Director's blog

Today I hit the streets for the first time in a long time to try and get out the vote for the Ideablob contest. Seems most of the work I've been doing has been web design, accounting, and other computer related tasks, so I was looking forward to being out in the real world again. 

The idea was to take the bus around town, talk to people, and ask for their vote. I made some paper-strip fliers and xeroxed them this afternoon, took a trip to Burbank to get our gear from the office, and got back to the bus to meet Marcin, Arlene, and Levi, who joined me for the trek.

Together the 4 of us set out to the Silverlake area where we canvased the street for an hour or two, handing out fliers and talking to folks we met about the Collaboration Foundation and the Ideablob contest. People were generally really positive and a lot of folks said they would vote. A few even signed up to be producers :)

Our first stop was a cafe called Intelegentsia that serves really good coffee. There I ran into a couple of our producers that I hadn't seen in years. We passed out fliers by the bus and went into a few stores where the bored cashiers were happy to go online and vote right away. After exhausting the corner, we went over to Orange 20 and the Bicycle Kitchen on Heliotrope. This is a really nice block with 2 great restaurants and a lot of cyclists hangin out. We passed out more fliers and ate some food. I met a girl that had gotten a speeding ticket while riding her bike. That was pretty unbelievable.

The sunsetting as we made our way back down Sunset Blvd. We stopped at a little Echo Park community performance gallery called the Echo Curio where a bunch of folks were hangin out. Folks liked the bus, and it sparked some conversations. We handed out more fliers and headed home, pretty tired.

Back home I started entering names of new signups. I thought about going for a climb, but soon fell asleep while typing. Woke up an hour later and went with Levi to a party at Little Radio. I handed out some more fliers during the night, and a few more folks said they would vote.  

Meanwhile, we are currently in 2nd place with 162 votes. The top idea currently has 264! This is disappointing after a long day, but I'll be back at it tomorrow. I'll be going to a coffee shop to try a few new ideas. Will be hitting the streets this weekend as well. iJustine and Brookers may be joining on Monday when they get back in town.We had talked about a bus ride when last we met.

We got 6 more days to get votes. If you have yet to vote, please do so here:

http://ideablob.com/ideas/1247-The-Collaboration-Foundation-C 

and please share with friends.

Thanks!

n

Sent out a newsletter flash yesterday about the ideablob Vote, and we got 129 votes! We still need another 871 votes in a week to reach 1000. We stand to win a $10,000 Grant for The Collaboration Foundation.

I heard from some of you that the newsletter went to your Spam, or that you didn't receive it. There is a copy of it online here: http://www.the1secondfilm.com/newsletter/flash/2

Voting continues for another 7 days here:

http://ideablob.com/ideas/1247-The-Collaboration-Foundation-C

 A few volunteers and I will be hitting the streets of Los Angeles w/ our bus to get out the vote. Stay tuned for updates. Or follow us on twitter for the micro-details.

Thanks to everyone who has voted and passed along the link!

Hey everyone,

Our non-profit, The Collaboration Foundation, is one of 8 finalists in this months Ideablob contest!

We received enough votes to make it into the finals, now the votes get reset to zero, and we have one week to get the most votes. If we do, we will receive $10,000 to help build the Collaboration Foundation. This would be absolutely amazing, and make a huge difference in our ability to finish this film faster. Best of all, they give the winning idea the award via a GIANT Check! How great would that be???

Please note: If you voted before, you need to Vote again!

Please Vote Here: http://ideablob.com/ideas/1247-The-Collaboration-Foundation-C

Copy and Paste this button on your blog or website by copying and pasting this HTML code:

<a href="http://ideablob.com/ideas/1247-The-Collaboration-Foundation-C"><img src="http://ideablob.com/ideas/1247-The-Collaboration-Foundation-C;button" target="_blank" alt="My Idea" /></a>

It's free to vote (you have to register). Please pass along to friends, post on facebook, myspace, twitter, etc.

