As humans, we naturally lack patience. This is even more true when it comes to innovation. We picture great innovations in our mind and we launch into those projects brimming with excitement and enthusiasm. But as the project wears on, the sparkle of a new idea starts to fade, and the pressures of deadlines, budgets, […]
via Phil McKinney | Virtual Innovation Coach and Mentor
Understanding the Law of Patience in the Innovation Cycle
The Easy Way to Catch Up on 50 Years of Star Trek
Star Trek is big. Like, really big. There have been six TV series
A Beginner’s Guide to the Star Trek Franchise
A Beginner’s Guide to the Star Trek Franchise
Most people know about Captain Kirk, Spock, and the Starship Enterprise. But beyond that, how much do you know about the Star Trek franchise? Our beginner’s guide answers all of your questions.
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totaling more than 700 episodes, 13 movies, and a whole host of companion novels, comics, and video games. Which all adds up to more Star Trek than you could hope to get through in years of hardcore binge-watching
The Pros and Cons of Binge-Watching Television
The Pros and Cons of Binge-Watching Television
Binge-watching is a recent phenomenon that pretty much everybody has done thanks to Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime. But for all of its various pros, it does also have some cons.
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.
In spite of, or more likely because of, this ridiculously large universe, Star Trek remains a hugely important cultural icon. It has inspired dozens of other science fiction movies
6 New (ish) Science Fiction Movies Better Than Star Wars
6 New (ish) Science Fiction Movies Better Than Star Wars
Is Star Wars really the pinnacle of science fiction movies set in space? Haven’t several films already surpassed the Star Wars series? Here are six we consider to be better…
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, some great sci-fi television shows
10+ Brilliant Sci-Fi TV Shows That Aren’t Star Trek [Stuff to Watch]
10+ Brilliant Sci-Fi TV Shows That Aren’t Star Trek [Stuff to Watch]
The best sci-fi movies are often cherished by fans and placed up high upon the mantle, but it’s TV shows that make up the bread and butter of any geek’s media diet. A good TV…
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, and countless ludicrous online debates
Star Trek vs. Star Wars: Which Is More Technologically Advanced?
Star Trek vs. Star Wars: Which Is More Technologically Advanced?
There are three topics that should never be discussed at the dinner table: religion, politics, and the relative merits of Star Trek and Star Wars. Luckily for us, MakeUseOf isn’t a dinner table.
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between nerds.
If you’ve never watched Star Trek before, or have just caught some of the recent movies or old episodes in syndication, it can be hard to know where to begin. Today, in honor of Star Trek‘s 50th anniversary, let’s look at some of the ways you can get up to speed.
The Completist
For the completist, there’s only one way to do Star Trek: start at the beginning and work your way through everything (except the Animated Series, even Gene Roddenberry disowned that). If you really want to get your uber-nerd membership card you’re going to need to watch every minute that’s been broadcast on TV or screened in a cinema. The best viewing order for the completist is:
- Star Trek: The Original Series (CA, UK) (TV Series)
- Star Trek: The Motion Picture (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek: The Next Generation (CA, UK) (TV Series)
- Star Trek VII: Generations (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (CA, UK) (TV Series)
- Star Trek: Voyager (CA, UK) (TV Series)
- Star Trek VIII: First Contact (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek IX: Insurrection (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek X: Nemesis (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek: Enterprise (CA, UK) (TV Series)
- Star Trek (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek Into Darkness (CA, UK) (Movie)
- Star Trek Beyond (CA, UK) (Movie)
That IS a hell of a lot of content, but it will give you the complete Star Trek experience. It’s not in a strictly chronological order (Star Trek: Enterprise is a prequel set before The Original Series, and The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine overlapped for a while) but it’s near enough to it that you’ll see the development of the universe.
If you’re serious, go ahead and dedicate several years of your life to getting through it all! However, for most people, the completist order is a pretty bad fit. Star Trek is great, but it’s not “lose all your friends and disregard personal hygiene” great.
Thankfully there is an alternative way of plowing through 50 years of Star Trek, which we have outlined for you below.
The Alternative
The best way to watch Star Trek in any reasonable amount of time is to skip huge chunks of it. And by huge chunks, I’m talking complete series and runs of episodes. This viewing order might prove controversial (realistically, it will prove controversial) but let’s take a look at what parts of Star Trek are truly unmissable.
