• All in the Mind – iTunes
• Evernote Blogcast – I use Evernote, it is a great note-taking and information management application. I also like the back and forth among the Evernote guys who talk about updates and tips. iTunes
• Boxes and Arrows Podcast – Interviews or conference presentation audio from practitioners in Information Architecture, User Experience and other Information Design professions. iTunes
• The Economist: Special reports – iTunes
• FORA.tv Technology Today – iTunes
• HBR IdeaCast – iTunes
• IT Conversations – iTunes
• Knowledge@Wharton Interviews – iTunes
• Librivox: Roughing It by Mark Twain – Free audiobook version of Twain’s novel. iTunes
• Librivox: Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain – Another free audiobook version of a Mark Twain novel. iTunes
• MIT Sloan School of Management Podcast – iTunes
• Nielsen Analytics Podcast – iTunes
• Old Jews Telling Jokes – This video podcast is a comedy goldmine of classic jokes told with enthusiasm (and klezmer music). – iTunes
• FT Management – iTunes
• FT Digital Business with Peter Whitehead – iTunes
• The Royal Society – Audio Podcasts – Great talks about the history of science by authors, historians and practicing scientists. iTunes
• Vanguard: Plain Talk on Investing – iTunes
• The Moth Podcast – iTunes
• APM: Weekend America Enhanced Podcast – iTunes
• PRI: To the Best of Our Knowledge Podcast – iTunes
• Beyond Web Analytics! – iTunes
• Bloomberg On The Economy – iTunes
• Bloomberg Surveillance – iTunes
• WireTap from CBC Radio – Canadian scripted radio show with a collection of characters based in Montreal, but universally amusing. iTunes
• Intelligence Squared Podcasts – iTunes
• SALT – Seminars About Long Term Thinking – iTunes
• PRI: The Sound of Young America – iTunes
• New Yorker: Fiction – Past stories from the New Yorker Magazine read by current authors or critics. iTunes
• NPR: Books Podcast – iTunes
• NPR: Fresh Air Podcast – Terry Gross interviewing just about everyone.iTunes
• NPR: Planet Money – Easily digestible review of topics relating to finance and the economy. iTunes
• NPR: Krulwich on Science – iTunes
• NPR: Health & Science – iTunes
• NPR: At Your Leisure – iTunes
• Science & the City – iTunes
• The New York Review of Books – iTunes
• New York Times Book Review – iTunes
• Travel with Rick Steves – iTunes
• Science of Better: Crunching the Numbers, an INFORMS – iTunes
• 60-Second Mind – iTunes
• The Tobolowsky Files – Biographical reflections from Stephen Tobolowsky, a Dallas-born actor and raconteur. iTunes
• Slate’s Audio Book Club – iTunes
• PRI: Science and Creativity from Studio 360 – iTunes
• Everyday I Read the Book – iTunes
• The Big Money Podcasts – iTunes
• WNYC’s Leonard Lopate Show – Radio interviews with authors and experts discussing almost anything. iTunes
• Bob Edwards Weekend – iTunes

Matthew Weiner presents…Mad Men

Former Sopranos writer Matthew Wiener has created a masterful tale about one of New Yorks most prestigious ad agencies at the beginning of the 1960s. Focusing on one of the firms most talented and extremely mysterious executives Donald Draper. Weiner will be on hand for a special cocktail hour screening of one of his personal favorite episodes of the beloved TV show.

Weiner’s talk was the highlight of the festival for me. Why there was a TV-guy at the film festival I don’t know but I certainly enjoyed his talk about making Mad Men. We watched a recent episode: Guy Walks Into an Advertising Agency, which Weiner said was originally titled Nothing Runs Like a Deere. He said this episode was all about expectations and their anticipation. After watching it again with the audience, I saw many other ideas based on that theme. Most enjoyable was seeing the episode with a theater full of people. You forget how great the dialogue is, especially John Slattery as Roger Sterling. His timing is perfect and with a spirited, enthusiastic audience – had us roaring. Mad Men has been renewed for a fourth season too, so lots to look forward to.

