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Please Be Patient
I don't know how you got here, but I've had a bit of a problem with my domain name. Right now "da-man.com" is not owned by me somehow through some slightly underhanded dealings from an old hosting company. I am working to get it back, but until then we'll just have to hang out here.
Thanks for your patience and prayers that I will get back up on my feet again. ;-)
Big, Huge, Momumental
That's how Pixar rolls it.
This weekend found the release of Pixar's latest film, Cars. Just as Pixar creative head John Lasseter loves toys and made great movies with toy characters, it's very apparent after watching this movie that he's a huge fans of automobiles and the culture that surrounds them. After the movie I was thinking, "What kind of car would I be if I were in Cars?"
First off, every single movie preview before the movie itself was for some crappy, 3-D animated movie from another studio. None of them looked any good. The execption, of course, was next year's Pixar film directed by The Incredibles' Brad Bird - check the preview of Ratatouille to see fun and original upcoming movie about a rat.
Of course, the short film before the show was fun. The short, entitled One-Man Band, involved two one-man bands dueling for the single coin of a tiny peasant girl. It was very funny and enjoyable musically, as usual.
As with every Pixar release, the animation in Cars is amazing. Although I wouldn't say any certain aspect of the rendering was amazing, everything looked almost perfect. It wasn't photo-real; it was still a bit more clean than that, but, of course, they are talking cars, so ultra-real would be a bit scary. It was amazing to see a NASCAR-style stadium full of 10,000 watching cars, the cheering trailers in the middle of the track, and equally the amazing western desert scenery of Route 66.
So what about the story? As a local review said, "There are no human characters in Cars, but few movies this year will have more humanity." The story finds star racecar Lightning McQeen getting stuck in Radiator Springs, a happening place in the '50s that got passed up by the freeway. Through it, the hot-shot realizes that there's more to life than just him, his fame, and fortune. Plus, there is more beauty and friendship off the beaten path than on the race track. Plus, if you like classic cars and the '50s neon light decor that brought those little towns to life, you can't miss it. It's priceless.
Pixar fans will love the credits for their funny jokes about past 
Pixar movies as well as other Pixar references. See if you can spot a blimp that looks like Buzz Lightyear as well as the cast of the For The Birds short. Sports fans will find car-styled versions of favorite sports announcers and a clip of "Jay Limo" cracking a couple jokes on late-night. It's a blast.
Just for your information: if you get me a copy of the cool poster with every character on it, I'll be your friend forever. It's just so cool, I need to have it!
Did You Ever See Invasion of the Body Snatchers?
Two years ago, I was visiting the new Infuze Magazine and checking out their new features. One of the features was Prodigy, a serialized novel by Robin Parrish. I loved it, mostly because Robin watches many of the same movies as I do and has much of the same tastes. The book played like a mystery, had elements of The Matrix and other futuristic sci-fi movies in it, and was action-packed at every turn. Every two weeks the website would have another chapter, and I'd spend the next couple days after reading it asking, "What's going to happen to Grant?", "Who is that barefoot girl anyways?", and "What the heck is going on?"
Although the online version had some answers, it was enough to keep me clamoring for more. Apparently I'm not the only one, because Bethany House Publishers decided that the budding novelist was worth investing in. Robin will have his first novel, Relentless, available in stores within the next couple weeks. I haven't read it yet, but apparently it's much like the online serial but better. You can read the first chapter on Robin's official website, so if it sounds like your type of book, give it a read.
Sometimes I buy stuff like these on Amazon.com, but because I'm really looking forward to this one and I get everything else online, I'm going to do my offline buying game. Basically, it goes like this: If Barnes & Noble or Borders has the book in the store and I can find it (I don't like talking to Customer Service people), then we win. I win because I get to purchase and start reading the book, and the store wins because they made a sale. Losing in this game is me breaking down and buying it on the internet.
I play this game somewhat often with music releases, and, sad to say, most of the time the mainstream music stores lose. So don't tell me I don't try to support the best artists in the industry and promote them in the mainstream.
To Be A Revolution, Yeah
The past couple weeks I've been reading an interesting book called The Cluetrain Manifesto. I just finished it, so I figure I'd offer my thoughts. I picked it up because I was researching a lot of SEO/SEM stuff, and one of the biggest names in the industry said it was required reading in an interview.
So how was it? Well, first of all, it's an old book. The copy I have was published in 1999, I think. But for being so long ago (and before the dot-com bust), it certainly has a lot of good stuff to say.
For the most part, it explains why traditional business is dead. With the rise of the Internet, there's no way to keep your company's critics quiet. The Internet is not about you marketing your company, it's about people having an open conversation about your company. Apple sure doesn't get it, because they keep their process up as tight as possible (and sue anyone who uses the Internet like one would expect).
Some of it sounded like a couple people who were just fed up with "business as usual" and just wanted to rip on their bosses. But most of it made sense. It made me think that we should be working harder to provide that interactivity and openess on our sites and not make it such of a one-sided conversation. Sure, nobody sends us e-mail unless they need to complain, but we should make it easier for them to comment on it.
The revolution is happening on the Internet right now and it is not being televised. Are you and your company involved in the open and free exchange of ideas, or are you shut up in your own little world, ready to be trampled upon by the competition?
I don't know what to decide out of this book, but it was good reading. Next I'm reading about how to use blogging to promote your company, so that should be a bit more practical application of the Cluetrain ideas.
If you want to read the book, I just found out the entire book is readable online. So, if you're interested, check it out.
Break The Spell Of The Typical
Since posting YouTube short videos is so fun, here's yet another that I found really hilarious:
I find Wes Anderson to be on of the most brilliant filmmakers, although many of you don't get him because his brand of humor is very satirical. This short film/commercial totally encapsulates Wes Anderson.
