Back in 2005 I wrote a post about the digital scanning of actors and its future value. Watching Ed Ulbrich at TED brings that post to mind. In honor of their awards at last night's Oscar festivities, and for all Benjamin Button fans, this is remarkable:
Here's my original post from Dec 2005.
And true to Moore's Law and other predictable changes in technology, I'm certain that the work Ed did with hundreds of people over two years will be somewhat commonplace during the next decade, and the use of that skill will be applied across multiple fields, and not just entertainment. Something to think about. Want to keep your young body in your files, just in case?
Monday, February 23, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
What Sundance Can Learn From TED
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ron-galloway/what-the-sundance-festiva_b_167908.html
Sundance and TED. It’s funny to see these two in the same sentence. Both are big interests of mine, having gone to Sundance since 1987 and TED more recently, since 2004. Getting to attend both is a sincere privilege, and makes for one fantastic Q1, which ripples throughout the rest of the year.
But Sundance has been getting more and more problematic for me over the years. Getting passes was done by a strange sort of lottery that meant that even after ten years, there might be the odd year where you simply couldn’t get a pass. This struck me as absurd. So the very people who helped spread the word and build the event into the popular festival it is could be randomly rejected to the point that no one could plan accordingly. In a town where you need to rent a room a year in advance for the festival, not knowing if you have tickets a few months prior is untenable. For Sundance, this would serve to keep the attendance varied, and make it possible for new folks to get in, which is good. But at the expense of the relative few who are the die-hard fans or professionals who want to make this part of their year. Are they (we) necessary? Maybe not. But Sundance grew and became fashion and a venue where the films were only the backbone, and where the side-events were as important as the movies. I would say Sundance was a victim of its success, growing to accommodate the interest and take advantage of the exposure. Like our economy, it’s all good when everything is growing, but the risk is perhaps when things turn around, and attendance drops, and the festival has alienated its core, and forced them to find other avenues to enjoy new films. Will they return should the festival contract? Maybe it doesn’t matter. Growth is natural, unfortunate for the early adopters but great for the latecomers and the organization itself.
TED too went through this radical growth. From its long decade as a tight, idiosyncratic forum for new ideas and passionate creators, even at its exclusive worst, it continued to grow. It added a “simulcast lounge” to give members a chance to drift, which then became a forum unto itself, not entirely unlike “Slamdance”, the ecosystem that grew in the Sundance shadow. With the creation of these second tier spaces there was a class system of sorts, and eventually – under new management – TED took its expansion seriously and moved to a larger hall, restoring the single (high) class. It was always impressive to me that they not only provided DVDs of all the talks which they made available to all attendees, but that they encouraged the sharing of these talks. The web presentation of videos made this an order of magnitude more viral.
So both events are reasonably exclusive and both have grown in popularity and influence since the ‘80s. Both are forums for insiders to discover new talent as well as get inspired in their own work. And as an early adopter of both, I have sometimes bristled with their increasing internal resistance and apparent bureaucracy.
But other than the random cautionary tale inherent in the risks of growth, tales common to hundreds of successful companies that expand their markets, I’m not sure there is much Sundance can truly learn from TED. The best I could come up with was this:
Perhaps if Sundance wanted to make its films available simultaneously (or nearly so) on the Sundance Channel (or Netflix!) for devoted fans to watch and enjoy (receiving the festival catalog in the process), they’d take an appropriate step to allow access to the exclusive content in an appropriate way. Sure, it’s not the same as overhearing Weinstein rant in the corner booth at Chimayo, but it remains true to the festival’s roots, to give independent filmmakers their first audiences and help them find larger ones. The web is good at exactly this kind of effort, and could be utilized better. If the festival films were all instantly available online, sharable (in the network), Digg-able and so on, in a limited time window, hits could be found and directors could still reap the rewards of getting into theaters. You’d go online to sign up just like you do today for Sundance Ticket Passes, pay your $50 or whatever, and get a software key that lets you watch all the film online for 2 weeks. Like TED simulcast, you’d be privy to the exclusive content, and have online forums to chat and share. The more concurrent it was with the real festival (and films could even have similar limited availability), the better. People might form salons to watch, having watching parties, or even do these in addition to being in Park City (it can be impossible to get tickets to everything you want to see).
