Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Actors with Puppies & some other important stuff

Motion Picture Gems wrote a bit of a nasty post about the Twitter account @ClassicFilmRead. (which has since been taken down.) The blogger points out that there was no announcement about the Twitter feed, no name, no identification, no nothing. Is this person just capitalizing on other's people posts? Why are certain blogs on there but others are not? Who is this Classic Film Reader person anyways?

The answer is, it's ME!

Yes, it's me. I decided to secretly create an RSS-fed Twitter account to help support classic film bloggers who put so much time and effort into their posts, I feel like they should be recognized. And maybe Twitter followers only want classic film posts to read. Maybe they don't want to read about what you ate for breakfast, how much you hate your work and what happened on last night's episode of Mad Men. But you are posting links to your articles on your Twitter along with that other junk. ClassicFilmRead, it's all posts, all the time. That's more opportunities for people to read your work. Please give me a good reason why that is a bad thing, because I would L-O-V-E to hear it!

Also, some folks use their Twitters as Readers. I know sometimes I use Twitter to alert me when a new post is up. And while I depend on Google Reader for most of my blog reading, I get alerted to a larger set of interesting links on Twitter.

I left two big honking clues on the @ClassicFilmRead account. Two images of actresses with wrenches.

First is Bonita Granville.



She's my choice as a profile picture. If you've been reading this blog long enough, you'll know that I dressed up as Bonita Granville - Nancy Drew, wrench and all.

The background is Ginger Rogers.



This is a screen cap that Jonas from All Talking! All Singing! All Dancing! got for me because he knew I loved a classic film actress with a wrench. I used it in my Birthday post for Ginger Rogers.


For those of you who figured and out and kept it to yourselves, thanks for your discretion.

The blogger also likened by @ClassicFilmRead to the Pakistani blog thief that I warned people about a while back. REALLY?! That infuriates me to no end. Because unlike the Pakistani blog thief, each and every one of those RSS-fed tweets contained a prefix naming the blog in question and a link to a blog. You got all the credit! The account was just alerting people to a new post.

You know they would have found you on Google right?

I know KC inquired too. I felt really bad about not telling KC my identity but I didn't think it was necessary to reveal myself. I set up a Twitterfeed account, loaded it up with RSS feeds (even to some blogs I don't care to read), and left it at that. I haven't had many suggestions on what to add, but would have been welcome to add them. With the proliferation of classic film blogs on there, I can't follow them all, I don't know them all and it would be impossible to collect them all. So I put up what I knew and left it at that.

Why didn't I announce it? Why should I have to? I did this as a good deed, not a selfish one, and I didn't want any attention for it. Instead, I get negative attention so now I have to defend myself.

Now I would like to end this post with happy pictures of classic film actors and puppies. Enjoy!


Dirk Bogarde from Discovering Dirk Bogarde


Tony Curtis


Clark Gable


Cary Grant


William Powell


Errol Flynn




Buster Keaton


Humphrey Bogart


John Wayne

Rudolph Valentino 


Paul Newman (oh heck yeah!)



Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. (provided by Noir Girl)

lucynic83:

Gregory Peck

As if he needed a kid and a wagon full of puppies to be more adorable! 

Gregory Peck along with his son and lots of puppies. (provided by @addieread)


Randolph Scott



Robert Cummings (via Classic Montgomery)



Richard Barthelmess (via The Long and Short of It All)



Marlon Brando (via The Long and Short of It All)



Frank Sinatra


Steve McQueen

@QuelleLove Here's one! Sorry @IngyandMillie -I sort of stole this from your blog! Please forgive me! :-D

Bobby Darin (via ClassicForever)


22 comments:

  1. Wow. Why do people get so upset about something so minor as having a Twitter feed with no ID? Sounds a bit preposterous to me.

    The actress with a wrench thing -- totally cool. (I like a woman with a weapon. Hehe.)

    Paul Newman and...is that a chihuahua? Anyway, YUM!

    Humphrey Bogart and his enormous pooch look quite amazing as well.

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  2. Emm - I just guess people are too on their guard and think anonymous activity means negative activity. Oh well.

    Thanks! I know quite a contrast, Newman and a tiny pooch and Bogart and an enormous one! Ha.

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  3. I read the Motion Picture Gems post. I'm with Emm on that one. & I'm now following your ClassicFilmRead, btw. Anyone who has followed your blogging activity should know you're not out here to rip anybody off--you generate lots of great content!

