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Platystemon
Feb 13, 2012

as a person who never leaves my house i've done pretty well for myself.

Cemetry Gator posted:

Wait, it's not common to have your place of residence and office bugged?

Have I ripped my apartment walls and mattress apart for nothing?

And will the person flashing their headlights using Morse code to tell me not to look for any bugs please stop. It's really annoying.

Three comrades share a hotel room in Novosibirsk.

The first two men open a bottle of vodka, while the third is tired and goes straight to bed. He is unable to sleep however, as his increasingly drunk friends tell political jokes loudly.

After a while, the tired man gets frustrated and walks downstairs for a smoke. He stops in the lounge and asks the receptionist to bring tea to their room. She says it will be up in ten minutes.

The man walks back to the room, joins the table, leans towards the phone, still on hook, and speaks into it:

“Comrade major, room sixty-two would like some tea.”

His friends laugh on the joke, until there is a knock on the door. The receptionist brings a tea pot. His friends fall silent and pale, horrified of what they just witnessed. The party is dead, and the man goes to sleep.

After a good night's rest, the man wakes up, and notices his friends are gone. Surprised, he walks downstairs and asks the receptionist where they went.

The receptionist suggests it is best not to ask such questions.

The man is horrified. “Why was I spared?” he wonders aloud.

This time the receptionist has an answer: “Comrade Major liked your tea gag.”

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The Lone Badger
Sep 24, 2007

The modern equivalent would be to take the battery out of your phone.

Platystemon
Feb 13, 2012

as a person who never leaves my house i've done pretty well for myself.
Who these days has a phone with a removable battery?

The Lone Badger
Sep 24, 2007

Platystemon posted:

Who these days has a phone with a removable battery?

Everything is removable if you have a screwdriver.

Platystemon
Feb 13, 2012

as a person who never leaves my house i've done pretty well for myself.
Chelsea Manning at one point asked the people she met with to put their phones in the microwave—not turning it on, just using it as a Faraday cage.

I don’t know that that’s enough. There’s nothing stopping a modern phone from recording now and transmitting later, so all it would really do is muffle the sound.

Leave the phone in the car, or do nothing because the agencies already have the place bugged.

feedmegin
Jul 30, 2008

The Lone Badger posted:

Everything is removable if you have a screwdriver.

I mean, in a modern phone quite often the whole thing is glued together internally as well. It's removable in the 'everything is removable if you have a sledgehammer' sense I guess.

wesleywillis
Dec 30, 2016

SUCK A MALE CAMEL'S DICK WITH MIRACLE WHIP!!

Guy Axlerod posted:

The rotary dial pulses are not audio, they basically are hanging up the phone and picking it up rapidly. You could technically dial by tapping the hook if you were good enough.

No kidding eh?
It was an older touch tone phone, or whatever the gently caress a non-rotary phone is called and I somehow dialed 911 by hitting the hang up button a whole bunch of times really quickly.

FreudianSlippers
Apr 12, 2010

Shooting and Fucking
are the same thing!

Wasn't there a blind dude called Joybubbles who became a legend in the Phreaker (like hackers except for with phones) community in the 60s due to his ability to hack phones and get free long distance calls by whistling at the exact correct frequency.

New Yorp New Yorp
Jul 18, 2003

Only in Kenya.
Pillbug

FreudianSlippers posted:

Wasn't there a blind dude called Joybubbles who became a legend in the Phreaker (like hackers except for with phones) community in the 60s due to his ability to hack phones and get free long distance calls by whistling at the exact correct frequency.

Yes. There was also John Draper, aka Captain Crunch, who got his name because he discovered that a toy whistle included as a prize in Captain Crunch cereal had a pitch of exactly 2600 hz, which is what the phone companies used.

Imagined
Feb 2, 2007
Apologies if this has been discussed recently in the thread, but we were watching Looney Tunes just now and I was reminded of how many references there are in it that are so forgotten now that we don't even recognize them as references. For example, anyone watching in the 1940s would've known:

Wikipedia posted:

Foghorn Leghorn was directly inspired by the character of Senator Claghorn, a blustery Southern politician played by Kenny Delmar on Fred Allen's popular 1940s radio show. Foghorn adopted many of Claghorn's catchphrases, such as "I say.." and "That's a joke, son!" Delmar's inspiration for Claghorn was a Texas rancher who was fond of saying this.
Similarly, I have a wonderful old annotated hardcover collection of Sherlock Holmes stories, and it's amazing how many references there are in them to (then) contemporary events and personalities that just slide right on by us without even being recognizable as such.

