Xtranormal

I love the internet. I love movies. It was only a matter of time before these two competing mistresses met, and I have to say I am not disappointed at the outcome. Xtranormal is a neat little website that allows you to make small movies with their animations, all you need to do is fill in the script and choose your actors, which in this case are computer rendered figures.

It’s hard to describe Xtranormal without actually using it, but the most pertinent analogy I can think of is Lego. You have a limited amount of bricks (in Xtranormal’s case, the scenes, actors and animations) but you can combine these elements in limitless possibilities. The fact that the actors look a bit like Legomen only facilitates this comparison.

Of course, this wouldn’t be the internet without shameless capitalism (I always imagine the entrance to the internet having that sign off the Simpsons “Sorry, but there’s profit to be had.”) and so there are ‘premium’ options if you feel like spending a few dollars to get some more actors/voices/camera angles/gaffer boys. I subscribe to the nihilist school of thought and think that the movies you can make with the ‘beige’ set are potentially funnier than multi-dollar blockbusters (the rule of the indie film applies to the net too!)

Before you Spielbergos get too carried away, it should be noted that there a few glitches/bugs in the system, such as the foreign voices not really sounding very authentic and some of the load times getting towards the astronomical range. I noticed that for a pretty tidy 129MB you can download the text-to-movie program and use it offline, definitely a plus, especially if you’re going to have to explain to someone that you spent 2GB of your internet plan getting a small CGI rendered person to swear for your amusement.

Another cool feature is that you can group your movies together, and if you use similar actors and settings before you know it you have a long running series on your hands. Its up to you whether you want to turn it into a US 22 episode marathon or a classy British ‘leave the audience wanting more’ 6 week project. Also, once you’ve downloaded your movie you can share it magically through Facebook, Digg, Twitter and wherever else you hang out online so that the four hours you spent making a one minute movie aren’t in vain.

This is the kind of stuff that the internet is made for. I can understand why people used to say they were bored in the 19^th and 20^th century (did you know Charles Dickens created the word boredom?) but in this day and age there is no excuse why your few idle hours at work can’t be spent making ‘The Greatest Story ever Xtranormaled’ masterpieces.

Check out:

www.xtranormal.com

Twitter: Or, How to stop worrying and love the 140 character message

Twitter provides a simple, direct and quick way to connect with people. It has enormous potential as a marketing tool or something that can quickly spread ideas and important messages. Here are some cool and intriguing things that would not have happened without Twitter, the little website that is changing social interaction one tweet at a time:

• Professional cyclist Lance Armstrong impulsively organised a group ride in Ireland via his Twitter account.

• @abolish cancer announced that for every person who followed their account, a supporter of theirs would donate one US dollar. Over $7,500 was raised.

• Recently, South Korea tried to bar users from reading tweets from an account opened by a branch of the North Korean government, who were using Twitter to spread anti-South and anti-US propaganda.

• A Chinese school used Twitter to help students learn by asking them to tweet and respond to fellow students tweets in English

• Mike Massimino, an astronaut, sent the first tweet from space in 2009 during a mission to the Hubble space telescope.

• In the US, the library of Congress has pledged to document every single tweet made since Twitter’s inception in 2006.

• In Australia, the Australian Football League official Twitter has involved the fans in the game by publishing crowd tweets LIVE on the scoreboard at the game. This turns every spectator into a potential commentator. Look> http://twitpic.com/2jujhx

Twitters effectiveness in connecting people will only grow as more people sign up, with currently 100 million users on Twitter. In the future, Twitter could be used even more prominently in events like elections, national disasters, and other global issues which require the quick dissemination of important information. Twitter is more than just inane status updates, it’s changing the way we interact.

Check out: 

www.twitter.com

www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter_usage