I have spent the last 15 hours or so designing a 3d model of a chariot that is driven by a monkey riding a bicycle. It is the final project in one of my classes.
Oh, college.
Matchbox 20
I nominate Matchbox 20’s song How Far We’ve Come as the best song of the last year. Also, I find the video to be on the same level of quality.
Here’s the youtube.
don’t worry, the social ladder is alive and well.
People will pay a premium for what they perceive to be superior, regardless of improved performance, extra functionality, etc. Not only that, but they will perceive what they are buying to be superior – even if evidence supports otherwise. Even if an unbiased source rates a Hyundai as a better all-around car than a Bentley, the wealthy will still prefer the latter and defend its superiority.
Logical people would search for the best option, most efficient, cheapest, longest-lasting, overall best product – regardless of perception or price. But we, the consumer generation, are hardly logical – it’s all about what you’re seen with and what the perception is of your possesions. The hope that we live in a time where the things we own do not own us is a naive one – Apple is not a brand of consumer electronics, it is a lifestyle. Blu ray players, HDTVs – all status symbols, even though the normal person cannot tell the difference (or even understand what the numbers mean) between 480i, 720p, 1080i/p – from the distance in a living room or home setting that they’d be watching it at. But I’ll be damned if I don’t want that higher resolution, that larger external harddrive, the bigger monitor, more megapixels per inch per camera (even at 12″ by 18″, a 3mp camera will take just as good as a picture as a 6mp camera, but everyday consumers demand at least 7 or 8 megapixels to take pictures for 4×6 photo frames). We are taught to want more, that more is always better. We are told that we should want more than we can afford, that we should take outrageous loans to finance our expensive homes, regardless of if we’ll ever be able to pay them back. Run up credit cards, mortgages, whatever – it’s all free money. And this is what our economy is resting on – the hope of the middle class that they can spend like the rich and never have to come to terms with their paycheck.
Music
Being on a college campus with an interconnected high-speed unmonitored network between the residence halls, it isn’t all that difficult to find new types of music – which is really a hobby of mine. I enjoy branching out and discovering new genres, bands, styles – not just ‘looking for whatever new indie band that I can brag about that I know and no one else does,’ because people with that type of motivation shouldn’t be allowed in everyday conversations. Just trying to broaden my horizons, since music is truly the one human concept that we all ascribe to, and nothing can connect us together quite so well.
But anyway, of all the various genres I now actively seek out, I’m having quite a trouble finding some very tribal-sounding music, and perhaps it’s because I don’t know what genre it would fall under. Just some drums and chanting, bringing to mind visions of campfires and native dances. The band Konono No1 is pretty close to this, with some odd electric sounds mixed in, but listening to them late at night is fairly relaxing. I figure there must be some Native American music which falls under this category, and so I shall continue my search. It’d be nice to someday just travel round to different countries and hear local bands and enjoy the different music various cultures have to offer.
Also, I heard a cover of Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise yesterday sung entirely in Korean. It wasn’t half bad.
