E.R. Torre's Blog, page 135

Trouble in paradise…?

For the past I-don’t-know-how-many years when one talked about sophisticated and popular electronics, one of the first companies you mentioned in that respect was Apple.

But even the mighty Apple appears, at least of late, to be experiencing problems and this has translated to its stock recently losing ground.  What is the cause of these problems and is it a sign of bad things to come?  Paul R. La Monica for CNN.com explores these issues and possible ways the prestigious company can rectify its current difficulties:

What’s Wrong With Apple?

For myself, reading an article like this is seeing history repeat itself.  I’ve written several times before about the rise of the Personal Computer (PC) and the way I (and many others) back in the early days of home computers bought just about every new iteration of the PC because each was so much better than the model which preceded it (you can read the post here).  The end result was a super-hot marketplace where computer companies made fortunes on each new model, especially when it boasted faster and faster processors.

So too it would appear it is with Apple and their most popular product, the iPhone.

The iPhone was a watershed device, and that’s saying something considering how many cellular phone models were out there at the time of its unveiling.  Most were rudimentary but one stood out: The Blackberry.

You remember the Blackberry?  People absolutely loved that device and couldn’t be without it.  They loved it so much it was jokingly referred to it as a “Crackberry”.

A year or so after the release of the iPhone and despite attempts to modernize the product (including having color screens and touchscreen functions), the Blackberry was essentially done.  The smartphone of choice became the iPhone or something that rivaled it in terms of functionality.

While one can argue about just how “original” an iPhone is/was, Apple delivered a stable, beautiful product that many found hard to ignore.  Demand for it was through the roof.

With each new iPhone model released, we had more/better at our fingertips, not unlike those PCs of yesteryear.  Better processors, better batteries, better screens, better cameras, more gizmos.  You name it.

With each new iPhone model’s release, you would find incredibly long lines of Apple fanatics at those Apple stores waiting sometimes overnight to be the first to get their hands on those shiny new models when they were officially released.

And then, just like the PC, Apple hit its ceiling and the iPhone reached something of a plateau.

Look, I’m not saying there isn’t room for improvement.  One could always improve a phone’s batter or camera or get a still faster/better processor.  But the changes now, just as what occurred with the PC back then, are smaller and more subtle.  It’s been a while now since I’ve seen news stories about consumers waiting in lines overnight to be the first to get the shiny new iPhone model.  The fact is that the “old” model they have may be perfectly fine and they no longer need to get the newest version.

As I stated in that original PC article, following the release of the Pentium processor I realized the desktop computer I had was perfectly fine.  While I had been buying a new computer practically every year, I had my previous computer for over six years without needing to replace it.  Last year I finally did but not because I felt I needed an “upgrade”.  I did so because my old PC was starting to show signs of its age and glitching on me.  Because I need a computer to do my work, I decided to be proactive and get a new model before my current one suddenly died on me.

With the iPhone, Apple is trying to maintain peoples’ excitement for their new model phones but truly the changes are not all that earth-shattering.  If anything, one of their most recent “changes”, releasing a smaller iPhone like they used to have, appear regressive.

The ultimate arbiters of all things technological in my family, ie my daughters, love their iPhones and wouldn’t be caught dead without them in hand.  At one time they had a model 5 and, when the model 6 appeared, they were desperate to upgrade.  We did so and they’ve had the model 6 for close to a year now.  In that time, the model 6s has debuted and my daughters are keenly aware of it yet have absolutely no interest in upgrading.

They’re fine with what they have, just as I was fine with the PC I had for all those years.  Just as I suspect many iPhone users are fine with the model they currently have, even if it may not be the latest version of the iPhone.

Unless the next generation model iPhone, 7, really wows, I suspect we’ll not see those big lines to buy it.  At that point, Apple may have to find some other product to supplant the one that’s been, until recent times, their goose that lays the golden eggs.

Nerd alert!!!

