EPIC
A big thank you to Dean Landsman who pointed to this 8-minute flash movie called EPIC, an absolute must-see. Nice touch: when an id card flashes on the screen, it’s Winston Smith‘s. Also, tying in to my earlier posts about Andrew Potter and Joseph Heath’s books — The Rebel Sell and the two posts on Nov. 24 and Nov. 22 that glanced at The Efficient Society — I was struck by the narrator’s closing comments in EPIC. He notes that the end result depicted is “what we chose,” that it’s “our choice.” He also notes that “commercial success pre-empted any discussion of democracy, journalism, and ethics.” (quoted verbatim, not exactly). Nothing in this “history” is implausible, least of all the idea that market forces, unchecked, would logically allow for this development.
I still haven’t seen the dam thing. Flash!!! Ugh.
What blows my mind though is this: laissez fair economics lead to monopoly positions. This isn’t Marxist cant, it’s right out of a grade ten economics text book. Monopolies are not good things. We know this. In fact it’s impetus around which the free marketization of government services and monpolies and crown corporations is based.
Food, info, water, money. All under one roof.
Comment by brian moffatt — December 2, 2004 #