Roadrunner Research Articles

Attenuating information in spoken communication: For the speaker, or for the addressee?

Speakers tend to attenuate information that is predictable or repeated. To what extent is this done automatically and egocentrically, because it is easiest for speakers themselves, and to what extent is it driven by the informational needs of addressees? In 20 triads of naive subjects, speakers told the same Road Runner cartoon story twice to one addressee and once to another addressee, counterbalanced for order (Addressee1/Addressee1/Addressee2 or Addressee1/Addressee2/Addressee1). Stories retold to the same (old) addressees were attenuated compared to those retold to new addressees; this was true for events mentioned, number of words, and amount of detail. Moreover, lexically identical expressions by the same speaker were more intelligible to another group of listeners when the expressions had been addressed to new addressees than when they had been addressed to old addressees. We conclude that speakers’ attenuating of information in spontaneous discourse is driven at least in part by addressees. Such audience design is computationally feasible when it can be guided by a “one-bit” model ( my audience has heard this before, or not).

Commentary: Pedestrians: Truly Vulnerable Road Users

Commentary: Pedestrians: Truly Vulnerable Road Users

This Jaguar's Built for Speed

Oak Ridge National Laboratory's upgraded supercomputer, dubbed Jaguar, has broken the petaflops barrier. Jaguar's ability to perform 1.3 quadrillion calculations per second leaves it second only to the Road Runner at Lawrence Livermore nuclear weapons lab in California, and Jaguar's accessible to

Jim Mann: 3N2 Baseball

Jim Mann, a shoe engineer and ex-Nike technician, is cofounder of 3N2, a start-up company that makes baseball and softball Forty-two years old, six feet tall, and built like a catcher, Mann is a former ballplayer and champion race walker who early on became fascinated with athletic In narrative he talks about baseball cleats--how he got interested in their design and manufacture and what it has been like trying to get a new sports equipment company off the ground in a market dominated by giants, such as Nike and Adidas. It all started in high school. I was a baseball player, and baseball was my passion. One day during practice, some of us were making fun of the race walkers who were practicing on the track nearby. The track coach saw us and, as punishment, made us try it. The funny thing was that I was really good at it. I mean really good. He had me enter a race and I set the freshman meet record. At the next meet I set a state frosh record. They hand me trophy two feet high, and they interview me after the race on television. I'm in the newspaper. I'm thinking, wait a minute, is fun, I gotta keep doing this. When spring came around, I had to make a decision between race walking and baseball. Baseball was still my passion, but having become one of the best race walkers in the country for my age, I chose it. Within a few years I was the USA team national junior champion. Race walking led to my fascination with footwear. In other sports the athlete has lots of equipment to help him do his job, like the ball, bat, and glove in baseball. In running and walking it's just the shoes on your feet. And there is no teamwork; it's just you and your feet competing against everyone else. Footwear becomes the key factor in what you are doing. I got a job while in high school working for Road Runner sports store in Schenectady, New York, selling This was during the running boom in the eighties when everyone seemed to be out running and walking. I got really interested in how two people with the same height and build, same everything, can run completely differently, and consequently wear down their shoes in different places. That lead to a fascination with how the shoes are made and how they can be made better. I could sit with a runner after he's worn his shoes for three hundred miles and, without him saying anything, I could say, this is how you run, these are the pressure points ... and if he was having problems, like a bad ankle on his left side, I could often say why. Like, You're running on a track every day, right? Yes, and you're only going one direction, right? See? You can see it here in the wear on your shoes. The shoes were like reading a crystal ball. I also really got interested in how shoes could be made better, in part because I was race walking for Nike. (I raced until 1990 when I got hurt--plantar fascia--which in those days couldn't be easily fixed, so I was done.) But by then I had learned enough about shoes that Nike asked me to work for them as a tech rep. Tech reps are the guys who teach salesmen the technical parts of shoes and also how to sell them. After just six months, I was on a plane to Korea. Nike needed some tech reps to work with the Koreans on the inner makings of their They sent five of us overseas. The morning after we landed, we walked into a factory that's making 22,000 pairs of shoes, and it blew me away. They were making the Air Force 1--David Robinson--basketball shoes, and it was like Mecca for somebody who likes footwear--seeing how they were engineered, made, and distributed. That's when I realized was the business I wanted to be in. And, ten years later, I was still there in Asia. Over there I got back into softball and baseball in a big way. First, with a team called the Hialeah Pusan Commanders who asked me to play for them. Then, Nike put together a team and I played for them as well. At Nike we were a bunch of ex-players and pretty good athletes. …

