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I moved

2009-06-06T17:31:00.003+02:00

Here at The Eclectic Metalhead dot com. Please update your links and RSS feeds and wish me good luck.

Black Metal Band of the Year

2009-05-12T13:24:00.003+02:00

That, ladies and gentlemen, is Cobalt.

I just can't get enough of their music. It would be hugely unfair to call it "Tool with an unholy ravaging screaming voice" but I'll do it so you can get the main idea. Try the song "Arsonry" on their MySpace page.

I kind of auditioned. And it's temporarily over.

2009-04-26T19:46:00.006+02:00

As I was previously telling you, I made an attempt at joining a Death Metal band as lead singer. Well, it didn't work out as I planned so the Eclectic Metalhead remains - for the moment - just a mélomane and avid listener. Thank you all for your warm support.

Here are a few conclusions of this enriching experience :

Singing in an extreme Metal band requires a lot of practice and a considerable amount of physical effort. In my case it required also experiencing with my voice and the sounds I can come up with, especially in the screaming section where I am most lacking.
As far as I can come up with at the moment, my voice is more suited for a Brutal Death Metal band than a Modern Death Metal one. The big difference is that in the former genre, the voice is basically constant monotonous growls while the latter requires more developed skills like screaming and even having melodic hints in the voice.
There is an incredible difference between my standards of Death Metal and those of the younger generation, let's say 10 years younger than me. My references date back from the end of the eighties, beginning of the nineties, theirs are recent bands no more than 10 years old. So when we speak about Death Metal we might not be speaking about the same thing. From a certain perspective I find this rather regrettable - how can you not know the band Death - but from a different perspective I think that it contributes to the genre renewing itself every other 10 years.
I kind of started to like some Gojira pieces and appreciate the vocal performance of Randy Blythe from Lamb of God. These two Metal bands were not at all on my playlist just two weeks ago and they still don't make it in my top 20 - maybe my top 50 - but Clone and Laid to Rest really rock.
I will definitely try this again when another occasion shows up.

I kind of auditioned. Wish me luck.

2009-04-22T22:18:00.003+02:00

Last Saturday I auditioned to sing in a Death Metal band. Nothing big, a small young local group, just an attempt to sort of "put my money where my mouth is" because no amount of listening to Metal music compares to being part of a Metal band and actually doing this kind of music. The bad part was that it went quite awfully, but the good part was that I sort of got another chance, so I'll be back next Saturday in a second attempt at screaming and growling my lungs off into the microphone:)

Wish me luck.

Metal: A Headbanger' Journey

2009-04-03T21:36:00.005+02:00

For some time now I have been thinking about writing a review of Sam Dunn's acclaimed documentary, Metal: A Headbanger's Journey. Now it's the right time because I think I finally found my words.

The most striking thing about the documentary is what I would consider an inconsistency between the title, suggesting the author's personal experience, and the method he applies to describing the Metal phenomenon, an inquiry from an anthropological perspective - since Sam Dunn is an anthropologist. He is absolutely brilliant in the first endeavor, that of a Metal fan. He sincerely and openly throws on the table in all detail the way in which he constructs and lives his passion for Metal, he goes as far as having personal and absolutely enriching discussions with artists considered as landmarks of the genre - Dio and Bruce Dickinson just to name a few - and he ends the film with the blunt and sincere conclusion :

"But I set out on this journey to answer one question : 'Why has Heavy Metal been consistently stereotyped, dismissed and condemned?'. And what's become clear to me is that Metal confronts what we'd rather ignore. It celebrates what we often deny. It indulges in what we fear most. And that's why Metal will always be a culture of outsiders. Ever since I was 12 years old I've had to defend my love for Heavy Metal against those who said that it's a less valid for of music. My answer now is that you either feel it or you don't. If Metal doesn't give you that overwhelming surge of power that makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck, you might never get it. And you know what? That's OK. Because judging by the over forty thousands Metalheads around me, we're doing just fine without you."

There's a lot of theatrics in this very well orchestrated crescendo with Metallica's "Master of Puppets" in the background, but as a Metalhead I totally adhere to the fundamental meaning of these words: ignore the naysayers around yourself, stick to what you value most about Metal and give them a metaphorical finger if you feel like, it is all about the music and nothing else.

Where I don't go down along the same path as the documentary is in it's second endeavor, trying to sketch the Metal culture for the mainstream public through the anthropological perspective. Yes, Metal is a culture and obviously one can draw some basic lines upon which it is build. Here again Sam Dunn does a good job at gathering views about Metal from sociologists, musicologists, psychologists, people who approached different aspects of the culture through a scientific method and tried to come up with a coherent view. But something is badly lacking in spite of all that and if we go back to the finale of the documentary we can sum up one characteristic of this view of Metal I cannot possibly agree with, that it's a culture of outsiders. That somehow Metalheads are an ostracized and victimized bunch of rebels against the established order. And it's a perspective present throughout the entire film, developed with more assiduity in Global Metal, Sam Dunn's second documentary which deals with the manifestations of Metal throughout the whole world. Let me explain.

My basic assumption about why some people listen to Metal and choose to be part of the Metal culture is not because they are some kind of outsiders. Outsiders relative to what? Mainstream music? Of course, yet again considering the huge diversity of contemporary "popular" music, who is an outsider and who is not? Mainstream values supposedly commonly shared by some kind of majority of the society? Even less, I don't think Metalheads are an homogenous people who share the same values, far from that. Just listen to Kreator's Mille Petrozza's slightly communist views or Napalm Death's Barney Greenway's leftist anti-capitalist rants and you'll quickly jump on your feet if you're like me. The opposite is obviously valid, one can be conforted by such views. But that is not what makes me a Metalhead, it is the sound and the pleasure of feeling it live so I enjoy every single note of the good tunes Kreator or Napalm come up with. Or considering as anarchists or rebels Metal fans who have a daily job, pay their taxes, have a family and live their own lives without making much fuss about the "established order". The lowest common denominator among all of them is the Metal music, I cannot think of anything else in the first instance. It is the amplified guitars, excessively downtuned bass, highly skilled drumming and impossible voice performances who go always "faster, harder, louder" always searching for a sharper and more punching sound, always breaking barriers in speed and technicality or ceaselessly searching for a heavy sound that expresses ever deeper emotions whatever the speed. Or staying true to the basics of Metal music writing and building ever more fantastic visuals on the scene. From this perspective I could say that Morbid Angel's t-shirt describes the best what Metalheads have in common : "extreme music for extreme people". And extreme music isn't fitted for everybody because it requires a considerable amount of personal investment whether it's time, money, giving up a secure job or facing a close social environment where you don't fit in. That's about all. It might look like a culture of social outsiders, considering the term outsiders as "outside the society" but it isn't. I haven't yet met a Metalhead in a liberal society that is opposed to the fundamentals upon which the society he lives in is built. Instead I have met Metalheads whose personal values don't match with those expressed in the mainstream media or with those of his family or his close environment. But that's a totally different issue. And if one finds an appropriate answer in the metaphorical finger then let him point it. It ultimately boils down to our freedom as individuals to find our own way and follow it.

To close my argument, I will say that Sam Dunn did a great job with his documentary in being sincere about what a true Metalhead is and you should watch it for this reason. As far as the rest of the argument is concerned, just try to figure it out by yourself why you listen to Metal, it will be enough.

Hayek in Practice

2009-02-21T21:22:00.003+01:00

From a Romanian movie from the communist era that I just caught a glimpse of while watching TVRi, the international channel of the Romanian state television.

- Because I'm a free man.
- No, because you're a liberated man.

How could one summarize Hayek better than this.

Somebody has been playing with my deathbed song

2009-02-21T20:50:00.005+01:00

Remember Hallowed Be Thy Name from the band that was this year's Best British Live Act? Well there's a new cover running around freely in beautiful shape and renewed strength, by the one and only Machine Head. Enjoy!

PS : You might also want to check out Cradle of Filth's haunting interpretation, but this one works the other way around, it will wake you up from your grave. In case you're thinking about an exit strategy, other than Heaven Shall Burn... When We Are Gathered.

The Comeback

2009-02-13T21:47:00.003+01:00

After some long months of absence I hope I'm back on a more regular basis. With some Metal in my bag, of course. But I'll make it quick.

Cephalic Carnage. Until last Sunday they were number one on my must-see-live list and they stood up to my (high) expectations. They put up one of the most enjoyable shows I have ever seen. Heavy as shit - the genre they play isn't called Grind Death for nothing - unleashing the public into a wild moshpit with every song and most of all delivering every single note with a combination of technicality, precision and plain amusement close to delirium. Just great! And to get a grasp at their music, here's Endless Circle of Violence.

Another genuine pleasure on Sunday evening was to see live Psycroptic. These guys are one of the highlights of Technical Death Metal of 2008; theirs is my number one Metal album of the year without any hesitation. And I'm enthusiastic about it:) They don't deliver that much on the scene because a lot of their music involves insanely fast guitar shredding, nevertheless I was absolutely impressed by the energy they induced in a not yet ready to fully deliver moshpit in the public with the starting note of (Ob)servant, the title track of their latest album. To give you a better idea of what these guys are capable of I present you Initiate. Focus on the guitar, you will be blown away.

Time for Some Metal Storytelling

2008-09-18T20:58:00.002+02:00

I came over this piece where Mikael Akerfeldt from Opeth and Mike Portnoy from Dream Theater tell the story of how each of them got into Metallica. Quite interesting, I'm closer to Akerfeldt's experience, me too I was first attracted by Metallica after having listened songs from "Master of Puppets" and "Ride the Lighting" - on a poorly recorded tape of a live concert - but it was "...And Justice for All" that dragged me into the whole Metallica thing. Only later I truly abused my cassette player with "Ride the Lightning" and afterwards with "Kill'em All" and "Master of Puppets".

Therefore allow me to indulge in some memory backtracking about how I got into Metallica. I was about 12 or 13 years old and just coming out of a long period of Depeche Mode after a short period of Roxette:) Yes, this Metalhead was into that kind of stuff in his early childhood and still loves some old school Depeche Mode, not so Metal, but it definitely grabbed me irreversibly:) We had an excellent music teacher in our school that really made me love classical music and most importantly taught us to seek the story behind the music; a music so rich and diverse in sounds that it actually filled the whole listening space. And what I remember very well from that age were the live performances of our town's philharmonic orchestra of Brahms, Beethoven and Stravinsky. Sadly I'm much less into classical music now than at that time, but one day I'll fill the gap. So the story goes that one day I went alone to buy my first Metal tape - which was a huge thing back then - and since Metallica was all I knew about Metal I went for "... And Justice for All", the only one from the band that was on sale. I had a very nice Walkman back then so I put it to good use on my first walk with Metallica banging in my ears. And then it struck me : that incredible sound filled the whole listening space just like Beethoven and Brahms did, except it was faster but still complex enough, had highly appealing lyrics and gave me power like no other music I heard before. It wasn't a question of aggressiveness or rebelliousness - I wasn't that kind of a child - it simply was that fuckin' huge sound the size of a symphony coming from the hands of four guys playing straightforward Metal.

Now I'm asking myself about "Master of Puppets" being "Metal's quintessential masterpiece", what Mike Portnoy calls it. I've seen other people calling it a perfect album, some kind of a peak in Metal music which has never been reached since. The thing is I don't exactly know what a quintessential masterpiece means, how it can be defined. The best definition I can come with is a standard by which one judges the quality of the music he listens to from that moment on, but this is also quite weak and confusing. First of all it's highly subjective, therefore everyone has it's own standard and I bet that in the Metal world "Master of Puppets" is far from making the unanimity of a standard, just try asking people about Black Sabbath, Dio, Motörhead, Napalm Death, Slayer or Iron Maiden and suddenly things get much more complicated. Second, Metal is so diverse that "Master of Puppets" would make a very poor standard, how the heck one can compare it to "Symbolic" from Death or "Focus" from Cynic, they are both masterpieces and standards in Death Metal respectively Progressive (Death) Metal. Symbolic is THE album through which I judge much of the Death Metal I listen, but even in this particular niche I wouldn't dare compare it to Cryptopsy's "None So Vile", it simply is something else. Third, standards change over time, just check out the influences of the new Metal bands, how these evolved from the 80's until now, Metallica is loosing ground, all the bands from the 80's are losing ground, Metal musicians our days grew up with Napalm Death, Slayer or Blind Guardian. Nevertheless it is a masterpiece, but not THE masterpiece of Metal, that's absurd. One cannot look at Metal and single out "Master of Puppets" as the ultimate, most accomplished, the greatest Metal album ever, it's simply pretentiously stupid or just a subjective opinion not worth of much attention.

Transylvanian Hunger

2008-09-16T23:15:00.002+02:00

Cluj 2 - 1 Roma on the opening day of UEFA Champions League. Cluj is a town in Transylvania and it happens to be this Metalhead's hometown. And this post is also a nice little reference to a nice Black Metal tune from Darkthrone.

The Metallica Thumbs Session

2008-09-12T21:39:00.004+02:00

Thumb up for two songs on from "Death Magnetic" : "That Was Just Your Life" and "My Apocalypse". Old school Thrash Metal, something that has been missing from the Metallica catalogue for many years. Overall the album deserves 6 out of 10 which is a big improvement compared to "Load", "Reload" and "St. Anger".
Thumb down for Lars Ulrich for imagining that people expect Metallica to save Metal. Gimme a break:) A) Metal is alive and kicking wildlier than ever, so thinking that it needs being saved is simply arrogant. B) A whole bunch of fresh new bands are carrying the flag forward with exceptional vigour - and first on my list would be Decrepit Birth. C) Old timers are doing an excellent job of sticking to their guns and delivering quality Metal without the large scale marketing Metallica benefits from : hail to Kreator, Iron Maiden, Cynic, Sodom, Slayer, Obituary and the list could go on.
Thumb up for the marketing campaign for "Death Magnetic" centered around creating the buzz and steadily building up to the grand finale. Internet was perfectly used for what it best serves at, propagating information.
Thumb down again for Lars Ulrich for having stated in the "Some Kind of Monster" documentary that classic Metal soloing is outdated. What better proof that he's fundamentally worong than Kirk Hammet delivering some of his best solos on "Death Magnetic" in the 3 songs I already mentioned. Simply pathetic.
Thumb up of for me making peace with Metallica. I would have been really sad if they went down with "St. Anger", instead I'm comfortable with having two or three fresh Metallica tunes I can headbang on. I flash them the devil horns for that. Maybe that's their secret, driving the expectations sow low that any new song with fast riffing where James doesn't try to sing and Kirk's solos have a decent space sounds great.

The Dawn of an Era of Bullshit

2008-09-11T21:03:00.004+02:00

You might say that it's quite pretentious for a title and you might be right. The thing is that studies like this one are supposed to be revelatory for the wider public, while for me they are a confirmation of a multitude of observations which I still consider biased until they are not backed by enough scientific proof. In spite of that I consider myself on the right track while trying to keep as much rational distance I am capable of. So, science dipped again it's fingers into the Metalheads phenomenon - quite unintentionally I guess - and it came up with the following:

Unlikely as it may seem, fans of heavy metal and classical music have much more in common than most people would imagine, according to a new study. Researchers found fans of the music styles shared "virtually identical" personality traits, such as being creative and at ease with themselves.

The finding was revealed in a major study into the link between people's musical tastes and their personalities. Professor Adrian North, of Edinburgh's Heriot-Watt University, said the survey of more than 36,000 people from all over the world is by far the biggest study of its kind ever undertaken.

"I was struck by how similar fans of heavy metal and classical music really are," he said. "Apart from the age differences, they were virtually identical. Both were more creative than other people, both were not terribly outgoing and they were also quite at ease."
He speculated that both types of music have a sense of theatricality about them which may appeal to similar types of people.

I will let the scientists question the method and the interpretation of the study and I would be very interested by such a debate of course. But let's focus on the layman interpretation. I'm not that much into the comparison between fans of Heavy Metal and of Classical music. I don't find it very convincing and too relevant at this stage. What I find really interesting are exactly the personality traits outlined by the study : creativity, "not terribly outgoing" and at ease with themselves. That's where they hit the right spot. So I guess I won't go out tonight on a killing spree on the soundtrack of the latest Slipknot album, I'm not that outgoing tonight. And I'm so at ease with myself that I'll stick to Raining Blood from my speakers:)

This being said, I wish you all an excellent in-between time after the morning coffee and before the teeth brushing or vice versa.

