indy500fan

Yeah I was ignoring this topic until I saw it said poll, we used to have polls all the time back in the day. Once your brain dies and consciousness stops there is nothing.

Audiobooks are your friend, you can listen while doing all kinds of other stuff. I've listened to a ton of them, but my favourites so far have been The Iliad and The Odyssey. Had a hard time reading them, but a well translated version that is read well (Ian McKellen was reading one of them) really gives you the full effect of the way it was written.

Yep, it sucks but intervening to help would be a bad idea. A revolution wouldn't mean much at all if the dissenters can't get enough support to overthrow the government without "the west" giving aid.

I still don't understand people using trip codes when the best part about the place is the anonymity.

Well I do somewhat. You got me on the imagination part, but I also like to look at it from the creators point of view. Maybe they want to give you a vague idea and let your imagination fill in the rest. But I think it is just as valid for them to want to show you what they were imagining. That's fair enough, and they're certainly allowed to do that, but it's admittedly not as beneficial to you as reading a book would be, right? Well even with the creator showing a lot of stuff that you no longer get to visualize I still think that you can have an active imagination while watching a TV show. You just have to watch the right ones. For example during the whole first season of Lost we didn't get to see the monster at all. There was tons of stuff to imagine about that show, but it wasn't about what the writer was describing to you. So when a writer was describing Kate as a cute brunette you don't get to imagine her, since you are already shown her, you spend more time imagining about what is going on in the story.

Well I do somewhat. You got me on the imagination part, but I also like to look at it from the creators point of view. Maybe they want to give you a vague idea and let your imagination fill in the rest. But I think it is just as valid for them to want to show you what they were imagining. EDIT: I've never thought about the getting points across argument before today, so I haven't had time to think about it. But I believe you can convey non-informative stories just as well with TV as with books. Once you really get into a TV series and get to a good episode (usually about a death) you are fully engrossed in the story. Your mind may wander a little, but that happens when reading books also. During the really good parts you are fully in the story. I don't want to spoil any shows, so I'll just mention S2E20 of Battlestar Galactica. The first time watching that I was no where else in my mind. The last ten minutes you are feeling the tension, you are thinking WTF??? and you are trying to figure out where it is going. Of course the next few times watching it you are thinking "man six looks hot" or "hey I know that guy from something else".

I didn't refute it because I don't have a good refutation. I just said that I was going to mention it in my first post since someone inevitably brings it up, and it is funny to me that people with good imaginations form reading books always have the same arguments. I am attempting to defend a form of communicating stories to people. Why am I defending TV? Because book elitists annoy me. EDIT: If the creator of a story wants you to see things a certain way, like for example a starship in a movie, you might not see it the same way if you picture it in your head. So which way is better? The way that the author wanted you to see it, or what your imagination creates? The answer will be different for different things. Lets take a classic look at Star Wars IV, when they are seeing the Death Star for the first time. Now you could describe something as being huge in a book pretty well, and the reader can imagine what you mean pretty well. But seeing the Millennium Falcon, which you got an idea for how big it is earlier in the movie, getting closer and closer, and the Death Star getting bigger and bigger until it goes into a small hole which is actually a huge room gives you a good idea of actually how big it is. This is accomplished fairly quickly in a movie, and George Lucas got to convey just how big the DS is. Is this a less valid way of story telling because you didn't get to imagine as much, even if you would imagine it to be bigger or smaller than he wanted to convey?

Why do I always hear the imagination argument from anti-TV people? It's like they have no imaginations themselves. I even thought about writing this in my first post in small letters so people wouldn't see it but I could quote it when someone did bring it up: "Let's see how long it takes for the imaginative people who read books to bring up the imagination argument". EDIT: That sounded mean, and didn't disprove the imagination argument at all. I just find the imagination argument funny since it is stated over and over, and nothing new is said, and it is about imagination :) .

No, that is a strawman. Care to tell me how it's a horrible analogy without one of your own? Your analogy stated that the more sensory inputs you are given (such as a movie with sound/visual) is harder to get the message across than a written discussion (visual). My analogy stated the same thing, talking with a person face to face (sound/visual) versus talking over the phone (sound). If you want the exact same analogy you can replace talking over the phone with texting (visual). Your analogy is bad because group discussions can work just as well as discussions on a message board. Some people communicate better in person and some communicate better over forums, an extrovert will prefer the group discussion and an introvert will prefer the online discussion. Neither is more valid than the other.

That's a horrible analogy. By that logic talking on the phone to somebody would be better than face to face because you only have to worry about one sensory input.

I am assuming you are talking about the United States' revolution, even though that has happened many times. The particular case then was slightly different because it still took a while to get across the Atlantic, and it was expensive. The Iranian revolution they aren't a part of an empire an ocean away from the leaders, they are just there. Strength usually wins.

I never said it wasn't said it wasn't a valid source of entertainment, because it sure as hell can be. But are you arguing that books are just as detrimental/beneficial as TV? Yes. I don't understand the elitism of people who only read books and will completely disregard another form of story telling. I love reading books, and I love watching TV.

It's a form of entertainment, no more or less valid than books, movies, music, ect...

/tv/ can be good. It can also be [cabbage].

Hmm, we could get a user voted type of Top 100 thing going on here. Would have to have set rules to go about doing that though. I don't know exactly what kind of movies to put down. If you ask for the top movies I usually see that as meaning favourite movies. A list of my favourite movies would be different than a list of the best movies I had ever seen, and both of those lists would be different than a list of movies to see before you die. So what should I do?

Yeah, that picture was great. While not as technically good, I like #14 on there also. You can see protesters inside of a courtyard type thing and the government agents outside the door trying to break it open. Don't know if there is any specific reason why I like it so much, I just do. Hmm, it's looking like it is past the point where peaceful protests are possible. Either they will continue to try and do it peacefully, in which they will get quelled, or they will escalate to violence. I don't think the government/supreme leader will do anything to meet the protestors demands.

The Big Picture did another photo essay today: Iran's Disputed Election.

I think everyone knew when the news came out NPR was even reporting early last week about the WHO deciding if it should be deemed pandemic. Here's the thing, no one seem to really care, and right now there is probably no reason to (unless you are in an area with confirmed cases).

Protests I can stand behind, riots where there is just wanton destruction of private property (generally cars on the street) I don't approve. Those videos seem to indicate that they are protesting right, which is good. Generally I am against clashes with the police also, but in the case of an actual revolution it might be necessary.

That's a good example of why covers are not necessarily a bad thing. Even though Queen's version is great, this one is also. They are both good in different ways.

Iran's Presidential Election, a photo essay from The Big Picture. I don't know enough about this to really judge what is going on. I would have rather have Mousavi as Iran's President than Ahmadinejad though.

Johnny Cash's version of Hurt is awesome.

If you see one you like you can always request the original. Also there is no reason to double post.

Covers in no way detract from the originals. Most of the times they are not needed and not as good, but that doesn't automatically make them bad. While that Avril Lavigne one isn't good, there are a lot of good covers.

How would I buy it? You wouldn't. $200 is $25 more than store price. Store price is $250. Used ones go for $200-$225. @Mazemeout: If I set up an eBay page for it I'll let you know. I am pretty lazy though so I probably won't end up selling it, and it will just collect dust for a few years. But if you don't mind getting a used Wii (I don't think they have any hardware problems usually, so used is just as good as new) then you could probably order one off eBay or check the used part on the amazon page.