News

Birds of a feather: emergency nurse Michelle Young and Claudine Roche are entering the Flora London Marathon this month dressed in costumes inspired by the cartoon character, Road Runner. They will be running for the charity, Sense, which supports people with deafblindness, a combination of both sight and hearing difficulties. Ms Roche, who works with Ms Young in the A&E department at St Thomas' Hospital, London, says: 'I want to run for Sense because I was lucky enough to be born with my five senses and take it for granted. I want to raise cash for people who don't have that privilege.' To find out more about sponsoring Ms Roche and Ms Young, log on to www.justgiving.com/roadrunner-claude.

A Good Pine

A Good Pine Chris Offutt Every afternoon he waited on the porch for his grand-daughter to walk home from school, following a path he'd forged through the woods surrounding their house. The trail ended at the yard, like a creek feeding a pond, and he watched the treeline for the faded yellow of her coat. Five years ago, a coal truck had nudged his daughter's car over a cliff. The car landed upside down in a dry creek. She and her husband had departed life in less time than it took for a leaf to drop from a tree. Lucy had lived with him ever since. He was a father at fifteen, a combat veteran at twenty, and a grandfather by thirty-five. At age fifty he was widowed. The seasons had carved furrows in his face, turning his limbs to muscled tools covered by leather. His hair never turned gray or fell away, but remained thick and black, as if his genes had bred a permanent hat. He'd never really learned to live, but was adept at getting by, standing fast, holding ground. He rarely changed expression. The infrequent visitor to his small house at the head of the hollow often mistook the old man's countenance for inattention or stupidity—but they were wrong. He simply wore an armor of his own creation. Lucy emerged from the woods, followed by her dog. The coat she wore was too big but protected her against the December chill. Something vague inside the old man glowed briefly like the final ember of a dwindled fire. Lucy trudged toward the house, followed by her dog. Behind them the trees were empty of leaves. The bare branches were like a fur trim on the blue sweater of sky. At twelve she was still mostly girl, suddenly running thin and exuberant across the patchy grass. She raced past him into the house to turn on the TV. It was an old television that got one channel and the old man prevailed with an antenna atop a steel pole lashed to a hickory post. He gripped the pole and waited. "It's on," Lucy called. "But fuzzy!" He turned the pole in tiny increments to improve the TV's picture. "Wait," she yelled. "No, back up!" He gave the pole a slight reverse. "Okay, Papaw," she said. "That's good." He released the metal pole and blew into his palms. Gloves he reserved for serious work, not this daily ritual of drawing television 57 reception for her favorite show, Mr. Cartoon. They'd begun this when her parents were still alive. He believed that maintaining simple traditions would help her accept the terrible loss. As Lucy grew, she had abandoned his lap to sit beside him, then gradually migrated toward the other end of the couch, where she now sprawled with her shoes off. He joined her, sitting heavily on the worn cushion. "I saw him today," she said. "We had a field trip to town and saw Mister Cartoon for real. He did some magic tricks and showed Road Runner. I liked it a lot. Mr. Cartoon looked short but it was really him, I could tell. He wore the striped coat and sunglasses like he always does. Then he asked for questions—and guess what Papaw—he picked me! So I asked him why he always wore sunglasses. He said it was because if he didn't wear them, someone would ask why he never wore them. That didn't make sense to me, but then he gave me an autographed picture of himself. Want to see it?" She withdrew the photo from a math book for his nodding admiration. Mister Cartoon came on the screen and Lucy stared intently as if seeing a lost relative returning for a holiday visit. She laughed at the cartoons, and he arranged on his face an expression he knew from long experience would pass for a smile. Television was a habit that had never adequately fastened to him. It reminded him of a campfire—steady motion that never got anywhere. He'd learned not to look directly at a fire because the...

