Which of course, is a lovely opportunity to share a bit of gratuitous elevator humour, from the Scottish comedy show, Burnistoun:
Showing posts with label innovation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label innovation. Show all posts
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Elevate me!
I had a delightful experience today using an elevator in a recently-opened building. Like many modern elevators, this one included voice annunciation to call out each floor. But unlike many automated voicemail systems hereabouts, this one seemed to have an accent somewhat uncommon here in North America--to my untrained ears at least, it sounded like Scottish English.
Which of course, is a lovely opportunity to share a bit of gratuitous elevator humour, from the Scottish comedy show, Burnistoun:
Which of course, is a lovely opportunity to share a bit of gratuitous elevator humour, from the Scottish comedy show, Burnistoun:
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Mediated art: Ways of Seeing
Ways of Seeing (1972), an engaging series by John Berger, opens with a look at how mass reproduction of paintings mediates a different relationship with a painting than a person seeing the same item in its original environment, whether on a moveable substrate such as canvas or as part of a particular building.
The first part of the first episode is here:
The notions discussed in the first episode are credited to an essay by Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (1935).
The series' content is fascinating, but so too is the meta of the medium, seen from a 2013 perspective.
Berger explains what we're viewing both for what's in a shot as well as how the shot is being broadcast and the ways the medium changes the content of what we're viewing. This meta-narrative is deliberate: Berger is making visible aspects of viewing we often fail to notice or forget is present.
The precise framing and carefully choreographed camera movement of each piece seems sedate compared to typical video today. Our gaze is directed at each step, and only late in the episode is music introduced for a particular purpose that further aides in mediating the meaning and experience of the images we view.
Colour is also intriguing. Berger as narrator stands in front of a blue screen that only serves as a backdrop that contrasts reasonably well with his clothes and skin, not as part of special effects. The final credits also point out that the item is BBC Colour, further reminding viewers of today that colour wasn't necessarily a universal given in video or film footage.
The opening title is static over footage of television production equipment: no swooping animations or other visual noise (... but for the sake of reminiscing, here's a nifty Flash re-build of several historical television logos). Paintings are depicted without additional title overlays: we need to listen to Berger's narration to know what we're viewing if we don't already recognise the painting.
Additionally, the opening includes a selection from Dziga Vertov's film, The Man With a Camera, ground-breaking in many ways that could appear quite familiar to modern audiences. Vertov's full-length film is also available here in a re-scored (1996) edition:
The first part of the first episode is here:
The notions discussed in the first episode are credited to an essay by Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (1935).
The series' content is fascinating, but so too is the meta of the medium, seen from a 2013 perspective.
Berger explains what we're viewing both for what's in a shot as well as how the shot is being broadcast and the ways the medium changes the content of what we're viewing. This meta-narrative is deliberate: Berger is making visible aspects of viewing we often fail to notice or forget is present.
The precise framing and carefully choreographed camera movement of each piece seems sedate compared to typical video today. Our gaze is directed at each step, and only late in the episode is music introduced for a particular purpose that further aides in mediating the meaning and experience of the images we view.
Colour is also intriguing. Berger as narrator stands in front of a blue screen that only serves as a backdrop that contrasts reasonably well with his clothes and skin, not as part of special effects. The final credits also point out that the item is BBC Colour, further reminding viewers of today that colour wasn't necessarily a universal given in video or film footage.
The opening title is static over footage of television production equipment: no swooping animations or other visual noise (... but for the sake of reminiscing, here's a nifty Flash re-build of several historical television logos). Paintings are depicted without additional title overlays: we need to listen to Berger's narration to know what we're viewing if we don't already recognise the painting.
Additionally, the opening includes a selection from Dziga Vertov's film, The Man With a Camera, ground-breaking in many ways that could appear quite familiar to modern audiences. Vertov's full-length film is also available here in a re-scored (1996) edition:
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Some of these things might not be like the other
The other day I watched a TED talk by Pattie Maes on a technology dubbed 'SixthSense'. The video is here:
It's an interesting concept, but one part of the presentation troubled me: the comment about a user possibly preferring to purchase a product that was not as "ecologically responsible" as some other product. Would a technology like this actually allow us to know which product was most 'ecologically responsible' or would it merely re-iterate corporate greenwashing?
