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Thread Ethic | Modest Fashion Blog: HAIR

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Sat, 02 Jun 2012 00:00:00 -0700

OK guys. Melody's going to do it. It's not a terribly drastic change, but it's still a change. She's cutting some locks before she takes off to Mexico next week. It will be the cut of Alexa Chung up top, with the length of Rose Byrne down below. If anyone thinks she shouldn't do it, speak now or forever hold your peace.... ...
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Eric James Stone: Light the lights – Зажигают огоньки

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 07:43:00 -0700

This week’s Russian pop song: “Light the Lights” by Fabrika. Note that although it sounds like they’re saying “Die! Die! Die!,” it has a very different meaning in Russian.

Here are the translated lyrics (courtesy of Google Translate and megalyrics.ru):

Light the lights
Naughty fireflies
And by the river near the river waves are quick and easy
Yes, and high grass
And by the river at the river
His lips are sweet and lovely eyes like cornflowers
Only a short nighttime

Let me go, sadness random
I fell in love, I’m lost
Let me not disturb the heart
Give happiness a girl, give, give

Let me quilt the far
I fell in love, I’m lost
The sun does not get up early to clear
With a nice little stay give, give, give

Light the lights
Naughty fireflies
Neighbors have tongues and eyes like coppers
Mother locks on the doors
Dad did not hurt Lupi
And in the bright room ceilings are nice to me without low
Tears run down so bitter

Let me go, sadness random
I fell in love, I’m lost
Let me not disturb the heart
Give happiness a girl, give, give

Let me quilt the far
I fell in love, I’m lost
The sun does not get up early to clear
With a nice little stay give, give, give

La la la la la la la la
Give Give Give Give Give Give

Let me quilt the far
I fell in love, I’m lost
The sun does not get up early to clear
With a nice little stay give, give, give

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Thread Ethic | Modest Fashion Blog: ANJA RUBIK FOR VOGUE JAPAN

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 06:18:00 -0700

All right, you guys saw bits of the Dior Couture collection here, and now you can see some of these beautiful creations in print. Keep in mind the hats are crazy, but we love the full skirts nipped in at the waist. And we have to admit, those sleeves in the looks up top are pretty wonderful. We always love to see when runway looks show up in magazine shoots.... ...
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I'd Rather Be Writing: An Ingenious Way to Solicit Community Contributions, or, How to Replace the Screen for an Asus Laptop UL50AG

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 05:20:00 -0700

Last week one of my kids broke my ASUS laptop screen (she closed it while something was caught in the lid). At first I thought it would be the end of life for my laptop, but then I found that replacing a laptop screen was somewhat inexpensive (about $75 + shipping) and easy (according to this video). So I ordered a new screen from laptopscreen.com. After my order shipped, I also received this curious email from the company:

Dear Tom Johnson,

To get instant cash:

1. Make a detailed video tutorial of your screen installation with on-screen or spoken instructions
2. Post it publicly on YouTube
3. Send us the link via support ticket (from your account at www.LaptopScreen.com). Please include full laptop model name with your submission.

Mandatory guidelines:

-Your video title must be: “Laptop screen replacement / How to replace laptop screen [Manufacturer Model]”
-Your video must contain a link to http://www.LaptopScreen.com in the first line of the description and in the video’s tags.
- We reserve the right to disqualify any submission (offensive, unclear, misleading etc.).

Quality expectations / best practices:

-Keep your camera stationary – no need for an operator
-Keep the video under 10 minutes and have sufficient lighting
-Do not use licensed music (even if provided by YouTube), if music must be used, pick neutral (elevator) music

This offer is customer specific based on your order, it is not offered to everyone, this offer is aimed towards building a comprehensive publiclaptop screen replacement instructions library, rather than an incentive to purchase from us.

Funds will be transferred to the method of payment used to purchase the screen. Bonus $5 for uploading the same video to www.vimeo.com

The best videos will be displayed on our website!

Thank you for choosing LaptopScreen.com

Their challenge intrigued me. Although I don’t make hardware-replacement type videos, I wanted the $35 back and decided to give it a try. Here’s my video:

Here’s the same video in Vimeo.

It’s not that exciting, but if you had an ASUS UL50AG model laptop and needed to replace the screen, I bet you would watch all 9 minutes of the video.

The kickback idea from LaptopScreen.com is rather ingenious, I think. First, it would be nearly impossible for any company to provide support on how to replace a laptop screen for the hundreds of different laptop brands and models.

