X to Z - Lost In Translation

One of the recent stories flooding news everywhere features a new PSA about texting and driving produced by the Police Department in South Wales (that's the UK). The graphicness of the ad is what's getting attention, as it shows a teenage girl texting and driving and crashing head-on into another car which kills her friend, followed by a third car, killing a small child's parents. The discussions surrounding this ad are focused on the graphic nature of the images. It isn't currently airing in the US, only on YouTube for now. I don't know if they've tried to get it on TV or not, but one would imagine consistent failure if they had, this is untouchable for profit-minded programming (as opposed to socially-conscious). Most TV talk shows and blogs talking about it are proponents of spreading this kind of message, saying this is what we need to get the message through to (primarily) teens and the reasons why more and more states are adopting laws to ban texting-and-driving.

This concept brings up deeper and more interesting psychological issues than just graphic imagery and blaming teen irresponsibility. Though I doubt it was through any course of research, the police in Wales have capitalized on what years of media studies have told us: that we are being desensitized at a sky-rocketing rate. And logically, since teens consume more media than anyone, theirs is to a higher degree. So their conclusion is that effectiveness lies in shock factor. However, while it's appreciable that this realization has made its way into cautionary advertising, it's also essential that marketers targeting teens and young adults now take into account a newer trend that numerous articles have called the "narcissism" of Gen Y. Last week Mashable.com ran an article titled Study: Social Media is for Narcissists which features a study whose revelations that go beyond its predecessors. It shows that not only do teens agree that "social media cater to a more self-promotional audience", but most "agree that being self-promoting, narcissistic, overconfident, and attention-seeking is helpful for succeeding in a competitive world." Cracked.com recently ran an article titled 6 Bullshit Facts About Psychology That Everyone Believes, one of which is "Just Believe in Yourself, and You'll Succeed!": the process by which we have concentrated all our societal efforts on training children to be fountains of self-esteem, and abandoned any importance of having an actual reason to feel good about themselves. As Cracked points out, we Gen Y-ers have invented a term for this: Self esteem - Justification = Douchebag.

If researchers, parents, marketers, media producers, and Gen X-ers of all kinds are not acutely aware of these trends and willing to accept that a communication “model” is out and the “amoeba” is in, their attempts at cross-generational communication will fail. I predict this would cause a cognitive disconnect that would progressively reinforce the desire for peer-to-peer isolation that social media has occupied.

For the majority, in-your-face graphic commercials may arrest their attention for the moment, but then be mentally filed away along with that pamphlet on abstinence they got at school. Our narcissism comes with a belief in inherent invincibility. We view a commercial about a girl texting and killing 4 people and think, “That’s a terrible thing that happened to her. She is obviously a much less talented multi-tasker than I am." The message intended by the producers is not exactly the one that's received. Bottom line: I believe our desensitization has reached a point where the news' squabbling about whether the ad is too graphic for Americans under 18 to see is actually ridiculous and magnifies their failure to comprehend (or willingness to attempt to) the dynamism of teens.

What outstretches my comprehension is beginning a thought train about Gen Z. Mine (Gen Y) is a population still constantly changing and requiring new studies because of the impact of the technology, internet, new media, and social media. These things developed or came into their prime during our lifetimes, so we have grown up in a period of shift: from landlines to cells; from a paper system to a computer-based; from an analog society to a digital. Although our parents' certainly have more, we still retain an appreciation for immediacy. I appreciate the skip button on my CD player because I still own cassette tapes, I appreciate DSL because I remember dial-up, I appreciate Blackberries because I remember when Zack Morris' phone wasn't a source of comedy. But Generation Z is being born and growing up in a life where all these things come standard and the qualifications for value exist on a scale of different dimensions. It's a completely different mindset that older generations must learn how to teach, advertise to, and entertain. I wouldn't even know here to begin.

But that's why I'm not a researcher. Good luck guys!

Tweeting With The Stars

First, the other day I was sitting at Panera working on some film festival stuff, and this guy comes in. He was dressed in some stereotypical homeless garb, so I instantly assume he is homeless. He is holding a giant plastic BW3's cup when he comes in the door, stands and looks around, goes over to the pop machine and fills up his cup, and walks out. For some reason this is the most incredible thing I have seen all week, maybe it's just a slow week.

