You should contact the legal firm of Spiro Moss Barness, etc... They are one of many firms united in a class action lawsuit about the Thompson DVD drives that were used in the Xbox. Microsoft seem to have been aware of the lack of quality in these drives as later models used different manufacturers. Despite this, if you talk to their customer service reps, they continue to ask you if your discs are dirty despite the fact you tell them you just bought the damn game.
I don't give a rat's ass about Sony's problems. I'm here to ask about the awful consumer experience I had with my original Xbox and what exactly is the truth about this new product. Here are links that show what a known issue those drives were.
Then there was the power supply issue. A recall in which power cords were issued to cover up shoddy circuitry that could and did cause house fires. Mostly due to bad soldering. In the recall, older Xboxes were given power cords with breakers, so in the event of a short, you may burn out your Xbox but at least your house won't burn down.
Now we have reports of crashes that yes, are online and could be from a vocal minority, but I have never heard of or owned a console that crashes the way photographs show us is happening to the 360 - and let's remember the people complaining about it are the ones who braved the cold and the nuisance of picking one up.
Now apparently there is a fix in the form of suspending the power supply. People are finding it's working. Ergo, the power supply is defective. Just like the one on the original Xbox which was RECALLED.
Whatever marketing spiel Microsoft want to give, I want for them to answer one thing. What exactly is Error 74 and Error 79 - what does it mean is happening to the box. They have refused, as they did with the Thompson DVD drive, to let us know what is going wrong. Even if it isolated. Does it bode poorly for the future? Why is there a SPECIFIC error message already in the box's OS that is happening to people?
Now we know for certain that the machine is not only prone to overheating, there is an inbuilt error message related to it.
They also threw it out a car going 50 miles an hour which led to scratches which were awful but the screen still looked readable. Look at the pictures here:
I have yet to see a single picture from a compainer that matches the devastation they are communicating in words. All iPods have always scratched. iPods are pretty. Getting them dirty or scratched is doubly frustrating because they are so pretty. But this story is a lot of kerfluffle about nothing.
Initially I read that the screen scratches easily which leads to it not being usable whatsoever, like a shuffle. That does not seem to be the case.
Right, so you've negated your own point. They've confused developers and customers. If you want added content you'll need to purchase (x). If you're a developer, you need to plan for the contingency of not having feature (x). Since a group of your customers won't have it, why bother putting it in. I don't care how easy it is to plug it in. It's a mixed message to both ends of the market, which is stupid.
It's basically an extension of the whole idea of charging us for content everywhere they can in bits and pieces in order to make some more money. The Xbox marketplace is the future of the EA dominated, death to beautiful gaming. Want a better sword? Pay extra for it and have it downloaded to your additionally purchased harddrive while looking at these sponsored ads. Want to drive the Ferrari in the new Forza? Just buy it on marketplace.
Also, I have yet to see it confirmed anywhere that the 360 is shipping with a hard drive. That's not doomsaying.
But my priority problem is the hard drive. Basically Allard has told developers to make sure their games don't need it. Wasn't Morrowind possible on the original Xbox because of the harddrive? By removing this from the bundled equation, a great deal of gaming innovation goes out the window. Also, how the hell is live content going to work without one? Ohhh, guess you're going to have to buy one on top of your Live subscription after all.
Also you should try running hi-def.wmv files on a PowerMac (development kit) sometime. Doesn't work so well.
Then you've got the Team Ninja at Tecmo dude talking about how there's barely enough room on conventional DVDs for the games he wants to make now in terms of art assets data AND hi-def cut scenes. He has yet to state what console Ninja Gaiden 2 will appear on, one of the few must have Xbox games. What's astonishing to me isn't so much what's being passed onto the consumer, it's what they're telling developers.
Why buy now when later I'll be able to get an HD-DVD compatible mode. Why bother when the hard drive is being removed from the equation and will cost extra as an addon, thereby limiting developers' use of its potential, thereby removing the outstanding feature of the original Xbox.
I got to see the Xbox 360 in closed doors demos at E3 this year, and I have to say despite the ringing hype endorsement of the PS3 over a prerendered demo (Killzone) which everyone on the floor as developers could name who created it - the Xbox 360 really did blow me away technically and the games were impressive looking and desirable - especially the new EA sports iterations (not to say anything of their gameplay and the company's lack of innovation).
But this latest news really puts me off bothering to pick one up soon. I recently had a ton of games stolen and went to eBay to load up on games I lost in the theft that were out of print. When it came time to find all the titles for the Xbox, there were very, very few I even wanted to bother replacing.
The current lineup, Call of Duty 2 excepted (which looked exceptional at E3 running in a limited capacity), does nothing to make me jones for Xbox 360. It still is a box dedicated towards dumbed down PC games played on a television. For now, I'll wait and see if an HD-DVD model ever comes out. I'll pick up a PS3 and use it as my Blu-Ray player.
Because OSX is so simple to grasp that it's like learning to drive a golf cart after being a truck driver in the world that The Road Warrior took place in.
