LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA- Inspired by the blockbuster series of movies from the 1970's & 80's, aspiring filmmaker George Lucas has added his own project to the growing array of Star Wars fan films. While its production values far outpace other fan films, it bears all the hallmarks of garage cinema.
To prove that imitation is indeed the sincerest form of blatant copyright violation, Lucas premiered his "film" at a local Star Wars convention. Lucas' mother, in whose basement he has lived for the last twelve years, is reportedly proud of her son's accomplishment. However, she also felt the love story between Padmé and Anakin was forced and poorly written.
Like most fan-generated "films," George's was not a film at all. Lucas admits that he shot everything on digital video, about one quarter the image density of standard 35mm film. While he maintains that the choice was an artistic one, the issue of cost is undeniable.
During the screening, many patrons complained of the blurry look of the film print. A defensive Lucas reminded them that it looked much better on his computer monitor.
"If you look at color retention and light response, it would have looked much better on film," offered local film buff Wes Antilles. "I would have let him borrow my Super16 camera. He's too proud to ask, I guess."
The film suffers other ills common to fan films. Even the B-movie title, Attack of the Clones, is a dead giveaway of its amateur origin.
While some critics say that story elements take a back seat to flashy special effects, it would be difficult to argue that Lucas underwrote the film. The first two thirds of the film consist of nothing but mouths moving, gums flapping.
"I've seen this kind of thing ruin otherwise promising films," says UCLA film professor Leonard Calrissian. "Independent films often turn out too 'talky' because amateur directors are often too in love with their script to cut unnecessary or forced dialogue."
The most common complaint so far is that the film is not very much fun to watch. One walks away from Attack of the Clones wondering for whom it was made. Like most independent/amateur cinema, it is likely that the movie exists mostly for its own sake.
"I've got lots of other friends who do this kind of thing," said one local independent filmmaker. "Every time I run into them, they demand that I watch their latest project. It's getting to the point where I'm avoiding people. I haven't talked to George for over a year."
Unable to pay real actors and having run out of available friends, Lucas had to create many of the characters digitally. In spite of their obvious unreality, these digimuppets do a great deal to mask the awful acting and terrible direction common to such efforts.
There is no word yet whether the owners of the Star Wars trademark and franchise will do with Mr. Lucas. Clearly Attack of the Clones violates more than a dozen heavily-guarded copyrights while creating unsanctioned and [according to some] inconsistent backstory for established Star Wars characters.
In spite of its problems, most audience members agreed that Attack of the Clones was one of the best five fan films they had seen this year. Some even went so far as to compare it with the much-loved The Lego Strikes Back from 1996. Not bad for a first effort.
Inspired by the slightly-warmer-than-luke response to Attack of the Clones, Lucas announced plans to begin work on a sequel- as soon as he can come up with a better title.
Harlan Ellison is an excellent example of why one should never know what one's favorite authors are like as people.
I loved Alone Against Tomorrow and his [imho] groundbreaking novella The Region Between. He was my undisputed king of unapologetically weird 70's-era sci fi.
I would say "love" but it's impossible to pick them up again without thinking of his trite rants on the [old] Sci Fi Channel. Now he's suing AOL for serving up content he explicitly asked for.
Scorpion King Wows Moviegoers, Closeted Homosexuals
If you ever thought pro-wrestling was a bit too macho not to be gay, read this article: http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail .php?id=55 2 an older one on the same subject: http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail .php?id=4
That's right. Keyboards are antiquated, but they allow for fast, relatively accurate input. Text to speech is slower and less accurate [for now] but easier. However, imagine a text-to-speech office- the noise would drive productivity down and cases of workplace violence way up.
What we need is the MindReader6000, a wireless input device to translate brainwaves & EEG data into text and interface controls- replacing both the mouse and the keyboard.
Yes, it would be a steep learning curve at first. And yes, the control units would have to be tuned to the individual people using it. But people have to learn to type, too, don't they?
I've seen them in my http logs a few times over the past few weeks. Their site says that they "empower our clients to retain control over their names and brands on the web." I may be wrong, but that sounds a lot like marketing-speak for "corporate bully."
Their tag line: "monitoring and protecting your brand equity."
Check the connotations of the individual words:
Monitor is a fancy way of saying "invasion of privacy," but don't worry, we're invading someone else's privacy.
Protect carries images of military campaigns and gunning down burglars in "self-defense."
Brand is a corporate identity, an entity bigger than [and therefore above the laws of] governmental institutions.
