Shame-faced self-promotion

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DaveMc
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Joined: Tue Jul 28, 2009 12:28 pm

Shame-faced self-promotion

Post by DaveMc » Sun Nov 18, 2012 3:06 pm

It's like shameless self-promotion, but with added shame!

Here's the thing: I'm a scientist, and I'm currently involved in a somewhat peculiar grant selection process. We had to write a research proposal, but in addition to that, we were asked to produce a two-minute video describing the proposed project. These videos have now been posted online, and some portion of the decision process will depend on getting people to "like" the video. (I say "some portion" because I don't know how much this counts, and nobody will tell us! I suspect it's just that they want some reasonable amount of response to the video. Part of the grant involves public outreach, so my theory is that this video is a way to see if the applicant can convey information in an accessible way, and generate at least some non-zero amount of interest in it, as measured by "likes".)

If, by any chance, any NoS forum readers might be willing to go see the video (shot on location in Bangalore, India), and then "like" it, it would be a great help. The voting period closes on November 22, so there are just a few days left. Here's the link:

http://applications.grandchallenges.ca/ ... B4CA87F6AA

Or sometimes the direct link doesn't work, in which case the truly dedicated might go to

http://applications.grandchallenges.ca

and search for "mcmillen" (I'm the only applicant with that surname).

One implication of posting this, I suddenly realize, is that I'm showing everyone what I look like. So there you go, behold the results of three-and-a-bit years of NoS; for my pre-NoS appearance, add about 20 pounds to what you see there. And please mentally subtract 10 pounds that the camera has added. :)

Cheers,
DaveMc


["DVD extras": The "bad dubbing" joke originates because I was being filmed by some friends with an iPad, who were standing right next to a busy Bangalore street, making the location sound completely unusable. We'd been toured around Bangalore all day by this group of friends, and we were running out of time to make the video. The kids were feeling ill, we needed to head back to the hotel soon, so the original plan of returning to the hotel to get my notes before going to some other location wasn't going to work, and I needed that video footage *that day* if was going to have time to edit it all together. So I just did my best to remember the script I'd written, then recorded new audio in a quiet hotel room, later. I guess I got the words pretty well right for the first few seconds, but after that it started to diverge hilariously. And given the lack of time, I decided to make the whole thing into a joke rather than, say, reshooting the video in a boring hotel room. I love the way people are turning to stare at me as they pass, I think it makes it all seem much more real. Directly behind the camera was a group of about 30 people watching the process, probably assuming I was shooting a news story or a documentary.]

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