Movie Review | Strange Days

December 31, 1999: On the eve of the new Millennium, with the national economy in shambles, the city of Los Angeles is a war zone jam-packed with armored tanks and armed-to-the-teeth national guard soldiers patrolling the streets. Meanwhile, life goes on as usual for Angelenos.

Lenny (Ralph Fiennes) is ex-L.A.P.D. and currently makes a living on the black market selling other people’s memories recorded on computer disc media. The discs were burned using the latest technology referred to as “playback” on the street. Playback allows the user to experience a recorded event in the first person, that is, not merely via standard audio-visual input, but stimulation right down to his cerebral cortex. Playback is wildly popular and highly illegal. Lenny is hung up on former girlfriend, Faith (Juliette Lewis) who has since shacked up with a slime bag record producer by the name of Filo (Michael Wincott) in hopes of getting a recording contract. In his spare time, Lenny uses playback to re-live his recorded memories with Faith.

Macy (Angela Bassett) is a limo driver. She has an eight year old son and an ex-gang banging husband in the slammer. She knows Lenny because he participated in the raid on her home when the ex was hauled off in cuffs. Lenny was the cop consoling her son when his father was taken away. Lenny occasionally sees Macy during his daily routine, but they don’t have a lot of interaction. She doesn’t have much interest in spending time with him because of the way he makes his living.

It’s business as usual until one of Lenny’s hooker acquaintances (Brigitte Bako) turns up dead, but not before she manages to get a playback disc to him containing the recorded details of her last trick. Thereafter, Lenny involves Macy, and, his buddy, Max (Tom Sizemore) who is also ex-L.A.P.D., and is presently employed by Filo as a bodyguard. Max checks in with Lenny regularly to report back on Faith. In the meantime, black rapper and civil rights activist, Jericho 1, is reported in the news as dead. Not much news there since black rappers always eventually end up getting shot by one of their own anyway. Or so it would seem.

Despite the cyberpunk-like hype surrounding the movie, at its fundamental core, Strange Days is a racial revenge fantasy masquerading as a science fiction murder mystery. Considering the 1995 release date –a mere three years following the Rodney King debacle –race rioting is still a fresh memory. The war between the then mostly Caucasian Establishment, as personified by the LAPD, and Black Angelenos (where are the Mexicans and everyone else?) is very much alive. In fact, the entire movie seems to be an homage to civil insurrection motivated partially by racial inequality (for Blacks) but mostly by belligerence. As an aside here, it’s ironic how Hollywood has backed down from the race card rostrum lately since the Obama Administration. As if racial bias has somehow been eliminated. Newsflash: We have still have racial discrimination in the U.S., it’s just the reverse kind now. But I digress.

The character of Jericho 1 (Glenn Plummer) represents the ongoing conflict between law enforcement and rebellious youth. And his death, although perpetrated by a couple of hillbilly LAPD officers (Vincent D’onfrio & William Fichter), is not reported as such (because no one knows about it yet) is perceived instead by the fans as the by-product of his gangster lifestyle. The movie portrays the community as a great mass of unwashed, ignorant junkies and star-fuckers always on high alert for the next me-too trend in a city already devolved into a third world shit hole, which is a fairly accurate description of L.A., in my opinion.

When Lenny & Macy discover the contents of the playback Iris (the hooker) left behind for Lenny, the last 15 minutes of the film ties up the revenge fantasy all nice & neat for the viewer –right down to the beating of (Macy/Bassett) by the riot squad in the street. But this time, the crowd timidly intervenes and manages to stop the beating.

I should mention here that this intervention between Macy and the riot squad by the rowdy crowd (comprised predominantly of street thugs & wannabes) wasn’t very believable on any level. Envision throngs of raucous, disaffected malcontents in downtown L.A. on New Year’s Eve celebrating what most believe is the last day of the world. Meanwhile live bands play strident, electric guitar-led anthems all the while as people party it up in the congested streets high on drugs & booze –basically doing whatever the hell they want– but somehow, suddenly these thousands of party-goers become restrained when a few cops in riot gear show up. It’s an end-of-the-world party, and, the ratio of civilian to cop was at least 100 to 1, so I’m not sure what the hell writer/producer James Cameron, or director Kathryn Bigelow had in mind here, but I didn’t buy it. Suspension of disbelief is one thing, but this is pure fantasy. In reality, given the circumstances, the riot squad would have been toast.

Further, Ralph Fiennes (best known for his role as Lord Voldemort) in the title role was unadulterated bullshit. Not only was it hard to swallow that the Lenny character used to be a cop, but Fiennes’s barely contained English accent caused him to mumble all of his lines. (There weren’t any third rate, American actors available for this one-dimensional, shithead character…Really?) Additionally, Angela Bassett playing the role of a subdued black female limo driver makes about as much sense as making Stallone a British literature professor. (There’s only so much disbelief a viewer can suspend before common sense takes over and asks, What the hell?)

In the final analysis, my opinion of this movie is not very complimentary mostly because it appears that producer Cameron wanted to cash in on the then latest cyberpunk phenomena without actually having to acknowledge the guy who created it. (William Gibson). But his race driven content falls flat on its face; the film is nothing more than a glorified soapbox named after an old Doors’ tune (Strange Days) to flesh out trendy, politically correct talking points.