The Original Series
First off, skip The Original Series. Yes, that’s right, skip the one that started it all. No Kirk, no Spock, no Bones. It’s all skippable. I know it’s a bold claim but hear me out.
When The Original Series was being broadcast it wasn’t the cultural monster we know today; it was just another TV show competing for air time. Although Roddenberry was a visionary and had very definite views on how Utopian the future would be, the network had other ideas. He had to make compromises to get his show on TV. These compromises show.
The Original Series also doesn’t hold up very well. It’s a product of the swinging 60s and is about as cheesy as it gets. The various human-shaped-body-but-with-bad-prosthetics-stuck-to-their-faces aliens the crew encounter look ridiculous. There’s a certain nostalgia value to it, and it did kick off the Star Trek franchise, but it’s really not very good. If you must, pick a few random episodes to get a feel for The Original Series, but otherwise skip it entirely.
The Movies
By throwing out The Original Series you also get to skip Star Trek I through VI. This is far from a bad thing. The movies are, at best, overlong TV episodes and at worst, time traveling capers involving whales.
Actually, while you’re at it, skip movies VII through X too, as they’re awful as well.
The Next Generation
The Next Generation is almost universally recognized as being the best Star Trek series. Patrick Stewart brought a level of acting skill to the role of Captain Picard that was sorely missing in William Shatner’s Captain Kirk. Everything about the series is miles above The Original Series. Rather than having to bow to the whims of the network, Roddenberry had a lot more creative control over this series, so his vision of the future was more fully realized. It’s the show The Original Series should have been.
Produced in the late 80s and early 90s, The Next Generation holds up a lot better than The Original Series (although there are still a few too many bad prosthetics for my liking).
This isn’t to say The Next Generation is perfect. There are plenty of skippable episodes. Luckily, the wonderful Max Temkin has created a viewing list that condenses the show’s 178 hours down to just 40. This makes the whole thing manageable in just a few weekends. Star Trek: The Next Generation in 40 Hours is flat out the best way to watch the best series of Star Trek. If you’re looking to invest as little time as possible, this is the way to do it.
Deep Space Nine
While Roddenberry was fully able to realize his vision in The Next Generation, his Utopian ideals were even criticized in the writer’s room. Roddenberry banned crew members from having any conflict with each other, because a bunch of people crammed together in a tin can wouldn’t fight in the 24th Century… obviously.
After Roddenberry died, the writers who had been limited creatively on The Next Generation decided to push the boundaries and explore the limits of Star Trek‘s Utopian future. What happens when the ever-tolerant Federation comes into contact with a truly intolerable group? It makes for compelling viewing.
Deep Space Nine is set on a space station. With all the major characters confined to one main location, the writers were able to take a more continuous approach to the story rather than the episodic nature of the previous two series.
Although this is great for fans of character development, it makes it harder to skip episodes as the series works best as a whole. Still, Max Temkin had a shot with his Medium post condensing Deep Space Nine down to 82.5 hours. He wasn’t able to condense things quite as much as with The Next Generation, but it’s still a good deal shorter than the original run.
Deep Space Nine divides Star Trek fans because it strays the most from Roddenberry’s vision. This controversy is, to me, what makes it such essential viewing for Star Trek fans. It will get you right into the middle of one of the biggest Trekkie debates. Nerd cred engage!
Voyager
Voyager, while either the second or third best Star Trek series depending on who you ask, isn’t essential viewing. It’s another 200 hours of a crew banging about in a spaceship. It’s a lot more serialized than The Next Generation so it does have more character development, but it also makes it much harder to drop in and out.
If, after watching The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine, you’re still hungry for more Star Trek, then it’s time to dive into Voyager. You’re probably going to have to tackle the whole thing, at least until Max Temkin tackles the unenviable task of condensing Voyager down.
Enterprise
There’s not much to say about Enterprise than to advise you to skip it. While it’s not bad, it’s far from great. It was cut short after only four seasons, making it one for the completist rather than the casual fan.