American Cowslip

Ethan Inglebrink an eccentric agoraphobic heroin addict w ho is obsessed with his garden is searching for the perfect moment in a life that is running out of time. And the odds are against him. This darkly comedic tale set in small town California follows the last days of Ethan’s life as he struggles to find love and purpose – at a time when it might be too late to even matter.

This movie was interesting, especially for the cast of actors (Diane Ladd, Rip Torn, Cloris Leachman, Val Kilmer, Peter Falk, Bruce Dern). The plot is odd, and meanders a little in the middle (ok, a lot) but it was fun. I ran into the star and co-writer Ronnie Gene Blevins, the next night in line and he implied it was quite an experience. I commented that they should have featured the donkey more in the trailer, as a donkey always equals comedy gold.

Harmony And Me

The sharp-witted Byington returns with the Austin-shot story of Harmony a prototype nightmare dumpee – the sort of heartbroken friend you take out for consolatory drinks two or three times before resorting to any excuse to avoid hearing yet again the play-by-play rehash of what went wrong with his relationship. Never self-indulgent Byington creates a memorable modern comedy with subtle and sharp performance from his cast.

Locally made here in Austin and starring lots of local talent. Nice to see some Austin locations, but once you know Austin, you realize some strange liberties are taken with the driving about town. The audience was really behind this film, which made it fun to watch. Good dialogue and a few strong scenes, but I couldn’t tell if most of the movie was improvised or not. Not that it matters.

The Vicious Kind

A dramatic comedy set in small town Rhode Island brings tog ether elements of depression romance and self exploration among a dysfunctional family of men. Lonely and frustrated after a bitter break up Caleb warns his younger brother against women especially the pretty young thing he’s bringing home for the holidays. His indifferent opinion and steely resolve is put to the test as his attraction to Peter’s girlfriend begins to grow. The Vicious Kind features a very well written script and inspired performances by Simmons Scott and Frost.

Hard to classify, but interesting characters. I also didn’t know they had McMansions in Connecticut.

Houston We Have A Problem

With Houston We Have a Problem filmmaker Nicole Torre steps inside the world of Texas oil culture to understand just how the United States developed its large appetite for crude. Wildcatters independent oilmen and even the president of Shell Oil examine some hard truth s while discussing the history and the future of this limited commodity upon which we have become so dependent and weigh in on the future of this country’s energy supply.

A talky documentary about the history of oil, mostly in Texas, and what we’ve got to look forward to next. A surprising range of opinions (some unintentionally humorous). My big takeaway was to invest in energy stocks, which might not quite be the point.

Earthwork

In 1994 real-life crop artist Stan Herd traveled from Kansas to Manhattan’s Upper West Side to create a massive environmental artwork on land owned by Donald Trump. The multi-acre artwork was made from soil rock plants and vegetation near an underground railway tunnel. Stan recruited a number of homeless individuals living in the tunnel to become his crew. Over the months it took to complete the earthwork Stan dealt with a number of difficulties in bringing his unique rural art form to an urban canvas. In the process he unexpectedly encountered the true meaning of his art and it’s ultimate lasting rewards.

Nicely cast and acted movie. The most surprising thing about it was that the director, Chris Ordal, mentioned in the post-screening chat that it was shot on location in Kansas instead of somewhere in New York. Also, a supporting role by the great Zach Grenier.

Love the Beast

What if you were a Hollywood movie star with an obsession for cars and racing? You would probably read every script with even the tiniest link to the subject matter in hopes that you could tell a great car story the likes of Grand Prix Le Mans or Mad Max. Then one day you open your garage door and sitting there right in front of you is the inspiration that gets you thinking about that old saying If you want something done right Eric Bana has now unwillingly cast himself in his own real life drama and it is a love story between Eric and the car he has owned since he was fifteen. We follow him from inside the race car to the surreal world of the red carpet. The personal and social pressures mount up in the face of re-building a car that means so much to him.

