One year ago today: April 21, 2016, coffee, empanada.
Five years ago today: April 21, 2012, you, another commodity.
Nine years ago today: April 21, 2008, rare duplicate post (I may fix this.)
Random years ago today: April 21, 2015, here’s Pretty Joe.
Here’s a picture that came up when I went to search “Bass Player”, looking for the magazine. Folks, this is what your typical guitar player thinks is a bass player. I don’t know what this guy is doing, but he is not playing bass. Bass playing uses a pick and does not use chord patterns on the left hand. But like I said, this is what a guitar freak thinks is a bassist. Psssst, if I ever look like this on stage, you have permission to unplug my life support.
So here is a little test of your personality. Who do you side with? Ready? Okay, historically, my song list changes by 85% every five years. Yet every guitar player I’ve met in Florida has a list of music he has been playing for twenty-plus years. So here’s the test. Am I being competitive against these guitarists, or am I just going along and only appear to be competitive because of their general lack of momentum? Fingers on your buzzers.
That’s an unfair question, since the situation is not that dichotomized, nor do they have much reason to learn new material once they are out there. Should I provide that reason, it is musically speaking, a good thing. There is always the chance of having a less-than-talented person like myself come along who is willing to do whatever it takes to make a living at music. And yes, I would like to make a living at it. It is the cleanest, most prestigious business one can do in old age where you get to call all the shots. Stocking grocery shelves on graveyard shift doesn’t look to me like much of an exercise in free will.
I kept the practice going until we hit a song that he naturally played “right” as a duo. So now he knows we can have that winning sound in every tune. Providing he is agreeable to changing his guitar style to adapt to it. The resistance is there because it can be a departure from what they’ve been taught is the way to play. That’s the damage that needs un-doing. Oh, if I forgot to say, I had him play through the Fishman “to test out the sound”, but really to disconnect from his drum box. Within in minutes, he forgot his entire PA wasn’t even in the loop.
Chinese junk yard.
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My conclusion at this early leg is I’m satisfied with the progress. That’s eight hours of solid progress, not the usual malarkey with the others that made it to audition. Changing the subject a bit, there is something else that happened during three of these auditions. Once was four years ago in Mississippi, but twice in Lakeland. A guitarist began to play that Van Halen tune where he touches the strings with his right hand. No, I don’t know the tune, but it was the same tune three times now. He then declares, get this, that the ability to play bass to that specific song is his measure of how good a bassist is.
Now, you don’t need much more evidence than that to conclude these guitar freaks are being indoctrinated. It’s a brain-fart and it smells like Guitar Center. I mean, otherwise, what are the odds? Note, I don’t have a thing against Guitar Center and I shop there. What I don’t like is guitarists who thoughtlessly buy into the Guitar Center way of doing things.
Here are the tunes we went over y’day:
Travelin’ Man
Jambalaya
Wagon Wheel
Memphis
Chatahoochie
Momma Tried
Oh Lonesome Me
Tennessee Flat Top
Six Days
Save The Last Dance
Don’t Rock the Jukebox
And we ran through some non-country older Beatles material. “Back In The USSR”, “Don’t Pass Me By”. He is applying pressure to include some of this, his old material, and I assure him as soon as we get our country material done, we’ll look at it. Of course, by then I expect he will be totally converted to playing only country. Like myself, not so much the music as the gigs and the full tip jars. Oh, and unlike a few, he was amenable to playing the rhythm to Tennessee Flat Top while I played the solo, something other guitarists consider an abomination to their trade.
There is something else. This new guy, and many other people will tell you they are computer literate. Then you find out they have Android on their smart phone. So, in fact, the guy cannot bring up his own song list. Agreed, these people are fully occupied for the full minute it takes them to find and play one damn song, but they don’t seem to be aware of how long a wait that is for the other guy. Android is too slow and the same goes for the operators, to be of any practical use for getting things done. It also means he cannot download the song list I gave him unless he pays for each tune. I’ve never liked Android on so many levels.
[Author’s note: I occasionally get flak about the way I use double-quotation marks. It does not conform to certain establishment rules, such as omitting the ending marks on long passages, or always placing the ending mark outside the final punctuation. The way I do it is not random. A moment’s thought shows those who developed the rules were highly influenced by making it look right and being consistent.
