The Gospel according to Dr Witmol*

Earlier this week I had the pleasure of attending my client's national conference where the closing address was delivered by the Reverend Tim Costello, head of World Vision Australia (and brother of former Federal Treasurer Peter Costello).

The reverend was an excellent speaker, articulate and engaging, and covered topics from the outcry against executive bonuses, to poverty and climate change. In rolling out the figure that thousands of people (I believe 400,000) died because of the GFC, he said we're now living in a Global Ethical Crisis. However, he argued that the world has lacked certain values all along but it's only because of recent events that we've been able to see them, and that at the furore over excutive bonuses was really just "haggling over the price tag".

[His example was the movie 'Indecent Proposal' (where a millionaire offers a struggling couple a million dollars if he can sleep with the wife) and an anecdote attributed to George Bernard Shaw where Shaw offers an attractive lady 10,000 pounds to spend the night with him. After agonising over it, she agrees. He then offers her a shilling and sixpence. "Mr. Shaw! What do you take me for?" "We have already established what you are," Shaw replies. "Now we are merely haggling over the price."]

I'd beg to differ that whether or not you are buyable equates to a lack of ethics and the amount was just about haggling over price. In any transaction there's a sacrifice on both sides, whether that's money, dignity, values, services etc. While I don't disagree with the reverend about the fact that most of the world has been missing certain values (regarding human lives, the environment etc) all along, if you only look at the direct transaction, you miss the context of why events occur.

For example, an otherwise chaste woman sleeps with a man for $300. Is she a prostitute? Has she sold out on her ethics? Well, what if she were desperately poor and needed the money to buy her child medicine? In this case, the transaction was not actually sex for $300 but sex for health of a child, in effect.

Costello's address was all about interdependency so it was interesting that he did not seem to demonstrate that price tags themselves have interdependencies. In my view, what needs to happen is a good hard look at those interdependencies, identifying what they are and changing things so that we can get more direct correlations between actions and impacts.

But overall, I did agreed with his premise, that we should not be outraged about how much executives are being paid, but rather question on what basis they receive them, considering the social impact certain behaviour has wrought worldwide.

* Please note that I am not a doctor, medical or otherwise. The history of my handle 'Dr Witmol' came from a conversation I, aged 13, had with a friend, whose mother was completing a PhD. Me: "What does PhD stand for?" Her: "Doctor of Philosophy." Me: "Like, 'what is the meaning of life?'"

This is Not Art (festival)

Above: The All-Star Literary Smackdown

This is Not Art
Various venues, Newcastle (1-5th October, 2009)

Despite having half a dozen unfinished reviews sitting in the drafts folder on the back end of this blog, I've decided to come through with this one because of the profound effect TINA has on me every time I go.

I'll start by saying that I go to TINA primarily for the National Young Writers' Festival but occasionally (though not this year) go to other sessions under the TINA umbrella. But I have to say it's all about 'the vibe of the thing'.

I drifted in at 1.30pm on Saturday on account of train trouble, which I won't go into (a whole separate blog post) and left on the 2.35pm train to Sydney on Monday, so this is my account of the parts of TINA I did actually attend.

SESSIONS
Adaptation (Sat): For a panel that has been in the making for several years, it was surprising to find this tucked away in a pocket room of the Newcastle City Hall, with predictable audience spillovers. As someone who has often been in debates about book vs movie vs play, I found the overall conclusion to this rather satisfying: that a creation needs to fit the medium, not concern itself with what's left in or left out.

I also liked Marieke Hardy's answer to my question on 'definitive' versions, which was (roughly) 'the medium that best tells the story to an individual', though Philip Gwynne emphatically said: "The book, always the book."

Give me Cleo over Kerouac (Sat): This was a pop culture vs literary panel. I have to admit I've read neither Cleo magazine nor Kerouac's work (though considering the number of times Kerouac kept being mentioned through the weekend I've since picked up 'Windblown World'). Despite the excessive number of panellists, the message came through clearly: it doesn't have to be literary to be good, and pop culture is 'consumed' differently to literature so stop bloody well comparing apples with oranges.

Journalistic Ethics (Sun): Some thought this an oxymoronic title but to that I say: you should have been there. You would have encountered an intelligent discussion of the commercial, political and temporal pressures compromising journalists these days, with the upshot being that we need more transparency, and we need to educate readers so they can identify agendas and read between the lines.

Life in a Lonely Planet (Sun): Travel writing fascinates me, mostly because I'm terrible at it. I'm a decent writer and an enthusiastic traveller, but after this panel, my self-diagnosis is that there's not enough of an internal journey in my travel writing. A lot of the panel focused on how to make a journey your own, which I found a nice contrast to those bland travel articles in mainstream newspapers that pay badly anyway.

'Neon Pilgrim'/'Apply Within' launch (Sun): Caught only the end of this on account of being at the Zine Fair but I did get my copy of 'Neon Pilgrim' signed by Lisa Dempster and learnt that it was actually more difficult to write the book than do the henro michi.

