EP389: Keeping Tabs

[matweller]

Google glass is the first step toward making the movie Strange Days a reality, but we'll do one better and make it live streaming (assuming the US telcos ever advance our broadband to be competitive with third-world countries).

[Ken Schneyer]

May I just say that it is incredibly gratifying to get all this feedback?  Even from the people who didn't like the story so well.  I love it.  Thanks so much!

[CryptoMe]

I'm in the camp that thought the ending was great. When Dorthy walks away from Pearl and the Tab, she is doing what she can to at least stop the abuse that she was participating in. She voted with her feet. If more people did that, in all aspects of life, the world would be a better place. 

[Max e^{i pi}]

Just dropping in to comment on Nathan's commentary on the comment thread. (Am I meta or what?)

1. I'm pretty sure that should have been a soft 'c' in "scifi". It's short for "science", so it should be the same sound, no? Also, a 'c' before an 'i' is a soft 'c'. At least that's what I was taught...
2. This was the first time that his funny little schtick at the end made me laugh. If at first you don't succeed...

[Scattercat]

I'mma say skiffy if'n I wanna and YOU CAN'T STOP ME.  Besides, "skiffy" rolls more smoothly off the tongue than "science fictional" which is the nearest adjectival form I can think of.  ("Elements of or pertaining to the tropes commonplace in literature of the genre of science fiction" would perhaps be most correct, but by the time I get to the end of the sentence I'd have forgotten what I started saying.)

Also, seriously?  The first time?  Not even the whole bit with "Passengers" or the Punk Voyager segment?  Jeez louise, you're a tough audience.

[benjaminjb]

"Skiffy" has been around since the 70s (according to this Wikipedia article, which jives with the memories of the 70s I had before I was born). There was even that alt history anthology of stories never written, Alternative Skiffy.

[Scattercat]

Indeed.  I picked it up from reading some book or article somewhere and found it amusing, but opportunities to use it where it won't just require me to explain myself afterward are sparse.

[benjaminjb]

That's why I rarely talk about my experience of sensawunda.

[Unblinking]

This story got under my skin.  Which I think is appropriate for this one because it's an expansion of celebrity-obsessed culture that bothers me to no end.  The whole speculative element just bothered me, though I'm surprised they don't mass-stream this instead of having one-person-at-a-time structure.  The ending was appropriate enough, it seemed that she still didn't understand what her celeb was so worked up about even though she herself would want privacy.

That's why I rarely talk about my experience of sensawunda.

That's how you know when you've found kindred spirits. 

[Thomas]

I heard this story in another podcast. gave it a second listen. was enjoyable tale on social behaviors. My issue here is not with the story. it is what the author said about HOSPICE. you may say i am being petty, but it bothers me when an author OBVIOUSLY did not do their research. a 5 minute search on the net would have told him that hospice is NOT a place. Hospice comes to where the patient is. my wife works as a hospice social worker and visit private homes, nursing homes, retirement centers and the like, where ever the patient is. Hospice is about bringing comfort to the terminally ill (a diagnoses of 6 months or less) in the last months/weeks/days of their lives and to help the family/caregiver, as well as the patient, deal with end of life issues. i could go on but i made my point.

rant over, you may continue with your lives.

Thomas, a.k.a. TREED!!

[Scattercat]

There are also dedicated hospice facilities.  I recall reading a news article just last year about a hospice facility that had a controversial patient and was dealing with asshole journalists trying to jump the fence, as it were, and snap pictures.

[Thomas]

this i am aware of, scattercat. it is just a picky thing with me, referring to hospice as a PLACE when it isn't. some hospices do have facilities, but most of them go to the patient, not the other way around, not like a hospital.

[Windup]

I live just down the road from a hospice building, so I tend to think of "a hospice" as a place. 

Though my grandmother received hospice care in her nursing home, and I have a friend who did hospice care for patients in their homes.  Which I guess is how I tend to think of it -- "hospice care" is what is done for the patient, while "a hospice" is a physical place.

Either way, one of the better things to come out of medicine in the last couple of decades, as far as I'm concerned. 

[Devoted135]

Either way, one of the better things to come out of medicine in the last couple of decades, as far as I'm concerned. 

This.

[Thomas]

I live just down the road from a hospice building, so I tend to think of "a hospice" as a place. 

since wifey works in the field, i tend to think of "a hospice" as a company, such as Odyssey hospice and palliative care,
a hospice facility would be a building or a section of a hospital or nursing facility dedicated to hospice care, etc, and hospice care is the care one receives from a company, either at home or in a facility.

perspective... different people see things and understands them in different ways.

i just wish the author of the story was more aware of the different aspects of the field, but that's my problem, not the author. just took me away from enjoying the story and had to come back from my stuff to finish it.

Either way, one of the better things to come out of medicine in the last couple of decades, as far as I'm concerned. 

amen

[Thomas]

OK, just had a rwalization on my problem here with the hospice thing

the main character was denying hospice care to her brother because he wanted to die at home. that is what hospice does. they go to the patient. be it in a facility or in the home. there are options. it just stuck in my side that the author only saw hospice, or at least presented it, as an "IN a facility only" option.

ok rant over

[hardware]

I liked this episode, and the ending has quite a lot to do with that. It was relieving with an ending in which all loose ends were not tied together, but we are left to consider for ourselves where this actually leads. There is definitely character growth here, but communicated with more subtility than we are used to find in SF stories I think. I'm very glad that the protagonist realized that she could not save Pearl, but rather respect her was the best way to help her. This story shows how satire can be done with a big heart.

[Fenrix]

Who says cyberpunk is dead? Simstim technology used to escape one bleak place to a slightly less bleak place. "Keeping Tabs" is another side of Gibson's "The Winter Market". I heartily recommend picking up a copy of Burning Chrome for that story.