Category: Theory

One License to Rule Them All

Posted by Ryan A - October 23, 08

I guess I should finish this post, since it is a couple weeks old, and omo started a nice little discussion with a relative thought. One of the strong points I found was this:

Even when you buy some copyright-protected media without DRM,
you don’t own it.

There is always going to be hubbub about downloading digitized media information, but the legal solutions suck ass! And I’m not very fond of DVD’s especially when they take ages to be released, what the hell is the point of fiber-Earth anyway. I question this because 98% digital media, particularly J-media, is still slow as molasses when done legally [or the quality is a stream, please, it sucks].

Disclaimer: I have no power in the business world, and I’m not a board member at a large media company, so this idea is just blown into the digital wind.

Transportable Information License

In concept, licensing of a product is always for commercial benefit, and never because the information is just so pure, true, and beautiful that the public needs to experience it (never, even in the case of すてき ARIA). It’s all about money, and consumers would be exploited by companies if they could get away with it; price-gouging is REAL. lol @ $50 Blu-Rays

One solution I believe could compensate for corporate greed, but still please consumers like myself is a Transportable Information License or a “take it anywhere” license. With respect to not owning the information, such a license would allow the holder right to keep the given information, end of story. If such a transportable license existed, it would not be illegal to have a digital copy of a title on the computer; getting it there may still be illegal.

The suggestion of a transportable license ensures that a license holder owns the right to experience the information in any form, but the said license would not allow distribution [for commercial benefit], or require the licensee to yield any physical copy of the information (paperless).

Naturally, an item this powerful would require a greater cost, but those recording those nice HD series from the airwaves would have a way to legally own access to what was recorded, and others who have somehow obtained a digital file would no longer be in the legal red, just because they have it.

Would there really be anything for consumers to complain about if they hold the license which allows them to store and experience a title in any digital form?

On another note, the core concept of such a license is the noncommercial nature.

Watch Raws

Posted by Ryan A - October 5, 08

This does not apply to l33ts, but those with actual skill and watch raws, could very well help.

I conjured up this basic idea of using raws to get better aquainted with Japanese as a language. First, let me explain my take, as I do watch raws under certain circumstance, but am not silly enough to sit there watch aimlessly and expect to understand the dialogs.

The first series I remember watching raw was Kamisama Kazoku, which was far from complex, and I could basically “get” was happening; conflict, characters, major points, etc. At the time I didn’t even attempt to learn or understand the language and hadn’t even memorized the basic writing system, such a pity, so naive.

The past Spring season, I managed to start about 4 series in the raw, though around week 7 or 8 I found myself tied up with projects and still haven’t pursued much of that season in general. It was not easy at all, though I relied heavily on hearing (train the ears well!), I was constantly looking up “main” words.

The next thing I did was pull up good episode summaries and run through them and sort out the details. Naturally, this was a logical action, and it did round out the context of a given series, but it totally does not help in learning the language, ABSOLUTELY NAI! I did not, however, watch the subbed version (fuck the subs, because reading will override listening priority and then what does that accomplish, w.o.t.).

Fail points

  • I wasn’t writing down words I referenced.
  • I wasn’t re-watching the raw version.
  • I wasn’t researching questionable sentence structure.

Terrible. Concurrently, I was studying vocabulary sets and kanji sets in flash-card mode, listening to audio, etc (still do, because it touches the general things), but honestly, it seemed like 96% of everything encountered in a raw was not something I had encountered in studying. That just feels sooo useless. Rant OFF.

A New Way

Hopefully, some may take this idea and run with it, creating something useful.

This past weekend, I sat down with a lump of Autumn series in the raw, but I took a modified approach. The biggest change was that I wrote words down in kana, and simultaneously referenced their general meaning (exact meaning is not always right). Not that I have awesome inference skills, but core words simply help in grasping the notion of a sentence.

God knows how many words are in a given 20 minutes, but I swear 50% of the “noise” comes from particles, structure, and conjugation; I worked around these and managed to jot down 15-20 words per series (yes I didn’t get every word I didn’t know, but I grabbed the most familiar and apparent first). This doesn’t allow for “fluid” viewing, and there were quite a few hiccups and sputters. At times I would just rewatch the scene and not be so keen on trying to translate in my head, but just listening for the words I just looked up.

It was in the moments between watching and checking out a summary, that I felt I should rewatch episodes now that I had a little “cheat sheet” of vocab.

Nifty, per episode vocabulary cheat sheets.
Wouldn’t it be nice to have one of these every time?

Thinking, and glancing at my cutely sized notebook, I realized that is precisely what I’ve done.

A Step Further

Now imagine a raw watcher composed one of these for each episode; 15-20 apex word/phrases with kanji, kana, meaning. I highly doubt I’d be able to get anyone to do this, but having such thing is only half the benefit, because the viewer still needs to “hear” the points. So while these apex words are composed from the episode, the voiced sentence can be recorded from the episode.

A vocabulary list and accompanying audio excerpts?

めちゃくちゃです!

Implement

Having such nice items doesn’t help unless they are analyzed and studied, but that is precisely the objective. Tweaking the algorithm, we should add a rewatch of the episode, but I believe a good in point would be just before viewing a recently aired “next” episode in the raw. That roughly means a one-week delay on the rewatch, plenty of time to take the special list and audio, flashcard it, flashplay it, listen to it, and learn it, pull it out, embed it!

Upon rewatching, I believe there will be slight learning advancement from this reinforcement, because it is totally in-context, relevant, and mixed-media. This might not be the case, and those who know their shit could argue against it, which I’d say “okay” because I don’t know my stuff, this is a simple idea I like.

Breakdown

  • View the raw, grope 15-20 words/phrases from it
  • Excerpt the audio of those moments
  • Read a trusted summary
  • In the next week, learn the list
  • In the next week, learn the audio fragments
  • Rewatch the raw just before the next episode airs
  • With the next episode, rinse and repeat

In terms of sheer, coverage, at 4 raw series per season, 15 words per series per week, and over the course of 1 year, that’s over 3000 words/phrases. Likely, there will be overlap, so as time goes on, comprehension will grow, it’s inevitable.

Watching raws without reinforcing may bring meaning to the series, but drilling and bombardment will likely produce a comfortable raw watcher.

Find Meaning

Posted by Ryan A - September 17, 08

Just a quick note.

lelangir posted quite a read on THAT. I read the opening and sections with an interlude, and finally made some comments. Yes, it took a little bit to gist the apex, but I think it is a coherent presentable position. Good Job!

Read it!

My summary: He argues depth exists even if undiscovered by a viewer. Meaning is ultimately in the eyes of the beholder in a purely subjective fashion. The writer’s connotation and denotation may exist for the writer, but viewers create meaning through the connotative elements of a work, and it may not mimic the writer’s intent.

Sounds of Consumption

Posted by Ryan A - September 6, 08

play

Omo wrote a very interesting entry, quite stimulating. In my path of anime, I went from fan to consumer and slowly getting back to the fanatic roots, specifically, savoring the media. What changed me to being a consumer? Plain and simple, it was seasonal viewing. Sensible notion right?

Now I’m not sure where this aspect lies with fandom, but perhaps there is a variance among fans who consume and fans who savor. I would say they are both valid forms of fandom, and I wonder if creators have a preferable type? An answer doesn’t fall one way or the other, and should not have anything to do with money [though likely]. Surely, I do not love the version of myself which consumes endlessly; gluttony is not becoming.

Omo makes a great statement about HD video, 5.1 audio, and 101% attention enhancing the experience. I do believe production quality enhances experience, but attention and cadence are more integral, and in a savoring manner, they will also enhance the quality of an experience.

Episodic Task List

Part of the trouble with trying to savor media is the stepping task list associated with episodes, chapters, volumes, seasons, etc. It should not be become a task list, as viewing should not be a task. Tasks are usually less appreciated then say fulfilling wishes. I had this verbal trouble when I created melative Wish and called items wishes, when objectively it is a task list. I didn’t want it to be a task list, because it leads to a consuming state of mind, where we shift objective from the experience to the check mark. Let me give a related scenario.

Casablanca and two viewers

Viewer 1 watches Casablanca to see what the fuss is about, but pays no mind to it after The End.
Viewer 2 experience the film, and falls innocently in love with the presentation; it is appreciated, and looked upon.
Viewer 1 watched Casablanca while doing sudoku and chatting with friends.
Viewer 2 experienced the film in one-sitting silence, on a simple, breezy afternoon.
Viewer 1 moves onto something new.
Viewer 2 is inspired, learns more of the film, its cast, and production.

