Thursday, December 29, 2011
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Monday, December 12, 2011
Powerpoint alternative (well done) delivers
Monday, December 5, 2011
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
A Collection of Starlings is called a "Murmuration"
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Dirty Night Clowns
The story behind the song is one of child abuse. Apparently, the pedofiles would dress up as clowns and lure victims. Yikes. Accepting that as the premise, the lyrics speak about the pain of the experience. "I will never be dirt free." Wow.
Also check out the behind the scenes - making video here below.
Quite an effort here. Fabulous work.
Chris Garneau - Dirty Night Clowns from ROCK*iT FiLMS on Vimeo.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Semi-organized, general complaint
Th
e "protests" on Wall Street in Boston and other cities seem to be a little peculiar. I mean it's almost as if people come together to complain about things in general - more or less to express the idea that something isn't right here. The repeat-after-me chants are awkward. People aren't sure what the leader of the chant, is going to say. They're hoping it will make sense but often it doesn't. It's really quite odd isn't it? It would seem that the wants are fragmented, loosely defined, numerous and having variety even in scale. Wouldn't it make more sense to decide what exactly we (the group) would like to have changed and be very specific? It is very difficult to get a large group to agree on what might be a good thing to change and how (be specific) to change it. What will the new rules (laws) be? To get that done (in a broad sense - not to mention the details and the language etc) is really something people will debate over. That's what government and democracy and an orderly society struggle to do all the time. That's why we have a political system in the first place. It's a way to shape the world we want. It isn't easy - it's practically impossible but we try anyway. Smart people, stupid people, the tall and the short - we try to work it out. It seems like the current protesting groups - having no way to be "specific" without grinding, debating and considering the downstream consequences of things we'd like to change, have decided to skip the process all together and go directly to protesting "things in general".In a way - I get it but have a tough time seeing how a non-specific argument can be won. Today I read Bob Lefsetz blog piece. Bob makes a lot of sense most of the time - and sometimes he makes none but after reading his thing today, I felt like it explains part of what I didn't really understand about the situation. There's a quote by Italian journalist Corrado Alvaro, quoted in the Sydney Australian:
"The blackest despair that can take hold of any society is the fear that living honestly is futile."
What the non-specific complaint is about is that people believe the game is rigged, that if they play by the rules they just can't win. And winning doesn't mean a private jet and an island vacation but the ability to put food on the table under your own roof after doing a hard day's work. It's not that rich people should cough up all their dough, but how is it that hedge fund management fees are taxed at capital gains rates when they're guaranteed?
What's up with that. Aren't we somehow getting hosed by this stuff - the people in the streets are saying.
I get that. I get it today better than I did yesterday. I still say that it would be better to be specific about what you want but I do get the general idea that if the game is rigged, we've got problems. The idea that a group gathers with the sole purpose of putting up a fuss - a general-fuss, just to bring attention... I think I get it.
Here's a link to Bob Lefsetz piece.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Layoffs Are Necessary If We Want To Keep The Lights On,' Says CEO Halfway Through Tasting Menu
Byatt explains the dire need to cut costs before enjoying his tuna tartare with a basil emulsion.PHILADELPHIA—As the fifth plate of his 10-course, $150 prix fixe tasting menu dinner was carefully placed on the manicured table in front of him, Kohl-Strauss Media Group CEO Tom Byatt reportedly told a colleague Tuesday that in order for the company to stay afloat in this adverse economic climate, staff layoffs would likely be necessary.
"The fact of the matter is, our financial outlook is just not what it used to be, and if we want to keep the lights on, we're going to have to start making some tough choices," said Byatt, cutting into a piece of seared foie gras subsumed in a rich pheasant consommé. "Personally, I wish we could keep everybody. But unfortunately, I'm in the position of having to decide what the best direction for our company is, and I don't see any other option than reducing our overall cost structure and finding some way to trim payroll."
"It's far from an ideal situation, but we have to cut corners somewhere," Byatt added as a second waiter arrived with a $110 bottle of Château Figeac from the wine cellar. "That's just a reality of our business model."
