John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

Death and the (old) maiden

2009-11-08T09:27:00-03:30

Not one, not two, but all three of us have been under the weather, to one extent or the other, over the last week. Here's a motivational video on how to beat back the bad stuff. It's a short video called How to Cope With Death, featuring some clever animation.

A thought on martyrs

2009-11-08T09:18:00-03:30

"The tyrant dies and his rule is over; the martyr dies and his rule begins."
- Søren Kierkegaard

Apparently, I'm rich and/or famous (on Twitter)

2009-11-08T09:15:00-03:30

I've been making use of Twitter's new list-making application, which allows for easy grouping for followers; you can do this on things like TweetDeck and HootSuite, although the benefit here is that it's interactive, so you can see other people's lists ... and see when you show up on the lists that people create.

I've started showing up on a few lists, with different groupings - Newfoundlanders, for instance; journalists; even politics. I got a kick, though, that my old friend Tim Peckham (who had a bit of a thing going at MUN in the early 80s with his hilarious comic strip Captain Leisure) put me among his "rich friends." As well, Adam Riggio, whom I met at a journalism workshop years ago, put me among "the famous."

There you have it... apparently!

A thought on travel

2009-11-07T14:20:41-03:30

"All travelling becomes dull in exact proportion to its rapidity."
- John Rusk

[The above image, of an installation - not an actual stack of luggage waiting to be claimed! - in Sacramento's airport, is from the V.H.S. photostream on Flickr.]

Jarvis Cocker is back

2009-11-07T08:05:00-03:30

Jarvis Cocker channels a bit of Jamiroquai, it seems, in the brand-new video for the title track of Further Complications.

Five-fact Friday

2009-11-06T11:46:00-03:30

What country boasts the highest coffee consumption? It's Finland, where per capita consumption (that includes the kids) is a hefty 12 kilograms per year. Canadians rank 11th, with 6.5 kilograms per person per year. [The image above is from JcOlivera's Flickr stream.]

Until this week, I did not know that the spooky, banjo-inflected music used as the theme song for Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (the BBC radio show from the Seventies, that is) was performed by the Eagles. The song is called Journey of the Sorcerer, and appeared on the 1975 album One of These Nights.

Ringtones are ubiquitous, and profitable: The downloadable tunes account, astonishingly, for close to 60 per cent of all the wireless data revenue generated in the U.S.

The Batmobile, as portrayed in the 1960s television series, was actually built by hand in Italy in the 1950s for the Lincoln line of Ford cars. The prototype was never developed, but became iconic after it was tweaked to be a TV fantasy car.

Otto, a Dachshund terrier living in Shropshire, England, has been named the world's oldest dog. He's 20 years and eight months old. You can read about it on this BBC News report ... although the phrase "put down" is perhaps not the best word choice.

Jersey boys

2009-11-06T08:15:00-03:30

Here's a list of the worst and best hockey jerseys in the NHL. Guess which one the Canadiens' stripey anniversary ones fall into?

A thought on the obscure and the apparent

2009-11-06T07:55:00-03:30

"The obscure we see eventually, the completely apparent takes longer."
- Edward R. Murrow

Shoe-donnay: What to do what you don't have a corkscrew

2009-11-05T20:01:00-03:30

Zut alors! A pretty funny video of a French gentleman caught in the worst predicament of all: a bottle of wine, a thirst, and a lack of equipment.

A thought on living with your decisions

2009-11-05T19:27:40-03:30

"All my life, whenever it comes time to make a decision, I make it and forget about it."
- Harry S Truman

Taking the twit out of Twitter

2009-11-05T19:22:00-03:30

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Oct. 22, 2009. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

In late September, Tyler Brûlé, the Canadian-raised, London-living journalist, wrote a column taking a crack against Twitter, the social-media site.

Brûlé is the former wunderkind who launched the ultra-trendy design magazine Wallpaper* in his 20s, and now, barely 40, is running another publication, Monocle, a high-end, internationally oriented (and quite good) magazine that launched as newsstands around the world have been losing one familiar title after another.

Kudos to Brûlé, then, for showing some bravado to stick up for magazines. But I could only laugh when I read what Brûlé wrote on Twitter for his weekly column in London’s Financial Times. On a business trip to Japan, he was delighted to find his contacts there, in the most technologically adroit country on the planet, did not know what Twitter was.

Brûlé revealed he loathes Twitter, and said he expected to become as quickly irrelevant as Second Life. I agree that much of what some people write on their Twitter feeds is inane, but the application is already powerful to warrant serious attention, especially in Brûlé’s line of work.

