Oscar Shorts

Through the wonderful service of Salon Magazine (for who I pay $30/year for subscriber services), I was able to view 5 of the 2005 Oscar-nominated short films - 3 from the animation category and 2 from live-action. Salon opened up these films for streaming during a 24-hour window.

I really enjoy short films - especially when you can view a few of them at the same time. Two of these shorts in particular I thought were just stunning.

The first one is called "Ryan" and I hope that it wins the animation category. This was an animated documentary by director Chris Lendreth about a famous cartoonist from the 70s - Ryan Larkin - who has since declined and is essentially a panhandler now. The use of some of the most startling animation to help display mental thought and expression was one of the most creative ways of representing a human being that I've ever seen. I love the use of technology when it is used to express something so artful. I really liked this movie and after such a short time felt that I could understand Ryan Larkin better than some other documentaries 2 hours in length.

The second one is called "7:35 In The Morning" and is from Spanish director Nacho Vigalondo. I watched this 3 times in a row because I was simply blown away. It takes place in a very macabre black-and-white cafe setting at - well - 7:35 in the morning. One of the patrons starts singing and the other patrons, very hesitantly, start dancing with him and even reciting some of the lyrics. Well, Vigalondo slowly reveals more and more of what is going on and it's just fascinating to watch. I hope it wins in the live action category as it's been awhile since I've been so taken with a film.

All in all, the five that I saw were all pretty dark. Even one called "Gopher Broke" which looks like a child's cartoon is not. Must be a trend. As I reported in this blog previously, the news from this year's Sundance Film Festival was much the same.

Enjoy the Oscar's tonight!

New Podcast

Pat and I just completed our second podcast audio show. The show can be found at our This And That (w/ Jeff and Pat) website. I think it's a pretty good show (for our second one) with some funny bits and observations here and there...

New Host - Some Problems

Yesterday I switched hosts for this site. I did this for several reasons but in a nutshell it boiled down to cost, consolidation, and functionality.

Unfortunately because of this change, the site may have been down for some of you. All right - that's not a big deal I know. The bad news is that if you are a syndication subscriber, the feed address has changed. No doubt if your syndication client showed errors trying to get your feed and you are reading - now you know! Please find the new feed address on the syndication buttons in the left panel. And please accept my apologies for the inconvenience of encountering errors and having to subscribe again - this should be stable for a long long time now!

Also, if you normally access this site via the URL www.jeffoestreichweb.com/randomthoughts, that no longer works - the correct URL should be randomthoughts.jeffoestreichweb.com.

I Am, Therefore I Podcast

My friend Pat Rodriguez and I have started a Podcast called "This And That (w/ Jeff and Pat)". We plan on doing a weekly show of about 15-25 minutes. We came into this first one pretty unprepared (and I put together some intro music in a blistering quick speed - nothing like working under pressure) but thought that for the first go, it turned out pretty decent. And it can only get better, right?

Once thing that I found out is now I am running out of web space pretty quickly. But a quick look at the marketplace has shown me that there are some pretty good deals out there.

Check out our webpage and podcast at This And That Podcast.

Podcasting Tips

After listening to a few podcasts over the last few weeks I have a few tips that I thought I would share with current and future podcasters. For these tips, I am going to assume that I am a 'joe average' podcast listener which I suspect is probably true. I listen to podcasts using my iPod primarily in my car (using a cassette adapter for now) during my 30 minute commute each way. I offer these tips because I'm finding that even the 'seasoned' podcasters (and I say seasoned somewhat loosely as this is a pretty new medium!) can make a couple of tweaks to really improve things. I put these in rough order of 'bang for the buck'.

Number 1 - Date Me

Name your podcast with the complete date within 21 characters (that's roughly the viewable length on the iPod). If we are fumbling around in the car and want to find a particular date (hmmm. haven't listened to this one for two days - where is 2/12?) it's annoying to have some long name taking up those characters when what we want is simply the date. This forces us to make extra clicks and go back, etc. iTunes already names the playlist after your podcast name (in the title field of your XML) so we navigated to your podcast by selecting it from the playlist - we already know it's yours! Put the date first and anything else you want after that.

