Friam

Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

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Barry MacKichan

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Alta Vista

On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

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Barry MacKichan

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

I promise that from now on, I'll read all the messages before responding to one. ;-(

On Feb 27, 2013, at 12:03 PM, Barry MacKichan <[hidden email]> wrote:

Alta Vista
On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

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FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Eric Charles

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

In reply to this post by Barry MacKichan

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

From: "Barry MacKichan" <[hidden email]>
To: "The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group" <[hidden email]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 2:03:41 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Alta Vista

On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

Nick Thompson

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Does anybody remember a wonderful, phony corporate ad which predicted the eclipsing of Microsoft by an entity called Googlezon (as opposed to Amazoogle, I suppose). I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it. Might be time to dust it off and wonder how close it came to being true. And, of course, we ain’t done yet.

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Eric Charles
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 6:45 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

Douglas Roberts-2

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

"I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it."

Use Google.

On Feb 27, 2013 8:24 PM, "Nicholas Thompson" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Does anybody remember a wonderful, phony corporate ad which predicted the eclipsing of Microsoft by an entity called Googlezon (as opposed to Amazoogle, I suppose). I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it. Might be time to dust it off and wonder how close it came to being true. And, of course, we ain’t done yet.

N

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Eric Charles
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 6:45 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

From: "Barry MacKichan" <[hidden email]>
To: "The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group" <[hidden email]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 2:03:41 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Alta Vista
On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Steve Smith

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Better yet...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPIC_2014

follow the link... it is on YouTube and other places.

"I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it."

Use Google.

On Feb 27, 2013 8:24 PM, "Nicholas Thompson" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Does anybody remember a wonderful, phony corporate ad which predicted the eclipsing of Microsoft by an entity called Googlezon (as opposed to Amazoogle, I suppose). I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it. Might be time to dust it off and wonder how close it came to being true. And, of course, we ain’t done yet.

N

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Eric Charles
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 6:45 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

From: "Barry MacKichan" <[hidden email]>
To: "The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group" <[hidden email]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 2:03:41 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Alta Vista

On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Nick Thompson

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

In reply to this post by Douglas Roberts-2

Vaaaary funny. It’s some sort of a video or perhaps only a link? If somebody doesn’t remember its name or have a better filing system than mine, I think it is lost in the bit-midden.

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Douglas Roberts
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 8:31 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

"I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it."

Use Google.

On Feb 27, 2013 8:24 PM, "Nicholas Thompson" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

David Eric Smith

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

<base href="x-msg://33/">Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

Amazoogle sounds like something from a Douglas Adams book, with a long wiggly trunk and lumpy multicolored skin, probably involving purple and green coloration and perhaps spots, and even more difficult to take seriously.

Now why would that be? Syllable-initial stops versus vowels and sibilants? Stress on the final versus the penultimate syllable? A reduced final vowel in the latter that kind of dribbles away? Must ask my psycholinguist friends for a breakdown. I'm sure they have nothing better to do.

On Feb 28, 2013, at 2:53 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:

Vaaaary funny. It’s some sort of a video or perhaps only a link? If somebody doesn’t remember its name or have a better filing system than mine, I think it is lost in the bit-midden.

N

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Douglas Roberts
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 8:31 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

"I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it."
Use Google.
On Feb 27, 2013 8:24 PM, "Nicholas Thompson" <[hidden email]> wrote:
Does anybody remember a wonderful, phony corporate ad which predicted the eclipsing of Microsoft by an entity called Googlezon (as opposed to Amazoogle, I suppose). I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it. Might be time to dust it off and wonder how close it came to being true. And, of course, we ain’t done yet.

N

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Eric Charles
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 6:45 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

From: "Barry MacKichan" <[hidden email]>
To: "The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group" <[hidden email]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 2:03:41 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Alta Vista
On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Steve Smith

Googlezon and phonotactics

Eric -

Great observation.   I'm very interested in the power of how things are *shaped* in their ability to persuade (all perceptions, with sound being unique). It also ties into synaesthetic experiences. Your description of the hypothetical Douglas Adams creature is a good example of how the sound of the name is highly suggestive of it's shape/etc. Another aspect of the Structure/Function duality.

I do suspect that the EPIC2014 folks chose Googlezon specifically for it's phonetic reference to Godzilla...