I enjoy Cameron’s movies when he sticks to straight sci fi such as Aliens, but I can live without the politically motivated bloviations that are front & center in a movie like this one. Hey James? I know this is about a decade and-a-half too late, but leave the lets-all-just-get-along and down-with-the-man themed flicks to Spike Lee.

Minute Movie Review Corner

Priest (A Fist Full of Cheese)

If you enjoy the gritty imagery of Dark City, the cinenamatography of The Matrix, the thrill of the hunt (and hunted) of Blade Runner, then Priest is the movie for you. 

Like an incredibly bad version of Mad Max (except in American English) and a CGI-enhanced “B” vampire flick, Priest is the hi-tech epitome of modern day entertainment. All the coolest movies, books and music have already been cashed in on (and copyrighted) by someone else, so all that there is left to do is take the best of the best and make it your own. In pop music, this concept is called sampling, and basically, it is an end run around getting sued for copyright.  In movie-making, Hollywood calls it entertainment.  I call it re-animated cheese. 

How shall I count the cheesies?  It will be tough, but following are some of my difficulties. Priest is supposed to take place in the far off, distant future.  So far off and distant, you see, that people are riding around on motorcycles that can break the speed of sound.  In fact, the bikes look a lot like a saddle with fuselage attached, a veritable crotch-rocket for-real.  Nevermind the vampires and the class of warrior, Catholic priests that was created to fight them, let’s talk about suspension of disbelief. 

I can suspend my disbelief just long enough to buy into the vampires and their nemesis, the priests.  I can even buy into the world having obliterated itself back to the dark days before electricity and indoor plumbing.  What I can and will not buy into is the fact that in the face of the new technology (especially the crotch rockets) that the characters are STILL using vinyl records.  WTF?  Really? Vinyl records??  You mean the recording industry has not developed yet another medium allegedly superior over compact discs with which to continue to fuck the fans??  Now that’s what I call fantasy.

To a lesser extent, I also object to the usage of a could-have-been-really-cool-but-isn’t character called Black Hat.   He’s so badass that not only is he a warrior priest, but he’s also been transformed into a (wait for it) vampire!  Gasp! Shock! And his demeanor is based on none other than the king of the spaghetti western, himself, Clint fuckin’ Eastwood, right down to wearing an identically-styled, trademark cover AND using a hoarse, whiskey-laden speaking voice. The cheese doesn’t get much stickier (or stinkier) than this. Rent this one only if you don’t have access to any of the original movies referenced above that it was inspired by.

Minute Movie Review Corner

Hanna

Hanna is a blonde haired, blue eyed, sixteen year old girl.  Slight of build, she is deceptively cunning and agile.  She has spent her entire life in a remote cabin, far from civilization, learning survival techniques and training to kill with her rugged, hirsute padre in the frozen tundra somewhere above the arctic circle. What she knows of the modern world, she has learned from her father’s books. Then one day, Hanna informs him that she is ready.  She confidently flips the switch on the transmitter that broadcasts their location to an unknown third party’s GPS that then picks up the signal.  Shortly thereafter, a special ops unit of unknown origin shows up at the cabin in the middle of the night.  Hanna is retrieved and removed to a special bunker somewhere in Morocco.  Meanwhile, Eric, her father, is en route to France. 

This flick moves along in typical, action-packed fashion with the kind of soundtrack that hasn’t pumped you up this thoroughly since the Rocky movies or even, Midnight Express.  So much ass to kick, so little time to do it.  You know that Hanna is a different sort of girl, you just have no idea why.  And neither does she.  But hey, wherever she goes, shit does seem to get blown up a lot, and, dead bodies tend to accumulate.  There is the obligatory doctor evil –this one in female form with a really bad haircut and an even worse dye job–  The audience doesn’t know why the sick bitch is after Hanna, or, for that matter, her father, but it is fun to watch. 

Hollywood hasn’t really had much use for a female-dominated storyline unless she has been spread & ready or armed to the teeth decapitating werewolves. And there especially hasn’t been much interest in teenaged girls unless they are drooling over boorish, narcissistic, male vampires. Who knew that there would one day be a market for such rubbish written by a mediocre female writer who can barely string two words together?  Welp, Hanna isn’t a trollop, and she doesn’t drool over boys, in fact, she doesn’t even quite grasp the concept of indoor plumbing or electricity, but hey, she sure knows her way round firearms and smashing a man’s nose up into his brain.  And all without those damn vampires, too.

I have no complaints about Hanna, generally speaking.  It appealed to my fascination with all things genetically modified, and re-awakened my long since forgotten liking for the days of Dark Angel, before the writers turned the human jungle cat, Max, into a quivering pile of romance novel-inspired, air-headed, ditz.   But, substantively, I do, however, have just a few small quibbles with the screenwriter’s thought process. 

If all Eric wants for his astoundingly, athletically-gifted daughter, Hanna, is to have a regular life, then WHY are they living in an isolated cabin in subzero temperatures and WHY the HELL would you EVER have her push a button on a transmitter so the evil, red dye job who wants her dead can find her??

Wouldn’t it have made more sense to integrate quietly into society and just sign Hanna up for track or something at the local high school and THEN have the evil, red dye job somehow find her?  But noooo, you just had to bring out the transmitter and have her stupidly press the button so she could be easily located in the woods. Either the writer thinks the audience is THAT dumb, or this is the kind of insipid trash movie producers think will sell.  Even the girl with the dragon tat wasn’t this obtuse.

