TOW #19: "Happiness Is a Warm iPhone" by Charles Yu

"Her", the new Spike Jonze film about a man who falls in love with an operating
system, has prompted many people to reconsider their relationship technology.

Quirky filmmaker Spike Jonze recently released "Her", a movie about a man in the future falling in love with a 'female' operating system. "Her" has been critically acclaimed and is one of the most popular films currently in theaters. People interested in technology have commented on whether, as it advances, human-computer relationships could become common, and one of those people is Charles Yu, writing for The New York Times. In "Happiness is a Warm iPhone" Yu writes about how his once-ardent love of new technology has faded in recent years. He uses his own personal experiences, likens a love of technology with a romantic relationship, and describes current technological trends to argue to they are too similar to the real world and no longer "challenge" people. This results in a piece that may make a reader question their own relationship with technology.

Yu is in this thirties, so he was a child when computers became popular. He explains, "My first real crush was on my family's Commodore 64." Yu says that after giving up one making computer programs he 'fell out of love' with the Commodore 64. However, he continues, "It was my first experience with what I could call a possibility space... in theory, anything could happen." Later in the piece, Yu says that he also became infatuated with email and his first iPhone. However, he says, "... as in too many real relationships, I woke up one morning and found that, for all my affection for and dependence on that phone, I was no longer in love with it." By comparing losing love for a phone to losing love for a person, Yu shows that both changes are caused by the same thing: boredom due to familiarity. This helps him prove that we become dependent, and therefore too used to, technology, so we no longer see how wonderful it is and how much potential it has.
Although personal stories can help establish a writer's ethos, readers cannot always relate to the writer's experiences. Therefore, it was a good decision on Yu's part to generally describe what technology is currently like, which is something that readers can understand and relate to. Yu writes, "Our gadgets are engineered to fit just right, into your hands, our lives. Virtual environments, apps and sites are designed by experts with care, forethought..." It stands to reason that when things are made to be perfect and are made to be an outright improvement in one's life, its marvels are not recognized and it is thought of as just another part of life. Yu appeals to this logic to support his argument that technology is too familiar to be loved and appreciated. 
Charles Yu claims that technology is so integrated into our lives that it becomes just another uninteresting part of our landscape. Those who do not agree with him may argue that it is too advanced and too impressive to ever be thought of in such a way. However, as Yu says, "We're holding magic boxes, boxes that want to serve us and coddle us, instead of challenge us. And how can you love something that doesn't challenge you?"




























Article link: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/23/opinion/sunday/happiness-is-a-warm-iphone.html?ref=opinion

TOW #18: Super Bowl Coca-Cola Commercial

On February 2nd, 2014, Super Bowl XLVIII was played between the Seattle Seahawks and Denver Broncos. As usual, the game itself received a lot of media attention, but one thing that also did was a simple minute-long Coca-Cola commercial that played during the game. The commercial is made up of short clips of people of all races dancing, eating, bowling, socializing, overlaid with the song "America the Beautiful". However, instead of being sung in English as one might expect, each part of the song is sung in a different language, which matches the race or ethnic background of the person or people in the clip that song section overlays. To the average viewer the Coca-Cola commercial is probably very cute, but to many, its point and the way the point was made were disgraceful.
Historically, racial and ethnic minorities in the United States have not been given fair treatment or representation. Fortunately, Coca-Cola clearly opposes this, as the actors in its Super Bowl commercial come from a variety of ethnic and religious backgrounds; some, like the Jewish men in the yarmulkes and Muslim women in the hijabs, are even wearing traditional outfits. They also sing "America the Beautiful" in languages other than English, including Spanish and Hebrew. Since none of these people are shown doing anything bad or out of the ordinary and are all singing a traditional patriotic song, the message is clear; all people in the United States are equal and all can be patriotic Americans. Coca-Cola used a very simple method of getting their message of equality across, so the point of the commercial was easily conveyed to the audience. The audience members understood exactly what Coca-Cola was conveying, and many were disgusted. They claimed that people like those in the commercial could not possibly be true Americans if they could not or would sing "America the Beautiful" in English, that Arabic was the language of "terrorists" and Spanish the language of "illegals", and that Coca-Cola was "on the road to perdition". Even though all level-headed and open-minded people decried this racist criticism and agreed with the message in the commercial, the criticism still got Coca-Cola more media attention and probably caused more people to see the commercial. The simplicity of the commercial's point made it easy to understand for everyone who saw it, and their views on it, whether positive or negative, got Coca-Cold a spot in the headlines and helped the company to spread their message of equality.







