My latest writing post is up, with my new first page to MIND THIEF
Why can't I quit you!
By Darrell B. Nelson author of I KILLED THE MAN THAT WASN'T THERE
Rev up for The Wraith
3 months ago
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Monday, May 28, 2012
Armageddon Devices Poll
Last week I held a poll as to which superpower commonly seen in movies you would like to have. It was a three way tie:
Superhealing
The ability to get in a fight that should send you to the hospital, and have all your cuts bruises gone in the next scene. This is an incredible superpower that most of the characters in action movies have.
Instant Clean-up
Being able to pull yourself out of any liquid sticky mess, have your clothes cleaned and pressed, and hair and make-up expertly done. In Star Wars they could say “the force” cleaned them up after they escaped from the garbage pile, in most other movies it's just a unmentioned superpower.
Hack non-computer powered systems.
The power to use a laptop to hack anything, even things that aren't powered by computers. “24” loved to do this, villains would hack the natural gas pipelines or nuclear reactors (Yes nuclear reactors do have computers, but in the US the ones controlling the core haven't been updated since the 70s so instructions from modern computers would overload them). With the awesome power that these hackers have they could easily get rid of their enemies. “Oh no, they've just hacked into the major support beam for this building!”
Of course, having all three would be awesome. You could get in a fight, fall into a garbage pit, pull yourself up and have you hair and clothes be spotless as you hacked non-computer powered systems. The sad thing is that is almost cliché in movies.
Next poll:
Everyone loves sci-fi devices, but few people notice the secondary systems that are activated to make the main ones work. I would love to get my hands on some of these.
Which Sci-Fi device would you like to have?
The Physics Inhibitor
As seen in, well, every sci-fi movie ever.
Need to go faster than light, need to turn a 397,805 metric ton starship on a dime without turning the crew into pancakes. No problem. Turn on the Physics Inhibitor and the laws of the universe don't apply.
Portable Time Dilation
As seen in every Micheal Bay movie.
This is activated after the Physics Inhibitor has been running for an hour of so. Are you in the middle of a countdown but have lots of stuff to do? Activate this handy device and you'll have all the time you need.
Micheal Bay loves this device. In Armageddon they had 14 minutes to blow up the asteroid. It was a full 50 minutes of real film time before they did. That includes Bruce Willis' five minute speech that he started at the one minute mark.
Personal Teleportation
Ever find yourself in the middle of the action. When its over you need to give a caring speech to the loved one of the person who sacrificed their life so that n-people can go on, but they are somewhere else. No problem just use your Personal Teleporter.
Again in Armageddon this was used way too blatantly. Liv Tyler was on the visitor balcony of NASA's mission control, staring down at Billy Bob Thornton, she senses someone behind her, turns and faces Billy Bob Thornton.
Multiple Launch Capabilities
NASA learned that a rocket launch is exciting. They film it from many angles. But sometimes thats just not exciting enough. In order to make it super exciting have the space ships launch several times repeatedly. In Armageddon the two shuttles launched six times each.
I won't get into the selective gravity, windy airless objects, or ability for a motorcycle to travel cross country faster than a private jet. To answer what you are thinking, “Yes I watched Armageddon again last night, and yes Armageddon tired of it.”
As always vote on the upper left hand corner of the page.
By Darrell B. Nelson author of I KILLED THE MAN THAT WASN'T THERE
Superhealing
The ability to get in a fight that should send you to the hospital, and have all your cuts bruises gone in the next scene. This is an incredible superpower that most of the characters in action movies have.
Instant Clean-up
Being able to pull yourself out of any liquid sticky mess, have your clothes cleaned and pressed, and hair and make-up expertly done. In Star Wars they could say “the force” cleaned them up after they escaped from the garbage pile, in most other movies it's just a unmentioned superpower.
Hack non-computer powered systems.
The power to use a laptop to hack anything, even things that aren't powered by computers. “24” loved to do this, villains would hack the natural gas pipelines or nuclear reactors (Yes nuclear reactors do have computers, but in the US the ones controlling the core haven't been updated since the 70s so instructions from modern computers would overload them). With the awesome power that these hackers have they could easily get rid of their enemies. “Oh no, they've just hacked into the major support beam for this building!”
Of course, having all three would be awesome. You could get in a fight, fall into a garbage pit, pull yourself up and have you hair and clothes be spotless as you hacked non-computer powered systems. The sad thing is that is almost cliché in movies.
Next poll:
Everyone loves sci-fi devices, but few people notice the secondary systems that are activated to make the main ones work. I would love to get my hands on some of these.
Which Sci-Fi device would you like to have?
The Physics Inhibitor
As seen in, well, every sci-fi movie ever.
Need to go faster than light, need to turn a 397,805 metric ton starship on a dime without turning the crew into pancakes. No problem. Turn on the Physics Inhibitor and the laws of the universe don't apply.
Portable Time Dilation
As seen in every Micheal Bay movie.
This is activated after the Physics Inhibitor has been running for an hour of so. Are you in the middle of a countdown but have lots of stuff to do? Activate this handy device and you'll have all the time you need.
