Tuesday, January 19, 2010
When Good Enuf Is Great
A selection from NYT's 12/13/2009 Sunday Magazine article, The 9th Annual Year in Ideas (yes…I’m a tad behind on the required reading list).
Good Enough is the Next Great
by Robert Mackey
"Cheap, fast, simple tools are suddenly everywhere," Robert Capps of Wired magazine wrote this (2009) summer in an essay entitled, "The Good Enough Revolution."
"Companies that have focused mainly on improving the technical quality of their products have started to notice that, for many consumers, "ease of use, continuous and low price" are more important.
High-definition televisions have turned every living room into a home cinema, yet millions of us choose to watch small, blurry videos on our computers and our mobile devices. Cameras capture images in a dozen megapixels, yet Flickr is filled with snapshots taken with phone cameras that we can neither focus nor zoom. And at war, a country that has a fleet of F-16 fighter jets than can cover 1,500 miles an hour is using more and more remote-controlled Predator drones that are powered by snowmobile engines.
Lo-fi solutions are now available for a range of problems that couldn’t be solved with high-tech tools. Music played from a compact disc is of higher quality than what comes out of an iPod – but you can't easily carry 4,000 CD's with you on the subway or to the gym. Similarly, a professional television camera will produce a higher-quality image than a phone, but when something important happens, from the landing of a jet on the Hudson River to the murder of an Iranian protester, and there are no TV cameras around, images recorded on phones are good enough.
In February, a music professor at Stanford, Jonathan Berger, revealed that he has found evidence that younger listeners have come to prefer lo-fi versions of rock songs to hi-fi ones. For six years, Berger played different versions of the same rock songs to his students and asked them to say which ones they liked best. Each year, more students said that they liked what they heard from the MP3s better than what came from CDs. To a new generation of iPOd listeners, rock music is supposed to sound lo-fi. Good enough is now better than great."
The death knell of the CD grows ever louder (or clangier if you're listening on lo-fi). Like vinyl, scarcity of recordings will drive prices higher and, unless we CD-lovers are stockpiling (attention my lovely Ever-Loving spouse!!) CD-players in some closet, we may be left with a treasure of CD's without an instrument to play it on. This lo-fi stuff is, frankly, beyond my scope of understanding. I remember (Uh,oh, Geezer expostualiton alert) when each year brought some new technological advance that IMPROVED sound quality. Forward was the only direction as far as sound reproduction was concerned. How could this reverse sound improvement be happening and, worse yet, be embraced so quickly and lovingly?
It's a sad state of affairs.
**** Addendum 01/20/2010 ***
In reaction to this post, Whisky Prajer posted this finer entry. I especially liked the tear he went on about that thoroughly moder thoroughly reprehensible Duck Face pose that charming and attractive young ladies (like my very own daughter) take to when asked to pose for a picture. I am raising farm fowl not future young female leaders of the world! Is Quality no longer a guidepost for product/service/behaviour? Is Quality so passe '90's?
Good Enough is the Next Great
by Robert Mackey
"Cheap, fast, simple tools are suddenly everywhere," Robert Capps of Wired magazine wrote this (2009) summer in an essay entitled, "The Good Enough Revolution."
"Companies that have focused mainly on improving the technical quality of their products have started to notice that, for many consumers, "ease of use, continuous and low price" are more important.
High-definition televisions have turned every living room into a home cinema, yet millions of us choose to watch small, blurry videos on our computers and our mobile devices. Cameras capture images in a dozen megapixels, yet Flickr is filled with snapshots taken with phone cameras that we can neither focus nor zoom. And at war, a country that has a fleet of F-16 fighter jets than can cover 1,500 miles an hour is using more and more remote-controlled Predator drones that are powered by snowmobile engines.
Lo-fi solutions are now available for a range of problems that couldn’t be solved with high-tech tools. Music played from a compact disc is of higher quality than what comes out of an iPod – but you can't easily carry 4,000 CD's with you on the subway or to the gym. Similarly, a professional television camera will produce a higher-quality image than a phone, but when something important happens, from the landing of a jet on the Hudson River to the murder of an Iranian protester, and there are no TV cameras around, images recorded on phones are good enough.
In February, a music professor at Stanford, Jonathan Berger, revealed that he has found evidence that younger listeners have come to prefer lo-fi versions of rock songs to hi-fi ones. For six years, Berger played different versions of the same rock songs to his students and asked them to say which ones they liked best. Each year, more students said that they liked what they heard from the MP3s better than what came from CDs. To a new generation of iPOd listeners, rock music is supposed to sound lo-fi. Good enough is now better than great."