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the current Rottentomatoes.com ratings for Captain America: Civil War.  Unlike Batman v Superman, the film is tracking very well and currently sits at 93% positive:

Captain America: Civil War Rottentomatoes.com rating

You’ve got 126 in favor and 10 opposed as of this day (the movie is scheduled to be released this week in the U.S. but was already released in foreign markets and thus there are already a large number of “professional” reviews already out there).

The film is expected to be a box office hit and predictions of a take as large as $190+ million in its debut are not out of the question.

I’ve been following the glowing reviews and the negative ones and it appears that if there are negatives to the film it is that: 1) It is too long and could have been trimmed down some, especially at the beginning (the movie runs two and a half hours), 2) the story is nonsensical, 3) the movies are becoming too “corporate” since Disney took over, ie no big stakes, no startling deaths, and when its all over we’re back to the status quo, and 4) the villain of the piece is bland.

The later complaint, that the villains of these films are usually bland and forgettable, has become (at least to me) an annoying commonality in the Marvel movies of late, even those not under the Disney umbrella.

There is one other thing some have pointed out: The plot of this movie bears some striking similarities to that of Batman v Superman.  Considering filming on BvS began over a year before this film, we’re once again treading into “x ripped off y!” type discussions, and given the way we fanboys are, much gnashing of teeth will surely follow.

I expect plenty of “BvS sucked, CA is great” and vice versa type discussions to also follow for the next year and/or century.

Let the games…begin!

The apocalypse draws ever nearer…

Last night Republican candidate for President Ted Cruz dropped out of the race with the grace and agility of Larry, Curley, and Moe…

I swear, sometimes it feels like we’re living in a Zucker Brothers and Abrahams movie.

Laugh all you want at the above clip, but this means the Republican candidate for office of the President of the United States is Donald Trump.  And you know what that means (memes?!)…

Here’s one:

Man, there are so many of these to choose from.  One more:

Seriously, and with all due respect, I find this incredibly scary news.  The fact this man is as close as he is to even the possibility of becoming the President of the United States is damn frightening to this liberal, but it appears to not sit all that well with many lifelong Republicans…

Some Republicans say they’re breaking away from the party now that Donald Trump is presumptive nominee

The incredible irony of the above article is that many of these lifelong Republicans, who in their own way helped to make the party what it is today and no doubt relished their hatred for all things Clinton, are now in the uncomfortable position of maybe/possibly having to actually…vote for her?!

As startling as Mr. Trump’s success in taking the nomination is, plenty of pundits (and polling) suggests the odds are against him to win the general election…

Yes, It’s Early, but Donald Trump would have uphill battle against Clinton

And this website, 270towin.com, which tracks polling and electoral vote counts, currently has Clinton winning 300 electoral votes (270 are needed to win) versus Trump’s 109.  129 electoral votes are too close to call:

2016 Election: Clinton vs Trump

I hope this stays as is.  Mind you, I’m not a HUGE (he said in a Donald Trump voice) fan of Hillary Clinton but this election, to someone like me, is a complete no-brainer. (I’m so tempted to make a snide comment regarding that!!).

So, anyone got a fast forward button so that we can get to November already?!

Another thing that may happen when self-driving cars fill our streets…

I’ve mentioned it before: I’m fascinated with the concept of self-driving cars and believe they very much are in our future, perhaps sooner rather than later.

What fascinates me is what will happen and how will this impact us once they become a reality.  Will anyone bother to own a car at that point or will we rely on a fleet of automated vehicles to call up and take us to our destinations?  Economically, how will it affect a large base of drivers, from taxis to Uber to cargo drivers?

And then there’s this:

Self-driving features could lead to more sex in moving cars, expert warns

What I like the most about this article’s headline is the fact that it warns of “more“ sex in moving cars.  Because that’s clearly a thing already and once self-driving cars become a reality you should expect more.

Much more?!

The article, by the way, appears on cbc,ca, the Canadian Press.

Corrosive Knights, a 5/2/16 update

Halfway through the revisions.  Should get this draft (#8) done by week’s end.

