COVID19 Kibosh

[Emanuel]

1 minute ago, mercer said:

I am trying to finish a sci-fi script for a contest at the end of the month. I also wrote my first "infection" inspired short film yesterday. My work was decimated by this damn virus, so I am trying to jump straight into working toward my dream. I plan on writing one short film a week and hopefully a few features by Summer.

WOW Is that the way you spend your quarantine period? What's up with your fiancée? Your worry, community's worry where everyone and goodwill are welcome without exception : -)

[mercer]

6 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

For sure, I am an avid reader of your content and miss your presence, you well know that : ) Unfortunately not clear to everyone here. I'm afraid Super8 reads everything from me with political bias because we don't exactly share the same angle about US politics : D Sounded irony to him/her I guess because I was used to apply for a different tone other than confrontation, pretending to not follow the hostile vibe. Hence the sarcasm at times. Make my sincere wishes we may handle to clear up the whole thing from now on for once.

Thanks, Emmanuel.

I think we all need to take a deep breath and remember that this is an online forum. I would take more offense by my own farts than I would from someone on this site.

With that said, through this site I have made some life long friends and this was probably my first true interactions with you damn foreigners... lol. So I have learned a lot about people over the years thanks to this site... and I have realized that I am a bit of a misanthrope because of it... haha.

[mercer]

6 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

WOW Is that the way you spend your quarantine period? What's up with your fiancée? Your worry, community's worry where everyone and goodwill are welcome without exception : -)

I'm trying. Maybe it will be a silver lining of this new world order. My fiancée has some fairly major health issues and we don't have a really large support system, if we need anything, I must go and get it, which could be disastrous if she gets this effin thing. I hope you and your's are safe!

[Super8]

Good luck to you also.

 

[Emanuel]

Have you ever watched this one from this famous foreigner (Lars Von Trier) who never visited America because he's afraid to fly despite his successful stories located in your country?

May this one serve as inspiration to 'infection' shorts? : ) Well, like it or not, impossible to deny his influence in the contemporary media in general... Sorta foreshadowing ; -)

[kaylee]

@mercer thats frickin awesome!!! go get em!!!!

hows the writing going, in general? definitely helps to dooo it right?? i mean i bet you can feel yourself becoming better and more confident all the time...! its tough bc its a huge investment to write anything, believe me i kno 😂 

like i mentioned, im writing a spec show that ive had in the back of my head for awhile, and its going pretty well i must say...!

im currently into this concept of a story circle, im sure youve heard of it, but ive basically started laying out my notes as callouts from a circle, and i rlly like it... its all there at a glance, unlike a long vertical list of stuff, u kno...?

kinda kewl

 

[Emanuel]

9 minutes ago, mercer said:

I'm trying. Maybe it will be a silver lining of this new world order. My fiancée has some fairly major health issues and we don't have a really large support system, if we need anything, I must go and get it, which could be disastrous if she gets this effin thing. I hope you and your's are safe!

In quarantine. Best way to protect while vaccine doesn't pop up. Thank you for your wishes and let's be realistic, so far so good! LOL

Keep yourselves safe! (E : -)

[mercer]

@kaylee I think I've said this a thousand times, I am already a better writer than I'll ever be as a filmmaker but I think I enjoy filmmaking more. Writing is a lonely endeavor and when screenwriting is your style of writing, very few people want to read it... because screenplays aren't really meant for reading... as you know.

I can't be alone when I say that the worst part of writing is sitting down to write but once you get into it is insanely addictive. I'm also a high concept script writer, so only my imagination limits the possibilities so sometimes I find it more difficult to write things that I may eventually want to shoot because I have to impose limitations onto my creativity.

With that said, I think I am going to go back to obsessing over my writing more than my filmmaking. Hopefully I'll be more productive. Before I got bit by the filmmaking bug, I could write a feature film script in a week. Obviously, it was a rough draft, but still. I wish I could film a movie in a week.

I have heard of the circle. I'm probably older than you so I still follow Syd Field's paradigm to some extent. And since Hollywood supposedly speaks in terms of Save the Cat, I've been working through my stories with that app. It works okay. I'll have to give the story circle a try on a future script. 

How's your pilot coming along?

[Mokara]

6 hours ago, Super8 said:

What's your source for "Case mortality rate for covid-19 is 7.7%" ?

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/6/20-0320_article

"Nevertheless, given the residual uncertainties, health sector decision-makers and disease modelers probably should consider a broad range of 0.25%–3.0% for COVID-19 case-fatality risk estimates.'