First you'd have to get people to RTFA, for starters.
I'm often amazed however at how many non tech literate people I know simply refuse to even try OSX even when I offer to show them how to. These are people who are completely frustrated by Windows but stick with it only because it's what they know and cannot even fathom an alternative.
Re:I was at E3 and gaming journalism is broken
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Inside the Xbox 360
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To clarify: oh yes it will work an SDTV... But the 360 sure looks a hell of a lot better on HDTVs. A hell of a lot. It's going to be the only way to get the beautuous resolution and 16:9 framing that all games will have ready if you have an HDTV.
Make no mistake, both Xbox 360 and PS3 were designed to sell more HDTVs.
You can get decent HDTV sets now for $500 by the way.
I was at E3 and gaming journalism is broken
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Inside the Xbox 360
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· Score: 5, Insightful
Because every developer on the floor knew that the most impressive demos for the PS3 were totally prerendered. They could even name the people who worked on them. And for some reason no one in the games journalism community would point blank persistently ask Sony and groups like Axis Animation what the deal was. Look at this article where it's all speculation and guessing. The public deserves to know that what they were shown is not exactly how a game is going to look on PS3.
Meanwhile, closed door demos of the Xbox 360 were actually impressive.
I don't work for either company or work in games for that matter, though I do love them. I am totally neutral about both machines. My bias is negative towards Microsoft as I'm a Mac zealot and my Xbox is my least favorite console. I went into E3 feeling Microsoft had blown it.
Then I saw what it could do, held the controller in my hand, and now am impressed and rather excited about the Xbox 360. And privately a developer told me that they aren't anywhere near having the machines run full speed or utilizing their full power in the very obvious Mac G5 dev kits they're running everything from.
But I will say this: HDTV is going to be a requirement.
The PS3 remains vaporware in my mind - I recall claims of rendering scenes of the Final Fantasy movie on PS2's "emotion engine".
And ultimately what's even sadder is there were a mere handful of games at E3 that made me excited. Okami, the new Zelda, We Love Kattamari, Shadow of the Collossus, Stubbs the Zombie, and that's pretty much it. Horsepower may be here, but games are as stunted, as juvenile, and as retreaded as ever. Future marines vs. monsters and bimbos galore.
Meanwhile next gen gaming is going to cost more, Microsoft have shunted most PC development to the Xbox, killing the richness of PC games for the most part other than MMORPGs. And now we're going to have live updating advertising in games, along with additional content that will have to be purchased. Want that sword +2? You can buy it for $4.99. Welcome to gamer hell.
Why do I not care for any games or apps or cameras or music being stored on my phone?
Because currently, and I'm sure this applies to a hell of a lot of travellers - I can't turn on my phone mid flight to listen to some music. Do phone manufacturers understand this in the slightest? What's the point of putting all my portable music into a device that I cannot use say in my car on a plane, probably the two most common places other than walking or exercising where such devices are used.
I own a Motorola RAZR V3 and have found it's nowhere near worth $500. The menu system and phone book are a joke, the battery life is negligible if bluetooth or any serious use of the screen comes into play. The interface is absolutely hideous. Internet via cell phone even to check on movie times is nightmarishly slow and pointless and probably costs more than calling a service. The camera often gets smudged by virtue of its placement and the photos arre hideous.
Anything else I need to do - I turn on my powerbook, latch onto a wifi connection. Done.
So what I'm left with is an expensive phone that has only served as a status symbol and little more.
For all the talk of iPod competitors, yes it is priced more - but furthermore no single device has music software and an interface anywhere near as good, and that's to say nothing of the preamp and headphones quality. My Razr can play MP3s, horribly, distortedly.
Phones are ubiquitous and not a single sci fi writer saw that coming - but here in the US we are lagging far behind some other worldwide markets in what can be done with such devices.
That's what I mean about the zero point of production though - you spent $20k on DV gear when you could've sourced on film. Our video cost under $6k and we were incredibly resourceful. DV shooting at quality still requires money - I think the dolly grip is one of the most underrated members of a crew and good ones deserve to get paid, for example. The problem is as a production company you can't keep expecting to people to work for free, and in my opinion they deserve to get paid for what they do.
In my ideal world labels would spend $40k for their bands on a video. We'd have middle budget videos, that sort of sweet spot where something technically proficient with a pro crew can be made but it's not such an enormous investment it requires comissioners to get involved in making a video that yet again looks like a bunch of dudes lip syncing performance while the cinematographer emulates the look of Fight Club and arbitrary cuts take you into some ridiculous story usually involving some hot chick.
But in my ideal world there's no such thing as the legal payola of the indepdent radio promoter, nor Viacom's stranglehold, and MTV2 would play a broad array of music programming all day long especially relfecting the way the Internet has changed music - people listen to The Shins in Itunes followed by Kelly Clarkson followed by Outkast. Issues of cool aside, that's a fact today - people have access to a broad array of various music crisscrossing genres. I wish "music television" would relfect that.