Number 2 - Best Content First

Recognize that we will often get to our destination (or done with our workout if we're exercising) before we are done with your podcast. We may get back to it but more often than not we won't. If you think you have something you want to highlight because it's your best stuff, delivering it early will increase the probability that it will be heard.

Number 3 - Short Intro

We all like the introduction music. It's sort of a branding logo for your podcast. It's important and welcome. Just keep it short. Because it's always the same for your shows, we really don't need to hear it for all that long. Announce the date and your podcast name quickly very first thing and then launch into your intro music - but keep it moving and get to that content! Yea, we can fast forward, but it's a hassle because of the extra step. Remember, we're most likely in a car or doing other things with our hands.

Number 4 - 20 Minute Rule

The median commute time for an average city in the US is about 20 minutes, for a large city it is about 30 minutes. Also, the average workout time is about 30 minutes. Keep this in mind. If your podcast is longer than 20-30 minutes you do risk people dropping off as they get to their destinations. I realize that because of your content, this may be unavoidable. For that reason, if you must go longer than 20-30 minutes, refer to rule 2.

Number 5 - Cut The Fuzz

Reverb can be fun when used as an effect but can lead to hard-to-understand podcasts when overused. That said, properly engineered reverb and/or delay can make your vocals stand out. Here's a couple of tricks. Use a short room reverb. Turn it up until you can JUST hear it in the headphones and then turn it back a bit. Reverb should be felt not heard - it shouldn't hit you over the head yet subtle reverb will make your voice sound better in most cases. If your style just MUST have that echo chamber feel, fine - add some pre-delay (50-100ms) to distinguish your voice against the reverb. This will make it easier for us to understand you.

Number 6 - Squeeze It

Take some time and learn just a bit about compression and limiting. These techniques help reduce the vocal dynamics and increase the headroom on your recording which will make your podcast stand out against the rumble of the car better. Google things like 'compresssion faq' or 'understanding compression limiting' - there is a wealth of good info out there and it's not super complicated.

Wireless Philly

Another article from the New York Times about how the city of Philadelphia is trying to make the whole city into a wireless hot spot giving all neighborhoods high-speed access to the web. The city's goal is to offer this service at less than current market value to citizens.

Some are arguing that this is a bad use of public funding and is an area that would be better served by private investment and competition. Given our natural cultural predisposition to competition and free markets, I also tend to think that probably this is an area that would be better served by private money vs. public money as well.

However like most things related to governments and politics, I've observed that too many people tend to get 'stuck' in philosophical battles and lose sight of real problem solving. I think that instead of having endless discussion regarding the philosophies of wireless network ownership, we should hope that Philadelphia does go this way as a great experiment that we can all watch. Smart people would select some success metrics and measure and compare these metrics to similar metrics from cities going in different directions. We can all learn what solutions work best for different situations if we keep open minds. Pretty simple and pretty cool I think.

The article goes on to site some small cities that have set up their own networks because they were forced to do so as they couldn't coax the big companies with enough profits to serve them. That's cool too. It is certainly not reasonable to suggest that one solution would fit all community's needs.

Anyway, it's an interesting article - have a read.

Army Robots

There was an article in the NY Times today about the efforts of the military to build robots for combat. Some of this technology is being used today conduct surveillance. Some of the technology that they say will be available in the next 10 years include some of more dangerous and easy jobs such as driving supply vehicles and providing artillery services. In the next 30 years, some suggest that much of the combat operations could be replaced with robots.

Not sure what to think of all this. Certainly the use of advanced technology in the military seems inevitable and correct. But what are the implications to future wars? The whole idea of sacrifice when faced with wartime decisions is almost completely taken out of the picture. In addition as history as shown, tactics have always lagged technology so we are almost assured that these issues will not be addressed anytime soon.

Gee, there are a lot of interesting questions. What will it mean to declare war on another entity if it's robot vs. robot? If there is no human sacrifice, does it become easier for leaders to declare war? What kind of defenses are required in this type of war? Are the 'winning' countries the ones armed with the best technology? Instead of the ones with the greatest wills or greatest ideas?

And ultimately, what will war mean? How is a robotic war different than say a war simulation played out between two countries on a digital battlefield - once you 'win', what have you won?

