Finally, I got a chance to see "Lincoln"

On Christmas Eve I finally had a chance to see Skyfall, the lastest James Bond effort. On New Year's Eve I finally had a chance to see Steven Spielberg's Lincoln. This needs to become a recurring tradition!

Lincoln could be a film in the same vein as say The American President - well aside from the romantic comedy aspects it's still a film that involves politics. I also have compared Lincoln to The West Wing TV series. They all did tackle some issues that were important to the eras that they had been set in.

In the case of Lincoln it was slavery and the Civil War. Basically what we saw in this film was President Abraham Lincoln securing the votes in Congress for the 13th Amendment. Not only that he also had to contend with ending the Civil War. In fact news of representatives coming from the Confederate States of America wanting to talk about the end of the war figured in the political machinations of enacting an amendment to the US Constitution to abolish slavery.

We also learned more about the other players involved other than Lincoln. Many members of Congress - Representatives & Senators - played a role in making the 13th Amendment a reality. Just like the effort it took to make many of today's policy objectives a reality. For example look no further than "Obamacare" as one example of many.

Granted it's not the most exciting movie to watch. There's only one scene of the movie that was action packed which is mainly of Black soldiers fighting against the Confederate army. Then there's a scene that shows the bombardment of a Southern city although we didn't see anyone in that scene. It's a movie for the history buffs and President Lincoln (portrayed by Daniel Day-Lewis) does come alive for us in this movie as well as the many other players in this drama!

When I came to see this movie again at River East there was a packed theater to see this movie. This movie and Skyfall has been out since November and people are still coming to see it. Spielberg must have done something right for it to have the appeal it does. :)

So is there going to be a NHL season?

To be honest, I haven't really kept an eye on the current NHL lockout that has already claimed half of the NHL season. It's unfortunate since I consider myself more of a hockey fan than anything else. It's also unfortunate that it almost seems like the NHL could lose another season to labor strife.

In 2005, the NHL cancelled their whole season thanks to another lockout. So far they are the only professional sports league in North America to have cancelled an entire season due to labor strife. In that vein I'm glad that the league and it's players are about to further their talks in order to save the current season.

You know all I when it comes to labor strife in professional sports is that I rarely know what's going on. It seems whether it's MLB, NFL, NBA or NHL it's always about the collective bargaining agreement. Some will make it about the players thinking their not getting enough money while it does seem the big news in sports is the latest million-dollar offer some athlete signed. At that it seems some athletes are making more money not on their respective fields of play but with outside offers such as endorsement deals. If it's all about the money how much is enough!

Anyway, hopefully the NHL will eventually start their season in the near future. I'm looking forward to some Black Hawks games in the near future! Then by April, it's time for my other favorite sport, baseball!

VIDEO: Spelman College acceptance reaction...

[VIDEO] I wish there were more videos of some young men getting college acceptance letters. That would be very exciting but I recognize young men may not be so willing to show their emotions on camera.

Although what we're looking at is a young lady who discovered that she had been accepted to Spelman College she's even more excited. Why is she excited because this was definitely her dream school.

You know her excitement is contagious as I see that many Spelman women are sharing this which is how I got wind of it. Well one of my Morehouse bros shared it on his wall as well. He may share in her excitement as well.

It makes me wonder what would've happened if I had allowed myself years ago to take some risks and fill out some applications when I was still a senior. My excitement came years later when I found that I had been accepted to Spelman's sister university of Morehouse College. Though thankfully my reaction didn't elicit a YouTube video as they didn't yet exist!

I'm very excited for the young people who are taking one step forward in their futures, but it's also envy. My youth didn't exactly allow me to take life by the horns! Thankfully many youth today are doing the same especially when it comes to college.

Congrats Nia on your acceptance to Spelman. I also hope that you will be able to afford going to school there. Hopefully you'll navigate the intricacies of college finance and then avoid going into serious debt! Meaning hopefully you will be good the day you walk the stage and graduate as a Spelman woman!