Good luck to you, too... As tough as it is being an independent filmmaker, I worry for all souls who have to deal with A&R people.
My problem with this argument though is that content production prices will not approach zero. Or it shouldn't. You need a decent crew and if you ask me high end sourcing to really compete with the giant videos. Even a format like HDV is just not good enough in my opinion.
Half the budget on this video went to sourcing on film and the steps necessary in post production to produce a high end format ready for broadcast. The other half went on traditional expenses like costuming, food, location lockdown. Everyone worked for free. But we can't ask the same people to work for free on the next one.
The reason so many amazing videos came out of commissions from the UK in the 90s (all those Spike Jonze, Michel Gondry, and Chris Cunningham pieces or say all of Radiohead's videos) is due to the mid budget video - something we don't really have in the US anymore. Now it's either the $5 million budgeted video, or the $10k video.
The problem is in the low budget, indie music world that there isn't really a point to making a video; which I as someone who wants to get jobs making videos understands. Every video is a gamble in the hopes of making it to rotation on MTV. That's a fact.
But the push from MTV is dependent on its playlist and brand attitude. Currently MTV2 decided to change and become another whole network and focus on major label pop punk and hip hop. For the most part all other music gets shunted to one hour a week timeslots. The other push is that there's some weird unwritten rule that a music video must contain primarily performance footage.
Result being - creative stagnation. And the bands who could make really interesting videos not having enough money to go to town when they realize how limited their distribution options are.
I'm hoping more people pick up the bittorrent torch and run with it and it leads to a blossoming of creativity in music videos. Artists who don't have the tools of a major label should add this to their arsenal.
Well we really thought it would be a good way to share a video that was made with their fans in mind. The band couldn't afford to host it. MTV2 botched the airing in ways I don't care to ennumerate. Their persistent logo is pretty big, by the way.
So we figured hey their fans are smart, if we can convince them to use bittorrent the least we can do with this thing is let them share it amongst themselves. Why have them wait for an MTV2 airing to capture, encode, and distribute themselves. Give them the highest quality we can directly instead.
We thought a few hundred people would do that. So far we've had a number of downloads equal to half the people who bought their last album.
Here's a direct link to the torrent.
If the video offends you, I apologize. And recommend you check out this as an alternative.
I should've mentioned - the band are not on a major label.
The album and video came out in the same week. A week later the band found themselves without the support of a major label in the Billboard Top 200 and in the top 10 at iTMS and top 20 at amazon.
We released a video we made for Portland band The Decemberists to bittorrent on purpose. We've had much greater impact from that than the few times MTV2 aired it.
To distribute a music video by the indie rock band The Decemberists. It was intentionally broadcast using bittorrent.
Wired article.
We deliberately posted it on bittorrent knowing that the band couldn't afford the bandwidth to host a high quality version of the video and we would hardly get air time on MTV2 anyway. I thought at best their hardcore fans on the message board would download it, maybe a few hunrded. We should clear 6000 downloads tonight.
So there are examples of artists using bittorrent legally and legitimately.
I directed a video recently for a band called The Decemberists who aren't on a major label. They have, however, drummed up a lot of mainstream press notice and attention and good sales for a true indie label band.
Once the video was done, however, I got my obligatory MTV2 airings at weird times of the night. So how were we going to share it? There'd be a cruddy low res version which is barely what the band could afford to host.
So we distributed via bittorrent directly. We literally gave their fans as high quality file as we could. In one week using only bittorrent and not including the low res Quicktime, we've had over 5000 downloads.
This is in the same week that Universal Music Group (one of the titans) has declared that music videos will no longer be streamed for free.
Wired ran an article with all the details here:
Wired article on how to get around MTV
And now? The band is at number 7 on the iTunes music store and 19 at amazon. That is with the marketing budget of a small indepdendent label. Rewards come to those artists who embrace and understand how to use this tech.
BTW i kept trying to submit this story but to no avail.
Name someone who worked on a Star Wars / Star Trek fan film who has been discovered by a big name and gone on to make a theatrically distributed motion picture.
Rather, individuals out there may borrow from other genres or sensibilities or influences but they invest within it their own unique consciousness. Ask a Kerry Conran (Sky Captain) or Shane Carruth or for that matter a James Cameron or Peter Jackson. The latter two who were enormously influenced and inspired by Star Wars to go out and become filmmakers on their own terms. But neither decided to create their own little Star Warrs film, despite having had the ingenuity to do so in their youth on the 16mm shorts they made.
This isn't to rain on anyone's parade - there's some wonderful technical achievement present in the discussed trailer. But the usual community theater level acting and rather silly casting. But what galls me is that the tools for personal, singular, unique filmmaking have fallen into the hands of people who have a chance to challenge the central authority of the studio system; and united with enough friends and volunteers something truly astonishing can be made - but all the geek community does with that opportunity is spit out more and more fan fiction films. We can do better.
