Could Wells Fargo's involvement with cutting edge face and voice recognition be evil twins? There are many evil twins out there just like the so-called Twisted Twins, Jen and Sylvia Soska who brought us the horror films AMERICAN MARY and SEE NO EVIL 2.Well, defenders of our right to privacy feel so, but surprisingly, so do many cleft kids and adults.The anti-surveillance state. The privacy folks' opposition to face and voice recognition has been made clear, and my recent blog lays out … [Read more...]
Block face recognition, make yourself digitally invisible.
Cleft kids often want to hide their faces. That's why they often love Halloween with its permission to hide behind masks. Adult clefts such as myself —and everyone else, for that matter— may soon be in the same boat as cleft kids. There may be occasions, and lots of 'em, when we want to block Big Brother, the NSA, or others from surveilling us.For this reason, I'm quoting—in its entirety—a recent Raw Story article by Janet Burns, AlterNet which is even more apropo now that the US Congress is … [Read more...]
“Mask class” and the importance of faces.
Every now and then, it's good to remind ourselves how important the human face is. It's why I devote so many blog posts to the subject of faces— be they good, bad, or ugly. Halloween masks. Most kids enjoy wearing masks, tho many will strip them off the minute they get hot and sweaty or become a nuisance. People with congenital facial deformities like my cleft lip and palate leave the masks on despite the hardship because they are reborn as normal. Elsewhere I've written about the joy I … [Read more...]
Face transplant judgment—Successful, Ethical?
Tackling the controversy about face transplants and judging their worth isn't easy, even if it's a qualitative assessment as the following will be. A registry of all transplant patients promises to allow a more quantitative assessment in the future. In my last blog, I did say that—no matter the judgment—facial transplants strike me as a better use of scarce surgical skills and resources than the endless tummy tucks and face lifts that dominate today's plastic surgery landscape. It's clear from … [Read more...]
Status of Face Transplant patients now?
Before we weigh in on the controversy over face transplants (e.g., if the recipient looks the stranger who donated it, won't he/she be a "walking dead" zombie?), let's catch up with some of the recipients thus far. The following "where are they now" story describes several of the America's facial transplant recipients—who're part of a very small exclusive club. Art rendering of a transplant from Cleveland Clinic/Plain Dealer Catching up with Face Transplant Patients CNN writer Elizabeth … [Read more...]
Face transplants, reconstructive surgery, Philip Seymour Hoffman.
Caught some snippets from "Mission Impossible-III" on TV the other day and was impressed not by all of Tom Cruise's over-the-top stunts, but by two rubberized face mask stunts. Face transplant of Philip Seymour Hoffman's face? At one point Cruise pulls on a face-and-neck hood which is a stunning facimile of Philip Seymour Hoffman who brilliantly plays the villain, Davian, in the movie. In the scene, Cruise as Hoffman approaches Hoffman from behind and you see both of them in the mirror at the … [Read more...]
Heart to heart about memoir, Cleft Heart.
As part of the International Authors' Day blog hop hosted by b00kR3vi3ws, I'm going to tackle some of the questions that're asked of me as I do various book events on Cleft Heart book tours. Debdatta, who reviews books at his site, b00kR3vi3ws, claims he's addicted to books. I hope he never goes into rehab. 1. Why now? What made you decide to write Cleft Heart? I finally got some time off from being a professor and decided to have another go at aspects of being a cleft afflicted … [Read more...]