Four Arguments for the Retention of Television

This week I watched five hours of PBS TV's AMERICAN MASTERS "You Must Remember This" series on the history of Warner Bros. and its films. I thought about how much my still photography has been informed by the likes of Orson Welles, Film Noir, and Sven Nykvist's work with Ingmar Bergman and others. And what I have learned by carefully watching (some) television. Following the last episode of "You Must Remember This" was a showing on my local station of "Casablanca". I hadn't seen it for a long time, so I was ready to go one more time, until Kim talked me out of it. It was getting pretty late, after all, and I can always study the camera work and individual scenes anytime by dusting if off from my DVD library.

But as I drifted off to sleep, I found myself continuing to think about TV, and remembered Jerry Mander's FOUR ARGUMENTS FOR THE ELIMINATION OF TELEVISION that was published in the late 70s. An executive summary of those arguments might be as follows, quoting from the book:

Argument One--The Mediation of Experience

"As humans have moved into totally artificial environments, our direct contact with any knowledge of the planet has been snapped. Disconnected, like astronauts floating in space, we cannot know up from down or truth from fiction. Conditions are appropriate for the implantation of arbitrary realities. Television is one recent example of this, a serious one, since it greatly accelerates the problem."

. . .

Argument Two--The Colonization of Experience

"It is no accident that television has been dominated by a handful of corporate powers. Neither is it accidental that television has been used to re-create human beings into a new form that matches the artificial, commercial environment. A conspiracy of technological and economic factors made this inevitable and continue to do so."

. . .

Argument Three--Effects of Television on the Human Being

"Television technology produces neuro-physiological responses in the people who watch it. It may create illness, it certainly produces confusion and submission to external imagery. Taken together, the effects condition for autocratic control."

. . .

Argument Four--The Inherent Biases of Television

"Along with the venality of its controllers, the technology of television predetermines the boundaries of its content. Some information can be conveyed completely, some partially, some not at all. The most effective telecommunications are the gross, simplified linear messages and programs which conveniently fit the purposes of the medium's commercial controllers. Television's highest potential is advertising. This cannot be changed. The bias is inherent in the technology."

These arguments continue to be rather compelling but very controversial to this day, of course. When I first read Mander's book, I mostly watched public television shows like "Nova" and "The MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour" -- and Star Trek. I was warned, when my kids came along, that I needed to gird against the temptation to use TV as an electronic babysitter. Right.

I still watch mostly public television, and perhaps even more so as a grow older. But I have discovered that for Sheer Entertainment, it is hard to beat these four "counter arguments", listed more or less in order of personal preference:

• Mad Men
• Battlestar Galactica
• Lost
• Pushing Daisies

The first three are sometimes characterized as soap opera in the sixties, in space, and on a desert island, respectively; the fourth is my daughter's favorite, and now one of mine, too. I believe you can watch the last two (ABC TV) completely online as well, while snippets and previews can be seen online for Mad Men and BSG.

Perhaps I will have to do some research and see whether Mander or anyone else has almost certainly extended the elimination arguments to the Internet as well ...

And finally, I must share with you a chunk of this incredible tableau that I ripped from the BSG (Battlestar Galactica) site:

Life, and Life Only (to quote Bob Dylan)

Life magazine's photo archives will go online in 2009. Visit the embryonic Web site now and signup for news and updates: http://www.life.com/Life/ I can hardly wait.

Here's the press release:

Press Release

Time Inc. and Getty Images Jointly Launch LIFE.com

New Site Offers Access to Millions of Iconic Photographs From Getty Images’ and LIFE’s Combined Photo Collections

3,000 New Contemporary Photos Uploaded Daily from Getty Images

New York, NY, September 23, 2008 – Time Inc. and Getty Images will jointly launch LIFE.com, the companies announced today at the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s MIXX Conference in New York City. LIFE.com will be jointly owned and operated by Time Inc. and Getty Images, and will provide access to the most comprehensive iconic and professional photography collections available anywhere online. Andy Blau, president of LIFE and SVP of Time Inc. Interactive, and Catherine Gluckstein, vice president of iStockphoto and Consumer Markets at Getty Images, will serve as CEO and CFO, respectively.

