A Different Take on the Arizona Tragedy
After a weekend of listening, watching, and reading both sides of our political system point fingers in search of the one person, image, heavy metal song, agenda to blame for the tragedy that occurred in Arizona this past week, Jon Stewart returned last night with his thoughts. While some out there may not agree with his politics, no one can disagree with this.
“Wouldn’t it be a shame if we didn’t use this opportunity to make sure that the world we are creating now [...] wasn’t better than the one we previously lost.” Well said, sir.
Leave a commentWhat does “The Social Network” mean to you?
“The Social Network” has been out for awhile now and most everyone has seen it. It’s been unanimously praised for Sorkin’s script, Fincher’s direction and the performances within so, I’m not going to talk about my thoughts about the film that are, no doubt, less important than the critics who have said the same things before me. Instead, I want to focus on some of the things that the film brings up about the way we interact with each other in the Web 2.0 era and, perhaps, spark a little discussion in the process.
After I saw the film, I asked myself this question: What is the goal of using Facebook? Or rather, what is MY goal for using Facebook?
For Mark Zuckerberg, if you follow the film’s story, it was about creating an exclusive social network and putting the college experience online. For Eduardo Saverin, it was about taking that network and turning into a business for financial gain. But, we are way past that now. Aside from being a BILLION dollar empire, Facebook has been integrated into our daily lives and has become an “essential” part of both our social and professional existence. We connect with our friends and with our past. Organizations use it to raise awareness, businesses use it to find and connect with clients, and artists and musicians use it to develop their fan base.
As I look out over my friends on Facebook, I see a lot of variety in the way that they use it. Many, like me, use it to post bits of daily life they want to share, news about upcoming events, funny videos or interesting articles they’ve come across and to catch a glimpse of friends both near and far. It’s a dialogue that allows you to feel an instant connection to friends (old and new) no matter the distance between you or the time that has passed since last you saw them. A great example of that happened recently when a classmate of mine from high school passed away. Though we are spread out across the country, my classmates and I were able to hear the news that morning and rally around her sister to show our support and send our love, thoughts and prayers in a way that 10 years ago wouldn’t have been possible.
For others, it’s less about them and all about the dialogue. They post interesting questions, articles, news items as a way to start the ball rolling on a discussion. They act as a moderator in a debate happening through the comments section of each post.
For others, it’s more of a monologue than a dialogue. But, let’s be honest, those people aren’t reading this anyway.
So, I ask, what is Facebook for you? Do you have a goal in using it? Or is it simply a way to pass the time at work when nothing else is going on?
P.S. – I don’t use Facebook Places. It creeps me out.
1 CommentHollywood, Twitter and Scott Pilgrim
Scott Pilgrim opened last night and, according to EW.com, that “despite the Edgar Wright film’s strong presence at Comic-con and its popularity on Twitter,” brought in a disappointing 4.5MIL and a likely fourth or fifth place finish through the weekend. What’s number one? Stallone’s action packed, blow ‘em up and ask questions later, man movie The Expendables.
I was fortunate to catch a screening of Scott Pilgrim two weeks ago as part of the Creative Screenwriting series here in L.A. Thoroughly enjoyed it (even more than I thought I would). This is a movie that was made for the Nintendo generation and I can promise you, if you see it, you’ll have a great time. I saw The Expendables last night (it was the only movie on the board at The Grove last night that was sold out). It’s everything you expect it to be. For real. But, I’m not here to talk about or promote either of these movies.
The interesting thing about the article above is that it says, “despite its popularity on Twitter,” it’s doing poorly, as if Twitter was an accurate reference point for taking the pulse of the general public. I think Twitter is an accurate reference point for taking the pulse of the people on Twitter who, incidentally, are going to see Scott Pilgrim.
Statistics show that a projected 26 Million Users will have Twitter accounts by the end of 2010. However, they also show that 60% of Twitter users abandon their accounts within their first month of use, which leaves roughly 10.4 Million users (that’s globally). So, if the US has a population of 307,000,000, what would make one think that popularity among 10.5 million people from around the world is a reason to believe your headed for success?
This is what Twitter is right now.
Everyone is still trying to figure out the best way to capitalize on the social media phenomenon. And people are experimenting with new ways of building and cultivating an audience for their projects and products (especially with the rise of crowdsourcing sites like Kickstarter). But, right now, there’s no way to really know how to do it. Mostly because, even if you have the most amazing thing to share, it’s going to get lost in the sea of other #hashtags and retweets. Personally, I still think Facebook is the most efficient (IF USED CORRECTLY) and until someone proves otherwise, Twitter will just be a way for me to find out interesting tidbits of news about the fascinating people I follow like @ActuallyNPH “expecting twins this fall. We’re super excited/nervous/thrilled. Hoping the press can respect our privacy… ”
Feel free to retweet this. And go see Scott Pilgrim. I promise you’ll enjoy it.
