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4560	9260	Okay. Hello, everybody. My name is Jason Scott.
9460	13840	Today's flight is to why tech documentaries are impossible
13840	16440	and why we have to do them anyway.
16600	20300	This is a discussion about the documentary medium
20900	23700	that I gleaned in my four years of production work
23700	25980	on a documentary I just finished.
26160	30680	And saying why we have to look at this medium,
30680	33260	look at its flaws, work around its flaws,
33260	38500	and encourage people to create new ones.
38620	41500	First question, of course, is who the hell are you?
41720	43580	My name is, again, Jason Scott.
43580	46920	I'm mostly known, I guess, for a site that I run
46920	49020	called textfiles.com,
49020	51440	which is a collection of BBS-era text files
51440	52940	that I started in 1998
53620	57340	because I was wondering whatever happened to my old BBS
57340	59800	that I used to go on all the time?
60160	62300	Does everyone here know what a BBS is?
62300	64040	Anyone here not know what a BBS is?
65260	66340	Okay, a BBS.
66340	67620	Did you just have fun with me?
67620	68160	I can tell.
68160	69160	Look at those eyes.
69160	70120	All right, anyway.
70140	72420	A BBS is like a single-use website.
72420	80440	Anyway, I created that archive of BBS-era information
80440	83260	because I saw a gap in history and knowledge
83260	86400	and I, as a person, happened to have collected a lot of that.
86400	90340	So it was more a case of seeing that there was a missing piece
90340	94840	of a story, a story that all of humanity is kind of telling about itself.
94940	96940	And by putting it all up there,
96940	99260	I was encouraging other people to add their pieces
99260	101500	and actually that kind of worked out pretty well.
102040	104340	Ah, I see that the 305 has arrived.
105800	112700	So that theme of filling in gaps is part of what drives me
112700	116860	and unfortunately because I have a bit of an obsessive-compulsive disorder,
116860	118840	I kind of start at one end and just keep going
118840	123060	until somebody pulls me up sweating, telling me to stop.
123660	126900	So textfiles.com grew into web.textfiles.com,
126900	130120	artscene.textfiles.com, cd.textfiles.com,
130120	134120	all these subsites of shareware CDs and old music things and groups
134120	136320	and all of these weird little subcultures
136320	138940	that I was discovering more and more about and more and more people.
138940	142760	And so after a while, I suddenly thought about this missing piece,
142760	145840	which was when you watch a lot of documentaries,
145840	149820	the documentary format is kind of interesting
149820	158640	because it's always been kind of the real dismal format in terms of things.
159640	164500	Until very, very recently, if a documentary grossed $1 million,
164500	169920	it was in the top 20 documentaries of all time ever made in terms of box office
169920	172900	because it's not a very beloved format.
172900	176320	It's very, very dry, and it's a very hard sell
177100	179800	unless it's about sex or death.
179800	181500	And even then, you have to kind of work on it.
181500	184820	That's why we currently have a documentary about wheelchair rugby
184820	186380	called Murderball.
188680	191180	There's one that came out a couple years ago
191180	193100	about a bunch of strippers unionizing.
193100	195020	Boy, what a tough sell that is.
195520	197940	I think it's called Live Nude Girls United.
200320	203100	That's the nature of general release,
203100	205060	and I'll go into general release in a moment.
207340	210300	Throughout this time, we've had a number of what are known as
210900	212640	documentaries of a technical nature.
212640	215780	I think in my encountering, the one that most people know
215780	218320	is Triumph of the Nerds by Robert Kringle
219640	222940	because it got on PBS, it got a lot of attention,
223480	226040	and it's a very decent documentary.
226040	229420	It's technical, but it's not really technical.
229580	232760	And when you have things like, say,
232760	239060	tech TV being the standard by which computer history is defined,
239060	242420	you run into problems because that kind of a cable channel
242420	244320	that has very monetary goals
245280	247840	produces films that are not really about
247840	249780	imparting a lot of information,
249780	252680	but about making a lot of video transitions
252680	253920	that move very quickly
253920	256940	and dazzle and delight you,
256940	258360	so you'll stay on long enough to learn
258360	260740	why you want to buy this G4 ad.
261200	262520	That's very important.
262520	266440	So that money issue gets in everywhere,
266440	268100	and it gets in everywhere in this format.
268100	272620	Now, the documentary format, thanks to a very, very fat man,
272620	275480	has become extremely politicized these days
275480	278400	because what's happened is that
278400	281140	suddenly people started looking at films
282660	286400	like Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9-11,
286400	288800	and they said, oh, documentaries!
289300	293840	And because it got political to attack the arguments
293840	296940	or arguments, however you go along that way,
296940	298840	they went after the medium.
299220	303060	And the medium by itself, the documentary medium,
303060	304380	has roots...
304380	306380	What's normally called the first documentary
306380	308220	is a film called Nanook of the North
308220	311120	by Robert Flaherty, made in the 20s.
311120	315100	Which tells the story of an Eskimo man and his family
315100	317880	who was trying to survive up in Alaska.
317880	320520	It is entirely fake.
320940	322640	Top to bottom.
322640	326540	Robert Flaherty filmed a bunch of Eskimos running around,
326540	329360	took it home, realized it sucked.
329420	331260	Just sucked. It was boring.
331260	333680	It was shots of these guys running around
333680	336280	in misty, bad film.
336320	339040	So he had an accident.
339040	340820	This is one of these things that comes out.
340820	342540	He was smoking a cigarette
343140	346020	and the nitrate went up on the film
346020	348880	and the film exploded, essentially, burned him.
349320	351500	And so the film was destroyed.
351500	352880	He had to make a new one.
352880	355140	So he went off and he made a film called Nanook of the North
355140	356700	starring a man named Nanook.
356700	357800	And it told the story.
357800	360540	Well, you see his family huddling for warmth
360540	363420	inside an igloo that is actually only half built
363420	364560	and has heaters.
364780	368340	And you have shots of people running around
368340	371280	that are filmed in lodged parking lots
371280	372640	and things like that.
372760	375060	Because he needed to tell a story
375060	377260	and he wasn't going to let reality get in the way
377260	378560	of a good story.
378780	381660	A common problem in documentaries.
382060	384500	In fact, it's endemic to the documentary format.
384500	385820	One of the funniest things that came out
385820	387920	of the whole argument over, I think it was
387920	390440	I think it was Fahrenheit 9-11
391380	393000	Bowling for Columbine got the Oscar
393000	394860	and then Fahrenheit 9-11 people were saying
394860	396260	it didn't qualify.
396260	398240	And that always made me laugh
398240	400760	about it not qualifying for a documentary
400760	402220	because it turned out this wasn't
402220	404240	an exactly right fact.
404240	406760	And if you go read the Oscar rules
406760	408740	for what is a documentary
409260	411160	it is a narrative film
411160	415100	that portrays historical facts
415100	419080	through recreation, creative editing
422000	425360	and basically narration.
426180	428400	Everything does that, right?
428400	429820	I mean that's not a very, very
430360	431760	you know, so the answer is
431760	433060	of course anyone can get an Oscar
433060	433960	and in case you're wondering
433960	436340	I did check and see if I could get an Oscar for this.
437900	439140	So in case you're wondering
439140	443000	the way that you qualify to be judged
443000	444640	for getting an Oscar
447080	449860	besides actually making a decent film
450880	453320	is you have to broadcast your film
453320	455540	on a screen greater than 20 feet
455540	457260	in New York and Los Angeles
457260	458680	for a period of two weeks
459320	460980	during the qualifying year
460980	464260	without showing it on television or cable.
465020	466480	So in case you're wondering
466480	468680	one of the interesting things about life
468680	470700	is we go through life
471320	472600	learning about things
472600	474400	kind of in a vague surface fashion
474400	475980	and we like to impart
476240	478800	a lot of our own internal stories to these things.
478800	481100	This is what people do with technical subjects.
481100	482600	They think of the story of the PC
482600	484540	and all they think of is once upon a time
484540	486260	there were a few computers
486260	488060	and then there was IBM and then everyone won
488060	490180	and everyone went home and then there were sound cards.
490620	492060	And that's great
492880	494140	because for some people
494140	496120	they just simply don't care about the subject.
496120	498120	As a documentarian you have to wonder
498560	500640	what will make people want to watch this?
500640	502020	Actually before that you have to say
502020	504000	what will make the kind of people I'm aiming this for
504000	505280	want to watch it?
505820	508260	And when you say, well who are you aiming this for?
508260	509980	When you say you want to make a documentary
509980	512780	let's say you want to make a documentary, you insane people.
512920	514300	Let's say you just give somebody some money
514300	515440	for a documentary.
515660	517980	So what ends up happening is you say
517980	518960	well who is it for?
518960	521020	And then someone will go, everybody!
521220	524480	No, don't do that, that doesn't work.
525020	526400	People perceive films
526400	527520	different ways.
527520	529560	Some people are looking at this and going, oh my god
529560	531580	look at that subject matter, that's incredible
531580	533340	I can't believe somebody did this.
533340	535860	Other people are like, well it's cool in here
537140	537960	that's nice
538680	539380	that's great
541080	541620	you know
543780	545480	you can't aim it for everybody.