That was completely irrelevant I just keep thinking about it.
Anyway, so I've been thinking a lot about this whole celebrities-on-social-networking-sites phenomenon. Mostly because Taylor Swift and David Archuleta are on my Twitter feed (is that what it's called?) and I am friends with them on Facebook. I think it is so sweet that celebs are on the sites, and clearly 63,000 others agree with me. This was actually sparked by Taylor's recent facebook status: "Trying to convince Abigail's parents to let her come to New York with me. I know the drill, we've been doing this since we were 14." and I was instantly like, oh Abigail from the song "Fifteen", that's cool that they are still friends. So I'm reading the comments on her status and only ONE other person mentioned that, so I was proud that I knew ALL the words to her songs, and then instantly depressed when I remembered I was 22. But I think that's the flipside of stars on Twitter/Facebook, it's humbling. Either someone like me who knows all the words and appreciates people foremost for their natural talent and the skill in songwriting, etc. Or the more stalkerish people who know her favorite kind of french fry and what day she gets her period. Especially when it comes to Taylor Swift, everyone thinks oh I am her biggest fan! and then you go on Facebook and... no, you are definitely NOT her biggest fan.

So I'm seeing possibilities:
One, we start seeing a dramatic increase in artists who get big after getting their start from a die-hard online following, like Secondhand Serenade, Ronnie Day, and Savannah Outen [who you can see at OIFF on July 27th!]
Two, fans start getting more stalkerish trying to outdo others and really be the biggest fan. I'm having flashes of King of Comedy here. [If you haven't seen it, basically Robert DeNiro is a crazed fan of Jerry Langford (a Jay Leno type host/comedian), who fantasizes an entire friendship with him because he knows him so well, and after real Jerry's repeated rejections, he kidnaps Jerry and steals his show for a night.]
Also, while doing research for OIFF, I came across this website:
http://www.contactanycelebrity.com
that absolutely blows my mind for obvious reasons.
While King of Comedy is the extreme of the "parasocial relationship" phenomenon introduced by serial television, I'm still guilty of it myself to some extent. In the past, my favorite tv show has become such a ritualistic part of my life that I kind of feel like I know the characters. I can still quote everything Ephram Brown ever said and tell you his whole life story. And then when the show ends it's like a part of your life is gone. It's kind of pathetic, but also really amazing to me. And now we can do the same thing with the actual celebrity. This might be getting closer to better, because it's real people and not fake characters. But then we get into the one-way parasocial thing, the same complication that plagues our interaction with "friends" with people we actually know on facebook. Does being friends on Facebook or Twitter really count as keeping in touch? Like I can read your updates and everything, but there's no guarantee you're doing the same thing with mine. The answer is clearly no and everyone knows it, and the same goes for celebrities: it only makes us feel like we know them better, when in fact we don't. It brings them closer to us and maybe humanizes them, but it simultaneously feeds our addiction and fuels our celebrity culture, perpetuating that they are deserving of the god-like status we afford them. So like most things nowadays, I guess we'll take the good with the bad!

This Week!

Well clearly this blog has been a huge failure. But now that it's summer and I have graduated (!!) I'm hoping to have more time, since during the school year I thought it would be a super idea to shoot a feature film in 30 days! I don't have anything intellectual right now so I will just copy KT and write down everything I did this week so that I can feel like maybe I am accomplishing something with my post-graduate life?

Monday
8am: wake up, shower, drive to Oxford
9am-10am: go to the mafia office, export the drum video, finish watching some more OIFF submissions, throw all the dvds in my car, drive around high street for a while working on locations for AJ's film looking for 26 1/2 High Street.
11am: Finally realize I am a failure at finding that place, head to JC's
12pm-3pm: watch about 20 more short films, quickly reject them all, re-watch about 30 shorts to remind JC what they are about, stare at the scheduling bulletin board for about 2 hours trying to fit 50 films in 26 spots?
3pm-4pm: finish the schedule (mostly), drive to work
4pm: arrive late for work, as usual
4pm-10pm: work/pretend to work
10pm-11pm: workout

