Inpector Cabaneta is crazy with his Michael Jackson moves.
GLAD: TEDxSFA
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 On 02/08/2014 at 06:22 PM by Super Step See More From This User » |
So the only thing I can say gaming wise is that I only got a bit further in Ghost Trick. All I have to say is I may be cheap when it comes to electricity, but not as cheap as these cops; if that's confusing, it's cause I don't want to spoil anything.
They may be cheap, but they are good dancers. Inpector Cabaneta is my favorite character so far
Anyway, I went to TEDxSFA today, which was ... not crowded. The theme was curiosity, which is why they posted these X's that I never saw all around campus (I live off campus and may as well be driving through a tunnel directly to and from my office and apartment most of the time):
Pictured above: ever intellectually curious, totally alert public university students walking by Surfin' Steve (Stephen F. Austin statue inside water fountain).
I hadn't thought of it until today, but now that I'm not working on something totally unrelated and am able to think of it, I was never once asked to run a PSA/announcement about the event through the radio station.
Beyond that, when I tried to tweet at them after getting out, I couldn't find their Twitter info online. They posted a specific account for the event on the Powerpoints, but not on their website (http://www.ted.com/tedx/events/9825) or blog (http://tedxsfa.wordpress.com/) as far as I can tell with ctrl+f.
It's a shame, cause while some talks were better than others, many were fairly interesting.
Now the whole thing was filmed and will be posted to Youtube they said, but since it ended about 30 minutes ago as I type this, I'll just give my general impressions through text and post the videos later when they become available, except for the presentations they themselves took off Youtube of previous TED Talks (apparently, it's a TED requirement to have 25% of a TEDx be previous video presentations).
By the way a TED talk is just a speech given by a person with a particular idea; there are tons of these on Youtube if you're curious.
To Play Or Not to Play
I came in on the tail end of this. The woman was just saying we need to always be playing into adulthood or something. Can't say I disagree, I guess.
A lot of these had themes or ideas I agreed with, but made me wonder "so what?" as my professors always tell me to ponder when doing research of my own.
Heart of an Orphan
This one was a little more investing for me, though I don't remember all the details. The woman was talking about her experiences adopted a Chinese child and was discussing inequality in the gloobal standard of living. Don't think she offered too many concrete solutions though (not saying there is a definitive answer, but I want at least some ideas how to fix a problem, not just hear pathos about a problem I already know exists), but I could have just been tired. She may have been more specific than I remember, I'll watch the video later.
Language is Music
This SFASU music prof. gave a presentation on how sentences can follow musical patterns. I guess it was good to wake everyone up having them repeat the sentences, but the concept was not new to me.
Reggie watts - (video) Disorients you in the most entertaining way
Building on what Fleshner had just talked about, they played this video of Reggie Watts playing with speech patterns and inflections. I've only ever seen Reggie on Comedy Central ads and this year's Superbowl ads, and have never been that intrigued by him, but he does have a good voice.
Beatboxing: better when sung
Mica Hendricks - Collaborating with my four-year-old
This woman let her daughter draw mismatched bodies on heads she drew professionally, then went viral (blog: http://www.micaangela.com/file/mica_angela.html) and was interviewed by Ellen DeGeneres (spelling?) online, among others. She asked fans on Twitter to collaborate and draw their own versions and her talk was really about the joy of collaborating. Here's an example of her and her daughters' artwork.
This is what I see on the road when I drive tired, but with more Lucky Charms around it.
Then break, then
T. Phillip Madison - Parasocial Experiences
I'm not just saying this because he's a professor in my department, but this really was one of the more interesting ones to me. He talked about how television programs positively depicting homosexuals like Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (remember that show? I remember when they had to remake Jay Leno's set twice, cause the first makeover they did had a couch people sunk into and a lamp right above their heads) and Wiil & Grace correlated with an increase of societal acceptance of these groups as well as shows like Big Love and another one I can't remember then name of doing the same for polygamous married ... groups?
Furthermore, people who watched shows like 16 and Pregnant were less likely to be or want to be pregnant themselves.
Anyawy, he had a solid point to what he was talking about (media portrayals may indeed bring about social change) and gave me more ideas for my own media research topic, so this presentation was certainly one of the better ones, in my opinion.
Keeping Curiosity Alive
Exactly what it sounds like. The woman came out looking at her own name on a Powerpoint and throwing her hands up, said she bet we were curious why she was acting strange, gave her presentation.
Generation of Laziness
This was a Freshman journalism major with a philosophy minor (my friend joked, "man, he really doesn't want a job," no offense to him or those of you in similar fields, I was in Radio/TV/psychology now in Mass Comm, so I can't talk much given my similar path ... hell, my friend's about to get his M.A. in Psychology, so he's pretty much looking at being adjunct faculty unless he pursues a doctorate; still ... c'mon ... philosophy) telling Generation Y (he was born in '94, I was '90, but I honestly feel like our generations are separate, even if they're lumped together by some arbitrary measure) to stop being so lazy. Also, he dislikes the focus on standardized testing in public schools. I was never subject to TAKS or STAR (Texas standard tests) having gone to Catholic school, but teaching towards a test is pretty awful.
My friend and I didn't feel like he provided a whole lot of a basis for his lazy argument, though. Frankly, while my generation certainly isn't working 12 hours 24/7 building railroads, that's kind of the thing: there's a lot more technology that simply permits for fewer man hours. We also joked how a suffering economy seems to correlate with everyone screaming about everyone else's laziness, as if everyone magically decided they wanted to be on welfare one day. That gave me another research thought: my hypothesis is a content analysis of Facebook/Twitter from a period of time in which economic health of the U.S. decreased will correlate with attributions of laziness by and to U.S. citizens with social media accounts. Hmm...
Juan Carlos Urena - Traveling Songs
This Spanish professor was a great singer and guitarist, and can't wait for those videos to post. The video I have on my camera doesn't do him justice. He was talking about immigration, the spread of ideas, and an interesting factoid that the ... a certain water channel that is now closed used to allow boats of some sort to come to Texas ... or maybe just the U.S. in general? WishI'd written this down, but it'll be in the video.
That was the first half.
I'll post about the second half tomorrow.
Until then, remember: care (yes care, or worry) killed the cat. Look it up. 
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