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Favorite electronics movies

J

JeffM

Back in the days when I considered myself a Republican,
defense of the Consitution and Bill of Rights was one of our tenets.
Richard Henry

Say it loud, Brother Richard.

NeoCons seem to think that
the 2nd Amendment is the only one necessary.
Well, maybe the 10th
--but only if you're talking about limiting individuals' reproductive
rights
(not if you're talking about kemo patients
using cannabis to treat their nausea and lack of appetite).

Y'know: Compassionate Conservatives(tm).
 
J

JeffM

the lo-budget Brit sci-fi TV series (Blake 7? I forget...)

Blake's 7 was better the 1st season
when they were writing about the Maquis-esque aspects.
When they started to veer off into the *strange new worlds* stuff,
they totally jumped the shark.
 
R

Rick

PaulCsouls said:
On Sat, 21 Jan 2006 23:16:38 -0800, Richard Henry wrote:

One of my favorites was on tv tonight - Enemy of the State.

Does anyone here think it was subversive of ABC to schedule this movie
during this time of arguments pitting national security against human
rights?

I don't think I have ever seen an electronics movie, Per Se. Or maybe I'm
just forgetting?

Unfortunately, any kind of electronics content in movies is usually
most notable for the hilarity it invokes. Such as the movie that cut
to a quick take of a computer screen- a PCB autorouter was operating.
The dialog: "Amazing! A computer searching for a bomb!".

Or, take this dialog (please) from the original "sci-fi" Star Trek
("Court Martial"):

----
Ready, Mr. Spock?
Affirmative, Captain.
Gentlemen, this computer
has an auditory sensor.
It can, in effect, hear sounds.
By installing a booster,
we can increase that capability
on the order of 1 to the 4th power.
The computer should bring us every sound
occurring on the ship.
All personnel have left the ship as ordered, sir.
Dr. McCoy?
All right, Mr. Spock.
[Loud Beating]
Turn it down a little.
[Volume Decreases]
Gentlemen, that sound is caused by the heartbeats
of all the people on board the ship.
Dr. McCoy will use this white sound device
to mask out each person's heartbeat
-----

How do you design a booster with a gain of 1 to the 4th power anyway?



Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

The best electronics bit in Star Trek is in the one with the evil
alternate universe (Spock with the beard). They need to take some
files from the computer and they put it on an orange 3.5" floppy disk.
Where did the prop department get one of those in 1967? They were
using punch cards back then.

Paul C

As I recall they also had a few Brown (or Honeywell Electronik) temp controller/recorder
units as instrumentation in a few episodes, too...
 
K

Keith Williams

One of my favorites was on tv tonight - Enemy of the State.

Not a movie, but the TV series "24" had a nice hidden moral. The
first season everyone using OS/2 lived and all Windows users died.
The second season all Mac users lived and Windows users didn't.
Does anyone here think it was subversive of ABC to schedule this movie
during this time of arguments pitting national security against human
rights?

No, but silly if that's their intent.
 
S

SioL

I don't know that I'd go that far - they're different, more modern -
not necessarily better. But yes I enjoyed them mightily.

I had a very high opinion of the "restaurant" books until I re-read
one recently. Somehow it seemed much worse this time.

SioL
 
J

Jim Yanik

No, but silly if that's their intent.

Not silly;they intended to get people to believe that such surveillance is
possible or is actually happening.
Naturally,they would then be against the government position.

There's too much of a coincidence with current events for this to be a
chance selection.It's politicking by the ABC Network.

I would not call it "subversive" though,but they ARE working against US
National interests in monitoring enemy communications with US citizens
during war.
(and we ARE at war with Al-Qa'ida.)
 
M

Michael A. Terrell

SioL said:
I had a very high opinion of the "restaurant" books until I re-read
one recently. Somehow it seemed much worse this time.


Sure but you already knew the plot line, and the ending.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
 
M

Michael A. Terrell

Richard said:
One of my favorites was on tv tonight - Enemy of the State.

