The importance of the written and spoken word

[fatbob]

Movies still do it. They show a scene and then revert to “10 days ago” and fill in the back story.

Absolutely - it's a stock movie/TV framing device.

Sometimes it works and serves to act as the great mysterious motivator - At least one of the things we're interested in about Jimmy/Saul in Better Call Saul is the very low key series cold open about his life as Gene and how he gets there given the whole show is a story we already know the major ending to.

Sometimes it's just lazy and/or pointless - the cold open in House of Gucci for instance couldn't make what was a starrily cast but rather basic melodrama into gold (well don't actually know what it aspired to be - you'd have to ask Ridley Scott probably). I watched that in fairly close proximity to the Irishman which like Scorcese's best makes excellent use of a double framing device to tell both a story about history and a softer personal tragedy.

I'm in two minds whether such prologues are dumbing down as in a motivation to get the audience to stick with a convoluted or slow initial plot or a key artistic necessity providing the basis for fakeouts and twists. Probably both and many things in between.

 

[Tony S]

No. That’s crap. I write much better than that but would never re-write the masters. My point was that the meaning was not changed- although the artistry and subtleties were lost in translation. It was originally intended as a contrast with King Lear where the iambic pentameter, intermixed with prose, was integral to understanding the character’s state of mind.

I got the point. My question came out of pure curiosity.

 

[Jacob]

I like trying to explain English to my son... Danger..manger...ranger...hanger.... Bastard language..

Tough, though, through, trough, rough.

 

[crosscountry]

That's true when it comes to pure information delivery but a bit dangerous when you're driving or out for exercise.

I do get your point and it does infuriate me when directed to look at something and it's hidden within a big audio or video clip without a transcript. Especially on forums.

I'm all for making audio version of well written text for listening while jogging (less sure about driving).

Either the audio clip is an unplanned rambling or well prepared speech. If the former, I don't need to listen to. But if the latter, then a transcript most likely already exist. In which case I'd prefer to read it in half the time.

If the authors prefer not to release the well-edited prepared transcript, the lose is theirs. If there's no transcript? It's probably not worth bothering anyway.

And while I'm at it, what about people who are hard of hearing? I guess the podcast authors don't care about "those people" anyway...

Can you tell I'm not a fan of podcast? That's only because... I don't jog!

 

[Tricia]

Dead on. I think it is most noticeable now in podcasts now they have evolved into a thing of their own and pros have well and truly penetrated the medium. A tight 30 mins, well edited and leaving the listener wanting more is worth any number of rambling 90 min streams of consciousness or uncut conversations.

And the think is no matter how long the text usually there will be some point that you wished had been addressed in any article and so q&a or a real intereactive comments does the job netter.

I wish I could like this post more than once. You hit the nail on the head.
I don't have 90 minutes. I REALLY don't have 90 minutes to sort thought uncut ramblings to find the information I'm interested in finding.

God help us with some of these podcasts. The navel gazing and irrelevant asides are maddening. Especially when they’re interviewing people. They waste so much time and don’t get the content out of the person. All this chummy stuff should be edited out, but it’s not.
Worse, they think it’s good.

We've been told by a bunch of people that we need to do a podcast, but with all the other balls we have in the air, we just don't have the bandwidth to do it well at the moment and we don't want to do it if we can't do it well.

We DO have some new stuff coming for our youtube channel to get that ramped up. Its taking the lion's share of our time to get it going this summer.
Stay tuned.

 

[fatbob]

I will say the rambling nonsense is not an absolute. I listen to a lot of podcasts by comedians because they are actually naturals at spinning rambling nonsense into nuggets and really getting the best out of their interviewees. And sometimes audio is the only medium in which silly voices and fake outrage can work.

Lots of more specific podcasts though are really bad at the rambling bro style conversation.

 

[SkiMore]

Tough, though, through, trough, rough.

It must be so difficult to learn English as a second language. I studied German in college and grammar rules, while pretty complex, had few exceptions as I recall. It seems English is filled with exceptions to rules.

 

[Powder High]

News reporters usually write pretty well. But sometimes they slip, like in this article today in the LA Times/MSN --

"Getting reinfected with the coronavirus may increase long-term health consequences over time.

Even just one infection with the coronavirus is associated with increased risk of long-term death and other symptoms of illness."

 

[James]

Long term death vs short term death?
Back to boiling lobsters…

 

[Powder High]

Long term death vs short term death?

I mean really, doesn't the LA Times have copy editors? I see that a lot today. Obvious errors that should be caught way before publication.

 

[James]

I mean really, doesn't the LA Times have copy editors? I see that a lot today. Obvious errors that should be caught way before publication.

The NY Times fired 100 editors a couple years ago.
It’s everywhere.
Try to make sense of this “review”-

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