Ideas, Money & Art

Ghost Town

San Francisco is a ghost town this week. A partner on a project was grumbing today about how you cannot get any production done this week if you work in SF. Why? Well, if you have to ask...

Cause of the ghost town

Empty Inbox

This has been a crazy week. We got approval on a new job that should be very cool but is on a very tight deadline. Needless to say, there hasn't been much time for blogging.

But it is a great segue into my Empty Inbox philosophy. In reality, it isn't really mine since I read it on another blog but what can you do? Anyway...

For the last few months I have been deleting every email that I receive after the task related to the email is complete. My goal every day is to have an absolutely empty Inbox. It feels great. It also forces me to deal with an email when it comes in and not procrastinate. For the record, my mail app is set to Get Mail only once an hour so I am not constantly distracted.

The obvious problem of losing pertinent information in those deleted emails is solved by a mirrored gmail account and a gmail widget that saves me the step of logging in through a browser. All in all, I highly recommend it. Give it a try.

Last Weeks Shoot

We had a great shoot last weekend for one of our new clients. Shooting with one of our favorite crews at Golden Gate Studios here in Marin. Everything we're doing these days is in HD. Becuase of the image quality and our fantastic gaffer we get great seperation for compositing and effects. It's a brave new world and we're loving it.

See more photos of the shoot here

Google SKY

Google is taking Google Earth UP. As in look up. Now you'll be able to zoom around the heavens the same way you have been zooming around your neighborhood. Looks promising, if not quite as voyeuristic.

More info here Google Sky

Some More iPhone

The Office 2.0 Conference is running an interesting little experiment. They are giving out an iPhone to everyone who attends. Obviously, it is a marketing stunt to pack the room. But they are claiming it as an experiment in conference communication. In this way, the iPhone has yet another use as an education tool for large groups. It will be interesting to see what kind of app they build for the experiment.

By the way, the conference costs $1495 to attend.

iPhone Experiment

Media Temple and iPhone

Thought this was cool and yet another temptation to get the GenOne iPhone. I'm still holding out for 3G and more gigs but every day that passes brings another cool twist. Media Temple is great, by the way. We switched our servers over about 6 months ago and have been very pleased. If you need hosting, look no further.

Media Temple

Long Now Foundation

One my favorite organizations in San Franscico is the Long Now Foundation. They are made up of intellectuals, artists and scientists and hold monthly seminars on the subject of the "long now". Which is what, exactly? It is the concept that the world should be approached through a longer lens. That a problem looks insurmountable if you have 6 months to solve it. But what does it look like if you have 10 years? Or 50? Or even 100? It doesn't seem so impossible then, does it?

To embody this philosophy the Long Now is building a clock that will run for 10,000 years (with or without human maintenance). They are planning to drop the clock off in a cave and leave the location undisclosed. Perhaps someone (something) will stumble upon the cave in the future.

Stewart Brand and Brian Eno are two of the more notable members of the brood. Mr. Brand leads the monthly seminars and Mr. Eno pops in now and again as a speaker.

Tonight at Fort Mason's Cowell Theater you can hear Alex Wright discuss information overload on a societal level. Unfortunately, I think I'm going to miss it but you should go.

Alex Wright is a writer and information architect who currently works for the New York Times. His first book, Glut: Mastering Information Through the Ages is an impressive survey on how societies have dealt with information overload through time. As an information architect, Alex has led projects for The New York Times, IBM, Microsoft, Harvard University, our own Rosetta Project, the Internet Archive, Yahoo!, Macromedia and Sun Microsystems, among others.

Long Now Foundation

Fear of Failure

We had a board meeting a few weeks ago to discuss where IMA is headed. Lots of great ideas went around the table and our board members had amazing input, as usual. One thing Joan said at the end that hit a nerve is, "no one knows anything." I thought that was great. It is the same thing William Goldman, the Oscar winning screenwriter, is famous for saying about Hollywood. Now Feedburner founder Dick Costolo has written a great piece about the same subject. The following caption caught my eye.

"Personally, I know going into any new company that there is a 90% chance we have the business model wrong on day 1. I also know that I have a historically poor track record for understanding what will and won't attract customers or defeat competition (I didn't get Twitter when Obvious Corp first launched it without an "e" in the name, I thought eBay would be out of business in six months after Amazon launched auctions, and I was certain Netscape would crush Microsoft in the browser wars because Netscape was more nimble). But the opposite of 'fear of failure' isn't confidence. The opposite of 'fear of failure' is just not bothering to think about failure (BIG difference between this and thinking about risk profile for your idea/company)."

You can read the enitre post here
Ask the Wizard

A bandshell made of car hoods

Everyone should make your way out to the bandshell. It is located in the Panhandle in SF and is free to visit. And, if you have some talent, you can sign up to be one of the acts. The coolest part is that it is made of recycled bottles, car hoods and doors. It's absolutely beautiful.

It is only going to be around through the summer so go check it out.

This is another excellent Rebar project. You can check out the 'lil movie IMA produced of the big opening day.

Bandshell Video

And for the official bandshell website with a full schedule of events

Bandshell Project

Readymade Magazine

IMA is happy to list ReadyMade magazine as one of our clients. Our partnership is starting to take off and there is going to be lots of regularly updated content in the near future. For now, get a taste with the video below. Also, if you are a DIY type, you can submit your own videos on ReadyMade's site for the world to see. Break out the glue gun and the handycam!

ReadyMade