My Deathbed Metal Song

2008-09-06T14:04:00.004+02:00

What song I would like to be played at my funeral? I amused myself with this exercise a few months ago after reading that AC/DC's Highway To Hell is at the top of the list of funeral songs in Adelaide, Australia. So I immediately started compiling my own list curious to see what comes at the top. I patched up a few criteria which seemed obvious : a) the central theme of the song must be about death, dying or the afterlife (or whatever you want to call it) ; b) I don't want people attending the funeral to walk away with a sad face - I would very much like to see them with a Tom Araya wicked kind of smile actually and c) it must be a damn good quality Metal song because I don't want to be remembered as an average Metal listener, only the best is suited on such an occasion. There I was cracking my scull open to find the best of the best suited songs for such a bizarre soundtrack - I quickly realized one song wouldn't be enough - and I came up with the following :

Slayer - Raining Blood and/or Hell Awaits. I simply can't pick only one from Slayer, both of them have crushing riffs, devastating intros and direct punch lines, plus they come along with the wicked smile of Tom Araya of a long bearded Yeti with the face of a child, just beautiful:)
Death - Pull the Plug, how could I leave out Chuck from the guests list. And I want the 1988 live version of this one, nothing less, it's the one that survived the best the test of time.
Paradise Lost - As I Die. This is the mellow depressing moment, time for respiro, time to listen to the grass growing. Since I believe there won't be many happy faces showing up at the funeral, bombarding people only with anthems is not a 100% good idea, therefore this should be the central piece to help every body gather their thoughts after Hell unleashed and before the upcoming climax.
Gamma Ray - Hell is Thy Home. Time to cheer up and bring bombastic melodic speed into the event : "Taken where the thunder roars into the blazing light / The hand of fate is crushing down before me / The eyes of god have turned away, no angels are in sight / As I face the final chapter of our story". Remember, I will go down all guns blazing, so you need crescendo to build up to the final moment.
Iron Maiden - Hallowed Be Thy Name. Epic, melodic, fast, insightful, the perfect song for a perfect death. " Somebody please tell me that I'm dreaming / It's not so easy to stop from screaming / But words escape me when I try to speak / Tears they flow but why am I crying / After all I am not afraid of dying / Don't believe that there is never an end". Scream for me!

Of course, since Metal is growing bigger and better every day I still have plenty of time to update this:)

This being said, I wish you all an excellent in-between time after the morning coffee and before the teeth brushing or vice versa.

Faster Harder Louder. Metal Links and Being a Fan.

2008-09-01T22:15:00.002+02:00

I am a Metalhead but at the core I am a Huge Metal Fan. A fan that instantly clicked on the link to the new Blabbermouth news about the album cover of the new Cynic album, "Traced in Air". And felt overwhelmed while reading the following : "CYNIC will be direct support slot on the OPETH European trek in November/December". I hope they keep their slot until December the 3rd when Opeth will be playing in Lyon. Needless to say the tickets are already bought:)
Therefore I get it how it feels to be a Metallica fan anxious to get your hands on "Death Magnetic" and simply just having to wake up to read fresh news about it. Except that Metallica news flows like tap water every single day on every single channel like the whole world will stop spinning on September 12th, the release date. Godspeed Newton! The apple might not fall on that day, but Metallica will remain solidly anchored. That's called gravity boots in our days. Great marketing nevetheless. Anyways, to say something good about them, I will actully listen to Bruce Dickinson's radio show on the 19th of September which will have Metallica as guests. I've listened to Bruce's shows in the past but they were featuring mainly young bands and the guy proved to be a very good public for new Metal music and an insightful but in the meatime a highly entertaining interviewer. There is also a very good interview he did with Lemmy from Motörhead, these two guys display excellent chemistry together - both being British must help. I really don't see the relaxed and wicked Bruce Dickison hitting it off with the Metallica MTV stars - especially Lars Ulrich - but I might be wrong.

Faster Harder Louder. Metal Links

2008-08-30T18:53:00.005+02:00

Metallica. They made it into the New York Times on the occasion of their European tour and the upcoming album entitled "Death Magnetic". Such a waste of print space, it almost hurts. Like the documentary "Some Kind of Monster" showed, endulging into following the creative process of this band nowdays is like taking a ten days walk in the desert after a fight with your long faithful camel. Briefly put, the two song from the new album published on the Internet make me at least skeptic : the solos and the Metal riffing are back but the drums still sound like and empty can of beans and I see no coherence throughout the songs, it sounds like good riffs artificially patched together just to put out a new album; worst of all, James actually sings... But the guys are the best in the business, that's for sure. There is so much buzz on the Internet about their newcoming album that no day passes by without Blabbermouth or Metal Hammer mentioning something about it and making news from anything. The stardom is not my dominion, under certain circumstances it's just crap and you know very well it's not a substitute for quality. But it pays in the short run.
Reviewing the classics part one. Exodus really kicks ass. If you didn't know, Kirk Hammet was part of this band back in 1983 before joining Metallica and their 1985 Bonded by Blood is a landmark album in Thrash Metal. My first Exodus listening was at this year's Wacken Open Air. Strong band, shitty motivational speech : "We come from the United States to teach you motherfuckers a Lesson in Violence". "Well, I come from Transylvania to feel good, have fun and listen to your music and most of all not be called a motherfucker. As far as violence is concerned, Kreator can teach you a lesson or two about Raising the Flag of Hate without insulting people". But they're good, old-school like good, Blacklist is one of my favourites and I recommend it.
Reviewing the classics part two. Immortal. After a 6 years hiatus a new album might be on the way, at least according to Wikipedia. I don't necessarily need a new Immortal album to complete my Yeti mongering personality, but it would be so much fun, so adrenaline intensive. Grasping Immortal is quite interesting, either you love them from the first riff either you make fun of them because of their looks; in my case the corpse painted Abbath stirrs apocalyptic images of an evil bunny rabbit while daydreaming but once I hit the play button on Solarfall I transgress life and human existence, or whatever you want to call it, into eternal permafrost. Or the alternative beer with friends.

This being said, I wish you all an excellent in-between time after the morning coffee and before the teeth brushing or vice versa.

The Mea Culpa Attempt

2008-08-22T20:31:00.006+02:00

I wasn't entirely fair when writing about Metallica's set list of their European tour back in May. Well, maybe except about digging a whole in the ground, I think I got that one right.

One cannot judge the quality of a band solely by looking at the set list of one of their live concerts; it is not completely honest even if in Metallica's case the songs they play live are a perfect proxy for their decrepit songwriting abilities in these modern times. But more explaining is needed for the shortcut I've made to be entirely comprehended. So let's look at another mythical band, Iron Maiden, and the set list of their "Somewhere back in time" 2008 world tour which ended somwhere in Poland after making a stop in the Metal Town of Wacken. To play for the cheerfull guests gathered there of course. The most recent song Maiden played is from the 1992 album "Fear of the Dark" and they enchanted the audience with 17 songs. They put up an excellent show both visually and musically and they rock stronger than ever. Since I never saw Metallica live I cannot make any comparison on these premises, but nevertheless you should all know that Maiden still kicks ass in their fifties. But where the comparison can be made is between the albums Metallica and Iron Maiden put out during the last 10 years. Both bands are uncontested Metal giants, but while the last 3 Metallica albums - Load, Reload and St. Anger - are barely listenable for an old school fan Iron Maiden has continued steadily on the road they paved back in the 80's with good albums - Brave New World, Dance of Death, A Matter of Life and Death - with 2 or 3 songs on each of them worthy successors of the 80's classics. Now it's easy to understand why Metallica playing Master of Puppets in 2008 after many years of crappy songwriting leaves a bad taste in your mouth while watching Bruce Dickinson wave the British flag during The Trooper (1983) makes me want to scream until my chest explodes. It's the difference between slowly sinking into oblivion while still trying to grasp at the last floating lifeboat and gloriously bringing the past into the present and making it sound better than ever. Iron Maiden is not the only example, Kreator is another one, although they play much more songs from their recent albums - Violent Revolution and Enemy of God - in their live shows while blasting the audience with classics on steroids like Extreme Agression, Flag of Hate and Tormetor. Thrash Metal has never sounded this good. To close the argument, all the difference between these two bands comes from the musicians which are the heart of the songwriting : Metallica's Clif Burton passed back away in 1986 while Iron Maiden's Steve Harris was always there and the band rebuilt itself during the late 90's with the return of Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith; similarly Kreator's Mille Petrozza has been the core of the band since the beginning and the guy knows how to pick his fellow musicians. Just like Chuck.

Before ending here's a live recording of Metallica's Fade to Black with Cliff Burton handling the bass duties. That should put a smile back on your face.

This being said, I wish you all an excellent in-between time after the morning coffee and before the teeth brushing or vice versa. And watch Heaven and Hell. Because everything pales in front of such magnificence.

Faster Harder Louder. Metal links.

2008-08-19T20:22:00.009+02:00

I'll do this with dots since concocting articulate phrases starts to be a long lost skill in my arsenal of expression.

The first and only ten points out of ten go to the Wacken Open Air festival. If I ever regain my writing skills I will enchant you with a few impressions at a later moment. But it really was faster, harder and louder. Good thing I didn't forget my ear plugs.
Decrepit Birth. Possibly the best sound in Technical/Progressive Death Metal ever to emerge from the American scene since Death and Cynic. Unfortunately for them... (but I'll leave this for the next two dots). "Diminishing Between Worlds" and "The Enigmatic Form" available on their Myspace page are highly recommended. The sound is an excellent blend of Death's Symbolic and Cynic's Focus, less fine tuned than the former and less jazzy than the latter but there is still space for improvement.
As I was saying, competition is tough because after 14 years of absence, Cynic is preparing a new album scheduled for this autumn (October 28th actually). I had the enormous pleasure and honor of listening to the guys playing live at this year's Wacken festival at the beginning of August and it's only growing bigger and bigger as the days pass by. As an appetizer to the upcoming album I have the pleasure of pointing you - Metal fans or not - to the superb Evolutionary Sleeper.
I could keep going on and on about Cynic but I cannot help quoting Lee Steadham's review of "Focus" on the "Satan Stole my Teddybear" zine : "To call this act 'technical' would be a cruel understatement; Focus sounds like three Dream Theater discs playing simultaneously, if John Petrucci had six arms and a four-neck guitar (okay that's not entirely fair - Cynic have TWO guitars). There are polyrhythms and time-changes shooting about everywhere, stabilized by a healthy jazz/fusion influence and an obvious understanding on how to blend these clashing styles into a coherent intellectual trip even the musical layman can appreciate". Economics morituri salute Michael Phelps, Metal morituri salute Cynic:)
If you ever wondered where the intro passage of Marduk's With Satan and Victorious Weapons" comes from, I now have the answer. You know it : "Because you were inspired by the Devil? Yes. That's it. I was inspired by the Devil! I am... inspired by the DEVVVVILLL! Lucifer! I summon you!". Well, it's a sequence from The Name of the Rose, part of the dialogue between Bernardo Gui and Remigion da Varagine during the latter's trial for heresy. A nice exchange and an even nicer Black Metal tune prefferably to be played between the two key moments of the day, brushing your teeth and preparing the first coffee.
And yes, I almost forgot. It looks like science confirmed it :"A little prayer does no good and may make things worse. Much prayer helps a lot". I don't know if this really proves that saints are listening - under certain circumstances of course, it's not like going to Walmart - instead there is factual proof that God listens... to SLAYER!

This being said, I wish you all an excellent in-between time after the morning coffee and before the teeth brushing or vice versa.

Metal Reflection of the Evening

2008-06-24T22:56:00.007+02:00

Upon listening to Pyramaze's latest offering, Immortal, a one time collaboration of the Danes with American singer Matt Barlow, more than one thought crossed my mind with the finesse and sharpness of a bullet shot with surgical precision. The least rewarding one was that Iced Earth main man Jon Schaffer - who currently enjoys once again the exceptional vocal services of MattBarlow - is in no way comparable in creativeness and melody as a songwriter to those Danes. This is not meant to undermine in any way what Iced Earth has already provided to Metal - there are loads of classic Metal tunes that came out of Schaffer's guitar in combination with Barlow's voice - but after more than a dozen spins given to "Immortal" it is almost impossible not to feel the slightest regret that Matt Barlow's collaboration with Pyramaze didn't extend beyond a single recorded album. Like Cynic's Focus it's a one time gem, a singularity - we'll see about the "landmark album" thing but I'm rather confident about this given it's intelligent blend of Epic/Power, Progressive and classical Heavy Metal - and it's up to the fans to hope now to see them reunited once again in one form or another. Given Cynic's history which found them reunited 13 years after releasing "Focus" - at the 2008 Wacken Open Air for example - there is no reason to be pessimistic... in the long run of course , but just before we're all Grateful Dead.

Death of Guitar Solo? Think Again

2008-06-16T23:40:00.000+02:00

Peter Aspden - FT's arts writer - deplores the death of the guitar solo in rock music in the article Slow death of the axeman after reading Rolling Stone magazine's recently published list of 100 greatest guitar songs of all time. No wonder, given the current creative desert which is the mainstream rock music.

What amazes me is the incredible largesse with which the author dismisses completely another musical genre close to the rock music, Heavy Metal and it's multitude of sub genres, in which excellence in handling the guitar plays a fundamental role. And what better place to look for a guitar virtuoso than in the "heavy metal attacks" and "murderous riffing" - terms that I would rather take as a compliment as a Metalhead in spite of being uttered disrespectfully by Mr. Aspden at the end of hi article. And even if I don't see a lot of Metal musicians in the Wikipedia list of Fender Stratocaster players, there is one from this infamous musical landscape who followed Mr. Aspden' advice, Yngwie Malmsteen, but judging by the FT columnist's standard he didn't exactly mange to make it sing because... he plays Metal. How unfortunate.

So if you want to see what top notch musicianship in Metal can provide I strongly encourage you to lend an ear to Machine Head's Aesthetics of Hate which is packed with great guitar solos.

Being French en Français

2008-06-14T20:20:00.002+02:00

A rapid summary in French about the French identity from Econoclaste. If you're confused after reading this it's normal:)

Que signifie pour vous être français ? What do you think is unique or distinctive about the French ?

Au cœur de l'identité française, on trouve de nombreuses contradictions. Un État corporatiste pesant, joint à une méfiance généralisée vis à vis du pouvoir; des spécificités innombrables, grandes et petites, jointes à l'idée selon laquelle la France a une vocation universelle; un goût prononcé pour l'égalité, joint à la multiplication des privilèges; une large ouverture au monde extérieur et à la nouveauté, joint à une grande méfiance de tout ce qui vient de l'étranger et un fort conservatisme. Et par dessus tout, la peur du déclin, de cesser d'être "exceptionnel" sous l'effet homogénéisateur du monde extérieur, de cesser d'être prospère lorsque les autres le deviendront, l'idée que l'avenir sera immanquablement négatif : soit il faudra "changer" pour se sauver, et au passage devenir comme les autres et perdre son identité; ou alors, conserver son identité et être voué au déclin. L'étatisme est source d'angoisse, en créant l'illusion, immanquablement déçue, de pouvoir maîtriser le cours des évènements. Les français souffrent de l'impression que leurs spécificités sont des handicaps. Il n'y a pas de raison, pourtant, de le penser.

Euro 2008 and Politics

2008-06-13T14:36:00.005+02:00

FT's Gideon Rachman offers five reasons for considering the Euro 2008 soccer championship a political gam e. My favorites : "you can mention the war" and "Spanish self-loathing".

"Some Spanish soccer analysts think that the national team’s lack of success may have something to do with the strength of regional identities in the country and the difficulty of moulding a successful team made up of players from Madrid, Barcelona and the Basque country. Interesting theory: but what then accounts for England’s lack of success? We’ve got rid of the Scots, Welsh and Irish and haven’t even qualified."

Nuclear Blast of Goodies

2008-06-01T00:50:00.005+02:00

Bleed from Meshuggah. Try headbanging on this one if you ever catch the rhythm:) Yes, it's less groovy than their previous productions, instead you're facing a wall of sound which will ineluctably crush you with a mathematical precision.
We are the Nightmare from Arsis. Technical Death Metal at it's best, just try to count the changes in the riffing. Melody finds it's own way in the whole madness.
Taking the World by Storm from Kataklysm. This one is taken from their recently released new album and is a classic Death Metal tune from one of Canada's finest.

What Music Embraces me this Evening

2008-05-31T23:22:00.006+02:00

First comes Faith No More's superbly crafted Evidence. A carefully tuned sound at every level, what else could be expected from Mike Patton. A soft landing in my ears, just perfect for a chill out session with a good drink before the grand journey Heading Northe with StormWarrior.

Why Parents Lie to their Children

2008-05-31T22:16:00.003+02:00

A reflection provoked by an interesting post on the Cafe Hayek blog, The Virtues of Innocence. I see this issue of parents "lying" to their children from a different perspective than the one presented in the article.