My wife watches a lot of movies on her computer/iPad while she works, where I cannot see them. I am generally not interested in the content of the movies themselves, so do my best to ignore the dialog. But I cannot ignore the soundtrack, the shape of the music and the dialog and the ambient sounds.   It is an entertaining (if sometimes distracting) experience.

I also enjoy the phonotactics of poetry and literature and marvel at the writers who can manipulate my emotions through the shaping of the sounds behind the writing (and no, I don't move my lips while I read, but I *do* hear eloquent writing as I read?).

I have tried to follow some of the Neuro Linguistic Programming literature but got put off by the cultish mind-control factions there to the point of letting that line drop. If you have more serious references to send me to, I would appreciate it.

Thanks,
- Steve

<base href="x-msg://33/">Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

Amazoogle sounds like something from a Douglas Adams book, with a long wiggly trunk and lumpy multicolored skin, probably involving purple and green coloration and perhaps spots, and even more difficult to take seriously.

Now why would that be? Syllable-initial stops versus vowels and sibilants? Stress on the final versus the penultimate syllable? A reduced final vowel in the latter that kind of dribbles away? Must ask my psycholinguist friends for a breakdown. I'm sure they have nothing better to do.

David Eric Smith

Re: Googlezon and phonotactics

Hi Steve, thanks,

I do suspect that the EPIC2014 folks chose Googlezon specifically for it's phonetic reference to Godzilla...

Yes, I think so too.

I have tried to follow some of the Neuro Linguistic Programming literature but got put off by the cultish mind-control factions there to the point of letting that line drop. If you have more serious references to send me to, I would appreciate it.

May I recommend Morten Christiansen at Cornell:

http://www.psych.cornell.edu/people/Faculty/mhc27.html

perhaps also in his collaborations with Nick Chater at Warwick

http://www.wbs.ac.uk/about/person/nick-chater/

Of the two, I know Morten's work better, and I also happen to think extremely highly of the person. The parts I have seen focus on the induction problem of child language learning. All of the following have to be solved: syllable boundary identification, syllable rules of structure, the languages phoneme inventory, parts of speech, syntactic rules, and lots more if one had the patience to list it all. What clues do kids have to do all this? How much is their own prior expectation (a proper constructive approach to "universal grammar"), and how much is the language responsible for carrying to help them?

One piece of Morten's work concerns patterns of sound shape that are systematically different for nouns and verbs in English, and which Morten can demonstrate (if I recall) kids do use to realize that these are different word categories, and then iteratively, knowing that the categories exist, to start figuring out what are their syntactic roles, attaching those roles to morphological rules, and from this what semantic tokens they might carry.

A nearly-triivial example is the way modern English has systematically begun a first-syllable/second-syllable stress distinction for words that have both noun and verb/adjective uses. It isn't stable yet, and it isn't pervasive. The noun is a COMplex, the adjective is comPLEX. But for this one, we still use the noun form when we COMplex (fold together) fats and meats in a braise. Other words are better behaved. When inVITE came to be used as a noun, it became an INvite. If I don't mistake, this is not the original pattern in English. These words used to have a single stress marking in all usages. The stress division is a thing that has been taking shape over the past several decades (maybe as long as a century). I can still remember my parents' indignation (incoherently expressed, of course, as such things can only be) at the east-coast mobsters in the entertainment industry who would HARass each other, when everyone knew that the "right" pronunciation was harASS. (Forgive the association of having a hair (or hare?) up one's ass, which this capitalization pattern makes it hard to overlook.) This "misuse" was a sign of their low class and criminal proclivities in the eyes of decent people, who however poor, at least knew how to speak. I actually have no idea what the original word is, but I suspect it was probably HARass in both usages, and my PARents were responding to the shaping distinction of their generation.

Morten's work contains things much more subtle than this, which require an actual scientist, usually doing statistics on a computer, to recognize, and I don't remember any examples from seeing this many years ago. He and Nick have at least one book out together, which I think is on topics related to these.

I share your pleasure in the shape of sounds, though unfortunately, philistine that I am, I am no more connaisseur of that than of any other form of art. But to listen to Joyce rehearse that in one of the childhood chapters of Portrait was perhaps the first example I have had in a long time of being able to resurrect the state of childhood experience as it was felt as a child (when things still had time to be interesting just for existing), which is somehow trapped inside the old person but mostly no longer accessible. The interest in synesthesia too. A topic I would learn about with another life to do it in.

