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Worth Reading: Crowdsourced Animation...AMPAS Rules & The Internet...'United Breaks Guitars'...The Etsy Economy, And More

A bunch of great stuff to point you to... some of which I've tweeted about earlier in the week...

- Sony Pictures is going to handle theatrical distribution of a crowd-sourced animated short called "Live Music" this November, from the start-up company Mass Animation. The budget was about $1 million (spent on what, exactly?), and 51 people around the world contributed shots; each was paid $500 (that adds up to about $25,000 of the budget) and will get a credit on the film. Here's the press release, the Mass Animation Facebook page is here (they don't seem to have a corporate site), and the teaser is below:



-Filmmaker Noah Harlan has this thoughtful rant about the Academy's Rule 12, which limits experiments with day-and-date releasing (at least if you want to be Oscar-eligible.) The rule says: "No type of television or Internet transmission of a contending documentary feature may occur anywhere in the world until 60 days after the completion of the New York and Los Angeles seven-day qualifying runs.” Here's an earlier Deadline Hollywood post on the issue.

- Some analysis of the impact of the music video "United Breaks Guitars" (worth watching if you haven't seen it) -- a customer complaint about United Airlines that turned into a viral hit.



- Fortune Small Business looks at the online crafts marketplace Etsy, where a few artists earn six figures annually -- but most are still working day jobs.

- Adam Chapnick points us to this important explanation of how to create "overlays" on your YouTube videos -- for instance, to suggest to viewers that they buy your DVD/CD/book.

- I'm a big Steely Dan fan, and I love the approach they're taking on their summer tour: playing some "Internet Request" concerts, where the entire set-list will be determined by fans.

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