Videos

You are currently browsing the archive for the Videos category.

“This Technology Is Going To Revolutionize Human Communications!”

March 19, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

Technology is an opportunity but not a panacea. While the Cold War was still on, it seemed to some that interconnectivity would warm relations, that we could 0 and 1 our way to utopia. As the current headlines remind us, disconnects can still occur among the connected.

The opening of “Slow Scan To Moscow,” Adam Hochschild’s 1986 Mother Jones article about the growing electronic link between peoples of the U.S. and the Soviet Union:

“Joel Schatz has wire-rimmed glasses and an Old Testament-sized beard. A big head of curly black hair flecked with gray adds a few extra inches to his sixfoot-two frame. ‘This trip we’re about to take,’ he says enthusiastically, ‘is so important that I’ve even gotten a haircut.’ Its effects are not noticeable.

Joel is sitting in the study of his San Francisco apartment, where most of the furniture consists of pillows on the floor. The largest thing in sight is an enormous reflector telescope, which can be pivoted around on its pedestal and aimed out a high window, Joel explains, ‘to remind me of my place in the cosmos. We’re all voyagers out there.

‘If I had millions of dollars I’d build neighborhood observatories all over the world. And at each one I’d have good conga drums, so people could drum together as well as observe.’

The object of Joel’s attention at this moment, however, as it is much of the time, is his four-pound, briefcase-size Radio Shack Tandy Model 100 portable computer. ‘I bought this machine for $399. For $1.82 a minute – $1.82! – I can send a telex message to Moscow. This technology is going to revolutionize human communications! Think what it will mean when you can get thousands of Americans and Soviets on the same computer network. Once scientists in both countries begin talking to each other on these machines they won’t be able to stop. And we’ll be taking a running leap over the governments on both sides.

‘I’m not a scientist,’ Joel adds. ‘I’ve only owned a computer for four months. I don’t understand how they work. I’ll leave that to other people. I’m just interested in how they can improve communication on this planet.’”

__________________________

Radio Shack Tandy 102 portable computer, the final refresh of the 100 series:

“We’ll Be Right Back With More Stuff“

March 18, 2014 in Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

Chuck Barris, game-show producer and occasional murderer, realized like P.T. Barnum before him (and reality shows after) that there was money to be made off the marginal and the freakish. But I doubt even Barris could have predicted that during his lifetime the sideshow tent would be relocated to the center ring. That’s the cost of new technologies decentralizing the media, a price that seems high but one we should be willing to pay.

“Software Substitution, Whether It’s For Drivers Or Waiters Or Nurses … It’s Progressing”

March 18, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

Automation is, of course, most likely coming for your job. It doesn’t end with travel agents, video-store clerks and bookstore managers. Via Julie Bort at Business Insider, a quote about the future of employment (or, more accurately, unemployment) from Bill Gates during his appearance at the American Enterprise Institute (with full video embedded below):

“Speaking at Washington, D.C., economic think tank The American Enterprise Institute on Thursday, Gates said that within 20 years, a lot of jobs will go away, replaced by software automation (‘bots’ in tech slang, though Gates used the term ‘software substitution’).

This is what he said:

‘Software substitution, whether it’s for drivers or waiters or nurses … it’s progressing. … Technology over time will reduce demand for jobs, particularly at the lower end of skill set. … 20 years from now, labor demand for lots of skill sets will be substantially lower. I don’t think people have that in their mental model.'”

“No One Cleans Up His Act Unless He’s Attacked A Bit”

March 18, 2014 in Politics, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

In my nightmares, ranked just below Ed McMahon’s direct participation in the Johnny Carson sex tape, is William F. Buckley discussing vivisection. That’s what he does in this 1990 Firing Line episode about animal rights that featured surgeon, Yale professor and author Dr. Sherwin Nuland (who passed away two weeks ago). The host and guest agree that animals should be used in medical experiments, though treated as “humanely” as possible. Nuland scoffs at the notion of speciesism and misnames the philosopher who popularized the concept in the 1970s, Peter Singer, as Peter “Berger.” All the while, Michael Kinsley darts around just offscreen, like an opossum with an impeccable résumé.