It's an interesting concept, but one part of the presentation troubled me: the comment about a user possibly preferring to purchase a product that was not as "ecologically responsible" as some other product. Would a technology like this actually allow us to know which product was most 'ecologically responsible' or would it merely re-iterate corporate greenwashing?
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Iterations: Clippy
Via Slashdot, a link to an article in IT World, Paul Roberts' Five ways the cool stuff at CES will ruin your life.
One particularly triggery-mention for old-timey folks who've ever owned a mobile phone sans smart is the role of Clippy, the infamous digital "assistant" that interrupted you at every possible turn when using a particular famous-brand office suite.
Jogging my memories of Clippy also brought back to mind a more recent experience: dealing with an appliance repair technician who--on that tragic day at least--acted like a human iteration of Clippy. In this case, the comparison is more because the supposed help was utterly useless, not necessarily disruptive. The discussion went something like this:
Me: Here's the broken washing machine.
Clipster: What's been happening?
Me: Well, it was starting to give me intermittent door-lock errors, but worked fine if you just opened and re-closed the door again, so I didn't worry about it. Now it's giving me this other error code, and won't run the cycle at all.
Clipster: Oh. (pause) Do you have the manual?
Me: Not where I can find it.
Clipster: Oh. (pause) What does that error code mean?
Me: Well, according to discussions I've read on the Internet, that error code on this model means there is a problem with the motor.
Clipster: Oh. (pause) Well, then the problem is with the motor.
Me: Yeah, that's what it said on the Internet.
Clipster: Right. (pause) Well, that's the problem, then.
Me: Soooooo ... what do we do to fix it?
Clipster: It would be too expensive to fix. You should just buy a new machine.
... and within five minutes, is charging me 60-some dollars and out the door. No repair possible, just a confirmation that I have decent search skills on the Internet. Assuming of course that what I found was correct--as far as I can ascertain, the Clipster didn't have any idea what the machine could/should/would do (whether operating correctly or not) and was relying entirely on my own verbal report.
Gosh, thank you so much. I had no idea that repair technician is now defined as "search engine result confirmologist." The Clipster came to check on my machine because I booked an appointment with the appliance company requesting technical expertise, expertise I don't have. Internet discussions helped me understand the range of possible problems--problems that the repair technician made no effort to assess further.
I know how to use a washing machine, not repair one. If I'd known how to repair one--or known that there was no point in calling for a technical expert--I could have purchased a new machine immediately, rather than waiting several days for the repair technician to show up and then having to source a new machine, then wait a few days more for delivery and installation because by that time, hey, it's holiday season and everyone has gone absolutely crazy with the big sales! Good luck getting expedited delivery now.
During the booking, I had to give the make and model of the machine, a description of the error codes involved and what I've tried to do to work around it. I think some of my frustration with the Clipster is due to unmet expectations: I expect the technical expert to come to an appointment with--at minimum--the information I've already given when booking the appointment, and I don't expect the technical expert to simply parrot back what I tell him, without any actual assessment involved beyond my own.
Buying a new washing machine was always a possibility--after all, I didn't really know how serious this particular problem might be, nor how feasible it would be to fix the problem, and in the interests of not randomly throwing out things that can easily be repaired, I chose to be responsible and call for expertise. The thing is, the appliance company already had 100% of the information needed to tell me to "buy a new one" before sending the repair technician on a call, and simply making me wait several days to do nothing but tell me not to bother made me 100% unlikely to purchase the replacement from them or any of their subsidiaries.
Clippy's unhelpfulness--in any iteration: digital, human, or other--isn't really the sort of feature that makes the user particularly happy or satisfied. Roberts' description of the impending wave of Clipster-style appliances, vehicles, and other devices showcased at CES is rightly shudder-inducing.
One particularly triggery-mention for old-timey folks who've ever owned a mobile phone sans smart is the role of Clippy, the infamous digital "assistant" that interrupted you at every possible turn when using a particular famous-brand office suite.
Jogging my memories of Clippy also brought back to mind a more recent experience: dealing with an appliance repair technician who--on that tragic day at least--acted like a human iteration of Clippy. In this case, the comparison is more because the supposed help was utterly useless, not necessarily disruptive. The discussion went something like this:
Me: Here's the broken washing machine.
Clipster: What's been happening?
Me: Well, it was starting to give me intermittent door-lock errors, but worked fine if you just opened and re-closed the door again, so I didn't worry about it. Now it's giving me this other error code, and won't run the cycle at all.
