Private Video

by | Oct 25, 2012 | Aggravation

I got a good laugh out of this this morning. I had THREE emails in my inbox telling me that my video, a bunch of clips of my old gaming team playing, contained “content” from Warner Music, EMI Music, and IODA. The punchline: it’s a private video. Always has been.

So, just remember kids, when you’re enjoying your life, having fun with your friends and you happen to be listening to music, you’re breaking the law. Even if you do it in private! Because, clearly, faceless corporations have a copyright claim on your private things too.

Dear WMG, EMI and IODA,

GET FUCKING BENT.

Sincerely,

Me.

World Series

by | Oct 23, 2012 | Baseball

So, Giants and Tigers huh? That’s not a bad World Series. Certainly more interesting than a Yankees/Cardinals WS, right? I was actually kind of pulling for the Nationals to go a little further, but the Giants are among my “if I didn’t have the Red Sox…” optional rooting teams. That’s a pretty small list by the way. Astros, Giants, Nationals, Blue Jays, Rangers, for the record. Those are the teams I don’t mind rooting for, unless they’re playing Boston of course. I was thinking about it and I don’t think it’s odd to have a “B list” of teams you don’t mind seeing do well, do you? Most of those teams have players that I’m interested in watching on them, so perhaps it’s more of a “I respect the players” sort of thing, and not so much their geographical location. I’ve never been to San Francisco, but I do like Brandon Belt, Buster Posey, Hunter Pence and Marco Scutaro as players. I even have a couple Belt and Pence rookie cards.

Anyone else think it’s odd that no one congratulates Posey, ever, at the end of a game? It’s very odd. He just kind of stands there and everyone else goes around him.

Happened last night too. I wonder if nobody likes him.

Also, Hunter Pence, with a beard, is freaky. He looks like a crack addict. Some people just shouldn’t do the beard thing. Hunter, sorry bud, you’re one of them.

As far as Detroit is concerned, it sounds bad, but they’re just not on my radar. Verlander is obviously interesting to watch, but I’m not really a huge fan of Fielder or Cabrera. Sure, he just won the triple crowd, but I can’t honestly say I’ve paid attention to him, or anyone in their line up, at any point in their careers. I actually just looked through Detroit’s lineup and I don’t even recognize most of the names. Besides the big 3, I would have been able to name Aníbal Sánchez, just because I have one of his autos, and Alex Avila, because he was my Fantasy team catcher last year. That’s about it.

As far as the series in concerned, Detroit’s got Verlander to get them started, but the Giants have the hot bats at the moment. I’ll give game 1 to Detroit, but I think the Giants will take the series in 6. What do you guys think?

In your Face…book

by | Oct 19, 2012 | Aggravation

Dear every major brand, product, company, website, celebrity, news organization and publication,

Please, I beg of you, stop using Facebook. Also, please stop assuming everyone is on Facebook in the first place. I’m not on Facebook. My friends are constantly amazed by that fact. They say, “but aren’t you a web guy?” and they’re correct. I simply can’t support the policies, systems and clear invasions of privacy (edit: for advertising purposes) that Facebook entails. You, however, you major brands of the world, have so embraced the desperation to be a part of people’s lives that you’ve forgone the opportunities to connect to your customers on your own terms. You’re in a walled garden and you’ve assumed everyone has accepted an invitation to the party.

Major motion pictures screening exclusive trailers only for their “facebook likers”. My local news broadcast, wanting “my” reaction to their top stories, not on their own website, but on their Facebook page. ESPN radio hosts, telling me to visit their Facebook page instead of ESPN.com. Hundreds of thousands of websites using “Login via Facebook” options as the ONLY option to leave a comment on their site. If I hear the phrase “please visit our Facebook page” one more time, I’m literally going to scream.

If you had told any marketing director 10 years ago that they would be ignoring their own brand’s websites and directing people to facebook.com/whatever, they would have laughed you right out of the boardroom. What’s changed? Are your web developers so inept that they can’t handle posting relevant information as needed? Have they not been trained to maximize your sites for search engine efficiency. Do they not work really hard to create often stunning and unique experiences for your users? What is it then?

It’s the millions of users isn’t it? You have a captive audience. You don’t have to “heard the sheep” to your website, you can get in their faces (pun intended) without leaving Facebook. They can be your “friends” and you can promote the number of “likes” your worthless content gets. Guess what it’s getting you? Nothing. Show me the data that shows that Facebook has significantly increased your brand power. People still buy Nike, still visit Disneyland, still drink Coke and still watch their local sports teams in roughly the same exact percentages they did before Facebook. Facebook has done nothing to help you reach fans you didn’t already have. The only thing it’s done is put their URL first, and yours second. You think Facebook is helping you? Really? Are you getting a cut of the massive amount of ad revenue generated by your pages? No. I didn’t think so.

