Reed Kavner

Americans who had watched FOX News or MSNBC in the past week...

Wed, 23 May 2012 10:57:14 -0700

Americans who had watched FOX News or MSNBC in the past week performed worse on an international current events quiz than those who had not read/watched/listened to any news at all. ANY NEWS AT ALL.

Read the whole study from Farleigh Dickinson University, including survey methodology, here.

storyboard: Lady Comics: Who Needs Late Night? We’ve Got...

Wed, 16 May 2012 11:05:29 -0700

storyboard:

Lady Comics: Who Needs Late Night? We’ve Got Tumblr

If you ask a female comedian how social media has impacted her professional life, she will likely respond like Elaine Carroll. “Social media has made my career,” says Carroll, the 30-year-old creator of the Very Mary Kate web series, a spoof of Mary Kate Olsen’s glam life in New York.

Remember just a few years back, when comedians (of any gender) relentlessly chased guest spots at the feet of David Letterman and Jay Leno? Getting a gig on late night was the ultimate career boost, but women comedians had to fight through the prejudices both professional (like infamously misogynist Letterman booker Eddie Brill) and cultural (let’s all try to forget that Christopher Hitchens essay).

But the level playing field of Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr means no one gets between ambitious talent and a potentially receptive audience. All it takes is perseverance, ability, skill, and infinite patience.

“Social media has essentially become my career,” says Kate Spencer, an improv instructor and writer at VH1 who blogs on Tumblr.

Consider Ilana Glazer, a New York comedy writer who, when she and writing partner Abbi Jacobson didn’t make it into the improv groups they wanted at Upright Citizens Brigade, decided to take their brand of girl-centric comedy to the web.

“We said, ‘Eff this, we’re going to make material for ourselves,’” enthuses Glazer, the co-creator of the Broad City web series.

That was 2009. The duo now have a deal with FX.

“In the old days, if you got a spot on Carson, your life changed forever,” says Lizz Winstead, co-creator of The Daily Show, who blogs at the Huffington Post. “That’s not true anymore. Do we even need those shows? I don’t think we do.”

Women still represent just a fraction of writers on late-night comedy programs, and they only represent 8 percent of directors of Hollywood films. Any female comic knows the comedy industry is rife with sexism.

But social media has opened up ways around these traditional paths. A sampling of a dozen women comedians offered up Tumblr and Twitter presences that have become huge in the comedy world — not just as side gigs, but as major marketing tools for these ladies’ work.

“Social media has done the same thing for women comedians as it’s done for other movements — it’s given women a way to know they’re not alone,” says Asie Mohtarez, a New York comedian and blogger. “What it does for me is provide daily evidence of women doing it — making weird/crude jokes (gasp), videos, and other content, which I find inspiring and freeing.”

There are plenty of other examples. Late Night’s Amy Ozols and Chelsea Lately’s Jen Kirkman have become social media standard-bearers in the comedy world, getting credit for their work in the public sphere. Last year, when The Office’s Mindy Kaling set out to promote her book, she used Tumblr to do it. And Whitney Cummings combined social media and dirty jokes about Bob Saget to get a prime-time show on NBC.

But for up-and-coming comics, those outlets can be even more important. “On the internet, no one can limit you, ” Glazer says. For her, that meant constant positive reinforcement of her work, and eventually, a mainstream gig.

She joined the likes of author Mariam Kobras, who used her Twitter following to land a book deal she said had “no agent interference, no rejections, no waiting. Or Allie Hagan, a Washington consultant by day and comedian by night, who turned her Suri’s Burn Book Tumblr into a publishing contract.

“I’ve gotten several freelance gigs based on Twitter and Tumblr, and I think that’s how a lot of people find me for live stuff,” says Julieanne Smolinski, a columnist for XOJane.com. “I’ve done a couple storytelling shows and some podcasts. I am also willing to do quinceañeras and that thing where you go to high schools and tell people not to be like you.”

And, of course, Elaine Carroll of Very Mary Kate, who got a deal with College Humor after producing the series out of pocket. And then got cast on Mad Men. ”There will always be hecklers and Youtube commenter types,” Carroll says of doing comedy on the web. “But the process of something going viral is contingent on it being good. It isn’t based on gender or race or sexual orientation. If your idea is good enough (or weird enough, or contains enough cats jumping into boxes), it won’t be ignored — even if you’re a female lesbian lady woman.”

As Mohtarez puts it: “My Tumblr has helped me hone my odd and sometimes dark sense of humor, and to find a little audience for it in between reblogged photos of other people’s breakfasts and titties.”