I think this is the basic learning process. Think of any subject taught in school. What you learn first is a simplified theoretical model which basically never applies at 100% in the real life, except maybe in rare situations. While your knowledge in that field increases you come to see all the nuances that drive the real life situation away from the theoretical model. Lying to children - meaning presenting them real life facts in a simplified manner which can match their understanding level - works very much the same way, parents provide them with a framework for understanding the surroundings. And the personal development provides the necessary nuances to dissociate framework models from real life examples. Of course, children's future development is very much dependent upon the kind of framework their parents provide them, but that is a different discussion.

Sexy Capitalism

2008-05-31T20:44:00.002+02:00

From Bryan Caplan. Joliment dit.

"For most of the 20th-century, socialists had hyper-confident advocates, but they lost anyway - in large part because capitalism is simply better-looking. I say the same thing will happen in the 21st-century competition between traditional Islam and Western culture. Islamists have an army of fiery spokesmen. But the West has Paris."

... and Paris has Bertrand Delanoé, one of the main candidates for the succession of Bilbo Baggins at the head of the French Socialist Party:)

Metallica Setlist

2008-05-29T22:59:00.005+02:00

Metal Hammer announces Metallica's setlist on the opening night of the new European Tour. The year is 2008.

My reading :

Total songs : 18
Cliff Burton era songs (until 1986) : 8
Pre Black Album songs (until 1988) : 11
Pre Load songs (until 1991) : 15

My friendly advice. Find a hole in the ground, dig even deeper and either :

You find Cliff Burton. Then reanimate him because you might actually be able to put out a decent album.
Or if you don't, just hide there.

I Take my Hat off to the Finns

2008-05-27T21:13:00.004+02:00

To quote the guy from Metalreviews, "in the vast wasteland of pop music known as the Eurovision Song Contest" Finns are a welcomed singularity. After Lordi in 2006, this year it's the second time Finland has sent a Metal band in the contest, Teräsbetoni, a band playing a very straightforward Heavy Metal in the vein of Manowar but blessed with more of a second degré sense of humor than their American counterpart. Unlike Lordi, who managed to fetch the big prise, Teräsbetoni ("Reinforced concrete" in English") finished only 22nd out of 24. They had everything Lordi lacked, some truly chest exploding riffing enhanced by powerful melodic vocals and they lacked everything Lordi displayed, the mind blowing visuals.

On the overall there is little to be proud of as a Metalhead. After all, what is the point in participating in a musical wasteland contest in the first place and even if you do, what is the point of participating in a contest at all without going there to win, one might ask. Well, the point here is different and there is reason to be proud. The audacity of the Finns deserves big respect (be they the voting public or a selected voting committee). By sending a Metal band in an European music contest they proved they value their Metal artists and Finland - along with Germany, Norway and Sweden - is among the leading European countries in producing worthy Metal acts with worldwide impact on a regular basis (think Children of Bodom, Finntroll, Nightwish, Amorphis, Stratovarius and Apocalyptica just to name a few). Another big step is that - at least in France - upon seeing Teräsbetoni performing live, TV commentators restrained themselves from uttering insulting comments of the like of which Lordi was greeted with two years ago, a sign that even people with stereotyped - not to say adverse - conceptions about Metal can learn to shut up when they have nothing useful to say. Not a very dignifying general observation, but that's the world we live in:)

So without much further ado, enjoy Missä miehet ratsastaa ("Where Men Ride") from Teräsbetoni.

Japanese Movies

2008-05-21T22:42:00.004+02:00

I am a big fan of Japanese movies while I'm aware that there are some gems of Japanese cinematography I still have to check out. This being said, Battle Royale and Zatôichi are on the top of my list while Takeshi Kitano is by far my favorite Japanese director.

So now I'm puzzled. While humbly admitting my own ignorance in the field of philosophy, I see that Tyler Cowen qualifies Battle Royale as an Hobbesian movie. This means that I really have to get into this Hobbesian side of the movie to see what it's all about, just because I'm purely intrigued by this comparison:)

PS : With a little help from my friends I finally got it:)

Inflation in Zimbabwe

2008-05-17T20:04:00.002+02:00

Last year inflation was declared illegal in Zimbabwe after reaching 1000% per year. Today we have a spectacular example of the velocity of the increase :

"During the meal, one of my mates was drinking beer — 750ml bottles of Castle Lager (fondly called bombers). He ordered a fifth one, was advised that the price, which when he ordered his first, second, third and fourth ones was 160 million per bottle, had gone up to 340 million per bottle.

That's right — during lunch there was a price increase…"(via)

McCain and US Foreign Policy

2008-05-15T22:59:00.004+02:00

An extensive an interesting article in the New York Times on The McCain Doctrines, an analysis of the future Republican candidate's views on America's military role on the international scene. His support for the war in Iraq is and will continue to be a difficult thing to defend for John McCain throughout the entire campaign, but nevertheless he says that he learned the lesson :

“I think we’ve learned some lessons,” McCain told me. “One is that the American people have to be willing to support it. But two, we need to work more in an international way to try to beneficially affect the situation. And you have to convince America and the world that every single avenue has been exhausted before we go in militarily. And we better think not a day later or a week later, but a year and 5 years and 10 years later. Because the attention span, unfortunately, of the American people, although pretty remarkable in some ways, is not inexhaustible.”

I'm eager to read a similar material about the future Democrat candidate.

Dave Grohl to Metallica

2008-05-08T23:46:00.004+02:00

Blabbermouth published Dave Grohl's letter to Metallica, an open statement of credit for their forthcoming album from a longstanding fan. Nice, Metallica still benefits of massive credit from their old fans, whatever the quality of their releases. Perverse as it may sound, we all hope Metallica will once be able equal their performance from the beginning 80's and therefore are ready to listen at least once to whatever (garbage) comes out of their instruments. But I do not think that in the current formation Metallica would ever be able to do better than The Black Album (1991) - not to mention Master of Puppets or Ride the Lightning because then I really get depressed - and this is because it's been more than 20 years that they no longer have bass player Cliff Burton on their squad. Sad but True.

PS : If you're and old Metallica fan you might want to check out Testament's latest release, The Formation of Damnation, also available in free streaming on their MySpace page.

Bringing down the 35 hour workweek. Howto.

2008-05-02T21:28:00.005+02:00

If the French government has big difficulties - or lacks the necessary will and skills - in reforming the 35 hour workweek law, then we can count on our national industry champions to find a workaround. Peugeot Motorcycles has recently made a bold move in this direction; either the French unions accept the renegotiation of the 35 hours or the production line of the latest scooter goes away to Taiwan and the French jobs in Mandeure (Doubs) et Dannemarie (Haut-Rhin) will go away too. And not all the unions are reluctant to this, CFE-CGC having voted in favor while CGT against. Peugeot Motorcycles even warned that they were ready to shortcut the unions going directly for a referendum among the employees. The irony is that, in the meanwhile, the government through the voice of labor minister Xavier Bertrand is worried of this becoming a blackmailing precedent. I think the minister's stand is part of a strategy to raise the abysmally low approval rate of our beloved Speedy Gonzales, rather than being the result of the government's economic policy. Either way, they did well by staying out of it and they should continue to do the same.

Bucati de istorie la 90 de ani

2008-05-02T19:53:00.004+02:00

Traian Vuia a a avut si el un rol in unirea de la 1918 in calitate de preşedinte al Consiliu Naţional al Românilor din Transilvania şi Bucovina înfiinţat la Paris pe 24 August 1918. Mi-e neclara inca natura acţiunii acestui consiliu, dar o scrisoare trimisa de Traian Vuia pe 11 aprilie 1922 lui George Dobrin, întâiul prefect al Lugojului după unire, arunca o lumina interesanta asupra felului in care s-a realizat unirea Transilvaniei cu vechiul regat. Scrisoarea are un ton dur fata de liderii politici ai românilor transilvăneni si fata de politicienii din Regat, reprezintă punctul de vedere personal al inventatorului ca si participant direct la evenimente si trebuie pusă in contextul vremii.

Redau in continuare câteva fragmente din scrisoarea publicată parţial în revista Provincia :

"Au fost douã momente istorice cînd trebuiau discutate conditiunile Unirei. 1. Înainte de intrarea României în rãzboiul european, cînd România cu concursul mandatarului Partidului National Român a stabilit frontierele României Mari, cari au servit de bazã guvernului român în tratativele sale cu aliaţii. Era momentul cel mai favorabil pentru fixarea conditiunilor noastre. 2. Dupã armistitiu, la Alba Iulia, sau mai bine zis înainte cu ceva. Aici au lucrat oamenii nostri în mod copilãresc. S-au fãcut declaratiuni platonice, cari angajează mai mult pe aceia cari le-au fãcut, decît pe guvernul român. Unirei trebuia sã precedereze un pact bilateral între guvernul român si mandatarii poporului nostru întrunit la Alba Iulia si ratificat apoi printr-o Constituantã. Toatã Unirea s-a redus la un gest pur teatral, pe care ciocoii din Vechiul Regat l-au primit cu zîmbet si au zis cã suntem naivi cã n-au avut nevoie decît de a deschide usa casei în care noi am intrat de voie.
Cînd doi indivizi se asociazã, cînd douã societati fuzioneazã, se face un contract, un pact."

"Cînd în 1917 si 1918 prin forta împrejurãrilor si neîmpins de nici o ambitiune personalã am fost silit sã mã ocup de prepararea Unirei noastre a trebuit sã vãd vîrful urechilor lor (ale politicienilor din Vechiul Regat, n. H. M. ). Ei nu admiteau nici mãcar termenul „unire”. Baza anexãrei dupã dînsii trebuia sã fie sacrificiul adus de Vechiul Regat prin participarea lui în rãzboiul european. Rationamentul lor ducea drept la acea ce dreptul internaţional numeste „droit de conquète” . Si într-adevăr, Unirea s-a fãcut pe aceastã bazã."

"În 1918 am atras atentiunea dlor. Sever Bocu, Octavian Goga si Vasile Lucaciu asupra chestiunei Unirei, le-am expus cã Unirei trebuie sã-i dãm o bază juridicã si conformã dreptului international. Am vãzut însã imediat cã mã aflu în prezenta unor ignoranti, fãrã nici o pregãtire serioasă, hableuri. N-am fost înteles si am fost suspitionat, cã voiesc independenta Transilvaniei. Dar pentru ca sã ne putem uni cu Regatul Român, trebuia mai întîi sã rupem cu Ungaria, adicã sã ne declarãm
independenţi si apoi ca popor liber, printr-un act bilateral, luînd angajamente reciproce, sã ne unim cu Vechiul Regat spre a forma Noua Românie. Cînd am vãzut în ce mîini necompetente, pesti politici ai fanariotilor, este depusã soarta poporului român aici, m-am retras scîrbit. Bãrbatii nostri cred cã marile probleme politice se rezolvã prin discursuri frumoase, fraze alese, alegorii patriotice si ditirambe poetice."

Update : acest post a fost publicat si pe Phoenix Transylvania.

Charlton Heston Obituary

2008-04-26T18:52:00.004+02:00

Another great obituary from the one an only Steven Colbert (here's the one dedicated to Gary Gygax). This time it's Charlton Heston's turn to get the Repor's RIP :

"They did not even need a camera to make those movies. They would just hold
up a film canister and his performance would stick to it."

And Ted Turner thinks we will soon become cannibals.

Presedintele Basescu si Educatia

2008-04-23T22:34:00.006+02:00

Acest articol de pe site-ul BBC despre cel mai recent discurs al preşedintelui Traian Basescu despre sistemul de învăţământul preuniversitar din Romania (discursul integral pe site-ul presedentiei) îmi provoacă câteva reacţii inevitabile. Sa luam pe rând :

Discriminarea pe piaţa de munca

Calitatea învăţământului calificată drept slabă de către preşedinte va conduce la o discriminare pe piaţa de muncă europeană a romanilor formaţi in sistemul educaţional romanesc. O piaţa a muncii concurenţială nu discrimineaza la angajare in funcţie de nivelul de educaţie. Obiectivul angajatorului de a-si maximiza profitul îl conduce automat pe acesta către recrutarea persoanelor cu productivitate ridicata, ceea ce poate fi rezultatul unui nivel de studii mai avansat - sau invers, nivelul avansat de studii al unui individ este un semnal al capacităţii acestuia de a fi mai productiv. Preocuparea pieţei de munca nu este de a discrimina ci de a selecţiona in funcţie de productivitate, iar faptul ca exista diferenţe de productivitate legate de nivelul sau calitatea studiilor depinde exclusiv de furnizorul serviciilor educaţionale respective. In România acesta este in mare măsura sistemul de învăţământul public.

Copiii maghiari si limba româna

Preşedintele afirma ca "separarea copiilor români de copiii maghiari în judeţe cu populaţie romă şi maghiară a creat un handicap uriaş pentru copiii maghiari", aceasta separare conducând la o mai proastă cunoaştere a limbii romane de către copiii maghiari, ceea ce ulterior le oferă mai puţine şanse pe piaţa de munca din România. Cum spuneam in urma cu un an, problema cunoaşterii limbii romane de către maghiari în România nu are nimic de-a face cu mixitatea şcolilor - ea este asigurata si exista cam peste tot - ci mai degrabă cu metoda de predare a limbii si civilizaţiei romane, la fel cum bias-urile romanilor legate de maghiari sunt legate in mare parte de lipsa totala a predării limbii si civilizaţiei maghiare in şcolile româneşti. Il mai citez inca o data pe Frunda György : "Orice maghiar care are putina minte si vrea sa se afirme e conştient ca nu poate face nimic fără sa vorbească bine romana."

Copiii romi si şcoala

Poziţia preşedintelui in ceea ce priveşte nivelul şcolarizării in rândurile populaţiei rome :

"Problema trebuie căutată la părinţi în primul rând, acolo unde, din punct de vedere cultural, mersul la şcoală nu este o prioritate. Sigur, nu trebuie să generalizăm pentru toate familiile de romi".

Cam acelaşi discurs exista si in Franţa in privinţa copiilor provenind din familiile magrebiene in contextul revoltelor din periferiile marilor oraşe de acum 3 ani - si dezbaterea s-a terminat in coada de peste. Acesta este probabil punctul cel mai delicat pentru ca este cel mai dificil de abordat. Întrebările principale sunt 1) cum aduci un copil dintr-o familie roma la scoală si 2) cum îl faci sa rămână in sistemul educaţional astfel încât sa ii permită sa se dezvolte si sa evolueze. Aceasta in cazul in care într-adevăr sistemul educaţional ii poate oferi copilului provenit dintr-o familie roma o perspectiva de succes personal mai solida decât ceea ce i se oferă in propria comunitate. Aici mă hazardez necunoscând extrem de bine subiectul, dar am tendinţa sa cred ca nu e atât de mult o chestiune de cultura - roma in acest caz, deşi contra exemple exista, rămâne totuşi de cuantificat exact partea de influenta a culturii - ci mai degrabă una de statut social. Unui copil rom dintr-o familie săracă, integrarea in sistemul educaţional îi poate oferi perspective mai bune decât ceea ce i s-ar fi oferit in cadrul familiei, unui copil rom dintr-o familie deja înstărită probabil ca nu. E o chestiune de target probabil.

Orarul elevilor, orarul profesorilor

In final ajung la poziţia dlui. Basescu fata de orarul profesorilor vs. orarul elevilor :

"dumneavoastră, în condiţiile în care ştiu că trebuie să vă pregătiţi acasă lecţiile pentru o bună calitate a predării, deci mai aveţi nişte ore acasă, dar, totuşi, aveţi 16 - 18 ore de muncă pe săptămână. Câte ore au copiii? Şase ori cinci? Treizeci. Deci, hai să fim cinstiţi! De ce un copil poate fi ţinut în bancă şase ore pe zi, în timp ce un dascăl nu poate să predea mai mult de patru ore pe zi, dar două ore pe zi? Dar copilul poate sta şase ore, îi dăm şi teme pentru a doua zi."