2 CommentsAlternate “Inception” trailers
So, I saw Inception and I loved it. While people continue to debate its awesomeness and other people continue to debate the awesomeness of those people debating its awesomeness (Lisa Schwarzbaum at EW.com wrote a great article called “‘Inception’, that ending and where critics go wrong” about this very thing), one thing is certain, it has become a bit of a phenomenon. This is not going to be about the movie, the ending, my thoughts on that (he woke up…WHAT?!), it is going to be about the amazing spoofs that have hit the web over the last week.
First up, we have INCEPCION, starring Dora the Explorer:
AND, if you’re asking yourself what could be better than that? What about taking the summer’s two biggest movies and combining them into one amazing story. I submit, for your viewing pleasure, “Toy Story 3: INCEPTION”.
Amazing…
Leave a commentThe OTHER Social Network
So, first off let me say that I can’t wait for the upcoming release of the Aaron Sorkin penned, David Fincher helmed “The Social Network.” Anything written by Sorkin and directed by Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club) is bound to be brilliant.
Now that we got that out of the way…this is funny.
Leave a comment
I cried at Toy Story 3
A couple of weeks ago, flipping through my copy of Entertainment Weekly, I came across this article by Owen Gleiberman entitled, “Message to Men: Yes, it’s okay to cry at “Toy Story 3.’” In it, he tells the story of being trapped between two of his colleagues and attempting to hide not only his tears, but his sounds of sobbing as this beautiful movie came to a close.
He’s got a “Stop Reading Now!” moment in there and, on his advice, I did. At that point, I had no real intention of seeing Toy Story 3. I had seen the other two and enjoyed them (as I have every film released by the brilliant folks at Pixar), but I just didn’t have a real desire to see this one. But, as the reviews continued to glow, my girlfriend and I both felt that we should see it. If nothing else, we knew it would be good fun and pretty, right?
And for the first 2/3 of the film, it was just that. The toys were facing the same challenge of overcoming the odds to get back to Andy and to, of course, be played with. But now that Andy has grown up and is headed to college, their adversary was something more than competing with “the new guy” or dealing with their own wear and tear. Now they were dealing with something they couldn’t stop…time. They were made to be played with, but Andy is the only child they’ve ever known. They belong to him, right? So, do they remain his and live in the attic until someday maybe Andy comes back to them? Or, do they follow a larger calling to be a part of another child’s adventurous imagination?
As Mr. Gleiberman did before me, I will warn you. If you haven’t seen the movie (and intend to do so), you should stop reading. I absolutely do not want to spoil the last 20 minutes of this movie for you…unless you want me to. If so, keep reading.
The last 20 minutes of this movie find our heroes at a crossroads and found me struggling to keep my s#!T together. Battered and bruised after a few rounds with some toddlers at a daycare and living through a near death experience at a trash dump (Pixar, you deserve applause for that scene alone), they are on a mission to get home. Back to where it’s safe. Back to the place that they know. And, even if it means a lifetime in the attic, that’s where they intend to stay because they will be together.
But, moments before being carried up there, Woody (who spent the entire trying to convince them that they should stay in the attic) realizes that they are meant for more than that…that they too must move on to accomplish more of what they were made to do. And, in that last scene we see a series of selfless acts, one after another, culminating in Woody choosing to let Andy go and stay with the gang that remind us what it means to love and pass on the gift of imagination in a world of Wiis and Playstations.
So, yeah…I cried. And I’m totally okay with it. Did you see it? What did you think?
Leave a commentAnd we’re BACK!
After a couple of days of messing around with WordPress, we are back online. I’ve added some new stuff, not the least of which will be this blog where I’ll be posting news from Back Mountain as well as just about anything else I feel like I should write about.
This should be an interesting experiment. I’ve been terrible about keeping blogs in the past. But, for some reason, I think this one might finally stick. So, bookmark, subscribe, whatever you want to do. Just check back often.
Leave a commentNew Site Coming…
Yes, I know. I just built this site two months ago. But, things change and I wanted to toy around with designing in WordPress. New site will be up in a day or two. Pardon the mess, we’ll be cleaned up very soon!
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