Any film school that would insist students ape and mimic other filmmakers rather than develop their own unique voices will find they aren't producing many working filmmakers at the higher level. Much filmmaking by its very nature is derivative... Asking to actuallly bury yourself in one of the most annoying atrributes is pointless.
And what of Star Wars fan films in particular? Remember when George Lucas chose a cartoon which extolled the virtues of Star Wars merchandising as the most creative of the bunch? What's that director up to now?
I'll be thinking about your comments next time I watch my work air on MTV.
Also when I go to deposit the bonus check I got from working on one of the highest grossing movies of last year (which incidentally, although entirely digital, did not feature a single crew member who came from the world of fan filmmaking).
I don't need or want the coverage slashdot has to offer; it's not part of the niche I inhabit in the rather large world of film production. However, since I am not ignorant of the film world, I wish the focus on cultural stories at slashdot especially involving film gave press and attention to those who do deserve it.
For all the talk of illegal movie downloading here I have yet to see a story on how DVD is turning the movie business into a primarily direct to video format. How technologies are being adopted and incorporated that offer less quality than what you've been getting analog for the past 100 years.
However, I will sing the praises of a guy like Shane Carruth, who I do not know even tangenitally, whose film did not get seen as it deserved to, and who is infinitely more capable and skilled and ingenious than any fan fiction filmmaker. He deserves the attention.
If you want to have fun, go dress up at San Diego Comic Con.
No, that's what I'm saying... People like you should be getting more attention, more resources, more praise. I'd rather sit through a shoddy no budget handmade film shot on digital video if it at least attempts to be somewhat unique than a million more legitimate Star Wars films made by Lucas himself.
For that matter has there been a single fan fiction film that has yet to get a director a single real job. No. Because like it or not and how the system eventually co opts originality, filmmakers who are talented who at least try to channel their influences or aim for complete originality do get noticed and funded.
I think hey if kids do this, fair play to them. But grown adults wasting their time and effort... There isn't a single thing in Revelations that surpasses the delivery of dialogue or character or emotion in Ep. 1 and 2... And that's saying A LOT.
This isn't about issues of copyright - but a minor rant about the attention paid to every nerd's attempt to craft their own little aside in an established universe.
The production tools the average person can get their hands on today are staggering. And yet we continually praise people for making films that show an absolute dearth of original imagination and inspiration. Yet audiences complain continually about how Hollywood shows no originality itself.
All the time spent on Revelations could've been put into crafting a story that would be infinitely more intelligent and challenging than any large scale expensive production. I want to see handmade films that offer the expansive ideas in real science fiction and fantasy that the expense of large scale moviemaking prohibits.
Shane Carruth spent probably as much money on the film Primer, a completely original and not at all amateurish looking film that fits perfectly into the comprehension and intelligence of the slashdot audience. But instead any time a bunch of uninspired morons use their time to knock off and emulate and continue the tyranny of imagination that a thousand executives push on audiences like Robert McKee or endless abortions engineered from a cursory reading of Joseph Cambpell, nerds freak out.
Own yourselves. Use those tools to make original, inspired, unique works of art. Stop making and continuing dreck based up on dreck, especially when you don't even have the option to afford hairstylists who'd make your film look as good as the original.
I do use Audio Hijack - I mean more generally for the user who doesn't want to go through all that hassle. In fact, I'd say that the Arcade Fire's KCRW session is the thing I've listened to most in 2005 so far. Last year I grabbed a CBC live recording of the Decemberists using said programming.
Since I work with musicians peripherally I believe they should be paid fairly, likewise shows that like should be creative in developing ways to cater to people like me who don't live in Los Angeles. While I don't like the DJs, the programming is excellent. Because my work is so demanding, I'd much rather pay say 6$ to download directly off the itms such a thing in as high a quality direct audio rip in a few minutes. And I don't have time to waste looking for torrents. Likewise, anyone could download the aac and capture it with the excellent Audio Hijack.
The distribution mechanisms need to change not just past CDs - radio and TV need to catch up to, because hobbyists and hackers out there are shifting the paradigm and again they're lagging.
Make my iPod like TiVo... There's a radio show I like in L.A. called Morning Comes Eclectic on KCRW. I'd pay a small fee to every morning sync my iPod on the way out the door to download the entire program from the morning and have it last for say, five days before expiring. People can get commercial free the radio programs they want directly in the genre they wish without fiddling.
Apple would do well to look at PodCasting and figure out how to bring large name radio broadcasts such as this (or say NPR's This American Life) to the iPod.
Slashdot Mirror
You should contact the legal firm of Spiro Moss Barness, etc... They are one of many firms united in a class action lawsuit about the Thompson DVD drives that were used in the Xbox. Microsoft seem to have been aware of the lack of quality in these drives as later models used different manufacturers. Despite this, if you talk to their customer service reps, they continue to ask you if your discs are dirty despite the fact you tell them you just bought the damn game.