Tags: , , ,

“[Iran] Doesn’t Want To Turn Its Back On The World”

March 17, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

Iran, 1960s.

Iran, 1960s.

As the world’s attention is fixed on Ukraine and parts unknown (wherever the missing Malaysian jetliner is), BBC’s Chief International Correspondent Lyse Doucet just conducted an Ask Me Anything at Reddit about another area of global interest, Iran. A few exchanges follow.

____________________________

Question:

What is the biggest misconception we have about life in Iran?

Lyse Doucet:

Iran is one of the most hospitable places in the world. And Iranians are also among the most inventive people I have had the pleasure to spend time with. Please don’t see it as a dark and hostile place. There are different views about the world, but it doesn’t want to turn its back on the world.

____________________________

Question:

How do Iranian women feel about their status in society compared to what it was before the Islamic revolution?

Lyse Doucet:

Women’s issues have always been at the heart of Iranian politics since the 1979 Islamic revolution. There have been advances in some areas including access to education including at University level, information and access to birth control, availability of some jobs, but not others. Women are still barred from many high level positions. Many women are hoping for greater freedoms after last year’s election of the reformist President Rouhani. But, like most Iranians, they are also just hoping that sanctions will be lifted and their daily lives will improve…

____________________________

Question:

How do you think Irans’ nuclear program is going to pan out?

Lyse Doucet:

That is the big question. on this visit i noticed that iranians, across the political spectrum, expressed support for a comprehensive nuclear deal..but that will require tough choices, on all sides..it’s still not clear there will be a deal by late July..but what is clear is that there will be a lot of work to try to reach one..

____________________________

Question:

Why do you think the general attitude of the West (western media) towards Iran has been changing in a positive way in the past few months?

Lyse Doucet:

..perhaps because more journalists are now being given visas to visit Iran ..and also because of the success of the nuclear negotiations so far..Also, the new leadership of President Rouhani and his Foreign Minister Javad Zarif are engaging with the world with a different tone.

____________________________

Question:

Would you tell us about your Internet experience in Iran?

Lyse Doucet:

I was suprised by how widely used the internet was including social media. Iranians are very inventive. They’ve found ways around the blocks on sites like twitter and facebook. To my relief, I was able to access my email account and use twitter. And Iranians, of all political persuasions, quoted my posts .

____________________________

Question:

What is daily life like for the young people of Iran and how does it compare to what we see in the Western world? Do they play video games, go insane over singers/bands, care about fashion and gossip?

Lyse Doucet:

Iranians are sometimes justifiably upset when we imagine they are somehow different from the rest of us. There is a very lively music scene, the fashion is fab (Iranian women even develop glamourous hair styles for their head scarves), Iranians of all political views are on the internet, talking to themselves and to the world. But they would like their restrictions to be lifted, and to have more freedom to come and go.•

____________________________

Iran Air TV ad that ran in the U.S. in the 1970s. Because of political fallout from the Islamic Revolution, the final flight from NYC was November 7, 1979.

Tags:

“This Is How Ernest Hemingway Would Have Written If He Had Gone To Vassar”

March 16, 2014 in Books, Videos | Permalink

A real rarity: Writer Mary McCarthy interviewed by Jack Paar on the Tonight Show in 1963. Fast forward to the nine-minute mark.

“Wouldn’t It Be Fun To Elect A President Who Had Done Something?”

March 13, 2014 in Books, Politics, Videos | Permalink

An interesting (if audio-only) 1977 Tonight Show clip of Gore Vidal, who may have been Sandusky, trashing Jimmy Carter during the opening weeks of his Presidency, discussing income inequality and demonstrating a waterless toilet. As with all episodes of the program, Johnny Carson performed the monologue with a loaded gun and a bag of cocaine stashed in his underpants.