I'll also be running around town this week (in our bus!) asking for people to vote for the Collaboration Foundation on Ideablob. I'll be posting video, links, etc.  If you can help, want to ride our bus around LA, or can help virtually by emailing friends, feel free to get in touch with me via email, or call 310-663-6212

If we win, the $10,000 will help us build a new website for the Collaboration Foundation that will look something like this:

The new site will provide tools for connecting ideas and artists with a global community of participants. You can find out more at www.collaborationfoundation.org

Thanks for your help!

best,

n

Yesterday my friend and I were biking through Silverlake on our way to Santa Monica for the Glow art fest. We pulled up to a red light and Kiefer Sutherland was standing right next to us on the corner, about to cross the street. I said "hi." It took him a moment to remember where we had met, until I mentioned that he had given me $600.23 to help Executive Produce The 1 Second Film. Then he smiled and said he had just been telling someone about our film the other day. I thought that was pretty cool :)

It has been about a year since I randomly ran into Kiefer at a restaurant. We caught up briefly with the project and I gave him one of our new fliers that has his photo on it, which was sort of funny. Kiefer is a really nice guy.

The light changed, and we kept on biking. I love random little moments like that.

i've been entering/itemizing receipts, etc. for some time, and finally finished! photocopied docs yesterday, organizing a packet and delivering to accountants today. this is one of the last steps toward our 501(c)(3) filing for the Collaboration Foundation. i'm also prepping final docs for our Board of Directors to sign, and will be mailing out in a few days. it will be amazing to finally have all this stuff done!

i've also been reviewing proposals for our web development and am narrowing down to final choices... big decision time.

In other news, it's looking like we will be a finalist in this months Ideablob contest. We are currently the #1 all time idea. If we become finalists, the votes get reset and we have to get folks to vote again. We could win $10K for building the Collaboration Foundation, which would be a huge help.

Meanwhile, several new producers have joined, including L.D. Ross, our newest Executive Producer from Canada. Big thanks to everyone who has joined our crew recently :)

In less exciting news, our bus got tagged for the second time. I painted over most of it right away, but need to clean up some details. Also spent some time cleaning the bus, but it really needs a good wash. Maybe this weekend... I also want to modify the paint job a bit to promote the Collaboration Foundation, and start taking it around town to sign folks up. Soon as all the paperwork and website are on track, that's what i'm going to do.

Also, the office building we've been in is getting remodeled, so we are going to have to move out in about a month. We are looking for a new space. Might have to move everything back to the home office, which would be less than ideal. Will see what happens.

Off to deliver.

best to all,

n

YouTube recently added the ability to view videos in high res, and I recently learned how to link to and embed to the high res videos directly (thanks mikeb!).

For posting/linking to a YouTube URL, add to the end of the URL:

&fmt=18

For embedding to a high res YouTube video add the following code onto the end of both URLs in the embed code:
&ap=%2526fmt%3D18

The hack links directly to the MP4 version instead of

High Res Embed:

Low Res Embed:

Link to High Res:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BNPLtYMAVw&fmt=18

Link to Low Res:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BNPLtYMAVw

Thought this was kind of interesting/useful.

Unfortunately, a lot of our videos were uploaded a long time ago with poor compression, so they don't even have high res versions. May have to reup some of the more popular clips like the Andy Dick vs Tom Green, which has accumulated over 110,000 views, all in low quality.

anyway, enjoy the hack.

Got some great feedback on the new home page design, and then made some more improvements. 

Here's the latest design for our new home page:

Summary of changes:

• main content area has been broken apart to feel less overwhelming.
• Intro video player is bigger.
• eliminated the "enter credit name" field (too confusing from user POV).
• added member sign in box to right column.
• crisper copy.
• dynamic blocks on bottom to display latest production blogs and featured videos.
• Action Blocks moved down to be consistent site-wide.

If you have any design notes, please let me know!

So, when will the new site be finished and how much will it cost? We are still figuring all that out. Our search for a Drupal developer has been going well, and we have been getting a lot of competetive bids. The response has been very enthusiastic, and several have offered big discounts which is totally awesome.

The timeline for building the site has ranged from 6 to 10 weeks. so this is going to take some time no matter who we go with. 

I'll share the final cost after negotiations end, but it's looking like we will be able to afford the upgrade with donations raised from the past few months. So big thanks to all of you who have been donating!

Of course, we still need to raise funds for other production costs, but being able to complete this site upgrade will be a really huge step for this project.

I'll be following up w/ the top candidates early this weekand and hope to reach a final decision by week's end.

Hope everyone had a great 4th!

Hey everyone,

So, this is a big update regarding our web development.

A few days ago I put the finishing touches on our site specs, and reached out to Drupal developers to put a bid on our job. The response so far has been great, and we have a lot of interested developers. 