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I don't give a rat's ass about Sony's problems. I'm here to ask about the awful consumer experience I had with my original Xbox and what exactly is the truth about this new product. Here are links that show what a known issue those drives were.
http://sentientcreations.com/xboxIssues/problem.p
http://www.llamma.com/xbox/Repairs/xbox_dvd_repai
Now there's an entire market based upon replacing your Xbox's DVD drive with a better one such as Samsung.
Microsoft's support solution: clean the disc. No matter how many times you tell them the disc is brand new, they say it's a dirty disc.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb
Then there was the power supply issue. A recall in which power cords were issued to cover up shoddy circuitry that could and did cause house fires. Mostly due to bad soldering. In the recall, older Xboxes were given power cords with breakers, so in the event of a short, you may burn out your Xbox but at least your house won't burn down.
http://s4.invisionfree.com/Popular_Technology/ar/
So a few weeks ago we started to see Xbox 360s in demo retail models showing the dreaded Error 74. Photograph of it here.
http://joystiq.com/entry/1234000480066825/
Now we have reports of crashes that yes, are online and could be from a vocal minority, but I have never heard of or owned a console that crashes the way photographs show us is happening to the 360 - and let's remember the people complaining about it are the ones who braved the cold and the nuisance of picking one up.
http://www.kotaku.com/gaming/xbox-360/hours-old-a
Now apparently there is a fix in the form of suspending the power supply. People are finding it's working. Ergo, the power supply is defective. Just like the one on the original Xbox which was RECALLED.
Whatever marketing spiel Microsoft want to give, I want for them to answer one thing. What exactly is Error 74 and Error 79 - what does it mean is happening to the box. They have refused, as they did with the Thompson DVD drive, to let us know what is going wrong. Even if it isolated. Does it bode poorly for the future? Why is there a SPECIFIC error message already in the box's OS that is happening to people?
Now we know for certain that the machine is not only prone to overheating, there is an inbuilt error message related to it.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/907533/
And did you hear about how the tech support person told that guy to "wipe his video cables with a soft cloth"? Too rich.
It still played.
3
They also threw it out a car going 50 miles an hour which led to scratches which were awful but the screen still looked readable. Look at the pictures here:
http://arstechnica.com/reviews/hardware/nano.ars/
I have yet to see a single picture from a compainer that matches the devastation they are communicating in words. All iPods have always scratched. iPods are pretty. Getting them dirty or scratched is doubly frustrating because they are so pretty. But this story is a lot of kerfluffle about nothing.
Initially I read that the screen scratches easily which leads to it not being usable whatsoever, like a shuffle. That does not seem to be the case.
Right, so you've negated your own point. They've confused developers and customers. If you want added content you'll need to purchase (x). If you're a developer, you need to plan for the contingency of not having feature (x). Since a group of your customers won't have it, why bother putting it in. I don't care how easy it is to plug it in. It's a mixed message to both ends of the market, which is stupid.
It's basically an extension of the whole idea of charging us for content everywhere they can in bits and pieces in order to make some more money. The Xbox marketplace is the future of the EA dominated, death to beautiful gaming. Want a better sword? Pay extra for it and have it downloaded to your additionally purchased harddrive while looking at these sponsored ads. Want to drive the Ferrari in the new Forza? Just buy it on marketplace.
Also, I have yet to see it confirmed anywhere that the 360 is shipping with a hard drive. That's not doomsaying.
But my priority problem is the hard drive. Basically Allard has told developers to make sure their games don't need it. Wasn't Morrowind possible on the original Xbox because of the harddrive? By removing this from the bundled equation, a great deal of gaming innovation goes out the window. Also, how the hell is live content going to work without one? Ohhh, guess you're going to have to buy one on top of your Live subscription after all.
.wmv files on a PowerMac (development kit) sometime. Doesn't work so well.
Also you should try running hi-def
Then you've got the Team Ninja at Tecmo dude talking about how there's barely enough room on conventional DVDs for the games he wants to make now in terms of art assets data AND hi-def cut scenes. He has yet to state what console Ninja Gaiden 2 will appear on, one of the few must have Xbox games. What's astonishing to me isn't so much what's being passed onto the consumer, it's what they're telling developers.
Why buy now when later I'll be able to get an HD-DVD compatible mode. Why bother when the hard drive is being removed from the equation and will cost extra as an addon, thereby limiting developers' use of its potential, thereby removing the outstanding feature of the original Xbox.
I got to see the Xbox 360 in closed doors demos at E3 this year, and I have to say despite the ringing hype endorsement of the PS3 over a prerendered demo (Killzone) which everyone on the floor as developers could name who created it - the Xbox 360 really did blow me away technically and the games were impressive looking and desirable - especially the new EA sports iterations (not to say anything of their gameplay and the company's lack of innovation).
But this latest news really puts me off bothering to pick one up soon. I recently had a ton of games stolen and went to eBay to load up on games I lost in the theft that were out of print. When it came time to find all the titles for the Xbox, there were very, very few I even wanted to bother replacing.
