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52 and Finished

Posted July 26, 2007 By Dave Thomer

Completed the DC weekly series 52 today.

By no means was it bad, and there were a number of character threads I liked. But it spectacularly failed at doing what it originally set out to do – explain what happened during the “missing year” in the DC Universe – and it wasn’t able to contain all of the plot threads it did start, requiring some miniseries and specials to handle the spillover. And the big finale involved time travel and someone eating dimensions in order to create alternate realities, which may have set up an interesting new status quo but as a story resolution itself left something to be desired.

Still, I’m glad I read it, and equally glad I’m not going anywhere near DC’s current weekly series, Countdown.

Filed in Comics

Press Hits the Fans

Posted July 25, 2007 By Dave Thomer

Comic-Con International in San Diego starts tonight with a preview night, and the panels and big events start tomorrow. I was talking with Earl earlier today, wondering when Comic-Con became such a huge event that the TV and film worlds paid so much attention to. If I had been looking for an example, this Reuters article about Lost season 4 news would have been perfect. When ABC Entertainment President Steve MacPherson said that there would be big announcements at the Lost Comic-Con panel tomorrow, the critics apparently got huffy that the news was being saved for a fan convention. They managed to get one tidbit from MacPherson that’s all over the wires tonight – including that article I linked to, so spoilers beware – but I’m willing to bet there’ll be more tomorrow. And that fan sites and word of mouth will spread the word plenty fast.

Man, I used to want to be a journalist, and this story makes me think they’re way too full of themselves.

Filed in Culture and Media

Aren’t We Special

Posted July 24, 2007 By Dave Thomer

Special Order Speeches essays from prior incarnations of Not News are now available from the SOS link on the sidebar. This category includes essays that were written for the Humor section of the site when that was its own entity. Transferring them into blog posts reminded me that I enjoy that kind of long-form not-quite-serious writing. I oughta do more of it, although now I probably will have to label those entries so that they don’t get taken too seriously.

(Oh, for what it’s worth, I did notice that one entry got reposted twice. I’ll fix that soon while I’m transferring the Culture & Media section.)

I’m thinking of reposting some discussion threads as blog posts, and leaning toward doing them as single posts with a sequence of block quotes. Probably not the most aesthetically pleasing option, but not every old poster is set up as a commenter here and I’d like to keep ghost accounts to a minimum.

Filed in Site Comments

Bad Gods, Good Jokes

Posted July 23, 2007 By Dave Thomer

Lore Sjoberg has diversified the content at Bad Gods to include comics strips – including this great strip about a Buddhist RPG – and a collection of limericks based on famous poems. After a day of reading and discussing all the wonderful examples of humanity’s depravity in The Lucifer Effect, I kinda need to unwind a little, and this hits the spot.

I’m probably a biased audience, but I gotta say, philosophy sure does seem like fertile ground for web comics. Then again, I guess everything is fertile ground for web comics.

Filed in Special Order Speeches

Poker AI No Flop

Posted July 22, 2007 By Dave Thomer

The AP has a pretty good article on a humans vs. computer poker match set to start tomorrow at a conference on artificial intelligence in Vancouver. The article does a nice job of explaining exactly why poker is seen as an interesting challenge by artificial intelligence researchers.

The game-tree approach doesn’t work in poker because in many situations there is no one best move. There isn’t even a best strategy. A top-notch player adapts his play over time, exploiting his opponent’s behavior. He bluffs against the timid and proceeds cautiously when players who only raise on the strongest hands are betting the limit. He learns how to vary his own strategy so others can’t take advantage of him.

That kind of insight is very hard to program into a computer. You can’t just give the machine some rules to follow, because any reasonably competent human player will quickly intuit what the computer is going to do in various situations.

I’m definitely gonna be on the lookout for the results of this test. Sounds like a fun conference.

Filed in Special Order Speeches

Live Smart

Posted July 21, 2007 By Dave Thomer

I’m very happy to have Eureka back on the air. I’ve been going through the commentaries and deleted scenes from the season 1 DVD set – look for a review soon on that – and the first two episodes of season 2 have been strong. I think I’m most amused by the Live Smart PSAs you can view from the show’s website. Remember, friends don’t let friends destroy reality.