E absolut justificata preocuparea pentru felul in care copiii sunt solicitaţi de sistemul de învăţământ actual, dar felul in care este pusă in lumina, in opoziţie cu numărul de ore de clasa ale unui profesor e denudeaza de orice conţinut si o transforma in demagogie curata. Probabil ca numărul de ore predate de către un profesor in învăţământul preuniversitar pe săptămâna este inferior fata de numărul de ore de curs la care asista un elev in aceeaşi perioada de timp, dar la ce concluzii exact conduce aceasta constatare? Părerea mea este ca la nu prea multe. Cu tot efortul dlui. preşedinte de a admite orele de pregătire necontabilizate ale profesorilor, tot ajunge sa îi stigmatizeze pe aceştia pentru numărul redus de ore predate pe săptămâna, 16 - 18, ceea înseamnă 3 - 4 ore pe zi. Daca luam exemple concrete, acele 3 - 4 ore sunt disparate intre ora 8 si 14, deci cu câteva ore de pauza, ferestre in care profesorii îşi ocupa timpul cum pot, probabil unii merg la shopping, la centrul de înfrumuseţare sau la respirat aer curat in sânul naturii, probabil unii le folosesc pentru a corecta extemporale, sau a se ocupa de treburi administrative legate de funcţia lor in scoală sau activităţi extra curiculare, alţii le folosesc probabil pentru a-si pregăti ora ce urmează. Alţii sunt probabil atât de prinşi de treburile scolii/clasei la care sunt diriginte încât ajung sa corecteze extemporale si sa pregătească lecţiile de a doua zi seara acasă, alţii corectează extemporale in timpul orelor de curs. Concluzia e simpla : în loc de a stigmatiza profesorii într-un mod simplist pentru numărul de ore de curs pe care le au e absolut necesara includerea activităţilor profesionale (pregatire, corectare de extemporale etc.) realizate de catre profesori inafara orelor de curs in timpul contabilizat drept timp de lucru. Abia atunci vom avea o viziune corecta asupra timpului total alocat profesiei sale de către un profesor si in final al costului sau orar, altfel e demagogie. Alt subiect foarte interesant, cum calculam timpul necesar pe care un elev trebuie sa îl dedice scolii in învăţământul preuniversitar, care e numărul de ore optimal si cum trebuie împărţit el intre cursuri si teme? In alte sisteme de învăţământ copiii rămân la şcoală mai târziu decât in Romania, pana la 16:00 sau 17:00, dar in acest timp intra si temele pentru a doua zi, iar rămânând in cadrul scolii pot fi ajutaţi de profesori.

Si profesorii...

Ca si bilanţ de final, ar mai fi o multitudine de lucruri de spus, dar vad un lucru care lipseşte cu desăvârşire din discursul preşedintelui, preocuparea fata de profesori. Si mă gândesc in primul rand la incentives-uri, nu transpare deloc din discursul sau felul in care profesorii vor fi stimulaţi (si nu in ultimul rand financiar) înspre a forma elevi cu rezultate mai bune. Vorbeşte despre o educaţie naţională orientata către atingerea unor obiective de performanta, nu vorbeşte in schimb despre cum vor fi determinate si calculate aceste obiective, felul in care profesorii vor fi stimulaţi in atingerea acestor obiective si modalităţile de control care vor fi impuse pentru a se asigura respectarea regulilor pentru atingerea obiectivelor. Nu am văzut nici un cuvânt despre ameliorarea procesului de formare a profesorilor pentru învăţământul preuniversitar si deocamdată marii furnizori de profesori sunt universităţile de stat, deci ele ar trebui sa fie primele care sa răspundă exigentelor de calitate impuse educaţiei naţionale, de unde si întrebare ce stimuli au ele pentru a forma profesori competenţi? Un alt subiect neabordat de preşedinte, învăţământul privat.

Colaterale

Il vad pe Cristian Banu vorbind despre orarul profesorilor si cel al elevilor. La fel si preşedintele. Poate eşti citit de consilierii prezidenţiali, Cristian:) Poate nu. Oricare ar fi răspunsul, de ce ramai la o abordare atât de superficiala, simplista si contraproductiva? Pana la urma chiar si Traian Basescu a afirmat ca problema n-ar fi cele 6 ore pe care le petrec copiii la scoală, ci felul in care le utilizează.

Ultima remarca : se vede ca in România nu preşedintele dicteaza politica publica ci guvernul, iar din toată dezbaterea pe marginea invatamatului public reiese clar ca lipseşte o autoritate care sa se angajeze într-o reforma cu obligativitatea unui rezultat si sa si-l asume. Iar de aceasta data deduc din discursul preşedintelui ca problema nu pare sa fie finanţarea ci absenta creierelor competente care sa folosească banii eficient.

What I've been watching lately

2008-04-21T23:18:00.004+02:00

The Corporation. I've actually seen only half of it this evening and decided to leave the other half for later. The first half is widely unbalanced towards "the evil that corporations do", mostly exclusively emphasizing the negative externalities and making CEO's explanations of the rationale behind a corporation's activity sound like a lunatic madman's assault on the welfare of the world. I don't find any incentive to watch the second half but just for the sake of having a complete overview of their standpoint I'll do it.
The Trap : What Happened to our Freedom, a BBC documentary series. If you are in search for a more balanced approach of the 20th century macroeconomics I advise you to skip to the next paragraph. Although this documentary features some very interesting interviews with scientists from different fields (economics, anthropology, psychology etc.) - my favorite one was with John Nash - discussing different factors that modeled - and sometimes altered - the perception of individual liberty in modern society, I definitely hate filmed material that uses irrational stimulus mechanisms - like emotionally engaging music and images - to propagate the idea that we are all living in a trap that limits our individual freedom based on a model that some powerful politicians try to impose us. As rational beings we should be capable to judge by ourselves to which extent the system limits our freedom.
Commanding Heights : The Battle for the World Economy, a PBS documentary in 3 parts, of which the first part is my favorite one, describing the battle of ideas between the economic currents inspired by economists John Maynard Keynes and Friedrich Hayek during the first half of the 20th century. The second part and the third one describe how economic policies in different countries throughout the world have been shaped during the entire 20th century by these two currents of thought. As in any filmed material, the power of the image is channeled to push through a central idea while omitting to give an honest account of the opposite points of view, but compared to the previous two documentaries I find this one to be the most balanced one.

Some Optimism for Italy

2008-04-21T22:43:00.003+02:00

Given Silvio Berlusconi's record during his two mandates as Italy's prime minister, hearing that he has just been elected for a third non consecutive one gives little reason to hope that anything will be fixed in that country in the short term. Therefore the words of Domenico Siniscalco - former minister of finance under Mr Berlusconi in 2004 and currently vice-chairman of Morgan Stanley Europe - about Italy's future in an interview given to The Economist's Certain Ideas of Europe blog are of a surprising but welcomed optimism. He basically asserts that Italy has hit rock bottom - or at least is very close to reaching it - so reform is inevitable and will be done, whatever the government.

The big question remains whether Mr. Berlusconi will be the man leading the much needed reform, whether he'll use wisely the "état de grace" following his election as prime minister, something our favorite MiB failed to do. Big, very big question and judging by his first initiative as prime minister to favor Aeroflot over Air France KLM in acquiring Alitalia, the long term answer is very unlikely to be a favorable one. But this leads me to another troubling question, are we here in France waiting to hit rock bottom also in order to actually do something? Fortunately I'd say that I see more initiative towards reform but Speedy Gonzales is far from being that speedy - speedy, not hasty.

Good Night and Good Luck

2008-04-13T22:54:00.002+02:00

An intellectually elegant stand of Milton Friedman on limited government on Google Video.

Viva la revolucion

2008-04-09T23:53:00.003+02:00

"Even when you spend your whole life combating the forces of capitalism, you still might wind up on a t-shirt sold in a store owned by the Gap." (details here)

A Nice Reminder

2008-04-09T23:33:00.003+02:00

A note on pessimistic bias :

"Problems come; problems are solved. Inability to see the details of the future scare many people; this inability doesn't scare me. As long as individuals have a sufficient quantum of freedom, their self-interest and creativity and inevitable competition will "solve" almost any problem over the long-haul.
[...]
Being optimistic doesn't mean being blindly insistent that the future will always be better than today. Take away enough freedom and, kaboom!, the economy implodes. (Or should I instead say "moobak!"?) Fortunately, though, the capitalist economy is so remarkably robust that it can take lots of beatings -- lots of interventions -- lots of unnecessary taxation -- lots of foolish dissing -- and keep on keeping on at raising living standards."

Mrs. Pelosi, come on, it's counter productive!

Change-t-elle la douce France?

2008-04-05T20:23:00.004+02:00

Je lis qu'il y aurait un politicien socialiste Français qui affirme que la hausse du salaire minimum crée du chômage.

Links for Today

2008-04-01T23:07:00.005+02:00

No more gifts for Czech doctors, an interesting post on Certain ideas of Europe. It speaks about a recent measure adopted by the Czech government which consists of charging patients with a small sum, roughly 1 euro, for visits to publicly funded doctors. This is aimed at discouraging people from "bothering the GP" with every tiny health problem they may encounter, which might be easily solved with a quick visit to the local drugstore. Ultimately this leads to lower costs for the national health care system. But it is the final part of the comment that made me relate to the current situation in the health care system in Romania, where small gifts to doctors are still a current practice for assuring the quality of the treatment. Interesting thoughts.

"One unexpected effect has been a sudden collapse in the tradition of bringing a small gift —some food or drink, often—to the doctor, as a sort of unspoken micro-bribe to ensure good care. Now, it seems, patients feel that as they are paying a fee, service should be included, as it were."

Some genuine econ fun by the world's first and only Standup Economist, Yoram Bauman, on YouTube : decoding Gregory Mankiw's Ten Principles of Economics. It is definitely worth 5 minutes of your time:)))

"Now notice the final two. 'Governments are stupid' and 'governments aren't that stupid' follow immediately from principle 5 and it's translation, 'trade can make everyone better off, why the heck do we need government for?'. But if 'trade can make everyone worse off' we'd better have a government to stop people from trading."

A short but comprehensive review of French football manager Arsene Wenger's 10 years at Arsenal F.C. published in 2006 by BBC Sport. One thing strikes me as obvious, unlike Italy (Carlo Ancelotti, Fabio Capello, Marcelo Lippi) , France (Arsene Wenger, Raymond Domenech, Aimé Jacquet) or Germany (Franz Beckenbauer, Otto Rehhagel, Ottmar Hitzfeld), England doesn't have world class football managers, even though it has world class players - of which my favorite is Liverpool FC captain Steven Gerrard. One should try to correlate this with the poor performances of the English national soccer team, I think I'm not that far from the answer. Lately even Portugal did much better than England in the international competitions and they have the infamous Jose Murinho on their record:)

I found a wallpaper for my Windows desktop at work. I don't really like having a beautiful and worthy to watch wallpaper because after I put it on, it's only a matter of hours until my desktop becomes overcrowded with very important and urgent to handle files, folders, shortcuts, stickies and anything else you can imagine, so you can't see shit. But this time I found THE wallpaper which will keep my desktop clean, Chuck Schuldiner's superbly crafted guitar from the very nice Chuck Schuldiner tribute website by B. C. Rich. RIP Chuck and take care of my desktop:)

Of Countdown Timers at Traffic Lights. Of Cluj and Taiwan.

2008-03-22T19:23:00.004+01:00

Via the Freakonomics blog, some interesting results about the impact that countdown timers installed at traffic lights in intersections in Taiwan have upon the number of accidents and injuries :

"A research institute within Taiwan’s Ministry of Transportation released a report showing that at 187 intersections which had the timers installed, those that counted down the remaining time on green lights saw a doubling in the number of reported accidents, with a 33 percent increase in the number of injuries, while those that counted down until a red light turned green saw a halving in both the number of reported accidents and injuries. Intersection that had both red and green light timers saw a 19 percent increase in reported accidents and a 23 percent increase in injuries."

My thoughts went instantly to the identical timers installed in intersections in my hometown of Cluj, Transylvania, a city with an unadapted infrastructure to the daily hellish car traffic. I always thought that these timers have a positive impact by reducing the drivers' frustration and in a sense regulating traffic discipline. The traffic still sucks but at least you know how much you have to wait at the traffic light. On the other hand some people might take it as a 100% guarantee that when the counter is down to zero the road is clear and they can push the accelerator pedal down to the floor. I don't know of similar studies in Cluj - I think they're badly needed - but the results from Taiwan should be looked into by my hometown's municipality. One thing is sure, regulating traffic in intersections is far from being a global solution to improving traffic conditions in overcrowded cities - taxing inner city access might also work provided the adequate infrastructure to avoid it exists - but it seems to have it's own benefits in certain conditions.

Bring Back the 80's Speed Metal

2008-03-20T18:11:00.003+01:00

A link I received today from a friend. Metallic, funny and a bit nostalgic. Just brilliant!

Barack Obama on Race in the U.S.

2008-03-19T23:17:00.005+01:00

The speech on racial issues in the United States that Barack Obama gave yesterday in Philadelphia is definitely one for the history books. You can watch the video feed accompanied by the animated transcript on the New York Times website.

As an external viewer unable to grasp the entire complexity of the racial issue in the United States I don't really see exactly to how much extent - if any at all - Mr. Obama played the racial card just to make believe he was not doing it at all. Maybe not that much. Also the repeated anti profit-driven-corporate-America message underlying the union of the races raises some serious doubts about Mr. Obama's actions in the case he wins the presidential race.

This being said - and again, as an external viewer - I am left with the feeling that Mr. Obama's view of race related difficulties people encounter in their everyday life is a complete and honest one. He doesn't leave anybody behind - be they blacks, whites or browns - and emphasizes better education as a means to overcoming racial bias. He is also a breathtaking speaker, your critical spirit as a listener is being constantly challenged by his capacity of embarking you on the Obama flow at any time (not a small temptation at all). I think this speech is a decisively winning one for him in the perspective of the Democrat primaries in Philadelphia next month, but on a national level it remains to be seen. It's not yet clear for me whether the racial issue in the U.S. still has the anvergure that Mr. Obama gave to it in his speech, but he definitely scored some major points with yesterday's speech.

Barack Obama's approach on race and ethnic diversity is not an exclusively American one, it can easily be applied - if correctly adjusted - to the French society. We just need politicians with more guts and and a less socialist mind frame. Is MiB one of them? Sadly not, at least not for now.

Atheist Clubs. Thanks But No Thanks.

2008-03-19T21:34:00.006+01:00

I have just discovered that a fellow blogger included Buffer Overflow on a "Promoters of Reason" - also called "Brother at Arms" - list of blogs promoting atheism if my understanding is correct. Another fellow blogger included Buffer Overflow on a similar list of blogs which if you visit you commit a capital sin - put in an ironic and cynical way, of course. And all this because of this post I recently wrote on what I called an embryonic form of intelligent atheism in the Romanian blogosphere.

As much as I appreciate readers finding topics worthy of their interest on my blog, I must kindly decline the offer of joining the kind of pro-atheist clubs as the ones I found my blog included into without my consent and I gently ask their promoters to remove me from them. And this for multiple reasons. The first one is that religion - and religious people - bashing is not on the menu here, it doesn't require a great effort of reading to realize that this blog doesn't promote anti-theism or militant atheism. The second reason is that I don't particularly endorse the breed of militant atheism I stumble upon in many productions of the Romanian blogosphere fueled by the legitimate rejection of the religious conservatism that is increasingly manifesting itself in Romanian society. At this point of it's evolution I don't really see it as a rational process, hence the word "embryonic" I used to qualify a rather singular moderate and rational view of things. The third reason is that when I pick up a fight I pick it by myself on what I consider as a strong basis, hence it is not necessary for others to do it for me. And definitely this is not the kind of fight I'm interested in:) Therefore thanks but no thanks. Cheers!

A Singularity in Metal

2008-03-13T22:19:00.003+01:00

That's exactly what the next Pyramaze album entitled "Immortal" will be. It is a one time collaboration of the Danish band with singer Matthew Barlow which also marks his comeback into Metal after a long hiatus. Given the quality of the short lived ensemble the expectations are high and I can now peacefully say that the long expectation was well worth it. "Now" means after a fourth listening of the two excerpts from Immortal published today on the Pyramaze website, "Year of the Phoenix" and "Caramon's Poem". Great stuff, cannot wait for the entire album.

And a quick review. The instrumental part is flawless as usual, the Danes set high standards with their two previous albums - "Melancholy Beast" and "Legend of the Bone Carver" - and they deliver bigtime, their brand of exquisite epic power prog gets better and better with every note. The vocals. The first spin was a little frustrating because it was only then that I realized what a heavy mark Lance King has left on the Pyramaze sound. Quite strange, isn't it? But as with every new Pyramaze song, you don't really get right the first time so you need to try harder. And after a while it hit me how well Matt Barlow fits in. His voice simply flows along with the music in a much lower tone than Lance King's performance transforming the elvish-like storytelling into a much heavier, powerful and emotional experience, the ultimate Barlow trademark. So go for it... as soon as it comes out:)

Two Links About Children

2008-03-11T13:34:00.009+01:00

A deliriously funny spoof news report on outsourcing child care overseas:

"The system is not without it's problems, however. In June, Patricia Nattings of Omaha, Nebraska, incorrectly wrote her ZIP code causing little Kimberly Nattings to spend nearly three weeks lost in the mail."

(via Greg Mankiw)

Another funny one comes from an article in the New Yourk Times on the never ending subject of naming children :

"But even if a bad name doesn’t doom a child, why would any parent christen an infant Ogre? Mr. Sherrod found several of them, along with children named Ghoul, Gorgon, Medusa, Hades, Lucifer and every deadly sin except Gluttony (his favorite was Wrath Gordon).

