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Indie comics in 80s LA, a homage featuring Groening, Panter, Hernandez bros…. http://bit.ly/b1FcGM
2010,
15:06 GMT
Peep Doc - Shooting (Faking) Again
Posted by: Hal
Hey everyone, we’re down in my basement all day today shooting what’s called “pick-up” shots for Peep Me – the Peep Culture documentary. Basically we’re going back and “recreating” or you might even say “faking” shots we now realize we need, but didn’t get the first time around. We’ve just spent the last hour trying to recreate the look below, which is a frame from the movie shot in the summer.
Once we get it just right (though my hair is a bit shorter, can’t do much about that) I’m mostly going to be pretending to be seeing things on my computer that I’ve already seen. We need more shots of me reacting to things to use as connecting scenes in the doc. I’ve written about the fake/real of the process of the doc shoot before, like the time they made me take out the trash about 10 times. At least it was garbage day!
2010,
12:58 GMT
Peep in the News: Location Sharing and “Super-Sized” Mom
Posted by: Hal
From the New York Times: an article on the rise of online location sharing. The new thing is Foursquare, which lets you check-in at a location and share with “friends”. That’s opposed to the Google Lattitude model which just constantly broadcasts your location once you’ve enabled the service on your smart phone. This phenomenon is, of course, an offshoot of Peep – these services are sold as lifestyle enhancers, basically a value added component to your social networking online persona. (Look for Facebook and Twitter to introduce location based services soon…) Yelp, for instance, is using it to give more validity to certain reviews – if you’ve “checked in” and proven you were there, your review is apparently going to have more credibility. In other words, pay more attention to this particular person: they’re really real and they’ve proved it.
Now let’s check in with Donna Simpson. An article on her (which is itself Peep since it has no other redeeming factor beyond providing us with entertainment based on someone else’s everyday life) documents the quest of this already very obese woman to reach 1,000 pounds. She’s already in the Guiness World Record books as “the world’s fattest mother.” My favourite peep detail: she finances her $750 a week grocery bill by eating fast food online in front of men with a plus-sized woman fetish.
Comes complete with nice Peep pic of mom using scooter to shop with her kid!
2010,
19:50 GMT
Mommy Bloggers Go to Corporate Boot Camp
Posted by: Hal
This piece in the New York Times talks about how mommy blogging is being infiltrated by corporate giveaways, ads, and sponsorships. Though it doesn’t get into the whole issue of using your kid’s life to develop your brand, it does have some eye popping stats about how many women are writing and reading mommy blogs.
2010,
15:14 GMT
Two Articles in Colombian Media
Posted by: Hal
Two links to articles in Columbian magazine Semana which quote my ideas about Peep Culture.
Here’s an article on the rise of online-spying-as-entertainment:
original article here. as translated by google here.
And here’s an article about surveillance, crime prevention and what happens when shocking surveillance footage becomes entertainment:
original article here. as translated by google here.
2010,
13:41 GMT
Peep My ‘Pplication
Posted by: Hal
Tufts University wins the award for realizing that not only is the college admission process grinding and nerve-wracking, it’s also highly entertaining for the rest of us! So Tufts has done the right thing, giving their applicants the opportunity to include a one minute posted-to-YouTube video with their application, as documented in this New York Times article.
Now thousands can watch these wannabe admitted students do whatever they think they need to do to get noticed. Before we get to the videos, which I will helpfully embed below of course, let’s think about a few things.
First, Tufts screwed up: why give YouTube this juicy material? If they’d set it up so the kids were posting to the Tufts website, they’d be drawing hundreds of thousands of eyeballs to their site and reaping the rewards, not Google.
Second, it’s a great precedent for anything that where one side holds all the power (think reality tv): make them do a video (a Peep Pplication) and tell them it only counts if they post it publically on the ‘Net. You get attention, they get laughed at, we’re entertained and the appropriate commercial messages are displayed a the appropriate intervals.
This is essentially an ancillary business model that could be applied to cash strapped schools, publishing houses with better reputations than bottom lines, blue chip talent agents who want to make money on the side…heck, even charities can employ this technique: make the needy beg online for their handout in the name of keeping us amused, and generating cash flow for those lucky enough to have shown how very desperately they need the help. (Wait a minute, they’re already doing this!)
The Bloggist
Hey, I’m Hal Niedzviecki. I’m a writer/thinker who lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada with my wife and daughter. Up till now I’ve always considered myself a private person. But at the same time I’m fascinated by people who effortlessly open themselves up to the whole world. So I’ve… more...
Indie comics in 80s LA, a homage featuring Groening, Panter, Hernandez bros…. http://bit.ly/b1FcGM
Issue 47 (spring) is now completely ‘unlocked’ on the NEW Broken Pencil website. Web TV, Liz Worth on punk TO & more http://bit.ly/bXvQuP
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