I noticed in the earliest of my blog days that some things that looked right in print did not do so on the computer screen. Long passages scrolled off the page and single quotation marks led to confusion as to where the material ended. I found different fonts were better for creating emphasis than for delineating passages, and so on. So I use the same license to make it visually appealing on screen as they do on paper. Fact is, I know as much about punctuation as the next guy and I’ve passed the same exams. But to do as they say? I mean, it’s not like anybody elected them.]
“Hell is wallpapered with your deleted selfies.”
You’ll get lots of reading today, since I’m staying home till dark. My chasing around this morning got me on a back road that arrived at Gordonville. JZ and I were through there once a year ago. He doesn’t know it yet, but I’m driving out to visit for a week. This is to re-establish a strong presence in Miami again. I’ll tell you why. I have not really moved any long distance away since 1999, when I arrived in Miami-Dade. I’ve mentioned how the system was tightening up, and when I left Broward Country last year, the place was getting a lot like Canada was in 1980. Remember, I used to work there, crossing the border every day. (Try that now.)
I thought it would take 50 years to get bad, but with computers and federal money, it’s already just as bad. However, unlike Canada, DC did not have to impose the drastically inefficient system that Ottawa did. I mentioned how in Canada, everything is designed to be continually checking up on you. No, you didn’t do anything wrong, but they need to check to make sure you don’t, but if you do, they have your number. Their mentality is that “You don’t have to let us check your bag without a good reason, but we don’t have to let you on our airplane. The choice is yours.”
Your choice, that’s Canada-think. It’s not like the Canadian airline ticket carries a warning sticker that purchase may subject you to abuse, delays, and warrantless search. One guy told me how he was searched simply because the last person searched was a Hindu and they wanted to appear “equal”. The American system is slicker. They just need a phone number and they’ve got you, but a name or address is often asked for anyway. So, now I’m out of Broward area and of course I notice how often people try to update my file. That’s fruitless, since my job in Canada, I’ve got mechanisms in place to handle anything they throw at me. But you still can’t avoid certain mechanics of the system.
For example, the library has been insisting on a home address for months. (I’m buying a laptop so I don’t need their silly passes.) The pharmacy balked at filling my prescription twice in a row (my address is still in Broward), despite the fact they are a national chain that advertises transparency on that count. I’m saying I can get around all these rules (I have 90 day supplies that are broken in half, so I only need refills twice a year, and that can be done in Miami) and therefore so could anyone. I’m light years ahead of the system on that count. And I have a new phone number which nobody gets unless I know them personally. The phone is a tracking device, folks. As long as they can get that, it all goes into a few central and very tight databases. My objection there is that they don’t tell you.
As a reminder, I’m not all that concerned if they get my phone number and such, because I don’t have any useful information attached to those items. But keeping the number off the lists is an excellent first defense for anyone. Some people fail to understand that if you keep your name off the suspect list, you’ll never be a suspect. What I do mind is the way that certain entities keep insisting they have a right information. Next item is a triple scam. I wanted some non-prescription sunglasses repaired and was flummoxed. You might say I ran into a brick wall after the glasses were broken, little joke there.
But I did get an optician willing to talk. Aha, I was right about the prescription lens boondoggle. The labs have to agree to sell only to eyeglass dispensers or be blacklisted by the ophthalmologists. If you’re thinking that is illegal, you are unaware that anti-trust laws apply only to large corporations or monopolies. He tells me they [the staff] are instructed to answer questions about this as there is risk of medical liability should you look through somebody else’s glasses. They will not even allow the labs to sell ground lens blanks. This country needs a Uber-eyeglass operation.
Now he also remembers the little stick-on lenses. I’ll look it up, as he is somewhat sure they are available on eBay. But nothing beats my idea of selling the software for each prescription to people with a 3D printer. Yes, it is easily copied, but like, who needs the other guy’s prescription, and besides, the clear plastic material has not been invented yet. And it sounds expensive. These are not meant to be ground and placed into eyeglass frames. They are meant to be glued to the inside of existing plain glass lenses, like sunglasses. Now, to find a crooked eyeglass lab employee. Hey, this is Florida, it won’t take long.
Another failed day of trying to find out about gold around here. There’s all the information you want on crops, soil types, railway grades, air quality, and even the types of immigrants wanted. But nothing on gold and nothing on how to grind eyeglass lenses. Agt. R is in Georgia for the weekend, hopefully he’ll have time to meet up with that guy with the mining claim.