Finely directed and edited movie. This surely had a larger budget behind it over most at the festival and it showed. Nice driving cinematography and some candid moments for Bana and his group of friends.

Floored

A world that’s more riot than profession, the trading floors of Chicago are a place where gambling your family’s mortgage is all in a day’s work. Floored, at a time when markets are unhinged, offers a unique window to this lesser-known world of finance. These men may not have degrees, but they’ve got guts, and penchant for excess that solicits simultaneous feelings of revulsion and admiration. But like many aspects of our economy, technology is changing the way these traders do business, and these eccentric pit denizens aren’t the type to take kindly to new tricks.

An interesting insight into some computer-phobic people. Very candid (and amusing) commentary by several interviewees.

The Donner Party

During the winter of 1846, a group of westward bound settler s is stranded in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. They must reach California for salvation, but without food and a guide, the group becomes disillusioned and decisions must be made so that others can stay alive. Inspired by the infamous Donner Party tragedy, the film is a harrowing look at survival and how far some will go to achieve it.

This movie looked beautiful, and the performances were on target. I was reminded a lot of Deadwood. However, I felt that with the casting (Glover) I was expecting something a bit more divergent (quirkier). I left this movie about half-way through because of the disrespectful behavior of others in the audience. People on both sides of me had their phones out throughout the movie and the festival staff let others in late with some clamor. One late-arriving couple sat near me and chatted/mumbled amongst themselves continuously.

Up in the Air

The timely odyssey of Ryan Bingham, a corporate downsizer and consummate modern business traveler who, after years of staying happily airborne, suddenly finds himself ready to make a real connection. Ryan has long been contented with his unencumbered lifestyle lived out across America in airports, hotels and rental cars. He can carry all he needs in one wheel-away case; he’s a pampered, elite member of every travel loyalty program in existence; and he’s close to attaining his lifetime goal of 10 million frequent flier miles and yet . . . Ryan has nothing real to hold onto. When he falls for a simpatico fellow traveler, Ryan’s boss, inspired by a young, upstart efficiency expert, threatens to permanently call him in from the road. Faced with the prospect, at once terrifying and exhilarating, of being grounded, Ryan begins to contemplate what it might actually mean to have a home.

In some ways it is unfair to compare this movie to the others. Obviously working with a much larger budget gives you a different kind of film. I’ll summarize that I liked it and remember hearing the book is interesting too. Reitman did a post-screening Q&A and was highly entertaining and talked a lot about his process writing (and re-writing) and directing.

Gerty, from the Moon (the movie).

Gerty

And in comparison, Microsoft Bob – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Microsoft Bob, the most expensive HCI failure of its era

If you’re getting to Austin for SXSW Interactive just a little early, come on by and get your SXSW started with some others in town a day early too, not to mention meet some of us lucky enough to live in Austin. Feel free to forward this to others you know coming to Austin for SXSWi too.

Those of you in Austin, tell your Web/IA/Designer/Startup/SWSXi-like friends to meet us there. (Look for the geekiest crowd at the Cedar Door, trust me, that’ll be us. Probably on the East patio.)

Here’s an upcoming link for the event, if you’re into that kind of RSVPing.

Note that now you can pick your SXSW interactive badge on at the Austin Convention Center the same evening, come to the meetup, then pick up your badge!

What’s your guess?

Update: Since there are 7,704 photos with the chi2006 tag, I may be underestimating.

Update on the Update: As of May 29, there are 3,341 photos with the chi2007 tag.

Here’s the blurb from the project’s Web page:

“What would 100,000 people chatting on the Internet sound and look like?”… Listening Post analyzes all the text—typed just moments ago—by tens of thousands of people in Internet chat rooms around the world. It presents them as six different “movements,” combining musical tones, sound effects, synthesized voice, and scrolling text. For example, in the first movement, Listening Post monitors and displays a randomly typed text beginning with “I am.” It then searches the Internet for related phrases, creating a simultaneously funny, sad, nonsensical, pathetic, yearning, quotidian, and ultimately mesmerizing tonal poem of identity in the Internet age.