Minute Movie Review Corner

Limitless

What if you could take a pill that would make you utilize more than 10% of your brain? And what would you do with that new-found productivity? 

Limitless answers these questions in a fast paced manner with a likable protagonist and a kinda, sorta believable story line. If you believe, that is, that human beings are basically good. 

Meh, not so much.  I think that the average person on the street’s sense of self-importance and overall level of douchebaggery is directly proportional to how much money he has in the bank, but hey, we’re talking about the movie.

We rented Limitless without knowing diddly about it, and were pleasantly surprised.  The movie moves along in a frentically paced, CGI cinemagraphic experience, and so there is not a lot of time to ponder whether the story line is, or is not possible.  Although it did remind me, vaguely, of a latter day version of Johnny Mneumonic.  

Not much to dislike here except maybe Eddie’s girlfriend, whose sense of commitment to him to  seems to lie somewhere between very little to none depending on how much cash he has.  Good for a Friday night rental with no place to go and nothing to do but entertain yourself with a pitcher of homemade Bay Breeze, less on the bay, but heavy on the breeze…

Sourcecode

As much as I enjoyed Sourcecode, I have to say that it reminded of a high tech version of Groundhog’s Day.  Jake Gyllenhaal has long since shedded his Donnie Darko days, but at least he’s staying true to character here and sticking with action packed storylines instead of making pussified movies for a Lifetime Movie for Men Channel (cough Costner cough).

Captain Colter Stevens is sitting on a train across from a pretty girl headed for destinations unknown somewhere in Chicago. It all seems fairly mundane until the train explodes and he wakes up in a metal pod of sorts only to return to the train again and again. Turns out, Stevens is teleported into another guy’s life on the same train, across from the same pretty girl every 8 minutes until he can figure out where the bomb is and who planted it.  Meanwhile, Captain Goodwin is his only on-screen guide in the pod, and she isn’t much into detailed explanations.

Now, I know what you’re thinking…you’re thinking this is a gimme…the bomber is obviously the pretty girl, and ol’ Jakey is far to engrossed listening to the lull of his hormones to figure it out.  But you would be wrong! That’s all you’re getting from me for now as I would not want to spoil the movie for you.  You’re just going to have to rent it yourself and see what happens.  Highly recommended.

Yiddish Word of the Week

Have you ever noticed that the Yiddish language is full of words that you couldn’t normally get away with in polite society?  For example, you wouldn’t walk around the office speaking in an amplified voice using the word, “fucked” to describe persons or events.  That’s right, Prattle readers, there is an even better word than fuck!

You could get away with the Yiddish equivalent because even if some delicate blossom waggled a finger or raised an eyebrow at you, the fact is, the American workplace has become so terminally politically correct that no one who wanted to keep his job would dare to question usage of a word that did not sound like it was English.  (Wouldn’t wanna offend the foreigners overrunning the country, dont’cha know? )

So the next time you find that you would like to express your opinion in a non-politically correct manner, just use a Yiddish word such as ”Fakakt,” \Fa’ cocked’\  which essentially means (in the vernacular, that is) fucked up.  As in, the American economy has been mismanaged and has become so systemically corrupt for the past 50 years that is it 100% irrevocably fakakt.

Learn it. Know it. Use it. Love it. Until next week, goys & gals, practice your Yiddish for a more fun-filled week!

Minute Movie Review Corner

Ironclad

During the dumbassery of King John back in merry old England, Brother Thomas -along with a gaggle of lesser intestinally fortified brethren- commits treason, kicks ass, takes names and breaks his vow of chastity all for the greater good of church and state.  This flick is a veritable CGI wet dream chock full of gore galore and bone crunching blows so realistic you can almost feel the arterial spray and chunks of brain hit you full in the face. No complaints except this movie should have been retitled to something more apt, such as “Templar Van Damme” or “Die Hard: The Templar Version.”

 

Black Death

Dateline Europe Middle Ages. No one is spared from the scourge of the plague. Meanwhile, a group of god-fearing mercenaries commissioned by an Abbey and led by a teenage monk travel into the depths of the mysterious forest to, well, that part wasn’t really all that clear.  Doesn’t matter, tho, because this movie is a cross between Centurion, Ironclad and Excalibir. When the mercenaries end up in a remote village whose inhabitants are plague-free, their eventual conflict with each other becomes a medieval battle royale over whose god’s dick is bigger. Noteworthy parts include an Apocalypse Now-like prisoner cage in freezing cold water and an exceptional drawing/quartering scene involving Sean “Eddard Stark” Bean.
 

The Conspirator

 Lincoln has been assassinated; Booth has since been found and shot to death, and yet someone has to pay for the crime in order for the American sheeple to be satisfied. Enter poor Mary Surrat.  Mary is a mild-mannered, god-fearing widow with two adult children just trying to survive by renting out rooms in her home to transients.  Meanwhile, her son, John, is caught up in a cauldron of hate for the North and associating with other post-adolescent malcontents. Mary Surrat was the original victim sacrificed by the civil war era federal government in the name of political expediency over due process of law. Don’t miss this most excellent account of how the State can crush the individual when it suits it to regardless of any alleged rights contained in the Constitution. History has repeated itself during our own time as a result of the destruction of the Twin Towers.

