Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Evening Thread
So important news of the day is that Steve King thinks Obama is blacketyblackblackblackblackBLACKBLACKcountBlacketyblackula.
Executive Order Shmorder
Now:
Then:
President Obama's deficit commission is likely to delay a vote, originally set for Wednesday, on a plan to rein in the soaring national debt, according to congressional sources.
As commission chairmen Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson huddle one-on-one with other members in hopes of assembling a respectable majority, sources said Tuesday that a vote later in the week is looking more likely.
Then:
Furthermore, 14 out of 18 votes needed to report recommendations, and recommendations must be reported to Congress by December 1, 2010.
Preznit Giv Me Slurpee
Oh boy.
...on the twitter chucktoddler sez:
Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama told GOP leaders behind closed doors Tuesday that he had failed to reach across party lines enough during his first two years in office, a senior administration official told CNN.
...on the twitter chucktoddler sez:
Gibbs confirms Cantor statement that POTUS admitted he could have reached out more but Gibbs said GOPers did not offer any similar retort
#Fail
They're moving the goalposts of course, but lets cheer on the likely failure of the catfood commission. We should remind the worst person in the world, Maya MacGuineas, that the point wasn't to come up with ideas. Ideas are easy. The point was to come up with a plan that was broadly acceptable, with enough to placate both sides.
SOTU It Is?
I guess I had some small hope that post-election Obama would come out swinging on the economy and try to ram through something that might actually help. Oh well. Maybe state of the union?
The People's Business
I suppose there isn't much point in the House actually trying to do something useful only for it to go die in the Senate, but a schedule like that doesn't exactly convey the message that they comprehend that there are a few wee problems at the moment.
Neither does a slurpee summit.
Neither does a slurpee summit.
Let's Pretend
Nobody cares about the deficit, least of all Republicans in Congress, yet everyone pretends otherwise.
What Fresh Hell
Having that feeling I used to get during those periods before major congressional recesses, just hoping they'd hurry up and go the hell home before they did more damage.
Obviously there are some good things they could do, too, so in the spirit of bipartisanship I will cut off my hand.
Obviously there are some good things they could do, too, so in the spirit of bipartisanship I will cut off my hand.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Parental Backup
A post like this always gets some pushback with people giving their "I lived in DC on under 30 grand with student debt and no parental support" stories which is why I conceded that it's possible to do, but I think 20somethings at the time and in their memories often underestimate the degree of parental support they actually receive. At one end you have people whose parents just give them large and direct cash subsidies, at the other you have people with no living family members or anyone else to help them, but there's a whole range in the middle who get parental support in various ways. You know, a generous cash gift at Christmas. A bit of help with needed car repairs. Paying for plane flights home for the holidays. Parental support also comes in the form of just providing an insurance policy in that if you choose a lower real wage "important" job as a congressional staffer over a higher wage one elsewhere and your career is truncated prematurely when your boss loses re-election, someone is there to smooth the transition to your next endeavor. Moving is expensive too. Some people have a bit of a parental social safety net and some people don't.
Stepping On Own Message
The administration has long been very bad at consistently articulating their "need more spending now, need to cut deficit later" two track message, but as Scarecrow suggests it's not clear they're going to bother to try anymore.
V-Chip Wasn't So Bad
Even though nobody uses it, but the pointless gimmick era of the presidency is apparently here.
Class Self-Selection
Obviously congressional staffers are only a small part of the federal workforce, but the dirty little secret of Washington is that the country is run by poorly paid 25 year olds. Washington is an expensive city. Low level staff jobs really don't pay enough* unless you have some sort of parental support and backup, and of course such jobs are stepping stones to other careers in various corridors of power. In other words, only people of a certain class will tend to take such jobs and move into positions of real power.
*They might pay enough that you can afford the austere life in the several roommate flophouse, if you don't have tens of thousands of student loans to repay, but these just aren't high paying jobs given DC rents.
*They might pay enough that you can afford the austere life in the several roommate flophouse, if you don't have tens of thousands of student loans to repay, but these just aren't high paying jobs given DC rents.
But Will He Pay?
Anyone predict Christie will demonstrate his awesomeness by not paying his bill to the Feds?
Also, Bad Santa
With several thousand municipalities trying to deal with legitimate church/state separation issues and the reality of multiculturalism, it's inevitable that some will do something stupid when trying to deal with quasi-religious holidays like Christmas. But, if they don't, just make stuff up!
It's The Economy Stupid
I don't quite believe as much as some that elections are entirely won or lost on the state of the economy, but cutting federal pay in real terms is anti-stimulus at a moment when no other stimulus is likely to pass. Also, too, unionized public workers are part of your base, and such.
We'll Be The Bad Guys So They Don't Have To Be
So awesome.
Well as long as we preemptively do what they are planning to do then we won't have to negotiate...
WASHINGTON -- President Obama plans to announce a two-year pay freeze for civilian federal workers later Monday morning, according to an administration official, the latest White House move intended to demonstrate concern over sky-high deficit spending.
...
While a pay freeze will make only a small dent in the federal deficit, it represents a symbolic gesture toward public anger over unemployment, the anemic economic recovery and rising national debt. By announcing it on Monday, the president effectively will preempt Republicans who have been talking about making such a move once they take over the House and assume more seats in the Senate in January.
Well as long as we preemptively do what they are planning to do then we won't have to negotiate...
Modern Capitalism
Haven't bothered to look up the details, but in a BBC report on the Ireland bailout I was informed (rough quote) "there is a plan for private investors to be responsible for losses due to financial crises starting in 2013."
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Moshe and Eddie Brakha: Standardizing Creativity
When most photographers hit "a certain age," they might be tempted to revert to the mean -- to play it a little safer, creatively speaking. Not so Moshe Brakha, who has never been one for safe lighting.
These days, his collaboration with his son Eddie combines experience and relative youth in a photographic one-two punch. For the Brakhas, stale is not an option. And to combat it, they are setting aside regular downtime reserved solely for stretching themselves. Read more »
A Thanksgiving Weekend Class for the Strobist Flickr Group
While you were busy digesting turkey and watching football this weekend, you may have missed Brad Trent* (at left, photo by Kazuhito Sakuma) dropping into the Strobist Flickr group to answer lighting Q's about controlling contrast. Definitely worth a read. As mentioned before, Brad not only includes lighting setup shots in his portfolio, but blogs about his shoots frequently at Damn Ugly Photography.
That's worth a read, too.
__________
*I ran into Brad in person at PhotoPlus Expo in NYC last month. Funny thing, that amped-up Brad Trent Light® seemed to follow him around wherever he went. Kinda like the Mona Lisa appearing to stare directly at you no matter where you stand…
-30-
Uploading 101 with Professor Compressor
This week in Howcast’s ‘Modern 101 for emerging digital filmmakers’ we’re pleased to welcome guest lecturer, Professor Compressor. Professor Compressor is one of the most revered thinkers in web video and is renowned for his ability to compress and upload videos using the proper codecs, in the correct aspect ratios, and at the precise data rate, so that they look, as he would say, ‘wunderful!’ Professor Compressor comes to us through the magic of video all the way from an Indian archipelago via Eastern Russia to share his expertise on uploading great-looking web video.
Thank you for watching Professor Compressor’s compression video! Here you can find all the pertinent notes from today’s lecture:
What is a codec?
A codec is the format in which you compress your video. It could be a variety of different formats, but the most modern, powerful, and commonly used codecs are H.264 and MPEG-4.
Why H.264 and MP4 (MPEG-4)?
H.264 and MP4 are wunderful codecs! They allow you to have a tremendous quality video at a fraction of the file size. Lets look at a theoretical example:
You’ve finished editing and have made a beautiful 1920x1080 master file. But it is in the Apple Pro Res format, and is over 2GB. This file won’t work for the web. The video codec is too large and the file size is too big. Inevitably you will end up with a low quality video, because the master file is not designed and optimized for the web.
Take that file and transcode it into an H.264. Since web players are designed to work seamlessly with H.264, you won’t have to worry about choppy or corrupted playback. And H.264 encodes your video in such a way that you won’t see a noticeable drop in image quality. What you will see is your 2GB master file shrink to less than 500MB -- perfect for the web!
Help, my footage looks stretched or squished and there are black bars bordering the footage!
This is a common problem that results from uploading an incorrect frame size. When uploading, you need to make sure the video is in the correct frame size for the player. This could be a variety of different frame sizes, varying from SD to HD, so check your website’s FAQ on uploading for instructions. The most common frame sizes are: 640x360, 640x480, 720x480, 1280x720, and 1920x1080.
This problem could also result from an incorrect Pixel Aspect Ratio. Pixel Aspect Ratio (or PAR) can be a little confusing, but the simple way to think of it is that this setting tells your program what aspect ratio to encode your video, at the pixel level. It determines how the digital information is presented and viewed onscreen. I recommend square pixels for HD, PAL for PAL, and NTSC for NTSC, though this can vary.. The best option is to play around with this setting when exporting until you get your video looking pristine.
Help, my video looks muddy and detail is lost. My text looks almost pixelated and the video is generally very low quality.
