Thank You Susan

I'm sure many, many people have seen Susan Boyle's perfromance. I really liked this video on YouTube. Watching reactions of individuals in a crowd, is almost as exicting as watching the game. There are more reactions to Susan Boyle's performance at this site.

Clutter...

So, there are a few people looking forward to the new digital age, so their houses filled with clutter can be ordered. By ordered the meaning is remove the books and CDs off your shelves, Tim Bray was quoted in this piece as "feeling crowded by the media artifacts", and longing for the day when "the chief furnishings would be a few well-loved faces and voices". There's something in this comment which resonates with me, and perhaps
explains why I'm not so keen on movement to the e-books. 

[The assumption that a] book remains a book when its words are transferred from printed pages to a screen. A change in form is always, as well, a change in content. That is unavoidable, as history tells us over and over again. One reads an electronic book differently than one reads a printed book - just as one reads a printed book differently than one reads a scribal book and one reads a scribal book differently than one reads a scroll and one reads a scroll differently than one reads a clay tablet.

I know that I won't find it easy to experience the same escapism in reading a book from an electronic device than I do as I read a book curled up in bed. As it is I read online information differently to how I read the printed page. My mind wanders a little too easily when I'm reading a piece online. (Here's another piece about the changing way we read and write)

..the final edition

I found  this piece very interesting reading, its in praise of the obituary (as a form of writing).

...obituaries aren't interesting because of what they say about death. They're interesting because of the funny and pathetic way they purport to deal with the unfathomable. Obituaries are little fairytales we tell ourselves, while imagining our own lives as one day complete enough to write about. An obituary, any obituary, transforms lives into stories, with interesting characters, a cohesive plot, and most importantly, a good ending. This is what we've got as humans — not the ability to understand or be at one with death, but the ability to generate lots of stupid crap to fill in the empty space of the unknown. Obituaries can do that as much as anything, and maybe we can think of them both in the Franklinian and Aristotelian sense: They might not complete life nor make it eternal, but they can make us feel better about living in the constant and terrifying presence of death.

Lest we forget

While we were watching the Dawn service from Gaollopli a few things struck me. The first was the difference between the Kiwi's and Aussies who attend the service, as the camera panned across the crowd the Australian's were quite easy to pick, and perhaps flowing from that I wondered about the difference in how the ANZAC legacy is seen in New Zealand and Australia. I think if I recall correctly the message when Howard spoke was about patriotism and nationalism while yesterday the theme was more around the links forged between the Turks, Kiwi's and Australians.

I've been working my way through Top Price, which is a collection of articles written by the late Matt Price (a journalist from the The Australian, who passed away in 2007). One of the pieces was a included a story about General Gerard Muirhead-Gould, who ordered that Japanese be creamated with full military honours, and in explaining why he came up with the following:

I have been criticized for having accorded these men military honours at their cremation, such honours as we hope may be accorded to our own comrades who have died in enemy hands; but, I ask you, should we not accord full honours to such brave men as these? It must take courage of the very highest order to go out in a thing like that steel coffin. . . . Theirs was a courage which is not the property or the tradition or the heritage of any one nation. It is the courage shared by the brave men of our own countries as well as of the enemy and, however horrible war and its results may be, it is courage which is recognized and universally admired. These men were patriots of the highest order. How many of us are really prepared to make one thousandth of the sacrifices that these men made?

 This afternoon I enjoyed reading this piece in which Alexander McCall-Smith writes about his characters and books, and readers reactions to the characters lives.

Classical Music...

I was thinking about the virtual-chatter about Susan Boyle (and Paul Potts) on Britain's Got Talent. The songs which generated the response were the classical songs Nessun dorma and I Dream A Dream. The goose-bumps I got when I heard Potts sing it (and Time to Say Goodbye) were similar to the goosebumps I get when I hear that song. I don't know if someone singing any current "chart-topping hits" such as "So What", "Sweet About Me", or a U2 song would get the same reaction.There's just something magical about those songs.

I Dreamed a Dream ...

Just saw this clip from the Britain's Got Talent show on YouTube. All I can say is wow~!  Go on, watch it, you won't be disappointed. Its as much the song choice, as song performance, its like she's singing her story.

Susan Boyle - Britian's Got Talent

Update: I liked this piece:, The Dream She Dreamed: Cheers for a Voice to Silence the Cynics

The World As 100

I quite liked these pictures which display the information in quite a clear, helpful way.  For more of these pictures, and details visit the website here.

the religious in politics

I often wonder about the role of the religious in politics, and with the election of Obama in the US, some now see the influence as good as gone - as detailed in an article in the Washington Post. It seems to me that there are lessons we can learn too from this here.