Winter in Wartime

(Disclaimer:  Obligatory foreign flick offering). Michiel is a bored teenager who spends his time riding his bicycle and otherwise stirring up shit with his neighbor in Nazi-occupied Holland during WWII.  He unwittingly becomes part of the anti-war underground when his friend’s older brother asks him to pass a note to another friend in the village.  When Michiel is unable to get the message to the contact, he reluctantly opens the note only to discover the location of an injured RAF pilot barely older than himself hiding in the woods from the Krauts. Meanwhile, all is not as it seems with his father and favorite uncle, Ben. In the end, Michiel learns exactly who he is.

Prattle Encore | Ten Personalities You Encounter at the Gym

[Originally published August 1, 2010]

10.  The Germ-A-Phobe

The Germ-a-phobe is most comfortable in his own home where his furniture is encased in plastic, and, the home itself is inside of a bacteria-free dome.  His preferred attire is a haz-mat suit with its own  self-contained oxygen supply (pictured above) but, nonetheless, is willing to pay for membership to a gym for the sake of appearing normal.  Once inside the gym, he will only touch the equipment with paper towels and mists himself (and the equipment) often with his own bottle of customized, industrial strength anti-bacterial spray.   (Latex gloves would be too obvious.)  The Germ-a-phobe will never, under any circumstances, ever use the restroom while at the gym.

Annoyance Factor:  1.5

9.  Crotchety Great-Grandfather Time

Grandpa Time has absolutely nothing to do and all day to do it, and, therefore, does not give a damn that you are having to wait for him to take his sweet time with any of the equipment.  His favorite activity is to arrive during peak usage, then determine what the most popular fixed weight apparatus is in the gym, and, then endeavors to ensure that 6 repetitions equals 90 minutes worth of time as he will have to nap in between reps. Watch out for the drool on the pads of the equipment.

Annoyance Factor:  3

8.  Business Casual Bob

Bob is usually in his middle 50s to early 60s, and, would prefer to be teeing off at his private country club with the rest of the elites if not for having lost his job.  You see, Bob is a dumbass and somehow managed to have his own cushy executive position outsourced, and now, the only recreation that he can afford is a membership at the same gym the little people use.   Bob, however, continues to dress as if he were on the greens at Pebble Beach right down to his spiked sole saddle shoes.

Bob usually sweats excessively, but the unsightly stains that accumulate under the arm pits of his pink golf shirt are nothing compared to the sweat that drips off him profusely in literal puddles onto the floor on either side of the trainer. If you happen to be using the trainer next to him, be sure to wear face shields and splash gear.  Maybe the Germ-a-phobe will have extras you can borrow.

Annoyance Factor:  5

7.  The Grunter

The Grunter likes to let everyone in the room (and the building) know that he is working out with extra gusto.  His favorite piece of equipment is the bench press which he enjoys loading up with excessive weight.  This in turn enables him to moan/groan/grunt without appearing to be deliberately doing so. The Grunter is equally loud while on the toilet in the restroom or refilling his water bottle from the cooler.

Annoyance Factor:  6

6.   The Cell Phone Yakker

The Cell Phone Yakker is almost always female, although there are exceptions. Her preferred equipment is the treadmill as it will enable her to maximize her annoyance factor to the highest number of people in close proximity.  She typically spends anywhere between 90 minutes and 2 hours on the phone while casually strolling along on the treadmill usually in white knee socks. (Because her stiletto heeled flip flops aren’t optimum equipment for this kind of leg work.)

Try to avoid using any equipment in the same room as the Yakker, but if  that’s not possible, then wear noise-canceling ear plugs because if you have to overhear her conversations, you will suddenly be overcome with an uncontrollable urge to drown yourself in Bob’s puddles of sweat.

Annoyance Factor:  8

5.   The Sweat Hog

The Sweat Hog’s preferred environment is the basketball court because it allows him to remove his shirt without being told by staff to put it back on. In addition to a glandular problem that causes profuse sweating, he is approximately 35 – 55 lbs. over weight and prefers wearing ill-fitting clothing that emphasizes the fact that he is wearing a bikini thong.

He also exhibits extraordinary signs of pendulous bitch tits and excessive hair growth, particularly on the back & shoulder region. Because women & small children have been known to run screaming in the opposite direction  and, some men have been rendered instantaneously blind upon seeing him, I have had to crop the Sweat Hog’s image for your protection.  The Sweat Hog is almost always the Cell Phone Yakker’s husband and/or Crotchety, Great Grand-Father Time’s son-in-law.

Annoyance Factor:   2  (Provided that you don’t have to shoot hoops with or see him.)

4.  The Social Moth

Also known as the Popped Collar Douchebag, the Social Moth’s entire reason for existence is to wear neon/brightly colored golf shirts to the gym. That he appears to be conversing with you is an illusion because he is there only to admire himself (and his haircut) in the full-length mirrors. If you value your sanity, you will avoid this boorish personality wherever and whenever possible.  Also, please note that the Moth’s father is usually Business Casual Bob.

Annoyance Factor:  7

3.  The Perfumed Whore of Babylon

The Perfumed Whore of Babylon is almost always married to Business Casual Bob. Although she is the same age as Bob, she still dresses like a Flashdash refugee in color coordinated, tight spandex with leg warmers, and, may or may not be carrying an extra 40 to 50 pounds of extra weight.

The most distinguishing characteristic is the Whore’s proclivity to marinate in a particularly strong, designer perfume.  Those with healthy upper respiratory systems have been known to become overwhelmed by the noxious fumes emanating from the Whore while she exercises created by the chemical reaction of sweat mixing with the perfume.