“LIFE.com brings together the two most-recognized brands in photography, making the defining images of our times even more accessible to people everywhere,” said Jonathan Klein, co-founder and CEO of Getty Images. “We are thrilled to partner with Time Inc. on the launch of this exciting new venture.”

LIFE.com will offer access to thousands of new photographs from Getty Images’ award-winning photographers, including today’s news, entertainment, sports, celebrities, travel, animals and many others. Consumers will also have access to millions of images from LIFE magazine, many of which have never been seen by the public. The collection contains the historic photos that LIFE published through the decades, in addition to many never-before-seen pictures of Hollywood stars, sports heroes, important people and events from the ‘30’s though the ‘90’s. Getty Images will be providing the majority of images at launch from its comprehensive archival and current collections. More than 3,000 new images will be uploaded daily from Getty Images.

“Image search is the fastest-growing type of online search, and LIFE.com will satisfy the public’s desire for quality and relevant imagery through a visually pleasing and easy-to-browse website,” says Blau. “Only three percent of the LIFE archive has been seen by the public,” says LIFE.com editor Bill Shapiro. “This site will put everything on display. You’ll be able to look at the biggest events of yesterday and the stories making news today with just a couple of clicks.”

The new site, which was designed with Getty Images’ industry-leading search technology, will be easy-to-use and navigate. When the site launches in early 2009, consumers will be able to interact intimately with imagery, including printing select photos, sharing photos with friends and family, playing the popular LIFE Picture Puzzle, creating collections of photos around special interests and purchasing photo albums of user-made collections. Through the site, consumers can view the photos the world is talking about by searching for recently added photos or viewing photos by topic. Searching for and viewing images on the site will be absolutely free.

About Time Inc.
Time Inc., a Time Warner company, is one of the largest content companies in the world. With more than 120 magazines, it is the largest magazine publisher in the U.S. and a leading publisher in the U.K. and Mexico. Each month, one out of every two American adults reads a Time Inc. magazine, and one out of every seven who are online, visits a company web site (more than 25 million unique visitors). Time Inc.’s popular brands and successful franchises extend to online, television, cable VOD, satellite radio, mobile devices, events and branded products.

About Life Inc.
Life Inc. publishes soft and hardcover books under the LIFE brand, distributes limited edition photography through galleries nationwide and offers fine art prints to consumers online. The LIFE Picture Collection is a working photography library dedicated to cataloging, scanning, researching, and digitizing images. Life Inc. is a subsidiary of Time Inc.

About Getty Images
Getty Images is the world’s leading creator and distributor of still imagery, footage and multi-media products, as well as a recognized provider of other forms of premium digital content, including music. Getty Images serves business customers in more than 100 countries and is the first place creative and media professionals turn to discover, purchase and manage images and other digital content. Its award-winning photographers and imagery help customers produce inspiring work which appears every day in the world’s most influential newspapers, magazines, advertising campaigns, films, television programs, books and websites. Visit Getty Images at www.gettyimages.com to learn more about how the company is advancing the unique role of digital media in communications and business, and enabling creative ideas to come to life.

Hallelujah

A friend just introduced me to Allison Crowe and her cover of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah. Crowe, he says, is a Canadian singer-songwriter-guitarist-pianist (classically trained, so I'm told).



So much music, so little time.

My friend knows that I like Cohen's "Hallelujah", one of the zillions of Cohen pieces that zillions of people cover.

Here is Rufus Wainwright (first heard on my daughter's Shrek CD):



k.d.lang (she was Nik's favorite singer for a while, when he was VERY young) has a pretty good one:



One of the first -- and best, imho -- Hallelujah covers I heard was the late Jeff Buckley (why do I come across so many people who think he wrote the song?):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AratTMGrHaQ

And, of course, the creator of the song himself:

Kim Sleeps

I have hundreds and hundreds of old slides and negs, never processed or printed or published, that I slowly try to review, cull and scan. I am trying to find at least one I like each weekend. Here is something taken (just barely) with one of my ancient Nikon Fs in our old downtown L.A. loft right after Nik was born, previously unviewed.