Does anyone here think it was subversive of ABC to schedule this movie
during this time of arguments pitting national security against human
rights?


Don't forget the original TV series "Battlestar Galactica" which used
a lot ot Tektronix equipment for all their instrumentation. Was that
bad planning, or just another not so subtle hint that they were headed
to our earth?

--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
 
P

Paul Hovnanian P.E.

Dirk said:
Jim said:
On 22 Jan 2006 11:36:42 GMT, Ian Stirling <[email protected]>
wrote:



One of my favorites was on tv tonight - Enemy of the State.

Frankenstein.

Uh uh. Gotta be "YOUNG Frankenstein." Woof!

WRT the OP's question. Hadn't seen the flick before, just happened to
surf by it and watched the rest (so I never did figure out what Will
Smith's character did that started the whole mess).


--Spoiler--

The Jon Voigt character arranged the murder of a Congressman who was opposed
toa bill giving more power to NSA. The murder was captured on a
motion-sensitive wildlife study camera. The biologist saw the tape, and
then called a friend who published a left-wing paper. The NSA intercepted
the call, and agents (on a Standard Training Op) chased him down. He
dropped a copy of the tape on a flash card, hidden in a hand-held game, into
Will Smith's shopping bag. The NSA then started chasing Smith, but he
didn't know what they were after.


I was rocking along with it okay until the part where (paraphrasing):

[team is looking at satellite images]
agent 1: Dang, I wish we could see his face.
agent 2: Dude! These are satellite photos from 150 miles up. They can
only look straight down.
agent 1: D'oh!

Ooooookay ...

Well, earlier they were able to take the film from a store security camera
and turn the image of a shopping back through 360° looking for suspicious
bulges.


WRT the OP's question: not subversive at all. And besides, it's already
too late. King George has (i) a "war" on an emotion that will last as
long as he wants it to last, and (ii) claimed "authority as Commander In
Chief" during time of "war" to ignore any laws that he chooses,
irrespective of the legislature or the courts.

I thought it was a fun movie, something that could get the leftist
weenie's panties all in a knot. Can't you just see Teddy (or Hillary)
screaming, "See what they're doing?" ;-)

I mean, it's not as if the US intel services would do anything illegal to their
own citizens, is it?

Yes, but "We were just following orders" is the excuse.
 
P

Pooh Bear

Frithiof said:
Red Dwarf - a british comedy series intent on taking the piss out off every
sci-fi movie ever made:

My favorites are the totally unreliable equipment and the robot - Kryten -
who always trying to put a blatantly wrong positive spin on things in spite
of the situation.............

Lister teaching Kryten to tell fibs was classic.

Graham
 
K

Keith

Not silly;they intended to get people to believe that such surveillance is
possible or is actually happening.
Naturally,they would then be against the government position.

There's too much of a coincidence with current events for this to be a
chance selection.It's politicking by the ABC Network.

Come on! The movie's been on the cable channels for months. These things
get re-released from time to time.
 
K

Keith

Don't forget the original TV series "Battlestar Galactica" which used
a lot ot Tektronix equipment for all their instrumentation. Was that
bad planning, or just another not so subtle hint that they were headed
to our earth?

Nah, Tek subsidized a bunch of the production. "Product placement".
 
P

Paul Hovnanian P.E.

Not an 'electronics movie' per se, but the scenes in Antitrust involving
working on computers doing 'administrative stuff' used actual command
line stuff. Not a ridiculous GUI that no self respecting admin. would
dream of using.
 
R

Richard Henry

Jim Yanik said:
Not silly;they intended to get people to believe that such surveillance is
possible or is actually happening.
Naturally,they would then be against the government position.

There's too much of a coincidence with current events for this to be a
chance selection.It's politicking by the ABC Network.

I would not call it "subversive" though,but they ARE working against US
National interests in monitoring enemy communications with US citizens
during war.
(and we ARE at war with Al-Qa'ida.)

