infobong.com

This is linked today on Slashdot, but since this blog is hosted by the University of Texas' department of Radio-TV-Film, its worth posting here. This NYTimes story describes how a Clear Channel subsidiary uses a database of sound bites from Carson Daly to create localized countdown shows for each of the radio market they serve. Engineers assemble a pastiche of soundbites to make it sound as if Daly is reading the countdown for the local audience, when in fact the petri-dish grown personality is as live as the feminine voice on the telephone network you need to start your call with a "one" or a "zero."

I'm particularly amused by this Anonymous Coward post, where the poster defines the word "Simulacrum," which I suppose is a fairly obscure concept for people who don't eat, sleep, and breath post-structuralism, then goes on to say:

Simulacra and Simulations, by Jean Baudrillard, is the book in which Neo hid his diskette. I started reading it and was amazed by the relevance of the concept of the 'simulacrum' to The Matrix.

Yeah, like the movie references the book for no reason in particular.