So it’s 1am and I’m waking at 5am. No idea if I’ll sleep at all this week, because I’ve been asked to break a world record of advice-giving, using video and a sexy new laptop as a video-editing platform. I’m tired but excited!!
Just drop in your email to enter to win the laptop. And I hope I can rely on your advice this week on how to make the project more interesting and the video more enticing. And subscribe to the Wheel Questions Twitter for more frequent updates.
Here is the press release. Please help spread the word. 🙂
HP Envy to break World Record through Massive Digital Art Project
Advice columns are popular and you can read three or four answers a week in any newspaper. Now there’s a Boston-based artist who wants to answer 1,000 questions in a week, a world record.
This would be the second world record for Johnny Monsarrat, best known as the founder of Turbine, Inc., the largest videogames company in New England. He and the Boston community set a first record this summer, through a public art project. Called Wheel Questions, it’s an outdoor kiosk that entices visitors to submit a question on a colored card. Monsarrat got over 10,000 questions in four months and answered most of them, all by hand. The results were posted on the outdoor installation and on a website.
Now Wheel Questions is taking it to the new level, through a “Video Blitz”, which is sponsored by HP, Intel, and Best Buy. They’ve loaned Monsarrat an HP Envy laptop computer and video equipment, and connected him with key New England festivals like the Thanksgiving celebration in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and Harvard Square’s Sparklefest, home to Harvard University.
Then it’s up to Monsarrat to work the festivals, shoot questions all day, and then answer, edit video, and blog from the HP Envy laptop in the evening. Can anyone really answer 1,000 questions in a week? Speed is essential. If each video needs 5 minutes’ labor, one night would stretch into 11 hours.
“If the essence of art is impact,” said Monsarrat, who will blog about his progress, “then the better tools you have, the more impact.” Billed as the dream laptop for digital artists, does the HP Envy have the clout to keep up? Unfortunately, at the end of the week, Monsarrat will have to part with the high-end laptop. It’s being given away. You can follow the Wheel Questions story and put your name in to win at www.WheelQuestions.org.
