Friday, May 25, 2012

Tom Standage, The Victorian Internet Zygmunt Bauman, community Zygmunt Bauman, liquid modernity Anna McCarthy, Ambient TV Timo Kopomaa, The City in your Pocket:the birth of the mobile information society Jaffrey Sconce, Haunted Media: Electronic Presence from Telepathy to Television

Monday, May 14, 2012

from eye to brain: gilles deleuze: refiguring the subject in film theory

patricia pisters dissertation Amsterdam 1998 p29 Clearly, taking the rhizome as an image of the brain is related to new developments in neurobiology. Also in this scientific domain the old tree-like model of the 'homunculus', the idea that the brain is centrally conducted by a "little man" in our head, has been replaced by the understanding of the brain as a complex network in which different areas have different tasks, and in which many connections can be made in probable but never exactly predictable ways. ---see Douglas Hofstader, Godel, Esher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid. New York, Basic books 1979.

Thursday, May 3, 2012

taming of chance

The Society for Psychical research founded in London in 1882 p206 "Its members wanted to replace vulgar and popular enthusiasm for mediums by a scientific study; instead of communication from the dead at Seances, they supposed that there was a phenomenon of thought transference between living people. The first project of the society was to conduct a census of examples of telepathy, and then to engage in experiments. An American society for psychical research was founded in Boston in 1884, with the same ends. (Henry james The Bostonians)" C.S. Pierce and J. Jastrow "On Small Differences of Sensation," Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences 1884:73-83. Ian Hacking, "Telepathy, Origins of Randomization in Experimental Design," Isis 79(1988):427-51.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

stanford university press books

From Iron Fist to Invisible Hand The Uneven Path of Telecommunications Reform in China Irene S. Wu Technological Empowerment The Internet, State, and Society in China Yongnian Zheng Re-envisioning the Chinese Revolution The Politics and Poetics of Collective Memory in Reform China Disorganizing China Counter-Bureaucracy and the Decline of Socialism Eddy U Private Life under Socialism Love, Intimacy, and Family Change in a Chinese Village, 1949-1999 Yunxiang Yan The Chinese Cultural Revolution as History Edited by Joseph W. Esherick, Paul G. Pickowicz, and Andrew G. Walder

Friday, April 20, 2012

一九八五电影发行放映工作回顾

杨柯 from《中国电影年鉴 1986》 11-1 ————11-5
11-3
全国有几万个农村电影队停止活动,其原因是多方面的, 经过调查了解:
首先是,放映收费发生了困难。这是在新形势下,所出现的新情况、新问题。自从农村实行生产承包责任制以后,公益金积累普遍减少,再象过去那样从集体经济中支付电影包场费,显然不那么容易了。再加上去年国务院发出了《关于制止向农民乱派款、乱收费的通知》以后,许多地方把筹集电影包场费,列入“乱筹资、” “乱摊派”的范围。。。还有,在农村经济改革中,农村电影队所有制的结构和经营方式,也发生了变化。在现有的十几万个农村电影队中,国办队已经很少,绝大多数采取以下两种所有制和经营方式。即:一是乡、村集体所有,个人承包经营;二是个人所有,个体经营。。。可是有不少地区的乡村基层领导干部,把电影队视同一般工商企业,城堡利润过高,致使电影队不敢接受。
事实证明,营业性录相队的大批发展,不仅队城市电影市场造成冲击,也给农村电影放映队坚持正常活动,增加了很大的困难。特别是在集镇和近郊,对电影的冲击更为严重。有许多县的营业录像队已超过电影队数。

全国观众人数下降
1979年,全国城镇电影观众达到92亿多人次,从1980年至1984年,城镇电影观众从92亿降至64.5亿。五年共减少28.3亿,下降了百分之三十,平均每年减少5.7亿人次,下降率为百分之六。然而去年一年,城镇电影观众就比1984年减少12亿人次,下降率为百分之十九,可见下降的速度加快了。

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Alan Nadel: Containment Culture: American Narratives, Postmodernism, and the Atomic Age

Citizen spy



1947 HUAC ( Houtse Un-American Activities committee) interrogations of high-profile witness in its search for communists and sympathizers, or "fellow travelers"

Ring Lardner Jr. and Dalton Trumbo were jailed because they refused to cooperate

Saturday, March 17, 2012

临街的窗 张贤亮

《小说家》1985.2
幸冬末南游东闽,见街头小报如群蝶乱舞,巨匠名家亦鼓吹“通俗文学,” 谓其有方兴未艾之势,并号召正宗文学作者不妨玩票,偶作客串。。。。今。。。。不失为表现一类城市青年潜意识之创新作品。如电影厂拟拍成中国第一部喜闹剧,请效街头小报,取一醒目标题——《现代梦幻曲》。广告词曰:滑稽!惊险!!香艳!!!武打!!!耗资百万,场面宏大;集中华武术、迪斯科舞、时装表演及最新科技之大成!看过本片,请君将不信阳光下有新事物焉!则保证场场爆满,连演不衰。