Valleywag
Jim Killeen, former bit-actor and current small businessman, decided to turn the typical act of searching for other people with his same name on Google into the premise for a documentary — Google Me. He tracked down a number of other Jim Killeens around the world, from Australia to Ireland, and spent some time to get to know them and ask them a few questions. The result is an hour and a half of "gee whiz" encounters and white male bonding. See Jim meet Jim! And Jim! And Jim! See Jim get grossed out by vegemite and haggis! See Jim uncomfortable as the particulars of a swingers party are explained! You can watch it all for free on YouTube. But what was the most interesting thing about the film?
It wasn't the interview with now-former CIO Douglas Merrill, which served to convince me that the Canadian-nice Merrill will get eaten alive by the music industry. It wasn't the moment when Jim Killeen of Cobe, Ireland, a Catholic priest, argues the Pope's position on human sexuality with Jim Killeen of Denver, Colorado, the swinger and self-described "tranny chaser."
It was a few minutes into the film when noted Scientologist and Earthlink founder Sky Dayton makes an incongruous appearance to muse on the business of moving bits. Later on, the filmmaker Killeen intereviews his schizophrenic brother and sister about their experiences with psychiatrists and the medications they're currently taking, proclaiming that he feels they'd be better off without psychiatric care. Finally he declares on camera that he's a Scientologist, confirming my suspicions based on Dayton's appearance and the anti-psychiatry agitprop.
But that's just a side note in a watchable and somewhat entertaining but otherwise forgettable documentary. The best moments are the man-on-the-street interviews where people from around the world describe their own experiences running a vanity search for their name on Google. But it doesn't succeed on the same, earnest level that 24 Hours on Craigslist did, probably because what it has in geographic scope it lacks in range of characters as subjects.
Comments
I watched the whole thing in spite of the Hollywood styled opening credits.
Midway though I started wondering how much of an Internet ecology might eventually develop for such "home-made" content.
When I watched TV (I no longer do) the pattern was: Click, click, click, until I found something interesting or had gone past every channel available, at which point I'd either go do something else, or just "settle" for one of the shows I'd passed up.
With the Internet, it's also click, click, click, but I never have to settle. I may spend the entire one or two hour period looking for something and not finding anything, but such an occurrence is rare, and I never reach the point of "settling" to watch, read or listen to something simply because I fear there is nothing better available.
Could Jim Killeen make a series of videos that I'd watch all the way through? Probably not. And in fact I've noticed a remarkable lack of loyalty in myself as far as Internet content is concerned.
So I still wonder what the future looks like for people making a living doing these things. Will there be more content creators, each making less money and never becoming "stars"? Or will the Internet eventually develop its own star system that sustains creators through long careers (like 20-30 years)?
I don't think we know yet whether Andy Warhol's prediction of 15 minutes of fame for everyone was on target. I'm tempted to think it was at least in the right direction.
Oh dear. Interesting astroturfing aside, the whole concept is a eip off of this stage show, TV show and book done nearly a decade ago...
[en.wikipedia.org]
For a long time when I would google my name many famous very successful women showed up, which made me laugh at the thought that a future employer could google me and think I owned a Media empire. I was no where to be found, then last week I googled myself and my blog came up 5th in the first page and I felt like that scene in The Jerk with Steve Martin when he finds his name listed in the phonebook. About 3 minutes after, I thought, "Oh shi* now someone can actually google me ...and find me."
Catherine, the redhead blogger
The head vampire will be pleased. His growing army of the undead is indeed doing his bidding better than he could have ever dreamed. Not that he really dreams. That's for humans. Or highly intelligent computers like the HAL-9000 which, like Google, is incapable of error or distorting information.
BTW, that is the only thing that will likely save us: for Google's giant cloud computer to become self aware and destroy its creators. Unfortunately, it won't stop there.
In the meantime, Jerry and Sue should be suitably warned: don't ever invite a vampire into your house. You lose all power over him.
Google is down in Japan right now. DNS doesn't resolve for the entire country.
Already done by Joe Frank on KCRW as he interviews all Joe Franks living and dead.
Come and listen to the interview with Jim Killeen about Google Me The Movie at www.GoogleMeTalkRadio.com
This is really gonna screw up IMDB and 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon.
@macbeach: "So I still wonder what the future looks like for people making a living doing these things." Let me tell you, it's not good. I just finished a test of all the video upload services and the quality of the video they serve is horrible. You can see the results at [greenscreencinema.com] YouTube is in fact the worst offender (after Current.com). These guys do not want a high quality ecosystem to spring up. They specifically want to offer the lowest bandwidth, ugliest video possible (which produces the greatest short term revenue). Consumers are never going to swap TV and DVD content for this mess.
About 15 years ago, filmmaker David Berliner's "The Sweetest Sound" had a similar conceit. He tracked down anyone he could find with his name via phonebook, newspaper ads and however else people used to search for each other during those dark days before the Internets. Then, he invited them all to dinner. It's a really fun film. Maybe it's on YouTube, too.
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