About two thousand years ago, the Year One arrived. It was composed of 12 months and that was what we call the 1AD. According to historians, it was the year 754AUC “Ad Urba Condita” (“From the Founding of the City”) to the Romans, whose civilization is one of the basis of our own. Our current numbering of years was initialized by the Roman and Christian monk, Dionysius Exiguus aka Dennis the Little, around 526AD. He based it on his estimate of the year when Jesus Christ was born.The Roman year 753AUC became what we now term as the year 1BC, with the year 1AD beginning one week later after December 25^th, on January 1, 754AUC. Exiguus retained the date of December 25, as was decreed the birth of Jesus Christ by Emperor Constantine in 1071 AUC – 318 AD. Exiguus ¹“prefered to count and denote the years from the Incarnation of our Lord” because the Diocletians at that time persecuted the Christians.

Meanwhile, Bede was the first historian to use a BC year. Therefore he was the first one to choose 1 as the origin of the BC era. The reason why neither Bede nor Exiguus used the number zero is simple. It is often stated that they did not know about the number zero at that time because the Arabic numeral for zero (0) did not enter Europe until the eleventh century, and the Roman numerals had no symbol for zero. But though, Exiguus and Bede used a Latin word nulla which means “nothing”.

Probably, it won’t really matter whether we use a time line with a zero or a time line without a zero and runs 3BC, 2BC, 1BC, 1AD, 2AD, etc. like what we have today. But since historians have not counted with  the year zero since Bede’s time, and no historian includes a year 0 when numbering years in the current standard era, it’s better to retain the dates the way they are. Neither the choice of calendar system, whether Julian or Gregorian, nor the era, Anno Domini or Common Era, determines wether a year 0 will be used. But ²“if writers will not use the convention of their group, historians or astronomers, they must explicitly state whether they include a year 0 in their count of years” so as to avoid confusion or misunderstanding regarding their historical dates. It is great… I haven’t thought about when the present date really started. : )

^{1     http://www.legionxxiv.org/dateyeartime/}

^{2 http://www.wikipedia.org}

Never mind the mainstream!

December 1^st, 2009 is Free-e-day, a day when any independent artist, writer, musician or filmmaker can give something of theirs away in electronic form for free and anyone who loves culture can discover a wealth of independent talent in one place.

Free-e-day is a celebration of independent culture, bringing together creative people from across the globe and giving them a louder voice and wider audience than they would ever have alone; and reminding the world that the next time they have money to spend on culture, there are more interesting places to go than the mainstream.

Free-e-day is about bringing people together – uniting audiences and creatives; but also uniting independent creative people with each other, to share ideas and practical advice, to debate the future, and to build friendships to last a lifetime. The website will be running a number of webchats, debates, and practical workshops all day, as well as linking to all the places where free downloads are available.

Creatives from as far afield as Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, USA, Canada, and Europe, are offering their work for free. All of them, along with the schedule of events, feature in the full colour free e-brochure available to download and keep from the event’s website.

There will also be at least one live gig, at Café Tarifa in Oxford, at 8pm GMT, featuring live music, readings, and dancing, as well as an art exhibition, to which entry will, of course, be free.

For further information contact songsfromtheothersideofthewall [At] Gmail [Dot] Com and put Free-e-day in the subject line of your e-mail.

Visit www.freeeday.wordpress.com for more information.

Them Crooked Vultures came to my attention when they did their show in Amsterdam back over the summer, mainly because of their interesting way of marketing the show. It made you think, it got you interested and involved. It was similar to something Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor did with the Year Zero release only not as well developed. With Year Zero Reznor started a viral marketing campaign that was based on online role play games crossing over into real life. When you’re

Them Crooked Vultures Co-Ordinates Poster

a fan that gets crazy about a band’s music this kind of thing is fantastic, and what’s more it’s fun. Even if you aren’t a super-fan it’s still an interesting departure from daily life to figure out the clues, and what’s more it gets you hooked in just like TV series do, keeping you coming back to find out what happens next. Them Crooked Vultures did something similar to towns a couple of days before their arrival, postering places with a string of numbers which related to the exact GPS co-ordinates of a venue and relying on avid followers passing the information on through blogs, forums and word of mouth. And it worked. The super group had amazing sell out shows, played as surprise special guests to the Arctic Monkeys and various festivals over the summer, before even officially recording one song.  Tonight Zane Lowe will be playing their first studio recording for their long awaited release New Fang. Exciting? I wish they’d done something as exciting as they did with their live shows, but I guess people now know who they are.