Consumer Survey of Selected Garden Chrysanthemum Cultivars in Mississippi

The objective of this survey was to determine the levels of liking and willingness to pay for selected garden chrysanthemum (Dendranthema ×grandiflorum) cultivars, and to measure relative infl uence of socioeconomic characteristics on consumer preferences and valuations. The survey was conducted during the 2003 Fall Flower and Garden Fest at the Truck Crops Experiment Station in Crystal Springs, Miss. Nine garden chrysanthemum cultivars were presented to 579 survey participants in three pot sizes. Respondents preferred `Mithra Maroon', `Venus Purple', `Amory Yellow White', `Adonis Purple', and `Road Runner Bronze' more than `Night Hawk Lemon', `Freya Salmon', `Amata Purple', and `Starlet Ivory'. Of the five preferred cultivars, however, respondents were willing to pay more for `Mithra Maroon', `Road Runner Bronze', and `Amory Yellow White'. Consumers of White or Caucasian origin liked the cultivars less and were willing to pay less for them as compared to other respondents who reported other racial origins, primarily Native Americans and African Americans. The levels of liking for the cultivars were similar for participants of different gender classification, but female respondents were willing to pay more for the cultivars. Respondents who previously bought chrysanthemums reported higher level of liking for the cultivars but were not willing to pay more for them. Participants who were interviewed on Saturday liked the cultivars more but were willing to pay less than those who were interviewed on Friday. Larger-sized households tended to like the cultivars less and were not willing to pay more for the cultivars. Respondents did not like the cultivars in larger-sized pots and were not willing to pay more for plants in larger-sized pots included in the survey.

A precarious balance

A precarious balance

The Language of comics: word and image

With essays by Jan Baetens, David A. Berona, Frank L. Cioffi, N. C. Christopher Couch, Robert C. Harvey, Gene Kannenberg, Jr., Catherine Khordoc, David Kunzle, Marion D. Perret, and Todd Taylor. In our culture, which depends increasingly on images for instruction and recreation, it is important to ask how words and images make meaning when they are combined. Comics, one of the most widely read media of the twentieth century, serves as an ideal for focusing an investigation on the word-and-image question. This collection of essays attempts to give an answer. The first six see words and images as separate art forms that play with or against each other. David Kunzle finds that words restrict the meaning of the art of Adolphe Willette and Theophile-Alexandre Steinlen in Le Chat Noir. David A. Berona, examining wordless novels, argues that the ability to read pictures depends on the ability to read words. Todd Taylor draws on classical rhetoric to demonstrate that images in The Road Runner are more persuasive than words. N. C. Christopher Couch--writing on The Yellow Kid--and Robert C. Harvey--discussing early New Yorker cartoons--are both interested in the historical development of the partnership between words and images in comics. Frank L. Cioffi traces a disjunctive relationship of opposites in the work of Andrzej Mleczko, Ben Katchor, R. Crumb, and Art Spiegelman. The last four essays explore the integration of words and images. Among five comic book adaptations of Hamlet Marion D. Perret finds one in which words and images form a dialectic. Jan Baetens critiques the semiotically inspired theory of Phillippe Marion. Catherine Khordoc explores speech balloons in Asterix the Gaul. Gene Kannenberg, Jr., demonstrates how the Chicago-based artist Chris Ware blurs the difference between word and image. The Language of Comics, however, is the first collection of critical essays on comics to explore a single issue as it affects a variety of comics.

Notes toward a rhetoric of animation: The Road Runner as cultural critique

–Recent studies have suggested the need to broaden our approaches to violence in children's programming. This paper uses the violence of “The Road Runner” cartoon series as a starting point for a mythico-rhetorical analysis of the message system contained in the cartoon. It explores how the animated short re-enacts the myth of Sisyphus in the context of the post-World War II technological boom in the United States. Technology is the source of most of the violence in the cartoon, and the violence is created by failures of technology. The use of a “children's” medium to critique our reliance on technology offers substantial freedom to the animator, and, in turn, to the viewer and the critic. Examination of “The Road Runner” yields insights into the meanings of cartoon violence, into how media reproduce mythic structures, and into the potentially rich message systems of children's media.

Cable Modems and DSL: Broadband Internet Access for Residential Customers

Cable Modems and DSL: Broadband Internet Access for Residential Customers by Jerry A. Hausman, J. Gregory Sidak and HalJ. Singer. Published in volume 91, issue 2, pages 302-307 of American Economic Review, May 2001

George F. Kennan as Represented by Chuck Jones: Road Runner and the Cold War Policy of Containment (1949-1980)

