Of Santa Hats and Political Correctness

The other day, I went to play a video in VLC Media Player, an excellent open-source alternative to other media players like Windows Media Player. The icon for this app is a traffic cone. I noticed that this particular time I opened VLC, the traffic cone was wearing a Santa hat! I thought it was a nice, Christmasy touch, so I went online to see if other VLC users noticed this. I did notice mostly positive responses to the Santa hat “Easter egg” (or in this case, Christmas present). I did, however, notice posts like these:

Christmas Icon? How to remove for non christians?
I am seeing a santa hat icon now on my media viewer. Not being Christian and not celebrating Christian holidays I'm wondering how I can remove that? I would not want to believe that VLC has positioned itself as a Christians only project. Is there a way to disable this if a user finds it offensive to his differing beliefs?
- rwhelan, VLC forums, http://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=69360

Re: Santa hat icon?
For those of us that do not celebrate Christmas (or Easter, and as such do not always enjoy "Easter Eggs"), is there a way to remove the offending icon?
- realityiseverywhere, VLC forums, http://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=53998&start=0#p177675

The only solution that is offered is to download the source code, remove the Easter egg code, and recompile the program. There was one reply to the second post, which I tend to agree with.

Re: Santa hat icon?
:shock: Offensive are you serious?! Has it gotten to the point where a Santa hat offends people? I mean seriously. My family celebrates Christmas and Easter but are not offended by the Menorah on display in my neighbors window. I'm not offended by The people at the corner gas station fasting for Ramadan or celebrating R'as as-Sana the Muslim New Year. Besides Santa has nothing to do with Jesus and Christianity. I'm sick of people of stirring the pot with all this holiday this is offensive that is offensive to somebody somewhere. It's bull and needs to stop :x
- cpyles07, VLC forums, http://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=53998&start=0#p177975

I couldn't agree more. Apparently, some people are so zealous about their own beliefs, that they take offense when they see others celebrating different beliefs. Not only do they want to take Christ out of Christmas (as so many retail stores have already done), they want to take Christmas out of Christmas!

As many people know, I am a Christian, and I celebrate Christmas. I take no offense at menorahs displayed in public, or postage stamps wishing people a happy Eid ul-Fitr. What I am slightly offended by is people or organizations who have taken any references to Christmas, and either replaced them or renamed them.

The federal holiday of Christmas is again under siege this year by secular forces that want to wipe out any public display of America's Judeo-Christian traditions. And what a problematic situation this has become, especially for big business. Sears and Kmart will absolutely not mention the word "Christmas" in ads this year. Wal-Mart will not either, along with scores of other retail stores. The reason these operations give for avoiding the C-word? They don't want to offend anyone by mentioning a holiday they might not celebrate.

These stores believe "Happy Holidays" is more "inclusive." (I'm sure some Americans don't believe in any holidays; what about them?) Frankly, the executives who have banished Christmas from their advertising are insane. By doing that, they are offending tens of millions of traditional Americans who respect the Christmas season and want it called exactly what it is - Christmas.

…There is a huge backlash brewing on this Christmas deal. Judging from reaction to my reporting on TV and radio, millions of Americans have had enough of denigrating the birth of Jesus.…

Eighty-five percent of Americans call themselves Christians, and many of them are not happy with "Happy Holidays" as the imposed greeting of the season. Federated Department Stores (Macy's, Bloomingdale's and others) learned its lesson last year when it pushed the "Merry Christmas" greeting out the door and sales suffered.

…Most Christians are more than happy to acknowledge Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Happy Winter Time or whatever. Use them all, and to all a good night.

But no. The incredibly dense Grinches that run many American companies are so infected with political correctness, so afraid somebody might complain about the word "Christmas," that they throw the Baby Jesus out with the bath water.

Well, humbug. You do that — I'm shopping elsewhere.

Three wise men once came bearing gifts to honor a baby who would grow up to bring a great message to the world. If corporate chieftains are not wise enough to honor that message as well, they don't deserve any Christmas cheer. Simple as that.