I found a couple of others that I am sending over to the family blog, also.

Seeing With A Different Eye

Provocative, and for real: http://www.theblindphotographer.com

Scalable City

A friend sends me this link to a QuickTime video of artist/programmer Sheldon Brown's Scalable City video installation.

Brown is an arts professor and Director of the Center for Research in Computing and the Arts at UCSD. In a couple of weeks, he will be in one of my favorite college-era haunts, the Nelson-Atkins Art Museum in Kansas City. You can learn more about him and his projects at these URLs:

http://va-grad.ucsd.edu/~drupal/node/170
http://visarts.ucsd.edu/node/view/491/22
http://crca.ucsd.edu/sheldon/
http://www.sheldon-brown.net/

Marian Anderson, 1939 at the Lincoln Memorial

Here it is; spinoff from my previous post. Goosebump time. Something for 9/11 ...



Now it is time to go bed. Goodnight.

Ellens Gesang III D. 839

While crawling around looking for something entirely different tonight, I stumbled upon a CD of Anne Sofie Von Otter performing, among other Schubert pieces, Ave Maria. When I was small child, one of my first musical memories was hearing my mother's favorite recording of Ave Maria. So I went scouting around on You Tube to see if I could find something I hadn't heard before, or for a long time ...

First, I found Pavarotti:




Then Barbara Hendricks in Brussels ...



Here is Renee Fleming:



Oh, yes. Marian Anderson in 193? (must remind myself to chase down her Lincoln Memorial performance!):



Marian Anderson with Leopold Stokowski conducting in 1944:



And a 1947 violin version by Yehudi Menuhin:



Now, it's really starting to get interesting. Jascha Heifetz at sixteen years, in 1917:

Steven Cantor, Rediscovered

Steven Cantor is maybe the best DJ I have ever heard. I grieved over his departure a year or so ago from OPB Radio, and have finally tracked him down at KMHD.org, where he holds forth on Sunday nights from 10pm - 2am. Don't know yet if the site archives its sessions for replay -- I didn't readily find them if they do. If you use iTunes, you can find KMHD listed under Radio | Public. The stream is pretty lo-fi, unfortunately, but how I use it is to capture the stream as one big MP3, then review it with the playlist at hand or onscreen, to note stuff worth tracking down and/or buying; then I can throw the low-bitrate file away. That way I actually get some sleep on Sunday night.

My earlier whinings on this matter: here and here

Antony and the Johnsons, So Near Yet So Far

Yes, Antony and the Johnsons -- I have mentioned them before -- were in performance this past Friday with the Oregon Symphony. And I missed it all. Here is a link to a video and a Luciana Lopez review that appeared on the front page of the How We Live section of today's The Oregonian. (Btw, that is NOT the video I would have chosen to illustrate Antony ... I will find something more appropriate, and post it when I get a chance.) And here is a rough scan of the half-page photo by Leah Nash that The Oregonian published ...



We can't stop here, though. Leah Nash is a wonderful photographer who does a lot of work for The Oregonian. Highly, highly recommended: go spend some time at her Website at leahnash.com.

Beirut

Another under-produced (to put it mildly) Vincent Moon video. At pitchfork.tv (great source of music vids, btw) Beirut can be seen/heard "one week only" (don't know if the week is just starting, or ending, or what ... but if you go today, you can experience this stuff) moving throughout Brooklyn -- from alleys to rooftops to pool halls to living rooms, etc. -- playing pieces from their Flying Club Cup album. These people use a really wide range of instruments; ukelele, various horns, cello, violon, accordian and more. I even spotted some drumming using ping-pong paddles, plus regular drumsticks on a watermelon. The music has Eastern European sounds with I'm not sure what else mixed in.

Beirut first came to my ears several months ago on opbmusic.org. Jeremy Peterson there seems big on the group and its very young leader, Zach Condon. At the time, they seemed somewhat interesting but didn't inspire me enough to pursue further. But I keep hearing them here and there, and seeing more Internet buzz, and find that they have really been growing on me. At their Website (http://www.beirutband.com) you can make an online buy of a DVD that might be the same or similar to the online stuff at pitchfork.tv. I'm tempted.