545480	547520	The story I like to tell people was
547520	549040	my father is not fond of Bush
549040	551520	so naturally when Fahrenheit 9-11 came out
551520	553200	I thought what a perfect gift for my father
553200	554940	I'll take him to see Fahrenheit 9-11
554940	557640	here dad, come with me, we'll go
557640	559420	and he lived in one state and I lived in another
559420	561080	we met in the middle and we went to go see it
561080	563140	and we see it, I watch it
563140	565060	it's from my eyes and he watches it
565060	566060	and we come out
566060	568660	and I'm a son, I want my father to be happy
568660	570680	but he's walking around like, huh
570680	573100	and I'm like, hey dad, did you like the film?
573100	574060	and he's like, well
574740	577700	yeah, they really let Bush off light
580820	582300	and so for me
583180	585200	I watched it, completely different
585200	585660	perception
585660	589220	and so when people watch a film
589220	591060	you can't say, oh well
591060	592920	I'm going to shoot this for everybody
593700	594740	the rule I usually
594740	597300	tend to use is, if I was walking down the street
597780	599280	and I saw this was here
599280	601120	would I want to see it?
601140	602620	and if I walked in and saw it
602620	604600	what about it would
604600	606440	make me think it was good?
606440	608880	like if I said, well no, he got it wrong, he had to do this
608880	610900	and he had to do this, and what rules are you going to
610900	612060	lay down?
612160	613980	In technical documentaries
614700	616100	the issue is
616760	618760	technical people are very hard
618760	619640	to please
619640	621860	there is a lot of money
622720	624120	in pointing out
624120	626140	flaws in technical situations
626940	627500	because
629500	630220	there are
630220	631360	so many details
631360	633580	and every single one is important
633580	636020	so it is very easy to hyper focus
636020	638000	on that, it's very difficult
638000	639640	to express
639640	641840	how important it is
641840	643540	how important it is
643540	645920	that yeah, you kind of needed a semicolon there
645920	647980	you know, that's why the spaceship
647980	649820	flew into the moon, not by it
651860	654140	there is a beautiful document out there
654140	655720	of major bugs
655720	657460	like they track down, why did this
658060	659760	satellite hit here?
659760	661600	and the answer is, oh, it forgot a while loop
661600	662900	and it will be like that
662900	665640	technical people want to focus on that minutia
665640	668040	but the video format
668040	669980	for instance, or even the audio format
669980	672000	it's very hard here to describe
672940	673900	the actual
673900	675180	technical situation
675180	677320	so the natural thing that I did
677320	678780	when I went after this was
678780	681700	well, I should focus on technical people
681700	683280	but technical people
683280	685240	are even more difficult than technical subjects
685240	687120	and it's a very hard thing
687120	689220	when you do nature photography
690040	691740	you try to tell a story
691740	692800	even though in fact
692800	694760	the stories tend to be rather dull
694760	696660	once upon a time, I got eaten
697540	698860	you know, once upon a time
699160	700640	a bunch of us were eating this one boar
700640	703040	and I hit him and he stopped eating it so I could eat his piece
703040	704860	you know, very simple stuff
704860	706780	but you'll see a nature photographer
706780	708400	kind of try to put things together
709040	711260	and he ends up having to put in artifice
711260	712580	the question is
712580	714760	what level of artifice is acceptable
714760	716220	when you're telling a story
716220	718240	this is a problem that I've encountered
718240	720020	many times in many films
720020	722980	and once Mr. Moore's films
722980	724060	got a lot of scrutiny
724060	726860	of course, the narrative utterly fell apart
726860	729020	because you end up with a problem
729020	730280	of you're trying to tell
730280	732060	you've got the parallel tracks
732060	733460	of the point you're trying to get across
733460	735320	and what reality ended up giving you
736560	738720	and how different those are
738720	740320	defines your skill
740320	741080	as a filmmaker
741080	743380	in other words, sometimes
743380	744540	when I started this film
744540	746940	I started out really kind of not knowing
746940	748120	what I was going to go with it
748120	750800	all I knew was, in my particular case
750800	753040	bulletin board systems were composed of people
753700	755320	and I said, well how do I
755980	757420	how do I express that
757420	759640	I know, I'll interview a metric
759640	760760	fuck ton of people
761420	764420	so I ended up interviewing 205 people
764420	766000	across 4 years
766000	767780	that's a lot of people, don't do it
769540	770660	documentary formats
770660	772240	the standard ratio is
772240	773240	you film 1 hour
773240	775900	you film 10 hours for every hour you do
775900	776780	or 20 hours
776780	779160	and I filmed 205 hours
779160	780540	and it ended up being 5 hours
780540	783620	so that's a lot, again, don't do that
783620	784840	let me be your warning
784840	785720	so
787760	789040	when I dealt with
789040	790300	my subjects
790760	791580	technical subjects
792140	793880	you have to strike this balance
793880	796800	and the balance is where the skill set comes in
797300	798580	and what it tells is
798580	800020	if you want people to get an idea
800020	802240	you can go all the way to the right
802240	804280	to the right you have industrial films
804840	806680	industrial films are basically videotaped
806680	807920	instruction manuals
807920	810760	they tell you where to put the little part in the copier
810760	812300	and you switch like this
812300	817500	And then you go down like this, and oh yes, remember this, and then they do a cutaway to show you this.
817500	822580	It is unbelievably dry. You watch it because somebody is reimbursing you in some way.
823640	827840	You do not go to see this film because you're like, oh yeah!
828620	831020	Oh, that was much better than Lost in Space.
832820	839560	So, on the other side, you end up with films like War Games.
840380	849500	War Games is a film that was filmed to tell a tale, and the tale was the tale of a young man
849500	858560	who encountered an innocent force that faced with the realities of war, you know, blah.
858560	864860	Anyway, Professor Falken was supposed to be played by John Lennon. I thought that would have been really cool.
864860	877440	Anyway, it is funny because as we get now to where it has been 22 years since War Games was filmed,
877680	883060	a new generation has latched actually onto the movie Hackers from 1995 as being a seminal event
883060	890760	of giving hints as to a way of living and a lifestyle and things to shoot for and belief.
890760	895780	And the reason that is, is because they went to people like Emanuel Goldstein,
895780	901080	and they used pieces of subculture that existed in various ways.
901080	906140	Mentor's Conscience of a Hacker and other such writings.
906140	910890	And they remixed them, much in the same way that a blender remixes a lemon,
911620	916260	so that it would become this palatable thing with Angela Jolie's tit.
917920	922940	And people who look to that as their indication of what their culture is,
922940	928520	because there's a dearth of stuff in the middle, end up having to do that.
928520	931680	They end up having to say, okay, well, that's kind of how it was.
932540	934480	And it wasn't like that.
935280	938780	And so there's, again, great lots of fun for technical people to go,
938780	940060	well, it's not like that at all.
940060	942380	Actually, it's like this, and it's like this, and it's like this,
942380	945140	and I know you can't get away from me because I got the door.
945140	949500	And so on, because, you know, some of you giggle,
949500	953620	because the problem is technical people are not very good at telling stories,
953620	955600	because that's not how they approach it.
955600	958940	Stories are these arcs that start with a beginning and a middle
958940	961240	and have some sort of theme that runs to an end,
961240	965780	whereas a lot of technical stories are impartations of information,
966400	968620	you know, peppered with puns.
968820	970940	And that's what they do,
970940	974060	because that's how they get the information to you as fast as possible,
974060	975400	and that's understood.
976640	979060	So, like you're watching on this film,
979060	982620	this film was trying to tackle a very difficult initial idea,
982620	986600	the idea that there was colored text that was transferred online,
986600	991860	and that people had an entire history of collecting them
991860	995240	and being, you know, 15 years old and working for months.
995240	998060	And it's fascinating because it's a people story.
998060	1000960	These kids are talking with great emotion.
1001380	1003540	And that's more from the interview.
1003540	1006080	You interview somebody for an hour,
1006080	1008200	you choose what to use from that hour.
1008200	1010840	You don't make people sit through the hour of that guy interviewing.
1011080	1015380	You can go the other way, which is where, like, say, MTV goes,
1015380	1017720	which is where you'll interview somebody for an hour,
1018160	1020060	and you'll do one of two things.
1020060	1024900	You will either force something to happen to the person that they don't expect,
1024900	1028500	so you get, you know, some horrified thing,
1028500	1031740	or you keep peppering them with the same question over and over again
1031740	1033840	until they answer it the goddamn way that you want it to,
1033840	1036080	which was, yes, I fuck children!
1037300	1040040	And then that'd be, you know, once again,
1040040	1042100	welcome to MTV, I fuck children!
1042500	1044220	The story of a pedophile.
1046960	1051920	Anyway, when I was young, I loved MTV, but MTV betrayed me.
1053680	1055000	Damn you, MTV.
1056900	1059180	Anyway, the way I like to think of it
1059180	1063840	is that a technical documentary is an engineering problem.
1063860	1068100	You have the problem of wanting to naturally turn everything
1068620	1073450	into either a lecture or a fictional narrative.
