One of the highlights of my working career was being paid for a week to play computer games (we were setting up gaming servers for an internet company). It can take “days” to get those things right. Now I read you can study computer gaming as part of a degree – we had to pretend we were only playing them to study the implementation of algorithms when I was an undergrad.
Greenflame
Jottings on science, religion, technology, pop culture, photography and faith from the Aotearoa New Zealand
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Jonny Baker posted a reading on grace read out at grace ten the other day. It’s probably the best thing for my soul that I’ve read in the past week or two. Here’s a bit of it
The grace of God means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn’t have been complete without you. Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid. I am with you. Nothing can ever separate us. It’s for you I created the universe. I love you.
You can read the rest at jonnybaker: worship trick 62 – grace
The reading comes from a book called “Wishful Thinking: A Seeker’s ABC” by Frederick Buechner who also says this about wine in the same book
Wine : Unfermented grape juice is a bland and pleasant drink … [but] it is a ghastly symbol of the life blood of Jesus Christ, especially when served in individual antiseptic, thimble-sized glasses. Wine is booze, which means it is dangerous and drunk-making. It makes the timid brave and the reserved amorous. It loosens the tongue and breaks the ice especially when served in a loving cup. It kills germs. As symbols go, it is a rather splendid one.
Amen.
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Thought about adding my iTunes “What’s playing now” to the blog using Kung-Tunes. Then I saw this article: Wired News: ITunes Undermines Social Security
Playlistism, Aubrey explained, is discrimination based not on race, sex or religion, but on someone’s terrible taste in music, as revealed by their iTunes music library.
Aubrey said an iTunes music library tells a lot more about people than the clothes they wear or the books they carry.
Now I’m just scared to. 🙂
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In my studies I have to use biblical Hebrew and Greek from time to time. SIL have some free fonts for both Mac and Windows which are quite helpful. You can find them at:
May be useful for the millions out there who are desperately seeking them 🙂
Also useful are:
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From a book I’ve just finished:
Defend the small spaces, don’t run with scissors, and remember that there is often an unexpected chocolate.
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Jaron Lanier coined the term “virtual reality” in 1986 and was (is) one of the leading inventors of VR technology. Originally a strong proponent of technology and its benefits he now worries about the future of human culture more than the gadgets.
Lanier is also a an artist and musician of note and the PDF article below is an interview about what he calls ‘cybernetic totalism’ and the effects of technology on and in society. In his writings you can pick up a definite sense of an understanding of the spiritual nature of technology as well as its economic and social effect.
Out in the wider world, though, there’s a rebellion brewing precisely as a result of the sort of wild pronouncements about technology you see more and more often in press releases from places like MIT and Berkeley. There has long been a sense of economic injustice, but there’s a brewing sense of spiritual injustice. There’s this sense that it’s one thing if rich people in America drive fancy cars and have lower infant mortality, but this notion that some elite somewhere is defining the soul or making the soul into an obsolete idea or is going to transform what it means to be human or is going to be first in line for immortality – that idea strikes so deep it creates a sense of panic. And I believe this is the explanation for one of the weird features of our time, that every major religion has a terribly violent fundamentalist wing at the same time.
Interesting stuff.
The PDF is available here: What Keeps Jaron Lanier Awake at Night?
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Darren has been putting together some really useful information and tips about blogging over at his web site. He’s put them all into an archive that you can access at: LivingRoom >> A space for Life: Blog Tips Archives
So if you’re an experienced blogger or just starting out why don’t you drop on by and see what you can learn.
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Henry Jenkins’s writing on the Matrix films talks of transmedia storytelling. The interweaving of cinema, home video/dvd, tv, the internet, video games and books to create narratives that go beyond a single, static portrayal. In fact, stories get added to by the individuals and communities that hear/watch them and then are spurred into creative response. In a consumerist sense he says,
In the ideal form of transmedia storytelling, each medium does what it does best–so that a story might be introduced in a film, expanded through television, novels, and comics, and its world might be explored and experienced through game play…. Reading across the media sustains a depth of experience that motivates more consumption…. Offering new levels of insight and experience refreshes the franchise and sustains consumer loyalty.
I found it interesting in that in effect a community hermeneutic is developed where internet communities comment on, adapt and critique the Matrix world in its various incarnations, developing their own interpretations and reinterpretations of the story.
It doesn’t seem new to me in the sense that people of faith have been doing this sort of thing ever since we could tell stories. However it may have some useful ideas for interacting with contemporary culture.
Technology Review: MIT’s Magazine of Innovation – Why the Matrix Matters
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I’ve been quite stressed over the last few days waiting for the NZ-SA rugby quarter-final. Would “our boys” do it or would they falter in the quarters? Then just as the game is kicking off my daughter got sick and I spent much of the game looking after her far away from the rugby. It brought everything back into perspective – one sick daughter is far more important that whether the All Blacks win a rugby game. Sometimes you need these reminders.
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The NZ government’s Ministry of Economic Development has a number of useful papers, articles and reports on Internet and technology use in New Zealand and the social issues attached with that. Some interesting ones include:
- The Social Impact of Information Technology – A Briefing to the Minister for Information Technology
- Statistics on Information Technology in New Zealand: Updated to 2003
- ImpacT 2001: How Information Technology Will Change New Zealand
- Information and Communication Technologies and Social and Economic Inclusion
A full list can be found at:
The irony of this being, I guess, that the “information poor” cannot access this information via the web.