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  4. I should've known it was your account! I always see that photo of Bonita pop up and it triggers something in my mind. I've just never connected it up. I like the idea of having a feed for classic film blogs. Seems quite marvelous to me.

    These hunky guys with puppies are a stroke of genius. Thanks for including my DFJ! :)

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  5. I love the classicfilmread twitter account, I think it was a marvelous idea! I get caught up on a lot of my classic film blog reading this way. I don't think it's anything AT ALL like the blog thief. That was stolen content, and you are basically providing free advertising for blogs. That's a good thing!

    I think 99% of film bloggers would commend you for starting this account (myself included), so don't let it get you down :)

    By the way, the Dirk photo is obviously my favorite (Thank you for including it!!) but that Paul Newman photo? YOWZA!

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  6. I don't understand very well how twitterfeeds work (and you know that I don't know the first thing about classic films!), but it seems to me that you were doing a good thing and providing a service that clearly there was a demand for -- otherwise the feed wouldn't have had that many followers. Don't let one person's unfounded criticism get to you. And thanks for the puppy pictures! The Gregory Peck one makes me smile! :)

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  7. This is AshInTheDark from Twitter. I've been following ClassicFilmRead for all the reasons you just explained. It doesn't offend me. I like reading about classic movies and it's another place for me to find posts I might not have otherwise. You never claimed all those posts were yours. I think it was clear you were just sharing. I don't get why anyone would be mad at you for driving more traffic their way. Isn't the idea of blogging to share with others? I say keep it up...and considering you've got 265 followers, others seem to like what you're doing too. Besides anyone who posts pics of actors with puppies is certainly not a bad person :)

    -Ashley

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  8. I suspected it might be you, and now I get to thank you! As you might be aware, I found the Classic Film Reader Twitter feed so useful I recently added it to my blogroll. (It was also part of the impetus for me to finally set up a Twitter account a few days ago; I haven't Tweeted anything, at least yet, but wanted to be able to more easily find Tweets of interest.) I really appreciate the time you have taken to make it easier to find interesting posts on classic movies. I regularly visit your feed, K.C.'s "Classic Links," Kristina's Kinema (which is one big blogroll), and other blogrolls to find the latest posts of interest. I also appreciate (and am flattered) that you have regularly linked to me!

    Earlier today I posted a comment at Motion Picture Gems explaining that I find that Twitter feed very helpful to direct me to other blogs of interest, and that I don't see any difference between that and a blogroll feed which lists the latest post title (a feature I hope to have someday when I finally upgrade to layouts, grin)...everything was attributed. I didn't mention it, but I also think there's no need to ask for participants, just as I wouldn't ask before linking to someone in a post or in a blogroll. Links are a big part of what blogging's all about, right?

    Thanks again!

    Best wishes,
    Laura

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  9. i'm with adriana. i don't understand much about twitter feeds or classic films, but based on your explanation above, the @ClassicFilmRead account sounds marvelous. you're spreading the word about the classics. how could anyone be mad about that?

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  10. Laura summed this up so well--I went to the blog & also left a comment, which is pending approval. Right now, there are no approved comments on the post.

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  11. And...as of right now, that post is gone. I went back to see if any comments were approved and it's not there. All it says is that it was taken down since he knows who you are now.

    Ashley
    @ashinthedark

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  12. I'm overwhelmed by all the support. Thank you everyone!

    John - Thanks, I appreciate your kind words.

    Noir Girl - I'm surprised most people didn't guess! And thanks for contributing that DFJ pic, it's swell.

    Kate - Thanks for your support and your Dirk Bogarde photo is what made me think of starting a series of Actors with puppies! That one is too adorable. And yes, free advertising. Not a bad thing at all.

    Adriana - It means so much that you stop by and leave a comment with your support. Thank you so so much.

    AshintheDark - Thank you! I hope those followers get something out of the service. And I'm glad that the actors with puppies rounds out this post. I hate just posting angry thoughts.

    Laura - Hey! I saw you on Twitter and that you were following Classic Film Read. Thank you so much for adding the Twitter to your blog roll. Since you are such a prolific and efficient blogger you show up a lot on there. I hope it's driven some good traffic to your site. Thanks for posting on Motion Picture Gems. I don't think he has accepted any comments though. It's still empty.

    Abby - Wowzah! You and Adriana both stopped by? I'm so honored. Thank you so much for your support.