A great thing is how Amercian Express has embraced the popular but often misunderstood filmmaker to support their product. Every Wes Anderson fan thinks this thing is awesome, so they'll be imimediately predisposed to American Express.
Although, I know movie makers use American Express, but how many of my friends use American Express credit cards? Absolutely none. "None more black."
I Walk The Line
An article I found in today's local news site was about a student who spoke out for his faith. I definitely urge you to read this badly-written, biased story.
What's wrong with it? Well, it seems to propose what Ben Kessler said was wrong. It only mentions people who were disgruntled with his statement. Was Ben Kessler the only one who has these opinions? Hardly.
If it were my graduation, I'd risk the boos and heckling to cheer Ben on. He was voted Tommie of the Year, so why not let him say his peice? Nobody would have given him trouble if he did the usual "y'all did good" speech. If you're not challenged at a graduation, then what good did the graduation speech do? The graduates certainly won't remember it in a couple years. It won't change their life.
Besides, this could be the start of the University of St. Thomas becoming a Roman Catholic university. For years, St. Thomas has been trying to be the most secular university possible without losing their Roman Catholic roots. If the administration was smart, they'd stop being the mediocre institution they have been for years and start being a real Catholic university. Support the students who represent the Roman Catholic church teaching well.
And if the Star Tribune wants to do a good job with their writing, why not talk to the head of the Vianney Seminary? Or, better yet, ask the Archbishop who was there was they thought? What did graduates who have Catholic Studies degrees think?
At least the President of the university, who has rarely had a thought of his own and usually just spends his 20 minutes reading from a book of quotes, said it was important "to treat one another with respect as we speak and as we listen, regardless of how controversial an issue may be."
Sheesh. I knew I should have gone to the U of M.
Promise To Keep It Innovative
One of my favorite muses, John Reuben, has released another amazing video work. No, it's not an addictive music video, but this time it's an amazing short documentary. Check out out right here:
He's serious. He's professional. He's inspiring. He's my hero.
We Are All A Little Crazy
Last week found Google's release of Google Trends. It shows the popularity of a search term over time, plus allows you to plot more than one next to each other. If you're trying to set up a Google AdWords campaign, it might come in handy.
But what about us casual searchers? Don't worry, there's lots of fun to be found. My friend Bjorn found some really interesting comparisons. Of course, none of these are to be taken at face value. There's no game called "Virtue City" or a TV show called "God and the City". ;-)
I Feel On Top of the World
And the other thing that I'm excited about from E3? Well, this one may involve some backstory. Actually, this backstory goes way back.
In 1993, Myst was released. It was an adventure game that was much different than hardly any had seen before, as the world was fairly free to explore and there were puzzles integrated to the game. It was much less of a game as it was an exploration of a whole new world. Of course, though, many of those who liked Doom did not have enough patience. Some did not like the fact that the game only offered periodic snapshots of the world, even though each one was breathtaking, but the technology was not yet available on PCs. Those who were interested in learning about whole, fictional cultures found it fascinating. Hidden throughout the world were hours and hours of written backstory, too. It went on to become possibly the best-selling game of all time.
Of course, repeating such success is almost impossible. Many other companies tried to do it for years after. Probably the best was Cyan's sequel to Myst, entitled Riven. After that, Cyan Worlds licensed their Myst series to other developement teams.
But after Riven, there were often rumors of the people at Cyan working on something big. We got a hint of the technology they were developing when we encountered RealMyst, which allowed the user the freedom to move wherever now that 3-D rendering technology had gotten good enough. Finally, we found it was to be entitled Uru, and a large part of the game was going to be an online experience.
When Uru was prepping for release, I was anxiously watching the beta testing phase and the community that was forming online. The world of Uru was expansive and very interactive, and people in the beta test seemed to be having a great time exploring and interacting with each other. And, like all the earlier games, every view looked stunning. There were even online websites devouted to what was happening in the game.
Even before the game was released, Cyan announced the closure of Uru Live because of a "lack of demand" or something else. Most are still unsure how they game to that conclusion, as many of us were waiting for the beta to be over or, in my case, the hardware to play the game. Thus, Uru lived on as a one-player, static game, and the fans discounted the loss of Uru Live as a game that was ahead of its time, a great idea that won't have enough users.
But a couple days ago at E3 that has officially changed. Cyan Worlds has announced that Uru Live will once again be live as a service from GameTap. The company's broadband-only service offers a user all of 500 games to download and play instantly, and this fall the Uru Live experience will be another facet of GameTap. I still haven't played Uru yet and only recently acquired the graphics card needed to run it, but I plan on playing the single-player version in the near future. Since GameTap has a free trial and is only $10/month, I may also try that this fall too. It will be fun to join a real-time world that grows and changes as time passes, I think. And we'll see if anything else comes from it.
Y'all Treat Art Like It Was Some Sort of Religion
Alright, so the title is possibly the antithesis of this post. The beginning of May found the return of the Derek Webb podcast. If you listened to the old podcast episodes, though, you knew it was nothing to get excited about. A couple of them were just audio versions of interviews off the How To Kill and Be Killed DVD. But it seems that Derek finally sees what podcasting is all about.
The new podcasts are not part of the label's promotional machine. They're Derek just talking into his audio recorder. And he's not talking about how great his latest CD is, either. He's taking real questions from real listeners. If the subsequent episdoes are half as good as this first one of May, then it's going to be amazing. In "Derek Webb episode 4", Derek talks about what "Christian music" is (and isn't) and why it can be acceptable to listen to non-Christian music. He goes over why it's not about the money or the fame but about bringing the truth. It's great. I can't wait to listen to the next one. Subscribe to it via iTunes to check it out.