Enjoy the Ride

“I am confident the need for great storytelling will endure for generations to come, enhanced by new technologies that will bring these tales to life and deliver them to people around the globe in even more extraordinary ways… we will always gravitate to stories that bind us together—tales of adventure, love, friendship, and heroism, tales that enable us to escape, that comfort and inspire us, that give us hope and reason to be optimistic, tales that inform us…. and, of course, touch our hearts.” – Bob Iger, Farewell

I woke up this morning and glanced out the window to see the sun peaking over the mountain tops.  The beams of light struck the beautiful and brilliant red and golden leaves of the trees behind our house.  The backlit spectacular was incredible!  As I soaked it in, I was struck by the temporal nature of this artistry.  The occasional leaf would detach and glide to the ground.  Soon, this majestic presentation would be gone and all that would be left will be the branches.  It occurred to me, how tragic it would have been if I had missed it.  It’s a great reminder that things change.  New scenes are appearing all the time.  The lesson is, enjoy the moment, those golden nuggets of time that grace your path.  Drink them in.  Be grateful for the show that was made, just for you.

I noticed another changing of seasons today.  Disney’s former CEO and Chairman, Bob Iger’s farewell email landed in my inbox this morning.  As with the beautiful sunrise, it definitely has me nostalgic, a bit misty eyed and grateful.

A few months after I started at Disney (now sixteen and a half years ago!) a new CEO was announced, Bob Iger.  Disney was a strong brand, but creativity and storytelling had become stagnant and mundane.  Bob came in with a simple yet powerful plan.  He identified three strategic pillars that would propel Disney forward: 

  1. Creativity – We would focus on creating compelling content and telling stories that delight our guests in new and powerful ways.
  2. Technology – Second only to creativity would be the adoption and innovation of new technologies to help us create and deliver those storytelling experiences. It would help us amplify the magic, better connect with our guests and allow our guests to better connect with us.
  3. Globalization – Disney would expand into new markets around the world.  As part of that effort, our content, products and experiences would strive to reflect our diverse human family around the globe, both on screen as well as behind the scenes.

The result of Bob’s strategy was a return to epic storytelling, investments and innovation in technology and the expansion of our impact around the globe.  It resulted in us welcoming PIXAR (2006), Marvel (2009), Lucasfilm (2012) and most recently 21st Century Fox (2019) to the Disney family.  Adding those creative engines, brilliant teams and storytellers, along with new innovative technologies, amplified our ability to entertain, inform and inspire people around the globe.

Like many of my fellow cast members, I feel like I have had the privilege of sitting in the front row watching the incredible transformation Bob Iger unleashed for Disney.  And like many others, I am incredibly grateful to have been able to participate and be part of that “ride of a lifetime” story with Bob at the wheel.  

I am sad to see Bob Iger leave, but I’m incredibly optimistic about the future.  The work Bob started is growing and shaping Disney into a modern force for good. I’m convinced it will continue.  Sure, we will make missteps, try and fail at times, but our mission to deliver magic, entertainment and inspiration to the world is still key.  It is an honor to be part of an organization that is about elevating the human experience across the planet, especially when it includes unlocking the potential of technology to do so.

Have a great week!  And don’t forget… enjoy the ride.

Words Matter

“In diversity there is beauty and there is strength. We all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry, and we must understand that all the threads of that tapestry are equal in value no matter their color.” —Maya Angelou

How do you visualize?  If you close your eyes and think about home, family and friends, can you see them in your mind’s eye?  I remember having an in-depth conversation with Ed Catmull who confessed that he can’t visualize mental images at all.  Most people can close their eyes and conjure up images.  But that’s right, Ed Catmull, the scientist who revolutionized computer 3D graphics and co-founded Pixar, has a blind mind’s eye.  It’s a condition called aphantasia.  Ed conducted a survey of artist and production teams across the studio and discovered he was not alone.  In fact, some of the world’s best animators have aphantasia as well.  Glen Keane, who created Ariel (The Little Mermaid), also has no visual imagery.  

How we represent our world in our minds does vary, person to person.  Some of us visualize, some of us don’t.  But we all model the world around us in a way that helps us interact with each other, relate to things and make decisions.  Over time, we construct mental models that help us filter what we see, hear and feel. We build synaptic short cuts that prevent us from being overwhelmed with sensory experiences and our daily work.  We enter our mind palace, even if it can’t be seen, and think about concepts, plan projects, solve problems and even practice interactions with each other.  How do we do that?  Have you noticed?  Well, similar to you reading this today, we do that through “words”.  Now maybe those words are symbols, lists or concepts, but they are a collection of mental Lego blocks that we use to construct our mental reality. How many of those atomic units we have collected and what they are, makes up our mental vocabulary. 

