he could talk for hours, nobody listened

the one minute for marriage videos continue. to tell the truth, you can better see the videos from the youtube profile page here.

the problem here is that you don't have enough time to watch every video. you probably don't have enough interest to watch any of the videos. and i don't blame you.

we might care about the cause but the subject matter is not intellectually stimulating enough to hold the attention of people who are not directly invested. to a large extent, people take human rights for granted. there is a natural flow of things towards enlightenment, toleration and equality.

this is not my fight, so i remain somewhat detached from the issues. i am flexible and ready to change the rhetorical strategy but i am also foreign to the issues and unfamiliar with the history.

i want to put together a one minute broadcast news style personality profile or human interest story of the gay community or people in support of marriage equality. the ideal person would have a unique and compelling point of view but also the people themselves would be interesting and able to hold the camera.

i cannot rely on the subject mater alone to promote the cause. a good model to go by is the prop 8 musical comedy staring jack black. take a look at this thing if you had not already.

my videos would follow in the same vain as my tommy dean show footage but less hobo music and more interviews.

most people i talk to think that gay rights can be won on the discrimination argument alone. many of the one minute for marriage videos will show that. i don't agree with this philosophy because to simplify an already boring issue will not improve it.

stick to the emotionalism and you will polarize hearts. take the time to actually develop a sound argument and you will win minds.

being gay is as natural and not a choice. this could be demonstrated in a number of ways but would be most effective coming from a concerned parent. especially if conservative family values are challenged and redefined.

gay people both understand and desire relationships of commitment and stability. building a strong argument might require some humility and a sense of humor. but also, a willing to expose one self and speak openly and poetically about notions of commitment and love.

politics are lame

i hate polarizing issues. i suppose it is the rebel white person in me that wants to say 'who cares' when so many people feel so passionate about them. or perhaps the solution looks so obvious to me, i don't see any reason to argue.

if you were to argue against marriage equality with me, i think i would just stare you down.

if you were to argue for marriage equality with me, i think i would just shut you off. that conversation would be boring.

i have yet to witness a good debate regarding marriage equality. perhaps because there is no such thing. these issues are playgrounds for the common people.

i am certainly not (sardonic snobby voice) common!

let the gays get hitched

one of my internships is with equal rights washington and i am responsible for maintaining this video campaign. i hope everyone who reads this blog goes on to make their own video and submits it to the website. not only would that make me look good but i believe in the cause.

things get complicated for me when i watch the videos. most people don't have anything to say on the subject that has not been said before. everyone knows the argument against it and most people are familiar with the campaign for it. you get bonus points if you can argue, from a conservative point of view, why marriage equality is essential to maintaining freedom and liberty.

however, most people don't want to spend more than five minutes on the subject. there has to be something else to grab me. a human interest or personal profile story for example, might help. no tear jerking stories of the terminal ill or the people who love them. no. stories about people we might know. neighbors and teachers and co-workers we might not even suspect as marriage equality supporters.

i want to see people who you might not even suspect because they might not even be gay or even liberal. they might be christians or jews or muslim.

i wish i had my own camera gear.

my agenda with seagate

i want to hold seagate accountable not only to me, the customer but also to themselves as a brand. i agree with you that seagate is the best hard drive brand on the market. when i buy a seagate, i expect to get a machine that runs as smoothly as a lexus. i don't think it is unreasonable for me to be upset when i discover i have a glorified toyota.

the hard drive industry is going to change. my girlfriend is a pm with microsoft with what used to be the office live group. she's part of a shift in the technology industry that will probably kill off the need for home users to buy external hard drives. the future of storage is in the internet clouds.

the hard drive companies will have to seriously rethink their consumer base and how people use their technology. professional content generators and media specialists such as myself will need fast cool running hard drives to work off of.

if they were smart, they would sell their hard drives in pairs. they would cut costs in angry customers, such as myself, if they sold their products in such a way that encouraged responsible media management. even better, if they developed a system that would write data onto two hard drives simultaneously kind of like writing onto carbon copy paper.

you can blame my father if you want, for raising me to think that i am smarter and more innovative than i really am, but i believe seagate should thank me for calling them and pointing out their wrong. here is a great opportunity for them to get a stronger hold on the hard drive market by going above and beyond their competition by delivering a better product. not just a little better but leagues ahead of western digital.

problems with seagate freeagent, continued

i've been having issues with my hard drive. seagate freeagents are known across the internets (for whatever that is worth) to have overheating problems. i know i should have backed up my data first, but damn! who wants to buy me a second hard drive? i'm unemployed.