Low image quality is usually due to a low data rate when exporting your video. When exporting your video, you’re given many options; one of these is data rate. Setting the data rate to automatic will usually result in the best image. It is also highly recommended to do a multi-pass encode. It will take longer than a single-pass encode, but it will result in a much smoother video with higher image quality.
Well, that was a lot of information! Digest it, experiment, and start uploading those WUNDERFUL videos!
Nardeep Khurmi, Howcast’s Post Production Specialist (a.k.a Professor Compressor) recently watched "Pygmy Jerboa".
Thank you for watching Professor Compressor’s compression video! Here you can find all the pertinent notes from today’s lecture:
What is a codec?
A codec is the format in which you compress your video. It could be a variety of different formats, but the most modern, powerful, and commonly used codecs are H.264 and MPEG-4.
Why H.264 and MP4 (MPEG-4)?
H.264 and MP4 are wunderful codecs! They allow you to have a tremendous quality video at a fraction of the file size. Lets look at a theoretical example:
You’ve finished editing and have made a beautiful 1920x1080 master file. But it is in the Apple Pro Res format, and is over 2GB. This file won’t work for the web. The video codec is too large and the file size is too big. Inevitably you will end up with a low quality video, because the master file is not designed and optimized for the web.
Take that file and transcode it into an H.264. Since web players are designed to work seamlessly with H.264, you won’t have to worry about choppy or corrupted playback. And H.264 encodes your video in such a way that you won’t see a noticeable drop in image quality. What you will see is your 2GB master file shrink to less than 500MB -- perfect for the web!
Help, my footage looks stretched or squished and there are black bars bordering the footage!
This is a common problem that results from uploading an incorrect frame size. When uploading, you need to make sure the video is in the correct frame size for the player. This could be a variety of different frame sizes, varying from SD to HD, so check your website’s FAQ on uploading for instructions. The most common frame sizes are: 640x360, 640x480, 720x480, 1280x720, and 1920x1080.
This problem could also result from an incorrect Pixel Aspect Ratio. Pixel Aspect Ratio (or PAR) can be a little confusing, but the simple way to think of it is that this setting tells your program what aspect ratio to encode your video, at the pixel level. It determines how the digital information is presented and viewed onscreen. I recommend square pixels for HD, PAL for PAL, and NTSC for NTSC, though this can vary.. The best option is to play around with this setting when exporting until you get your video looking pristine.
Help, my video looks muddy and detail is lost. My text looks almost pixelated and the video is generally very low quality.
Low image quality is usually due to a low data rate when exporting your video. When exporting your video, you’re given many options; one of these is data rate. Setting the data rate to automatic will usually result in the best image. It is also highly recommended to do a multi-pass encode. It will take longer than a single-pass encode, but it will result in a much smoother video with higher image quality.
Well, that was a lot of information! Digest it, experiment, and start uploading those WUNDERFUL videos!
Nardeep Khurmi, Howcast’s Post Production Specialist (a.k.a Professor Compressor) recently watched "Pygmy Jerboa".
So What Was It
So what was that policy? Saying there was general agreement within the economics team is not the same thing as saying that they had united around some policy proposal that the communications team could reasonably sell.
The Great Game
My 5 second takeaway from the latest wikileaks is that we spend an enormous amount of resources doing mostly pointless but still somewhat offensive stuff just so we can keep up the whole spy vs. spy nonsense, then cover it up.
The Jobs Are Too Damn Few
And the people whose job it is to think about how to solve such problems have basically punted.
Sunday Bobbleheads
This Week has 4 rich white people.
Face the Nation has Huffington, Woodward, Edmund Morris, and Ron Chernow.
Meet the Press has Durbin and Kyl.
Document the atrocities!
Face the Nation has Huffington, Woodward, Edmund Morris, and Ron Chernow.
Meet the Press has Durbin and Kyl.
Document the atrocities!
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Very Silly Irish People
The patriotic thing to do is give all your money to rich banksters and then thank them for your suffering.
Destroying The World
It is remarkable that all serious people agree that the best way to deal with struggling economies is to plunge them as deeply into recession as possible and steal money from poor people to cover the bad debts of billionaires.
At Least The War Is Over
And all the peeance and freeance is there.
BAGHDAD — A second exodus has begun here, of Iraqis who returned after fleeing the carnage of the height of the war, but now find that violence and the nation’s severe lack of jobs are pulling them away from home once again.
Friday, November 26, 2010
The Difference
Perhaps there is a lesson here.
“The difference is that in Iceland we allowed the banks to fail,” Grimsson said in an interview with Bloomberg Television’s Mark Barton today. “These were private banks and we didn’t pump money into them in order to keep them going; the state did not shoulder the responsibility of the failed private banks.”
Not Quite True
Krugman (read the whole thing) writes:
I think the "helicopter drop" could still probably work, but relying on a failed banking system as conduit can't.
And Milton Friedman was wrong: in the face of a really big shock, which pushes the economy into a liquidity trap, the central bank can’t prevent a depression.
I think the "helicopter drop" could still probably work, but relying on a failed banking system as conduit can't.
Also, Al Gore Is Fat
And such.
When Ms. Peck, now 75 and a caretaker to her husband, moved here 40 years ago, tidal flooding was an occasional hazard.
“Last month,” she said recently, “there were eight or nine days the tide was so doggone high it was difficult to drive.”
Larchmont residents have relentlessly lobbied the city to address the problem, and last summer it broke ground on a project to raise the street around the “u” by 18 inches and to readjust the angle of the storm drains so that when the river rises, the water does not back up into the street. The city will also turn a park at the edge of the river back into wetlands — it is now too saline for lawn grass to grow anyway. The cost for the work on this one short stretch is $1.25 million.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
One Big Giant Mess
And no one has any idea how to fix it.
For some reason I doubt "punishing the responsible parties" will play a major role.
For some reason I doubt "punishing the responsible parties" will play a major role.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Giving Thanks, Giving Back
It's Thanksgiving Day here in the US. Which means that in addition to trotting out the traditional Strobist before-and-after turkey shot (courtesy the tryptophan-laced Paul Morton) we pause to think about giving thanks and helping others.
This year, a quick look at how some local photographers in Howard County, MD are using their cameras to give back to their community. And not to put the idea in your head, but it was a really fun day -- and something anyone reading this blog could do, too. Read more »
DeLay
Seems ancient history now, but the DeLay thing was one of the early "things only liberal bloggers care about" while being lectured by our betters in the Village that this was all the work of a partisan (read: Democrat) prosecutor trying to criminalize politics.
The Bug Man Endeth
The twitter tells me that Tom DeLay was just convicted of stuff only crazy liberals took seriously.
Nobody Tell Lou Dobbs
Day after day he would rail against the evils of the movie "Bad Santa," unaware that it wasn't a movie about the real fake entity known as Santa Claus but instead about a mall Santa.
Sequel might be on its way. This is the best news for our side in the War in Christmas yet.
Sequel might be on its way. This is the best news for our side in the War in Christmas yet.
Ireland Logic
As far as I can tell it's borrow a bunch of money to shore up the banking system, and then cut spending and destroy the economy so that people will be willing to lend you the more money you're promising to not need.
Or something.
Or something.
Let's Just Have a Do Over For The Whole Decade
Well, for the rich and powerful who run everything anyway. It's distressing that there has been massive foreclosure fraud and no one will actually be charged with "fraud," they'll just be asked politely to clean up their act enough so we can go back to pretending not to notice.
But It's A Unicorn
Harold Meyerson takes a look at the German economy, which actually shouldn't exist given the standard theology of the Econ.
All In
Judging from reports of the press conference, Ireland is going to double down on the awesome policies it has had which are working so well.
AUSTERITY NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW
AUSTERITY NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW
Thursday Is New Jobless Day
Except when it's Wednesday. 402k new lucky duckies. Actual almost good news!
Morning Thread
by Molly Ivors
Matt Taibbi, why do I love you so much when you make me want to slit my wrists?
PS. What the hell? I need a drug to recover from that article.
Matt Taibbi, why do I love you so much when you make me want to slit my wrists?
You've heard of Too Big to Fail — the foreclosure crisis is Too Big for Fraud. Think of the Bernie Madoff scam, only replicated tens of thousands of times over, infecting every corner of the financial universe. The underlying crime is so pervasive, we simply can't admit to it — and so we are working feverishly to rubber-stamp the problem away, in sordid little backrooms in cities like Jacksonville, behind doors that shouldn't be, but often are, closed.
PS. What the hell? I need a drug to recover from that article.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Wong Fu film premieres on YouTube
In May 2010, Wong Fu Productions (Wesley Chan, Ted Fu, Philip Wang) and Ryan Higa started talking about doing a special project: a high-quality, long-form film that would be released just on YouTube for fans. Well, the moment is here: the film is now on YouTube, and Philip tells us more about it.
Written in a couple days, the 35-minute movie was shot in one intense week this past summer. Drawing from the talents of a few dedicated friends, the crew was no bigger than 10 and was usually just the three of us from Wong Fu Productions (WFP), plus the actors. There was no big budget, no big company, no big crews or equipment behind the shoot – just us, a DSLR camera, and the desire to do something major and to support each other.
