I bought the PGabor.com domain exactly 21 years ago today and launched the first version of the site two weeks later. Here is a quick summary of how the site has changed over the years:
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Múlt vasárnap szüreteltünk egy kicsit. Az alábbi másfél perce videó a három és fél óra cselekményeit foglalja össze, kissé felpörgetve.
Szeptember 20-án írtam egy posztot amiben azon keseregtem, hogy elvesztettem a “verified” (ellenőrzött) státusomat. Akkor még arra hajtottam, hogy meglegye az ezredik feliratkozója a cstornámnak, mert a szabályok megváltoztatása miatt már pénzkeresesésre sem volt alkalmas a csatornám anélkül. Akkor még nem is sejtettem, hogy hamarosan az egész csatornát elvesztem. Ez történt.
Szeptember 25-én kaptam egy emailt mi így kezdődött:
“Due to multiple copyright strikes associated with the videos below, your YouTube account has now been disabled.” (“Az alábbi videókhoz kapcsolódó több szerzői jogi figyelmeztetés miatt YouTube-fiókod most le lett tiltva”) Ezek után volt egy lista 11 számról amit a Budapest Bár májusi, Kobuci kertbeli koncertjén vettem fel.
Mielőtt tovább írnám, hogy ezek után mi történt szeretnék egy pár dolgot leszögezni.
Akkor most vissza a Budapest Báros esethez. A szóban forgó videókról a YouTube-n keresztül május 17-én kaptam üzenetet, mely szerint “may have content that is owned or licensed by UMPG Publishing, but it’s still available on YouTube!...This claim is not penalizing your account status.” (Azaz a videók, lehet, hogy tartalmaznak copyright-os tartalmatakat, de büntetést nem kapok.) Majd június 28-án ismét kaptam üzenetet, ezekkel kapcsolatban, ezzel a szöveggel “Good news! The copyright claim on your video was released.” (Azaz, jó hírt kaptam, a videó szerzői jogi igényét elengedték.) Más kommunikáció nem volt ezzel kapcsoltabn egészen addig amíg a derült égből jött a teljes letiltás. Nem igazán értettem, hogy 4 hónappal később, miért szánták el magukat ilyen drasztikus lépésre. Bárcsak szóltak volna, hogy mégis problémásak a videóim és akkor természetesen azonnal levettem volna őket.
Írtam a YouTube-nak, hogy levenném azokat a videókat ha visszakaphatnám a csatornámat, de azt mondták, hogy erre nincs lehetőség, a tiltás marad. Ezek után megkerestem a Budapest Bár-t. Ki kell jelentenem, hogy megértően és segítőkészen álltak hozzá a problémámhoz. A magam részéről megértettem, hogy
– ők minden rossz minőségű videót magukról le akarnak vetetni
– más lett volna a helyzet ha csak 1-2 számot rakok fel és nem szinte az összes, azon koncerten elhangzott dalt.
– előzetes engedély kéréssel talán lehetne felvenni/felrakni videót.
Nekik is felajánlottam, hogy leveszem az összes Budapest Bár videómat, ha visszaállíthatom a csatornámat. Beleegyeztek és hivatalosan visszavonták (“retract“) a copyright-s igényüket YouTube felé. A YouTube ennek ellenére sem volt hajlandó a csatornát újraéleszteni.
Mivel videózni továbbra is szeretnék ezért új csatornát inditottam, de ezután óvatosabb leszek. Az új csatornám a cégem neve alatt fut (Vision Nest Media) és irányt is vált majd egy kicsit. Tessék lehet (újból?) feliratkozni:
Iratkozz fel a YouTube csatornámra
Hogyan lesz más az új csatornám?
1. Ha koncerten akarok videózni akkor előre megkérdezem a zenekart, hogy beleegyeznek-e és felrakhatom-e a YouTube-ra.
2. Több “eredeti” videót akarok csinálni és felrakni. Mivel van legalább négy saját honlapom, négy különböző témában, elsősorban azoknak/azokhoz akarok majd videókat csinálni. Tehát ha (illetve amikor :-) sikeres lesz a csatornám akkor az annak is köszönhető lesz amit én csináltam, nem csak annak, hogy koncerteket dokumentálok.
