I mentioned Lance Weiler’s Workbook Project in an earlier post but I forgot to put a link to this article from the Winter 2007 edition of Filmmaker Magazine. It has lots of tips from Weiler on setting up websites, syndicating content, increasing your Google rating and links to some useful sites you may not already know about. It’s an inspiring article because as Weiler says: “In the end, there is no one right way to distribute or market your film. But if making Head Trauma has taught me one thing, it’s not to lose the sense of empowerment experienced during the production of a film when you get to the distribution phase. With the new tools of the Web you do not have to be powerless once you finish.”

I was having a browse on the always interesting London-based bigshinything website and rediscovered this video about Web 2.0 – I know it’s been around for a while and the music is just a tad irritating but it’s a nifty little examination of what is happening online.

Bigshinything also have a post which talks about a possible MySpace/Facebook class divide that is very interesting although the whole “hegemonic/subaltern” vocabulary is bringing back my academia-rash! The issue of how divisions and inequalities in the offline world get manifested online is an important one. The research in Danah Boyd’s essay is a little tenuous and incomplete, as she herself admits, but it’s good food for thought.

For some reason I read Wired magazine virtually from cover to cover yesterday. I came across an article about Luis von Ahn, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon who has invented a game called Matchin’ where two players compete to accurately describe a series of random pictures found on the web in a given space of time. It doesn’t sound like the most fun you can have with your clothes on to me but apparently it’s very addictive. The key element here though is that the game is using networks of humans to solve problems that computers cannot (describe photographs, make aesthetic judgments etc.) Von Ahn is all about making every time-wasting element of being online productive. He invented Captchas, those stretched and distorted words you often have to type in to fool spammers. His new reCaptcha system is not only fooling spammers but also using humans to translate smudgy words that computers can’t read for the Internet Archive, a non-profit organization that is putting public-domain books online for free.

I mention this here because I think that the possibilities of the “global overmind” – millions of human brains working together online to do things that just wouldn’t have been possible before the internet connected them – is fascinating and I’m excited to see what this can lead to in terms of film production and distribution. How are our expectations of what is even possible going to change over the next few years?

I have to say, however, that all this talk about productivity makes me a little nervous. I’ve always been a big fan of Kurt Vonnegut who said: “I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anybody tell you different. “

If you haven’t checked out Lance Weiler’s Workbook Project yet then go there now because it is fast becoming an invaluable toolbox for indie filmmakers. The Workbook Project describes itself as “a social open source experiment for content creators” and Wired Magazine have called Weiler “One of twenty-five people helping to re-invent entertainment and change the face of Hollywood.”

Here’s more about it from the site:

Our goal is to create a free resource for content creators that will become a user contributed repository of information. The concept is part of a “social open source experiment” called the workbook project. It’s a simple concept, the workbook is meant to be spread and edited. Meaning that content creators can add their own info, war stories, advice etc. We’re hoping that the workbook can grow as a resource. We’re building it with an open source “client side” wiki called tiddlywiki that can be saved to the desktop, edited and then uploaded again.

The goal is to have it grow organically as people add what they feel is important. Then over time, the various “additions” can be collected or at least interlinked so that the information can be shared. The first edition of the workbook will include extensive info about:

* Raising capital
* High Production Values with no money
* Putting together a 17 city theatrical release
* Building a fan base and creating buzz
* Clearance and Delivery issues
* A look at actual contracts
* Getting your work into retail and rental outlets
* Making a TV deal
* How to deal with world sales
* Emerging Markets

If you are making or distributing a film and want to learn more about how to use the tools of Web 2.0 to help you then The Workbook Project is a good place to start.

www.workbookproject.com