Is that the life cycle of most references? To go from topical to obscure to utterly invisible, or even deeper, for the thing that started as a reference to eventually supplant the thing it was referencing, ala Foghorn Leghorn?

Ritz On Toppa Ritz
Oct 14, 2006

You're not allowed to crumble unless I say so.
It’s like a game of Telephone!

BalloonFish
Jun 30, 2013



Fun Shoe

Imagined posted:

Apologies if this has been discussed recently in the thread, but we were watching Looney Tunes just now and I was reminded of how many references there are in it that are so forgotten now that we don't even recognize them as references. For example, anyone watching in the 1940s would've known:

Similarly, I have a wonderful old annotated hardcover collection of Sherlock Holmes stories, and it's amazing how many references there are in them to (then) contemporary events and personalities that just slide right on by us without even being recognizable as such.

Is that the life cycle of most references? To go from topical to obscure to utterly invisible, or even deeper, for the thing that started as a reference to eventually supplant the thing it was referencing, ala Foghorn Leghorn?

Same with Gilbert & Sullivan operas. Obviously a lot of the jokes and witicisms still hold up, as does a good deal of the general satire aimed at British society and institutions (some of it disturbingly so...) but some of the dialogue and lyrics are densely-packed with little nods and references that only the original audience would even discern as references. Some of the asides rely on the fact that the audience was sat watching an opera in the SavoyTheatre to properly work. Gilbert updated his libretti to keep the references as topical as possible while he was alive.

For instance, the Queen of the Fairies line in Iolanthe, "Could thy brigade, with cold cascade, quench my great love, I wonder?" relied on the fact that the head of the London Metropolitan Fire Brigade always attended first nights at the Savoy - in this case the singer sung the line while gesturing to and making eye contact with the man in question.

How many references from the Dragoon Colonel's song in Patience actually work still?. They're obviously references, but modern audiences wouldn't have a clue what most of them mean:

"The pluck of Lord Nelson on board of the Victory -
Genius of Bismarck devising a plan -
The humour of Fielding (which sounds contradictory) -
Coolness of Paget about to trepan -
The science of Jullien, the eminent musico -
Wit of Macaulay, who wrote of Queen Anne -
The pathos of Paddy, as rendered by Boucicault -
Style of the Bishop of Sodor and Man -
The dash of a D'Orsay, divested of quackery -
Narrative powers of Dickens and Thackeray -
Victor Emmanuel - peak-haunting Peveril -
Thomas Aquinas, and Doctor Sacheverell -
Tupper and Tennyson - Daniel Defoe -
Anthony Trollope and Mister Guizot!

If you want a receipt for this soldier-like paragon,
Get at the wealth of the Czar (if you can) -
The family pride of a Spaniard from Aragon -
Force of Mephisto pronouncing a ban -
A smack of Lord Waterford, reckless and rollicky -
Swagger of Roderick, heading his clan -
The keen penetration of Paddington Pollaky -
Grace of an Odalisque on a divan -
The genius strategic of Caesar or Hannibal -
Skill of Sir Garnet in thrashing a cannibal -
Flavour of Hamlet - the Stranger, a touch of him -
Little of Manfred (but not very much of him) -
Beadle of Burlington - Richardson's show -
Mister Micawber and Madame Tussaud!"

(the footnotes explaining all of these are here - https://gsvloc.org/gilbert-sullivan-resources/gilbert-sullivan-glossaries/patience/)

And it's not just the lyrics - Sullivan wasn't beyond putting musical references in his scores, either. I doubt many modern viewers realise that the ensemble chorus in Trial By Jury is a deliberate parody of contemporary Italian opera, that it's meant to be overwrought and over-complex and the fact that it grinds the action to a halt right at the climax of the plot while s the entire cast sing two lines of dialogue back and forth for five minutes is the joke.

Arsenic Lupin
Apr 12, 2012

This particularly rapid💨 unintelligible 😖patter💁 isn't generally heard🧏‍♂️, and if it is🤔, it doesn't matter💁.


Imagined posted:

Is that the life cycle of most references? To go from topical to obscure to utterly invisible, or even deeper, for the thing that started as a reference to eventually supplant the thing it was referencing, ala Foghorn Leghorn?
This is why Shakespeare needs footnotes. There are many, many * jokes that you don't have the context to get.

* dirty.

wesleywillis
Dec 30, 2016

SUCK A MALE CAMEL'S DICK WITH MIRACLE WHIP!!