It seems inevitable but it also seems gloomy. A future where we will learn to be afraid of being destroyed by technology isn't something I'm particularly looking forward to.

Jefferson, Texas

Amy and I spent last weekend in Jefferson, Texas - about a three hour drive from Dallas. Jefferson had the distinction of being the second largest 'port' town in Texas in the 1870s but because of some engineering events (the US Corps of Engineers blew up a natural logjam dam that made the river unnavigable by steamships -doh!) and poor decisions (the town leaders decided to decline offers of railway access believing they were well served via their river port) the town declined from a peak of 30,000 residents in the 1870s to about 2,000 today.

As a result there are a number of wonderful old homes from the mid 1800s and an equal number of legends of ghosts, curses and odd characters. Combine this with a feel that is half Louisiana and half Texas and you have a great place to spend a weekend.

The funny thing is that now the town is made up of 80% retirees and most of the larger grand homes are either museums or bed and breakfasts. The town's only real industry is tourism. In other words, Jefferson TX like many other small old towns in America, is a 'fake' town in a way. The things to see are the old houses, the old fashioned main store where you can still get penny candy and is filled with products of another age, antique stores and of course the ghost tours. Basically the town exists simply to allow you to try to visit another era. Kind of weird if you think about it too much.

The picture at the top is of the old courthouse built in the 1870s during Jefferson's peak. It now houses a pretty interesting museum.


Your's truly in front of the Excelsior House Hotel built in the 1850s. Dignitaries that stayed here include Oscar Wilde (one of my favorites), U.S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, and Lady Bird Johnson.


The "House of the Seasons" built in 1872. Now a bed and breakfast, George W. and Laura stayed here while he was Governor of Texas. The most unique features of the house are the cupola and the murals. In the cupola, under the picture, each wall contains a different colored stained glass that creates the illusion of the seasons of the year. The most interesting interior feature is the dome containing beautiful murals. It may be viewed from the first floor through the well-like opening.

These pics were taken with Amy's cell phone camera. Not bad for a cell phone.

Podcasting

As I promised, I am going to discuss what Podcasting is and why it is pretty interesting. If you remember in my article about syndication, news sources and blogs that offer syndication feeds can make life a lot easier for their readers by allowing them to subscribe to the news sources and manage the content in one place. Podcasting does this same thing for audio links (with a cool twist).

Through the use of a recently developed addition to the basic RSS script, now these scripts can contain references to audio. Adam Curry, the ex DJ from MTV, has been a pioneer in this development and has helped engineer a client that (much like a syndication reader for textual content) looks for updated audio links. Even more fancy, this reader (iPodder) automatically downloads the audio file and creates a playlist in iTunes seamlessly. Thus if you set your iPodder to check links over night, you can just plug in your iPod to your computer in the morning and automatically download fresh audio content for your daily listening pleasure.

So much for the technical discussion of podcasting - but what does this do? Well, it allows anyone with access to a microphone and some basic audio engineering skills and some software (a lot of the amateur stuff is free) to create audio content or shows. Currently there are about 3500+ of these regularly updated shows available and the number has been steadily growing since the introduction of the iPodder software last summer.

Admittedly, most of the people doing these shows will probably not keep it up but you can find some decent directories of what's out there at iPodder.org. Yea - it's amateur, but it's a great alternative to the garbage you hear on the radio these days. Plus, it's bound to get better with time.

There are a few shows that are pretty popular right now. The 'grandfather' of podcasting, Adam Curry does a show most days called The Daily Source Code which is pretty compelling. He's kind of a half tech-geek/half music nut with a great radio presence and personality. For anyone starting out with podcasting, I would highly recommend this show. More risque is the Dawn and Drew Show. They are a husband and wife team who just get on daily and talk about anything under the sun from their rural house in Wisconsin. The dialogue can get pretty raunchy but funny. They are pretty good but I find I do get bored a bit and generally don't make it through their complete shows. I like Viva Podcast which is also a husband and wife team and a similar format (the guy is fairly techy and straightman-ish and the woman is more artsy). Viva Podcast is a bit more mature and interesting (to me anyways). I also enjoy a daily podcast called The Daily Download with Chris Rockwell. He literally records his shows while on the crapper every day. As disgusting as this premise sounds (and it is sometimes), he's surprisingly compelling, thoughtful, and entertaining.