The mortality rate is from confirmed cases that have closed. Those are the hard numbers we know for certain, anything else comes from models and guesswork. A case is closed by death or recovery. Mortality rate = 100*(deaths/(recovered + deaths)). As of right now deaths = 7174, recovered = 79883 worldwide. That comes out to 8.24% right now. That number will continue to rise as the rate of infection increases since a death closes a case earlier than a recovery so there is some delay before the rate equilibrates at it's true value. Eventually it will come down again as the rate of infection falls once the pandemic peters out. That has more or less happened in China for now (infections may rise again once they start relaxing and taking less care since most of the population has not been infected yet) where the mortality rate has equilibrated at ~ 4.5%. There is not a lot of runway for that number to come down further because most people in China who were infected have either died or recovered. Of those who remain as open cases, a full 36% are classified as serious/critical.

It is early still in the US, but right now the mortality rate there is 55%. That will come down but it shows the effect of deaths leading recoveries when it comes to the mortality rate and we will have to wait a few months before we know where the US is going to equilibrate at. I would guess that it is probably going to be some number lower than China but still way higher than the flu.

[Super8]

2 minutes ago, Mokara said:

The mortality rate is from confirmed cases that have closed. Those are the hard numbers we know for certain, anything else comes from models and guesswork. A case is closed by death or recovery. Mortality rate = 100*(deaths/(recovered + deaths)). As of right now deaths = 7174, recovered = 79883 worldwide. That comes out to 8.24% right now. That number will continue to rise as the rate of infection increases since a death closes a case earlier than a recovery so there is some delay before the rate equilibrates at it's true value. Eventually it will come down again as the rate of infection falls once the pandemic peters out. That has more or less happened in China for now (infections may rise again once they start relaxing and taking less care since most of the population has not been infected yet) where the mortality rate has equilibrated at ~ 4.5%. There is not a lot of runway for that number to come down further because most people in China who were infected have either died or recovered. Of those who remain as open cases, a full 36% are classified as serious/critical.

It is early still in the US, but right now the mortality rate there is 55%. That will come down but it shows the effect of deaths leading recoveries when it comes to the mortality rate and we will have to wait a few months before we know where the US is going to equilibrate at. I would guess that it is probably going to be some number lower than China but still way higher than the flu.

60,000 people die from the flu each year in the U.S.  So still think we wil have more deaths than the flu?

[kaylee]

57 minutes ago, mercer said:

when screenwriting is your style of writing, very few people want to read it... because screenplays aren't really meant for reading... as you know.

omg 😂 SO true. its kind of WEIRD, rlly......

theres nothing like it. writing is so abstract to begin with, and no one reads screenplays, and even when ppl DO read your screenplay, like say some assistant looking at my spec pilot, THEY DONT EVEN CARE ABOUT THE DEATILS, cuz its prolly gonna change in production anyway

it took me a loooong time to accept that grim fact 😂 as opposed to a film or a painting or anything else that you might produce creatively, a pilot and story bible are like an elaborate log line — it seriously boils down to key conceptual elements that ppl might key into. ofc there are exceptions, shows that virtually flow from a single writers pen, but boy are they rare

sooo many FAMOUS examples of the former tho, its nuts — beetlejuice was not a comedy, it was way darker. good will hunting was abt a guy getting recruited by the cia or something... u kno??

ive finally embraced this, and its allowing me to be way less precious with my writing, in a good way. and lord knows that if youre trying to pitch a show, flexibility is in your favor...! so im currently more concerned about the view from 30,000 ft up, and my big brush strokes, as opposed to my [delightfully entertaining] writing cuteness

so its going good lol

[John Matthews]

News from Eastern France: now you need a letter of intention to go anywhere.

For those of you who believe that your current government should get a "pass" on COVID-19 and their handling of it, let me remind you that many governments in the world are able to spy on their citizens with ease, pass surveillance and copyright laws in the name of terrorism and child porn, start wars with unfriendly governments, manipulate elections in other countries, create coups, implement new governments, let homeless people starve on the streets, etc....

but they can't protect us from COVID-19. Are you sure they need a "pass" on how they handled this?

[BTM_Pix]

The contrast between Macron's handling of this in France yesterday and Johnson's in the UK couldn't have been more stark.

While Macron offers up a €300 Billion aid package and vows that no company will be left to go bankrupt, Johnson tells everyone not to go to pubs, restaurants, theatres etc but doesn't enforce their closure thereby leaving them unable to claim on their insurance and dooming them to bankruptcy.

Along with everyone over the age of 70, my mother is now confined to home for a period of 3 months from this weekend with absolutely zero plan on how food supplies and visits will be organised and managed for her and the other residents of the sheltered accomodation complex she lives in.

The centre did manage to have enough of a plan to ban their bingo game in the lounge last night for contravening the social gathering restrictions though.

Good luck to everyone on here, particularly those in countries without adults in charge.

