beyond magazine

Mad Men

It took me a decade on Madison Avenue to realize that I didn't want to be a Mad Man, despite the thrill of the kill, the pitches, the travel. I actually came to hate advertising. I think branding is generally a plague on the earth. I'm so glad to be a designer, hardly sin-free, but closer to making things where I can say they are what they are, and not something delivered to me in a black bag in some airport. My Mad Man story is really about a person being saved by design.

via Design Observer, I Was a Mad Man by William Drenttel

And Scenes from a Hit (New York Times) for a look at Mad Men's production design.

Target: Women

Even though we have no ads, we are constantly asked what Beyond's "target market" is. "Who is your reader?" One reader? We have one reader? Uh oh.

We have a hard time thinking of other human beings as targets. That's why we enjoy Sarah Haskins' program "Target: Women" at Current.com which deconstructs the silliness of advertising to targets.

"Say more stuff I generically relate to and then go to a wedding!"

 

Why we need alt-media of all kinds.

Chez Pazienza on being fired from CNN:

During my last couple of years as a television news producer, I watched the networks try to recover from a six year failure to bring truth to power (the political party in power being irrelevant incidentally; the job of the press is to maintain an adversarial relationship with the government at all times) and what's worse, to pretend that they had a backbone all along. I watched my bosses literally stand in the middle of the newsroom and ask, "What can we do to not lead with Iraq?" -- the reason being that Iraq, although an important story, wasn't always a surefire ratings draw. I was asked to complete self-evaluations which pressed me to describe the ways in which I'd "increased shareholder value." (For the record, if you're a rank-and-file member of a newsroom, you should never under any circumstances even hear the word "shareholders," let alone be reminded that you're beholden to them.) I watched the media in general do anything within reason to scare the hell out of the American public -- to convince people that they were about to be infected by the bird flu, poisoned by the food supply, or eaten by sharks. I marveled at our elevation of the death of Anna Nicole Smith to near-mythic status and our willingness to let the airwaves be taken hostage by every permutation of opportunistic degenerate from a crying judge to a Hollywood hanger-on with an emo haircut. I watched qualified, passionate people worked nearly to death while mindless talking heads were coddled. I listened to Lou Dobbs play the loud-mouthed fascist demagogue, Nancy Grace fake ratings-baiting indignation, and Glenn Beck essentially do nightly stand-up -- and that's not even taking into account the 24/7 Vaudeville act over at Fox News. I watched The Daily Show laugh not at our mistakes but at our intentional absurdity.

Book with a face.

Since we were removed from the book with a face several weeks ago, we have been hesitant to return on their new business/non-profit pages. We'll probably put a  page up - something akin to postering around a digital town. But we've always felt a little "Meh." about a company that can do so much data mining with no real outline of where this thing is going and how individuals will be respected.

And we wonder - why someone can't have something on the net that isn't owned by giant corporations where people share their stuff? Is it really that hard? And why do we, as media-savvy as we think we are, so easily give up a version of ourselves to these places? We have a lot of questions. Connection is great. Being able to find like-minded folks in an increasingly fragmented world is really something amazing. But can't someone do it without selling us at the same time? I'd be willing to pay a number of loonies for a place where folks loudly proclaim, "We like you. We'll protect you. We don't want to sell you."

So we'll be there and probably at the Space with a My because we like folks to find us. And soon we'll have groups you can sign up for here to talk about art and alt-media and things near and dear to Beyond-ish hearts. But we do wonder and we'll be keeping an eye or three on things.

CBC News: Facebook users say tracking tool invades privacy

Changing channels: writers' strike.

We've been watching the writers' strike in the United States rather carefully. There is more involved here than a bunch of TV writers trying to get a little more cash for an L.A. lifestyle. As an independent piece of print media, we're very interested in things like media consolidation and the economic arguments of large corporations that run over the creative rights of individuals.

We are regularly visiting United Hollywood and a few other sites. We love writers. Many of us are writers or our friends our writers and many of them have been very kind in helping a small budget publication like Beyond get off the ground. They tend to be not only talented but generous folks and if you can pay them well they usually pass that on, contributing to a good society in many ways.

If you don't know where to begin, try this Stop Big Media post at United Hollywood. And figure out a way to get involved in alternative and independent media in your own country or community. It can be as simple as changing channels.

Globe and Mail

Political blogger Warren Kinsella (No permalinks? So under today's date?)  informal survey  about the Globe and Mail's new redesign.  You can see some sample pages here.

Mediascapes...

I first watched this short film on ZeD TV a few months ago. A fascinating eight minutes proposing what the media could look like in under ten years.

