This essay on Stanislaw Lem helps to reveal how the Soderbergh remake of Solaris was such a failure. I was glad it failed since you can not remake a classic such as Tarkovsky's. Anybody who did see the recent version should do themselves a favor and rent the original. They will be glad they did.

 
Here are my predictions for the nominees for the Academy Awards. I usually E-mail these to my friends and make an offer of a small wager. Only this year has one of them accepted, however. I absolutely refuse to acknowledge Chicago for best picture nomination, since it is not the same caliber as the others.

Best Picture:
Lord of the Rings, Gangs of New York, Far from Heaven, Punch Drunk Love, Adaptation

Best Actor:
Daniel Day-Lewis (Gangs of New York), Robin Williams (One Hour Photo), Chris Cooper (Adaptation), Jack Nicholson (About Schmidt), Adrien Brody (The Pianist)

Best Actress:
Meryll Streep (The Hours), Nicole Kidman (The Hours), Julianne Moore (The Hours), Selma Hayek (Freida), Renee Zellwinger (Chicago)

Best Supporting Actor:
the man who supplied the voice and movements for Gollum

Best Director:
Spike Jonze (Adaptation), Martin Scorcese (Gangs of New York), Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings), Roman Polanski (The Pianist), Alexander Payne (About Schmidt)

Best Documentary:
Bowling for Columbine

Best Foreign Film:
Secret Ballot, Russian Ark

 
Even though I am not interested in sports, I have some thoughts on what might make an ideal Super Bowl game.

1. a veteran team that that has been to the Super Bowl many times and won at least a third of them
2. a newcomer team that has never been to the Super Bowl
3. the first half of the first quarter is a tie
4. the second half of the first quarter has the newcomers leading
5. the second quarter has the veterans leading
6. there is a need to review a play in the third quarter where the newcomers are leading
7. the veterans are leading in the first half of the last quarter
8. there is a tie in the second half of the last quarter
9. there are two overtimes to determine a winner

This could also apply to most footbal games in general, and can be extrapolated to other sports. It is a tried and true seesaw effect.

On another note, here is a foundng document on the open source movement.

 
On January 18th I attended the peace protests in Washington D.C., taking a bus with 53 other like-minded people from my area in New York State. I had known of other protests and had never had the time or resources to attend and make my voice heard. But I am truly glad I went and became part of a historical moment. I saw people from all backgrounds, and Green Party members from Vermont, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and even Mississippi. Forget what the mainstream media reported, there was at least 200,000 people there. If you have objections to International Answer's background, then you might be interested in the February 15th peace march in New York City. Also there is Not In Our Name.

 
Douglas Rushkoff, since he writes about technology, naturally will discuss open source ideas here and here.

 
This is a good place to start.

 
Welcome to THE PODIUM!

Unlike most blogs, that are daily, this one will be a weekly blog due to the fact that I am a very busy polymath. I will make sure there is a lot of content per posting.

I am currently interested in the open source movement. Hopefully there can be theories that can be expanded into other fields. An open source philosophy, if you will. In other words, how these principles can be expanded into society.