The Buzz of Technology

Web 2.0 has hit us hard and it seems like there is suddenly a rush to participate in anything video or virtual community oriented. But there's a weird dichotomy with technology as I've seen this week. I teach a Digital Storytelling course at Otis College of Art and Design, I decided this semester to do it differently and integrate the virtual community Second Life into the class. In the past, it's strictly been a writing class, but this time, I thought it would be good to try something new. The ideas was that students would propose some type of community to develop in SL, and we would go from there. Well interestingly enough, after my students, all around 20 years old, spent some time in SL, they decided that it sucks. They basically told me, as a group, that they felt that the graphics in SL were far inferior to the games they play, and that SL was for old people who are afraid of the computer. Being a young prof, I actually found their complaints to be very interesting and perhaps valid. On the one hand, SL is not a game--it's a virtual community, you define the experience you have there. On the other hand, if you are not there for a specific reason, then it might be dull. And, for younger people who are extremely tech savvy, SL would probably feel a bit dated. Some folks at Otis were really surprised by the response of the students, but some were not. I've decided to go back to keeping the course writing centered because then students can focus on being creative instead of on technology. Who knew that my students (who usually hate writing) would prefer writing to SL!

On another tip, I had lunch with a friend who is trying to break into TV writing. She is mostly into comedy, but she is also working on drama specs. She is really bright woman, a hustler who has made a good number of contacts, and I have no doubt that it's going to happen for her. She's being hip pocketed by an agent at UTA, and she was saying, she's been on lots of meetings with producers and agents, and right now, the buzz is for TV writers to have a scene from their script (pilot, spec) up on YouTube. She says everyone she's met with has asked her, "So do you have a scene up on YouTube?" She said people no longer want to read specs, they just want to see something. She was feeling very overwhelmed by this because she doesn't have a camera and has never really shot anything before. But, breaking a new writer is tough enough, and now with so many people going out and making films, the competition has gotten more stiff. A good friend of mine who is staffed on a comedy had been running a pretty successful online comic strip for a long time, which I bet helped him break in. Anyway, my other friend has decided to shoot a short sketch from one of her pilots. Technology has certainly made Hollywood an even more cut throat place...