[PD] [OT] technological parody was: Pd performance at TED

[Charles Henry]

eheh, I'm glad the concept of "technological parody" is giving so much to
discuss :)
We should put up a twitter account with the #technologicalparody (kidding)

M

I caught on to it, just because I liked the phrase so much.  But there are
some real examples--Rube-Goldberg machines come right to mind, but you never
see them in real life as anything other than comedy.

There may be more real-life examples from hacker/builder communities--like,
say, a robotic fridge designed to fire a can of beer into the air.  Although
it may be an awesome novelty, it's not actually practical.  Hence, it's
nearly a mockery of robotics to build it.  No offense to the creators of
beer can canons--but you knew it was going to be a joke before you started.

So, there's a clear comparison between Pd and Guitar Hero that illustrates
the difference.  With Guitar Hero on your favorite console, you have a
specialized controller, useless for any other "games", that only plays
canned guitar riffs from a CD.  Moreover, the software has to run on
particular hardware.  Then, a clever programmer with Pd can take that same
ridiculous controller and use it for whatever he/she wants.

Chuck
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