I posted the job on the Drupal forums here: http://drupal.org/node/275024

There are links in the job posting to several of the design mock-ups i've been working on.

Here is a little preview...(click for larger images)

new home page:

new credit layouts:

new profile layouts:

The goal of this upgrade is to empower our members to participate and to create a more dynamic platform for collaborating and communicating. We are moving up from Drupal 4.7 to Drupal 5.0, and will be simplifying the sign up process and introducing some new credit types (Publicists, Special Thanks, etc.). We will also be able to form groups to organize, upload photos and videos, earn participation points, and a bunch more. This new site will be a key building block for the Collaboration Foundation, and will give us the tools we need to finally finish The 1 Second Film!

I put together a google spreadsheet detailing all of the new features we are looking to build:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=p4qFxkPMbcN1GIBBGFUFZWQ&hl=en

Our list of functionality includes priority levels for different features. Every detail takes programming time, which costs money. Drupal programmers range from $50 an hour to $150 an hour and up. Generally, the more expensive programmers have more experience and work faster, so it's a bit of give and take.

Based on our previous development experience, conversations with programmers, and current financial picture, we set a ball park budget range of $10K - $20K.

Over the next week, we will be collecting bids from developers, looking for the best quality solution that we can afford. 

We are still fundraising and still need to raise more funds to keep moving forward. I'll be hitting the streets to fundraise after getting the web development on track. Anything any of you can do to spread the word and help us raise our budget is much appreciated.

Please let me know if you have any questions/thoughts about the web design. 

and big thanks for all the support that has helped us get this far!

best to all,

n

For anyone in the LA area, come to the LA-IP (formerly TED>LA) this Sunday. The Los Angeles Idea Project is a single-day event designed to catalyze Angelenos' imaginations toward action. www.la-ip.com

I presented at this event last year, which was really cool. This year's event looks to be even better, with 17 world class speakers and doers presenting topics such as human trafficking, sustainable land use, and the sacred geography of Los Angeles.

Many of the speakers have presented at TED, like Joshua Klein who taught Crows to use a vending machine.

Tickets are $125 for 8 hours of speakers and live-performances, plus lunch, an afterparty, and chance to win some cool prizes- namely a ride in a deepflight submarine!

All profits from the event will benefit the Greenway Arts Alliance.

The event is being organized by my friend Cooper Bates, who I met while making The 1 Second Film. Cooper became one of our earliest producers (#529!). Cooper is also one of the founders of Hint Mint, who has been giving us donations for signed celebrity tins: see video.

The Los Angeles Idea Project looks to be a super cool event. Seating is limited so get your tickets ASAP.

Hope to see some of you there!

n

We recently cleared 9,500 Producers and 10,000 Crew Member Mark! We have raised $264,812.18 with the help of thousands of people from 59 countries.

Here are some charts I put together for our Board of Directors meeting. Really helps to visualize the rate in which this project has grown.

This First Chart visualizes the # of producers over time (in Blue). After our site was automated in 2007, some people joined but have yet to donate (shown in Red).

Some key moments are also pointed out (getting listed on IMDb, getting featured on YouTube, etc). You can really see how our growth slowed down after IMDb decided to remove all of our crew credits. You can also see the spike achieved while on our Road to Oprah tour. Currently, most of our new online producers stumble across us on Wikipedia.Below is another chart showing money we have raised over time. This includes a lot of donated services and equipment.

We want to incorporate the members in RED as well. Our next site will add more Free features so that everyone who signs up can participate more. There are a lot of things besides just donating that people can help with. So we are trying to automate more ways to participate so we can better collaborate with our growing community.

Our fundraising rate of growth pretty much mirrors our rate of producer growth, except for a huge spike during our Road to Oprah. This reflects the $25K in computers we received from Apple for post production, as well as the $10,000.32 single donation we received from Michelle Brown while on our tour, which helped us cover production costs while on the road.

Since our tour, promotion/recruitment has slowed as I've been spending time refocussing the project, and resolving technical issues. Web development is an extremely taxing process. But I'm really encouraged by the fact that people continue to support this effort. It's always awesome when folks send in photos helping promote, and post videos. And the Executive Producers that joined last week are helping us save up for the next big step. Every $2 bill helps :)

E. Winston, one of our newest Producers of the Moment, sent us $2 and this rad pic. Thanks!

Best to all,

n