#and i went ahead and learned its internal and external workings and how to edit everything

[dwarf-vader-of-middle-earth]

Shitty father blocking WIFI is no match for Tor browser, plus VPN, plus onion search, plus IP resetting.

[siriusist]

What are you reading during the Coronavirus?

I actually finished all the books I had saved to read, so I recently went through my Dad’s office and grabbed the following from books that were a combination of my stockpile and from my Dad’s collection, that looked interesting to read but we’ve never had time to grab them:

Alan Turning: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges (I loved The Imitation Game, and this was the biography they used as the basis for the film; I started reading it, never got a chance to properly concentrate on it).

Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente: I know this was the book a while back on Tumblr in the young adult literature circles, and I’m a sucker for both Russian literature/Slavic folklore. Also just never got a chance to get absorbed into it.

Tesla: Inventor of the Modern by Richard Munson: Fun fact: Supposedly through one of those heritage sites, my cousin found out that we’re related to Nikola Tesla (Which would make sense, as our family is originally are Serbs from what is now Northern Croatia, where Tesla grew up, and ethnic minorities tended to overlap back in the day).  I already read the first two chapters of this book and I absolutely love the writing style. Even though I’m a Classics and Literature gal, I’m very picky about my writing style in biographies. It’s one thing to do research and regurgitate everything about another person; it’s another thing entirely to create a narrative and write it well. This book manages to do both, and is the better of the two major biographies on him. (Also fun fact: My one future goal is to go to Belgrade when I go back to Serbia and go to the Tesla Museum). 

Circe by Madeline Miller: I read The Song of Achilles back when I was doing my Classics degree and of course, ate up a narrative about Patroclus and Achilles (Which was hilarious, because my gay Classics professor when I talked to him about it was not having ANY of it, but I digress XD). I actually received this during Christmas, but was starting a new job before I had to take a medical leave, and then the coronavirus happened, so I’m only just picking it up now. I expect it to be as good as The Song of Achilles (Also, if you want to read another feminist take on Classical mythology, read The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood. SO good).

For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway: My Dad is a Hemingway freak, so I felt like I had to be reading this war classic sometime soon. Haven’t read it yet, but I actually do enjoy Hemingway’s prose style, so I’ll get back to you whether or not its my cup of tea.

BBC History Magazines: It’s been six years since I’ve lived in the U.K., but I still get the BBC History subscriptions. Their history magazine I think is 10-11 dollars Canadian, but really, you get a whole lot of fun and accessible history articles from top historians analysing modern history all the way back to the Celts and the Palaeolithic Era. It’s really like getting a small book every month, and I got some sort of deal for 49 dollars for twelve issues, which was really fantastic. Now, I just buy them straight from the store (They usually arrive a month/issue late in Canada, but obviously since it’s a history magazine, that really doesn’t matter). You can get them next time you have to do your grocery run in London Drugs, usually in Chapters (but obviously Chapters is closed right now in Canada), and I think they may have them at some Save on Foods locations and Costco locations. Check it out.

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable: I’ve put this one down currently, even though I’m about two hundred and fifty pages in, but the first few chapters were really fantastic, and it’s understandable why it won the Pulitzer Prize for History.

And then I literally just got these books in the mail, which are more self-help/ one history/policy book, but you might enjoy them anyway. I have problems with having a Puritan work ethic and getting on myself about not working every minute of the day, so I’m really trying to take this time to force myself to calm down, remind myself life is a marathon, not a sprint, and focus on being more forgiving and developing my self-esteem not so quantitatively about how much work I get done at the end of the day.

"A Problem from Hell": America and the Age of Genocide by Samantha Power:  ‘In her prizewinning examination of the last century of American history, Samantha Power asks the haunting question: Why do American leaders who vow "never again" repeatedly fail to stop genocide? Power, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School and the former US Ambassador to the United Nations, draws upon exclusive interviews with Washington's top policymakers, thousands of declassified documents, and her own reporting from modern killing fields to provide the answer.’

Chained to the Desk (Third Edition): A Guidebook for Workaholics, Their Partners and Children, and the Clinicians Who Treat Them by Bryan Robinson: ‘Intended for anyone touched by what Robinson calls 'the best-dressed problem of the twenty-first century' Chained to the Desk provides an inside look at workaholism's impact on those who live and work with work addicts partners, spouses, children, and colleagues as well as the appropriate techniques for clinicians who treat them. Originally published in 1998, this groundbreaking book from best-selling author and widely respected family therapist Bryan E. Robinson was the first comprehensive portrait of the workaholic.’

Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing, and Underliving by Celeste Headlee: ‘Despite our constant search for new ways to optimize our bodies and minds for peak performance, human beings are working more instead of less, living harder not smarter, and becoming more lonely and anxious. We strive for the absolute best in every aspect of our lives, ignoring what we do well naturally and reaching for a bar that keeps rising higher and higher. Why do we measure our time in terms of efficiency instead of meaning? Why can’t we just take a break? In Do Nothing, award-winning journalist Celeste Headlee illuminates a new path ahead, seeking to institute a global shift in our thinking so we can stop sabotaging our well-being, put work aside, and start living instead of doing. As it turns out, we’re searching for external solutions to an internal problem. We won’t find what we’re searching for in punishing diets, productivity apps, or the latest self-improvement schemes. Yet all is not lost—we just need to learn how to take time for ourselves, without agenda or profit, and redefine what is truly worthwhile.Pulling together threads from history, neuroscience, social science, and even paleontology, Headlee examines long-held assumptions about time use, idleness, hard work, and even our ultimate goals. Her research reveals that the habits we cling to are doing us harm; they developed recently in human history, which means they are habits that can, and must, be broken.’

Hope that gave you some ideas, nonnie, and hopefully that’ll give you something to access when we’re all stuck inside!

[missvalerietanner]

tagged by @jmhwriterblog​ and yeah, ‘course I’m gonna do writing stuff ;p

Rules: Answer the questions and then tag as many writers as there are questions answered (or as many as you can) to spread the positivity! Even if these questions are not explicitly brought up in the novel, they are still good to keep in mind when writing.

FIRST LOOK

(using The Seven Kings, ‘cause that’s what I’m wrapped up in right now)

1. Describe your novel in 1-2 sentences (elevator pitch)

The brutal assassination of a king sparks the partnership between a hated half-breed hungry for revenge and a well-educated prince whose father arranged said assassination. 

2. How long do you plan for your novel to be? (Is it a novella, single book, book series, etc.)

Editing the first book right now. Still need to finish its ending. And I was so excited, I might have already started to write the sequel... ‘bout two solid chapters in so far. AND there’s enough happening that it’d probably be a trilogy. 

3. What is your novel’s aesthetic?

I... suck at this question every time I see it.

I guess... I’mma have to go with redemption. 

4. What other stories inspire your novel?

Legend of Zelda for sure, mainly inspiration for the diverse kingdoms and people. And then, I dunno, there’s probably a little bit of every fantasy movie and book I’ve ever seen/read tucked in this story somewhere. 

5. Share 3+ images that give a feel for your novel

clicky - takes you to WeHeartIt

MAIN CHARACTER

6. Who is your protagonist?

Valerie Tanner and Eli Orphesis (named him during my Greek obsession)

7. Who is their closest ally?

They gain several throughout the story, but the main two are Roderick, a rancher and old friend of Valerie’s (practically a second father to her), and Elyn, one of the queen’s handmaidens who joins them on their journey. Oh and then Aaron pops up later, and he’s an old ally of Valerie’s as well. 

8. Who is their enemy?

Mainly: Darrean Orphesis (yep, Eli’s dad)

9. What do they want more than anything?

Valerie wants revenge for Garrett’s death, and Eli wants to forge a path to his own future, a future not doomed to exist in the shadow of his father.

10. Why can’t they have it?

Valerie: gaining revenge changes nothing; Garrett’s still dead, and she’s still an outsider

Eli: he has to grow up and learn who he is without his father’s title protecting him, and there are a LOT of tough lessons on the road ahead for my boy. 

11. What do they wrongly believe about themselves?

Valerie believes she’s completely alone and useless. She believes her life is worth little, and that spending her life in service to better people/better men is the best she can do.

Eli ... is pretty arrogant, so his are kinda negative. He believes he’s untouchable, that he’s immune to certain feelings (like pity and loss). He thinks he has all the answers.

