On James Franco trying to be a writer.

April 14, 2010
by Kanyi
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A friend of mine showed me this Esquire posting of James Franco’s writing: http://www.esquire.com/fiction/james-franco-fiction-0410 and I just want to take a moment to point out a few things about this piece.

My window is cracked, just a bit, and the air plays on my forehead like a cold whisper.

Now, let’s look at some facts here. James Franco graduated from UCLA in 2008 with a degree in English (he took some time off to try his hand at acting). He is currently working on an MFA at Columbia, and is 31 years old. He isn’t a teenager. He is a college graduate and grad student, and this is in his so-called wheelhouse. Am I missing something, or is this absolutely awful? Hilariously awful, even?

Here’s another gem: 

I often think about driving off the side of freeway overpasses, just plunge Grandpa’s old blue boat through the cement guardrail: The sculpted barrier crumbling about me and Grandpa’s blue machine; a great moment of metallic explosion and heavy ripping and jerking and then release; a soft, slow dive of arcing color through the windshield, into a hard second of impact, just before the black

If he used more inappropriate punctuation, didn’t use phrases like “slow dive of arcing color through the windshield,” and stayed in the same tense during that SENTENCE, I would be more willing to give him some credit. Now I’m not Hemingway, at all. But I didn’t study English or creative writing in college, or in my prestigious MFA program, or at Tisch. And to top it off, he’s about to start the PhD program in English at Yale. First of all, dude you’re famous and have a perfectly fine career. Why change? And why change to something that you’re terrible at, too? And second of all, seriously Yale? Is it just because he’s famous?

April 14, 2010
by Kanyi
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http://earbuds.popdose.com/will/KylieMinogue/NickCave%20-%20Where%20The%20Wild%20Roses%20Grow.mp3?plead=please-dont-download-this-or-our-lawyers-wont-let-us-host-audio
http://kanyi.tumblr.com/post/521165580/audio_player_iframe/kanyi/tumblr_l0uprdKhPC1qatcg0?audio_file=http%3A%2F%2Fearbuds.popdose.com%2Fwill%2FKylieMinogue%2FNickCave%2520-%2520Where%2520The%2520Wild%2520Roses%2520Grow.mp3

Kylie Minogue and Nick Cave. One of the oddest pairings ever. I find this song so satisfying, though.

On Why Family Works.

April 14, 2010
by Kanyi
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*DISCLAIMER* This is very much a freewheeling random post. Don’t read it if you want something data-driven or “productive”.

Also, none of this takes into account the fact that there are genetic traits that may or may not lead to compatible dispositions. I’m more interested in the notion of circumstance. I’m also using zero data to back up these claims. Just musing. If a number of people are trapped in an elevator for long enough, they will eventually become close, and comfortable, and even friends. When you put a bunch of young boys on a sports team together, they tend to become close friends. The majority of the people I care most about are those from my various institutions, be they schools or places of employment. What I’m getting at: I think family works because people, when given no other option, due to circumstances forcing them together, not only connect with each other, but learn to like, and to love, and to share their lives and hearts. If you have no choice but to talk to someone, and if you suffer and triumph with them, and you are both equally (or relatedly) helpless to circumstance, that binds you! At that point you have no excuse not to not only be kind, but to be friends, with the people around you. The only reason more people in the world aren’t connected is because we’re really good at making excuses for it. I don’t buy that “your social network caps at 150 people” crap for a second. I’m sorry, maybe I’m an optimist (or a social media addict). Anyway, back to life.

-K

April 14, 2010
by Kanyi
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http://www.carnivalsaloon.com/audio/macktheknife.mp3?plead=please-dont-download-this-or-our-lawyers-wont-let-us-host-audio
http://kanyi.tumblr.com/post/520130567/audio_player_iframe/kanyi/tumblr_l0uqcjtTHJ1qatcg0?audio_file=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.carnivalsaloon.com%2Faudio%2Fmacktheknife.mp3

I first encountered this song watching “Un Prophete” an excellent Audiard movie that some call the “anti-Shawshank”.  I said out loud, when I heard it. “Wow. Jimmie Dale Gilmore? Get outta town.”

On Design in Business

April 10, 2010
by Kanyi
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I was talking to a friend earlier today about how design thinking, and designers in general, are so incredibly critical to addressing the dynamic needs of consumers in a market where we’re getting increasingly inundated with products, not all of which solve new problems. As the iPad has proved – well, is proving – and as I’ve mentioned before, there isn’t necessarily a convergence where a panacea product emerges to solve all of our fire hose problems at once. There may not even be a suite of products. But there will be a few big winners, and the rest of the businesses in media, entertainment, and networking will be very lightweight, solving simple problems unobtrusively, and that clearly will require the birth of a design revolution on the internet. But I’ve got my concerns.

Bessemer Venture Partners has a “Designer-in-Residence”. IDEO is the talk of the town lately in terms of approaching problem solving in business. MIT Media Lab and Stanford d.school are teeming with venture capitalists, waiting to see the products that come out of their work.

But through all of this, and I’m only speaking from my experience and access, both of which are limited, where are the entrepreneurs? Where are the designers’ businesses? It seems to me like our designers are stuck in a pattern of talking about ideas, and then building for others, and then talking about ideas, and then building others, ad infinitum. Where’s the building for themselves component? A designer at the executive helm might make some inspired, creative decisions. Why isn’t that happening?

Exception: Inspiring entrepreneurs like my good friend Emily Pilloton are Executing. And kicking ass. She’s not doing it on the internet, though. Where are the web design entrepreneurs? Would the Tumblr guys qualify?