1074460	1078020	And what you do is you say, well, how can I take the reality
1078020	1080650	and portray it as a narrative?
1081180	1086820	That is to say, how can I make this somewhat dry subject interesting?
1086820	1088340	And there's several ways you can do that.
1088340	1091320	One way is to focus on characters, humans, people,
1091320	1094420	expressing themselves in a way that's engaging.
1094420	1096900	And again, bringing that out in an interview is very tough.
1096900	1103840	The other way is to do an awful lot of, I guess you would call it, dazzle.
1104400	1105980	And that's more like one of those things,
1105980	1108600	like when you inject stuff into the car to make it go a little faster.
1108700	1111300	It's not so great for the car, but it kind of works.
1111480	1114020	And so he's talking right now about something
1114020	1117000	that's relatively interesting to some people.
1117000	1120440	But for the other people, I just give them a whole bunch of pretty colors.
1121760	1124220	And he's talking about this work he did,
1124220	1126500	and it's being illustrated, and it's kind of interesting.
1126500	1128340	But why the hell is that back part there?
1128340	1129580	Well, because it's interesting.
1130260	1132320	And you try to strike that.
1132320	1136120	I also try to shoot, for instance, with very few exceptions,
1136120	1139080	nobody, no one shot lasts for more than 10 seconds.
1139320	1143360	A person might talk over something else so that his shot is 30 seconds.
1143540	1146180	But in fact, the point of fact, it's just not.
1149340	1151980	Right now in the world, there are an unbelievable amount of subjects
1151980	1153860	that just haven't been really tackled.
1153860	1157100	I tackle bulletin board systems because I decided in 2001
1157620	1160640	that it looks like the BBS movie wasn't going to be made.
1161980	1163380	They missed the boat.
1163700	1166280	We were having trouble where people were, you know,
1166280	1167300	people were disappearing.
1167300	1168640	It was harder to find the stuff.
1168640	1170420	The artifacts are kind of gone.
1170560	1172460	And how do you get that back?
1172460	1174700	And so in 2001, I started doing research,
1174700	1176620	and I did six months of research.
1176820	1180940	And I brought in an advisory team of about 20 people
1180940	1183740	who I both respected and didn't know,
1183740	1185620	and who would give me advice.
1185620	1188020	And I'd say, well, you know, I'm thinking I'm going to shoot this way.
1188020	1190200	And I think I'm going to go here and ask this question.
1190200	1191260	What do you think?
1191420	1193500	And sometimes they'd answer, sometimes they'd not.
1193500	1196600	You know, they'd just say, well, I hope he's interesting.
1196600	1198760	Or I hope you have a reason for going out there.
1198760	1201640	Or, oh yeah, ask him about this guy who I wouldn't know about.
1201640	1203660	Because that really changed his life.
1203660	1206900	So being open helped a lot.
1206900	1208540	There's a lot of money right now.
1208540	1211500	You'll find I get really ooky when people discuss money.
1211780	1215500	Whenever I say monetized, like someone says smeared with shit.
1216580	1219960	But it's just, you know, that's just because I'm some sort of freak.
1219960	1225340	But the money is in calling something open source.
1226180	1230500	There's a lot of money in calling things a brand that has meaning.
1230500	1235940	So revealing the people that you have a list of people you're going to interview,
1235940	1237700	suddenly makes it open source.
1238360	1241660	You know, or telling people, oh, well, you know, this new movie's coming out.
1241660	1243480	We shot it using this kind of camera.
1243480	1245200	This new kind of, oh, that's open source.
1245200	1247120	You revealed things.
1247940	1251220	So it's a case of marketing terms getting bastardized very quickly.
1251440	1254920	I tried to let everyone know I was working on this for four years.
1254920	1257840	And the problem there, of course, was that there were people who waited for four years.
1257840	1258340	Or five.
1258340	1260020	I have a gentleman here who waited for five.
1260020	1262680	Gave me 20 bucks five years ago.
1263260	1264620	There's an investment.
1267240	1270600	Actually, when I created the film, I asked for donations.
1270600	1271580	Because I was dumb.
1271580	1272160	I don't know why.
1272160	1274780	I thought I'd need a foundation to create this film.
1274900	1277180	So people sent me five bucks, ten bucks.
1277460	1279720	You know, just like, cool.
1279720	1280860	Sounds like fun.
1280880	1285940	So I made sure each one of them got a $50 copy, you know, sent to them.
1285940	1286780	My cost.
1286780	1288320	It's like, wow, that was a great investment.
1288320	1290000	So, hey, it pays to be charitable.
1290000	1290600	I guess.
1292600	1296240	Anyway, when I shot this film, I would go out and interview people.
1296240	1299320	And one of the things is that there are a lot of people out there who have very interesting
1299320	1301760	stories to tell who are slowly decaying.
1303120	1305060	And the longer you talk to them...
1305060	1310360	When I started shooting, there were a lot of people who were names.
1310660	1313640	You know, there's different levels of celebrity in any kind of technical subject.
1313640	1315140	Oh, he's the guy who wrote that.
1315440	1316940	You know, he's the guy who made that computer.
1316940	1318440	He's the guy who created this thing.
1318440	1320220	And you go and you track him down.
1320220	1322080	And sometimes he's really boring.
1322160	1324160	And sometimes he's really not.
1324340	1330200	Most markedly in mine, there was a network of bulletin boards called FidoNet.
1330440	1336280	And this started in around 83, 84, and still exists today.
1336360	1342900	And it's this beautiful, self-grown, volunteer network of people all around the world who
1342900	1345420	created this bulletin board system network.
1345420	1347740	And at the center of it is Thomas Jennings.
1348820	1352480	And Tom Jennings is fucking nuts.
1356340	1364680	He is a gay, bad ass, gate punk, vegetarian, fuck you, anarchist, who did this because
1364680	1369060	god damn it, it's great to write a god damn network because fuck everybody.
1369640	1370960	That's interesting.
1371740	1374500	And I don't think a lot of people knew that when they were doing it.
1374500	1381820	So when I interviewed him, he was amazing to a person who's looking at things like,
1381820	1382600	is this interesting?
1382600	1391600	So he's just this beautiful, profane man who I used in my way to tell a story around him.
1392460	1397060	The question becomes, how do you translate that?
1397060	1398760	And I wasn't going to do this...
1400660	1402260	I'm going to do it afterwards.
1402560	1404320	I'll play a sequence after I'm done.
1404500	1405360	I took...
1407420	1409100	Here's an example.
1409100	1412140	The documentary format has editing.
1412640	1417980	What that means is, you take two separate recordings of events in time and you place
1417980	1418960	them together.
1420000	1424540	And they didn't happen one after the other, but you put them together.
1424540	1428940	I know this sounds basic, but it's so easy to forget that.
1429080	1433460	A good example of a documentary that really does this a lot...
1435340	1437780	is something called MTV Cribs.
1437780	1440020	I don't know how many people know MTV Cribs.
1440100	1444380	MTV Cribs is supposed to be a documentary about the homes of stars.
1446100	1447320	Yeah, okay.
1447320	1454180	So for instance, there was the case where basically they go in and they shoot, right?
1454180	1457220	They shoot footage with steadicams and stuff of these guys' houses.
1457300	1459600	Yes, this is where the magic happens.
1459600	1460660	This is my bedroom.
1460660	1461640	This is my pool.
1461640	1463000	This is my kitchen.
1463000	1463760	And it's fascinating.
1463760	1465120	Look what they have in their kitchen.
1465120	1466300	Look what they have in their fridge.
1466300	1467440	Look what they have here.
1467440	1469100	They've got hangings, you know?
1469260	1472300	Well, recently, I believe it was Usher.
1472300	1473780	I don't care if I'm smearing him.
1473780	1475340	It's some other guy like Usher.
1475340	1480420	Usher or an Usher-like being had a little lawsuit occur.
1480420	1487700	Turns out, Usher rented an island for $350,000 for two days.
1487700	1489180	It's an expensive island.
1489180	1490820	Nice island, though.
1491320	1495560	First day, he shot MTV Cribs there to show his home.
1496800	1500300	This only came out because the second day he had a party with 2,000 fucking people
1500300	1503200	and they were having trouble getting condoms out of palm trees and all that.
1505780	1508120	So, right?
1508120	1514860	I mean, you'll see this documentary format where he's supposed to be describing reality to you.
1514860	1521540	MTV and he have agreed to 100% completely create a false reality.
1521800	1524720	Now, you compare that to when they interview, I think it was Ted Nugent.
1525420	1528760	Now, Ted Nugent's in a house that it's fucking Ted Nugent's house.
1530440	1534160	Because you can't rent that many animal heads.
1537570	1543790	You have to get a clearance from the TSA to ship that many guns to a shooting location
1544390	1545970	to shoot your documentary.
1545970	1547770	It's Ted Nugent's fucking house.
1547810	1548690	It's real.
1548690	1550770	You go through it and you're like, oh my god.
1551190	1552270	Oh my god.
1552270	1555430	A PETA member would like explode into flames walking in here.
1555930	1561590	So, you know, even a person who's watching it who's not technically oriented towards
1561590	1564970	documentaries or thinking of them that way, they get it in their mind.