Warning:  There is a danger of becoming rendered into anaphylactic shock upon having entered the same room where the Whore is so try to avoid her at all costs.  If you encounter this personality, unfortunately, you will have to exit the building immediately as there is no other way to escape from the effluvium.

Annoyance Factor:  10

2.  The Clones

The Clones are a primitive species of human from the 1970s era when it was considered socially acceptable for heterosexual couples to dress in matching clothing. For reasons unknown to scientists, the Clones have never been able to move on from that time period. They typically dress in matching tee shirts and gym shorts with cutesy sayings. The female has been known to wear shorts or full length sweats with the word “Juicy” embroidered across the ass, and, the male usually wears a baseball cap backwards with the words, Old Guyz Rule across the crown.

For the most part, the Clones are harmless, however, your mileage may vary.

Annoyance Factor: 2

1.  The Expert

The Expert enjoys instructing others how to use body building equipment regardless of whether he was asked for help. He will typically scope out a mildly overweight (and outwardly insecure) female and proceed to surreptitiously follow her around the gym while making casual, off-hand suggestions as to how many reps and how much weight she should be using during her workout routine.

The Expert is a semi-charismatic personality with self-esteem issues of his own and so is not very aggressive, however, his inclination to offer unsolicited opinions usually works against him. The Social Moth and The Expert are almost always mortal enemies.

Annoyance Factor:  9

©2010 Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Temporarily Gone Offline

Dear Prattle Readers:

Prattle has been temporarily suspended til further notice.  Please direct all questions & comments using the contact form found on this blog.  Thanks for your attention to this matter.

PF 

 

 

Happy Memorial Day

Semper Fi.  R.I.P.

Operation Iraqi Freedom:  4,772 casualties

Operation Enduring Freedom:  2,482 casualties

Bottle of Blog | Profiles in Cloddiness

Regardless of whether you pay for commercial hosting or you prefer the freebie, I think it’s safe to say that even the most casual blogger puts a fair amount of effort into his or her own blog.  So then if that is accurate, then why the hell doesn’t anyone leave any QUALITY commentary?

After spending well over a decade in the digital trenches, I think I have a few theories as to why you may just be talking to yourself in a blogger’s echo chamber of sorts instead of generating any kind of substantive interest.

Note here that I’m defining interest as the quantity & quality of comments as to your material.  I am not talking about the number of followers or how many people have elected to receive email notification of new content.  Just because you may have hundreds of followers doesn’t mean that they are religiously reading your blog.

While there is no shortage of didacticisms on the web regarding how to entice readers into commenting, I don’t believe that it is about writing “compelling” material.  Sure, that’s part of the appeal, but to rely on it exclusively assumes that the reason you aren’t generating any quality commentary (if at all) is because your content sucks.

Call me prejudiced, but I disagree.

Big time.

Case in point:  This blog is not compartmentalized into any kind of specific content, like say, someone who blogs about mullets.  On these pages is a goodly amount of information on topics ranging from soup-to-nuts.  The subject matter is staggering, even if I do say so myself. There is literally something for everyone here, assuming the audience’s eyeballs are attached to a brain with some EEG activity going on. But do you want to know what the most popular topics are in terms of search words that led Internet users to this space?

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but the top search words with thousands of hits include the following:

Hell

Whore

Fatass

Fat people

Really fat people

This is the sum total interest in a blog that has a #2 page ranking with Google.

Puts into perspective for you the level that the average Internet user is on, doesn’t it? No wonder the History Channel has abandoned history- themed programming in favor of white trash television in the prime time slot.

While Prattle has received some ongoing thoughtful and astute discourse, it is only because the people who left it are predominantly fellow bloggers I’ve become acquainted with. People in the same boat I’m in. Writers in search of a committed audience. The same blogger’s echo chamber referenced above.

As far as random passersby, I’ve had exactly one intelligent reply left by an anonymous netizen. Other commentary I’ve received from incognitos both on this blog and elsewhere has fallen strictly into the category of gratuitous self-promotion.  In other words, leaving a parting shot that has nothing whatsoever to do with the topic being responded to.

My comment policy affords a very wide latitude in that I will allow for pretty much anyone’s opinion provided that the comment has the potential to lead to wider discussion. In fact, I have been known to approve comments that are boorish, sarcastic & completely devoid of any critical thought.  Even if it disagrees with my premise, so long as the comment in question is not of a trolling, spamming, ad hominem attack or of an overly self-promotional nature, I will still approve it.

But unfortunately, when others do bother to comment, and I haven’t previously made their acquaintance, the resulting remark is one that attempts to shanghai readers to the person’s own blog.

The gist of the comment looks something like this:

Hey! Look at me! I’m an attention whore! Yayyyy! Visit my blog! Vist my blog!

Just this morning, I deleted two comments left by the same random WordPress chucklehead (not to be confused with a spammer) whose only reason was so that he could hijack the topic in favor of posting a link pointing to his own content.  It is astonishing to me that he even bothered, particularly since it was obvious the comment had to be approved before appearing. I suppose he could have accomplished the same objective had he just done what the Internet tough guy did a few weeks back, but I digress.

Really, the thing that blows my mind the most with regard to commenting is when I guest blog and the site’s owner not only allows a 100% self-promotional comment to my article, but actually thanks the b00b for stopping by!  I’m not saying that it happens all the time, but it does, in fact, occur.  Just goes to show that before you agree to allow your content to be posted elsewhere, it behooves you to find out what the comment-approval policy is, if any.