    John - I am not sure that he will accept any comments on his post but I'll accept all of them on mine!!!

    Ash - Thanks for the heads up. Good thing I e-mailed the post to myself before he took it down.

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  13. Awww, love the pics! The Steve McQueen and Robert Cummings pics are my favorites.

    As to the other, I have yet to go on twitter myself, but I think quite a few bloggers have gotten so paranoid of content theft that it's just easy to jump to conclusions. I know I frequently use the blog links on people's sidebars to find both new blogs and blogs with posts that are interesting me. Sounds like what you did is something similar, just in a different venue.

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  14. I can only echo what has been said above - the ClassicFilmRead is a god send for us Classic Film Bloggers!

    It is far from easy to get our blogs 'out there' in the wider web, and I have watched with great pleasure to see @ClassicFilmReads followers steadily accumulating and gaining real traction.

    And I completely sympathise with your reaction to the accusation that there was some sort of link between @ClassicFilmRead and the Pakistani blogger thief! That line of enquiry confirmed the slightly malicious tone of the article in question and there really is no place for such unsubstantiated accusations in our classic film community.

    I did suspect that you were running the account, and respected you all the more for keeping your identity anonymous.

    My only hope is that the post from Motion Picture Gems does not dissuade you from maintaining your fantastically altruistic attitude towards the classic film community - and that the many messages of support demonstrate just how invaluable a member of the community you are.

    And yes, the pictures are brilliant!

    Aman

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  15. I rather suspect the classicfilmread was someone I knew, and the use of Bonita Granville as a profile pic should have been a dead giveaway! Anyhow, I didn't care if it was anonymous or not, I liked it. For one thing, the way I see it, it gives my blog more exposure. For another thing, it makes it easier to keep track of my favourite classic film blogs!

    BTW, I love the pics of actors with puppies, although pictures of pretty girls with puppies would be better. Or better yet, pretty girls with kittens! :-)

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  16. Glad you got your account back, keep twitterfeedin' :-)

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  17. I hope you're going to keep the feed going, it's one of my favorites!

    I tried a similar thing a year or two ago with my now deceased @moviecollector Twitter account though I did regular Tweeting through that account as well. It became too much work to keep the second account up, but like you my only intention in starting it in the first place was to share content and promote others whose work I liked. I can't see it as theft anymore than linking out to someone on a blogroll is theft. It's generating traffic for others!

    PS: Had absolutely NO idea it was you, lol!

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  18. Well Ms. Raquelle, I have to admit that I was bummed out about the secrecy. Not so much the way it was set up--but that I asked and the secrecy remained. I don't know why, because I usually like suspense, surprises, etc. Maybe I don't have the sense of humor I thought I did? But it wasn't a big deal to me.

    As you know, sharing interesting classic movie tidbits is my passion--and I think it was kind of you to do the same on Twitter.

    I have to say I did eventually decide it was you. Tom asked me about it, got me curious, and gave me several clues I hadn't picked up on. At first I was like "no way, it's not Raquelle", but faced with the facts, I figured he had to be right!

    I hope you will keep it up. RSS and the like are such wonderful tools for getting information to busy people.

    xoxo

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  19. All promotion is good promotion! There's a lot more subscribers to that feed than to my actual blog so I can't see how it could be a bad thing creating a feed of favorite blogs. It's almost like StumbleUpon for classic film blogs.

    Of course I guessed it was you all along, I know a girl with a wrench when I see one.

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  20. little late to this party but must add another vote for your twitter feed being a great idea/ well done/ i love it! i'm only a few weeks on twitter and yours was the first classic film thingy i followed,so it's nice to find out the tweeter is the blogger i've been reading for so long. keep up the good stuff
    kristina

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  21. Whoa. Lots of comments. There has been a misunderstanding here because I never

    intented for a "nasty" post to ruin the reputation of any blogger. I'm sorry if it came across

    that way. Also I never said the idea was a bad thing; all I did was speculate why it would

    be anonymous and asked how my readers found it useful. As KC mentioned, an attempt to contact the person resulted in someone saying they were a "bot", not answering truthfully. Furthermore, I did not get one single comment on my post from anyone upset about it. At least now there is some contact information so people can recommend a blog, and now have a way to thank you.

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  22. Hey, blogging, tweeting, its all about connecting, sharing information with like minded folk. RSS feeds are the way to go! I was just happy to see @TCManiacs included. Great idea.

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