First Looks category archive

The rain came, and the wind blew, and the wall came tumblin’ down.

. . . or do they?

Bob Cesca’s interview with John Amato, accomplished saxophonist and founder of one of the most important websites you can add to your bookmarks, Crooks and Liars.

Aside:

I admit, it takes me a while to catch up with my podcast listening list.

Unchecked twits.

The Clock Struck One, by Fergus Hume.

It starts off slow, but, by fourth chapter, quickly picks up speed.

School rage marauders.

Story via Delaware Liberal.

Aside:

That’s the school district where my kids went to school. Back then, it showed no signs of insanity.

The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes.

In the early 1970s, the BBC ran two televison series, The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes and The American Rivals of Sherlock Holmes, dramatizing tales from the early days of mystery stories. These volumes compile the stories dramatized in those series.

Some of the stories are quite good; others, not so much. But they are all interesting, especially if you are a mystery buff like me, for the light they shed on the early days of the mystery genre. The contrasts between the British and American stories are also of note.

My especial favorite is “The Absent-Minded Coterie,” from the second volume of The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes. It is timely still; indeed, it presages all those phone calls you are getting telling you that your car’s extended warranty has expired.

The tales by R. Austin Freeman, creator of fiction’s first forensic detective, and by the Baroness Orczy, best remembered as the creator of the Scarlet Pimpernel, are also quite good. The others, well, hear for yourself.

Off to drink liberally.

To learn more about change ringing, read The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L. Sayers.

Via Michael-in-Norfolk, who has commentary.

PoliticalProf.

Profiled on a plane.

At Above the Law, Mark Hermann suggests that Donald Trump’s class action lawsuit against the “social” media sites which have banned and otherwise restricted him may not pass the test to be a class action.

I assume that most readers of Above the Law know that cases can proceed as class actions only where the members of the class are sufficiently numerous, legal issues are common to the class, the class representative’s claims are typical of the claims of others in the class, and the putative class representative is an adequate representative of the class.

(snip)

First, I bet it’s terribly hard to prove that Trump’s claims are “typical” of other members of the putative class. Facebook and Twitter probably throw people off their platforms for a multitude of different reasons, and those reasons almost surely vary from person to person. Trump was suspended, I assume, because he fomented insurrection (or some such thing).

The good frolics do not cancel out the evil frolics.

The Surgeon-General calls out the role of “social” media in spreading disinformation about COVID-19. A nugget (emphasis added):

“Modern technology companies have enabled misinformation to poison our information environment with little accountability to their users,” he said. ” They’ve allowed people who intentionally spread misinformation, what we call disinformation, to have an extraordinary reach. They designed product features, such as like buttons, that reward us for sharing emotionally charged content, not accurate content.”

He went on to note that social media algorithms often target users by pushing posts similar to ones that the user has interacted with in the past, “putting us deeper and deeper into a well of misinformation.”

The American Rivals of Sherlock Holmes.

This volume focuses on American mystery stories more or less contemporaneous with the Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. Most of these stories are no longer remembered, but, if you are a mystery buff, like me, they are well worth a listen.

Off to drink liberally, while hoping Elsa adheres to predictions and saves the worst for late night.

At Science 2.0, Johannes Koelman wonders why stupidity, which might be assumed to be its own worst enemy, manages to survive and flourish. A snippet:

Key feature of stupidity is that its power lies in its abundance. One stupid person is helpless, a herd of stupid persons can be invincible. Place a smart individual in a group of stupid persons and you will witness the smart person succumb to stupidity. In an environment infested by stupidity ‘being the smartest’ does not equate to ‘being the fittest’.

I commend the rest to your attention.

Aside:

Remind you of anything or anyone in the news?