- Bill O'Reilly, "Boycott 'Holiday' Stores," New York Post, December 3, 2005.

I have stated my position a few times, and there many who agree with me. However, there are still a few sticks in the mud that need to be corrected. A couple of years ago, I made a few spoofs of the MTA's "See something, say something" TV ads. The ads all began with the phrase, "Last year 1,944 New Yorkers saw something and said something." My twist was either an effect that this "seeing something, and saying something" caused, or a description of what was seen and said, as is the case here.


Christmas isn't just a holiday, it's a celebration. Merry Christmas, everyone!

OOPS! is brought to you by erasers. Don't make a mistake without one.

A couple of weeks ago, signs like this one appeared in dining halls across the Queens College campus:


At the time, the price of a bottle of soda was $1.50. Note the amount of the increase stated on the sign, as quoted above: 0.7¢. As is (hopefully) still taught in homes and elementary schools across the country, one cent, which can be written in figures as 1¢ or $0.01, is a hundredth part (1/100) of one dollar. Also (hopefully) taught in elementary schools is the concept of real values between zero and one – “Fractions.” Young students also (hopefully) learn about a concept called “place value,” which essentially means that for each digit to the left or right of the decimal point, the digit’s value increases or decreases by a factor of 10. Therefore that 0.7¢ increase reported on these signs means that the increase is less than one cent (7×10^-1 < 0×10⁰). If anyone remembers that sketch from Square One TV, that dealt with the different ways of expressing fractions (which first aired in 1987), 0.7 could also be written as 70% and 7/10. (I should note that they write and say the decimal form of the fraction without the leading zero, but its value is the same.) If you don’t, I miraculously found it on YouTube. Watch and learn.



Why am I going on and on about the value of “zero point 7 cents”? Well, when I first saw this sign, I thought that it was interesting that they would increase the price by seven-tenths of a cent, bringing the price to $1.507 (or more sensibly, rounding up to the nearest cent, $1.51). On November 30th, they increased the price, but instead of seven-tenths of a cent, the price increased by seven cents! The amount of the increase was ten times the amount reported on the signs!

This is just a part of a disturbing trend that I’ve seen across the region, where people seem to be forgetting about place value, and how it relates to dollars and cents. If I were to go to a store which displays a sign advertising copies at a price of “.10¢” I would easily expect to walk in, make ten copies of something, and pay exactly one cent, because the sign advertises copies at one-tenth of a cent. However, if I am asked to pay a dollar, I would protest, saying that the sign says “.10¢,” and that “.10¢” is less than one cent, and 10×.10¢ is 1.00¢.

My point: If you’re going to raise the price of something by seven cents, just say that you’re raising the price by seven cents, not a fraction of a cent. Besides, I don’t think I have enough coupons with statements of cash value being a fraction of a cent to make seven-tenths of a cent!

Video: Discipline

Video #41 comes out a week after Video #40, and is the first project to be fully done in iMovie.

Check it out!

And if you've got the bandwidth for it, watch it in HD!

Tenth Anniversary Video!

Ten years ago, I started a little web site called TransferPoint, on a web server at Queens College. Ten years later, I have taken tens of thousands of photos (OK, it's closer to 20,000, but still an impressive number). This video only goes through a handful of them.

This is also my 40th montage video, and my first one to be presented in WIDESCREEEEEEEEEN!

Enjoy! Oh, one more thing. If you have a high-speed Internet connection, feel free to view it in high quality.

2:53.75!

A while back, I posted the record time of a trip through the 60th Street tunnel. Well today, that record has been beaten by almost 5 seconds. The rest of my musings would likely duplicate those of the previous post, so I'll just link to it instead. Enjoy.

CSG, A Photo

Last month, I wrote about Creepy Statue Guy (or CSG).

Here's a photo of this him.


-- Post From My iPhone

Sure, it's been on YouTube for over a month now…

It's about time I put it on my blog!