The death knell of the CD grows ever louder (or clangier if you're listening on lo-fi). Like vinyl, scarcity of recordings will drive prices higher and, unless we CD-lovers are stockpiling (attention my lovely Ever-Loving spouse!!) CD-players in some closet, we may be left with a treasure of CD's without an instrument to play it on. This lo-fi stuff is, frankly, beyond my scope of understanding. I remember (Uh,oh, Geezer expostualiton alert) when each year brought some new technological advance that IMPROVED sound quality. Forward was the only direction as far as sound reproduction was concerned. How could this reverse sound improvement be happening and, worse yet, be embraced so quickly and lovingly?
It's a sad state of affairs.
**** Addendum 01/20/2010 ***
In reaction to this post, Whisky Prajer posted this finer entry. I especially liked the tear he went on about that thoroughly moder thoroughly reprehensible Duck Face pose that charming and attractive young ladies (like my very own daughter) take to when asked to pose for a picture. I am raising farm fowl not future young female leaders of the world! Is Quality no longer a guidepost for product/service/behaviour? Is Quality so passe '90's?
Labels: 2009: The Year of Living Dangerously, Only in America, Reviews
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Rehoboth Beach in The New Yorker
Reading Patricia Marx' article, Itsy-Bitsy Teeny-Weeny, in this week's New Yorker, was a hoot. Coming at the tail end of this article on the dangers of bathing-suit shopping, was this paragraph;"Speaking of winners, the first known bathing-beauty competition (not counting the ones on the Minaon cave walls) took place in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, in 1880. One of the judges was Thomas Edison. First prize, which went to a young woman named Myrtle Meriwether, a trousseau."
Ahh Rehoboth Beach!?! Home of the 2 hr parking meter and parking meter maids who work, I'm positive, on commission. While the meter says two hours, the time passes by quicker in Rehoboth Beach. In celebration of another beach season, parking fines were raised. Don't get me wrong, Rehoboth is a lovely place. Women are numbered for identification purposes. You never know who you'll run into at the beach. Families are welcome here. No Beach Tags! (Take THAT New Jersey!) And, of course, Dogfish Head Brews and Eats, reason enough to make the trek. But enough of the summer-based reminiscing.
In her piece (one piece; not two), Patricia Marx demonstrates why I, for one, will hang out by my land-line and wait for a call to join her on her shopping trips treatises she is commissioned to write about twice a year for the New Yorker. When not concocting her own bon mots, she is sure to quote a quip from one of a multitude of witty co-shoppers.
Here's Cynthia Kling, who notes,
"It's essential to bring a friend when bathing-suit shopping.
One, women are too crazy to judge how they look.
Two, if you go with your mother, she'll project her neurotic body image onto you.
and, three, salespeople lie."
In the article, along with other choice observations, Ms. Marx links to this Speedo LZR Racer suit instruction guide. All I can say is that any male out there who already hesitates uncomfortably at the mere mention of Speedo will be embarassingly tested if he even thinks of donning a LZR Racer. In fact, a guy may think that the only reason the swimming times have fallen so precipitously in the last year was that the faster a race ended, the faster a LZR Racer squeezed shmo can get out of his suit.
All in all, an enjoyable trip to stores that may give one reason to blush or avert one's eyes with a guide whose tongue is perpetually deep in her cheek. I'm here, Ms. Marz, waiting for an invite on your next foray into purchase land.
Labels: 2009: The Year of Living Dangerously, Delaware
Thursday, May 28, 2009
$6.66 Due
"You superstitious?", she winked as I perceptibly shook at the amount that appeared on the postage meter."I mean, about the $6.66?", she wondered, clearing up the matter in question. Or so she thought.
It’s a quirky little post office here in town, below the canal. I love it. The folks working at the counter there come in all range of friendliness, warming up to you over the years in indirect proportion to their natural wariness. I go there often enough, 2-3 times a week, to have packages shipped to various friends and family.
"Not another batch of movies?", one asks me as I dump another three self-returning Netflix envelopes in the out bin.
"Hmmm, hmmm, hmmm!", she continues. Weighty opinions via two consonants.
"Is she right?", I wonder calibrating the "mmm"'s loaded in her "Hmmmmm"'s.
"Am I spending too much time watching movies, instead of shifting my eyes to the passing clouds by my window, watching life go by?"
"Oh, another package going up to Canada with the Customs tag labeled "Family CD’s"?", another asks me as I fill in all of the requisite shipping documents.
"Don't you think they’ve had enough of your family’s pictures? Give their eyes a break, why don't you? Let their minds savor your packages so they start wondering what's up with you, instead of loading them up with pictures and CD's. That's too much information too soon, don't you think?"
"You know, she may be right!", I cogitate, my mind's cogs imperceptibly engaging.
"I'm no longer even a whisper of a mystery to my friends and family! I'm a drudge. No! Worse! I'm a self-recorded drudge!" I hesitate, before reluctantly letting the package go, vowing I will delay the next shipment for at least a month to allow a patina of inexplicability to coat my daily life.
"They forget something? Again??, he asked and laughed simultaneously as I pondered whether to overnight the forgotten items to one of my kids or make them suffer and send it Priority Mail.
