Historical Inaccuracies

“See, look, I . . . I know I’m homophobic, but not about gay guys. They don’t bother me at all. It’s straight guys who don’t know they’re gay. They %&*# my $#!@ right up.”


       – King Missile, Gay or Not Gay

The Battle at Thermopylae, when 300 Spartans led 5,000 Greeks against a Persian army 2.6 million strong, is considered by many the first great clash between Western and Eastern cultures. Some historians argue that if the Persians had successfully invaded Greece it would have changed the face of Western civilization forever, possibly even erasing the concept of Democracy.

What a shame then that Zack Snyder’s adaptation of Frank Miller’s graphic novel 300 had me wondering so early on, When are the Persians gonna hurry up and kill these guys?

Firstly, I have to take a critical eye to the film’s alleged historical accuracy. Putting aside the trolls, trollocs, giants, zombies, and other fantasy fiction staples comprising the Persian army in the film, or transforming Ephialtes of Trachis into a deformed hunchback, the film still has a great deal of historical accuracy in its depiction of… well… very little of substance in the film is true to history.

While true that Spartan boys were indoctrinated into military life at a very young age, the Hoplites, or Spartan warriors, initiation rites did not involve killing wolves, but Helots, who were the Spartans slaves, doing all the menial labor so the Spartans could enjoy their warrior-class lifestyles.

Spartan Hoplite

Secondly, I submit the following historically-accurate picture of a Hoplite for comparison to the red-caped, bikini-clad heroes from 300. The Spartans actually wore armor. They didn’t dress like Chippendale dancers like this film portrays them. I kept waiting for the King Leonidas and the other Spartan warriors to fling off their capes and start gyrating their hips so the Persian army could stick dollar bills in their leather Speedos, but I suppose the slow-motion “warnography.” as one critic put it, came close enough to make a few overly-excited fanboys wet their pants.

But the film warns us not to apply any homoeroticism to the Spartans’ many six-pack abs, swollen pectorals, and bulging packages. King Leonidas asserts his heterosexuality by making love to his queen and calling their allies, the Athenians, “Boy lovers.” However Anton Powell’s book “Athens and Sparta” states, “references to particular homosexual attachments of Spartans are conspicuous even by Greek standards (source)” The Athenians term for sodomy was to “Spartanize” someone.

But this confuses homosexuality with pedophilia and stereotypes homosexuals as lacking masculinity, and one thing neither history nor this film can deny is that the Spartans were definitely macho. In the film, when King Leonidas leaves his wife to go North into battle, he does not say anything, and the narrator makes sure we the audience understand that Spartans don’t say goodbye. They’re too tough for that, and Sparta is a hard land, where you can’t be soft in any way, and that means being hard, and being hard means not saying goodbye to your wife when you go away to battle. In case this extrapolation is too subtle for you, the point is that Spartans are tough.

Now compare this with what historians think he actually did say:

Plutarch mentions in his Sayings of Spartan Women that, after encouraging him, Leonidas’ wife Gorgo asked what she should do on his departure. He replied, “Marry a good man, and have good children.” (source)

How friggin’ cool is that? Why leave out this brilliantly poetic statement? This single sentence says so much more than Miller’s overly-verbose narration, which violates the show don’t tell principle of storytelling. The actual history is so much more fantastic than Miller’s silly comic book drama-kings.

To let the movie tell it, the Spartans completely went it alone. Sure, a small band of Greeks showed up, but they were just a bunch of farmers, not warriors, plus they only fought in one scene in the film and they quickly broke ranks and ran away. The Spartans also had a little bit of luck on their side, when storms sank part of the Persian navy–but mostly it was just those 300 incredibly brave nearly super-human Spartans who fought almost continuously for three days against wave after wave of the Persian army. They even named the film 300 to emphasize how utterly independent and all alone and strong and courageous these Spartans were and stuff.

In the actual battle, the 300 Spartans led an army of over 5,000 Greeks, who fought in rotating shifts throughout the battle, 700 of whom remained with the Spartans to fight in the final assault after the rest of the army decided to flee. Their valiance held off the Persian army long enough for the Athenean-led Greek naval forces to destroy the Persian navy in the Battle of Salamis.

The historical poppycock bothers me because I know I’m now going to get into an argument with some fanboy any day now about Spartan homosexuality, apartheid, or valor where the geek is going to reply, “Yeah, but in the movie 300 it showed blah blah blah…” Or some kid’s going to tell his younger brother the film as though it were historical truth. It’s historical disinformation, which brings people down, while historical veracity uplifts.

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Ethical Problems

Leonidas at Thermopylae

One could argue that there are timeless themes in 300 and those are what’s important, just like in the Lord of the Rings. It’s just fantasy, and we should view the film as a romantic idealization of the Spartan battle, that removing the Spartan’s armor and portraying the Persians as monsters were purely artistic choices made for dramatic effect. But even putting all of these historical innaccuracies aside, the film remains offensive for its internal logic, or lack thereof.

In the movie, as in real life, the Spartans abandon their newborns to die on Mt. Taygetos if they were deemed lacking in vitality. The film gives Ephialtes, who betrayed the Greeks, the backstory of being a deformed infant who’s parents refused to kill him. Leonidas refuses Ephialtes’ request to fight alongside the Spartans because he is too deformed to raise his shield. How convenient this explanation for the Spartan policy of eugenics. Instead of admitting the Spartans had some serious cultural flaws, the film actually tries to rationalize infanticide rather than admit some gray areas that might cloud its tale of ultimate good versus ultimate evil.

And what evil. The Persians come in horrific waves. First there’s the fat monstrous black men with eyes that appear disembodied in the night. Then come the Asian hordes, dressed in Oriental garb and weilding samurai swords. These are followed by burka-wearing arabian wizards. To top it all off is big gay Xerxes, who’s tent is filled with lesbian amputees.
So by “Persian” the film really means blacks, asians, arabians, and homosexuals. The Persians are the evils of multiculturalism come to overthrow the valiant, scantily-clad white guys. But our bare-chested warriors are ready for them.

“Freedom is not free,” queen Gorgo observes. The small band of Spartans are fighting all by their lonesome in the mountains for their “freedom.” They are fighting Persian tyranny and slavery. They are fighting for their right to live their own way, to own slaves, to commit infanticide on children born imperfect, to forcibly rip children from their mothers arms and indoctrinate them militarily by forcing them into violent combat with one another. Every time the Spartans would cry “Freedom!” I was reminded of Inigo Montoya’s statement from The Princess Bride, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

300 embodies all that is wrong in the disconnect between thought and action when we talk about freedom and democracy. That these aren’t just words you scream at the top of your lungs that somehow make you a better person, you must live these concepts, understand what they mean and strive to make them part of your daily life.

Many reviewers, historians, and bloggers have wondered what Western civilization would look like today were it not for the battle at Thermopylae. What would have happened if Greek democratic ideals had been conquered by Persian imperialism, replacing the Senate with a Monarchy?

We already know because history shows us what did happen. When Christianity conquered Western civilization, the Catholic Church imposed god-appointed kings and abolished all the philosophies and discoveries of Ancient Greece. It was called the Dark Ages, when myth and supersition overruled facts and rationality. Anyone who sees the myths portrayed in the film 300 has a responsibility to learn the reality and context of the Battle of Thermopylae.

There would be other battles, both military and ideological, equally important to the survival of Western civilization, and its concepts of democracy and egalitarianism. Many times throughout history Democracy would be ursurped whether from barbarians sacking Rome or Christian kings vanquishing it for centuries. Every time it comes back more powerful than before. That’s because democracy is a meme that works, not some mythological flag to wave thoughtlessly.