Moving Units (Mon): Marketing has been a dirty word for a very long time but the practical nature of this advice panel was really good at dispelling the myth that you have to sell out to make sales. Among the best tips: choose your marketing medium (ie don't blog if you're not a blogger), don't be afraid to get out there and do as many things as possible, and don't associate yourself with The Chaser if they've just been nationally abused for a sketch they did on TV.

Writing the Big One (Mon): It was a nice insight into the working lives of some very different writers; juggling work, life, study and family with writing as well as dealing with agents and publishers. I think the best thing that came out of it was the message that there's no definitive way to complete a work, you just have to be aware of the issues and navigate them the best way you can. Sigh.

HIJINKS
The All-Star Literary Smackdown (Sat): Fiction vs non-fiction. Well, my bum got sore sitting on the fence as a journo who makes a living off non-fic, but also an aspiring novelist. However, the Smackdown was highly entertaining with both well constructed and ill-conceived point-scoring from both teams. I think the highlight of the night was Shantaram shot-put as the tie-break (followed by Philip Gwynne arm-wrestling Anna Krien for the second tie-break). Maybe use a hardcover copy of 'Shantaram' next time?

The Great Gatsby Ball (Sat): I had on my drop-waist dress, a string of beads around my neck and a ribbon wound around my head as a headband, but without a program or a map at this point I could not for the life of me find the damn venue (which I knew was on King/Thorn but that was it). When I eventually encountered it on the way back to the YHA (having more or less given up at this point) there was a massive line out the front, so I took a detour and went up to The Obelisk.

I did make it down the hill again, and into the venue, to catch the last set of The Civic Big Band that gave the partygoers a grand swing sound to jiggle to. I was mightily impressed with the amount of effort that went into costumes and accessories, with a suprising number of people competent at moving in a 1920s kinda way. Don't ever let anyone tell you that writers don't know how to party in different eras.

Zine Fair & Makers Market (Sun): Despite the Sydney Writers' Festival now hosting a zine fair component in its program, this is still my favourite part of TINA. I like talking to zinesters about their work and I like supporting them, even if it means I skip a meal (yes, once again I blew my entire budget at the fair, which meant I had to find a dinner venue with EFTPOS. It's fortunate the YHA makes me put down a $10 key deposit so I can get a train home).

Every year I think: THIS YEAR I WILL MAKE A ZINE I CAN SELL. And every year I get a little closer. One Side Only #3 will be ready in about 11 months...

Wriron Chef (Sun): A Rosie Pham, Benjamin Law and Lisa Dempster cook-off was always going to be a fun premise, but add Bryan Whalen's random hosting - and a healthy dose of audience participation - and this was a veritable funhouse. This included an audience poll about whether to keep peanut butter in the cupboard or the fridge (cupboard! der!) and Benjamin Law forging a third path: "Who has a nut allergy?"

He was also responsible for the best call of the session: "I'm just going to the toilet to drain my eggs." Maybe this contributed to his eventual win.

Spelling Bee (Sun): This took spelling (and other word nerd processes) to another level, made extremely palatable by beer. The world needs more entertaining competitions based around literary devices hosted by Lawrence Leung with a vendetta against a contestant named Patch.

The best part was the huge amount of audience participation (all the contestants were audience members who'd nominated themselves) and the fact that I learnt a little bit more about grammatical, cheese and font terminology.

Un-Erotic Erotica (Sun): A highly amusing, highly social night out. Loved the MC, Rebecca Meston, and the barrage of literary (an oh-so-un-literary) smut read/performed. Audience engagement was very high, which also makes for a great night out. I think the Mystery Meet followed this reading, which was not nearly as entertaining, especially as I was at that point wedged in a booth with six alternative types with questionable personal hygiene.

RENEW NEWCASTLE
Just also wanted to say a little about Renew Newcastle, a project that takes vacant premises and turns them into cool venues for shops or galleries and the like. Ever since my first TINA (hmm, that would be 2000, I think) I've viewed Newcastle as this dying phoenix, with only the arts to reignite it.

I'm possibly a lot biased because the only times I come to Newcastle are for creative pursuits (TINA as well as The Shoot Out), but thanks to Marcus Westbury, the godfather of Newcastle, the city is a place worth visiting. So, thank you Marcus, for reigniting Newcastle.

A special mention to my favourite Renew venue, Totoro's Teahouse (above) because I love tea and writing and art so very much.

Every time I go to Newcastle I feel inspired and connected (despite not going up with anyone on account of plentiful indifference from several regulars - yeh, I know Lee Tran Lam hosts a radio show on Sunday afternoon, whatever - but I did meet some great people). Can't wait for next year. Will definitely (definitely) have something for the zine fair.

Festival rating: 9/10
Enjoyment rating: 10/10

iSnack 2.0: The unfortunate story of Vegecreme

A couple of months ago my mother gave me a jar of the new Vegemite cream cheese hybrid, which I christened Vegecreme. I don't like cream cheese at the best of times (except maybe sandwiched between two lattice biscuits...) but I took it because I'd just run out of Vegemite and I thought it would serve me until I could get another jar.

The next day I immediately went out and bought a large jar of Vegemite. Vegecreme sucks. I mean, if you want Vegemite and cream cheese, go out and buy a fucking jar of Vegemite and a fucking tub of cream cheese and combine them yourself you lazy fucker.

