tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post110616327944274040..comments2024-03-27T07:18:39.229-05:00Comments on In Medias Res: The DVD Changed My Life! (Simplicity, Part 2)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-1106772612644554722005-01-26T14:50:00.000-06:002005-01-26T14:50:00.000-06:00Man, I loved Northern Exposure. Do you have the e...Man, I loved Northern Exposure. Do you have the episode where Maggie gets a washing machine and then sends it back because she misses the sociability of the Landromat? I was never able to track down a script for it to cite it (or the specific dialogue) but it captured an important phenomenon about community identity and formation that helped me understand my dissertation topic better. Let's just say that Gallup, NM has a lot of laundromats per capita.  <br /><br /><A></A><A></A>Posted by<A><B> </B></A><A HREF="http://www.blogger.com/r?http%3A%2F%2Finmedias.blogspot.com%2F2005%2F01%2Fdvd-changed-my-life-simplicity-part-2.html%23comments" TITLE="dsalmanson at springside dot org">David Salmanson</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-1106263591091008932005-01-20T17:26:00.000-06:002005-01-20T17:26:00.000-06:00While I can understand the argument that TV is ove...While I can understand the argument that TV is overly commercialized, and that (the horribly unquantifiable value that is) "art" is compromised by said commercialization.... I don't really see how this is any different from other cultural medium. Books included: not just historically, in terms of the effects of serialization on a story, but genre conventions are rather strong as well--one need only look at a year's sampling of what comes out as "literary fiction" to see the power of convention.<br /><br />Even opera, not just in the creation but in terms of what is the current repetoire has been selected. Performance styles are popular or less popular, and have been codified. <br /><br />I think the distinction between things like opera or classical music and televsion/radio (perhaps also newspapers, and the novels or sequential art serialized therein) is that consumer-focused advertising has been included and presented alongside the work in question, and that one of the measures of success of the work in question is the effect that the work's consumption (and the corresponding consumption of the advertising included alongside) on sales. But even this, I would say, is not new. (Dickens, for example.) <br /><br /><A></A><A></A>Posted by<A><B> </B></A>AnonymousAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-1106246409760350262005-01-20T12:40:00.000-06:002005-01-20T12:40:00.000-06:00What to buy? How to set limits?
Your first post o...What to buy? How to set limits? <br />Your first post on simplicity mentions that we should think of the people in relation to simplicity, not the stuff. I agree. What should the people use as a guage to tell them 'ENOUGH'? <br />How do they keep some kind of grip on the changes which are seemingly out of their hands, such as globalization, taxes, etc.?<br /><br />Local control. Buy local foods, use local banks, invest in local business. There is always the desire to seek new technology which may benefit the world around us, but the key is to be a Net Creator. (re. Schroedinger, "Life as Anti-Entropy"--www.dieoff.org) Modern living is all based on volume consumption, not net creativity.<br />When we work and live locally, we can reach all the heights that our talents provide us the tools for, but we avoid the exploitation that is inherent in mass marketing. Whether we work to pass laws that encourage local business and personal choice (www.FairTax.org), or we just choose to tune out the morass, the key to liberty is taking responsibility for it and our future. <br />One argument against sales taxes is that they encourage the black market. On the farm, this is called 'direct sales'. The difference is that if transportation subsidies are taken out of the picture, local products are much more viable. Blackmarket sales of local products only hinders (face it, most people want to be honest and fair) the nationalist and globalist products which probably aren't necessary to our communities, anyway.<br />It's all fine and good to lead cheers for modern life, but you have to spend enough time looking at the soil to understand it can't be sustained for much longer. Whether or not we reach peakoil problems soon, our food is no longer nutritious, and people are dying and getting treated for problems which should be cured with proper foods. (http://www.westonaprice.org/index.html)<br />The data is out there, but the media isn't going to print it. Raw milk (from grassfed clean dairies)is GOOD for you. Eggs are GOOD for you. FAT is GOOD for you. The things that are necessary to healthy (sustainable) minds and bodies don't come in plastic wrappers. <br />The key to localised living is not elitism, it is diversification of the individual vs. specialization of the 'worker' in a hive. <br /><br /><A></A><A></A>Posted by<A><B> </B></A><A HREF="http://www.blogger.com/r?auntiegrav.blogspot.com" TITLE="dconine2000 at yahoo dot com">Dan Conine</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907752.post-1106240835128200852005-01-20T11:07:00.000-06:002005-01-20T11:07:00.000-06:00This is an interesting idea. I am coming at it fro...This is an interesting idea. I am coming at it from a little different approach I think. I have (or have had) a similar bias to the one you talk about against TV programs as durable works of art -- I started gradually to feel differently about them a few years ago and nowadays I think of shows like The Honeymooners or I Love Lucy/The Lucy and Desi Comedy Hour, as worthy of spending some time thinking about and reading about.<br /><br />But -- I don't collect videotapes or DVD's, feel no impulse to. (Don't have Tivo either.) I think the reason is that TV shows only make sense to me when they are "on the tube", with advertisements and everything, and you need to tune into them at a specific time -- that is part of what a TV show <I>is</I> to me. (I'm happy there is a TV Land.) <br /><br /><A></A><A></A>Posted by<A><B> </B></A><A HREF="http://www.blogger.com/r?http%3A%2F%2Fwww.readin.com%2Fblog%2Fblog.asp" TITLE="anacreon at gmail dot com">Jeremy Osner</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com