It's almost Xmas and without realizing it, a month has gone by since my last post!  Shit.  Well.  How is everyone?  I have a question.  For all the people who have signed up in the last six months or so.  Where the heck do you come from?  How do people still know about this site?  I'm always amazed when someone emails me about Storm Front.  I mean, it's so old now and rarely gets updated and still I tend to get feedback.  I'm currently writing the latest chapter but I've had trouble with it.  I knew it was going to be trouble for a long time because I hadn't decided in my head what role, if any, to give Storm.  But I've followed my gut and gone with it.  I really just want to get this story done, because I have a hell of a lot of other stories in my head, and I want this site to be a place I can put my writing.  One day, I would love to be paid to write, because I really enjoy it.  And most of the time it's the daily grind that gets in the way of me being able to do that.  Which is annoying, because I'm not getting any freaking younger. 

I need to get my head together.  My life is in all kinds of jumble and limbo right now, with my younger brother's situation and myself getting settled into Auckland again.  I feel so lucky to have this site to come back to and vent, but I wish it could be more than that.  I wish it could be busier, more active.

I want some help from you guys out there.  You know, we live in really interesting times.  In America, the WGA strike threatens to destabilize the TV industry.  But really, it was inevitable anyway.  The advent of the internet threatens to change the way people seek out their new media.  I may just be pissing in the wind here, but I have a screenplay that I'm sitting on that was written for SF.  And I don't know who to hand it to to do something about it.  I've had several people read it, and I even had one guy several years ago who was trying to sell it for me and even mock filmed a ten minute demo, but he went AWOL on me, and that really knocked me back.  Now here I am, years later, cursing fate for getting in the way of me doing what I want to do. 

Is anyone out there remotely connected to the industry that can help point me in a direction that might help?  What I really want to do is develop this screenplay independently here in NZ, because the feedback I've had from so many people is that the screenplay is really good.  So, I'm just putting this out there, my dream really, in the hope someone might read this and be able to help.  If I went the independent route to develop this, I'd be looking at between 200,000 - 300,000 NZ to finance this.  Which is really at the lower end of the scale.  But that would employ the use of a local production crew.  Unless I happen to win the lotto, I don't see that kind of money falling out of the sky any time soon.  But I want this.  I really want it.  I'm angry that I've let it sit for this long.

So now here I am, pondering where I'm at and what I can do.  If anyone has ties to a production company or wants to read the screenplay and even look at backing it themself, then contact me.  I've got nothing to lose by asking.  The other avenue I thought was something a bit more modern.

Given that developing the screenplay as an independent film would involve costs that are prohibitive right now, I've been pondering a different avenue.  Now, tech heads out there, help me out, and also anyone who might have something to add.  Let's say I scaled back the scope of the screenplay [which was either supposed to be a standalone film or could serve as a starting platform] so that it could be done with principal cast, thus lowering costs, and with a few HD digital cameras, and then streamed online from this site?  How much would I be looking at from a technical point of view as far as servers go and what would I need for this to really be something worth looking at?  The content could be ad or subscription supported to generate revenue and cover the cost of hosting, or would that still not be cost effective?

Someone please give me something to work with.  I'm just bouncing ideas here, but they're ideas that I am really hoping someone can come back to me with positive feedback from which to progress.  Storm Front, the story is still going to get done, but it's almost finished anyway, and I'm really looking ahead at a way to take what I do up a level.

So, there's the indie route, the online route, the stick to writing lots and make the site ad supported route, but either way, this site isn't going anywhere unless some kind of change comes for me personally.  So hear me and help me out with any thoughts you guys have.  Until next time,

Peace.