“Extraterrestrial Intelligent Beings Do Not Exist.”
      – Frank Tipler

Von Neumann Machines… Clanking Replicators… Universal Constructors… They are one of the many fascinating dimensions of speculation concerning Fermi’s Paradox, which posits the question: If there is life in the Universe, then why don’t we see it?

The Nobili-Pesavento 29-state approximation ofvon Neumann’s universal constructor, with a tape of instructions extending to the right.

Named after John von Neumann, who established the mathematical laws of self-replicating systems, the concept of Von Neumann Machines (VNM’s) is meant to reinforce this paradox. A VNM is a theoretical replicating probe that, given the age of our Universe, should populate all the solar systems in our galaxy. The idea is that, even using the worse case scenarios calculable through the Drake Equation, thousands if not millions of advanced civilizations should have come and gone by now in just our own galaxy. In the interest of colonization, one of them should have invented a self-replicating probe that can migrate from solar system to system, multiply, and inhabit every suitable planet in the galaxy.

This makes sense if we look at our own planet and its species. The human race has multiplied and migrated to every corner of our planet and even the local space. We have sent probes to the edge of our solar system and beyond, we have a bubble of television transmissions with a radius of nearly 60 light-years expanding from our planet, and we have accomplished this within just a few millennia of forming civilization and just 50,000 years of migrating out of Africa.

If the dinosaurs were not driven to extinction, it would not be unreasonable to think their evolutionary progeny would have evolved tool use, intelligence, civilizations, and space travel too–65 million years before the present. Take this thinking further, to the Permian-Triassic mass extinction 251 million years ago, and we can imagine their ancestors accomplishing the same. Take this thinking to other systems, where Earth-like worlds formed 1,000 million years before our own, and we quickly realize how plentiful advanced life should be in our galaxy and wonder why we are not seeing it.

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In the case of Von Neumann Machines, we wonder why we are not seeing the byproduct of advanced civilizations. With the apparent mathematical probability of advanced extraterrestrial life in just our galaxy alone, there must be some reason why we don’t see evidence of their existence, which would cause a revolutionary iconoclasm of thought in our planetary civilization.

This speculative exercise is useful for providing insight into the nature of our reality, if lacking any practical application to it. So I wonder, how difficult would it be to build a von Neumann probe?

These are the requirements I could think up. I’m sure in a Universe as complex as ours, there are a bazillion other criteria I can’t imagine. I tried to keep them simple; however the answers can become incredibly complex.

1. A Power Source.

VNM’s, like everything else that gets around intentionally, require energy to do so. Unless our Advanced Ancient Aliens have found a way around Newtonian Physics (or Zorkonian Physics, as they may have known them), and have equipped their VNM’s with a perpetual motion engine, they’re VNMs are going to need a fuel source. Solar and gravitational energy sources don’t appear ideal because starlight and gravity are vary throughout the galaxy, waning down to a miniscule resource in the vast empty spaces between stars.

So the VNMs must process a fuel source that they can carry with them: hydrogen, Uranium, or some other heretofore unknown form of matter that can be converted into energy. But not just any form of matter. It must be a form of matter found in abundance throughout the galaxy, especially on whatever planet our VNM lands on and decides to call home.

2. A Means of Propulsion.

Our VNM must be able to get off world, and it must be able to push in the direction of the next world. It needs a means of hurtling itself through space to the next system. If it has enough time, it can ride solar winds to the next star system, but it will still need a means to lift itself out of a planet’s gravitational pull.

Actually, our VNM will need many different means of propulsion. It must be able to walk on land, fly in the air, and swim in the seas in addition to jumping from planet to planet and solar system to system. It needs legs, wings, fins, and rocket boosters to make it truly effective as a Universal Constructor. It must be the deluxe Swiss army knife off replicating machines.

3. Adaptability

Allow me to further clarify my last point: Our VNM must be able to walk on many different types of land, fly in many different types of atmospheres, and swim in many different ocean consistencies. We all know and love Earth’s atmosphere, ocean, and landscapes, but our VNM must be able to work on Saturn’s moon Titan’s thick atmosphere and methane oceans as well as Venus’ acidic atmosphere and semi-liquid landmass.

The universe is filled with wondrous diversity. No single life form/robot could hope to survive on all types of planets. A robot that could roam Europa’s ice sheets would sink through Venus’ semi-liquid surface. If it could glide through Jupiter’s atmosphere, it would fall flat to the surface of winter-time Pluto’s atmosphereless environment.

That’s just in our solar system, which lies at the edge of our galaxy. Moving towards the center of our spiral disk, the Clanking Replicator would encounter an environment saturated with heat and radiation. Look at how much difficulty we have keeping satellites functioning in orbit around our planet? Solar radiation, temperature extremes, and orbital debris are constantly wiping out our network of machines serving us from space. Our VNM must be nigh invincible, or have some other trick up its sleeve, to populate such an unfathomable variety of environments.

4. Intelligence.

Even being stupendously-invulnerable and stupefyingly-adaptable, our VNM would need to be able to identify nearby planets/hostile environments to some degree. It would at least need to be able to look up into the night sky and figure out where to send its offspring. If happened to be residing on a planet with perpetual cloud-cover, it would need to have a databank profiling potential destinations. Since our galaxy is so complex as to be chaotic system lacking predictability, the VNM would need the intelligence to perpetually update that catalogue.

Our VNM would need the intelligence to circumvent black holes, predict and avoid super-novas, identify planets with the natural resources to reproduce and power its functions, and use its adaptability and various propulsion systems at the appropriate times and circumstances. In other words, it would have to be pretty damn smart.

5. Digital Replication.

Finally, because the purpose of a VNM is to colonize the Universe, it must reproduce. Everywhere a VNM probe sets down, it must take the raw materials it finds there and produce more VNM probes. It must build these new probes perfectly. If a flaw entered one of the VNMs, it might replicate to successive generations and the whole colonization process would stop. The VNM must have a flawless means of reproducing the vast complexity we have outlined in the preceding requirements.

In Summary: Our Clanking Replicator must have an incredible power source, a means of propulsion to get it between planets, solar systems, and galaxies, it must have the potential to adapt to any possible environment the universe can throw at it, the intelligence to foresee potential problems and avoid hazards, and the ability to replicate itself perfectly out of common materials found everywhere in the Universe.

No big deal, right? Ha! Ha!

This brings us to the sixth criteria for our Universal Replicator: a civilization advanced enough to construct such a fantastic device. They would need to have fantastic technological powers and a scientific understanding of our universe far beyond our muddled view of reality. They would have to be absurdly, ridiculously, nonsensically, mind-bafflingly and mind-bogglingly advanced. I mean really really really really really advanced. Got it?

So with all that, why would they want to make a wind up toy to colonize the Universe? What would they have to gain from such an unimaginable investment of energy and resources?

Suppose they did build this infinitely-adaptable and nigh-invincible machine with a superior intelligence for getting around the universe. Why would the VNM want to pursue colonization? If it’s that smart, wouldn’t it quickly come to the same conclusion as its inventors and say, “Screw this colonization stuff, I’m gonna build a telescope so I don’t have to make the trip (or build a probe to explore remotely, ponder my navel, or play Nintendo (or Zorktendo, as the VNM may have)).”???

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Maybe the AAEC (Absurdly Advanced Extraterrestrial Civilization) actually did build VNMs. Maybe we find these Universal Constructors all around us and we just don’t know it because we lack the ability to prove their origins.

Is it possible that Viruses, Archaea, Bacteria and Eukaryotes are Replicating Probes?