In a time when "YouTubers" are still foreign to industry studios and decision makers, we didn't want to wait around for someone to give us the green light. We just went ahead and did it ourselves. Being Asian-American is not something most mainstream outlets believe is marketable. We struggle with this constantly. But with Ryan and Wong Fu's combined audiences, and a fresh approach to producing high-quality stories, we can show the world what we're capable of – not just as individuals in a new industry, but as a community, as well.
Philip Wang, Wong Fu Productions, recently watched "Agents of Secret Stuff."
Written in a couple days, the 35-minute movie was shot in one intense week this past summer. Drawing from the talents of a few dedicated friends, the crew was no bigger than 10 and was usually just the three of us from Wong Fu Productions (WFP), plus the actors. There was no big budget, no big company, no big crews or equipment behind the shoot – just us, a DSLR camera, and the desire to do something major and to support each other.
In a time when "YouTubers" are still foreign to industry studios and decision makers, we didn't want to wait around for someone to give us the green light. We just went ahead and did it ourselves. Being Asian-American is not something most mainstream outlets believe is marketable. We struggle with this constantly. But with Ryan and Wong Fu's combined audiences, and a fresh approach to producing high-quality stories, we can show the world what we're capable of – not just as individuals in a new industry, but as a community, as well.
Philip Wang, Wong Fu Productions, recently watched "Agents of Secret Stuff."
Q&A with Chef John of Food Wishes
Chef John Mitzewich is the voice behind YouTube’s most subscribed cooking channel, Food Wishes. Chef John today posted his 500th video to YouTube, and he recently took time out to answer a few questions about how he makes his videos and the trends he’s seeing as a YouTube chef.
How do you decide what to make videos about?
The whole concept of the "Food Wishes" channel is "What's your food wish?" I get tons of recipe requests, and try to honor the most popular wishes when I plan my dishes. Other times, I'll just start cooking something and realize it would make a cool video, so I'll throw the camera on a tripod and begin filming.
How seasonal are your videos -- both in terms of how you think about what you create and how your audience fluctuates?
Since I film what I eat, and I tend to eat very seasonally, the videos are generally quite in tune to what's available that time of year. Also, if I know a certain seasonal dish is coming up (like chicken wings for the Super Bowl), I'll try and plan something a few weeks ahead so people have time to learn and make it.
What are some other trends you've noticed in viewership of your videos, subscriber growth or fan comments over the years?
Subscribers and viewership have both grown steadily over the last 12 months and are increasing faster compared to when I first started out. I've more than doubled both my subscribers and viewership this year compared to last. It seems every year that the holiday season is when my entire catalogue gets a boost, as I think more people are looking for that special recipe to make for their family and friends. My viewership has also been pretty diverse. I get a huge range of ages, from kids cooking their first recipe, to seniors who've never cooked before getting into it for the first time.
What are the keys to really great cooking videos?
To me, a great cooking video is one that makes the viewer feel like they're making the video with you, not just watching someone make a recipe. I want to bring the viewer right into the scene. Close, interesting shots of the food, with an engaging, affable narration are what I try and use to achieve this.
How important is a mouth-watering thumbnail?
A great looking thumbnail that is clear, bright, and close-up, is second in importance only to the recipe title itself.
What is a common mistake budding cooks make when making videos?
They try to do a TV-style cooking show. You're on YouTube, not Food Network, so stop trying to do an imitation of a network "stand and stir" show. Generally the viewer is way more interested in the food, than the person making it; so stop trying to "perform" for the camera, and just show us the cooking.
Do you have any insight into how much technology, like YouTube videos or iPad, is moving into the kitchen?
I know this is a huge trend! I get all kinds of emails from people that tell me they take their laptops or iPads into the kitchen to cook with. A library of your favorite video recipes from YouTube on your iPad IS the cookbook of the next decade.
Thanksgiving. How do you approach this holiday as a video-making chef?
I just try to film a nice variety of recipes suited to entertaining. People are at their most insecure when cooking for friends and family during the holidays, so I want these videos to make life a little easier (and more fun!).
Anything else you'd like to add?
For someone who doesn't cook, watching a video recipe is the best, and most enjoyable way to learn. As food television trends towards reality shows and contest-based programming, I predict YouTube becomes the primary resource for on-demand culinary instruction.
Annie Baxter, Communications Manager, recently watched "Peach Brulee Burrata Recipe."
How do you decide what to make videos about?
The whole concept of the "Food Wishes" channel is "What's your food wish?" I get tons of recipe requests, and try to honor the most popular wishes when I plan my dishes. Other times, I'll just start cooking something and realize it would make a cool video, so I'll throw the camera on a tripod and begin filming.
How seasonal are your videos -- both in terms of how you think about what you create and how your audience fluctuates?
Since I film what I eat, and I tend to eat very seasonally, the videos are generally quite in tune to what's available that time of year. Also, if I know a certain seasonal dish is coming up (like chicken wings for the Super Bowl), I'll try and plan something a few weeks ahead so people have time to learn and make it.
What are some other trends you've noticed in viewership of your videos, subscriber growth or fan comments over the years?
Subscribers and viewership have both grown steadily over the last 12 months and are increasing faster compared to when I first started out. I've more than doubled both my subscribers and viewership this year compared to last. It seems every year that the holiday season is when my entire catalogue gets a boost, as I think more people are looking for that special recipe to make for their family and friends. My viewership has also been pretty diverse. I get a huge range of ages, from kids cooking their first recipe, to seniors who've never cooked before getting into it for the first time.
What are the keys to really great cooking videos?
To me, a great cooking video is one that makes the viewer feel like they're making the video with you, not just watching someone make a recipe. I want to bring the viewer right into the scene. Close, interesting shots of the food, with an engaging, affable narration are what I try and use to achieve this.
How important is a mouth-watering thumbnail?
A great looking thumbnail that is clear, bright, and close-up, is second in importance only to the recipe title itself.
What is a common mistake budding cooks make when making videos?
They try to do a TV-style cooking show. You're on YouTube, not Food Network, so stop trying to do an imitation of a network "stand and stir" show. Generally the viewer is way more interested in the food, than the person making it; so stop trying to "perform" for the camera, and just show us the cooking.
Do you have any insight into how much technology, like YouTube videos or iPad, is moving into the kitchen?
I know this is a huge trend! I get all kinds of emails from people that tell me they take their laptops or iPads into the kitchen to cook with. A library of your favorite video recipes from YouTube on your iPad IS the cookbook of the next decade.
Thanksgiving. How do you approach this holiday as a video-making chef?
I just try to film a nice variety of recipes suited to entertaining. People are at their most insecure when cooking for friends and family during the holidays, so I want these videos to make life a little easier (and more fun!).
Anything else you'd like to add?
For someone who doesn't cook, watching a video recipe is the best, and most enjoyable way to learn. As food television trends towards reality shows and contest-based programming, I predict YouTube becomes the primary resource for on-demand culinary instruction.
Annie Baxter, Communications Manager, recently watched "Peach Brulee Burrata Recipe."
These Are Not Good Projections
Fed thinks unemployment will be around 9% all next year and near 8% at the end of 2012.
Go Bristol!
I gather there are a bunch of conservatives doing what they can to ensure a Bristol Palin victory on Dancing With The Stars. I assume they're doing this because they imagine it will piss of liberals. It really won't.
Modern Warfare
Apparently it involves killing some bad guys and handing over giant bags of cash to other bad guys in hopes of achieving some sort of karmic balance.
Modern Capitalism
Apparently it involves letting super rich people light hundreds of billions of dollars on fire, and then taxing poor people so they can afford to have a second bonfire.
Just A Few Million Innocents
And fortunately there's that radiation proof wall between the North and the South ensuring that only the bad North Koreans are affected.
Random Thought
There are certainly days when it seems like nobody in charge has any idea what they're doing.
And After You're Done Giving $25K/person To The Banksters
Please make sure to make the suffering more profound and intense.
Yes that will work. God I've come to loathe (most) economists.
IMF on Ireland, 2006:
(Reuters) - Ireland should gradually lower unemployment benefits and cut the level of its minimum wage in order to boost employment, the International Monetary Fund said in a paper released on Monday.
Yes that will work. God I've come to loathe (most) economists.
IMF on Ireland, 2006:
• The outlook for the financial system is positive. That said, there are several macro-risks and challenges
facing the authorities. As the housing market has boomed, household debt to GDP ratios have continued to
rise, raising some concerns about credit risks. Further, a significant slowdown in economic growth, while
seen as highly unlikely in the near term, would have adverse consequences for banks’ non-performing loans.
Stress tests confirm, however, that the major financial institutions have adequate capital buffers to cover a
range of shocks.
Disconnect
I'm repeating myself somewhat, but I think it's quite horrifying that we live in a time of extended and ongoing 9.6% unemployment, and what our media elite spend all day every day talking about is the fact that we need to cut Social Security benefits.
FAIL
FAIL
Morning
I'm so old I can remember pretending to be a Taliban leader was more of a 'get killed quick' rather than a 'get rich quick' scheme.
Sadly not a deleted scene from 'In the Loop'
Oy!
Apparently, they also mistook the gentlemen as the Taliban-representative of a large bank.
