film

“You’re not even making money from it!”

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I’m still buzzing from yesterday’s announcement that Game of Cages received a starred review from Publishers Weekly, but I know the rest of the world has quite sensibly moved on. So!

Writers of blogs and fanfic might want to watch this animated lecture. It covers a lot of recent research into motivation–is money a good motivation for people doing thinky, creative work? What are the best ways to get people invested in a project?

The answers are surprising (not only is a big pile of cash non-motivating, it actually has a detrimental effect). And as soon as I saw the artwork of the guy playing guitar, I thought about fanfic writers, why they do what they do and what they get out of it.

Anyway, it’s a fascinating little video (and beautifully produced, too). I recommend it highly, especially if you’re someone’s boss or manager.

Randomness for 7/2

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1) Wonder Woman trades in her star-spangled panties for actual pants (and a very ’90’s jacket).

2) “Officer, I recognize that woman! Her name is Selena Kyle!”

3) OMG. Promoted from a comment Rose Fox made: The Adventures of Lil Cthulhu. I love it!

4) Et Cetera and Otherwise: A Violent Book Trailer. That won a Moby Award for Best Foreign Book Trailer and I laughed my ass off.

5) The other Moby Award winning trailers are compiled here… except for the one named “Least Likely to Sell the Book”–aka: the worst book trailer of the year. The author pulled that one off of YouTube, and produced this new, “improved” version of the trailer. And I swear, if this is the good version, I can’t even imagine that bad one.

6) Batman’s Greatest Tweets. Sample: “We’ll miss you, Jack Bauer. If you ever come out of exile, I’ve got a pair of green ankle shoes and a yellow cape waiting.”

7) What sf ideas does Rudy Rucker wish you were writing about?

Randomness for 6/29

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1) A half-hearted defense of the Star Wars prequels. I agree with his assessment of the attitudes of the Jedi in the prequels, but I’m not convinced that Lucas himself recognized that it was problematic.

2) British stores told they can no longer sell eggs by the dozen.

3) The NY Post reacts to U.S. World Cup elimination.

4) I’m not one to link to music videos, but here’s The Go-Go’s circa 1984 (love the lighting) cross-dressing onstage and looking good doing it. And Belinda Carlisle sings the hell out of this song.

5) AT-AT afternoon.

6) An American woman in a German supermarket discovers an American ethnic food section. What foods do you think they consider American?

7) More evidence on the brilliance of Facebook users. The fan page for this author’s book has 700,000 fans, and he is sure none of them care one bit about reading his book. But damn, if even three percent could be convinced to buy a copy…

I buy my video games used…

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Most of the time, anyway.

I also rarely see movies in the theater (unless it’s something for my son) and I don’t belong to Netflix or Blockbuster so I don’t rent DVDs. When I see movies (with a few exceptions) they’re borrowed from the library. And yesterday I saw the rebooted STAR TREK DVD sitting there on the shelf, so I snagged it.

Let me say upfront that I’m not a Star Trek devotee. The original series was mostly good. The Next Generation was mostly good after it worked the kinks out. Voyager was a bore and Enterprise couldn’t hold my attention. My favorite out of all of them is DS9.

So, understand that I’m not going to be all yay or nay based on the changes to canon…

Hoo boy. People liked this? Spoilers in the rant below. Continue reading

Randomness for 6/25

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1) via Robin Bailey, this video about a guy who’s mom “beat the gay out of him” is crazy funny. It seems so real at the start…

2) Kitten wearing a tiny hat eats a miniature ice cream cone.

3) Next step: cub burgers. You know what surprises me but shouldn’t? The free-range lion “farm” (not ranch?) in Illinois. No one would believe it if they read it in a book.

4) Steve Martin’s Tour Rider leaked! So funny, and I so want to steal this idea for my upcoming non-existent book tour!

5) Cormac McCarthy’s Toy Story 3.

6) Reality TV artists create book cover designs, prove they are not book designer.

7) The development of the title page, 1470-1900.

This was no boating accident!

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Quick question regarding a conversation going on elsewhere: Have you ever walked into the wrong theater at the multiplex (or put the wrong disk in the DVD player) and watched a whole movie that was different than what you thought you were seeing?

This question is prompted by a grandmother and 8yo who sat through the first 15 minutes of GET HIM TO THE GREEK before deciding that they weren’t seeing TOY STORY 3 and leaving the theater. Also by a group of older women who watched all of TRANSFORMERS unsure if it was the chick flick they’d been planning to see.

I’m trying to get a grasp on this. I know that sometimes people don’t see things they don’t expect to see. I know that people try very hard to make shoehorn things into their pre-existing mental models. I also know that people in a group are less likely to jump up and say “This is wrong!” that people who are alone.

Once, I sat through ten minutes of a history channel documentary wondering when they were going to tie the subject of strip mining to the show on ancient Rome I was expecting (wrong night and I’d missed the opening).

But GET HIM TO THE GREEK?? Once Russel Brand dropped his first f-bomb, wouldn’t you get it? I just don’t understand. Has anyone had this experience?

Randomness for 6/23

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1) Carnage on Hoth, the cake.

2) The rule, usually, is “Don’t read the comments,” yes? But look at this post about a delicious salad sandwich and then scroll down to the fourth comment by “Brownhornet”. WTF? I don’t understand that at all.

3) A trailer for all Academy Award Winning Movies. This is funny.

4) So is this: The angry police captain. Seen via the-isb.

5) White guys for rent.

6) Want to have a good-looking kid? Talk to the sperm (and egg, supposedly) donors at beautifulpeople.com. Money quote: “Letting fatties roam the site is a direct threat to our business model and the very concept for which BeautifulPeople.com was founded.”

7) “Do you think the author wanted you to learn something?”
“No screaming.”

Randomness for 6/17

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I sure am posting a lot of these lately.

1) How to save lives.

2) How to clean oil off a pelican.

3) How to tell a completely believable story.

4) How to make crappy Hollywood movies.

5) How to plot a novel, Glenn Beck style

6) How to unveil a secret place in the middle of a city.

7) How to write a bad query (with true-life examples!)

Randomness for 6/16

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1) Mary Jane Watson, master of the obvious. Now THIS is writing!

2) Thomas Kinkade, if Thomas Kinkade was cool.

3) I know I’m behind the times linking to this, but damn! This is cool.

4) Look upon the face of evil.

5) Night Of The Killer Lamp: 23 Ridiculous Horror-Movie Adversaries

6) The Stockholm Library. It’s a rare library that gives me vertigo. There’s this one and the main downtown library in Seattle. Brrrr.

7) Star Wars, now with more pants.

Randomness for 6/15

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1) Tee hee.

2) All fame is fleeting. Best-selling books of decades past.

3) Somehow, I don’t think Syfy is taking their movie originals very seriously.

4) How to keep someone with you forever.

5) A friend made a documentary called THUNDER SOUL about a famous high school funk band from the 70’s
and their reunion tour. Listen to the band here.

6) Quote from article: “The findings do not directly link playing video games to reckless driving. They only show an association. Researchers say the impact of playing games like “Grand Theft Auto” is minimal.” Headline to the same article: “Study: Video Games Linked To Reckless Driving.”

7) The original Last Panel of Little Orphan Annie.