- Alex Leo

(Photo courtesy of Ilana Glazer, at left, with Abbi Jacobson, on the set of Broad City)

"someone on twitter said that they had considered memes “the democratization of humor,” which i think..."

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 08:38:38 -0700

“someone on twitter said that they had considered memes “the democratization of humor,” which i think is fascinating. because there’s an effort to make you think that by proliferating someone else’s joke, you yourself become as funny or clever as its originator. there is money to be made from this. empires are built on that idea! but it doesn’t hold water. the word BACON or the word SCIENCE is not humor, it does not indicate the presence of humor; but it’s been positioned as a punchline for so long, we react to it as if it’s a fully-formed joke. put it this way: we used to all own headphones of various qualities. then apple bundled those trashy white earbuds with all music players, and audiophiles everywhere said “man, they are really horrible for music — they have terrible bass response and kids are growing up thinking that all music is supposed to be tinny and shrill.” i’m not an audiophile, but i’ll take those guys’ word for it. memes are those white earbuds, but for comedy.”

- chainsawsuit by kris straub - my thoughts on memes, distilled (via stryker)

The hosts of ‘The Morning Show’, a national…...

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 13:06:23 -0700

The hosts of ‘The Morning Show’, a national… er… morning show on Aussie TV, spent a segment rocking out with our app. This is awesome.

Ben Kweller playing for the SXSW crowd on 6th Street from the...

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 12:36:29 -0700

[Flash 10 is required to watch video.]

Ben Kweller playing for the SXSW crowd on 6th Street from the window at The Stage on Sixth.

deliberatepace: Like mother, like daughter. Cool.

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 12:10:58 -0800

deliberatepace:

Like mother, like daughter.

Cool.

The Path Fiasco Will Lower Your Conversions

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 10:06:00 -0800

Regardless of your opinion of Path’s sneaky activities, if you are part of the startup community, you should think twice before you forgive and move on. Their lapse in judgement will lower your conversions.

When the news broke that Path had been peeking into users’ address books and saving a copy on its servers, I didn’t much care. Sure, I thought it was immoral at best to do this without informing the user and it was certainly risky from a publicity perspective, but it was just another example of a startup that figured it would beg for forgiveness rather than ask for permission.

As the news, opinions, apologies, and absolutions swirled around the internet, I still didn’t much care.

But today I care.

Today I read Nick Bilton’s NY Times piece about Path where he poses the question “What’s the big deal anyway?” and immediately answers it:

The big deal is that privacy and security is not a big deal in Silicon Valley. While technorati tripped over themselves to congratulate Mr. Morin on finessing the bad publicity, a number of concerned engineers e-mailed me noting that the data collection was not an accident...

(emphasis added)

That sucks. The Path fiasco is contributing to the public perception that startups routinely abuse users’ trust with impunity. And as that thought permeates the brains of consumers everywhere, it has the potential to hit me where it most hurts: my metrics dashboard.

It’s a bit of a miracle that startups like Mint, where part of user registration is handing over the keys to your bank and credit card accounts, have been able to get off the ground—let alone become great successes. Consumers are astoundingly trusting and we as purveyors of new products and services benefit from that endlessly. But when a story about a startup abusing users’ trust and not being held accountable by the industry breaks, a chunk of that trust erodes and a few new visitors to your site decide that they’d rather not hand over their data. Good luck, Cake Health.

There’s a lot of chest thumping in The Valley about being a “hacker” or a “hustler.” And that’s awesome if being a hacker means “ building something quickly or testing the boundaries of what can be done” and if a hustler is a founder who masterfully pits VC against VC to get a better valuation. While we should celebrate those who find success in hacking or hustling, we must be careful that we don’t let the spirit of these terms become wed to the idea (or even the perception) that part of starting a business is a willingness to embrace moral ambiguity and play games with users’ trust.

Path has a beautifully-designed product and it’s a shame that this is the context in which many users are being introduced to it. I hope the company is able to recover and move forward. And in doing so I hope they recognize the irreparable systemic damage they leave in their wake and I implore anyone with an interest in this community and industry to make user privacy and security a big deal.

Are they A/B testing language or colors? Or just trying to...

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 22:28:43 -0800

Are they A/B testing language or colors? Or just trying to confuse viewers?

“You take a hot dog, stuff it with some jack cheese, roll...

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 14:49:00 -0800

“You take a hot dog, stuff it with some jack cheese, roll it in a pizza, you’ve got Cheezy Blasters!”

Thanks, ~~Meat Cat~~ Epicurious!

In case you’ve been living under a rock (or in a...