So, please, stop using Facebook. If you make Facebook the only login option, the only information source and the only interaction you’re having with your client base, you’re diminishing your brand and pushing people out of a walled garden that isn’t even yours. You’re just renting the garden for a while. I’ve lived my life just fine without seeing the latest “exclusive” movie trailer, or by talking to real people, in person, about the election, or about my local sports team. You can too. Be strong. Dump the book, and build your own brand.

October

by | Oct 17, 2012 | Personal

The fall has always been a traditionally busy time for me. Weddings and photo shoots ramp back up now that the weather is turning cooler here in Texas. My day job switches into Q4/End of Year hurry-up mode, when all the business development folks lose their minds and want all sorts of crazy things (graphics, brochures, etc) to try and close a deal. Church picks up it’s “social activities”, again because the weather is turning nicer. Everything from politics, to baseball, to holiday shopping, everything just seems to get busier.

So, rest assured, not posting daily is a product of my own over-scheduling, and not some lack of literary ambition. As I implied, I’ve been busy.

The last two weekends I’ve been on photoshoots. First is was the Susan G Komen “Race for the Cure” marathon, which was unlike anything I had ever seen. 30,000 people, on a street, moving like cattle, and me standing on a guard rail, in the median, trying to get some photos. It was insane. It didn’t help we arrived down there at 5am, the butt-crack of dawn. Just this last weekend, I was helping on a corporate “employee day” shoot at the zoo. Massive crowds that day too, but that was more manageable. There was face painting, animal exhibits, snow cones, all sorts of goodies. We were just there to cover the event. The next two weekends are similar. Basically, I don’t have a free Saturday for all of October. Busy is good right?

During the week its the usual 9-5, but we’ve been particularly busy with re-branding one of our identities. It basically involves coming up with a new logo, and then replacing it on every scrap of paper we’ve ever put out, which is insane. Everything from the websites to individual business cards needs to get updated.

When I do have a chance to take a break, I’ve been sinking my time into the awesome sauce that is XCOM: Enemy Unknown. It’s a new take on the classic X-COM, one of the original brilliant turn-based games. The new game is absolutely fantastic and if you’re a fan of the genre (Chip, Jason), you’re going to want to check it out. I was also surprised how well it runs on a variety of systems as well. It runs just as well on my MacBook, running Bootcamp as it does at home on my gaming rig.

Lest we forget about baseball cards for a moment, I did manage to complete my base set for Topps Update. It was only 8 cards, so that’s now exactly a spectacular accomplishment. However, I am missing several of the Red Sox inserts and the minis. If anyone runs across those, please let me now, I’d love to work out a trade. I also picked up several gold, blue and black bordered refractors from Topps Chrome, all for a buck a pop, from the same seller. I’ll show off the rainbow at some point. I also got the cards from a group break Ryan was having, and Sam’s group break cards are on their way. I’m sure I’ll do some scanning in the near future.

Several people have asked me what I think about the Red Sox and their current news. It’s all surprisingly simple to sum up. Valentine was a mistake to hire in the first place, so I’m certainly not crying that he’s gone. I’m certainly not in the camp of “he’s a terrible manager, he sucked”, but he wasn’t right for the Red Sox last year, he just wasn’t. He was the temporary solution because the list of other available coaches was fairly limited. He was a stop-gap. I never perceived him as anything different. I’m not going to hold it against him, I don’t think he did anything agregiously wrong. He was just the wrong manager at the wrong time. It never felt right.

Also, Papi wants $25mil, GIVE IT TO HIM. Let him retire with a “B” on his hat, retire his number, end of story. This shouldn’t even be a discussion. You know why?

  • 2 World Series rings
  • 8-time All-Star
  • 5-time Silver Slugger
  • Red Sox single-season home-run leader
  • First player in Sox history to hit 40+ home runs in three consecutive seasons
  • 85+ extra-base hits for four consecutive years (passing Lou Gehrig)
  • MLB’s all time DH home run leader
  • MLB’s all time DH RBI leader

Also, 25mil is LESS than we spent to have Lackey sitting on the bench this year. So, yeah, there’s some perspective. He’s arguably the best pure DH in the game, and he’s asking for less than we paid several worthless bums who, career wise, are just mediocre. Just start writing the check. End of discussion.

Anyway, that’s about it for stuff going on around here. It’s back to the grind for me, working 29 out of the 31 days this month. Hopefully that will lead to some extra cash on hand. I’ve got an anniversary coming up, and we were planning on visiting New England for the holidays. Maybe there will be a couple ducats left over for some cards too. Take it easy everybody.

Matt out.