When I was learning Spanish in high school, I remember the moment when I had gained enough understanding of the language to begin creating mental models in Spanish. Up till that point, I realized my mental models were all in English and I was passing all of those models through a “translation function” in my mind instead of thinking natively in Spanish.  “Gran mesa roja” became atomic in my representation of a big red table. I never achieved full model (immersive thinking in Spanish) but it gave me the insight into how we think.  Words and patterns of words are the building blocks of how we see and interact with the world around us.

Words matter.  Because words make up our perception of the world, the words we use affect us and those around us.  How we think, evaluate and relate with things is shaped by our words.  Sometimes the words and phrases that we collect and use to build mental models can be harmful.  For example, technological phrases like “blacklist” and “whitelist” are often used to denote things that should be denied or allowed.  While the connotation of “whitelist” is generally positive, something that you want included and accepted, the inference of “blacklist” is predominately negative, something that should be shunned, blocked or denied.  The general concepts make sense, but the words used can subconsciously create a mental association that anything “black” is bad, negative, a threat or an object that should be denied or avoided.  Tragically, this can shape our model such that a “black person” is unintentionally connected with the same connotation.  This is the danger.  Words shape our reality and words can project unintended meaning or reality onto others just by simple association.

I’m proud to say that as part of our inclusive efforts, Disney technology leadership is taking on this issue so that we can level up.  Technical words and phrases that are culturally insensitive or can threaten our inclusive efforts will be replaced with more inclusive terms.  In many cases, these are actually better descriptors for the intended concepts anyway.  Using phrases like “allow-list” or “deny-list” not only encapsulates the concept but describes it as well.  Now, to be fair, I know this isn’t an easy transition.  A lot of these words are deeply ingrained in the industry and our mental models.  But it is the right thing to do.  We don’t want unintended association to negatively impact us or any of our fellow team members.  Everyone is a welcome member of our human family and we are willing to reshape our language and mental models to help enforce that love for each other.

Join me in helping raise awareness on this issue.  Call me out if I accidentally use words that are non-inclusive.  To reshape tomorrow, we need to challenge each other, our teams, our vendors and ourselves to use this more inclusive language.  If you have any ideas that might help, please let me know.  We can create a better more inclusive world.  Sometimes it is as easy as changing one word at a time.

A Sonic Revolution

“We knew it could become big but could have never imagined it would be a revolution.” – Lou Ottens

Magnetic tape was genius!  A ferric oxide placed on a thin plastic film allowed the world to record, store and playback audio.  It revolutionized broadcasting, radio and especially, music.  In 1960, the portability of that music was still captured in a clumsy 7-inch reel.  It wasn’t easy to play. You needed a hefty machine the size of a small suitcase.  Lou wasn’t happy with that.  

Lou loved technology.  He was ever the engineer and loved solving problems.  As a teenager during World War II, Lou made a radio for his family so they could listen to programs like Radio Oranje.  To avoid the Nazi jammers, he even constructed a primitive directional antenna.  Just as he had made those freedom broadcasts accessible to his family, he now turned his attention to democratizing music.

The 7-inch music reel was too bulky and awkward for the general population.  He wanted music to be portable and accessible.  He thought a lot about what it should be like.  Trying to envision something that didn’t yet exist, he began shaping it into a small wooden block.  It needed to be small enough to easily fit in your hand and more importantly, fit in your pocket.  His “compact cassette” tape came to life in 1963 and quickly became a must-have sensation across the world.  It unleashed a multi-billion dollar industry but also taught us how to use our own voice.  The cassette became an audio canvas for the masses to self-create their own albums or compile their own mixtapes to share with others.  For those of you who don’t have as many candles on your cake as I do, mixtapes were basically the playlists of the 1980s.

The cassette tape was a raging success, but Lou wasn’t happy with it.  He complained about the noise and distortion that would eventually plague the aging tapes. In his mission for higher fidelity, he worked with his company, Philips and Sony to co-develop the digital optical storage system, the compact disk (CD).  As he had done with the cassette tape, Lou championed a portable disk size that could be easily held and used.

Lou Ottens passed away earlier this month, at the age of 94.  He sparked a worldwide sonic revolution, but humbly dismissed his role as nothing special, instead crediting other engineers and designers for bringing his ideas to life.  Lou reminds us that making science and technology accessible is just as important as the discovery itself.  

Do we make our complex technical inventions and solutions accessible?  When technology is done well, the technology itself fades to the background and becomes “indistinguishable from magic”.  That is to say, it provides a human experience and value and doesn’t get in the way.  My challenge to us this week is to examine the solutions we deliver and ask ourselves, can we make them more accessible and magical?  