Bacterial Morphology

They are found in every environment on Earth, even the most extreme. They employ a variety of methods to obtain energy from their environment–Oh heck, Wikipedia says it better:

Bacteria are ubiquitous in every habitat on Earth, growing in soil, acidic hot springs, radioactive waste, seawater, and deep in the earth’s crust. Some bacteria can even survive in the extreme cold and vacuum of outer space (source).

The simple microscopic are the most ultimately adaptable organism. They appeared on Earth and immediately began evolving into higher life forms.

Not bacteria precisely, but Eukaryotes evolved into the plant and animal kingdoms. Although the two exist on different branches of the evolutionary web of life, evidence suggests they both originated from Protobionts for which we are still reverse-engineering the process of how inanimate molecules formed replicating molecules.

DNA is digital replication. Mutations occur very rarely, preserving the biological models that emerge, but apparently mutate with enough frequency to introduce novel biological models that test and challenge the preceding models.

These simple models adapt successfully to the planet they land on, evolving to consume whatever materials they can turn into energy and reproduce themselves. They fill every niche on the planet, and eventually evolve intelligence, the most adaptable trait of all.

The only factor missing is the propulsion, but they might hypothetically use the natural flow of our galaxy to migrate between worlds. Found in the Earth’s upper atmosphere, they are regularly blown away into space, catching a ride on the solar winds to the outer planets. They could also possibly hitch a ride on a comet to land with life-sustaining water on another planet in another solar system.

Or maybe it would just hitch a ride with it’s younger, however more evolved siblings. A human astronaut landing on Europa leaves a dusting of microscopic organisms and one of them manages to survive. This interstellar panspermia eventually becomes a colony that is the foundation for evolving more Universal Constructors to fill the Universe.

“Hey guys! Remember that rest stop we made on the third planet from that star on the edge of the galaxy when we were vacationing 3 billion years ago? Guess what it turned into!”

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For further speculations on Von Neuman Machines, I recommend an essay forwarded by one of my readers, Alexander Popoff, “The Hidden Alpha,” which got my mind wrestling with the topic.

I also recommend Greg Bear’s The Forge of God and Anvil of Stars books, which chronicle a fictional invasion of Universal Constructors that attack Earth.

Imagine No Religion

“Religion has actually convinced people that there’s an invisible mand–living in the sky–who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever ’til the end of time… But he loves you!

     – George Carlin

Despite how American politicians try to spin the World Trade Center attacks for their own ends. The 9/11 terrorists were not going to war against American’s “freedom,” they were attacking our secularism. America and other Western countries tend toward pluralism and naturalism. Our governments were founded on a mostly pragmatic and evolving empirical understanding of the world.

When the “jihadists” flew passenger jets into the Twin Towers, they were attacking what the Middle East saw as the icon of the West’s materialism. They were attacking our empiricism, and assaulting a culture not founded on Abrahimic religious laws. They were attacking our disbelief.

Richard Dawkin’s book The God Delusion, does not appear to have much to add to the debate on theism versus atheism, and that is the book’s great strength. Instead, Dawkins draws upon the great world history of atheist thinkers and religious skeptics from icons such as Thomas Jefferson to modern comedians such as Julia Sweeney. By focusing and promoting the ideas of other great skeptics, Dawkins puts the emphasis of his book on the truth of these ideas and their broad support across a diverse collection of educational and historical backgrounds.

Dawkin’s takes critical aim of Stephen J. Gould’s concept of ‘non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA),’ used to draw a strict dichotomy between the realms of science and religion. Gould argued that natural laws were the realm of science, while deriving meaning and purpose to the world were the realm of religion.

As we have seen with the Creationists assault on public school ciriculums, religion has no intention of respecting the borders between the Empirical and Spiritual. As we saw on 9/11, religionists are outraged to the point of commiting spectacular acts of violence against our secular Western civilization. Religion has no intention of honoring NOMA; therefore, it’s the responsibility of secularists to argue Empiricism’s superiority over the unprovable.

Dawkins wonderfully takes apart the modern notion that, without religion, we would have no reason to act morally toward one another. By surveying the litany of atrocities commited god and his chosen prophets in the Old Testament, and Jesus’ lack of family values in the New Testament, Dawkins banishes this illogical argument:

The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully (Dawkins).

We are more moral than the prophets of the Old Testament, which tells the story of Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son, Isaac, for god, when god stays his hand. Today, Abraham would be locked up for child abuse. When criminals claim god compeled them to commit their crimes, we don’t excuse the offense because our law is not Biblical. The Old Testament is so foul, Dawkins observes, that if it were not a sacred text, people would not leave it lying out for children to stumble upon.

While it is true that history holds examples of atheists who were monsters, such as Stalin and, possibly, Hitler. They did not commit their atrocities in the name of atheism. No one has ever blown up a clinic or shot a doctor in the cause of disbelieving in god. Scientists don’t strap bombs to themselves and detonate them in crowded public places because that culture doesn’t accept the theory of evolution. The difference between the existence of good and bad people within atheist circles and those of religious circles, is that the religionists are the ones who use their gods as a justification for their inhumane behaviors.

Dawkins also puts yet another fact on the mountain of arguments crushing creationist ideology, when he refutes their argument that evolution is a random process and that complexity cannot rise from chaos. Natural Selection, Dawkins points out, is not random at all. In fact, it is just the opposite; it is a clearly defined process that naturally brings order out of disorder.

Dawkins most original observation comes when he looks at teaching religion as child abuse. He uses the example of a woman raised in the Catholic church who was sexually abused, but who also found the memory of that abuse nowhere near as scarring as the psychological abuse the church inflicted on her with the threat of Hell and the nightmares of her dead loved ones in spending eternity in torment.

Dawkins also points out the evangelical Hell House, where parents are encouraged to bring children as young as 12 years to see the most horrifying depictions of eternal damnation. The difference between these and a Halloween haunted house is that children are taught that what they are seeing is real and awaits them if they don’t believe in Jesus.

Jill Mytton, a psychologist, runs a support group for survivors of abusive religious upbringings like the ones mentioned above. To this day, she still has difficulty talking about the images of eternal damnation with which she was raised, and now seeks to rehabilitate similarly affected children.

Richard Dawkins notes that Douglas Adams converted from Agnosticism to Atheism through their interactions, so Dawkins knows of at least one successful convert through his work. I would like to add myself to the list of converts as well. Formerly a believer that there was something, I see now how unproductive such belief is and how unnecessary.

Douglas Adams once said, “Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?” We live in a spectacular world that only gets more interesting the more we explore it. Isn’t that enough?

Children of Men

The year’s best film won a scant three Academy Award nominations for Best Cinematography, Film Editing, and Adapted Screenplay. It did not win any of these, and that is a shame. Despite overwhelmingly positive reviews from critics, the film was completely ignored at the box office, only bringing in a scant $34 million domestically.

It’s the year 2027, and the world’s youngest person has just been murdered. He was nearing the age of 20 in a world where women have been infertile for two decades. A small crowd of weary faces absorb the news in run down coffee shop. What happens next is both shocking and predictable, introducing us to a world where all countries have descended into anarchy except Britain, which has maintained the illusion of order by imposing a police state. Billboards bearing messages of paranoia, terrorist bombings, angry mobs, cages filled with illegal immigrants, and a product called “Queitus” for citizens wishing to “Choose” their time to die fill this hopeless decaying setting.

In this world, Theo Faron (Clive Owen), a bureaucrat, is approached by members of the Fishes, an underground resistance movement. They want him to use his connections to ferry Kee (Claire-Hope Ashitey) out of the country. Kee is miraculously pregnant and the Fishes, led by Theo’s ex-wife Julian (Julianne Moore), are attempting to deliver her to the Human Project, an organization of scientists rumored to be working on the future of the human race.