of course, data recovery is FAR more expensive than buying a second hard drive. the cheap data recovery is more expensive, actually.

so i took my hard drive to progressive tech on rosevelt. $55 in the hole for diagnostics told me that i need to get a cleanroom. that would be $1500 out of pocket if seagate doesn't help me.

i've been in a panic because i store all my video on it. my first documentary film that i spent this last year working on is on that thing. again, i would have backed it up if i only had the resources. i had no idea that my hard drive had potential to go so awry.

and ask yourself this. if one goes bad, how can i guarantee that both hard drives won't fail on me? the folks at seagate decided that comfort and stealth silent operation was more important than reliability. there is no real cooling system. you can almost fry an egg on the thing when its on.

i've called three times now and spent almost ten hours on the phone. i spend most of that time on hold. i keep my cool and i make demands. you can't do anything? give me someone who can. i raised my voice only once. that was when some manager told me he was sorry for the inconvenience.

inconvenience? my film is in limbo! i know it is not gone but it might as well be. this is no inconvenience. this is a fucking tragedy. children are dying in africa and i can't watch my film, goddamnit!

someone is going to call me tomorrow. lets hope i can say "seagate stuck by my side and made my film possible."

if anybody has any suggestions out there, i would love to hear them.

all ages shows

i've been volunteering at vera project to pay off my parking tickets. i have a lot of parking tickets. people are always surprised to learn from me, you can pay off your parking tickets with community service. i am thinking about charging people money for this tip. then, i might just pay off my parking tickets by giving people the advice. it is, in itself, a sort of community service. don't you think?

i appreciate any group that serves kids. also, the new venue is a great move. not only is this a noble non-profit, but they are able to bring in an objectively decent level of tallent. staff writers from the seattle weekly's are not ashamed to show up and review shows.

there has been drama in the past. recently, there was drama between eric grandy and atlas clothing. back in the summer, the capitol hill thrift store was trying to become an all ages venue by night. eric wrote an article about it and pointed out a curcial flaw, that atlas clothing was not up to fire code. thanks alot eric!

but i met mr. grandy the other day. to my surprise, he was quite charming. he had a very youthful face and i could see, he had taken the time to develop a personal report with the vera staff.

i did front door for the clues show. this band has previous members of the unicorns and the arcade fire. this band seems to be very popular among people with a unique taste for obscure music. seriously. do you understand what i'm saying?

of the artists i've met, i was most impressed with PWRFL people. he was so well dressed. i know, it might seem shallow to you that i can judge a musician by the clothes he wears but let me put it this way. he understands that music is never just about the music. it is about the whole package. his friends also, were well dressed.

from what i rember, he wore a pair of unpolished mustard brown wingtips with white skinny jeans. i've seen so many hipsters these days that seem to give up on dressing well below the waist and this kid certainly did not let me down.

he was accompanied by an older gentleman who wore a suit jacket, two sizes too big. he would have been just another hobo off the streets with an ironic sense of humor if it wasn't for the tapered slacks rolled up high above black and white stripped socks. i will call him guliver, certainly. or perhaps jonathan swift. an eccentric intelectual. do we have enough of those in seattle? you tell me.

then there was a girl. she was wearing tights for pants. i understand this is a very trendy look. the high school girls from behind the counter told me that lots of girls do it and it looks rather trampy. but this girl almost pulled it off. i mean, it would have been best if she wore it with a t-shirt dress. my girlfriend does this with a t-shirt dress by alexandar wang. this girl did it with a frumpy old thing she might have pulled from her dad's closet. it showed her youth and it was cute.

closing thoughts. vegetarians are just like hitler. see?

problems with seagate freeagent

my hard drive crashed. yippie! all of my tommy dean footage is in limbo.

but i am not alone. a simple google search of 'seagate freeagent problems' will show you something interesting. overheating. and its not uncommon, either.

search for 'seagate freeagent overheating' and you'll find more stories of destruction and woe.

or search 'external hard drives overheating' and you will find some crazy stories about people who try to make their own external devices. then you'll see an amazon review of my product. it describes my problem exactly! also, on seagate's own website. the forums are bursting with complaints.

the drive doesn't mount. the drive doesn't show up on my desktop. it doesn't spin up anymore.

i called up seagate and by now i've spent 6 hours on the phone with them. on hold. waiting for someone to say something that makes sense. arguing with tech support. arguing with bureaucratic warrant nazis. arguing with their hapless managers.

basically, nobody at these call centers can do anything but tell you that they are sorry.

here is the problem. data recovery is expensive. $150 or more when its done on the cheap.

i am looking into class action lawsuits. that sounds like a good idea about now.