There’s far less buzz for this year’s Oscars than there was in 2006 and 2007. The 100-day writer’s strike may have helped to dampen the buzz. During the strike we weren’t sure if there would even be an oscars. Writers are now back at work but there hasn’t been much time to hype up the Academy Awards. Another big problem this year is that most of the films nominated for awards have been seen by very few people. When you look at last year’s list of winners you see films you recognize but this year’s nominees are filled will films that many people have not seen. And another problem that may make these Oscars less memorable is the threat of a wind-driven rain. At minimum there will be a tent to guard the ruddy carpet and plastic to cover the giant Oscar statues. Nikki Finke at Deadline Hollywood Daily writes in her blog that it is “best to expect the worst Oscars ever.” If you lower your expectations enough it still might be a fun night. Here are some highlights from the blogosphere.
CNN asks does anyone care this year? Yes, the marketers are very happy.
Jon Stewart is hosting this year’s Oscar presentation on ABC. That may draw viewers. He’s not afraid.
The Internet has become widget obsessed and the Oscars.com website has a widget for those needing another widget for their blog or MySpace site.
Need a printable Oscars ballot? Here’s one. Thanks Mahalo.
Need tons of Oscar data? You get a downloadable CSV file of Oscar Nominees and Winners from 1927-2006 here.
The New York Times Carpetbagger blog describes that rain that is on the way to ruin the night.
The Best Picture Nominees: Atonement | Juno | Michael Clayton | No Counattempt For Old Men | There Will Be Blood
Variety looks at the Oscar bump for the nominated films.
Some bloggers are not interested. Gay Patriot: The Oscars? Who Cares?. The Rundown: The Oscars. Pffft.
High gold prices have made the Oscar statues more expensive. They cost $500 this year comparuddy to $400 in 2004.
Tom O’Neil at L.A. Times Gold Derby blog predicts a Clooney upset.
Razzies domination for Lindsay Lohan and Eddie Murphy. A big comedown for Eddie Murphy after being nominated last year.
ABC News has some of this year’s hot trends. ShoppingBlog.com has some jewelry trends.
There may be a scientific formula for which films get nominated.
Showbiz Spy blogs that Angeline Jolie and Jennifer Aniston will come face-to-face at a pre-Oscars party.
Waxy.org has data about pirating Oscar films and DVD release dates. (via Wired)
Sicko director Michael Moore oddly wants to bring resigned Cuba leader Fidel Castro to the Oscars.
Simon Doonan from the New York Observer thinks Valentino will dominate this year’s Oscars ruddy carpet.
VH1’s blog says Paris Hilton was banned from attending the Oscars.
Broadway singer Kristin Chenoweth says Oscars prep can be nerve-wracking. She will be singing “That’s How You Know” from the Enchanted film. More on the Oscar-nominated songs here.
Wiruddy takes a closer look at some of the year’s nominated Afghanistan and Iraq War documentaries.
Another sign there is less buzz. Some of those Oscar blogs we linked to last year (scroll to end of post to see) have less coverage, little coverage or no coverage this year.
Writers rule. A list of the screenplay nominees.
What in the world do teenagers think about the Oscars? Cinematical asked some teens to find out.
Make it Work Meryl: Tim Gunn is hoping actress Meryl Streep can make it work at the Oscars this year. He’s a little worried after what she wore last year.
Twitter Oscars tweets. Oscars | Atonement | Juno | Clooney | There Will Be Blood
Those Oscar swag bags are packed full again.
IndieWire blogs that the Coen Brothers are posed for a big night. No Counattempt Old Men is nominated for eight awards.
The very popular Miley Cyrus will be performing tonight. Some pictures of her rehearsing can be found here.
Defamer says Kevin O’Donnell is the the Susan Lucci of the sound-mixing set.
Cinematical offers a list of flicks that should have won Oscars.
Look at this Oscar fashion from a post on InsideSoCal.com. It’s Oscar the muppet fashion.