Imagined posted:

Apologies if this has been discussed recently in the thread, but we were watching Looney Tunes just now and I was reminded of how many references there are in it that are so forgotten now that we don't even recognize them as references. For example, anyone watching in the 1940s would've known:

Similarly, I have a wonderful old annotated hardcover collection of Sherlock Holmes stories, and it's amazing how many references there are in them to (then) contemporary events and personalities that just slide right on by us without even being recognizable as such.

Is that the life cycle of most references? To go from topical to obscure to utterly invisible, or even deeper, for the thing that started as a reference to eventually supplant the thing it was referencing, ala Foghorn Leghorn?

I listen to some of the olde tymey radio programs on satellite radio, youtube etc and while I like the dramas and westerns and crime/mystery shows, I have a hard time with the comedies because a lot of it seems to be the sort of thing that you had to have lived during that time to really get it. Like if Bob Hope makes some joke about a senator that was caught up in a scandal at the time the show was broadcast, for example, my Dad might laugh about it, but I'm kinda like "uhhhhh what"?

Some of it is timeless like Who's On First, but a lot of it seems to be contemporary references.

stratdax
Sep 14, 2006

Arsenic Lupin posted:

This is why Shakespeare needs footnotes. There are many, many * jokes that you don't have the context to get.

* dirty.

At the Shakespeare plays I've seen the actors just act out whatever the dirty joke is or just motion to the body parts, so even if the audience doesn't understand the exact reference, they at least know somebody is going to butt-gently caress somebody, and that's good enough for it to be funny.

wesleywillis
Dec 30, 2016

SUCK A MALE CAMEL'S DICK WITH MIRACLE WHIP!!
Who would have thought that sodomy could be funny if depicted by Shakespeare.

HopperUK
Apr 29, 2007

Why would an ambulance be leaving the hospital?
These are country matters.

Imagined
Feb 2, 2007

AmbassadorofSodomy posted:

I listen to some of the olde tymey radio programs on satellite radio, youtube etc and while I like the dramas and westerns and crime/mystery shows, I have a hard time with the comedies because a lot of it seems to be the sort of thing that you had to have lived during that time to really get it. Like if Bob Hope makes some joke about a senator that was caught up in a scandal at the time the show was broadcast, for example, my Dad might laugh about it, but I'm kinda like "uhhhhh what"?

Some of it is timeless like Who's On First, but a lot of it seems to be contemporary references.

I recently tried listening to some of the 50s and 60s British radio comedies that are supposed to have inspired the likes of Monty Python (e.g. The Goon Show) and found that, despite generally not being the sort of person bewildered by accents, I literally couldn't even understand what they were saying between the speed they were talking, the low quality of the original recording, the low bitrate of the files of that, only having the audio to go off of, and then not recognizing what they were parodying or satirizing.

HopperUK
Apr 29, 2007

Why would an ambulance be leaving the hospital?
One of the odder experiences I had visiting Minneapolis was when chatting with a bus driver - an older African-American gentleman - finding myself in an in-depth discussion of the Goon Show which his dad used to play for him and which he absolutely loved. I did not in any way expect anyone in the US to have heard The Goon Show. I've only heard bits and pieces. He was super nice, I hope he's still about next time I visit.

wesleywillis
Dec 30, 2016

SUCK A MALE CAMEL'S DICK WITH MIRACLE WHIP!!
And here we are.....
Goons ourselves.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
I was just rewatching Arrested Development and I bet there’s a ton of poo poo that would fly over the heads of a 20 year old that watched it now. So much Bush-era stuff that they would have been too young to get constantly slammed by.

Krispy Wafer
Jul 26, 2002

I shouted out "Free the exposed 67"
But they stood on my hair and told me I was fat

Grimey Drawer
I’d like to believe all the Arrested Development Army jokes would go over the younger generation’s heads except there are Zoomers in Afghanistan. Still they might not get the Popemobile being better armored than Humvees.

Isn’t Dante’s Divine Comedy full of gently caress you’s to various political and religious leaders? I think the Canterbury Tales is similar. Shakespeare was a scrub comparatively speaking.

Gaius Marius
Oct 9, 2012

Dante's filled with them, especially in hell. Nicholas the third and Boniface the VIII are both condemned to hell. Saladin also ends up in the First Circle which isn't all that bad, but nobody wants to hang out with him

Cobalt-60
Oct 11, 2016

by Azathoth
Michelangelo wins the petty artistic revenge award for "you're being condemned in the Last Judgement, also a snake is biting your dick."

I made a "HEY ABBOT" joke at a game table, and the only people who got the joke recognized it from Robin Hood: Men In Tights.

MightyJoe36
Dec 29, 2013

:minnie: Cat Army :minnie:
I think the only Abbott and Costello reference anyone under a certain age would recognize is "Who's on First?" and a lot of them would only recognize it from Rain Man.

