I Had A Random Thought...

[Akidu]

(About musicians/music on youtube. )

 

After reading this blog post about upcoming youtube changes I feel so bummed.

It seems like all the awesome elements of the site are slowly being removed and replaced with old style media stuff. With all the conditions proposed to put on the artist (5 year contract, must upload all music etc) it seems to be re-establishing the old gate keeper monopoly that was the record industry.

It will be such a shame if a few single companies get a strangle hold on the internets musicians.

I wonder if this period will be looked on in the future as a wild west type scenario where people made careers out of nowhere before everything settled back into a more controlled system. 

[Badfinger]

It's not a remake, it's a sequel, as far as I know. Although it occurs to me it's probably not a sequel.

Also fuck all y'all! Ghostbusters 4 Lyfe!!

 

Ghostbusters 4 Lyfe crew reppin. The original is a comedy classic, and Jake's entire argument against 2 seems to be that they steer the Statue of Liberty with an NES Advantage. Frankly, that's a point in its favor. It's fine.

 

It's been billed as a "reboot". The reason I'm against it is these ladies in particular. I'm ambivalent about Kristen Wiig, but I find Melissa McCarthy dreadfully unfunny. Casting these women screams formulaic, familiar comedy with a wrapper you're familiar with to me.

[N1njaSquirrel]

i use "also" way too much.

Also who has android lollipop? My phone just updated and now it's a strange ugly beast that doesn't work like it used to.

[Griddlelol]

The reason I'm against it is these ladies in particular. 

 

I don't think I've seen any of them in any thing, so who they are doesn't bother me in the slightest. It's more than they're making a terribly unfunny movie...again. It's probably why they couldn't get anyone famous to do it. 

 

Ok, I'll stop now. I just had to let my Ghostbusters hate out somewhere.

[Bjorn]

I don't think I've seen any of them in any thing, so who they are doesn't bother me in the slightest. It's more than they're making a terribly unfunny movie...again. It's probably why they couldn't get anyone famous to do it. 

 

Ok, I'll stop now. I just had to let my Ghostbusters hate out somewhere.

 

I'm sorry that you hate beautiful things. It must hurt so much to be pained by joy and wonder. It makes my heart ache for you and all the other sad jackasses complaining about Ghostbusters on the Internet.

 

 

 

It's morning and I haven't had my first cup of coffee, something about that post made me irrationally angry and grouchy.

[SuperBiasedMan]

Does anyone else ever feel like far too much speculation goes into the ramp up for this stuff? The movie is not out yet, we can't possibly know how good or bad it will be. Every creative venture is a gamble where you pull together as best you can and hope it comes out well the other end.

Even when I'm looking forward to something (ie. Transistor) I know that my response to it is never going to be predictable (ie. Transistor). It feels like hype is literally the only point of any of this discussion, and even though hype is a terrible indicator of quality people buy in a lot.

I feel like I might be coming off as a bit elitist or condescending here. I'm not claiming I choose to abstain. I just don't seem to have a compulsion to digest early marketing material. Admittedly I'm also a person that never plays games at launch and sometimes fails to see movies I'm interested in while they're at the cinema because I just didn't get round to it. But it's just weird to me that people generally don't seem conflicted about it? Maybe it's selective memory here but a lot of people do buy into the discussion every time.

[Badfinger]

I don't think I've seen any of them in any thing, so who they are doesn't bother me in the slightest. It's more than they're making a terribly unfunny movie...again. It's probably why they couldn't get anyone famous to do it. 

 

Ok, I'll stop now. I just had to let my Ghostbusters hate out somewhere.

 

They are pretty famous, at least en los Estados Unidos over here. Network TV, SNL, etc. The announced cast and crew so far is basically the same as made Bridesmaids, which is the lady version of The Hangover. Melissa McCarthy got nominated for Best Supporting Actress. They have the famous part. They don't have the comedy I enjoy, for instance Ghostbusters, part.

[Griddlelol]

 

I'm sorry that you hate beautiful things. It must hurt so much to be pained by joy and wonder. It makes my heart ache for you and all the other sad jackasses complaining about Ghostbusters on the Internet.

 

 

 

It's morning and I haven't had my first cup of coffee, something about that post made me irrationally angry and grouchy.

 

I'm sorry, I'm in the mood for winding up people for no reason today. Especially Ghostbusters fans.