Tuesday
8am: wake up, shower, drive to Oxford
9am-10am: go to the mafia office, re-edit and re-export the drum video, go through all the bad OIFF dvd's looking for all of the animations.
10am-12pm: start taking pictures of different locations for AJ's movie [drive down Western Drive, stop in the middle of the road to snap one of Langstroth Cottage, almost get hit by a kid on a bike, keep driving, stop at Boyd Hall, get pissed that the whole street's parking is blocked off, so I park across the street, and look around for a good 5 minutes for any parking services spies since my parking pass is expired, run up to the top of Boyd Hall and take pictures until I get back down to the bottom, drive over to Peabody, park in the lot down the street, do another parking services survey, run into Peabody and repeat the Boyd routine, run back to my car, realize I left all 4 windows completely down, take a quick inventory of all my valuables, and drive over to Western Cottage, where I take pictures all around the building, start driving up the driveway and quickly realize it's a sidewalk and I am about to roll down a steep tree-covered cliff, get out to take more close-up pictures, get yelled at by some random guy with a disgusting red beard that did not match his equally disgusting brown hair, drive away quickly, drive back up the one-way street and discover that the Peabody parking lot I just parked in is now GONE, and the dumptrucks are hauling away the remains, repeat the picture-taking routine at Clawson, Thompson, McKee, Patterson Place, Havighurst, and some random bridges]
12pm: go over to Tom's to pick up DVD's and head over to JC's
12pm-4pm: re-watch more DVD's, double check the program, organize all the accepted films into their appropriate categories, look up all the films and copy down all their information into my master excel sheet, create contact list for all 50 films, create online listings for all the films that were submitted via paper entries, get invited to create an IMDB page for all the films I just submitted
4pm: JC and I go to McDonald's
4:30pm-10pm: continue with the list-making, type up and revise the 3-page acceptance email to be sent out to everyone as well as the rejection letter, send out 40 personalized acceptance letters to all the short films, call IndieFest to setup our online screenings
10pm-12am: Cody arrives at JC's to pick up the camera/lights, and ends up staying for two hours talking about Christian Bale and Michael Bay and the Cincinnati Film Commission
12pm: go over to Williams to get Cody the camera/lights
12am-5am: continue with programming, re-watch about 20 shorts with JC to remind him what they are about so that we can pick the remaining 25 online films, learn how to use our scheduling software B-side, enter in all 50 films and their information
5am-6am: drive home, fall asleep at the wheel several times, but somehow manage not to hit anything (that I know of)

Wednesday
8am: wake up, start doing laundry, thinking that it will be a good idea to do laundry and sleep in between every 40 minutes. It was not, naps are very overrated and everyone I know (and don't know) decided this was a really good time to call me. Somewhere in there I (allegedly) left Lauren a really interesting voicemail that I have no recollection of. Note to self: don't call people while you are asleep.
1pm: shower and go to work
2pm-10pm: work
10pm-11pm: workout
11pm: go home, pass out

Thursday
9am: wake up, shower, go to Oxford
10am-1pm: edit drum video, export and burn and deliver to Pete's house
1pm: meet with Matt to pickup the camera, have him drive me over to my car since I have to park really far away now :( then over to the Cole Service Building.
1:30pm-3pm: Met with Mark Lawrence, director of utility services, who gave me a tour of the steam tunnels underneath Miami. Apparently the entrance is in some secret portal inside the new business school, I felt like I was in the Chronicles of Narnia. Except the wardrobe did not lead to Narnia, but to hell. The steam tunnels were probably like 90 degrees so I was basically pouring sweat, but they were really cool (looking) and I got to wear a hard hat, and took tons of pictures for AJ. A lot of the pipes and stuff in there are apparently about 300 degrees, so pretty much almost burned all my skin of several times, and learned from Mark wayyyyyy more than I ever wanted to know about utility systems.
3pm-4pm: go back to the MAFIA suite, finish exporting Petrol trailers, put the MAFIA computer in my car while trying not to look suspicious and drove home.
4pm: work out, shower, go out with fam for Curt's birthday

