Viva Las Vegas

We have been back from Vegas for a couple of weeks now and I have a couple of posts to put up about it which I will try and get round to putting up shortly. Suffice to say that Vegas rocked and I cannot wait to go back - even with the mammoth flights,

Seriously though if you get the chance you should make the time to head out there

Twitter or Twit - Benefit or Fad?

Ok so I have given in and decided that I would give twitter a go. The notion of micro blogging never really worked for me. For one thing I hate the term micro blogging - it just sounds so pretentious and secondly it was not convinced that anything that would be posted would be meaningful or interesting.

Having thought about it for a wee while I figured that as someone who works in IT, I should maybe have a look and see whether there was anything too it and whether it would actually be of any use. Setting it up and picking some people to follow was pretty easy and surprisingly some of the recommended followings were of interest to me - though I was not sure if it would get any benefit. In order to give it a fair run I also figured I that I would pick one of the phone apps so that I could use it on the go.

Having used it for a day, though not all that heavily I think that I can see some uses for communities. If you want to promote articles then it is a good way to put a link up with a one line comment. I know that there are wikis and the like but having something that is short and too the point may well be useful. If you do want to have discussions that are more than a line or so long then you would need to make sure that you have somewhere else to do it.

An interesting notion for this is around whether or not business should make use of these tools for allowing their organizational communities to interact, while absorbing the cost. It was in the papers not too long ago that business' loose money becuase of people in the organsisation using twitter rather than working, treating it as a social networking type site. Another article I looked up places the cost of twitter at about $13.5bn per year (worked out at a $20/per hour productivity loss per person -link I am sure that figures like these will lead, or maybe have lead to some companies blocking access to twitter from the employees desktop, but there is a chance that by encouraging positive use you could actually get some productivity gains or at least increase knowledge share.

What we need to remember is that the easier you make it from someone to do something - the more likely they are to do it. In a lot of organizations knowledge sharing is hampered by the fact that it is difficult, prescriptive or they just don't have the time. Perhaps use to twitter would help alleviate some of this. Thinking back to cost - I would have to wonder whether the use of other tools would be just as high as the use to twitter and prove just as costly. I don't have stats on instant messaging but I would think that there are similar costs and similar benefits, though perhaps a few more logistical issues.

One thing that does come to mind and it not business related it the notion of chain of consciousness blogging. In terms of changing the way that people think about the effort for sharing their thoughts with others informally just putting it out there, this is the next logical step from blogging. For some folks the idea of sitting and keying in line upon line of text is just not something that they have the time/notion/inclination to do. Tools like twitter may encourage them to start getting their thoughts out. Whether these end up as meaningful conversations, is debatable but I guess if people feel like they are interacting with others and they get something from their conversations then perhaps it is no bad thing, to give people the means to have a voice.

Am I a convert to micro blogging - I would say no. I need to think about it and use it a bit more to get my head around its use. Can I see some possible benefits, yes I think so but only time will tell. In the mean time, should you wish to twitter you can find me there under JennyLally (imaginative don't you think - lol). I look forward to twittering you soon!

Who watches the Watchmen - well me

Watchmen blew my mind.

I had been looking forward to the film, I had read the reviews, seen the costumes and was excited, In the past I had read the graphic novels and enjoyed them and had high hopes for the film. I was not disappointed

As far as the comic book films go this is definitely grown up fair. It does not mince its words and it paints a harsh picture of fame and its consequences and how power is perceived, It even asks the question of what would a higher power do if it came to earth and looked at the way we behaved. Set in a cold war America the film looks at what could happen if there really were Capes among us

There are some really interesting parallels at play when you look at the film and todays society. With the rise of reality TV we are making Joe Public famous and then taking delight in watching things fall about their ears. You don't have to look to far to see the parallel here. We even have the question of who looks over those who look over us. Who will be there if those the say they will protect us turn out to not be doing their job?