"What happened to the news? And what is EPIC? And what comes next?"

Why Columnists Aren't Futurists...

Quotes from an essay published in 1997:

The End of Heroism – Charles Krauthammer
Time Magazine, February 10, 1997

But what else is there to do? In this century – I dare say, in the life of this country—Americans have never known a time of such profound tranquility at home and abroad. Anxiety, yes. There is no life without anxiety. But danger? Risk? Threat? Challenge? From where?.....We traditionally call the late ‘40’s postwar. But, in fact there we went from one existential struggle (World War II) to another (the cold war). The ‘90s saw a real end to the wars of this century. And with that comes fatigue, exhaustion, malaise –and loss of heroism. The romance of struggle is done.....Americans are living Ulysses’ nightmare. Our wars are done, our wishes granted. Now we suffer the consequences: the quiet satisfactions, the banality, of normality.

News of the Day

I don't usually check the television in the morning but today I had to run out the door and replace a lost driver's licence. In Canada, in November, you must check the weather before running out the door. So I took a quick look, got my degrees in Celcius and also the "Headlines of the Day" according to the local news. This is what was on the screen:

- Yassar Arafat
- Pet-of-the-day
- Charity Wine Auction

Real News...

Here are the first five minutes of CNN headlines running along the bottom of Jon Stewart's challenge to CNN's Crossfire to use their forum for a real engagement in the issues of the day. In IMPORTANT capitals just like on CNN:

FEDERAL HEALTH ADVISERS SAY CURRENT SAFEGUARDS FOR BLOOD DONATIONS IN U.S. ARE SUFFICIENT DESPITE DISCLOSURES THAT A 2ND BRITISH RESIDENT MOST LIKELY ACQUIRED MAD COW DISEASE THROUGH A TAINTED TRANSFUSION. (AP)

PERSONALITY DISORDERS APPEAR TO SHIFT OVER TIME WITH MANY PEOPLE IMPROVING AT A STEADY RATE. NEW RESEARCH SUGGESTS. (RUETERS)

SWEDISH STUDY SUGGESTS WITH AT LEAST 10 YEARS OF CELL PHONE USAGE MIGHT INCREASE THEIR RISK OF DEVELOPING A RARE BENIGN TUMOR ALONG A NERVE ON THE SIDE OF THE HEAD WHERE THEY HOLD THE PHONE (AP)

JIMMY SMITS AND ALAN ALDA FOR PRESIDENT? THEY ARE AMONG THE CANDIDATES KICKING OFF CAMPAIGNS ON “THE WEST WING” AS A NEW SEASON STARTS NEXT WEEKS. SHOWS EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS SUGGESTS GOP TAKEOVER POSSIBLE.

“SEX AND THE CITY” STAR KRISTIN DAVIS IS IN NEGOTIATIONS TO PLAY TIM ALLEN’S WIFE DISNEY REMAKE OF THE “THE SHAGGY DOG”.

CHRIS ROCK TO HOST NEXT ACADEMY AWARDS TELECAST. SHOW SCHEDULED FOR FEB 27 JUDGE DENIED REQUEST BY ROBERT BLAKE’S LAWYERS TO INTRODUCE ALLEGATIONS LINKING MARLON BRANDO’S SON TO THE 2001 KILLING OF BLAKE’S WIFE DURING HIS UPCOMING MURDER TRIAL.

PRISON LIVING? NEW YORK MAGAZINE SAYS MARTHA STEWART MAY WRITE A BOOK ON HER PRISON EXPERIENCE. SAYS DEAL COULD BE WORTH $5 MILLION. RONALD ISLEY LEAD SINGER OF THE ISLEY BROTHERS INDICTED ON TAX EVASION CHARGES. ISLEY EXPECTED TO MAKE FIRST COURT APPEARANCE IN NOVEMBER. (AP)

MONEY PIT? TEXAS JURY AWARDS ACTRESS SANDRA BULLOCK $7 MILLION IN A LAWSUIT AGAINST HER BUILDER. BULLOCK SAYS SHE NEVER LIVED IN HOME ON LAKE AUSTIN DUE TO CONSTRUCTION FLAWS (REUTERS)

RAP RADIO EMINEM TO LAUNCH SATELLITE MUSIC RADIO CHANNEL CALLED “SHADE 45” ON SIRRIUS NETWORK OCT 28 WITH A LIVE BROADCAST OF A CONCERT FROM NEW YORK (REUTERS)

LOG ON TO CNN.COM ENTERTAINMENT FOR A LOOK BACK AT THE LIFE OF ACTOR CHRISTOPHER REEVE AND A GALLERY OF IMAGES FROM HIS CAREER.