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Ever since @marcohamersma pointed me to Going to the Store, I’m hooked on this kind of 3D art. I can’t explain why it’s so mesmerizing to me, as it makes many other people quite uncomfortable. I was very happy to have found some more lately, and even more so to collect a bunch of those videos here to show you. Here it is, a list of my favorite uncomfortable, hyper-realistic, human-like 3D animations. Be sure to check out the individual artists, because there is much more to be discovered that will keep you watching for a while longer!

The internet became a terrible place. It seems that today we need to give our data, content and attention to others in order to receive a virtual form of social affirmation. This is my answer to that.

Attention as a currency

I don’t like this. I have trouble managing my attention and I noticed I started to develop several nervous habits. I am a child of the internet, a true early adopter. Hence I used to be an avid user of any services that had gained traction. It was interesting to see platforms rise to the liking of the crowds, but also to see them disappear again to be forgotten. The end result seems to be a war of titans, with monopolies fighting for our attention and content. Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Google {Home|Photos|Mail|Drive|etc}. The patterns and habits we develop in using these services and apps are new. When we pat each other on the back and talk about rising engagement numbers or stickiness, what does that mean to the person that has been using your app? Did we solve a problem? Maybe. Did we improve that person’s quality of life? Probably not. Not really, at least. But to keep these services running we need to monetize them, make money off the attention that we’ve generated.

Since a couple of months we’ve been anxious, excited and proud. A new human was about to be born, but most importantly; it would be our human. We quickly learned that the old-school Dutch name “Teun” is a little complicated to pronounce for non-Dutch speakers. Luckily we could do something about that. Borrowing some code I’ve previously wrote on Music Hack Day projects, we’ve whipped up this little landing page to help people to learn how to pronounce his name. Of course we’ve registered his name as a domain. So, a little landing page, a little domain, here’s to you little man: https://www.teunvanderven.com.

My early learnings as an online media consultant still seem valid. As the current market is changing at a maddening pace I thought it relevant to write a retrospect. In 2007 I had my first job at a publisher, Techmedia. It was a small company (±6 people) and we worked with a network of freelancers to publish a young brand called Bright. We worked on a magazine, weblog, video podcast and even a TV show. I was really excited about the market we were in, traditional publishers were just starting to understand what was coming and we had the opportunity to alternate between these two worlds: online and traditional media. We were creating branded entertainment, sponsored stories and set up barters with similar outlets in the market. After working there for a while I needed to expand my views and quit my job but started freelancing for several other publishers. It was at the end of 2007, in an attempt to structure my learnings that I wrote this manifest. Besides some proof reading by friends I never published this, until I found it again in my notes.

I’ve always been fascinated by stories and what they do with us. Our thoughts, our characters, our experiences. Stories shape who we are and who we’re becoming. I was really inspired by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, who opened my eyes with her talked on the danger of a single story.

A single story emphasises on how we are different, rather than how we are similar.

I think that’s a brilliant phrase to live by. Never trust the single story. Try to learn more by viewing something from other perspectives. And know that as long as you know only one story, you should withhold your opinions and prejudice because they might portrait you as a single story. With everything we make in this world, be it a product or a service, we should consider: are we building something real or is this going to be perceived as another single story? Update: This travelers report on North Korea is an apt example of the danger of the single story. If you haven’t read about North Korean tourism this is a great article to get an idea of what the country tries to tell tourist and it’s inhabitants: https://medium.com/@ryannee/my-summer-vacation-in-north-korea-910571c48f76

Technology and music are two of the most important things that keep me inspired. The people behind Blogotheque have been my heroes for a long time, but no they made a leap into the future by filming the band ALB with a drone. The whole video is shot in 1 take, which reduces the chance of “catching your breath”. Without switching context your brain keeps processing what it sees, thus keeping you on edge for the whole length of the video. Here you go, hope you enjoy it as much as I did:

I haven’t been able to post anything lately because of a new and interesting adventure. I’ve joined http://tape.tv, more about that later. This post is about Run River North, who released an amazing music video with their new song called Excuses. Every once and a while you see and/or hear something what makes you think: “Yes. This is it”. Well, this is it. The video combines a lot of ideas that have been applied and tried out in film and other music videos, but here everything seems to come together in this incredible funny, creative story. Enjoy. Run River North “Excuses” from Nettwerk Music Group on Vimeo.

After a splendid Music Hack Day London in 2011 we were lucky to be invited to a small tour in the National Physical Laboratory of London. Ian Butterworth was so kind to show us around and illustrate the impressive effects of the acoustic chambers they use for testing. These recordings have been sitting around on my SoundCloud account for ages and I am finally posting them here for you to enjoy. The quality is not great since I recorded these with an iPad, but you should be able to get a pretty good impression.

Yesterday Atoms for Peace released the music video for their track “Before your very Eyes”. Mister Thom Yorke can be a music industry defeatist all he wants, but I’ll be inspired by his works forever. Enjoy.