Where has James Bond been?

Not sure why exactly but James Bond wasn't even a blip on my radar screen this year. It got squeezed between The Dark Knight Rises and next year's Star Trek into Darkness. And there's more than enough time to watch the Star Trek sequel next May.

I'm big into genre movies especially action and science fiction. In fact if there were any two movie franchises that have been long time favorites over the years it's Bond and Star Trek. It's even more puzzling to me that not a lot of focus on my part was put into the latest Bond effort entitled Skyfall.

I went to see Skyfall recently at River East near Navy Pier. It was pretty good and it almost seemed like a classic bond film with an old school sounding theme song and of course there's the Ashton Martin that was a fixture in the Bond films of the 1960s. It was certainly a nice touch at the end where the offices Bond enters into near the end of the movie simply went retro!

I've been a Bond fan for a long time and it's very regretful that no trailers were shown here on this blog prior to its release. Besides trailers for Star Trek and The A-Team had been shown here in the past on this blog for example. Why was I too slow for Skyfall?

James Bond will return in the near future and I promise to do much better in the future.

Instagram will not sell your photos

Whoever decided to write this language should've been fired! It's good that it will be corrected if it hasn't already:

Instagram apologized to its users today, saying it will "remove" language from its legal terms that would have let it sell users' photos or use them in advertisements.

In a blog post this afternoon, Chief Executive Kevin Systrom said it's "our mistake that this language is confusing" and that the company is "working on updated language."

"Since making these changes, we've heard loud and clear that many users are confused and upset about what the changes mean," he wrote.

Instagram's terms of use agreement announced yesterday sparked a user revolt unprecedented in its history -- and prompted competitors to tout their own services as more user-protective. It came three months after Facebook completed its acquisition of the popular photo-sharing service, which has over 100 million users, and follows recent efforts by the social network to increase revenue.
No other photo-sharing service appears to have had a policy as broad as Instagram's now-abandoned language, which claimed the perpetual right to license users' photos to companies or any other organization, including for advertising purposes, which would effectively transform the Web site into the world's largest stock photo agency. A hotel in Hawaii, for instance, could have written a check to Instagram to license photos taken at its resort and then use them for its own purposes.
...
Another pitfall of the now-abandoned policy: If Instagram users continued to upload photos after January 16, 2013, and subsequently deleted their account afterward, they may have granted Facebook an irrevocable right to sell those images in perpetuity. There's no obvious language that says deleting an account terminates Facebook's rights, said Kurt Opsahl, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. 

I was about to consider myself if I would continue using Instagram. Basically loathe to deactivate any usage of social networking sites, but for the right reason such as this it would be worth it. Enough people revolted where it was known it would be a problem.

New preview "Star Trek into Darkness"

[VIDEO] This the new preview for the upcoming Star Trek into Darkness that will premier next May. We also know more about the characters who will be portrayed in this movie. The only character introduced into this universe from Star Trek canon is Dr. Carol Marcus.

The main villain whom many thought was either Khan or Gary Mitchell well his name isn't very familiar to Trek fans. There's a chance he's brand new or it's possible he may be revealed to be someone from canon. To me the odds are about even and we won't know until the movie is out. The main villain is played by Benedict Cumberbatch.

The 2009 Star Trek was very intense, into Darkness appears to be even more intense judging by these previews!

Marathon Pundit wants to save President Reagan's former Chicago home

832 E. 57th St.

John Ruberry wants his post to be shared and so I shall share. It's safe to say Obama's Chicago neighborhood of Hyde Park was briefly home to another president almost 100 years ago. In fact a year ago I wrote a post about that apartment building where a young Ronald Reagan once lived.

A year ago there were some activists who wanted to preserve this residence, and today it's in the shadow of the University of Chicago hospital and they're looking for room to expand. This building is also owned by UChicago according to Ruberry.