New Half-Blood Prince Trailer

Warner Brothers released a new Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince trailer on Friday exclusively for fan sites. (You can check it out on MuggleNet.)
It looks incredible and there's only one thing I didn't like about it. So first, the things I'm really excited to see:
- The special effects for apparition look awesome! I know Fred and George did some apparating in Order of the Phoenix, but that was just a pop-in, pop-out sort of thing. This looks a lot better.
- I don't know how well the music in the trailer reflects the score for the movie, but I like the updated version of Hedwig's Theme.
- The books and the movies have done a good job of including humor amidst the dark and dangerous scenes, and Half-Blood Prince doesn't seem to be an exception.
- Scenes involving the Pensieve are always interesting. I love how J.K. Rowling uses the Pensieve in the books to give us background information, and it's great to see that carry over to the movies.
- There's a brief shot of Draco Malfoy looking at himself in the mirror. It made me think he was questioning what he was doing. I wonder if the movie will explore Malfoy's work with the Death Eaters and how he feels about it. I hope so.
And what didn't I like? We have to wait until July 17th to see the movie instead of lining up in theaters on November 21st.

Technorati Tags: Harry Potter, Half-Blood Prince, J.K. Rowling, trailer, Pensieve, Malfoy, November, July

NaNoWriMo: T-minus 29 days

National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) started today. During November, people all over the world write original novels. The goal is 50,000 words by November 30th. It's quantity, word output, that matters, so participants have to hold their inner-editors back. They'll be plenty of time for revisions later so their task is just to write, write, write.

This is NaNoWriMo's tenth anniversary. I found out about the project a few years ago and would love to do it, but there's no way I could write that much in a month (and have it be a coherent story) and keep up with school. So count me out for now, but I'd love to join in on NaNoWriMo some time in the future. I'll be thinking of plots and characters in the mean time.

Good luck to everyone's who's participating!

Technorati Tags: NaNoWriMo, writing, novel, November

Lifehacker posts too much

I love Lifehacker and the vast range of topics it covers, but I'm tired of seeing 20+ posts in my RSS feeds on a daily basis. I'm not interested in every article that goes up, but I'm subscribed to every post. I barely pay attention to the headlines anymore as I scroll through Google Reader, and I rarely read more than 5 posts per week. Lifehacker has become exercise for my scroll wheel.

I did read one article today, but I found it when I visited the site--not through the RSS feed even though I'm sure it was in there today.

I unsubscribed just now, and I'll probably check the site a few times a week. No more clogging my feeds, though.

What I Want in a Blog

I'm currently subscribed to about 30 blogs in Google Reader. That's a lot to follow, but I don't read every post on every blog. Why not? For starters, I don't have that much time to spend reading blogs on a daily basis. I'm not interested in every post in my RSS feeds, and I don't read some posts simply because they're not useful to me.

Here are some things I look for in blogs, what I like and don't like. It's the difference between visiting the blog once and coming back to read every post.

Post enough to keep me interested and not much more

I generally prefer shorter posts. They take less time to read and the faster I can learn from them, the better. The other thing I look for is how the post is written. If there's a list or it's broken into parts, I'm more likely to read it even if it's more text. I can easily see what that post is about and read what I want from it. I don't need to dig through a block of text for one useful tip. I tend to skim long posts anyway, so I'm essentially reading a short post.

Frequency is also a factor in if I subscribe to a blog. I don't care if a blog posts once a day, a week, or a month as long as it's somewhat consistent. I like a steady stream of updates. Blogs that post multiple times a day are great, but I don't find their posts nearly as useful to me. Seeing 20 posts from one blog over the course of the day can be a turn off and I might unsubscribe.

Make your posts easy for me to read

Write descriptive titles and include relevant images. Break the text up into sections or make lists. Include links to what you're talking about so I can read more information about the topic. Use bold and italics and change the font size to make your post visually appealing.

Include the post's publish date

Nothing bugs me more than a hard-to-find publish date (or author for group blogs). The internet changes all the time, and new information is always available. I want to know how old the post I'm reading is. An old date won't put me off reading a post. I just want to determine if it's still useful (software updates and responses to news items, for example).

Think about the layout

I prefer stream-lined designs. I don't want flashy banners, auto-play videos, or background music. (I'll click the video when I want to watch it--no worries.) Don't crowd ads and posts together. Make sure the color scheme doesn't interfere with text readability, and please make sure the text is big enough to read. Nothing makes me leave a site faster than the likes of size 8 pink text on an orange background. Or worse--white text on a busy background image.

I like blogs that are reader-friendly. They don't bombard me with too many posts too fast and so I can actually enjoy what I read. The color scheme makes sense, the layout is organized, and there are enough updates to keep me interested.

These are my thoughts. What do you look for in blog posts? What makes you subscribe to a specific blog?

