Lego Takes Juniorization to Its Logical Outcome

Ugh. A lot of Lego fans hoped that Lego would take to heart what many think is the main lesson from its recent economic problems — juniorizing its product line is the wrong approach. Instead, Lego seems intent on accelerating the juniorization pace.

What’s juniorization? Roughly it means reducing the complexity of Lego toys to the point where you begin to wonder what’s the point of calling it a construction toy in the first place. In the last couple years new Lego sets have seen a lot of custom pieces. Rather than build a tree out of Lego bricks, for example, Lego will simply mold a tree into three separate pieces. The tree parts aren’t useable for anything but making the tree, however.

Anyway, Lego takes this to the extreme with their new Bionicle Robot toys which are supposed to premier in August 2001. Toy industry insider Chris Byrne parrots the Lego company line saying, “These robots are all about the children being the builders or creators.” Yeah right — the big feature of the Bionicle Robot line is that the masks and the weapons the characters use are interchangeable. The robots themselves snap together with about 5 or 6 pieces, so switching masks and weapons is pretty much the beginning and end of the creation process.

Lego is apparently convinced that today’s children simply don’t want to put together relatively complex models. I don’t think that’s true, but on the other hand don’t think Lego does a very good job of transitioning kids from less complex to more complex models.

Lego seems to be betting the farm on two things: these new sorts of juniorized toy lines and its Harry Potter line of sets that will be out in September or October. Meanwhile apparently Lego has decided not to do anymore Star Wars sets in 2001, leading many people to fear the worst — that unlike the Star Wars sets, the Harry Potter sets will be heavily juniorized as well.

What Was I Going to Write About Again? Oh Yeah…

The Sunday Times (UK) reports about “preliminary findings” from a study of only 150 people where researchers are claiming that the prevalnce of electronic gadgets is destroying people’s short term memories. The Times quotes Japanese researcher Toshiyuki Sawaguchi complaining,

They’re losing the ability to remember new things, to pull out old data or to distinguish between important and unimportant information. It’s a type of brain dysfunction. Young people today are becoming stupid.

British researcher Pam Briggs isn’t quite as extreme in her conclusions but does say,

I think increased use of the internet and computer technology is starting to have an effect. Everyday memory might be at threat if you are using the computer as a kind of external memory.

Both of these arguments are simply an updating of one of the oldest anti-technology arguments in human history — Socrates’ argument against reading. Socrates, of course, could neither read nor write since literacy would not become widespread in Greece until the 4th century BC.

In the Phaedrus, Plato records a fable that Socrates told. In the fable the Egyptian King Thamus reviews the inventions of the god Theuth. Theuth explains the values of literacy telling King Thamus, “Using letters will make the Egyptians wiser and give them better memories. It is a specific both for the memory and for the wit.” Thamus, of course, will have none of it.

O most ingenious Theuth, the parent or inventor of an art is not always the best judge of the utility or inutility of his own inventions to the users of them. And in this instance, you who are the father of letters, from a paternal love of your own children have been led to attribute to them a quality which they cannot have.

For this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls, because they will not use their memories. They will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves.

The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence. You give your disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth.

They will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing
They will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing
They will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without the reality

Socrates himself — filtered through Plato — pronounces his own judgment upon writing that is not too far removed from Thamus,

I cannot help feeling, Phaedrus, that writing is unfortunately like painting; for the creations of the painter have the attitude of life, and yet if you ask them a question they preserve a solemn silence. And the same may be said of speeches. You would imagine that they had intelligence, but if you want to know anything and put a question to one of them, the speaker always gives one unvarying answer. And when they have been once written down they are tumbled about anywhere among those who may or may not understand them, and know not to whom they should reply, to whom not: and, if they are maltreated or abused, they have no parent to protect them; and they cannot protect or defend themselves.

Both Socrates and the learned researchers cited in the Sunday Times are certainly correct — if the technology ends up using the individual rather than vice versa, it is certainly no boon. However, both writing and current electronic technologies aid both memory and understanding by reducing the amount of things that a person need remember at any given moment.

I have much better things to memorize, for example, than people’s phone numbers or birthdays and so I don’t. (On the other hand, I can remember many of the stories my daughter told me over the past couple months, which are far more important to me).

The XFL’s Opening Weekend

The first thing to note about the XFL’s opening week is that it more than accomplished its goal. The whole point of putting the XFL on Saturday night was to try to capture more 12 to 24 year old male viewers, and NBC said it hoped for a 4-5 share. Initial ratings figures have the XFL garning a 10 share on Saturday night. There’s no way it will keep that high a share throughout its 10-week season, but it seems likely to meet and probably exceed its expectations as far as number of viewers.

As for league itself. Ugh.

I thought the level of competition on the field was respectable. A lot of sports writers are comparing the games to NFL games and finding the XFL lacking, but in that they’re just buying Vince McMahon’s hype. The XFL didn’t come close to the NFL, but it was certainly equal to (and in my opinion better than) the Arena Football League which, like the XFL, is filled with gimmicks but is taken seriously as a legitimate football league.

There were some standout performances…and some not-so-standout performances. It was fun watching former Western Michigan University quarterback Tim Lester airing it out for the Chicago Enforcers. On the other hand after watching a few series it became obvious why he never fulfilled his potential in the NFL.

As for the off-the-field stuff, I expected all of the cheerleader shots and other crude devices, but thought that was held pretty much in check for most of the broadcast. McMahon thinks you can never have enough sex on TV, but I think he’s dead wrong about that. Proof of how wrong McMahon is was demonstrated when NBC switched from showing the Las Vegas game with Jesse Ventura, to the Orlando game with Jerry “The King” Lawler.