You can sort of understand parents’ affection for the sound of Chimera Griffin, but Monster Moor and Goblin Fester? Or Cheese Ceaser and Leper Priest? What provokes current celebrities to name their children Sage Moonblood Stallone and Speck Wildhorse Mellencamp?"

(via Tyler Cowen)

Toata lumea vorbeste despre CFR Cluj

2008-03-10T23:51:00.003+01:00

Toată lumea fiind Stefan Beldie într-o analiza foarte buna despre starea echipei in contextul campionatului de fotbal din Romania si Andy H care aduce culoarea regionala specifica lui.

Mai rămân 12 meciuri in campionat si orice se poate întâmpla, dar CFR Cluj rămâne deocamdată cea mai serioasă pretendenta pentru titlul de campioana echivalent cu o calificare directa in grupele UEFA Champions League din sezonul următor. Preocupările mele sunt altele. Care vor fi obiectivele CFR-ului in sezonul următor? Calificarea in optimile Champions League este foarte improbabila, in schimb calificarea in Cupa UEFA si realizarea unui bun parcurs in aceasta competiţie pare un obiectiv mult mai realist. Ce se va alege de pe urma tinerei echipe a CFR-ului construita in acest sezon la finalul sezonului următor? Daca rezultatele vor fi bune, multi dintre actualii jucători vor fi probabil tentaţi sa plece in cluburi europene mai puternice cu un beneficiu financiar net atât de partea lor cat si de partea CFR-ului, plecări in urma cărora clubul va fi nevoit sa se reconstruiască si aceasta va însemna probabil achiziţionarea altor jucători cu eforturi financiare importante. Strategia lui Paszkany Arpad nu merge deocamdată in direcţia construirii unui centru de formare puternic la Cluj, investiţie costisitoare dar care ar asigura un pool de jucători tineri si buni indispensabil performantei sportive pe termen lung. Dar deocamdată strategia lui da rezultate mai mult decât satisfăcătoare, dovada ca este bine gandita si bine pusă in practică. Rămâne de văzut ce se va întâmpla de acum încolo.

Perla zilei

2008-03-10T22:05:00.004+01:00

Semnata Sorin Ionita in Evenimentul Zilei.

"Nu-mi fac, de asemenea, iluzia că publicul majoritar ar putea înţelege principiul economic elementar, dar contraintuitiv, că preţul final pe piaţa concurenţială nu e decis de producători şi costurile lor, ci de puterea de cumpărare a consumatorilor. Dacă noi am fi dispuşi să plătim mai mult, de mâine preţurile ar sălta instantaneu, în ciuda lacrimilor de crocodil vărsate în conferinţe de presă."

Sorin Ionita nu vede decât jumătate din realitate, cea in care deplasarea curbei cererii in sensul in care consumatorii ar fi dispuşi sa plătească mai mult pentru aceeaşi cantitate, preturile ar creste. Dar nu doar preturile ar creste ci atât producţia cat si cantitatea vândută, ceea creează beneficiu atât producătorilor cat si consumatorilor. Rămâne de văzut daca o astfel de schimbare ar fi punctuala sau de lunga durata, de ce ar fi ea determinata si la ce produse se aplica. In schimb cealaltă jumătate ignorata de Sorin Ionita s-ar putea exprima astfel : daca condiţiile de producţie ar evolua in sensul in care producătorii ar fi dispuşi sa producă mai mult la acelaşi preţ atunci cantitatea vândută ar creste si preţul ar scădea, chiar daca unii producători ar ieşi din business, activitatea devenindu-le nerentabila. Deci cererea si oferta stabilesc împreuna preţul pieţei maximizând surplusul total, cel al producătorilor si consumatorilor luat împreuna. Daca cineva s-ar obosi sa explice corect si pedagogic publicului majoritar mecanismul cererii si ofertei atunci fenomenul nu ar mai parea atât de contraintuitiv.

Următoarea oprire, dezbaterea despre preţul alimentelor care ii are in centru pe producători, procesatori si vânzători. Cred ca un rol important îl are starea precara a agriculturii româneşti care face ca multi dintre producători sa nu poate produce suficient de mult astfel încât sa fie rentabili la preţul actual al pieţei. Scăderea protecţionismului odată cu intrarea in Uniunea Europeana are si partea sa de influenta, deşi probabil tocmai agricultorii ar trebui sa fie primii beneficiari de pe urma aderării si implicit a Politicii Agricole Comune.

An Embryonic Form of Intellingent Atheism in Romania

2008-03-08T20:02:00.007+01:00

Among the various manifestations of atheism I came across in Romania, the one expressed by Costi Rogozanu - journalist and literary critic - is one of the most reasonable and articulate ones. He quotes English novelist Ian McEwan in an interview to The New Republic :

"I think it is important that people with no religious beliefs speak up and speak for what they value. It is a bit of a problem, the title "Atheist"--no one really wants to be defined by what they do not believe in. We haven't yet settled on a name, but you wouldn't expect a Baptist minister to go around calling himself an "aDarwinist". But it is crucial that people who do not have a sky god and don't have a set of supernatural beliefs assert their belief in moral values and in love and in the transcendence that they might experience in landscape or art or music or sculpture or whatever. Since they do not believe in an afterlife, it makes them give more valence to life itself."

to sum up his view in the following phrase :

"it is not the anti-God attitude which fundamentally characterizes an atheist (that is if he is a rational individual), but rather the decision to dedicate himself to the immediate palpable values, to analyzing himself and the others"

A very elegant argument by McEwan and a nice conclusion by Rogozanu. "Atheist" is an unfitted word to describe such a person, "humanist" would be much more accurate. Indeed, if one's goal were to narrow one's artistic spectrum only to productions without religious connotation, then he would miss a big part of what human nature is all about, which is not a true humanist's approach.

Side note : As you all know, my favorite form of atheism - for now I have to use this unfortunate word since "humanism" hasn't yet gained enough momentum during the last 5 minutes - is satanism which basically is atheism with a dark sense of humor (in the words of Akercocke).

Whose Voters are More Rational

2008-03-08T15:48:00.003+01:00

I guess Mrs. Clinton's, the "beer-track" Democrats as they are portrayed in this week's issue of The Economist magazine in the Lexington column, Obamaworld versus Hillaryland. Unlike the unselfish supporters of Mr. Obama, the "wine-track" Democrats, Hillary Clinton's followers seem more inclined to follow their own interest when they cast their vote.

Gary Gygax Obituary

2008-03-08T14:44:00.003+01:00

A nice RIP to Gary Gygax, inventor of Dungeons & Dragons, from the one and only Steven Colbert :

"May you prismatic spray always bypass your target's reflex saving throw."

Manchester United - Olympique Lyonnais

2008-03-04T21:31:00.003+01:00

At halftime Manchester United leads 1 - 0 in today's match against Olympique Lyonnais. My usual reaction in moments like these is to quote Winston Churchill and as an immediate consequence to think to Iron Maiden's Aces High. Except that right now I'm not doing any of these since I'm blogging:)

" We shall not flag nor fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France and on the seas and oceans; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills. We shall never surrender."

Update : Nothing changed during the second half. Anybody knows a victory song for when you lose?:)

Links for Today

2008-03-03T21:08:00.014+01:00

Buffer Overflow has been elected on a shortlist along with 78 other blogs to compete in the Best Romanian Blog section of RoBlogFest 2008 awards. Unlike in the similar section which is open to public voting, the winner in this one will be elected by a jury. This is a decisive step forward in turning RoBlogFest into something more than a popularity contest with the remark that there is a lack of visibility over the jury's evaluation criteria. Thanks a bunch for the nomination and good luck to me:)
Via Greg Mankiw, a very interesting article in the New York Times about the mechanism of informational cascades which contributed to the housing bubble and led experts into failing to anticipate it - although I cannot imagine experts being completely unaware of the phenomenon.
Senator John McCain scores some good points on NAFTA (check out this video on YouTube recorded before the Iowa primaries) unlike Barack Obama. At least the guy is trying to be reasonable, some loose their jobs because of free trade but the overall benefits of buying foreign-made goods at a lower price is much more important and the loss of jobs can be balanced through training and education for the local needs. He also found a new line of attack on Obama which links NAFTA to Canada's military support in Afghanistan, very nice move Mr. McCain (via Greg Mankiw).
Transylvanian Black Metal will be represented at this year's Wacken Open Air festival by Negura Bunget from Timisoara. They will also be playing at the Summer Breeze festival which I attended last year. Kudos guys, very nice achievement. Although I'm not exactly up to date with their latest albums - from 2000 onwards - I am still seduced by their first release in 1996 under the name of Negura Bunget, Zîrnindu-să. It was mind blowing! I remember I was like "Where do these guys come from?" the first time I listened to the tape. The album is a masterpiece of classic Black Metal, fast paced drumming, raw guitars, foggy corpse painted figures roaming on the misty hill tops of Transylvania, barely listenable poor production and on top of that cryptic lyrics written in a difficultly comprehensible form of old (maybe middle-aged) Romanian language. As a kid the overall feeling I got from listening to this album was the revival of a long lost form of Romanian pagan culture which once extended beyond the grim boundaries of those years' nationalistic and religious orthodox exuberance. I guess it's not that far from the excitement of a Norwegian kid when listening for the first time to Darkthrone or Mayhem, but my gateway into Black Metal was Negura Bunget. Today Negura Bunget's artistic expression has evolved into a much more articulate form of esoteric mysticism which makes them far less appealing even if their music still preserves some raw Black Metal elements. When people take these things too seriously they suddenly loose all their fun. Nonetheless, Zîrnindu-să remains a landmark album in the Romanian Black Metal scene, so I encourage you to listen the keyboard enhanced version of Dupre Reci Imbre on the band's MySpace page. I'm anxious to seeing them at Wacken.
Another excellent news coming from the 2008 Wacken Open Air festival is the participation of the godfathers of Progressive (Death) Metal, Cynic. There's no better review than that on Satan Stole My Teddybear which reflects what the band's only album, Focus (1993), stands for in the Metal world : "To call this act 'technical' would be a cruel understatement; Focus sounds like three Dream Theater discs playing simultaneously, if John Petrucci had six arms and a four-neck guitar (okay that's not entirely fair - Cynic have TWO guitars). There are polyrhythms and time-changes shooting about everywhere, stabilized by a healthy jazz/fusion influence and an obvious understanding on how to blend these clashing styles into a coherent intellectual trip even the musical layman can appreciate". So here is the Cynic classic How Could I from a live performance from 2007 (in front of a rather small crowd) and also the brand new Evolutionary Sleeper which has the full potential of turning the Metal world upside down once again. Kudos to Paul Masvidal on guitars and Sean Reinert on drums. Update : This is the brutal one, Uroboric Forms, and the intricate one, Textures.

Single-Sex Public Education

2008-02-29T22:11:00.004+01:00

An excellent and quite extensive piece on single-sex education in public schools in the U.S. in the New York Times newspaper. While there is a lack of scientific support to generalize single-sex education in the public school system, it seems like it works quite well in particular social environments. What is less clear is the extent to which neurological gender differences support it. Personally - read "based on purely subjective observations" - I think that in the particular cases where single-sex education has better academic outcomes that coed education, it seems to apply more to pupils in their early age and that with the coming of age coed education is far more preferable. Another observation I would like to make is that the article doesn't speak that much - rather not at all - about the possible downsides of single-sex education.

One thing that struck me in the article was the American public education system. While far from being a fully functional one, this particular example of single-sex education proves that in certain aspects the U.S. public education system offers enough space for experimentation in teaching models. This is a rare quality among public policies which must be safeguarded from any legislator's enthusiasm to impose a supposedly uniformly applicable model.

In the end I quote one of the final paragraphs of the article as it's final conclusion. But the seven previous pages definitely worth 30 minutes of your spare tame (or less if you're a fast reader, unlike me).

"That certainly appears to be the case for single-sex schools. The data do not suggest that they’re clearly better for all kids. Nor do they suggest that they’re worse. The most concrete findings from the research on single-sex schools come from studies of Catholic schools, which have a long history of single-sex education, and suggest that while single-sex schools may not have much of an impact on the educational achievement of white, middle-class boys, they do measurably benefit poor and minority students. According to Riordan, disadvantaged students at single-sex schools have higher scores on standardized math, reading, science and civics tests than their counterparts in coed schools. There are two prevailing theories to explain this: one is that single-sex schools are indeed better at providing kids with a positive sense of themselves as students, to compete with the antiacademic influences of youth culture; the other is that in order to end up in a single-sex classroom, you need to have a parent who has made what educators call “a pro-academic choice.” You need a parent who at least cares enough to read the notices sent home and go through the process of making a choice — any choice."

Links for Today

2008-02-27T22:51:00.003+01:00

Who pays the VAT. A nice article in French published on the Ecopublix blog which brings nothing new and revolutionary, rather is explicit and elegant.
LOLCat Bible. Funny as hell, excellent for reading in small bits when you have 5 minutes to spare during the day. Genuine fun which beats any religious vs. atheist gritty confrontation. Here's the excellent section about Proof of Ceiling Cat and one of the very good awgooments not for Ceiling Cat :

"If Ceiling Cat wuz reel, He iz gud kitteh nd haz teh powerz to pwn evrywun. But if Ceiling Cat wuz gud kitteh, then He wants all teh kittehs to haz cheezburger. Nd if Ceiling Cat has powerz to pwn evrywun, He haz powerz tu gives all teh kittehs cheezburger. But sum kittehs no has cheezburger. :'( So Ceiling Cat iz not reel.
(Sum n00bs say this iz becoz Ceiling Cat gived us Free Will, and teh reel reason some kittehs no has cheezburger is becoz other kittehs yuze Free Willz tu steel cheezburger and eaten it--not Ceiling Cat's fault! But this splaination not plausibling: everycat knowz that cheezburger iz better than Free Will. kthxbye)"

Frica de a utiliza cuvantul "etnic"

2008-02-27T20:49:00.003+01:00

Intro

Cei doi Sorini (Adam Matei si Ionita) vorbesc din nou despre autonomie si descentralizare in Romania. Primul in Adevarul, Autonomia starpeste separatismul, iar al doilea in Evenimentul Zilei, Care e problema cu autonomia. Discursul fiecăruia este centrat pe ideea de descentralizare administrativa a României, o autonomie aplicata uniform pe întreg teritoriul tarii si care sa nu aibă caractere etnice. Ambii folosesc argumentul nesustenabilitatii economice al Secuimii ca potenţiala regiune autonoma pentru a susţine o alta schema de descentralizare decât cea pe criterii etnice, Sorin Adam Matei mergand chiar un pas mai departe introducând o doza de ideologie despre care nu vad prea bine ce loc îşi are in chestiune:

"singura garanţie a integrităţii teritoriale româneşti pe termen lung este numai introducerea unei reale autonomii locale. Una ce nu trebuie să fie înţeleasă în termeni etnici"

Este perfect de inţeles de ce ambii insista atât de mult pe eliminarea chestiunii etnice din discuţia despre descentralizare - cu excepţia afirmaţiei lui SAM citată de mine - e firewall-ul cel mai bun într-o opinie publica din România in care se manifesta majoritar doua tendinţe opuse : aversiunea fata de orice discurs care atinge pana si tangential considerente etnice/naţionale si tentaţia de a cădea prada discursurilor cu tente naţionaliste. Astfel ambii îşi asigura un safety net care le conferă o doza ridicată de credibilitate fata de restul mass-mediei. Nu înseamnă ca este si abordarea optimală.

Parerea mea

Atât afirmaţia lui Sorin Adam Matei despre "garanta integrităţii teritoriale româneşti" cat si argumentul nesustenabilitatii economice al lui Sorin Ionita resping ideea unei regiuni autonome Secuiesti organizata in jurul actualelor judeţe Harghita si Covasna si presupun o alta decupare regionala - care in acest caz precis ar consta probabil în includerea Sibiului si a Brasovului într-o regiune care sa conţină atât Harghita cat si Covasna. Mai mult, citindu-l pe SAM deduc ca în nici una din potenţialele regiuni ale unei Romanii descentralizate populaţia etnic majoritara nu ar trebui sa fie de alta etnie decât cea româna pentru ca in cazul in care ar exista una, atunci ar avea toate incentives-urile sa se desprindă din statul român - aici probabil Sorin ar argumenta ca ideea lui de românism se extinde dincolo de etnicii români si i-ar include si pe etnicii maghiari de exemplu, ceea ce tine de domeniul utopiei după părerea mea.