The article comments that the heart of Christianity is the family unit, the home, and it is in and through these units the church influences society, and not in the "shrill and nagging manner" we often seem to do.

I also like this quote that if we do want to see influence in our culture and society, then we should start following the commands of Jesus and people will be so amazed that they will be attracted to Him".

Ancient Art..

Really liked this piece by Phillip Adams in the Australian today, about perserving art and ancient artifacts, and a suggestion so that they could be seen by a maximum number of people and well preserved. A snippet below.

Let the Cairo Museum, the Uffizi and others rent their spare treasures to the world’s museums. Egypt, for example, has multiples of major pieces and no room to display them. And make it a condition that rented works are given necessary restoration by the host museum. The world shares its history and heritage. Everyone – except the looters and the profiteers – wins.

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National Folk Festival...

We headed down to Canberra for the Easter weekend to spend some time with Fi's parents, and on our agenda yesterday was to go spend the evening at the National Folk Festival. I guess though I do listen to some music which would be classified by i-tunes as folk, it was a great experience to hear some folk music live - including Eric Bogle and John Munro of 'And the Band Played Waltzing Malitda' fame, that I was not really familar with.

There was something in Bogles's lyrics which is getting harder and harder to find in contemporary music. Bogle's songs are more than just protest songs, they are social commentries. Of the songs we heard last night, one was about the colour of dreams (touching on MLK, Nelson Mandela), one was around the obscene amount of money our government seems to spend on sport, another on the casualties of war coming home The ones which really struck me - one was a call and response song around the death of an elderly women, who lay in her home for a year unnoticed, and "And the Band Played.." really reasonated with me, even though I've probably heard it before.

On top of the lyrics, the harmonies of John and Eric's voices and guitars was wonderful too. It wasn't all serious though, there was great banter between Eric and John, and they played a song reminding us that the greatest endangered speices - is the male.

I know I've said this before, and I know that there's more protest songs out that that I can recall, but these  songs were powerful statements, and I can't think of many bands to let their music talk in the same way as folk-singers such as Eric. I know that both Gen-Y and Gen-X are not as apathetic as they're are often made out to be, and perhaps they protest in a different sort of way.

While we were there last night we also saw the April Vietch Band - a Canadian group out to Austalia for the first time, and one of the highlights of their performace was watching their fidller / tap-dancer duel with the drummer, and then play the fiddle while tap-dancing... very great entertaining stuff. Was well worth the trip.

Of these things we are witnesses

For the record, April is Genocide Prevention Month. Genocide Prevention Month is organised by the Genocide Prevention Project. The stated aim is to build the public will to call on the international community to take action when indicators signal possible onset of mass-scale atrocity crimes.

More U2 Wordles

I recently posted a Wordle of U2's latest CD. This site here has 'wordles' of
all of their albums. Quite enjoyed having a look at it.

Myspace ... myDanger

Herald columnist, Miranda Devine adds her voice to those asking questions about how the internet, and the virtual community are transforming how people think. Devine quotes Mubarak Ali who believes that by 2012 internet addiction will be "classified as a mental disorder in Australia, akin to gambling addiction, only more widespread".

It may be true that we are changing, but it seems to me that there are both positive and negative effects from these changes. Perhaps a point which is often lost in articles such as these is, does anyone really substitute real friendship, with a virtual friendships? For example its true to say that a growing number of people are building real friendships from an "online connection".

The other point made in Devine's piece is around the lack of empathy in today's teenagers, but sadly, there's nothing new in her account of a traffic accident "where onlookers were said to have watched, laughed, chatted and taken photographs, ignoring the pleas for help from one man as he died, treating the scene as if it were entertainment." Stories of onlookers failing to assist in these situations is not new and perhaps could be put down to the bystander effect.

Literary Matchplay..

I was quite intrigued by this website - tournament of books - bringing the theatre of sport to as library near you - 16 of the best titles from 2008 compete in the tournament - literary critics judge which title deserves to win the ties through to
the final.

Working out judging criteria, is perhaps no more subjective than gymnastic and dancing (for example), but people may resent adding the sporting-contest to literary prize. As for me, it just seems like a bit of fun.

g-ball ....

I caught this via Google Australia this morning - apparently Google has come up with a new technology and created the gBall - more information is available here.

In other exciting news this morning was the development that Shane Warne was being flown to South Africa to join the Australia Cricket team. He is said to be thrilled to have received the SOS from Ricky Ponting. [I heard it via NOVA].

~~
Update: Pranksters out in force today... [via The Age]. And here [SMH]. Apparently the Guardian was going to the birds. [Tweet Tweet]. Anyone get any other ones?