The government claims the Fishes are behind the terrorist bombings, the Fishes claim the government is behind them; however, as we learn, no one is as they claim, and the film wisely chooses not to explain the realities of these conflicts. Instead it uses the randomness of the violent mobs and bombings to convey the fear and confusion of a world falling into anarchy. The terrors are abstract, making them all the more effective and making us wonder if the Human Project even exists.

There are many subtle themes running throughout the story. Theo regularly attempts to light up a cigarette, but never succeeds. Animals take a liking to him, as if they can see into his honorable nature. Then there is the string of chance that places Kee in Theo’s care; although, there are no deux ex machina cop-outs in the film, there is this incredible sense of higher-powers at work. The synchronicities alternate between aiding and imperiling the protagonists, and we may assume they are secular in nature from the wide variety of unrecognizable religious denominations that exist in this future. The director does a superb job of keeping the audience guessing, “Is this providence?”

Alfonso Cuaron’s previous directing credits include such diverse films as the mainstream Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and the independent Y Tu Mama Tambien. His choices of filters and hand-held camera shots provide the raw, grungy feeling that help to make the film’s world all the more convincing. He orchestrates several edge-of-your-seat moments such as a chaotic ambush scene, a suspenseful chase in a stalled car, and battle siege reminiscent of the war scenes from Saving Private Ryan.

Clive Owen is an actor of great diversity, and here he plays an unlikely hero in Theo. Opposite him is Claire-Hope Ashitey as Kee, an equally unlikely candidate for mother of the human race. Michael Caine provides a wonderful performance as Jasper Palmer, Theo’s father, a pot-smoking (and growing) freethinker, and a litany of other peripheral characters all stand out in their own ways so that we know them all and remember how they fit into the complex scheme of things.

The film is science fiction and distopian, but, most importantly, the film is a commentary on our present circumstances. So much of the film’s imagery and themes, terrorism, anarchism, detention camps, and illegal immigration, match the imagery we find in our present news media, provoking us to think about our disturbing modern events and reinforcing our suspension of disbelief with real-world experience.

Children of Men is a film that stays with the viewer, haunting them for days with its powerful storytelling. For days I kept returning to the film’s climax. Weeks later I found myself thinking about the curse of notoriety foisted upon the world’s new youngest person, and what that would be like. Like all great science fiction, the film begs us to speculate and stirs our social conscience.

Perhaps the talent appearing in this film will receive its recognition at future Oscar ceremonies, similar to the way Stephen Spielberg has received numerous nominations for lesser films after the Academy snubbed him for his work on The Color Purple, and how Martin Scorsese took home this year’s Oscars for his film The Departed, after being overlooked for his superior work in films like Raging Bull and Taxi Driver. Either way, I’ll be keeping an eye out for Cuaron’s future works.

The Second Life Science Center

Second Life Science Center

I’m a Second Life tourist. I don’t own property or buy things or invest anymore interest in Linden’s virtual world beyond wandering around taking in all the amazing things the world’s user-base comes up with, snapping pictures, and talking to people all over the world. One of the first places I had to visit when I joined SL was the Science Center. There’s a growing body of science displays and museums in SL and I was very impressed with this set up.

Standing tall in to one side of the center is a giant carbon nanotubing model provided by the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) It includes a 3-d video demonstration of the tubing in action with atoms actually flowing through it. For some reason it rarely seems to work though. It wasn’t until my third visit to the center that I actually got it to run, which is a shame because it’s a nice demo.

My Avatar Chillin’

Wandering around the grounds outside, I found a genetics display titled “Independent Assortment in a Dihybrid Cross,” featuring a variety of red and white and short and tall flowers in a garden. It demonstrates Mendel’s Law of Independent Assortment, that the genes for red and white are inherited independently of the genes for short and tall. Clicking on the display progresses the garden to the next generation of flowers. A larger genetic museum located in SL is The Gene Pool, which I plan to visit in the future.

A giant rotating model of a euglena, a single-celled organism with a flagellum, also resides outside the center. When you get close to it, labels appear identifying it nucleus, chloroplast (misspelled “cholorplast”), eye spot, and other features. A two-dimensional display of images further detail the organism’s structures.

I took the load off of my virtual feet by sitting on a telescope, which apparently do not serve any purpose in SL other than as decorations. At least, I was never able to figure out how to use one, which is weird because they have them all over the place. Somebody correct me if I’m just too much of a dunce to figure it out. You can see the giant euglena in the background of this picture.

TRUTHS Satellite Calibration Display

NPL has another exhibit outside titled “TRUTHS: A future satellite to underpin climate research.” Apparently Earth Observation (EO) satellites lose some of their accuracy after being calibrated due to storage and space exposure. The TRUTHS satellite will focus on calibrating itself based on the Sun, Moon, and Earth. This calibration will then be used to calibrate other satellites in orbit, improving accuracy of the EO fleet. Accompanying this data is a model of the satellites in their relative positions to the celestial bodies.

The first thing you are confronted with inside the center is a giant model of a Buckminsterfullerene molecule, also known as the carbon buckyball. Composed of 60 carbon atoms, it is theorized that this molecule could capture atoms, similar to the way the carbon nanotubing could be used to transport them. All of that’s cool and whatnot, but I was more interested in a moment of Zen floating inside this fantastic structure.

Carbon Buckeyball

Okay, so I’m embarrassed to say it took me two or three visits to the Science Center to figure out how to get upstairs to the other exhibits, but after much bonking my head into the second and third story windows like some demented oversized bird (SL avatars can fly), I figure it out (teleportation).

The second floor (inaccurately named the first floor) has exhibits demonstrating protein synthesis on cellular ribosomes, optical illusions, and a language illusion I didn’t understand. Maybe that’s an advantage to RL museums, I can grab someone and say, “Excuse me, but WTF?” To which they might reply, “O RLY?” and I’d be all like “YA RLY!” – If people spoke like that in RL.

There’s also a gravity well demonstration, which, if this were a real life museum, I would have been asked to leave after scattering balls all over the place in my eagerness to see planets collide and wash down the black hole. Luckily, SL demos usually have a timed reset feature, so the museum cleaned itself up.

Mmmmm… Giant Caffeine Molecule

The top floor (accurately named) features giant models of three molecules: aspirin, caffeine, and sucrose. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything else to the top floor display beyond this.

Back on the first floor, several links take you to sources on the World Wide Web with additional information. Additionally, I found an SL link here for the NOAA’s island of exhibits. Some of these sounded outright fantastic, and I immediately had to rush out to take a look.

But the NOAA was closed, all I could do was stare from the island’s entry point at the exhibits beyond the gate. It was like that scene in National Lampoon’s Vacation, when the family gets to Wallyworld and it’s closed… only I simply clicked on a link and teleported there instead of driving cross-country for a week and experiencing an abundance of misadventures. Click. Swoosh! (Why can’t we fly and teleport in RL???)

Still… NO FAIR!!! I wanted to see the Weather Balloon! I wanted to chill out on the Glacier! I wanted to witness the Tsunami! I wanted to hop on the Hurricane Ride! I wanted to hang with Flipper at the Sea Life exhibit! I wanted to experience the Earth-shattering iconoclasm that is the “Meeting Hall,” and what the heck is “Science on a Sphere” anyways?

Technorati Profile

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The International Space Museum

Welcome to the International Space Flight Museum in SL

The first thing you see when you teleport into the International Spaceflight Museum (ISM) in Second Life is the above quote from the great pioneer of cosmonautics Konstantin Tsiolkovsky.

