Better You Than Me

According to Bry, the Beantown Jazz Fest wasn’t really anything to write home about:

“Only 2 stages… the jazz was O.K., but not really that good… It wasn’t set up very well and it was difficult to hear sometimes… It was mostly vendors.”

The most telling comment of all? “I wish that I had gone to the Fluff festival.”

I’m not too disappointed that I had to work.

Studying the Obvious #2

O.K., so this wasn’t altogether “obvious” to me, but the idea that women get turned on just a quickly as men do is not out of the realm of logical deduction. Which is why I’m highlighting this little study for you.

Our cousins to the north at McGill University are trying to treat female sexual dysfunction and began their journey by showing porn, comedy and horror movie clips to volunteers… Which is exactly how most sexual encounters start.

You’ll be able to read all of the results yourself in the Journal of Sexual Medicine in January, if you're into that kind of journal… I only read it for the pornographic pictures.

If you threw a festival in a forest and nobody heard it...

If you read the Globe’s Arts section today, you saw a pretty damning article about the lackluster Boston Film Festival that took place a few weeks back. If you missed it, don’t worry; you weren’t alone.

Robin Dawson, the festival’s new executive director, made some noise about an unnamed company’s pulling of sponsorship dollars at the last minute. This resulted in a lot of events being cancelled, some stars not showing up, and a derth of promotional material. That’s valid, but I think that a focus on the funding shortfall shows a lack of understanding as to why an event like this isn’t embraced by the population at large.

From the outside, it looks like this festival is a vehicle to expand Boston’s place on the movie-industry map: Use a great cinema complex. Throw trendy parties where people-in-the-biz can network. Get big-name stars to attend and draw press. That’s all well and good, but why not add a civic/cultural enhancement component to this? What sponsors wouldn’t jump at the chance to get behind a festival that actually worked to engage one of the richest, most educated populations in the country? Hell, we’ve got the largest concentration of college students on the planet; get them attending shows and the sponsors will line up!

You want some tips for making the Boston Film Festival more successful next year? Try these on for size:

Public, free films on the Esplanade: Friday Night Flicks is a regular event during the summer. Why can’t some of the filmmakers participate in a week of free shows each night here (weather permitting)?

More venues: Why no usage of the film room at the Museum of Fine Arts this time around? Next year you can add the auditorium at the new ICA on the waterfront. There is a theatre complex over in the Fenway with a bunch of screens, right next to a bunch of colleges. You’ve got a newly renovated theatre in Uphams Corner. How about a documentary or two at the JFK Library? Which theatres in the Theatre District can handle films besides the Wang? They’re all within walking distance of the Boston Common cineplex that is used now and would provide a physical continuity to the festival without confining it to a single building. Get the crowd out into the streets!

What do our native celebrities contribute to this event? I don’t pretend to know about the politicking that goes on behind the scenes, but I can’t imagine that folks like Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon, Denis Leary and their ilk wouldn’t be motivated to bring their talents to bear if the focus was more about creating cultural opportunities for the people of Boston than it is for celebrity self-aggrandizement.

Expand the notion behind the festival: Have events spread over 10-14 days. Make one half the “Boston Film Festival” and make the second half the “New England Film Festival.” (Maybe you can alternate nights.) Provide more opportunities for filmmakers from all over New England. What’s more, with this new focus, you can use the Brattle & Harvard Square theatres (only 2 blocks apart) and/or the Kendall theatre. Boston’s the capital of New England anyway, right?

More events for the public: Make sure that there are plenty of parties, roundtables & meet-and-greets for regular folks to attend. Sure, exclusive parties at trendy clubs and restaurants will take place, but give the citizenry a glimpse of Tinsletown glamour, too. You’d be guaranteed to attract a crowd.

Civic benefits: How about workshops in local schools with actors and/or directors? Drama clubs and technical production classes would get a great benefit if some professionals could devote a little time while they are in town to talk to kids just starting out. Maybe even include a private screening/party for winners of some sort of contest among the schools.

So there. I’m not a marketing expert, but I know what I’d like to see , and that’s just a few ideas off of the top of my head. Now, if we could only get the festival folks to give a crap about what regular folks want.

Decisions, decisions...

This Saturday promises to be a red-letter date on the calendars of all Boston socialites. Unfortunately, it presents a tough decision: Jazz or Fluff?

"Eat now?"

Deborah
43 Carmine St. (West Village)
New York, NY
(212) 242-2606

I am not complicated. I enjoy an occasional fine dining experience, but more often than not I prefer to walk through a residential area and find a hole-in-the-wall type establishment that locals flock to. New, exciting and trendy spots have their place, but small unpretentious venues that have been around for years are still there because they are doing something right. They are the foundation of a city’s culinary culture.