Anyway, TED and Sundance are both great brands, very cool, and lots of fun. But I’m not convinced that Sundance can learn something important from TED anymore than it can learn anything from other organizations that have successfully navigated the tricky waters of success, grown and maintained their brand value in the process. Just my two cents.
Sundance and TED. It’s funny to see these two in the same sentence. Both are big interests of mine, having gone to Sundance since 1987 and TED more recently, since 2004. Getting to attend both is a sincere privilege, and makes for one fantastic Q1, which ripples throughout the rest of the year.
But Sundance has been getting more and more problematic for me over the years. Getting passes was done by a strange sort of lottery that meant that even after ten years, there might be the odd year where you simply couldn’t get a pass. This struck me as absurd. So the very people who helped spread the word and build the event into the popular festival it is could be randomly rejected to the point that no one could plan accordingly. In a town where you need to rent a room a year in advance for the festival, not knowing if you have tickets a few months prior is untenable. For Sundance, this would serve to keep the attendance varied, and make it possible for new folks to get in, which is good. But at the expense of the relative few who are the die-hard fans or professionals who want to make this part of their year. Are they (we) necessary? Maybe not. But Sundance grew and became fashion and a venue where the films were only the backbone, and where the side-events were as important as the movies. I would say Sundance was a victim of its success, growing to accommodate the interest and take advantage of the exposure. Like our economy, it’s all good when everything is growing, but the risk is perhaps when things turn around, and attendance drops, and the festival has alienated its core, and forced them to find other avenues to enjoy new films. Will they return should the festival contract? Maybe it doesn’t matter. Growth is natural, unfortunate for the early adopters but great for the latecomers and the organization itself.
TED too went through this radical growth. From its long decade as a tight, idiosyncratic forum for new ideas and passionate creators, even at its exclusive worst, it continued to grow. It added a “simulcast lounge” to give members a chance to drift, which then became a forum unto itself, not entirely unlike “Slamdance”, the ecosystem that grew in the Sundance shadow. With the creation of these second tier spaces there was a class system of sorts, and eventually – under new management – TED took its expansion seriously and moved to a larger hall, restoring the single (high) class. It was always impressive to me that they not only provided DVDs of all the talks which they made available to all attendees, but that they encouraged the sharing of these talks. The web presentation of videos made this an order of magnitude more viral.
So both events are reasonably exclusive and both have grown in popularity and influence since the ‘80s. Both are forums for insiders to discover new talent as well as get inspired in their own work. And as an early adopter of both, I have sometimes bristled with their increasing internal resistance and apparent bureaucracy.
But other than the random cautionary tale inherent in the risks of growth, tales common to hundreds of successful companies that expand their markets, I’m not sure there is much Sundance can truly learn from TED. The best I could come up with was this:
Perhaps if Sundance wanted to make its films available simultaneously (or nearly so) on the Sundance Channel (or Netflix!) for devoted fans to watch and enjoy (receiving the festival catalog in the process), they’d take an appropriate step to allow access to the exclusive content in an appropriate way. Sure, it’s not the same as overhearing Weinstein rant in the corner booth at Chimayo, but it remains true to the festival’s roots, to give independent filmmakers their first audiences and help them find larger ones. The web is good at exactly this kind of effort, and could be utilized better. If the festival films were all instantly available online, sharable (in the network), Digg-able and so on, in a limited time window, hits could be found and directors could still reap the rewards of getting into theaters. You’d go online to sign up just like you do today for Sundance Ticket Passes, pay your $50 or whatever, and get a software key that lets you watch all the film online for 2 weeks. Like TED simulcast, you’d be privy to the exclusive content, and have online forums to chat and share. The more concurrent it was with the real festival (and films could even have similar limited availability), the better. People might form salons to watch, having watching parties, or even do these in addition to being in Park City (it can be impossible to get tickets to everything you want to see).
Anyway, TED and Sundance are both great brands, very cool, and lots of fun. But I’m not convinced that Sundance can learn something important from TED anymore than it can learn anything from other organizations that have successfully navigated the tricky waters of success, grown and maintained their brand value in the process. Just my two cents.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
WISDOM
A fine, insightful and inspirational talk by Barry Schwartz (at this years TED). I have to say that much of his talk speaks to why Netflix is such a remarkable company - internally the business operates on many of these principles...
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Reuters, and Hollywood, Doesn't Get It.