Following a 20-minute period in which the executive and his colleague sampled a lobster broth hors d'oeuvre arriving compliments of the chef and listened to the maître d' explain how the lobster had been flown in from Maine that morning, Byatt reasoned that, although it pained him to say so, his company could definitely stand to lose about a dozen people in sales, and roughly another 15 or 20 in the marketing and production divisions.
As the pair continued through lavishly designed plates of haute cuisine at a table situated near the window so that Byatt could keep an eye on his valet-parked 2011 Jaguar XJ, they discussed the unfortunate challenges of today's market and the tremendous stress placed on those at the management level to keep their businesses financially solvent.
"As you know, nothing about these layoffs is easy for me," said Byatt, lifting his arms so that a waiter could gently sweep tiny morsels of gourmet artisanal bread off the table with a stainless-steel crumb comb. "I'm going to have to go into the office Monday morning and tell Mark to tell these people that they're going to be let go, all while trying to maintain employee morale. You can imagine how heavily that weighs on me."
"But I think our remaining staff will certainly recognize everything I'm doing to keep us competitive," Byatt continued before deeply inhaling the aroma of a dry-aged bison filet mignon lightly coated in a truffle glaze and resting on a bed of imported fiddlehead ferns. "I just hope they appreciate the kind of pressure I'm under."
After consuming his dessert courses of lavender crème brûlée and a caramelized brioche with a strawberry foam, restating his belief that payroll cuts are simply part of what a modern company has to do, and offering to have further talks on the subject of reducing company expenditures this weekend at his country house, Byatt thanked his colleague for working with him to "do right by this company" and snapped his fingers for the bill.
"Oh, no, no, no, please," said Byatt, waving away his colleague's hand and putting down the company credit card. "I got this."
Monday, August 29, 2011
Phil Hartman - Sinatra - SNL
Take a few minutes - let the pre-clip ad get over with - and watch Phil Hartman do his 6-minute thing as Frank Sinatra. Some of these lines kill. How about Sinbad O'Conner? Watch it all - it's only 6-minutes. One of the great lines of all time comes at about the 5:40 mark.
Enjoy!
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Friday, July 22, 2011
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
More attacks on Final Cut X - Clever
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Friday, June 17, 2011
Friday, June 10, 2011
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Friday, April 29, 2011
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Remembering when "Dink" stole the limelight. We were not pleased.
Freestyle was fun to watch. Guts was a little crazy.
Ultimate was the real game.
If I remember correctly (it's fuzzy) Santa Barbara defeated Rutgers in the final. We (Boston) didn't cut the mustard that year. Boston (without me), then called the Boston Rude Boys, later went on to win several World Ultimate Championships.
We were disappointed that the network news coverage made it look like the most interesting thing was the dogs. For years, we struggled to win legitimacy for Ultimate and the network made "Dink" the winner.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
CSCO - Hmmm...
1st, there's no such thing as a sure thing. Okay, we know that.
Find a truck.
Load it with money (not the easiest part of this idea)
Back the truck up and buy CSCO.
Ya - it's a big big (cap) puppy and ya - it's scary but...
Forward PE under 10 times earnings (and at worst they will meet estimates - guidance is never optimistic - never).
They now toss off a dividend of 1.4% (based on today's price)
Anywhere under $18 = Get the truck.
My guess (of the wild-ass variety) is that we'll see an easy $22 by the end of Q2 (quicky) and $25 by year's end.
Or not.
Fine print: I have no real clue. Don't leave the house - you may turn an ankle. See your local PGA professional. Cape does not enable user to fly. Actual price may vary. See dealer for details. Forget this. Avoid eating too much swordfish. Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
Saturday, February 26, 2011
"Hosed" - Episode Four ~ Paul(a) Returns
Friday, February 18, 2011
Monday, February 14, 2011
"Hosed" - Episode Two
Juston McKinney - Writer, Marc Dole - Director, Jonathon Millman - Director of Photography. Gary Valentine, Danica Carlson and Jessica Webb in this episode.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
"Hosed" - Episode One
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Online Video - 60% of business people prefer Video to text
How Online Video Can Reach the Business Audience
JANUARY 4, 2011Even busy executives want to do more than just read on the web
Executives with no time for fun and games do have time for the sound and motion of video, according to findings from Forbes Insights. In some cases, they may actually prefer it to text for learning about products and services.