Then you look up and see the towering models of all sorts of different rockets in the distance. There are models of the lunar lander, rover, command/service module, models of the moon with the lunar landing sites, models of just about EVERY SINGLE FREAKING ROCKET IN THE HISTORY OF SPACE FLIGHT rendered in scale and detail. There are a lot of models at the ISM. It’s like a botanical garden of space flight vehicles.

ISM Rockets Display

Among the more interesting displays were boxes you can walk into and find simulations of the space capsule and shuttle interiors. The effect was an eery one. The displays used real pictures of the interior spread across the insides of the model cockpit. It was a cool and realistic display technique and one I’d like to see used elsewhere in SL museums.

A Real-time Satellite Propagator (RSP) presented a large globe rendering Earth with the present location of various satellites. There was a control panel, which I believe would allow you to select the satellites you were interested in viewing, but it wasn’t operable. Among the options for satellites were Sirius and DirectTV. The globe was showing the present location of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), but I didn’t see an option for the International Space Station, which I was interested in because it can be seen with the naked eye, even in Cities.

Second Life Planetarium

The notecard for this display also had a nifty link to satellites and space debris currently tracked in orbit, along with PDF descriptions of what they are. There were also a few smaller displays demonstrating types of satellite orbits and interactions with Earth.

The Second Life Planetarium had a show about the constellations. The planetarium was less interesting than the fact that this was the largest collection of avatars I had yet to find in one place. They were hanging around outside the doors waiting to get in. There was one dancing in the air while we awaited our turn at the show.

Check out the dork in the background with the rocket pack! Who’s he trying to be anyway, that albino from the movie Powder? Where’s the “Wedgie” button on this thing? Or maybe the “Wet Willy.” He’s totally got it coming to him.

Shuttles and Space Stations and Hubble Oh My!

A series of teleportation nodes carried me way up into the sky, farther than avatars can naturally fly in SL. Each teleportation took me to a different platform with a display. There were models of the planets and human engineered space objects, each with facts on the display. If you can find a partner to come with you, the display has a rocket-ride up to the platforms.

Of course, at the end, I couldn’t resist walking off the platform to freefall alllllllll the way down through the atmosphere to fall flat on my face… and then get up like it was nothing.

A robotic arm at the base of the space-voyage display allows visitors to take the controls and play with moving cargo around themselves.

I spent some time perusing the gift shop. There were free books on the History of Cape Canaveral, Stages to Saturn, detailed NASA Flight Plans (PDF Warning), and Moonport: A History of Apollo Launch Facilities and Operations As far as virtual objects for sale, there were model rockets, virtual space apparel, posters and art.

There were also telescopes for sale around $1200 (linden dollars). Unlike the telescopes I’ve found everywhere else in SL, which appear only useful for sitting on, these actually worked. They contained slideshows of celestial objects rendered in moderate detail.

Outside the gift shop was a series of newspaper vendors; although, being virtual, only one tried to look like the newspaper vendors we have in real life.

Aimee Weber’s Exploratorium

Next door to the ISM, I found Aimee Weber’s Exploratorium, a large, modern-looking building with a coi pond on the roof. Here were several different models of how a lunar eclipse works, and I think they were all helpful in understanding the process. There was also a tour of the solar system and several diagrams of Earth’s local space.

A “Coming soon…” sign also neighboring the ISM heralded the future site of “Explorer Island” future SL home of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). The science sector of Second Life is growing faster than any prime-realstate in real life.

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NASA’s COLAB

COLAB Headquarters in SL

Right next door to the ISM in SL is NASA’s COLAB. I visited COLAB when it was just in the planning stages a few months ago and was suprised to find that the island has exploded into a myriad of displays… or more specifically, experiments.

The COLAB is collaborative effort, experiments and displays built by volunteers. It’s main building is still in a state of construction, but there are plenty of other items on the island worth checking out.

Magellan and Voyager Satellites

I found my favorite satellite, Voyager, here. This deep-space probe is currently leaving our solar system after providing us with some stellar close up views of our planetary neighbors. Eventually, Voyager will fall into a wormhole, be discovered by a race of robotic life, and return to Earth with the upgrades they provide in the movie “Star Trek: The Motion Picture.”

There was also a model of the Viking lander, which may have discovered life on Mars in 1976. The Mars Pathfinder was also on display, and I learned that it was renamed the Sagan Memorial Station after landing on Mars July 4, 1997 in honor of Carl Sagan.

COLAB Theater and Lecture Area

The Genesis Mission was memorialized with a slideshow and photograph of the team who worked on the project. Genesis collected particles of solar winds and brought them back to Earth.

A series of walkways take visitors up a rocky mountainside, which has a pleasant waterfall running down its face. At the peak, a lecture and presentation area provides both a view of the COLAB and an inspiring location for talks and films. The video display was showing old NASA news footage, and appeared to have rotating content.

Mars Information Center

A three-story building made of red glass serves as the Mars Information Center. A notable feature in this monument was Minerva, a chatbot in the form of a rotating cube intended to answer questions about Mars. After asking it questions about Mars for several minutes, all I was able to learn about the red planet was its diameter. It’s 6794 km at the equator and 6750 km at the poles… in case you were wondering.

The Mars Society has a display of what a dwelling on Mars would be like. I walked around this cylindrical house, and despite a comprehensive explanation of the floor plans and layout, the whole thing still felt rather 50’s retro to me. It was like wandering around somebody’s fantasy of living on Mars from the Cold War era. Still, kudos to them for what was still a fun display.

Lavatube Base

Dwarfing this display was a skyscraper-sized monolith of a structure called the “Lavatube Base.” Inside it was like an excavated cave, with giant modules inside. A COLAB voluteer I met here explained this was a model for a lunar living space that is to built in real-life. Inside each module notecards described how life was maintained, where inhabitants would keep their space suits, where they would bath, and how the water used would be recycled back into the system. Managing lunar dust seemed to be the biggest obstacle, and ionized suits and vacuum units were common solutions.

Right outside of this building I picked up a free Yuri Gagarin T-shirt. Yuri was the first human in space, and I found a “World Space Party” in his honor. Very hip.

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NOAA

NOAA Island in Second Life

The island is the creation of Aimee Weber, Second Life’s most well-known designer and most attractive avatar (She also made a nifty tour of the universe using Second Life, which you can see here (Quicktime Movie)).

The NOAA Conference Hall had Earth Day posters everywhere and several displays and slide presentations on human causes of global warming. There was also a poster for Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, the book that helped to jumpstart the Environmental Movement. Another poster summarized the career of George Davidson, who surveyed the West Coast of North America for six decades. A third poster introduced me to Col. E. Lester Jones, father of the NOAA Corps, and its remarkable contributions to the body of scientific research we have on our planet’s environmental systems.

NOAA Real Time Weather Exhibit

Opening a treasure chest labeled the “Treasure’s of NOAA’s Ark” on the Confrence Hall’s first floor starts visitors on a trivia scavenger hunt around the island. I didn’t have the time to find out what the prize was for completing the quest, but it seemed like a novel and fun way to get kids to fully explore the island.

On the first floor at the SL Science Center, there was this large map hosted by the NOAA. The same Real Time Weather display appears on the NOAA Island, housed in a warehouse-style building. It took me a couple of visits to figure out that this display shows real-time weather information for the United States. 3-D clouds and temperatures hover over the map. 3-D rain pours down wherever’s appropriate.

NOAA Science on a Sphere Exterior

The Science on a Sphere exhibit is the largest building on the island. Avatars can pass through the giant dome on the top of the building and find a virtual reality display work in progress. It appears the the display will fill the interior of the sphere, changing environments using a control panel on a platform.