I just read an article from Reuters called "Hollywood struggles to find wealth on the Web"* that begins:
Point one: There will be a role for expensive movies and television. Internet media will deeply change, but not erase, the existence of Hollywood. Hollywood will just scramble to higher ground as the flood waters rise, producing big budget content, using star power, and probably an assortment of new expensive presentation technologies (simulator rides? 3D? IMAX?)
Point two: What the Internet does best, and uniquely, is connect individuals, and democratize voices and information. You can use online tools to "broadcast" in the traditional sense, but you only have to understand that in doing so, you're turning a camera on a radio show. Similarly, for more than a decade webdesigners have argued that webpages are not newspapers, no matter how we are often forced into that visual presentation paradigm. News online is not consumed in that way, it is not necessarily best presented that way.**
If you're going to make a very expensive product--a movie for instance-- which needs to be distributed through an expensive process--theaters and broadcasting--there is a great deal of risk involved for the investors. You cover your risk by using "stars", people whose name or image will draw people out to pay for the product. If the product costs tens of millions, it's worth paying a star a few million to improve the odds of an audience. And if you're not a star, you're out of luck. It sucks trying to get discovered in Hollywood. Very few people will take a chance on new.
The Internet is just the opposite: it's very inexpensive to make product and even less expensive to distribute. Tons of content is created and distributed every second, and the Internet famously leverages the connections between people (plus zero costs) to sort through the enormous pile of crap to discover the hidden gems. Wikinomics, and all that. Most people--the vast majority in fact-- do not get discovered, however, but it is absolutely true that some people do. Once discovered, it's easier to utilize that notoriety as Hollywood starpower, and pass through the semi-permeable membrane that surrounds the "industry."***
But Hollywood is probably never going to get the system to work the other way: they'll be able to put stars onto the Internet, but the content will be vetted just like every other bit of content, without regard to cost. If it is good or funny it will spike, and if it isn't, it probably won't. Hit or miss, it still will never generate the kind of revenue stream (from pageviews and ads) that it would in another medium.
And in most cases, no pageview economic model will generate enough cash to make productions that are "star-based" viable. In some cases it will pay the production costs for typical quality content, but the very best actors and writers will simply make more going a different path. SAG has it backwards: forget trying to collect royalties for content online. Online it wants to be free, or mostly, and the labor and resistance associated with this will hardly be worthwhile. On the other hand, if you want a piece of new action, make every Tom, Dick and LonelyGirl online a SAG member just for being in online media, and demand your piece of the pie when the random individual really does join the ranks of the bankable. Now I don't think this will work, but the opposite seems pointless.
So when Reutuers reports that it was only hype that the Internet would be the next great stage for mass entertainment, they're missing that it already IS a great stage for mass entertainment: what else do you call the DAILY HOURS absorbed on Facebook and Myspace, genuine portals in their own right to an array of media -- news articles, videoclips, even product endorsements -- all by the people for the people. The Internet promised and delivered: it wasn't hype. The irony is that the industries that have the most to lose by the meteoric rise of Internet entertainment continue to fail to see what is going on.
* Posted on Wed Feb 18, 2009 11:32PM EST
** I tend to think of online news as ideally a cross between DIGG and Twitter, augmented with a side of Facebook Wall, and mediated by a rheostat. Broadcast news is more like CNN. If CNN wanted to do news online they might use the DIGG model, but instead of use the teaming millions to vet and promote, simply use a smaller set of qualified news experts to do the DIGGing, what you lose is breadth you make up in weight and veracity.
***Actually, I tend to doubt this will happen frequently. In much the same way that daytime television actors, directors, technicians tend not to migrate to primetime dramas, and television stars are often looked down on by movie stars, I think web stars will be considered a class below television, and have difficultly transitioning.
"After more than a decade of hype about the Internet being the next great stage for mass entertainment, it remains dominated by amateurs with most Hollywood stars watching from the wings."I shout at the screen "Of course it is! That's the point!" I can barely get myself to keep reading, and yet I can't stop, it's like I'm watching a train wreck. And all I can think of are those apocryphal tales of how, when television was new, people just turned a camera on folks performing a radio show. They couldn't really imagine what television was if not just radio with pictures. And Hollywood cannot imagine what the Internet is except in how it just keeps failing to support the archaic economic and creative model on which the movie, television and music industries are established.