[Emanuel]

These politicians were not ready to be proactive as Macau did when the virus was still confined to China and act quick with such threat to spread so fast as this novel (corona)virus does.

If Europe won't have an effective decision chain as U.S. has as for instance, we risk to be drown by the increasing nationalism, a setback for our civilization...

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/14/health/coronavirus-covid-19-flu-comparison-frieden-analysis/index.html

 

The strategy of Boris instead is to create Herd Immunity which will cost many lives no matter what:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/13/herd-immunity-will-the-uks-coronavirus-strategy-work

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/03/coronavirus-pandemic-herd-immunity-uk-boris-johnson/608065/

Seems this is an option on their table. Is this acceptable? : ( This is the level of politicians we have, reason why most of us don't like species of this kind. Call it political motivation as you wish, I'd rather accurately identify it as respect for human life. Here's as mantra and reminder:

 

[1Ale82]

2 hours ago, John Matthews said:

News from Eastern France: now you need a letter of intention to go anywhere

Same as here in Italy, where this measure has been in force since 10 days with valid reasons for travel being only work, health issues, buying food and other reasons of necessity

[BTM_Pix]

20 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

The strategy of Boris instead is to create Herd Immunity which will cost many lives no matter what:

They are now attempting to gaslight the country that herd immunity wasn't on the cards despite them crowing about it last week.

When this is all done, I hope that not only have the country developed herd immunity but also developed turd immunity so the country stops electing absolute shit to lead them.

They can't sloganeer, focus group, war game and micro target Facebook ads their way out of this one.

[sanveer]

I have friends and family in London, and I am surprised at how little is being done by the Government for testing and quarantining people, leave alone having lock-down, and forced holidays (or making people work from home). At this rate, Emgland will have much faster spread of the virus than possibly even Germany (where Merkel claims 60-70% of the population will be infected). 

[John Matthews]

2 hours ago, 1Ale82 said:

Same as here in Italy, where this measure has been in force since 10 days with valid reasons for travel being only work, health issues, buying food and other reasons of necessity

And with all that, cases are still coming. No flattening of jack poo in Italy! It's still all exponential.

[IronFilm]

18 hours ago, fuzzynormal said:

This is tangent to the COVID conversation, but I would like to point out that polls are simply pollsters asking a control group questions about how they're going to vote.  People answering those polls could have been coy, the posters themselves might have asked poor questions, people were legit undecided up 'til the end, ect.  Donald's win fell inside the margin of error for respectable polls that were held within the few days of the campaign.

Yes people might be coy in answering, but professional pollsters do take into account many factors. 

And there were many many polling organisations who right up until the very day of the election itself felt very confident Clinton was going to win. (such as New York Times and even FiveThirtyEight!! To be fair, FiveThirtyEight was one of the most "optimistic" about Trump winning, but even they gave Clinton a 71% chance of winning!)
 

[IronFilm]

19 hours ago, sanveer said:

The Media in the US and S.Korea aren't even in the same ballpark. Right now, the US media is too busy trying to make everyone believe that covid-19 was probably created in the US, and that no geographical references to Wuhan or China should be made wrt the virus.

 

19 hours ago, fuzzynormal said:

So, in all seriousness, do you really believe this?  

I think you'd need to be a little oblivious of the recent news to not be aware of what @sanveer is saying? (not meaning to imply I agree with him, but I at least understand the perspective he is coming from)

For instance, here are the top two results I got for "China" when I searched Google from the news just now, major headline stories from big mainstream news sites:

Trump angers Beijing with 'Chinese virus' tweet
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-51928011

Trump sparks anger by calling coronavirus the 'Chinese virus'
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/17/trump-calls-covid-19-the-chinese-virus-as-rift-with-coronavirus-beijing-escalates

There are countless more like this that have been published just in the past 24hrs or so:

Trump tweets about coronavirus using term 'Chinese Virus'
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/trump-tweets-about-coronavirus-using-term-chinese-virus-n1161161
Trump’s ‘Chinese Virus’ Tweet Adds Fuel to Fire With Beijing
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-17/trump-s-chinese-virus-tweet-adds-fuel-to-fire-with-beijing
China to Pompeo: Stop Calling It the ‘Wuhan Virus’
https://www.thedailybeast.com/china-tells-pompeo-to-stop-calling-coronavirus-covid-19-wuhan-virus
Trump Roundly Condemned for Divisive ‘Chinese Virus’ Tweet
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-roundly-condemned-for-divisive-chinese-virus-tweet
Trump called it the 'Wuhan coronavirus' for a legal — and commonsensical — reason
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/487931-trump-called-it-the-wuhan-coronavirus-for-a-legal-and-commonsensical