I agree that monitoring communications between US citizens and unfriendly
foreigneers is in the US national interest. In fact, Congress agrees, so
much so that they set up a special secret court to issue the necessary
warrants so that the Bill of Rights is not trashed in the process.
 
P

Paul Hovnanian P.E.

Richard said:
[snip]

I agree that monitoring communications between US citizens and unfriendly
foreigneers is in the US national interest. In fact, Congress agrees, so
much so that they set up a special secret court to issue the necessary
warrants so that the Bill of Rights is not trashed in the process.

That court (the FISA court) will even grant subpoenas after the fact.
So, why is George opposed to using them? My guess is that the wiretaps
in question have nothing to do with the war on terrorism. Its more
likely that the administration is venturing into areas like industrial
espionage or putting together lists of 'Friends of George' and 'Enemies
of George'.
 
M

Mac

Dirk said:
Jim said:
On 22 Jan 2006 11:36:42 GMT, Ian Stirling <[email protected]>
wrote:



One of my favorites was on tv tonight - Enemy of the State.

Frankenstein.

Uh uh. Gotta be "YOUNG Frankenstein." Woof!

WRT the OP's question. Hadn't seen the flick before, just happened to
surf by it and watched the rest (so I never did figure out what Will
Smith's character did that started the whole mess).


--Spoiler--

The Jon Voigt character arranged the murder of a Congressman who was opposed
toa bill giving more power to NSA. The murder was captured on a
motion-sensitive wildlife study camera. The biologist saw the tape, and
then called a friend who published a left-wing paper. The NSA intercepted
the call, and agents (on a Standard Training Op) chased him down. He
dropped a copy of the tape on a flash card, hidden in a hand-held game, into
Will Smith's shopping bag. The NSA then started chasing Smith, but he
didn't know what they were after.


I was rocking along with it okay until the part where (paraphrasing):

[team is looking at satellite images]
agent 1: Dang, I wish we could see his face.
agent 2: Dude! These are satellite photos from 150 miles up. They can
only look straight down.
agent 1: D'oh!

Ooooookay ...

Well, earlier they were able to take the film from a store security camera
and turn the image of a shopping back through 360° looking for suspicious
bulges.


WRT the OP's question: not subversive at all. And besides, it's already
too late. King George has (i) a "war" on an emotion that will last as
long as he wants it to last, and (ii) claimed "authority as Commander In
Chief" during time of "war" to ignore any laws that he chooses,
irrespective of the legislature or the courts.



I thought it was a fun movie, something that could get the leftist
weenie's panties all in a knot. Can't you just see Teddy (or Hillary)
screaming, "See what they're doing?" ;-)

I mean, it's not as if the US intel services would do anything illegal to their
own citizens, is it?

Yes, but "We were just following orders" is the excuse.

Well, the CIA and especially the FBI have a pretty bad track record for
respecting the limits in the constitution.

But it is my opinion that the people in the NSA understand the
constitution. You can bet that president Bush's illegal order to
monitor US persons without FISA or other court approval was leaked by
someone in the NSA who was disgusted and appalled.

As far as I can see, without a bona-fide declaration of war from the
congress, precious little slack should be accorded to the president on
matters of the constitution and limits to executive power.

--Mac
 
J

Jim Thompson

Richard said:
[snip]

I agree that monitoring communications between US citizens and unfriendly
foreigneers is in the US national interest. In fact, Congress agrees, so
much so that they set up a special secret court to issue the necessary
warrants so that the Bill of Rights is not trashed in the process.

That court (the FISA court) will even grant subpoenas after the fact.
So, why is George opposed to using them? My guess is that the wiretaps
in question have nothing to do with the war on terrorism. Its more
likely that the administration is venturing into areas like industrial
espionage or putting together lists of 'Friends of George' and 'Enemies
of George'.

Bull puckey.

But George IS "listening" in on calls that end up yielding no
subpoena-worthy information.

If you are blind listening to calls from "over there" what do you
expect?

In this day and age, I'd call it "Googling" ;-)

...Jim Thompson
 
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