All best,

Eric

Thanks,
- Steve

<base href="x-msg://33/">Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

Amazoogle sounds like something from a Douglas Adams book, with a long wiggly trunk and lumpy multicolored skin, probably involving purple and green coloration and perhaps spots, and even more difficult to take seriously.

Now why would that be? Syllable-initial stops versus vowels and sibilants? Stress on the final versus the penultimate syllable? A reduced final vowel in the latter that kind of dribbles away? Must ask my psycholinguist friends for a breakdown. I'm sure they have nothing better to do.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Nick Thompson

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

In reply to this post by David Eric Smith

Thanks, Eric.

It’s great to hear your voice.

I think this is the first time I have ever bent one of Doug’’s threads, so, while I am at it, I am going to bend it real good!

The philosopher Rorty would insist that we have to include HISTORY, just plain old history, as one of the factors. I cite from the authority, Seuss, PhD, his ground-breaking work on the origin of the famous, Circus McGurkus:

Then a fluff-muffled Truffle will ride on a Huffle,

And, next in line, a fine Flummox will shuffle.

The Flummox will carry a Lurch in a pail,

And a Fibble will carry the Flummox’s tail

While, on top of the Flummox, three Harp-Twanging Snarp

Will twang mighty twangs on their Three-Snarper-Harp

While a Bolster blows bloops on a three-nozzled bloozer!

A Nolster blows flops on a one-nozzled noozer!

And then comes lion who’s partly a trout!

Then more stuff! For forty-five minutes, about!

Now, that’s what I call a well bent thread!

Mind those slithetoes, Eric

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Eric Smith
Sent: Thursday, February 28, 2013 4:49 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

On Feb 28, 2013, at 2:53 AM, Nicholas Thompson wrote:

Vaaaary funny. It’s some sort of a video or perhaps only a link? If somebody doesn’t remember its name or have a better filing system than mine, I think it is lost in the bit-midden.

From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Douglas Roberts
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 8:31 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

"I know it’s on my hard drive but I cannot imagine how to search for it."

Use Google.

On Feb 27, 2013 8:24 PM, "Nicholas Thompson" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Don't be silly. Soon as WebCrawler aggregates all those results, they will be the clear winner!

--------
Eric Charles
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State, Altoona

On Feb 26, 2013, at 6:02 PM, Gillian Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Anyone else remember when google was this small internet search engine that hardly anyone had heard of because they were off using yahoo? (or possible lycos?)

Nick Thompson

Re: Googlezon and phonotactics

In reply to this post by Steve Smith

Eric,

Your reference to EPIC2014 suggests you remember the provenance of the original spoof, which I am still hoping to find. But I got nothing when I googled epic2014. Do you remember it? Nobody else has confessed to having seen it, yet. Can you give me more breadcrumbs? Nick

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Steve Smith
Sent: Thursday, February 28, 2013 8:18 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Googlezon and phonotactics

Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

Amazoogle sounds like something from a Douglas Adams book, with a long wiggly trunk and lumpy multicolored skin, probably involving purple and green coloration and perhaps spots, and even more difficult to take seriously.

Now why would that be? Syllable-initial stops versus vowels and sibilants? Stress on the final versus the penultimate syllable? A reduced final vowel in the latter that kind of dribbles away? Must ask my psycholinguist friends for a breakdown. I'm sure they have nothing better to do.

Joshua Thorp

Re: Googlezon and phonotactics

<base href="x-msg://33/">http://www.robinsloan.com/epic/

On Feb 28, 2013, at 11:13 AM, "Nicholas Thompson" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Eric,

Your reference to EPIC2014 suggests you remember the provenance of the original spoof, which I am still hoping to find. But I got nothing when I googled epic2014. Do you remember it? Nobody else has confessed to having seen it, yet. Can you give me more breadcrumbs? Nick

From: Friam [mailto:friam-[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Steve Smith
Sent: Thursday, February 28, 2013 8:18 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Googlezon and phonotactics

Eric -

Great observation.   I'm very interested in the power of how things are *shaped* in their ability to persuade (all perceptions, with sound being unique). It also ties into synaesthetic experiences. Your description of the hypothetical Douglas Adams creature is a good example of how the sound of the name is highly suggestive of it's shape/etc. Another aspect of the Structure/Function duality.

