Hacker Cinema
The Rum Diary
2011 · Film · 120 min
Directed by Bruce Robinson
Tired of the noise and madness of New York and the crushing conventions of late Eisenhower-era America, itinerant journalist Paul Kemp travels to the pristine island of Puerto Rico to write for a local San Juan newspaper run by the downtrodden editor Lotterman. Adopting the rum-soaked lifestyle of the late ‘50s version of Hemingway’s 'The Lost Generation', Paul soon becomes entangled with a very attractive American woman and her fiancée, a businessman involved in shady property development deals. It is within this world that Kemp ultimately discovers his true voice as a writer and integrity as a man.
3 positive2 neutralfrom 5 commenters
Where to watch
No streaming data for this title.
5 comments on Hacker News
In the film Rum Diary, the goal of a group of characters is to request a permit to build 50 houses with the actual goal of building three hotels. The "negotiation" step is when they "concede" the houses and "just" build the hotel instead, the hotels being the original plan. The houses were basically just a trick to start the negotiations way in favor of one side.
That's the scheme being described above, it is not something that is specific to content creators, but instead a description of shady negotiation tactics used by powerful entities (like YouTube or billionaire real estate developers). There is nothing about it that is specific to YouTube or content creators.
It does indeed have a name: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door-in-the-face_technique
I think it's an interesting topic, more people should want to learn about life in other circumstances, so I'm not sure why you were downvoted.
Maybe just because no one has come by with an answer.
Not that it's what you're looking for, but this reminds me of Kacey Musgraves, who has some anti-country songs about the pain and false promises of small town life in a changing America. Merry Go Round and Blowin Smoke especially.
There's some social psychology research on "sense of place" that covers how drawn people are to staying in the place where they grew up, which makes it hard for some to leave. The Rum Diary (the novel, can't vouch for the film) is kind of a meditation on this too, though about Puerto Rico instead of the rural midwest.
Agreed on books over the movies. First time I watched F & L I turned it off. Eventually I read the book which is fantastic. I did go back and watch the movie then and liked it more but the book is much, much better. As for The Rum Diary I'd suggest the book first because there are a few major character changes between it and the movie and it was harder to follow the book after seeing the movie. Unlike F & L the movie for Rum Diary is on par with the book in my opinion.
For those not familiar with Hunter S. Thompson and looking to get an understanding of his outsize personality and cult following, I highly recommend watching the 2 movies in which Johnny Depp played his character:
* Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120669/
* The Rum Diary (2011) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0376136/
If you are not already a fan of Johnny Depp, these movies should do it.
There's a scene in the movie The Rum Diary where Sanderson says roughly that the way to sell the public on the idea of building a hotel on an untouched island is to start by trying to build 20 hotels. Public outrage will occur, people will write their politicians, and finally a compromise will be reached, in which you get to build only one hotel. But the trick is, that's what you wanted to do in the first place. In the end, this compromise wasn't good enough: the result is still horrible.
This is roughly what Lenovo is trying to pull off here.
> Superfish was previously included on some consumer notebook products shipped in a short window between September and December to help customers potentially discover interesting products while shopping.
This is the compromise being offered. They're claiming, "We didn't violate your privacy, we didn't violate your security, we just wanted to help you discover interesting products."
Superfish opens up all sorts of security holes and privacy concerns, but it's probably true that this wasn't Lenovo's intention (not yet, anyway). But to accept this as a compromise would be to give Lenovo the thing they want in the first place: to serve ads into our web searches. And that in itself is deplorable. It is not acceptable for companies to force their agendas on us.
Lenovo's only defense here is that they were doing something disgusting. We should not accept this compromise.