For centuries, the soaring buttresses, vaulted ceilings, and luminous stained glass of cathedrals, along with hymns and chants, have transmitted that which is beyond expression. Using algorithms, software, and data mining, Listening Post generates a similar experience around what sometimes seems beyond comprehension.

It’s quite an experience with seven “movements” that range from ideas like Wave Cycle, Topic Cluster and I Am (I Like/I Love) where text from the messages floats, drifts or cycles across the many small LED screens in sync with some Philip Glass-like music.

The exhibit runs Saturday, June 3, 2006 through Sunday, May 20, 2007, so hurry up and take a look while it’s still there.

All those questions (and more) can now be (mostly) answered by the man himself, Red Wassenich, who did in fact come up with the saying as an offhand remark when he called in to a local radio station.

Now Red has a book chock full of Austin and Weirdness: Keep Austin Weird: A Guide to the Odd Side of Town, by Schiffer Publishing.

Some friends had a signing party for Red’s book and I got to attend. Here’s a picture of Red in action:

Don is a favorite writer-director-actor from Toronto. You’re a fool if you don’t watch some his work including:

• The Red Violin: tracking a violin’s path through history with Samuel L. Jackson (but no snakes or planes), a child prodigy, a Chinese musician in the era of Cultural Revolution and a love-triangle including the violin itself.
• Last Night: an unusual “end of the world” movie with a small role by David Cronenberg as a dedicated power company employee dealing with the destruction of the planet in the only way he knows how – by thanking all of his customers (how Canadian)
• Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould : wonderful and insightful and you get to learn what Glenn Gould might eat for lunch.
• Twitch City: which recently came out on DVD and captures slacker Toronto, in the Kingston Market area perfectly. Watch this now.

Do they cancel each other out?

Technorati Tags: photos

Maybe that’s why this week the two most interesting (which means “best” by my own definition) TV shows have been Daybreak and The Lost Room.

In Daybreak, the main character is a police detective, who much like the movie Groundhog Day, is repeating the same day over and over – presumably until he gets it “right”. There are a number of contingencies and clues the detective must solve to make progress. Each week, the plot changes as some issues get “solved” and the detective isn’t plagued by them on the next version of his day. We gradually learn more about the detective’s world, his past and how everything fits into place.

In The Lost Room, the main character is also a police detective and needs to unravel a mystery based around understanding, collecting and using a set of magical objects. He must discover objects, negotiate with their owners and determine the object’s proper uses. In an attempt to go meta about the issues in the plot, several of the characters are written to seem very much like I’d assume people that are deeply involved in a social game (MMORPG or the like) might be as to forming clubs (even cults in show) around studying, finding and advancing skills in the use of the objects and making alliances. It seems like they’re truly playing a game about the objects within the episodes as independent characters, but overlapping with the main detective’s role in the show/game.

Obviously, these concepts: working through a game level, a quest, negotiating with characters and finding objects of power are common to many video games of the last few decades. Adding in the social interaction and high quality rendered environment (studio sets with actual actors) and it’s a bit like watching a someone work their way through a game. Is this a new trend in scriptwriting that will bring in the gamer demographic? (Am I only noticing this because these examples are more obvious than past shows?)

(Note: do people really say “video games” anymore? I’d think the people that design all the audio would start feeling left out.)

(Double extra bonus note: I just bought a Nintendo DS Lite – got any game or gear recommendations?)

Technorati Tags: games

Canadian Secret Service agent (yes, they have one too) on a mission: he’s out to get some respect. Caught between working with top US Intelligence officials and his budget-conscious boss back in Canada, Darryl finds himself solving world-threatening conspiracies on a small-time budget.

