Announcement

I work at alivenotdead.com - I am just a web-monkey. :-P

Born in DC, Lived in SF for 12 years, then Japan for 2 more. Been in HK since Summer 06. Take a look around, feel free to leave a comment!

我可以懂日文和中文。私の日本語下手じゃないけど、中国語のほうが上手よ！日本語分かったらコメントをくれて下さい！

My blog

US Movie Review: "Knocked Up"

Thursday, Oct 8, 2009 12:00PM / Standard Entry / US Movie Review

Entertaining but after recently watching "The Hangover" and finding out that this was the same director who also did "40 Year Old Virgin", I was somehow expecting more. Also I have a low tolerence for potheads and bums, so Seth Rogan's character didn't really appeal to me for 90% of the movie. I'll give it a 5/10. :-P

3 comments– Add a comment
US Movie Review: "Ghost of Girlfriends Past"

Wednesday, Oct 7, 2009 6:30PM / Standard Entry / US Movie Review

As you can guess from the title its like a Christmas Carol except w/ relationships.

A bit cliched, but entertaining for what its worth. Matthew McConaughey does a decent job carrying the film as the bad boy womanizer who is shown the error of his ways by the super natural. Jennifer Garner is very engaging too as the girl he should have ended up with.

Although not too nauseating for male viewers, in the end of the day its mostly just a chick flick w/ the requisite storybook ending. Michael Douglas's part as the Hugh Hefner-like uncle is the best part.

4/10 if you're a guy, maybe higher if your the girl who always tried to change the bad boy but were never able to. :-P

10 comments– Add a comment
Good thing I don't live in the US right now! FTC to Require Bloggers to Declare Freebies!

Tuesday, Oct 6, 2009 2:49AM / Standard Entry

Something for all of us (especially artists) to be aware of, (if you're living in the USA):

FTC: Bloggers must disclose payments for reviews
(AP) – 4 hours ago
PHILADELPHIA — The Federal Trade Commission will require bloggers to clearly disclose any freebies or payments they get from companies for reviewing their products.
It is the first time since 1980 that the commission has revised its guidelines on endorsements and testimonials, and the first time the rules have covered bloggers.
But the commission stopped short Monday of specifying how bloggers must disclose any conflicts of interest.
The FTC said its commissioners voted 4-0 to approve the final guidelines, which had been expected. Penalties include up to $11,000 in fines per violation.
The rules take effect Dec. 1.
The fact of the matter is there are a lot of bloggers out there who blog about products. Its reasonable to believe that if they received the goods in hand, they probably didn't have to pay for them. I don't think this is a controversy by anyone's definition (you don't expect Ebert to be paying for all those movie tickets, do you? Or if a game reviewer could only review the games he went out and bought, he'd be broke pretty fast)

But there's some stickiness when it comes to 'advertorial', ie 'I'm getting paid to write this review'. Obviously from the business point of view, I think that getting a mention in a blog (especially a celebrity's blog) has some fair market value, bit I think its not unreasonable to be up front about it if you are writing a glowing review of something and getting compensated. (ultimately people will be able to figure it out, so you might as well be honest from day 1).

In my case, I can't think of too many cases where I've written any blogs as a direct result of compensation (although I will admit I do write nice thank you blogs when I get free stuff!)

Anyway, if you're in the US, I guess start paying attention to this stuff, or the FTC may come knocking!

6 comments– Add a comment
giving my blog new life. Edison is back!

Monday, Oct 5, 2009 6:27PM / Standard Entry

This is making the rounds online today:

HONG KONG — Edison Chen will appear in his first movie since his career was derailed by a sex photo scandal more than a year ago.
The 28-year-old Chinese-Canadian actor-singer will feature in the English-language comedy, "Almost Perfect," which stars Kelly Hu, according to the Web site of New York-based production company Slew Pictures.
Slew Pictures founder Bertha Bay-Sa Pan is directing the movie, the story of an Asian woman who juggles the competing needs of her new boyfriend and her immediate family. Pan made the 2002 drama, "Face," starring Bai Ling.
It was not clear when the movie would be released. Slew Pictures' publicists did not immediately respond to an e-mail Monday seeking further details about the movie, and Chen's managers didn't return a call.
Photos that were leaked onto the Internet early last year showed Chen performing sex acts separately with eight female Hong Kong stars. The photos caused an uproar and forced the stars to suspend their careers.
A Hong Kong computer technician was sentenced to 8 1/2 months in jail in May for copying the photos from Chen's laptop.
Chen appeared in the 2002 hit Hong Kong police thriller, "Infernal Affairs," and in the 2006 horror movie, "The Grudge 2." He also had a cameo in the Hollywood blockbuster, "The Dark Knight," released last year.

cool! my original Edison blog has only 58k views.
http://www.alivenotdead.com/etchy/Edison-Chen-Sex-Photos-updates--profile-90395.html
This will give me a reason to blog about him more, maybe bump that up some more. ;-)
tags:
Edison Chen sex photos - Edison photo - 淫照陳冠希英皇公司鮑魚臘腸

7 comments– Add a comment
Alive in Singapore - THK Screening

Friday, Oct 2, 2009 8:35PM / Standard Entry / AnD-specific

On the 19th we did a screening of 'The Heavenly Kings' and panel discussion about the film and AnD at Sinema @ Old School in Singapore.

Before the show I set up our banner. Including HK, Macau, Mainland China, Japan and the US, this is the 6th country we've done an official event at!!! (did I miss any?)

After setting up it was just a matter of waiting to see who shows up!

Hey, all the way from KL, its Elvanna! And all the way from Singapore, its Philip Ng, who was in town working on a TV project.

Singapore artists rEpReSeNt!

And special guest, Terence!

Our host for the weekend, Nicholas Chee, who is the director at Sinema. They invited alivenotdead.com to participate in their 'Social Action Film Festival', we were part of a series on social media.

As you can see there was a good turn out of alivenotdead.com members and artists. I didn't get a chance to take pics of everyone unfortunately! That's Fish Chaar rocking his official alivenotdead.com logo T! ;-)

After the movie we did a panel discussion and answered questions about the movie and the website. There were a lot of questions about the reaction to the movie in the entertainment industry, the media, the general public, etc.

Philip shared his perspective and experience as an artist on how participating in AnD has helped him. He has been very effective in using it as a networking tool and has helped us bring in a lot of artists. Elvanne is dazzled with his story telling ability too.

Jedi_Jean shares her thoughts at the Q&A!

After the discussion panel, we met up with everyone outside for photos, chatting and delicious Coca Cola Zero (thanks to our sponsors at Coke Zero for the drinks!)

I was too busy talking to people to get any pics, I only took a few worth sharing:
Charlyn

Thanks to everyone who came out! I hope we can do more events with Sinema in the future!

18 comments– Add a comment