

And, Spock – well, he keeps trying to deal with logical vs. the illogical – and seems to finally reach some kind of acceptance of these things that are actually already deep in himself.

And, McCoy – sometimes, there’s something very cool about him being the only one who can call Kirk on his bullshit: McCoy is the one who has to tell Kirk that he was wrong for undermining Decker and to point out the danger to Decker for choosing to stay with V’ger.  The triumvirate of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy was maintained, though, and the movie ends with hope for what else is out there.

Come to think of it, TMP came off as a mix of The Original Series and TNG, and it then makes sense for why/how TNG developed as it did.

I checked out others’ top 10 or ten worst of 2010 tv.  Check out the top 10 list of Time’s James Poniewozik (the blog post explanation vs. the Time.com feature version of the list; Poniewozik also has a top 10 episodes list, separate from the best series of 2010).  Poniewozik also has his 10 worst of 2010 and his 10 best performances of 2010 (the Emmies don’t quite cut it, I do say!).  Critic Alan Sepinwall divvies up his list for new vs. returning stuff.  Entertainment Weekly’s Ken Tucker actually has a top 20 list (but he divided it up accordingly with a top 10 and another 10).  Critic David Bianculli directs us readers to his list via the NPR website (so we get to listen to him too).

My personal notable TV 2010 list would be less exciting than a lot of other lists, since I’ve drastically cut tv viewing this year for various reasons and primarily because I’m such a PBS snob.  But, I came up with the following as making it on my list.  In no particular order:

1. “Lost” final season – what a season of tv for 2010.  I think FC and I probably blogged all we had to say about it this year.  (I’ll at least link to my comments on the series finale).

2. “Fringe” – pursuing the alternate universe arc made the season exciting indeed.  Anna Torv as two Olivias was quite the acting feat.  John Noble as two Walters was also amazing – sadly, he didn’t get nominated for the Emmy for it, but that was terrific.

3. Craig Ferguson and his (didn’t make it on tv/but smuggled on YouTube) Doctor Who opening. (I’ll link to EW’s Ken Tucker’s blog post about it; good stuff…)

4. Baseball: The Tenth Inning – the extra inning episode covered the harsh 1990’s and 2000’s of baseball.  Ken Burns didn’t ignore the steroids scandal, the strike, and the impact of 9/11/01.  But, he was clearly a Bosox fan.  Oh well!

5. Macbeth – Patrick Stewart as Macbeth!  Kate Fleetwood as Lady Macbeth!  That was amazing tv! (yes, making up for my not being able to see the show when it was in Brooklyn, which FC blogged about seeing).

6. Hamlet – David Tennant as Hamlet!  Patrick Stewart as Claudius!  That was amazing tv! (which I blogged about a little)

7. new Sherlock on Masterpiece Mystery! (which I already blogged about)

8. Jon Stewart and the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear on The Daily Show.

9. Conan O’Brien’s Tonight Show last episode (see my comments here).

10. Community – this is turning into my favorite show this year.

Other personal tv notables : “Justified”; “Archer” (ridiculously sick and funny); the Winter Olympics in Vancouver; “Law and Order” – the final season.  Oh, and I’ll give “Hawaii 5-o” some credit, although I haven’t really caught it since the series premiere.

Must 2010 go already?

Christmas!

Merry Christmas!  Some stuff to keep us entertained at this time of year…

Time Out New York has a terrific hot chocolate list.   The list looks soooo tempting – and decadent – and… not cheap… dare I dip into the wallet, in the midst of Xmas shopping, for this… Hmm…

Time Out New York also has a nice holiday walk through midtown.

Just a question: if everything’s on sale before Christmas, what’s left for the after Christmas sales?

And, I just find the Lowe’s Christmas commercial with the APA couple to be great.  They’re APA’s!  And, she’s just buying a power drill for her tool-crazy husband, and he’s just pretending that he’ll be surprised for Christmas!  It’s so normal and so… American!  (now, if only I can find a link to the video).

Ken Jeong in the Pepto Bismal commercial – that was a little over the top.  I think a little Jeong is okay; too much and it’s a little creepy and not funny.    Plus, he’s a medical doctor in real life (see his imdb entry, after all); maybe he can actually tell us if Pepto really is any good for the holiday over-eating.  Well, maybe medicine and comedy don’t quite work, but Jeong’s pointing out the foolishness of holiday foods wasn’t that much fun.

I haven’t had much in the way of Christmas cards this year, beyond those so far from a few friends.  Slate has an interesting article about whether Facebook killed the Christmas card.   Well, I still believe in Christmas cards, so I still send them out (holiday cards, at the rate I’m going; thankfully, there are days of Christmas/Kwanzaa and even New Year’s Eve/Day left!).  But, the Internet is both a curse and a blessing…

And, in case you haven’t gotten the perfect geek Christmas present – seriously: a Voltron USB drive? Angry Asian Man says it does come with a Blazing Sword AND an episode of the cartoon! And, it’s officially licensed by the Voltron people. But, it does not mean you get 5 thumb drives that form into one Voltron. Aww. Still: one can totally geek out on this.

PBS Newshour’s Jeffrey Brown did an interview with Garry Trudeau, on the 40 anniversary retrospective of Doonesbury.  Kind of cool that Trudeau made some observations about the next generation: Alex Doonesbury and her dating Toggle, the Iraq War vet.  (I’m still puzzled by the whole Jeff Redfern’s misadventures in Afghanistan – Jeff is such a weirdo; but otherwise, the struggles of the armed services in war and at home as portrayed by Trudeau has been rich stuff).

Because we’re lawyers here at triscribe: in light of my current superhero obsession (wherein I’ve been reading a bunch of graphic novels / compilations of Batman and friends), it’s kind of fitting that the ABA Journal and the NY Times covered this fascinating blog (blawg?), Law and the Multiverse, by lawyers who ponder on the legal implications of the superhero world.  Thumbs up!!  (someone has to answer questions about whether Batman’s searching and seizing is unconstitutional and whether Superman can be a US citizen or is a really illegal alien (literally), and whether Hank McCoy (Beast of the X-Men) has a claim under the Americans with Disabilities Act as a mutant).  Awesome!!!

Because Santa showed up a lot in the DC and Marvel worlds, the Law and Multiverse people did a legal analysis of Santa’s actions.  Cool…

Some pictures of snowmen:

Slate had a slide show in honor of winter solstice earlier this week.  Some of the snowmen in the slide show are creepy looking snowmen (which had me laughing like an idiot for some reason).  Unsurprisingly, the photo of the snowcouple of Central Park were the cute snowman/woman; the Tokyo one was funny; and yes, the creepy ones were creepy…

I loved the NPR photos of “Snowmania” – where the snowmen’s poses were inspired by Calvin and Hobbes’ snowmen stuff.  These photos were kind of sick and funny.

At Columbia, my undergrad Alma Mater, had this weird tradition of the announcements/voice mail lady reading the “T’was the night before Xmas” poem (yes, voice mail lady was real!).  And, Clement Clarke Moore, the man who wrote the poem was a Columbia prof prof.  Here: we have Harvard scientist saying that the idea of Santa and flying reindeer came from hallucinogenic ‘shrooms…. Thanks, Harvard!

From Time’s Techland section: Links to holiday tv things. To paraphrase the writer of this blog post, Merry Christmas, to everyone who celebrates; everyone else: have a great weekend! (and enjoy He-Man and She-Ra fight Skeletor and Hordak from ruining the season’s greeting for everyone).