Aside from the more moral aspects and questions it is a really pretty film. The imagery, special effects and costumes work really well and I was blown away by the aging makeup. Seeing Jeffrey Dean Morgan made up to look in his late 50's was amazing and it was far better than I thought it could be.

While it is a long film, at just over 3 hours, a remarkable amount is crammed into it. The first 15 - 20 minutes could be a film in and off its self let alone what happens throughout the remainder and the masterful use of a soundtrack of well known tunes helps guide you to where we are in the film when the plot really starts.

Another thing that I was very impressed with was the way that they managed to age the characters up. Jeffrey Dean Morgan in particular was aged very well and it was hard to see where he was made up and where it was his real facial features. This was also the case for the other characters but it was most noticeable on Morgan.

I know that there have been a lot of people who were not happy with the end of the film because it was different from what was seen in the graphic novels. Personally I thought that the end of the film worked really well and while it was different it did not detract from the the overall film experience.

All in all I would have to say that it is one of the most enjoyable superhero films that I have seen in a very long time. If you are wanting to see something that is about folks flying about while saving the world and looking cute then this is not the film for you. If you are happy with a gritty film that is more about the psyche of the characters and their flaws as people then this could be it for you.

Get off your horse and drink your milk

So here's the thing I had a great post all about how westerns are highly underrated and that it was strange how, when all things were circular it seemed that westerns never really seemed to come around in popularity. I was all set to put the post up and then I had a wee look about and realized that this was not really true.

See the thing is I love Westerns. You name it and there is a chance that I have seen it. From the classics through to the new films I have watched most of them and own quite a few on DVD. I, like many others, grew up on John Wayne and Clint Eastwood as Cowboys and would regularly watch the matinee Western at the weekend with my Dad and I loved them. They were simple films, often with great soundtracks that you could just loose yourself in. Pale Rider is, to this day, one of my favorites (though you cant help but love two mules for Sister Sarah)

When I looked into it further it is not that Westerns are not cyclical in their nature but rather that they cycle quickly and in shorter bursts than other films. Just looking at rough numbers there were 30 Westerns released in the 1990's and another 25 from 2000 -2008. Now admittedly not all of these got into the cinemas but they were released so there must be some kind of audience for them. In the lists I have seen about 12 of the films in the 1990's and 6 of the films in the past 8 years did well while the others did not really make much of an impact

Just out of interest I had a quick comparison with superhero films. In this case there were 21 films released in the 1990's and 48 released between 2000 - 2008. Again looking at these results about 10 did well in the 1990's and at least 24 did well in set starting in 2000.

So why do Westerns seem to come and go far more quickly than other films, but still seem to be fairly prolific based on the numbers I found. I think that it may be to do with how the films are evolving. Look at the simple plots of a lot of Western, it is white hat v's Black hat. It is, much like the superhero film a story of good v's evil, yet as the audiences have evolved so have the plots. you have films like Young Guns where it is all about the action and then you jump forward to something like Brokeback Mountain where it is about emotion and relationships. When you have films of other genres I guess you know what you are going to get, with Westerns not so much.

What does seem to happen is that when there are westerns that do not do so well it knocks back the chance of there being new Westerns which can do well. It probably links back to supply and demand. If no one is willing to pay to see a movie then there will be no backing for the film and it is likely when a writer looks to sell the option on their script then likely buyers will look to see how the genre has done in the past and if it is down then they are unlikely to invest. if this is soley the way that films were financed then new genres would be unlikely to ever come into being as there is no historical data. In these cases there must be something else which has an effect.

If you look at some of the Westerns that did well then you can see that there are quite a few cases of a 'star' investing in their movie. This way you get a name in the frame and they help with the cost. The other way seems to be that you get some bug named actors to be in it and rely on their fan base to pull in new people, revitalizing the film industry.

So anyway what inspired all this thinking? Well at long last I got to see a film that I have been desperate to see since it came out - Appaloosa. It is an unusual film, in that it is not a Tombstone or a Wyatt Earp, that is to say that is does not rely on gun fights and action, but is more of a Dancing with Wolves (though not as long). The film is definitely dialogue driven and focuses on the relationships between the main characters rather than action to drive the plot forward.