The cream of the crop is a guy named Michael Geoghegan with a broadcast called Reel Reviews. He does movie reviews (usually about one or two a week) and he is really good. He reviews movies that have been around for awhile but does a lot of research and brings a lot of passion to his broadcasts. He's sold me on a few movies (most recently he did an incredible detailed review and background of Apocalypse Now) and has a very radio-ready demeanor.

If you don't have an iPod or a mobile MP3 player, all of these broadcasts are available for downloading and listening to on your computer at their websites. And it's all free (for now)....

Contents of my iPod

I added a link on the left panel of this blog that allows you to view the contents of my iPod. Just scroll down a bit - it is the last entry in the panel. I used a free piece of software called iTunesXHTMLPlaylist to create the webpage automatically from iTunes. It's actually amazing how large it is - I don't even have half of my CD collection on it yet. Here is the link.

Bottom line: 2261 songs, 6.6 days, 10.04 GB. I have seen other people's lists on-line so I assume that some of you like to know things like this. I keep current mostly by downloading editor's picks from magazines like Salon.

Syndication 101

Many of you are probably curious about the graphics under the 'Syndication' header on the left panel of this blog. In this article I am going to attempt to give a quick explanation of what syndication is all about and why it's useful.

As you travel around the web, no doubt you have come across the ubiquitous little orange graphic marked 'XML. This is a link to the syndication address of the website. Syndication is a way that content providers are able to send their latest information to an application. That application can be anything from a sophisticated publishing tool to something as simple as a web portal. Actually the term 'XML' is not quite right and is why many times you will see similar buttons saying things like 'Atom' or 'RSS'. Rest assured - all of these mean basically the same thing to the user (the programmers are the ones that really care about this). XML is the underlying technology (not unlike HTML - it is a meta-language that simply wraps it's contents around bracketed explanation of what that data represents). Any application reading an XML file can interpret the data any way that it wants but the key is that the language itself tells the application WHAT the data is. (which is why it is called a meta-language - a language that describes itself). Neat? or Nerdy?

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and is a type of XML designed for web content. Atom is a special form of RSS but it works the same way.

Here's the key to why it's cool and important. Once you have an application that reads RSS, you can 'subscribe' to any sites with RSS feeds (most of them are blogs and news sources) by simply copy and pasting the RSS address into the application. From then on, the application will tell you automatically whenever there is updated content from that source. Some of us kind bloggers even give you buttons that automatically copy the RSS into the application with one click. That's what the two buttons '+ My Yahoo!' and 'SUB BLOGLINES' that I have on my page do. The first adds my feed to one of the most popular web portals automatically (My Yahoo!) and the second adds my feed to one of the most popular feed readers (Bloglines).

Here you can access Bloglines (it's a web application) and you can even see my version of Bloglines with my subscriptions here.

Today's RSS readers are fairly simple things - they primarily download updates and let you browse and discard entries simply. But tomorrow's RSS readers will be better at taking these feeds and organizing them for you in a way that highlight what their expert systems think you will be interested in most. It's much of what was promised when 'push' technology was all the talk about 10 years ago. Push technology didn't work because it required too much bandwidth. RSS allows these applications to work with minimal bandwidth.

Next time I'll talk about an extension to RSS that enables a broadcasting technology called Podcasting.

Review - "Kung Fu Hustle"

This morning's Talk Cinema feature was "Kung Fu Hustle" written and directed by probably the most famous guy of film in Asia - Steven Chow. The film will be released in the United States on March 18 though they did screen it at Sundance last month. This movie is fun with a capital F. After the last screening - "Nobody Knows" the good folks of Talk Cinema promised us a faster and more upbeat movie this week. They did not disappoint.

If you like action, if you like zany goofy comedy, if you like just a touch of romance, if you like lots of references to previous movies and finally if you like a heavily stylized movie where every scene is full of visual interest, you'll like this movie. This is the first Steven Chow I have seen (apparently he's directed 7 now and acted in more than 50) but he is known for his comedy and resurrected characters.