The current lineup, Call of Duty 2 excepted (which looked exceptional at E3 running in a limited capacity), does nothing to make me jones for Xbox 360. It still is a box dedicated towards dumbed down PC games played on a television. For now, I'll wait and see if an HD-DVD model ever comes out. I'll pick up a PS3 and use it as my Blu-Ray player.
Because OSX is so simple to grasp that it's like learning to drive a golf cart after being a truck driver in the world that The Road Warrior took place in.
First you'd have to get people to RTFA, for starters.
I'm often amazed however at how many non tech literate people I know simply refuse to even try OSX even when I offer to show them how to. These are people who are completely frustrated by Windows but stick with it only because it's what they know and cannot even fathom an alternative.
To clarify: oh yes it will work an SDTV... But the 360 sure looks a hell of a lot better on HDTVs. A hell of a lot. It's going to be the only way to get the beautuous resolution and 16:9 framing that all games will have ready if you have an HDTV.
Make no mistake, both Xbox 360 and PS3 were designed to sell more HDTVs.
You can get decent HDTV sets now for $500 by the way.
Because every developer on the floor knew that the most impressive demos for the PS3 were totally prerendered. They could even name the people who worked on them. And for some reason no one in the games journalism community would point blank persistently ask Sony and groups like Axis Animation what the deal was. Look at this article where it's all speculation and guessing. The public deserves to know that what they were shown is not exactly how a game is going to look on PS3. Meanwhile, closed door demos of the Xbox 360 were actually impressive. I don't work for either company or work in games for that matter, though I do love them. I am totally neutral about both machines. My bias is negative towards Microsoft as I'm a Mac zealot and my Xbox is my least favorite console. I went into E3 feeling Microsoft had blown it. Then I saw what it could do, held the controller in my hand, and now am impressed and rather excited about the Xbox 360. And privately a developer told me that they aren't anywhere near having the machines run full speed or utilizing their full power in the very obvious Mac G5 dev kits they're running everything from. But I will say this: HDTV is going to be a requirement. The PS3 remains vaporware in my mind - I recall claims of rendering scenes of the Final Fantasy movie on PS2's "emotion engine". And ultimately what's even sadder is there were a mere handful of games at E3 that made me excited. Okami, the new Zelda, We Love Kattamari, Shadow of the Collossus, Stubbs the Zombie, and that's pretty much it. Horsepower may be here, but games are as stunted, as juvenile, and as retreaded as ever. Future marines vs. monsters and bimbos galore. Meanwhile next gen gaming is going to cost more, Microsoft have shunted most PC development to the Xbox, killing the richness of PC games for the most part other than MMORPGs. And now we're going to have live updating advertising in games, along with additional content that will have to be purchased. Want that sword +2? You can buy it for $4.99. Welcome to gamer hell.
Why do I not care for any games or apps or cameras or music being stored on my phone?
Because currently, and I'm sure this applies to a hell of a lot of travellers - I can't turn on my phone mid flight to listen to some music. Do phone manufacturers understand this in the slightest? What's the point of putting all my portable music into a device that I cannot use say in my car on a plane, probably the two most common places other than walking or exercising where such devices are used.
I own a Motorola RAZR V3 and have found it's nowhere near worth $500. The menu system and phone book are a joke, the battery life is negligible if bluetooth or any serious use of the screen comes into play. The interface is absolutely hideous. Internet via cell phone even to check on movie times is nightmarishly slow and pointless and probably costs more than calling a service. The camera often gets smudged by virtue of its placement and the photos arre hideous.
Anything else I need to do - I turn on my powerbook, latch onto a wifi connection. Done.
So what I'm left with is an expensive phone that has only served as a status symbol and little more.
For all the talk of iPod competitors, yes it is priced more - but furthermore no single device has music software and an interface anywhere near as good, and that's to say nothing of the preamp and headphones quality. My Razr can play MP3s, horribly, distortedly.
Phones are ubiquitous and not a single sci fi writer saw that coming - but here in the US we are lagging far behind some other worldwide markets in what can be done with such devices.
That's what I mean about the zero point of production though - you spent $20k on DV gear when you could've sourced on film. Our video cost under $6k and we were incredibly resourceful. DV shooting at quality still requires money - I think the dolly grip is one of the most underrated members of a crew and good ones deserve to get paid, for example. The problem is as a production company you can't keep expecting to people to work for free, and in my opinion they deserve to get paid for what they do.
In my ideal world labels would spend $40k for their bands on a video. We'd have middle budget videos, that sort of sweet spot where something technically proficient with a pro crew can be made but it's not such an enormous investment it requires comissioners to get involved in making a video that yet again looks like a bunch of dudes lip syncing performance while the cinematographer emulates the look of Fight Club and arbitrary cuts take you into some ridiculous story usually involving some hot chick.