Point one: There will be a role for expensive movies and television. Internet media will deeply change, but not erase, the existence of Hollywood. Hollywood will just scramble to higher ground as the flood waters rise, producing big budget content, using star power, and probably an assortment of new expensive presentation technologies (simulator rides? 3D? IMAX?)
Point two: What the Internet does best, and uniquely, is connect individuals, and democratize voices and information. You can use online tools to "broadcast" in the traditional sense, but you only have to understand that in doing so, you're turning a camera on a radio show. Similarly, for more than a decade webdesigners have argued that webpages are not newspapers, no matter how we are often forced into that visual presentation paradigm. News online is not consumed in that way, it is not necessarily best presented that way.**
If you're going to make a very expensive product--a movie for instance-- which needs to be distributed through an expensive process--theaters and broadcasting--there is a great deal of risk involved for the investors. You cover your risk by using "stars", people whose name or image will draw people out to pay for the product. If the product costs tens of millions, it's worth paying a star a few million to improve the odds of an audience. And if you're not a star, you're out of luck. It sucks trying to get discovered in Hollywood. Very few people will take a chance on new.
The Internet is just the opposite: it's very inexpensive to make product and even less expensive to distribute. Tons of content is created and distributed every second, and the Internet famously leverages the connections between people (plus zero costs) to sort through the enormous pile of crap to discover the hidden gems. Wikinomics, and all that. Most people--the vast majority in fact-- do not get discovered, however, but it is absolutely true that some people do. Once discovered, it's easier to utilize that notoriety as Hollywood starpower, and pass through the semi-permeable membrane that surrounds the "industry."***
But Hollywood is probably never going to get the system to work the other way: they'll be able to put stars onto the Internet, but the content will be vetted just like every other bit of content, without regard to cost. If it is good or funny it will spike, and if it isn't, it probably won't. Hit or miss, it still will never generate the kind of revenue stream (from pageviews and ads) that it would in another medium.
And in most cases, no pageview economic model will generate enough cash to make productions that are "star-based" viable. In some cases it will pay the production costs for typical quality content, but the very best actors and writers will simply make more going a different path. SAG has it backwards: forget trying to collect royalties for content online. Online it wants to be free, or mostly, and the labor and resistance associated with this will hardly be worthwhile. On the other hand, if you want a piece of new action, make every Tom, Dick and LonelyGirl online a SAG member just for being in online media, and demand your piece of the pie when the random individual really does join the ranks of the bankable. Now I don't think this will work, but the opposite seems pointless.
So when Reutuers reports that it was only hype that the Internet would be the next great stage for mass entertainment, they're missing that it already IS a great stage for mass entertainment: what else do you call the DAILY HOURS absorbed on Facebook and Myspace, genuine portals in their own right to an array of media -- news articles, videoclips, even product endorsements -- all by the people for the people. The Internet promised and delivered: it wasn't hype. The irony is that the industries that have the most to lose by the meteoric rise of Internet entertainment continue to fail to see what is going on.
* Posted on Wed Feb 18, 2009 11:32PM EST
** I tend to think of online news as ideally a cross between DIGG and Twitter, augmented with a side of Facebook Wall, and mediated by a rheostat. Broadcast news is more like CNN. If CNN wanted to do news online they might use the DIGG model, but instead of use the teaming millions to vet and promote, simply use a smaller set of qualified news experts to do the DIGGing, what you lose is breadth you make up in weight and veracity.
***Actually, I tend to doubt this will happen frequently. In much the same way that daytime television actors, directors, technicians tend not to migrate to primetime dramas, and television stars are often looked down on by movie stars, I think web stars will be considered a class below television, and have difficultly transitioning.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Skills for My Kids
I am always talking about "video literacy" and how I think it's important for kids to understand how media (in general) and video/film (in particular) are used to communicate and especially to persuade. I talk to my kids often about how shows make them happy or excited or tense (not THAT the programs do this, but how they do this: using music, certain camera shots, certain kinds of cuts and juxtapositions, etc.) Obviously this is important to me. I write books about video and introducing novices to the fun and use of media.