3. Lassan, amikor az időm engedi azért vissza-vissza fogom töltögeteni azokat a videókat az új csatornára, amik megvannak nekem még valahol és nem copyright-osak. Úgy saccolom, hogy kb 500 régi videómat fogom, az 1000+-ból, felrakni. Ez el fog tartani pár hónapig. Kezdetnek tegnap 44-el indítottam.
I’ve been a happily married man for a year now.
My YouTube channel is about to lose its “verified” status after almost 13 years, because of the changes in YouTube’s rules. To become “verified” all I had to do, as far as I remember, was sending a copy of my ID to them. (The verification process still seems to be the more or less the same.) As a result I got that little check mark next to my name as you can see on the screenshot above. Continue reading
Yesterday when I was going through airport security in San Francisco I noticed that in the privileged, aka the fast lane an interesting set of people were coming through. What grabbed my attention was men with pink rectangular pillows on their heads that they were holding with one or two hands. These objects were clearly ceremonial. Some of the men were wearing regular semi-elegant western clothes, others semi-elegant clothing from India. Based on their skin color they all seemed to be from India. There was more than a dozen of them. I also noticed 2 or 3 people around them , who seemed to be ritually fanning the top of these pillows. Eventually I also saw one or two elderly gentleman in turbans and more traditional Indian clothing, with big white beards. For my untrained eyes they looked like gurus. I would appreciate if someone could identify them for me and for the people who asked me on Facebook or Instagram about them; i.e. do they belong to a new (age?) religious movement or were adherents of a more traditional religion. I was too shy to shoot too many pictures, so here is the best of the ones I took:
Please subscribe to my YouTube Channel, so I could reach the new 1000 subscribe threshold. (Here are the details of why YouTube increased the number.)
What to expect? Just like in the past I will mostly keep posting videos of songs from concerts as I attend them and plan to do more original content too, e.g. film reviews.
Thank you,
Gábor
Iratkozz fel a YouTube csatornámra, hogy elérjem az új, 1000 fős miminumot. (Itt vannak a részletei annak, hogy a YouTube miért emelte meg a határt.)
Mit várhatsz? Ahogy a múltban is, ezután is dalokat rakok majd fel az általam látogatott koncertekről, illetve tervezek eredeti tartalmat is felrakni, például film kritikákat.
Köszönöm.
Gábor
Yesterday I finished reading Infomocracy by Malka Older. (Thank you Bryan, for the recommendation.) Part of the plot was about what to do when elections go awry, i.e. one or more sides influence or hack elections in ways that are illegal according to the rules. One option is to repeat the election and hoping that the changes in voters’ behavior due to the fact what it was repeated election won’t be too anomalous. But what happens when the second election as the same or similar issues. Should the authorities just keep repeating elections until they get the results they want?
Today I came across a short AP piece in The Washington Post, titled “What’s Bundespraesidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebung?” and included this:
It’s “Bundespraesidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebung,” or “postponement of the repeat of the runoff of the presidential election.”
The tongue-twister was born of the record time it took to elect Austria’s president, and was announced following a poll of 10,000 people carried out by the Research Unit for Austrian German at the University of Graz, in cooperation with the Austria Press Agency.
A first round in April was followed by a May runoff between the two most popular candidates. This was annulled because of irregularities. A new date set for October was then postponed because of faulty absentee ballots to Dec. 4, when the vote was won by Alexander Van der Bellen.
Right now there are a number of suggestions running amok on Facebook about what should happen in the US:
I cannot avoid noticing the pattern in my readings that new elections are called for or happening. In a lot of areas of life scarcity equates value. The rarer a stamp is the more expensive and collectible it gets. I am wondering whether the value of elections is similar or not. The less frequently we have them the more valuables they can get. The aforementioned book touches on this. Meanwhile I keep chewing on this idea/ What do you think?
*”Connections” are ideas that occur to me as I read books, watch movies and TV shows and sometimes even connect them to current events.
I am holding multiple perspectives of my trip to Berlin last month that I want to share with my future self along with a quick summary of the trip. I went with my Mother for three days. She was there last time in 1987 and never ventured to West Berlin. I did managed to cross the magical “West” around the same time for a few hours and I also passed through Berlin a week before the Wall came down in 1989. So we both wanted to check out the new/changed city. Hence the first perspective: comparison with itself from almost 30 years ago. I think the most memorable difference is the contrast between the vast empty spaces back then around the Wall–along with the general dreary grayness–versus the bustling constructions and new buildings everywhere. Yes, the changes on the streets could not be more tangible. We didn’t venture out too much to the East and West part of the city, so couldn’t fully compare the success of the unification. However we got the sense that it is mixed success. There are parts where it was hard to decide/remember whether which side we were on. Other spots were clearly belonged to one or the other too in their former selves.
