Lockdown Diary - Thursday 21st January 2021

More of the same today: very busy at work, so will not have much time to write until later.

Lots and lots of lovely work, until the early evening when it's time for the idler drinks Zoom session.  Tonight's guest speaker is Jaron Lanier, who is described on Wikipedia as 'an American computer philosophy writer, computer scientist, visual artist, and composer of contemporary classical music. Considered a founder of the field of virtual reality...', and also a critic of social media, especially of Facebook and YouTube.

Another incredibly thought-provoking session, which was attended by around 500 people at the peak, with Jaron talking widely on a variety of topics including, social media, ownership of personal data, access to creative works (music, art, literature etc), bitcoin, blockchain and GDPR, to name but a few.  I'm sure I've said it before, but these weekly discussions have been one of the highlights of lockdown and a major contributor to my sanity.

Dinner tonight is a new prawn stir-fry recipe and, after I've finished with the Idler, sons 2 and 3 have it all underway.  We all sit down to dinner together and have a discussion about what we'll watch together tonight. After a brief discussion we decide to continue with 'Mr. Robot', starting series 2.  In the event you might decide to watch it, there's not much I can say, though I can say that when it started it seemed to be a story about hacking on an industrial scale aligned with a desire to destroy capitalism, now those seem to be secondary plot lines, but who knows where it's gonna go next?  I guess I should add that it is quite interesting and worth watching, though we're not quite far enough in to give a an overall view on it. 

Music, maestro! In the light of the cancellation of Glastonbury for another year I thought I'd choose a band who are considered to be one of the major influences on the re-emergence of festivals, post their 1970s heyday.  Ozric Tentacles, for it they I refer to, are especially associated with Glastonbury and, from their first official, post-cassette only, album 'Pungent Effulgent', this is 'Kick Muck'


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