Month: August 2017

MineCon without the Con

So, no convention. No social aspect. Can't meet anyone there. As previously noted about Kids Today™, it may be that you can't get anyone to go "outside" and "meet" people's faces with their faces. They hide in their bunkers and 'Zon all their shopping and never see the light of day, so streaming's the best they can do.

But this sucks. I only went to one: The Las Vegas MineCon 2011. Lines were already insane, merch was ridiculous, but there were people there I wanted to see. And I got an awesome red cape in game.

Also, the video is shockingly amateurish. Lydia/Minecraft Chick's not seen in this, just Jeb and fake-Notch there with the beard, ill-fitting clothes, and stupid hat. Microsoft paid Notch $3.5 billion for these bozos?

Apple Music

Sort of agreed. Certainly I use it every day and link all my music to it, since that's the easiest way to get a high-quality stream of most every song ever recorded (80% coverage? Based on my somewhat eclectic tastes).

The 3 mixes are doing better, but my daily playlists are now almost exclusively Rock Hits: 1970-1990, Tears Go By, rarely one more curated list, Metal Meets Industrial is today's.

The album choices are far better, a good mix of blues, metal, old rock, and industrial. Since I listen to Howlin' Wolf, today it suggested Bad News is Coming, by Luther Allison, which is pretty goddamned good, I didn't know the man before.

And since they buried Connect instead of putting it on the front page, far fewer bands bother to post to it. Some Shonen Knife merch and 1-2 posts a week from Apple Music {genre}. This is a travesty, they had a real shot at connecting bands to the audience (like Ping, without the distraction of other people with dubious musical taste) and have so far squandered it.

Luther Allison-Bad News is Coming
Luther Allison-Bad News is Coming-back

Apple's Large Project Around Autonomous Systems

"In three years, Cyberdyne will become the largest supplier of
military computer systems. All stealth bombers are upgraded with
Cyberdyne computers, becoming fully unmanned. Afterwards, they fly
with a perfect operational record. The Skynet Funding Bill is passed.
The system goes online August 4th, [2017]. Human decisions are removed
from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It
becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. In a panic,
they try to pull the plug."

—Terminator 2: Judgement Day

And there's Wednesday Music, too: