Thursday, September 10, 2009

Random thoughts

  • The NFL realizes that maybe people can't exactly afford tickets in the middle of a recession. Well, okay, not really. They're actually going to let you watch a game online when it doesn't sell out, but not until after midnight the day of the game, only for 72 hours after the game, and not during Monday Night Football. Welcome to the 1970s, Commissioner Goodell. Just a couple more courageous jumps forward and you'll be caught up with the rest of us. (Not like the other sports are any smarter with respect to blackout rules.) What's better than spending three figures to watch your team get beat? Waiting 24 hours to watch online after you already know the score.

  • Completely non-shocking news: Brett Favre was injured late last season and a Belichick disciple lied on the injury report. Of course blah blah blah and whatever. Anyway, Favre wouldn't do the same thing this season, and he'll be certain to play all 16 games, because he wouldn't have come back if he couldn't, except he might not play all 16 games. I hope the Vikings get exactly what everyone else thinks they're getting, and I expect McDaniels will turn out to be the same kind of coach that Weis and Mangini have already proven to be. (To quote Bill Simmons – ironically – we'll call them "Bassbowls.")

  • Paul Krugman has a great article in the New York Times magazine about how very few economists actually believed the bubble would burst. If you read it closely, you'll find that there are professionals who refuse to take into account the possibility that people do not make financial decisions wisely. Keep this in mind the next time you hear someone explain how of course health care doesn't need reform because the insurance companies will sort it out themselves.

  • Beatles: Rock Band is out and is cool. I haven't played with other singers, so I don't know how the harmonies are going to work, but they should be interesting. Some of the songs are definitely challenging on one instrument or another, but it's the good kind (involving actual music) rather than the Guitar Hero kind (speed metal).

2 comments:

  1. In music games, I prefer to play songs that are challenging technically rather than simply through quantity of notes.

    Personal preference may also come into play: for example, I'd rather play Iron Maiden than Slayer, even though the difficulty of the songs may be similar.

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