Deadpool (2016) a (mildly) belated review

I know little about the Marvel Comics character Deadpool.  In fact, as big a comic book fan as I am, I doubt I’ve read even a single issue or story involving this character though the various illustrated pieces (covers mostly) I’ve seen suggest a tongue-in-cheek take on “badass” superheros like The Punisher or Wolverine.

Based on the movie version, looks like I nailed it on the proverbial head.

The movie version of Deadpool was released earlier this year following some very clever marketing such as this, which suggested (too well!) the film was some kind of romantic tearjerker…

And this one, which backed that up a little and hinted more at what to expect:

I’ll include the following red band (beware NSFW language and some sexual content) trailer (can’t believe I’m showing three trailers to one film!) which gives a better indication of the film’s actual tone:

Now, I’m a fan of “crude” humor.  Some of my favorite comedies are those that push the limits and, here and there, Deadpool does just that.  There are parts of the film that had me laughing out loud but there were other parts of the film that…didn’t.

The movie’s plot goes like this: A merc-for-hire named Wade (, clearly not afraid to make fun of everything, including himself) is introduced via a mission involving a stalker.  Nothing big, just one of those things intended to get audiences to see he’s one of those guys with good intentions despite the fact that he has no problem killing people in the most gory of ways (this we’ll see plenty of).

At his bar/hangout he meets Vanessa (), a hooker who it turns out has a glib attitude very similar to Wade’s.  He “hires” her, takes her out (he, like she, has a heart of gold so therefore Wade doesn’t just hit the sack with her) and of course they fall deeply, madly in love.

Then, tragedy.  Wade finds his body is riddled with cancer and, out of desperation, agrees to a nebulous procedure conducted by an equally nebulous group to cure himself.  Of course, the people behind the procedure, Ajax () and Angel Dust () are eeeeevvvviiiilllll villains interested in bringing out people’s mutations to then do something or another with them.  Seriously, I don’t even know the why here.

So they torture Wade until his mutation appears and it winds up being something along the line of Wolverine-type healing.  The experimental procedure, however, is so brutal it takes away Wade’s good looks and leaves him resembling a burn victim (much knee slapping fun is to be had with this).  While his cancer is gone and his ugly new looks keep him from going back to the love of his life, Wade hides his identity behind a costume and -voila!- Deadpool roams the streets of the city hunting down the evil scum that made him while pining for his lost love.

His bloody actions, however, catch the attention of X-Men members Colossus (a really well done totally digital creation voiced by ) and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (a delightfully sullen ) and they try to get Deadpool to renounce his bloody ways and become a “true” superhero.

As I said above, there are parts -many parts actually- of the film that were funny and enjoyable.  Unfortunately, there were other parts of the film that were, IMHO, childish and stupid and featured, again IMHO, far too much gore.

Mind you, I’m not squeamish and I’ve loved me some very hardcore features in the past, but the bloody violence presented here felt at odds with the silly tone of the film.  For me it came down to this: If you’re going to make a cartoon, why not go all out and feature cartoonish violence rather than more realistic and bloody gore?

Further, when all is said and done one comes away realizing this film has a surprisingly dull story to tell.  The main villain, like far too many of them of late in movies, is given very little motivation beyond being bad for the sake of being bad.  Worse, he’s upstaged, in my opinion, by Gina Carano’s Angel Dust, a character who barely has any dialogue.

Now that I mention that character, it occurs to me the movie’s side characters, and especially the female side characters wound up being the ones I liked the most, from Angel Dust to Negasonic Teenage Warhead (love the name and the character’s attitude…like Angel Dust she barely says anything and yet she’s more interesting than most people around her!), to Blind Al (), Deadpool’s weird roommate.

What does it say when you come away from a film like this and the three leads, Deadpool, Vanessa, and Ajax, aren’t necessarily the ones you care about or want to see the most of?

Despite all the complaints mentioned, I nonetheless recommend the film.  As I also said above, while there were parts of the film that didn’t work for me there were others that were quite hilarious.  In its own bizarre way Deadpool tries to stretch the borders of the superhero film and for the most part manages to do so well.

Recommended.

