Outsiders and Outliers

I'll be brief. Thanks to Les Stroud, aka Survivorman, (who --many years ago-- was gracious enough to write the cover quote for my alien-survival-romance Insufficient Mating Material), I discovered research "gold" today on YouTube.

Here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpJcBozuF6A

Les Stroud, aka Survivorman, shows a wide variety of survival scenes in popular movies and points out what they did right, and what they got wrong. His insights are remarkable.

Seduced by the sidebar, intellectually speaking, I then "discovered" the fascinating Jonna Mendez, a CIA mistress of disguise, who walks viewers through a variety of action/spy movie clips, with commentary. Apparently, Tom Cruise got one of his Impossible Missions badly wrong, no matter how wonderful he looked in a long black dress. There are three professions that the secret services will never use as a disguise, and Jonna Mendez explains.

Here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpJcBozuF6A

Former FBI agent Jim Clemente discusses how the FBI detects lying and deception. Topical, that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpJcBozuF6A

Apparently, most liars are caught because they don't lie with enough detail. Jim Clemente asks the sort of question that every would be author plotting a well-developed hero (or any other character) ought to ask and commit to note cards.

When nosing out the truth, a good agent cannot rely on myths, and short cuts. Just because I cover my mouth with my hand does not mean that I am a liar.... I might have bad teeth! (He did not say that.)

Another former FBI spy catcher and body language expert, Joe Navarro, explains how to read body language.

Here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jwUXV4QaTw

As Romance authors, we know about the different stages of touching, from the first brush or shake of the hero's and heroine's hand. Joe Navarro explains how and why touching is important.... and if we are all doomed to never shake hands with a stranger again post Covid-19, at least we will know why we are missing what we are missing.

Finally, a real expert archer, Cameron Hanes, critiqued a selection of bow scenes, and gave particular props to  Legolas actor Orlando Bloom for his technique. Skip to frame 17.25, if extensive footage of bare chested John Rambo with bow and arrow is not your cup of tea.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdipblQmgnw

All the best,

Rowena Cherry 

SPACE SNARK™ http://www.spacesnark.com/ 

EFF vs FBI

It may be cheaper to buy a new computer than to give your crook one to the Geek Squad!

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/02/FBI-tries-to-bypass-Fourth-Amendment-Safeguards-by-using-Geek-Squad

EFF would like to hear from anyone who had their computer serviced by Best Buy in Brooks, Kentucky, and who was subsequently prosecuted because of private information discovered by the Geek Squad on the computer and provided to the FBI.

From a sci-fi writing perspective, it would make sense for a rogue government to deliberately put out some kind of malware that would cause computer-users to have to take their devices to a repair shop such as Geek Squad.

This would result in warrentless searches of unlocked computers. It would be a brilliant solution to device-makers' refusals to create "backdoors".

There would have to be collateral damage to innocent internet users, so that the true targets would not be suspicious.  On the same principle, grannies and toddlers have to be patted down by the TSA, so that there is no appearance of improper "profiling" of persons (more) likely (than grannies) to cause problems on planes.

The government might prosecute persons found with certain kinds of porn on their pcs, but persons with seditious stuff might simply disappear.  Or, if the government had really clever malware, perhaps the malware would plant porn on infected computers, just like bad and inaccurate Hollywood movies show crooked crime scene investigators planting marijuana in places that they did not have probable cause to investigate.

Read the EFF article. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/02/FBI-tries-to-bypass-Fourth-Amendment-Safeguards-by-using-Geek-Squad by Stephanie Lacambra and Aaron Mackey. You may be inspired.

For stock tips, if such a thing were going on, it would be very good for the hardware sellers, and perhaps for landlines and broadband cable.

All the best,
Rowena Cherry