Link to video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MEsOzzunPQ

IRB Post #3: In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

One of beloved author Truman Capote's most celebrated works, In Cold Blood tells the real-life stories of the Clutter family of Holcomb, Kansas, of their brutal murders in 1959, and of their killers, Perry Smith and Richard "Dick" Hickock. The perpetrators seemed to leave no clues behind and there was no apparent motive, so they escaped scrutiny for a few years before being caught and executed. Capote himself interviewed and gathered background information about those involved, before gathering all of his findings into one book. However, the truthfulness of the account was questioned after In Cold Blood was published. Despite any criticism or discrepancies, the Clutter murders are still well-known today, thanks to how horrific they were and to Capote's storytelling talent. 
I have heard about both In Cold Blood and Truman Capote for years, but never knew precisely what the story was about or why it is one of Capote's most famous works. I chose the book almost randomly, and when I found out that it was about a quadruple murder, my interest was macabrely piqued. I am interested in many subjects, and one of them is true crime; I frequently watch crime shows, have taken a psychology class, and am currently enrolled in a forensics class. Of course, I do not want to commit crimes myself, but instead simply enjoy studying them. Having the opportunity to read a book like In Cold Blood for school is very exciting to me. Now that I have begun reading it, I cannot put it down; Capote was right in calling his book a "nonfiction novel" because it is written in a very compelling way, characterizing and describing each person while still reminding the reader that they were all real people. I am very much looking forward to reading the rest of In Cold Blood and perhaps to reading more of Capote's work.

TOW #17: "Are You My Cousin?" by A.J. Jacobs

This old family tree may appear large and complicated to some, but to those
who dream of constructing a family tree of everyone on the planet, it is minuscule.

Services such as Geni, 23andMe, and Ancestry.com have become rather well-known in recent years due to their ability to help people learn about their ancestry and connect with distant relatives. However, it seems that few people think about what these services could possibly accomplish in the future, especially the connection of all human beings, both dead and alive. Editor and author A.J. Jacobs ponders this possibility and its implications in his editorial "Are You My Cousin?", published in The New York Times opinion section. He focuses on the benefits and drawbacks of so-called "quantum genealogy", especially whether it may lead humans to love and understand each other better. It seems that Jacobs presents a convincing argument and presents himself as a very informed person on the subject of genealogy. 

The personal experiences of an author may be limited in terms of the scope of evidence it provides to readers. However, in Jacobs' case, it proves rather valuable. When he writes about finding out, through the website Geni, that he is related to television show host Judge Judy Sheindlin, he says, "I'd always found her grating, but when I discovered our connection, I softened. She's probably a sweetheart underneath the bluster." By writing about his change in opinion after he found out he was related to Judge Judy, Jacobs showed that if humans were to build a complete family tree, they would see each other as family. Family members are more likely to see the good in each other, and Jacobs argues that this could lead to more understanding and peace worldwide. There is also the 'cool' factor in finding out one is related to celebrities, like Jacobs did with Judge Judy and others, including Paul McCartney and Gwyneth Paltrow. Obviously, these are positive consequences, but, to make a complete analysis of the subject, Jacobs does not and cannot end there.

Obviously, something world-changing like the advent of mega family trees have negative consequences, not just positive ones. Jacobs writes, "Critics point out, convincingly, that the shared trees are often poorly sourced and packed with errors that will take years to untangle." When addressing how public many family tree services are, he adds, "... If the general public knew how much of their family information was accessible, they might have a conniption." By addressing the opposition to his opinion that a worldwide family tree would be beneficial, Jacobs makes himself seem a lot more level-headed and informed. It also gives him the opportunity to argue directly against the counterargument, whereas he would not have been able to so effectively without bringing up the fact that people disagreed with him. 

Article link: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/01/opinion/sunday/are-you-my-cousin.html?ref=opinion