Category: Personal

The Supreme Court as TV drama: Yeah right

Hey, I’m a big James Garner fan and Joe Mantegna is pretty good in my book as well. But I have to wonder what the heck CBS and producer Donald Bellisario (JAG, Quantum Leap, Magnum PI, Battlestar Gallactica) were thinking when they gave the greenlight to First Monday. This show, coming Jan. 15, will attempt to dramatize the US Supreme Court. Think about that last sentence for a minute.

What does the Supreme Court actually do in the process of rendering decisions that, as the publicity remarks, effect every American? Remember that before this there has been a trial and at least one appeal; also, the appellant must cite a constitutional error worthy of the Supreme Court’s consideration. The court is asked to hear thousands of appeals each year but only hears around 100.

If a case makes it past this stiff hurdle, both parties to the dispute (defendant and prosecutor or plaintiff and defendant) and often many interested third parties (via amicus curiae briefs) file lots of paperwork. A sitting is scheduled for the parties to appear before the court between the first Monday in October and the end of April on a Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. (with a break for lunch) during a two week period each month. When the great day arrives, each side is allotted no more than 30 minutes to make a presentation. So you can see one reason why so few cases actually get heard–there are only 168 potential slots a year!

The rules of procedure during the actual hearing are quite precise and intense and completely focused on allowing the justices (never refer to them as judges) to get information they want without wasting a moment of time. Generally the justices will not allow an attorney to make a prepared presentation but will interrupt at any time with questions and the attorney best stop speaking immediately when a justice so much as clears his throat.

After the hearing, the justices have a preliminary discussion and then one justice is assigned to prepare an opinion, most of which is actually done by one of the justice’s clerks, which lays out the thinking and precedents underlying the decision. The draft is circulated and other justices, particularly if they disagree with the preliminary decision, may prepare their own opinions. In the end, the justices vote on the question at hand and this becomes the official holding. Justices may sign one of the opinions or publish their own and only if five or more justices sign an opinion does the opinion become official precedent.

So, having laid this all out, from where do Bellisario and CBS execs expect the dramatic tension to come? Fistfights in the courtroom between Greenpeace and oil industry lawyers or between liberal and conservative court clerks? This is all about a process that is largely on paper, a brief Q&A, and some occasionally heated discussion. I wonder how much they will try to do with dramatic music, facial expressions, and hand gestures to overcome the inherent passiveness of the material.

Amusingly, this is not the only show that will completely fail to succeed on this topic. ABC is readying “The Court” starring Sally Field and Kellie Martin for a late March debut. ER/West Wing/Third Watch producer John Wells is behind this one.

Micro-advertising experiment, day seven

Good day for the ad! I had seven more visitors through the ad yesterday (out of 353 views, 1.98% CTR!) for a total of 32 from 2718 views for a 1.18% CTR. More Woohoo!!

Hating Internet Explorer

It’s my own fault. I really ought to change to another browser. There are a couple of reasons why I don’t, such as the fact that the Blogger tools don’t play well in Opera and the CSS controlling my page layout is different. But IE is pushing me to the limits of possibly even switching from Windows 2000 to Linux. The stupid software is crashing my machine on a daily basis with a Blue Screen of Death. I would include a screenshot but of course that isn’t possible unless I grab my digital camera quickly next time. The specific error message is

wait operation, attach process, or yield was attempted from a DPC routine

Then the machine goes into some odd process/terminal loop. The only solution is to pull the power, which on this laptop means power cord and battery. Of course the Microsoft help sites have no help for this problem. And just try and get any answer out of them without paying for support incident! Ugggh!!!!

Tautological

garret has dangerousmeta! pointing to my MetaFilter ad response posting. But g, you only pointed to one!! (LOL)

p.s. Hope your neck doesn’t snap off!

Reason to love the web, part {next}: Spider-man

Downloading cool movie trailers in seconds, like the one for next Spring’s Spider-Man. More video and other neat stuff at the official movie site. You wouldn’t expect Tobey Maguire to be that much of an action hero but looking at the trailer and other clips he shows that a good actor can do almost any role, though I bet at age 26 he’s tired of playing high school students; he must be betting that this picture will have long legs and turn into a franchise. Kirsten Dunst, totally hot with hair dyed red, has no trouble convincing us she’s the adorable love interest. Willem Dafoe will be as slimey as he wants to be as the billionaire gone insane and twisted into super baddie Green Goblin. The movie is written by David Koepp, will it be as good as his Jurassic Park or as bad as his Stir of Echoes? Will director Sam Raimi live up to A Simple Plan or down to the Tom Selleck snorer For Love of the Game? This opens the day before my birthday and seems like a treat to look for.

