Messages

421

The Green Room / Re: Shall there be an SMNetwork LinkedIn Group?

« on: Oct 27, 2012, 09:26 am »

What would be the point of making a LI group for us.  What would we gain?  I am having trouble seeing the advantage.  I see the advantage of individual members having LI profiles, but why do we need a group?

This was the root question behind my earlier post - perhaps better stated by Jessie. 

422

The Green Room / Re: Shall there be an SMNetwork LinkedIn Group?

« on: Oct 26, 2012, 03:13 pm »

Perhaps a question that needs to be asked of our pros who are still in the business:

• Those that hire: how often is LinkedIn a tool that will sway you towards hiring, or not hiring, a candidate?
• To our profesionals: how much career gain can you quantify from LinkedIn?  Have you been hired based on your profile or connections you've made through the network?  Have employers requested your LinkedIn profile as a tool to supplement your resume?

423

Tools of the Trade / Re: How to best use Dropbox?

« on: Oct 22, 2012, 11:21 pm »

Actually, Google Docs does a lot of the things Dropbox does (keeps a history, reversion, sends email notifications, mobile access) - I don't know if they have RSS alerts though.  I haven't found that any of my links have broken with the GDrive transition.  I prefer it for regular team collaboration and content creation, whereas Dropbox is solid for single-authorship file-sharing.

Based on my experience using the two I'd say Google Docs does a much better job of the things you mention - revisions, history, etc... as Google docs is a purpose-built cloud-based collaborative suite of applications.  Dropbox is primarily geared towards storage and client-side editing.

The one thing to be careful about with Google is their data mining.  There is a reason everything google offers is free - they mine all of your data to better refine their advertising services, which is their primary source of revenue.  For things like props tracking, rehearsal schedules, etc... - big whoop as these are not likely to have sensitive information, but could be concerning if you're getting into things like contact sheets and emergency contact forms. 

424

Employment / Re: Freelance, Non-AEA - need insurance?

« on: Oct 12, 2012, 09:33 pm »

While having professional liability insurance would never be a bad thing, it doesn't seem like it's a necessity in your case, especially if you're not working frequently due to your child (congratulations, by the way!).  It would certainly be an asset, however it would increase your cost and likely necessitate a rate increase on your end. 

What you may think about doing is getting a quote or two on a short-term policy that you could consider "show-specific".  Say, a 12-16 week duration, at a specific venue (or venues), at a relatively low level of coverage - something like $25,000 per occurence / $50,000 aggregate, or 50/100 depending on the size venue, type of equipment, what your specific role is (all things that could have an impact on your financial liability in the event of an accident).  If you have a quote handy and know your cost, you'd be able to pull the trigger quickly should a future employer ask you to obtain coverage.  More importantly, you'd be prepared for negotations.  You'd know immediately the costs associated with obtaining the coverage and would be able to adjust your rates with agility and accuracy, as opposed to shooting in the dark.

425

Tools of the Trade / Re: Backstage pants

« on: Oct 02, 2012, 08:28 am »

When I was SMing I had a few pair of black BDUs (Battle Dress Uniform) I picked up from an Army/Navy surplus store.  I wore them for 4-5 years and they held up amazingly well, though I guess that shouldn't be a surprise given what they're designed for.  They'd still be great, but I outgrew them (and not in a good way  ).

You may run into issues with length as the sizes don't come in many options (I think S, M, L only), but if you have access to your costume shop perhaps you can simply hem whichever pants you decide to go with? 

426

The Green Room / Re: Home Brewing

« on: Sep 17, 2012, 03:31 pm »

I've done a few kits before--they're easy, generally speaking, and tend to produce a decent brew. Where's your kit from?
Make sure you set aside a good chunk of time for it, of course--can easily take a full afternoon with the sterilizing & boiling, etc. And try to plan ahead so you don't have to bottle things during tech. Beer will always win over Q to Q.

It's a Brooklyn Brew Shop 1 gallon kit.  A small batch but it's meant for those of us who live in apartments or condos with limited storage.  The typical 5 gallon batch that home brewers use is a bit too large for my current apartment. 

Regarding the scheduling - yeah I've allocated basically an entire day for the process.  I'll take my time, especially on the first couple of batches.  I've been out of the production side of the industry for ~6 years now so I have weekends free.  Brewing will be this Sunday, bottling on Sunday the 14th

And Maribeth - thanks!

