Mr. Toy's Mental Notes

This will interest anyone who watches movies. I have long been quietly (well, not so quietly if you live under the same roof as I do) complaining about the state of movie streaming services, none of which I subscribe to because I think they’re a scam. The problem is they are openly engaging in anti-competitive practices that many, including myself (not a lawyer), say violate anti-trust laws. Let’s go back to 1948. A landmark case known as United States vs Paramount Pictures busted up movie monopolies that engaged in “vertical integration” of movie production, distribution, and exhibition of motion pictures. In plain English movie studios not only made movies, they also owned the theaters their movies played in, which stifled competition. There were independently owned theaters, too, but they had to agree to play blocks of movies selected by the studios whether or not theaters wanted to play all of them. The courts, including the United States Supreme Court, agreed with the plaint...

There’s something about the recent Artemis II mission that stands in stark contrast to how the rest of the country is being run. That something is professionalism. A team of rocket scientists, engineers, and technicians designed and built the rocket that safely launched the astronauts into orbit. The astronauts went through years of rigorous training for just ten days of flight. Flight controllers in Houston guided the spacecraft on its flight path so precisely that it splashed down in the Pacific Ocean at the exact minute they had planned. None of this would have been possible without the glue that held it all together: professionalism. What exactly is professionalism? It’s an attitude that demands the very best of everyone involved. It is a combination of proper training, skill, dedication, teamwork, ethics, honesty, integrity, respect for others, cooperation, planning, attention to detail, orderliness, personal responsibility, and putting safety first. Professionalism demands st...

I've been watching Artemis II on the TV all week. It is encouraging to see us finally going back to the moon after more than 53 years since Apollo 17. So I was dismayed to see a post on Nextdoor from a former NASA employee who thinks the whole manned space program is a waste of money, and always was. I responded to him with the following. Sending people to the moon seems like a much better use of our money than bombing Iranian bridges, power plants, and schoolgirls. Or buying up abandoned warehouses for use as "detention facilities."  Or shooting peaceful protesters on American streets. Or maintaining a nuclear arsenal that could wipe out the entire Earth several times over.  Humans are natural explorers. It is part of being human to push our boundaries. We've been at it for thousands of years. By doing so we have created many wonderful (and some not so wonderful) inventions, expanded our collective knowledge, and learned more about ourselves in the process. You sa...