Refenestration Daily.
Half the company was laid off today, including me.
I was still a contractor there, but I was getting closer to the hire part of the contract-to-hire stage. However, my boss tells me that they may be able to bring me back within a couple weeks, even. So, I have my hopes up.
Josh passed along this behind-the-scenes look at Trading Spaces over at Salon.
[…] That the show looks so real may explain why people feel cheated when, for example, they find out that the show is not always shot chronologically.
In Houston, for example, in front of the camera, Doug asks carpenter Amy Wynn Pastor to make him a bench. The bench in question, however, is sitting a few feet away, almost finished. They are, technically, lying — but not being untruthful. Doug did indeed show his plans to Amy Wynn earlier, and she did build the bench. They just held off doing it for the camera. […]
Reading this did at first give me that what-do-you-mean-Santa-Clause-isn’t-real feeling. But, in the end, I can accept that Trading Spaces has to tweak “reality” to make it more interesting for a television audience. And, I’m no less of a Trading Spaces fan than before I read the article ;).
And, as of today, I’m also a Salon Premuim subscriber. Some things are worth paying for.
Via ObscureStore, an obituary article of Ray Wallace mentions that he faked some occurances of Bigfoot.
“He’d been a kid all his life. He did it just for the joke and then he was afraid to tell anybody because they’d be so mad at him,” said nephew Dale Lee Wallace, who said he has the alder-wood carvings of the giant humanoid feet that gave life to a worldwide phenomenon. […]
Apparently, even the Patterson film may have been faked:
Chorvinsky believes the Wallace family’s admission creates profound doubts about leading evidence of Bigfoot's existence: the so-called Patterson film, the grainy celluloid images of an erect apelike creature striding away from the movie camera of rodeo rider Roger Patterson in 1967. Mr. Wallace said he told Patterson where to go — near Bluff Creek, Calif. — to spot a Bigfoot, Chorvinsky said.
“Ray told me that the Patterson film was a hoax, and he knew who was in the suit,” Chorvinsky said. […]
Well, I’m not sure whether I ever believed in Bigfoot in the first place, but I find this interesting nonetheless.
As reported in the Washington Post (via Politech), the Bush administration wants a parallel legal system for terror suspects:
The Bush administration is developing a parallel legal system in which terrorism suspects — U.S. citizens and noncitizens alike — may be investigated, jailed, interrogated, tried and punished without legal protections guaranteed by the ordinary system, lawyers inside and outside the government say.
The elements of this new system are already familiar from President Bush’s orders and his aides’ policy statements and legal briefs: indefinite military detention for those designated "enemy combatants," liberal use of “material witness” warrants, counterintelligence-style wiretaps and searches led by law enforcement officials and, for noncitizens, trial by military commissions or deportation after strictly closed hearings. [&hellip]
Ooh, that’s not good. With shenanigans like these, I’m especially glad that I didn’t vote for the fellow (I voted for Harry Brown instead).
And, Ashcroft is turning into more of a disaster than I would have realized. At the time of his nomination procedings, he seemed harmless enough, but I’ll have give more trust to whichever groups opposed him at the time (can anyone jog my memory and name some of those?).
USA Today writes that HBO shows use real brands, but channel has no paid product placement deals:
Commercial-free HBO doesn't pocket a penny from the cars, phones and soft drinks seen in such shows as The Sopranos, Sex and the City and Curb Your Enthusiasm. The 34-million-subscriber pay channel also prohibits paid placements in its original movies. […]
My favorite bit, though were the examples cited towards the bottom of the article, such as this one:
Motorola places about three or four cellphone models each season, with Tony favoring the StarTac. '“As long as our phones are not used to beat somebody over the head, I don't have a problem,”' says David Pinsky, director of entertainment marketing for Motorola. […]
Man, now I’m really jonesing to watch some Sopranos (if only I could get HBO here). (Link from Media Bistro).