I'm running an older browser on a 4-year-old sgi. It sees stylesheets just fine, but I get this bizarre error page everytime I load arena.net.
In fact, [and this is the annoying bit] during the 2 second meta-refresh pause, my browser acutally loads the page. But since it could not display just the right version of Arial, I could not view the page for long.
I'm sure the article is very interesting. I thought of loading on the laptop sitting behind me, but since they're being so snotty about it I think I'll pass.
Let me get this straight: ICANN wants to transform itself into something that looks very much like it does today except with a few more members and a sticker that says "New and improved STRONG formula" on it.
By the time ICANN "gathers consensus and buy-in from various ancillary parties on the direction it wants for how it will make later decisions," users will have grown frustrated enough to not resist a takeover by a Microsoft-like entity- running roughshod over the idea of "openness."
"...but this article addresses the specific concerns of how best to backup these protected CDs, and how to extract the music data at high quality for download to a personal MP3 listening device."
Does anyone really believe that music consumers "backup" thier discs to mp3 for purely "personal" use? Let's at least be adult enough not to sugar coat this: we want to get around Cactus Data Shield because we want to "share" [or steal] music.
Make your argument based on non-profit-based music sharing [we're spreading the music around and not making any money at it], not on some obviously disingenuous use of the language.
If it isn't stealing, and people really do enjoy the convenience and portability of technologies like mp3, no one is going to listen until the user community grows up enough to level with itself.
If the music industry is going to pull its collective head out of its collective cornhole, we're the only ones who can do the pulling.
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA- Under pressure from the Motion Picture Association of America, executives at New Line Cinema have decided to scrap the title of the upcoming Austin Powers film originally known as Goldmember. The film's producers immediately began surveying area sixth-graders for new title ideas. In just four hours, they had gathered half a dozen Bond-based double entendres including:
Thunderballs
Decapussy
Her Majesty's Shag-o-licious Secret
Dr. Yes Yes Oh, God Yes!
From Russia With Scabies
The theatrical trailer for the film certainly indicates that the new film will find a way to break new creative ground. The 2-minute short appears to be a parody of the original 1997 film.
We spoke with director Jay Roach. "It's a copy of the dance sequence from the first movie, but with all small actors. Get it? It's a mini Austin! The wig, the teeth, even a tiny sports car. Ha. Little people are funny."
Let's all pretend it ended after season 7
on
The End of The X-Files
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
It's like watching a friend marry someone you don't like. When it ends badly, you are neither completely sad nor completely happy.
Agnst over the show's direction, the carrot-and-stick approach to the Mulder/Scully relationship, and the exodus of the show's better writers has been building up for years.
If it weren't for the failure of Milennium, Harsh Realm & TLG, the show would have gone off with a satisfying bang years ago. Sad, really.
SAN FRANSISCO, CALIFORNIA- Instead of stuffing old iMac guts in a new candy-colored shell, Apple has stuffed their old iMac guts into a candy-shaped shell, specifically a Hershey's Kiss.
SAN FRANSISCO, CALIFORNIA- It's the same old story: rumors abound of Apple
releasing a ground-breaking product; Apple threatens to sue/kill/maim various web
sites for publishing pictures in advance of Jobs' keynote address; Long-neglected
Mac users hold hands and watch the webcast with saucer-wide eyes; the whole
thing turns out to be another color/shape of iMac. Hurray.
Just like the rum-soaked father figure who says "this time it's going to be
different" every time he blows the family savings and crashes the car, Apple has
issued a statement that this is, indeed, going to be different. Instead of stuffing
the relatively slow iMac guts in a new candy-colored shell, Apple has stuffed their
relatively slow iMac guts into a candy-SHAPED shell, specifically a Hershey's Kiss.
LOTR=Crappiest Xmas Movie Ever?
A movie review parody contends that LOTR is the crappiest Christmas movie ever. Again, it is a parody. Unbunch panties, please.
Another Short Barefoot Boy Saved by Fabulous Shirt
Broadband, stop yer whinin' and get on the cart!
on
Why ADCo?
·
· Score: 2
"But I'm not dead yet."
"You'll soon be stone dead."
"I'm getting better."
One thing we can say for sure, 2001 has proven that a lot of technologies we all believed were slam dunks only a year ago are looking less and less like sure things.
ABC's Monday Night Football suspended HDTV broadcasts indefinitely. DSL companies are dropping like flies. And now cable broadband is starting to waver.