The trailer has gags on the agent having to ride the bus and still using dialup to access the internet. The show is related to some of the writers and producers for Monk, a show I quite like (and also set in another city I used to live – San Francisco).

(Yes, it comes in a little, commemorative gasoline can.)
Included are:

• Select Scene Audio Commentary
• Pulp Factoids Viewer
• Playing it Fast and Loose: A Documentary
• Profiling Reservoir Dogs – Featurette
• Tipping Guide
• Deleted Scenes
• Classic Interviews with Quentin Tarantino and others
• K-Billy Sounds of the ’70s

Of course, as readership grows and authorship becomes more finely tuned there is great potential for advertising or sponsorship revenue. There’s nothing particularly new about all this, except we may be seeing mainsteam publishing getting re-invented (again). These group blogs have the potential to invert the pyramid, if not abolishing it altogether, of providing certain types of news targetting the same demographics as the bloggers themselves.

The most useful aspect (for me) is that the authors are many and can therefore collect a wider range of news and events than one single person (and their blog) can, if anything, point out links to other blogs or Web sites that have local content or appeal. With the informal and often humorous writing style, these blogs are fun to read. Having access to them via RSS feeds makes getting local information quite easy.

And of course, there’s the obligatory quote from me in the Statesman’s article about bloggers telling us about what they had for lunch and how eventually (hopefully, oh please) we will see this kind of blogging evolve into a more cogent kind of restaurant review.

The (unintentionally?) ironic part of the article has a quote from Ben Brown, who was the initial Austin Austinist: “It is the greatest city in the world in which to live, and we will hear no arguments to the contrary. We fight with tooth and nail to stay here, even when our real job asks us to travel for cash.” I’m told Ben has since moved away from Austin for a job out in the Bay Area.

With Blanks on a Blank, the film making challenge here in Austin at the Alamo Drafthouse. Check out the contest trailer too, it’s hilarious.

Note: the newest Snakes on a Plane theatrical trailer takes itself awfully seriously. I guess you can only run a joke so far, but seeing the joke played out (at length), in action, is all this movie may have going for it. It would be nice to see if they could push it even further.

“A guy goes into a bar and orders ten shots of brandy.
The barman asks him ‘Ten, sir?’
‘Give them to me,’ the guy says.
The barman pours the ten shots and lines them up on the counter.
The guy takes the first and the tenth one, picks them up and pours them out
on the floor. He drinks the remaining eight, one after the other.
The barman asks with surprise, ‘Why did you pour those two shots out on the floor?’
The guy says ‘Look, sonny, the first one always tastes horrible and the last
one always makes me sick.’

From 101 Reykjavík (2000) (also a novel):

Why do Marlboro cigarettes have white filters in America, and yellow filters in Europe?
So Keith Richards can tell which continent he’s on.

Go Houston!

What I hope to find upon reading it is that a business can be more competitive by being more data driven than their competitors, be it from extending Knowledge Management ideas to fully forming a company around leveraging knowledge or from using data to help establish a conversation with customers about expectations and higher levels of service.

From the Web page:

TiVo Desktop for Mac v1.9.2 Updated February 14, 2006. This update provides compatability with Mac OS X 10.4: Tiger.

Download it now.

Of course, regular RSS feeds are available as well. (Please, just put the link for both media player formats on the page for each broadcast, do we really need to go to another page just to select which streaming format? Thanks NPR!)

For the record, I still think “podcast” is a bad name for this media distribution method. Media RSS seems to be more descriptive (because eventually people will also have to say “video podcast” or somesuch and so on…).

I thought it would be a quick way to look up just one thing when I don’t have the book at hand, but amazon.com has missed scanning and OCR-ing this one. Even more strangeness – a google search reveals a product search result (i.e. an ad) for the book at Wal-mart.com.

Am I the only person who cares about this book any longer?

