[Sunspots] The droid edition

[Sunspots] The droid edition 37signals Mar 07

8 comments Latest by Ryan

Bigger isn't always better for business: “Americans think big. This has helped make them the most powerful nation on Earth, but bigger is not always better, either for our bodies or, I suggest, for our organizations. If I were to visit a symphony orchestra and ask them about their growth plans for the future, how would they respond? They would talk about their plans to extend their repertoire and to bring their work to new audiences, not about increasing the number of violinists…Why does almost every business that I know seek to grow in size, year after year, in fact, as if there were no limit? Why can’t they be content with doing more with less?”
Tech support “greatest hits” CD leaks: “When they say, ‘Your call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes,’ that’s only partly true. They also record your calls so they can pass around recordings of the funniest ones. They actually gave me one of those “Best Of” disks at the end of my day in the call center. Herewith: a few actual calls from that disk or that I heard about from the agents themselves.”
Site shows you the $0.99 “Movie of the Week” on iTunes: “Every Tuesday iTunes offers a special rental price of 99 cents on a movie selection. This special price is available through the following Monday. We’ll keep you updated on what that movie is every week.”
droidMAKER: The inside story of George Lucas: “The inside story of George Lucas, his intensely private company, and their work to revolutionize filmmaking. In the process, they made computer history. Discover the birth of Pixar, digital video editing, videogame avatars, THX sound, and a host of other icons of the media age. Lucas played a central role in the universe of entertainment technologies we see everyday.”
Elaine St. James on the importance of imagination: “Einstein said, ‘Imagination is more important than information.’ I experienced this first hand after I canceled my magazine and newspaper subscriptions. I’ve never been much of a TV watcher, but I just kind of unplugged from everything. I found out that I could take the time at the end of the day to just sit and daydream, opening myself up to really thinking rather than constantly reacting. We all fall into that habit. We react to the things that are going on around us and feel there is a certain response or a certain expectation that we have to live up to—usually somebody else’s expectation. If we let go of that, we can really get the feel of how important imagination is in our life. It’s not that information is not important, but imagination is what we do with that information. We have to learn to take the time to tap into our own intuitive knowing.”
The secular Sabbath is a digital day of rest: “Thus began my ‘secular Sabbath’ — a term I found floating around on blogs — a day a week where I would be free of screens, bells and beeps. An old-fashioned day not only of rest but of relief.”
Behind the scenes of the old school HBO intro

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8 comments so far

Noah Everett 07 Mar 08

Interesting to how they did the old HBO intro. They had to get creative before CGI .

Bryce 07 Mar 08

Re:Droidmaker — I had a chance to see the author, Michael Rubin, speak a while back and it was a BLAST . Very engaging, insidery ‘old days at Lucasfilm’ kinda talk. Highly recommended, if you ever get the chance.

(Click on my name above for my notes on his talk.)

Mark Eagleton 07 Mar 08

I know this dates me a bit, but I remember seeing this HBO behind the scenes when it first aired.

Alejandro Moreno 07 Mar 08

Re: Behind the HBO intro, I love it. I’m sure people at, say, PIXAR , work their butts off, too; but there’s something satisfying about a mostly hand-made product (see also, muppets, etc.)

David Andersen 07 Mar 08

“Why can’t they be content with doing more with less?”

Because investors are trying to maximize their return.

GeeIWonder 07 Mar 08

American don’t think bigger.

They think consume. They think stuff. Get a new laptop. Get a bigger house. Get a white laptop. Get a nicer car. Get a more powerful laptop. Get a new phone. Get a smaller laptop.

Can’t pay for it all? Get a new credit card.

3stripe 08 Mar 08

Thanks for sharing the HBO making-of, best thing I’ve seen on YouTube all year.

Love the fact that the camera movement is computer controlled but the effects are so old-school, I mean, rotating leds really fast in a circle to make coloured stripes, lol!

Ryan 11 Mar 08

I used to love that HBO intro, me and my brother woudl pretend we were flying into the logo and got attacked by the led barrage. Cable was so cool back then when it jumped from 4 to like 30 channels whoa!

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