This seems appropriate (NSFW if the volume is up).
For months, the secret talks unfolding between Taliban and Afghan leaders to end the war appeared to be showing promise, if only because of the appearance of a certain insurgent leader at one end of the table: Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour, one of the most senior commanders in the Taliban movement....
United States and Afghan officials now say the Afghan man was an impostor.
Apparently, they also mistook the gentlemen as the Taliban-representative of a large bank.
“It’s not him,” said a Western diplomat in Kabul intimately involved in the discussions. “And we gave him a lot of money.”
This seems appropriate (NSFW if the volume is up).
Monday, November 22, 2010
… Or, a Soft Box Will Work, Too
After reading Sunday's post on improvisational ring lights, Haristobald Photography shot me a link to this BTS video.
Camera on axis with a soft box, and everything on an overhead boom gets him a different perspective for these calendar shots of a local track club -- with very cool results. More info and final pics are on his dual-language blog post.
If he sounds familiar, it is because he was one of the winners in the PocketWizard/Strobist video competition a ways back. If you are a new reader (since November '08) you'll want to check those out.
-30-
Random Thought
Pretty sure that at about $25k per person, Ireland would be better off writing checks to its citizens than lighting $120 billion on fire giving it to the banks.
Scams
Identity verification systems do nothing but...verify identity. Past performance is no guarantee of future terrorist activity.
More Commenters Like This Please
I don't know if Boilerguru is a pardoy or merely sent from heaven to keep me entertained without having to go to the Inqy web site, but this was a pretty good entry:
I don't care if people like the urban hellhole, but I am endlessly fascinated by what they imagine is wrong with it.
The sooner Harrisburg chokes off the funding to Philly the better. Philly needs to cut salaries and pensions for all the city workers, reduce or eliminate state aid to the city, eliminate WIC and state welfare programs. Business's that are stuck in Philly that employ people paying the ridiculous city wage tax need to be provided state tax intensives to move out to the burbs. As someone who has never nor will ever ride public transportation - a huge reduction of state funds into this area would also be refreshing.
Allow Philly to be 100% responsible for themselves - the rest of us in the burbs have 100% zero use for that garbage dump of a city. I live 5 miles outside the city and havent' set foot into the city for over 5 years.
Today, 3:36:42 PM
– Reply – Moderate
I don't care if people like the urban hellhole, but I am endlessly fascinated by what they imagine is wrong with it.
Happy Hour News
Obviously the important news of the day is the scary announcement of a Buffy movie remake. Not that the original movie was any good, but the teevee series of course has a fan or two.
But What Are They Standing In The Way Of
I have no doubt that Republicans will destroy the economy in order to return them to power if given a chance, though I have to ask: what exactly are blocking? The only thing I'm aware of us is the small business tax cut plan. I don't think that's a horrible idea, but it isn't going to save the economy.
It's A Wonderful Lie
Aside from factual issues, I have no idea how Beck's brain blender processed It's A Wonderful Life like that.
Austerity At Home
Pennsylvania's new GOP overlords are going to do their best to destroy the state, and most don't have any love for Philly.
At some point we should stop making fun of the French and realize that we're doing it wrong.
At some point we should stop making fun of the French and realize that we're doing it wrong.
FranceAndGermanyWillDie
Of course it isn't just Tom Friedman. It's been conventional Village wisdom for as long as I can remember that continental European countries are DOOOOOOOOOMED unless they destroy their welfare state and put the free market fairy in charge of everything. At some point maybe Tom Friedman should wonder how Germany manages to be a high wage net exporting economy with all the socialism.
Hedgies
FBI has raided 3 huge funds, and market participants are concerned that our Galtian Overlords at Goldman might get ensnared.
I predict small civil fines with no admitted wrongdoing all around.
I predict small civil fines with no admitted wrongdoing all around.
Own Goal
Yes the Right will exploit this, as everything, for their own stupid ends, but it really should be obvious to our overlords that taking pictures of and fondling peoples' genitals aren't really acceptable security measures.
Insolvent
All along there's been a failure to really come to terms with the magnitude of the financial disaster and of the culpability of the Very Serious People in charge. In the beginning it was all the fault of poor minorities who used their immense political power to force banksters to give them loans they couldn't afford, then when the crisis really hit it was just a wee 'liquidity' problem which could be easily solved with a couple trillion dollar gift from the Fed.
And we left the people responsible in charge, because, well, nobody could have predicted, without considering the fact that this is what the people in charge will continue to do because this is what they know how to do.
The powers that be thought the economy would turn itself around and some of these problems would evaporate. But it didn't and they didn't and that light at the end of the tunnel no longer appears to be just around the corner.
And we left the people responsible in charge, because, well, nobody could have predicted, without considering the fact that this is what the people in charge will continue to do because this is what they know how to do.
The powers that be thought the economy would turn itself around and some of these problems would evaporate. But it didn't and they didn't and that light at the end of the tunnel no longer appears to be just around the corner.
Does This Remind You Of Anything Else
Felix Salmon:
When a residential property bubble as big as Ireland’s bursts, there will be always enormous bank losses. But because those losses haven’t materialized yet, everybody in Ireland and the EU is sticking their heads in the sand, pretending that they’re never going to arrive at all.
The best-case scenario, then, is that the EU bailout will kick the Irish can three years down the road. But in implementing the plan, Ireland’s banks will effectively be nationalized and any future mortgage losses will have to come straight out of these bailout funds. Which aren’t remotely sufficient for such a task. If the spike on mortgage defaults comes sooner rather than later, this particular bailout package could prove to be very short-lived indeed.
But They're Our Greatest National Treasures
Banksters have some problems.
The top 35 US banks will be short of between $100 billion and $150 billion in equity capital after the new Basel III global bank regulations are imposed, with 90 percent of the shortfall concentrated in the biggest six banks, according to Barclays Capital.
Morning and Stuff
It's really quite remarkable that all the mortgage scamming was going on and no one complained. With all the lawyers around, you would think that someone, somewhere would have said something.
Sunday, November 21, 2010
YouTube Holiday Solutions Center to the rescue
With Thanksgiving around the corner, another holiday season moves into full swing. Every year at this time, we see searches for cooking videos and turkey recipes surge on the site, and it’s one reason we’ve aggregated many great culinary videos on a single channel, the YouTube Holiday Solutions Center, which is back for its third year.
For 2010, we’ve spiced up this holiday destination with even more recipes and how-to tips, including:
This tasty and easy-to-follow stuffing recipe from Howcast...
Ideas to decorate your home for the holidays from Real Simple Network...
A guide to building a gingerbread house with the family from Epicurious.com...
We’ll be updating the channel daily, so make sure to check back regularly. We might just have that solution you’re looking for.
The YouTube Holiday Solutions program is brought to you by Target.
Lee Hadlow, Marketing Programs Manager, recently watched “How to Carve a Turkey.”
For 2010, we’ve spiced up this holiday destination with even more recipes and how-to tips, including:
This tasty and easy-to-follow stuffing recipe from Howcast...
Ideas to decorate your home for the holidays from Real Simple Network...
A guide to building a gingerbread house with the family from Epicurious.com...
We’ll be updating the channel daily, so make sure to check back regularly. We might just have that solution you’re looking for.
The YouTube Holiday Solutions program is brought to you by Target.
Lee Hadlow, Marketing Programs Manager, recently watched “How to Carve a Turkey.”
More For More
Given the realities we've created, I don't think cheap on street neighborhood parking permits are wrong. Even in the urban hellhole cars are somewhere between very useful and necessary for a lot of people. But, yes, the first permit per household should be cheap and the rest should be expensive. I'd argue that they should a lot more expensive.
Sunday Bobbleheads
Face the Nation has Secretary Clinton and Admiral Mullen
This Week has Mullen
Meet the Press has Clinton and Jindal
Document the atrocities!
This Week has Mullen
Meet the Press has Clinton and Jindal
Document the atrocities!
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Substituting an Umbrella for a Ring Light
Just a quick-hit post today on when and how to use your umbrella as a faux ring light -- and when it may be even better than the real thing.Save some bucks, and/or get a completely different look, inside. Read more »
Shoes
Steve Benen wants to know why folks trying to actively make America weaker are not being called out.
Seems newsworthy to me.
If a major, powerful political party is making a conscious decision about sabotage, the political world should probably take the time to consider whether this is acceptable, whether it meets the bare minimum standards for patriotism, and whether it's a healthy development in our system of government.
Seems newsworthy to me.
What About Lieberman
I gather most sensible people think that John McCain made a wee error in selecting Palin to be his Veep candidate, but I've never really read anyone seriously try to explore what would have happened if his personal first choice, Lieberman, had been chosen. I know Kristol and the gang told him that the lunatic right wouldn't accept him, but I'm just not sure that was true. At that point in time Lieberman was still pretty good at pissing off liberals, and that's mostly what they want...
Con
That rhetoric is just what they regularly acknowledge, that the Greenspan commission was a con, and that the buildup of the Social Security Trust Fund was just a way to raise taxes on poor people in order to cut taxes on rich people who have no intention of having their taxes increased in order to pay it back.