Chapman | George F. Kennan as Represented by Chuck Jones: Road Runner and the Cold War Policy of Containment George F. Kennan as Represented by Chuck Jones: Road Runner and the Cold War Policy of Containment (1949-1980) Roger Chapman TheAmerican television cartoon series RoadRunner and Coyote (1949-1980), created by Chuck Jones, should be regarded as a Cold War cultural text. Some of the episode titles betray the Cold War connection: "Guided Muscle" (1955), "War and Pieces" (1964), "Rushing Roulette" (1965), and "Sugar and Spies" (1966). In the following analysis, I attempt to uncover the "structure offeeling"1 that permeates this cartoon animation , arguing thatitis inharmony withwhatwas the viewpointofGeorgeF . Kennan, one oftheleading architects oftheUS ColdWarpolicy ofcontainment. This structure offeeling is related to ideology, in the sense thatit is about "a system of fundamental, value-laden beliefs thatexplain andjustify apreferred domestic political order (and often, by extension, an international order)."2 The interpretation I offer aboutthis workis thatit served as a "manic moral fable"3 to explain andjustify America's aim to "contain" the Soviet Union. Cartoon animation has too often been neglected in film studies ,4 and virtually ignored by historians. There is perhaps the tendency to equate cartoon shows with child's play, even though it is quite obvious that such programming is laden with ideas and messages that are above the understanding of the average young person . In his analysis of war toys, James Combs perceptively notes that "popular play with war toys is an aesthetic experience that includes the potential for politically-relevant learning."5 Certainly the same could be said forchildren viewing certain animation films. But regardless of the young viewers' aesthetic experience, cartoon productions are created not by children but by adults. Consciously orunconsciously, producers ofanimationfilms infuse their works with adult meanings that are ideological. According to Jean-Luc Comolli and Jean Narboni, all films are political in nature because they are determined by the ideology in which they areproduced.6 Iffilmmaking, based on the "reality" wrought by a camera, is considered by its very nature ideological, then it stands to reason that an animation film, based on drawings, should also have political overtones. Indeed, years prior to the debut of RoadRunnerand Coyote there were times when cartoon programs proved to be highly politicized. Thepoliticizing ofAmerican cartoon animation dates back to at leastWorldWar ?, when the character Bugs Bunny served as a type ofnational mascot. In "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips" (1944) and "Herr Meets Hare" (1945), the rabbit figure fought against the Japanese and the Germans, respectively.7 Prior to America's involvement in that conflict, an episode of the Porky Pig Show satirized the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact between Germany and the Soviet Union by characterizing the two countries as feuding hillbillies. In that episode, "NaughtyNeighbors" (1939), PetuniaPigMartinand Porky (the Real McCoy) were depicted as making a less thanconvincing peace.8 Such earlier works established a precedent for how some American animators would respond to the ColdWar. One lingering trend that had been developed by Warner Bros, was the chase cartoon, which Joe Adamson describes as a "series of two character battles in a milieu in which passersby are conspicuously absent."9 Examples of such conflict duos inelude Sylvesterthe Catversus TweetyBird, Foghorn Leghorn versus Henry Hawk, Elmer versus Daffy Duck, and Elmer versus Sylvester. Beginning in 1948, coinciding with the early ColdWar years, there was the debut of Marvin the Martian, a space alien who was determined to blow up planet Earth on a whim, but fortunately there was Bugs Bunny to stop him.10 (This was a popular approach to the Cold War, depicting thecommunistthreatas onparwith an alieninvasion.11 ) In such cartoon dramas the world is a stage where two characters are at conflict, but the moral of each episode is that the aggressor always loses. Bugs Bunny, an animation character that reached its height of development under Chuck Jones, was cast as a lover of peace who, through no fault ofhis own, sometimes had to fight. In other words, Bugs Bunny was the "good guy," presumably like Uncle Sam, who never starts conflicts but sometimes has to finish them. Chuck Jones had precise ideas about his Bugs Bunny, which were quite ideological: My...

Scientist Uncovers Chipmakers' Micro-Art

Abstract Tallahassee, Fla. - Dan Zuras admits he never thought he'd be alive when a scientist discovered the microscopic Road Runner image he engraved on a computer chip 16 years ago. But then again, at the time, who knew the minute circuitry of microprocessors would grace the pages of wall calendars in the 1990s? Wee pictures of everything from animals to license plates have become the signatures of chip creators, But knowledge of this practive generally stayed within industry circles - until Florida State University researcher Michael Davidson discovered the imprints left by engineers under his highpower microscope.