Below the sphere stands a model of the Earth in a separate room. Selecting items from a menu on a nearby wall allows visitors to view the Earth in different perspectives. A nighttime view shows the Earth covered in lights, artificial lights from developed countries and wildfires in the third world. A topography and bathymetry renders the Earth in 3-D, illustrating the trenches and mountain ranges around the planet. The Blue Marble view of Earth, assembled by NASA, is a mosaic of Earth-views put together to show what the Earth looks like on an average day.

NOAA Science on a Sphere Display

There are also land, ocean, atmosphere, and models perspectives of our spaceship Earth circling the Sun. Each view is accompanied with narration, explaining the significance and reasons for why the Earth looks the way it does.

A boardwalk running behind the SoaS building leads to an Ocean Life exhibit. A yellow submarine ride takes visitors on a tour of the aquatic display here. I opted instead to simply fly around the display on my own. Krill, sea anemonies, killer whales, schools of fish, kelp, underwater volcanoes, jellyfish, and dolphins fill this virtual lagoon. The killer whale and dolphins swam about on their own, apparently run by an internal AI mechanism, which wasn’t very smart. The whale often gets stuck in the shallower waters, and I’ve found beached dolphins here as well.

There were also many caves in this area, a link to a resource on the World Wide web in each one. Wandering around this display was like Easter-Egg hunting in an octopus’ garden, finding the many links hidden all around.

NOAA Glacier Exhibit

An enormous Glacier Exhibit allows view the time-lapsed effects of global warming. Clickin on an animation control panel causes the surrounding glaciers to melt away, simultaneously bringing the surrounding sea levels to rise up to the visitors virtual knees.

A Tiny hurricane merry-go-round, which played such wonderful little ditties as “Song of Storms” Legend of Zelda, the Beach Boy’s “I Get Around,” and “Right Round” by Dead or Alive. Parts of the island simulate stormy weather with waving trees, rain, and even a giant hurricane flying way up in the sky. I both flew a US Department of Commerce plane and rode in a balloon up to get a closer look at this last feature.

NOAA Tsunami Exhibit

The Tsunami Exhibit takes visitors through the sequence of events leading to a catastrophic tidal wave. It begins with the sirens, followed by the waters receeding out to sea, then the tidal wave rolls in, taking down the life-sized houses set up along the shore, and leaving the visitor standing in the ruins of a small town.

Unlike a real tsunami, the NOAA’s display can then be reset, making the houses spring back up and setting everything back to the way they were.

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NOAA Related Links:

NOAA’s Virtual World

Video Tour

Visit an Undersea Lab

Explore Undersea Volcanoes

Marine Science Careers

Arctic Ecosystems

Comprehensive Marine Education Resources

Ocean Related Career Opportunities

Educational Graphics on Global Climate Change and the Greenhouse Effect

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Miscellany

SL Royal Society

The Royal Society, UK’s national academy of science, was something of a disappointment in Second Life, but that was because I was expecting to find the official headquarters for the academy. Instead, what I found was more of a gift-shop in a Renaissance-era community hidden in SL.

The unassuming building was apropo for the society’s humble beginnings, which actually began as a group of “natural philosophers who began meeting in the mid-1640s to discuss the ideas of Francis Bacon (history).” Inside the building there were decorations and wearables for SLers in the style of Renaissance and Englightenment-era science.

Terry Lightfoot

The SL society has its own version of the Proceeding of the Royal Society, with abstracts such as “Wireless Transmission of Signals through the SL Aether” and “Cumulative effects of spontaneous bling.” So it seems that the SL Society is performing science, virtual science, only applicable to SL. It was cute, however useless.

The entire island on which the Royal Society building resides is one big Renfaire, filled with avatars wearing the most fantastic Renaissance-style clothing. The houses, with the exception of the Royal Society’s, were incredibly ornate as well. This was a very beautiful spot in SL, just not was I was looking for.

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Shock Proof

The SL Medical Library, located right by the Science Center, has Consumer Health Information, Breast Cancer Awareness, Medical Podcasts, Medical Research Information, NIH Displays, and Medical Art.

Right outside the building is a display for the “Shock Proof” stroke victims support community. Like using SL for computer simulation science experiments, I’m intrigued by this idea. I took a quick visit to the community, and found it still a work in progress after several months; however, there were plenty of avatars hanging out there. It is an interesting idea, possibly providing an environment for stroke victims to meet and collaborate.

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Institue of Temporal Dynamics

The Institute of Temporal Dynamics has an active meeting place at their SL office. While the Nevada-based not for profit science institute is making excellent use of SL as a resource, I could not find a WWW site for the organization. Very odd.

On display at the institute were posters communicating research on “Water Flow Through Widespread and Interconnected Void Spaces at Depth in a Temperate Glacier (abstract).” These included charts, video imaging of “Planar Voids,” void distribution, connectivity and water flow.

Support Science

I would have had no idea what these findings were about if I had not seen Al Gores An Inconvenient Truth this year and knew that water flow through a glacier can cause it to break up dramatically. Greenland’s iceshelf is quickly becoming more porous, lubricating the space between the ice and ground beneath it. This is a natural process, but Global Warming is causing it to accelerate. ITD’s research into the dynamics of glacial hydrology is important for determing the threat-level global warming presents to Greenland’s Iceshelf.

Here I got my first object that I could put on my avatar: a button that reads “Support Science.”

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Update: Thanks to Ben McGee of Temporal Dynamics, Inc for clarifying:

The website for the Institute of Temporal Dynamics, Inc., is “temporaldynamics.org” – We appreciate your stopping by the SL office and hope you’ll do so again – there are now weekly seminars concerning on-going research being offered in our expanded SL education center!

Paper I wrote for one of my Strayer Economics classes. (Download this document as a PDF)

Introduction

Discovery Holdings Corporation has built a successful corporate venture based on providing educational content through cable, Internet, retail stores, and public schools. Founded in 1985 by John Hendricks. Discovery offers quality documentaries and has found a niche audience in its intellectually stimulating programming. The company has branched out into online tutoring services, providing educational media to schools, and expansive online content. Discovery’s major company competitors are other cable companies and entertainment providers. Discovery focuses on Digital Cable Media, but also provides educational content to schools via subscriptions, homework help services to K-12 students, and sells DVDs, books, and toys through stores across the country.

The company has stayed ahead of the curve technologically by connecting its cable content to its Internet content and investing heavily in digital cable. The company faces competition from rival cable channels the History Channel and National Geographic (Ahren 2006), as well as an emerging and still unrecognized threat from Web 2.0 services. The company has also failed to act on the emerging use of video games as a medium for distributing educational content. Overall, the company is very successful, but it must maintain its corporate strategy of staying ahead of the curve technologically if it intends to continue dominating the market.

Revenue has climbed over the past year while income has leveled off. Operating income for 2006 was $160 million, below $166 million for 2005. Third quarter revenue for 2006 was $722 million, up from $639 million in third quarter 2005 (Ahrens 2006). Discovery is a top 10 network in primetime among adults 25-54 (Downey 2005).

