For Better And Worse And Everything In Between.

Ran into a friend the other day who was going thru a parenting related crisis of self confidence that I easily related to.

Seems that for whatever reason we can lose ourselves in our work or whatever else we may be passionate about to the extent that we are defined entirely by our level of interest and people hate to see us coming because it means there'll be another long goddamn self absorbed discussion about our thing. But it doesn't reveal itself in the same way it does when we become so wrapped up in the raising of our children that it seems like that's all we are. That is easy to see in the mirror.

Before we had kids I had a lot of anxiety about how it would change my life and what those changes would cost. I was absolutely right about almost all of them and the ones I got wrong were underestimates. But I don't care in the same way. Life eventually comes back to you in a way that is different but far better.

Gettin' my geek on..

I've been reading Wealth Of Nations by Adam Smith for what is unfortunately the first time and it has set me to pondering how and why advances in technology have not lowered the bar for easier distribution in the making of films. Other creative endeavors; books, magazines, music, have obviously experienced a serious demonetizing due to vastly lower costs of production and distribution. Not so with film and in fact Im wondering if it'll ever happen.

Technological advances in film making have tended to increase the overall costs of production rather than lower them. So while Smith argues that a greater increase in the division of labor within an industry tends to make that industry more efficient and thus produce cheaper products the reverse would be true here. It seems that increased specialization in film production is leading to increased costs and is substantially raising the bar for entry into the market. Evidently advances in technology are not blurring the line between small and large budget films but in fact are making the distinctions all the more clear, to such an extent that its almost as if they are two separate genres.

Can we infer that what applies to the production of widgets does not apply to the business of creativity? Im sure Im not smart enough to know but it strikes me that this is exactly the opposite of what economists would predict.