The New Movies
The new Star Trek movies are a total reboot of the franchise. You don’t need to have seen any of the TV shows or earlier movies to watch them (although you will catch plenty of references and in-jokes if you have). They’re a lot more action driven than the rest of the Star Trek universe, so some Trekkies
The 10 Best Sites To Go On A Star Trek & Become A Trekkie
The 10 Best Sites To Go On A Star Trek & Become A Trekkie
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aren’t fans. For everyone else, these are three fun movies worth watching with friends (if you didn’t catch them in the cinema
6 Reasons You Shouldn’t Abandon Movie Theaters
6 Reasons You Shouldn’t Abandon Movie Theaters
Movies are awesome. Watching a movie in a theater makes them awesome-er. Sadly, most people are skipping movie theaters and just watching films online instead. Which is something we simply cannot let happen…
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).
Live Long and Prosper
Star Trek has a long history. It’s been a big part of pop culture for the last 50 years, and its popularity shows no sign of waning. There are new movies on the way and a new TV show too. Star Trek: Discovery looks rather promising, and it will hopefully become essential viewing for generations to come.
In this article I’ve had to make some pretty big calls about what the highlights of Star Trek are. I openly admit I could be wrong about some of them.
So, if you’re a massive Star Trek fan, feel free to let me know in the comments just how badly I’ve messed up. You should also recommend some of your favorite series, individual episodes, or movies so that everyone gets to hear more than just my take on this wonderful franchise.
via MakeUseOf.com
The Easy Way to Catch Up on 50 Years of Star Trek
Trump Up, Hillary Down, Obama Out
Without traditional battle lines to fight over, Hillary Clinton is lying low while a frenetic Donald Trump talks nonstop. By Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online In most presidential elections, the two candidates spar over issues. The president campaigns for his party’s nominee in hopes of continuing his legacy. … Read more →
via My CMS
Trump Up, Hillary Down, Obama Out
The Making of Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Greatest Episode, ‘The Inner Light’
This episode should’ve never worked. It was a one-off, inconsequential story about characters we’ve never seen before nor would ever see again. It had no battles, no enemies, no star trekking of any kind. And yet, “The Inner Light” from Star Trek: The Next Generation lives on; not just as one of the best episodes of Star Trek, but as one of the finest pieces of modern television. And I’m not the only one who thinks so.
We talked to writer Morgan Gendel, and stars Margot Rose and Daniel Stewart (Patrick Stewart’s real-life son) about the episode, which not only tops most Star Trek best episode lists, but also won the 1993 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, the first television show to do so since Star Trek: The Original Series won for “The City on the Edge of Forever.”
Airing during the show’s fifth season, “The Inner Light” is your classic “the road not taken” story. At the beginning of the episode, Captain Jean-Luc Picard is hit with a probe beam that transports him to another reality. In it, he’s an iron weaver named Kamin, living on a dying planet called Kataan with his wife, Eline.
Most of the story takes place over the course of Kamin/Picard’s life. At first, he’s scared and suspicious, yearning to get back to his former life as a starship captain. As the years progress, he accepts and embraces his new reality, starting a family, integrating into the community, and living a rich, full life that spans decades. In the final moments, it’s revealed that Kataan (dead for over 1,000 years) built the probe so that one person could live as one of them and tell their story. Picard lived 40 years in less than half an hour, and he ends up alone.
“I’m amazed they let me do this episode as I ended up writing it, because it’s so unbelievably, heartbreakingly sad,” Gendel said. “Picard did have a wife, he did have children, he did have a family and they’re all fucking dead.”
It wasn’t actually the original story Gendel sent to Star Trek. A freelance writer at the time, he first pitched a story about an advertising blimp that would transmit experiences into someone’s brain. In it, Picard would envision being on an island with Commander Riker and Ensign Ro Laren, and a love triangle would ensue. Gendel told me the story evolved into Picard’s solo journey over time, after some rejections and rewrites. He got called in five times before they moved forward with the script.
Similarly, it actually took eight tries for Margot Rose to get a part on Star Trek: The Next Generation before she finally got the role of Eline. Rose said she kept getting called in for auditions, but none of the parts worked out. Still, she told me she’s glad it ended up being Eline, calling it one of her proudest roles as an actor.
“I never in a million years could’ve asked for a better part,” she said. “It was the best part I ever got to play on television. I’ve gotten to play some great parts, but it was the penultimate.” Rose added what she loved most about the part was Eline’s genuine sincerity, what she described as “guileless.” Eline was never mysterious, cunning, or had something up her sleeve. She was just a woman in love with a man who seemed to be going crazy, talking about another life.