Here’s the Video:

I also came across the news that Lil Wayne is going into prison on gun possession charges. That didn’t seem to stop him recording this song with Weezer. I’m so so so unsure about this. It sounds cheesy and like it’s trying too hard to me, maybe I’m being too close minded by thinking that you should stick to one genre but if you’re going to do it, at least do it well!

Weezer ft Lil Wayne :  Can’t Stop Partying

Ok, übertrieben, nur ein bisschen. Für die US-Fernsehserie “Fringe” hat Trent Reznor seinen Song “Zero-Sum” vom Album “Year Zero” mit einem neuen Text versehen, der Dialogen des Seriencharakters William Bell (Leonard Nimoy) entnommen ist. Evtl. noch viel interessanter ist diese Anmerkung des Serienproduzenten Jeff Pinkner beim Hollywood Insider:

“If he wants to come act on the show, that’s not tit for tat—that’s an open invitation, and we made that known to him,” says Pinkner. Any ideas on what he may play? “Well, his head would probably end up exploding,” deadpans Pinkner. “There’d be some uncomfortable biology in there one way or another.”

.

Quellen:

• offiz. Nine Inch Nails Twitter
• Echoing The Sound Forum
• Hollywood Insider

The term “post-human” didn’t enter into everyday usage until a televised interviewwith Dokter Klaus “Dr. Shark” Hai (a Nazi super-scientist smuggled out of the Fatherland by Prometheus for his work building a fleet of gilled human U-boats) in 1952.

Responding to a question of Nietzschean ideals, Doktor Shark said, “the  overman must be a going under– an eternal tragedy, but I market flesh for after man, the post-human.”

The term matched the zeitgeist– the following day the Homelander’s twelve-year-old son was seen soaring over Manhattan and a soldier’s emergent pyro-kinesis immolated his entire squad.

Prometheus also began its “exotic census” that year, tallying the number of hypercognitive, paranormal, supernatural, biologically  unusual, or artificially augmented American citizens. In 1952, that number was 153. Parallel dimensions, nor afterlife, nor extraterrestrials were acknowledged by the organization.

In 2009, Prometheus clocks that number just over 300,000.

50% of that number are what Prometheus labels “non-tactical variants,” meaning that the mutation or supernatural curse distinguishing the Post-Human does not make him or her or it more dangerous than a human (vast majority of Year  Zero activists fall into this range). They might have purple skin pigmentation, mobile birthmarks or tattoos, or an extra-long neck. 60% of the remaining 150,000 are designated “minor tactical assets.” Examples include low level telepathy, necropaths, night vision, an extra limb, heat resistance, teleportation through a rare medium, sorcerous dabblers (like Parlor Trick), hyper-hearing, or being a living puzzle.

80% of remaining 60,000 are “moderate tactical assets,” manipulating electricity, possessing an array of exotic visions, radioactivity-hardened, telekinesis, mental controllers.

No accurate estimation models accurately projection the demographics of the remaining threat  levels (Severe, Critical, and Prime).

Established in 1986 after a Year Zero faction known as the Zeroheads (headed by Catapult) nearly destroyed the Seattle Space Needle by teleporting two human bio-detonators from their hidden base (the Front later discovered that the Zeroheads were paying Saudi Arabia to shelter), the American NRG Defense is a field traced vaguely along America’s continental border that prevents extranational teleportation threats.

A combined effort of Conjectural Energies and Omnilab, the NRG Defense was beset by wave upon wave of litigation and post-human threat (particularly by members of Terra Occulta, until the group kidnapped enough scientists to confirm the Curtain could not nullify mystical teleportation). The US Justice Department brought Professor Phenomenon, Smartacus, and the Iron American up on sabotage charges (because these three heroes were especially versed in strange technologies).

Every two years, a member of congress from Rhode Island (where Conjectural Energies is based) brings up a bill to redefine the NRG curtain, updating the government’s contract with the technology firm and altering the precise scientific tact the field uses to stop transnational teleportaion.

The political effect of the anti-teleportation field is two fold: first, it provides an initial wave of national security and, second, all extranational missions must be approved by the Prometheus Director or the President himself.

A series of seventy-two geo-synch sattelites maintain the anti-teleportation field by bounces a series of anti-neutrinos to twenty land-based stations along America’s borders.

*NRG= Non-teleportation Reaction Grid

There came an hour like no other.

On one cold clear day in September, 1963, the Atomic Brain’s assault on the White House occupied both the Front and Professor Phenomenon, the Astonishers fought the Final Men of the Forever Reich in Los Angeles, Malcolm Extreme kidnapped and then lost Frank Sinatra to the Black Hope, Mr. Mystery confronted Dr. Dread for the first time, and Papa Crow & the Witching Hour defended against the Conqueror Worm in Underland.