*******

POSTSCRIPT:  As I wrote the above review I had to bite my tongue.  I really, really don’t want to flog a dead horse but now that the review is “over”, I just need to get this out of my system:

Why are people so negative about the so-called “murderverse” of Zach Snyder and the dark tone of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice yet give a film like Deadpool a complete pass?

As “brutal” as Batman was in BvS, there was a reason given for that (his view that Superman was a threat to all humanity).  However brutal as Batman was in the film, he never did anything approaching what Deadpool does in his film yet because its “tongue in cheek” we can accept his multiple, bloody murders, including the very brutal way he eventually takes out Ajax?!

Weird.

Good, it’s not just me…

Found this article written by Amy X. Wang and appearing on qz.com:

Apple’s iTunes is 13 years old today and its still awful

As a young man, I never would could have conceived of the idea of having my entire musical catalogue at my fingertips.  Further, it was unimaginable in those days that pretty much any and all albums/songs would be available to you from the comfort of your home and in a matter of seconds via legal (and for those who do it -not me!- illegal) downloading.

To the youngsters out there: Yes, there was a time back in the “good old days” when you wanted a certain album or song you had to drive to your nearest record store and scour the bins for the record(s) you were interested in.  And if the store didn’t have them, you had to special order it and wait a week or so to get your hands on it.

I’ve mentioned before how when I first got into David Bowie I was delighted to find (this was circa 1985 or so) a cassette copy of The Man Who Sold The World.  At that time, this was simply not a very easy album to find.  Nirvana didn’t even exist and therefore hadn’t done their “unplugged” cover of the song which brought it a large wave of attention.  “Bigger” David Bowie albums such as Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane, Young Americans, Heroes, and Scary Monsters were readily accessible but it was hit and miss finding some of the earlier stuff.

Anyway, this all changed with the arrival of the MP3 file and, to a big extent, iTunes and, more specifically, the iTunes store.  It allowed users to buy their album via the internet and, suddenly, you no longer had to trudge your way to a store with the hopes of finding something that wasn’t there.  Since the arrival of the iTunes store you also have Amazon.com which also features pretty much every bit of music available for purchase.

Thing is, and as the above article states, iTunes is an awful program.  Considering how much money it’s made for Apple, it is truly bizarre the company, which lives on a reputation for creating truly great products, nonetheless hasn’t been able to make it any better after all these years.

While I do use the program now and again to listen to music, I much prefer using other programs such as the Amazon music app or whatever the current Windows music player is.

But as the article notes, this may all be becoming irrelevant and the days of iTunes still existing may be coming to an end as streaming music appears to be the preferred means of listening to music to the younger generations versus actual music ownership.

For an older fart like me, it feels odd to not want to actually “own” things but the new generation is doing just that.  Instead of buying albums, they stream their music.  Instead of buying movies, they check out what’s available on netflix or “rent” a film via a movie service.  I suppose someone out there is trying to do the same for books as well.

On a tangential note, I read how some Hotels are catering to younger generations by offering “bare bones” hotel rooms with larger lobby/social gathering areas.  As so much of what they use is available on their smartphones, some in the younger generations no longer need Hotel rooms to have a large amount of things within them for their use.  They’re content with the minimum, which the older crowd may not be.

It’s a changing world out there, but you knew that already, right?

Brave New (Creepy) World

For the most part, I love technology and the advances being made.

However…

Creeps are using a neural network to dox porn actresses

The upshot of this article, written by Darren Orf and found on gizmodo.com, is that by scouring the internet for photographs and using face recognition software, some very creepy individuals are able to link porn actresses, many of whom may employ stage names and may try to keep their professional and personal lives separate, to their personal lives.

These links, by the way, may be inaccurate as facial recognition software is far from perfect though like most technological things, I can only see it getting better over time.  Regardless, this hasn’t stopped some of these creepy individuals from linking photographs of porn actresses with photographs of, say, graduation pictures or family life pictures and, essentially, “outing” women who may (emphasis on that word) also be involved in the porn industry.

Now I suppose there are those who will say: So what?  Some porn actors/actresses don’t mind being in the public eye and, indeed, promote themselves and their work.  So what if they’re exposed?