Micro-advertising experiment, day six

Going by the official stats, I had four more visitors through the ad yesterday for a total of 25 out of 2307 views for a 1.08% CTR. Having used MetaFilter’s Ad Management screens for a week now, I am ready to admit they have some shortcomings. Most explicitly is that after 20 minutes one must login again so I can’t just keep a browser pointed at the page and hit Refresh every now and again; Matt says he could change this but hasn’t yet. Further, the design of the screens is less than optimal. I would also like more summary information on the main page and that some other format than Flash be used to visualize the daily results chart. Hmm, this is an odd write up, I think, since most of you can’t see these screens. So I captured the graphic just to display for you:

After waiting for four months, I finally got to see the centennial Ansel Adams at 100 exhibit. Featuring over 100 wonderful photographs from perhaps the greatest naturalist–I’m happy to say I have three Adams prints on my living room wall–but get there fast as the party ends January 13. Also recommended: Matisse and Beyond and some cool new pieces like this Magritte.

Design Your Own O’Reilly Book Cover

[Via aaronland] O’Reilly has established itself as perhaps the primo publisher of technical books. But they have one of the plainest, most ordinary cover styles for like all of their books. Now Jay Link has posted a book cover generator. Another wonderful Internet toy. Mine is displayed here in all its glory:

Others are getting in on the game as well. Some of these people have an even more twisted sense of humor than me.

Micro-advertising experiment, day five

Wondering if the evening hours would do much, I waited until almost midnight to check the results. What were they? 21 total clickthroughs out of 1957 accumulated views for a ration of 1.07%. Very decent Tuesday with seven clickthroughs but very poor Wednesday with only two. Boo hoo hoo.

Human integration

Almost since there have been computers, and possibly longer, people have dreamed about directly connecting them to human beings. Augmenting memory, directly controlling machines, facilitating communications are just some of the forms these dreams might take. Personally I would be happy never having to type again since by the end of the day my hands always hurt.

In Scientists activate neurons with quantum dots, R. Colin Johnson reports that University of Texas scientists are making real progress in human-machine interaction. Their idea is to stimulate particular neuron clusters, non-invasively, using some kind of programmable stimulator. Such basic research is years away from being generally available but shows much promise of a feasible solution.

In A Chip ID That’s Only Skin-Deep, David Streitfeld reports on a company called Applied Digital Solutions of Palm Beach that is about to commercialize a very basic form of HMI. Their product is a simple and small implantable chip targeted at people with artificial organs and limbs. The chip can hold up to 60 words of relevant medical information but must be read by a special scanner. Another near-term potential application is a personal ID but this raises serious privacy questions.

The future, one might say, gets closer every day.

AIDS Ride: too expensive?

After eight years of partnering on the high profile California AIDS Ride bicycling fundraiser, a AIDS Ride management dispute leads to lawsuit, competing event. This is really sad to see but not too surprising. One of my friends has ridden the event the last four years and I’ve always given generously to support him. But I also felt that this was a very expensive way to raise money for a charity and not enough was going through to the beneficiaries. I hope the charities and organizers can resolve the dispute soon since the preparation takes so long but I have to come down on the side of spending less to run the Ride; perhaps the riders need to pay an entry fee to help defray the costs of sheltering and feeding.

World Cup ’02: Argentina early favorite

According to a Reuters poll of soccer writers, Argentina is a strong early favorite to take a third world crown this Summer in the World Cup finals in South Korea and Japan. Getting 24 out of 40 votes, the South Americans will open in the ‘Group of Death’ with England, Nigeria, and Sweden. England got three votes, while defending champs France were second with seven; the US team got zero zilch nada no votes and will be lucky to get out of the first round after their miserable performance in 1998. With five or more Liverpool men slated to play, though, I give England my vote.