Lawler embodied everything that critics feared the XFL would be about. After a few minutes of Lawler I was hoping Andy Kaufman would rise out of his grave and smack a few chairs over Lawler’s head. Lawler clearly knew nothing about football. Ventura wasn’t exactly a font of football knowledge, but Lawler acted as if he had never even seen a football game. Instead he engaged in endless banner about the cheerleaders involving the sort of innuendo that can only be truly appreciated by 13 year old boys (which, again, is the target market for the XFL).

On the other hand I thought putting microphones and cameras everywhere worked very well. Now what the XFL needs to do is add a third announcer who actually knows a lot about football who can explain what all of the arcane calls and terminology actually mean to the casual fan. Unfortunately, I suspect as time goes on the XFL is going to focus more on the spectacle rather the on-field game in an attempt to try to replicate this weekend’s high ratings.

Ban Guns — After I’m Finished Shooting

I vividly remember Barbara Graham’s appearance on CNN during last year’s “Million Mom March” because she symbolized everything that is wrong with the gun control argument. Here she was on national television explaining the tragic death of her son who was murdered in Washington, DC, in 1999. Graham went out about how stricter gun control laws would have prevented her son’s death, the only problem being that Washington, DC, already has some of the strictest gun control laws in the country (not to worry, when they can’t buy guns, criminals make them — a 1986 study found that 20% of illegal guns seized in the district were homemade weapons).

I felt sorry for her loss, but that’s no reason to go around arguing for ineffective laws that ultimately end up disarming victims.

Anyway, it turns out Graham herself appreciated the power of guns, and decided to avenge her son’s death by shooting the man responsible. As with her gun control efforts, however, Graham went after the wrong target — she mistakenly shot the wrong person! She ended up shooting Kikko Smith who is now paralyzed from the waist down. Smith remains in the hospital with a bullet lodged in his spine.

On February 1, Graham was convicted on nine separate charges and faces up to 50+ years in jail.

One of the interesting aspects of the case is how liberal newspapers chose to cover it. The Washington Post, for example, ran several stories on Graham’s trial over the past couple weeks but somehow never thought it was relevant to point out Graham’s prominence at the “Million Mom March.” If Graham had been a member of an “extremist” organization such as the National Rifle Association and had actively protested and spoken out on the right of people to bear arms, it is hard to believe that The Post wouldn’t have found a way to include this prominently in their stories. In fact, the headlines would have almost certainly read “Gun Advocate Convicted of Murder” or some such headline rather than the plain old “Mother convicted in shooting” headlines The Post went with.

When guns are outlawed, apparently only gun control activists will have guns.

Source:

Mother Convicted in Shooting. Donna St. George, The Washington Post, February 2, 2001.

‘Million Mom’ activist convicted in shooting. Jon Dougherty, WorldNetDaily.Com, February 5, 2001.

United Nations Needs More Funds to Avert Sudan Famine

In November 2000 the United Nations issued a rather optimistic assessment of the hunger situation in Sudan. In late January 2001, however, it had to issue a further request for aid and suggested that 1 million people could be at risk of starvation if nothing is done.

What happened in the intervening months to alter the situation so drastically? War happened.

Although some Westerners like to believe that places like Sudan are “overpopulated” or suffer from some other problem, the bottom line is that famine in Sudan is caused by war. As the World Food Programme summed up the situation in a November 2000 report,

War remains the major cause of the massive humanitarian suffering in Sudan. Long-term peace is the only way forward for the people of Sudan. Efforts at national, regional and international levels to bring peace and stability to the region have not been successful.

When that WFP report was written things looked positive as several peace conferences seemed to move the peace process in Sudan forward and people across the country were beginning to move back to their homes. Food production was on the upswing.

Since then, however, tribal conflicts have again flared up and Sudan’s civil war, which had been put on hold thanks to a cease fire threatens to take hold again.

As in the past, the Sudanese government has chosen to use food as a political weapon. In 1998 the WFP estimates that tens of thousands of people died in the southern province of Bahr El-Ghazal after the government refused to allow relief flights into the area. The government was, in effect, trying to starve out the rebels. In January the government renewed this policy by forbidding United Nations aid flights from key areas in Bahr El-Gahazal.

Combine constant civil war with governments that have no problem starving out civilians, and the result will almost always be the same — starvation on a large scale.

Source:

New appeal for drought-hit Sudan. Caroline Hawley, The BBC, January 21, 2001.

WFP In Southern Sudan. The World Food Program, November 29, 2000.

PETA: Puffy Combs Guilty of Murdering Animals

At the moment, rap mogul Sean “Puffy” Combs is on trial for allegedly discharging a handgun in a New York City club. Combs claims he didn’t have a gun on him the night of the shooting, but several witnesses say they saw him fire off a round.

Regardless of how his trial turns out, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals maintains that Combs is guilty of murdering poor defenseless animals, and PETA activists have been protesting outside of the courthouse where his trial is taking place.

Among other ventures, Combs produces his own line of clothes under the brand name “Sean John” that prominently features Fur. Combs also regularly wears fur. According to PETA, its members have been showing up at the trial with signs reading, “Puffy: Accessory to Murder of Animals” and “Animals Killed for Your Fur Got the Death Penalty.”

No word on what Puffy thinks of his PETA protesters.

Source:

PETA To Puffy: You’re Guilty!. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, February 2, 2001.