"Security"
Teh Crazee response to any failed attempt to blow up an airplane is to assume that everybody in the future who gets on an airplane may attempt to blow it up in the same way that failed. It's been unfortunate that The Crazee happen to be in charge of the TSA, but there it is.
One wondered what they were gonna do in response to the failed undie bomber attempt.
Turns out, they wanna look underneath, or, failing that, feel up your undies.
This seems to have hit some kind of tipping point. Taking off the three year old's shoes makes people safer apparently, but having some bureaucrat completely mess with the "don't let any stranger touch you there" lesson crosses the WTF? line.
Fallows has been writing about the idiocy of security theater in commercial aviation for some time.
One wondered what they were gonna do in response to the failed undie bomber attempt.
Turns out, they wanna look underneath, or, failing that, feel up your undies.
This seems to have hit some kind of tipping point. Taking off the three year old's shoes makes people safer apparently, but having some bureaucrat completely mess with the "don't let any stranger touch you there" lesson crosses the WTF? line.
Fallows has been writing about the idiocy of security theater in commercial aviation for some time.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Subject For a Day
Photo ©Mark HeaynI had the tables turned on me a few weeks ago when Baltimore photographer Mark Heayn shot my family. It was for a marketing campaign for the company that converted our house to solar energy.
As much as we tend to dislike it, staring down the barrel of a camera occasionally is a very good perspective swap for a photographer. I learned some stuff watching Mark shoot -- and even discovered a cool new (old) piece of gear. Read more »
Getting In My Way
Normally I appreciate on location film shooting as I think it can provide a great deal of genuine atmosphere to a film, but judging by all of the NYPD cars around I gather that my urban hellhole is just a fake NYC.
Happy Birthday Automatic Captions! Celebrate with more videos and higher quality
Today marks exactly one year since we launched automatic captions. We started with just a few partner channels in November 2009, and soon after turned on auto-captions for everyone. As we explained back then, we like to launch early and iterate, and this year we’ve been making steady progress to expand the quantity and quality of captioned video online. It’s been truly gratifying to see how far we’ve come.
Here’s the quick summary:
Back in November we talked about how online video presents a tremendous challenge of scale. Before automatic captions, there were around 200,000 videos on YouTube with captions. It sounds like a lot, but at YouTube more than 35 hours of video is uploaded every minute. We want all videos to be accessible to everyone -- whether or not they can hear or understand the language.
Since March, people have been able to get captions for almost any video that has clearly spoken English. Less than a year later people have watched video with automatic captions more than 23 million times. Clearly, there’s a lot of demand for captioned content, and people have been really making use of our technology. They’re also using the technology to access content in their own languages, since captions can be automatically translated to more than fifty languages; we’ve seen more than 7.6 million caption translations.
Auto-captions aren’t perfect, so we’ve also been pursuing a number of initiatives to help people manually create captions. At our event a year ago, we introduced automatic caption timing, a feature that will take an ordinary text file and turn it into captions with time-codes. Since then we’ve added these features to the YouTube Data API to make it easier for people to write scripts and apps that can upload large numbers of captions at once. More recently, we started the YouTube Ready qualification program to help video owners find professional caption vendors familiar with YouTube. Thanks to these efforts, we’ve seen the number of manually-created caption tracks available on YouTube more than triple (with more than 500,000 available today).
When it comes to captions, we care not just about quantity, but also quality. Here again we have good news: just like a real one-year old, YouTube has been learning many new words! For example, we now recognize the word "smartphone" (turn on speech recognition to see). =)
In the past few weeks, we’ve rolled out a significant improvements to our speech recognition technology to improve the accuracy of automatic captions. YouTube's new speech recognition model reduces the overall word error rate by about 20%. Although the improvements vary from video to video, a video that had identified 50% of the words correctly before will now recognize about 60% of the words, and a video that was at 75% before will now correctly identify about 80% of the words. We continue to make improvements and there is much more on the way.
On a personal note, it's been amazing to see the feedback, videos, blog posts, thanks, (and bug reports!) sent in over the past year. Even though we can't possibly respond to them all, we love to see them, and they shape our efforts on this project. We’ve taken this feedback to make a number of subtle improvements to the service, such as adding an “Always show automatic captions” setting, adding an interactive transcript button so you can see all the captions and skip through the video, and making the red
button easier to find.
What's next? We’ll continue to work on accuracy, and we also want to make sure captions are available on YouTube everywhere, on your Internet TV, your computer and your mobile phone. We have a few other things coming... but I don't want to spoil the surprise. You'll have to stay tuned, and I hope you'll turn the captions on when you do!
Ken Harrenstien, Caption Jedi, recently watched "Sign Language from the Space Station"
Here’s the quick summary:
- People have watched video with automatic captions more than 23 million times, and have automatically translated captions more than 7.6 million times.
- The number of manually-created caption tracks has more than tripled thanks largely to automatic caption timing technology.
- Just recently, we’ve reduced the error rate in our speech recognition algorithms by 20%
Back in November we talked about how online video presents a tremendous challenge of scale. Before automatic captions, there were around 200,000 videos on YouTube with captions. It sounds like a lot, but at YouTube more than 35 hours of video is uploaded every minute. We want all videos to be accessible to everyone -- whether or not they can hear or understand the language.
Since March, people have been able to get captions for almost any video that has clearly spoken English. Less than a year later people have watched video with automatic captions more than 23 million times. Clearly, there’s a lot of demand for captioned content, and people have been really making use of our technology. They’re also using the technology to access content in their own languages, since captions can be automatically translated to more than fifty languages; we’ve seen more than 7.6 million caption translations.
Auto-captions aren’t perfect, so we’ve also been pursuing a number of initiatives to help people manually create captions. At our event a year ago, we introduced automatic caption timing, a feature that will take an ordinary text file and turn it into captions with time-codes. Since then we’ve added these features to the YouTube Data API to make it easier for people to write scripts and apps that can upload large numbers of captions at once. More recently, we started the YouTube Ready qualification program to help video owners find professional caption vendors familiar with YouTube. Thanks to these efforts, we’ve seen the number of manually-created caption tracks available on YouTube more than triple (with more than 500,000 available today).
In the past few weeks, we’ve rolled out a significant improvements to our speech recognition technology to improve the accuracy of automatic captions. YouTube's new speech recognition model reduces the overall word error rate by about 20%. Although the improvements vary from video to video, a video that had identified 50% of the words correctly before will now recognize about 60% of the words, and a video that was at 75% before will now correctly identify about 80% of the words. We continue to make improvements and there is much more on the way.
On a personal note, it's been amazing to see the feedback, videos, blog posts, thanks, (and bug reports!) sent in over the past year. Even though we can't possibly respond to them all, we love to see them, and they shape our efforts on this project. We’ve taken this feedback to make a number of subtle improvements to the service, such as adding an “Always show automatic captions” setting, adding an interactive transcript button so you can see all the captions and skip through the video, and making the red
button easier to find.What's next? We’ll continue to work on accuracy, and we also want to make sure captions are available on YouTube everywhere, on your Internet TV, your computer and your mobile phone. We have a few other things coming... but I don't want to spoil the surprise. You'll have to stay tuned, and I hope you'll turn the captions on when you do!
Ken Harrenstien, Caption Jedi, recently watched "Sign Language from the Space Station"
License To Steal
Really nobody should consider buying a house now. The whole system is fucked.
The companies have opened wide their wallets for lobbying and are flying top executives to Washington for one-on-one meetings with lawmakers. They are holding briefings for key staffers, including an event last week that drew more than 60 aides. And they are blanketing Congress with white papers, memos and other documents that lay out their arguments.
The focal point of their efforts is Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, or MERS, the controversial, privately run electronic database that is used by practically every lending institution and investment company to track the transfer of the ownership of mortgages as they are packaged into securities and traded at lightning speed around the globe.
Surge
Just after the '06 election, a very chastened George Bush responded to the election losses of his party and the tremendous unpopularity of the war in Iraq by... increasing troop levels.
Nothing To See Here
I'm reasonably sure that if I showed up in a court with forged documents claiming ownership of Wells Fargo I'd be heading off to jail fairly quickly.
Going Forward
We still might get one more unemployment benefits extension, but then I imagine that's it.
Unless the banksters finally get around to lending money to John Galt so he can fund his perpetual motion machine I'm really not sure what's going to save things.
Unless the banksters finally get around to lending money to John Galt so he can fund his perpetual motion machine I'm really not sure what's going to save things.
How producing for the web can fit into a filmmaking career
Heather Menicucci, Director, Howcast Filmmakers Program, is writing weekly guest posts for the YouTube blog on filmmaking in the digital age. You can catch up on previous posts here.
After a little break last week, we’re back today to share a post I’ve been really excited about. When we first began planning this blog series I knew I wanted to interview an established filmmaker who could share their experience producing videos for the web versus other more traditional venues like television. Someone who has worked professionally across platforms definitely has some insight into what makes producing for the web unique and how it fits into a filmmaking career. This week, I’m happy to introduce Clayton Long, producer for the Bajillionaires Club, which has worked on television and web projects for companies like Cisco, Kodak, Travel Channel and made over 30 shorts for Howcast. Clayton grew up in Dallas and currently lives in Los Angeles.