A majority of businesspeople surveyed by Forbes in October 2010 said they watched more online video than a year earlier. Nearly 60% of all respondents said they would watch video before reading text on the same webpage, and 22% said they generally liked watching video more than reading text for reviewing business information. Three-quarters of all executives said they watched work-related videos on business websites at least once a week, and more than half did the same on YouTube.
Video can be highly effective for merchants. The executives surveyed reported taking a wide variety of actions after watching online videos, with about two-thirds visiting vendor websites subsequent to viewing and more than half searching for more information. Especially among younger executives, likelihood of making a purchase was high.
Generational differences ran throughout the Forbes research, with a split in behavior at age 50. While the youngest executives were most interested in video across the board, baby boomers in their 40s had comparable participation levels. It was older executives who had not yet gotten on board with video, and business-to-business marketers must continue to reach them through other means.
But video has only become more important for the younger set, and marketers can depend on them to watch, pass along, recommend—and often, enter the purchase funnel.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Leonard Cohen - Everybody Knows
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Bob Lefsetz - Good read indeed
Eagles On The BBC
There’s no cheating in music!
I’ve been reading Matt Taibbi’s book, "Griftopia". Love the attitude, but most of what’s in there I already know, except for the explanation of the gas price increase back in 2008, remember that? I do. Suddenly I was debating driving an extra mile or two to save a dollar or so, just wasn’t worth it, gas cost too much. Some said it was overconsumption, too many greedy Americans driving SUVs, others decried regulation, the inability to drill for more oil, but the real story is it all had to do with bets on a new commodities index. How did this happen? Goldman Sachs asked for private rulings from the CFTC, then created a game predicated on commodity prices always going up, which they don’t, but for a time there, you could barely afford to go anywhere.
Don’t think that Wall Street is playing by the rules. To the degree there are any left, they lobby and cajole to eliminate them or create exceptions. But you can’t do this in music.
I’m not talking about the labels. As soon as a streaming service takes hold you can bet your bippy Lyor Cohen and Jimmy Iovine will pay people to scam the count, that’s the way this business works. But what they’re selling…that can’t be rigged, that can’t be faked.
Let’s be clear, you can imitate, you can rip off what’s been done before. You know that Kia that looks like a Benz? But it doesn’t drive like a Benz, and Kia certainly ain’t gonna create the next breakthrough, they’ve got no one on board to do that, no one investing in testing the limits, it costs too much for too few dividends.
Why did we want to play music?
The Beatles.
Sure, everybody in the U.K. picked up an axe to escape the factory, but in middle class America we bought Fenders because we wanted to be just like the Fab Four, we wanted the music to come out of us, we wanted the girls to fawn all over us.
And soon there was a schism. Started in 1967, although one can argue the Beatles began it even earlier, with "Rubber Soul" and "Revolver". Suddenly, it was no longer about the one hit wonder. It was about the statement. Created by people who’d paid their dues. The original British Invasion was over, replaced by a plethora of players who could truly do just that, expatriate Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, all the FM staples. They had one thing in common, they could play.
Their stories were all the same. They bought records and practiced in their basements and bedrooms until they were good enough to get a gig. And then they gigged long enough until someone noticed them. And then they got a chance. And some of them broke through.
That’s a long hard road. That’s not like Snooki getting on "The Jersey Shore", or Kim Kardashian getting enough plastic surgery to look like a Barbie Doll. There’s no short cut. And you’re starting from scratch. How many of those bankers would be rich if they couldn’t start out at the aforementioned Goldman Sachs or Morgan Stanley? Never forget, Steve Jobs started out in his basement. Without rich parents or a college degree. Just passion and hustle and…
Jobs was just like the musicians, only he was peddling tech, not tunes. Still, the sky was the limit.
A reader e-mailed me a video. Of the Eagles on the BBC. The concert I wrote about and downloaded over the weekend.
My jaw dropped.
It was like being transported back to ‘73 instantly. Better than "Almost Famous", better than reading about it in "Rolling Stone", this was exactly it.
