February 8th, 2008, 9 Comments »
A reader–we’ll call him Junior–writes with an Apple-related quandary. He wants one, but his bosses don’t want him to have one. He works in an educational institution (which is odd, because usually they’re keeners for the Apple):
As my role expands and changes I’m working on more and more rich media. We have an initiative to get started on podcasting, screen casts, video tutorials, image and logo development and other duties.
Problem is, I’m limited my by hardware and software. We have money in the budget of our department and I want a mac but the head of the tech departments says that without a really convincing argument he’s going to purchase a PC for a new editing suite.
The fact that I’m an experienced mac user doesn’t matter, it’s a moot point as he says that wasn’t the reason they hired me plus what if I leave, no one will use it (i counter you can run it as a PC of course). Both platforms can output the same formats, so that in that regard the platforms are equal. I can’t argue that we need one to help with student support as we don’t support macs.
So, the question is, can you think of any reason why I need a mac? How is it superior? How can I break though to the head of technology? Why will a mac help to keep the department and faculty competitive?
Any suggestions?
UPDATE: Junior has replied in the comments with, well, some comments.
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November 16th, 2007, 2 Comments »
Last week I watched The Brave One, an unremarkable but enjoyable revenge thriller starring Jodie Foster (and her awful hair) and directed by Neil Jordan.
CAUTION: What follows probably constitute minor spoilers. If you know the film’s premise, then they’re not going to harm your viewing pleasure, but I feel obligated to warn you just the same.
As is my habit, I went home and read a few reviews of the movie. Roger Ebert’s review features this line:
One day she buys a gun and practices on a shooting range where you can see fear turning into anger in her eyes.
In the version of the film I saw, there was definitely no shooting range.
Later, there’s a scene where Foster’s character goes after a guy on the roof of a parking garage. He ends up on pavement six floors below. In the film I saw, they exchange a couple of blows, Foster goes at the other guy with a tire iron and the film immediately cuts away. I was surprised by the cut–it seemed out of sync with the scene’s pacing. Plus, I was left puzzling over how she hauled him over the railing–she’s not a big woman.
If you saw the movie (somewhere other than Gozo, obviously), did this scene conclude differently?
I’m aware that films get edited differently for different countries, but it’s a little frustrating to not know what I else missed. I’m not sure if this qualifies as censorship–I think it probably does if the film is edited to suit a particular nation’s (apparent) morality.
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