Filed in Culture and Media

Growth of Filibusters

Posted July 20, 2007 By Dave Thomer

A follow-up on filibusters: McClatchy has a nice article and chart detailing the growth of filibusters as a tactic over the last couple of years.

In many ways this is a shoe-on-the-other-foot situation, but what I find interesting is that it seems to me that Republican senators considered to be moderate have been more willing to stick with the party line than Democratic senators considered to be conservative were during the 2002-2006 period. That could be a superficial impression based on my ideological perspective, and I’m not making a value judgment about whether or not party discipline is inherently good or not. But I do wonder if the cultures of the two parties means that sometimes they choose to play by different rules. And I wonder how voters will feel about that next year.

Filed in Public Policy

Double Duty

Posted July 19, 2007 By Dave Thomer

I’m back from my educational psychology class, and there have been a couple of things running through my head since the summer session started:

1. I can not believe that this is an elective within the education program and not a mandatory introduction class. Maybe it’s just the bookworm in me, but getting this kind of background on how kids develop and how they learn is doing a lot to help me make sense of the various techniques and practices I’ve learned about in some of my other classes. I just don’t get how you can learn how to teach without learning how kids – and adults – learn.

2. It ain’t half bad material to have on hand as a parent, either. Although I imagine hospitals would start getting funny looks if they gave out educational psychology textbooks shortly after the delivery.

Filed in Life in Practice

Pass Judgment? No Rush

Posted July 18, 2007 By Dave Thomer

I’m following the reports on the Michael Vick indictment, and there are two things running through my head:

1. A few days ago, I was seeing reports that this very indictment was unlikely. I’m not blaming any particular reporter; I have no reason to believe that the reporters on the case worked diligently and trusted reliable sources. But sometimes when we want the news now, rather than when it’s ready, we get the story wrong.

2. There are already calls for boycotts and suspensions and boycotts if there are no suspensions. And yet there are plenty of indications that many NFL powers that be want to see how this plays out in the legal system first. I can’t say I have anything against that approach – let’s see how Vick defends himself from the charges which, at the moment, are just charges. That said, should the trial and related investigations reveal enough proof for people to be confident Vick is guilty, even if he manages to beat the charges, I don’t think I’d have a problem with the NFL using something less than the reasonable doubt standard in making its decisions about whether Vick is fit to be a player in the league.

Filed in Special Order Speeches

Fill the Bus

Posted July 17, 2007 By Dave Thomer

Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo seems annoyed that several news outlets are not calling the all-night session being held in the Senate a filibuster. This isn’t necessarily isolated to TPM – folks at other blogs had been calling on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to force Senate Republicans to “actually filibuster” various amendments and measures designed to force a change in Iraq policy. And I gotta say, I don’t get it. What’s happening tonight may well be a significant event and means of moving legislation forward – but it ain’t a filibuster in the modern or the traditional sense. In a traditional filibuster, the kind we associate with Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and anti-civil rights senators, opponents of a measure get the floor and keep on talking to prevent a bill from moving to a vote. If the bill’s supporters can get the floor, they can presumably move things forward. In a modern filibuster, a bill’s opponents just vote against a motion to stop debate – no one has to give any speeches or do any talking.

Now, what’s happening tonight is that Reid has called for an all-night session of debate. Senators from both sides are taking turns speaking. If the Republicans wanted to, they could yield their time and just let the Democrats keep yakking. At some point, there’s still going to have to be a motion to end the debate in order to get to an actual vote. And whenever that motion occurs, it will almost certainly fail because enough Republicans (plus Joe Lieberman) will vote against ending debate.

I’m not saying I’m against the stunt. I just don’t think it’s an actual filibuster.

There is a related point that Marshall makes – somehow, the media is not using the word filibuster to describe the Republicans voting against cloture. And that’s definitely a mistake.

Filed in Public Policy
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