In honor of National Potato Day here in the U.S.
National Potato Day
Couch spuds
Craig Hockenberry’s Take on the Why of Liquid Glass
Is Liquid Glass an edge case?
There is a quote largely attributed to Robert F. Kennedy. No not the one rampaging through the U.S. healthcare system. It goes “some men see things as they are and ask why. I dream things that never were, and ask why not?” But, it actually came first from George Bernard Shaw in his play Back to Methuselah.
The text gets mangled often enough as does the attribution. Regardless, the point is made. In my experience as a theatre producer/director/designer/playwright the biggest part of the game is the “dreaming” part. The next hurdle is finding a way to turn that into reality. The dreams often come when least expected, occasionally after many attempts at finding a solution, and sometimes at random moments. They sometimes come into focus as almost impossible, or perhaps wrong-headed.
Typically, in something completely uncharacteristic for me, when I find I can’t articulate what I’m feeling or seeing, I know I’m on to something, and that’s the moment to ask “why not?” rather than “why?”
I’m also very familiar with the desire or temptation to do something new instead of doing again what I know works. Speaking from my experience that’s yielded both positive and negative results. There’s a reason some things are called “tried and true.” There’s also a reason to hold your breath, roll the dice and gamble it all on something new.
Honestly, either way is a risk. And that’s how it should be. But if you feel the need for change, go for it and don’t reverse course.
But what do I know? I’m just a theatre guy who’s produced hits and flops along the way and comfortable taking slings and arrows along with occasional accolades. I’m not sure what feels better, being admired for a courageous leap of faith, or feeling accomplished for sticking the landing. In the end, I’m not sure it matters.
Liquid Glass
A lot has already been said, good, bad, or indifferent about how Apple’s designers dreamed up its new Liquid Glass design approach. But that doesn’t answer the “why?” Was it a compulsion for something new? Time for a change? A diversion to distract? Or a romantic new vision spurred on by a heavy new headset?
App developer and designer Craig Hockenberry of the
, in an interesting post recently asked that question and provided what he thinks is a possible answer. It’s titled simply Liquid Glass. Why? I don’t want to spoil the post. You should go read it yourself. But his answer points to a possible future of devices “with screens that disappear seamlessly into the physical edge.”
A cautionary note here. For several years Apple trumpeted “edge-to-edge screens” that still had bezels. Marketing mavens often outrace product dreamers to the destination.
I joked with Craig on Mastodon that he should have subtitled the piece Liquid Glass is an Edge Case.
The joke may indeed prove to be true, but it’s a truth we’ll live with in some form or fashion for the next few years, edge case or not, regardless of the good, bad, or indifferent reactions.
Anyway, go read Craig’s piece. However Liquid Glass is received in a few weeks, I’m looking forward to discovering it myself.
I mean, why not?
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.
Mainstream Media Continues to Dismantle Itself
MSBNC to become MS Now
It’s been an accepted part of conventional wisdom for quite some time that what we consider mainstream media is gradually fading away in the face of newer generations turning to other sources available on the Internet for news and entertainment. Heck, even some older generations are turning what used to be the dial.
The business models have suffered for a while now whether it’s print, broadcast or cable. The fading away has gained new and seemingly panicked momentum thanks to the depredations of the Trump administration, aided by the greedy cowardice of the corporations worried more about avoiding the wrath of the beast they helped create, than the standards they all proudly trumpeted for years. Those trumpets have largely fallen silent or just ring hollow.
The end of late night comedy shows captured a lot of attention recently, but eventually most broadcast scripted news and entertainment will also give way. Which is ironic given that the convicted felon largely responsible for this quickening pace came to prominence via Reality TV, which let me tell you is anything but reality and is very scripted.
Now NBC Universal, owned by Comcast, is making a move away from MSNBC, attempting to distance the Peacock from controversy by rebranding as MS Now. That little branding acronym stands for My Source | News | Opinion | World.
Yeesh. I guess the marketing department was the first place they made changes. As a social media friend Judgment Dave says, “it sounds like a translation of something in Japanese that doesn’t translate well into English.”
It’s weird, yet it isn’t to hang onto the ‘MS’, given that MSNBC was birthed as partnership with Microsoft and NBC, long since dissolved. Somewhere Bill Gates is laughing because it also sounds like a software program delivered on a CD-ROM.