 

They are pretty famous, at least en los Estados Unidos over here. Network TV, SNL, etc. The announced cast and crew so far is basically the same as made Bridesmaids, which is the lady version of The Hangover. Melissa McCarthy got nominated for Best Supporting Actress. They have the famous part. They don't have the comedy I enjoy, for instance Ghostbusters, part.

 

Yeah, I've never seen any of those things, probably because they're mainly American. The idea of watching a gender swapped "The Hangover" fills me with even more disgust than watching a gender swapped Ghostbusters. Ghostbusters is not my thing, but The Hangover caused me to walk out of the cinema. 

 

I just just being obnoxious anyway!

[Bjorn]

Just thinking they are "gender swapped" movies is really dismissive, which the dismissiveness is what pissed me off with the first post I replied to. It crossed the line from, "fun, joshing about something some people do/don't like" to writing off professional women who have busted their asses to succeed in an area of entertainment that's notoriously dismissive of women (comedy). "They couldn't get anyone famous." Like, oh, you've starred in multiple long running, successful TV shows, plus blockbuster movies? Whatever. You wrote the highest grossing female led comedy movie ever? Oooo, I'm shaking with how impressed I am. You earned a full cast member slot on SNL? Anybody can do that.

The Heat (McCarthy and Sandra Bullock) could be written off as a gender-swapped buddy cop movie, but that would be missing out on what actually makes it good, and the fact that it was a woman led action movie that succeeded. Women are only the protagonists in 15 percent of Hollywood movies. So when someone says, "I don't know who these women are", part of the reason for that is that women get a tiny fraction of the chance to lead major movies that men do. Plus the women writing and starring in these movies don't necessarily want to have to sell their properties as "like that one movie, but with women" but sometimes that's the only way they are getting things greenlit. I would rather see four women helm a big budget, sci-fi or supernatural superhero movie that was original. But that's so incredibly unlikely to happen. So we have to take Ghostbusters, and hope that it's good.

[Patrick R]

Also, Bridesmaids is not like the Hangover.

[Griddlelol]

I apologise. It was never meant to come across like that. And probably should have considered the ramifications of being dismissive to what is potentially a giant leap forward. I think it's fine I've never heard of them. They've been in a bunch of stuff I'd never watch - comedy movies and American network TV.

I was only interested in making fun of ghostbusters' popularity.

[Twig]

Futurama sucks.

[Badfinger]

Also, Bridesmaids is not like the Hangover.

 

Yes it is.

[Patrick R]

STALEMATE.

[Dewar]

I guess we'll all just have to watch it and find out.

[clyde]

Does anyone else ever feel like far too much speculation goes into the ramp up for this stuff? The movie is not out yet, we can't possibly know how good or bad it will be. Every creative venture is a gamble where you pull together as best you can and hope it comes out well the other end.

Even when I'm looking forward to something (ie. Transistor) I know that my response to it is never going to be predictable (ie. Transistor). It feels like hype is literally the only point of any of this discussion, and even though hype is a terrible indicator of quality people buy in a lot.

I feel like I might be coming off as a bit elitist or condescending here. I'm not claiming I choose to abstain. I just don't seem to have a compulsion to digest early marketing material. Admittedly I'm also a person that never plays games at launch and sometimes fails to see movies I'm interested in while they're at the cinema because I just didn't get round to it. But it's just weird to me that people generally don't seem conflicted about it? Maybe it's selective memory here but a lot of people do buy into the discussion every time.

It takes a lot of effort to start a discussion. That's kinda why the marketing exists. Billions of dollars are being spent to influence which subjects are currently being discussed by your peers. In order for anyone to have anything to say about something, they have to feel that they have some information on it. Seeing a poster on the screen of a television within the newspaper ad of an electronics-store or a PR announcement in your feed is enough to have an opinion so that the brand can propagate through casual discussion, and it is a much lower investment of effort than digging into the shit-storm of content being produced hourly.

That's why it is nice when you can find people who go to the effort of digging through the shit-storm and not being completely demotivated by all the stuff that poorly mimics it in uninteresting ways. Finding other people with whom to discuss the resulting jewels is another obstacle.

In other words, substantial discussion doesn't typically occur by default, you have to seek it out or start and maintain it.

[Reyturner]

My high school programming teacher had a thing about superfluous use of the word "like".  Unless you were actually saying "I like this", he would always interrupt by saying "like? Like? LIKE?" several times.  Even now I can occasionally hear his voice whenever I say "like".