As Lou taught us, the genius of a great idea is not just in the science, it is making that technology portable and accessible.

Pursue Your Dreams

“Even though I worked hard at times, it was always magical. I have to confess I enjoyed every minute of it. Even the down times I enjoyed, because we were creating something that would make people smile and lift their hearts. You can’t think of a better job than that.” – Floyd Norman

A tall skinny young man passed through the gates of the Walt Disney Studios.  He was on his way to meet Ken Seiling in the Personnel Department.  As he looked around the campus, he must have thought back to his childhood.  He had been so inspired by Walt Disney cartoons and animated features.  He loved drawing.  He often found canvases to adorn with his art.  That included, much to his parent’s dismay, even the walls of his house as a young child.  Growing up he had dreamed of being part of Walt Disney’s magic factory.  His dream motivated him to reach out to Disney and was eventually connected with Ken.  Ken agreed to meet with him after he graduated from High School.  Today was that day.

His dream was happening before his eyes.  He was inside the Disney creative factory speaking with Ken.  Ken offered him a job in Traffic.  But understanding the young man’s passion he quickly added, the wise choice would be going back to school.  “Go back to school,” may have been disappointing to hear.  It would have been tempting to take the easier path and just settle for the Traffic job.  However, that is not what happened.  The young man took the advice and went back to school.  Three years later in February 1956, he, along with other starry-eyed youngsters reported to work at 500 South Buena Vista Avenue to start their careers in the cartoon business.  He later reflected, “like Alice, we had entered Wonderland.” 

That young man was none other than Floyd Norman who went on to become a Disney Legend, spending over 60 years in animation. He is credited on many familiar titles including Sleeping Beauty, The Sword in the Stone, The Jungle Book, Mulan, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Toy Story 2 and Monsters, Inc.

Like Floyd, we all have dreams. But how do we act on them?  Do we settle or do we keep pursuing?  Hopefully, like me, you are inspired by Floyd’s story to keep running after your dreams, don’t be afraid to reach out and try.  But also, don’t be afraid to pivot, learn and try again.  We may not all become Disney Legends like Floyd, but we can all run after our dreams and make a difference.  It begins with us.  Keep trying, keep the faith.

PS – Check out Floyd’s story in this great documentary on his life: Floyd Norman: An Animated Life

Floyd Norman
Floyd Norman

Remove the Barriers

“The talent is here. We just need to remove the barriers.” – Ed Catmull

I confess, I am very sentimental.  At all hands, sendoffs and celebrations, I love to show photos to reminisce about events, people, places and days gone by.  The photo storage platforms I use all know this about me and are always offering me “on this day a year ago…” teasers which I can’t refuse.  I love those.  As we wrapped up January, the AI wizards began sending me reminders of our 2020 and 2019 Cloud Summits.  First of all, I was shocked to realize it has been a year since that pre-pandemic in-person gathering and streaming event in 2020.  Second, I was reminded of the great 2019 event and particularly our special keynote guest, Dr. Ed Catmull.  The talk from this incredibly brilliant technology leader and the prior discussion over dinner was a highlight of a lifetime.  I want to share the impression he made on me by giving you a glimpse into his story 

Shortly after the acquisition of Pixar, Ed Catmull and John Lasseter were given the charge by Bob Iger to reboot the Walt Disney Animation Studios, which had been suffering a string of box office flops.  Pixar was delivering blockbuster movies that leveraged innovative technology to deliver compelling and connecting stories to the big screen.  Walt Disney Animation Studios on the other hand was not.  Ed tells how he dreaded but was expected to clean house and start over, hiring Pixar level talent to reboot the studio.  To his surprise, as he began to spend time there, he discovered that the problem wasn’t the talent.  The problem was the management and the debilitating processes and culture.  They began to change the management, removing obstacles that were blocking the creative process and unleashing the team to be able to deliver results.  That same team that had delivered a series of flops in the past, suddenly were able to deliver blockbuster hits like Tangled, Wreck-It Ralph, and Frozen.  Ed observed, the talent was there, we just needed to remove the barriers.  

I know what you are all thinking.  Sounds great, but Jason, the lesson here is that we need management to remove barriers for us!  Yes, that is true.  Leaders must take on the challenge of empowering people and removing blockers.  Our job is to unleash potential, give opportunity with responsibility, not control people.  But that’s not all, nor does it fall to managers only.  If we want to unleash the generative potential of our organization, we all must be laser focused on removing constraints that slow down the delivery of value to our guests and to our company.  That job falls to all of us.  You are all capable of helping build platforms, tools and processes that empower our cast members to deliver magic, better, faster, safer and happier.  We just need to do it!