Live & learn, I guess.

Frankly, I would rather have one, quality comment versus one hundred comments left by self-absorbed attention whores all clamoring to be in the limelight no matter how inappropriate. But that’s just me.

PS:  Notwithstanding the above referenced, I still wouldn’t whore myself out for free to a major publication.

©2009-2011 Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Letting Go of Letting Go

You’ve long since kicked your significant other to the curb, and, almost to your surprise, you’ve hooked up with another sweetie who more than makes up for all the past grief.  But the memories of the drama from the previous relationship not only remain, but are also beginning to subtly creep into your new relationship.

How and why has this happened?

Some would refer to what I’m talking about as “baggage,” and, I think that is an apt description.  We have all experienced it in one form or another.  It is a kind of emotional post-traumatic stress disorder.  But wait a sec.  You may be telling yourself that you should be over it, and, your new honey should make you forget about it.  But this is not necessarily the way you will progress.  After all, and let’s face it, every relationship you’ve ever had is an exercise in personal growth.  If it hasn’t been, then you’re doing something wrong. Mileage can and does vary from person-to-person, but letting go of the past can be difficult, especially if a relationship was problematic.

Now I’m not a shrink, although I sometimes cover like-material on this site, but regardless of how extraordinary your new love may be, there is no getting around the fact that no two affairs of the heart are ever the same.  This doesn’t necessarily mean that you love your new beau any less, or that s/he is any less significant to you.  It simply means that your needs & wants may have undergone a recalibration since the last time you were romantically involved.

In a previous relationship, you may have thought that if you acted in a certain manner that it would be enough to make love last.  And while you probably didn’t seek to change the other person, you would be a liar if you said that you didn’t want your time & effort to be reciprocated.  The bottom line is that people affect each other differently.  Sometimes for better, sometimes for worse.  It all depends on the individual’s tendency to absorb the lesson. (Hey, we all have our own, personal learning curves.)

In a new relationship, you will most likely still wrestle from time-to-time to unlearn unhealthy past behaviors and otherwise endeavor to deactivate the “hot buttons” an ex installed.  Eventually it will get better over time if you work at it. Additionally, being involved with someone who is vested in the relationship and doesn’t have issues expressing love, support & encouragement will certainly go a long way.  But you should also realize that no matter how amazing this new relationship may be, it will never be identical to a previous one, nor should it be.

I’m not saying that your passion is any less, or that your connection is anything short of exceptional–nay–what I am saying is that given your experiences, expectations & behaviors have probably been adjusted & amended accordingly.  If you’re coming out of a negative relationship (and isn’t that the whole reason why you’re reading this article), then you already implicitly know that the dynamics are very different with a new person.  And if you don’t know or haven’t noticed, then maybe you’re just unconsciously repeating the same fact patterns of the old relationship.  If that is the case, then you’re in for another negative experience, in my opinion. Whatever you do, don’t walk down the aisle or become co-tenants on the same mortgage because that is a recipe for disaster. (Don’t laugh some people are actually foolish enough to do both.)

Regardless of what the situation may be, the fact remains that as long as you continue to involve yourself with the same kind of personality and repeat the same patterns, time after time, you will probably never break the chain of dysfunction. Maybe you’re OK with that because you don’t want the relationship as much as you want the lifestyle that combining incomes will afford. But if you’re not (and I hope that is the case) then you would do well, as you go along,  to strive to acknowledge and accept that stumbling over all the same obstacles erected by former romantic alliances is a part of the human experience.  And as long as you recognize that these psychological speed bumps exist, simple awareness can go a long way to help neutralize the harmful effects of emotional baggage on a fresh relationship.

©2009-2011 Peyton Farquhar and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Unpaid Blogging | Valuable Exposure or Digital Serfdom?

Serfs: They obey.

As a blogger, you may be peripherally aware of the lawsuit filed this past April by freelancer Jon Tasini on behalf of unpaid bloggers at The Huffington Post.  Tasini is best known for his other suit filed against the New York Times that gives paid freelance writers the right to be paid for their content when the NY Times puts their work into a database like Lexis Nexis. But the gist of the lawsuit against HuffPo says that the content provided by unpaid bloggers is worth at least $105 million and that the publication ought to pay them that amount.

For sake of brevity, and because your ADD would not allow you to follow along, I’m not going to get into the legal causes of action here contained in the suit, so let me just pose a simple question instead–

Given that HuffPo sold out to AOL for $300 million, do you, as a blogger, think that those other bloggers ought to have been paid for helping to build the value of the site sufficient to make it attractive to be sold for that amount?

Regardless of the reasons why anyone would agree to work for free for such a large publication thereby rendering himself a digital serf in the process,  it’s a fair question.

Personally, I think bloggers were snookered, which is essentially what Tasini’s lawsuit alleges.  As an unpaid blogger, it goes without saying that I want my content to be exposed to as many eyeballs as possible just to help market my writing ability.  And while publication of my content on a major publication such as HuffPo seems like it would be a means to accomplishing that end, the fact remains that it probably wouldn’t have occurred to me that the site’s owner would cash out for millions.