Aceasta perspectiva nu ar rezolva problema autodeterminării minorităţilor naţionale deloc, doar ar deplasa-o probabil pe un plan regional. Eu susţin dreptul minorităţilor naţionale istorice de a se autoguverna, ceea ce mă face sa cred ca o soluţie de autonomie locala tocmai bazata pe criterii etnice este de preferat si compatibila cu coexistenta într-un acelaşi stat federal cu o alta etnie pe baza unui acord semnat de ambele părţi. Dar un astfel de criteriu etnic se poate aplica in România doar regiunii Secuimii unde populaţia maghiara este compacta si majoritara, nu si restului Transilvaniei sau al tarii, in schimb criteriul acordului, contractului, da. Cum spuneam si cu o alta ocazie, in Cluj diversitatea etnica este un plus in crearea unei identitati regionale puternice, deci problema se pune complet diferit fata de Secuime. Alta dificultate a aplicării uniforme in toată România a aceluiaşi model de descentralizare o reprezintă regiunile frontaliere si mă gândesc aici in special la Banat. Banatul ca regiune este transfrontalier, cuprinzând atât părţi din România cat si din Ungaria si din Serbia.

Argumentul economic al lui Sorin Ionita împotriva autonomiei Secuimii pare mai serios. Zic pare pentru ca are doua falii interesante, prima fiind creată chiar de el in fraza de final : "dar dacă oamenii vor lua la un moment dat o decizie în cunoştinţă de cauză, ceea ce până acum nu s-a întâmplat, pe ce motiv am putea să le respingem noi opţiunea?". A doua, dar corelata cu prima : vorbim despre doua judeţe sărace din Romania, Harghita si Covasna, care rămân subdezvoltate economic in ciuda faptului ca pe planul bugetar se număra printre beneficiarele redistribuirii bugetare centralizate din România. In cazul autonomiei, how worse can it get? Prima reacţie ar fi necesitatea unei administraţii locale mai competente, inafara oricărei discuţii despre autonomie. A doua este legata de modalitatea prin care se ajunge la acest obiectiv. Deplasarea centrului de redistributie bugetara de la Bucuresti la Brasov nu rezolva problema, in schimb deplasarea centrului direct in Secuime ar însemna o presiune sporită asupra politicienilor locali din partea populaţiei locale. Adaug : pe criterii etnice. Aici intra in joc situaţia minorităţii romane din zona, ale carei drepturi pot fi garantate de "contractul" pe care s-ar baza statul federal.

Concluzie

Elementul etnic nu trebuie exclus din discuţia despre regionalizarea Romaniei - la fel ca si tema identitatii regionale. In special cand vine vorba despre Transilvania. Reprezinta un plus si in abordarea economica, un motiv in plus pentru a nu-l abandona. Iar din punctul meu de vedere in spatiul actual al statului national unitar românesc si indivizibil este loc din belsug pentru un stat federal construit pe baza unui contract care sa tina cont de întreaga diversitate etnica a regiunii.

Links for Today

2008-02-25T12:48:00.004+01:00

A great article in this week's The Economist magazine about Cuba's state of the nation in at the moment of Fidel Castro's leave from power, The comandante's last move. If you ever wondered what Romania was like back in 1989 - the year of the fall of the communist regime - then you will find in this article a quite accurate description even if it's about a country locate at the opposite side of the globe. There are numerous similarities, my favorite piece being the depiction of the underground economy which developed in a centrally planned communist state.
Judging by the winner of the Academy Award for Best Performance by and Actress in a Leading Role, Marion Cotillard, it seems like French culture is not dead yet. Personally I haven't seen the movie and I probably won't see it in the near future because my TODO list is already full, I just wanted you to know that I was waiting for a few good months to utter these words.

Nice comment

2008-02-20T21:39:00.003+01:00

As usual, a nice post (in Romanian) on Trafic de idei. This time it's an elegant argument about whether Kosovo's independence setting a precedent. It asserts that it's all about distinguishing the case of Kosovo. Definitely the best article on this subject I've read until now in the Romanian blogosphere, highly recommended.

Intriguing thought of the evening

2008-02-19T23:04:00.004+01:00

Why Turkey recognized the independence of the freshly born state of Kosovo and Romania didn't. Is it because of the Muslim majority in Kosovo, is it because of Turkey's EU accession aspirations or none of these? Romania's and Spain's positions are being correlated with the issues both countries have with their large national minorities. Is it just that or something else? Because Turkey too has issues with it's own Kurdish minority.

I guess you all see where I'm going. If the local national minorities are the only reason for Romania's refusal of recognizing Kosovo's independence, then the Turks painted a much better picture of themselves. Because the message sent by the Romanian state is that Kosovo's independence sets a dangerous precedent instead of that of a liberal state being capable of dealing with it's national minorities issues in a liberal manner. So it might well be that Romania's choice was not the intelligent one.

Daca nu criterii etnice atunci de care?

2008-02-18T22:06:00.005+01:00

Un punct de vedere personal asupra declarării independentei statului Kosovo, punct de vedere inspirat de cartea lui Will Kymlicka, Multicultural Citizenship : A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights.

In cazul rămânerii Kosovo-ului ca parte din Serbia, beneficiul conservării de către Serbia a teritoriului originar al naţiunii sârbe - beneficiu al majorităţii sârbe a ţarii - ar fi avut ca si cost lipsirea minorităţii albaneze - 1,9 milioane de persoane - de a avea la rândul ei un stat propriu. In situaţia actuala, beneficiul albanezilor de a exista într-un stat independent are ca si cost apariţia unei minorităţi naţionale de 150.000 de sârbi in noul stat Kosovo. In ambele cazuri, costurile si beneficiile sunt împărţite intre populaţii diferite, cifrele absolute sunt cele care diferă. In ceea ce priveşte dezvoltarea economica a regiunii - subiect cu totul înghiţit de chestiunile ideologice (oare cum altfel ar putea sa fie într-o astfel de situaţie când participanţii sunt mai degrabă iraţionali?) - se pare ca atât UE cat si U.S sunt dispuse sa pună umărul cu mai multa aplicare în această nouă configuraţie, un Kosovo independent. Revenind la titlul postului, daca diversitatea chiar are downside-uri reale - coeziune socială, colectarea taxelor etc. - soluţia nu mi se pare deloc asimilarea ci mai degrabă divizarea. Cu o remarca importanta, nu mă gândesc la orice fel de formă de diversitate - in ceea ce priveşte Clujul cred sincer că egalitatea în diversitate împărtăşită de toţi ar duce din contră la creşterea coeziunii pentru că ar permite închegarea unei identităţi regionale puternice, situaţie ce nu e valabilă pentru toate regiunile din Transilvania - ci doar la formele mai "adverse" de diversitate.

O observaţie de final, Will Kymlicka găseşte justificată intervenţia unui stat liberal - termenul liberal referindu-se in acest context la drepturile individului - într-un stat ne-liberal in sprijinirea unei minorităţi locale in adoptarea practicilor liberale împotriva status-quo-ului existent în momentul in care comunitatea respectivă manifestă o reala tendinţă in acest sens dar nu dispune de mijloacele necesare. In lumina istoriei recente a Kosovo-ului nu cred ca paralelismele sunt a wild leap of imagination.

Gandurile Metalheadului eclectic inainte de a vedea Rambo

2008-02-16T19:47:00.003+01:00

Absenta unei indentitati transilvane reprezinta prima piedica in imaginarea Transilvaniei ca parte dintr-o Romanie federala sau ca stat independent. Prima observatie critica : de ce Transilvania in sine ar exista ca si regiune delimitata admnistrativ sau ca un stat independent, de ce nu coboram la un nivel de segmentare suplimentar, Ardeal, Secuime, Banat etc. E o observatie perfect pertinenta, totul depinde de nivelul de granularitate al definitiei de identitate regionala, iar in momentul in care in Romania va exista intr-adevar un curent puternic al identitatii regionale - si aici nu ma rezum doar la Transilvania, la fel se poate vorbi despre Moldova, Muntenia, Oltenia etc. - vom vedea unde se stabilesc barierele. Deci il iau mai degaraba ca pe un exercitiu intelectual. Paradoxal imi pare faptul ca Transilvania are o imagine puternica peste tot inafara Transilvaniei (culturally biased or not, nu toti se uita la Dracula) dar daca ar fi sa ne punem - "sa sedem" ca in bancurile cu taranii ardeleni - sa o desenam ne-ar lipsi pana si creioanele. Maghiarii din Transilvania au o identitate puternica si lor le-ar fi cel mai usor. Romanilor le-ar fi mult mai greu, apartenenta la statul roman depaseste identitar apartenenta la Transilvania, chiar lansez pe aceasta cale un challange tuturor celor care pot sa descrie concret in ce fel identitatea lor regionala prevaleaza in fata identitatii "statale". Sau ca sa ramanem la lucruri de baza, un challenge mai simplu, de a defini identitatea lor regionala transilvana (sau orice fel de diviziune subregionala gasesc). Din pacate nu am suficient de multi cititori ca sa provoc vîltori identitare - desi mi-ar placea - dar contez pe putinii mei cititori hardcore ca vor purta mesajul mai departe. Chiar, ce gasiti transilvan la voi? Spit it out! Pe Sorin il astept primul sa raspunda pentru ca el are si un tricou:)

In ceea ce ma priveste Doamna mea mi l-a soptit intr-o seara si cred ca are dreptate. Mitteleuropa. Conceptul transgreseaza foarte elegant diferentele etnice dar nu exclude deloc o mai mare granularitate administrativa decat pur si simplu Transilvania.

An Ecclectic Metalhead's Thoughts on Valentine's Day

2008-02-14T20:16:00.011+01:00

A significant part of Europe seems seduced by Barack Obama and it's quite easy to see why, because Hillary Clinton isn't delivering as well as he does. The key word here is seduction, that's where the Obama power lies. With Mitt Romney out of the race I guess my choice goes towards John McCain. I might sound cynical, but abortion ban, gay rights and religious conservatism are overrated topics in this election campaign since there is plenty of lobbying around this issues in society on a daily basis and this regardless of the political orientation of the U.S. president. Instead there is a disproportionate lack of lobbying in favor of free market and free trade. As far as foreign policy is concerned - and particularly Iran - McCain fits me most : "form an alliance with European countries to put economic and diplomatic pressure on Iran". But both Democrats and Republicans fail the test on immigration, the huge costs of strengthening the borders are easily imaginable, but what about the benefits. From zero to none.

Why Dark Passion Play, the latest Nightwish album, is among the best Metal albums of 2007 ? For a starter, Anette Olzon is far from being the main factor. If you want the long answer you should read this piece on Metalreviews.com. If you want the short one, here it is : composition and heaviness. Not everything on this album is gold, it becomes self indulgent at times and makes you want to fast forward to the next song. But the symbiotic combination of a full symphonic orchestra with heavy downtuned guitars unleashing themselves into devastatingly fast and melodic pieces creates little gems of what Symphonic Metal should sound like. Kudos to Tuomas Holopainen, the main songwriter of the band, for achieving such a performance. The implication of bass player Marko Hietala into the songwriting process must also count for something, not to mention the use of his excellent voice on a much larger scale than on any previous Nightwish album. For a quick preview of Marko's vocal talent here is the song Pyre of Gods from his other band, Tarot. In support to what I was saying until now here is the excellent The Poet and the Pendulum (part 1 and part 2) from the latest Nightwish.

Two Links for Today

2008-02-13T20:04:00.002+01:00

Greg Mankiw points to a very interesting article in the New York Times on measuring the gap between rich and poor. While the difference in households income is indeed huge (15 to 1), the consumption per person in the top fifth is only 2.1 times bigger than in the bottom fifth. What I make out of it is that the money saving capacity could be a better measure of the poverty rate than the classic income based one.
Another good piece on the Microsoft bid for Yahoo! in this week's issue of The Economist magazine, When clouds collide. I think the discussion is too centered on online search and advertising - in a way it's only normal since that's where the big money is - and it misses other important topics like web based e-mail, instant messaging or photo-sharing (Flickr is owned by Yahoo!) where the new Microsoft-Yahoo! giant would largely be the market leader.

Dig This. Slayer at the Grammy Awards.

2008-02-11T22:31:00.000+01:00

Via Blabbermouth, Slayer won the Grammy award for the Best Metal Performance this Sunday with Final Six, a bonus track from their latest album Christ Illusion. The list of nominees was interesting : Machine Head with the superb piece of modern Metal Aesthetics of Hate (this would have been my choice for the winner), the classic King Diamond with Never Ending Hill and two metalcore acts, As I Lay Dying with the impressive Nothing Left and Shadows Fall with Redemption.

Here's a sequence on YouTube with Tom Araya receiving the award and some pictures from backstage - my first sight of a metalhead in a shiny business suit. The most remarkable thing about Slayer's song walk to fame is in the following passage from the Blabbermouth article (see below). This prize might actually be an important mainstream acknowledgment that things change massively in the music listening universe - which wouldn't have been the case if either Machine Head or As I Lay Dying would have won - we'll see if the industry follows.

(PS : Before going further, remember that God listens...)

The track made its debut last July as the "Single of the Week" on MySpace where it has since accumulated some 750,000 plays, an astounding number for a song that received no commercial airplay.

"This is awesome," Araya stated backstage. "I guess we're part of the industry now, above ground. None of those tunnel diggings anymore. No, this is our second win actually. It's kind of exciting. We've been fortunate to have been around this long with no radio play. We've gotten support from satellite radio recently, MTV gave us minimal support, but it's all on word of mouth and people liking what we do and passing it on to their friends. We owe a lot of our success to our fans. The industry is great, but the fans are the ones that take the time to look you up to see what you're doing, wait for the record to come out and buy it so..."

American Presidential Elections

2008-02-09T23:14:00.000+01:00

A very useful and comprehensive page on the US Presidential Election in the New York Times.

La phrase du jour

2008-02-09T20:13:00.000+01:00

Via Econoclaste, la phrase du jour appartient à Jack Lang, elle date de 1981 à l'époque ou il était ministre de la culture et elle porte sur la loi sur le prix unique du livre en vertu de laquelle Amazon a été condamnée à cesser la pratique de la gratuité sur les frais de livraison.

"Ce régime dérogatoire est fondé sur le refus de considérer le livre comme un produit marchand banalisé et sur la volonté d'infléchir les mécanismes du marché pour assurer la prise en compte de sa nature de bien culturel qui ne saurait être soumis aux seules exigences de rentabilité immédiate."

Heureusement que le marché continue de fonctionner malgré cette magnifique loi. Heureusement que le même livre n'est pas le même s'il est publié en format "bestseller" à 20 - 30 euros ou en format "livre de poche" à moins de 10 euros.

Political Economy in Metal

2008-02-09T19:59:00.000+01:00

Judging by the lyrics of Black Sabbath's famous song it almost feels like Dio read Bryan Caplan's Myth of the Rational Voter. Or vice-versa. For all you rationally irrational voters out there :

If you listen to fools
The mob rules

Hollywood Writers Strike

2008-02-09T19:38:00.000+01:00

A small hint about why Hollywood writers are on strike, U.S Online Video Top 10 Billion during the month of December 2007. Keep in mind that YouTube accounts for 97% of the traffic and that the writers strike helped pumping it up but still, even 1% payed views represents a shitload of money.

Some links for today

2008-02-02T23:51:00.000+01:00

Time to write something, otherwise this blog will die alone.

An excellent piece in the New York Times about Microsoft's recent move to buy Yahoo. It will help you understand the big picture.
After a very long separation, brothers Max and Igor Cavalera join forces under the name of Cavalera Conspiracy. Judging by the two songs from the band's forthcoming album released until now we are looking at the worthy successor of Arise, possibly Sepultura's best album to date - and since it has been released in 1991 I think it's not very difficult to grasp the longtime frustration I have endured as a dedicated Sepultura fan, more precisely since Max Cavalera quit the band in 1996. I'm not throwing dirt on Chaos A.D and Roots - both of these albums widened my musical spectrum - it's just that I fell in love with Sepultura because of Schizophrenia and subsequently Beneath the Remains and Arise strengthened it. If I were to choose a Sepultura anthem this would definitely be Troops of Doom which stands at the crossway between Thrash Metal and Death Metal.
Rugby is back on the menu with the Six Nations Championship kickoff. Today at Twickenham Wales scored bigtime defeating England 26 to 19, their first victory in England in 20 years. France will be facing Scotland tomorrow without Captain Caveman in the squad. Poor lad...
If you enjoyed Insomnia then it would be interesting for you to know that it's the remake of a Norwegian "Insomnia" starring the excellent Stellan Skarsgård. And the Hollywood remake is far from being a match to the original. Everything in it is ten times stronger than in the Hollywood remake : the atmosphere, the heavy weighing insomnia, the character study and the scenario. Plus you get to see a 1 minute Black/Death Metal enhanced sex scene. Forget Al Pacino and Robin Williams, dive into the Northern European movie making.
I realize once again I'm definitely into whatever new Metal means. After Machine Head's Aesthetics of Hate worthy of Beethoven's most accomplished compositions I find myself more and more attracted to what some metalheads disqualify as unworthy metalcore. Therefore allow me to emphasize once again the sound of the Swedes from Sonic Syndicate with the song Denied or that of As I Lay Dying with Confined. By the way, who said that counterpoint isn't present in Metal? Think again.
The closing chapter is provided by Children of Bodom. The Hate Crew is back with a new album and the first track, "Banned From Heaven", is available on their Myspace page. Heavier, darker, technical but yet melodic, those Finns score bigtime once again.