This week, I challenge you to look for opportunities to remove barriers.  Devise plans to make it better and raise those with your leadership.  We can swarm, align and drive the change.  Let’s remove barriers and unleash the incredible potential of our talent to do amazing things.

Ed Catmull and Jason Cox
“The talent is here. We just need to remove the barriers.” – Ed Catmull

It’s a Wonderful Life

It's a Wonderful Life

“You see George, you’ve really had a wonderful life. Don’t you see what a mistake it would be to just throw it away?” – Clarence

Strange, isn’t it? Each person’s life touches so many other lives.

What is your favorite holiday movie?  Each year, at our house, we celebrate the countdown to Christmas with a selection of some of our favorite movies: Home Alone, The Santa Clause, A Charlie Brown Christmas, The Christmas Story, Elf, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, The Muppet Christmas Carol, Miracle on 34th Street, White Christmas and many more.  Whatever your list may be, I suspect many of us would also list “It’s a Wonderful Life” as a holiday classic.  You might be surprised to know it was a spectacular flop and very well might have vanished from history, if it hadn’t been for a mistake. That’s right, a mistake. Let me tell you about it…

Philip Van Doren Stern was unable to find a publisher for his 4,100 word short story, “The Greatest Gift.”   He eventually privately published the story in the form of a Christmas Card booklet that he mailed to friends and family. Producer David Hepstead happened to receive one of these and decided to purchase the rights to make it into a film.  Frank Capra was selected to direct the film starring James Stewart.  It opened in 1947 to extremely poor performance.  It resulted in a bankrupting loss of $525k for RKO Radio Pictures. Paramount Pictures purchased rights to the film temporarily and through a sequence of other sales, it landed a new home with Republic Pictures.  This is where the crucial mistake happened. 

The U.S. copyright protection law act of 1909 required that copyright holders file renewal notices with the Copyright office after 28 years from publication.  Republic Pictures failed to file for this renewal.  The film lapsed into the public domain in 1974, meaning anyone could show the film without permission or royalties.  As a result, television stations, networks and distribution groups looking for low cost ways to program holiday content, picked up the movie and begin airing it at all hours and in all markets, often times even in back-to-back showings.  Over the next 20 years, this beloved story found its way into the hearts and minds of so many who would have never seen it.  It surged to become one of the greatest “holiday classics” of all time, all because of a clerical error not to renew the copyright.

It’s a Wonderful Life tells a great tale of how we all make a difference.  In the story, Clarence gives George Bailey a gift to see what the world would be like without him.  In that revelation, George and the audience discover the incredible impact that one person has on others and on history.  Every person matters.  We are all of infinite worth and are irreplaceable parts of our human story.  We imperceptibly touch lives around us, profoundly affecting the performance of our human symphony.  We may never know all the lives we touch or events we change, but it is there.  Every encounter, each friendship, every word, each choice and every actions radiate from our lives as a force of change.  They are like ripples of gravity invisibly pushing and pulling us together and weaving the sparks of life into the beautiful tapestry of our human story.

I know I say this often, but I can’t emphasize this enough.  You matter!  As the protagonist of your own story, you are part of a much bigger epic and you make a difference. Every role, every part is significant. As we go through this holiday season in the 2020 pandemic way, continue to play the part you were born to play.  Be the best you, you can be!   You have a wonderful life.  Enjoy it, celebrate it and use it to continue to touch other lives. 

I wish you all, a wonderful and blessed holiday season!

Reference: Library of Congress https://blogs.loc.gov/copyright/2017/12/its-a-wonderful-life/

Creativity, Inc.

creativity-incCreativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration Hardcover

by Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace

 

Raspberry Pi – AirPiano

Wouldn’t it be cool if you could control your MIDI equipped digital piano from your iPhone?  Imagine a player piano capable of jukebox queuing up MIDI or Audio files and playing them in order.  That was my goal!  RPI to the rescue.

