The Village Idiots

Architecture of Happiness by Alain de Botton

Kevin recommended this to me, and I just finished it. I think the book might be more aptly titled, Architecture of Beauty, as the author talks more about beauty than happiness. Indeed, at the end of the book I feel like de Botton equates “happy” architecture with beautiful architecture. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. What was bad was that he didn’t really clearly articulate his definition of beauty or happiness. (I did like the historical overview of the concept of beauty through history, the reasons our notions of beauty change and the attitude we should have towards beauty.) Read more »

I want to draw the idiots’ attention to one of the best critical reviews I have come across. The review–or, to be more specific, the analysis–is of the Harold Arlen song, “Over the Rainbow,” and it comes from the NPR music series, “What Makes it Great,” a series that explains what makes specific, famous songs so good. (I urge you to check out the review here.) Everyone knows the song, but the commentators, Fred Child and Rob Kapilow, walk the listener through the song–with Kapilow playing the song on the piano while he and Child interject comments. Sometimes Kapilow will repeat a phrase until the point is clear; at other times he will play a phrase in a way one would expect and then quickly play the actual way it was written. The approach is highly effective, and the points made are absolutely clear and compelling–so much so that I want to use the words like “enligtening” and “magical” to describe the review.

Now, how often does that happen with a review of a movie, book, or piece of music? I’d say almost never–certainly not in as vivid and compelling a way as this NPR episode. While I don’t expect reviews to be “magical,” I do expect a better job of helping me appreciate the merits (or lack thereof) of the work in question.

To be fair, I think reviewers have multiple objectives: they want to help viewers determine whether they should see a movie or not (which is not always related to the aesthetic merits of a film) and they want to critically analyze the work (at least some of the reviewers). Complicating matters is the high volume of movies/books/music they must review, as well as the limited words and time to write these reviews. It’s no wonder that reviews don’t leave people with a greater understanding of what makes a work of art great or bad.

Here are some changes I would suggest to deal with the problem:

1. Limit the number of works to review I can hear the critics saying, “How can we do this? We don’t have a choice on the matter?” My response is try a different approach. I believe that the majority of works don’t deserve a lot of time and energy to review. I’m thinking of the mediocre works, the cookie-cutter and copycat type of film. A really short review or even just a rating would be sufficient for these films. These works may not be bad, but they don’t warrant a lot of time and energy. This will allow reviewers to have the time and energy to review the films that deserve it.
2. Select a handful of works that deserve the time. These works would be either really terrific films (certainly those that could be all-time greats) or, perhaps, critically acclaimed films that don’t deserve it.
3. Copy the “What Makes it Great” approach. I’m thinking specifically of the way the NPR commentators use specific examples of the film to make their points. The movie review equivalent would be for reviewers show actual clips of the film and comment on them (similar to what filmmakers did in films like The Celluloid Closet, The Cutting Edge or Visions of Light). Yes, this would take a lot of time, but it could also help people understand what makes a film so great.

Helping the layperson to understand what makes a specific book, movie or piece of music so great is one of the most important roles a critic plays in society. While the suggestions above aren’t easy, I think they would go a long way in making the reviews more valuable.

Larri and I will be going to the Big Island in May for the weekend, and I’m looking for restaurant recommendations, and recommendations of things to do in general.

I recently found a bunch of old VHS cassettes from my college days and thought people might find it interesting. Probably not you guys, but whatever. I’m putting it on YouTube and will probably share some of it here.

Here’s Amy Grant singing Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi” on The Late Show with David Letterman on September 6, 1994.

1. WordPress’s auto-update feature.
2. Symphony X’s The Odyssey.
3. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (the film).
4. Angel hair pasta.
5. Naps.

The NPR website has a page in their book section entitled, “You Must Read This.” Various authors write about a book they frequently recommend to others. I enjoyed reading some of these essays, especially the ones that motivated me to check out the books in question. This thread is for idiots to post anything they feel others should check out, not just books (although, please, do recommend books). Perhaps you’ve tasted the best dessert; read a super illuminating article; seen the greatest movie; used the most fabulous egg beater (do they even make those?)…you get the idea. Here’s one thing that I’d recommend: Read more »

Let’s suppose you win or inherit enough money where you don’t have to work anymore. In fact, you have enough money that you can pretty much do whatever you want with your life. You go to sleep and wake up and you can do whatever you want for the rest of your life. Off the top of your head, list the kinds of things you would do with your time and energy in the remaining years of your life.