The road runner

Discusses the service provided by Parcelforce with particular reference to the changes motivated by the increased customer demand for reliability during the 1980s. Outlines the history of the services and the changes in 1986 when the Separation Strategy was introduced to bring the collection and delivery of parcels increasingly under the control of dedicated managers and staff. Explores the challenges posed by opposition companies and the eight step Quality Improvement Process (QIP). Details the “Customer First” approach, highlighting the scoring system used and the guidance given to help depot managers decide on the appropriate behaviour to adopt. Explains innovation techniques and outlines the aims for the future, suggesting that the need is to feed customer requirements right into the heart of the network operation.

Distributions of choline acetyltransferase and acetylcholinesterase activities in the retinal layers of the red‐tailed hawk and road runner

The activities of choline acetyltransferase and acetylcholinesterase were assayed in submicrogram samples from layers of red-tailed hawk and road runner retina. Both enzyme activities were concentrated in and near the inner plexiform layer. Within the inner plexiform layers of both species, activities of each enzyme were concentrated in two bands, one in each half of this layer. Little choline acetyltransferase activity was found superficial to the middle third of the inner nuclear layer. The distributions of acetylcholinesterase activities corresponded well to those of choline acetyltransferase, except in the outer plexiform layer and the outer margin of the inner nuclear layer of the hawk. These distributions of enzyme activities indicate that populations of amacrine cells in the retinae of these species are cholinergic. In addition to these same cells and presumably cholinoceptive amacrine and ganglion cells, acetylcholinesterase activity in the hawk was associated with a population of horizontal cells that may be unrelated to synaptic cholinergic neurotransmission. Choline acetyltransferase activities associated with amacrine somata and processes were about four times greater in the hawk than in the road runner, suggesting important differences in the density and function of cholinergic elements between species. Possible synaptic relationships in the inner plexiform layer consistent with the interspecies differences in enzyme activities are considered.

Midwatch by Keith Wilson, and The Old Man and Others by Keith Wilson, and Rocks by Keith Wilson

Reviewed by: Midwatch by Keith Wilson, and The Old Man and Others by Keith Wilson, and Rocks by Keith Wilson Kenneth Brewer Midwatch. By Keith Wilson. (Fremont, Michigan: The Sumac Press, 1972. 86pages, with illus. by Lucy Evans, $2.45.) The Old Man and Others. By Keith Wilson. (Las Cruces: New Mexico State Univ. Press, 1970. Illustrated. $25.00.) Rocks. By Keith Wilson. (Oshkosh, Wise.: Road Runner Press, 1971. 26pages, 50¢.) Kenneth Brewer Utah State University Copyright © 1972 Western Literature Association

Some Coactions of Rabbits and Rodents with Cactus

RELATED STUDIES Taylor and Vorhies (10) reported extensive eating of cactus pads and stems by jack rabbits in Arizona. The eating of the prickly pear fruit by animals has been reported from various sources. Phillips (4) observed in South Africa that cattle, goats, baboons, monkeys and birds eat the prickly pear fruits and disseminate the seed. Darnell-Smith (3) reported that the Emu, black magpie, rabbits and cattle ate the prickly pears. The rabbits appeared to have ground most of the seed during mastication but the others were credited with scattering the seed. Timmons and Wenger (9) reported the jack rabbits eating prickly pear cactus fruits in West Central Kansas and disseminating the seed in their fecal pellets. Clements and Shelford (1) reported the golden flicker and Indian road runner as including cactus fruits in their diets. Cook (2) reported rabbits and rodents as being among the chief disseminators of prickly pear seed in the Central Great Plains.

The Road Runner of North America

ONE of the most remarkable and interesting birds of the arid portions of North America is the road runner (Geococcyx californianus), a ground cuckoo, which is often seen running in the road, sharing this habit with the killdeer plover (Oxyechus vociferus). The genus extends southward to Nicaragua, being represented in that region by another species (Geococcyx affinis). The accompanying illustration (Fig. 1) of a road runner attacking a rattlesnake, was furnished by Mr. G. A. Pearl of Garden City, Kansas. He got it from a travelling photographer whose name he does not know. Mrs. Merriam Bailey states that in the stomach of a single road runner, taken in New Mexico, were a large black cricket, a number of big grasshoppers, remains of a caterpillar and some beetles, a centipede six inches long and a garter snake a foot long.

Roadrunner Nesting in Kansas

Roadrunner Nesting in Kansas

The Road-Runner in Kansas

The Road-Runner in Kansas