RaspiModelB

Required Ingredients:

  • Raspberry Pi – Model B, 512MB RAM, 16GB SD Card, Raspbian Linux, Apple 12W USB Power Adapter, USB WiFi Dongle
  • USB MIDI Digital Device (e.g. Yamaha Clavinova CLP-440 with USB MIDI port and RCA L+R Audio Inputs)
  • Software:  Apache HTTP Server, PHP, MySQL, (Nice to have:  Netatalk file server, Shairport AirPlay server)

Instructions:

My original thought was to turn the Yamaha speakers into a AirPlay device for our many iOS devices.  It’s nice to pipe in background tunes without having to hook up a device.  AirPlay is great way to do that but I didn’t want to spend $100+ to be able to do that.  The Raspberry Pi is more than capable of doing this. I found an extremely helpful blog post here:  http://www.raywenderlich.com/44918/raspberry-pi-airplay-tutorial

NOTE: Power is a big issue for the Raspberry Pi.  If you are using a WiFi dongle or any other USB device, I recommend making sure your power supply has enough kick to keep the RPI going.   I started out with a microUSB adapter that advertised 700mA but performance became very unstable, especially under load.  I switched to a 12W Apple adapter that I had handy and the problems disappeared.   The RPI FAQ recommends 1.2A (1200mA).

Setup for AirPiano – MIDI Control

The Project Code: https://github.com/jasonacox/raspberrypi

  • MySQL: Database ‘piano’ – see piano.sql file
  • Dequeue Service: Run the cron.sh script to have the RPI scan for new midi or wave files to play. Run it with:
bash -x cron.sh 0<&- 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null &
  • Apache: Install apache http with mod_php and mysql support
  • Website Code: Install index.php, setup.php and the folder.png files into the document root of your webserver. Upload the MIDI (*.mid) and WAVE (*.wav) files to this location. Be sure to update $globalBase in setup.php to the folder where these files are located.

 

AirPlay via Raspberry Pi

Adam Burkepile has the best tutorial I’ve found on how to set up a RPI for AirPlay:

http://www.raywenderlich.com/44918/raspberry-pi-airplay-tutorial

Apple Share (AFP) Server via Raspberry Pi

The RPI is great for a tiny file server!  At the least, having it run an AFP server will allow quick drag and drop transfer from your Macs.  A Samba service for Windows shares is easy to set up as well.

sudo apt-get install netatalk

Yes, it is that easy.  Finder will now show your Raspberry Pi under “shared” along with any other local network shares:

Screen Shot 2013-12-27 at 11.22.08 PM

 

 

 

 

Yamaha Clavinova CLP-440

I wanted a music workstation synthesizer and my wife wanted a real acoustic piano that looks like beautiful furniture.  We compromised by getting the Yamaha Clavinova CLP-440.  It looks, sounds and feels like a real piano with enough tech (MIDI, USB, voices) to make a armchair techy musician like me happy.  The PDF documentation covers most of the details you will need to start using the nice features, but there are a few things lacking so I’ll record some of my discoveries in this post.

USB Files

The piano has a USB port that will easily accommodate a thumb drive or external hard drive.  It stores and reads MIDI and WAV files.

Files created by the Clavinova will be stored in the “User Files” folder with a name USERSONG??.MID for MIDI files and USERAUDIO??.WAV for Audio files saved from the Clavinova.  The ?? is the number of the song selected from the Clavinova LED interface.  Here is an example listing of files on the USB drive:

USB Host with iPad

I wanted to be able to use my iPad to link to the piano for added voices and sequencing.  There are several MIDI options available for the iPad, but since the CLP-440 has a USB host port, I was able to use an iPad camera kit (essentially an adapter to allow the iPad to view pictures from a SD card or USB camera).   The Apple version and third party version should work fine.  Using that, I found that several apps could see and control the CLP-440.

iPad Apps for the CLP-440

Searching the Apple iTunes store for app to work with the Clavinova wasn’t easy.  I’ll record a few good apps that I found.

GarageBand
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/garageband/id408709785?mt=8 – This $5 app from Apple is amazing on its own but it works great with MIDI from the Clavinova.

Midi Monitor
http://iosmidi.com/apps/midi-monitor/ – This app shows the iPad connecting to the Clavinova and the events coming from the keyboard (as well as driving action back to the keyboard through the iPad interface).  Useful for troubleshooting.

Alchemy mobile Synth App
http://www.camelaudio.com/AlchemyMobile.php – This great app from CamelAudio adds a great selection of synth voices to be controlled by the Clavinova.  As their site says, “Turn your iPhone/iPad into a powerful synthesizer! Alchemy Mobile includes everything from evolving soundscapes and fat basses to lush pads and pulsing arpeggios, and is available for free from the iTunes App store.”

 

 

Disney War

Author, James B. Stewart, provides a chronological account of the Walt Disney Company during the Eisner 20-year tenure.  This book of nearly 600 pages dives in to the details of the events, players, tragedies and successes that surrounded the on-boarding of Michael Eisner, his career as Chairman and CEO, and the drama surrounding his departure. 

The book is divided into three sections: The Wonderful World of Disney, The Disenchanted Kingdom, and Disney War.