There’s a lot of talk about the economy now, and I get tired of the simplistic and ideological nature of these discussions: we need more regulation (government intervention) or we need less (free market). Along those lines, politicians and journalists often talk about our economy as if it is an absolute free-market. That’s why I really loved this Atlantic website article, “Libertarianism is dead…vive le libertarianism”. (I have no idea about the meaning of the title, if I understand the article correctly.) I didn’t fully grasp the more technical aspects of the piece, but I appreciated the way the author talked about the economy, and I liked the point of the article–that we live in a mixed economy and the problems were of a systemic nature; simply adding more regulation or less is a bad way to approach the problem. This is one of the few times I’ve seen someone discuss the economy in a more complex and realistic way.

Hi Fellow Idiots! Saturday, September 27, 2008 is designated as the “Day of Action.” As some of you may know, I participate in Kanu Hawaii and they are advocating for participation on this day (and other days, too, of course!) But Sept. 27 is supposed to spotlight volunteerism and maybe get people more involved in their communities.

Anyway, there are a list of events happening in Hawai’i here: I thought if anyone was interested we could sign up for an event together (or smaller groups of us can sign up for different events) or maybe even create our own event to do that day. Any thoughts? Helpful suggestions?

For the non-Hawai’i Idiots, I’d love to hear what you are doing in your communities, too!

Marc gave me a bunch of books because he felt like giving them away would be better than having them sit on his bookshelf. That inspired me to do the same; and that lead me to the idea of creating a thread where people could post items (not just books) they’re looking or looking to give away, sort of like a village-idiots craig’s list.

So post things you’ve been looking for or things you have that you’d be willing to part with. You could trade for items, or just give them away. Whatever. Hopefully this will be helpful and fun.

This Thursday I volutneered to read aloud a book at Wai’anae Intermediate School. I didn’t really think much about the book I would, figuring that I could easily find something. When I thought about more, I got a little worried. I want to find something really compelling, and, hopefully, something that will inspire someone in the audience to read, too.

My first thought was to read an excerpt from Ender’s Game, but I haven’t read that in a long time, and I would have to find the right passage. If anyone has any recommendations–for a book and a particular passage in the book–let me know. I don’t have much time.

I’ve been unable to find my mp3 player for about six weeks now, and have relegated myself to listening to NPR and sports radio.  It seems as if a show doesn’t go by where someone doesn’t say something about throwing somebody under the bus.  While this often used cliché clearly gets one’s point across, is it time to throw “throw __________ under the bus,” under the bus, and what would be some good alternatives?

In the 2006 issue of Honolulu, several (somewhat) prominent locals wrote short articles about where they grew up. I was surprised at how compelling and, even moving, these short, simple stories were. I could relate to the stories because they were about growing up in Hawai’i, I guess. More than revealing something about the individuals, I thought the stories effectively captured what it was like to live in a particular time in Hawai’i.

I thought it would be cool for the idiots to tell their own stories about where they grew up. (And, yes, I really would like to see the non-Hawai’i people participate in this!)

Hey guys! Is anyone interested in reviving the V-I podcast? Who would like to be involved? Should we keep the same general format or change things up? Any suggestions regarding topics, who you would like to hear from, or who should go head-to-head? Idiots and honorary Idiots, let your voices be heard!

The recent Atlantic Monthly has asked ten historians to name the one hundred most influential Americans. I wanted to see if I could name the top ten and compare it with theirs. Before I start let me tell you how the Atlantic defined “influential–”  Read more »

In an earlier thread (“I-tunes Killed CDs”), I talked about my switch from listening to musi on cds to the computer. However, a new problem has a arisen with this switch. I would like a way to listen to music without having to sit at the computer. What makes this more challenging is that ever since watching An Inconvenient Truth, I don’t like to leave my computer on sleep for long periods of time. That means I have to turn on my computer everytime I want to listen to music. Moreover, if I’m listening in bed, I have to get out of bed, stop the music and shut down the computer before I go to sleep. It has become so inconvenient that I don’t listen to music as much as I would like.  

What I want to do is to be able to have access to this music without having to sit in front of my computer or booting up/shutting down my computer all the time.

So I’m turning to you idiots for some help.

Here’s some possible solutions I’ve been thinking about. Read more »

This is totally nerdy (…”as if the other threads are not”…), but I thought discussing the ways people keep organized might lead to an interesting discussion. Let me describe some of the things I like to do to keep myself organized. Read more »

As Larri and I are spending more time raising our niece, I’ve been thinking about ways we can prepare her for the “real world.” One of my biggest concerns is preparing her for a good college and eventually a stable job. While my niece is doing OK in school, she’s not very motivated either. That got me to thinking about what makes someone motivated to learn, do well academically and have the ambition for a quality job.

I tend to believe there are two factors that influcence the level of desire to excel academically: Read more »

help

Mitchell closed the thread to the first thread, “Oral History of the Kikaida Generation.” (Read it here) because it was such a spam magnet.

I’m starting it up again, if for nothing else but to provide some non-movie threads. Here are some questions to jump start things:
Read more »