Do not see the World Trade Center movie!

It would be very easy to say that that Oliver Stone's film World Trade Center is nothing more than an attempt to play on people's nationalism and grief in order to make a lot of money.

It would be easy to say this film is an obvious attempt for an Oscar-minded producer/director to play the sympathy card at next years Oscars. (If you're a member of the academy it will be like voting against the No Child Left Behind Act: "Oh, you didn't vote for the World Trade Center movie for Best Film? You must be a terrorist or French or something!")

But, I've thought about it and these are not the reasons that I will not see this film boycott this film.

I remember the events of 9/11/2001 well. It has be almost six years since that day, and I don't find my recollection of the events or my emotions to be fading.

I don't need a movie to be made for me to remember what happened that day. I don't need a movie to be made about two men, when there were thousands of other stories that day that are just as important. I don't need a movie to be made for me to remember the heroes and survivors and victims of that day.

So, Mr. Stone, instead of giving you $10, or some other ridiculous sum, to see your pathetic attempt to mimic a day that lives far more vividly in my own mind's eye... I will donate that money to help build the memorial where every story will be remembered.

I invite you to join me in agreeing to NOT see this movie, sign this petition and donate the money you would have put towards the movie to the World Trade Center memorial fund.

As an aside, if you want to see what some really committed citizens/designers/minds can do around the subject of the World Trade Center, go check out Project Rebirth.

Design by numb3rs

On the tele this morning, I saw a promo for a new television show on ABC called, The Nine. The title treatment of the show utilizes a design element where a number is used as a letter. In this case, a horizontally reflected 9 replaces the letter 'e'. It's a design element that I have seen before, most notably in the movie posters for Seven.

So this morning, I got to thinking... how many other designs utilize the number in design of a title, name, or logo? Thanks to the Internet, I present to you some design by numbers.



























Well, that's what I found, given an hour of searching. My favorite use of typography is in the Eight Days a Week album cover. Not only is it the right typeface, but the 8 is perfectly integrated, and there is nothing more beautiful than the interaction between the 'h' and the 'd' in the design.

There must be some better examples out there, so I'd be interested if anyone has anything else to add to the list. If so, shoot me an e-mail, and I'll add it to the list.

Can't remember names

In this New York Times article, a condition known as prosopagnosia is described. Basically it is "face blindness" or the inability to recall persons by their faces.

Prosopagnosia is described as some people's inability to distinguish facial characteristics, but a complete ability to recall phone numbers, books, or other pieces of fact.

I have the opposite problem. I recall faces right away… but I don't remember people's names. Both situations lead to awkward moments and I feel embarrassed whenever I recall someone's face, but not their name. This even happens with celebrities and movie stars.

So is there a name for my condition? Am I the only one who can read an entire book and never be able to recall the main character's names? I'll be able to tell you the whole plot in generalities and expunge on the moral or undertones. What is it that I lack in my medical make-up that prevents me from recalling names easily?

Are we developing whole conditions for small individual differences? Is "face blindness" a real condition in the same way schizophrenia is a condition?

The article talks about different ways that those with the condition learn to remember people. They cite people's mannerisms or clothing. But isn't that useful to each of us without prosopagnosia as well? Is it a condition simply because we can measure a specific amount of the population to share the characteristic in common?

Does labeling it a condition elicit sympathy or the desire to change the situation… to "better" the person afflicted?

I'm not sure the answers, so I ask the questions.

Are Macs for drop outs?

I just saw an ad for the new movie by Justin Long, a.k.a. the "Mac" in the new Apple ad campaign. The movie is called Accepted and chronicles the events surrounding a high school senior, played by Long, as he fakes not only his acceptance into college, but the colege itself.

So, my first question is: do we need another "college is just an amazing party" movie?

The bigger question is: what does Apple think about this? The hero of their newest ad campaign, the guy who they use to personify their personal computer, is not only faking his way into college, but lying about being a college student altogether! Hmmm.

