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Jaybird

Jaybird is Birdmojo on Xbox Live and Jaybirdmojo on Playstation's network. He's been playing consoles since the Atari 2600 and it was Zork that taught him how to touch-type. If you've got a song for Wednesday, a commercial for Saturday, a recommendation for Tuesday, an essay for Monday, or, heck, just a handful a questions, fire off an email to AskJaybird-at-gmail.com

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23 Responses

  1. Road Scholar says:

    I’ve been bingeing on American Horror Story: Asylum. Sheesh, it’s like a clean-out-the-fridge stew of disparate horror tropes. It’s certainly interesting, but only just barely sorta, kinda, hangs together. For all that, though, I have to say, for what it is — whatever the hell that is — it’s very well done.Report

  2. Mike Dwyer says:

    I had this amazingly modern experience yesterday that is only possible in the digital age. I’ve been binging on The 100 on Netflix which is another post-apocolyptic story but with some interesting new angles. Finished Season 1 and was starting to feel sad and then realized there was a whole second season I was unaware of. Happy days! So I saved it for my work trip this week where I can watch a few episodes each night guilt-free.Report

    • From the other side of the technology divide, I’ve been reading bits and pieces of old “airplane novels.” For the youngsters, those are thick paperbacks with some sex, some violence, minimal character development, and a fairly straight-line story that moves along at a brisk pace. Back in the day when Bell Labs (and subsequently, various parts of the dismantled Bell System) were sending me about the country, one of my stops on the way through the airport was at the book store to pick up an airplane novel. My project to replace at least part of the enormous mass of books in our house with EPUBs ran into a double-rowed shelf full of the damned things.

      Now I’m wondering just how many trips the Labs sent me on, and why I don’t remember more of them.Report

  3. aaron david says:

    Savoring, yes SAVORING, Ubik. Limiting myself to a chapter a night, letting the ideas and thoughts it generates wash over me, as opposed to just devouring it a sitting. So, also reading more John Buchan thrillers.

    Watched Gods Pocket last night, one of Phillip Seymore Hoffmans last movies. A very black comedy, that doesn’t always strick the right notes for a given situation, but not bad.Report

  4. Morat20 says:

    Been working my way through Person of Interest, now on Season 3.

    Sooner or later I need to watch the comic book stuff (Agents of Shield, Green Arrow, Flash, Daredevil, Jessica Jones…)Report

  5. Kazzy says:

    1:48:49!!! Wahoo! New PR! Snow stayed away. Still cold but decent conditions including a run through a car-free Times Square.Report

  6. The kids (both home for the break) and I watched the first episode of Louis CK’s Horace and Pete. It’s very much a filmed play, with only one or two sets, and the actors keep going after muffing a line. It’s generally described as a comedy-drama, the first part is only because of Louis’s involvement — it’s not a comedy in any way, The cast is outstanding: Alan Alda (completely different from anything I’ve ever seen him in), Steve Buscemi, Edie Falco, and Jessica Lange. Louis too, though he’s completely outclassed as an actor.

    It’s very unpleasant, and may not be everyone’s cup of tea. (It’s set in a bar, but much more The Iceman Cometh than Cheers.) Still, I’d recommend checking it out.Report

    • Zac in reply to Mike Schilling says:

      I’ve been really enjoying Horace and Pete as well, although I’m a couple episodes behind now. It’s kind of like if Eugene O’Neill directed a season of Cheers. If you get the chance, watch through to at least the third episode: I’m curious to see your reaction to it.Report

  7. Maribou says:

    Didn’t really read last week, much, and the two things I’m in the middle of are hugemungous.

    Watched some movies and tv on the planes. Carol was wonderful, In Their Own Words: Jim Henson was only mediocrely made but b/c Jim Henson, was still super-interesting, and The Muppets (new one) was… difficult. Sometimes it was High School Musical-y or The Larry Sanders Show-y (neither of those things are good), sometimes it captured the spirit of the old Muppets perfectly. I went back and forth from “ugh, must stop watching,” to swooning with delight many times, in 4 episodes. Might watch more episodes or might not. One technical note: WAYYYYYYYY not enough stuff blowing up!!!Report

  8. j r says:

    I started watching season 4 of Homeland. Was curious to see where the show was going to go post-Brody.