Both Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen are (IMHO) very believable as men of the old west. The gruff attitudes and conflicts shown in he film go some of the way to showing you the difficulties and challenges that could have been in play at this time, but it is not really romanticized. All in all it is a film that I can watch time and again and seem to get something else out of it

So while John Wayne did not say the title of this post, and while the Western is unlikely to ever be a huge box office hit I am glad they are still made and I am glad I got to see this film and add it to my collection. It is not my choice when I want more action but as far as stoic contemplation goes this is a great film and definitely worth watching

Back to the mat

After laying off anything that looked like it was even close to looking like exercise for a wee while (based on the fact that eating or sitting on my couch do not count as exercise) I have decided to make an effort and start back on a programme that would hopefully improve my fitness and health somewhat. Now knowing that I tend to be a person of extremes I have tried to take a more measured approach in the hope that this would mean that what ever I pick is more attainable and manageable. In order to try and achieve what I was looking for I decided to try and approach this in the most practical manner that I could think of. So here is my plan

Step 1: Membership is not a requirement
The first step for me is to find somewhere that does not require a membership fee. A lot of the time I find that there is pressure to go as often as possible in order to get value for money - and while you can keep this up for a wee while it is not something that can be sustained when you have to balance everything up. The local leisure centre in the next village up has a good set of facilities and you can pay for classes or training sessions on a session by session basis so this may well be an option

Step 2: It is not a grott hole
A lot of the time when you actually look in the changing rooms etc of a gym no matter how clean and nice they look on the outside the changing rooms/showers etc are often grotty or smelly and if this is the case then you are never going to attend the sessions when you are feeling a bit demotivated. So I went up to the centre and took a few minutes to have a good look around. With it being the local centre they were happy for me to look around by myself rather than having someone show me what they thought I might like to see. This actually made a big difference as it meant that I was actually able to have a look around and think about whether I wanted to use the facilities.

Step 3: Understand what they provide
Having looked around I asked for some material to take away with me about costs, opening hours etc. Now because membership was not a requirement they provided me with timetables and costs and although they took the time to explain the costs they did not place pressure to take a membership. What was refreshing is that they actually said to go home a look over what I would want to do before I came in to discuss whether or not I would like to take membership. This lack of pressure was really refreshing and meant that I knew I would have time to consider my options and see if this was for me. A note to any other gym's -if you don't pressure people then you may keep them on your books for a bit longer

Step 4: Work out what you want to do
I have a tendency to be an all or nothing person. When I am working on something I tend to want to do that to the exclusion of all other things and I wanted to try and avoid this being the case again so I took the time to read all of the blurb provided and picked only one thing that I would start with to see whether I liked heading up there to work out.

While there is a lot of choice from classes through to different sports you can book in for I figure that if I only pick one thing and try that then I can focus on it and then change it if it does not work. Initially the classes appealed but I don't always know when I am going to get in let alone get up to the centre so I probably going to go for the gym

This being the case I need to work out what I want to get out of it. If they say to me that I should have a gym program which means I have to run on a treadmill then I may as well just not bother going. I hate doing that and while I am happy with a brisk walk the idea of jogging on the spot for 20 minutes is not so much.

Step 5: Meet the people that work there
Having made a decision on what I will do I have decided that I need to go up to the gym to meet the folks that run it. As a bonus I can also do an induction which means that I will be able to use the gym freely after this session. I know it does not sound that exciting but I find you get a real feel for how you will be treated when you go to these things and see whether or not they listen to you when you give them your goals.

So there it is - my 5 step plan. Of course there is a step 6 where I actually have to go along and work out. I am prepared for the fact that I will find it hard going at the start and for the fact that I will likely get annoyed when I cannot do things, so hopefully I will make it out the other side a little healthier and largely in one piece