Perhaps my belief in technological manifest destiny was unwarranted. Anybody want an HD monitor cheap?
The Hindenberg disaster meets 9/11- that's what we may very well get when we combine hydrogen-based fuel cells with air travel. Only this time it won't be terrorism but some minor maintenance foul-up that kills thousands of people.
Why not put wings on nuclear submarines?
Fuel cells, high-def TV, Linux: they all make so much sense, if only we could manufacture enough consumer interest...
Average guys bumbling around in space, making all kinds of amusing [albeit costly and dangerous] mistakes... sounds interesting. But isn't there already something like this?
The Chinese leadership says that the Internet represents a threat to traditional Chinese culture, but it doesn't make sense. Imagine a world where China was as wired as the US...
[wavy dream sequence effect]
Spam floods Chinese in-boxes: "A no-money-down real estate opportunity for YOU, comrade!" "Refinance your hut today!" and "OMG! ULL CUM! HOT PROLETARIAN AXXXION!"
American Internet porn companies begin to target this new market, making downloadable titles featuring the likeness of Chairman Mao Tse "Swollen" Tung.
You can talk all you want about how you don't want to see the movie. Believe me, you will. AOL/Time/Warner have assured me that you will definitely see this film at least once.
There is no escape.
A few humbly-submitted links for supplementary reading:
Linux game development taking Mac model?
on
Rune for Linux Review
·
· Score: 2, Redundant
Mac games tend to come out 6 to 12 after the PC version [with as many bugs as the 1.0 PC release]. How long ago did Rune come out for PC? It looks like Linux developers are taking a page from the Mac game development playbook (porting PC games after they have proven their worth [and become passe] ).
The drawn-out death of Loki is a great example. How far can you get asking people to buy a game they probably already own on a different platoform? And a domographic that isn't used to paying for software, either?
I built one some time back to run the database-driven Scott Adams text adventures using only Javascript and PHP- since even the best Java tended to break my browser.
It works well on older versions of Netscape as well as IE 5. Opera users have reported some trouble.
Funny. My ancient Netscape for Irix works just fine. I believed this story completely for a time because I had no real interest in msn.com. I'm sure they're locking out some browsers, but why not all?
[kidding]
Hey, this is just a trick to get us to try it- and thereby up their hitcount!
[/kidding]
Ah, Windows. Be it a backdoor in Outlook or a macro in Office, virus writers cannot get enough of Windows.
Idea: Purchase a brand new computer to support a buggy OS so that you can run all those fancy new viruses.
[true story]
I know of a guy who updated his ActiveX in order to view an attachment that later turned out to be a particularly nasty virus.
[/true story]
Slashdot Mirror
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA- Inspired by the blockbuster series of movies from the 1970's & 80's, aspiring filmmaker George Lucas has added his own project to the growing array of Star Wars fan films. While its production values far outpace other fan films, it bears all the hallmarks of garage cinema.
To prove that imitation is indeed the sincerest form of blatant copyright violation, Lucas premiered his "film" at a local Star Wars convention. Lucas' mother, in whose basement he has lived for the last twelve years, is reportedly proud of her son's accomplishment. However, she also felt the love story between Padmé and Anakin was forced and poorly written.
Like most fan-generated "films," George's was not a film at all. Lucas admits that he shot everything on digital video, about one quarter the image density of standard 35mm film. While he maintains that the choice was an artistic one, the issue of cost is undeniable.
During the screening, many patrons complained of the blurry look of the film print. A defensive Lucas reminded them that it looked much better on his computer monitor.
"If you look at color retention and light response, it would have looked much better on film," offered local film buff Wes Antilles. "I would have let him borrow my Super16 camera. He's too proud to ask, I guess."
The film suffers other ills common to fan films. Even the B-movie title, Attack of the Clones, is a dead giveaway of its amateur origin.
While some critics say that story elements take a back seat to flashy special effects, it would be difficult to argue that Lucas underwrote the film. The first two thirds of the film consist of nothing but mouths moving, gums flapping.
"I've seen this kind of thing ruin otherwise promising films," says UCLA film professor Leonard Calrissian. "Independent films often turn out too 'talky' because amateur directors are often too in love with their script to cut unnecessary or forced dialogue."
The most common complaint so far is that the film is not very much fun to watch. One walks away from Attack of the Clones wondering for whom it was made. Like most independent/amateur cinema, it is likely that the movie exists mostly for its own sake.