12. Draw your protagonist! (Or share a description)

Valerie: 28, 5′8″ (172 CM), weighs 135 pounds (yes, I did), lean and muscular, smaller-than-average bust size, wavy brown hair that ends between her shoulder blades, deep/dark brown eyes, Caucasian, Ossa tattoo on her upper left arm (all black ink), muscular stomach, narrow hips, fit legs, covered in old/faded scars from battle and/or training, wears: black trousers that fit tight, knee-high boots, a fit undershirt to keep the girls pinned down and covered (;p), and a loose white overshirt to keep her cool. 

Eli: ~26, 6′2″ (188 CM - people of his race are tall as fuck), blue skin (similar to Oxford blue but a hair lighter), black hair that is a bit shorter than shoulder-length and he keeps it in a low ponytail at the nape of his neck (sexy!), bright golden eyes, muscular and well-built, hands lack callouses (only trained, never fought), no scars or wounds, wears proper royal clothes like a prince should (tunic, trousers, knee-high boots, waistcoat, the works)

PLOT POINTS

13. What is the internal conflict?

Learning to accept help, realizing that people are more than their pasts or their titles and especially their race

14. What is the external conflict?

A power-hungry king and his massive army of well-trained, well-armed soldiers who are all purebloods, so they all have magical abilities.

15. What is the worst thing that could happen to your protagonist?

For Valerie, losing the people she loves who she tries to protect. She’s watched so many die. She tends to be pretty self-sacrificing because she’d rather jump in harm’s way and die if it means saving someone else. (She has some self-esteem issues as well, so wanting to be someone’s shield makes her feel useful, and therefore, good. She also values others’ lives over her own.)

For Eli... Failure’s a big one for him. He’s probably afraid to die, but I’d say failing and letting down those around him is worse. His mother went to great lengths to make sure he was cultured and well-educated, so with all his knowledge, if he fails, yeah, that’d probably be what would crush him more than anything. 

16. What secret will be revealed that changes the course of the story?

Probably the reveal of Eli’s power. He was never trained as a child like he should’ve been (for reasons!), and so since he’s a pureblood, his powers developed on their own. He’s powerful but uncontrolled, so his abilities start leaking out, so to speak, on their own.

The reveal of what his power actually is, is a good moment. It’s subtle, but as each of the other characters begin to realize just how much power he wields, they also start to realize how REAL everything is becoming: like the war, their chances of survival, etc.  

17. Do you know how it ends?

Yes. I know the jist. I know what I’m aiming for. How I get there, I dunno, and what’s said or done when we get there, I dunno. 

I know which port I want to dock in. Just not what it looks like. 

;p

(I swear I am not drinking.)

BITS AND BOBS

18. What is the theme?

Hmm... unity for sure, redemption’s a big one, some focus on equality, but I’d say mostly it’s about people finding their place in the world by following their own intuitions rather than falling into the role provided for them or forced upon them. 

[cue Disney music]

19. What is a reoccurring symbol?

Valerie has a tattoo on her upper left arm that marks her as a member of Ossa, so basically an outsider. After what happens in the opening chapters, she keeps the tattoo hidden whenever possible. But its meaning causes some tension with... basically everyone she meets. 

...there’s probably others, but I can’t think of any that don’t require a lot of explaining... and I was pretty vague on the tattoo for reasons.

20. Where is the story set? (Share a description)

In the country of Nubrya (hate the name, can’t find one yet to replace it). It’s the border country on a massive continent and is encircled by three (possibly four or five... haven’t finished plotting the map) other countries to its east, west, and north. The south of Nubrya is open to the water. Its eastern edge rises into steep cliffs overlooking coves dug into the mountain side to house the nation’s ships during the winter. The western border levels off into desert. The north is rocky terrain, isolated, and sitting on a raised plateau, so every step from the heart of Nubrya upward is a hike. And to the northeast, there is a massive mountain range, upon which one of the Seven Kingdoms sits. And to the east/southeast (before the cliffs) are the farms and vineyards of the country.

Every type of landscape and temperature zone and climate is represented. 

21. Do you have any images or scenes in your mind already?

Since the first book’s finished except for a few scenes and the final fight leading up to the already-written ending, most of the scenes are already down on paper. The second book, however, oh, boy! I have SO much planned and cannot wait for the willingness to write it down. XD

22. What excited you about this story?

I originally wrote this story back in high school. As you can tell by my username, I’ve kept the characters with me through the years. :] Recently (meaning last year, I think), I got to thinking about the original story from high school (titled: “The Unknown Soldier,” I think), and I missed it. So I dug out the original copy, started reading it, and by about, oh I dunno, page 2, I was ready to hang myself ‘cause the writing was THAT BAD.

But the plot was a good one. The characters were half-developed, but they had the potential to be so much better. So I remolded them, fleshed them out, added a ton more characters, revamped the settings, added MORE settings, dumped in a whole bunch of emotional turmoil, updated some names, increased the stakes tenfold, added more magical/fantasy elements, and landed these characters in a MUCH better story. 

A lot about the story excites me, but to know I revitalized an old story, pried it off the gurney, and zapped it back to life--a life better than the one it had before--that excites me. :]

23. Tell us about your usual writing method!

Frantic. Messy.

I write scenes as they come to me. Stitch them together later with transitions, and edit to fix any time lapses or to plug in missing information. I do outline, but they look like this:

Guy does this thing. it’s cool, but not too cool. Then girl finds out. And note for later: the girl’s really a guy. OH! And remember by scene five to put in a live rooster or else the whole chicken joke won’t make ANY SENSE. End with badass scene with knives. RESEARCH: knives.

Hey, I just made that up on the spot. Welcome to my brain.

But that’s the basic idea behind what my outlines look like. XD Except, I do usually write my outlines in ALL CAPS and important items are bolded or highlighted. But that’s a minor detail.

Rooster.

...

Thanks for reading if you made it this far.

NOW GO WRITE! (or tag yourself and do this. T’was fun.)

[mralexbeach]

Before I Begin..

When I initially became curious about the intuitive realm (emotion, mood, energy, etc.), I used my crappy journalistic process to expose the inner workings of my mind. I asked myself questions about virtue while typing the questions and responses into a document.

I’ve been editing the document, over and over again, as my understanding of the concepts evolved. The main point here is that I wanted to see if I could develop a clearer understanding by actively improving the information I had amassed, not with the influence of external media, but with the application of internal belief.

We use some of the words in this document so often and, because of how ambiguous the English language can be, we often find ourselves in conflict because of that overlap in meaning. I didn’t expect to post this, so I only have the most recent draft, but take a glance and let me know what you think::

Displaced Conversation in an artist

The promise of virtue

Love – sacrificial selflessness

Control – The ability to manipulate something

Passion – Having an immeasurable amount of desire to connect with something or someone

Trust – Belief that you are safe in the presence of something or someone

Faith – The understanding that the future will be better than the history

What is something you believe in?

People can be good.

What does it mean to believe in something?

To know that it exists in the universe somewhere.

Trust: Belief in mutuality

Purpose: A reason for existing

The purpose of emotion is for individuals to engage interactively, wholly, and intimately with the community.

What are the duties of a student?

To learn, to study, to practice, to perfect.

Do you trust your teachers?

Not all the time.

What does trust mean to you?

I am always thinking through and ahead, and am very concerned with self-preservation because of the world we live in. If I trust you, you should not take it lightly.

All this being attributed to purpose, what do you have to say for yourself.

- Not a question. A prompt.

I recently went through a phase that was similar to puberty. My intuitive senses were strengthened because of I how chose to understand and manipulate the new energy. If a puberty is the manipulation of transformative energy, then I chose to focus much of the time on strengthening my mind, body, and soul. I have so much energy. I have been busy for a lot of this time, only because I wished to see how much my discovered skills and abilities could affect the environments around me. I impressed myself because of how dedicated I became to this journey. I had my mantra. I had my plans. I was looking for peace. I knew that having an active role in my life would grant me that. I didn’t want my experience to be governed by people that did not have my best interest on their agenda. Finding out who I was and then finding a place for myself in this world was the ultimate test of virtue. I was an asshole. I was ruthless, ill-mannered, misguided, and angry. However, that was the result of not dealing with toxic history. I thought I could just manage to avoid toxicity and things would be fine, but by avoiding toxic history, I neglected my opportunities for closure. It was to the point at which I spent months tracing my negative thoughts and emotions back to specific events that I abandoned in the hopes of protecting my self. Due to the lack of understanding,  I was forced to forgive things that really hurt me so that “Mirror Me” could smile for once. I was forced to let go of painful memories and situations, or at the very least to make peace with them. After all of the forgiveness, forgiving myself as well, I found that there was still an anger which was the result of feeling lost. After letting go of all the pain, I found myself lost in a world that has so much to offer. I had to make a choice, and that choice was whatever kept the smile on “Mirror Me”. I took classes at school for the feeling of accomplishment. I started being nice to the people around me because they deserve that. I had to reinforce the positive relationships because I had forgotten how to nurture such connections. The truth is that in finding a purpose, I found that which made me whole again.

