Spring, Herald of Doom

(Note: This was written for school last year, but I figured I might as well put it here.)

In winter, all was good and cold.

Crisp air made walking nicely brisk.

Skies overcast with murky grey,

Gave pleasant rain to those below.

But spring, a green assassin, creeps,

And slays the clouds with sunlight spears.

Their corpses fall, and soon are dew,

To feed this vile season’s verdant minions.

The sun lets loose its baleful gaze,

Like a cruel tyrant smiting from on high.

Horrific heat weighs down the weary people,

No more clouds left to shield them from the rays.

But even worse, whenever spring comes along,

The dreaded summer will be upon us before long.

Comments

Do We Really Want the Trump Administration Censoring the Media?

MissRepresentation was an excellent documentary. Before watching it, I was already aware of many of the problems with the representation of women in media which it illuminates, but I was still impressed at how comprehensive and powerful its argument was. However, I disagree with the film on one major point: I do not think that media content should be further regulated by the government or any other organization, even with the purpose of reducing the objectification of women. To see why this kind of regulation could be so problematic, it is helpful to look at the history of media censorship in the United States. From 1930 to 1968, almost all American movies were produced under the Motion Picture Production Code , a set of rules governing what could be shown onscreen. The rules were intended to safeguard public virtue by eliminating immoral content from the media and were created by the film industry itself to preempt government regulation. While the idea of such a code may seem l...

Unconventional = Good

Anyone who analyzes enough entertainment media quickly begins to notice a few patterns. Every story has a (usually white and male) protagonist who, along with his band of supporting characters, faces some kind of conflict, defeats the villain, and lives happily ever after. This is (an oversimplified summary of) the Hero's Journey, that pervasive force which consigns so many stories to the dustbin of sameness. This common theme makes all media somewhat similar, but within specific genres there are many more of these similarities, so much so that one quickly realizes that the vast majority of stories are just a bunch of prefabricated parts assembled in a predictable order with a new coat of paint slapped on to trick people into thinking its something different. For evidence of this, I direct you to go to TV Tropes , an incredible database of fictional tropes (common elements found in many different pieces of media). Once you're there, find the page of a movie you like and scroll...

Narrowcasting on Youtube

The discussion of narrowcasting we had in class reminded me of this fascinating video on the surprisingly complex process which determines what ad you see when you click on a video on Youtube. The short version is this: In the millisecond between you clicking the video and the ad playing, Youtube's algorithms analyze the video (looking at its title, views, comments, etc.) and analyze you (trying to determine your age, gender, location, etc. based on your watch history) and then give those pieces of information to the algorithms of the advertisers, which have been programmed to target certain kinds of videos and specific viewer demographics. The advertiser algorithms then hold an auction to determine what commercial you see when the video loads. While this process is certainly useful for Youtube, advertisers and content creators, it has some disturbing implications. If you and someone else watch the exact same video, you may well see completely different ads. This, as with all ...

Jacob's Font of Perspicacity

Search This Blog