2006 May - NoFilmSchool

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New city, new look

05.21.06 @ 10:19PM Tags

A while back I lamented the fugliness of this site, but then I ended up scrapping my redesign efforts, and No Film School’s less-than-stellar appearance persisted. For posterity’s sake, until today, NFS looked like this:

While I knew this site needed an extreme makeover worthy of a shitty reality television series (is there any other kind?), I didn’t exactly have the time to redesign the whole thing properly. So, this weekend I quickly jacked a theme from Bharath Kumar (thanks, Bharath), modified it a bit, and now you have the new, hopefully improved, No Film School. One day this site will look great; today is not that day. But it does look better, I think.

If you’re a longtime No Film School reader (meaning, your name is John, Pat, Scott, or Becca), then you’ll notice the organization of this site has changed. Categories have been simplified (“Internet Tanning” has changed to “Web,” “Worthless Opinions on Worthwhile Issues” has changed to “Politics,” etc.). The pages are now listed across the top, and there will be some new ones coming soon.

The biggest change is that the site is (finally) three columns. I’m of two minds on this; on one hand, the third column allows for more functionality. On the other, it distracts from the main text, which is what this site is (supposed to be) about. But given that I’m now a bona fide New Yorker, with actual stuff to do, my entries will likely become shorter (which no one will object to, I’m sure). On the other hand, the quality of my writing may also go (deeper?) in the shitter. So it goes.

I made all these changes in a hurry, so it’s likely that I’ll be tweaking and adding a lot in the weeks to come. Let me know what you think of the new look, and thanks as always for visiting. Hopefully now is when this story gets interesting.

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Must... resist... the urge... to make a pun... about URGE

05.17.06 @ 9:04AM Tags

I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t help myself. And neither could the mainstream media.

I still haven’t written up the story of how I finally got a job and moved to New York, which is kind of the point of this site. Regardless, the project that I’m doing graphic design for, MTV’s digital music service URGE, launches today. URGE is a combination a la carte music store, ala iTunes, and subscription service, ala Napster–but it’s much more editorially-driven. There are a lot of passionate music fans at MTV programming the various channels, feeds, blogs, and playlists in URGE–all of which are ways of helping users explore its very, very deep catalog. iTunes operates under the assumption that you pretty much know what you want when you head to its store; URGE is designed to be a place you can go to discover new music. And I’m not just talking about the teenyboppers screaming outside my office window; whatever your niche may be, it’s likely well-represented in the service (one of the first things I did at MTV was to make a Klezmer playlist image, if that gives you any idea). And while my taste in music was pretty indie by North Carolina standards, I’ve got nothing on the folks I sit next to.

Don’t just take my word for it; initial reviews of the service have been very favorable. Head on over to URGE.com, or download Windows Media Player 11 (also released today) and click on the URGE button. You’ll see my dirty work scattered about.

UPDATE: For everyone who’s complained to me about URGE costing money, I’d like to point out the big “14-Day Free Trial” button on the site (no credit card required). If your trial period runs out and you decide not to subscribe, head on over to Pandora or Last.fm. I actually wrote a review of both services once upon a time (I liked Pandora more), but I forgot to post it–essentially they’re both music recommendation engines similar to URGE’s Auto-Mix feature, without the portability. It’s the new millennium–there are no excuses for not having your musical tastes extend deep into the Long Tail.

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What does "human resources" even mean, anyway?

05.16.06 @ 8:53AM Tags

Now that I’m gainfully employed at MTV, I’ve been enjoying receiving boilerplate rejection emails from other companies. When one unexpectedly pops up in my inbox, I think: oh, okay, yeah, I remember you guys–I would have never worked for you anyway. Which may or may not be true–but the sting of rejection inspires such a response, regardless. One example:

Dear applicant,

Thank you very much for your interest in Lime Wire’s film project and for taking the time to complete the first-round interview process with us. We very much enjoyed reviewing your application. Blah, blah, blah. However, although your skills and experience are impressive, we feel that your qualifications are not a match for our needs at this time. Thanks again for your interest in Lime Wire; we wish you the best of luck in your job search.

Sincerely,

[Name withheld]
Human Resources Associate
The Lime Group, LLC

First of all, if I were a HR person, I’d occasionally put the “blah, blah” in there just to be a dick. Within a split-second of opening the email (or envelope), the applicant knows that he or she didn’t get the job, so the contents of the notification are just a formality anyway. On the other hand, actually hearing back from a job, one way or another, is better than not hearing back at all.

Second, if I were a HR person, I’d have to ask myself, what the hell am I doing?

Dealing with HR is widely accepted to be a consistently shitty experience. I know more than one person who had their hiring nixed by HR, even though their interviewer and potential boss wanted to hire them. So what, exactly, is the point of HR, other than to entangle employees (and potential employees) in a mess of red tape? HR seems to exist primarily to make things more difficult in life. Institutions that serve such a purpose make life so much more enjoyable. That was sarcasm.

It’s no coincidence that the job that ended up working out for me was the rare position that did not involve going through HR–but that’s another story, which I’ll get to soon. The point is, HR department infrastructures are so bloated, it seems to me that anyone who could come up with a new way of leveraging online applications to streamline the admin processes–thus cutting out 75% of the personnel required to accomplish an inane task, and opening up more direct channels of communication for employees–could change the very definition of human resources, and make a fortune in the process. Of course, HR is another in a long list of institutions that are overdue for revolutionizing. Another obvious one? The film industry.

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