    I am having very confusing feelings about the show. On the one hand, much of it is incredibly ham-fisted. At the same time, there are moments where I realize that I am watching the best fictional critique of the war on terror that I’ve seen yet. The former makes me wonder if the latter is a complete accident. I’m only five episodes in, so I guess that I will find out.Report

    • Glyph in reply to j r says:

      I watched the first three seasons. Rarely has a show combined “very good and intelligent” and “completely preposterous and stupid” to the degree Homeland is capable of.Report

    • Zac in reply to j r says:

      The fourth season was a bit of a mixed bag, IMO, but I really enjoyed the recent fifth season, which relocates the show to Berlin. It’s worth checking out, assuming you’re still interested after Season 4.Report

  9. Kim says:

    Is “outro” a real word?
    My friend the musician thought he had just made up a word, and people were just humoring him…
    But then it appeared on a TV show we were watching (by some of his friends, so they might have picked the term up from him…)…

    Wikipedia says: yes, real word. still a portmanteau, of course, but it’s got more widespread usage than just a dude and his friends.Report

  10. Zac says:

    I interrupted my re-watch of Breaking Bad (of which I’m about 2/3rds of the way through) to watch the new season of Punchlord (which is what I call Daredevil). I was excited about Jon Bernthal as the Punisher when his casting was first announced, and he’s proven to be even better in the role than I’d imagined — he is absolutely killing it on this show, both literally and figuratively (I’m pretty sure he’s racked up an on-screen body count in the triple digits by the time the season is over); he basically steals every scene he’s in. The first season I’d give something like a B+, but this new season is absolutely an A in my book, evolving the themes the first season presented and really taking the storytelling and production to the next level, along with the fight cinematography.Report

    • Morat20 in reply to Zac says:

      One, I’m totally stealing Punchlord.

      Second, I can’t think of the Punsher without this popping into my head.Report

    • Glyph in reply to Zac says:

      Bernthal brought an energy and intensity to early Walking Dead as well. I’m interested to see him here.Report

    • Chris in reply to Zac says:

      I am only two episodes in, and have been told that it is in Episode 3 that the show reaches a whole new level, but so far I have two beefs with Season 2 (only minor spoilers):

      (1) They hit you over the head with the Daredevil caused The Punisher narrative, and

      (2) Perhaps my favorite aspect of Season 1 was the brutality and chaos of the fight scenes. There was no romanticism in that violence: it was dirty, sweaty, bloody violence. When Daredevil fought even ordinary tough guys (as opposed to superhumanly tough guys like Kingpin or Punisher, it was a real struggle with every part of their bodies. It was almost difficult to watch (and I almost stopped watching), which is how violence should affect us, I think.

      In Season 2, the fight scenes feel highly choreographed, and look as much like dancing as fighting. Those involved in creating them are clearly fans of kung fu movies and the recent Batman trilogy, and the fights have completely lost the edge they had on Season 1. It is not at all off-putting. They kept the thrill and lost everything else. I find that disappointing. Report

      • Chris in reply to Chris says:

        Ugh, the fight scenes get even more blatantly choreographed, and the hand feeding us the “you created me” narrative with respect to Punisher gets even heavier, in episode 3. This season isn’t bad, but 3 episodes in it has a long way to go to catch up to Season 1.Report

  11. Michael Cain says:

    Are any of the lawyers here knowledgeable about copyright across international borders? A. Merritt’s old lost-world fantasy novel Dwellers in the Mirage passed out of copyright in Australia, but remains covered in the US. If I read a public-domain copy from a server in Australia, surely someone is breaking some law somewhere. But who, and where?Report

    • PD Shaw in reply to Michael Cain says:

      Merritt’s pretty cool. Love the Moon Pool and the Ship of Ishtar. Haven’t read Dwellers, but I’ve run across this situation a lot in pulp fiction from that era — public domain there, but not here. I assume its solely a matter of international treaty. I don’t like to read fiction on-line, so don’t follow that aspect too closely.Report

    • What I know about international copyright law is this.

      1. Most European nations and their spinoff colonies subscribe to something called “moral right,” which substantially inhibits the creation of derivative works without the artist’s permission. So if you read something credited to Merritt chances are really good it’s what Merritt wrote.

      2. There is a global clearinghouse of copyright registrations, called the World Intellectual Property Organization. If you’re going to market a work of art globally, you need a WIPO registry to keep track of where your works are really protected and where you only think they are.

      3. For the love of fish, don’t violate a copyright in the UK. Her Majesty’s legal system will come down on you hard. No, if you’re going to violate a copyright, do it in the PRC. Which ostensibly has robust IP laws of its own, but for some reason they don’t seem to get enforced for works deriving from outside the PRC’s borders.

      Aaaaand that’s it. Maybe one of my sister or brother lawyers can supplement this.Report