Deborah is a great neighborhood haunt that is as welcoming a place that a visitor can find in New York. The staff was terrific, the small space lent an air of “homey-ness” and the menu was full of familiar favorites with twists and turns that promised to be surprising and satisfying at the same time… As a good friend of mine said: “Rule #1 of dining - If you see lamb on the menu, order it; it's a great indicator of how much they care about preparation." I would have preferred a leg of lamb as opposed to the chops that were served on the night that we went (more meat, please), but the flavor was wonderful and the accompanying salad topped with goat cheese was a great addition. The Seafood paella was fantastic, with enough spices to give it a hint of exoticism, but not so much that it drown out the subtleties of the various fish included… As for dessert, both the Nutella chocolate cake and the Dutch chocolate and Tahitian vanilla sundae sated our sugar cravings… Service was incredibly friendly and stayed comfortably away from the edges of overbearing, though the intimate atmosphere created a sense of disappointment when the night ended without a visit from the chief. (You have to squeeze by her and the open kitchen to get to the seating area in the rear.)

Rating: ***1/2 (out of 5)
Final Word: I'll definitely have to go back and try more items on the menu.
Listings: Zagat & NY Magazine

Its A Miracle!!

So this is my first ever mobile posting to my blog. I'm in a cab right now, on my way from JFK airport to Joe's new place in Brooklyn... And I'm posting on my freakin' blog!

Yeah, yeah, I know. Its no big deal. I came of age along with the Internet, so the technology all makes sense to me. I know all about how it works and what makes it go. That's not what gets me about it.

Just the fact that we *can* do stuff like this - that's what amazes me.

Just 15 years ago, nobody was online yet. Nobody outside universities and the military, anyway. 5 years prior to that almost nobody had a fax. Now we're instantaniousily communicating point-to-point all around the world (to mobile targets, no less) using various forms of media.

Damn.

The cab is nearing Joe's, so I'll sign off. Its fun to think that if anything cool happens tonight, I can blog it in seconds!

Scooped!

I’m no gossip-monger. In fact, I shun the Page Sixes of the world quite pompously. But somebody pointed out a funny piece to me from yesterday’s NY Post about gossip, waiters and the mob. Check it out here.

Apparently, those waiters & waitresses at the posh restaurants that you and I can never hope to get into are may all be on the take. Celebrities thinking that they are insulated from public scrutiny because they can get into an exclusive venue may find that their every move is being monitored by starving actors hungry to make a buck and score a connection.

A Pirate’s Life for Me

I love me my downloaded music. And video. And software.

You see, I’m a digital pirate. I don’t break the law by uploading these things onto the web, but I do lurk around the Usenets and pilfer what is laying about. There are hundreds of newsgroups with millions of files posted onto them every day. That’s a hell of a lot of movies, TV shows and music.

The only time that I will pay for music is when I am looking for something specific and don’t feel like trolling through 1-2 million postings on alt.binaries.multimedia.complete_cd looking for it.

In those cases, I turn to the Russian mob.

Go Music (which has just raised their prices significantly in an effort to go more semi-legit) and All Of MP3 (still $0.10 per download) in Russia severely undercut iTunes when it comes to MP3 prices. Furthermore, their downloads are in raw MP3 form, not the proprietary format that Apple uses that prevents you from copying onto more than 1 CD or 5 registered computers. Already, All Of MP3 is the second most-popular MP3 download site on the web. And iTunes may be in even more trouble soon with Yahoo’s announcement that they are launching a new download service that does not have any anti-piracy features.

Come to think of it, the cool PC vs. Mac commercials notwithstanding, I think that I’m pretty anti-Apple.

I’ve always wondered about the appeal of the iPod. Sure, it’s portable and light-weight. Yes, it allows you to carry around a lifetime’s worth of music in your pocket. But… It’s proprietary. And the players themselves are quite minimal on functionality. Every other brand of player includes FM radio and the ability to record it. All of the ones that play video files allow you to play any type of media, without hacking, instead of being forced to use iTunes to download. Some models have output slots so that you can plug them into your TV, freeing you from the 2” screen. Some newer ones even include iTrip-like functionality that allows you use any radio without wires. (The latest iteration of this is a function that allows the player to scan the local spectrum and will broadcast on an unused frequency, rather than a preset one.)

I guess that my problem with the iPod stems from Apple’s initial marketing strategy to push it’s convenience and make it hip & stylish. I think that this approach -making the iPod as much a fashion accessory as a useful tool- has driven it’s (lack of) development. A new model comes out every 6 months, with the only upgrades so far being increased memory and a video screen. Because it was first to market, is so hip and folks gravitate to what is easiest, they have been able to dominate the market almost unchallenged.

A great way to see just how stagnant Apple has become when it comes to portable media devices to by checking out AnythingButiPod.com. This based-on-vitriol site does a great job keeping track of the latest innovations that are coming. Most of this creativity has been, and still is, happening over in Asia, so there are plenty of cool toys that you can’t buy yet. But rest assured, if it’s over there, it will make it here in short order.

Why I love the Internet

I would never be caught dead watching The O.C., but I have to admit that this 2:19 clip from last year’s Christmas episode accurately sums up every Geek’s dream… until the final few seconds, that is.

I’m sure that you can imagine how I would have ended it if it were my fantasy.