But in my ideal world there's no such thing as the legal payola of the indepdent radio promoter, nor Viacom's stranglehold, and MTV2 would play a broad array of music programming all day long especially relfecting the way the Internet has changed music - people listen to The Shins in Itunes followed by Kelly Clarkson followed by Outkast. Issues of cool aside, that's a fact today - people have access to a broad array of various music crisscrossing genres. I wish "music television" would relfect that.
Good luck to you, too... As tough as it is being an independent filmmaker, I worry for all souls who have to deal with A&R people.
Here's the torrent.
My problem with this argument though is that content production prices will not approach zero. Or it shouldn't. You need a decent crew and if you ask me high end sourcing to really compete with the giant videos. Even a format like HDV is just not good enough in my opinion.
Half the budget on this video went to sourcing on film and the steps necessary in post production to produce a high end format ready for broadcast. The other half went on traditional expenses like costuming, food, location lockdown. Everyone worked for free. But we can't ask the same people to work for free on the next one.
The reason so many amazing videos came out of commissions from the UK in the 90s (all those Spike Jonze, Michel Gondry, and Chris Cunningham pieces or say all of Radiohead's videos) is due to the mid budget video - something we don't really have in the US anymore. Now it's either the $5 million budgeted video, or the $10k video.
The problem is in the low budget, indie music world that there isn't really a point to making a video; which I as someone who wants to get jobs making videos understands. Every video is a gamble in the hopes of making it to rotation on MTV. That's a fact.
But the push from MTV is dependent on its playlist and brand attitude. Currently MTV2 decided to change and become another whole network and focus on major label pop punk and hip hop. For the most part all other music gets shunted to one hour a week timeslots. The other push is that there's some weird unwritten rule that a music video must contain primarily performance footage.
Result being - creative stagnation. And the bands who could make really interesting videos not having enough money to go to town when they realize how limited their distribution options are.
I'm hoping more people pick up the bittorrent torch and run with it and it leads to a blossoming of creativity in music videos. Artists who don't have the tools of a major label should add this to their arsenal.
Well we really thought it would be a good way to share a video that was made with their fans in mind. The band couldn't afford to host it. MTV2 botched the airing in ways I don't care to ennumerate. Their persistent logo is pretty big, by the way. So we figured hey their fans are smart, if we can convince them to use bittorrent the least we can do with this thing is let them share it amongst themselves. Why have them wait for an MTV2 airing to capture, encode, and distribute themselves. Give them the highest quality we can directly instead. We thought a few hundred people would do that. So far we've had a number of downloads equal to half the people who bought their last album. Here's a direct link to the torrent. If the video offends you, I apologize. And recommend you check out this as an alternative.
I should've mentioned - the band are not on a major label.
The album and video came out in the same week. A week later the band found themselves without the support of a major label in the Billboard Top 200 and in the top 10 at iTMS and top 20 at amazon.
We released a video we made for Portland band The Decemberists to bittorrent on purpose. We've had much greater impact from that than the few times MTV2 aired it.
Wired article details how and why.
For everyone concerned some four weeks later it's been an enormous success.
To distribute a music video by the indie rock band The Decemberists. It was intentionally broadcast using bittorrent. Wired article. We deliberately posted it on bittorrent knowing that the band couldn't afford the bandwidth to host a high quality version of the video and we would hardly get air time on MTV2 anyway. I thought at best their hardcore fans on the message board would download it, maybe a few hunrded. We should clear 6000 downloads tonight. So there are examples of artists using bittorrent legally and legitimately.
I directed a video recently for a band called The Decemberists who aren't on a major label. They have, however, drummed up a lot of mainstream press notice and attention and good sales for a true indie label band. Once the video was done, however, I got my obligatory MTV2 airings at weird times of the night. So how were we going to share it? There'd be a cruddy low res version which is barely what the band could afford to host. So we distributed via bittorrent directly. We literally gave their fans as high quality file as we could. In one week using only bittorrent and not including the low res Quicktime, we've had over 5000 downloads. This is in the same week that Universal Music Group (one of the titans) has declared that music videos will no longer be streamed for free. Wired ran an article with all the details here: Wired article on how to get around MTV And now? The band is at number 7 on the iTunes music store and 19 at amazon. That is with the marketing budget of a small indepdendent label. Rewards come to those artists who embrace and understand how to use this tech. BTW i kept trying to submit this story but to no avail.
Name someone who worked on a Star Wars / Star Trek fan film who has been discovered by a big name and gone on to make a theatrically distributed motion picture.
Rather, individuals out there may borrow from other genres or sensibilities or influences but they invest within it their own unique consciousness. Ask a Kerry Conran (Sky Captain) or Shane Carruth or for that matter a James Cameron or Peter Jackson. The latter two who were enormously influenced and inspired by Star Wars to go out and become filmmakers on their own terms. But neither decided to create their own little Star Warrs film, despite having had the ingenuity to do so in their youth on the 16mm shorts they made.