The Top 74 Photos of 2008

Two Things: End of a Season, and an FML

1. Bye-bye, Creepy Statue Guy!

First, today marks the end of a season. From the start of the year until today, someone has been roaming the streets of my neighborhood, passing out flyers for a local tax service in the neighborhood. I call this person: Creepy Statue Guy, or CSG. CSG, as the name implies, is a male, dressed in a green robe, Styrofoam "crown," sandwich board, and sneakers. The "crown" is often lopsided or pointed in some irregular way. The guy is obviously trying to dress like the Statue of Liberty, but is a total fail. First off, the statue is of a woman. Next, using a national landmark like that is reprehensible to say the least, but to encourage cross-dressing like that? Eeew. Creepy!

2. An FML

I've been reading a lot of posts from F My Life recently, and I found this one to be fitting.

[T]he guy I like asked to me the upcoming dance. I immediately rejected him, assuming that it was just a joke between him and his friends. With a dejected face, he walked away, and I saw him throw something in the trash can. It was a rose, for me. He wasn't joking.

I kinda feel like that guy sometimes.

Test

-- Post From My iPhone

You Thought I Forgot? The Conclusion.

Actually, I was busy uploading videos to YouTube, but anyway, to close out Unrequited Love Awareness Week (ULAW), I'll just hit you with the link to the Wikipedia page, and a few more things.

First, the link to Wikipedia.

Next, a few reasons why I blogged about ULAW this week.

• Unrequited Love Sucks!
• Unrequited Love deprives the sufferer of necessary human emotions.
• Unrequited Love can lead to depression, and no antidepressant can cure it.
• Unrequited Love can affect future relationships, for the victim can live in fear of losing the current partner.
• Unrequited Love is the least desirable of feelings.
• Valentine's Day is the bane of all sufferers of Unrequited Love. Since the day is filled with expressions of romantic love (ἔρως eros), the sufferer commonly feels left out.

There. That's a few reasons why I started this. Hopefully, next year will be different. I really wouldn't mind a good cuddle every now and then.

Just like in fishing, sometimes they get away…

Unrequited Love Awareness Week would not be complete without a look at another one of its outcomes. Basically, a girl you have a crush on (or some other form of romantic interest) suddenly becomes unavailable (typically by marrying someone else). The subject of your interest then becomes "one that got away."

This has reference to the old fishing metaphor. Let's say you're fishing, and you have a fish on your hook that is certain to be a prize fish. Maybe your efforts to reel the fish in are so intense that the line breaks. Maybe the fish is too much for you to handle. In any case, you're forced to let the fish go. Same thing in this case. For whatever reason, the person doesn't go for you.

I've had several of these in my life. One went away to college in Idaho and came back at the end of her first semester engaged. Another met someone on the Internet. Another had the audacity of announcing her getting away from me (read: engagement) via text message, complete with smiling emoticon! (How's that for impersonal? I would have responded with a frowning emoticon if I wanted to.)

I have had a total of 7 of these situations. A few of these (including the one I wrote about yesterday) were unrequited loves.

As much as it sucks to have a love go unreciprocated or unrequited, it can be something else to let one get away from you.

The Most Devastating Unrequited Love

RESTRICTED

Because of the sensitivity of the topic of this particular blog post, I have elected not to post it to The B24 Blog. However, if you are one of my Facebook friends, you'll know where to find it, IF you're one of the guys.

Feeling Unrequited?

While it's almost never easy to get over unrequited love, there are a couple of things that can help ease the pain. They won't help you find someone, but they can ease the pain.

Here's an article from the New York Times showing that the pain of unrequited love afflicts the rejecter as well as the rejected.

Here's a Facebook group with a very appropriate title.

Share your story with those who can sympathize with your situation. It'll be OK.

Speaking of sharing stories, have I got a doozey for you! I'll post it tomorrow on Facebook, but I'll only let certain people see it.

What Am I Doing Wrong?

I recently replied to a friend's status on Facebook, stating my previous claim that the only kind of love that matters on Valentine's Day is romantic love (or ἔρως, eros, as the Greeks call it). She replied that if the only kind of love that matters to a person on V-day is romantic, then they're doing something wrong on the other days of the year. I thought about this statement for a moment. I then discovered that something that was wrong. It's three little words that construct a single phrase: "Not Getting Any." While the rest of the English-speaking world may refer to "not getting any" in a sexual context, I use it here in a much broader context.