New York City had no united front against Year Zero, the post-human supremacy organization.

Dr. When (in one of his first appearances in recorded Post-Human history) appeared to seven separate New York super-powered vigilantes urging them to congregate at a Rockefeller Center before Year Zero appeared. None of them did. Rockefellar Center fell.

The seven vigilantes arrived late, barely preventing Professor Zero from broadcasting his telepathy via a nation-wide television signals.

The Conscience (an 11th hour founder) insisted, “We should make this easier next time.”

And thus there’s always been an 11th hour defending New York– a loose union of New York’s solo supers. Not a proper team, but a collaborative effort.

Dr. Tara Chance insisted in her book Too Much of a Muchness that if the Eleventh Hour functioned like a normal interventionist squad, they would “kill each other in under an hour.”

Hi, I’m Anne. I’m the one who goes on and on about money, spending, frugal living and such. Dan, in an instant of cider-induced madness, thought it would be a good idea for me to blog, based on some of the things I write about. By the time he’d sobered up I’d already said yes, so it was way too late for him to change his mind. You see, I’m not a literary genius or anything like that, no, not in the least.

I write mainly non-fictiony kind of stuff. I suppose this stems from my training and work; counselling young people while doing some heavy relationship coaching on the side. Things just kind of blossomed from there, and the next thing you know, I’m writing all over the place.

I’ll try to do a weekly column giving tips on how we all can spend less. I’ve chosen this particular topic at this time because I’ve just released my new book and all this information is still lashing around in my system. You will notice that when I start writing about weight issues in the spring, some of these money-saving trends will still be visible in my work. If some of what I say seem very obvious to you, we could both pat ourselves on the back for working them out. In my research I’ve found that apparent money-saving ideals have not even crossed the minds of some people. After all, one cannot possibly know that rice can be grounded to make flour, until wheat is made illegal in their little world, right?

My topic this week concerns pets. They can get very expensive to maintain, can’t they, especially in this current financial climate. My idea for cutting down on pet-related costs is to share a pet with your siblings/friends and their families.

How will this work?

If you’re now thinking of having a pet, you could start off by choosing one with another member of your extended family or good friend. Pet insurance, vet bills, food, toys, care etc will all be shared equally by both parties. The pet will have two homes and twice as much love. You could alternate visits weekly, and when you go away on holiday you’ll save yourself a bundle on pet care/sitters because the other family who owns the pet will have it at their place for free. Of course you’ll still have to buy food, litter etc, but whatever you purchase will last twice as long, thus be half as expensive.

If your kids have always wanted a dog (for example) and you have no objection other than you could not afford it, you could make plans to half adopt your friend/sibling’s dog (with their agreement of course).  If you’re thinking that the animal may be stressed, I don’t think you have to worry about this at all. My friend’s cat lives with her and her neighbour equally. It gets fed, petted, loved and needed at both places. It thrives on its regal lifestyle. My dog, China did exactly the same thing with myself and my friend. She was equally happy at both homes. I didn’t have any kids at the time, but my friend did. China got her exercise running around with my friend’s kids. When she was tired, she came home to me and played lazy, got her back rubbed, and a nice bowlful of food to eat.

A burden shared is a burden halved. A pet shared is twice as much fun and the financial responsibilities halved.

-

Check out my book ‘How to Sp£nd L€$$’ available to download for free on Smashwords, as promotional offer. If you like it and want to show your support, join us at the Facebook fan page called, I Know How To Spend Less And Still Live Well.’  If you’d like to connect with me you can find me hanging around here, Sunday’s Child Lives At Annie’s House. My relationship articles pile up at, The Relationship Supermarket.com, and my new writing blog is here.  Don’t be a stranger, now.

 Anne.

Mr. Cthulhu: "Even death must die, baby."

GENERAL THREAT RATING: Critcal

MOTIVATION: New World Chaos

WEAKNESSES: Womanizer, unnerving appearance, animosity toward Year Zero

APPEARANCE: Six foot six. Two-fifty pounds. Head of an indeterminate species of octopus, proportionate to body.

HISTORY

Smartacus maintains Mr. Cthulhu is another failed attempt to engineer the “god-human” because he once forced Conan O’Brien to do an entire show within knowing he was speaking in Mandarin. Machinism insists that he’s a refugee from a hive-mind reality abandoned here during the Parallel Wars. Nightwatch thinks he’s the anti-christ. But know one knows.