Some links for today (not only about Metal)

2008-01-26T20:03:00.000+01:00

Cover songs are a very interesting example of how music evolves through time. It's one thing to list you're musical influences as an artist and a completely different one to actually perform one of your favorite band's song live. It's a tough challenge and a necessary exercise because that is the exact moment when you truly measure up to your forefathers to see if you can do it as well as they did it but it is also a way of paying respect to their art. Plus it's a definite crowd-warmer:) For tonight I picked the song Black Night from Deep Purple. First a live recording of Deep Purple playing it at the beginning of the seventies, then comes a definitely heavier and faster interpretation by Bruce Dickinson with Therapy? and in the end Deicide's destructive Death Metal interpretation with damn good guitar solos. Enjoy!
Via Tihi, a very funny Hungarian road movie - judging by the trailer - set in my homeland, Transylvania, Kalandorok. Very anxious to see this one:)
Via marius, my second best discovery of the day in the field of Metal, the band Truda from my hometown Cluj. They succeed very well in blending Hardcore and Death Metal into a distinctive sound which - albeit not very innovative - is incredibly well produced for a Romanian band (check out their MySpace page or the Media section on their website for complete songs from their album "Taraf Nation"). They also have a quite extensive list of videos - see them on YouTube or in the same Media section of their website - which are indispensable while listening to their songs because of their intro and outro messages which are elements of the mission statement of the band expressed more accurately on their Myspace blog. For the moment I'll stick with the song I like most of their offerings so far, Mashini, unelte, and hope to get to know them better over a pub session when I'll be in Cluj:)
At this point you must wonder which was my best Metal discovery of the day. OK, here we go. Heaven and Hell, the DVD of the live performance of Black Sabbath with Dio from their 2007 world tour. You should definitely listen to this one if you want to know what "heavy" stands for in Heavy Metal. Again, hats off to the heaviness of Tony Iommi's guitar - don't worry, the guy is into much more else than heaviness so you won't be disappointed - to Geezer Butler's heavy bass and to Dio's majestic vocals and overwhelming stage presence which reminds me that I'm just a grownup child. As far as Vinny Appice is concerned, I really like the guy and he is a good drummer but I can't really figure where his second pedal is hidden, I will have to look more closely:) My latest theory is that Black Sabbath irreversibly turned Metal with the Heaven and Hell album in 1980 shortly afte Dio joined them. That doesn't mean undermining Ozzy's merits - both him and Dio as singers and composers are fundamental institutions for what Metal is today along with Tony Iommi as main composer and lead guitarist of the band - but as a Metalhead I clearly see a shift in the band's style between the Ozzy era of the seventies and the Dio years at the beginning of the eighties from a more Hard-Rock oriented sound towards a Heavier and more Doom-ish one. And the little guy must certainly be in for something.

Romanian Cinema

2008-01-20T10:18:00.000+01:00

I just came across an extensive article in the New York Times about the new wave in Romania Cinema written by film critic A. O. Scott. It's practically the first time I see a comparative analysis of all the recent critically acclaimed (and also Cannes festival award winning) Romanian movies The Death of Dante Lazarescu, 12:08 East of Bucharest, California Dreamin', 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and The Paper Will be Blue. The most interesting part is the section discussing the similarities between the aforementioned movies which is at the core of the "is there a Romanian wave or not" debate but it's definitely worth reading the entire article since it will give you some very interesting insights on current Romanian society, movie industry and many more. Like for example this one which I personally tested in France :

"I bumped into Mungiu just outside the theater doors. He appeared to be listening intently to what was going on inside. “I think there are a lot of Romanians here tonight,” he said, looking up. I asked what gave him that impression. “They’re laughing,” he said. “They always do.”"

No, they are not brutes laughing at the horrible drama of the two students, it's the scene of the dinner party which is funny since it brings backs memories for people who have lived in Romania in the years before 1989. This scene has also another great quality, because it is placed right before the finale it works perfectly as a psychological decompression valve in an overall gloomy and depressing movie.

You should definitely check out also the multimedia section associated to the article, Romanian Cinema Rising, containing brief video analysis of scenes from each of the 5 movies. In the end here is a long citation from the article, the part which makes a parallel analysis of the movies, in which I tried to highlight the main ideas. Have a nice lecture.

"It seems like something more than coincidence, for example, that the five features that might constitute a mini-canon of 21st-century Romanian cinema — “Stuff and Dough,” Puiu’s first feature; “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu”; “12:08 East of Bucharest”; “The Paper Will Be Blue,” by Radu Muntean; and “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” — all confine their action to a single day and focus on a single action. This is less a matter of Aristotelian discipline than of respect for the contingency and loose-endedness of real experience. In each case, the action is completed — Lazarescu dies; the abortion in “4 Months” is performed; the broadcast in “12:08” comes to an end — but a lingering, haunting sense of inconclusiveness remains. The narratives have a shape, but they seem less like plots abstracted from life than like segments carved out of its rough rhythms. The characters are often in a state of restless, agitated motion, confused about where they are going and what they will find when they arrive. The camera follows them into ambulances, streetcars, armored vehicles and minivans, communicating with unsettling immediacy their anxiety and disorientation. The viewer is denied the luxury of distance. After a while, you feel you are living inside these movies as much as watching them.

When Otilia, the heroine of “4 Months,” joins a dinner party at her boyfriend’s house, the camera stays across the table from her, putting the audience in the position of a silent, watchful guest. We know she has just been through an unspeakably strange and awful experience, but the others, friends of the boyfriend’s parents, are oblivious, and their banal, posturing wisdom becomes excruciating. The emptiness of authority — whether generational, political or conferred by elevated social status — is an unmistakable theme in the work of nearly all the younger Romanian filmmakers. The doctors who neglect Mr. Lazarescu; the grandiose, small-time television host in “12:08”; the swaggering army commanders and rebel leaders in “The Paper Will Be Blue” and their successors, the officious bureaucrats in “California Dreamin’ ” — all of these men (and they are all men) display a self-importance that is both absurd and malignant. Their hold on power is mitigated sometimes by their own clumsiness but more often by unheralded, stubborn acts of ordinary decency. An ambulance technician decides to help out a suffering old man who is neither kin nor especially kind; a student stands stoically by her irresponsible friend; a militia officer, in the middle of a revolution, goes out of his way to find and protect an errant, idealistic young man under his command.

There is almost no didacticism or point-making in these films, none of whose characters are easily sorted into good guys and bad guys. Instead, there is an almost palpable impulse to tell the truth, to present choices, conflicts and accidents without exaggeration or omission. This is a form of realism, of course, but its motivation seems to be as much ethical as aesthetic, less a matter of verisimilitude than of honesty. There is an unmistakable political dimension to this kind of storytelling, even when the stories themselves seem to have no overt political content. During the Ceausescu era, which ended abruptly, violently and somewhat ambiguously in December 1989 — in the last and least velvety of the revolutions of that year — Romanian public life was dominated by fantasies, delusions and lies. And the filmmakers who were able to work in such conditions resorted, like artists in other communist countries, to various forms of allegory and indirection. Both Puiu and Mungiu describe this earlier mode of Romanian cinema as “metaphorical,” and both utter the word with a heavy inflection of disgust."

Lyrics of the Month

2008-01-19T22:46:00.000+01:00

Inspired by Madame, this one is from Black Sabbath's masterpiece Heaven and Hell.

"Sing me a song, you're a singer
Do me a wrong, you're a bringer of evil
The Devil is never a maker
The less that you give, you're a taker"

Tony Iommi really kicks ass handling the guitar, but the real treat is definitely the little guy behind the microphone, Ronnie James Dio. If you want to see more of the little guy here is Holy Diver from his debut album in a brilliant live performance or as a video clip from the early eighties. So do me a wrong...

Wacken 2008

2008-01-19T19:56:00.000+01:00

A follow-up to my previous post since I absolutely have to spread the word. This year's Wacken Open Air festival will feature some of the finest Metal bands out there. Alongside Iron Maiden, Opeth, Children of Bodom and Kreator, some long awaited old school-ers are rebanding for a guaranteed quality Metal show, Carcass and At the Gates. La cerise sur le gateau will be the minstrels from Corvus Corax enacting the second part of their Cantus Buranus and the Eurovision song contest winning monsters from Lordi. So be there. Guess who just ordered tickets:)

Is this Metal?

2008-01-19T19:18:00.000+01:00

Damn right it is!:) Van Canto are my most interesting discovery in Metal this month. Their style is "Hero-Metal a capella" and they're doing a damn good job especially in the rhythmic section (and also a big thumbs up for the crescendos). It also helps that they realized much earlier than Apocalyptica that they needed a real drummer:) I'm also wondering what the guys in the background could put in their CV, maybe something like "bass guitar in Van Canto, my job was doing taca-ta taca-ta all the time":) All jokes aside, I invite you to listed to their superb offering, The Mission, on YouTube (and if you really want to fall off your chair listen to Rain, they take their music one step further into guitar solos). By the way, they'll be at Wacken this year.

I think this is an interesting example in the discussions we had with Sebi around defining Metal. I wasn't that accurate then, but I'll definitely try to score better very soon in a post on this blog. It's clear that the Metal culture revolves around the music, but while produced music (as well as Metalheads) can come in many various shapes, there is one more thing that keeps everything glued together. To be continued...

Update : OK, these guys are not only good but also extremely funny:))) Here's an excerpt of the definition of their style, Hero-Meta a capella :

"For all those, who are interested in mature men who like to sing „rakkatakka“ through a guitar amplifier, only to imitate fat rhythm guitars"

Generation Hexed

2008-01-19T18:32:00.000+01:00

An interesting article on the Hungarian website hvg.eu dealing with the issues of the generation born in 1989, the infamous year of the fall of the Berlin wall and of the anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe. In spite of it's relatively messy presentation and some contradictory assertions (like "they spend more time in education" vs. "they come to us with average grades, and most aren't even interested in getting better grades in their final exams" - ok, I see who "they" are in the latter statement, it's unclear who are "they" in the first one), the article draws a rather accurate picture of the generation born in Hungary at the turn of the tide in 1989. The most interesting part is that the same conclusions about this generation can be drawn when referring to the ex-communist neighboring country, Romania.

Fraza zilei

2008-01-19T17:59:00.000+01:00

Via Hotnews cu ocazia disputei provocata de delocalizarea Nokia din Germania in Romania.

"lucrul cel mai important intr-o intreprindere nu este castigul, ci oamenii, angajatii" (premierul landului Renania de Nord-Westfalia, Jürgen Ruttgers)

Atentie totusi, afirmatia e scoasa din context. Cu toate astea ma gandesc ce altceva ar putea sa mai contina discursul pe langa pentru ca afirmatia sa nu fie ceea ce pare a fi:) Pentru ca si din perspectiva politicianului preocupat de somaj sau de bunastarea populatiei, tot suna idiot sa declasezi castigul in ordinea prioritatilor unei intreprinderi private. Asta nu inseamna scoaterea de pe lista a preocuparii fata de capitalul uman, dar Nokia nu e institutie de binefacere.

Pentru a va face o parere de ansamblu va invit sa il vizitati pe prietenul Sebi care face referinta la un articol din New York Times despre subiectul pietei libere (marturisesc ca eu inca nu am avut timp sa citesc articolul cu atentie, dar am incredere in parerea celui care il recomanda:)). Protectionismul politicienilor in chestiunea delocalizarilor e calea cea mai usoara si mai directa catre sensibilitatile alegatorilor, dar contraproductiva pe termen mediu si lung. Calea mai lunga si mai dificila ar fi sa puna in practica politici care sa-i stimuleze sa se reorienteze profesional pe salariatii care isi pierd locul de munca datorita delocalizarii, de unde si intrebarea perversa, de ce un politician ar imprumuta a doua cale daca luand-o pe prima stie ca isi maximizeaza sprijinul electoral cu un efort minim.

Cum sa traiesti (in Ardeal sau in presa) si sa nu intelegi nimic

2008-01-15T21:32:00.000+01:00

Un articol din Ziua de Cluj semnat Octavian Hoandră (via Rareş Bogdan) despre recentele mişcări din presa locala (încetarea ediţiei EVZ Transilvania) şi cea naţionala (demisia lui Cristian Tudor Popescu din functia de director de la Gandul). In completare un inside despre posibilul motiv al demisiei dlui Popescu (via Rareş Bogdan si Dragoş Novac), orientarea către Internet impusă de Adrian Sârbu şi rezultatele implicite care erau impuse prin această reorientare.

Atât la Cristian Tudor Popescu cât şi la Octavian Hoandră acelaşi simptom, acelaşi raccourci : un ziar cu impact la publicul din România nu poate fi decât un tabloid, ceea ce jurnalistul roman al unui quality newspaper refuză sa facă, considerându-l degradant. Felul acesta de a vedea lucrurile vorbeşte de la sine : jurnalistul roman de felul celor doi amintiţi mai sus nu concepe sau nu cunoaşte o alta metodă de a-si mări audienţa decât prin tabloidizare (înţeleasă în sensul conţinutului, nu al formatului ziarului). E un fel destul de limitat si complet deformat de a înţelege meseria de jurnalist şi rostul unui ziar in vremurile noastre, când adevăratele exemple de "quality newspaper" sunt departe de a lipsi (luam doar New York Times ca exemplu, accesibil tuturor pe Internet). A doua explicaţie ar fi desconsiderarea publicului pe motivul incapacităţii sale de a se adapta nivelului ridicat actual al presei de calitate din România, o poziţie paternalistă cu totul rupta de realitate din moment ce aceeasi presa de calitate este capabilă sa şi-l îndepărteze până si pe cel mai avid consumator de presă din Romania prin luări de poziţie partizane, bălăcire in politicianismul de Dâmboviţa şi fuga după senzaţionalul mediatic (bineînţeles, fiecare publicaţie centrală are excepţiile ei care merită atenţie, dar de la un moment dat excepţiile sunt într-atât de puţine încât nu mai justifică efortul de a vizita ziarul sau a-l cumpăra).

Concluzia e dezarmată. Niciuna dintre cele doua luări de poziţie amintite mai sus nu ia in calcul posibilitatea de a realiza audienţă mergand pe calitate. Iar channel-ul Internet in cazul Gândului e doar un detaliu pentru că şi pe Internet tot content-ul (şi implicit calitatea lui) este cel care primează, iar valorificarea lui în rezultate financiare necesită doar o persoană competentă în ceea ce înseamnă business pe Internet care a putea fi foarte uşor recrutată. Deci poziţia dlui Cristian Tudor Popescu e o scuză slaba dar explicabilă prin câştigul important de imagine din acuzarea unuia dintre "mogulii" presei româneşti in comparaţie cu costul de a debarca într-o pozitie de senior editor în care face mai puţin management dar publică la fel de mult pe un salariu probabil nemodificat. Iar pentru a face referinţă completă la titlul postului, Octavian Hoandră vede in aceste mişcări de presă o neîntelegere a spiritului ardelean civilizat si educat căruia i se refuza o presă de calitate din partea străinului (a celui de România sau a celui de Ardeal). My 2 cents este că în primul rând dlui Hoandră îi lipseşte cu desăvârşire credibilitatea ca jurnalist (vezi acest articol al dansului, via CRU), motiv pentru care nu m-aş obosi sa îi mai citesc vreun articol, iar în al doilea rând autovictimizarea regională şi paternalismul regional nu trebuie confundate cu mândria regională, dovedesc doar un ego demăsurat şi o viziune deformata a realităţii.

