Too Legit To Quit

Bridge Talk went legit this week. That is to say that this week's video is the first to be completely comprised of material I filmed or created myself and works that are in the public domain. And perhaps not coincidentally, it is the episode I'm most satisfied with to date. Here it is in all its legitimacy:

If You Were Satan ...


I can't promise I'll keep it legit in the future, especially when we're dealing with a new movie or television show as our weekly topic. I can tell you though what principles have governed my use of material that I didn't personally create or isn't obviously in the public domain. Apart from never using these materials to make money, using them in service of "education" and as part of the program of a registered charity, the following interview segment illustrates the principles I follow when using clips:

Leslie Moonves, president of CBS as interviewed in Wired Magazine, June 2007, pg 169:

Wired: " There's a lot of CBS material on YouTube. How does that work?"

Moonves: "You have to look at it in two different ways. One is content that you will get paid for directly, and the other is promotional content. Our attitude is, either pay us for it or give us promotional value that will eventually lead to our getting paid for it."

Wired: "How do you tell the difference?"

Moonves: "If there's a one-minute clip of CSI, or user generated clips like different shots of David Caruso taking off his glasses, that's great promtion. If they were showing a whole episode of CSI and we weren't getting paid, we'd object."

So there's your surprise for the week: There are voices of sanity in the entertainment industry.

Pre-school

Emily and Kaylee started pre-school this week. French emersion pre-school to be exact. They get quite flustered when I call it "play school" by mistake. This is serious business! (Mostly involving playing).

I was taken aback by how much their afternoon dragged some long-lost, difficult childhood memories out of me. It's been both stretching and healing to see them respond so positively this week.

On their first day they each went over to a young guy who was shyly clutching his mother and introduced themselves and smiled at him. They're a little shy themselves, so it was a little bit of effort for them to go up to him. Of course both Stacey and I were brimming with pride.

...

Then they smacked the kid down, stood on him and yelled out "who's next?!"

Harry Haters Haven't Humility

This short article on J. K. Rowling's faith is well worth reading (if you don't plan on reading the final Harry Potter book). It was printed in the Calgary Herald, but I'm linking to this other paper's printing of it because the Herald makes you pay to read it.

I'm kinda annoyed in recent days because I encountered a little over-the-top Rowling-bashing recently, which contributed to a growing overall feeling of alienation from the maintream church.

Despite being disowned by many a fundamentalist Christian, Rowling is not only a Christian herself, but the only one in history who has sold well over 12 million books with explicit Christian themes in a single day.

Here's the Bridge Talk Harry Potter link if you want to see what other folks are saying and sound off a little on this:
Harry Potter's Hamstrung Pedantics

Oldness, Sadness & Wonder.

I had an old, sad & wonder-filled day.

Old: I realized as I listened to "Smells Like Teen Spirit" on the radio that Nirvana was breaking that song out around 17 years ago; So for the main consumers of music these days, it's "one of those songs written before we were born." It's probably even been musaced by now.

Sad (& old): I attended a pre-school parents meeting in preparation for E & K's first venture into institutional education. Because the pre-school is hosted in an elementary school, my kids will experience fire drills .... and lock-down drills. In a post Columbine world, kid's need to practice sitting quietly with teachers under tables behind locked doors. **sigh**

Wonder (& old but not sad): It just freakin' amazes me that thirty years ago we (humanity) sent out two little low-tech probes that took first-hand pictures of the wonders of our solar system countless millions of miles away. The girls & I sat and looked at pictures and talked about planets & moons & millions of miles & God & science & just wondered together.

Wired, Voyager 30 year anniversary album.

Deciduous Trees of the World Unite!

I don't want summer to end. I never want summer to end. I consider trees whose leaves start changing colours to be traitors. There's a tree across the street from me that's already 1/3 of the way to fall colours. I'm considering a plan to cut it down while the elderly people who live in the house are sleeping.

For those of you who live in the suburbs, I'll explain what a "tree" is later.