What is purpose to a community of mankind?

The purpose of the community is always to work together to solve problems. Until we can achieve world peace, every community should strive for peace from the single individual to the whole of the people.

Do you think this represents a truth about you?

Yes. To truly love something is to understand its purpose as it is presented by the thing. You can know an individual finds purpose in something when they are truly dedicated and devoted to the preservation of the thing. In understanding this drive, or desire, you can then truly understand the virtue of the life you are committing yourself to.

[businessfrontrunners]

NANCY MATTHEWS: The One Philosophy 3rd Edition is No. 1 Best Seller On Amazon

https://authoritypresswire.com/?p=34175 The One Philosophy was a No. 1 Hot New Release in multiple categories including Philosophy Movements, Business Image and Etiquette, Structuralism Philosophy, Business Etiquette, and Customer Relations.Listen to Nancy Matthews discuss The One Philosophy with Tami Patzer on the Business Innovators Radio Network. “Thousands of lives have been transformed through the One Philosophy teachings as well as the certified speakers and trainers who all hold the vision of a world where everyone treats each other as The One,” said Nancy Matthews. “The Third Edition builds upon the framework and foundational six principles to further equip us in living the way of The One and uniting humanity in the process.”The One Philosophy has garnered accolades from its readers and practitioners.Bob Burg, co-author of The Go-Giver said, “The One Philosophy is a powerful, life-enhancing book. It's the very embodiment of the saying that great things come in small packages. Following the principles set forth in this book is the way we're meant to live and experience each other. It will result in a more abundant life...for you, and for those whose lives you touch.”“This is a Universal message that aligns with the laws of attraction, faith, inspired action, and cause and effect,” said LaWanna Bradford, COO of the Bradford Group, LLC.  “I encourage everyone to get The One Philosophy. Read it. Study it, and then pay it forward and bless someone with it.”Top 200 Amazon reviewer Cyrus Webb said, “With The One Philosophy author Nancy Matthews reminds us that everyone has the chance to be ‘The One’ through what they do for themselves and others. It's all about making the choice, doing the work and staying focused on the journey ahead. Just imagine the impact that could have on the world if we all chose to be The One!” “The principles of The One Philosophy give us a guideline to live by in modern times. When I am aware of and follow the six principles, I feel good about myself and I am conscious of how I treat others,” said Pat Rogers, CEO at Unity for Service. “Being conscious of my behaviors and attitude allows me to attract amazing people into my life and build a professional network.”“Conventional wisdom tells us not to judge a book by its cover,” said Don M. Green, executive director at The Napoleon Hill Foundation. “By reading Nancy Matthews' book, The One Philosophy, you will realize how so much wisdom can be imparted into a small book. I read the book and love the knowledge that Nancy shares with her readers.”Nancy brings more than 30 years of experience and the perfect blend of business expertise, authenticity, and heart to all her endeavors. After 20 years in corporate with several entrepreneurial endeavors on the side, in 2002 Nancy went into business for herself, developing several multi-million-dollar enterprises. Nancy is on a mission to co-create a world where every person treats each other as "The One." Imagine a world where people treat each other with the same level of interest and enthusiasm as they do when they think someone is "The One." She shares this message across international platforms speaking, writing and interviewing people as well as equipping people with the skills needed to master their internal and external communications. She is a Leadership, Sales & Marketing Expert, Master NLP Practitioner, and Founder of Women's Prosperity Network.Nancy is the International Best-selling author of The One Philosophy, co-founder of Women’s Prosperity Network, the highly acclaimed Receiving Your Riches Course, and the Best-Selling Series, Journey to the Stage. Learn more and connect with Nancy at NancyMatthews.com and WomensProsperityNetwork.com Get a copy of The One Philosophy on Amazon.

[erossiniuk]

What Bill Gates said about the internet in a Microsoft internal memo 25 years ago today: It’s a ‘tidal wave’

As a pioneer of the personal computer revolution, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates spent decades working toward his goal of putting “a computer on every desk and in every home.”

So, it’s no surprise that, by the mid-1990s, Gates was among the earliest tech CEOs to recognize the vast promise of the internet for reaching that goal and growing his business.

Exactly 25 years ago today, on May 26, 1995, Gates wrote an internal memo to Microsoft’s executive staff and his direct reports to extol the benefits of expanding the company’s internet presence. Gates, who was still Microsoft’s CEO at that point, titled his memo, simply: “The Internet Tidal Wave.”

The Internet Tidal Wave

“The Internet is a tidal wave. It changes the rules. It is an incredible opportunity as well as [an] incredible challenge,” Gates wrote in the memo.

The point of the memo was that the internet was fast becoming a ubiquitous force that was already changing the way people and businesses communicated with each other on a daily basis.

“I have gone through several stages of increasing my views of [the internet’s] importance,” Gates told Microsoft’s executive team in the memo, which WIRED magazine re-printed in full in 2010. “Now I assign the internet the highest level of importance.”

Gates goes on to pinpoint his foremost goal for the memo: “I want to make clear that our focus on the Internet is crucial to every part of our business.”

In the memo, Gates explained a bit about how he saw the internet being used in 1995, with both businesses and individuals publishing an increasing amount of content online, from personal websites to audio and video files.

“Most important is that the Internet has bootstrapped itself as a place to publish content,” Gates wrote. “It has enough users that it is benefiting from the positive feedback loop of the more users it gets, the more content it gets, and the more content it gets, the more users it gets.” 

Gates saw that as one area where Microsoft would have to seize the available opportunities to serve its software customers. He notes that audio and video content could already be shared online in 1995, including in real-time with phone calls placed over the web and even early examples of online video-conferencing.

While that technology provided exciting opportunities, Gates says, the audio and video quality of those products at the time was relatively poor. “Even at low resolution it is quite jerky,” he wrote of the video quality at that point, adding that he expected the technology to improve eventually “because the internet will get faster.”

Gates writes that improving the internet infrastructure to offer higher quality audio and video content online would be essential to unlocking the promise of the internet. While Microsoft’s Office Suite and Windows software were already popular with computer users, Gates argued that they would need to be optimized for use online in order “to make sure you get your data as fast as you need it.” 

“Only with this improvement and an incredible amount of additional bandwidth and local connections will the internet infrastructure deliver all of the promises of the full blown Information Highway,” Gates wrote before adding, hopefully: “However, it is in the process of happening and all we can do is get involved and take advantage.”

The then-CEO of Microsoft also pushed the need to beef up Microsoft’s own website, where he said customers and business clients should have access to a wealth of information about the company and its products.

“Today, it’s quite random what is on the home page and the quality of information is very low,” Gates wrote in the 1995 memo. “If you look up speeches by me all you find are a few speeches over a year old. I believe the Internet will become our most important promotional vehicle and paying people to include links to our home pages will be a worthwhile way to spend advertising dollars.”

Gates told his employees that Microsoft needed to “make sure that great information is available” on the company’s website, including using screenshots to show examples of the company’s software in action.

“I think a measurable part of our ad budget should focus on the Internet,” he wrote. “Any information we create — white papers, data sheets, etc., should all be done on our Internet server.”

After all, Gates argued, the internet offered Microsoft a great opportunity to communicate directly with the company’s customers and clients.

“We have an opportunity to do a lot more with our resources. Information will be disseminated efficiently between us and our customers with less chance that the press miscommunicates our plans. Customers will come to our ‘home page’ in unbelievable numbers and find out everything we want them to know.”

Of course, in 1995, it wasn’t just Gates’ fellow executives at Microsoft who needed convincing that the internet was the future. In November of that year, Gates went on CBS’s “Late Show with David Letterman” to promote his book “The Road Ahead” and Microsoft’s then-newly launched Internet Explorer, the company’s first web browser.

That same year, Gates gave an interview with GQ magazine’s UK edition in which he predicted that, within a decade, people would regularly watch movies, television shows and other entertainment online. In fact, 10 years later, in 2005, YouTube was founded, followed two years later by Netflix.