Jack B Nimble
Dec 25, 2007


Soiled Meat
"Go ahead and back up" would also remain readily accessible. And I showed the "gambling in the barracks" clip to some friends the other day, they liked it. Oh! And the math trick would be a nice opener for a class period. :allears: Now I want to watch Abbot and Costello.

Mr. Fall Down Terror
Jan 24, 2018

by Fluffdaddy

Jack B Nimble posted:

"Go ahead and back up" would also remain readily accessible. And I showed the "gambling in the barracks" clip to some friends the other day, they liked it. Oh! And the math trick would be a nice opener for a class period. :allears: Now I want to watch Abbot and Costello.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLjq3I8ZyMo

Carillon
May 9, 2014






I just watched Abbot and Costello meet frankenstein and it still is pretty good! My partner with which others I watched as a kid, but I'm not sure africa screams would hold up in 2021.

Charlz Guybon
Nov 16, 2010

Alhazred posted:

""Hòw ìs the sèà, sòn?"
"Hàrsh ànd ùfòrgìvìng, bùt ìt ìs bòùntìfùl."
"Ì dò sò ènjòy thèsè tàlks, sòn. Lèts dò ìt àgàìn nèxt jòl."

When writing down stuff became a thing Socrates was worried that people would be incapable of remembering stuff.

Hasn't this been proven in academic studies? Illiterate people have much better memories than literate ones. Get back to me when you memorize the Illiad and the Odyssey line for line.

Gaius Marius
Oct 9, 2012

Anything in a poetic form is much easier to remember in general than standard prose. That might make much of the diffrence

The North Tower
Aug 20, 2007

You should throw it in the ocean.
Many oral traditions also learn texts as a group, so a combination of it being sung and as learned as a group corrects for errors. Like at a concert when a band plays their #1 song: there are many people who make mistakes in the audience, but the crowd can make it clear what the actual lyrics are, even without much importance. If Don’t Stop Believing was our holy text it might not change for hundreds of years.

Charlz Guybon
Nov 16, 2010

Arsenic Lupin posted:

This is why Shakespeare needs footnotes. There are many, many * jokes that you don't have the context to get.

* dirty.

A lot of those dirty jokes are puns and they can be fixed by performing the play in the original pronunciation.

https://www.britannica.com/video/187707/David-Crystal-pronunciation-Ben-Elizabethan-English-British

Gaius Marius
Oct 9, 2012

Reading Shakespeare is for plebs, watching Shakespeare is also for plebs, but ones who will understand what the hell is going on

Toph Bei Fong
Feb 29, 2008



For those curious, here's a pretty good summary of how phone phreaking worked back in the 70s and 80s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tHyZdtXULw&t=252s

Platystemon
Feb 13, 2012

as a person who never leaves my house i've done pretty well for myself.
I can’t take that guy seriously since I saw that a photo of him in a Subway with an AR‐15 a 10/22.

Platystemon fucked around with this message at 04:47 on Apr 17, 2021

wesleywillis
Dec 30, 2016

SUCK A MALE CAMEL'S DICK WITH MIRACLE WHIP!!
Is that an actual AR-15 or is it an "OMG BLACK GUN MUST BE AR-15"!!!

I'm a gun weirdo, but not down with the latest tactical army man stuff

Penguissimo
Apr 7, 2007

AmbassadorofSodomy posted:

Is that an actual AR-15 or is it an "OMG BLACK GUN MUST BE AR-15"!!!

I'm a gun weirdo, but not down with the latest tactical army man stuff

who gives a poo poo, if he's bringing either one to a loving subway then his dick is measured in microns anyway

Platystemon
Feb 13, 2012

as a person who never leaves my house i've done pretty well for myself.
Thank you for making me actually look at the photo, because what he’s actually carrying is funnier than an AR‐15.

Maybe this tacticlol Ruger 10/22 with a red dot sight?

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Platystemon posted:

Thank you for making me actually look at the photo, because what he’s actually carrying is funnier than an AR‐15.

Maybe this tacticlol Ruger 10/22 with a red dot sight?



I have a feeling it’s an airsoft sight he jammed on a 10/22.

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Platystemon
Feb 13, 2012

as a person who never leaves my house i've done pretty well for myself.
Because this is the lost references thread, imagine the period is circa 2010, then have the following analogy.

The AR-15 is an IBM PC. They’re functional, everyone has one, and parts are readily available to customize them however you want, for a vast variety of purposes and budgets.

The Ruger 10/22 is a WebTV netbook.

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