Tags: ,

“Ashley’s Operas Are About The Transformation Of Just Such Ordinary Landscapes Into Astonishing Ones”

March 13, 2014 in Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

What little I know of 20th-century avant opera concerns the otherworldly work of Robert Ashley, the iconoclastic Ann Arbor-born composer of Perfect Lives and other droning, enigmatic slices of American surrealism intended for TV whether the medium was ready or not for his Lynchian “sitcoms.” Ashley, who in his mature years resembled Andy Williams’ Martian doppelganger, something of an avuncular extraterrestrial, familiar yet unnameable, recently passed away. Here’s the opening of Mark Swed’s 1992 Los Angeles Times piece about his singular career at midpoint:

“One of the most offbeat incidents in American opera occurred a dozen years ago when the city of Chicago hosted the now-defunct annual New Music America Festival and presented a complete performance of Robert Ashley’s radically innovative seven-part opera Perfect Lives. The incident was the unwitting involvement of then-Mayor Jane Byrne.

The mayor, wanting election-year publicity any way she could get it, insisted the festival be named ‘Mayor Byrne’s New Music America’ in return for her allocating considerable city resources and cash. So at her welcoming speech, which was covered by local television news and given on the Perfect Lives set, someone played a joke on her. The opera employs lots of voice-altering electronics, and the microphone she spoke into was rigged, splitting her voice into octaves. She became a breathy soprano and male baritone duet. She sounded like Laurie Anderson.

What made the occasion remarkable was not that a puerile prank was played on a public official, but the brilliance of the result. In the reality-skewered world of Ashley, Jane Byrne belongs on the late-night news impersonating Laurie Anderson, not the other way around.

Ashley’s operas are about the transformation of just such ordinary landscapes into astonishing ones. They are operas intended for television, surreal as rock videos.”

___________________________

“The Park,” part one of Perfect Lives:

Tags: ,

“I Had Hoped He Would Die. I Had Hoped He Would Be Hung.”

March 13, 2014 in Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

Art Linkletter’s daughter Diane plunged to her death from a six-story window in 1969, perhaps influenced to suicide by LSD. Timothy Leary was the most famous proponent of the drug. Talk show host Stanley Siegel, that button-pusher, thought it a good idea in 1977 to have Linkletter and Leary speak by phone on live TV.

)

“His Obsession Is With The Architecture Of The Universe”

March 11, 2014 in Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

The complete version of the very cool 1974 film The World of Buckminster Fuller.

)

“Electronic Pub Pong Is Fun And Games All The Way”

March 10, 2014 in Science/Tech, Sports, Videos | Permalink

In the 1970s, Continental Airlines offered passengers electronic pong games in its on-board pub.  

“Open To Free-Thinking Adult Couples”

March 10, 2014 in Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

An attempt at mainstreaming and upscaling anonymous sex during the raffish days of NYC in the late 1970s, Plato’s Retreat in the Ansonia Hotel was a straight club where you could “make your dreams come true,” especially if those dreams involved penicillin–sexy, sexy penicillin. It was a place where the button-down set could go to unbutton alongside the sybarites. Jerzy Kosinski claimed he frequented not to participate but because, no kidding, he liked to watch. It was shuttered in 1985 when the city finally took belated action during the AIDS crisis. Here’s a 1977 public-access ad for the club.

“I Lay Awake At Nights Wondering Whether We As A Species Are Simply Too Stupid To Figure Out The Universe”

March 9, 2014 in Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

Human DNA is only about about 1% different than that of a chimpanzee. If we encounter intelligent life from elsewhere in the universe and they’re 1% smarter than we are, they will probably view us as chimps. In this 12-minute, “fascinatingly disturbing” thought experiment, Neil deGrasse Tyson, who stepped into Carl Sagan’s moon shoes tonight with the premiere of Cosmos, wonders if we’re just too dumb to figure out the biggest puzzles of the universe, whether those questions can only be answered by species brighter than we’ll ever be.