However, Gates missed the mark when the interviewer suggested that the internet could also become rife with misinformation that could more easily spread to large groups of impressionable people. The Microsoft co-founder was dubious that the internet would become a repository for what might now be described as “fake news,” arguing that having more opportunities to verify information by authorities, such as experts or journalists, would balance out the spread of misinformation.

The letter

May 26th, 1995: Bill Gates sends a memo, entitled “The Internet Tidal Wave,” to all executive staff within Microsoft. In it, he makes clear his intention to focus the company’s efforts online with immediate effect and “assign the Internet the highest level of importance,” going on to call it, “the most important single development to come along since the IBM PC was introduced in 1981.”

A few highlights from a long but highly quotable 16-year-old memo include: Gates forewarning, “One scary possibility being discussed by Internet fans is whether they should get together and create something far less expensive than a PC which is powerful enough for Web browsing”; the Microsoft boss later grumbling that after 10 hours of browsing the Internet, he “had not seen a single Word .DOC, AVI file, Windows .EXE (other than content viewers), or other Microsoft file format,” then adding, “I did see a great number of Quicktime files”; and his determination to “match or beat” the services offered by Netscape, a “competitor ‘born’ on the Internet” who then boasted “70% usage share” in the browser market. There are many more choice moments.

Gates even ends the memo with a categorised appendix of external websites, all of which he recommends. Under the heading “Cool, cool, cool,” links can be found to Lycos, Yahoo, and RealAudio. It’s worth noting that 3 months after the memo was circulated, MSN was launched.

A full transcript follows courtesy of Donelle Gan, but first an image of the memo’s first page. Download the letter here.

Transcript

To: Executive Staff and direct reports From: Bill Gates Date: May 26, 1995

The Internet Tidal Wave

Our vision for the last 20 years can be summarized in a succinct way. We saw that exponential improvements in computer capabilities would make great software quite valuable. Our response was to build an organization to deliver the best software products. In the next 20 years the improvement in computer power will be outpaced by the exponential improvements in communications networks. The combination of these elements will have a fundamental impact on work, learning and play. Great software products will be crucial to delivering the benefits of these advances. Both the variety and volume of the software will increase.

Most users of communications have not yet seen the price of communications come down significantly. Cable and phone networks are still depreciating networks built with old technology. Universal service monopolies and other government involvement around the world have kept communications costs high. Private networks and the Internet which are built using state of the art equipment have been the primary beneficiaries of the improved communications technology. The PC is just now starting to create additional demand that will drive a new wave of investment. A combination of expanded access to the Internet, ISDN, new broadband networks justified by video based applications and interconnections between each of these will bring low cost communication to most businesses and homes within the next decade.

The Internet is at the forefront of all of this and developments on the Internet over the next several years will set the course of our industry for a long time to come. Perhaps you have already seen memos from me or others here about the importance of the Internet. I have gone through several stages of increasing my views of its importance. Now I assign the Internet the highest level of importance. In this memo I want to make clear that our focus on the Internet is crucial to every part of our business. The Internet is the most important single development to come along since the IBM PC was introduced in 1981. It is even more important than the arrival of the graphical user interface (GUI). The PC analogy is apt for many reasons. The PC wasn’t perfect. Aspects of the PC were arbitrary or even poor. However a phenomena grew up around the IBM PC that made it a key element of everything that would happen for the next 15 years. Companies that tried to fight the PC standard often had good reasons for doing so but they failed because the phenomena overcame any weaknesses that resisters identified.

The Internet Today

The Internet’s unique position arises from a number of elements. TCP/IP protocols that define its transport level support distributed computing and scale incredibly well. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) has defined an evolutionary path that will avoid running into future problems even as eventually everyone on the planet connects up. The HTTP protocols that define HTML Web browsing are extremely simple and have allowed servers to handle incredible traffic reasonably well. All of the predictions about hypertext – made decades ago by pioneers like Ted Nelson – are coming true on the Web. Although other protocols on the Internet will continue to be used (FTP, Gopher, IRC, Telnet, SMTP, NNTP). HTML with extensions will be the standard that defines how information will be presented. Various extensions to HTML, including content enhancements like tables, and functionality enhancements like secure transactions, will be widely adopted in the near future. There will also be enhanced 3D presentations providing for virtual reality type shopping and socialization.

Another unique aspect of the Internet is that because it buys communications lines on a commodity bid basis and because it is growing so fast, it is the only “public” network whose economics reflect the latest advances in communications technology. The price paid for corporations to connect to the Internet is determined by the size of your “on-ramp” to the Internet and not by how much you actually use your connection. Usage isn’t even metered. It doesn’t matter if you connect nearby or half way around the globe. This makes the marginal cost of extra usage essentially zero encouraging heavy usage.

Most important is that the Internet has bootstrapped itself as a place to publish content. It has enough users that it is benefiting from the positive feedback loop of the more users it gets, the more content it gets, and the more content it gets, the more users it gets. I encourage everyone on the executive staff and their direct reports to use the Internet. I’ve attached an appendix, which Brian Flemming helped me pull together that shows some hot sites to try out. You can do this by either using the .HTM enclosure with any Internet browser or, if you have Word set up properly, you can navigate right from within this document. Of particular interest are the sites such as “YAHOO” which provide subject catalogs and searching. Also of interest are the ways our competitors are using their Websites to present their products. I think SUN, Netscape and Lotus do some things very well.

Amazingly it is easier to find information on the Web than it is to find information on the Microsoft Corporate Network. This inversion where a public network solves a problem better than a private network is quite stunning. This inversion points out an opportunity for us in the corporate market. An important goal for the Office and Systems products is to focus on how our customers can create and publish information on their LANs. All work we do here can be leveraged into the HTTP/Web world. The strength of the Office and Windows businesses today gives us a chance to superset the Web. One critical issue is runtime/browser size and performance. Only when our Office – Windows solution has comparable performance to the Web will our extensions be worthwhile. I view this as the most important element of Office 96 and the next major release of Windows.

One technical challenge facing the Internet is how to handle “real-time” content – specifically audio and video. The underlying technology of the Internet is a packet network which does not guarantee that data will move from one point to another at a guaranteed rate. The congestion on the network determines how quickly packets are sent. Audio can be delivered on the Internet today using several approaches. The classic approach is to simply transmit the audio file in its entirety before it is played. A second approach is to send enough of it to be fairly sure that you can keeping playing without having to pause. This is the approach Progressive Networks Real Audio (Rob Glaser’s new company) uses. Three companies (Internet Voice Chat, Vocaltec, and Netphone) allow phone conversations across the Internet but the quality is worse than a normal phone call. For video, a protocol called CU-SeeMe from Cornell allows for video conferencing. It simply delivers as many frames per second as it sees the current network congestion can handle, so even at low resolution it is quite jerky. All of these “hacks” to provide video and audio will improve because the Internet will get faster and also because the software will improve. At some point in the next three years, protocol enhancements taking advantage of the ATM backbone being used for most of the Internet will provide “quality of service guarantees”. This is a guarantee by every switch between you and your destination that enough bandwidth had been reserved to make sure you get your data as fast as you need it. Extensions to IP have already been proposed. This might be an opportunity for us to take the lead working with UUNET and others. Only with this improvement and an incredible amount of additional bandwidth and local connections will the Internet infrastructure deliver all of the promises of the full blown Information Highway. However, it is in the process of happening and all we can do is get involved and take advantage.

I think that virtually every PC will be used to connect to the Internet and that the Internet will help keep PC purchasing very healthy for many years to come. PCs will connect to the Internet a variety of ways. A normal phone call using a 14.4k or 28.8k baud modem will be the most popular in the near future. An ISDN connection at 128kb will be very attractive as the connection costs from the RBOCs and the modem costs come down. I expect an explosion in ISDN usage for both Internet connection and point-to-point connections. Point-to-point allows for low latency which is very helpful for interactive games. ISDN point-to-point allows for simultaneous voice data which is a very attractive feature for sharing information. Example scenarios include planning a trip, discussing a contract, discussing a financial transaction like a bill or a purchase or taxes or getting support questions about your PC answered. Eventually you will be able to find the name of someone or a service you want to connect to on the Internet and rerouting your call to temporarily be a point-to-point connection will happen automatically. For example when you are browsing travel possibilities if you want to talk to someone with expertise on the area you are considering, you simply click on a button and the request will be sent to a server that keeps a list of available agents who can be working anywhere they like as long as they have a PC with ISDN. You will be reconnected and the agent will get all of the context of what you are looking at and your previous history of travel if the agency has a database. The reconnection approach will not be necessary once the network has quality of service guarantees.