Whatever sturm and drang comes from this news of the moment, (news of the Now?) the bigger picture is that these troubled corporations, in what feels like desperate efforts to try and save themselves, are essentially hastening their eventual final curtains in the wake of current trends already overtaking them.
Some may lay blame on the rise of the Internet and mobile devices in every hand, but the fact of the matter is the smart folks at the top of these corporations missed the moment. Some eventually tried to make changes. Remember CNN Plus? But in my opinion their failures were less about the delivery mechanisms and more about the decline of the news and entertainment products that they delivered as the cost cutters held sway.
NBCUniversal isn’t done trimming the sails yet. Plans are in place to spinoff other properties as well (CNBC, USA, Oxygen, and E!).
Some will blame it on advertisers seeking the best way to reach customers. That’s mostly true, but ask podcasters how that’s going for them these days. Chasing advertising revenue is always a cyclical game for just about everything except sports.
It’s no wonder then that it feels like we see our politics more and more resembling blood sports. Of course the irony is audiences claim they want less, not more in that realm. What will be interesting to see in the next decade or so is how political advertising, which fills so many corporate media coffers sorts itself out, once the usual outlets fade away as they continue to play to ever diminishing audiences that keep spreading themselves wider and wider, attempting to flee the same old, same old.
Certainly ads will continue to be designed to run on social media and circulate that way. But the only folks making real money off of that trend are the political consultants and ad-makers.
I hope I’m around to see how my grandkids eventually consume what we once revered and respected as the news. I’ll regale them with what I imagine they will view as fairy tales and myths.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.
Sunday Morning Reading
The lazy days of Summer
We’re technically out of the Dog Days of Summer, but it doesn’t feel much like it. It’s the kind of hot Summer I remember as a kid when the dogs would spend the hot part of the day lazing under the porch. I’m spending mine traveling (too much traveling) and sharing what I can here and there. Find some shade and check out this week’s Sunday Morning Reading.
Peter Wehner thinks the only way out of the wreckage we’re in is to rewrite the cultural script. Tall task. He spells it out in The Virtue of Integrity.
Knowing is half the battle. What you do with knowledge is an altogether different story as knowing and knowledge are two different things. Check out Jim Stewartson’s piece The War on Knowing.
Somehow in all of the wreckage we’re sorting through, empathy became a bad thing for those doing the wrecking. NatashaMH thinks this crazy Artificial Intelligence race we’re in is taking the human out of being human. If you ask me it’s all a bit too human as we look to foist off responsibility for the choices we make. The Risks of Synthetic Empathy is a great piece. Give it a read.
Then take a look at Mathew Ingram’s piece, People Fall In Love With All Kinds of Things Including AI Chatbots. When chatbots start filing for divorce I think we might have created Artificial Generative Intelligence.
Kyle Chayka is exploring The Revenge of Millennial Cringe. Home may be where the heart is, but it was a terrible song.
Stephen Marche is talking about Profound and Abiding Rage: Canada’s Answer to America’s Abandonment. Abandonment is a good way to describe what we’re all feeling these days.
Apple’s about to unleash new operating systems for its devices in a few weeks and the one that has my interest is for iPads. From what I’ve seen (I don’t run the betas) the changes to the multi-tasking capabilities will be a positive step forward. Craig Grannell takes a look at how long it took for Apple to finally make these changes in Apple Finally Destroyed Steve Jobs’ Vision of the iPad. Good.
Chicago’s Uptown Theatre celebrated 100 years this week. Robert Loerzel takes a look in Uptown Theatre: 100 Years of Glory and Decay.
When you think you’re the center of the universe it can rock your world when you find out you’re not. Kids learn this. Republicans in the current administration have not. Eric Berger writes about NASA’s Acting Chief Calls For the End of Earth Science at the Space Agency.
(Image from Machekhin Evgenii on Shutterstock.)
If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. If you’d like more click on the Sunday Morning Reading link in the category column to check out what’s been shared on Sunday’s past. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.
Swallowtail-ing
Another lucky catch with the camera.
More Monarch-ing Around
Just another shot of a Monarch butterfly toiling in the neighborhood.
These moments give me joy.
Apple Brings Back Blood Oxygen Feature to the Apple Watch
Apple breathing easier with friends in high places
Apple Watch users can breathe easier again. Or at least measure their blood oxygen levels with their Apple Watches.