The clip begins with "Train Leaves Here This Morning". But what’s stunning is the band is sitting on stools singing all the music. ALL the music. There’s no one in the background, nothing on tape. And the harmonies are ALMOST perfect. And when something is almost perfect it’s just like life itself. Perfection is not human.
And Bernie Leadon is wearing a UCLA t-shirt. I don’t think he thought much about it. It was probably at the top of his suitcase, or the only clean thing he had. You see it wasn’t about the look, but the music.
When Glenn Frey sings about sleeping in the desert tonight you know why all the girls ran to grab their sleeping bags. We’ve been hearing how Glenn was so cool for years, how he was a ladykiller. You get it here, it’s not the "Miami Vice" guy hyping gyms, it’s that guy on the couch who you can’t wait to zip apart, who you can’t wait to get inside of you.
This is a band. Remember bands? They rehearsed until they got it right. And when you get it right, you’re undeniable. People clamor to sign you. Not because you’re making the music on the radio, but because you’re making music so GOOD!
And there are some snide comments. How do bands stay together?
Actually, they don’t. Because one person can no longer take it. You might say to not quit, but musicians aren’t looking for security, they’re following their muse.
And when Randy Meisner sings "A Certain Kind Of Fool"!!!!
You see him smiling, and then what comes out of his mouth…WHERE DID HE GET THAT VOICE? How does it sound so right? He’s like a choirboy having sex for the very first time. You get why we needed to get close. You don’t want to have dinner with Lloyd Blankfein, but you can’t wait to just be in the VICINITY of your favorite musician.
And Bernie’s guitar has got that distortion that’s just a bit different from the studio, which is why you go to the show, because it’s just a little bit different, it’s a one time only performance.
And Glenn is playing lead. There’s no hired hand. And he can DO IT!
And when Bernie picks his banjo at the beginning of "Earlybird"… How’d he get that good? PRACTICE! You remember practice, don’t you? All the Olympic athletes do it. And standing in front of the mirror perfecting your ‘do is not practice!
And when you hear Henley sing "Witchy Woman"…it takes you right back to the first time you heard it, when you had no idea who this guy was, only that the sound reminded you of times when anything could happen, both good and bad.
Still, it’s got nothing to do with any specific notes, although it does have a lot to do with the songs. They wrote ‘em. And they weren’t their first.
But what is striking is the fact that you’re watching a band. A living, breathing thing. Something that developed. Something that exists in the minds of the players, not the label.
This is the way it used to be. Inspired journeymen woodshedded to the point where they established a vision. And then they rode that vision to unknown places. Watching this ‘73 show you can’t see "Hotel California" in the future, but it happened.
They’re impossibly skinny. They’re not dancing. A stylist would be yearning to clean them up. As would an engineer. But you can’t clean up live. It’s messy. But it’s so SATISFYING!
I don’t care if you hate the Eagles, you’ve got to watch this show. Because this is how it used to be. Create a 24 hour cable channel with all this heretofore unexposed greatness and watch catalog sales explode.
This is not "Glee", this is not covers. This is not a tribute. This is like stumbling upon the Dead Sea Scrolls. And you’re yearning to know the backstory. How did they come up with this shit? Did they practice the harmonies? Did they get along? How do you write a song?
They watched the Beatles and formed the Eagles.
We watched the Eagles and…
And when you’re that good, you write your own rule book. You become so successful that you tell the label the way it’s gonna be. The agents and promoters work for you. Money and sex and drugs rain down. Because you’re delivering life. People want to be closer to you, you just can’t get enough.
Goldman Sachs is not building America, one can argue strongly it’s destroying it. And at the center, all there is is money, nothing real. But you can be broke and still sing "Take It Easy". And when you lower the car window and put your elbow on the sill while the radio blasts your favorite song you feel more alive than when you’re at the bank, you’re right where you want to be.
I don’t know if these days will ever return. It was so hard to get noticed. But there were fewer people vying for attention. And radio was about music, not commercials. And it wasn’t bad if you looked good, but we hardly ever saw you. At best, from a distance, at the show.
But we went to the show. We had to. Just like we drank and ate. There was no choice. And although there were programs and t-shirts, they were only on sale because fans needed totems, tangible representations of the experience. Because the music was enough.
The Eagles video is HERE