2 posts from October 2008

"This is arguably the first presidential election of the HDTV age.  So is it more important a candidate looks good on high-def... or on YouTube?"

That's the question I asked author Neal Stephenson at a Q and A in London last night.  I couldn't ask about his new novel - I bought it on day one, but it's big and intimidating and haven't had courage to crack open the cover yet.  But my inner-fanboy desire to make an obscure allusion to his work could not be stifled.

Plus, I'd been rewatching that "Zero?" McCain moment that Danny had linked to earlier in the day.

I don't have a copy to hand, and haven't read it for 14 years, but I remember that in Interface - the political techno-thriller Stephenson co-wrote - one character claims that after HDTV is introduced into American homes only movie stars will be electable.  (The higher resolution making regular people, politicians included, appear hideous.)

Years ago, if Americans got to see a presidential candidate giving a speech, it was at a distance.  Across a town hall.  At a state fair or some-such.  This distance favoured candidates who were emotionally "hot".  Television would later give the appearance of something more intimate.

For the benefit of the audience Stephenson brought up the canonical example of the 1960 Kennedy/Nixon televised debates.  Television didn't do Nixon any favours, his physical reaction to the studio lights appeared to make him less trustworthy.  Radio listeners gave the debate to Nixon, but more people had seen it on TV where the advantage was with the visually cooler Kennedy.

That's the problem, Stephenson said, writers have with projecting technological advances - even into the near future.  It always seems far simpler when they're the ones deciding what the implications are going to be.  

TV may be high-def, but how many people in 2008 had their main exposure via the comparatively crappy resolution of online video?  

"It needs to be both" he eventually offered, but more as question than an answer.  If you can't see them sweat on YouTube, have we switched back on to some invisible path forked prior to 1960?  Is the best way to project a candidate on HDTV the best way to project them in low-resolution online.  Does it just scale down, or are the approaches fundamentally incompatible?

I guess it's a question for the pundits of the future.  Well, the future beginning next month.

Zero?

"Yeah, well I blame George Lucas."

"Oh for... Well you seem to have been consistantly blaming Lucas for everything bad the last few years.  Do tell - how has this creator of fiction caused the current economic crisis?"

"You say that, but the economy itself is a fiction."

"Ok, a Frank Capra angel."

"Yeah, was going to stretch a metaphor around the Force or maybe people not believing in faries, but... nice Darmok.  Anyway, you see these guys on the trading floors, high ups in the investment banks.  Lot of guys in their 30s."

"Ok, go on."

"So, back in the 90s most of the previous guys in those positions were of cinema attending age in 1977 - when the original Star Wars was released.  But a lot of the guys today were either not born or two young to see Star Wars in the cinema.  Empire came out in 1980, Jedi in 1983."

"Oh, god.  Is this like when you openly mock people for believing in star signs, but then go on to contend that people's attitudes can be determined by who their first Doctor Who was?"

"Your close-minded attitude clearly marks you out as Tom Baker's, but yes, it's very much like that.  If you came to Star Wars between 77 and 80, or after 83, you had a very different perspective.  Those people had hope - new hope.  Their story ended in a very visibly defeated enemy, celebrations, medals, dancing teddy bears, whatever.  But for those years between Empire and Jedi...  You found out you were adopted and your real dad was a dick, had your hand cut off, your best friend flash frozen.  Bleak.  Precious little hope ahead. It's got to have some impact.  If you were a Star Wars obsessed 12-year-old in 1982, you're a 38-year-old today.  And hey, maybe you are managing pension funds or something.  It's not even a curve - it's high in 77, drops rapidly in 1980, then shoots back up in 83.  Not movie quality, mind you - just the perception on how well the fictional war was going for the good guys."

"Well, three years is a long time in war.  Even a star war."

"It's an even longer time in economics."