But I can tell you this much –if I had, in fact, contributed free content, only to later find out that the site had been sold, then I would have been a tad disgruntled about it.  Case in point: I was recently interviewed by a well known writer from the Washington Post for material that I have previously covered here on Prattle, but I was never under the impression that my input was going to be used for any other reason than the Post writer’s one-time article about the subject matter. In short, I knew exactly what I was getting into. The only agreed upon compensation was an honorable mention in the article, but it remains to be seen as to whether this level of exposure will help my writing career. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t.  In either case, my feedback didn’t go towards building the WP brand name.

As to the unpaid bloggers at HuffPo, since Arianna Huffington is a self-identified progressive, you’d think that she would have at least had the common decency to share some of the ad revenue that was generated as a result of visits to the site. She had me pretty convinced she wasn’t just about the greenbacks based on the Move Your Money Project, alone.  But talking the talk does not necessarily mean alleged progressives will walk the walk.  See also the Obama Administration & Democratic Party that has so far proven to be every bit as big of a tool for their criminal friends on Wall Street as the former administration was.

Duplicitous much?

So maybe the compelling question here isn’t so much one of deceptive business practices (as alleged in the HuffPo suit) as much as it is an ethical one.  Essentially, the unpaid bloggers were partners that contributed valuable content that in turn, helped build the brand.  Without the free content contributors, I strongly suspect that HuffPo would have been just another partisan politics-flavored blog along the lines of Crooks & Liars and Fire Dog Lake. The blogger content featured on those blogs aren’t paid either, but then again, neither cashed out to a member of the corporately consolidated media for a multi-million dollar deal.

Which brings me to another well-known, progressive blog.  Daily Kos was big long before HuffPo came along, but the only reason why it hasn’t had the same fate as HuffPo is because “kos” himself, Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, didn’t sell out to a corporate entity for big bucks the way Adrianna did.  And no wonder –with 2 million unique visitors per month and 300,000 registered users, he didn’t have to.  The ad revenue alone pays his bills and then some.  But that’s not the same as selling out and screwing over the contributing free bloggers in the process.  Zuniga merely uses the kos name brand to pimp his book(s) and to otherwise showcase his writing ability.

©2009-2011 Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Blog Revenue Generation

So there you are with your very own spot in the ethernet.  When you began, your blog wasn’t much, just a simple electronic presence on the web with which to amuse yourself.

Eventually, you picked up a few followers, here & there, partially as a result of  the half-assed marketing you did on social networking sites & such, and the rest from sheer serendipity. Before long, the trickle of casual fans transformed into a torrent.

Now your blog is receiving more daily hits than malicious state governments give to the downtrodden & unemployed in these United States of, by and for the white collar corporate criminals.  You want to cash in on this new-found, digital popularity before all those eyeballs blink, but you’re not sure what the best way to do that is.  Hey, welcome to the club!

Types of Revenue Generation

There are two ways of generating income –active & passively.  The former allows for an electronic tip jar of sorts such as PayPay & Google Checkout, while the latter includes the implementation of adserving applications such as Adsense.  Theoretically, you can use both, but your choice will be determined largely by whether your site is commercially hosted or a freebie, as well as your level of technical savvy.  For our purposes here, let’s assume that your site allows for the usage of Adsense & other javascript based applications.

PayPal (Active)

PayPal is one way for your most avid fans to pay you electronically.  It works exactly like the shopping cart mechanism does on all the big retailer sites.  The only difference is that the buyer (the donator) must have created his own PayPal account. Thereafter, he simply clicks on your donate button, logs into PayPal, and, selects the numerical amount to be deducted from his card. It is a fast, easy and free way for the fan to demonstrate his appreciation for your writing skills without having to reveal his financial information.  On the other hand, PayPal will remove a nominal fee from your bank account for the privilege of using the service.

Google Checkout (Active)

Google Checkout works similar to PayPal in that it allows for an electronic funds transfer (EFT) to take place.  However, when Google removes payment from the buyer’s card, it’s going to be in the form of a bank ACH Transfer. You should know that if you bank with one of the bailed out, too big to fail thieves, such as Wells Fargo, then you will most likely get hit with fees for the privilege, in which case, you are responsible for paying them.

Adserving Apps (Passive)

There are many adserving apps available for the enterprising webmaster, however, I’m only going to mention Google Adsense.  Once you enroll, you can enable text, video & image ads on your site.  Revenue is generated on a per click, or per impression basis.  Since a more in-depth wiki has already been written on the subject matter, you can click here to read more.  The only caveat with regard to Adsense is that you must have a javascript enabled blog in order for this feature to work.  The free version of WordPress does not have it, but Blogspot, however, does.

In either case, whichever (or both) active or passive trickle down economy bin(s) you end up using, successful execution is going to involve a fair amount of due diligencing on your part to help determine which method better suits your financial disposition.

Good luck & happy blogging!

©2009-2011 Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Extreme Couponing: Thrifty or Mentally Ill?

The Freak Show Network’s latest foray into reality TV is about shopaholics -mostly women- that collect enough coupons to buy bulk quantities of food at the supermarket for deeply discounted prices. Now, on the surface, this may sound appealing.  Admittedly, it is pretty cool to rack up a thousand dollar food bill and be able to take it all home for under $100 bucks.

Upon further consideration, I have to say that for anyone who wants extreme couponing to be worth his while, it would be appealing provided that the food was nutritional and worth the time & effort of collecting enough coupons to make it happen.  But the thing is, that is not the case at all. In fact, if you watch the show, then you know that the kind of food these women are bringing home to their families consists exclusively of processed junk food.