Here’s the irony: I first heard about the column via my own Twitter feed. A contact had a link to the online version of the FT column. Through the next hour or two, at least three or four of the other people in my network highlighted the same column, or retweeted someone else’s message. A check on a Twitter search a week later showed screen after screen of various Twitter users pointing to the column or discussing it … often by trashing it.

I have no idea how much traffic the Financial Times picked up from all that Twitter-fed attention on the purported futility of Twitter. I bet someone noticed, though.

Which leads me to some advice for people who expertly dismiss something they don’t understand. Yes, Twitter will have no role in many people’s lives. But you assume at your peril if your own industry, business or organization need not take a serious look at how social media already works.

Elsewhere this week

Gary’s Social Media Count
In part to illustrate the above, here’s a handy tool that shows just how massively different the online landscape is now, and how it’s changing, with split-second updates on the volume of chatting, posting and, yes, spending online.

CitySounds
Some bands really soak up and showcase the cities that spawned him; many cities have strong musical identities of their own. CitySounds is a music-streaming service that is carving a niche by grouping its offerings (independently produced and artist-posted music) by geography. So, if you’re into what’s happening in, say, New York or Sao Paolo or Stockholm or, yes, Calgary, there’s a tab for you to explore. (There’s no tab, yet, for St. John’s.) Much of what played for me fell into ambient and techno-lite themes, regardless of the city.

Super Obama World
Mario, Obama. Obama, Mario. The old-school Nintendo game gets a presidential makeover as a wee li’l Barack collects points and such. Use your arrow keys and space bar in this streamlined game.

Listal
Enjoy making lists of your favourite movies, songs and such? Listal is the place for you; you can post just those types of things, as starting points, or go into very specific subcategories, like many of the users. A healthy place for a pop-culture fanatic to hang out for a while.

10 things we don't understand about humans
Why do humans blush? And why do teenagers take so long to, well, turn into adults? New Scientist collects a set of questions for which there are theories, but not necessarily answers.

History of punctuation
The question mark and exclamation point didn’t just appear in our sentences; this very short illustrated history offers the lowdown on those dots and marks.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Facebook right here. John is on Twitter right here.

A thought on being kind to the kids

2009-11-04T18:22:43-03:30

"Always be nice to those younger than you, because they are the ones who will be writing about you."
- Cyril Connolly

Duane Andrews: Inside Raindrops

2009-11-04T09:38:00-03:30

Duane Andrews has released this online video to help build buzz around his latest album, Raindrops. I bet a lot of former St. John's residents will appreciate the footage shot around the city and heading out to St. Philip's, where Andrews recorded the album.

For those living away and who are not familiar with Duane's music ... work on that. He's amazing.

Last days of Gourmet magazine

2009-11-03T10:45:00-03:30

Martha picked up a copy of the final edition of Gourmet at the bookstore recently; we're still agog that there's not enough room on the still-crowded magazines shelves (which groan still with specialty magazines on food and such) for a grand old dame like Gourmet. Maybe Condé Nast will revive the title in a future time, like Vanity Fair.

In the meantime, I came across this gallery of photos called Last Days of Gourmet, photographed by associate art director Kevin DeMaria. It really puts a human face, lots of them, actually, on the closure.

A thought on the inherently gracious

2009-11-03T08:51:00-03:30

"She was a woman who, between courses, could be graceful with her elbows on the table."
- Henry James

A thought on being a producer

2009-11-02T10:50:05-03:30

"I often say to people that producing is the best paid form of cowardice. When you produce things you almost always get credit, if it's a good record, but you hardly ever get the blame if it's not."
- Brian Eno

[This quote comes from a new interview with Eno on Pitchfork]

Next stop: Where the wild things are

2009-11-02T09:45:05-03:30

My thanks to my friend Tim for pointing me to this picture, the best family outfit for Halloween I've seen this year, by far. As seen here.

Christopher Walken puts on his Poker Face

2009-11-02T08:52:02-03:30

My PVR is set to record Friday Night With Jonathan Ross, although BBC Canada airs the episodes weeks after they air in the U.K. The latest episode had the always entertaining Christopher Walken on, with a line reading of the lyrics of Lady Gaga's Poker Face.

Take two tablets, and call the publishing industry

2009-11-01T09:24:00-03:30

[Surf's Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram on Thursday, Oct. 15, 2009. Click here to read more Surf's Up.]

There’s been a lot of chatter for the last few months about what Apple’s forthcoming tablet device will look like, and more importantly, what exactly it will or do.

All this speculation – and remember, it’s all speculation – is kind of odd, because no one has publicly seen what’s expected to come down the pike in early 2010, if the rumour mill on the release date is in the ballpark.