Some links for today

2008-01-13T20:40:00.000+01:00

IMDb's predictions for this year's Oscar Awards. A very nice list of films and actors, definitely better than last year's, comparable with the one in 2006. Even if I haven't seen yet the movie, I definitely share IMDb's dream nomination for the Best Director Award, David Cronenberg for Eastern Promises. Judging by the quality of Cronenberg's previous collaboration with actor Viggo Mortensen, A History of Violence, I think we're in for a great treat. Maybe it's a long shot, but I also hope that Cristian Mungiu's 4 months, 3 weeks, 2 days will be nominated for the Best Foreign Movie Award.
A nice - and also fun - analysis (part 1 and part 2) of our national Speedy Gonzales' first major speech on Tuesday using the tag clouds technique. The highlight of the word "civilisation" clearly points out what our president's plans are for the next years of his mandate. Let's see how they turn out, but I think the first step - if managed correctly with a big IF - is not such a bad one - one should have in mind though that the promoter's economics views were at one point quite doubtful. This is also related to the recent Foreign Policy article about teaching economics (biases) in France and Germany (via more than one blogger, but I prefer to link my friend Sebi:) ).
Iron Maiden 's website has an unusually high page rank in Alexa's top of bands and artists websites, unusual in the sense that it's higher than that of some highly mainstream artists like Metallica, Britney Spears or Linkin Park (via Ryan Holiday). Ryan's conclusions are extremely interesting, but while evaluating them you have to consider the selection bias introduced by Alexa's method of gathering data and the fact that Iron Maiden website's traffic had a very important peak less than 3 months ago - nevertheless it has been in Alexa's top 5 of bands and artists websites during the entire 2007 year. (Nightwish is in a identical situation, see comparative traffics on Alexa). Keeping all this in mind, Internet is a damn good medium for promoting high quality music when the mainstream channels become too mainstream.
Immigration flattened the Phillips curve of inflation vs. unemployment in the Spanish economy in the recent years. Similar conclusions stating the benefits of immigration on the economy are expected in France from the Attali commission, which will submit its report on the 23rd of January. It will be particularly interesting to see how the political speech will manage macroeconomic arguments in favor of immigration and the integration factor, a delicate issue in the French public opinion.
A rather old news from December 2007, but very interesting. The French Librarians Union won a trial against Amazon.fr for it's no shipment fees policy considered illegal according to the Lang law of 1981. The law establishes a fixed price below which retailers cannot go more than 5% and forbids providing free additional services - which was the case for the Amazon.fr shipment practice. There are more things to say about the union's move than could fit in a few lines of comment. First, people have more different incentives to buy from Amazon than just the price : the diversity and availability of the offer is huge compared to any bookstore in any part of the country, the search-evaluate-and-buy time is minimal and the book is at you door in 48 hours, not to mention that when you live in the countryside buying a book at the nearest bookstore may require more than a few kilometers of driving and a few hours of your spare time. Just as with music, the books consuming model has largely evolved and is now appealing to a wider category of people, those in the business should be aware of that. Second, every book retailer has finally understood what Internet is good for, even the French Librarians Union, so I don't really understand what are their benefits from attacking Amazon.fr except proving that they can tackle the big guy's ankle having an obsolete protectionist law on their side. Third, I myself I am a books loving person, I buy books both from Amazon and from the small bookstore down the street, I just love to find myself wandering for long hours among shelves full of books and just feel their smell, so in certain aspects Amazon will never ever be able to replace a good old fashioned bookstore. So monetize this for example, give people incentives to come to your store, plus as an union you have the largest and fastest distribution network in the whole country. But don't take stupid steps into a direction that is fundamentally opposite to your work.

Good night and good luck:)

The Power of Transylvania

2008-01-05T17:42:00.000+01:00

...by Wizzair. Extremely funny story by Andy. I would have personally preferred "Cluj, Transylvania" - like on their website - instead of just "Transylvania", it wouldn't have made a big difference in the impact but it would have been far more precise about the actual final destination, but nevertheless it's a good start in understanding how to use the worldwide known Transylvania brand to make money.

Cel mai cel din 2007

2008-01-04T22:18:00.000+01:00

Indemn de la Cristian Banu la care raspund cu mare placere:)

Cel mai bun album - aici raspunsul e cel mai rapid, Cephalic Carnage - Xenosapien
Cel mai bun film - am un film, A fost sau n-a fost de Corneliu Porumboiu, si un serial, Dexter
Cea mai buna carte - am inceput multe si nu multe am terminat, dar una pe care am inceput-o recent si pe care o citesc sustinut este The Myth of the Rational Voter : Why Democracies Choose Bad Politics de Bryan Caplan

If anyone reading this feels like carrying the flag further, placerea de a va citi sugestiile va fi de partea mea:)

Steal this Album

2007-12-18T20:03:00.000+01:00

Or do whatever you have to do to get it, but get your hands on it and listen to it goddammit!

Speedy Gonzales Foreign Policy

2007-12-13T23:11:00.000+01:00

Two interesting fragments from an interview with Nicolas Sarkozy in the Nouvel Obs highlighted by the French Politique blog.

First, Iran. The French president wants to step up and fill the void left by the recent US NIE report on the Iranian nuclear program. Audacious at the first sight but it's still unclear how much the French foreign politics can weight in this issue. But the perspective of doing legitimate business with Iran while gaining an aura of local peace keeper is quite tempting.

Second. This is really really stupid : "I wanted to reconcile France and the United States, not with the Bush administration. When I delivered my speech in Congress, I was applauded more by the Democrates than the Republicans". It sounds more like sucking up to the Democrats than reconciling France and the United States. Mr. Sarkozy should know better than this that there are other breeds of Republicans in the US than the supporters of the now rather isolated Mr. Bush and that the election of a Democrat president in 2008 doesn't automatically guarantee good relations between the United States and France, even if Al Gore supports him. Al Gore is not running for the White House and doesn't even have that much of a role to play in the 2008 elections.

Geek Stuff

2007-12-13T22:55:00.000+01:00

Since I'm not really into blogging lately, allow me to share with you a short but very entertaining lecture about TCP/IP connections and the infamous TIME_WAIT state (part 1 and part 2). Yes, the dirty job is HTTP servers' to do, but it's quite hard to imagine it otherwise. They are intelligent creatures and cannot rely on the billions of visitors accessing them:)

Le cimetière Házsongárdi en photos

2007-12-10T22:21:00.000+01:00

Vu à travers le caméra d'un français à Cluj.

Alegeri PE, o analiza interesata

2007-12-10T22:05:00.000+01:00

Ce faci cand ai timp la dispozitie, faci chestii faine.

Tune of the Day

2007-12-08T20:36:00.000+01:00

Homage for Santa, good old Deicide Death Metal exactly how it's supposed to be. Fast and aggressive with killer riffs and magnificent guitar solos. Take your time and lend a patient and attentive ear to the solos, they are quite rare these days.

De ce UDMR e un pas inaintea tuturor

2007-12-07T21:11:00.000+01:00

Pentru ca in sfarsit are o concurenta serioasa pe piata electorala pe care activeaza, iar alegerile pentru Parlamentul European din noiembrie au demonstrat efectele ei benefice pentru UDMR. Atat Cristian Banu cat si Doc au tinut sa semnaleze disparitia PRM din lista de adversari politici ai Uniunii. Eu cred ca pe plan politic PRM nu a fost niciodata un adversar al UDMR, sansele prezentei UDMR in Parlament nu au fost niciodata influentate in vreun fel de existenta PRM din moment ce Uniunea era singura pe o piata de alegatori semnificativ izolata de restul electoratului. De-abia acum incepe distractia, in momentul in care UDMR nu mai e singura organizatie politica ce aspira la reprezentarea electoratului maghiar, iar ceea ce intr-adevar risca sa le fie fatal este tocmai pretentia de a se considera singurii potentiali reprezentanti ai acestuia, singurii beneficiari indreptatitit ai magicului 6,6%. Indraznesc o predictie, aceea ca in cazul unor alegeri parlamentare in 2008 care s-ar desfasura intr-un sistem proportional (sau partial proportional), damage-ul cel mai mare pe care il va incasa UDMR va fi in cazul in care va fi singurul partid care va concura pentru voturile maghiarilor si daca o va face cu aceiasi lideri pe care ii are acum. In aceasta situatie prezenta la vot a maghiarilor risca sa fie sub asteptari si mai mult decat atat, o parte non neglijabila din voturile lor risca sa mearga la partidele "ne maghiare". In cazul unei reale concurente - cu UCM de exemplu - riscul ca minoritatea maghiara sa nu fie deloc (sau foarte slab) reprezentata in Parlament creste enorm avand in vedere pragul de 5%, situatie in care prezenta lor la vot poate creste substantial iar votul lor sa fie unul util, partea de voturi acordata formatiunilor politice "ne maghiare" scazand semnificativ. De unde si preferinta UDMR pentru sistemul electoral (total sau partial) proportional fata de cel majoritar, high risks high pay. Exista totusi o pista deloc explorata pana acuma care ar putea reprezeta salvarea UDMR, deschiderea discursului politic catre o parte a electoratului "roman", iesirea din albia electoratului traditional. Pana acuma UDMR pare a fi deasupra mocirlei politice dambovitene, deci potential ar fi in aceasta directie cu conditia de a lucra la discursul politic inspre a-l face mai putin "maghiar" si mai mult "regional transilvan". Pana acum UDMR a raspuns la concurenta UCM si a lui Tokes Laszlo "maghiarizandu-si" discursul, mergand in sensul impus de concurenta, dar cred ca piste de explorat sunt si in directia opusa. Deocamdata in Romania nu exista un partid care sa insiste pe valorile regionale, in ceea ce ii priveste pe ardeleni pe valorile transilvane, UDMR (chiar daca are M in nume, ceea ce nu place tuturor) are profilul perfect si o carte serioasa de jucat in acest sens.

Le message du président

2007-12-06T15:53:00.000+01:00

Message de Nicolas Sarkozy aux FARC.

Post number 1001. The minimalist one.

2007-12-05T16:41:00.001+01:00

Neoanderthals. Female Extreme Metal drummer. 1001.

Here we go (again)

2007-12-05T13:27:00.000+01:00

French Culture is Dead (Time Magazine) ! Non, la culture française n'est pas morte (Le Figaro)!

And this comes precisely after the election of Speedy Gonzales as the most American friendly French president in the past 30 years.

Votare la Cluj

2007-11-28T21:42:00.000+01:00

Intr-un articol din Ziua de Cluj am găsit rezultatele votului de duminica repartizate in funcţie de cartierele clujene şi m-am gândit sa le redau într-o forma mai sintetica in tabela de mai jos. De la început trebuie remarcat faptul ca Clujul are mai multe cartiere decât cele menţionate in articol - lipsesc de exemplu Andrei Mureşanu, Iris, Gruia sau Intre Lacuri - ceea ce mă face sa mă gândesc ca este vorba mai degrabă de decupaje electorale pe zone decât de cartiere in sine.

Prima constatare ar fi că cele 3 sondaje fierbinţi nu s-au confirmat deloc, UDMR-ul si candidatul independent Tőkés László obţinând nişte scoruri foarte bune iar PSD-ul clasându-se mult sub aşteptări.

A doua constatare îmi vine uitându-mă la acest decupaj pe zone electorale - presupunând ca despre zone este vorba si nu despre cartiere in sine - si corelându-l cu alegerile uninominale. Presupunând ca cele 7 zone astfel delimitate au o populaţie comparabila si ca Clujul ar avea cel puţin 7 deputaţi conform noii legi electorale ce va sa vina, le-am putea asimila cu nişte colegii electorale, fiecare producând un deputat ales majoritar. Lucrurile de-abia acum încep sa devină interesante, pentru ca în această configuraţie există şanse ca Clujul sa aibă si 1 deputat reprezentându-i pe maghiari, provenind din colegiul corespunzător Centrului. Aceasta presupunând bineînţeles că ar strânge atât cele 23 de procente ale UDMR-ului cât si cele 12 obtinute de Tőkés László in zonă (o mica paranteza aici : 1) participarea populaţiei ne-maghiare la alegerile legislative riscă sa crească sensibil fată de alegerile pentru Parlamentul European, ceea ce va diminua procentajul de voturi culese de candidatul maghiar, dar aceasta n-ar fi neapărat o problema daca surplusul se repartizează intre PD, PSD, PNL si ceilalţi ; 2) va fi totuşi o concurenta intre persoane, nu intre partide, deci procentajele de acum nu trebuie luate de bune înainte de a vedea candidaţii). Oricum, perspectiva mi se pare interesanta.

Si o ultima constatare. Este posibil ca zonele menţionate in articol sa nu fie deloc comparative ca număr de populaţie, iar cum centrul are de regulă mult mai putini locuitori decât zonele periferice el ar putea fi secţionat in mai multe bucăţi care sa intre fiecare într-un alt colegiu electoral, ceea ce nu ar mai produce un deputat maghiar. Sau - din alta perspectiva dar cu acelaşi rezultat - localizarea atât de pronunţata - tocmai în centrul oraşului - a zonei in care un candidat maghiar ar avea şanse foarte mari de câştig ar putea deschide câteva perspective frumoase de gerrymandering:) Vom vedea in 2008.

La France, pays gréviste ? Mais bien sûr.

2007-11-24T17:00:00.000+01:00

La question de la véridicité des chiffres avancées par Libération sur le nombre de jours de grève en France me turlupine déja depuis un bon moment. Pour rappeler le contexte, l'article essayait de démonter le mythe de la France nation grévicultrice en expliquant qu'au niveau du nombre de journées non travaillées pour fait de grève la France ne se trouvait que sur une malheureuse 11-ème position, bien derrière d'autres pays européens plus doués dans le domaine de la confrontation syndicats - patronat. Et ce fut une tentative fort pathétique, chose démontrée assez méthodiquement par un excellent billet publié sur le blog Ecopublix. Pour faire court, les chiffres présentées dans l'article de Libé ne tiennent pas compte des jours de grève dans le secteur public - et en connaissant l'esprit gréviste de la SNCF ou de la RATP il s'agit d'une part absolument non négligeable - et pire encore, elles ne couvrent qu'une partie des jours de grève du secteur privé. Après les corrections faites en s'appuyant sur ces deux constatations, la France saute de la 11-ème à la 2-ème place. Sacré changement, non?:) Cela remet les choses en perspective. En fin de compte le classement risque d'être faussé par le manque d'une méthodologie homogène de calcul des jours de grève dans les pays européens, donc il est à prendre avec des pincettes. N'empêche que c'est étonnant comment le Danemark, dont la population est la moitié de la population de l'Ile de France, réussit à accumuler plus de jours de grève que la France.

Pe culmile autoculpabilizării

2007-11-23T10:08:00.000+01:00

Astăzi Mircea Cărtărescu in EVZ a hotărât să devină un martir contemporan. Purtare de cruce optimă îi doresc, loc de bătut cuie se mai găseşte. Iar in afară de autoculpabilizare, dl. Cărtărescu recurge şi la eternele generalizări belicoase despre cum sunt şi cum nu sunt românaşii mioritici pe alte plaiuri.

Eu votez? De data asta se pare ca totusi da.

2007-11-22T13:11:00.000+01:00

De la Cristian Banu. Fiind in Franta, nu am dreptul sa votez la alegerile europarlamentare din Romania, deci am deja un motiv mai putin sa ma duc la vot in weekend-ul urmator ba il am si poate ma si duc. Daca as fi in Romania nu stiu exact pentru cine as vota - am simpatiile mele dar stiu destul de putine despre calitatea de profesionisti in ale Bruxelles-ului a candidatilor - ezit intre PNL si UDMR. La referendum voi putea vota dar n-o voi face pentru ca nu-i vad absolut nici o finalitate. Guvernul si-a asumat raspunderea pentru modificarea legii electorale, proiectul de lege a fost deja depus, cred ca mai ramane doar de discutat in Parlament, referendumul e in consecinta inutil.

Stafeta merge mai departe la Sorin, Eduard si Sebi, if they feel like.

Movie Quote for the Day

2007-11-21T23:34:00.000+01:00

Masuka : How come you get a hug and I get a pet on the nose?
Batista : Cos' you look like a retarded puppy.

Dexter

Why 24 Didn't Air in 1994

2007-11-16T15:58:00.000+01:00

That's why:)

La France, pays gréviste ?

2007-11-16T13:51:00.000+01:00

Un article publié dans Libération s'efforce de prouver le contraire. Intéressant, même provoquant et ça mérite une investigation plus poussée parce que je ne suis pas d'accord avec cette approche de la question des grèves. Par contre je vois peux de pays dans lesquel les étudiants des universités publiques sautent aussi rapidement au blocage - c'est d'ailleurs la deuxième année consécutive que cela arrive - et je ne suis pas sûr que leur apport est compté dans les "journées individuelles non travaillées pour fait de grève". Dans ce cas pensons au CPE et les chiffres augmenteraient immédiatement.

Morning Wise Thoughts

2007-11-16T09:42:00.000+01:00

Spidart, a very promising (and Web 2.0) project enabling people to actually finance the production of their favorite band's album. With a little chance it might be the next big hit in the music business. Hopefully not only mainstream crap will emerge from it.

While sneezing, people close their eyes for their eyeballs not to pop out in the process.

The most musical and obsessive word of the week : Disembowelment.