"You'd think with their young minds they'd be able to remember all this stuff. Well, maybe they just have too much stuff. Maybe living without would make them appreciate what they live with?"
I nod, taking in another Post Office gristy observation that I'll roll around into a pearl later.
"The regular?", he inquires, not so much as expecting a negative reply as going through our routine exchange.
"Yep, the regular"
"O.K., Two Day delivery. $4.95. See you tomorrow?"
I hand over a five, wait for the change, and first shake and then nod my head, thus covering all possible answers to his question.
"Ha!", he notes, "Kids! They've got you to where you don't know "No" from "Yes". See you...whenever.", and he turns around chipping my package into a rolling bin.
So, today the $6.66 incident. My passport had expired 2 years ago; an indication that I'm losing it. Since I was a teen, I'd never had my passport expire without having a renewed one in hand. If you're going to be a self-perceived Man-On-The-Go, you best be sure you’ve got the legal documents to Go-Where-You-Want-To-Go. How I’d let the expiration date slip by 2 years ago sadly indicated that my On-The-Go had been going nowhere. An application was quickly filled out, passport pics taken (you don’t want to ask), check written, and expired passport shoved all together in a padded envelope destined for Philly. Registered Mail, of course, the only accepted method of Slavic Mail Paranoids.
"So, are you superstitious?", she quizzed me again.
"Me, superstitious?", I muttered to myself, the Ever-Suspicious One.
I had all reasons to be! Sure! This passport was going to be with me for 15 years. Fifteen Years! And it's begun its decade and a half life's journey by being marked with the postal total of $6.66!?
What is that saying?
Will my letter, registered,yes, but still...will it arrive at all?
Will the State Department employee who receives my letter notice the $6.66, scream and toss my letter and application into a shredder?
What if the State Department employee, droning away, misses the $6.66 postmark, processes the application, and mails the new passport to me, not realizing that the sign of the $6.66 has burned itself into my passport thus guaranteeing some horrible, nasty, unforgivable act to be done to my person in the next 15 years that I have this passport.
I hesitate. Do I take back the envelope, rip it open and shove blank pages inside to up the weight and the postage?
"Look, I know this will sound peculiar. Can you mark it up to $6.67? Can I pay $6.67? Please!?"
Slyly, she tempts me with a pause."I understand, but I can't overcharge you. It would be against the postal code. Do you want to take it back and add more blank pages?"
What! I know now that she's cruelly toying with me. She's reading my thought. Quick! Wipe out that ATM card access code from your mind!
"Uhmmm, no. That's o.k. Just send it in as is"
"As is? You mean...", she stares at me as she combs back her horns, "...as $6.66!??".
I leave, then turn around as I see her putting my package in a special bin. I take out a nickel and surreptitiously slip it onto her postal scale and quick step out the door, just barely hearing her laugh and yell, "This Washington's not going to shield you from the $6.66!!"
Labels: 2009: The Year of Living Dangerously, Glimpses, Self-Therapy
Friday, May 01, 2009
This Version is Way Too...
Short.
But it will have to do until someone posts a full version. I blogged previously about the song for this summer here. IMHO, this song should be a Grateful Dead-ish Phish-ish 20-25 minutes long. It is a catharsis of all that has (and will) ail you for the can't-get-through-fast-enough 2009.
Labels: 2009: The Year of Living Dangerously
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Track #3, Hey Ya
I'm sitting in a pizzeria, awaiting a delivery of two slices while my foot is furiously tapping. I'd just come in from my car where I'd left Potato Hole in the CD player. Track #3 had just finished. The tune's lodged in my head and it has seeped down to my right foot, the one noted as "furiously tapping".
The song starts with five distinctive notes, clearly enunciated by Patterson Hood’s guitar. Five seconds later, loud and deep thumps on Brad Morgan's drum. Twelve seconds into the song, Mr. Booker T. starts with his patented j-j-j-j-j-Ja-JA-JABBING notes. Hey Ya! A minute thirty-seven seconds, you can hear Neil Young’s distinctive string tear and at one minute fifty, he starts shreading a la Neil Young w/ Crazy Horse. The song takes off and spins a furious carousel of blazing summer days and popsicle lighted boardwalk nights. Cars are driving with tops down with everyone bouncing in tune. Mr. Booker T. brings down the excitement a notch. Get folks calmed down a touch, before launching the B-3 "pipes" off again in full accompaniment of the Drive By Truckers and Neil Young.
This song should go on forever, or at least until the temperature breaks 70 from the dismal mid-50’s this spring has plagued us with.
But, no it slowly slides down and disappears into the recesses of the car speakers. At 3 minutes 52 seconds, joy has been swallowed up.
And, that’s what the seek key was made for. Track #3, one more time. One more time, many times over.
Labels: 2009: The Year of Living Dangerously, Reviews
