Some people can tune and play their guitar. Some can only play their boombox. iPad is a boombox. I'm ok with that, but I'm on the other side of the door where making software and having the freedom to access user screens sans the interference of the screen maker is important to competitive success.
Then there are the old radicals on the West Coast who traded their Grateful Dead t-shirts for open shirt dress coats and Bob Dylan blasting from earbuds, became the vendors of the over-the-counter culture and own a lot of Apple stock. They value their freedom but maintain it at the cost of the freedoms of others. They demand to be recognized as creative but cheer when that creativity is boxed. They remind me of H.G. Wells' Morlocks who fled underground and then controlled and fed on the Eloi who stayed above ground and endured. When it is a choice between their stock portfolio and their ethics, the portfolio wins every time. When Apple rings the marketing bell, they come out at night to herd the Eloi into their stewpots.
Open systems are tough to endure. Meanwhile, LA is shutting down city services for two days a week. I wonder if there is a market for garbage perfume or if they can simply green screen a paradise. Ah California: home of recyclable indignity. Here's an ode for the blowed.
It's a green screen paradise
The weather there is very nice
Bright images in focus all the time
California cats are big and fat
But, hey, they've got an app for that
Just plug right in. Enjoy that sunny clime.
With tsunamis, floods, volcanoes and drought
It's the perfect place to live no doubt
It's all the rage for the smarter set, ya know
Sliding into the sea in an earthquake zone
Thank God, Nevada's holding on
When the Santa Ana winds begin to blow.
Take a shovel when you walk the dog
Don't lose that poop in the summer fog
Concrete rivers and illegally tended lawns
Regulating collected feces
Considering exotic species
If you can't see the air you know it's gone.
The oldest trees and the largest debt
There's not a thing they don't tax yet
And still they can't believe they're out of dough
Interactive and highly polished
Can't do much but who's astonished
It's overpriced and they've sold out the show
They say politics are in need of fixing
By Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon
I think there's a slicker pig left in the sack
California is the Golden State
For give aways. They just can't wait.
We would but the Mexicans won't take'em back.
There's a rain shadow hanging on the mountain turn
When the sun goes down you can watch it burn
The girls are tan and the men are so controlled
With empty wallets, their banks are closed
A fortune blown right up their nose
They'll move to Hawaii as soon as the mansion's sold.
It's a green screen paradise
The weather there is very nice
Bright images in focus all the time
California cats are big and fat
But, hey, they've got an app for that
Just plug right in. Enjoy that sunny clime.
len bullard april 7, 2010
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