ithought

You would prefer to see a grown man die on TV?

Your comment is wrong and false. He doesn't spend every night in a hotel, the shoots are between 5 to 7 days. Some he stays outside all night, the other supporting shots he stays in a hotel.

He risks his life in significant (and foolish) ways every episode. Climbing and swinging on rope vines over 1,000 foot drops are not faked. Hunting by hand, cleaning and cooking animals, or eating them raw is not faked. Sure he has assistance and safety precautions but that's reasonable.

I wouldn't conflate 'bullshitting' with bullshit. The ability to schmooze is largely about communicating personal emotions and resonating with others in obvious ways. You acknowledge their feelings, regardless of how trivial it is, and now you're connected. But I've seen some people use this in very bad ways. Almost in predatory ways.

However, despite how much I hate being forced to schmooze with someone (say on an impromptu conference call) or be able to talk about nonsensical things in a clever funny way when meeting a new girl or being out in social situations, I resigned myself that what I really hate is being UNPREPARED.

So for me Toastmasters, learning simple comedy routines, exercising, dressing nice, knowing current events and some pop culture, recent sports news; all give me confidence to speak smoothly, conversate well etc etc. I'm more referencing dating and meeting people than office situations but it's all the same thing -- getting people to like and notice you.

So prepare and improve yourself how you can. And if you are okay labeling yourself an introvert then learn to play the guitar and take dance classes. No words needed with those but they will tremendously help your social life.

Like RevolutionMoney? Free transfer fees I think, then sold to American Express. (Was/is Steve Case's company.)

I hope Dwolla never sells for this reason.

The biggest real cost of a film is film; the stock, its processing and the prints to be distributed to the theaters.

This makes the distribution channel narrow and the market is such that spending more money almost always mean breaking even or earning tens of millions. The financials and agreements are so convoluted and unfair, that most actors and producers want to get paid upfront because they know the system is rigged against them.

Shooting big expensive grandiose scenes is useful when your business model is based on excessive production expenses.

However, we are at that point where technology for pre-visualization and digital blueprinting could radically change how a film is made. A famous effects artists and inventor is going back to 70s style sets and models but using modern high frame rate cameras etc. He is building a giant digital-virtual studio. And he's the type of person with the background, skill and clout to change how this technology is viewed and used in the industry.

The future is fair productions where major participants can defer compensation for backend, digital filmmaking, digital film distribution to theaters, end the studio's cartel of exorbitant rates, use pre-viz, blueprinting, CG, mix of modern and classic technology.

Already is and will. Check out Shai Agassi. (BetterPlace)

EDIT- Israel, Denmark, Australia and some US testing. Why is this downvoted? My point was a solution exists and is being implemented on a large scale.

My only interest in Facebook is keeping in touch with old friends and having a way to remind either myself or others to reach out and say hello.

If it wasn't for e-mails (gmail), I would had never re-connected with some people on Facebook. The interface is an ice breaker and a way to less awkwardly contact someone you haven't spoken to in years. Or quickly see how someone is doing.

Most of what I want is simple and fundamental. It doesn't require me giving a never-ending marketing survey on my interests. My desired service is connectivity with a simple interface that can largely exist off my e-mail contacts. I don't see why a $75 billion company is needed to do this.

I can cut 40% of a film's budget just going outside of the studio system. Plus more with technology you reference.

Studios want the films to appear to lose money so they can keep all the profit. They control distribution and inflate production costs >35%, move money from one pocket to another etc all to limit the net profit participation of equity holders.

My full comment explaining it- http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3498112

Studios inflate production budgets so it appears the films lose money in order to cut out investors/producers/etc from net profit participation. The studios make their money on distribution and by charging exorbitant rates. A lot of money goes from one pocket to the other of the same company at these exorbitant rates. Here's how to cut:

- Studios charge production overhead fees in excess of 35% reducing significantly the amount of money spent on the actual production

- Studios charge interest in excess of 20% on all expenses incurred in development, production and development

- Producers are required by the studio to contract with vendors they either partially own or have pre-negotiated rates with the studios

- Example, Technicolor pays Universal $25 million at the beginning of the year to be the exclusive lab for all Universal productions. Then Technicolor charges inflated rates to Universal. The $25 million offsets this and the result is the production budget is artificially (i.e. criminally) inflated.

- Example, studios may make a producer pay 40 cents a foot for negative film processing vs 15 cents normally, or up to $4 per foot for release prints vs $1.50. (this data is old)

- A fair system using digital cameras and related technology (e.g. visualization, digital 3D mapping), along with digital distribution to cinemas, should reduce the production and distribution cost of a major film to a few million. +advertising

Same things happens with marketing. The studios will advertise a film through their TV network, all while controlling the prices and limiting net profit participation for the outside investors and producers. All this is a clear case of financial fraud and is known as - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting

This is absolutely wrong.

Feudalism died because people joined debate societies, talked about enlightenment ideas, fought hard and took over the government to fight the oppressive nature of the monarchy and the Catholic Church. Honorable people started this endeavor and then radicals took it over. But the French Revolution wasn't an easy or pretty process.

