Comments by "Magic Beans" (@Magic_beans_) on "vlogbrothers" channel.

  1. The spoiler thing bugs me so much.  I read a lot of history books, and when we're talking about big stuff I think it's safe to assume we're already pre-spoiled; you don't have to pretend it's going to work out between King Henry and Anne Boleyn.  If we're talking about something more obscure, like a bunch of slaves stealing a ship and sailing it past the freaking White House, just let me enjoy the ride.
    5
  2. It's not about them, it's about you.  Did you do something inconsiderate or hurtful?  Do you value their friendship enough that you want to repair that relationship?  Then apologize in a real and meaningful way.
    4
  3. Arceushero If I drop my Nook and it breaks (unlike the dozen times I actually have dropped my Nook, or the time my friend dropped a Kindle in the bathtub) my library is still intact.  I can go to my computer or my phone and continue reading.  Also, e-readers don't cost $300, multimedia entertainment tablets do.  Black and white e-readers cost about $69 and can go a month between charges.  I use mine all the time in small villages without Internet access or reliable electricity. That said, I still give e-books a big negative mark in one category: sharing.  If I like a book and want somebody else to read it, I can just give her the book.  To share an e-book, the other person must have a compatible reader and the publisher must enable sharing.  Assuming those are true, I can only ever share a given book with one person one time for 14 days.  For me, that's a huge handicap, and as such I only use my e-reader for public domain classics and mass-market stuff that everybody's already reading.
    2
  4. As with so many problems, I don't believe the Internet caused it, but merely exposed it.  George Carlin observed decades ago that a moment of silence at a ballgame was a nerve-wracking ordeal.  Everything we've ever created -- art, science, literature, sport -- is an attempt to fill our time, to avoid silence, stillness, and boredom.  Can one go too far in that direction?  Of course.  If you check your phone so often that it disrupts your daily activities and social life, or if you spend so much time at the office that your spouse is basically a single parent, you should probably think about your priorities, and whether your actions are working toward or against them.
    1
  5. No, that was real.  In the late 80's and early 90's, it was trendy to wear jeans with rips and holes along the front of the leg.  The look started with early punk bands like the Ramones, who often had worn-out clothing because that's what they could afford.  One could encourage specific spots to tear with a razor blade, but this wasn't something one would admit to doing; the generally accepted thing was to buy new jeans and let nature take its course. Anyway, capitalism looked at this and saw money to be made, so they started selling pre-torn jeans at a premium.  As you might expect, the only people who bought them were rich kids who didn't really understand the concept and just wanted to be trendy.
    1
  6. Audiobooks can be a great way to sneak some reading into a busy day.  I listened to "Nineteen Eighty-Four" and "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" in half-hour shifts during my commute.  Librivox provides free recordings of public domain classics.  Since the readers aren't compensated, the quality ranges from "really good" to "just okay", but it allows anybody to tap into a huge library of material. Audiobooks aren't the same as reading from a page and imagining everything from scratch, but sometimes the performance adds something of its own.  I've read "The Handmaid's Tale", but hearing it again through the voice of Claire Danes shed light on several parts that I didn't really notice before.  Neil Gaiman's "American Gods" was recently released as a full-cast recording, sort of like a radio play, which again presents the work in a new fashion.
    1
  7. It's on the Staples website.  Go to your search engine of choice and search for "Staples reading speed test."
    1
  8. I can't find the exact quote, but I believe Lincoln requested that if we must put his face on a coin, let it be the coin of least consequence and greatest inconvenience to the Union. Of course, if we've replaced Mercury and Liberty with Roosevelt and Kennedy, why couldn't we bump Lincoln into the dime (FDR's nice and all, but we gotta cut somebody) and Jefferson onto a dollar coin?
    1
  9. Personally, I think it's fine to like NatGeo and dislike Fox News if that's your thing. The most important take-away (I believe) is that the purpose of any campaign is to make you do something. What do they want you to do? Dove doesn't care whether your comfortable with your body; they want you to think, "These people understand me. Buying from them makes me feel like I'm supporting something positive," and then follow through on that thought.
    1
  10. He never said it was an exhaustive list. Videos have a finite length, so maybe he didn't consider the Vatican to be one of the three best examples, particularly considering that people don't choose a religion the same way they choose a brand of soap. Perhaps he just didn't want to start a pointless flamewar when there are plenty of non-religious examples.
    1