Did he use Pages to create the fake letter of admission? Did he edit the whole experience in iMovie and burn it to a DVD with iDVD for nation-wide distribution? Is this the kind of movie that Apple wants coming out close to back-to-school with high expectations surrounding computer sales for new colllege students?

OR is this only the worries of an overly-obsessed Mac geek, and no one else really cares about this stuff? Probably the latter. In fact it's probably even better press for Apple, as proven by the fact that I wrote about it at least.

UPDATE: So, after actually watching the trailer... I've noted a few things.


Justin' Long's character actually is using a Mac when he fakes his acceptance letter, but he is using Microsoft Word and an HP scanner. Proof of concept for the "Macs can do that too" ad and the "works well with other technologies" ad.

Plus the movie has the ultra-edgy moral that "all it takes is a committed group of people, dedicated to learning to make education happen... not an institution filled with traditions and schedules and credits." Nice commentary, poor premise for a movie about hazing, wet-t-shirt parties and celebrating the nerds and losers from high school.

Marriage training

When you are preparing to get married, it's amazing how many things about marriage will rise to the surface of your consciousness. One such thing has been this article from the New York Times that relates the training of animals to the handling of one's spouse.

I liked it when I first read it, and it is amazing how long the article has lasted in the Times' Most E-mailed Articles list - one whole month! Most articles drop off the list after one or two days. There must be a lot of people out there who are looking to train their spouses, or perhaps many spouses who resemble Shamu.

Seymour Butts welcomes a fellow author to the bibliosphere

Under the Bleachers by Seymour Butts.
Next Day Service by Tom R. Oh.
A Good Night's Sleep by Rose Refreshed.

If you can appreciate that kind of humor, than you'll surely enjoy a series of books called An Improbable Library: Books that Should Be Written Someday.

These volumes would certainly make a great addition to any coffee table, magazine rack or road trip. You'll come to expect a subtle appreciation for the moment of silence that follows the one liners as they zing off the page and promote a round of "Oh's!" and "I get it!" from a laughing-under-ones-breath audience.

Best when read aloud, these comedic notions come from my Uncle Jim, who has taken his act from the friendly and accepting confines of the family gathering to the printed page, seeing fit to subject the rest of the world to his insightful banter and dry wit.

So check out these books and you too may find yourself with new ammunition for the next family gathering.

Too much of everything

Being a "creative" in the marketing and advertising industry demands that you are constantly reading about how much bad advertising there is in this world. From infomercials to billboards, banners and pop ups, movie ads, etc. etc. everybody is bitching about something someone else made.

This is not to say that there aren't any good ads, and that they don't get their due, but an exorbitant amount of time seems to be spent pointing out, ridiculing, justifying, and lamenting the bad ads of the world. Many fingers are pointed. Many agencies are shunned. Fewer are exalted.

Recently I have been thinking about how many people there are in the world. This led me to a dizzying attempt to think about how each of them could really find a job, a place in life, to be happy. I came to the conclusion that there must be a huge number of people working in jobs that they don't belong in, despise or even hate. This must be true of the many players in advertising as well - client and agency side alike.

So, with that motivation and considering the number of possible time slots on televisions to fill, the number of billboards that need communication, the ever-growing pages of magazines, an internet explosion... it seems to me that it is fairly reasonable to expect a lot of terrible advertising to be produced.

Great work takes time and cunning and the ability to revise and contort and just plain think. We don't have enough time or committed people in the industry to make them all great ads.

So, when we choose to be choosy about the least among ourselves, perhaps we should consider that the people who made it might have no desire to do good work in the first place. Perhaps they are on their way to the thing that really makes them happy, or they are filling the space that we have generated or perhaps the process killed everything good along the way, because the process is the same people who hate their jobs anyway.

Perhaps we just have too many people who need jobs and too many ad spaces to fill.

All of this was spurred by this lovely post from American Copywriter.