Potato chips, sugary cereals & carbonated beverages, flavored water, cookies, candy, cheese spread & frozen dinners equals a nutritious meal only if  you want to be a circus sideshow featured on fattertainment TV.  Hello? Where is the fresh produce?  I don’t see anyone buying anything except foodstuffs with enough fat, sodium & high fructose corn syrup to kill a brontosaurus with heart disease & diabetes several times over. No wonder this country has an obesity epidemic! All the time in the world spent at the gym isn’t going to make up for the fact that you’re experiencing a slow death by eating fast food.

Making off with a thousand dollars worth of groceries may seem like you’re getting something for nothing, but not if the food you’re bringing home is devoid of nutrition! But let’s address the reality of the situation here.  Notwithstanding the prospect that eating a junk food diet is the quickest path to having a physique like this, the fact is, all that extreme couponing and subsequent scrambling around to make room for all the shit you bring home afterwards is indicative of mental illness.

Oh yes! Make no mistake. The women and their families featured on the show are not only obese & unemployed, but they’re also mentally ill.  Let me count the pathologies for you:

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

By their own admission, the women spend ungodly amounts of time hunting down and printing coupons from the web.  In fact, if all the money spent on buying newspapers for the necessary coupons and ink to print them out from the Internet were factored in, I strongly suspect that the alleged great savings from couponing would not be so great.

Delusions of Grandeur & Addiction

Many of the women refer to themselves as “divas” and otherwise freely admit to a “rush” of adrenaline each time they make off with thousands of dollars worth of groceries. Now I’m not a shrink, but any time you start thinking of yourself in terms of deification, or you get a “rush” from some activity (not associated with physical exercise) then it’s a pretty safe bet you’re experiencing an unhealthy addiction.

Hoarding

In case after case, a significant amount of time is spent making room for and constructing shelves in the home for the multiple jars of condiments, boxes of cereal, sports drinks and other foodstuffs.  Now lest you think I’m being too harsh, let’s consider for a moment something overlooked on the show.  Let me ask you –When the HELL was the last time you ate 35 jars of mustard? Or 85 boxes of cereal? Or drank 75 cases of soda?

Anyone? Anyone at all?

The bottom line is that unless you’re donating the crap you know you won’t use to a soup kitchen or some other charity to help stock the increasingly stressed food pantries in this country due to the Second Great Depression, you don’t need to turn your living space into a general store and otherwise be storing 85 boxes of cereal or any other processed shit in bulk quantity that you won’t be eating in this lifetime or any other. Your time would be better spent on other endeavors besides the idiotic stockpiling of unhealthy foods and extreme hoarding.

©2009-2011 Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Joomla!

What Is It

Joomla! is a cloud-based, content management platform that is used to publish to the world wide web. It is free open source software (FOSS), which simply means that developers can tweak the code to suit their needs without fear of litigation for doing so. (cough Microsoft cough.)  FOSS is popular with self-starters and other technically inclined people who tend to use other open source products such as Linux and Open Office.  (Yours truly uses all of the above.)

According to the New York state non-profit group, Open Source Matters, Inc., the word, “Joomla” is a Swahili word meaning “all together,” or “as a whole.”  It embodies the idea of open source software in that it involves the community, rather than the corporation.

This alone probably explains why FOSS usage is limited to ‘nux geeks & nerds, as opposed to being used in mainstream America.  A sense of united community is diametrically opposed to the financial interests of the plantation owners and their Presidential & Congressional lapdogs currently raping & pillaging the national economy in favor of the uber-wealthy 2% of the population.

How Easy Is It to Use

Since Joomla! is cloud-based computing, there isn’t anything to install to your hard drive. You simply create an account (it’s free), set up the software accordingly, and away you go.  But Joomla! isn’t for everyone.  Depending on your level of technical proficiency, there can be a steep learning curve.

The company recognizes this and has a readily available, veritable plethora of video tutorials, comprehensive documentation, and support from an ever-attentive community of international users, as well as its own techs.  In fact, during the first 24 hours upon having created an account, I contacted tech support twice, and, in each instance, I had a substantive reply to the issue within an 8 hour window. Note here the reply wasn’t just the standard boilerplate, useless, happy horseshit embraced by other companies that take your money and leave you hanging.

You can test drive Joomla! for a 30 day trial period, no strings attached.  At the end of the 30 days, assuming you liked it, you can purchase hosting from Joomla! itself, or bring your own commercial host to the table. As a side note here, Joomla! hosting prices are fairly competitive starting at $4.95/month. Each tier has disk and bandwidth limitations, which, I haven’t seen so much among American owned hosting services, but that is not to say the latter is more cost effective. You may not be limited to bandwidth, but you will, however, get nickel & dimed to death elsewhere for basic services.

Is It For Me

Deciding to choose Joomla! over any other content management system is identical as to whether you use a free blog or  a commercial web hosting service.  First & foremost, it is up to you to assess:

1. Discretionary cash;
2. Your level of tech savvy (or lack thereof);
3. How much time & effort you want to put into the endeavor.

If all you want is a pretty themed site to pimp your pet-sitting business, for example, and you don’t want to spend your free time learning the technological aspects of being a webmaster, then like commercial hosting, Joomla! is definitely not for you.  Of course, this article is but a guide to help bloggers determine fundamental content management needs.  One size does not fit all, and, mileage may, and, usually does, vary.

©2009-2011 Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Peyton Farquhar™ and Prattle On, Boyo™ with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.