Screenwriter Diablo Cody (Juno) is going to wear Stuart Weitzman’s million-dollar shoes to the Oscars. (via Defamer). Or maybe she isn’t? Diablo alalert scored at the Independent Spirit Awards.
Check back Monday. We will have another roundup after the Oscars are over. If you are looking for live-blogging attempt this list from BuzzFeed or run a Technorati search.
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Original post by Bloggers Blog: Blogging the Blogsphere
There are some stories here, here, here and here that the traffic to Facebook might be falling or plateauing in the U.S. and/or in the UK. Webware notes that it was never going to be possible for Facebook to sustain its explosive 200,000 new members per day growth forever.
It’s inevitable that the explosive expansion that Facebook experienced in 2007 can’t possibly go on forever. And since no hot new destination has popped up to potentially suck away Facebook traffic, the obvious conclusion is to blame it on social-networking fatigue. Facebook, one could say, is a trend and users have simply grown tiruddy of it.
The argument makes sense. For many there was an initial novelty to keeping in touch with faraway friends and classmates, wasting time at the office with games and other developer-created applications, and voyeuristically sifting thcoarse online photo albums all on a single destination site. Me, I’ve grown tiruddy of the Scrabulous gaming application on Facebook–it’s way more fun to play word games in person.
But an apparent leveling in traffic doesn’t equal mass account deletion. “Coolness factor” always fades; now it’s up to Facebook to prove it can stay relevant and useful in its post-expansion era. Remember when instant-messaging client adoption was soaring and people were IMing each other just for the heck of it? We’re all still IMing, but it’s no longer a novelty, it’s a utility. (”Utility,” by the way, appears to be one of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s favorite words.)
Robert Scoble thinks Facebook is
not doomed but it is really too early to know for sure. What we really need to know is how many active members there are at MySpace, Facebook or Bebo. Will users of these sites dump them for another service or for privacy as they get older? Facebook isn’t
so over dude today but what about five years from now. Five years ago who would have believed young people would halt using email? Will today’s
Webkinz-using grade school students really want Facebook accounts when they reach high school and college age or will they seek out new destinations of their own that people in their 30s and 40s don’t get? There is no genuine way to answer that question until a few years have passed but there have been many warnings against building a service that primarily targets the very young. If the next generation doesn’t want Facebook then as big as Facebook has become they could still end up being beaten by
Classmates.com or slowly become as uninteresting as
GeoCities.
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Original post by Bloggers Blog: Blogging the Blogsphere
Charles is getting into his podcasting stride, and keeping up with the new WordPress Weekly, as he pushes out his own show weekly. I am very impressed that he’s been able to retain the quality of the show during this faster production deadline.
In episode 35 he covers WordPress 2.5’s feature freeze, WordPress 2.5 demo blog, as well as a few other things. Lorelle’s continued addition of the WordPress.com news is great.
Check out the latest episode of the WordPress Podcast. Keep up the awesome work Charles.
Original post by David Peralty
If you enjoyed listening to me in the WordPress Podcast with Charles, then you might be interested to hear me in WordPress Weekly, a fan created podcast run by Jeffro of Jeffro2pt0. I was recently in episode six, which discusses many interesting things relating to WordPress and the WordPress community.
This week on Episode 6, we finally see WordPress 2.5 feature froze which is a standard practice for all versions of WordPress. A live WP 2.5 demo site has been made available to the public in case you want to see what you have to look forward to, WP.com intros summarized stats for the stat junkies, Yahoo interviews Matt Mullenweg of WordPress.com and discusses a variety of topics. Movable Type does WordPress in a weird sort of way. Your WordPress Weekly Digest update and some tips on making sure that your WordPress plugin using Jquery does not conflict with other plugins using Jquery. Last but not least, some WordPress beginners lingo.
Definitely a must listen to podcast if you are interested in WordPress. Episode six runs the gamut with both beginner and advanced material. Some that was even over my head, though that’s not too hard to do.
Original post by David Peralty