While some porn actors/actresses may indeed not mind the spotlight, there are others who may have done this as a one time lark or a short term money making job.  They never intended to make this a profession yet it will potentially haunt them for the rest of their lives, especially with people using facial recognition to “out” them.

Yet again you say, “so what?”  They got into the field, they should know the risks, right?

To which I would say: Look beyond pornography and you’ll find using facial recognition in this way is an extremely troubling invasion of privacy.

There probably are many, many situations where someone takes a provocative -and not at all necessarily pornographic- photograph.  There are occasions where someone is “caught” doing something mildly or moderately risque.  It could be a one time thing but because it was caught on camera it therefore lives forever.

As the facial recognition software improves, I can see how any “youthful indiscretions” could result in a person being searched out and, whether they like it or not, exposed for whatever actions are caught on film.

Imagine you are a reasonably well-behaved wo/man who takes your studies and/or career seriously.  Over the years you attend school, then college.  You earn your degree, get a stable job, and work hard to become successful in your field.  During that time you marry and build your loving family.

Ten years before, while you were still single and a very young college student, you attended a party and, uncharacteristically or not for the time, got drunk.  Let’s say you got so drunk you fell asleep on a couch and your friends had a little fun with you and posed you in silly positions.  Nothing pornographic, just young kids doing stupid stuff.  And then someone takes a photograph of this silliness and posts it online.

The photograph and the party may be a distant memory when, ten years later, someone uses facial recognition software and connects this single photograph of a young, drunken person in a silly position with you.  You’re outed and, worse still, your bosses get a hold of this information and suddenly your job and your entire career could be in jeopardy.

The party and your drunkenness (or whatever) may have been nothing more than a one time thing.  Hell, it could have happened several times over the course of those early years but you’ve cleaned up and the person you were back then is certainly no longer the person you are.

And yet because of this one photograph and facial recognition software, your present may well be affected by your distant past.

A most sobering thought.

Corrosive Knights, a 4/26/2016 update

It’s been…something…these last few days/weeks.  Time I was hoping to use on writing was hijacked by life events and yet I’m feeling giddy.

Why?

Because I finished the 8th draft “read-through” of my latest Corrosive Knights books (#6 in the series) and while it was a struggle to find the time to work through it (as well as to re-re-re-read it), towards the end of the book I realized/came up with something significant which clears up one of the bigger problems I had with one of the characters in the book.  This realization not only makes perfect sense, it also makes the book significantly better than before.

And the really funny thing about this is that in retrospect this change is so damned obvious I can’t believe I didn’t think of it from the very beginning!  The change fits so naturally into the story I doubt anyone will realize it was quite literally a near last minute change/add-on!

That’s the funny thing about writing.  While I don’t subscribe to the notion of “characters writing themselves”, there are times I’m surprised when something like what I described above happens.  Perhaps this change/add-on lay in my subconscious all this time and took eight revisions for me to finally “see” it.  Or perhaps it was one of those lucky breaks you get, where the stars align and all works out for the best.

I know, I know, I’m being very vague about this change/add-on but this is deliberate as it involves one of the bigger reveals toward the very end of this novel.

Anyway, as of this morning, here we are:

Over my right shoulder and in that blue folder is the latest read-through of Corrosive Knights book #6.  I’m seconds away from starting the rewriting process and, once finished with this latest draft, will of course print the new draft (#9!) out and give it another revision.

We’re getting closer to the end but it is difficult for me to estimate when I’ll feel this book is “done”.  I’ll have a much better idea when this draft is finished, printed out, and re-read but as of this moment I suspect I’m at least two drafts away from finishing up (I know, I’ve said this before but, as I said above, it is difficult to estimate these things).

Regardless, I remain excited.  The book is progressing and with each draft I’m getting closer and closer to the end.

Let’s hope it comes very soon because I’m dying to get to the next novel.

…some levity

After some dreary news, let’s have some levity:

Jack Mehoff Endorses Donald Trump

’nuff said.