http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Brian Clark (Publisher, indieWIRE) ruminates on digital change for independent artists and the meta of all things indieWIRE. en-us 2007-03-05T11:57:48-05:00 hourly 1 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00 This is an XML content feed. It is intended to be viewed in a newsreader or syndicated to another site. http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/99506326/days_24_the_joy.html.html Reflections from the amazing communal experience that was ARGFest-o-Con from the POV of the search for independence during my Death by Junket: the most amazing and terrifying phase of any independent arts movement is when it is a scene but still growing. Scenes are different than industries or genres or movements (although they sometimes grow into those things if they are successful) because they can maintain a sense of intimacy and collaboration -- what you have in common with other members of the scene tends to transcend whatever differences there might be.... 12923@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Death by Junket 2007-03-05T11:57:48-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/days_24_the_joy.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/98477170/day_zero_overtu_1.html.html I love a good metaphoric roadtrip story, probably more than I actually love being on roadtrips. For the next two weeks I'm on just such a journey, exploring a broad set of communities of American artistic independence. Unfortunately, there's always that pesky and boring travel part, which for me started with 11 hours of airports and travel from Orlando to San Francisco via Texas. I had a companion for the journy, though: songs from 737 of the bands playing at SXSW this year (worth the 3.1 GB download for the glimpse into where the independent music scene breathes and snarls.)... 12897@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Death by Junket 2007-03-02T10:24:42-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/day_zero_overtu_1.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059904/loopy_ambitions.html.html The most exciting aspects to me about our new community indieLOOP are my high ambitions for what the indieWIRE community will end doing with it. As a community, we've also got the advantage that one group's not-quite-shameful self-promotion is almost always another group's valuable content: film festival deadlines and information are valuable to filmmakers, deeper information about film projects is of interest to others in the industry, etc. With a tool as complex as indieLOOP, though, it's going to take some smart innovative thinkers to build the "first of breed" that other independents look to for good ideas. I'm doing... 7550@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ indieLOOP 2006-03-20T16:40:01-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/loopy_ambitions.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059905/the_point_of_th.html.html On Friday, we quietly launched indieLOOP (see my profile), our new social networking space at indieWIRE. Gone are the days of just providing classified and event announcements and a scattering of discussion boards: we've always wanted to provide the community something far more substantial than just that. So for the next few weeks, I'm going to be blogging about indieLOOP and some of the cool things we hope the indie film community do with the tools inside it (and, hopefully, I can point out some good examples to give other people ideas.) The place to start, though, is with what... 7546@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ indieLOOP 2006-03-20T08:06:39-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/the_point_of_th.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059906/january_is_alwa.html.html The hectic energy around Park City alone is usually enough to make January the most insane month of the year for indieWIRE. This year, though, we have even more going on than normal. With the publishing of this year's Top 10 Undistributed Films list, it means it is time to start ramping up the Undiscovered Gems program with the California Film Institute and Emerging Pictures (in ways that make it bigger than ever.) We're in the process of relaunching our Community with a really amazing social networking system from Sparta Social Networks instead of simple discussion boards and classifieds. It... 7470@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Inside indieWIRE 2006-01-03T11:59:08-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/january_is_alwa.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059907/how_to_write_a_1.html.html After working with tens of thousands of dollars of BlogAds across hundred of different blogs for a number of different clients, I started to realize that part of the reason I saw such better response (as an advertiser) from BlogAds as compared to other advertisements (even on other blogs) was the format of the ads. Freed from the constraints of official banner sizes and given the flexibility of "mixed elements," we consistently saw BlogAds over-perform for us if you found ways to make the most of those potentials. As the publisher of indieWIRE, I'm wearing the opposite hat – I... 7469@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Inside indieWIRE 2005-10-14T10:05:23-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/how_to_write_a_1.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059908/post.html.html You'll probably also notice an increased focus on photography --how can you not love big images with articles like this and huge iPop photos like this one? 7468@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Inside indieWIRE 2005-09-09T14:11:24-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/post.