1) Tell us what you do and you how you got started.
The Bajillionaires Club approaches each project differently. Some days I'm wearing the development hat; other days it's post-production, and others it's coordinating resources and communicating with clients. The guys I work with (Tom Campbell, John Erdman and Bryan Madole) are all brilliant creatives, so that makes my job easy. I surround myself with brilliant people and hope some of it rubs off.
We've been collaborating since grade school, making short videos for fun. In high school, we started making videos for our English classes. We modernized Hamlet and set it in a bowling alley. We made a redneck version of The Canterbury Tales. They were big hits and gave us the confidence to keep going. Everyone scattered for college -- I attended UCLA's Film, TV, and Digital Media Program -- then came back together.
2) When did you start making videos for the web and why?
Our first video was made when we were all living in an apartment together in Hollywood. One weekend we had a 35 MM camera package sitting around our apartment (which is, by the way, not a prerequisite for making a successful web video), so we decided to make a few commercials for Folgers coffee in the style of those old ads from the ’70s. They were very unique, and when we uploaded them on websites like YouTube, they attracted some attention. We built relationships with companies like Howcast, which led to other web-content related jobs. The rest is history. So yeah. Just for fun. But we definitely had an angle we were going for.
3) Are there things that work on the web that simply do not work in other venues?
Randomness works incredibly well on the web. Audiences are young, and they're interested in something new, different and weird. Spoof works really well on the web, though it can survive elsewhere. But why shell out the money to see Vampires Suck when you can laugh at that same one-note joke on the web done in two minutes?
4) Are there things that work for TV or film that don’t work for the web?
Sure. TV and film projects take more time to develop. They're much more polished, and a lot fewer of them get made. In short, there are a lot more rules. You must develop your characters with a certain timing, revealing bits and pieces as you go.
5) Describe your crew and equipment list for web video. How is it different from your crew and equipment selection for other projects?
Depending on the budget, we might use a 5D, 7D, T2i, or an HVX. Sometimes we just use a Flip or another low-cost HD consumer camera.
The budgets for web projects are smaller, so the equipment list is smaller and the crew is leaner. Crews can be anywhere from three people to 10, depending on the project. But we always light, and we often use dollies, cranes and other traditional means of making shots stand out, even if the camera we're using is the size of a cell phone.
6) What's your favorite web video?
Too hard to pick a favorite. “Muto,” “Cows & Cows & Cows” and “Independence Day” are great animated pieces. “Who Needs a Movie?” is still one of the best. I also recently saw a really weird video about horses by this band called L.A.Zerz. Can't find anything about these guys, but I dig their style.
Heather Menicucci, Director, Howcast Filmmakers Program, recently watched “Abandoned Six Flags New Orleans Tour.”
After a little break last week, we’re back today to share a post I’ve been really excited about. When we first began planning this blog series I knew I wanted to interview an established filmmaker who could share their experience producing videos for the web versus other more traditional venues like television. Someone who has worked professionally across platforms definitely has some insight into what makes producing for the web unique and how it fits into a filmmaking career. This week, I’m happy to introduce Clayton Long, producer for the Bajillionaires Club, which has worked on television and web projects for companies like Cisco, Kodak, Travel Channel and made over 30 shorts for Howcast. Clayton grew up in Dallas and currently lives in Los Angeles.
1) Tell us what you do and you how you got started.
The Bajillionaires Club approaches each project differently. Some days I'm wearing the development hat; other days it's post-production, and others it's coordinating resources and communicating with clients. The guys I work with (Tom Campbell, John Erdman and Bryan Madole) are all brilliant creatives, so that makes my job easy. I surround myself with brilliant people and hope some of it rubs off.
We've been collaborating since grade school, making short videos for fun. In high school, we started making videos for our English classes. We modernized Hamlet and set it in a bowling alley. We made a redneck version of The Canterbury Tales. They were big hits and gave us the confidence to keep going. Everyone scattered for college -- I attended UCLA's Film, TV, and Digital Media Program -- then came back together.
A trailer for a film the Bajillionaires Club will be shooting in 2011.
2) When did you start making videos for the web and why?
Our first video was made when we were all living in an apartment together in Hollywood. One weekend we had a 35 MM camera package sitting around our apartment (which is, by the way, not a prerequisite for making a successful web video), so we decided to make a few commercials for Folgers coffee in the style of those old ads from the ’70s. They were very unique, and when we uploaded them on websites like YouTube, they attracted some attention. We built relationships with companies like Howcast, which led to other web-content related jobs. The rest is history. So yeah. Just for fun. But we definitely had an angle we were going for.
3) Are there things that work on the web that simply do not work in other venues?
Randomness works incredibly well on the web. Audiences are young, and they're interested in something new, different and weird. Spoof works really well on the web, though it can survive elsewhere. But why shell out the money to see Vampires Suck when you can laugh at that same one-note joke on the web done in two minutes?
4) Are there things that work for TV or film that don’t work for the web?
Sure. TV and film projects take more time to develop. They're much more polished, and a lot fewer of them get made. In short, there are a lot more rules. You must develop your characters with a certain timing, revealing bits and pieces as you go.
5) Describe your crew and equipment list for web video. How is it different from your crew and equipment selection for other projects?
Depending on the budget, we might use a 5D, 7D, T2i, or an HVX. Sometimes we just use a Flip or another low-cost HD consumer camera.
The budgets for web projects are smaller, so the equipment list is smaller and the crew is leaner. Crews can be anywhere from three people to 10, depending on the project. But we always light, and we often use dollies, cranes and other traditional means of making shots stand out, even if the camera we're using is the size of a cell phone.
6) What's your favorite web video?
Too hard to pick a favorite. “Muto,” “Cows & Cows & Cows” and “Independence Day” are great animated pieces. “Who Needs a Movie?” is still one of the best. I also recently saw a really weird video about horses by this band called L.A.Zerz. Can't find anything about these guys, but I dig their style.
Heather Menicucci, Director, Howcast Filmmakers Program, recently watched “Abandoned Six Flags New Orleans Tour.”
Nice Country You've Got There
And pass my plan or I'll blow it up and take most of the world with it.
Can the person who thought appointing Simpson was a good idea please quit?
Can the person who thought appointing Simpson was a good idea please quit?
Changing The Subject
I don't know how to convince Villagers that nobody gives a shit about the deficit, but they do care about having jobs and not getting thrown out of their homes.
Probably someone will announce a new Gingrich-Kerrey deficit commission tomorrow.
Probably someone will announce a new Gingrich-Kerrey deficit commission tomorrow.
Messaging Matters When All You Have Is Messaging
I'm certainly in the "actions speak louder than words" category, or more specifically the "results speak louder than actions and words" category, but the fact is that before the election the Democrats failed to present a coherent agenda and thus far after the election they've failed to do that as well. We can quibble about how many seats an awesome post-Labor Day messaging and agenda strategy would have saved, but it's certainly incorrect messaging doesn't matter at all, especially when it's all you've got.
They Didn't Consider That?
Of course increasing the retirement age would spike disability claims, and not just semi-fraudulent ones. There are plenty of people at that age who can work if they find a precise job match to their skills/needs and employers willing to accommodate them, but who are genuinely disabled.
Instead We Will Ask Each Citizen To Sell A Kidney
Because it's only right.
More seriously, they should just default. Tell the continent to bail out its banks directly if they want.
The Irish government has insisted it will not raise the country's low corporation tax rate in return for a European Union-led bail-out.
Deputy Prime Minister Mary Coughlan said the 12.5% rate - much lower than the EU average - was "non-negotiable".
More seriously, they should just default. Tell the continent to bail out its banks directly if they want.
Putbacks
I'm surprised it took this long, but now one of the mortgage insurers has decided it shouldn't be on the hook for fraudulent loan originations.
Default
It cannot be said enough that bailing out "Ireland" is really about bailing out its creditors. It's dumb.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
After All We've Done For Them
The amazing thing about the banksters is that despite all we've done for them, and continue to do, many of them are still probably basically insolvent.
Time to ponder a little trickle up, idiots.
Time to ponder a little trickle up, idiots.
Burning The Whole Place Down
3 month unemployment benefits extension failed to pass House (needed 2/3 to get through given how it was done).
Anyway, I wouldn't be repeating myself so much on what the administration has done wrong if they'd signal some way forward. They haven't.
Anyway, I wouldn't be repeating myself so much on what the administration has done wrong if they'd signal some way forward. They haven't.
At Least Maxine Waters Knows What's Going On
I get the sense that our political culture tends to treat her like the crazy aunt, but she knows the deal with the banksters and the useless regulators.
Treasury has done nothing, the OCC has done nothing. There is no accountability for the rich and powerful whatsoever.
The regulators kept saying they understood the issues, but Waters asked the fundamental question, “If you can understand it, why can’t you do anything about it?”
Treasury has done nothing, the OCC has done nothing. There is no accountability for the rich and powerful whatsoever.
Things I've Learned
All the banksters are utterly corrupt, including the ones we partially own, the regulators don't know anything and don't care, and this is the system Treasury has put its faith in.
huzzah. time for lunch.
huzzah. time for lunch.