“He’s her husband, and she’s thunderstruck, let’s say, that he’s behaving the way he is. And she adores him, and it’s a little bit, it’s not just unnerving… it’s horrible for her because she adores him,” Rose said.
Kamin/Picard’s children and grandchildren were just as guileless in their portrayal, partly because one of the children was actually Picard’s real-life son. Daniel Stewart explained how The Next Generation was his first major role as an actor, and he was terrified not only for himself, but also because he was representing his father, in a way. He’s proud of the episode but doesn’t like watching his performance, saying he looks like a “deer in the headlights.” (The pair have since worked together on several projects, including Patrick Stewart’s show Blunt Talk, where he also plays his son.)
Daniels said the tense scene between Batai and Kamin, where he drops school to focus on his music, reminds him of his family talks about becoming an actor. “I’m not sure I clocked it at the time, but I was very determined to act as a teenager. And my parents were quite keen that I shouldn’t. I had to really prove to my dad that I wanted it,” Stewart said. “He once told me that to make it in this business … unless you had an enormous drive and commitment, you would never succeed. I had to prove to him that I had that.”
Gendel, Rose, and Daniel Stewart unanimously agree that the glue that holds the entire episode together is Patrick Stewart’s performance. His portrayal of Kamin was not only genuine, but it also deepened our understanding of Picard as a person. For many of us, Star Trek is the ultimate escape, a fantasy world where we can pretend we’re the brave starship captain. Picard’s dream life is a quiet, subdued one, with a wife and children, and by the end he loses it all. That’s pretty messed up.
But sadly, the series doesn’t really explore this beyond the end credits. At the end of the episode, Picard wakes up, back in his reality. His wife died before his very eyes. His children are gone, along with the life he spent decades building and making his own, but he doesn’t really address it again. There are references to his experience, like in the season six episode “Lessons,” but it’s never really given the gravity it deserves.
“He doesn’t have a gravesite,” Gendel said. “He’s just stuck alone carrying the burden of this.”
In truth, the only truly lingering proof that “The Inner Light” happened to Picard at all is his flute. Gendel said when he first brought up the flute in the writers’ room, someone actually laughed. They later reconsidered, and rightly so, because it’s now one of the show’s most iconic symbols. It’s been featured and mentioned several times over the series, and the melody got a full orchestral treatment. Daniel Stewart said he originally learned to play the song by composer Jay Chattaway, but he never got the chance to do it onscreen. His dad did, though, even if didn’t quite master the melody.
“I spent hours learning that bloody tune on the tin whistle,” Daniel Stewart said. “Then he gets to play it at the end and he’s basically making it up. Fingers all over the place. And there it is forever. One of the most iconic moments in the series. Typical.”
The episode also had a lasting impact on Star Trek as a whole. As Gendel put it, every show that followed had its own “Inner Light” episode. Voyager had “Memorial.” Deep Space Nine’s version, “Hard Time,” actually featured Rose as Rinn (seen above), the alien who induces Miles O’Brien’s virtual 20-year prison sentence. Rose said she doesn’t know if she was cast on purpose, to connect the two episodes together, but she thinks that’d be cool if true.
Gendel remembers a time at a Star Trek convention where he met a former Hell’s Angel who was inspired to change his life after watching the episode, and now has a family of his own. “This was a guy who was on one path, and realized he could change it and pick another path,” Gendel said.
As it turns out, “The Inner Light” almost had a sequel. Gendel pitched a follow-up episode, where Picard helps out a group of Kataan survivors, including his wife Eline. It would have explained the technology behind the probe beam, and given Picard some closure from his decades-long experience. The story was rejected, so Gendel later turned it into a fan comic called The Outer Light, seen above.
But “The Inner Light” still works on its own, and works beautifully. Rose, who’s accumulated dozens of acting credits over the years, said she still gets emotional whenever she watches the episode.
“I literally have to tell you the truth, I can watch it and I’m brought to tears myself,” she said. “Not because it’s me, but because I think it’s really good. And I’m really moved by it, and I’m really proud to have been part of it.”
via Gizmodo
The Making of Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Greatest Episode, ‘The Inner Light’
This Star Trek Combadge Actually Works… With a Little Help From Your Phone
It’s linked to your mobile phone rather than a ship’s computer, but hey: This is the best attempt yet at getting a Trek-style combadge, and it’s pretty dang neat.