LOL!!!

I’m a geek, so I appreciate geek humor, which can be found daily in the talkback/feedback/forum sections of geek news websites like AintItCool News, Cinescape or the like.

Today I was forced to disturb my co-workers with my burst of uncontrolled laughter at this posting on Cinescape… It was in response to some casting news for the new Die Hard movie: Live Free or Die Hard, the story of which centers on an attack on the U.S.' computer infrastructure that begins to shut the country down.

From: jamesdalton
Date: 9/22/06
Time: 2:40am PDT
Comments: McClaine’s brand-new catchphrase: “CONTROL-ALT-DELETE… MOTHERFUCKER!!”

Helping out the terrorists

Got a surface-to-air missile? Need to know exactly where a flight is so that you can take it down? Well, put away those binoculars and cancel that trip to the airport, because a company called Passur is marketing a tool to local airport authorities, like Massport here in Boston, that gives folks to access real-time flight tracking data on all flights arriving, landing and simply passing through local airspace. It even tracks helicopters.

I think that this site is pretty darn cool. In fact, I’d love to see something similar for local transit systems, like my local MBTA. It would be extremely helpful to be able to know where trains & buses are.

It’s not like I’m a jihadist or anything.

Thanks to Bry for the link!

Studying the obvious #1

I'm always intrigued by scientific studies, be they medical, physcological, sociological or the like. This probably stems from an erroneous subscription to the journal Science that I got via a pharmaceutical company with a similar address as mine. I would peruse it and sometimes found myself curling up in a chair trying to decipher String Theory.

On occasion, I will use this space to bring attention to studies that either deserve an Ig Nobel prize for there absurdity, or that tell us something that we already know. I will leave truly interesting, valid and important studies to websites with a bit more prestige than mine.

Take this study, for instance. It took a couple of researches at Laval University 35 years to determine that women who get breast-enhancement surgery might not be as happy as the population at large. Further study is warranted, they contend.

Gotta keep that research gravy train running!

"Vote early, vote often" - Part 3: This time it's personal!

So my guy won.

Yes, I am a Deval Patrick fan. I admit it; he kind of swept me off of my feet… In a political way, you sickos!

Anyway, the election’s results has caused me to think about some things:

It seems like it has been a very long time since we have seen a politician with the charisma of Deval. It’s so effective in fact, that lots of analysts on TV were talking about how his campaign was light on the issues and heavy with over-arching rhetoric designed to inspire. I heard “feel good campaign” uttered on more than one occasion.

Clearly, nobody has seen Deval’s webiste. There you can read reams and reams of policy papers, chock full of details. It’s almost as if there are two campaigns going on: One on TV and the rest on the web and at candidate forums. It’s not like the details are hidden, but by the pundits’ reasoning, if you’re not trying to explain your policy positions in 30-second ads, then you don’t have any positions… What a joke!

And another thing… Anytime somebody complains about how politicians just buy elections, mention Chris Gabrielli. This guy -who is a really decent man with very good public service credentials- wants to serve. He wants to serve so badly that he dumped $10 million into the race but couldn’t even garner 30% of the vote. The bottom line? Money can’t buy me votes.

So what does all of this mean? I’m no expert, but I think that Deval Patrick will be our next governor. If he can keep up the positivity and work on inspiring more and more voters, I think that Kerry Healey will come off as she did last night in her nomination stunt/speech: An angry, fear-mongering attack dog. Not to mention the fact that Christy Mihos will dump plenty of money into the race and siphon off Republicans and conservative-minded Independents from her.

The real race starts today. Buckle up!

"Vote early, vote often" - Part 2

The nation is, in fact, doomed.

I was sitting in the cafeteria at work yesterday triumphantly eating my lunch after having just cast my ballot in the Primary election when I was forced to stop in mid-chew. A table full of young’uns (they were in their early 20s… *sheesh* when did that become “young” to me!?) was chatting amongst themselves amiably and the line of discussion went something like this:

Girl #1: “There’s this show about a guy who escapes from prison using a map that he had tattooed al over his body.

Girl #2: “Is that a real story?”

Now I know that I’m an idealist and all, but on the day when we have some pretty important choices to make about our future, can we at least make a show of thinking/talking about them? Furthermore, who in their right mind thinks that Prison Break might be based on a true story, or be a reality show?

Good Lord!!

Woah...

Dude, the muppetts have you.

"Vote early, vote often" - Part 1

So Primary Day is upon us here in the Commonwealth... did/will you exercise your franchise? Do you even know who said that famous line alluding to voter fraud? Google has a cool quote quiz here if you want to guess. You may be surprised.

Your choices:

Be gentle...

Yes, it's my first time.

I've kinda blogged before, but not really. Mostly, I would work on somebody elses' blog and maybe post a few entries when the spirit moved me. But this was never sustained and I didn't really focus on it too much. Will this time be different? I'd like to think so.

So welcome to my tiny corner of the internet. I hope that my ravings will entertain and (maybe) inspire a tiny spark of thought here and there.

Fly Casual!