The ordeal a friend’s mother went through with her Android phone

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She was regaling us with the tale of how her Android phone’s battery was draining precipitously, faster than any phone had a right to. She took her HTC phone to a Verizon store to have it looked at, and they determined (at first) that it was the battery. Only problem was, it wasn’t in stock and she was sent to another store to see if it was in stock there. (It wasn’t.) The clerk then determines for some reason that it isn’t the battery and as a remedy erases the phone and all its apps and data. The phone eventually dies, unable to recharge, and she gets sent a new one.

Later the true problem with her old phone is discovered: the charging port is damaged, leaving the phone no way to get juice; all this after (did I mention it?) several people from two stores misdiagnosed the problem as either a software or a battery problem. And after several hours of time that she didn’t have spent waiting at Verizon stores, her replacement HTC is completely lobotomized, all her data and apps lost in the wind.

(Poor guys at the Verizon store. Their salesman are peddling twenty different Android phones at the same time, and they have to fix them all.)

I’d better contrast this with the time I had a similar problem with my iPhone, that is to say, my battery was draining fast. I take it to the Apple Store, plus it into a diagnostic computer in the back, and come back out and tell me it’s one of the apps that’s draining the power. Their solution was to wipe the phone, but they ask me first whether I have all my data synced to the computer. I did, and they wipe the phone. (if I didn’t, I’d be told to back up and wipe the phone at home.) And hypothetically, if the battery was dying, they’d probably swap my phone out right in the store, not charging me if I was in warranty. It would be very unlikely that I’d be bounced from store to store, either.

As for my friend’s mom, she’s due for an upgrade in ten days, with a replacement HTC in her purse to hold over over until then. But she’s already dead set on and enthusiastic about what she’s chosen for her next phone. And after the ordeal she’s gone through, she deserves to be happy with her new choice.

Just in case the National Defense Authorization Act is signed…

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Dear Friends and other Fellow Citizens,

I am not planning to overthrow the government, but as a writer, I’m sure I’ll eventually say something someone doesn’t like. So in the unlikely event that I am detained indefinitely in accordance with the upcoming National Defense Authorization Act, I’d like to take the time to encourage all of you to prepare a rendition plan in case you fall on the wrong side of this law and disappear into the ether. I mean, all of you have zombie plans, right? Well, a rendition plan is way more useful than a zombie plan.

Step 1: Designate someone to execute your rendition plan. Preferably someone who is civic -minded enough to care about civil rights but someone who has no plans to overthrow the system and would never be suspected of doing such a horrid thing. Someone who pays their taxes and their credit cards and is articulate and looks good on camera and hasn’t been to a fringe political meeting and especially hasn’t been photographed walking out of one. Assign that person a failsafe word, like something you’d use in bed, say, “pomegranate”. Maybe something easy to text so that you have to type it or yell it onto a message machine before the CIA rips the phone from your hand, it’ll be done.

Step 2: Assume that you will, at this point, have no contact with the outside world. So beforehand, have that person tell absolutely everyone they can that you have in fact, been rendered, and why. If you have been planning something innocuous but distasteful to the government, you’ll have to trust this person bough with your life so that she’ll have a clue as to why you’re gone. If you’ve important information that has to be sent to, say, The New York Times, tell that person where you’ve hidden said documents/pictures of your congressman/major design flaw in predator drone/plot to kill Angelina and frame it on Jennifer. I don’t care, just don’t mail it to her house, okay? Make peace with everyone and tell them how you really feel about them, good or bad. It’ be preferable if you could prepare a statement beforehand.

Step 3: Have your friends start a campaign for your release. Play up the fact that 93 senators voted for it, except for you guys in Oregon, God bless you… The President may or may not have vetoed it so either play up his heroism or drill in his shame, depending on what he does. Get celebrities in on the action (I’m personally two degrees away from some good ones), get lawyers to work pro bono, hire some PR people and graphic designers, the works. It’s your freedom. Spare no effort.

Step 4: Hang in there. If you’re God knows where, try and figure out where that is. Keep a good sense of humor and faith that the people you’ve left on the outside are trying to get you out. In fact, at this point, it’s all about faith, so take whatever makes you strong, your God, your lack thereof, your belief that you’re right and they’re wrong, and keep it with you during your lonely nights and long days. If you can eke out a stiff upper lip for as long as possible, try to be proud of how long you actually lasted.

And Step Zero: Attempt to do something non-violent that’s worthwhile, something that challenges perceptions and runs you afoul of either a small stupid law, or better yet a small stupid governor or congressman. (Emma Sullivan is one of my heroes right now.) Get heard before it gets too difficult for people to hear you. Because the prison of our own silence, of our complacency, is the forerunner of the prisons that wait for us in those dark unknown places like Leavenworth and Gitmo.

New Year’s resolutions you can believe in

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I guess I should post something before I leave for the holidays. I’m totally disappointed with the lack of progress I’ve made in my life. The film thing’s going nowhere, and as well it should be; my heart hasn’t been in it for a while and I’ve never liked showing up for work in that condition.