Generally it’s agreed he is not a member of the pantheon of Old Ones from HP Lovecraft’s fiction. Multiple mystical operatives have scanned him and never detected mystical energy in his being. He does possess some of the abilities of Lovecraft’s Old Ones.

Specifically: making people go crazy. Generally anyone who can see him or is within five hundred yards is Mr. Cthulhu’s psychic yoyo.

His minions in the field are typically normal humans he’s dominated with his mind. After he uses them, he rewrites their history to turn them into cannibals or serial killers or catatonic vegetables (SEE FILES: Marauder or Insaniac). In some tragic cases, he’ll put them back exactly as they were minus a vital cornerstone in their life.

That they had a six-month old, for instance. Or were allergic to gluten. Or believed in God.

He repeatedly tangled with the Front, the 11th Hour, and the LA-based team The Vengeance. Nightwatch specifically hates him (Nightwatch was forced to watch as his wife killed herself in front of him because of Mr. Cthlhu).  He’s been active since at least the seventies. Though he became aware to the public at large when a psychic battle with Professor Zero put the entire city of Des Moines, Iowa into a coma for three days.

I’ve always wanted to be in Time Out New York, but Time Out Chicago got there first:

Playwright Kristoffer Diaz is describing the plot of The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, his new play about small-time professional wrestlers. “I think [pro wrestling is] a really wonderful art form. But it does tend to play to the lowest common denominator, which means it can be really racist and sexist and homophobic,” he says. “It plays to stereotypes in a really huge way.” That kind of pigeonholing is precisely what Ignition, the new Victory Gardens initiative that’s bringing Chad Deity to the stage, is meant to combat.

Aki Ra (pictured) decommissioning unexploded ordnance.

A movie about Aki Ra, renowned landmine activist, founder and curator of the Cambodian Landmine Museum, in Siem Reap, is currently in production.

The working title is: Year Zero: Story of a Khmer Rouge Soldier and it explores the history of Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge regime as lived through the experience of Aki Ra.

After losing his parents to the Pol-Pot regime as a 6-year-old, Aki Ra was conscripted into the Khmer Rouge army as a child soldier and taught to lay mines before eventually being captured and then recruited by the Vietnamese army in 1983 and then later with the Cambodian army as a teenager.

After receiving landmine clearance training from the UN in 1994, he personally removed over 50,000 mines and other unexploded ordnance (UXO), 20 per cent of all that which exits in Siem Reap province.

Using only a knife and sharp stick, Aki Ra continued to clear landmines until 2007, when he ended his de-mining activities in order to officially authenticate the landmine museum.

The Cambodian Landmine Museum Relief Fund (CLMRF), the official NGO of the landmine museum, and other philanthropic groups and individuals have helped provide funding for safety education for Cambodians living in rural and jungle areas that are still littered with mines and UXO.

The Cambodian Landmine Museum has become a well-known attraction for tourists who come to Siem Reap to see the Angkorian ruins. It displays various kinds of UXO removed by Aki Ra and others involved with the NGO.

Cambodia is one of the most heavily mined countries in the world. Decades of war left behind an estimated 6 million unmapped landmines throughout the Cambodian countryside. In addition to the mines, half a million tons of carpet bombs were dropped on Cambodia during the Vietnam War by the United States in the late 60s and early 70s.

In 2008 Aki registered a new sister NGO of the CLMRF called Cambodian Self Help De-mining (CSHD) in order to secure a formal accredited certificate, in order to continue removing mines.

The film’s executive producer, Richard Fitoussi said “Year Zero is due for release at numerous film festivals in the Spring of 2010.”

“We hope that it will be ready for distribution next fall/winter 2010. This is all depending on how well it does at festivals and if it gets picked up by a major distributor.”

A preliminary trailer is available in high definition on the films official website.

En base a la lectura de The Future of Music, de David Kusek.

La música es un producto actualmente, sin embargo cada vez se acerca a ser más una experiencia, que no se termina solamente en escuchar una canción, comprar un disco o ir a un concierto. Y lo que nos indica la velocidad con la que se mueve las tecnologías, es que va a ser asequible donde estés, cuando quieras, on demand, y no sólo la música, sino todos tus contenidos digitales y de entretenimiento.

Music is becoming more about the experience than a product… perhaps we can once again become part of the experience of music, rather than the static purchasers of it. We can be involved, we can cheer our favorite artists on, we can participate in events and react to them, and we can actually make a difference.

