Slashdot Mirror
Aardman Animations Releasing New Animations Online
michael writes "Apparently, Aardman Animations, who made the Oscar-winning Wallace and Gromit films will be releasing their latest work over the Web rather than through cinemas or television.
They also mention that the company 'will encourage viewers to distribute the animated films by e-mail.' " It'll be using the new character, Angry Kid, who will /not/ be at all like Wallace and Gromit. May 7 is the first release date.
I agree, my reply *was* hasty. It was a rant. I wasn't expecting a +5 for it! (see how far the moderators have slipped? :)
;)
:)
I care more about having a site at least look nice in most web browsers (at least IE, Netscape and w3m) because let's face it, people don't write pages for specs, and specs don't view pages. However, the Times page couldn't even do that. From a coding, design, *or* user interface point of view, it's just sorry.
Slashdot, however, at least works well. It has a functional design that people like to copy. And the validator people usually point to is somewhat overzealous. (no doctype? ALT tags are required?) I'm also not a big fan of later HTML specs, because I'd be happier without Frames, but they've taken over somewhat. So it isn't perfect, but it's definitely usable, and not openly offensive.
You didn't miss anything, except that I tend to free associate a tad too much. Yes, that's what I meant to say. No, that's not how you're supposed to interpret it. And why can't I say it in the same breath? Slashdot does, they just don't tell you. Besides, my point holds: if the web designers for The Times would make silly movie files instead, I'd be very thankful.
Ah, but *if* you have an account, the contract you agreed to by getting that account is in the U.K., and it's meant to be interpreted under their laws (says so at the bottom). I don't know how they expect to *enforce* such a badly-written and ad-hoc agreement, but there you are. Oh, and I linked to their "Terms & Conditions" page, so *if* I had an account, I would have broken the terms already. And if they were written in 1998, the more reason to change them.
Actually, the trademark issue *is* hard to understand, from the contract. I don't believe that's what it says. It might be precisely what they *meant*, but it certainly isn't what it says. That's why legal contracts *need* to be 10 times longer, and written in legalese. The same goes for your other point about changing the rules, it's all pretty vague and threatening, trying to get more mileage out of the law than it actually allows.
Heh heh. Funny story at the end, there. I say, if they can weasel their way in there, they can subject the Chinese populace to their crappy 'media'. We know corporations have no ethics, and I'm amused when they find themselves having to prove it to governments that have no ethics (read: governments). Competition is a good thing when it works, and I'm not sure if that's an instance of this. (it's like going from a one-party system to a two-party system. Either you have one real option, or you have a choice, sorta, but it's a choice between evils..)
I try not to follow politics if I can help it, and I don't watch that much TV just because it's so *BAD*. This is the same issue, really. If all the content on the web dropped out, I wouldn't surf, I'd find something better to do with my time, like code, maybe.
Thanks for the reply, Alex, nice post.
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Yes, this is slashdot, where the trolls get more rabid and the moderators get more irrational, but remember, folks, it isn't just you: the whole WWW gets uglier with each passing day.
I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the creators of all cool-looking animated movie files for their work, because I'd rather be watching their movies than reading their HTML.
What inspired me, in my baseless ranting? I'm glad you asked! Not only does the story linked from slashdot look horrible, but so does its HTML--it's really broken. The HTML tag is commented out, the ads are in JavaScript, so not only are they annoying, but they output broken HTML if Java/JavaScript is not turned on; the commenting looks like some of the joking in the polls (this is the TITLE tag...), and the background and page layout doesn't scale at all.
Beyond that, their Terms & Conditions are also a travesty. First, the whole thing is invalid because condition #1 is false!
(I have no User Account with them, and I wish I didn't have to have one for *EVERY* frickin' web site I ever visit. That isn't the answer. A universal ID isn't, either, but I'm sure we could use some sort of common challenge/response method, at least...)
Let's hope our friends at Slashdot don't have an account, because you're not allowed to link below the main page of their site without express written permission from the webmaster. Oh, and you can only display the page on the screen or on paper, so you'd better delete that netscape cache...
You also need their express written permission to use the trademarks "The Times" and "The Sunday Times". So can I say "My grandfather likes to read The Sunday Times"? Can I write it? Sue me already, I'd love to see it.
Oh, and my favorite: we reserve the right to add or change this agreement, so if you do something we don't like, we can change that contract you agreed to, and sue you under the new one. Yeah, that's fair.
Summary: Screw corporations. Take back the web. If you need to have a DISCLAIMER on a web page, feel a need to sue your client base, or don't want to learn how to write HTML correctly, leave. If you'd rather make pretty pictures and movies, and let everyone see them, stay.
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
rOD.
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Rod Begbie done this, and he's not
Aardman Animations i already releasing films over the web. angrykid.com is not the first thing on the web, just the latest.
They were already sold on the web BEFORE angrykid.
-- I doubt, therefore I might be.
By reading this post, you consent to be bound by it's terms. TERMS: You must moderate this +1 if reading on slashdot, or reply saying something posititive if viewing on another medium or do not have moderator points. You further agree with the poster in all respects and will not visit the site, or download any video not MPAA Approved. Failure to do so will result in your monitor exploding and your speakers melting (thanks intel!).
Your compliance is appreciated,
~ The MPAA
Actually, Aardman has a whole history of great characters from before Wallace & Grommit. They did a series of claymation lip-synch portraits of people telling their stories or of office scenes, including an incredible one of this rough kid who'd just been released from jail ("Going Equipped," from 1985). There was also the one of the social security office ("Down and Out," 1977) which was an early one but really incredible.
Their homepage http://www.aardman.com has details on these and many other great shorts. Well worth the visit!
Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachtani?
www.fogbound.net
A bit offtopic, but the site that will be hosting the new Nick Park films, www.atomfilms.com, already has a ton of wonderful shorts on their site. My personal favourite has to be Jolly Roger, which is absolutely hilarious.
It's nice to see a group of people who, unlike some organisations we know, are committed to making full use of new technologies rather than launching litigation against anyone who sees potential in digital distribution.
On a related note, it's important to support sites like this. By spreading the word, and voicing your appreciation, we can encourage others to venture into this new realm of distribution. Don't let the MPAA control the course of technology! Support this kind of thing by downloading their stuff and possibly even buying a video/DVD of their animation. (No, I'm not affiliated with them, or the animation industry, in any way!)
As I say, it's great to see people who see the Internet as a great new means of distribution instead of a threat. Keep up the great work!
Last time I was at the cinema, watching Toy Story 2, they had a trailer for a new Aardman feature film called "The Chicken Run" about a load of factory-farm chickens planning a Great Escape (shot of chicken lying down on a little cart in a tunnel and tapping it twice with a trowel). Paul.
You are lost in a twisty maze of little standards, all different.
you wouldnt want those commercials if you took 30 mins to download a 1 minute film over your 56K modem and 30 seconds of the one minute movie were commercials. trust me - internet content (specially video) needs to be commercial free. pissing off customers when an industry is just taking off is the *worst* thing you can do.
IMHO, this is a *bad* thing to encourage users to do.
Email was never intended to be used for file transfers, and is poorly suited to this task. Message attachments, or the ability to make attachments, is a hack of the system - if you've ever read an email without decoding the "attachment" all you see is a rather large amount of seemingly meaningless text.
It's also important to note that the majority of people connected to the Internet are still connected with analogue modems - and to download even a 2MB file can cause timeouts on a 56k (or 33.6k) line.
I cannot recount the number of times I had to clear a "blocked" mailbox in my 5-odd years of working in the ISP industry, mainly due to the presense of a message with a large (2MB or above) attachment.
Come to think of it, I think I'll do that right now...
www.eFax.com are spammers
Defining a way to send the e-mail attachments as pure 8-bit data (instead of fluffy encoded garbage that inflates the data size by one third for nothing) would be a good start...
As if the overloading problem wouldn't be bigger with large e-mail attachments...
--znarkFreenet? It doesn't waste lots of bandwidth outside of a given network if lots of people inside the network request it, and it doesn't get overloaded unless a huge number of people request one file at the same time. Of course, not a lot of people use it right now, but this animation could be good, legal reason to get lots of people to try it out (as Ian Clarke was hoping at the end of yesterday's slashdot interview.
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The shareholder is always right.
This is Really Cool(tm) imho, but I really really hope they let us have them in some format other than QT4/Sorenson/can't-play-it-in-linux or ASF/Microsoft/still-can't-play-it-in-linux. The article doesn't mention anything about what formats they will use, so I can only hope.
>Does this mean that we'll be subjected to the rants of the bandwidth police
Well, yeah, probably. But this time they'll be taking a different stance. I mean, distributing the stuff on their website is one thing, but encouraging people to pass the movies around via email is quite another. I envision myself going away for a weekend, deciding to check my email while I'm on a 56k modem, and being forced to download a 26mb DamnVideo(tm) G2 movie at that time. (as opposed to while I'm sitting on the T1, where it wouldn't bother me as much).
The point is, for god's sake, EMAIL was meant for text, dammit! Maybe an attachment here and there, but not mass-mailing full movies a-la chain letter.
Bring on the video - bring on the audio...
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Next thing you know, they'll release an animation of Craig Shergold taking a date rape drug and waking up in a bathtub full of ice -- MISSING A KIDNEY -- and comforting himself with cookies made from his $250 Nieman Marcus recipe while he sends a message to the FCC protesting their impending modem tax ....
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``Life results from the non-random survival of randomly varying replicators.'' -- Richard Dawkins
Did Nick Park do this one? Aardman Animations != Nick Park all the time. Just for distributing Wallace and Gromit. I'd sort of be surprised if Nick Park did this one since he's been working on the feature length movie Chicken Run which is coming out June 23. It looks pretty cool and in his style. Has Mel Gibson doing the lead voice. I can't find any mention of Angry Kid in IMDB so who knows.
This is the kind of stuff I like to see on the net. While it's ridiculous to speculate that commercialism is dead, or even struggling. I believe distribution of films/shows on the internet is a viable means of entertainment. The quality is there - and it's DEFINITELY worth what you pay for it. I only wish we could see more of this - with shows that are already mainstream, such as south park, or anythin on the cartoon network. It's allready out there, but when corps like Comedy Central get wind of it...they throw a veritable shit-fit. Why? It actually raises interest in the product.
on a side note, one solution could be a marriage between capitialism and 'net' distribution, to course to leave commercials in. We're constantly arguing about no one does anything for free. Well - why is network telivision free? Because of commercials. I for one am willing to deal with a few minutes of advertising on my Mpeg in order to obtain freely distributable media that i actually WANT to see, and can see whenver i want to boot.
FluX
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
As much as I like Wallace and Gromit, Nick Park has dome some /very/ different kinds of stuff. Lok for the video Creature Comforts. Highly recommended.
I just hope that the video is *not* in Quicktime.
Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Anomalous: deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Canard: a false or unfounded repor
They've got a number of their works under the Aardman Observer section including Creature Comforts, one about a rambling old man's war story, and too many more.
You are given the choice of high or low bandwidth Real Media G2, or Windows Media.
Rant: while aardman's great animation, is it really slashdot news?