1564970	1567910	They're like, this guy's house has four pieces of furniture.
1568290	1569650	That's fake.
1569670	1572310	Even if you've got a really good maid, that's fake.
1572310	1575690	But this other guy's house, full of little things, and they've obviously sorted up and
1575690	1578130	cleaned things and dusted them, that's his house.
1578130	1580870	That kind of visceral reaction comes from right here.
1580870	1582790	And it's very hard to fake.
1583030	1590630	And so when I shot people, when I filmed people, I would ask them questions.
1590730	1597530	And they knew, talking to me, that it was somewhat unlikely I was going to fuck them.
1597530	1603910	That's very important to note, because the standard method of communication in film media
1603910	1605410	is fucking people over.
1605850	1609670	Where you convince people something is going to be a certain way so that you can get the
1609670	1612610	thing you want, which is antithetical to their needs.
1613490	1617110	This is part of, by the way, I should mention, I went to film school.
1617490	1623450	I went to film school, Emerson College, Boston, film class of 1992, mass communications,
1623450	1625030	concentration in film.
1626950	1629750	I immediately decided not to go into film.
1629750	1631210	Dad was so happy.
1631970	1636150	I instead went into video games, which, by the way, is worse than film, but still, it's
1636150	1638110	film at that time.
1639010	1642970	So I went to work for a company called Psygnosis, and they had all sorts of beautiful things,
1642970	1644690	and I thought it was like film, but it wasn't.
1644690	1645770	It was just mean.
1646970	1649770	And so I didn't actually make films for a long time.
1649770	1653890	I didn't want to, because the more I learned about the film industry, because, you know,
1653890	1657590	after a while, they take you away from, oh, look how beautiful Citizen Kane is, to around
1657590	1658470	your junior year.
1658470	1663710	So this is how the film industry works, and you're like, ah, you know, it's like petting
1663710	1665830	the bunny and then seeing the inside of the bunny.
1668350	1671850	Bunny ain't cute no more, even if they put the bunny back like they did before.
1672070	1677630	So I got tired of looking at the inside of the bunny, and instead I went into computers,
1677630	1681310	and computers have been very well by me, and have actually been rather lucrative,
1681310	1683870	and because of that, I could afford to have a stupid hobby.
1683890	1688430	Um, I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't do drugs, I don't do PowerPoint.
1690270	1691970	So, yeah.
1694990	1699630	So what ended up happening instead was that, you know, I got into, like, doing little projects,
1699630	1701750	and doing film projects, and computer projects.
1701750	1706930	So when I decided I was going to do this documentary, I was like, oh, I guess I'll do it.
1706930	1708710	I guess I'll use that damn film degree.
1708910	1711270	Now, ironically, I've had people say, well, is this your first film?
1711270	1713670	The answer is no, I had a film play at Sundance.
1713670	1715930	And they're like, ooh, that's really impressive.
1715930	1721770	Um, it was a two-minute film I did for a comedy troupe in 1993.
1721970	1725870	It is a schoolhouse rock animation about the Kennedy assassination.
1727670	1731390	And what happened was, was that Comedy Central bought it,
1732150	1737130	and played it on the 30th anniversary, across the weekend.
1738930	1744050	For that, I got, for that, five of us got the princely sum of $1,200.
1744630	1746930	And they got the rights for one year.
1747010	1749550	And they proceeded to play it 300 times, you know,
1749550	1751650	because it's two minutes long, they could shove it everywhere.
1751930	1754870	So that was my introduction to the industry.
1756650	1761310	Yeah, you know, I lent a guy the tape 15 years ago.
1762110	1766530	Every year, like clockwork, he apologizes and says he's going to get it to me.
1767130	1769310	I just have to get it off the 16 millimeter film.
1769310	1770850	I used to do stuff in film.
1771090	1773450	When I shot this, I shot it using film techniques.
1773450	1775050	That's why everyone looks kind of goofy.
1775450	1778090	Because I use indirect lighting and shots like that.
1778090	1780390	That is nine processors, by the way.
1780650	1782450	Give you an example of Artifice.
1782450	1786630	That shot right there, dark as crap, didn't look good, he wasn't there.
1786650	1790430	I've applied softening filters, lightning filters, highlight filters, everything,
1790430	1791630	to make him look like it.
1791630	1792730	But no, it's real.
1793510	1795790	And there's a lot of that, a lot of noise reduction.
1795790	1796950	You take what you can.
1796950	1800750	When you're a one-man crew, you make an enormous amount of mistakes.
1801750	1807010	Anyway, so when I decided to actually shoot this film, I hadn't even looked at that for 10 years.
1807010	1811290	But I had a pretty good salary, and I could afford to pretty much do it myself.
1811990	1818370	Budget-wise, because I engineered it, the film, this film, okay.
1818490	1823090	When I made this film, how many people here were at my talk last year?
1823410	1824210	Two, three, four, five.
1824210	1824830	Okay, good, good, good.
1824830	1825330	All right.
1825970	1826830	Thank you very much.
1826830	1835590	The film, when I saw the film, I decided that I was going to make a film that was,
1835590	1838650	you know, when people make a film, they want it to be like an hour and a half,
1838650	1840550	you know, because that's what plays in theaters.
1840650	1841690	But I was like, fuck theaters.
1841690	1842830	I don't need to put them in theaters.
1842830	1843770	I'll put it on DVD.
1843810	1845290	What a delightful format.
1847450	1849590	Boy, DVD got the hivies.
1850610	1853750	DVD sucks, as a person who uses it, by the way.
1853990	1856350	You have never seen, you want standards.
1856350	1858310	Don't go to DVD.
1858550	1862710	People put out, as far as I can determine, peanut butter jelly sandwiches that claim
1862710	1863850	they're DVD players.
1864310	1865870	I've gotten more, anyway.
1865890	1867090	So it's like, it'll go like this.
1867090	1868890	And the answer is, well, maybe it will.
1868890	1872850	If the Fong Song Trading Company, when they made it for five minutes ten years ago, think
1872850	1873650	it was good.
1874090	1875350	And you get this, anyway.
1875350	1876810	So I love DVD.
1876810	1878090	DVD has been good to me.
1879410	1881870	So DVD was the format I was going to go into.
1881870	1884090	So I said, well, okay, well, I'm going to have subtitles.
1884090	1885450	I'm going to have director's commentary.
1885450	1886170	I'm going to have this.
1886170	1887150	I'm going to have that.
1887630	1890910	And so when I shot it, I knew it wasn't going to be an hour and a half.
1890910	1895490	I thought it was going to be nine hours, which hurts people.
1895670	1899630	I mean, I explain to people, what it is, is when you take on a subject that's 25 years
1899630	1904750	long, because nobody else has done it, you have to make up for a lot of slack.
1904810	1910250	And there are stories that aren't in any way paired up.
1910250	1911090	They're not paired up.
1911090	1913210	PhytoNet is not the story of the BBS industry.
1913210	1914470	It's not the story of ANSI art.
1914470	1916210	It's not the story of the hacking BBSs.
1916210	1917510	It's not the story of this.
1917670	1918190	So what do you do?
1918190	1919410	Well, you make separate episodes.
1919410	1920850	So I made a miniseries.
1921170	1926850	And I shot it, like I said, 250 hours, edited it down to five and a half hours.
1926850	1928310	The rough cut was seven.
1929230	1932110	Each of these episodes is about 40 minutes.
1932110	1933270	Some of them are less.
1933410	1937670	And the whole thing, shooting-wise, cost me $21,000.
1938930	1943030	Now, some people drop their payload on that.
1943030	1945190	In fact, that's actually rather cheap.
1945190	1946970	It actually works out to a very cheap price.
1946970	1949610	And the way that I did it was to kill myself.
1950030	1951910	For instance, I would land.
1951910	1955850	I would determine 14 interviews I had to do in the Midwest.
1956390	1963450	And in one trip, in 10 days, I went from Chicago to Indiana, back up to Milwaukee,
1963450	1969890	over to Minneapolis, down to St. Louis, over to Kansas City, down through Oklahoma City,
1969890	1972030	over to Texas, and then flew out of Austin.
1973030	1974170	That hurt.
1974530	1979010	I can also tell you that I can drive precisely 302 miles at a stretch.
1980230	1984230	But by doing that, by combining what would have been a whole bunch of little trips in the one trip,
1984230	1985730	it cost me almost nothing.
1986570	1987970	I didn't sleep in my car.
1987970	1989210	I should have, but I didn't.
1989310	1993870	So by just adding these prices together, I was able to shoot very cheaply.
1993870	1995250	I had a crew of one.
1995510	2001970	I had a camera that I purchased as a floor model.
2001970	2007870	You know, I edited it on a PC because it's much cheaper to edit on a PC than a Mac right now.
2008170	2013450	I shot, I guess for anyone who cares, I used a product called Vegas Video.
2013830	2020930	And I had a PC, a one gigahertz PC, and four terabytes of USB storage.
2023110	2028570	And I lost 14 drives in the two years of editing.
2028870	2031950	So anyway, that's the price you pay.
2032390	2035030	Mac store is the James Dean of hard drives.