En el tema de la música como una experiencia más allá de un producto estático, como ha ocurrido todo el siglo pasado, los artistas, las empresas y las marcas ahora deben mirar a los usuarios, a los consumidores, como partes activas de los procesos, no sólo de consumo de medios, sino también para conocerlos, iniciar conversaciones, saber de ellos, crear comunidades, para que los ayuden a difundir su música, comprar sus productos, hablar bien de ellos, producir mejores productos, e involucrarlos en la marca o en lo que el artista es, volverlos fans reales.

Experiencias como las que desarrollan personas tan innovadoras como Trent Reznor, con el lanzamiento offline online del disco Year Zero en 2007, donde se creó una serie de actividades, mediante un alternate reality game, que involucraron a los fanáticos de una manera interactiva,  en la cual buscaban pistas y encontraban páginas que les iban contando una historia que habla del futuro en el 2022 o el “year zero”, historia que continua en el disco, del cual comienzan a encontrar canciones en USBs en los conciertos y posteriormente estuvo disponible vía streaming en la página de MySpace de la banda, previo al lanzamiento del disco.

Este lanzamiento involucró a los fans y se volvió un fenómeno en la red, creando comunidades, incluso antes de que Facebook y Twitter tomaran la fuerza que tienen hoy en día. Los usuarios crearon Wikis, chats, centros de conversación, compartieron las canciones que se encontraban, escribieron en sus blogs, tomaban fotografías y las subían a la red… los fanáticos crearon comunidades y se involucraron, y no había día que no buscarán más información no sólo de Nine Inch Nails y Trent Reznor, sino de esta historia, del disco, de las canciones que encontraban.

Esta campaña de lanzamiento realmente no usó medios tradicionales, aprovechó el interés de sus fanáticos, la existencia del tour de la banda e Internet, y su interactividad. Fue llamada por revistas como Rolling Stone como “el sueño de cualquier equipo de mercadotecnia, por el involucramiento de sus fans, y ganó Webby Awards por mejor campaña integral y campaña online. Lo principal de esta campaña fue que realmente aprovechó la interactividad del mundo online y lo mezclo al mundo off line. Y el disco es muy bueno! Y tuvo éxito. Vendió 187 mil unidades a nivel mundial en la primera semana desde su lanzamiento y llegó al segundo lugar del Billboard 200 y estuvo en los diez primeros lugares de países como Australia, Canadá y Reino Unido.

Otro ejemplo reciente ha sido el fenómeno Twitter. Esto no sólo para música, sino también para marcas, como Dell, BlackBerry, y empresas de medios, como CNN y BBC. Twitter permite a los usuarios no sólo conocer noticias sobre los artistas o las marcas, pero comenzar una conversación con ellos, rompiendo con la pared que normalmente tienen los artistas y las marcas a su alrededor, o la falta de medios de contacto con los usuarios y consumidores reales. Actualmente, seguir a un @davenavarro, un @Skank o un @SabrosaPurr le ofrece a los usuarios comentar sus noticias, difundirlas, y sentirse más cerca de ellos, volviéndolo más una experiencia. Y no necesariamente significa comprar su música, estáticamente.

Otro ejemplo ya son los conciertos y lo que están haciendo los medios interactivos alrededor de ellos. Aunque la industria de las disqueras no es la más prolífica actualmente,  la industria de la música  sigue creciendo, datos como que le industria de los conciertos ha aumentado exponencialmente, según datos de la lectura de 1.3 mil millones de dólares en 1998 a 2.3 mil millones en 2003. Los medios digitales ya te permiten acceder a contenidos digitales como canales especiales de los artistas, donde puedes comentar sobre los videos y canciones, y encontrar a otros como tu, creando comunidades; conciertos globales como Live Eight y Live Earth se pueden transmitir, acceder on demand, a millones de personas que no están ahí en tiempo real, y abrir espacios para comentar y convivir, y dar seguimiento a la experiencia, de manera que no sólo es un producto, pero una experiencia total que sigue y que engancha más a los consumidores y los vuelve partícipes de la marca o del evento, como elementos activos.

Además, con tecnologías como PhotoSynth de Microsoft, que te permite crear un espacio virtual por medio de la contraposición y combinación de fotografías tomadas desde diferentes ángulos, dando una percepción de tercera dimensión, los usuarios y fans podrán estar dentro del concierto, incluso si no fueron, viendo el escenario,  acercándose al artista, comentando sobre las fotografías, la experiencia en el concierto, etc. LA experiencia del concierto y de la música del artista no termina en el evento, continua por medio de la interrelación de los fanáticos, haciendo un mayor engagement con el artista, las marcas, la industria.