“The Project Itself Is Permanently In A Formative State”

March 9, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Sports, Videos | Permalink

By the time Moneyball was adapted for the screen, the sport had already moved on to next-level analytics, a steady stream of data that keeps bending around new corners. One of this year’s global improvements, showcased recently at the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, will be the exceptionally close reading of fielders’ body movements while they make plays, but each “nation,” each team, has its own mechanism for measuring every aspect of the game. From Evan Drellich’s Houston Chronicle article about “Ground Control,” the database that GM Jeff Luhnow is hoping will help reverse the fortunes of the grounded Houston Astros:

“One of Luhnow’s favorite songs is David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity,’ with the lyrics, ‘This is ground control to Major Tom.’ He happens to be a big Bowie fan and joked that the tune should play every time the site is accessed.

‘That was during my formative years,’ Luhnow said of his affinity for Bowie.

The project itself is permanently in a formative state. There are constantly new features and abilities to add, and what makes Ground Control so powerful is its customizability.

Teams don’t have to build their own databases. When Luhnow arrived, the club used a popular system sold by Bloomberg Sports, and it kept using Bloomberg while Ground Control was built.

Priority No. 1 for the club was getting Ground Control up in time for that year’s amateur draft. Just like this year and 2013, the Astros had the first overall pick in 2012.

By the end of 2012, or maybe early 2013, Ground Control had reached a fully functional state, although that’s a disingenuous characterization considering it’s perpetually in flux.

‘The analytical engine is separate from the interface, so there was a lot of work going on developing the database and developing the interface,’ Luhnow said. ‘The database you have to build right away, because you can’t analyze without having the data in the right format. The priorities were the database first, then the analytical engine, and the interface was a third priority.'”

___________________________

“And the stars look very different today”:

Tags: ,

“The Studies Available On Eugenics Have An Interesting History”

March 9, 2014 in Politics, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

A 1974 clip from Firing Line of William Shockley, the Bell Labs genius who gave us transistors and helped birth Silicon Valley, who was at this point sadly tarnishing his reputation with a second act as a quack attempting to link race, class and IQ, with African-Americans not faring too well in his theories nor anyone who was an unskilled laborer. It’s difficult to be angry at Shockley for his bigotry or Bobby Fischer for his ugly anti-Semitism because they were both clearly deeply ill, but how strange the human brain is that such genius and idiocy can reside in the same organ.

“It Became, In Mr Parker’s Hands, The Public Typeface Of The Modern World”

March 7, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

It’s hard to overemphasize just how much our world looks the way it does because of typographer Mike Parker, the “godfather of Helvetica,” who just passed away. From his obituary in the Economist:

“Of the more than 1,000 types he developed, his greatest success was Helvetica. It was he who adjusted it, or corralled it, to the needs of the obdurate, cranky, noisy Linotype machines which then printed almost everything in America. Originally it was the brainchild of a Swiss designer, Max Miedinger, who devised it in 1956. In contrast to the delicate exuberance of 16th-century types, Helvetica was plain, rigidly horizontal—and eminently readable. It became, in Mr Parker’s hands, the public typeface of the modern world: of the New York subway, of federal income-tax forms, of the logos of McDonald’s, Microsoft, Apple, Lufthansa and countless others. It was also, for its clarity, the default type on Macs, and so leapt smoothly into the desktop age.

Not everyone liked it. He did not always like it himself: as he roared around Brooklyn or Boston, opera pumping out at full volume from his car, he would constantly spot Helvetica being abused in some way, with rounded terminals or bad spacing, on shopfronts or the sides of trucks. But far from seeing Helvetica as neutral, vanilla or nondescript, he loved it for the relationship between figure and ground, its firmness, its existence in ‘a powerful matrix of surrounding space.’ Type gave flavour to words: and this was a typeface that gave people confidence to navigate through swiftly changing times.”

______________________

“What did Helvetica tell you today?”:

Tags: ,

“The President Flew From His Texas Ranch For The Services”

March 7, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

As Bryan Cranston takes on the drawl of a lifetime on Broadway, here’s LBJ in 1965 attending the Houston stop of a Rev. Billy Graham crusade, a tricked-out, latter-day revival show for the television-and-arena age.

