Meeting Minutes – 10.22.08

In attendance – Leesa Abahuni, G.H. Hovagimyan, Thomas Hutchison, Mayuko Nakatsuka, Maria-Joao Salema, Raphaele Shirley

Leesa says that she got Inocente Tequila to sponsor the youTube Slam and give us five bottles of Inocente Tequila. The group then talked about the youTube slma scheduled for Nov.8th.  The set-up at Postmasters is a large projector in the main gallery. The gallery is carpeted. Magda asks that we set up a bar either in the front foyer or in the back gallery. 

GH says he will check out the gallery today.  Tech questions are where to put the computer for the slam and can you have two computers one of which plays the playlists while the other may be used  for participants add their own playlists.  Raphaele say that we should have the computer in the main gallery so that the VJ can interact with the crowd.

Leesa thought that if food (tostidos) and booze were in the back no one would be in the gallery. She suggested to do a performance piece where she and other AM members carry shot trays around in the main gallery.  She suggested a costume. GH said like a marching band. Leesa said she was in a marching band in HS.  Joao said that we should all wear the AM shirts for the party making it a “performance.”  GH said that he wants to video the party as a part of the Plazaville  project. He referred to the cocktail party/execution scene in Alpahville. He said that we could play the execution scene from youTube and have some of the actors watch it while mixing with the crowd. 
Thomas asked how the Vjing was structured – the consensus was to play it by ear and see how the situation is on the day of the event.  Joao said that based on her experience with Lee doing YouTube parties at Monkeytown the AM group should prepare the material beforehand and not rely on the crowd to participate.   We need to confirm who is doing the event and what the division of labor will be.   So far we have confirmed for the event – Leesa & Nicole, Mayuko, Naho, GH, Thomas, Maria-Joao. Of course we all miss Lee and wish he wash here with his expertise in the video area.

There was some discussion about using deezer.com as a DJ combat event in the back room. Two questions are whether this will distract from the main room and how complicated it will be to add another layer to the event.  Thomas & Maria-Joao said we need a backup plan in case youTube freezes or something. Thomas said he will bring his iPod as back up. GH said he wants to shoot video of the event and then upload it to youTube. 

The group decided to meet once more before the event to edit the playlists and view all the content thus far.  The meeting is scheduled for Tuesday October-29th at 8pm at GH’s place.  The group will look at all the videos to get a sense of the event. GH said he put the playlists up on the AM site.
The group talked about Plazaville as a group project. GH said he is pursuing grants and venues for doing an installation of a projection piece.  He felt that VIDEO DUMBO would be easy because everyone knows Casper Straecke.
He said he is also proposing to Centre Pompidou and Museo Reina Sofia.

GH Said he still has a lot of material that was shot by Christina McPhee that needs to be edited. Thomas and Raphaele said they would help with the editing. The discussion went for a while on how to create various scenes for Plazaville. Raphaele said she wanted to use Zircotti Park and put up a temporary Sunken city with a smoke Machine and incorporate that into Palzaville. GH said there is a part in the script of Alphaville that has the scientists talking about the plans of Alpha-60 computer.   He also talked about doing a hotel scene at the Tribeca Grand.  Raphaele.

The group said they liked Lee’s idea to do a newsprint paper like the one we did for Conflux. GH had suggested twice a year. Fall and Spring. No ideas on content or theme yet.