MSP76 [] Disruption and the Death of Empathy

In part 3 of our Disrupted World series, MSP takes a look at the social costs of digital disruption and asks if we are somehow becoming less human in the process.

Of course, that takes us to CoffeGate, Game of Thrones and Gladiator, and Matt considers launching the world’s first Sesame Street fake movie review podcast.

Episode Excerpt

This week we’re staying with us, people, consumers, listeners - whatever you want to call us - to ask: what’s happened to our humanity? I assume this is a response to CoffeGate?
•Hey Jeff.
•Isn’t it strange how these serendipitous things pop up.
•We’re in the middle of a disrupted world series. We were working on human empathy – or the lack of it – for today’s show.
•And what do we get? A barrel roll of haters piling on because a modern day coffee cup was stuck in the background of a shot of this week’s Game of Thrones.
•For those of you who have better things to do with your day, in a shot of the post battle feast in the episode, a takeaway coffee cup was left on a table in front of Daenerys, the Dragon Queen.
•Isn’t it remarkable how far we’ve come, that that statement doesn’t sound as ridiculous as it obviously is.
•Best thing is, you can’t even see it anymore. Because HBO have CGI’d it out following the backlash.

I think some people were commenting that last week’s episode, the Battle, was too dark, and this week, suddenly you can see everything and the crew has left a modern cup in shot. So what was hiding in the dark of last week’s episode?
•It’s a fair point. And I imagine that in the future someone with a BluRay player and a lot of time will take a forensic look at every scene in that episode.
•Hopefully, my Internet will be down on that particular day.
•Look for the most part it’s funny. It’s always funny when this kind of thing gets left in shot.

Did you like the Memes?
•And there are some really good ones. I particularly like the one that makes it look as though it was a deliberate act by Dani rival Sansa Stark to sabotage her.
•I thought that was a nice way of mixing onscreen and offscreen.
•To Jeff: Is there one you liked [We can skip this is easier]?

Jeff Replies
•But there’s also an undercurrent of anger there as well.
•That somehow the production team is lazy and sloppy.
•I saw one post on Twitter along the lines of ‘how dare you charge me so much to watch HBO and then allow mistakes like these to occur.

People are taking it too seriously?
•Is there anything that doesn’t get taken too seriously on Twitter?
•People complaining that their right to say hateful things and insult people has been impinged upon.
•You only have to spend a few seconds on YT to find the streams and streams of videos that unearth these kinds of bloopers and continuity mistakes in big movies and TV shows.
•Gladiators is a classic example.

I think that movie is legendary for its continuity errors…
•Russell Crowe is holding his sword in different hands as the camera moves from
•In his death scene he pancakes onto bare earth but is suddenly resting his head on a rock in the close up shot.
•But do those things ruin your enjoyment of the film?

There’s also a scene where one of the chariots overturns and you see there’s some kind of petrol tank or gas canister underneath.
•This stuff happens. When you consider that blockbuster movies take a couple of years to make and GOT is doing multiple episodes at a similar scale, it’s a wonder that more things don’t get missed.
•But the point is, how can you let something so inconsequential get you angry.
•Your faith in the TV show has been rocked by a single continuity error. To the point where you have to insult the cast and crew.

Didn’t Jon Snow attack the haters online a few weeks ago?
•Even before the new season began there w