From the LBJ Library, a transcript of a 1964 telephone call between the President and the preacher:

“[Graham is on hold 0:35 at beginning of call]

Secretary: Dr. Graham on nine-one

BG: Mr. President?

LBJ: Hello, Billy. How are you, my friend?

BG: Well, God bless you. I was telling Bill [Moyers] that last night I couldn’t sleep, and I got on my knees and prayed for you that the Lord would just give you strength.

LBJ: I told my sweet wife last night–we got mental telepathy–I said that if I didn’t think I’d embarrass him [Graham], I’d say, “Please, dear Lord, I need you more than I ever did in my life. I got the Russians on one side of me taking after, the Chinese are dropping bombs around contaminating the atmosphere, and the best man I ever knew, uh, had a stroke and disease hit him, and I’ve been tied in here with my Cabinet all day…and I’d have Him just make him come down and spend Sunday with me.”

BG: Well, bless your heart, I’ll be glad to. I told Bill that there were two things. One was I just felt terribly impressed to tell you to slow down a little bit. I’ve been awfully worried about you physically.

LBJ: Well–

BG: And then the second thing–you’ve got this election, in my opinion, wrapped up and you’ve got it wrapped up big. There’s no doubt in my mind about that. And then the second thing, you know when Jesus dealt with people with moral problems, like dear Walter [Jenkins] had–and I was telling Bill I wanted to send my love and sympathy to him–

LBJ: Thank you–

BG: –He always dealt tenderly. Always. This is the way He handled it. And that’s the way I feel about it. I know the weaknesses of men, and the Bible says we’re all sinners and we’re all involved one way or another, and I just hope that if you have any contact with him, you’ll just give him my love and understanding.

LBJ: Well, that’ll mean more than anything. Come down here Saturday evening and have dinner with us, and let’s have a quiet visit and maybe have a little service Sunday morning in the White House itself.

BG: Well, I’ll be very happy to. I told Bill that my wife couldn’t come because she’s in bed sick with the flu.

LBJ: Oh, gosh, I’m sorry–

BG: I’m up in Maine and I’m traveling all over New England in different towns, preaching every night in a different town.

LBJ: Oh, wonderful, wonderful. Well, I know you’re doing a lot of good, and I’ll look forward to seeing you Saturday. You just come, bring your bag on in and call Bill and tell him what time you’ll be in so they can have a gate, and we’ll send a car for you.

BG: One of my associates, T.W. Wilson, the brother of the fellow that you met before–

LBJ: Bring him with you.

BG: Alright.

LBJ: I want him with you. I want anybody. And we’ll just have a good visit and I’ll feel stronger next week.

BG: Well, God bless you.

LBJ: Thank you so much.

BG: Bye.

LBJ: Bye.”

 

Tags: , ,

“Do You Investigate?”

March 7, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

Jacques Cousteau, surfacing briefly in 1956 to appear on What’s My Line? Just-retired Yankee Phil Rizzuto, who once got his uniform wet during a rain delay, is on the panel.

“I’m Glad You’ve Got A Computer Being The Man That Makes The Decision”

March 5, 2014 in Science/Tech, Sports, Videos | Permalink

While Muhammad Ali was suffering through his Vietnam Era walkabout, he “boxed” retired great Rocky Marciano in a fictional contest that was decided by a computer. Dubbed the “Super Fight,” the pugilists acted out the computer prognostications in 1969 and the filmed result was released in theaters in 1970. Marciano dropped a lot of weight and donned a hairpiece to provide viewers with some semblance of his younger self. Prior to the machine-driven bout, Marciano awkwardly stumbled onto a great description of this Singularity moment: “I’m glad you’ve got a computer being the man that makes the decision.” He died in a plane crash four months before the film reached theaters.