One common thread that seems to be emerging is that the tablet, which will be something more than an iPhone (or iTouch) and less than a Macbook), will be engineered to showcase newspapers and magazines, in no doubt stunning detail. I haven’t been at all surprised to read that Apple has, very quietly, been working with major publishers, including the New York Times.

I'm sure the tablet, whatever it will be called, will have a big impact – and not just Apple's version. The technology blogs have had plenty of juice over the last few weeks about Microsoft’s competing product, which so far is known as Courier. Leaked images and details show it is not so much a tablet as a book-like device that closes on itself, featuring two work areas. As the ultra-influential blog Gizmodo put it, "maybe we've all been dreaming about the wrong device."

Since the advent of Amazon’s Kindle, which is still restricted from sale in Canada for copyright and other reasons, there’s been a sense that e-books, tablets, or whatever you want to call them, may dramatically change how we read periodicals.

The timing could not come at a better time for the newspaper and magazine industry, which was slumping for years before last year’s economic meltdown, and has been in seeming freefall for at least a year. The possibilities of a new distribution are considerable, not the least of which is the ability to sell advertisers on a marketing capability that could be as interactive as the web.

Tablet technology – which is being touted as prominent titles like Gourmet magazine are folding – might be just what the doctor ordered.

Elsewhere this week

(The Customer Is) Not Always Right
First things first: the folks at this blog do not believe in poor customer service. They do believe, though, in giving people who have toiled in the retail trenches the platform to vent about what they’ve seen and especially heard. Like Overheard in New York and many other variations, you’ll find one painful (but often funny) conversation after another. Hit the "popular" tab to see ones that have most resonated with other readers, and the "random" tab to see any old chestnut that’s been collected to date.

The Raven
With Halloween around the corner, set the tone with one of the most wonderfully creepy bits of writing of all time: Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven. Get ready for your own once upon a midnight dreary with this version; if you don’t want to read it aloud, click on the link to have it read for you. (Turning off the lights might help!)

Balls
Want to play divide and conquer with a bunch of balls? Actually, it’s more of a game of just dividing, and it’s not so much a game at all … but you will likely be amused as you see how this Flash-based attraction works. Move your mouse over four circles, and watch them divide, and then divide again, at least as long as your cursor is in place. The circles, or balls, get progressively smaller; I counted them down to 1/128th of the original size, but I stand to be corrected. Look also for some other games on the left-hand side, including a photo-tag guessing game that is pretty challenging.

John Gushue is a writer in St. John's, and is currently on leave from his job with CBC News in St. John's. John is on Facebook right here. John is on Twitter right here.

The Muppets fall into the Rob Zombie universe

2009-11-01T07:14:46-03:30

Not qute a House of 1000 Corpses, and you don't even need to know the Rob Zombie movie to enjoy this trailer to the Muppet movie that was never made:

The New Yorker cover on Halloween, parents and phoning it in

2009-10-31T19:33:00-02:30

The New Yorker's Halloween cover is brilliant. Although I saw nary a parent out there tonight (mind you, we weren't out long) with a smartphone, I think artist Chris Ware - more from him here - nails something about the obsession grown-ups have with their gadgets, perhaps at the expense of their kids.

My boy, Death

2009-10-31T17:04:43-02:30

This wasn't the plan. The plan, hatched in February, when we visited Disney World, was that Nick was going to go as the Sorcerer's Apprentice. (You know, Mickey Mouse in the red cape and blue hat, the one with the stars. The side deal, which I was willing to go along with, is that I would go as one of the brooms carrying pails of water (the pails actually holding treats and such), with Martha more than willing, somehow, to turn a grass skirt into the broom part of my costue. Like I said, we were all willing to do what we had to do.

Well, that got cast aside, as nine-year-old boys are wont to do. Instead, in September he informed us that he was going out as the Grim Reaper. And that was that. Martha stitched the costume this week, and it turned out really well, given that it was just one big heaping pile of fabric at the start. Our friends Christine and John donated their (plastic) scythe.

I'm suggesting that Nick go around tonight with a sack with "soul food" on it, for his snacks.

RSS: Really scary syndication

2009-10-31T16:33:47-02:30

One of these years, I'll get around to carving one of those brilliant pumpkins that people talk about for years. In the meantime, here's a link to a collection of pumpkins with social media motifs. Very clever.

A skeptical thought on spooky things

2009-10-31T09:13:00-02:30

"A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere."
- Groucho Marx

Jean Knight, Mr. Big Stuff

2009-10-29T14:20:00-02:30

Mr. Big Stuff is a heavily anthologized tune, but I was surprised to learn that Jean Knight's recording sat on a shelf before Stax decided to release it in 1971. Here's a video of Knight lip-synching the tune on Soul Train.