To mark the franchise’s 50th Anniversary, ThinkGeek has just announced this Bluetooth-powered replica of the Next Generation-styled combadge. The device (which can last for 10 hours on a single charge), can be connected to your phone or smart device. A tap of the badge—which, of course, is accompanied by the distinct chirping sound they have on the shows—can answer or end phone calls, play and pause music, or bring up Siri or Google Now for voice-control (man, that’ll be even better when they eventually get Majel Barret’s voice!).
It might not be the most perfect version of Trek’s combadge—no universal translator, for starters—but it’s a very cool (and incredibly nerdy) way to use your phone hands-free. And for $80, it’s not too eye-watering a price to fulfill your dreams of being part of Starfleet. Hopefully they’ll do one in the Voyager/Deep Space Nine design, too!
You can preorder a badge of your own at ThinkGeek now, ahead of a release in November.
[H/T Alex English]
via Gizmodo
This Star Trek Combadge Actually Works… With a Little Help From Your Phone
It’s a long, hard road from idea to IPO
It may not seem it, but coming up with an idea for your startup is probably the easiest part of launching your own company. As one industry insider told me, there are a million ways to screw up that idea through poor execution, and many, many lose their way in spite of having a good initial idea. Yet a precious few fight through the problems and the challenges, and somehow with a bit of luck and a lot of moxie, make it to IPO.
The four original founders of Box, one of those companies that made it through that long journey, talked about their experience in a panel discussion this week at BoxWorks.
While CEO Aaron Levie and CFO Dylan Smith have long been the public faces of Box, there were two others — Jeff Queisser, chief systems architect and Sam Ghods, services architect — all childhood friends in Seattle, who quit college to follow the startup dream.
The idea
The group seemed destined to launch some sort of startup, and often bounced ideas off one another, even after they went their separate ways to college. After Levie came up with the idea of what would be Box as part of a marketing class, the group saw potential, at least Smith did. Ghods didn’t see the value right away, but eventually all four were on board and Box was born.
These guys were living a Silicon Valley cliche in the early days, giving birth to their idea in a dorm room, then quitting school and renting out a converted garage that acted as their office and living space. You have to remember, these were four young men in their early twenties with no business experience whatsoever, yet they fell into their roles, as Levie with some marketing classes would be CEO, Smith with his financial sensibilities became CFO, Ghods with some coding background headed up engineering and Queisser, who had spent summers installing cable modems, became the de facto head of IT.
Box’s four founders around 2005 outside their converted garage apartment/headquarters.
The core group soon began selling Box subscriptions and were making a little bit of money. They even found an early backer at DFJ, who gave them some initial funding and helped form their fledgling board of directors.
Moving beyond the core group
One of the first inflection points for any startup is when you move beyond the core group of founders and begin to look for additional employees. The core group has passion, and in the case of Box, were four guys who had grown up together, further complicating the hiring dynamic, but as with everything, they had some luck in the deal (and they have some advice for those starting on that journey now).
The core team knew they were looking for a good cultural fit, but they warned don’t get people who have the same exact skills and think just the way you do because you just get an echo chamber. Early on, any startup needs people who can cover a lot of jobs. When you get a little bigger, specialization begins to take over.
Even if they weren’t quite sure what they were looking for, they had a sense. They definitely had a “no asshole” rule and they needed someone they would be comfortable brainstorming with in a small room for hours. They lucked out when they brought in Karen Appleton as their 8th or 9th employee. She brought a level of professionalism and business experience the founders lacked and she encouraged them to form partnerships.
“We were 19 or 20 years old. We didn’t know how it would work to hire more experienced people. Karen was the first of those hires and changed our hiring trajectory from cultural fit to cultural add,” Smith explained.
Changing direction
One thing that most startups do is pivot from the original idea, and Box was no exception. In about 2007, they began to recognize that consumer online storage was becoming increasingly specialized with Flickr handling photos and YouTube video. They didn’t think they could compete with that, and at the same they began to recognize a need for a file sharing product for business.
“I had a simple rule of thumb. Bet on whatever Steve Jobs is betting on.
There were a lot of heavy discussions about how to proceed. Eventually Box switched to the enterprise, but they didn’t make the transition willy-nilly. They actually went out and hired a consultant, who made some calls and gathered some data for them to confirm they were making a sound decision. You have to remember in 2007, the iPhone was just coming out and it wasn’t obvious that content and collaboration would move to the cloud. The consultant confirmed that some companies were thinking about this and there would be a business in that space.