Second, even if they could provide written instructions, most users are probably uncomfortable with the task and would gain more confidence in watching a video taken by a regular user (rather than a professional) in a home setting showing how to do it.

Third, all the links pointing back to laptopscreen.com are clever and legit SEO.

I don’t know if my video will meet the requirements they listed — there are a few guest appearances from Lucy, who broke the screen in the first place. And I started out using a screwdriver that was too big (I didn’t make a practice run or anything before replacing the screen). But I think it’s good enough for Youtube.

Also, I had been looking for some good video editing software for HD .MOV files for my Kodak Zi8 anyway, and Vegas Movie Studio HD worked pretty well. They also have an amazing starter tutorial, but I’ll have to cover that in another post.

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Gently Hew Stone: June

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 03:12:00 -0700

Especially if you prefer some categories here over others, here are the topics I'll try to focus on each day: Monday: Arts Tuesday: Education Wednesday: Humor Thursday: Language and Literature Friday: Living Well Saturday: Politics and Society Sunday: Religion ...
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Reach Upward: The Myth of the Job You Love

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Thu, 31 May 2012 16:10:00 -0700

When I was in 7th grade one of my teachers told us that the key to a happy career was to find a job doing something that you love to do. He read an article to us about a highly paid lawyer that discovered that he hated legal work. So he quit, went back to school, and eventually ended up as a professor of music. He was paid far less, but he loved his job.

Similar scenarios were repeated from time to time throughout my school years as a regular parade of people regaled us with tales of job-loving workers. The promoters of these narratives weren't always teachers. Sometimes they were paid consultants or people from various agencies. I even got some of this same counsel at church.

I was a newspaper carrier during most of the years this was going on. I didn't hate my job. But I sure didn't love it. Then I spent a summer planting pineapples in Hawaii. Yeah, it sounds exotic. But it was hard and boring manual agricultural labor. Nice climate; lousy job. I spent a couple of months working at a McDonald's restaurant before leaving to find something that I disliked less and that had better hours.

Setting up and cleaning up for a small company that did wedding receptions was OK, as was doing janitorial work for an architectural firm. I worked for a floral shop putting together pine bough wreaths for the Christmas season in a cold shed. I occasionally delivered flowers for the shop, which was kind of fun.

Finally I spent a summer working as a counselor at a Scout camp. The days were long and were regularly punctuated by hard work and trying circumstances. But I loved it. While I had found a job that I loved, it was seasonal work and it paid only enough to cover the cost of required uniforms. I could love the job, but I couldn't make any money at it.

After that summer I worked checking and bagging groceries at a local market. That was tolerable but not much in the way of lovable.

Then one day it dawned on me that all of the advice about finding a job I loved was little more than feel-good claptrap. How many people did I know that actually loved their jobs? I realized that few if any of the people that had told me to find a job I loved had followed that advice themselves. There's the rare person who loves their job, but for most people their job is ... just a job.

Over the years I have worked at lots of jobs. I have generally been happy to get the work and I have always been happy to get paid. Some jobs have suited me better than others. Few of them have been intolerable. Most of my jobs have been more or less fine, but I can't really say that I have ever had an actual paying job that I just loved.

Actually, I think that advising youngsters to go on a quest for the perfect "meaningful" job can be harmful. In real life, you don't get paid to do what you love to do. You get paid for doing something that somebody else needs to have done. Doing what you love to do is called recreation, and you generally pay to do it rather than getting paid for doing it. Jobs are called work because they involve a healthy dose of drudgery.

Telling kids to get a job doing something they love could lead to a lifetime of job disappointment and a feeling that they are entitled to something that is unlikely to happen. It could keep them from getting productive work while they are young, as they sit around waiting for a 'good' job to come along instead of following the tried and true pattern of starting out doing menial work and working up. Dude, it's hard to get paid much for playing video games and posting social media updates.

In reality, you do not need a job you love or a job that is meaningful, whatever that means. You need a job that you can tolerate and that provides sufficient compensation for your needs. You should find fulfillment in your work from time to time, but you should also expect to find a whole lot of drudgery. You can do what you love to do when you're on your own time.

It may actually be helpful to warn kids about finding work doing something that they love to do. They may discover that turning a beloved activity into a job kills enjoyment and turns the undertaking into drudgery. Or they may find themselves becoming so engrossed in their job that they neglect more important aspects of life.