2036990	2038510	Just so you know.
2039650	2045870	It, you know, it tries to seduce you with, look, I'm $50 and 200 gigs.
2046130	2049050	And then the next day, I'm not feeling too good, man.
2050590	2053810	Jesus, man, I can't feel anything right now.
2054910	2059070	So that's, you know, the things you learn when you put things through stress tests.
2059070	2062890	I had people going like, like I had one time where I was really pissed because I put 200,
2062890	2067410	I put 205 gigabytes of footage on something and it died.
2067610	2070470	Like, it was like, here's your data, foot.
2071410	2074910	And I went on IRC bitching, which is a mistake, by the way.
2074910	2076470	IRC will bitch you right back.
2076490	2079530	And someone's like, you dumb fuck, they're not meant to be used that way.
2081170	2083850	That tells you a lot about customer expectation, doesn't it?
2085410	2088450	Hard drives aren't meant to store data, you dumb fuck.
2089370	2090170	Anyway.
2092410	2096710	So one of the side effects of me going through and doing this as a one-man crew
2096710	2099770	is that I interviewed a lot of people who had never been interviewed before
2099770	2103110	and people who'd always been interviewed, like been interviewed for all their life.
2103350	2106670	And so when they met me, it was like, oh, here's some guy.
2107350	2109470	And there's an old quote in the movie industry,
2110010	2113510	which says that honesty is the most important thing in the film industry.
2113510	2115570	And once you can fake that, you're golden.
2117830	2122590	And so I was very honest, and in fact, I was very honest and I made a lot of,
2122590	2127470	I offered a lot of things that people didn't normally get when you deal with media.
2127470	2131590	I told people, after I've interviewed you, even though you've signed a release,
2131590	2134690	if after one month, up to one month, preferably,
2135270	2139450	you think you said something you didn't like, tell me and I will erase it off the tape.
2139870	2143390	Because I'm not going to hurt you for my film.
2143770	2147290	I'll get four other guys to say what you said that you're not comfortable saying.
2147510	2150930	I don't need you to get in trouble with your buddies.
2151090	2154810	And I don't, and I, and a lot of people, I would explain to them what I was doing
2155430	2159710	and I would send them cuts and say, okay, I'm going to use you this way. Is that okay?
2160010	2162790	I also had what I called the jerk crank index, which was,
2162790	2166990	if I made somebody say something funny and that made them look weird,
2167830	2170930	they had to be somewhere else saying something smart.
2171310	2173910	If I couldn't find that, I wouldn't use it.
2174270	2178490	Because, and the thing is, that's antithetical to how a lot of films work.
2178710	2180270	These films work that way.
2180430	2185970	I have, I have a, I have a, I have a recording of a guy, still good, okay.
2185970	2187950	Well, anyway, there's a recording with this old man.
2187950	2191970	He just goes, you know, man, I used to get laid off that BBS.
2192810	2195470	And it's really funny in the shot, trust me.
2195470	2199790	And I love audience feedback.
2199830	2204750	The, anyway, I made sure that that old man told another story.
2204750	2207050	That it wasn't just the old man who said that.
2208050	2216410	And at the end of the day, if people do not get these stories on tape, they disappear.
2216750	2221890	And what you end up with are very, very,
2223090	2227730	I would almost call them, you know, cliff notes of history.
2227730	2229650	You say, well, there used to be this.
2229650	2231190	And that's it, that's all they'll say.
2231190	2234090	You know, Ward Christensen, he invented the BBS.
2234090	2240290	And there is a massive story behind why he did it, how he did it, involving a snowstorm.
2240330	2243830	And it being, you know, Chicago.
2243830	2245910	And because he couldn't get to the guy's house, he was like,
2245910	2248910	let's just write something to transfer files, wouldn't that be neat?
2248970	2251250	And this whole industry rises up from that guy.
2251770	2253570	And there's things before him.
2253570	2255990	And there's things after him that are actually very important.
2255990	2258910	He actually got the idea for BBSs off the ARPANET.
2259790	2261230	The ARPANET was around.
2261230	2264850	He was on the list because he had written XMODEM and he was kick-ass for doing that.
2264990	2267070	And so they gave him an ARPANET account and everyone was saying,
2267070	2271330	wouldn't it be a great idea to have something where you could use these little toy computers
2271750	2273210	and leave messages on them?
2273210	2274370	And he was like, hey.
2274550	2276570	And he was like, so when's anyone going to do it?
2276570	2280570	Or as he puts it, nobody was plugging in their soldering irons to get started on doing it.
2281250	2283230	Which tells you how long ago that was.
2285870	2286670	Anyway.
2287350	2290870	You know, it's funny now because, like I said, I have these hacking text files.
2290870	2294610	And when they start out, it's like, well, here's how to write machine language to be able to play
2294610	2296410	Crisis Mountain for free.
2296630	2300910	And I get over here with, here's how to remove ads from your GeoCities account.
2301870	2305790	And it's just this amazing, well, the progression doesn't go this way.
2305790	2306930	Let's put it that way.
2307850	2311850	I love the present, but I love the past more.
2311870	2313090	Let's put it that way.
2313430	2314130	Anyway.
2314630	2318810	At the beginning of this film art scene, there's an old man.
2318810	2320530	His name is John Sheets.
2320530	2324210	John Sheets was the pimp of teletype art.
2324510	2326190	A lost art.
2326190	2331750	It was a way of sending text over ham radio and other ways.
2331750	2334210	So that you could write things and other people would get it.
2334210	2336130	So, of course, they used it to send porn.
2337390	2340750	But they also used it to send, you know, images of Snoopy and everything.
2340750	2345450	And they used to have art contests in the 60s and the 70s of who could draw the best,
2345450	2349070	you know, Bordeaux-based art and who could do this.
2349070	2353550	And so nobody had ever talked to John Sheets about this.
2353550	2355750	And I was doing this thing on Antsy Art.
2355750	2361430	And wouldn't it be funny, I thought, to go interview this man about this technical subject.
2361430	2365890	And when I got there, he was stunned that I had driven from Boston to New Jersey for him.
2365890	2368790	And he had all this old art out that nobody had really seen.
2368790	2370650	And I interviewed him for one hour.
2370690	2371610	Asked him all about it.
2371610	2374710	He talked about his family and working on this stuff and everything else.
2374950	2377210	And then I did that and I never saw him again.
2377210	2378570	You know, I went away and I edited.
2378570	2382010	And this year I went to go give him his free copy and I discovered he had died.
2383530	2384910	And I got his widow.
2385110	2391550	And his widow was absolutely delighted that somebody had an hour of her husband talking
2391970	2393590	for me to give to her.
2393590	2402340	And the thing is, that little story plays out over and over again.
2402480	2406580	You know, you get all these things where it's like, well, just sit the guy down for an hour
2406580	2409180	and ask him about this technical subject.
2409180	2411880	Because people don't just tell those stories that way.
2411880	2416220	They actually tell stories that are actually indicative of other things.
2416220	2420500	I'm a very big fan of this idea that when you record something...
2420500	2423340	I'm collecting all the podcasts right now.
2423460	2425060	This gets me some press.
2425060	2426640	It's cute that it does.
2426640	2427800	But it's not that hard.
2427800	2429180	It's an RSS feed.
2429180	2430220	The guy's doing...
2430220	2436000	It's like a self-service anthropology experiment.
2436060	2440380	It's like driving by an African village and there's a pile of videotapes for you to pick up.
2440600	2442120	Not that hard.
2442320	2443780	I have a little bash shell script.
2443780	2447080	I'm currently collecting 4,800 podcasts.
2447360	2449820	It's something like 600 gigs now or something.
2449820	2450420	Why?
2450420	2451420	Why not?
2451420	2454920	And people go, well, they're boring.
2455360	2456940	And I'm like, well, they're not really boring.
2456940	2460760	They're actually stories about what it was like to be alive when that person was talking.
2460960	2462780	It's supposed to be about wine.
2462780	2464080	You know, the wine cast.
2464080	2467340	But no, it's actually kind of about his friends and how they had wine together
2467340	2471580	and what it was like to be alive in 2005 and order wine and be at this place.
2471580	2473200	And places that won't be there anymore.
2473200	2475860	You know, we live on shifting sand.
2475860	2477200	Sand that disappears.
2477520	2479600	And people, you know, they don't want to hear that, of course.
2479600	2482540	That's why it's used to sell, you know, cigarettes.
2482540	2488300	But, you know, it's one of those things where people don't really think that through.
2488300	2489680	And the answer is, you know, will...
2490480	2494060	I will not live to see a lot of the results of the work I'm doing.
2494060	2495920	You know, like where somebody, you know, people...
2495920	2501660	I'm like, if you think it's difficult, if you think it's difficult to tell the BBS story in 2005,
2501660	2504500	imagine trying to tell it in 2050, you know.
2505380	2515200	I love how in about 200 years, we're going to be these Afro-wearing, silver-suited, grunge-tattooed kids
2516140	2518420	from the 20th century.
2518640	2524560	Because they'll just take all of that, that 10 years, which we think of as a lifetime, and just compress it.