Clipster: Oh. (pause) Do you have the manual?
Me: Not where I can find it.
Clipster: Oh. (pause) What does that error code mean?
Me: Well, according to discussions I've read on the Internet, that error code on this model means there is a problem with the motor.
Clipster: Oh. (pause) Well, then the problem is with the motor.
Me: Yeah, that's what it said on the Internet.
Clipster: Right. (pause) Well, that's the problem, then.
Me: Soooooo ... what do we do to fix it?
Clipster: It would be too expensive to fix. You should just buy a new machine.
... and within five minutes, is charging me 60-some dollars and out the door. No repair possible, just a confirmation that I have decent search skills on the Internet. Assuming of course that what I found was correct--as far as I can ascertain, the Clipster didn't have any idea what the machine could/should/would do (whether operating correctly or not) and was relying entirely on my own verbal report.
Gosh, thank you so much. I had no idea that repair technician is now defined as "search engine result confirmologist." The Clipster came to check on my machine because I booked an appointment with the appliance company requesting technical expertise, expertise I don't have. Internet discussions helped me understand the range of possible problems--problems that the repair technician made no effort to assess further.
I know how to use a washing machine, not repair one. If I'd known how to repair one--or known that there was no point in calling for a technical expert--I could have purchased a new machine immediately, rather than waiting several days for the repair technician to show up and then having to source a new machine, then wait a few days more for delivery and installation because by that time, hey, it's holiday season and everyone has gone absolutely crazy with the big sales! Good luck getting expedited delivery now.
During the booking, I had to give the make and model of the machine, a description of the error codes involved and what I've tried to do to work around it. I think some of my frustration with the Clipster is due to unmet expectations: I expect the technical expert to come to an appointment with--at minimum--the information I've already given when booking the appointment, and I don't expect the technical expert to simply parrot back what I tell him, without any actual assessment involved beyond my own.
Buying a new washing machine was always a possibility--after all, I didn't really know how serious this particular problem might be, nor how feasible it would be to fix the problem, and in the interests of not randomly throwing out things that can easily be repaired, I chose to be responsible and call for expertise. The thing is, the appliance company already had 100% of the information needed to tell me to "buy a new one" before sending the repair technician on a call, and simply making me wait several days to do nothing but tell me not to bother made me 100% unlikely to purchase the replacement from them or any of their subsidiaries.
Clippy's unhelpfulness--in any iteration: digital, human, or other--isn't really the sort of feature that makes the user particularly happy or satisfied. Roberts' description of the impending wave of Clipster-style appliances, vehicles, and other devices showcased at CES is rightly shudder-inducing.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
One for all, and all for one
The old saying one for all, and all for one takes on a deeper meaning in a story in The Economist. Me, myself, us argues that a human is much more than simply a man or a woman: we are complex beings inhabited by substantial numbers of microorganisms essential to our survival, known collectively as the microbiome. According to the article, "[a] healthy adult human harbours some 100 trillion bacteria in his gut alone. That is ten times as many bacterial cells as he has cells descended from the sperm and egg of his parents."
Understanding the human as a complex, multi-organism being may open the way for very different ways of approaching medicine and human health. Dealing with disease may turn out to be a matter of better managing the balance of organisms that comprise any given individual. According to the Canadian Microbiome Initiative, "microbes play an important role in human health, not just as pathogens, or as benign communities that keep pathogens at bay, but also in association with a number of chronic health conditions including gastrointestinal diseases, obesity, autoimmune diseases, diabetes, cancer, arthritis, asthma and cardiovascular disease."
For a slightly tongue-in-cheek look at what a microbiome-positive world might look like, see Tuberculosis bacteria join UN by microbiologist and science fiction writer, Joan Slonczewski.
Understanding the human as a complex, multi-organism being may open the way for very different ways of approaching medicine and human health. Dealing with disease may turn out to be a matter of better managing the balance of organisms that comprise any given individual. According to the Canadian Microbiome Initiative, "microbes play an important role in human health, not just as pathogens, or as benign communities that keep pathogens at bay, but also in association with a number of chronic health conditions including gastrointestinal diseases, obesity, autoimmune diseases, diabetes, cancer, arthritis, asthma and cardiovascular disease."
For a slightly tongue-in-cheek look at what a microbiome-positive world might look like, see Tuberculosis bacteria join UN by microbiologist and science fiction writer, Joan Slonczewski.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)