Rather than teaching kids to look for some kind of ideal employment, teach them to find fulfillment in being a productive member of society and in building life enriching relationships. If they happen to find a job doing something they love to do along the way, they will be among the lucky few that win life's lottery. But they should know that they don't need a job like that to be happy and to have a satisfying career.
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Richman Ramblings: How to Translate the Internet for Free

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Thu, 31 May 2012 11:08:00 -0700

The video below is a very interesting TED Talk. The first part of the talk is about now CAPTCHA works and how it is used to create value. This is a captcha:

The second part of the talk is about how the concept can be applied to language learning, while at the same time creating usable, valuable translation.

Duolingo launches in 20 days!

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Connor's Conundrums: Nanny State Smackdown

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Thu, 31 May 2012 09:16:00 -0700

photo credit: peasap

Because it believes you are unable or unwilling to take care of yourself, the state aims to do it for you. This trend started subtly at first, of course, for who would welcome tyranny when presented as such? No, the nanny state increases incrementally, working by degrees to assert control over your life.

At times, stories of the nanny state’s interventions catch fire in the news, as has happened lately with two examples. Both of these stories are but an infinitesimally small fraction of the many ways in which the state treats adults as children, and imposes mandates that implicitly assume that such persons are too stupid to make appropriate decisions for themselves.

Like Utah, the state of Idaho exerts illegitimate control over the state’s alcohol supply. There, the Liquor Control Division recently ruled that a certain drink may not be sold at state-controlled liquor stores, nor in private bars. The drink in question is called “Five Wives Vodka,” and features a drawing of five 19th-century women with kittens in their petticoats.

In a letter written to the drink’s Utah-based manufacturer, the alcohol-banning agent in Idaho wrote the following (multiple typos in the original):

Social responsibility is very important aspect of the marketing and sales of distilled spirits in the State Idaho. The Idaho State Liquor Division is responsible for the safety and well-being of the citizens of our State.

Products that we feel are marketed toward children, or are in poor state with respect to our citizens will not be authorized for distribution.

We feel Five Wives Vodka concept is offensive to a prominent segment of our population and will not be carried.

Thus, because some bureaucrat believes that the title and/or image is offensive to Mormons, he has prohibited it for sale—while hypocritically allowing Polygamy Porter, another drink, to be sold. According to NPR, the title and drawing are not even a reference to polygamy, but are, as the company’s director of marketing said, “five wives who just like to get together and have a cocktail.”

But the bureaucrats disagreed. “My team made the recommendation that this is offensive to women, and it’s offensive in addition to the whole [Mormon] faith, because they’re playing on that whole polygamy thing,” Idaho liquor control division director Jeff Anderson told the Los Angeles Times.

Of course, only individuals can determine whether they find something offensive. Products should not be restricted from the open market simply because some illegitimately-empowered government agent believes that somebody may not like it. This is a classic example of the nanny state, and is oddly even more restrictive than Utah—a state with very strict anti-alcohol policies—where the drink is allowed for sale.

The nanny state’s regulation of beverages appears to be in vogue at the moment. In New York City—where one might expect such absurdity to be common fare—Mayor Bloomberg is about to enact a ban on large sugary drinks to “combat obesity.” Gone are the days of the government confining itself to protecting the lives of its citizens—now it uses its supreme authority to mandate behavior it believes will extend their lives. What’s next, mandated vitamin consumption with jail time for those who refuse?

Of course, this mandate is absurd since instead of being able to buy one large drink, people can buy two medium drinks. How does the Head Nanny respond to this? “Your argument, I guess, could be that it’s a little less convenient to have to carry two 16-ounce drinks to your seat in the movie theater rather than one 32 ounce,” Mr. Bloomberg said in a sarcastic tone. “I don’t think you can make the case that we’re taking things away.”

This latter claim comes in response to the argument that this mandate limits consumer’s choices, and is therefore a bad idea. Whether that is true or not (of course it’s true), it is beside the point. The point missed by so many is that the government has no authority to enact such bans in the first place. People cannot dictate to their neighbors what size (or type) of a drink they may consume, and therefore cannot empower the state to do it on their behalf.

But legitimate authority and moral behavior has never been a concern of the nanny state. Its smackdowns come with no regard for the liberty and property of those being affected. Propagandized with feel-goodery and justified as altruistic behavior, the nanny state’s initiatives inevitably come at the expense of the liberty and property of those it aims to assist. In pursuit of promoting a worthy end (such as not offending people or helping fight obesity), its agents employ evil means.