LotR: Building the One Ring

One more day. Or actually, about 7 1/2 hours since many theaters are having 12:01 showings. Will McCarthy, columnist for SciFi Weekly, looks at the feasibility of building the One Ring with technology available today. Let’s just say quantum dots will be very big in our lives before much longer. Can we do it? Almost, he almost makes it but not quite. Still, could be very cool. I like the immortality bit myself.

One Ring to rule them all, one Ring to find them,

One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them

That would be a cool to have, who will front me the big cash?

Greetings from Florida

Fooled you, didn’t I? You read the headline and thought I was in Florida. I bet Boynton Beach, Florida (where the picture below was taken) is warmer than Mountain View, California, where I actually am sitting. Still, my friend Betsy sent in this recent photo of her new beau Steve and herself. Aren’t they a cute couple? Here’s a holiday wish that Betsy and Steve ‘take it to the next level’ sooner rather than later. Are you listening, Steve?

The Watchers get on the case

Well I’m glad to see the Zaphods finally got off their duffs and responded to Dave’s awards–can we call them the Fruities? Winerlog calls them “Dave’s Big Ego Awards,” “Dave’s ‘I have a Big Dick Awards’,” and “narcissim awards.” Their weblog entry also points out the incredibly obvious fact that “Dave just wants love and attention.” Don’t we all, guys?

Cam Barret, who writes the swell CamWorld, rants in response to his Blogger of the Year nomination. He wants nothing to do with the awards which “are nothing but a disgusting display of self-importance from the man himself. They are also a thinly-veiled effort to show off the somewhat useful, but hardly robust, content management features of Dave’s Manila software, which runs many of the sites nominated.” And of course the MetaFilter gang jumped in with gusto; got to give Winer credit, he did respond on that thread. Some of the folks there, though, are unfortunately just way stuck in the multi-culturalism virus that says everyone is equally good at every possible activity.

Don’t they all realize that BillSaysThis is the greatest weblog, no, heck, the greatest single piece of writing ever made by the hand of Man?

Micro-advertising experiment, day four

Not a great day, only two more clicks. 1163 accumulated views. 1.03% clickthrough ratio.

Who will watch the watchers?

When it comes to ragging on the man who takes himself just a mite too seriously, I depend on the Zaphods at WinerLog. But just when Dave comes up with an almost-too-easy target in the Scripting News Awards, they let me down and don’t have a pie in the face ready. The Romans had a saying which I’ve used to title this entry, “Quis Custodiet ipsos Custodes?”

Last night’s movie: The Seventh Stream

Usually I only write about theatrical films but some TV films are special enough to warrant it as well. Last night I finally got around to watching the Hallmark Hall of Fame production of The Seventh Stream (thanks Tivo) and I’m glad a friend asked me to record it, even though she ended up not wanting to watch it. Scott Glenn and Saffron Burrows star in this old Irish folktale of the Selkie, a seal come to human form, who brings a heart back to a distraught widower fisherman in the first years of the 20th century. Glenn must, of course, rescue the exquisite Burrows from a dangerous man and come to know her tue nature and needs from an old blind man since this is a mythic tale whose theme is the power of love to transform and redeem.

Writer-director John Grey wrote the script 15 years ago but only now was able to get it produced and a lovely job he did, filming the rocky cliffs and beaches of Tully, Ireland, using the rain almost as another character, light here, heavy there, letting the sky clear for short bursts. Anne Simpson, writing in the Herald, suggests that this film may be a portent of a turn to the gentler in taste after the violent, sexual outburst of the past decade. Perhaps, although if one considers the long line of action movie sequels in the pipeline, one would doubt her conclusion. (Terminator 3, Star Trek 10, X-Men 2, The Scorpion King, Jurassic Park 4, and so forth)

Micro-advertising experiment, day three

The Clickthrough Ratio is edging up to 1.35%, although that means nine clicks on 666 viewings. I left the wording the same as in the Blogger ad but I think I need to work on it for next time, if there is a next time.

Making money on the Internet

For almost everyone except eBay and PayPal, making money on the Internet has been beyond elusive. Even Yahoo!, which turned small profits in a few quarters, is searching for revenue beyond the banner and popunder advertising markets. One new twist, which shows someone is thinking, is selling analysis of search queries. Their new Buzz service, a basic version of which is freely available, scores the percentage of Yahoo! users searching for that subject on a given day, multiplied by a constant to make the number easier to read. Useful for market research, Buzz looks like a smart way for Yahoo! to make more out what is has.