"I've got lots of other friends who do this kind of thing," said one local independent filmmaker. "Every time I run into them, they demand that I watch their latest project. It's getting to the point where I'm avoiding people. I haven't talked to George for over a year."
Unable to pay real actors and having run out of available friends, Lucas had to create many of the characters digitally. In spite of their obvious unreality, these digimuppets do a great deal to mask the awful acting and terrible direction common to such efforts.
There is no word yet whether the owners of the Star Wars trademark and franchise will do with Mr. Lucas. Clearly Attack of the Clones violates more than a dozen heavily-guarded copyrights while creating unsanctioned and [according to some] inconsistent backstory for established Star Wars characters.
In spite of its problems, most audience members agreed that Attack of the Clones was one of the best five fan films they had seen this year. Some even went so far as to compare it with the much-loved The Lego Strikes Back from 1996. Not bad for a first effort.
Inspired by the slightly-warmer-than-luke response to Attack of the Clones, Lucas announced plans to begin work on a sequel- as soon as he can come up with a better title.
[the above article is from ridiculopathy.com]
Harlan Ellison is an excellent example of why one should never know what one's favorite authors are like as people.
I loved Alone Against Tomorrow and his [imho] groundbreaking novella The Region Between. He was my undisputed king of unapologetically weird 70's-era sci fi.
I would say "love" but it's impossible to pick them up again without thinking of his trite rants on the [old] Sci Fi Channel. Now he's suing AOL for serving up content he explicitly asked for.
Harlan, Harlan. Feh.
Scorpion King Wows Moviegoers, Closeted Homosexuals
l .php?id=55 2l .php?id=4
If you ever thought pro-wrestling was a bit too macho not to be gay, read this article:
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detai
an older one on the same subject:
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detai
That's right. Keyboards are antiquated, but they allow for fast, relatively accurate input. Text to speech is slower and less accurate [for now] but easier. However, imagine a text-to-speech office- the noise would drive productivity down and cases of workplace violence way up.
What we need is the MindReader6000, a wireless input device to translate brainwaves & EEG data into text and interface controls- replacing both the mouse and the keyboard.
Yes, it would be a steep learning curve at first. And yes, the control units would have to be tuned to the individual people using it. But people have to learn to type, too, don't they?
Now, all I have to do is invent the damn thing...
"All these worlds are yours-- except EUROPA. Attempt no landings there."
Their tag line: "monitoring and protecting your brand equity."
Check the connotations of the individual words:
Again, I may be [and probably am] wrong.
I'm running an older browser on a 4-year-old sgi. It sees stylesheets just fine, but I get this bizarre error page everytime I load arena.net.
In fact, [and this is the annoying bit] during the 2 second meta-refresh pause, my browser acutally loads the page. But since it could not display just the right version of Arial, I could not view the page for long.
I'm sure the article is very interesting. I thought of loading on the laptop sitting behind me, but since they're being so snotty about it I think I'll pass.
By the time ICANN "gathers consensus and buy-in from various ancillary parties on the direction it wants for how it will make later decisions," users will have grown frustrated enough to not resist a takeover by a Microsoft-like entity- running roughshod over the idea of "openness."
Does anyone really believe that music consumers "backup" thier discs to mp3 for purely "personal" use? Let's at least be adult enough not to sugar coat this: we want to get around Cactus Data Shield because we want to "share" [or steal] music.
Make your argument based on non-profit-based music sharing [we're spreading the music around and not making any money at it], not on some obviously disingenuous use of the language.
If it isn't stealing, and people really do enjoy the convenience and portability of technologies like mp3, no one is going to listen until the user community grows up enough to level with itself.
If the music industry is going to pull its collective head out of its collective cornhole, we're the only ones who can do the pulling.
The theatrical trailer for the film certainly indicates that the new film will find a way to break new creative ground. The 2-minute short appears to be a parody of the original 1997 film.
We spoke with director Jay Roach. "It's a copy of the dance sequence from the first movie, but with all small actors. Get it? It's a mini Austin! The wig, the teeth, even a tiny sports car. Ha. Little people are funny."
Full Story
Agnst over the show's direction, the carrot-and-stick approach to the Mulder/Scully relationship, and the exodus of the show's better writers has been building up for years.
If it weren't for the failure of Milennium, Harsh Realm & TLG, the show would have gone off with a satisfying bang years ago. Sad, really.
Further reading:
Chris Carter Plots Series Finale- On The Toilet
X-Files: "We're going to dish out answers this time, we swear!"