This isn't to rain on anyone's parade - there's some wonderful technical achievement present in the discussed trailer. But the usual community theater level acting and rather silly casting. But what galls me is that the tools for personal, singular, unique filmmaking have fallen into the hands of people who have a chance to challenge the central authority of the studio system; and united with enough friends and volunteers something truly astonishing can be made - but all the geek community does with that opportunity is spit out more and more fan fiction films. We can do better.
Any film school that would insist students ape and mimic other filmmakers rather than develop their own unique voices will find they aren't producing many working filmmakers at the higher level. Much filmmaking by its very nature is derivative... Asking to actuallly bury yourself in one of the most annoying atrributes is pointless.
And what of Star Wars fan films in particular? Remember when George Lucas chose a cartoon which extolled the virtues of Star Wars merchandising as the most creative of the bunch? What's that director up to now?
I'll be thinking about your comments next time I watch my work air on MTV.
Also when I go to deposit the bonus check I got from working on one of the highest grossing movies of last year (which incidentally, although entirely digital, did not feature a single crew member who came from the world of fan filmmaking).
I don't need or want the coverage slashdot has to offer; it's not part of the niche I inhabit in the rather large world of film production. However, since I am not ignorant of the film world, I wish the focus on cultural stories at slashdot especially involving film gave press and attention to those who do deserve it.
For all the talk of illegal movie downloading here I have yet to see a story on how DVD is turning the movie business into a primarily direct to video format. How technologies are being adopted and incorporated that offer less quality than what you've been getting analog for the past 100 years.
However, I will sing the praises of a guy like Shane Carruth, who I do not know even tangenitally, whose film did not get seen as it deserved to, and who is infinitely more capable and skilled and ingenious than any fan fiction filmmaker. He deserves the attention.
If you want to have fun, go dress up at San Diego Comic Con.
No, that's what I'm saying... People like you should be getting more attention, more resources, more praise. I'd rather sit through a shoddy no budget handmade film shot on digital video if it at least attempts to be somewhat unique than a million more legitimate Star Wars films made by Lucas himself.
For that matter has there been a single fan fiction film that has yet to get a director a single real job. No. Because like it or not and how the system eventually co opts originality, filmmakers who are talented who at least try to channel their influences or aim for complete originality do get noticed and funded.
I think hey if kids do this, fair play to them. But grown adults wasting their time and effort... There isn't a single thing in Revelations that surpasses the delivery of dialogue or character or emotion in Ep. 1 and 2... And that's saying A LOT.
Forgot to choose HTML when I posted - Info on Shane Carruth's Primer - now with a link.
This isn't about issues of copyright - but a minor rant about the attention paid to every nerd's attempt to craft their own little aside in an established universe.
The production tools the average person can get their hands on today are staggering. And yet we continually praise people for making films that show an absolute dearth of original imagination and inspiration. Yet audiences complain continually about how Hollywood shows no originality itself.
All the time spent on Revelations could've been put into crafting a story that would be infinitely more intelligent and challenging than any large scale expensive production. I want to see handmade films that offer the expansive ideas in real science fiction and fantasy that the expense of large scale moviemaking prohibits.
Shane Carruth spent probably as much money on the film Primer, a completely original and not at all amateurish looking film that fits perfectly into the comprehension and intelligence of the slashdot audience. But instead any time a bunch of uninspired morons use their time to knock off and emulate and continue the tyranny of imagination that a thousand executives push on audiences like Robert McKee or endless abortions engineered from a cursory reading of Joseph Cambpell, nerds freak out.
Own yourselves. Use those tools to make original, inspired, unique works of art. Stop making and continuing dreck based up on dreck, especially when you don't even have the option to afford hairstylists who'd make your film look as good as the original.
I do use Audio Hijack - I mean more generally for the user who doesn't want to go through all that hassle. In fact, I'd say that the Arcade Fire's KCRW session is the thing I've listened to most in 2005 so far. Last year I grabbed a CBC live recording of the Decemberists using said programming.
Since I work with musicians peripherally I believe they should be paid fairly, likewise shows that like should be creative in developing ways to cater to people like me who don't live in Los Angeles. While I don't like the DJs, the programming is excellent. Because my work is so demanding, I'd much rather pay say 6$ to download directly off the itms such a thing in as high a quality direct audio rip in a few minutes. And I don't have time to waste looking for torrents. Likewise, anyone could download the aac and capture it with the excellent Audio Hijack.
The distribution mechanisms need to change not just past CDs - radio and TV need to catch up to, because hobbyists and hackers out there are shifting the paradigm and again they're lagging.
Make my iPod like TiVo... There's a radio show I like in L.A. called Morning Comes Eclectic on KCRW. I'd pay a small fee to every morning sync my iPod on the way out the door to download the entire program from the morning and have it last for say, five days before expiring. People can get commercial free the radio programs they want directly in the genre they wish without fiddling.
Apple would do well to look at PodCasting and figure out how to bring large name radio broadcasts such as this (or say NPR's This American Life) to the iPod.