A jar of Vegemite is useful on its own. You can have Vegemite on toast. You can make my favourite toastie (multigrain bread, Vegemite, avocado and cheese). A tub of cream cheese is useful on its own. You can blend it with sugar and lemon and sandwich the chilled results between two lattice biscuits. Together in the one jar it becomes a very poor substitute for Vegemite or salty cream cheese that you can't make into a popular dessert.

So anyway. Kraft ran a competition to name the new product. The name that won? iSnack 2.0. I thought it was a joke or some kind of Twitter mistake, but no, Vegecreme is officially Kraft iSnack 2.0.

There are three main reactions I've gauged thus far:
1) Surely Apple will sue.
2) The name's a piece of crap and the product is a piece of crap.
3) This is a marketing stunt right?

Well...
1) No, Apple doesn't own the 'i' prefix (think iRiver), and certainly not for food products in Australia.
2) Yes, the name doesn't really represent the product. I think it's trying to be clever ('I snack too') but it will date very quickly. And yes, as you've surmised, I think the product is a piece of crap.
3) Yet to be seen. Most people who think it's a marketing stunt are saying things like 'the name's so bad this can only be a marketing stunt'. There's no doubt that the announcement of the name has generated huge amounts of publicity with even The Guardian picking it up. It was a trending topic on Twitter at one point, too.

However, large amounts of publicity does not mean large amounts of sales and I don't see all this hype representing much financial benefit to Kraft. In fact, there has been a huge backlash with negative views on Vegecreme (such as this one!) being written and read that never would have seen the light of day had it not been for the publicity about the name.

So, #vegefail?

There have been upsides to the hype, though. My favourite was the call made by Twitterer @allanmoran: I wonder if iSnack spreads easily on a Rick-Roll :P #vegefail

...but also this gem:

And the monkey dances

I once had a friend (actually, I'll call her a frenemy because that's what she turned out to be) who used to enter heaps of competitions and win a lot of prizes. Her strike rate was exceptional, and I later found out why.

The rules and regulations of competitions in Australia insist that if the draw is of a random nature, that the entity running the competition has to apply for a permit in each of the states where the competition is run.

A permit doesn't cost that much, but the process that you have to go through to get one is paperwork heavy, and can take a few weeks. I know this because I once worked for a magazine that ran competitions and I was the dogsbody who had to apply for the permits.

Anyway, the alternative is the free method of running a competition where the entrants compete on skill. A skill-based competition merely needs someone to judge the entry on a basis clearly defined upon entry. Mostly this takes the form of the '25 words or less' creative entry. There are, however, problems with this.

This afternoon I entered a competition to see a film screening of 'Mao's Last Dancer' based on the fascinating story of Li Cunxin, who trained under Madam Mao's ballet school and then while in the USA, defected from China. Li enjoyed a career as a ballet dancer in the USA and Australia, and now lives in Melbourne as a stockbroker. I saw him speak at the Sydney Writer's Festival a couple of years ago and he was quite moving.

The competition, run by Event (formerly Greater Union) cinemas, instructed entrants to, Tell us in 25 words or less why you want to see Mao's Last Dancer, with a text box ready for entries. Below that was the competition basis: All 25 word or less entries will be judged, and the prize/s will be awarded based on the creativity of the answers.

I don't know about you, but it is very difficult to make a reason you want to see a film 'creative'. I want to see the film because I think his story is fascinating and insightful and says a lot about China; a different China to the economic enthusiasm being celebrated worldwide at present.

The 'creativity' basis thus poses a problem. My frenemy revealed to me that she always used rhyming poetry to convey 'creativity'. I was disgusted, and you'll know why if you know my views on poetry, what it is and what it is not. And yet thess rhyme wins prevail. I have won more '25 words or less' competitions with bad rhymes than I have any other way.

(Although there was that glorious time I won tickets to see 'Adaptation' by making a joke about Nicolas Cage 'Being John Travolta' in 'Face/Off', thus also referencing Charlie Kaufman's previous film 'Being John Malkovich') (P.S: When I won the tickets, my frenemy took credit, noting: 'Some of my luck must have rubbed off on you' despite the fact it was a game of SKILL. MY. SKILL.)

So instead of conveying my appreciation for Li's insights to China in a concise, intellectual fashion, monkey-see monkey-do I ended up submitting:

"Economically, China sets the world alight
But Cunxin writes of creative flight
From the nation's poor reality
His life a book and now movie."

Note the embarassingly poor rhyme of 'reality' with 'movie'. And I did this because I thought it would be more likely to get me the tickets than my original 'reason', which was pretty much centred on my admiration of Li and his story.

I want to see a '25 words or less' competition that makes sense. Instead of based on 'creativity', I want Tell us in 25 words or less why you want to see Mao's Last Dancer, with the competition basis being: The prize/s will be awarded based on the best reason.

P.S: I'll let you know whether I get the tickets.

P.P.S: A competition: In the comments section below, tell me in 25 words or less why this entry is wonderful. The prize is my admiration and it will be awarded on the basis of how much I like your entry.