But there is another skill I think would be particularly useful for my kids to have: Computer-based 3D Modeling. Now I was never that good at 3D modeling tools over the decades; they were always too hard for me, too technical and in some cases, not WYSIWYG-enough. I had friends of course who made careers out of building and moving objects in 3D - some of them at Industrial Light & Magic or Pixar or where ever. While I was editing in my earlier career, they were modeling. Most still are. And I had often wished i could do it. Building and sculpting in 3D on a screen. The skills have uses in architecture, of course, but also many kinds of product design, industrial design or visualization. The skills are doubly important in entertainment fields like videogame design or film/video special effects, or animation. But also in many more less obvious fields, like law (forensic analysis), pharmacology and medicine (molecular modeling, antiviral drug creation...) and on and on...
Modeling had historically been too complicated, too computationally complex, too demanding on computer technology... but not anymore. This is great for professionals who need these tools and products for their work, but it's also fantastic for amateurs and novices, for kids and parents, who might embark on simple 3D modeling projects using simple tools.
So back to where I began. In addition to video literacy, I would like my kids to have comfort and familiarity with the basics of 3D modeling. They don't need pro tools, they need to start to learn about x-y-z coordinate space, about moving and manipulating an object, pulling and pushing its dimensions to build shapes, merging and joining shapes to make more and more complicated forms... Left to my own, I would never be able to imagine what a good kid-appropriate 3D modeling tool would look like. I had watched my Lego-addicted son jump into Lego's really cool "Digital Designer" software, for constructing novel Lego objects. But it was actually a little hard and missing some intangible element such that it didn't crystallize for me. It didn't make ME want to play too. It needed to work on both levels, kid and adult -- both novices.
In Turin last November, at the VIEW Conference (a forum mostly dedicated, i might add, to the arts associated with 3d modeling) I was introduced to two men who had developed different tools that both addressed this for me. I had long heard of both of their products, but had limited interaction with them myself.
SketchUp had been an independent project that eventually was purchased by Google for allowing regular people to build 3D buildings and monuments to augment layers in Google Earth. I met Mike Springer, one of the software developers of SketchUp and was finally inspired to give the tool a shot. I really fell for it. For free modeling software, it's remarkable. Not all that easy to be skilled, but really easy to play with. My kids were immediately interested in it. And I encouraged this.
At the same time I finally met Will Wright, famous as the inventor of SimCity, and now the popular creator of SPORE. I had seen prototypes of Spore over the prior years, at SXSW, at TED, and now again at VIEW. It never really did much for me. But the game was now released, and Will's presentation was really exciting; he spoke at length about the creative tools he had made available to the public. I purchased Spore for my 9 year old son's birthday, and gave it to him recently. We've both been hooked. The game is fun, but i'm particularly enchanted with the 3D modeling tools he's created, and watching my son experiment with them. One could easily create a course of study in evolutionary or comparative biology using the modeling tools here, but I guess I just love that my son has finally got his hands on something he is thrilled to be experimenting with. It's got the mojo that the Lego software couldn't approach.
Anyway, I think the foundation of my new media curriculum is coming together.
But there is another skill I think would be particularly useful for my kids to have: Computer-based 3D Modeling. Now I was never that good at 3D modeling tools over the decades; they were always too hard for me, too technical and in some cases, not WYSIWYG-enough. I had friends of course who made careers out of building and moving objects in 3D - some of them at Industrial Light & Magic or Pixar or where ever. While I was editing in my earlier career, they were modeling. Most still are. And I had often wished i could do it. Building and sculpting in 3D on a screen. The skills have uses in architecture, of course, but also many kinds of product design, industrial design or visualization. The skills are doubly important in entertainment fields like videogame design or film/video special effects, or animation. But also in many more less obvious fields, like law (forensic analysis), pharmacology and medicine (molecular modeling, antiviral drug creation...) and on and on...
Modeling had historically been too complicated, too computationally complex, too demanding on computer technology... but not anymore. This is great for professionals who need these tools and products for their work, but it's also fantastic for amateurs and novices, for kids and parents, who might embark on simple 3D modeling projects using simple tools.
So back to where I began. In addition to video literacy, I would like my kids to have comfort and familiarity with the basics of 3D modeling. They don't need pro tools, they need to start to learn about x-y-z coordinate space, about moving and manipulating an object, pulling and pushing its dimensions to build shapes, merging and joining shapes to make more and more complicated forms... Left to my own, I would never be able to imagine what a good kid-appropriate 3D modeling tool would look like. I had watched my Lego-addicted son jump into Lego's really cool "Digital Designer" software, for constructing novel Lego objects. But it was actually a little hard and missing some intangible element such that it didn't crystallize for me. It didn't make ME want to play too. It needed to work on both levels, kid and adult -- both novices.