Micheal Bay loves this device. In Armageddon they had 14 minutes to blow up the asteroid. It was a full 50 minutes of real film time before they did. That includes Bruce Willis' five minute speech that he started at the one minute mark.
Personal Teleportation
Ever find yourself in the middle of the action. When its over you need to give a caring speech to the loved one of the person who sacrificed their life so that n-people can go on, but they are somewhere else. No problem just use your Personal Teleporter.
Again in Armageddon this was used way too blatantly. Liv Tyler was on the visitor balcony of NASA's mission control, staring down at Billy Bob Thornton, she senses someone behind her, turns and faces Billy Bob Thornton.
Multiple Launch Capabilities
NASA learned that a rocket launch is exciting. They film it from many angles. But sometimes thats just not exciting enough. In order to make it super exciting have the space ships launch several times repeatedly. In Armageddon the two shuttles launched six times each.
I won't get into the selective gravity, windy airless objects, or ability for a motorcycle to travel cross country faster than a private jet. To answer what you are thinking, “Yes I watched Armageddon again last night, and yes Armageddon tired of it.”
As always vote on the upper left hand corner of the page.
By Darrell B. Nelson author of I KILLED THE MAN THAT WASN'T THERE
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Shut-up Stupid Sunday: School Vouchers
There are some ideas that are wrong on every level. School Vouchers are one of them.
The idea is to do to the Public Schools what we have done to higher education over the last thirty years. Back when I went to college there was a choice of going to a State University, for almost free, or pay out the nose for private school. Just like parents have the choice in school now.
Having to compete with free made private universities have to really look at their programs and justify the value for students. Not just the big name Ivy League schools. Places like Devry specialized in awesome job placement. Some of my classmates would graduate and take a special six week course at Devry just to get in their job placement program.
Then funding for State Universities got chopped to the bone by people claiming the private market is better. Student loans replaced funding for State Universities.
The result was programs that the State Universities and Community Colleges used to handle shifted to for-profit colleges. Many of which barely kept their accreditation for a few years then lost it. All the students who spent a few years struggling to pay for the courses are told, “Oops, tough luck your diploma isn't worth the paper it's written on.”
So now people want to repeat this by offering school vouchers instead of funding public schools.
Here is my quick answer to the claim that Private Schools are better than Public Schools. If that is true why do they need my money?
I went to Private School until High School. Those Schools really needed to prove they were worth the money as they had to compete with free.
Those in favor of school vouchers like to claim, “It's my money, I should have a choice.”
No, it is not. Part of it is mine. I pay school taxes. For that money I get in return the comfort of having the majority of people around me not be total morons! A good value in my opinion.
Using my money to have your kid go through some religious indoctrination so they want to kill me, or get a substandard education so they end up being a beggar on the street, isn't quite as good a value to me.
So to all the people who are pushing to have vouchers replace the public school system, I say, “Shut-up Stupid. It didn't work with Higher Education, it just got rid of the competition. If public schools are so bad then private schools should be able to easily beat them for people's money. The fact is public schools make a minimum standard for education. If private schools want your money they have to go above and beyond that standard. Vouchers are great way to destroy the value of both Public and Private Schools.”
By Darrell B. Nelson author of I KILLED THE MAN THAT WASN'T THERE
The idea is to do to the Public Schools what we have done to higher education over the last thirty years. Back when I went to college there was a choice of going to a State University, for almost free, or pay out the nose for private school. Just like parents have the choice in school now.
Having to compete with free made private universities have to really look at their programs and justify the value for students. Not just the big name Ivy League schools. Places like Devry specialized in awesome job placement. Some of my classmates would graduate and take a special six week course at Devry just to get in their job placement program.
Then funding for State Universities got chopped to the bone by people claiming the private market is better. Student loans replaced funding for State Universities.
The result was programs that the State Universities and Community Colleges used to handle shifted to for-profit colleges. Many of which barely kept their accreditation for a few years then lost it. All the students who spent a few years struggling to pay for the courses are told, “Oops, tough luck your diploma isn't worth the paper it's written on.”
So now people want to repeat this by offering school vouchers instead of funding public schools.
Here is my quick answer to the claim that Private Schools are better than Public Schools. If that is true why do they need my money?
I went to Private School until High School. Those Schools really needed to prove they were worth the money as they had to compete with free.
Those in favor of school vouchers like to claim, “It's my money, I should have a choice.”
No, it is not. Part of it is mine. I pay school taxes. For that money I get in return the comfort of having the majority of people around me not be total morons! A good value in my opinion.
Using my money to have your kid go through some religious indoctrination so they want to kill me, or get a substandard education so they end up being a beggar on the street, isn't quite as good a value to me.
So to all the people who are pushing to have vouchers replace the public school system, I say, “Shut-up Stupid. It didn't work with Higher Education, it just got rid of the competition. If public schools are so bad then private schools should be able to easily beat them for people's money. The fact is public schools make a minimum standard for education. If private schools want your money they have to go above and beyond that standard. Vouchers are great way to destroy the value of both Public and Private Schools.”
By Darrell B. Nelson author of I KILLED THE MAN THAT WASN'T THERE
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