I do suspect that the EPIC2014 folks chose Googlezon specifically for it's phonetic reference to Godzilla...

My wife watches a lot of movies on her computer/iPad while she works, where I cannot see them. I am generally not interested in the content of the movies themselves, so do my best to ignore the dialog. But I cannot ignore the soundtrack, the shape of the music and the dialog and the ambient sounds.   It is an entertaining (if sometimes distracting) experience.

I also enjoy the phonotactics of poetry and literature and marvel at the writers who can manipulate my emotions through the shaping of the sounds behind the writing (and no, I don't move my lips while I read, but I *do* hear eloquent writing as I read?).

I have tried to follow some of the Neuro Linguistic Programming literature but got put off by the cultish mind-control factions there to the point of letting that line drop. If you have more serious references to send me to, I would appreciate it.

Thanks,
- Steve
Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

Amazoogle sounds like something from a Douglas Adams book, with a long wiggly trunk and lumpy multicolored skin, probably involving purple and green coloration and perhaps spots, and even more difficult to take seriously.

Now why would that be? Syllable-initial stops versus vowels and sibilants? Stress on the final versus the penultimate syllable? A reduced final vowel in the latter that kind of dribbles away? Must ask my psycholinguist friends for a breakdown. I'm sure they have nothing better to do.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Steve Smith

Re: Googlezon and phonotactics

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

My Bad Nick, I thought I had included a link in my original jumped thread:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPIC_2014

<base href="x-msg://33/">

Eric,

Your reference to EPIC2014 suggests you remember the provenance of the original spoof, which I am still hoping to find. But I got nothing when I googled epic2014. Do you remember it? Nobody else has confessed to having seen it, yet. Can you give me more breadcrumbs? Nick

From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Steve Smith
Sent: Thursday, February 28, 2013 8:18 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: [FRIAM] Googlezon and phonotactics

Eric -

Great observation.   I'm very interested in the power of how things are *shaped* in their ability to persuade (all perceptions, with sound being unique). It also ties into synaesthetic experiences. Your description of the hypothetical Douglas Adams creature is a good example of how the sound of the name is highly suggestive of it's shape/etc. Another aspect of the Structure/Function duality.

I do suspect that the EPIC2014 folks chose Googlezon specifically for it's phonetic reference to Godzilla...

My wife watches a lot of movies on her computer/iPad while she works, where I cannot see them. I am generally not interested in the content of the movies themselves, so do my best to ignore the dialog. But I cannot ignore the soundtrack, the shape of the music and the dialog and the ambient sounds.   It is an entertaining (if sometimes distracting) experience.

I also enjoy the phonotactics of poetry and literature and marvel at the writers who can manipulate my emotions through the shaping of the sounds behind the writing (and no, I don't move my lips while I read, but I *do* hear eloquent writing as I read?).

I have tried to follow some of the Neuro Linguistic Programming literature but got put off by the cultish mind-control factions there to the point of letting that line drop. If you have more serious references to send me to, I would appreciate it.

Thanks,
- Steve

Don't mean to thread hijack, but it seems this thread was pretty far gone anyway.

I must say that the English phonotactics are really on display here.

Googlezon sounds like something big, heavy and vaguely dangerous, a kind of Golem but somewhat clunky and difficult to take seriously, like the monsters in old Japanese semi-animations.

Amazoogle sounds like something from a Douglas Adams book, with a long wiggly trunk and lumpy multicolored skin, probably involving purple and green coloration and perhaps spots, and even more difficult to take seriously.

Now why would that be? Syllable-initial stops versus vowels and sibilants? Stress on the final versus the penultimate syllable? A reduced final vowel in the latter that kind of dribbles away? Must ask my psycholinguist friends for a breakdown. I'm sure they have nothing better to do.
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

Arlo Barnes

Re: Wow. 6 whole days without a Nexus 4 post.

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

That's, um, "slithy toves". You know, the ones that gire and gimble in the wabe.
It's pronounced "Throat-Warbler Mangrove", though.

Another factor in 'why GoogleZon' is that perhaps the name is meant to instill the sense that this is an unholy mashup of two already cluttered giants. The name certainly does not flow poetically, and this is supported by the logo: despite being a multi-billion dollar company, apparently they did not want to pay graphic designers to make a new one - why, just smash the old two together, it is serviceable!

-Arlo James Barnes

123