By the time Viewer 2 has experience one of AFI’s 100 Greatest lists, Viewer 1 is back to blockbusters and out of ammo. Viewer 2 is like the sniper, and Viewer 1 is the frontline machine-gunner. Yes, Viewer 2 is similar to Akari and Mizunashi-mode, but this savoring attitude has yielded a greater experience in the same about of time on the same title as Viewer 1. I’m not implying sniper’s are beautiful, but slightly more rich in existence.

Necessity and Judgement

Is that experience really necessary? No, absolutely not, personally, I know plenty of anime series that wouldn’t change my experience if savored or not. Some series are better unsavored (ie R2, Ninomiya-kun), hell. It comes down to judgment of when to savor a series, and when to gorge consume. May be it doesn’t matter in this media rich period, but I will still acknowledge the fact that brilliant experiences are more rare than some may believe.

Bring back the single-tasking media!

self-note: wut about marathons? Yes, marathons are more savory than not.

Geass AMV Thought

Posted by Ryan A - August 22, 08

How about this…

El Mark

I think it’s “Fuck Ya” material.

Edit: I can’t believe I mini-marathoned 19 episodes of this in two short evenings, the brain is fried.

Habits of Plenty

Posted by Ryan A - May 20, 08

So Riex posted a little tid-bit about viewing habits, which I found very similar to my own ways. I agree with stocking up and batch viewing, though unfortunately, I never managed to get 20+ episodes in on a non-marathon day.

Basically, I try to stay in the flow of episodic releases, but for this year I have decided to let some seasonal things slide and push them to a Year-End Marathon list. The idea is to keep things at bay, but not entirely on the “To-Watch” list, since we all know these take forever to clear. Sticking to the annuals makes prioritizing slightly easier, and it adds a wider comprehension with respect to the year in anime.

Also, my personal concerns are spread among other experiences (film, music, F1, soccer, or simply playing in the physical world), which anime sometimes takes the back seat, that’s just how life is. At the moment, I have current episodic viewing which I am backlogged and will likely batch view; things like VK and S.A. I have a hard habit of not dropping things, so the question is never “if” but always “when” … “will I take in the experience”

Ryan A

note: I have created the monster… Blogpocalypse [link]. Style and content to arrive shortly, but probably not that soon.

In light of melative, Rating

Posted by Ryan A - May 7, 08

I was lead into a post over at Meaty Anime Blog recently, initially by the basis (Ouran and Towards the Terra), but something was stated:

…it’s the twelfth top rated show on MyAnimeList. Not that the last point means anything,…

This may or may not be out of context, since I cannot attest the same reasoning for the statement, but it has implications… ratings are flawed. And no, this isn’t a MyAnimeList-only problem (see how many 10s are given to popular movies on IMDB, ie Rush Hour 3).

What we have is an arbitrary rating system with a limited-number scale. In other words, I can arbitrarily rate multiple items 10/10 as much as I want…. but does this mean they are equivalent? Definitely not. Perhaps we should increase the arbitrary scale, as AniDB does with enhancement scripts (test that thing for steroids!), from 10 to 1000, does that make it better? Probably, but it also increases the level of “pain-in-the-ass”. Do I sound tempered?

This does not irritate me, because I don’t have to use it if I choose, though I would like to see accurate ratings, and so I come to the point, melative. (I know, I’m a broken record, shoot me for being my own fanboy… jkwut or just jk?)

The general idea: Relativity

melative.com has an embedded RRS (Relative Rating System), a premise which has held with me for a few years now (apparently there is a book that has a similar notion called slicing, I don’t know that the book is titled though). The idea is extremely simple, but it can work on the large scale, via recursion. Let’s do an example:

I have 2 media, A and B, let them be on the same “tier” or “level”. In this state they are equivalent, I feel they are equally great. If I feel A is greater than B, I place it on the next level up, or if I feel B is less impressive than A, I place B a level down. Effectively, I have rated A and B relative to each other, clean, concise, simple.

Rinse and Repeat

When dealing with a large list of titles, this may seem like hell, but it always uses the base… A=B, A>B, or A<B; there are only 3 options. On the large scale, it is easier to know a fuzzy location of a title, perhaps in the top 10%, great melative knows how to do that too, but that isn’t the point. Just because the ratings model is a recursive base case, does that really yield accurate averages for a title?

I ask too many questions, for more information, here is an overview/instructions on this RRS, but the money is in the Theory section. Douzo meshiagare!

Ryan A

note: further discussion, questions, or ideas can be directed to me via e-mail or on irc (#animeblogger or #melative).