Twice a Day

There is a man who lives just down the street, a grandfatherly man. He lives several houses down. Every day, twice a day, this man slowly walks to Patten Elementary and back. He shuffles, really, with his back bent and his head bowed.

In the morning the man goes by with two boys trailing closely behind, two brothers on the way to the start of school. They walk along reluctantly, as everyone does at that time of day. And fifteen minutes later or so, the man comes back by himself.

Then in the afternoon, around 2:30 or so, the man walks by again, going to get the boys. And when he returns, they inevitably dash far ahead of him, leaving him with their backpacks and their coats and their books and whatever. They race ahead eager to get home, while the man lags far behind, sometimes loaded down tremendously with all their stuff.

Every day this back and forth goes on. Rain or shine. Hot or cold. The man walks with the boys to school in the morning and fetches them back in the afternoon.

Years from now, the boys will remember this. They will remember walking with their grandfather. They will remember how he went with them every day. They will remember his shuffling feet and his bowed head. And perhaps they will even remember how they made him carry all their stuff. They will remember this, and it will make them smile.

4:17:18 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Mr. Rogers Went to Washington

As quoted from the website of the Home Recording Rights Coalition in boingBoing which was linked in Michael Tsai's blog, a man sits before the supreme court:

Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions. [...] anything that allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy way, is important.

That was the Sony Betamax case, which established the (radical) notion that video cassette recorders are legal, that we get to use them, to use them fairly as we saw fit.

The man was Fred Rogers. Without him and a court that was able then to see things independently of the financial interests of the corporate media, using a VCR would be illegal.

Alas, the Betamax case was an anomaly from a period when individual rights still held their own against corporate profits. Today corporate interests trump all. Learned economists and executive fat cats looks down at the people with contempt as they deliver their lectures: It's the economy, stupid! The corporate economy.

And when DVDs and CDs and HDTV finally drive out VCRs and casette tapes and analog television, the Betamax case will be irrelevant, superceded by the revised notions of fair use and limited times In the coming digital world, Mr. Roger's notions of personal control will have passed away (with great corporate applause) and finally put to bed.

1:31:51 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []