by cameron | Feb 27, 2007 | Melbourne, Video
ThomasR alerted me last week to a machinima festival taking place in Melbourne, so on Saturday I got a leave pass from the family and went to check it out. It was really amazing, lots of great content getting produced out there using gaming engines as a shortcut to producing on-screen characters instead of 3D rendering engines. The event had people such as Gus Sorola (Red Vs. Blue), Eddo Stern (Dark Game), Peter Rasmussen (Stolen Life) and Rod Maher (FRAPS) on stage. After Saturday’s event, I asked Tom to sit down with NY-based machinima guru Paul Marino (Director of the Machinima Film Festival and Executive Director of the Academy of Machinima Arts and Sciences) to give an overview of what machinima is all about, how it gets made, the legal issues and where it is going in the future.
DIGG THIS STORY.
by cameron | Feb 26, 2007 | Melbourne, Podcast
Private equity is a broad term that refers to any type of equity investment in an asset in which the equity is not freely tradable on a public stock market. (wikipedia)
One of the trends around the world at the moment is for private equity firms (commonly called “PE Firms”) to acquire publicly-listed companies, so they can make them more efficient and then re-list them at a profit a few years hence. In practice, this process often involves stripping the companies of their assets, sacking a bunch of staff, before re-listing the companies which will often have to go back and buy those same assets back again at an inflated price. It’s one of the cycles we see come around every decade or so. The last time we saw it become trendy was in the 80s, when famous junk bond firms like Michael Milken’s company “Drexel Burnham Lambert” was providing cheap cash to Alan Bond, Rupert Murdoch and Ivan Boesky.
Is it time for Oliver Stone to make a sequel to WALL STREET?
On tonight’s show (recorded early last week), I chat with Melbourne-based journalist and editor Andrew Pegler about the re-rise of the PE Firm.
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The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Feb 22, 2007 | Melbourne's Leaders, Podcast
J. J. C. “Jack” Smart is the Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, Research School of Social Sciences at Australian National University. Someone once said that if there was a Nobel Prize for Philosophy, he would have won it at least twice. He graciously invited me to lunch at the Monash Club (and insisted on picking up the tab!) and afterwards we discussed philosophy, especially his major contributions, including the demolition of mind-brain dualism and his contribution to metaphysics in the area of philosophy of time. We also talk about his ethical stance of utilitarianism, where his arguments against rule utilitarianism have been very influential.
Jack is 86 and said he doesn’t know much about podcasting but his grandkids are always talking about it.
Link: Jack Smart’s homepage at Monash University.
If you enjoyed this podcast, make sure you don’t miss future episodes by subscribing to our feed and leave us a voice comment!
The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Feb 20, 2007 | Melbourne, Melbourne's Leaders, Podcast
Dr Peter Ellyard is a Melbourne-based futurist, strategist, author and Chairman of the Preferred Futures Institute. He has worked for the United Nations, various international governments and NGOs, and is an incredibly popular speaker and strategic consultant to global corporations.
We caught up today for a discussion about:
the role of a futurist
the rise of “planetism”
the role of globalisation
the role of corporations
leadership versus management
If you enjoyed this podcast, make sure you don’t miss future episodes by subscribing to our feed and leave us a voice comment!
The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Feb 16, 2007 | media 2.0, Melbourne
I remember going to see a Ben Folds gig in Melbourne a couple of years ago (we go pretty much every time he visits, it’s always an awesome gig) and when he performed his cover version of Dr Dre’s “Bitches Ain’t Shit” I nearly wet myself laughing. What a stroke of genius.
Over on Coverville, Brian recently linked to the below video which is an acapella band from U of C Berkley doing a cover of Ben’s cover. Brilliant. But the best part of the story is that Ben Folds is asking people to “Sing It Bitch” – he wants people to make their own videos of the song, post them up to YouTube, and he is then posting the best ones up onto BenFolds.com.
What a great way to get your audience involved, create a community and generate some buzz at zero cost.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjNNxnKVEpQ]
by cameron | Feb 5, 2007 | media 2.0, Melbourne, Podcast
James Farmer and I will be debating the future of citizen media on Jon Faine’s top rating ABC radio show this WEDNESDAY morning. James used to be a great blogger… until he sold out and took a job with Aussie media dinosaurs Fairfax in the middle of 2006.
Nah, only kidding. Well about James that is (Fairfax are definitely dinosaurs). I’m just trying to get into the BATTLE frame of mind for Wednesday’s event. James is a top bloke although he has become a bit of an apologist for tree media since he went on their payroll (link).
To pre-empt the usual questions:
1. no, I will not be recording it.
2. yes, ABC do podcast some of Jon’s shows but I don’t know if this one will be or not. You can find Jon’s site here.