The context in which I use this phrase is the same one that all sufferers of unrequited love are associated with. They give, but they don't receive. They show their love, affection, and desire to further the relationship towards a person, but that person doesn't give any back in return. In other words, the lover doesn't get any back from the beloved.

The progression of love in a relationship, using the Greek language (I'm just loving the Greek language right now.) is first, ἀγάπη, agape, the general love one towards another. A respect for other people which has nothing to do with being friends or lovers, just the fact that that other person is a fellow human being. The next stage is φιλία, philia, a more familiar relationship. This relationship is had between friends and family. It's that "brotherly love" that people with close ties to each other have for each other. Finally, there's ἔρως, eros, the passionate love that is most commonly seen (in conjunction with φιλία) between boyfriend and girlfriend, husband and wife, and other such couples, showing their affection toward each other publicly. It needn't be sexual, just romantic.

"Not getting any" comes when one wants to transition the relationship from φιλία to ἔρως, or introduce more of the latter into an existing relationship. Situation: A guy wants to further his relationship with a girl he's been interested in for a while. He has had various opportunities to hang out with her and a group of mutual friends, but he now desires a more "one-on-one" type of relationship. He wants a bit of ἔρως thrown into the mix. He asks her to go out on a date with him. Now several things can happen here. If she turns him down, it's devistating for him, especially if he was genuinely attracted to her. If she says yes, it can mean one of two things. It could mean that she genuinely has an interest in him (in which case, more ἔρως can safely enter the relationship), or she just doesn't have the heart in her to flat out say no and hurt his feelings. If the latter is the case, this leads him on to thinking that the relationship is progressing, but in reality, she's just doing it to be nice. This may eventually lead to the "Let's just be friends" discussion, which basically destroys him more than just saying no to him when he first asked. It's like making an investment in the stock market. If she accepts the date invitation, it's like the price of his emotional stock is rising. It's a bull market for him. But when she says, "Let's just be friends," the stock makes a spectacular crash. (Like the price of a share of Google (GOOG) dropping from $350 to $0.01 in the time it takes for her to utter that phrase.)

I have had situations like this numerous times in my life, but there was one who transformed my emotional investment from the hottest stock on the market to a penny stock almost instantly. More on that later.

Valentine's Day: It's All About Eros

Yesterday, I went to Red Lobster with my family. The first words out of our server's mouth were, "Happy Valentine's Day." I reply, "What's there to be happy about?" This is my general attitude toward the day. Everywhere I look, I see couples going around to restaurants, movie theaters, parks, anywhere else that's public, obviously showing their affection towards each other. My reason for asking, "What's there to be happy about?" is simple. Valentine's Day, in its current form, is a celebration of love. Not just any kind of love, mind you, but a specific type of love: Romantic love. I am of the opinion that romantic love is the only kind of love that matters on Valentine's Day. Since I am not currently in a relationship, I do not have that outlet to which I can share requited romantic love, and so I am frustrated at the fact that others are getting it while I am not. It's like the kid in a candy store who, while in line to buy some candy, is continuously being passed over. While everyone else in the store is getting candy, the kid has been skipped and overlooked so many times, he has no choice but to leave the store visibly upset.

Every time I see a couple, cuddling, kissing, holding hands, with the couple visibly happy with each other, I think to myself, "I want that," referring to the relationship and the obvious status thereof. It just bugs me that I have been, up to this point, unable to obtain that. All my relationship experience has consisted of love unrequited. You know, "I love her, but she doesn't love me," or "She sees me as nothing more than a friend," or "Get away from me before I file a restraining order against you," things like that. (Although I must say that I have never heard that last one used against me.)

If there was more than one word in the English language used to identify a certain type of love. The Greek language has at least three. At least, these three are the big ones:

First is Philia (φιλία), which means friendship in modern Greek. It's a love without passion. "It includes loyalty to friends, family, and community, and requires virtue, equality and familiarity," according to Wikipedia. This word is the root word for the name of the city of Philadelphia.