In Turin last November, at the VIEW Conference (a forum mostly dedicated, i might add, to the arts associated with 3d modeling) I was introduced to two men who had developed different tools that both addressed this for me. I had long heard of both of their products, but had limited interaction with them myself.
SketchUp had been an independent project that eventually was purchased by Google for allowing regular people to build 3D buildings and monuments to augment layers in Google Earth. I met Mike Springer, one of the software developers of SketchUp and was finally inspired to give the tool a shot. I really fell for it. For free modeling software, it's remarkable. Not all that easy to be skilled, but really easy to play with. My kids were immediately interested in it. And I encouraged this.
At the same time I finally met Will Wright, famous as the inventor of SimCity, and now the popular creator of SPORE. I had seen prototypes of Spore over the prior years, at SXSW, at TED, and now again at VIEW. It never really did much for me. But the game was now released, and Will's presentation was really exciting; he spoke at length about the creative tools he had made available to the public. I purchased Spore for my 9 year old son's birthday, and gave it to him recently. We've both been hooked. The game is fun, but i'm particularly enchanted with the 3D modeling tools he's created, and watching my son experiment with them. One could easily create a course of study in evolutionary or comparative biology using the modeling tools here, but I guess I just love that my son has finally got his hands on something he is thrilled to be experimenting with. It's got the mojo that the Lego software couldn't approach.
Anyway, I think the foundation of my new media curriculum is coming together.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Sunday, February 15, 2009
"The People vs. George Lucas"
No comment.
But if you're into Star Wars, I believe this will interest you.
http://io9.com/5153077/the-prosecution-apparently-doesnt-rest-against-george-lucas
But if you're into Star Wars, I believe this will interest you.
http://io9.com/5153077/the-prosecution-apparently-doesnt-rest-against-george-lucas
Friday, February 13, 2009
Over the Top Geek Moment Today
I'm almost too embarrassed to write about this, but in a pure expression of my utter geekiosity, I am drawn to it. In 1970 a counter was turned on at the center of a computer system and it started counting upward in seconds. Today, at precisely 3:31pm (and 30 seconds!) that counter hit the number: 1234567890. It is called "Unix Epoch Time" and engineers, computer scientists and geeks of all sorts WORLDWIDE took a moment to stare at the counter as it rambled by. A friend at Netflix shot me a glimpse of the festivities in the company theater for a few moments, as the counter was celebrated on a giant screen, more satisfying than any silver ball in Times Square.I hope yours was a good one.
For more information on festivities...click here.
(photo by Tim Roach - a few minutes before zero hour)
A Letter I'd Like To See (But Won't)
I was just going to post the link to this (and the original has interesting hyperlinks), but I wanted to put it here too.
http://www.theagitator.com/2009/02/01/a-letter-id-like-to-see-but-wont/
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Dear America,
I take it back. I don’t apologize.
Because you know what? It’s none of your goddamned business. I work my ass off 10 months per year. It’s that hard work that gave you all those gooey feelings of patriotism last summer. If during my brief window of down time I want to relax, enjoy myself, and partake of a substance that’s a hell of a lot less bad for me than alcohol, tobacco, or, frankly, most of the prescription drugs most of you are taking, well, you can spare me the lecture.
I put myself through hell. I make my body do things nature never really intended us to endure. All world-class athletes do. We do it because you love to watch us push ourselves as far as we can possibly go. Some of us get hurt. Sometimes permanently. You’re watching the Super Bowl tonight. You’re watching 300 pound men smash each while running at full speed, in full pads. You know what the average life expectancy of an NFL player is? Fifty-five. That’s about 20 years shorter than your average non-NFL player. Yet you watch. And cheer. And you jump up spill your beer when a linebacker lays out a wide receiver on a crossing route across the middle. The harder he gets hit, the louder and more enthusiastically you scream.
Yet you all get bent out of shape when Ricky Williams, or I, or Josh Howard smoke a little dope to relax. Why? Because the idiots you’ve elected to make your laws have have without a shred of evidence beat it into your head that smoking marijuana is something akin to drinking antifreeze, and done only by dirty hippies and sex offenders.