2524860	2526700	And so you'll just have all everyone together.
2526700	2528120	Because that's what we do as a people.
2528120	2530200	We just go, oh, like Roman centurions.
2530200	2534480	They all got little brushes on their heads and run around clanking metal.
2535100	2535920	That's it.
2535920	2538560	And they have a big wooden horse somewhere, I think.
2540120	2541800	You know, that's what people do.
2541800	2542820	And people go, ha, ha, ha.
2542820	2543980	They don't really, you know.
2543980	2544860	And the answer is no.
2544860	2545620	I mean, people do that.
2545620	2547200	They compress them in their minds.
2547200	2551660	And they'll compress this in their minds, except now, by recording this history, we get it.
2552700	2557920	Anyway, all that said, I should open this up to questions.
2558020	2562080	I don't have a really zinger closing statement.
2562080	2567800	Other than to say that, like I said, don't shoot for perfection.
2568580	2570220	Perfection is not attainable.
2570880	2574100	Shoot for something.
2574100	2576360	Because something is attainable.
2576360	2578460	And something is much better than nothing.
2578800	2581480	Nihilism is not an answer.
2582160	2583760	It is a symptom.
2586180	2589580	So I guess I'll open it up to any questions, people.
2589580	2590360	Yes, sir.
2590360	2593460	Do you have any plans for another book project?
2594200	2594500	Yes.
2596140	2600460	My next documentary will probably be on text adventures.
2602720	2603980	Yeah.
2604280	2606300	Oh, yeah, that's right.
2607420	2611100	There's another one I might do on arcades.
2611140	2615660	Like, not arcade games, like 1980s arcades.
2615660	2621020	I found a guy who worked as an arcade technician.
2621020	2623420	And he was working at a Namco timeout.
2623420	2628360	And they had thrown out this booklet of slides.
2628360	2634180	And it was 1,000 promotional arcade slides from 1980 to 1982.
2634640	2639940	It was just perfectly posed pictures of arcades and all the games that were in them in pristine
2639940	2642540	shape and everyone looking good and all the shots.
2642580	2642980	So I'm...
2643720	2645260	He put up, like, 50.
2645260	2646320	Wasn't this funny?
2646320	2648360	And I'm, like, I'm going to send you a scanner.
2649220	2652660	And I'm going to pay you to put them up.
2653180	2655400	And, you know, and he's, like, well, I've got to give them away.
2655400	2656760	And I'm, like, hells yeah.
2657400	2658720	I don't care.
2658820	2659760	Do that.
2660120	2665380	I got a lot of press because having finished this five and a half hour, eight episode documentary
2665380	2673420	with all the bells and whistles and the little twirly bit, I licensed it Creative Commons
2673420	2678080	Attribute Sharealike, which means basically leave my name on it.
2680540	2684720	And so I have people who tell me, oh, they're going to pirate your documentary.
2684720	2686460	And I'm, like, you can't pirate it.
2688180	2689600	It's copyable, sure.
2689640	2690280	There's no...
2690280	2691260	Oh, yeah, I should say that.
2691260	2692280	When you go through...
2692280	2693500	This is an important thing in life.
2693500	2697380	If you always dream of doing something and you do it, take the extra time to do all the
2697380	2699560	things you promised yourself you were going to do.
2699560	2703840	Even if by the time you do it, you're a bitter old man who can't walk very well.
2703840	2704760	Do it anyway.
2705080	2709980	So if it's, like, when I own a car, my car is going to have the shiniest gas cap ever.
2710140	2713680	And when you get older, you're, like, well, that's a stupid thing to want.
2714060	2715480	Get yourself a shiny gas cap.
2715480	2715840	What's the...
2715840	2721160	Well, when I got this thing, I was, like, I'm not going to have any menus you can't
2721160	2722040	get out of.
2722040	2724320	I'm not going to have any fucking FBI warning.
2724640	2728080	I'm not going to have it be region encoded because that's the stupidest fucking thing
2728080	2729220	I've ever seen.
2729220	2730900	So it's region zero.
2732620	2738200	You might not know this, but it actually costs money to put CSS on a machine.
2738200	2743700	Like, you pay a royalty to MacroVision to make your disk not work well.
2745140	2747800	Like, my printing company was, like, don't do that.
2748080	2748940	Like, don't use it.
2748940	2749660	We offer it.
2749660	2751700	We offer this service you should not do.
2751920	2753560	But we have to offer it.
2753560	2755120	Because MacroVision is right here.
2755180	2756380	Behind us.
2761780	2764420	So I made sure that all that stuff was like that.
2764420	2767860	And I also found out, by the way, don't do DVD layer dual layer.
2767920	2769860	It actually works really shittily.
2769860	2771600	The laser goes like this.
2771720	2773080	And at one point, I found this out.
2773080	2775520	You know what it's like to find out, you're, like, I must be doing something wrong.
2775520	2776980	And you find out the world is wrong.
2777540	2781500	The way they get dual layer is that they have two separate areas on a disk.
2781500	2782720	And they're, like, kind of like this.
2782720	2784680	And the laser goes along like this.
2784680	2785540	And it goes, oh, time switch.
2785540	2786160	Whee!
2786240	2786360	Okay.
2786360	2790460	Except that you kind of can't completely control where that is.
2790800	2791980	You kind of can.
2791980	2792860	Sort of.
2792860	2794940	And at one point, it goes, whee!
2795760	2801220	Except, like I said before, some DVDs go, man, battle stations!
2801700	2802660	Whee!
2805000	2807680	And to get around that problem, they have buffers.
2807680	2809540	Which are sometimes too small.
2810520	2812300	So they go, whee!
2813700	2814660	Eee!
2814660	2819700	If you look at a lot of dual layer DVDs in Hollywood, how do they solve this?
2819700	2821700	They move it to between transitions.
2822400	2823780	So it goes black.
2823780	2826000	And you hear, and then it goes over here.
2826000	2826680	That's great.
2826680	2830220	What a fantastic future jetpack world we live in.
2830800	2832080	Piece of shit.
2832100	2833920	So I would never do that again.
2834460	2835440	Don't ever do that.
2835440	2837860	And once you learn all these things, you're, like, oh, Jesus.
2837860	2838480	Oh, man.
2838480	2839540	That's horrible.
2839960	2840640	Anyway.
2841160	2842360	Other questions?
2842360	2843720	Can I...
2843720	2846240	Can you make fun of DVD more?
2850560	2852100	Yeah, you just asked, how do you...
2852100	2854900	How do I feel about people torrenting my DVDs?
2855440	2859220	I wrote an essay called, Why the BBS Documentary is Creative Commons.
2859620	2864780	And in that, I talk about why I very specifically understand what's going on with this whole thing.
2865000	2868640	You know, there's a little bit of a horror going on in a lot of industry.
2869840	2870240	Because...
2870640	2871780	Okay, I'm gonna get in trouble.
2871780	2872060	I...
2872060	2873700	I call media...
2873700	2874740	I call a lot of media...
2874740	2875740	I'm gonna get in trouble.
2875740	2877920	I call a lot of media makers air sellers.
2879160	2882240	Because they enclose some air and try to sell it to you.
2883100	2885300	And, like, the oxygen bar.
2885300	2885820	And that's not...
2885820	2886580	You know, I mean, that's one thing.
2886580	2888020	They're, like, it's my fucking livelihood.
2888360	2891760	I'm, like, well, your livelihood is extremely duplicatable now, sir.
2892840	2899920	You know, when we used to be able to make a wheel, and it took three days for Bob the Cobbler to make the fucking wheel, great.
2900260	2903320	But now we have a machine that makes 4,000 wheels a minute.
2903320	2904600	Don't stop thinking...
2905860	2907540	Give Bob a, you know...
2908500	2910060	Make Bob the guard or something.
2910060	2911260	You can watch the machine.
2913640	2916000	So, stop trying to keep Bob around, okay?
2916000	2916660	I understand.
2916660	2917220	Poor Bob.
2917220	2918140	You have a lot of jet...
2918140	2922320	We have a lot of jet companies in this world that have people whose job is to wind the propeller.
2923080	2924400	And the thing is, is...
2925140	2930000	When I made this, I realized we're in a world now where some people simply do not pay for media.
2930780	2931880	They don't.
2931880	2934840	They have tools to do it, to get it for you.
2934840	2936940	No matter what you put on it, they're going to get around it.
2936940	2946840	All you've done now is treat the rest of your audience like a bunch of, you know, criminals, twitchbags, who are going to steal.
2946840	2947560	You never know.
2947560	2948180	Get back here.
2948180	2949100	I have a knife.
2949320	2952040	And meanwhile, the guys over here are like, whee!
2952040	2956260	And so they feel really elite over here, because look at all the...
2956260	2958560	Look at how they're pounding mom into the ground.
2958560	2959800	They didn't even touch me.
2959800	2961260	I got 20, ah!
2961260	2964980	So what you end up with is this kind of a stupid dichotomy.
2964980	2966380	So my take on it the whole time...
2967860	2972300	Around two or three weeks in, I think it was like two weeks in, info fallout.
2972660	2974340	Where's the documentary?
2975560	2976860	And I contacted them.
