Saturday, April 24, 2010

Dinner Theatre Family Time

BEDA: April 24, 2010

Hey, there BEDA. Almost weren't able to type you today.

Today was a family day. Yesterday, I went and picked up my brother from his school and got here at around 2:00am this morning but safe and sound at least.

Woke up incredibly lazily today around 1:30pm, played around on my brother's PS3, and then tried to mow the grass. It started raining so that was cut short. The lawn is still only about 1/3 done.

Oh well.

Then, in the evening, my sister's high school stage band performed at Dinner Theatre which was fun. My brother was going to be a guest piano player but decided against it at the last minute.

Right now, I am watching "The Box" with my brother, sister and mom. You know, the movie about the box with the button and if it's pushed the pusher gets one million dollars but someone in the world will die. It's a lot more interesting than I thought it was going to be.

Tomorrow, I'll be visiting my uncle and then head back to school. Somewhere in there, I need to watch the new Doctor Who episode.

Yay, Doctor Who. :D

Friday, April 23, 2010

Road Trip to Ohio University

BEDA: April 23, 2010

So today, Friday, marks yet another occurrence of me driving from my tiny little corner of Ohio down, down, down to Ohio University in Athens, Ohio, to pick up my brother for the weekend.

Those of you that know me well enough know that, instead of thinking, "Ohio University, where my brother goes to school," as the first thing that OU makes me think of, I instead think, "Ohio University, where Hayley G Hoover goes to school."

That doesn't make me weird by any means, right? Right.

Moving on.

So from my current location to OU back up north to my parent's house where we will be headed, it's a near nine hour drive. Yay, road trips. Kinda.

The drive is always fun after I pick up my brother. We've really been getting a long this last year or so, about the time that he started his own YouTube channel. I swear, they have nothing to do with one another. :)

During the drive one always convinces the other that we should make a stop here or there and it ends up being a lot of fun not having to be back at any certain time because, hey, we're going to get back after midnight anyway so we might as well make a few stops.

It's the drive down that's completely un-lol-tastic. I mean, sure, I'll have CDs to which I will sing obnoxiously loud, I'll have phone calls to make, and I'll even listen to my dose of NPR. But there are times when the drive just goes on and on and on. I'll be packing up my car and leaving around 4 and that's what I have to look forward to. Joy. I'd better start working on those CDs...

Shut up. Small doses of NPR makes me feel smart.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Hints About the Next Secret Parody

BEDA: April 22, 2010

So, I've been toying around with the idea of another parody to put up very soon. A lot of the stuff I've been working on needs the go-ahead from other people, input from other people, and a few others I just hit a wall during the writing. I don't even know if those ones will ever see the light of day.

But a few days ago, I had such a wonderful idea for a song that, as far as I know, no one has parodied.

I like keeping you guys wondering about the secret projects that I'm working on because, not to sound big-headed or anything, but when a song comes together as well as this one is, I know it's going to be a big deal.

That being said, I don't think anything will be as wonderful as 'Nerd'. Thanks, huge and daunting expectations.

I jest. I'm so happy you guys enjoyed 'Nerd' and money couldn't buy the publicity that Hank and John and Alan were able to give the video. Thank you guys so much.

And now to the part that you curious buggers have been waiting for. Hinting at my idea.

Hint: I tweeted about it within the past week without saying I was going to make it a parody.

There you go, that's all you get. If you're able to figure it out, don't let anyone know. But you should @ reply me on Twitter to @WhatTravisSays letting me know if you were able to put 2 and 2 together.

It should be up within the next week. I'm just tweaking a few more of the lines.

Be excited.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

I Am Now an Award Winning Director

BEDA: April 21, 2010

That's weird, isn't it?

But, no, seriously. I won an award for "Terri the Library Fairy," a video I wrote, directed, and even had a role in. But let me start from the beginning...

So, early March, Angela told me that the university was going to have a video contest for the library. The submissions needed to be very pro-library so that the library could possibly use them for promotion of their services. Makes sense.

The next weekend, Angela, John and I wrote out the ideas for what we were going to film, where we were going to be at what times, and figured out where to find the props we needed. The weekend after that, we began filming.

Filming only lasted about two hours, at which time we were running around the library, slamming dictionaries, and causing an overall scene. Well, that part isn't actually true. But Angela's wings did cause a scene.

Editing the video only took about three hours, much shorter than I had planned it to take. By the end, I was pretty proud of our work. Very confident. I proceeded to upload the video.

Filling out the forms ended up taking almost as long as the editing process with all the little snags I ran into, though. For example, the online form had two selections for me to bubble in. Bubble one was that I read and agreed to all of the terms and rules put forth by the university. Bubble two was that, if asked for them, I had forms filled out by all of the people recognizable in the video. I had read and agreed to all the rules and I had the release forms for the video so the logical choice would have been both, right? Well, it would only let me electronically bubble in one of them. So, after running around the internet and making loads of phone calls (I was NOT going to get disqualified because of a stupid error) I finally just bubbled in one and emailed one of the heads of the contest about my issues.