YouTube Binge

Also known as one of the reasons I haven't written a blog entry in two weeks despite having ideas for roughly 8 posts.

Every now and then, I go on a video binge and watch every video on an entire channel over the span of a few days (or sometimes all in one day). The first time this happened, I came across ItsJustSomeRandomGuy. He has a running series about Marvel and DC super heroes and villains using action figures, mini sets, and props, and he and his girlfriend voice all of the characters. RandomGuy voices Peter Parker and Joker particularly well, and he sings as the Green Goblin. I found his channel with 40 videos uploaded and watched them all in the span of two nights. Lots of time on YouTube, but well spent.

Then some time this past spring, I followed a suggestion to watch a Doctor Who-related video and ended up watching everything on littleradge's channel. He's funny, he's thoughtful, and he's a Doctor Who fan. What more can I ask for?

Earlier this week I was looking for clips from Blink, a Doctor Who episode from season 3, and found this awesome fan-made song which was posted as a response to Trock and I had no idea what that was, so of course I clicked. Turns out Trock is "Time Lord Rock," the equivalent of Wrock--"Wizard Rock," as in original fan-made music about the Harry Potter series. (Check out the Ministry of Magic for excellent examples.) So Trock is that but for Doctor Who and the term was coined by nerimon on YouTube. I've now watched about 70 of nerimon's videos over the course of 3 days...He and littleradge comment on everyday topics like movies, education, annoyances, and technology just to name a few.

Nerimon leads to charlieissocoollike and fiveawesomeguys which connect to fiveawesomegirls, but I don't have time to delve into all those videos. Maybe I will, though, since television doesn't offer much to look forward to anymore. I'm currently following two shows, but I'm more excited about Trock and new videos in my YouTube subscriptions.

5 Things I Love About Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles returned for a second season on FOX. The series has its ups and downs, but it has my attention. Set between the second and third Terminator movies, The Sarah Connor Chronicles explores Sarah's task to raise her son to lead mankind against the machines in the future. The series stars Lena Headey as Sarah Connor, Thomas Dekker as John Connor, Summer Glau as Cameron (a reprogrammed terminator future John sent back to help), and Brian Austin Green as Derek Reese. Here are 5 things that keep me interested in the series. (Minor spoilers for season 2, episodes 1 and 2)

Image from FOX

5) Sarah's in charge

I know we're in a post-Buffy era where strong female characters aren't so rare anymore, but regardless I enjoy how much of the series is about Sarah. It would have been easy to focus on John and his destiny, to watch the hero grow up (and that might also make for a good series), but instead we see how Sarah deals with what's going on. She can't provide a normal life for her son and she doesn't try to. Sarah is careful about trusting Cameron and she adjusts to working with Derek, a resistance fighter from the future. They all have different ways of doing things, but Sarah takes the lead. Sarah is one of the few fictional mothers that must put her son in harm's way for the greater good, and she doesn't shy away from that challenge.

4) Time travel

Time lines play a big part in the Terminator movies, and even though the writers use time travel in the show, they're smart about it. We're clear on who's from the future and from when and what they're doing in the present. Sarah, John, Derek, and Cameron are always working toward a better future, so we don't have a mess about altering the past to affect the present or the future. Time travel can be really confusing but the series keeps it clean.

3) Flashbacks of the future

This doesn't seem to make sense at first, but neither does "back to the future." We see glimpses of Derek's memories--his past, which means our future--and we also see random scenes from the future. Robot fights, resistance fighters taking out bases...They're a direct tie to the future depicted in the original Terminator movie.

2) Cameron isn't human

Summer Glau is so believable as a terminator. She's socially awkward, blunt in her comments, and always takes the efficient path rather than the compassionate one. She calculates her movements and her speech sounds unnatural at times. She's programmed to act the way she does, and it shows. The season 2 premiere showed us Cameron out of control, and as scary as that is, the insecure feeling that she could short circuit at any moment and attack John is even scarier. Glau may seem meek and unassuming, but she packs a lot of power into her role.

1) John Connor, strategist

John Connor's characterization hasn't been completely consistent throughout the series. Sometimes he needs his mother's protection, and sometimes he plays the rebellious teenager. He's been a peacekeeper but also the one to spark action. John's brilliant at times, and I love those moments when he shines, when I believe he will lead humankind against the machines. The first season finale showed John's intelligence through his plan to take out the AI traffic control network. We see John's training applied to how he talks to new people and how he moves in unfamiliar places. The Connors have a code of saying the date first when they talk call each other to ensure that a terminator isn't mimicking one of their voices over the phone. Simple things, but that's what makes their characters. I hope as the series goes on, we see John grow into an intelligent, strong leader.


Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles airs on FOX, Monday nights at 8:00 EST.

Technorati Tags: Fox, terminator, john, sarah, connor, chronicles, cameron, glau, dekker, headey

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