427

The Green Room / Re: Relief from insomnia

« on: Sep 17, 2012, 10:42 am »

I have always found that exercise is a great way to get my brain to stop thinking about things a couple of hours before bed.  This could be difficult though if you're not on a normal schedule (as you've mentioned) or traveling away from home.

428

The Green Room / Home Brewing

« on: Sep 17, 2012, 08:38 am »

Any other home brewers out there?  My better two thirds bought me a home brewing kit this weekend and I'm quite excited to get started.  The kit is quite nice in that it's geared for smaller living spaces, and perfect for condos/apartments/city dwelling.  Looking forward to making some beer!

429

Tools of the Trade / Re: Looking for suggestions

« on: Sep 14, 2012, 08:57 am »

For work-related purposes I'd still have to recommend a laptop for an SM.  While tablets are an excellent supplement to a laptop, they're not quite robust enough to make a laptop obsolete - especially for the duties of anyone on an SM team.  If your primary reason for getting a tablet was reading and referencing documents or media on the go and writing some basic emails, then yes - a tablet would cover thoses tasks effortlessly.  However, SMs are almost always the document creators.  How many reports, spreadsheets, word documents, etc.. are created or modified on a daily basis?  For me a tablet would just not cover that (especially as anally retentive as we are  ). 

But - at the end of the day, "how long is a piece of string?"  There are a million answers and this will ultimately boil down to your personal preference.  That said, hope the opinions of all here are helpful in making your decision!

430

Tools of the Trade / GoDaddy Outage

« on: Sep 10, 2012, 03:02 pm »

It seems as of about 40 minutes ago that all GoDaddy services are currently down after a suspected attack on their DNS services.  This includes any websites hosted by GoDaddy and mail services associated with those sites.  An FYI if you have hosted sites - and more importantly - hosted email, by GoDaddy. 

431

Tools of the Trade / Re: Style Question

« on: Aug 24, 2012, 01:37 pm »

Certain things we buy can be tax deductible if "they are not suitable for everyday use" I don't know about you but how often do you see people wearing long black sleeve shirts, dickies, and steel toes out on the town...so add that to your 2%

Quite often, as a matter of fact.  Maybe not wearing them all at the same time, but certainly piecemeal. 

I'm with Ruth on this one.  And on a larger note be careful what you decide to deduct from taxes.  No reason to flag the IRS (or similar tax collecting body) to pay any more attention to you than they already do.

432

Tools of the Trade / Re: Style Question

« on: Aug 21, 2012, 10:38 pm »

I think BalletPSM’s point about the culture of the specific theater is important, and this is also an issue of personal choice.  Most places I have worked, even admin staff dress very casually. 

I agree with this as well, and this applies to any line of work or company.  I have always had the mindset though to dress for the position you want, not the position you have.  If you are a PA and want to ASM, mirror the ASMs in level of "formality" (for lack of a better word; I don't want to say "style" as that's a personal choice, especially in the theatre industry), if you are an ASM and want to PSM, dress to a similar level as the PSM, etc..

While it won't guarantee upward mobility it will certainly help perception, even if only subconsciously.

433

Tools of the Trade / Re: Newish comm system - Green Go Comm

« on: Aug 14, 2012, 12:16 pm »

Looks promising, Green Go  http://www.greengocom.com/contactus.html
7. PoE has limited current supply. Maybe they should recommend some switches or hubs which can support 30+ beltpacks on a string.

Haven't heard of this as of yet.  The PoE raises a few flags for me as well,  though perhaps the current supply would not be an issue depending on the power requirements of the packs?  I don't see any information on their spec sheet that would detail power consumption.  I suppose another option would be a PoE injector, however that's simply an added failure point and not the most robust solution. 

434

Stage Management: Plays & Musicals / Re: ESCRIPTS: Post your requests for electronic scripts here!

« on: Jul 19, 2012, 10:55 am »

Project Gutenberg is also a great resource for digital copies of public domain books and plays. 

435

The Green Room / Re: SM: WORST THINGS

« on: Jun 27, 2012, 11:23 am »

The kicker, though, was him wondering why it sounded like the Northern end of a Southbound donkey. 

  Thank you very much for this phrase, KMC. It's one of those I'd like to store up and use on appropriate occasions.
[/quote]

Hah hah, it's a good one - please steal it!  When you say it in conversation people will stop, take a few seconds to think, then realize what it means.