[jennegatron]

The most recent This American Life about internet comments talked about the use of "like" as well as "vocal fry" as something that old people complain about in regards to young women's speaking patterns, even though men do (or did in this case) it too, things like the "Valley Girl" speech pattern is pinned on women.

 

So when I hear a high school STEM teacher harping on a vocal pattern most often attributed to women, it's just another thing I think about that keeps women out of those disciplines.  I'm sure he was just a dude who thought he would bully it out of people and they would speak "normal" and sound like grownups, but I bet more than a few people just stopped talking in class to avoid being belittled.

[Architecture]

The newer usage of the word like actually serves a purpose that no other word in the English language can. It's a way to approximate a qualitative or quantitative statement while still hedging your bets.

 

"There were like 30 people there" is more concise than saying "I believe there were approximately 30 people there, but I can't be sure."

[SecretAsianMan]

The most recent This American Life about internet comments talked about the use of "like" as well as "vocal fry" as something that old people complain about in regards to young women's speaking patterns, even though men do (or did in this case) it too, things like the "Valley Girl" speech pattern is pinned on women.

 

So when I hear a high school STEM teacher harping on a vocal pattern most often attributed to women, it's just another thing I think about that keeps women out of those disciplines.  I'm sure he was just a dude who thought he would bully it out of people and they would speak "normal" and sound like grownups, but I bet more than a few people just stopped talking in class to avoid being belittled.

 

I'm not sure if you're talking about my CS teacher specifically, but I can say that with him it was certainly never about gender.  He didn't care who said it, it was just a pet peeve of his.  I was his aide one year and he did to me all the time.  And he always joked about it in a way that clearly said he wasn't serious, he just wanted you to be aware that it was a silly thing.  I don't think it ever crossed his mind that it was a "girl" thing.

[jennegatron]

I know that if any of my high school teachers were more interested in teasing me over my vocal pattern than listening to me, I would stop talking in that class, and avoid any other class taught by that person, because nothing filled/fills me with more anxiety than being scolded by an authority figure.

 

I'm sure he picked on everyone about it because what else are you going to do as a high school teacher than tease your students. I bet this actually made him charming to a lot of students.

He wanted his students to know it was a silly thing. But silly by whose standards? Why did he (or anyone for that matter) think it is silly? Because it makes you sound like you don't know what you're talking about? Why is that the perception? Is it because of an age thing? Young people talk like that and young people don't know what they're talking about? Young white women talk like that and they don't know what they're talking about?

 

I just think asking the question as to why it's a pet peeve of anyone that I think is something worth thinking about. (This is true of almost all linguistic pet peeves; they're always worth interrogating a little bit.) I don't think that he was actively making this a gender thing. But I can't help but see that that criticism (on the whole) is most often lobbed at young women. That's all.

 

Teachers have a lot of impact over their students lives and those tiny little things that may seem innocuous or funny to them can really impact kids for the rest of their lives.

[SecretAsianMan]

It's definitely a fair question to ask.  I just felt the need to defend my specific case since I'm the one who brought up my teacher in the first place.  I'm pretty sure if you said something to him he wouldn't keep doing it and he definitely still listened to what you were saying.  I exaggerated the amount he actually did it.  Mostly it's just a thing I remembered because I took 3 classes he taught, one of which I was the only student.

 

All that aside, I do understand your point.  I'd personally never associated use of the word "like" with just women because by the time I was in high school it was a pretty prevalent part of everyone's speech.  But now that I think about it I can see the link to the idea of the 'valley girl' and the association that comes with it.  It is pretty unfortunate that a thing so many people do would be attributed to women when seen as a negative.

[Twig]

(I'm going off on a tangent here, leaving the topic of making fun of "young white girl" talk.) All of that's definitely valid! But the complete opposite is true for me. The teachers I found the easiest to relate to were those who were willing to call me out on dumb shit I did with a smile on their face. It made them feel more human, I dunno. Without them, I wouldn't have had any desire to talk to any of my teachers about anything in high school. Probably because that's very much my attitude in life. Self-deprecating humor is my forte. The teachers I hated most were those who would never criticize me, or if they did, would only do it when I was in trouble (which wasn't really all that often, but happened enough anyway when my shirt was untucked or whatever...)

[SuperBiasedMan]

Also worth pointing out that you could say that you think people should be more assertive and you might mean all people but it doesn't affect all people in the same way given their individual social conditioning.

[jennegatron]

I think teasing your students requires a very sensitive barometer on who can take it and who can't, and all my favorite teachers had that.

 

Thank y'all for being so great. These forums are a perpetual delight.