I can make the claim that I’m one of many who have read all 1.5 million words of his Civil War, a Narrative three volume set. Not only are they essential to getting an understanding of how the South and North (note the capitalization) are similar and different from each other even today, it’s also a great read into the management styles of the various military leaders as well as one of the best (threaded throughout the set) Lincoln biographies in context of this series of battles.

I also enjoyed a series of letters between Foote and his friend Walker Percy (author of most famously The Moviegoer).

I remember savoring an interview with Mr. Foote in September 2001 where we got to hear him talk about his work and life, as well as tour his home office and get a look at his favorite books. Memorably, he was a devotee of Proust and had read his Remembrance of Things Past many times, from the same set and each time and wrote the dates of his readings in the back of one volume. That is something we all might want to do with our favorites. Perhaps I’ll do that with my own editions of Mr. Foote’s works.

Note: the phrase “Let us cross over the river, and rest under the shade of the trees” is said to be Civil War general Stonewall Jackson’s final words before dying in 1863, which some say was a major turning point in the Civil War.

This brings two thoughts to mind:

• The use of the word “modern” to describe Google now, when HHGG is (as far as I can tell) isn’t set in the past, but perhaps grounded in its original publication date. Either way, Google is better than when the book(s) were written, but certainly not as great as the Guide described in the books.
• I don’t know if that’s Google’s goal, but I think that Wikipedia is more in the spirit of the Guide.
  
  See:
  • Austin, Texas
  • H2G2
  • Project Galactic Guide

Here’s what events look good to me:

• Saturday
  1. 11:45 – 12:30: H.W. Brands, Lone Star Nation
     Reading and Q&A introduced by Greg Curtis
     Location: Auditorium

  2. 12:30 – 1:30:
     James Ellroy: Destination: Morgue!
     Jessee Sublett: Never the Same Again
     Reading and Q&A introduced by Kip Stratton
     Location: Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum Main Hall

  3. 12:45 – 1:30: Dayton Duncan, Lewis and Clark
     Reading and Q&A introduced by Regan Gammon
     Location: Capitol Extension Room E2.028

  4. 2:00 – 3:00: What’s So Funny About Politics?
     Jim Hightower, Let’s Stop Beating Around the Bush
     Andy Borowitz, The Borowitz Report
     Panel discussion by Evan Smith
     Location: House Chamber

  5. 2:15 – 3:00: Men Behaving Badly:
     Adam Johnson, Parasites Like Us
     Kyle Smith, Love Monkey
     Jonathan Ames, Wake Up, Sir
     Reading and panel discussion moderated by Neal Pollack
     Location: Capitol Extension Room E2.010

  6. 7:00 – 9:45: Texas Book Festival After Hours: Movies
     Location: Alamo Drafthouse–Downtown -
     Oscar-winner Peter Bogdanovich will introduce two of his favorite films: 7 p.m.: Targets & 9:45 p.m.: Saint Jack.
• Sunday
  1. What’s Cooking in Texas
     John DeMers, Houston: Culinary Capital
     Fernando Saralegui, Our Latin Table
     Linda Bauer, Historic Recipes from Texas and American Sampler Cookbook
     Panel discussion moderated by Virginia Wood
     Location: Capitol Extension Room E2.014

  2. 12:30 – 1:15: Meghan Daum, The Quality of Life Report
     Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Queen of Dreams
     Reading and Q&A introduced by Mary Margaret Farabee
     Location: Senate Chamber

  3. 2:00 – 2:45: Mind of a Killer
     Michael McGarrity, Slow Kill
     David Lindsey, The Face of the Assassin
     Reading and panel discussion moderated by Gary Lavergne
     Location: House Chamber

Why would I want to HEAR posts from someone when I can skim them in seconds in my RSS reader? There are so many other interesting things to listen to and it’s not like most of our voices are sonorous enough for lengthy attention.

Learn, be amazed, and tell your friends. RealAudio format.

Who would have guessed climate change came with such melodrama? I’m embarassed for the actors just thinking of them having to recite some of those lines.