There is not that much to say about this film except to say that it is an hour and a half of movie enjoyment. And of course, you never what is going to happen next and I'm not going to tell you!

Super Bowl 2005

Everybody ready for the Super Bowl? I'm not quite sure what to expect and I'm not quite sure yet who I will end up rooting for. I thought that the championship games going into this one were great matchups but they turned out be pretty mediocre football games. I think the teams playing in this year's Super Bowl are also well matched on paper and I believe are truly the best two teams in the league. Again, great matchup but will it make a great game?

One one hand I would like to see the Patriots win because it does seem like their destiny. They are a great football team - one of the best true teams. There are less individual standouts than in previous 'dynastys' so it is a joy to watch these guys play. On the other hand, the Eagles are the underdogs and it seems my heart always goes to the underdogs - and it's been a lot of fun watching Donovan McNabb play - he's just a very exciting player.

I guess if it's not a good game, we always have Paul McCartney at halftime and, of course, the plethora of new commercials. Enjoy!

Ani DiFranco Live

Tonight I saw Ani DiFranco at the Granada Theater in Dallas (about 12 blocks from my house). She put on a great show and I was happy to get there right before she started (9:30) and have her set end by 11:00. My pet peeve about some of these concerts at clubs is that the headliner often doesn't get started until after 11:00 and you end up standing around forever.

Ani's style is singer/songwriter heavily laden in acoustic guitar riffs. For this show she was accompanied by an acoustic bass only. Just guitar and bass. It was a great combination. Ani plays the acoustic guitar very rhythmically with a lot of energy - in fact I saw at least two string breaks because of her aggressive style. She peppered the audience with a few monologues of the current political situation - nothing too outlandish but it was obvious that she cares about politics and the liberal cause.

She played a lot of songs from her new album (I'm only familiar with "Studying Stones" from my monthly Salon Magazine download - but I like it a lot) peppered with some of her older hits. I was a bit disappointed that she didn't play "32 Flavors" but you can't have everything. The crowd started out pretty rowdy and I could tell she would've liked it a bit better if they were quieter especially for the more laid back songs in her lineup. But they ended up setting down after 15-20 minutes or so building up to a great crescendo on her encore - one of my favorites "Shameless".

M. Butterfly Revisited

Tonight I saw the opera "Madame Butterfly" for the second time in four years (yes the Dallas Opera likes to play the popular operas a bit too frequently probably - but it's a financial thing...). Like most people, I find Puccini's operas to be very nice - melodramatic and lyrical with wonderful orchestration - "easy" opera if you will. The first time I saw Madame Butterfly I thought it was good but didn't compare to Tosca or La Boheme.

Well what a difference a director makes. The performance I saw tonight was directed by one of the most famous Cio-Cio-San's ever - Renata Scotto and starred Veronica Villaroel in the lead spot. This performance lifted my sense of this opera to new heights. I saw for the first time in Cio-Cio-San the vulnerability, youthfulness, and naivity mixed in with a type of strength not often found with those first descriptions. Pinkerton also was directed with more complex shades than I remember from the first. Additionally, I was absolutely touched by Villaroel's take on "Un Bel Di Vedroma" - probably one of the best aria performances I've seen in six seasons of opera. The action in the opera made a lot more sense to me (and the tragedy much more vivid) with the characters developed with so much better clarity .

I guess it makes sense sometimes to give an opera a second chance - you never know what the director has in store for you.

Oh dang, I missed the State of the Union address... ;-)

The Search Is On

Just saw that the total market value of Google is larger than that of General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. combined. Apparently Google’s P/E ratio is 230 compared to other internet companies like Yahoo!, Amazon, and eBay whose P/E ratios ranges from 58 and 68 (which is still really high!).

Google’s a fine company and I am a big user and fan but this definitely seems to be a bit out of whack with reality.

On a related note, Microsoft today released their new search engine. Of course because I am, after all, only human, I put my name into it and the first three entries come to my web sites. Contrasting that to Google, only the fourth entry is one of my web sites.

Hmm… I’m thinking I might be liking this new Microsoft search…. ;-)