Not Such A Great Idea
I'm reasonably sure that a big reason car free people like me use car sharing is because of the occasional need to carry some things. That doesn't mean car share cars need to be giant - I usually get a Prius though occasionally get a pickup if I really need to carry a lot - but not sure what the advantage of bicycle replacement vehicles is.
Unless You Fix This
Zach Carter is twittering a House hearing on the mortgage mess. As one Rep. said, 4 million more foreclosures are projected over the next couple of years. I don't know how the administration, and especially the assholes at Treasury, expect the economy to rebound when that is happening.
In our meeting, Obama said the best way to fix the housing market was to fix the economy. Fair enough, except you can't fix the goddamn economy without doing more and the executive has tools available to improve the housing situation that don't need President Snowe's approval.
In our meeting, Obama said the best way to fix the housing market was to fix the economy. Fair enough, except you can't fix the goddamn economy without doing more and the executive has tools available to improve the housing situation that don't need President Snowe's approval.
Because It Pisses Off Liberals
Basically any issue liberals rally around will garner denial and opposition from conservatives. That's really what animates them.
They're On To Me
The teabaggers have figured out my plans.
First, they took on the political establishment in Congress. Now, tea partiers have trained their sights on a new and insidious target: local planning and zoning commissions, which activists believe are carrying out a global conspiracy to trample American liberties and force citizens into Orwellian "human habitation zones."
At the root of this plot is the admittedly sinister-sounding Agenda 21, an 18-year-old UN plan to encourage countries to consider the environmental impacts of human development. Tea partiers see Agenda 21 behind everything from a septic tank inspection law in Florida to a plan in Maine to reduce traffic on Route 1. The issue even flared up briefly during the midterms, when Colorado Republican gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes accused his Democratic opponent of using a bike-sharing program to convert Denver into a "United Nations Community."
Morning
I guess it's no surprise that the health insurance industry funneled $86 million to various groups in an attempt to derail health care reform, even though they promised Obama they would wouldn't work against reform. Actually, is anyone surprised by this?
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Green Jobs
This piece by Mark Mills in Forbes is at least interesting, but his analysis carelessly confuses various systems and so his conclusion don't follow logically. I was going to write a longish(er) post about his errors, but suffice it to say that (putting aside some nitpicking about labor productivity) he fails to draw distinction between the US economy and the global economy.
The obvious flaw in Mills analysis is that nations trade surplus goods, and a cleantech manufacturing boom in the US can employ a large number of Americans without necessarily requiring that they are all working to generate domestic energy. In fact, when you go one step further and acknowledge that over the next century the global economy will transition from fossil fuels you recognize that the nations that invest in their domestic industries will benefit by exporting technology and goods.
If Mills wanted to make a simple case from first principles against the economic benefits of various cleantech technologies, he'd probably be better off focusing on energy return on energy invested (EROEI). Of course, given that increasing global demand, falling reserves, and declining EROEI of novel fossil fuel sources, cleantech still doesn't come out looking so bad.
Of course, one doesn't get to write columns for Forbes without be a wrongheaded contrarian. Full disclosure: I work in solar R&D and am not an economist.
The obvious flaw in Mills analysis is that nations trade surplus goods, and a cleantech manufacturing boom in the US can employ a large number of Americans without necessarily requiring that they are all working to generate domestic energy. In fact, when you go one step further and acknowledge that over the next century the global economy will transition from fossil fuels you recognize that the nations that invest in their domestic industries will benefit by exporting technology and goods.
If Mills wanted to make a simple case from first principles against the economic benefits of various cleantech technologies, he'd probably be better off focusing on energy return on energy invested (EROEI). Of course, given that increasing global demand, falling reserves, and declining EROEI of novel fossil fuel sources, cleantech still doesn't come out looking so bad.
Of course, one doesn't get to write columns for Forbes without be a wrongheaded contrarian. Full disclosure: I work in solar R&D and am not an economist.
Your Gratuitous Pool Boy Awaits
Yes, I know that 94% of the people who read this site are male. But that does not mean I am not looking out for the other six percent. Or, [6%+(94%/10)-(6%/10)] if you want to get really mathematical about it.
To that end I offer this BTS video of a Harper's Bazaar shoot by Melissa Rodwell, whom I met last March in Dubai. There's actually some lighting stuff wedged in, so you can call it educational.
Melissa gets a little more into the overpowering-the-sun stuff and shows all of the final images in her blog post. But the blog itself is mostly about the vagaries of fashion photography, a world that is obviously completely foreign to me.
At least until my 17 pairs of cargo shorts come into style.
-30-
Trade Not Being Offered
Instead what's being offered are Social Security and Medicare cuts and higher regressive taxes in exchange for tax cuts for rich people.
What a deal!
What a deal!
Teabagging Republicans
One point I haven't seen made anywhere is that the teabaggers have made any Republican cooperation with Democrats impossible. The teabagger policy agenda is mostly incoherent, but what really pisses them off is any perception of cooperation with that man in the White House or his allies. It's why Orrin Hatch is probably going to get teabagged in 2012. It isn't because he isn't conservative enough, it's because he occasionally does (or at least did) work with Dems on things and he was Ted Kennedy's buddy.
That's Where The Money Is
The other fantasy is that if you pass some sort of plan which gets Social Security in surplus for the next 75 years according to the SSA then you get credit for "saving" Social Security and that the issue will be then off the table until the end of time. What will happen in practice is that the trustees will inevitably make minor and completely reasonable tweaks to the assumptions underlying their projections so they can once again have the trio of "nightmare," "middle ground," and "everything's awesome" scenarios, with the middle ground scenario showing problems at some point in the future. Then the pain caucus will be back to tell us just how much granny needs to starve and Wall Street will return to siphon up all the money into their gaping maws.
It will never end.
It will never end.
Can't Tie The Hands Of Future Congresses
Yes it's possible to implement things which are hard to get rid of, but one reason these commission are so idiotic is that you can't force future members of Congress to do what you want. The idea that members in 2025 are going to remember what Alice Rivlin said in 2011 let alone stick to any kind of blueprint is absurd. Instead of worrying about a hypothetical future we should be worried about the present, a present with some very pressing problems that maybe somebody should do something about.
Our Great Commissions
Apparently 'deficit reduction' is just Washington code for increasing taxes on poor and middle class people and cutting taxes for rich people.
Resentment
It might not get her to the White House, but perfectly channeling conservative identity politics victimhood is a large part of Palin's schtick. It works quite well for her.
Do Something
California's next budget catastrophe is just another reminder that this economic crisis is not over. It was never over. It's distressing watching our political system being absolutely unable to even come close to dealing with the problems we face.
Austerity
I really don't think you can overestimate the impact of failing to extend unemployment benefits. We're watching the system fall apart.
Broke The Contract
As for the bailout, HAMP was what the administration offered to get people on board with authorizing the second half of the TARP funds.
HAMP was supposed to help the little guy, not rich people.
HAMP became a government blessed predatory lending system.
HAMP was supposed to help the little guy, not rich people.
HAMP became a government blessed predatory lending system.
How Many Thieves
While I'm guessing banks mostly failed for the obvious reasons, I also bet some people downloaded some cash once the end was near.
(Reuters) - The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (FDIC) is conducting about 50 criminal investigations at U.S. banks that have failed since the start of the financial crisis, the Wall Street Journal said.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Snap Judgment
This sounds like a pretty good idea, though I don't know enough to judge it relative to the alternative.
Some Days I Get Angry
The appropriate fix for the foreclosure crisis - principal reductions through various possible means - was always obvious. And they didn't do it. And now everyone is paying the goddamn price.
#fail
#fail
Bankster Madnes
Dday and emptywheel cover today's hearing.
The administration failed to back cramdown and turned HAMP into a government blessed predatory lending problem. So, yes, policy failure also too and such.
The administration failed to back cramdown and turned HAMP into a government blessed predatory lending problem. So, yes, policy failure also too and such.
Stealing All Their Money
I don't know enough about the Tax Foundation's methodology to have any opinion, but while they're officially "non-partisan" they're also not exactly left-leaning. And, yes, California is a "donor state" as higher income states tend to be.
Grill The Bird
My Thanksgiving the past few years has involved 2-3 scrawny heritage turkeys, but one of them always goes on the grill. Add some smoking chips.
Greg and Marty
From my long years of watching them, their loyalties are to team R more than they are to sensible (even by their standards) policy.
A Glorious Paradise
With the underwhelming but over reported news that iTunes now will sell you Beatles albums, I was reminded of that brief shiny moment when Napster ruled the world. It's true that with a bit of work you can still find just about anything on the internets for free if you want to, but Napster was something else entirely. For a brief moment in time, the entire world, or at least college kids with broadband, shared the entire music catalog.
Not justifying the 'not paying for stuff' aspect, but there was also glory in the 'able to find rare stuff that you couldn't find otherwise' part of that. It was a moment.
Not justifying the 'not paying for stuff' aspect, but there was also glory in the 'able to find rare stuff that you couldn't find otherwise' part of that. It was a moment.