No better conclusion to a topic such as this could be provided than by this one from C.S. Lewis:

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

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Eric James Stone: Some Recent Reviews

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Thu, 31 May 2012 06:44:00 -0700

Poet at Large Reviews reviewed my collection Rejiggering the Thingamajig and Other Stories [Amazon | B&N]. A key quote:

It is a book that is hard to read all at once because unlike a novel you have to stop and think between stories where as with a novel the story runs chapter to chapter. Some of the stories are funny some of the stories are scary, but all of them make you think and I find that to be a good thing.

John Fairhurst favorably mentioned my short story “Lobstersaurus” in his review of the May 2012 issue of Analog:

Again, this was a story with an old fashioned theme though with a modern sensibility that made it a fun and straightforward read.

Tanget Online had a less favorable take on “Lobstersaurus”:

Stone’s piece falls into what I can only call the ‘girl-keeps-absurd-pet’ genre. You know where this story is going from the moment little Esperanza turns gooey-eyed at the adorable lobstersaurus, and I found it more than a little frustrating to watch as her parents failed to do the responsible thing. If you can get past that, this story will fill some time in an afternoon, but its plot twist comes as no surprise to anyone. The short-sightedness of the characters here is mind-boggling, and ultimately that proved too much for me to overcome. I suspect that this will be the case for many other readers, and it is a shame, because the story universe itself is quite well imagined. Snippets of a colonisation report punctuate the story, and I think Stone’s world held more promise than “Lobstersaurus” delivered.

Note: I’m the webmaster for Tangent Online, but I have no editorial control over the content of the reviews.

Over at A Motley Vision, a Mormon arts and culture blog, Mahonri Stewart has very nice things to say about “That Leviathan, Whom Thou Hast Made,” which he read in the Monsters and Mormons anthology [Amazon | B&N]:

Stone’s writing in this story is exemplary. He wastes no time introducing us to the moral quandries that exist within the relatively new interaction between the two societies. Cultural hubris, religious exchange, scientific sterility, and spirituality all play interesting and even legitimately moving aspects of this unique and beautiful story.

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Thread Ethic | Modest Fashion Blog: LOOSE WHITE BUTTON DOWN

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Thu, 31 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

This look was definitely inspired by one of our favorite street style bloggers Hanneli. We just love how accessible our favorite blogs are for inspiration. We loved the look here so much that we had to recreate it in our own way. And we're telling you, the looser fitting button down is a must with skinny jeans right now (just check out some of our most recent pins on pinterest). On that note, in case some of you guys missed our tweet and f...
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Gently Hew Stone: 25 Years of Pulitzer Winners and Me

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Wed, 30 May 2012 20:09:00 -0700

In a rare turn of events, no Pulitzer for fiction was awarded this year. That got me to thinking about my own history with that award. Here are my notes on the last quarter century of Pulitzer winners. 2011 A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. Sounds interesting, but I’m not really that [...]
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A matter of preparedness: LDS Preparedness Manual 2012 from AVOW

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Wed, 30 May 2012 19:17:00 -0700

Image courtesy of AVOW.com

This is an amazing offer from Another Voice of Warning (AVOW). Currently, they are offer their LDS Preparedness Manual for.....free! It is very comprehensive, and worth taking a look at. You can also purchase it in hard copy for just under $20.00. There is also a second manual (for purchase) for Wards and Stakes.

To download or find out more about this current opportunity, please go to this link.

I would encourage you to take advantage of this very generous offer!

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Reach Upward: Almost Everyone Cheats: Do You?

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Wed, 30 May 2012 14:11:00 -0700

The vast majority of us are dishonest. So says behavior professor Dan Ariely in this fascinating article. Ariely describes various tests he and his team used to measure honesty and explains his team's conclusions. Some of the more salient points include:

Only a few people are nearly always honest and only a few are seriously dishonest.
Most people are dishonest right up to the point that they believe their personal integrity is at stake. They are only a little dishonest.
The seriously dishonest impose marginal costs on society. Although each may cheat much, their relatively small number makes for small total cost.
Those that are a little dishonest impose large costs on society. Although each may cheat only a little, their huge number makes for major impact.
Dishonesty by the many is related to opportunity; it is not significantly tied to the amount of gain or even the chance of being caught.
Dishonesty is contagious in two ways. 1) People observing others being dishonest (especially with no apparent negative consequences) tend to behave more dishonestly than normal. 2) Those engaging in one kind of dishonest behavior (i.e. wearing fake designer fashions) tend to more readily engage in other dishonest behavior.
Increasing the psychological distance between the behavior and the payoff tends to increase dishonesty. More immediate payoff reduces dishonesty.
Mental and/or physical stress can increase dishonesty.
A desire to please the group can increase dishonesty and can be excused as helpful.
Reminding people of moral codes at the point of potential dishonesty severely curtails the behavior. This worked even when atheists swore on a Bible. (Although, the moral codes don't have to be religiously based to be effective.)

