Last Time out.....
"In any case the contest is about who controls what. The people in cloudland want to maximize revenue. They don't want you using hacked software, or pirated media and if you are correspondingly that much more stupid as a result it is small price to pay to keep the servants down. You must obey!
There's a paradox here - one that is not new. As an employer it is in your interest to keep workers healthy, as you would any livestock, and to teach them basic rudimentary skills in math and writing- but the more you teach them the greater becomes the possibility that they will escape your control, so most try to arrive at some sort of happy medium."
---- That's the disgruntled viewpoint. I recall one time being on the Island of Jamaica and speaking with a man about the colonial experience. He did not have fond memories of British rule and his biggest complaint was "Don't you see? They kept us stupid to prevent us from taking control of our own lives."
Does that sound familiar?
You would think that improving the quality of life, educationally and every other way would be a no brainer - but instead there's that cheap fear that someone out there is going to have it easier then us.
And it is not rare to find a CEO in America wishing he had a better educated workforce. A healthy population, an educated population - these are things most agree to be good - the question is who will pay for them? I'm not here to attempt to answer them. Basically, after discovering the ways and means of the information age state the Tamlinmediaco's task is to work within those confines- which means that the roles hitherto held to be the responsibility of society must be taken over by the corporation and the corporation consequently must undergo a radical change in it's composition and responsibilities.
To use an increasingly common metaphor the era of the empires is over but the era of government goes on. The Russian empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Chinese Empire, the British Empire, all outlived their usefulness and had to be replaced - the same holds true with the present economic empires, CitiBank et al. - and in time we may begin even to see them in a more positive light - but at present it is enough merely to make them go away.
I try not to write in too academic a style. I read such material and am convinced that it sounds better to the person that writes it then to the reader.
Fortunately I'm not in a contest to write a best seller. There's an adage to the effect that what we may experience at first as tragedy, we can think back on later in comedic terms. The Sanderson's and the Graingfords, eternal feuding neighbors in Mark Twains work, are a good example - if you don't think too hard about the dead kid.
After tragedy and comedy, of course comes the best telling of a story - payday.
Payday is when you are far enough removed from an experience to milk it for all it's worth.
Psychology mirrors the Social environment and vice versa. In science talk ontogenesis mirrors phylogenesis and once again vice versa. What happens to the individual happens to a society. Individuals really are the microcosm, or monad, of human society.
I gave a little hint about what I'm about to talk about when i spoke of the evolution of the corporation. Self proclaimed "futurologists" tend to fall into optimistic or apocalyptic camps but one need not, and ought not, make such intense generalizations.
When we think of community as a desired goal it's worthwhile to consider the kind of community that feels right - preferably one without too many people.
What I am about to speak of goes to the heart of man as homo sapiens - the tool maker. Perhaps telecom brings us together, or perhaps it allows us to remain apart. As we develop ever more complex languages we increasingly limit the number of people with whom we can correspond.
I've mentioned before the so called Coney Island/Theme Park scenario. Coney island, like early movie theatres, was available to the general public, - a subway ride away whereas Theme Parks are intentionally designed so that only persons of a substantial income may visit. It's a form of segregation -based on income instead of race - and it permeates the entire society. We are all free to buy helicopters for weekend jaunts, but as to whether we choose to do so - that's another question.
Where I used to live on Lpng Island was another Jamacia, several in fact, including Jamaica estates and in the twenties, being about ten miles from Manhatten, they were quite affluent. One can still see vague traces of the glory days - Large houses that no one can afford, rotting away - A Boulevard that is six lanes wide with beat up store fronts on either side - and the White Elephant to end all white elephants - Call it the Grand Theatre. (I don't remember the actual name.)
It was built in the heyday of hollywood, one of the Cathedrals of the Common Man, where Joe Average could, for a reasonable fee, dress up and sit down to the finest entertainment America had to offer - right next to the big shots.
Now, of course, the average Joe Average never even sees a big shot in person - there's so few and they guard their privacy
When I went to the Grand it had become a Porno House. It sat something like four thousand people and was filthy. Porno is now big business but in those days it was the raincoat brigade and you'd see on guy in the middle of a hundred seats - they too valued their privacy. If you're familiar with acoustics you know that if you have a large room, virtually empty of people the sound will be very loud and so it was - the breathing of the Gods had nothing on them.
There was a second floor lobby with the red carpets that had long ago seen better days. There were a few girls in casual attire smoking cigarettes - outside the men's bathroom.
But the piece de resistance was the movie screen itself. It was maybe thirty by fifty feet - none of these fifteen foot screens like you see in a multiplex. This was when movies were movies - BIGTIME! When one would thrill to the spectacles years in the making and exploding onto the movie screen.
What you actually saw by the end I will leave to your imagination. But one can think of extreme close ups and what they look like when they are forty feet across.
I would not be so bold as to suggest I have seen Hell. Too many men, seeking sympathy, exaggerate their miseries - but I have seen the end of the world.
In the shopping centers there's Labor Day sales, and Columbus Day sales, and Pre Christmas Sales and January Sales but in the Grand Theatre time stands still. A heavy hippted momma come a shaking and a smiling
And the Horns Blaze out, "Ladies and Gennelmen, Mister Gene Pinney, sanging his latest number one hit record - "Town without Pity."
=Tamlin
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