Another way to connect a PC will be to use a cable-modem that uses the coaxial cable normally used for analog TV transmission. Early cable systems will essentially turn the coax into an Ethernet so that everyone in the same neighborhood will share a LAN. The most difficult problem for cable systems is sending data from the PC back up the cable system (the “back channel”). Some cable companies will promote an approach where the cable is used to send data to the PC (the “forward channel”) and a phone connection is used for the back channel. The data rate of the forward channel on a cable system should be better than ISDN. Eventually the cable operators will have to do a full upgrade to an ATM-based system using either all fiber or a combination of fiber and Coax – however, when the cable or phone companies will make this huge investment is completely unclear at this point. If these buildouts happen soon, then there will be a loose relationship between the Internet and these broadband systems. If they don’t happen for some time, then these broadband systems could be an extension of the Internet with very few new standards to be set. I think the second scenario is very likely.

Three of the biggest developments in the last five years have been the growth in CD titles, the growth in On-line usage, and the growth in the Internet. Each of these had to establish critical mass on their own. Now we see that these three are strongly related to each other and as they come together they will accelerate in popularity. The On-line services business and the Internet have merged. What I mean by this is that every On-line service has to simply be a place on the Internet with extra value added. MSN is not competing with the Internet although we will have to explain to content publishers and users why they should use MSN instead of just setting up their own Web server. We don’t have a clear enough answer to this question today. For users who connect to the Internet some way other than paying us for the connection we will have to make MSN very, very inexpensive – perhaps free. The amount of free information available today on the Internet is quite amazing. Although there is room to use brand names and quality to differentiate from free content, this will not be easy and it puts a lot of pressure to figure out how to get advertiser funding. Even the CD-ROM business will be dramatically affected by the Internet. Encyclopedia Brittanica is offering their content on a subscription basis. Cinemania type information for all the latest movies is available for free on the Web including theater information and Quicktime movie trailers.

Competition

Our traditional competitors are just getting involved with the Internet. Novell is surprisingly absent given the importance of networking to their position however Frankenberg recognizes its importance and is driving them in that direction. Novell has recognized that a key missing element of the Internet is a good directory service. They are working with AT&T and other phone companies to use the Netware Directory Service to fill this role. This represents a major threat to us. Lotus is already shipping the Internotes Web Publisher which replicates Notes databases into HTML. Notes V4 includes secure Internet browsing in its server and client. IBM includes Internet connection through its network in OS/2 and promotes that as a key feature.

Some competitors have a much deeper involvement in the Internet than Microsoft. All UNIX vendors are benefiting from the Internet since the default server is still a UNIX box and not Windows NT, particularly for high end demands, SUN has exploited this quite effectively. Many Web sites, including Paul Allen’s ESPNET, put a SUN logo and link at the bottom of their home page in return for low cost hardware. Several universities have “Sunsites” named because they use donated SUN hardware. SUN’s Java project involves turning an Internet client into a programmable framework. SUN is very involved in evolving the Internet to stay away from Microsoft. On the SUN Homepage you can find an interview of Scott McNealy by John Gage where Scott explains that if customers decide to give one product a high market share (Windows) that is not capitalism. SUN is promoting Sun Screen and HotJava with aggressive business ads promising that they will help companies make money.

SGI has also been advertising their leadership on the Internet including servers and authoring tools. Their ads are very business focused. They are backing the 3D image standard, VRML, which will allow the Internet to support virtual reality type shopping, gaming, and socializing.

Browsing the Web, you find almost no Microsoft file formats. After 10 hours of browsing, I had not seen a single Word .DOC, AVI file, Windows .EXE (other than content viewers), or other Microsoft file format. I did see a great number of Quicktime files. All of the movie studios use them to offer film trailers. Apple benefited by having TCP support before we did and is working hard to build a browser built from OpenDoc components. Apple will push for OpenDoc protocols to be used on the Internet, and is already offering good server configurations. Apple’s strength in education gives them a much stronger presence on the Internet than their general market share would suggest.

Another popular file format on the Internet is PDF, the short name for Adobe Acrobat files. Even the IRS offers tax forms in PDF format. The limitations of HTML make it impossible to create forms or other documents with rich layout and PDF has become the standard alternative. For now, Acrobat files are really only useful if you print them out, but Adobe is investing heavily in this technology and we may see this change soon.

Acrobat and Quicktime are popular on the network because they are cross platform and the readers are free. Once a format gets established it is extremely difficult for another format to come along and even become equally popular.

A new competitor “born�� on the Internet is Netscape. Their browser is dominant, with 70% usage share, allowing them to determine which network extensions will catch on. They are pursuing a multi-platform strategy where they move the key API into the client to commoditize the underlying operating system. They have attracted a number of public network operators to use their platform to offer information and directory services. We have to match and beat their offerings including working with MCI, newspapers, and other who are considering their products.

One scary possibility being discussed by Internet fans is whether they should get together and create something far less expensive than a PC which is powerful enough for Web browsing. This new platform would optimize for the datatypes on the Web. Gordon Bell and others approached Intel on this and decided Intel didn’t care about a low cost device so they started suggesting that General Magic or another operating system with a non-Intel chip is the best solution.

Next Steps

In highlighting the importance of the Internet to our future I don’t want to suggest that I am alone in seeing this. There is excellent work going on in many product groups. Over the last year, a number of people have championed embracing TCP/IP, hyperlinking, HTML, and building client, tools and servers that compete on the Internet. However, we still have a lot to do. I want every product plan to try and go overboard on Internet features. One element that will be crucial is coordinating our various activities. The challenge/opportunity of the Internet is a key reason behind the recent organization. Paul Maritz will lead the Platform group to define an integrated strategy that makes it clear that Windows machines are the best choice for the Internet. This will protect and grow our Windows asset. Nathan and Pete will lead the Applications and Content group to figure out how to make money providing applications and content for the Internet. This will protect our Office asset and grow our Office, Consumer, and MSN businesses. The work that was done in the Advanced Technology group will be extremely important as it is integrated in with our products.

We must also invest in the Microsoft home page, so it will be clear how to find out about our various products. Today it’s quite random what is on the home page and the quality of information is very low. If you look up speeches by me all you find are a few speeches over a year old. I believe the Internet will become our most important promotional vehicle and paying people to include links to our home pages will be a worthwhile way to spend advertising dollars. First we need to make sure that great information is available. One example is the demonstration files (Screencam format) that Lotus includes on all of their products organized by feature. I think a measurable part of our ad budget should focus on the Internet. Any information we create – white papers, data sheets, etc., should all be done on our Internet server.

ITG needs to take a hard look at whether we should drop our leasing arrangements for data lines to some countries and simply rely on the Internet.

The actions required for the Windows platform are quite broad. Pual Maritz is having an Internet retreat in June which will focus on coordinating these activities. Some critical steps are the following:

Server. BSD is working on offering the best Internet server as an integrated package. We need to understand how to make NT boxes the highest performance HTTP servers. Perhaps we should have a project with Compaq or someone else to focus on this. Our initial server will have good performance because it uses kernel level code to blast out a file. We need a clear story on whether a high volume Web site can use NT or not becaues SUN is viewed as the primary choice. Our plans for security need to be strengthened. Other Backoffice pieces like SMS and SQL server also need to stay out in front in working with the Internet. We need to figure out how OFS can help perhaps by allowing pages to be stored as objects and having properties added. Perhaps OFS can help with the challenge of maintaining Web structures. We need to establish distributed OLE as the protocol for Internet programming. Our server offerings need to beat what Netscape is doing including billing and security support. There will be substantial demand for high performance transaction servers. We need to make the media server work across the Internet as soon as we can as new protocols are established. A major opportunity/challenge is directory. If the features required for Internet directory are not in Cairo or easily addable without a major release we will miss the window to become the world standard in directory with serious consequences. Lotus, Novell, and AT&T will be working together to try and establish the Internet directory. Actually getting the content for our directory and popularizing it could be done in the MSN group.

Client. First we need to offer a decent client (O’Hare) that exploits Windows 95 shortcuts. However this alone won’t get people to switch away from Netscape. We need to figure out how to integrate Blackbird, and help browsing into our Internet client. We have made the decision to provide Blackbird capabilities openly rather than tie them to MSN. However, the process of getting the size, speed, and integration good enough for the market needs works and coordination. We need to figure out additional features that will allows us to get ahead with Windows customers. We need to move all of our Internet value added from the Plus pack into Windows 95 itself as soon as we possible can with a major goal to get OEMs shipping our browser preinstalled. This follows directly from the plan to integrate the MSN and Internet clients. Another place for integration is to eliminate today’s Help and replace it with the format our browser accepts including exploiting our unique extensions so there is another reason to use our browser. We need to determine how many browsers we promote. Today we have O’Hare, Blackbird, SPAM MediaView, Word, PowerPoint, Symettry, Help and many others. Without unification we will lose to Netscape/HotJava.

Over time the shell and the browser will converge and support hierarchical/list/query viewing as well as document with links viewing. The former is the structured approach and the later allows for richer presentation. We need to establish OLE protocols as the way rich documents are shared on the Internet. I am sure the OpenDoc consortium will try and block this.

File sharing/Window sharing/Multi-user. We need to give away client code that encourages Windows specific protocols to be used across the Internet. It should be very easy to set up a server for file sharing across the Internet. Our PictureTel screen sharing client allowing Window sharing should work easily across the Internet. We should also consider whether to do something with the Citrix code that allows you to become a Windows NT user across the Network. It is different from the PictureTel approach because it isn’t peer to peer. Instead it allows you to be a remote user on a shared NT system. By giving away the client code to support all of these scenarios, we can start to show that a Windows machine on the Internet is more valuable than an artitrary machine on the net. We have immense leverage because our Client and Server API story is very strong. Using VB or VC to write Internet applications which have their UI remoted is a very powerful advantage for NT servers.

Forms/Languages. We need to make it very easy to design a form that presents itself as an HTML page. Today the Common Gateway Interface (CGI) is used on Web servers to give forms ‘behavior’ but its quite difficult to work with. BSD is defining a somewhat better approach they call BGI. However we need to integrate all of this with our Forms3 strategy and our languages. If we make it easy to associate controls with fields then we get leverage out of all of the work we are doing on data binding controls. Efforts like Frontier software’s work and SUN’s Java are a major challenge to us. We need to figure out when it makes sense to download control code to the client including a security approach to avoid this being a virus hole.

Search engines. This is related to the client/server strategies. Verity has done good work with Notes, Netscape, AT&T and many others to get them to adopt their scalable technology that can deal with large text databases with very large numbers of queries against them. We need to come up with a strategy to bring together Office, Mediaview, Help, Cairo, and MSN. Access and Fox do not support text indexing as part of their queries today which is a major hole. Only when we have an integrated strategy will we be able to determine if our in-house efforts are adequate or to what degree we need to work with outside companies like Verity.

Formats. We need to make sure we output information from all of our products in both vanilla HTML form and in the extended forms that we promote. For example, any database reports should be navigable as hypertext documents. We need to decide how we are going to compete with Acrobat and Quicktime since right now we aren’t challenging them. It may be worth investing in optimizing our file formats for these scenarios. What is our competitor to Acrobat? It was supposed to be a coordination of extended metafiles and Word but these plans are inadequate. The format issue spans the Platform and Applications groups.

Tools. Our disparate tools efforts need to be brought together. Everything needs to focus on a single integrated development environment that is extensible in a object oriented fashion. Tools should be architected as extensions to this framework. This means one common approach to repository/projects/source control. It means one approach to forms design. The environment has to support sophisticated viewing options like timelines and the advanced features SoftImage requires. Our work has been separated by independent focus on on-line versus CD-ROM and structured display versus animated displays. There are difficult technical issues to resolve. If we start by looking at the runtime piece (browser) I think this will guide us towards the right solution with the tools.

The actions required for the Applications and Content group are also quite broad. Some critical steps are the following:

Office. Allowing for collaboration across the Internet and allowing people to publish in our file formats for both Mac and Windows with free readers is very important. This won’t happen without specific evangelization. DAD has written some good documents about Internet features. Word could lose out to focused Internet tools if it doesn’t become faster and more WYSIWYG for HTML. There is a critical strategy issue of whether Word as a container is strict superset of our DataDoc containers allowing our Forms strategy to embrace Word fully.

MSN. The merger of the On-line business and Internet business creates a major challenge for MSN. It can’t just be the place to find Microsoft information on the Internet. It has to have scale and reputation that it is the best way to take advantage of the Internet because of the value added. A lot of the content we have been attracting to MSN will be available in equal or better form on the Internet so we need to consider focusing on areas where we can provide something that will go beyond what the Internet will offer over the next few years. Our plan to promote Blackbird broadly takes away one element that would have been unique to MSN. We need to strengthen the relationship between MSN and Exchange/Cairo for mail, security and directory. We need to determine a set of services that MSN leads in – money transfer, directory, and search engines. Our high-end server offerings may require a specific relationship with MSN.

Consumer. Consumer has done a lot of thinking about the use of on-line for its various titles. On-line is great for annuity revenue and eliminating the problems of limited shelf-space. However, it also lowers the barriers to entry and allows for an immense amount of free information. Unfortunately today an MSN user has to download a huge browser for every CD title making it more of a demo capability than something a lot of people will adopt. The Internet will assure a large audience for a broad range of titles. However the challenge of becoming a leader in any subject area in terms of quality, depth, and price will be far more brutal than today’s CD market. For each category we are in we will have to decide if we can be #1 or #2 in that category or get out. A number of competitors will have natural advantages because of their non-electronic activities.

Broadband media applications. With the significant time before widescale iTV deployment we need to look hard at which applications can be delivered in an ISDN/Internet environment or in a Satellite PC environment. We need a strategy for big areas like directory, news, and shopping. We need to decide how to persue local information. The Cityscape project has a lot of promise but only with the right partners.

Electronic commerce. Key elements of electronic commerce including security and billing need to be integrated into our platform strategy. On-line allows us to take a new approach that should allow us to compete with Intuit and others. We need to think creatively about how to use the Internet/on-line world to enhance Money. Perhaps our Automatic teller machine project should be revived. Perhaps it makes sense to do a tax business that only operates on on-line. Perhaps we can establish the lowest cost way for people to do electronic bill paying. Perhaps we can team up with Quickbook competitors to provide integrated on-line offerings. Intuit has made a lot of progress in overseas markets during the last six months. All the financial institutions will find it very easy to buy the best Internet technology tools from us and others and get into this world without much technical expertise.

The Future

We enter this new era with some considerable strengths. Among them are our people and the broad acceptance of Windows and Office. I believe the work that has been done in Consumer, Cairo, Advanced Technology, MSN, and Research position us very well to lead. Our opportunity to take advantage of these investments is coming faster than I would have predicted. The electronic world requires all of the directory, security, linguistic and other technologies we have worked on. It requires us to do even more in these ares than we planning to. There will be a lot of uncertainty as we first embrace the Internet and then extend it. Since the Internet is changing so rapidly we will have to revise our strategies from time to time and have better inter-group communication than ever before.

Our products will not be the only things changing. The way we distribute information and software as well as the way we communicate with and support customers will be changing. We have an opportunity to do a lot more with our resources. Information will be disseminated efficiently between us and our customers with less chance that the press miscommunicates our plans. Customers will come to our “home page” in unbelievable numbers and find out everything we want them to know.

The next few years are going to be very exciting as we tackle these challenges are opportunities. The Internet is a tidal wave. It changes the rules. It is an incredible opportunity as well as incredible challenge I am looking forward to your input on how we can improve our strategy to continue our track record of incredible success.

HyperLink Appendix

Related reading, double click to open them On-line! (Microsoft LAN only, Internet Assistant is not required for this part):

“Gordon Bell on the Internet” email by Gordon Bell “Affordable Computing: advertising subsidized hardware” by Nicholas Negroponie “Brief Lecture Notes on VRML & Hot Java” email by William Barr “Notes from a Lecture by Mark Andresson (Netscape)” email by William Barr “Application Strategies for the World Wide Web” by Peter Pathe (Contains many more links!) Below is a hotlist of Internet Web sites you might find interesting. I’ve included it as an embedded .HTM file which should be readable by most Web Browsers. Double click it if you’re using a Web Browser like O’Hare or Netscape.

HotList.htm

A second copy of these links is below as Word HTML links. To use these links, you must be running the World Internet Assistant, and be connected to the Web.

Cool, Cool, Cool..