There was still a lot of discussion among the founders, but they eventually all agreed it was the way to go — and it turned out to be a good decision.
A couple of years later, the iPad came out and this was a major turning point.. “I had a simple rule of thumb. Bet on whatever Steve Jobs is betting on,” Levie joked. The company turned its attention to the iPad right away and was one of the first enterprise companies with an iPad app. It was then that they realized content management was changing in a big way and it was going to be about protecting content in motion.
It’s a learning process
The founders learned you need to compromise and that was all part of the process. They also were voracious readers and reading books like The Innovator’s Dilemma and Crossing the Chasm helped shape the company philosophy over time.
They all recommend getting mentors and learning as much as you can because it’s tough going it on your own. You don’t know what you don’t know and mentors who have been through the startup experience can help point you in the right direction — and they found when they asked, people generally wanted to help.
They also say that there will be scary moments in the life of any company. They point to 2008 when they went looking for a Series B round in the middle of a huge economic crisis as one of those times.
There will also be tough times. You will definitely fight with your co-founders and you may question what you’re doing, but if you believe in the core mission, you can reach the goal of becoming a public company. It worked for Box — and it’s worth noting that the four founders remained close friends through it all.
Star Wars Movie Realization Yumi Ashigaru Stormtrooper
It’s good to see that Bandai isn’t done with its samurai-themed Star Wars action figures yet. While I’d love to see samurai Jedi and droids, this archer stormtrooper is still badass. He’s got a short sword, a folding bow and five arrows, as well as a cool shoulder-mounted shield and a jingasa, i.e. pointy hat. The figure will be available for pre-order on September 30 for around $85 (USD).
via MightyMega
Star Wars Movie Realization Yumi Ashigaru Stormtrooper
Dead and Deader: The Insane History Of Deadpool
Almost everyone and their blind old grandmothers with guy names seem to be in love with Deadpool now. And who can rightfully blame them? The movie did a fantastic job of capturing the humor and madness of the comic book perfectly and brought it to new heights. But for all you fair weather friends of Deadpool, what do you REALLY know about the merc with the mouth? You see, there is a lot more to Deadpool than just what we saw on the screen. Truth is, his origin is more twisted than even a R-rated movie could capture. But you know who have it down? Looper, who made the video below.
As fantastic as the movie was, there were some aspects of the Deadpool story that clearly had to be omitted or left on the cutting room floor for various reasons. This video sort of assumes you are a fan of Deadpool through the recent movie and fills all the holes in between.
It also gives the reader some more key Deadpool 411 that may need to be carried over to his next cinematic outings (which we all know are coming, one already confirmed). It is just so sad Bea Arthur is not alive to see her soulmate shining so brightly right now. But you know she’s smiling down on him from heaven. He asked me to include this video as proof:
via Forever Geek
Dead and Deader: The Insane History Of Deadpool
Lightsaber Safety 101 Instructional Video
Everyone wants their own lightsaber for chores around the house, shaving and what not, but you should always practice safety first. You shouldn’t get yourself a lightsaber until you watch this helpful and mandatory instructional video. Either that or get instructions from a little green man who lives in a swamp.
This fun video was created by Los Angeles filmmaker Andrew McMurry, producer Seth McMurry, and sound designer Matthew McMurry of Nukazooka. It will teach you how to handle a lightsaber properly. Don’t be like Larry. Be safe. Be smart. Once you know the dangers of the lightsaber, you can use this multi-purpose tool effectively.
Overcome Shyness with “Radical Implosion”
Shyness isn’t a lifelong personality trait. Learning to talk to strangers is a skill you can acquire. Want to know how Conan O’Brien and Will Ferrell got over their shyness? Using a technique called “radical implosion”.
Radical implosion is based on psychologist Albert Ellis’s shame-attacking exercise. The idea is to do something much more intimidating than whatever you’re afraid of. Once you get over that, your original problem seems easy, and the anxiety around it more manageable.
For example, Conan O’Brien started performing live comedy because that’s what frightened him most. To over his shyness, Will Ferrell would purposely do idiotic things in public, so people would laugh at him.
While their examples are extreme, the core idea is solid. If you’re afraid of talking to people at a party, go and talk to 50 strangers in a park first. Just see what happens. The party will probably be much easier.