Revival

228 days or 5,472 hours or 328,320 minutes.
That’s the time it took for you guys to get a new TV Calling post from me.

Is there anybody out there?

“Wait, wait! You’re telling me you still exist?”

Yes, I do!

After this wait, you may wonder, why come back at all?
If you’ve seen Galaxy Quest, then you know: Never give up, never surrender.
It may actually be better to ask why I took a break in the first place.
Time, travel, life.
Stuff happens.
Days turn into weeks, then months. And then it’s easier to not do than to do.
Sometimes it is also best to take a break from one writing to focus on another.

So what was 2012 like?
For one thing, the world did not end in December. That came as a shock to many people.
I was also busy re-watching Space Jam over and over again. Come on and slam!
A few pop-culture fads came and went. Psy anyone? Now we have some kind of Harlem Shake going on.
We also have a crazed ex-LAPD officer on a revenge binge running around our city.
On the entertainment front, well..
In those seven months, the biggest movies of all time came out, and they were…just okay.
J.J. was announced as the director of every movie and producer of every pilot.
Shows lived and shows died. Showrunners quit and showrunners were fired.

More importantly though, we opened a fancy Meetup group for TV writers like you.
It’s an off-shoot of the famous LA TV Writers Yahoo group.
Feel free to post all the meetups you want to host/attend. It is there for you!
I’ll probably end up adding a sidebar widget for upcoming events at some point.

Since people have been hammering me for months now about this very question:
Yes, the annual spec list will be published, but it’s still early February folks.
Many changes are afoot.
I know you were all excited to spec a Do No Harm, but sadly that ain’t happening.
All good things come to those who wait.

First things first.

Today, I come to you with a promise of hope and change.
And no, I’m not talking about a recovery, a bailout, medicare, or any other political issues.
I am talking about fresh new content. Right here. (right now?)

That’s right people. A TV Calling is back.

I am oiling this very machine (the website) to have it run more efficiently and smoothly (lean and mean). Faster load times, etc. It is, after all, a complex page with a lot of original graphics. This is kind of a behind-the-scenes makeover if you will.

I have also installed a brand new add-on/plug-in for all of the site’s posts: Flattr.
Flattr is a micro-donation service for creative content.
You set a monthly donation limit, and you “Flattr” (i.e. “like”) content across the web that you enjoy and/or think deserves something. At the end of the month, the set donation is divided across all the content you “Flattrd.”
Such a system may seem weird to install out of the blue. Simply put, I have been a fan of Flattr for a bit and I wanted to try it out from the creator’s angle. An experiment in progress.
I’ll expand on this process and why it matters on a creative level in an upcoming post.

On a personal note, I am also setting up 2013 to be kind of an experimental year for me on another front: life-logging. It is not as weird as it sounds. And you do not need to wait for Google Glass. This will be the subject of another post and, obviously, a very subjective article about my ongoing experiences with it.

You may think none of this has anything to do with TV writing or even the entertainment industry. What the hell is “life-logging” or “social micro-donations”?
But isn’t technology and new forms of storytelling what our industry is all about these days? What about monetization?
Yes, you will get actual articles about writing and television. These are just additional topics of conversation.
If you can’t expand your horizons, then what are you doing in a medium in constant flux?
Adaptation is the name of the game.
The distribution model is rapidly changing, and so is the creation model. For that matter, is there one to begin with? (that was deep)
Netflix premiered last week its first fully-developed series, House of Cards. Although not a completely original piece, it was still the first series of its kind in this new paradigm.
Ramblings to be developed in, you guessed it, a separate post.

To sum up.
Coming in the coming days, weeks, months: articles.
For real.

I hope you will follow me on this new journey.
Welcome to 2013.

Write on!