Friday
9am: wake up, shower, answer a bazillion OIFF emails
11am: try to procrastinate by watching Everwood, but I cannot find the episodes, so I get really depressed because I really wanted to watch it
12pm: put all 400 OIFF dvd's in numerical order on my bookshelf so that I can find them quickly next week
1pm: arrive late for work as usual
1pm-10pm: work/pretend to work, talk to AJ and JC about all the legalities of him coming to Miami to film, talk to a random PR woman for one of the OIFF films, talk to Kelley about how much more exciting her summer is than mine
10pm-11:30pm: workout
11:30-1am: answer emails, watch The Soup, and talk to the epic Cody Smith about some epic stuff
(...like his epic failing)

Twitter...and the collapse of organized society

Right now I think the most American thing out there is Twitter.

Twitter, which recently came on the scene, is a fascinating enigma which I have yet to decipher. I feel compelled to check it everyday. I've checked it twice since writing this entry. And the only reason I can even point out that compulsion is because it's new (whereas calling attention to my need to check email and Facebook is about as eventful as my need to sleep or eat dinner.) Soon enough, Twitter will solidify it's cultural foothold and settle in somewhere between breathing and doing laundry, and tweens will laugh at me for only having one update per day. Thanks to my friend Lauren, who recently informed me that her life goal is to be a Twitter Jedi, I now know that it's a verb, with it's own book of new words sure to make their way into Webster within the decade [twitter.pbwiki.com/Twitter%20Glossary]. Stepping back from my compulsion, so far it's only value for me is in it's existence as a perfect metaphor for American culture. We have to know what's going on, right now, and we can never be too up-to-date.

You can follow everyone: John McCain, Dennis Rodman, your neighbor, your neighbor's 12-year-old daughter. It's an addiction for a lot of people, on the road to becoming a full blown condition, like obsessive Facebooking. They did a whole 2-minute package on it yesterday on the CBS Nightly News (who you can also follow on Twitter). But when you get down to it, the content is... meaningless. John McCain just wrote a bill. Dennis Rodman just drove home. Your neighbor just wacked off. Is this our definition of meaningful content? Who cares?

You do. And you can't escape it. The internet is an enabler of our addiction to immediacy. And we've managed to accomplish something so immediate that it's inane: it's the ultimate simulacrum. It's everything we want, but nothing at all. Baudrillard would have written novels on it.

I hear this argument all the time, that things are getting shorter and faster to accommodate for shrinking attention spans. I filmed a doc at the Creation Museum on Friday and their director told us they did away with most of the text placards that have become requisite outside museum displays, in favor of short videos that play in every room, because "people won't stand and read a big block of text, but they will stand and listen to a 2-minute video". So, they spent an additional $20,000 on flat screen TV's for... people's attention. Finally! Someone's put a price on it.

Americans have made ourselves into one big paradox. Why are we so obese? Many experts say because we don't take our time to eat, like the French. Why are we in massive debt? Because we want it now and credit provides a way to do that. But at the same time, we've created a culture of such over-stimulation that, for our urgent need to slow down, Ritalin is like a speed bump and Botox is like a Band-Aid on a broken leg. Debord called it our "Society of Spectacle".

Consumerism is our collective religion. Mass media has created itself (yes, it's out of our hands) as your solitary form of gaining information, and oftentimes treated as your only method of communication. Take it as a microcosm: the world is your body and media is your brain. Imagine if the conscious part of your brain went all I-Robot and figured out that it could think for itself independently of the rest of your subconscious brain, and other parts of the body started paying it to insert little subconscious messages into you that will benefit it: your hand pays the brain to make you buy some nice lotion, your feet pay the brain to buy some new Nike's. Every once in a while, the subconscious part of your brain (you) figure out what's going on...but there's absolutely nothing you can do about it. You can't get rid of your brain, being the center of communication for your body and the thing that holds everything together.

That might be an absurd representation, but that's where we are with media. It's destroying us, but we cannot live without it. It's everything we want, but satisfaction is always a dollar away.

Blog!

This is my new blog. It was supposed to be a New Year's Resolution, but clearly that did not happen. This semester I am not taking any real classes that will challenge me to think about anything, so take this as an attempt by me to prevent my brains from turning to mush.
Ready, set, ruminate!