2976860	2978500	I'm like, you go, girl!
2978900	2980700	And I found where they posted it.
2980700	2986540	And I put up this thing going, just so everyone's clear here, it's region zero.
2986540	2986920	It's...
2986920	2988160	There's no CSS.
2988160	2989360	It's Creative Commons.
2989360	2993340	So they essentially went into a McDonald's and scooped up all the sugar and ketchup packets
2993340	2994660	and went, free food!
2994660	2996340	I scammed some food!
2997540	2998780	And I said, okay, well...
2998780	3001800	Okay, well, here's a link to a PayPal account if you want to send me some money.
3001800	3003240	But otherwise, you go.
3003240	3005620	When I was 20, I couldn't afford pizza either.
3005880	3009420	So of course, you know, you can afford a $50 hard drive,
3009420	3013800	but you can't afford the $10,000 worth of movies you're putting on it.
3014400	3017640	And they don't see a problem with that, because it's very hard to explain to them why.
3017640	3020660	So this is going to look like I'm doing a sales pitch, but I'm not.
3022040	3026640	When I did my documentary, I wanted to make sure that it would have, you know, three DVDs.
3026640	3029060	It has the photos of everybody there.
3029160	3030660	It's frigging huge.
3030660	3032140	It's got the photos in it.
3032180	3034300	It's 18 gigabytes of data.
3034300	3037600	It's got a DVD-ROM with the stuff, all the photos I took.
3037600	3039200	The idea being twofold.
3039200	3042840	Number one, make it worth the money that I'm selling it for.
3043160	3046200	And two, make it so fucking big, it's really hard to BitTorrent.
3047920	3050300	I will out-feature your ass.
3055140	3056540	I did nine hours.
3056860	3061660	Some people, I mean, but some people, they're quite happy to watch a postage stamp-size rip
3061660	3063680	of your film with no subtitles.
3064040	3068080	And trying to convince those people that they want to spend $50 on anything is impossible.
3068520	3069600	So I don't do that.
3069600	3072160	So when I saw the BitTorrent thing, I just hopped right on there.
3072160	3073220	And I was like, hey!
3073220	3075100	I mean, I have the NFO framed.
3076000	3077540	And I've talked to the kid.
3077540	3079000	And the kid's like, I hope to be like you.
3079000	3080560	And I'm like, yeah, ripped off, like you.
3080560	3082000	No, I didn't.
3082700	3084280	He's like, I hope to go into film someday.
3084280	3085880	And I'm like, oh, what a great start you are.
3085880	3087500	What a great start you're getting up there.
3088380	3091620	So no, my attitude with the torrent thing was like, you know, go ahead.
3091740	3094400	At worst, I mean, I get mail from kids.
3094400	3096060	I got mail from a kid just recently.
3096060	3097180	He was like, I'm 17.
3097200	3098660	I never used BBSs.
3098660	3101160	This is the best fucking documentary I've ever seen.
3101680	3103760	You know, I downloaded off a BitTorrent site.
3103760	3104400	It's great.
3104400	3106060	Wow, thanks for making this thing.
3106420	3110540	You know, I'm like, oh, at worst, you know, it makes me sad, actually.
3110540	3112760	I had a school write to me.
3112760	3113720	They had purchased a copy.
3113720	3115900	And they said, can we show this to the kids?
3117020	3119320	May we show this to the kids?
3119400	3121860	And I was like, you can make copies for the...
3121860	3125660	I wrote this big thing back where I'm like, you can make copies for the teachers
3125660	3127160	so they can all evaluate it.
3127160	3130260	You can have a fundraiser where you charge money to show it to everybody.
3130520	3134020	You know, you can edit it to take out the profanity, which is, you know,
3134020	3136460	pretty big in some places to show it to the kids.
3136460	3137720	Do what you need to do.
3137900	3138680	You bought it.
3138680	3139220	You own it.
3139220	3140660	It's a piece of fabric in your house.
3140660	3141160	Cut it up.
3141160	3141680	Put it somewhere.
3141680	3143720	Put it on your front yard.
3143720	3146580	You know, don't come back to the fabric maker going, please.
3146960	3150220	You know, don't call up Singer going, oh, sir, can I please do it?
3150220	3151160	So, no, anyway.
3151160	3153500	That was a very long answer for a very short question.
3153920	3157820	Was there an internal anger as a fuel?
3160560	3162940	Any other questions?
3163540	3166780	Actually, you know, I always thought that was the reason why the Hacksaw CD got,
3166780	3169200	the DVD got so ripped last year.
3169220	3173560	Was because, or it was the year before, where they were just ripping it and coming up to him
3173560	3175180	and trying to get him to sign the rips.
3177380	3178700	Yeah, the porn DVD.
3179860	3184520	Because it was a cynical exploitation of a subculture presented to that subculture in
3184520	3186200	an attempt to make them swallow it.
3186700	3187820	And they knew it.
3188280	3192160	They're like, wow, this was made as long, this probably took as long to make as it is long.
3193660	3195020	And they felt that.
3195020	3197960	You watch this thing and you're like, okay, well, this guy really worked on this thing.
3198040	3199120	Maybe I want to buy it.
3199120	3200140	Or maybe I can't afford it.
3200140	3201300	But I would if I could.
3201480	3205100	You know, I would, I'll keep an eye out for him and maybe something else some other time.
3205740	3208380	People know, people know when you're not even trying.
3208640	3210180	You know, when you're just, anyway.
3210180	3213820	So that, so I think that's why, I mean, I didn't, I didn't have that happen.
3213820	3214960	I mean, don't try it now.
3214960	3218260	But I mean, I had, I didn't have anyone walk up to me and go, you know, hey, I ripped your
3218260	3218660	DVD.
3218660	3219260	Can you sign it?
3219260	3219920	Ha ha ha.
3220320	3221420	They stayed away.
3221420	3224200	They either bought a copy, thanked me for it or whatever.
3224860	3225840	Oh, he's waving.
3225900	3229040	Okay, that's, oh yeah, oh yes, exactly.
3229040	3236280	Just so you all know, I'll stand here and answer questions and sell DVDs for a little,
3236280	3238600	you know, while longer here, gladly.
3238600	3242880	Just, but you should know that the awards ceremony will be starting over in the big
3242880	3243580	room.
3243600	3248640	So if you want to go to Jeff Moss's Box of Hot, you know, you should go.
3248960	3250400	Any other questions?
3253500	3254480	Oh, hello.
3269290	3274010	How do I make something as boring as somebody typing on a computer and looking at a screen
3274010	3276310	interesting in a film environment?
3277010	3283670	And the answer is, you instead focus on why that person was there in the first place.
3284110	3286510	You ask them, why are you at this keyboard?
3286510	3287810	Why were you doing this?
3287810	3289370	Why did you think it was so important?
3289370	3291810	Why did you think it was important to do that?
3291810	3296950	And you focus on him, knowing that the story of his thing, you know, the pure technical
3296950	3298830	aspect can be downloaded.
3298830	3299990	What did the software look like?
3299990	3300950	Well, you can download that.
3300950	3302190	What did it, who made it?
3302190	3303350	It's over here.
3303450	3304370	Who was on it?
3304370	3305590	Here's the user list.
3305590	3308370	But asking a human being, why are you even here?
3308370	3316790	Why, why, you know, why is the Onion Shack BBS so important to you versus the, you know,
3316790	3318810	the Cat Box BBS, which you hated?
3318810	3321250	What was so bad about the Cat Box BBS?
3321370	3326190	And so you go, you know, it's, it's one of these things, you know, instead of asking
3326190	3328730	why, you know, how do I make this interesting?
3328730	3330670	Ask why they're even there in the first place.
3330670	3331810	Go back to the human thing.
3331810	3332870	That's the answer.
3333010	3337670	When I do text adventures, people are like, I love the, I'm shooting it in high definition.
3340010	3345590	Which I think is, anyway, I'm sure, yeah, anyway, yeah, yeah, actually the URL is getlamp.com.
3345590	3347530	The movie's called Get Lamped, don't make one.
3348510	3352270	And anyway, so it's like, well, what, how could you possibly make that interesting?
3352270	3353490	It's a bunch of text adventures.
3353490	3354850	But it's not.
3354850	3362090	It's actually the story of a bunch of storytellers who had to decide everything their readers
3362090	3363850	could ever want to know ever.
3364650	3366690	And how do you write like that?
3366690	3370590	How do you say, I went across a bridge, and you know some people are going to go,
3370590	3372490	can I whiz off the bridge?
3373330	3374950	Can I blow up the bridge?
3374950	3376950	What if I bring a dragon on the bridge?
3376950	3378150	Can I move the bridge?
3378150	3380290	Is the bridge, is there actually a bridge?
3380290	3381590	Is the bridge in my mind?
3382430	3385330	And he had to think all this stuff out beforehand.
3385610	3386750	And you had to do it.
3386750	3387670	You had to come up with this stuff.
3387670	3392890	So to me, talking to the people who came up with those ideas will be fascinating.
3392910	3398150	How much of that comes out in like just scrolling text is another thing.
3398570	3403310	Because it's not, it's not, again, it's not, how do you make Zork interesting?