You decide what you hear and see, and who can share the experience.

http://www.officelabs.com/#productivityfuturevision Este video habla de este tema de la convergencia de medios y de disponibilidad y acceso de contenidos on demand, cuándo quieras, donde quieras, desde donde estés, con una experiencia seamless, como ejemplifica Dave Kusek con el Universal Media Gadget.

Como este video nos indica, los contenidos de entretenimiento digital van hacia ese punto de tener una convergencia y comunicación entre diferentes gadgets que te permiten siempre estar conectado con lo que te gusta, fluyendo de la red, de las computadores, los móviles, sin barreras.

La forma de compartir música además, ha cambiado en forma impresionante en años recientes. Desde los sistemas de P2P a los radios personalizados de streaming, como Last.fm, Spotify y Blip.fm, permiten a los usuarios encontrar música que les gusta, y encontrar gente con sus mismos gustos y crear comunidades, por medio de las cuales pueden compartir, descubrir y conocer nuevas canciones, nuevas bandas y nuevos contenidos. Encuentras almas gemelas con quien te identificas y compartes lo que te gusta.

Los mismos artistas están creando espacios y nuevas formas de compartir sus contenidos y de distribuir su música. Radiohead prefiere lanzar su nuevo disco, in Rainbows, a través de la red, al igual que Nine Inch Nails, que lanza su nuevo disco The Slip en diferentes calidades para los usuarios, así como lanza un concurso de remixes en conjunto con GarageBand, poniendo a disposición de sus consumidores las pistas de sus canciones, para que ellos re mezclen sus canciones, y las compartan. Los CDs físicos están disponibles, como agua Evian, para los usuarios que quieren lo físico, el collector ítem.

Este tipo de movimientos impulsados por los artistas, también hace que cambie la forma de establecer los precios. Con In Rainbows, el consumidor decidía el precio que quería pagar por el disco; con Napster pagas una cuota mensual;  con sistemas de servicio de download de música vía móviles on demand, como Play Now Plus de Sony Ericsson pagas un precio flat fee cuando compras el teléfono, pero no te puedes quedar con todas las canciones que bajas por temas de Royalties. En años siguientes seguiremos viendo el desarrollo de estos servicios, como comenta Kusek en su libro.

La industria de la música va a seguir cambiando, generando nuevas formas de disfrutar los contenidos digitales, centrados en las experiencias de las personas. Con la convergencia de medios digitales, conceptos como el Celestial Juke Box, los nuevos servicios de suscripción a contenidos, redes semánticas, los usuarios podrán experimentar y compartir lo que quieran, cuando quieran.

I’ve been a little behind in my posting of these, but my excuse is that I’ve been up at Norm’s Fish Camp, getting shredded by mosquitoes. But now, without further ado, here are pictures from the first day of rehearsal at Victory Gardens’ Biograph Theater:

This poster is in the window at The Biograph. There's an even larger one, more than life-size one that I'll shoot soon.

The two shows that make up the Ignition Festival. You're expected to see both.

Like any show, we start with table work and a first read. Here, Kamal and Christian talk about all the bone-crunching things they're going to get to do to Desmin.

Some people say this is a show about penises. I, on the other hand, think it's a show about falling. Right after the first read, fight choreographer David Woolley started teaching the boys how not to break their necks when they get thrown to the ground.

One of the first moves we learned was the armbar. The important thing here is the sell, not the move itself. You've got to make it *look* like it hurts. You can't kick a guy's ass in wrestling with the help of the guy whose ass you're kicking.

And this is how the whole process feels. A wonderful blur.

Next time, I’ll post from our first off-site rehearsals, with lots of pics of squats and fight choreography, and even some video. Of powerbombs.  For real.

If you’ve got Flickr, you can see more right now.

1.  The Wire series is on hold for a second while I figure out how to get this damn DVD player to work.

2. I still can’t get into Mad Men, although I’m giving it time.  I don’t dislike it, but it’s just cigarette porn to me.

3. Rehearsals for Chad Deity are awesome.  It’s been mainly fight choreography.  Wrestling choreography.  We’ve almost worked up to the powerbomb.  It’s a little crazy to watch.  I’ve got videos and pictures galore, but I can’t share them until I’ve got union clearance.  Working on it.

4. Tickets are onsale, by the way.

5. For Year Zero too.

6. There’s a lot of great stuff happening in Chicago in September theaterwise.  It’s going to be a hell of a month.  You should be here.