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059909/professionals_c.html.html In the past, indieWIRE has served three different audiences ... and not particularly well, I might add. Professionals look to indieWIRE to cover the "indie biz" as comprehensively as possible. Consumers, from film fanatics to occassionally just fanatics, see indieWIRE as a glimpse into thriving world of independent film. The prosumer audience (call them "the emerging indie filmmaker") is looking for indieWIRE as a resource, a native guide to the landscape. We try to scratch all three itches (as people frequently want more than one of them scratched), but scratching them better and more distinctly is a big part of... 7467@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Inside indieWIRE 2005-08-30T09:33:18-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/professionals_c.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059910/old_blog_new_in.html.html There's another premiere planned for the Toronto Film Festival that we've been tight lipped about: our own here at indieWIRE. Technically, it would be indieWIRE version 9 (see a rough ten-year history), but it is the heftiest re-creation of indieWIRE yet. First chunk rolls out in time for the editorial team's arrival in Toronto, with a fuller rollout during the festival. It seemed worth dusting off my year-old blog here at indieWIRE (you're soaking in part of the new design right now) to write a bit about what we're aiming for as we grow toward indieWIRE's tenth anniversary next year.... 7466@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Inside indieWIRE 2005-08-30T07:22:39-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/old_blog_new_in.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059911/please_send_bro.html.html So today is officially the eighth anniversary of indieWIRE (so the traditional gift would be something bronze or pottery if you feel the burning need to send us something.) Some of those earliest editions of indieWIRE are "lost" to all but the elephantine memory of the Wayback Machine, but I remember when Karol Martesko forwarded me Issue #1 and by the time Issue #3 came around, we were helping Eugene and The Rabbi publish them to the Web. Long ago we stopped numbering the issues, but by my rough count today's edition is probably about Issue #2250.... 1098@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Inside indieWIRE 2004-07-15T06:39:34-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/please_send_bro.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059912/filmmakers_as_d.html.html So I stumbled upon a new blog that's focused primarily on the world of public relations and the Web, and found a really challenging post that (from a PR perspective) describes the world of blogging, pinging and filmmaking by the new PR challenges they present: the rapid propogation of "disruptive messages" to existing brands.... 1089@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Internet & Filmmakers 2004-07-14T11:51:30-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/filmmakers_as_d.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059913/foxing_fox_with.html.html When guerilla documentary filmmaking meets the Internet and political activism, sparks are sure to fly, and Robert Greenwald is certainly causing alot of those sparks with his new documentary about Fox News' republican bias, "Out Foxed". Fox News (the people famous for suing Al Franken for trademark infringement for his book title) is now hinting they might sue the filmmaker (or are they?), bringing an added focus to the issue of "fair use" in modern copyright law. Some of the expected copyfight pundits are weighing in, but this is something that filmmakers (especially documentarians) should be paying close attention to... 1075@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ D.I.Y. Filmmaking 2004-07-13T07:19:28-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/foxing_fox_with.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059914/objectivity_is.html.html Eugene raised the question, "Is F9/11 a doc?" in his blog last night, a debate that I've been having with a lot of my friends down here in Orlando. Most of the F9/11-as-not-a-doc proponants I've talked to describe Moore's film as "propoganda," as if they are expecting a documentary to be "objective" and "comprehensive". If you're looking for objectivity, look to science and mathematics -- filmmaking is never truly objective, and the perspective of the filmmaker is one of the key qualitative componants of a doc. That perspective might seperate a "good doc" from a "bad doc," but it doesn't... 1004@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ News 2004-07-01T06:02:30-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/objectivity_is.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059915/astroturfing_mo.html.html Eugene posted a little piece about "Stop Michael Moore". There's actually moore to the story as a site called What Really Happened tracked down the PR firm behind it, Russo Marsh & Rogers, a GOP heavy-weight. In viral/buzz marketing circles, this is called an "astroturf campaign" -- techniques designed to simulate the appearance of a grassroots movement when there isn't one.... 848@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Internet & Filmmakers 2004-06-15T07:44:19-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/astroturfing_mo.html.html http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/BrianClarksOtherWeblog/~3/77059916/harry_potter_pr.html.html Over the last couple of years, I've taken to reading Aljazerra.net as a broadening of the news coverage I consume. Imagine my surprise to find it writing about about Hollywood films. Mexican producer Alfonso Cuaron, no stranger to the indie scene, uses his Harry Potter soapbox to level some charges at Hollywood. When accused of being part of the Hollywood system he was criticizing, Cuaron replied: "That distinction is as offensive and sad as saying that the (US) Drug Enforcement Administration certifies other countries for their cooperation against trafficking, when we are really talking about the number-one producer (of drugs)... 788@http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/ Independence 2004-06-09T07:46:20-05:00 http://blogs.indiewire.com/bclark/archives/harry_potter_pr.html.html