A week after the “fight” played in theaters, a Life magazine article ran photos from the film along with some text. “The result was dramatically uncomputerlike,” it offered. An excerpt:

The only two heavyweight champions who never lost a professional fight are Rocky Marciano and Cassius (Muhammad Ali) Clay, and this has provoked many a nonprofessional fight among their fans. So Miami Promoter Murray Woroner decided to make a hypothetical “Super Fight” of it, using a computer. First he matched the two champions and filmed 75 rounds of Hollywood-style fighting, finishing three weeks before Marciano’s death in a plane crash last summer. Then the skills and weaknesses of each fighter–as diagnosed by 1,500 sportswriters, fighters and managers–were programmed. The computer punched out a blow-by-blow reading and selected film segments were matched to it.

Seven possible endings were shot: a knockout, TKO and decisions for each man, and a draw. To foil any gambling capers, the seven endings were held in bonded secrecy until the last minute. When the film was shown at 750 theaters and arenas around the country last week, the result was dramatically uncomputerlike. Cut to simulated ribbons and even floored once, Marciano came back to knock Clay out in the 13th round. “It takes a good champion to lose like that,” Clay smiled afterwards.•

“The Table Is That Television Set”

March 4, 2014 in Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

So strange and wonderful: In 1972, Rod Serling introduces I’ve Got a Secret host Steve Allen to the home version of the video game Pong. Begins at the 15:40 mark.

“It’s Just Like Planning A Dinner”

March 4, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

The opening of “The Computer Girls,” Lois Mandel’s classic 1967 Cosmopolitan article about the promise of young women entering the field of computer programming, a promise which has only been partly fulfilled:

Twenty years ago, a girl could be a secretary, a school teacher…maybe a librarian, a social worker or a nurse. If she was really ambitious, she could go into the professions and compete with men…usually working harder and longer to earn less pay for the same job.

Now have come the big, dazzling computers–and a whole new kind of work for women: programming. Telling the miracle machines what to do and how to do it. Anything from predicting the weather to sending out billing notices from the local department store.

And if it doesn’t sound like woman’s work–well, it just is.

‘I had this idea I’d be standing at a big machine and pressing buttons all day long,’ says a girl who programs for a Los Angeles bank. ‘I couldn’t have been further off the track. I figure out how the computer can solve a problem, and then instruct the machine to do it.’

“It’s just like planning a dinner,” explains Dr. Grace Hopper, now a staff scientist in systems programming for Univac. (She helped develop the first electronic digital computer, the Eniac, in 1946.) “You have to plan ahead and schedule everything so it’s ready when you need it. Programming requires patience and the ability to handle detail. Women are naturals at computer programming.

What she’s talking about is aptitude–the one most important quality a girl needs to become a programmer. She also needs a keen, logical mind.•

____________________

Grace Hopper outwits David Letterman in 1986:

Tags:

“It’s The American View That Everything Has To Keep Climbing”

March 3, 2014 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

George Carlin was about to release his first comedy album in seven years in 1982 when he sat for a Playboy interview. He was wondering at that point if he would have a third act after being a straight comic in the ’60s and a countercultural force the following decade, and ultimately he found it in the role of philosopher and self-designated mourner for a sense of decency and honesty in American politics and media. Carlin has been criticized for this latter stage of his career, accused of being too angry to be funny, but I think it’s as valuable a phase as his 1970s brilliance. It elevated him to greatest American stand-up ever, and no one has quite reached that level since, though Louis C.K. and Chris Rock have their moments. The opening of the Playboy Q&A:

“Playboy:

Back in the early Sixties, when you were still a disc jockey and just beginning to do comedy in small clubs, Lenny Bruce supposedly selected you as his heir—

George Carlin:

Apparently, Lenny told that to a lot of people. But he never said it to me and I didn’t hear it until years later. Which is probably fortunate. It’s difficult enough for a young person to put his soul on the line in front of a lot of drunken people without having that hanging over his head, too.

Playboy:

Because of what Bruce said about you, are you now overly sensitive about being compared to him?

