begin rant

I could leave an essay here on how the internet is a wonder when it comes to the phenomenon of distribution, and mention that it has made the careers of several young animators and filmmakers - but I'd be happier to just show you a couple of Star Wars fan films.

YouTube also has several smaller presentations of the films available for streaming download.

It is still interesting to note the relatively high production quality of these amatuer films put together by what amount to a bunch of bored high-school and college students. The advent of digital filmmaking and now digital distribution have made these guys virtual stars overnight. The tools of production have become much cheaper and more accessible; where once it might be unusual for a public school to have a camera for analog video, even some high-end cell phones now include a respectable digital video camera. Where before it might have been difficult to edit video or add sound and post-production SFX to a production, many computers now include this software as part of their basic installation.

Most importantly, the channels of distribution have broadened and become more accessible to any with an internet connection, lowering the obstacles to achieve your desired target audience. Ryan Wieber certainly parlayed his success into a career with LucasArts, and fans of other popular media have also launched their careers on the back of a successful intellectual property...

Posted by Derksen at 6:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ordering as many of my textbooks from the UK (which were originally printed in the United States and shipped over to the other side of the pond) as possible and then having them shipped back to the States will still save me nearly a hundred dollars - and this is just from Amazon.co.uk. Even the American incarnation will save me nearly thirty dollars on the school bookstore. This is almost as crazy as re-importing drugs from Canada.

Posted by Derksen at 2:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Sometimes it seems that it pays to be a little paranoid. You never have any idea when your day is going to turn from perfect - to perfectly frustrating. For example, your friends might tell you that you are crazy for wanting to leave for your four PM flight with more than two hours of spare time, but you know you need it - just in case of 'emergencies'. Little things. Like your car's battery suddenly, spontaneously, and mysteriously failing to start some two hours and twenty minutes before your flight. While you are in downtown Houston, instead of at home, and can therefore not afford to abandon your car all on its own for half a week. So you have to call your insurance to get the numbers for a towing service to have your car hauled home - all while you are trying to board a plane.

So you call on your friends.

Who thankfully have not left Houston yet, and who curtail their afternoon plans to try and help jump your car. You don't care if it starts again after you stop it next - right now you just need to get to the airport. Of course, the car proved unjumpable. The battery has either had its charge boiled off by the hot and humid Houston afternoon, or it is completely and spontaneously dead. Or maybe the starter is having issues. Or the alternator, or the distributor, or any of a dozen other things that could go wrong. The problem is that one of those things has gone wrong, and now you only have two hours to resolve it and drive half an hour down the road to the airport.

And now it is raining.

So your friends not only take your sorry backside to the airport - but some of them also sit around and try to deal with whatever minion the towing company sends their way. Having learned that it will be frighteningly expensive to have your car towed all the way back up to Conroe, they elect to hunt down a new battery in a city that is not their own, and replace yours and then drive your car home for you where it will be waiting for you in the parking lot.

Which is more than amazingly cool of them, and you are now eternally in their debt.

I still don't know how this story ends (and probably won't until Wednesday when I return), but Kate, Lowell, Karmin, Rick?
Thanks, guys.

You ever need anything?

You have but to call.

Thanks.

Posted by Derksen at 11:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fencing is all about good timing, and it appears that summer nationals will be held in Miami, Florida this year. This means that I will unquestionably have to join the UFl fencing team - if only so that I can attend nationals to see my old coach again - and to maybe watch my fencing kids grow just a little more.

Who knows? Maybe I will finally even get a real épée or sabre coach who could put all that untapped potential to some good.

Posted by Derksen at 12:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Director of Human Resources:

In order to continue my education, I have decided to volunarily terminate my employment with Lexicon Genetics on August second, 2006.

Thank you for your time;
Andrew Derksen
July 19th, 2006

Posted by Derksen at 8:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

"When the going gets weird, the weird go pro."
- Hunter S. Thompson

Happy birthday, Mr. Thompson. You're an inspiration to rebels and truthseekers everywhere.

Posted by Derksen at 8:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay... as of today, it appears that I have a new major advisor for graduate studies in entomology, and a new project focus for my education. I will now complete a lifelong goal by defending America from an alien invasion. Admittedly, this will be an invasion of small biting arthropods known as thrips, but they're strange enough to be from beyond this world.

They are tiny parasitic insects of about a milimeter in length whose wings can only be described as feather dusters. They are incredibly prolific, and once a colony is established, it can be extremely difficult to eradicate. Worse still, they are promiscuous parasites, readily leaping from a preferred host to an alternate host when environmental conditions demand. Most important of all, they can also act as vector to several commercially important plant viruses, and to top matters off, they will bite human beings when they run out of plants.

It appears that Florida stands poised on the brink of invasion by a creature that could only be described as an enemy to all I hold dear - the Chilithrips, Scirtothrips dorsalis. It will be my duty to develop a management strategy to control and identify their advance across the nation. Millions stand to perish if I fail.

I am actually looking forward to the challenge. I mean, it isn't mosquitoes, but it still will be ecological control of a potentially harmful species, and it presents all sorts of interesting opportunities to explore the evolution and adaptation of an invasive species: resistance, founder's effect, structured competition, host-shifting and sympatric speciation. As in all such things, only time will tell.

Posted by Derksen at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Will someone kindly remind me to go out and purchase a new set of hiking boots at some point during this weekend? I've quite worn the rubber soles of my old pair of Wolverines down to their leather lining, and the steel toe-gaurds are starting to shine through. It is wonderful to note that the wear patterns of a shoe can reveal much about their user's health and habits. Mine reveal that I have high arches, and that I like to sprint on my toes, rolling across the ball of my foot instead of my heel. They also imply that I usually fence with my right foot forward, dragging my left leg on deep lunges - and that I walk with my toes pointing slightly outwards: a sure sign of lateral chondromalacia...

Posted by Derksen at 7:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The other week, one of the guys I fence with was trying to convince me that I had too much tension in my poise while on strip, and that I should loosen up my form and relax. I tried taking his advice because he really is a more experienced fencer, and I know that he was trying to help - but after following his lead, he and three other guys mopped the floor with me. Then I told them to get back on strip and to let me do things my way. I still didn't win, but my performance improved so drastically and I narrowed the gap between our scores so rapidly that I frightened them.

They didn't realize all that coiled tension could explode outward so suddenly, or jump that far down the lane, or outpace them, or dance unflaggingly on the strip for fifteen minutes. They called it an unnecessary expenditure of energy and told me that I would tire - but after three hours, they were ready to go home, and I was just getting started.

Swordplay can tell you a lot about a person, and that barely constrained energy is part of who and what I am. Some people find their moment through serenity and calm. I find mine through action and passion. For me, it is better to be slightly wound up about enjoying life than placidly accepting circumstances. Yin and yang, my friends. That knot in my neck really is the only thing keeping the puppet on its strings held upright. I will relax the day I die, thanks.

I get more done this way.

Posted by Derksen at 11:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)