If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the iPod must be blushing its scroll wheel off right now. After the debut of Cupertino’s quintessential wonder-player in 2001, a torrent of upstarts started to flood the market. Some were legitimate iPod competitors. But most were no better than well-shined turds.
A new report by Josh Bernoff of Forrester Research states that usage of social technologies increased markedly in 2008: three in four US online adults now use social tools to connect with each, up from 56% in 2007. According to the report, the largest growth came from ratings and reviews, “voting” on websites, and user-generated video. Blogging and tagging were also popular.
The premise is simple. Take a scene from a movie and ask the director to talk about it. Dammit, I like this shit. It may have required a specially commissioned interview (in this case with with Mike Leigh), it may be a cute edit from a standard EPK. But, whatever - its a nice, simple example of how enlightening and enriching online content can be. Bravo, NYT.
In 1976, screenwriters Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett expanded on an unfinished O’Bannon screenplay called Memory (about a spaceship crew answering a distress call on a desolate planetoid), adding an alien monster to the story and calling the new script Starbeast. Then, they immediately realized that Starbeast was a fucking terrible title and re-named it Alien.
Cracked.com is a groove and a gas. Hats off to Cracked.com.
http://www.cracked.com/article_16716_7-terrible-early-versions-great-movies.html
Noted directors, such as John Landis, Joe Dante and er…Eli Roth, talk passionately about flicks from the Grindhouse. Created by the Nickels Group.
“No End in Sight”, the Oscar nominee for best feature-length documentary will screen in its entirety on YouTube between September 1st and November 4th. Charles Ferguson’s doco casts a critical eye on the decisions made during the early months of the war in Iraq. The project was winner of a special jury prize at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival and originally released by Magnolia Pictures in 2007. This marks the first widely released feature film to play in full on the site.