The Cortland Contrarian recently joined scientists and software experts of WeAreAllWastedLabs for an experiment to compress into full digital format the popular old song: I've Got the World on a String. The song was composed by Harold Arlen. The lyrics were written by Ted Koehler.
We wanted to test the delay and amplitude distortion of this digital format traveling over a long distance, including underwater cable. The delay would be measured in microseconds and the distortion would be measured in percentage. The experiment was funded by a grant from NASA.
We chose Shanghai, China, as our "bust back" server location and transmitted our digitally formatted lyrics 14,288 miles round trip from Cortland to Shanghai to Cortland.
These are the uncompressed lyrics we sent:
I've got the world on a string
I'm sitting on a rainbow
Got that string
around my finger
What a world, what a life - I'm in love
I've got a
song that I sing
And I can make the rain go
Any time I move my
finger
Lucky me, can't you see - I'm in love
Life's a wonderful
thing
As long as I've got that string
I'd be a silly so-and-so
If I
should ever let you go
I've got the world on a string
I'm sitting on
the rainbow
I've got that string around my finger
Oh, What a world, what a
life - I'm in love
Life's a wonderful thing
As long as I hold the
string
I'd be a crazy so-and-so
If I should ever let her go
I've
got the world on a string
I'm sitting on a rainbow
I got that string
around my finger
What a world, what a life
Oh, what a world, what
life
What a world, what life, cause I'm in love
(He's in love, he's in
love)
I'm in love
(Got the world on a string)
And what a wonderful
thing
(Alright)
When you get the world on a string
(Uh huh)
These are the uncompressed lyrics we received:
我已经得到了世界上的绳子
我坐在彩虹“
我的手指了一个字符串
什么样的世界，生活中，我在爱
我有我唱的一首歌
我可以让雨里去
任何时候，我移动我的手指
幸运的是，你看不到我恋爱了
生命是一个美丽的事
只要我认为字符串
我是一个愚蠢的某某
如果我曾经放手
（不走，不，你知道，你永远不能放手）
我已经得到了世界上的绳子
我坐在彩虹“
我的手指了字符串
什么世界，什么样的生活，我的爱
生命是一个美丽的事
只要我认为字符串
我是一个愚蠢的某某
如果我永远应该放手
我已经得到了世界上的绳子
我坐在彩虹“
我的手指了一个字符串
什么样的世界
啊，这是企业的生命
嘿，现在
我那么爱
We recorded zero microseconds of delay and zero percent amplitude distortion. We have forwarded our findings to NASA. The lyrics were supposed to return in English, exactly as sent.
We contacted an acquaintance who lives and works in Shanghai and requested assistance. The phone connection was poor. We heard her say, "Bu shi!"
This reply has us puzzled. Chinese bu shi means no in English. We don't know if she was speaking fluent Chinese, or garbled English.
We are presently advertising for a professional Chinese interpreter.
"Enjoyed this tongue-firmly-in-cheek send-up by my favorite Contrarian. As usual his (I'm assuming) wit and wisdom shines through. The Cortland Contrarian never ceases to delight-not to mention amaze with the heft of his political cojones...as a successor to Twain he scores high marks..keep it up C.C. You're one of the few VERY smart and funny (not to mention scholarly) bloggers around the net."
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