Apple today announced that an update to Apple Watches and iPhones (16.1) to be released today will bring a redesigned Blood Oxygen feature for those with the Series 9, Series 10, and Apple Watch Ultra 2 users.
This comes after a long legal fight with Masimo, a health technology company, over a patent dispute that required Apple to deactivate the feature on Apple Watches in the U.S. that included the feature. Apple had to stop selling Apple Watches without the feature intact, but got a pause on that import ban for the Christmas season in 2023.
The patent case is still under appeal by Apple, but Apple is saying that the move comes after a U.S. Customs ruling that allows Apple to once again import Apple Watches with the Blood Oxygen feature.
I may be speculating, (I doubt it) but it sounds like a friends in high places who like gifts moment to me.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.
Change Is Hard
Why hasn’t AI figured this out yet?
Change may be inevitable but change is hard. Change becomes harder when those making the change, for whatever reasons, don’t remember change is hard. The only thing that doesn’t change is how easily we forget that change is hard.
OpenAI met with some real friction after announcing its big changes last week. Apple is going to meet some when it doles out its new operating systems with Liquid Glass next month. HBO changes its name so often it can’t even get it right in press releases. The list is as long as history. Every company faces this. Some do it well. Others not so.
As M.G. Siegler points out in this column if you’ve been around long enough you learn to recognize the patterns. You have to be willfully blind or consumed by ego not to. In fact, the problems with instituting change are so predictable it makes one wonder why these AI engines, endlessly regurgitating whatever human wisdom they can scrape and scrounge, don’t caution against it. I’m sure somewhere in all the words and wisdom created by humans “change is hard” has been said before.
If we’re marching towards an advanced AGI with PhD level knowledge that can reason better than humans, I think the masters of the AI universe need to solve that problem before anyone can make a claim that we might someday get there.
Call me when that happens.
It’s like watching a new edition to the Alien franchise hoping one actually turns out to be more than a repeat. Or watching an American football team with a bad offensive line try to run the ball up the middle over and over again. Or thinking that once inflation retreats that prices will come down. Or thinking humans will one day be smart enough not to fall for obvious con games.
The unsolvable riddle about change involves the variables and vagaries of human nature. That’s a constant that will never change.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.
(Image from Linus Nylund on Unsplash)
Monarch-ing Around
Just a quick share of a shot I caught of a Monarch butterfly yesterday.
Amazed I was able to catch this full wing spread. FWIW I’ve seen fewer Monarchs and Swallowtails this year than in the last two.
Chicago’s Uptown Theatre Hits 100 and is Still On The Skids
Decaying majesty
They certainly don’t make movie theatres like they used to. That’s not surprising or new, and long ago signaled a passing of a time when building special places for people to gather became less of a priority than so many other concerns. Chicago’s Uptown Theatre was one of those special places back in the day. It’s been decaying and shuttered since 1981 and every now and then efforts surface to try and bring it back to life.
The Uptown celebrates its 100th birthday on August 18. Built as a grand show palace by Balaban & Katz and the architectural firm Rapp & Rapp, it was hailed as spectacular, and a “splendiferous palace of a place.” The Uptown sat 4,320 in what was called “an acre of seats.”
Offering movies and live entertainment it was billed as a “shrine to democracy where there are no privileged patrons. The wealthy rub elbows with the poor — and are better for this contact.” It also had air conditioning.
Obviously a lot changed throughout the years, talkies took over from silent films, the Great Depression, and the advent of TV changed the dynamic. The Uptown part of town itself fell on hard times and saw big changes, and during much of my time in Chicago was the last section of the lakefront resisting redevelopment. The final act on the Uptown stage was a concert by the J. Geils Band in 1981.
Robert Loerzel has a terrific piece looking back at the Uptown Theatre in the Chicago Tribune that’s more than worth a read as we approach the show palace’s centennial. There’s also an excellent gallery of photos, which the photo above is from. The link should be a gift link, although I don’t know how long that lasts. Loerzel has also authored a new book, The Uptown: Chicago’s Endangered Movie Palace
When I first moved to Chicago in 1999 there were still a few of these show palaces in operation around the city, but the Uptown had long since shuttered. I got to take a tour of the place in the early 1990’s and the scale of what it once offered was impressive to see, only dwarfed by the decay and disrepair.
There are still efforts to try and find funding to restore the Uptown, but I’m sad to say I think priorities have shifted in such a way that we won’t see that happen.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.
Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 3 