Posts

Showing posts from April, 2013

Shopping as a Game

Image
JC Penny recently fired its CEO -- Ron Johnson -- because his concept of simplicity was not working. With hindsight, we see that they forgot an important fact: for the typical JC Penny customer --  shopping is a game . Exploration: Imagine a computer maze game. It has twists and turns. Imagine that you had to discover gold and treasure  hidden along the way, by exploring, discovering, and then learning tell-tale signs -- often coming up empty-handed, but finally hitting pay-dirt. Now imagine the game developer decided to simplify things  by removing the maze. Instead, he gives you a straight hallway. And, why hide the gold --- such a waste of time? He simply places it on clearly-visible tables along the way. Perhaps the tables are placed so the gold jumps into your hand as you pass by. You start the game, press the forward key for a while, and you're done. You get through at record speed, and with all the gold. Simple and efficient... great if this was something you really

Old poems used as songs

Add this: David Gilmour sings Shakespeare's Sonnet #18  ( a post about it ) ------------- previously listed ---------------- " Golden Slumbers Kiss your Eyes " by Thomas Dekker sung as Golden slumbers (by the Beatles) ; [I like K.D. Lang's version ] The ballad " Scarborough Fair "., sung by many ( Sarah Brightman , Celtic Woman , Emerson Lake and Palmer, Simon and Garfunkel ) . Words We are the Music Makers , by Arthur O'Shaughnessy (by the Northwest Choral Society ) Poem recitation here . She walks in Beauty (Lord Byron), sung by Sissel , for the movie "Vanity Fair" (Also, a church choir version) [Rehtaeh seems to do the same version.] Invictus, by "The Peter Ray Band" The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes, sung by Loreena McKennitt (One could turn this approach on its head: Instead of putting a poem to music, find a tune and write a poem to it. This has been done with songs like Yankee-Doodle and others. The famili