Rant rant rant, more inanity to prove insanity

Grippo

"Well...that's not my branch of physics"

A virtual blog celebrating the art of avoiding tricky questions

Musical Plagiarism
"Pure coincidence. What are the chances?"
Is imitation the sincerest form of flattery?

Contemplate my cornucopia of correlations

"Plagiarize, Plagiarize, let no one else's work evade your eyes ...."

My friend RV says:

"Surely you haven't just discovered that pop music is highly derivative and formulaic? What do you think the dictum "pop will eat itself" is about? (OK, maybe it's not a dictum, but it is a record title.)"

Dyson's Vortex of Dazzling Spin

"Is it art. Nah! It's a vacuum cleaner or a hand drier, or a fan, or...

Nature abhors a vacuum, and so do I.
Unfortunately Gary Larson say:
" ...please, please refrain from putting The Far Side out on the Internet."
So you'll just have to imagine or use Google Images like I did. As for those Dyson hand-driers...

ELP

However, ruminating as I cruised in search of a place in which to rest the night, I thought about bands, tastes, readers' letters and prejudice and came to the conclusion that my constant bitching about Zavaronis and the ELPs of this world is due not so much so out-and-out blind loathing of what they do, are, stand for; but rather frustration that so much attention is focused on them to the exclusion of bands, musicians, performers who are, in my view, worthy of a portion of that attention. Yes, that's it.

[from the Olivetti Chronicles, by John Peel]

John Peel... called ELP's performance at the Isle of Wight

"a tragic waste of time, talent and electricity."

I promise you all the gold you can eat...

Australian price gouging is rampant

It reminds me of our visit to Iceland in June 2008.
Prices for everything were massively over-inflated.

Why are my favourite music books
sprayed on by my cat Oscar?

England's Dreaming by Jon Savage.

JE says "Great book, naughty cat"
"There is no future in England’s dreaming" not now anyway...

Julie Burchill's & Tony Parsons' The Boy Looked At Johnny

Hip young gun slingers firing a mix of blanks & dumdums...

Emotion and Meaning in Music by Leonard B. Meyer

A classic text unimproved by cat's piss...

Developing a Capacity to Point Pointlessly

Lies, Lies, Lies...

The lies told to justify the invasion of Iraq never, ever, looked convincing.
So I sent a letter to my local MP, who just happened to be a backward PM at the time.
He had already tried to belittle and de-legitimise the marchers in the largest protest marches seen in Australia ( & London &...) for decades.

The nicest thing I can say is that:

John Howard is a modest man with much to be modest about.

There was no credible evidence for "weapons of mass destruction" so I sent a letter to John Howard.
He replied, not presenting any evidence, just this blatant untruth:
"We know that Iraq has chemical and biological weapons and the capacity to develop a nuclear capacity"
Disillusioned by the cynical sophistry of war I never sent this reply.

Patents kill, rather than promote, innovation.

Numerous articles argue the point.

A very in-joke for those who understand combining
patents to save filling fees

Darren Aronofsky's
Black Swan perchance?

The Matthew Effect

"the rich get richer and the poor get poorer"

For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken even that which he hath. [Gospel of Matthew]

N.N. Taleb's The Black Swan sums it up nicely.

John Peel captured it perfectly in his approach to music...

Not
Extermistan, nor Mediocristan, just Stan

The Dangers of Statistics

as exemplified by Stan the Statistician from Viz

N.N. Taleb's The Black Swan goes off the rails in the second half.

The impact of the highly improbable might look like this...

This is so true. As with clichés, avoid consultants
like the plague

Consultants & consulting

If you're not a part of the solution,
there's good money to be made in prolonging the problem.