The Lycos Home Page Yahoo RealAudio Homepage HotWired – New Thinking for a New Medium

Competitors

Microsoft Corporation World-Wide-Web Server Welcome To Oracle Lotus on the Web Novell Inc. World Wide Web Home Page Symantec Corporation Home Page Borland Online Disney/Buena Vista Paramount Pictures Adobe Systems Incorporated Home Page MCI Sony Online

Sports

ESPNET SportsZone The Gate Cybersports Page The Sports Server Las Vegas Sports Page

News

CRAYON Mercury Center Home Page

Travel/Entertainment

ADDICTED TO NOISE CDnow The Internet Music Store Travel & Entertainment Network home page Virtual Tourist World Map C(?) Net

Auto

Dealernet Popular Mechanics

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In 2012, actor Oscar Isaac and dancer Bobbi Jene Smith, friends from Juilliard, sat across from each other in a room in New York City and performed a piece choreographed by Smith called Arrowed. Smith has described it as “a dance without any movement”; based on an Internet video of the performance, I would call it more of an interview or an interrogation. In that clip, Isaac sits on one side of a stage, Smith on the other, and he asks her a series of questions, some banal (“Where are you from? Do you drink? Do you smoke?”), others cryptic (“Are you an anchor or an arrow? Are you waiting or weighed down?”). At first the tone is friendly and inquisitive, and she is leisurely and thoughtful with her responses. Soon the questions begin repeating, faster and faster each time, more probing, more intrusive, more difficult to react to. Smith becomes palpably flustered. As the pressure mounts, her answers begin to change, to contradict.

Lind and Smith began corresponding, and eventually Lind traveled to Sweden, where the Iowa-born Smith, on hiatus from her longtime gig as a principal with the prestigious Israeli dance company Batsheva, was performing with choreographer Sharon Eyal’s troupe. The filmmaker arrived by train, “quite nervous,” to ask if Smith would be open to doing a documentary. “This is such a weird thing,” Lind remembers. “It’s a little bit like: Will you marry me? But like: Will you marry me and my camera?”

That makes more sense when you see Bobbi Jene, Lind’s new film, in theaters now. I’m sitting across from the director and her subject at a sidewalk café just a few blocks from where their project won top documentary honors at the Tribeca Film Festival this past spring. Shot over the course of three years, Bobbi Jene is a feat of vérité filmmaking, so intensely intimate that “intensely intimate” doesn’t really do it justice. Partly that’s a tribute to Lind’s masterful fly-on-the-wall maneuvering. “The way I work is basically I do everything I can do to disappear,” she explains. “Then I can make a film where it’s not at the forefront of Bobbi’s mind that there’s someone capturing her thoughts. It doesn’t become part of her . . . consideration.”

But it’s equally a tribute to Smith’s remarkable ability to move through the world without artifice and her willingness to trust-fall into Lind’s vision. “Bobbi knows at any point she can say, I don’t want this to be seen by anyone,” Lind goes on. “And at the same time, I’m going to film it. Because maybe in two years you’ll be like: I’m so glad you filmed that.” Smith nods and describes a scene that ended up making it into the documentary: Desperate to be alone in a moment of anguish, she realized, “Oh, actually the moments when I don’t want her there, those are when she gets to do what she loves.”

“Oh,” Lind exclaims. “That’s so sweet!”

At the film’s outset, Smith has just made the decision, in her own parlance, to be an arrow not an anchor, to strike out on her own as a dancer and choreographer. It’s a choice that means parting ways with Batsheva, her creative home for nearly 10 years, and with its charismatic artistic director (also her former lover), Ohad Naharin, whose fluid, intuitive movement language, Gaga, is Smith’s dancing vernacular. It also means leaving behind Tel Aviv, the city where she’d relocated at Naharin’s invitation as a 21-year-old Juilliard dropout, and saying goodbye—geographically, if not emotionally—to Or Schraiber, the Israeli Batsheva dancer, 10 years her junior, with whom she had fallen deeply in love.

Lind trails her subject as she performs her last shows in Israel, then moves back to the States, first to San Francisco, then to New York City. She reconnects with her family, particularly with her devoutly Christian mother, who admires her daughter’s courage but worries about her more free-spirited ways. We see Smith struggling with Schraiber’s absence, reckoning with his reluctance to join her in America, with their considerable age gap (“Maybe we think similarly,” he tells her, “but we are not in the same place”). We’re in the room for their wrenching reunions and partings of ways (and for some mildly NSFW Skype sessions in between). And we watch her work to channel her personal trials into A Study on Effort, a powerfully provocative new solo piece that Smith, a magnetic dancer, performs naked for a live audience, with only her very long hair as a veil.

In one bit she braces her arms against an imaginary wall, pushing with all her might, the sinews of her impressively chiseled body tightening and quivering with exertion. In another, she throws her arms up in the air, over and over again, like a woman raging at a cruel god, a heaving motion that takes on its own momentum. The longer she does it, the harder it is to read whether it’s gravity or her body that’s doing the work. And at the end of the performance, she drags a sandbag onto the stage, lies facedown on top of it, and grinds her hips against its mass, shuddering and moaning until she achieves, spectacularly, an orgasm.

It’s a sexual act, though not particularly sexy, or at least it’s not meant to be. Even as she performs it publicly, nakedly, there’s something unnervingly internal about it, centered, extremely private. She’s playing with ideas she learned from Naharin, “about effort and pleasure and pain and pleasure,” she tells the camera, “and how it’s just a switch. It’s the same thing.” But the piece is also a radical reclamation of the naked female body, and of female pleasure, as something separate from the familiar framework of shame and purity and modesty, and, though there are men in the audience watching, as something utterly apart from the male gaze or external desire.

Bobbi Jene is radical, too: It’s a film that says incremental progress and process are as important as monumental feats of achievement. It’s a portrait of an artist coming out of a long incubation period, seeking and finding her own voice, the kind of female artistic bildungsroman that’s still in terribly short supply in our culture, and the kind of female sexual bildungsroman that’s still almost entirely absent. It’s also the story of a woman of a certain age—at the beginning of the film Smith expresses dismay at her looming 30th birthday—who is claiming her body for her own purposes, and about what happens when she bets on one kind of creative potential over another. “I could have danced there longer,” Smith tells me of Batsheva, “and settled down, continued. But I felt like I wasn’t able to make the separation between what was my work and what I gave to the company. What do I want to say to the world? I feel like a lot of times in life we’re waiting for that aha moment that’s like, okay, now is the time to go. One day I woke up and was like, that moment doesn’t exist. It’s not real. It’s an abstract idea. That pushed me off the cliff, the moment when I realized there is no moment.”

Smith’s ambivalence about having children hovers at the margins of this movie, alluded to but never directly addressed. It goes unspoken that childbearing—not to mention child rearing—would take a major toll on a dancer’s career, as it would, to a different extent, on any creative work. These were questions that were very much on Lind’s mind during the years she was filming. “There’s a primal scream,” she says. “It’s really loud. You kind of don’t want to hear it, but it’s the body that’s talking to us. And we have to face these things. To have a baby, and to settle, and be a mother, is different than for a man. It takes up a different volume in your life. It’s something I really battled with. And it helped me a lot to work with it, to see it from a different perspective.” Toward the end of the long process of making Bobbi Jene, she and Isaac were trying and failing to conceive. “Maybe I had to finish the film first,” she surmises. “My body was like, nope, not yet.” She got pregnant as soon as editing was done, went into labor during the documentary’s Tribeca premiere, and gave birth shortly thereafter to a son.

In Smith’s life, the big news is that Schraiber finally joined her this fall in New York. She breaks into a big, shy grin when I ask her about him. “I’m so moved that he came,” she says, her voice wavering. When I spoke with Lind and Smith it was a few days ahead of when Bobbi Jene would officially hit theaters, and Smith admitted to being anxious and a little out of sorts. At one point in the film she talks to Lind about the limited upside of being a dancer. “It’s just . . . keep working. It doesn’t have a payoff like acting or even film. Performing arts don’t have that. Or music: You can have one song and you can get royalties. The equivalent in the dance world is you make one really great solo. And maybe some people will see it. That’s it.”

Unless, of course, someone makes a documentary about you, and then there’s a pretty good chance that thousands and thousands of people will see your work, in all its complexity, in any number of contexts. It’s very different, after all, to perform a naked sexual act for the type of solemnly reverential performing arts enthusiast who might buy a ticket to an avant-garde dance recital, and to do so in front of a camera, in footage that will be available for the foreseeable future to anyone with an iTunes account or a Netflix log-in. “You could go back and watch it, that one moment,” Smith acknowledges. “It feels very vulnerable in a way that I’m not used to. With live performance, part of the magic is that it disappears. And it becomes a memory. It’s like”—she gestures toward me, then back to herself—“I’m with you. You’re with me. It’s a dialogue. And now it’s different.”