She understood.

And then we won first place. Yay.

Earlier today, Angela, John, and I were awarded with our prize at a party for the library employees and "Friends" (the people who donate money to the library after they graduate)and there was free food, they showed the video we made on a huge television, and everyone loved it.

Horray for being a few hundred dollars richer.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Why the Lost Next Gen iPhone is NOT Viral Marketing

BEDA: April 20, 2010

My video about the lost next gen iPhone.

Now, a lot of people are saying either a) This is fake and Gizmodo is making this all up or b) this is a "controlled leak" for a viral marketing ploy. After all, controlled leaks are kind of Apple's bread and butter but there's a specific way in which Apple handles them.

There are a few rules when creating a controlled leak. First off, find an Apple employee who has a trusted friend with a big media outlet, for example, The Wall Street Journal. Remember the rumors of the Apple tablet? It's always an inside job. No leaving products with random drunk people who could break something.

Secondly, only phone and in person correspondence. Mention the product to the media friend, maybe drop a few pictures off in person, but no emails. Nothing that could leave any sort of paper trail to either party.

Thirdly, leaks will generally happen about three weeks before a product's media or actual release. That way, it generates plenty of buzz about a product and competitors don't have a chance to see what they're going up against until it's too late.

If Apple wanted to generate buzz about this product, they would have done it a) closer to the announcement date and not three months before like this instance and b) Apple would have shot a bit higher than Gizmodo for their media buzz. Besides, a leak generally involves a blurry photo, not a complete hands-on-and-rip-apart-to-analyze. This seems like this situation is causing more promotion for Gizmodo than for Apple.

It is not an intentional leak.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Back on YouTube

BEDA: April 19, 2010

Yay for interesting things actually happening in the world that I can talk about on camera! Not that my last two videos, both birthday videos, weren't interesting at all, but they weren't really for my target audience. Unless you're Steve. Or Raquel. In that case, you're welcome. ;)

Like I said a few blog posts ago, I have a lot of ideas for videos but there are a few reasons why they don't get put up as the "next" video.

1) Time. I have some ideas that will take an entire weekend to write, film, and edit and some of them will even require costumes.

Yup, costumes. Awesome, right?

2) Organization of time. About half of the ideas I want to film involve other people and it's just really hard, being college students, to find time when I can meet up with Angela or John and film something real quick.

3) Feelings. I mean, there are some ideas I've had that I can film, that I really wanted to film at one time, but now they're old news or I am just not excited about it anymore and I know it'll be done half-heartedly and I don't want to do that to you guys.

4) Waiting on someone else. There are a few videos that I've shot my parts for, I'm just waiting for the go-ahead from another person. This could either be in the form of me waiting for their footage or waiting for the right time to mention them. My buddy Mark, who I've used guitar footage from in my Breaking Ohio video, is going to be in a video very soon. He just has to re-vamp his website beforehand.

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Buying Will Grayson Will Grayson

BEDA: April 18, 2010

Today, I fulfilled my Nerdfighter SLASH Book nerd-ness SLASH John Green fandom duties. I purchased Will Grayson Will Grayson at my local Books-A-Million. It came to a surprising $17.00 which I was happy about, considering the copy of Paper Towns I bought for a friend at a book signing last year ran me about $24.00.

There must have been a discount on the WGWG letters for using the same title twice.

I know a lot of people pre-ordered their copy of WGWG and some Nerdfighters are finding it pretty cheap on sites like Amazon but I didn't go that route for this book. Don't get me wrong, I love buying things online but there are few positives and just as many negatives to the whole ordeal.

Yes, when something is purchased online, it will be much cheaper than in the stores nearly all the time. Sites don't have to charge for on-site storage of the product and in a lot of cases, deals are offered for bulk or close-proximity items. Also, the internet offers you a wide selection of any sort of product. Odds are, someone is selling something that you want. Stores don't have near that much selection. As far as positives go, that's about it. Pricing and availability.

As for the positives of the bookstore, that list can go on for a while. First off, I love going into bookstores for the array of visible selection. You can go online to find something specific but you have to know what you're looking for whereas in a bookstore, you'll see thousands of options you probably wouldn't have thought of otherwise. Do I even have to go into how awesome it feels for a nerd to walk into a bookstore? #NoIDont #HashtaggingBlogs

Also, pricing is taken into consideration when you realize you don't have to pay shipping. In most cases, you'd pay about the same amount for a book online plus shipping as you would in the store.

Although this doesn't deal with books as it does other products or clothes, but it's nice to be able to hold what you're going to purchase before you trade your money for it. How many times have you or have you heard of someone buying something online, receiving it, and then being disappointed with it because something wasn't specified?

This isn't what I thought this was going to be.
It's blue instead of red...
This can only cut apples and not oranges...
She was supposed to be a RUSSIAN mail order bride...