Strengths

Chief among Discovery’s strengths is the company’s broad diversification. Its holdings include “the Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet, Travel Channel, Discovery Health Channel and emerging digital tier networks, such as The Science Channel, Discovery Kids, The Military Channel, Discovery Home, Discovery Times, Fit TV and Discovery HD Theater, Online Content, Commerce, Educational Services, and Media (Reuters 2007).” Discovery also has a history of forging alliances with more traditional media providers that have long histories and large libraries of content, distributing BBC content via BBC America (Discovery Corporate 2006, Jan 25), and teaming up with the New York Times to produce Discovery Times (Scocca 2006). A weakening Advertising market and rating problems recently prompted the company to diversify into international markets and begin offering educational content to public schools (Washington Post Staff Writer 2006). Continued diversification will reduce the risks of loss by spreading Discovery’s investments across a wide variety of media and business strategies (Griffin et. al. 2007 p.548)

Another of Discovery’s strengths is the company’s farsighted technological focus. Discovery invested in digital cable technologies long before the technology had become mainstream, so early on, in fact, that Forbes magazine called it “Discovery’s Big Gamble (Dubow 1999).” Discovery also expanded its e-commerce business using CommerceHub’s Universal Connection Hub and Drop-Ship Master (Brooks 2006). These software solutions will allow Discovery to solidify its matrix relationships between its numerous methods of online retailing (Internetretailer 2006). Discovery’s new CEO, David Zaslav, also comes from a strong technological background, as Variety magazine reported, “Under Zaslav, NBC Universal has extensive plans to transmit its shows to the Internet, iTunes, cell phones and other wireless devices (Dempsey 2006).” In 1999 Discovery signed a content deal with Intellihealth to integrate its cable and online content (Rosen 1999). Such forward-thinking moves give Discovery an edge over its competitors in the technological environment, allowing it to create better entertainment and educational values for its customers (Griffin et. al. 2007 p. 39).

Discovery’s third strength is its talent pool, voted one of Working Woman’s top 100 companies to work for in 2005 and 2006 (Working Mother 2007). The magazine cited Discovery’s flexible working schedule, kid-friendly environment, and extended leave times for new parents in its reasons for accepting the company. Such policies are also forward thinking as, “the next generation of talented, caring and healthy citizens is dependent on their mothers in the workforce today (Evans 2006).” Additionally, Discovery has a history of being able to hire talented CEOs, such as the former head of NBC Universal David Zaslav. “It is a sign of the firm’s growth and status in the industry that it can regularly attract high-level network talent such as Zaslav and former CBS executive Billy Campbell, president of Discovery’s U.S. networks, hired in 2002 (Ahrens 2006).” Discovery’s corporate goals are fun and productive. Educating the masses is a fulfilling career. Discovery should continue pushing the education aspect of the company’s media and emphasize the company’s mother and family friendly environment.

Weaknesses

While Discovery’s focus on digital cable will eventually pay off, as it is the inevitable future of broadcasting, it has also been expensive. Digital Cable is growing at a much slower pace than expected. In 2005 digital cable subscriptions had yet to reach the

40% mark despite steady growth, and international markets are even worse with India at only 5% digital and China having a mere 1% digital cable subscription rate (Breznick 2005). The American Government keeps pushing the drop-dead date for analogue broadcasting back from it’s original date of December 21, 2006 now set at February 18, 2009 (Broache 2005). Discovery’s best strategy for dealing with the extended delay in payoff for their prescient strategy is to maintain diversification. While cable broadcasting lags behind, the World Wide Web continues to grow. Streaming video gains popularity every day. Plus Discovery’s audience tends toward the “upscale, educated adults aged 25-54 (Stay Free! Magazine 2006),” a demographic more likely to own better technologies.

However Discovery’s technological focus may also exclude the less tech-savvy demographic. Digital receivers are still prohibitively expensive for many people ($146 US) (Breznick 2005), and the Internet is complicated to use. These facts prevent a large number of people from accessing Discovery’s online and digital content. Time will resolve this weakness as people become more web-savvy and analog technologies die out, but the company can take more proactive steps. For instance, pushing their educational tools in schools gets school kids familiar with these technologies and raises the next generation of Discovery fans.

While Discovery’s overall audience is large, it doesn’t have any single shows that are big hits. The Big Three networks have shows that bring in millions of viewers, which draws in advertisers, who don’t see having a wide variety of shows that bring in smaller audiences as appealing (Pulley 2003). The Discovery Channel accomplished double-digit ratings growth in August 2006 (Discovery Corporate 2006, Aug 2007)), and both the Discovery Channel and TLC finished 2006 with double digit ratings growth over 2005 (Discovery News 2007, Jan 3); however, these numbers don’t impress advertisers, and Discovery’s attempt to compensate for not having any hit shows, by pulling in an overall larger median audience has had one unintended consequence:

Like many networks that launched with a tight focus, Discovery Channel’s image has grown murkier over the past few years as it rolled out general-interest programs like “Monster Garage” and “American Chopper” that could easily air on any number of networks. Adding to Discovery’s blurry image is that it has begun competing with itself with its newer networks, including Discovery Health and the Science Channel. (Downey 2005)

Discovery brought in an advertising sales expert from CBS to improve ad revenues (Pulley 2003), but Discovery does fine with ad revenues and should focus on expanding its brand. Discovery’s business model should continue to focus on it psychographic, which obviously prefers educational entertainment to the lowest-common-denominator reality shows and sitcoms. Discovery should not dumb down its content to get explosive ratings.

Opportunities

Discovery has cornered the educational media market. There is very little educational content on cable television, with reality shows and sitcoms bringing in the largest audiences (MSN Encarta 2007). Discovery has found a niche with education and capitalized on it by expanding the number of channels, each one focusing on a different field of intellectually stimulating content such as history, medical sciences, and animals. “Journalistic accuracy and high production values of Discovery documentaries have earned the programs a place in the curriculum of numerous educational institutions, from grade schools through graduate schools (Freed 1998).” As Marketing VP Chris Mosely puts it, a “psychographic tie binds [our audience] together–they want information and they want to be entertained (Stay Free! Magazine 2006).” More recently, Discovery has introduced COSMEO, an online homework aid, and “Discovery has no direct rivals in offering streaming educational videos to the 11 million households with high-speed Intenet connections that include school-aged children (Washington Post Staff Writer 2006).” While Discovery should continue to press this content onto educators its focus on public schools at the expense of Universities seems too narrowly focused. Discovery should push into the University market as well.

Time Magazine named Web 2.0 contributors their “Person of the Year” for 2006 (Grossman 2006). Online communities, bloggers, streaming video services, and social networking sites are all harnessing the power of their active user bases to provide content. Under David Zaslav, NBC Universal announced UNBC 2.0. the company’s “plan to reposition (and streamline) the company to focus on digital media (Brady 2006).” Now that Zaslav heads Discovery, he can take his experience implementing Web 2.0 at UNBC and apply it to Discovery. Discovery also has an existing expansive online presence, which it can use to leverage its audience into an interactive online community. These communities are then allowed to free-associate, provide news links, amateur content, and other bottom-up creations of which discovery may then take advantage.

Additionally in Discovery’s list of untapped technological markets, we find the educational power of video games are only now being realized. Doug Lowenstein, President of the Entertainment Software Association, states:

Everywhere we turn, we hear more about visionary people recognizing how games can help train first responders, how they can help prepare surgeons, how they can help kids manage pain, how they can help prepare air traffic controllers and software engineers. Does it make any sense to you that we can acknowledge all of this, but we can’t acknowledge that games can help kids learn about the American Revolution, of the Middle Ages, that they can help kids learn about biology or physics, or they can help kids understand economics? (Federation of American Scientists 2006)

“Re-mission” is a new video game that allows kids to pilot a nano-character around the human body battling cancer cells (HopeLab 2007). Civilization is a popular game that allows players to learn the intricacies of developing cultures while conquering the world (Sid Meier’s Civilization III 2007). The Army uses a free downloadable Bootcamp simulator as a recruitment tool (Gonzalez 2004). Discovery is taking some important steps to compete in this realm with the introduction of its COSMEO subscription-based homework aid (Washington Post Staff Writer 2006), which it has teamed up with DELL computers to distribute (Design Taxi 2006); however, Discovery needs to expand aggressively into the business of making video games. It has diversified into so many other media, this is an obvious complement to their corporate strategy of being on the cutting edge of technology. They should acquire or ally themselves with a video game developer.