It’s a coincidence that last winter also saw the U.S. release of Mr. Gaga, a documentary by Israeli director Tomar Heyman, about Naharin, Smith’s longtime mentor. That film, a more straightforward survey of its subject’s life and work, ranks as the most successful documentary in Israeli history. It’s a fascinating companion piece to Bobbi Jene, but some reviewers have drawn unflattering comparisons. Variety called Bobbi Jene “considerably less rewarding than last year’s Mr. Gaga . . . alongside which this new film feels like a footnote.” A critic at RogerEbert.com said of the attention paid to Smith’s romantic and personal quandaries: “We all have these problems. Who cares?”

But it’s precisely because we all have these problems that we ought to care. “The personal is political,” a truism, sure, but never truer than in this documentary, which shines a spotlight on a woman gambling on security and love, betting on herself and her ideas, using her body as she sees fit—and doing all those things at an age when society quite frankly discourages women from taking such risks. Bobbi Jene is quietly exceptional, unique because of the unique nerve and talent of its subject (that much is evident having spent just an hour with her), and universal, even mundane, because the questions that plague Smith—how to balance ambition and creative drive and personal fulfillment and biological reality—will be deeply, painfully familiar to any woman staring down the ticking clock of her young adulthood. Lind’s film makes the case that these kinds of stories are not mere footnotes, but ones well worth telling. And anyone enlightened enough to see past the great-men theory of history would probably agree.

One scene from the film reveals Smith spreading the gospel of Gaga to a class of dancers. (Teaching, she tells me, may be her true calling: “I speak through my body, and actually that feels like my work, where I meet people in the studio. Letting them know how much power they have, how loud their voices can be.”) Demonstrating a movement, she grabs her ankle behind her, uses the momentum to spin her body around, plants her foot, and then swoops her clasped hands under her parted legs so that she’s contorted into a standing backbend. “And you just have to hope for the best,” she admits to her students as they try, clumsily, to imitate her. “Usually it’s a 70 percent chance. Thirty percent I hit my head really hard on the floor, 70 percent I don’t. But you’re not going to die.”

You give into the motion, you accept pain as a possible side effect: that seems to be Smith’s philosophy both in and out of the studio. “It’s terrifying, it’s humbling,” she says of watching the finished film. “I remember thinking, like, Oh, maybe that part I don’t like, that movement. I could do that much better.” She glances at Lind. “Then I realized: She probably spent hours on it, dreamed on it, changed it, cut it one second earlier, got a glass of wine, came back to it, tried it with different music. And that’s what she landed on. I need to trust that this is the right decision that she wants to make.” Smith goes on: “This is my life, but this is Elvira’s art. It was an amazing lesson in letting go.”

###

[vamytas]

Alex: 12, 16, 19; Moll(u)s(k): 4, 10; Daena: 13, 14; DJ Dad: 1, 16; Heidi: 4, 2; Jake: 3, 18; Bubble Dee: 10, 11, 4; I-A-go: 16,8; Seb: 13 (canon as in: related to Lexie), 1 HAVE FUN I'M SORRY THIS IS MUCH NO RUSH

Questions About Alex’s Conceivement

12. What have you found to be most difficult about creating art for your OC (any form of art: writing, drawing, edits, etc.)?

Writing wise, Alex has never really been that hard … he’s very soft.. very receptive to pulling his strings. If the meme question was worded as ‘most challenging’ then there’d be a lot more to cover! Welcome to challenges !! Much of the research that goes into him, as well as what routes I’ve decided to take since his fruition, have been a learning curve as a writer to just throw any inhibitions and initial criticisms of ideas out the window and just say FUCK IT!! Eg. from the get-go of this blog, his dialect and accent were nowhere near as apparent because I was afraid people wouldn’t take him seriously and would find it laughable..but after actually Going For It after a few months, I feel his voice is truer to how he’d vocally express his thoughts and the phonetics that adorn such conglomerate of profanity, flamboyant vocabulary and SOUTHERN BRIT BOY roots.

In terms of graphics, the black/grey/red colour scheme was always a primer & foundation I loved but I just never had a character who fit that? Especially only limiting myself to canon characters beforehand. Then when I got further into delving through zines and tattoo work as those aspects of Alex were brought to the forefront, editing stuff that was representative of that was just FUN in its challenge rather than ‘too difficult !! this doesn’t look right!! >:((’ since technically there is no ‘right’ way of making something that’s based on the ethos of being messy and experimentatening.. and Alex is a boy who’s adverse to The Right anyway … to the left, to the left. …

GENERALLY VERY LIBERATING !! If there are any difficulties, I get enjoyment out of tackling them and seeing what I find on the other side!!  Alex is very ripe for trying new things… haven’t tried drawing him though– has been a !!! lifetime since I’ve put pen to paper with intent of illustrating anything !! Maybe something to think about getting back into !!

16. What is something about your OC  can make you cry?

EVERYTHING???????????/  In all seriousness though I may have a bestowed realisation to do with tragic elements of his past  while I’m traversin through day-to-day life and while externally, at work while making a bed, I’ll be D: for 0.5 seconds, internally –  this is mE (warning for earthshatteringly loud Tom Hardy wail ( ALSO an apt analogy for ~death~ of Molly in 19th Century Gothic AU)).

I GUESS the saddest element of him would be that he still has yet to realise manipulative elements of relationship with sire due to his own overdependency at the time, however the sexual aspect was probably the healthiest in terms of amplified importance of consent and assurance that he was actually enjoying BDSM. Sire, however, took full advantage of his vulnerability post-break up with Molly, and I’m wondering whether to implement that she may have been in the Sabbat and had intentions of ‘grooming’ Alex into the sect (PLAN WENT AWRY THO!!). He definitely defines the bloodbond with an emotional tether of grief and anger but thinks this is simply due to her killing then leaving him, which certainly plays a part, but he doesn’t like to dwell on past trauma AT ALL and so any retrospective ‘oh shit’ from experience with sire that he may learn from to extrapolate ‘oh, shit’ into ‘oh shit that was emotionally abusive’ is something he needs to be helped with… Seb seemed to be the only  one around to recognise this (even though he jumped to conclusions on the wrong end of the stick sometimes), so if he and Alex reunited there’d be a CONVERSATION.

(( As a fairly digressive disclaimer; I don’t really have any interest in indulging the stereotype that all Toreadors will manipulate people they obsess over in order to ‘attain’ them. Alex, I don’t think, would ever fall into that kind of destructive behaviour (if any woman shows cues of disinterest he wouldn’t bother pursuing anything or trying to convince/charm them into otherwise). It’s something he’d be even more mindful of after getting the therapeutic help to reflect on that attitude present in his sire, and EVEN more after reuniting with Molly since she’s so harshly critical of Toreador clan accepted practices, much like he is with ghoulification.))   

19. What is your favorite fact about your OC?

He’s animated !!! He’s expressive !! He’s beautiful !! And he looks good eating a Crunchie bar. ..(even tho he would throw it up afterwards..)

NOW ONTO SEB !!!

(Since this is the most relevant place to answer)

13. How far past the canon events (canon as in: related to Lexie, who is the centre of all things) that take place in their world have you extended their story, if at all?

After being too overwhelmed by the PANDEMONIUM of abiding by Alex through his embrace, Seb moves back to England and becomes roomies with Molly (the two were very close before Seb moved to the States! Siblings of the soul!!) The original uprooting to America wasn’t actually  a move Seb wanted to go ahead with, he was under the impression that flying to California would be a temporary respite and Healing Ritual for Alex, as well as a good laugh, but didn’t work out that way.. Kindred ruin everything .. 

SO after getting back on his feet, he’s offered the leather shoppe he originally worked in by the owner who trained & employed him. Business fairs very well!  Reconciles close ties with Thomas (who now has a family) and attends many art exhibitions with Molly! Also full well knows about her nature… Gets therapy and councilling for healthily dealing with Ricky’s death! Only grievance is estrangement with Alex, then when the floor above leather shop is up for sale he reaches out to mate to see if he’s curious about moving back to London. Alex thinks about opportunity a lot before making final decision… To be continued. ..