George Carlin:

Yes, and those comparisons are unfair to both of us. Look, I was a fan of Lenny’s. He made me laugh, sure, but more often he made me say, ‘Fuckin’ A; why didn’t I think of that?’ He opened up channels in my head. His genius was the unique ability to investigate hypocrisy and expose social inequities in a street rap that was really a form of poetry. I believe myself to be a worthwhile and inventive performer in my own right. But I’m not in a league with Lenny, certainly not in terms of social commentary. So when people give me this bullshit, ‘Well, I guess you’re sort of…uh…imitating Lenny Bruce,’ I just say, ‘Oh, fuck. I don’t want to hear it.’ I want to be known for what I do best.

Playboy:

Nevertheless, throughout the early to mid-Seventies, with a five-year run of albums and packed auditoriums for an act that viciously ridiculed every nook and cranny of “the establishment,” you really did seem to be fulfilling Lenny’s prophecy. Then it stopped abruptly about five years ago. No more albums; no more college tours. Why?

George Carlin:

I’ve just now completed a five-year period that can perhaps best be called a breathing spell. A time of getting my health back and gathering my strength. That time also included incredible cocaine abuse, a heart attack and my wife’s recovery from both alcoholism and cocaine abuse.

Playboy:

It’s comforting to hear you talk about that breathing spell in the past tense.

George Carlin:

My wife, Brenda, and I are both clean and sober now. I’ve been doing a lot of writing. By the time this interview appears, my first album in seven years will be out. I’m also working on a series of Home Box Office specials, a book and a motion picture. It’s the American view that everything has to keep climbing: productivity, profits, even comedy. No time for reflection. No time to contract before another expansion. No time to grow up. No time to fuck up. No time to learn from your mistakes. But that notion goes against nature, which is cyclical. And I hope I’m now beginning a new cycle of energy and creativity. If so, it’ll really be my third career. The first was as a straight comic in the Sixties. The second was as a counterculture performer in the Seventies. The third will be…well, that’s for others to judge.”

________________________

“I’ve been uplinked and downloaded”:

“You have to be asleep to believe it”:

Tags: , ,

“Are We Finally Seeing The Dawn Of The Hydrogen Age? Not So Fast.”

March 3, 2014 in Excerpts, Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

There will soon be thousands of hydrogen cars available for purchase (largely in California) from major automakers, but why? The refueling infrastructure is sorely lacking and these alternative vehicles don’t have momentum the way EVs currently do. From Basem Wasef at Popular Mechanics:

“The basic principle behind hydrogen fuel cells is fairly simple: Hydrogen atoms are stripped of their electrons to generate electricity and then combined with oxygen to form water as a by-product. Mainstream deployment of fuel-cell vehicles, though, has proved to be complex. Compared with liquid fuels, hydrogen is tough to transport and store. And without a meaningful number of vehicles on the road, there’s been no incentive to build hydrogen fuel infrastructure. Now new initiatives in California and across the U.S. are pushing for a long-awaited expansion of the refueling network. And with the debut of three promising hydrogen-fuel-cell vehicles from Honda, Hyundai, and Toyota, consumers will have new options beginning in 2014. Are we finally seeing the dawn of the hydrogen age? Not so fast.

Why Now?

The current hydrogen push has less to do with consumer demand than with government incentives that treat fuel-cell vehicles (FCV) as equal to or better than electric vehicles.”

_____________________

Jack Nicholson betting on hydrogen in 1978:

Tags:

“I’m Very, Very Beautiful”

March 2, 2014 in Videos | Permalink

Great Little Richard performance and interview on a 1970 Dick Cavett program.

If Eddie Murphy had ever played the often-androgynous music sensation in a drama as was rumored at times and not just in the SNL “Little Richard Simmons” mash-up, it would have likely been an incredible performance. Based on comments Murphy made back in the day, he was uncomfortable with the role because of the self-proclaimed Bronze Liberace’s homosexuality, though in retrospect it seems Murphy’s discomfort was largely with himself.

Tags: , , , ,

“Are You Here To Comfort Me?”

March 2, 2014 in Videos | Permalink

Jim Henson and the Muppets entertain Dick Cavett on his 1971 Thanksgiving show. Missing is the section where Gore Vidal walked out and referred to them all as a bunch of crypto-fascist Nazis.

Tags: ,

« Older entries § Newer entries »