Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
ups.com...
Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
ps.com...
Julio Laredo wrote:
"Michael Baldwin, Bruce" wrote in message
oups.com...
It was screening on TV the other night so I thought I'd watch it.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120647/
Man, talk about crap.

I happened to see only a few minutes of it, once. It's use of cliches
showed the thinking behind the writing was way too conservative for my
tastes.

I know what you mean. Almost every film made nowdays is formulaeic.

Starts off with some kid with with a ****ant little scope (not even a
Mead!) discovering a comet or assteriod. So what does he do? Calls
some turkey in Nevada who is laughingly supposed to be a
professional asstronomer.

It is essential in effective satire that the satirist have some
modicum of
knowledge of the subject be satirized. Let's see how you stack up.

Ah, so it was satire. Yeah, I can see how that makes sense now.

Most comet discoveries have been by amateurs, and one of the 2002
winners of the Edgar Wilson Award used binoculars.

They give out awards for this? A0L!

Yes, they sure do.

How dumb is that!

No more than any other award which is based on a combination of knowledge,
skill, and luck.

Ah, you mean like the Darwin Awards!

And not everyone would head right to CBAT, it would be
within the realm of possibility that an amateur would try to contact
someone
he considered a professional for verification.

To verify what? That he saw a comet?

Yes, there is a procedure. And it is a race to get your name on it.

The last thing I'd want is my name on a comet that's going to destroy
the Earth.

They wouldn't know the trajectory at that time.

You could guess.

So, here, your satire was off the mark. Strike one.

That clown is sitting in what looks like a radio scope station
listening to classical music (what else?). After he's told, he looks
for it himself. Not sure how he gets an image of it the way he did
with a radio scope, but he does.

Radio telescope stations do have optical scopes for aiming the dishes,
and are often used in
conjunction with the radio images. Here, too, your satire is off the
mark.
Strike two.

Are they located on top of mountains by themselves or in arrays? Did
the film show an optical scope being used?

I don't know what they showed in the film.

So your "strike one" was illinformed?

No. Optical scopes are used to help aim the dish or dishes. And it would
be reasonable
to presume that an optical scope could be attached to a camera, and the
camera to a computer. Anyone who knows astronomy knows that.

Yes but no optical scope was evident in that part of the film. If you
had bothered to watch it, you would have seen for yourself.

I tried to watch the part where
they were planting the explosives. Once I predicted almost every thing
that
was going to be shown before it was shown, I got bored and changed the
channel.

Well, I watched it all. Its entertainment value was laughable. Which
was just what I wanted that particular night.

Then, get this, he transfers it to floppy disk! What the hay! Is he
using OS/2 or something? Let me guess. His crappy software is
written in FORTRAN too.

I guess you think that optical disks and XP have been around forever;
they have not.

The film was made in '98. The Internet had been around a while by then.

Doesn't matter. In the film the guy saved the information. Some people
save to the Internet, some don't. I don't save things to the Internet.
Back in 1998 I saved to floppies and CDs. Now I save to thumbdrives.

Good for you. My point was that the plotline at that particular point
was ludicrous. So you're "strike two" doesn't hold water either.

Sorry, still holds up. There would be absolutely nothing wrong with his saving
a text file to a floppy. Besides, FORTRAN would be tape and punch cards.

Tell me about it.

If you were paying attention, the movie came out in 1998, which means
shooting would have begun at least 2 years before.

Are you sure about that? Don't forget these types of films are usually
set in the future. Would be kind of dumb to set something like this in
the past, don't you think?

Shooting still began in about 1996 with no regard to when the picture
was going to come out.

Since it came out at about the same time as Armageddon, I find that
odd. Why do these sorts of films come out in rapid succession? 2 years
is a long time to wait to cash in on the popularity of something else.

Serendipity. Deep Star Six, Leviathan, and Abyss came out in rapid
sucession, as did
Red Planet and Mission to Mars, Ratatoulle and No Reservations, and Monsters
Inc
was quickly followed by Ice Age. The lead times for movies can be measured
in years,
and in the case of all these movies, one did not influence any of the
others.

And you know that for a fact?

"Silent Running" was set in the future, and showed
hardwire programming. Who does that, now?

I set the registers on a PDP-11 not too long ago. Not very exciting.

That is a little different than using a microscope and a laser to change
the circuitry on a an integrated chip, which is how it was done in that
movie.

Your point being?

While it is possible to predict what may happen, and could happen, you
still have to base it on what is known, now.

You mean like in Star Trek and Star Wars?

Two entirely different kinds of movies, and different, still, from Deep
Impact, which is set in a time frame of only a few years from the release
date.

While Star Wars' timeframe is unknown (it was supposed to be set in
the past), Star Trek's one is.

At the time the movie was being made,
the most popular way to save small files was by floppy. The movie
audience would immediately know what he was doing, and why.

You could also do a printout or write it to a mag tape. I'm sure the
audience would know about that too.

And would you have made the same comment? Be that as it may, he
didn't, and it would be no reflection on the kind of software he was
using.

I was pointing out the inadequacy of the plot. What are you doing?

In that time frame nearly
all computers had floppy drives, and since the coordinates for the
object
would be in a relatively small text file, a floppy would have been a
very reasonable method to store the information.

So would email.

Again, this isn't a particularly secure way, especially at a place of
employment.

Why? I don't follow your logic here. He also had a radio dish outside
he could have used.

Anyone who knows astronomy would know that, unless he was involved
with SETI, the radio dish is made to recieve, only.

You mean like in Contact?

You had made it sound like he was being secretive, so he could make sole
claim to the discovery, and the cash prize of the Edgar Wilson award. If he
wanted to be secretive, email is not the way to go, as anyone who has
had emails used against them in court or disciplinary procedures could
attest.

No, I'm making it sound like the plot at that point was stupid.

All in all, I don't think the plotline leading up to his death was
well concieved or necessary.

Well, that is something different from your original complaints

Not entirely.

Strike three. You have proven yourself to be inept and I can see no
reason
to go further since whatever you would have to opine would be of no
merit.

Sounds more like your batting average needs some work.

Note: no response.

No repsonse there was needed. I had proven my points before.

Since you admitted you didn't see that part of the film, I fail to see
how you can claim any of your points hold water.