Print A Bunch Of Money And Stop
I didn't make it all the way through my graduate monetary economics course, but one thing I do remember from it is the policy prescription for a country dealing with hyperinflation caused by governments being a little bit too fond of running the printing presses in order to pay their bills. Basically the idea is have one last trip to the printing press and print a massive amount of money so you can, in fact, pay your bills, and then...stop.
We don't have hyperinflation, of course, and if anything deflation is the concern, but the point is that sustained inflation requires a sustained increase in the money supply. One giant helicopter drop wouldn't cause sustained inflation.
We don't have hyperinflation, of course, and if anything deflation is the concern, but the point is that sustained inflation requires a sustained increase in the money supply. One giant helicopter drop wouldn't cause sustained inflation.
Destroying The System Completely
Dday has a bit more on the fraudclosure report. One wonders how many times the banksters will nearly destroy the economy before anyone except desperate homeowners suffers any consequences.
We will continue to suffer for their sins until they are purified.
We will continue to suffer for their sins until they are purified.
The Only Measure That Matters
It's quite sad that if the stock market hadn't gone back up we'd be hearing a lot more about just how bad the economy is and elites might be prompted to do something about it, like light giant piles of money on fire or whatever they deemed appropriate. But 9.6% unemployment, no big whoop.
If Things Were Better They'd Be Better
There is a weird unwillingness to admit that maybe they got the policy wrong too. It's one thing to argue that they got the best they could get out of Congress, though I think that's a dubious claim too, but I think if I traveled back in time to January of 2009 and explained to them where the economy would be in November of 2010 and projected to be in December of 2011 they probably would have done some things differently.
Probably He Should Just Go Galt
The parasite bureaucrats have failed to appreciate and compensate him for the genius of his perpetual motion machine and have denied him the health insurance that he is obviously due.
You Think?
I suppose we could always just bail them out for the third time.*
*Everyone pretends not to remember, but the Fed did what TARP was originally supposed to do, eat big shitpile, then the Treasury lent them a bunch of money and also ate AIG.
Widespread problems in how U.S. lenders documented foreclosures could spark a wave of legal challenges resulting in massive losses to banks and serious new troubles for the housing market, a federal watchdog warned on Tuesday.
*Everyone pretends not to remember, but the Fed did what TARP was originally supposed to do, eat big shitpile, then the Treasury lent them a bunch of money and also ate AIG.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Don't Talk About Unemployment
During exchanges on the twitter, it occurred to me that even Republican challengers didn't for the most part run on the bad economy/unemployment. They ran on issues more separate from peoples' lives (stimulus spending, deficit) and on being the great defenders of Medicare. Our political press isn't putting jobs front and center, and neither are our politicians.
Well the unemployed are all losers anyway, so there's that.
Well the unemployed are all losers anyway, so there's that.
The Wage Is 2 Damn Low
I don't expect all politicians to be super smart, but I thought it was pretty much universal common sense that delivering on jobs if you're in power was basically the most important thing. If the projections below are anything close to correct, then it means that at the end of 2011 we'll have had 32 months of 9.0%+ unemployment.
Maybe somebody should do something.
Maybe somebody should do something.
Also, More Tax Cuts
As predicted, austerity is driving Ireland and Greece into hell. I don't know why they don't default..er... restructure.
Grim
Philly Fed Survey of Professional Forecasters:
Real GDP (%) | Unemployment Rate (%) | Payrolls (000s/month) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Previous | New | Previous | New | Previous | New | |
| Quarterly data: | ||||||
| 2010:Q4 | 2.8 | 2.2 | 9.6 | 9.6 | 114.1 | 86.6 |
| 2011:Q1 | 2.3 | 2.4 | 9.4 | 9.5 | 159.3 | 104.2 |
| Q2 | 3.1 | 2.7 | 9.3 | 9.4 | 190.7 | 144.3 |
| Q3 | 3.0 | 3.3 | 9.0 | 9.2 | 189.9 | 139.8 |
| Q4 | N.A. | 2.9 | N.A. | 9.0 | N.A. | 170.6 |
| Annual data (projections are based on annual average levels): | ||||||
| 2010 | 2.9 | 2.7 | 9.6 | 9.7 | -45.2 | -56.1 |
| 2011 | 2.7 | 2.5 | 9.2 | 9.3 | 143.8 | 105.5 |
| 2012 | 3.6 | 2.9 | 8.2 | 8.7 | N.A. | N.A. |
| 2013 | 2.6 | 3.0 | 7.3 | 7.9 | N.A. | N.A. |
On Repeat
Some days my pontificating even bores me, as I have nothing new to say but a need to repeat what I've said a million time in hopes that somebody hears me. What we need first and foremost is... jobs. Ideally we have people passing awesome legislation to help achieve that. Since that is apparently impossible, we should have politicians talking about the awesome legislation they would like to pass and pointing fingers at the people who are preventing it from happening.
On Assignment: Frickin' Lasers
Update: I answered several reader questions in the comments. Click the [more>>] link below (or here) for full post, comments and Q/A.
__________
Being both a photo geek and a garden-variety tech geek, I love it when my two worlds collide. Shooting people who roll with cutting-edge tech is one of my very favorite things to do.
I photographed Shirley Collier, CEO of Optemax, for the Maryland Entrepreneur Quarterly. Her company is beyond cool as far as the tech goes. They specialize in setting up laser-based data networks in just about any location. Local/terrestrial is no problem. But neither is air-to-ground -- as in using a laser to send data to and from a moving aircraft. And they can move that data at the rate of one terabit (about 9 DVDs worth) per second.
When emailing back and forth with Shirley for ideas, she suggested she could bring a laser pointer. Ten seconds of Googling told me that was a big no-no for the CMOS chip in my D3. But it did give me an idea… Read more »
__________
Being both a photo geek and a garden-variety tech geek, I love it when my two worlds collide. Shooting people who roll with cutting-edge tech is one of my very favorite things to do.
I photographed Shirley Collier, CEO of Optemax, for the Maryland Entrepreneur Quarterly. Her company is beyond cool as far as the tech goes. They specialize in setting up laser-based data networks in just about any location. Local/terrestrial is no problem. But neither is air-to-ground -- as in using a laser to send data to and from a moving aircraft. And they can move that data at the rate of one terabit (about 9 DVDs worth) per second.
When emailing back and forth with Shirley for ideas, she suggested she could bring a laser pointer. Ten seconds of Googling told me that was a big no-no for the CMOS chip in my D3. But it did give me an idea… Read more »
Change The World
Jobs
All the Very Serious People spent years laughing at silly Japan and their "lost decade" and how stupid they were and blah blah blah, when the truth was that the economy of Japan was never all that bad. The dirty little secret is Japanese unemployment peaked just above 5.5%. The horrors!
But Then You Don't Save Any Money
Saying that "the Affordable Care Act haven’t really sunk in yet" is another way of saying that the assumptions used to calculate cost savings to the government of increasing the Medicare eligibility age are quite wrong. Shifting old people out of an efficient insurance provider into an inefficient one that they pay for with government subsidies isn't sound policy.
Out Of Touch
Most of the country must think DC elites - journalists, politicians - are completely insane for talking about "the deficit" right now. Polls show that nobody gives a shit about the deficit, but I don't need polls to actually tell me that. Get a goddamn clue.
...as Rotwang says, the only appropriate response is "WHERE ARE THE JOBS?"
...as Rotwang says, the only appropriate response is "WHERE ARE THE JOBS?"
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Chrome Extensions for YouTube
I’m a movie buff, and love getting excited for upcoming releases by checking out trailers on YouTube. It’s easy and convenient to watch the trailers online, but I’ve often wished I could get closer to the theater experience in my browser. So I did some research, and found a few really handy Chrome extensions that can make your YouTube viewing experience bigger and better.
For example, Window Expander for YouTube maximizes YouTube videos to fill your entire browser. With Turn Off the Lights, you can make the entire page outside the video fade to dark like you’re in a movie theater. Not sure whether a video is worth viewing? The OpinionCloud extension summarizes comments on YouTube (and Flickr!), so you can quickly get the crowd’s overall opinion.
And just recently the Google team released YouTube Feed, which notifies you whenever new videos are available in your YouTube homepage feed. You can directly access videos that your friends upload, rate and like right in your browser.
There are many other useful extensions in the gallery to make your YouTube experience more customized. Find out more about Google Chrome extensions here, or by checking out the video below.
Koh Kim, Associate Product Marketing Manager, recently watched “Rymdreglage - 8-bit trip”.
For example, Window Expander for YouTube maximizes YouTube videos to fill your entire browser. With Turn Off the Lights, you can make the entire page outside the video fade to dark like you’re in a movie theater. Not sure whether a video is worth viewing? The OpinionCloud extension summarizes comments on YouTube (and Flickr!), so you can quickly get the crowd’s overall opinion.
And just recently the Google team released YouTube Feed, which notifies you whenever new videos are available in your YouTube homepage feed. You can directly access videos that your friends upload, rate and like right in your browser.
There are many other useful extensions in the gallery to make your YouTube experience more customized. Find out more about Google Chrome extensions here, or by checking out the video below.
Koh Kim, Associate Product Marketing Manager, recently watched “Rymdreglage - 8-bit trip”.
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