Airely uses a lock analogy to make his point. A lock on a house or a car is not going to stop a determined thief. It will, however, stop the average person that might filch something from the house or car if they found the door unlocked. Although it's not that hard to figure out how to break or pick a lock, doing so would violate the average person's sense of personal honor, while opening an unlocked door might not.

This Businessweek article provides an interesting side note to the integrity issue. Ariely and colleague Francesca Gino say that creative people are more dishonest. The article says that "creativity fuels dishonesty and that dishonest behavior triggers creativity." The researchers suggest that creative people are better at rationalizing their unethical behavior.

I could not tell from Ariely's article whether reminding people of moral codes away from the point of behavior is effective. For example, do people that attend church regularly behave more honorably than those that don't? Perhaps more research is needed to find out.

Various studies have been done over the years to try to measure the effect of church attendance on honesty, but results have been inconclusive, partially due to poor study design. For example, reliance on survey responses as opposed to actual observed behavior means that you are relying on people to self report their dishonesty. How accurate can such a measure be? It's like relying on an individual's own math to test whether he is a good mathematician.

It would also be interesting to find out what effect continuously reminding people of moral codes has on ethical behavior. Would effectiveness constantly increase or would there be a saturation point where effectiveness levels off?

For most people, then, the question is not whether they are honest or dishonest, but how dishonest they can be without violating their personal sense of honor. Ariely says that "many good people cheat just a little here and there. We fib to round up our billable hours, claim higher losses on our insurance claims, recommend unnecessary treatments and so on."

Society cannot make us reliably honest. That requires personal choice and determination. I suppose that each of us ought to seriously face the questions of how much dishonesty makes us dishonest, and how much our personal integrity is worth.
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Thread Ethic | Modest Fashion Blog: THE REST OF CANNES 2012

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Wed, 30 May 2012 00:37:00 -0700

Doutzen Kroes in Elie Saab Alexandra Maria Lara in Elie Saab Couture Diane Kruger in Chanel Berenice Bejo in Giambattista Valli Couture Aishwarya Rai in Elie Saab Kirsten Dunst in Dolce and Gabbana Diane Kruger in Prabal Gurung Kylie Minogue in Dolce and Gabbana Elodie Bouchez in Chanel Couture Marion Cotillard in Chanel Reese Witherspoon in Versace Here are some of the other looks from the Cannes red carpet. I don't thin...
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Reach Upward: Why Should We Remember the Titans?

noreply@nothingwavering.org (No Reply) — Tue, 29 May 2012 11:18:00 -0700

I don't often sit down to watch TV or to watch a movie. On a recent rainy Saturday my wife and I sat down to watch Remember the Titans. I had heard about the film for years and had seen video clips from the film. I'm no sports fan, but I understood that the film was a triumphal movie about far more than football.

Our youngest son joined us to watch the film. We found it necessary to pause the film from time to time to explain the history and culture behind the racial tensions depicted. Although my son has a pretty good grounding in the history of slavery and the Civil War, and has been taught for years about the civil rights movement, he simply had no context for understanding early 1970s race issues, especially with respect to the South.

It took me quite a bit of explaining before my son could even begin to fathom some of the movie scenes that showed racially charged events. He just could not seem to grasp why anyone would consider someone superior or inferior on the basis of race. He couldn't figure out why anyone should be treated differently on the basis of race. It made no sense to him.

My son attends school with people of various races. To him, all of these are just people. Sure, people look different. But, so what?

I greatly enjoyed the 12-year-old film, which portrays football as the catalyst for overcoming the harsh realities of culturally enforced racism. The coaches are depicted as heroes, but interviews with the actual coaches included in the bonus features make it clear that they did not see themselves that way. They gave much of the credit to the boys on the team. They seemed to suggest that youth often have the ability to transcend issues that stymie adults.

In truth, the film is about far more than football or racism. It's about the triumph of the human spirit. We tend to love stories of this nature because we have all had a taste of this kind of accomplishment and because such stories speak to the best that is within each of us.

I was glad for an opportunity to discuss our nation's history of racism. I would no more want to hide the truth of these ugly episodes than I would want to bury the history of the Holocaust. Our country is still far from perfect when it comes to racial issues. But I think my son's attitudes about race show how far we've come in the past 40 years.
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