You’ll have to pardon my cynicism. But I call bullshit. You don’t give a damn about my health. You just get a voyeuristic thrill from watching an elite athlete fall from grace–all the better if you get to exercise a little moral righteousness in the process. And it’s hypocritical righteousness at that, given that 40 percent of you have tried pot at least once in your lives.
Here’s a crazy thought: If I can smoke a little dope and go on to win 14 Olympic gold medals, maybe pot smokers aren’t doomed to lives of couch surfing and video games, as our moronic government would have us believe. In fact, the list of successful pot smokers includes not just world class athletes like me, Howard, Williams, and others, it includes Nobel Prize winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, the last three U.S. presidents, several Supreme Court justices, and luminaries and success stories from all sectors of business and the arts, sciences, and humanities.
So go ahead. Ban me from the next Olympics. Yank my endorsement deals. Stick your collective noses in the air and get all indignant on me. While you’re at it, keep arresting cancer and AIDS patients who dare to smoke the stuff because it deadens their pain, or enables them to eat. Keep sending in goon squads to kick down doors and shoot little old ladies, maim innocent toddlers, handcuff elderly post-polio patients to their beds at gunpoint, and slaughter the family pet.
Tell you what. I’ll make you a deal. I’ll apologize for smoking pot when every politician who ever did drugs and then voted to uphold or strengthen the drug laws marches his ass off to the nearest federal prison to serve out the sentence he wants to impose on everyone else for committing the same crimes he committed. I’ll apologize when the sons, daughters, and nephews of powerful politicians who get caught possessing or dealing drugs in the frat house or prep school get the same treatment as the no-name, probably black kid caught on the corner or the front stoop doing the same thing.
Until then, I for one will have none of it. I smoked pot. I liked it. I’ll probably do it again. I refuse to apologize for it, because by apologizing I help perpetuate this stupid lie, this idea that what someone puts into his own body on his own time is any of the government’s damned business. Or any of yours. I’m not going to bend over and allow myself to be propaganda for this wasteful, ridiculous, immoral war.
Go ahead and tear me down if you like. But let’s see you rationalize in your next lame ONDCP commercial how the greatest motherfucking swimmer the world has ever seen . . . is also a proud pot smoker.
Yours,
Michael Phelps
This entry was posted on Sunday, February 1st, 2009 at 10:49 pm by Radley Balko and is filed under General Drug War.
http://www.theagitator.com/2009/02/01/a-letter-id-like-to-see-but-wont/
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Dear America,
I take it back. I don’t apologize.
Because you know what? It’s none of your goddamned business. I work my ass off 10 months per year. It’s that hard work that gave you all those gooey feelings of patriotism last summer. If during my brief window of down time I want to relax, enjoy myself, and partake of a substance that’s a hell of a lot less bad for me than alcohol, tobacco, or, frankly, most of the prescription drugs most of you are taking, well, you can spare me the lecture.
I put myself through hell. I make my body do things nature never really intended us to endure. All world-class athletes do. We do it because you love to watch us push ourselves as far as we can possibly go. Some of us get hurt. Sometimes permanently. You’re watching the Super Bowl tonight. You’re watching 300 pound men smash each while running at full speed, in full pads. You know what the average life expectancy of an NFL player is? Fifty-five. That’s about 20 years shorter than your average non-NFL player. Yet you watch. And cheer. And you jump up spill your beer when a linebacker lays out a wide receiver on a crossing route across the middle. The harder he gets hit, the louder and more enthusiastically you scream.
Yet you all get bent out of shape when Ricky Williams, or I, or Josh Howard smoke a little dope to relax. Why? Because the idiots you’ve elected to make your laws have have without a shred of evidence beat it into your head that smoking marijuana is something akin to drinking antifreeze, and done only by dirty hippies and sex offenders.
You’ll have to pardon my cynicism. But I call bullshit. You don’t give a damn about my health. You just get a voyeuristic thrill from watching an elite athlete fall from grace–all the better if you get to exercise a little moral righteousness in the process. And it’s hypocritical righteousness at that, given that 40 percent of you have tried pot at least once in your lives.
