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This Is Just So Wrong

Holosonics is called the "audio spotlight" because it can project sound directly into your head, claiming that it is inaudible just a step away.

So of course, it's being used in outdoor advertising here in New York. Innocent pedestrians (well, innocent by New York standards) are assaulted by a bodiless voice murmuring "Who's that? Who's there?" It is then followed by: "It's not your imagination!"

I have two reactions to this: 1) Shades of Philip K. Dick, and 2) How stupid do you have to be to put additional voices inside the heads of already stressed-out NY pedestrians?

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Affordable?

Way back when, I mentioned that I'd discovered Tangent Audio while working on the 2007 Buyer's Guide. Initially, I was attracted to the Tangent gear because of the affordable prices. Later, that attraction grew. First because I'd seen how handsome the gear was, and then because Richard Kolhruss, Tangent's US distributor, sold me on the company's attention to detail. I was intrigued, and wondered if I'd wandered into something special and new.

Richard and I discussed the possibility of securing a couple of review samples. Time passed. Seasons changed, and so on.

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Coming soon - List-o-mania!

Coming this week: What everyone loves this time of the year—lists! Best jazz albums of the year! And not just that: Best jazz albums of the decade (so far)! Best newly discovered jazz treasures! Best living jazz musicians in various categories! Etc.!

Happy 60<SUP>th</SUP> Transistor

December 16, 2007 was the 60th anniversary of the invention of the point transfer transistor. Forbes has an article on it.

This is a picture of Shockley's "improved" gen 2 junction transistor—essentially a cylindrical plug of germanium, impregnated, with chemical impurities to enable it to carry a charge.

Still think you would would have invested in Bell Labs when they announced the breakthrough? I'm pretty sure I would have looked at a nice shiny triode and determined that a blob of mud could never have outperformed it.

Sinatra's Second Act

Was Frank Sinatra's failed marriage to Ava Gardner responsible for one of the greatest comebacks in American art?

How to Say Love in "Click"

Walker Brown was born 11 years ago with "an impossibly rare and random genetic mutation—cardio-facio-cutaneous syndrome, a technical name for a mash of symptoms. He is globally delayed and can't speak, so I never know what's wrong. No one does."

"But there are other times too—moments of unstoppable happiness. Reading the paper next to a lake on a deck chair with Walker in my lap, laughing delightedly as I swear at the news. The four of us in bed together on a Saturday morning, Walker on his knees, towering for once over us all, and never happier. This is something, you see: Every time he…

Embiggening Lincoln

Andrew Ferguson has written a highway history of Abraham Lincoln. Among other observations, he points out that the man who "waged one of the most savage wars in our history" was definitely not non-judgmental.

Ferguson says our collective vision of Lincoln is shrinking.

Perfect Score

Rolling Stone just published its list of the 100 best songs of 2007. I scored 0 out of the 100—oh well, I used to be hip. Maybe.

I have to confess I did like Randy Newman's "A Few Words in Defense of Our Country," even though I kept wondering if anybody had ever seen RN and Robert Baird in the same room.

Arghh Matey

Helen A. S. Popkin has written a fine opinion piece on the new, phenomenally wrong-headed Congressional Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act (PRO-IP Act), which among other things (such as absurd penalties) includes a spanking new enforcement agency called WHIPER (White House Intellectual Property Enforcement Representative).

Read H.R. 4279 here.

Here's what John Conyers has to say about it.

This is Public Knowledge's analysis of it.

The DOJ claims the PRO-IP Act is only a clarification of existing statutes, although that's not what…

The best of 2007 (and more!)

Today in Slate (which, as some of you know, is where I do most of my writing, mainly on national-security politics), I lay out—as I have in each of the last five Decembers—my picks for the 10 best jazz albums of the year. Here are the best of 2007:

Charles Mingus Sextet with Eric Dolphy, Cornell 1964 (Blue Note).
Maria Schneider Orchestra, Sky Blue (ArtistShare).
Erik Friedlander, Block Ice & Propane (SkipStone).
Anat Cohen, Poetica (Anzic).
Carla Bley, The Lost Chords Find Paolo Fresu (ECM).
Paul Bley, Solo in Mondsee (ECM).
Herbie Hancock, River: The Joni…