3403810	3407310	It's, why did you make Zork?
3407810	3409830	Why did you decide to make a Gru?
3409830	3413650	Why did you make it, why did you do full sentences in that way?
3413650	3414890	Why did you insist on doing it?
3414890	3415590	And so that's the thing.
3415590	3419350	Those answered questions are where the interest comes from.
3419790	3421810	And then people go, wow, that's pretty interesting.
3422690	3423950	Anyway, any other questions?
3423950	3424630	Yes, sir?
3424810	3426650	When is Slashdot coming out?
3426650	3427350	When?
3429030	3432670	Slashdot is a really great place to get very informed, useful comments,
3432670	3434350	especially if you go to negative one.
3435210	3436250	So I did that.
3436250	3437810	A few times I've been announced.
3438090	3439470	Oh, humanity.
3440530	3445890	But one of them was, this film was actually the sequel to Mr. Scott's first film,
3445890	3449790	The History of Drying Paint, a 200-hour epic.
3451090	3453630	And I wrote back, like, you know, like, dude,
3453630	3456350	you know how hard it was to get Dutch Foy to sponsor that?
3457610	3459870	But one of the other comments was, oh, fuck this.
3459870	3462030	I'm waiting for the extended director's edition.
3462870	3467270	Actually, one of the Easter eggs is a sequel, is a trailer for the sequel to this.
3467270	3473090	You know, I went and hired a drive-time DJ in Seattle called Smiling J. Andrews
3473090	3478650	to talk about The Tears of Bordeaux, this epic.
3478650	3480470	Anyway, so that's buried in there.
3480470	3484630	Yeah, because a lot of people are like, well, are you, you know, where's the sequel?
3484630	3485530	I do get that, by the way.
3485530	3486850	I do get, where's the sequel?
3486950	3491930	The answer is, I'm going to be taking pretty much all of the 250 hours,
3491930	3493770	cutting out the parts where they're like, where do I look?
3493770	3494370	Where do I look?
3494370	3496370	And that kind of stuff, which is question answer.
3496370	3498750	And I'm just going to put them all up on archive.org.
3499170	3503050	So archive.org is getting like 200 hours of footage.
3503890	3504850	Attributes share alike.
3504850	3506570	And I'm like, make your own fucking documentary.
3507310	3508510	Right there.
3508870	3513590	So no, that's pretty much, that's how I'm going to handle it.
3513590	3515030	I've already made arrangements with them.
3515030	3518510	I'm going to be another sub-collection of 200 plus hours of footage.
3518510	3519750	And people can make their own.
3519750	3522350	Because of course, you know, when I make it, I'm American.
3522650	3524810	And it's kind of shot in North America.
3524950	3526350	So the Europeans hate me.
3526930	3528250	Because I didn't tell their story.
3528250	3529210	And I'm like, well, I couldn't.
3529210	3530390	I couldn't tell it.
3530450	3531590	Where were you?
3531650	3532310	Fucknut?
3532450	3533250	2005.
3534670	3538930	So now they can take my footage and they can remix it under the license any way they want to.
3538930	3540610	And redo it and do whatever they want.
3540650	3542450	So I hope people do it.
3542450	3546590	I always say, I hope this is the worst documentary on BBS's ever made.
3546850	3549170	And that all the rest of the ones that come kick my ass.
3549210	3551870	But currently, I am the lowest priced one.
3553690	3554910	Any other questions?
3555490	3556290	Yes.
3560860	3561660	Okay.
3561740	3563280	Netflix, what was the other one you said?
3564180	3565380	Green Scene?
3565640	3566820	I never heard of it.
3566820	3568000	But beyond that.
3568060	3572860	The traditional relationship with rental agencies is traditionally an adversarial one.
3572860	3574320	Normally, the movie directors don't, yeah.
3574320	3576660	So actually, there's very little...
3576660	3577480	I have found this out.
3577480	3580340	There's very little mechanism to go, no, please, rent me.
3580620	3582820	Because people think that's a money loser.
3582960	3584340	So they normally want to go through it.
3584340	3585900	So I've told people...
3585900	3587180	I mean, I have an ISBN number.
3587820	3589580	Go tell Netflix the ISBN number.
3589580	3590920	And a couple people have requested it.
3590920	3593040	But Netflix hasn't figured out how to reach me.
3594200	3595460	I wouldn't care.
3595460	3600020	I mean, I know that I'm in at least a few rental companies.
3600380	3603140	I had a friend who I hadn't talked to for like 10 years.
3603140	3608200	He was like, I was walking by the computer film section of my rental place.
3608200	3608960	And there was your film.
3608960	3613300	And I thought, oh, I guess I might as well see the film my friend made.
3614720	3616160	And Need for Speed.
3617180	3618320	Just in case.
3618460	3619560	What he said to me.
3619840	3622180	So I know it's out there being rented.
3622180	3624140	But it's one of those things of like, yeah, I'd love to do it.
3624140	3627900	I mean, again, this is where you get into distribution issues right now.
3627900	3628900	I'm the distributor.
3628900	3630280	I'm doing it all myself.
3630400	3632180	Because money.
3633020	3635980	And when you go through a middleman, middleman goes, money.
3635980	3637140	And you go, money.
3637280	3641820	And then a little bit later, when you go through other ones, it's like, money, money, money.
3642000	3642640	Nickel.
3644020	3644660	Nickel.
3646600	3651360	And so, and you know, and that's fine when it's one billion nickels.
3651360	3652240	But anyway.
3652380	3653100	Amazon.
3653140	3654100	I sell through Amazon.
3654100	3655160	Here's a good example.
3655200	3656160	I sell through Amazon.
3656160	3658840	Everyone's like, because I had a lot of people who were like, well, why would I buy it from
3658840	3660420	some anonymous fucking up with a computer?
3660420	3661700	I want to buy it from Amazon.
3661940	3662380	Great.
3662380	3662820	Excellent.
3662820	3664120	Good. 60 bucks.
3664820	3668200	Reason why is because Amazon takes 55% of the cover price.
3669500	3672780	So when you sell, so people like, why are you selling 50 on your site?
3672780	3677120	And, you know, and you're selling it for 60 on Amazon.
3677120	3680140	I'm like, well, because less than half is a bitch slap.
3680840	3682560	I'll deal with half.
3682840	3687560	I don't mind getting 25 of the 50 instead of 50.
3687560	3691520	But man, I'm not going to do, you know, that's just, that hurts.
3691520	3691880	That hurts.
3691880	3694140	That hurts in the no-no hole.
3696620	3701040	So I actually ended up just, you know, selling through them.
3701040	3701880	And it's nice.
3701880	3704500	They'll call me and say, we need 30 units.
3704660	3706400	So I box up 30 units and mail it.
3706400	3708880	I have 5,000 copies in my basement.
3709540	3710960	Because I think big.
3712040	3715200	Oh, that's, yeah, that's the thing I probably should make clear.
3715960	3717300	You know, I shot it for this.
3717300	3719400	And a lot of people were like, wow, you're really fucked.
3719400	3721180	But I really pull in for you.
3721240	3722080	You know, that kind of thing.
3722080	3724100	Like, I'm going to walk backwards across the United States.
3724100	3726120	It's like, you go.
3726380	3727440	Kind of a deal.
3727440	3731300	Anyway, the BBS documentary was profitable within three weeks of coming out.
3732180	3736700	And I mean, like, including the $30,000 duplication price.
3737940	3741180	So it was like $30,000 to duplicate it.
3741180	3742660	It was like 20-something thousand.
3742660	3744860	We're still arguing over exactly how much it was.
3744860	3747180	My wife is mad at that and so on.
3747700	3748720	You know, she's the shit.
3748720	3750800	As soon as it was a product, she grabbed it.
3750800	3752160	I don't even see it anymore.
3752300	3753000	She's shipping.
3753000	3753940	I don't see it.
3755340	3757820	So, you know, it was like 50 grand.
3757820	3759620	I made 50 grand within the first three weeks.
3759620	3763840	Because I knew that there was a story to be told.
3763840	3764880	I saw the gap.
3765120	3766400	And I didn't do it for money.
3766400	3768180	Or it would have been shot in six months.
3768500	3770540	I did it for four years, because let's get it right.
3770820	3772440	And I got it right, I think.
3772440	3773380	I got it somewhat right.
3773380	3774460	I got a good start.
3774720	3778940	I got something where someone can go, it's like that, except actually it was blue.
3779440	3782920	It's much easier to go, and it was blue, as opposed to trying to explain to somebody
3782920	3784160	everything this tells them.
3784160	3784660	So that's good.
3784660	3785180	I like that.
3785180	3786980	I don't mind being put down that way.
3786980	3791840	Um, but yeah, I definitely was able to, um, what's the word?
3791840	3794380	I was able to recoup my costs almost immediately.
3794660	3797320	So that reminds me, I'm selling these.
3797400	3798380	I think we have to get out.
3798380	3799220	Do we have to get out, sir?
3799220	3800060	Yeah, we got to get out.
3800060	3801200	They're going to close the tent.
3802320	3804860	It's been wonderful to have you all stick around.