ADDENDUM
I’m watching the DVD “Stealth”, with all the computer special effects. It’s a tired theme, how we spend a billion dollars per airplane to fight people who live in mud huts. Even when we win, we lose and they know it. So watch the movie for the action, not the lame script. The opening credits say 400 pilots volunteered, but only three were chosen. Let me guess, one was black, one was a woman and the other was queer. Our country may not have its head on straight, but we’ll go down in history as the first empire that self-destructed out of being equal to a fault.
It turns out to be the same old human ingenuity plot, despite the fact humans also go haywire. This robot plane joins three less-than-enthusiastic human types, so the theme is will robots ever replace human pilots, and by extension will they ever replace other humans? Mark my words, then can, they will, and they already have. Pilots are a rather extreme example because of the selection process and specialized training.
But face it, dumb machines have been progressively replacing humans up the food chain since the Industrial Revolution or really, the Stone Age. When you have superior spearpoints, it takes fewer troglodytes to bring down the mastodon. Suddenly, geologically speaking, Grog and Ugg are out of work, so their choices are starve or start cooking up religion from handy tribal legends. You know, gardens, floods, and primogeniture.
As predicted here so long ago, the big players are banking on AI (artificial intelligence). I first programmed an AI computer in 1981. I did so again 1985 with a program to identify gemstones. I have not programmed fuzzy logic, but I scored 100% on the exam on the advanced statistics over which it is based. There are several facets of AI, each being targeted by Amazon and Google types. These people are by far not the best and cannot be relied upon to act in anyone’s best interest but their own, so you better watch the hell out. There’s nothing you can do, because they have all the money. The only thing known for sure is they will pursue the same agenda of claiming it is good for you when in fact, it is destroying your world from the inside out.
I’m saying the mechanics have already been around for decades. They need only supply the code. The next big thing as I see it will be AI, and the initial applications will be feeble. Yet they will still outperform the average Millennial, and if there is one thing that bunch excels at, it is being average. I’m quite aware of what I’m saying here, so let me leave no doubt. Robots combined with AI can and will surpass our greatest generation simply because they’ve lowered their own bar.
They left no child behind in the school system. Now they’ll all be left behind in the world. Strange, how they are busy at work writing the very code that will oust them. Talk about working yourself out of a job. I kind of did that in my life, but for me it was the opposite of what they are up to, har-dee-har-har.
Considering the matter further, the one unknowable weakness of AI is measurable IQ. It is quite impossible for programmers to develop software above their own IQ, any more than hiring more teachers will make students smarter. There will always be a tiny group of humans smarter than any machine, so the machines will have to be designed to find and neutralize that elite. Not consciously, but in the overall context in which the machines will be deployed. Take a look at IQ. How will an AI machine hunt down the opposition, if any?
The factor nobody will ever openly admit is that the primary indicator of IQ is heredity. And no government will allow anybody to publish what has been shown by every valid study ever done—that intelligence is also based on race and white people are at the top by a considerable margin. If you can still find them, there are a series of British studies that were released before the governments clamped down the lid. The second most telling condition for high IQ is environment. So all bad government has to do is take over the school system and jail people who don’t fill out census forms. Then once the AI tap is turned on, if there is any resistance, you already have them on file. A FEMA file.
[Author’s note: the three companies that are actively developing Artificial Intelligence are, in socially responsible order, MicroSoft, Amazon, and Google. The concepts of AI have been around for half a century, what was lacking was the financial will to develop the code. I learned from my early studies that AI requires a lot of code, and it cannot be written like sloppy, hard-to-read C+, because it has to be easy to maintain. Intelligence is not a static entity.
A lot of code means a lot of programmers, and I believe my original estimate of 7% effectives holds to this day. As IBM found out in 1983, you cannot run out and hire a thousand good programmers. Today you can, but only 70 of them will be worth anything. That’s who’s writing the code, but consider this. The financials of such an operation will never be scientific innovation or human progess. The goal will always be to carve out as much money and power as possible from those who do not have the code. Every software giant in history has followed this formula.
There can be little doubt the worst of the pack, Google, will quickly turn whatever AI they develop inward on the existing American structure to gouge what they can from the carcass. Europe has safeguards that blocked MicroSoft and others from abusing their citizens, but the big players are nations, not companies, and like it or not, if AI arrives in any form, it will be shoved into every orifice you have, unless, that is, you were one of the few who took measures to prevent it a long time ago.]
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