Itroducing iLamp:
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail.php?di
releasing a ground-breaking product; Apple threatens to sue/kill/maim various web
sites for publishing pictures in advance of Jobs' keynote address; Long-neglected
Mac users hold hands and watch the webcast with saucer-wide eyes; the whole
thing turns out to be another color/shape of iMac. Hurray.
Just like the rum-soaked father figure who says "this time it's going to be
different" every time he blows the family savings and crashes the car, Apple has
issued a statement that this is, indeed, going to be different. Instead of stuffing
the relatively slow iMac guts in a new candy-colored shell, Apple has stuffed their
relatively slow iMac guts into a candy-SHAPED shell, specifically a Hershey's Kiss.
full story: Honey I Melted The iMac
It's a link to another parody/satire year-in-review thingy:
l ay=20011231&id=480
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail.php?disp
Enjoy.
LOTR=Crappiest Xmas Movie Ever?
2 00 11220
A movie review parody contends that LOTR is the crappiest Christmas movie ever. Again, it is a parody. Unbunch panties, please.
Another Short Barefoot Boy Saved by Fabulous Shirt
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/index.php?display=
"You'll soon be stone dead."
"I'm getting better."
One thing we can say for sure, 2001 has proven that a lot of technologies we all believed were slam dunks only a year ago are looking less and less like sure things.
ABC's Monday Night Football suspended HDTV broadcasts indefinitely. DSL companies are dropping like flies. And now cable broadband is starting to waver.
Perhaps my belief in technological manifest destiny was unwarranted. Anybody want an HD monitor cheap?
Fake News Story: Welcome Back To 56k
Wow. I had no idea.
.1 drive update would be incompatible with Win95 because it is so far removed from Win98.
I guess it makes sense that a
[/sarcasm]
The Hindenberg disaster meets 9/11- that's what we may very well get when we combine hydrogen-based fuel cells with air travel. Only this time it won't be terrorism but some minor maintenance foul-up that kills thousands of people.
Why not put wings on nuclear submarines?
Fuel cells, high-def TV, Linux: they all make so much sense, if only we could manufacture enough consumer interest...
Average guys bumbling around in space, making all kinds of amusing [albeit costly and dangerous] mistakes... sounds interesting. But isn't there already something like this?
Average Slobs Get Chance At Space
"Rocket Scientist" no longer conotes incredible intelligence
[wavy dream sequence effect]
Spam floods Chinese in-boxes: "A no-money-down real estate opportunity for YOU, comrade!" "Refinance your hut today!" and "OMG! ULL CUM! HOT PROLETARIAN AXXXION!"
American Internet porn companies begin to target this new market, making downloadable titles featuring the likeness of Chairman Mao Tse "Swollen" Tung.
There is no escape.
A few humbly-submitted links for supplementary reading:
Harry Potter Premieres, Becomes Soul-Sucking Eddy of Ubiquity
"Hairy Potter" Adult Film Franchise Already on 7th Sequel
Mac games tend to come out 6 to 12 after the PC version [with as many bugs as the 1.0 PC release]. How long ago did Rune come out for PC? It looks like Linux developers are taking a page from the Mac game development playbook (porting PC games after they have proven their worth [and become passe] ).
The drawn-out death of Loki is a great example. How far can you get asking people to buy a game they probably already own on a different platoform? And a domographic that isn't used to paying for software, either?
I built one some time back to run the database-driven Scott Adams text adventures using only Javascript and PHP- since even the best Java tended to break my browser.
It works well on older versions of Netscape as well as IE 5. Opera users have reported some trouble.
Here's the link:
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/adv_sa.php
Funny. My ancient Netscape for Irix works just fine. I believed this story completely for a time because I had no real interest in msn.com. I'm sure they're locking out some browsers, but why not all?
[kidding]
Hey, this is just a trick to get us to try it- and thereby up their hitcount!
[/kidding]
Windows X-Con is ready for you!
Ah, Windows. Be it a backdoor in Outlook or a macro in Office, virus writers cannot get enough of Windows.
l ay=20010827
Idea: Purchase a brand new computer to support a buggy OS so that you can run all those fancy new viruses.
[true story]
I know of a guy who updated his ActiveX in order to view an attachment that later turned out to be a particularly nasty virus.
[/true story]
Dangerous New Virus Called "WindowsXP" Poised To Cripple Users
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/news_detail.php?disp