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 11:00:53 -0800

In case you’ve been living under a rock (or in a third-world country in which access to potable water, let alone the open Internet, is a rarity) and you haven’t heard, Louis CK is doing an AMA on Reddit right now.

dailyseinfeld: Kramer: My service rates went up? You banks are...

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 12:43:28 -0800

dailyseinfeld:

Kramer: My service rates went up? You banks are all the same with your hidden fees and your service charges. Well, maybe I’ll just take my blood elsewhere, yeah.
Blood bank employee: Well, we can transfer to another bank for you.
Kramer: Oh, no no no…no more banks. I’m keeping my blood in my freezer with…my money!

(via The Blood)

Kramer is the 99%.

The Internet Makes TV Better

Sat, 15 Oct 2011 14:04:00 -0700

This is kind of awesome. Even if you’re not a “Community” fan, check this out.

1. On Thursday an episode of “Community” aired. The episode, “Remedial Chaos Theory” explored several different parallel timelines.

2. A really perceptive viewer Tumbled his theory that events in the prior episode are clues that timeline we are lead to believe is “real” is not.

Last night’s Community featured seven different timelines based on the roll of a die. They led you to believe that the final timeline was the real one, but I don’t believe this to be true. Here’s why.

The episode begins with a brief argument about whether Troy and Abed live in apartment 303 or 304. This episode was season three, episode four. What this hints at is that this episode takes place before the last one.

3. “Community” creator/executive producer Dan Harmon responds to the theory (and puts any speculation to rest) with a thoughtful Tumblr post of his own, revealing just how much respect he has for the show’s viewers.

The production code of “Remedial Chaos Theory” is 303, because it was the third episode to be written and shot. We intended to air it third. Troy and Abed’s apartment is 303 because, hey, we needed an apartment number, so we gave it the production code’s number.

…

As much fun as we want to have, we never want to confuse you or lie to you. We just don’t consider that a right that we have. I hated that stupid “The Killing” show on AMC after the first five minutes; don’t show me someone discovering a body but then reveal that the camera was somewhere else and it was a pig. That’s dumb. That’s not storytelling, that’s a parlor trick and an abuse of power.

4. Dan Harmon Tweeted the text exchange between him and writer Megan Ganz that began the development of the episode.

…And posted pictures of the writers room whiteboards after mapping out the parallel timelines.

I love television.

He rocked the fusion of these two disciplines so hard....

Wed, 05 Oct 2011 20:21:00 -0700

He rocked the fusion of these two disciplines so hard. Masterful.

One thing that’s kind of a bummer about the Internet is...

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 12:38:50 -0700

One thing that’s kind of a bummer about the Internet is the constant reminder that people like Hannah Hart exist and that you’ll never be as cool as them.

via Here’s Some Awesome

I spent way too much time last night choosing my FB Cover photo....

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 15:45:32 -0700

I spent way too much time last night choosing my FB Cover photo. Love how the new profile/timeline fosters a great sense of ownership. It screams to be filled with content.

ericmortensen: sunfoundation: The World’s Largest Photo...

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 18:12:44 -0700

ericmortensen:

sunfoundation:

The World’s Largest Photo Libraries

This should be retitled “quality vs quantity.” Of course, that’s not to say that this isn’t impressive or that Facebook isn’t providing a valuable service. If anything, the alternate title demonstrates the problem with most info-graphics. They present a overly simplified version of a relationship that’s easy to pass around without including any sort of context. This info-graphic ought to raise questions. Instead, it is digested as an answer.

Reblogging for Eric’s caption. Infographics make us feel informed like Sorkin dialogue makes us feel smart.

Good caprese makes up for bad UX.

Tue, 06 Sep 2011 18:42:00 -0700

Good caprese makes up for bad UX.

lizlet: By far the most elaborate bus stop ad I’ve ever seen in...

Mon, 05 Sep 2011 17:50:59 -0700

lizlet:

By far the most elaborate bus stop ad I’ve ever seen in L.A.

Very, very cool. But creepy floating hands. Like a ghost flight attendant. A boo-ardess.

mattmorain: Every @robdelaney mention of @BarackObama so far in...

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 20:54:48 -0700

mattmorain:

Every @robdelaney mention of @BarackObama so far in 2011.

Individually delightful, collectively genius.

@robdelaney

Thank God this show is coming back!” - Me Seriously. It...

Thu, 25 Aug 2011 14:38:25 -0700

Thank God this show is coming back!” - Me

Seriously. It ain’t ‘Breaking Bad’, but it’s a fun show.

tvhangover:

“Thank God this show is coming back!” - No one.