If you are already game for PhD, and all set for getting in a PhD program next year, this is your year ZERO. This year will neither count anything for your actual PhD, nor to anything else, but nevertheless is going to be one of the most eventful years of your life. You will be extremely busy with the examinations, applications, SOPs, CVs, acceptances, rejects; and if succesful, visa interviews, shoppings, and flying to USA. I still look back to that year with immense pride, be it cramming those weird wordlists; or making drafts and drafts of SOPs; or those running for recommendation letters; and trying to meet deadlines (had never faced such intense schedule before). And this was followed by 9 rejects until I got my final acceptance! With that grilling experience, I have few suggestions for those in year ZERO.

• Keep your schedule as free as possible of anything else

This is most important of everything else. To do full justice to your applications, and to your future, try to spend all possible time on the application process than anything else. In most cases, you will be in final year of your undergrad and this sound difficult. Not really though. People go through many jobs interviews and job/farewell parties in their final year. If you want to do PhD, you can easily skip those interviews (some backup plan is good but some risk will save you much time) and many such parties. Also, make sure you dont screw up your academics much in this process, so be prepared in advance.

• Make a plan

On day 1 of this year (may be a little sooner or later), get a notebook/diary and jott down a plan. Don’t take it as a childish advice, as you will seen realize this when things get too cluttered. This plan must consist of the following (among other things you feel important):

1. Discipline of application (in most cases its your discipline in undergrad but you can switch if you wish to)
2. Universities to apply (the first list, which you have in mind, or just make up for the moment to get an idea) and approximate deadlines of applications
3. Examinations: GRE general test,  TOEFL, GRE subject test(if you need to)
4. What else will be needed : e.g. SOP, CV,…
5. Recommendation letters (who? think of people who can write good recommendation for you)

Now you have the basic plan set up, think of how much time all of these would take, and set aside times for it. Divide your time in phases and deadlines, and make a schedule of what needs to be done in months to follow. A typical schedule for a guy applying for next fall (August/September) may be:

• Phase 1: (May-July)

a. University/Program search

b. Preparing for GRE/TOEFL

• Deadline 1: August 1 (GRE/TOEFL written)
• Phase 2: (Aug-Sept)

a. SOP

b. CV

c. Final list of universities/programs with detailed requirements

• Phase 3: (Oct-Nov)

a. Contact Professors/Employers for recommendation letters

b. Arrange transcripts and other application material

c. Finalize SOP and CV

• Phase 4: (Dec-Jan)

a. Application packets: Prepare and send

b. Follow up on responses

c. Think on some backup universities

• Deadline 2: Feb 1: All applications complete

• Phase 5: (Feb-Mar)

a. Wait for decision

b. IF(Accept) Enjoy++, ELSE Backup++(apply to more univs or look for jobs if you don’t have one)

• Phase 6: (Apr-May)

a. If all rejects, QUIT (plan for next year)

b. If selected, choose university, send acceptances

c. Visa formalities

• Phase 7: (June-July)

a. Take rest, spend time with family, do shopping, flight tickets

b. Fly to USA

I will draw a typical roadmap for PhD. Specifics of each of the milestones will be a subject of later posts in the blog.

• Year(s) < ZERO : The pre-preparation year(s), i.e., the year(s) before the actual applications for PhD
• Year ZERO: Applications, Examinations, and getting in
• Year ONE: Setting up for the job, Finding adviser, and research topic
• Year TWO: Cooking the PhD proposal
• Year THREE and YEAR FOUR: The main course
• Year FIVE: Winding up & Defense, Making the next step
• Year(s) >FIVE: Still in school?, Life after PhD

Note that the actual number of years and the roadmap may vary on a case-to-case basis. The above outline is written with a US PhD in mind but can be adapted for PhD program of any country with appropriate revisions.

For those of you who enjoyed the Year Zero experience or are interested in Alternate Reality Games, be sure to visit our friends at 42entertainment.com and sign up. They will notify you of any new scenarios they are involved in.
These guys are amazing at what they do – don’t miss out.
Thanks-
TR

posted by trent reznor at 8:36am

discuss @ nin.com

NINE INCH NAILS 2009

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Memorial Day passed.  The school year has nearly expired.  My car’s heater is stuck on the hottest setting.  Summer is here!  I glorify attending movies any time of the year, but it is most rewarding in the summer.  There’s  always a slew of excitement-packed/CGI-filled/action-figure-inducing films that are sure to be available for sale on DVD just as the Christmas shopping season begins.  I embrace the commercialism of this American tradition.  I love it.

I already saw Star Trek.  Did I mention I saw it twice?  Thumbs up.  I also took The Max to Night at the Museum last weekend.  I wasn’t disappointed, but I expected Ben Stiller and his cronies to be poor to fair, which I think it was.