We met an old friend from Hungary who has been living in Berlin for decades. He wasn’t the only one who described the city as “livable”. I cannot imagine a highest praise for a city. After all that’s what city folks want to do there live. This is where the second perspective comes in. We came directly from Budapest. Which is a great place to visit. It can also be made quite comfortable if one puts the effort in it and ha the resources to do so. However in Berlin I felt that the leaders of the city do a lot, including legislation and the way they must make decisions (involving the populace and experts) to ensue that the city serves its inhabitants and visitors. This concerted effort seems to be lacking in Budapest. So from the second perspective, comparing contemporary Berlin to Budapest the former comes out as a winner. It was most obvious when we were looking at the people on the streets, buses or S-Bahns. And I am not just talking about the multitude of skin colors and styles/types of people who coexist cheerfully. (After we returned to Hungary and watched the people on the public transportation they seemed so monotone, way less vibrant.) No, the its the general outlook and the mode of the people that I found more interested/interesting in Berlin. Yes, a lot of people look at their smartphone at both places, which seems alienating. However Berliners also looked up and were engaged with their surroundings and people lot more. And their face was more vivid, alive. Hungarians just keep looking stressed and sad. (Of course it is a gross generalization, there are lots of counterexamples in both cities, but I am just sharing trends I noticed.)
My third and final perspective came form the fact that I have been living in the US for 21 years and somewhat internalized its culture and frame of reference. Looking at Berlin as an American tourist was also refreshing. “We, Americans” are used to convenience, we like when things are arranged in a way that is easy to access, digest, consume. Berlin is a vary tourist friendly city. The signs are clear and unambiguous, everyone speaks at least some English, the spectacles are numerous, well maintained and vary enough to keep the visit interesting. One can find any kind of cuisine at any price range, although didn’t see “traditional American” food; not that I was looking hard. So my American self was fully satisfied with the visit.
So what did we do and see? Here are some highlights along with links to the images I took
P.s. From the hundreds of pictures I took on this trip I chose the one you see above, because it represent my biggest experience. I had a strong epiphany that I do love my life, which is how the German text translates.
I stopped eating refined sugar on September 1. I’ve known for a long time vaguely that it is not good for my body, but what prompted me to do so was this article in Fast Company. This explained to me that (over)consuming it is not just relates to weight and metabolism issues, but also affects the brain, including cognitive abilities. I think of myself as being good in that area so I decided I want to keep it that way by giving up refined sugar for an indefinite time.
I ate sugar knowingly only 4 days in the last 40 days, including a wedding and a birthday. (The two other days I just couldn’t capitulated to the craving.) But not once in the last 20 days. Even on the other days I might have had some trace amount of sugar. E.g. I had ketchup the first week, as I forgot that it contains sugar and more recently ragu for my pasta. Now I know better.
The article mentioned that the withdrawal syndromes would be the worst between day 2 and 6. Knowing this was a double edge sword. On one hand it prepared me for the worst. On the other hand maybe it was a self-fulfilling prophecy, because indeed, those days I could barely think of anything else than sugar. But now that time period is way behind me I feel much better. I still crave it quite often, but not that bad. Easy to resist, just need to think of my personal fear of addiction to other kind of drugs.
Some people who were aware of my sugarlessness asked me whether I feel different. I know that I am not the best person at self-observance, so I couldn’t give them an answer on the spot. Now that I think about it, I think there are 3 parts of the answer:
A final note. I decided to write this little summary after 40 days of (imperfect) abstinence, because 40 days has spiritual/religious significance. Moses was on Mount Sinai (working on the Ten Commandments with God, see Exodus 34:28), Jesus was in the wilderness (and got tempted by Satan, e.g. Matthew 4:1-11), Muhammad prayed and fasted for the same amount days in a cave. I am not comparing myself to them (or my tribulations to theirs), just borrowed the idea of forty days from these traditions. However I will keep not eating refined sugar, albeit won’t stick to it religiously. Every once in a while, on special occasions, I won’t deny myself from it.