Part of my loss of enthusiasm is the idea of watching a movie. I haven’t seen anything since Drive and I turn down any calls to see even the good stuff coming out this winter. Theaters are cramped, loud, obnoxious, poorly-maintained places that aggravate a sense of claustrophobia in me. I’m sure I’ve written abut it before. It doesn’t help that the last movie I was asked to see as Twilight 4 or something or other. I’ve already shamed my friend on Facebook about it.

The other part of my loss of enthusiasm is my own lack of creative spark. Writer’s block implies sitting at a desk and staring at a screen, waiting for the words that won’t come. The words do arrive; they just get shunted to Twitter or Facebook. Pithy little comments about the news of the day that could’ve been more interesting i they weren’t just one-liners. Everyone’s asking when the next Rain City is coming out. For a while I was thinking that the store had closed. I’m still not sure what to tell everyone.

So I’ve come up with a few things to take my mind off the movies, and I’ve been talking about it with friends. New year’s resolutions, if you will:

  • FInd a new job. I’ve been volunteering at an undisclosed TV studio one day a week somewhere in town. It’s not enough. I need to do something to exercise my brain and keep it from turning to mush, but not so overwhelming like a full-time job would most certainly be. I’m thinking volunteering at a food bank of a shelter. But sometimes I question my own motivations for doing so.
  • Reactivate Rain City. The people asking when the next episode of Rain City is coming are either already in Rain City or want to be. I need to come up with some hilarious situation for them to get in. Something that makes them wish they hadn’t asked. Muhahahaha.
  • Write shorts and possibly a novel. There were grandiose ideas I’ve had for the screen that will never see the light of day if I tried to make screenplays out of them. The only reason I never wrote prose for them is because of doubts in my prose-wrtiting ability. I don’t read enough books to know whether what I’m writing is any good or not. Which brings me ass-backwards to the next bullet point,
  • Read more books. And most importantly, stop judging how good those books are going to be before reading them. ‘Cause that stops you from reading in the first place. It’s also a good thing not to have every book you write be accompanied by a twenty-page paper that’s due on Friday. I hated that.

And so there you have it. Four ways I’m specifically going to get my creative spark back.Hopefullyit works out. Check back next year, will ya?

News update 2011-08-26

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A test of how fast I can edit with FCP X. And also, maybe I’ll do more news segments like this later.

Making the cut

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I got a volunteer job with an unnamed organization doing some editing. The job’s going well and I’m getting along with everyone there. What’s of note is, we’re using Avid and Adobe Premiere, so I’m forced I have an opportunity to learn all four major editing platforms: Avid, Premiere, FInal Cut 7, and FInal Cut 10.

Which brings me to FInal Cut 10. Everyone’s leaving in droves. Everyone from film school who learned on Final Cut 6 and 7 is, at least; I read your Facebooks. I’m compelled to tell you I’m not jumping ship, and I’m actually looking forward to the updates.

Why, you ask? Let’s cut to the chase. ‘Cause that’s what Final Cut 10 does. It’s fast. Wicked fast. Scrubbing through the footage I want, locating it and getting it onto the timeline is the fastest it’s ever been.

It’s like, um, iMovie. When iMovie was redesigned from the ground up in 2008 everyone complained about how it didn’t work at all like old iMovie. That transition was easier. I never liked how old iMovie worked. It didn’t have much of a timeline, traditional or magnetic, and there were the obvious limits to what you could do in an app that came with the computer for free. Understood. iMovie ’08, with all the limitations of an app that came free with the computer, had promise. Cataloguing your footage and picking through it was never easier or faster. I started using it for simple projects, like getting hastily edited clips onto YouTube in less than an hour. There I was, wishing that they’d take some of the same concepts of the new Event Viewer and the new Timeline and expand on it, eventually making a new pro program out of it. And they did. They made iMovie Pro, which I sheepishly admit, I was actually hoping they wold do.

Of course, stuff’s still missing that I’ll need to keep Final Cut 7 around for. Multicam, for example. My old projects, with their old Boris titles that will never transfer to the new program. It’s going to be interesting talking to a sound engineer, if I ever get around to it. But it can’t be that way forever. The new way of editing is so good to me that it’s worth keeping a candle lit for it for at least a year or two while the rest of the features come back.

Of course, you’re reading this, and you’re a real editor, unlike my small-fries self. And you’re contemplating a switch to Avid, or Premiere. And I ask you, why? There’s nothing that you could really do that’s better than sticking with FCP 7, even if it is EOL. You’ll have to keep a separate machine around running Lion or Snow Leopard and never really update it, which is what Avid people do, but you don’t have to buy an Avid. And converting your projects into another format will never work like you want it to. So even if you don’t like FCP X, why not just stay with FCP 7? Nothing will ever be more compatible with your current system that your current system.

And so, I’ll be using FCP at home and for Rain City while work beckons me to use Avid and Premiere. I’ll know all the major programs and be badass for it. But I know what I like, and I hope it only gets better from here.

Two things you have to do immediately after you install Lion

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Firstly, when you you scroll, you realize that  the scroll directions have been reversed! To fix this, open System Preferences, select “Mouse”, then uncheck “Move content in the direction of finger movement when scrolling or navigating”.

Secondly, the first time you look in your user directory, you notice the Library folder is missing. It’s actually hidden. To fix this, open a Terminal window and type in:

chflags nohidden ~/Library

Every user (who cares) will have to do this.