Tag Archives: politics

Blog

Political science redux: Marketing, the Internet, and all that

2 Comments

Reading yet another article about how !!11!!ZOMG politicians are learning to use the interwebs!!11!!! suggests an observation, which I’ll try to make as politically neutral as possible:

If one particular candidate I’m thinking of wins the Presidency, one of the reasons is going to be how easy his Web site makes it to do volunteer work for him.  I’ve volunteered for several candidates over the years, but I have never seen anything this user-inviting.

Just an observation, but one that I think fits the mission of this site.

(Hint: His name ends in a vowel besides Y, which would be another first)

[Internet poster by Sebastian Prooth]

Blog

Sarah Palin’s accent

Look, her accent doesn’t bother me.  (It’s the last thing about her that bothers me.) My family includes Minnesotans, so I kind of like her accent. But I’m not the only person who’s been wondering where it comes from. Slate.com called upon a regional-speech specialist, an Alaskan-native scholar, and Frances McDormand’s dialect coach to venture some guesses. Sounds like Minnesota after all:

[Some] have wondered whether her accent hails from Idaho, where her parents are from. But dialect features tend to come from one’s peers, not one’s parents, and Palin spent her childhood in Alaska’s Mat-Su Valley, which is where she got her distinctive manner of speaking. The next town over from Wasilla, Palmer, has a large settlement of Minnesotans—who were moved there by a government relief program in the 1930s—and features of the Minnesotan dialect are thus prominent in the Mat-Su Valley area. Hence the Fargo-like elements in Palin’s speech, in particular the sound of her “O” vowel. (Despite its name, Fargo took place mostly in Brainerd, Minn.) However, even in the area, many people speak a more general Alaskan English, the sort one would find in nearby Anchorage. Palin’s frequent dropping of the final G in -ing words and her pronunciation of terrorist with two syllables instead of three are characteristic of general Alaskan English (and Western English) rather than the specific Mat-Su Valley speech.

As with Donald Rumsfeld, some of Palin’s statements can be rendered as poetry.

[Panel: Diesel Sweeties]

Fiction

NEW FICTION: THE RIGHT PEOPLE by Adam Rakunas

13 Comments

Imagine what high school would have been like if dealing drugs had been legal when licensed, mobile social networking had been ubiquitous and the in-crowd had more leverage than most political parties… what would the smart-but-slightly-crazy outcasts end up doing?

In Adam Rakunas‘s novella “The Right People”, they’re in the lucrative but precarious position of selling clandestine bootleg sex toys to the overachievers, but the rug is about to be pulled out from under their operation…

It’s simultaneously a slice of full-bore gonzo science fiction blended with a Brat Pack movie, and a timely metaphor for the present presidential tussle, and Futurismic is very proud to present “The Right People” as Adam’s first fiction sale – in fact, I think we’re lucky to have found him first!

Do be warned, though – this one’s definitely not for the very young or the easily offended!

The Right People

by Adam Rakunas

So, it’s Wednesday after school, delivery time, and we’re doing the usual: I’m checking invoices on my cell, and G.R.’s violating the safety parameters of our merchandise.

“Gene,” he says, gripping the pickup’s wheel with one sweaty hand and his cell in the other, “check this out.” G.R. thumbs the keypad until his torso makes an unnatural beep, and then he sprouts breasts.

No. One breast. Right in the middle. A grin spreads on G.R.’s ruddy face like mildew on a locker room floor as he unbuttons his shirt, revealing a pink, rubbery udder.

I shake my head. “G.R., you know the rules.”

His smile wilts. “But–”

“No playing with the product in public.” I thumb in an override code, and the Pleasure Chest (we boosted this review model from my parents’ samples before leaving the house) sags to its default flatness. “You gotta be discreet.” Continue reading NEW FICTION: THE RIGHT PEOPLE by Adam Rakunas →

Blog

Sarah Palin’s Second Life

2 Comments

Two different Sarah Palin avatars in Second LifeYou don’t have to pick sides to say that Sarah Palin’s nomination as Republican VP candidate has been controversial. No medium is devoid of discussion about her, be it positive or negative – and even in the metaverse of Second Life, both poles of opinion are represented.

But of course, a virtual world allows ways of expression support or disdain that are arguably impossible elsewhere, like creating walking talking embodiments of Palin’s attributes as perceived by the creator. As Wagner James Au at New World Notes reports, some are positive:

“Sarah has some pretty distinct features,” she says. “I’m used to making more round and smooth featured faces, and while I could just make a square head I wanted to try for something more realistic.” She pretty much kept her Palin avatar’s body generic. “I can only guess as to what type body frame and build she has.”

While some are more critical:

… the Sarah Palin in the fur bikini, which its creator, Cymbal Constantine, developed as a satirical riff off the notorious bikini Photoshop.

“I don’t agree with her hunting views or her views regarding women’s rights,” Ms. Constantine tells me. “I am highlighting her extremist views which I do not feel the media is doing a good job of [covering]. As a woman, Sarah is deeply insulting to me.”

It’s hard to concentrate on our conversation, because Bobby the chatbot baby insists on gurgling random sentences out loud. “You make me feel loved!” he babbles.

Cymbal Constantine nods to him. “My child of course. Prop baby.”

Second Life’s much-touted potential as the next platform for internet business seems to have been moved to a back burner, but I think its potential for creative peaceful protest and socio-political satire has yet to be fully explored. [image from linked New World Notes article]

Blog

Doug Rushkoff blogging at BoingBoing

2 Comments

Douglas RushkoffThose of you who follow the Double-Boing may have noticed that they’ve started getting guest bloggers on board again. This week sees a visitation from Douglas Rushkoff; there are few thinkers and writers that I would recommend without reservation, but Rushkoff is one of them. [image from biography page of Rushkoff’s website]

He’s written (sometimes with great influence) on politics, cyberculture, religion, ethics, finance, viral marketing, reality hacking and all sorts of other stuff, and he never fails to come up with something challenging. So if you’re not a regular BoingBoing reader, I’d suggest grabbing the RSS feed, if only for this week. Here’s a snippet from his ‘Open-Source Democracy’ post:

Back when everyone was thinking about digital democracy as some sort of voting scheme or mass feedback polling operation, I wrote a short book called Open Source Democracy in an effort to extend people’s thinking beyond elections to include participation in civics. Yes, we have representatives, but they’re only good as their ability to respond to the needs that come from the bottom up.

Rushkoff’s a blogger in his own right, and a novelist too. More recently he did an excellent comic-format series on DC Vertigo called Testament – Old Testament fables meet dark near-future corporate dystopia. Recommended.