You don't have to centrally plan the creative destruction of Hollywood. This is like arguing we can't cut overseas military spending because think of the jobs we will lose.

What would you replace slavery with? What about internal combustion engines? Replacing these things aren't easy, more people will suffer in the short-term. But guess what? People are suffering now, and society as a whole rots because we squander the opportunity to use TV and film to enliven people's minds, instead we just want to empty their pocketbooks by any means possible.

I worked as an executive in Hollywood. The culture and cartel-like nature encourages people to be mean and unethical. It's not about creating art or entertaining people, it's about controlling a market and creating profit regardless of who you destroy.

You are confused by nice people and their charm. Show me a list of GOOD people in Hollywood. Do you even know the history or mechanics of film finance?

Do you think the euphemism "Hollywood accounting" is justified? The entire system is a scam and deserves to be creatively destroyed. And they do need to be destroyed, especially after threatening to cut off funding for Obama just because the White House won't blindly support the predatory and foolish laws the industry puts out.

It's over. The industry's model is dying.

We should have lobbyists pushing Congress to investigate Hollywood studios for massive fraud-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting

This is indeed awesome. I was literally just thinking about the importance and potential of something like this. FLUX Power bms are too expensive but remarkable technology. Thanks for doing this. It is open technology like this that will change the market for electric cars.

I like Aaron's post on this topic- http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/productivity

I currently work at 6 startups, 12 hour shifts, over 24 days per month. The 2 main startups I spend 48 hours per week at. The other 4 take up 36 hours per week. One is very profitable and I use it to fund the others. However, I don't think this is a smart strategy at all. I'm just wasting money but having fun intellectual pursuits.

Jew here. I'm willing to give up my religion if I can find a Muslim friend to pledge to give up his religion.

We could become deists and agree to stop allowing religion to influence government, culture and education.

I'm gonna try this. Coding to me is mystifying even though I started in grade school. Later I met a hardware engineer/hacker when I was 18 and I decided then to focus on the business side even though I had made a few applications. He was so good at the math and the art of it that I never wanted to waste time to learn it properly. But I was lazy with it before all that. So I should challenge myself to this.

If a man like Santorum was President, Google would probably be required by law to fix it. The problem with your excellent comment is that nobody gamed Google's search ranking. Google can't censor the result as it is legitimate.

The real problem here is Santorum's insane ideas and forcing his delusional beliefs on the public. Thus the Internet public has chosen to redefine his name as cultural slang. For Google to censor this would be simply wrong.

He could have stopped before PayPal after he sold Zip2 for over $300 million in 1999. Elon's incredible and the next 50 years will be amazing because of people like him.

Those small tech startups are exploiting a loophole in the law to allow them to monetize the studios' content. There is nothing unethical about monopolizing access to content you create.

Think of how profitable cable & satellite TV is now. If they applied that model of guaranteed revenue to the entire Internet, and eliminated piracy 100% with SOPA II, they will make hundreds billions of dollars more.

This is not about stopping piracy, it's about gaining control and a market of guaranteed revenue regardless of the junk they put out through it. In other words, this sinister conspiracy you suggest is just in fact good business, they 100% know about technology trends and thus is why they seek to control, manipulate and police the Internet at this early stage rather when it's too late to take it over.

This is spot on. I didn't realize until now that the owner of MegaUpload was kimble. Unbelievable. He used to have all these intensive flash sites celebrating him, his businesses, his hacking etc. Everyone I knew considered him a joke and a con artist.

I thought 137 was the secret number? Feynman, Heisenberg, Weisskopf and Pauli were intrigued by it.

http://www.1377731.com/137/

I am guilty of downloading one episode of Pawn Stars after my DVR messed up the recording. My DVR re-recorded it the next day. If this is illegal, then I'll just get a VPN and cancel my satellite service.

I started writing notes if I thought it was worth remembering. Too often I'd read the article and then later try to discuss it with someone and forget simple facts. I realized I'm not even learning anything, just temporarily distracting my mind with 'shiny' factoids and stories. Basically the same as looking at imgur all day. I also try to focus what I read and follow only things that relate to my job, projects and 1 or 2 hobby interests.

This is highly inaccurate.

You guys are referring to Gresham's Law which is only applicable due to legal tender laws. Without legal tender laws, the "good money" wouldn't be driven out by the "bad money" (i.e. US currency).

Also, the reason the US government went completely off the gold standard in 71 was to increase deficit spending without having to pay our debts in gold or something of real value. The Fed has a policy of steady inflation, only through debt liquidation can we ever expect to pay off the huge amounts we owe. That is, we borrow 10 trillion and inflate 50% over a certain time, now we only owe 5 trillion.

End the legal tender laws, allow alternative commodity-based currencies and end the central planning of interest rates. This is the solution. It has nothing to do with gold (or Bitcoins) being a deflationary currency. It has everything to do with big corrupt government.

edit- I don't want that last sentence to color my whole statement. I'm an Austrian, not a Republican. I worked for Obama last time and will vote for him again. For a better perspective on this, check out (future Fed Chairman!) James Grant's Interest Rate Observer http://www.grantspub.com.