Next is Agapē (ἀγάπη), which is more of a general love. The above-linked Wikipedia page says, "It can be described as the feeling of being content or holding one in high regard. The verb appears in the New Testament describing, amongst other things, the relationship between Jesus and the beloved disciple....The Christian sense of the term expands the original Greek sense and encompasses a total commitment or self-sacrificial love for the thing loved. A great deal of Christian theology is indebted to the frequency of this word and its interpretation in the New Testament."

The final one of the Big Three Greek Words for Love is Eros (ἔρως), which is a passionate love. "Eros can be interpreted as a love for someone whom you love more than the philia love of friendship. It can also apply to dating relationships as well as marriage." It does not have to be sexual in nature (the English word "erotic" comes directly from this Greek word), but it has to be more than just philia. This kind of love is what Valentine's Day is categorized to be about.

While you can demonstrate Agapē love to almost anyone you see on the street, and have Philia love for your friends, it's this Eros love that makes Valentine's Day special for almost everyone.

As a relationship matures, there may be a shift in the balance of the types of love between the couple. However, on Valentine's Day, it's all about eros. Those who want eros, but can't get eros tend to end up not liking the day much. Those who want eros with someone who only wants philia with that person is even worse, as he is the victim of what we call, "Unrequited Love."

"Happy" Unrequited Love Awareness Week!

There are many names associated with unrequited love: Cyrano de Bergerac, Don Quixote, Charlie Brown, the list goes on. But nothing could be more crushing to the heart of an individual than to be the victim of unrequited love. The numbers are unknown to me at this point, but I would think that millions of people around the world – both men and women, but mostly men – suffer from loving someone who does not love them back. I have experienced this feeling numerous times, and I can, without any hesitation, declare that unrequited love stinks. That's why I declare this week – February 14th through February 20th – to be Unrequited Love Awareness Week. It is a week to recognize those among us who may be suffering from this heartbreaking predicament, and perhaps help them get out of it by showing them what everyone in this world needs: A relationship where romance is a mutually contributing factor.

Also take note that while suffering from Unrequited Love is a negative feeling, the only word in the English language which recognizes the observance of some event or holiday is the word Happy. So, while the idea itself is a negative one which brings much unhappiness, observance of a recognition of such an idea with an attempt to seek out and help those who may be suffering from it can cause much happiness to all involved. Therefore, I put the word Happy in quotation marks, to indicate that the idea being recognized is, in and of itself not one that brings happiness.

As for the timing of this observance, well, Valentine's Day is the perfect day to recognize it, since with all the requited lovers out there, almost none of them recognize that there are still those who feel left out or excluded in something that all should be happily participating in (unless, of course, they don't want it, but that's another story). Maybe next year, I'll move it so that it ends on Valentine's Day (Feb. 8-14), to make it a goal for those unrequiteds to shake it on V-day.

As for this lowly blog, each day I'll try to find something to write about.

A Saturday Night Random Fact

The icon for the Maps app on iPhone and iPod Touch is a depiction of the neighborhood surrounding Apple's headquarters in Cupertino, California.

A Mathematical Inaccuracy.

Last night, I was watching NBC. Now, I don't usually watch TV on Thursday night because I am out of the house. But last night, I didn't feel like going out, so I was watching TV. Anyway, After American Idol, I switched over to NBC to watch The Office and 30 Rock. As the credits for The Office comes to a close, an announcer says the following.

What's 10 Rock times 3 Rock? It's 30 Rock, coming up next.

I then said to myself, "It's 30 Rock squared." Obviously, someone over at NBC didn't do well in algebra.

Given that Rock is an unknown variable, or a series of unknown variables, the product of 10·Rock and 3·Rock would be 10·3·Rock·Rock, or 30·Rock².

The only ways to express 30 Rock as the product of two factors would be to take two of the factors of 30 (when when multiplied together produce 30 as the product), and then add Rock to one of those factors.