Here’s a crazy thought: If I can smoke a little dope and go on to win 14 Olympic gold medals, maybe pot smokers aren’t doomed to lives of couch surfing and video games, as our moronic government would have us believe. In fact, the list of successful pot smokers includes not just world class athletes like me, Howard, Williams, and others, it includes Nobel Prize winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, the last three U.S. presidents, several Supreme Court justices, and luminaries and success stories from all sectors of business and the arts, sciences, and humanities.
So go ahead. Ban me from the next Olympics. Yank my endorsement deals. Stick your collective noses in the air and get all indignant on me. While you’re at it, keep arresting cancer and AIDS patients who dare to smoke the stuff because it deadens their pain, or enables them to eat. Keep sending in goon squads to kick down doors and shoot little old ladies, maim innocent toddlers, handcuff elderly post-polio patients to their beds at gunpoint, and slaughter the family pet.
Tell you what. I’ll make you a deal. I’ll apologize for smoking pot when every politician who ever did drugs and then voted to uphold or strengthen the drug laws marches his ass off to the nearest federal prison to serve out the sentence he wants to impose on everyone else for committing the same crimes he committed. I’ll apologize when the sons, daughters, and nephews of powerful politicians who get caught possessing or dealing drugs in the frat house or prep school get the same treatment as the no-name, probably black kid caught on the corner or the front stoop doing the same thing.
Until then, I for one will have none of it. I smoked pot. I liked it. I’ll probably do it again. I refuse to apologize for it, because by apologizing I help perpetuate this stupid lie, this idea that what someone puts into his own body on his own time is any of the government’s damned business. Or any of yours. I’m not going to bend over and allow myself to be propaganda for this wasteful, ridiculous, immoral war.
Go ahead and tear me down if you like. But let’s see you rationalize in your next lame ONDCP commercial how the greatest motherfucking swimmer the world has ever seen . . . is also a proud pot smoker.
Yours,
Michael Phelps
This entry was posted on Sunday, February 1st, 2009 at 10:49 pm by Radley Balko and is filed under General Drug War.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
"Eat, Pray, Love" Author Elizabeth Gilbert
Jennifer read Eat, Pray, Love (at least twice) and while I don't directly credit that with her Fiji expedition, it also wasn't entirely coincidence. I didn't read it. But I had heard that Gilbert was wonderful at TED and so I checked out her talk. 18 minutes later I wanted to read her book. I don't think you can NOT like her after hearing her speak.
Jen isn't going to loan me her copy. Do I have to go buy this now?
Enjoy. Elizabeth Gilbert, on Creativity and Genius.
Jen isn't going to loan me her copy. Do I have to go buy this now?
Enjoy. Elizabeth Gilbert, on Creativity and Genius.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Saturday, February 07, 2009
The Gainesville Sun
I wonder if some measure of success is when you show up in your hometown newspaper?http://www.gainesville.com/article/20090128/MAGAZINE01/901280934
My mom tells me there is something similar in the printed version of Gainesville Magazine.
As I read it now I am struck by two things. The first, the petty one, is how many little facts got mis-stated between the interview and the final result. It's strange but it mostly reminds me to be marginally cautious about things I read in print. When I was working on Droidmaker I remember being surprised that Lucasfilm requested only that I get first person accounts of events, and not rely on what was printed. And I'd read of things in the archives of the New York Times or Wall Street Journal that just had to be true, and I sometimes started to use those as sources only later to find, in fact, that important details were incorrect.
The second thing is simply that the article really captures a moment in time a few months ago, when I was in the midst of a transition. I can feel that undercurrent in the mood the article captured. Jen and the kids were still in Fiji but about to return, and I was at the end of months of deep career introspection. When I read that interview, I was all about that shift.
It's mostly right, of course. I've been consulting a lot recently for a company in the wind energy business. Wind Energy. I know so little about it, and yet I'm left with the feeling it's the dawn of an era that will be defined by wind energy, and other renewable energy options. Moving into that world feels foreign and exciting, like the first moments of reading a new book you purchased by an author you love, unsure of what you'll find, but excited in the not-knowing and slow-reveal.
More on that as I turn the pages.
Monday, February 02, 2009
Facebook Privacy - for Newbies
This is a must-read article on how to protect yourself if you use Facebook.
http://www.allfacebook.com/2009/02/facebook-privacy/
http://www.allfacebook.com/2009/02/facebook-privacy/
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