Threats

Discovery is no longer the only provider of streaming content online. Google Video and YouTube are now providing access to BBC Documentaries. YouTube and Google’s advantages are their Web 2.0 strategy, harnessing the power of their user communities to provide content. As outlined in Discovery’s opportunities, the company needs a user community to compile and draw users to online streaming video content.

Also on the Web 2.0 front, scientists are forming their own online communities. Seed Magazine has a portal featuring posts from various scientists working in a variety of fields (Seed 2007). While the traditional Discovery audience member is probably not as serious about science as someone working in the field, Institutions of higher-learning are an obvious demographic Discovery should hope to expand into and not allow other content providers to shut them out of this potential market. Discovery must expand their Web 2.0 efforts. They need to begin building their own user communities and include professional scientists and academics with incentives for providing content. Discovery can then harness from this online think tank, keeping it on the cutting edge.

Because Discovery focuses on educational entertainment, much of their content appeals to educational institutions. Under the Fair Use clause, schools and institutions can show copyrighted materials for educational purposes (U.S. Copyright Office 2007). They don’t have to pay royalties to Discovery for each showing. Discovery can limit the impact of this by providing service to educational institutions that is so affordable and with such convenience that it would make more sense for the institution to pay a subscription fee to a streaming on-demand broadcast rather than purchase and store libraries of dvds and books.

Conclusion

Discovery Holdings Corp. has a well-established brand and market share; however, it faces challenges from rivals such as National Geographic, the History channel, and free online content. Discovery has successfully stayed ahead of the curve technologically, but technology changes daily and Discovery must recognize the importance of Web 2.0 online communities and user-inspired content.

Discovery needs to build an online community similar to MySpace or YouTube, allowing users to contribute into a feedback loop of content. It’s imperative for Discovery to break into the video game market before other companies scoop them in providing educational content in this untapped medium. Discovery’s success is owed in great deal to its corporate strategy of investing in technologies like digital cable long before their competitors recognized their importance, by focusing on this strategy and investing in Web 2.0 and video game mediums, Discovery will continue to stay ahead of the game.

REFERENCES

Ahrens, Frank (2006, Nov 17). Discovery Appoints New Chief. Retrieved February 4,2007 from Washington Post website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/16/AR2006111600607.html

Brady, Shirely (2006, September 25). NBCU’s David Zaslav on the New Digital Frontier. Retrieved January 22, 2007 from CableWorld website: http://www.cable360.net/cableworld/departments/advsvcs/20367.html

Breznick, Alan (2005). Australian Digital Cable. Specs News and Technology from Cable Labs. Vol 17 No. 5 November/December 2005.

Broache, Anne (2005, Dec 21). Digital TV Switch set for early 2009. Retrieved February 3, 2007 from CNET News website: http://news.com.com/Digital+TV+switch+set+for+early+2009/2100-1028_3-6004429.html

Brooks, Kim (2006, Jul 17). Discovery Commerce Selects CommerceHub to Expand E-Commerce Multi-Channel Platform. Retrieved February 23, 2007 from CNN’s Marketwire website: http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release_html_b1?release_id=144755

Dempsey, John (2006, May 7). NBC U exec adds duties. Retrieved February 2, 2007 from Variety Business website: http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117942746.html?categoryid=18&cs=1

Design Taxi (2006, Aug 8) Dell Gets an Education from Discovery. Retrieved February 4, 2007 from Design Taxi website: http://www.designtaxi.com/news.jsp?id=4004&monthview=1&month=8&year=2006

Discovery Corporate (2006, Jan 25). The BBC and Discovery Communications Sign New Partnership. Retrieved March 2, 2007 from Discovery Corporate website: http://corporate.discovery.com/news/press/06q1/012506.html

Discovery Corporate (2006, Aug 2007). Discovery Channel Scores Double-Digit Ratings Growth in August 2006. Retrieved January 22, 2007 from Discovery Corporate website: http://corporate.discovery.com/news/press/06q2/083006.html

Discovery News (2007, Jan 3). The Discovery Channel and TLC Finish 2006 with Double Digit Ratings Gains over 2005. Retrieved February 3, 2007 from Discovery Corporate website: http://corporate.discovery.com/news/press/07q1/ratings.html

Downey, Kevin (2005, March 5). Discovery Channel: Back to its Roots. Retrieved February 3, 2007 from Media Life Magazine website: http://www.medialifemagazine.com/News2005/mar05/mar21/2_tues/news3tuesday.html

Dubow, Charles (1999, Aug 6). Discovery’s big gamble. Retrieved January 22, 2007 from Forbes website: http://www.forbes.com//1999/06/08/feat.html

Evans, Carol (2006). 2005 100 Best Companies. Retrieved February 2, 2007 from Working Mother Magazine website: http://vebranch.rgisolutions.com/web?service=direct/1/ViewArticlePage/dlinkFullArticle&sp=S95&sp=123

Federation of American Scientists (2006). Summit on Educational Games: Harnessing the power of video games for learning. Retrieved from the FAS website: http://www.fas.org/gamesummit/Resources/Summit%20on%20Educational%20Games.pdf

Freed, Ken (1998). Financial Opportunities in Educational Television. London: Financial Times Media & Telecoms.

Gonzalez, Lauren (2004, Apr 24). Spot On: The US Army’s There-based simulation. Game Spot Magazine. Retrieved March 3, 2007 from: http://www.gamespot.com/news/2004/04/21/news_6093860.html

Griffin, Ricky and Ebert, Ronald (2007). Introduction to Business. Pearson Education Inc.

Grossman, Lev (2006, Dec 13). Person of the Year: You. Time Magazine.

HopeLab (2007). About Re-Mission and re-mission.net. Retrieved March 3, 2007 from: http://www.hopelab.org/remission.html

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Other Assignments from BUS100 Intro to Business:

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 01 Assignment

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 02 Assignment

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 03 Assignment

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 04 Assignment

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 06 Assignment

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 07 Assignment

BUS100 Intro to Business: Week 08 Assignment

Download a free PDF of this screenplay.

Logline:

Ian returns from college to reluctantly hang out and play a game of chess with is old friend Duf, who runs a comic book shop. Their competitive conversation mimics the competitive nature of their game.

Estimated Running Time: 73 Minutes

Shah Mat by Ryan Somma is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.

This is a letter to the editor I published at the Daily Advance. Posted here for posterity, since they have no online archive:

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Prayer vigils and marches through Sawyertown are all well and good for combating Elizabeth City’s plague of drug abuse, but without providing real alternatives to this self-destructive lifestyle they are no more than symbolic gestures. People deal drugs because this town doesn’t offer gainful employment within walking distance of the area’s downtrodden neighborhoods, or even public transportation to take some of the burden off these people.

Being a drug dealer isn’t fun or profitable. I’ve watched drug dealers stand outside in the cold by my house until three in the morning, trying to hustle enough money to pay their rent or utilities. If you do the math, the meager profits drug dealers pull in, divided by the number of hours they must work selling their product comes out to well below minimum wage, and the workplace hazards, prison and violent crime, are appalling.

These aren’t bad people, but simply people living in a community without options. I hope Elizabeth City’s religious community will take a “love the sinner, hate the sin” approach to confronting our worst areas and not villanize the people they find there. I hope they will look for practical real-world solutions to Sawyertown and other areas. “You shall know them by their fruits,” is another good principle, we’ll be watching to see what fruits the religious community bares as they work with the police on this matter.