Fun With Emoji

If you have an iPhone with software 2.2 or later, you can see the characters below.



Music Vs. YouTube

The other day, I logged on to Facebook, and at the top of my home page, was an interesting news item. My cousin had changed her profile status to say that she F*****G HATES YOUTUBE! Included in that status line was the URL of a video she posted on YouTube. I have an extension in Firefox which turns URLs into clickable links, and it did the job flawlessly in this case. I clicked the link to see what was up. It was a video tribute to a high school friend of hers, and the audio was SILENCED!

The other day, I received an e-mail from YouTube. Basically, a company I never heard of in a place I've never been to has "claim" as the e-mail puts it to "some of the audio content." However, they have allowed the video to remain on YouTube, but with advertisments on the watch page in Ireland and the United Kingdom.

Now, I've never heard of the Claimant (VidZone) until I received this e-mail, and at this point, there is no option on YouTube to restrict access to the video to any specific country or countries. Because of this, I've made it private, with an empty contact list. However, what's going on here is part of a disturbing trend.

With the proliferation of affordable video editing tools, regular everyday people are creating videos and posting them on sites like YouTube. Many of these videos are video and photo montages. And what goes great with a montage? Music! Especially if it's a photo montage, which would have no other audio content included. And what better music to put into a montage than some popular music, especially if the selection fits the time period in which the photos are taken, or the theme of the montage. “Womanizer” by Britney Spears or “Here It Goes Again” by OK Go and a photo montage of scenes from New York City during the late 19th century certainly do not go together. Neither would Duke Ellington's “Take the A Train” go with a photo montage of scenes from the Chicago “L” or BART.

Therein lies the problem. It seems that all of the good music is controlled by the corporate fat cats of the music industry, whose methodologies were the same ones used in the 20th century, before sites like YouTube were ever conceived. The first decade of the 21st century is almost over, and you have these fools still thinking it's the early half of the last decade of the 20th century!

The music industry is missing the boat on the possibilities this could bring to them. Picture this. A movie maker makes a movie, and uses an obscure song from an obscure artist, whose album has been released for quite some time now, but has not seen much in sales, both of physical media, and in digital downloads. Anyway, the video becomes wildly popular and is soon on YouTube's list of Featured Videos. It is watched millions of times within the first month or two. Most of them hear the song used in the video and like it. They begin to ask, "What song is that?" Once they learn what song that is, they go to places like iTunes, Amazon, and their local stores, all in search of that song. People buy the song and/or the album on which it's contained. It finds its way onto the CHR-format radio stations. The song, the album, and the artist all receive increased exposure. Many more people listen to it, like it, and buy it. The song becomes a chart topper. The album goes gold, then platinum. It becomes an award-winning mega hit.

Sure, that may be the best case scenario, but even if the song that is used has been out for a few years, that doesn't mean there isn't the potential for a sale because someone uses the song in a video. I have contributed in this way. Someone uploaded a video. A time-lapse video taken on a night run on New Jersey Transit's North Jersey Coast line, from Hoboken to Bay Head. The song used in the video is Aphex Twin's “IZ-US.” After watching the video a few times, the song grew on me. So much so that I bought the song from iTunes. Someone uploaded a music video of a song I haven't heard in years. I remembered how awesome the song is. I bought that one, too.

There you go. Two real-life examples of how music on YouTube could lead to sales. However, Big Music (including unknowns like VidZone) is trying to halt this process, citing copyrights and such. While copyrights do have their purpose, it shouldn't keep everyday people from using them in their videos. If a video maker uses a song in his video, it's like he's saying to the world, "Hey everyone! I like this song! If you like it, go out and buy it!" It's essentially free advertising for music. Big Music sees sales at no cost to them.

In closing, the silencing of YouTube videos because they have music in them is wrong. Big Music should be lenient to video makers who use their music in the videos, and should work on promoting the artists whose music appears in the videos. They should also not remove a video just because it has music in it. Besides, music makes te world go around. Who wants a silent YouTube? Nobody!