Here’s some other movies I will be viewing while drinking Cherry Coke:

Up

I don’t think this looks as promising as many previous Pixar movies.  I hope to be pleasantly surprised when I watch it.

*I went an saw Up since writing this…not bad at all.  Better than I presumed.

Transformers 2

Stop sniveling haters. True, the first one was 1 1/2 stars for the story.  But surely the 4 star worthy robots made the film, at minimum, entertaining for a couple hours.   I long to watch the robots in transformation and follow it up by  killing other robots.  If I desired an epic story, I’d go rent Slumdog Millionaire.  Someday there will be a robot killing movie with an Oscar worthy plot.  I accept that it will not be in this series.

Year One

I’m hoping to laugh.  The kid from Juno is in it.  He’s a fun time.  I’m not expecting a killer plot, just laughs.

Terminator 4

This sequel, twenty-five years after the original is a maybe.  I’ll go if  I get around to renting part 3.    It will not be superior to T2.  Why? If Linda Hamilton is not making voice overs as Sarah Connor, it’s not entertainment.    Also, can you imagine if the casting director got all comical and re-cast Edward Furlong as John Connor?

Because, this is what he looks like today.

Imagine this guy trying to save the world.

I’m going to skip over summer now and head straight into fall.  This October brings about the most anticipated children’s movie of my long, long life.

Watch that video, for real.  Here’s why I am drooling for this film:

A)  It’s Where the Wild Things Are!  It’s a classic.  Kids read it today…my generation read it…and the generation before read it to their kids.  Most are acquainted with the story.

B)  There’s a lack of computer animated hooey.   We have come to expect amazing visuals in childeren’s films, but often this is the focus of the movie, which leads to less than decent story.

C)  This is a guess, and a hopefully correct one: There doesn’t seem to be a lot of times where adults are on film.  I think an ample number of live action kids movies could be helped with cutting out the time adults are on screen.

There’s a bunch more movies I did not review, because I don’t necessarily want to see them.  Especially Ice Age 3.   Why must every animated movie now come in  groups of at least three?

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I changed the look here, yes.  I might change it back or at least make it similar to what it was as this light background is annoying me.  For now, you get the mannequin from the surplus store staring into your soul…

MARILYN MANSON With TRENT REZNOR

New MANSON album, ‘THE HIGH END OF THE LOW’, is out. All kinds of details and tour dates HERE.

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So, hopefully, with a bit of luck the new look What Katie Wore will go live at some point today (although I wouldn’t hold you breath). As well as looking nicer, it should have some new functionality (like a Twitter plug-in). You’ll need to be looking at www.whatkatiewore.com and not the whatkatiewore.wordpress.com site. Hopefully that makes sense. Fingers crossed it all works. Today Katie is wearing Swear shoes, Burberry shirt dress, Year Zero necklace (again! – it’s clearly a favourite), and her Bell & Ross watch. Fantastic.

So we decided it might be time to get out of the City for a bit and so have high-tailed it up to Scotchland. Here’s Katie as we make a break for the border (I think we shook the police off around Newcastle). David and Jane were pretty surprised to see us but thankfully had some Sancerre on ice for just such an occasion. Katie’s getaway-outfit consists of my T-shirt (inside out) from H&M, Whistles skirt, Year Zero heart jewellry nonsense and Le Pancaldine shoes from Munich (no website). Now back to the wine.

This is a brand new segment called ‘Art of the Month’. I’ll shed some light on artists of any medium doing exceptional work. Today, I’m gonna bring some well-deserved attention to Trent Reznor’s concept album ‘Year Zero’. While it’s not his most recent album, (which is ‘The Slip’ or their live collection ‘Lights in the Sky’) it’s an incredibly relevant record.

I’m a huge NIN fan, admittedly, and this album is slowly becoming one of my favorites. I picked up a copy of it last week. The concept is based around a future US government that is staunchly conservative and extremist. A National Bureau of Morality is established, homosexuality is outlawed, privacy is destroyed and the church controls the state. Meanwhile, an underground resistance against the government slowly gains strength and fights back. The concept was so interesting that HBO even greenlit ‘Year Zero’ as a TV series, although episodes were never shot. (Reznor is still trying to get the mini-series made) Here’s the CD artwork, which was actually done by the same production/artwork company that produced ‘The Dark Knight’.

A shot of the city:

The Resistance Flag

The scariest piece of art in this series, the stamp for the Bureau of Morality.

Finally, here’s the official video for ‘Survivalism’. (It won’t let me embed, so follow the link)

Got any suggestions for Art of the Month? E-mail them to adamsteevens@gmail.com