Category: Opinion

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Fearless Oscar Predictions 2025

Results 16/23 – not too bad.

Predictions are in Italics and winners in Bold.

Best picture
Anora
The Brutalist
A Complete Unknown
Conclave
Dune: Part Two
Emilia Pérez
I’m Still Here
Nickel Boys
The Substance
Wicked

Best director
Sean Baker, Anora
Brady Corbet, The Brutalist
James Mangold, A Complete Unknown
Jacques Audiard, Emilia Pérez
Coralie Fargeat, The Substance

Best actress
Cynthia Erivo, Wicked
Karla Sofia Gascón, Emilia Pérez
Mikey Madison, Anora
Demi Moore, The Substance
Fernanda Torres, I’m Still Here

Best actor
Adrian Brody, The Brutalist
Timothée Chalamet, A Complete Unknown
Colman Domingo, Sing Sing
Ralph Fiennes, Conclave
Sebastian Stan, The Apprentice

Best supporting actress
Monica Barbaro, A Complete Unknown
Ariana Grande, Wicked
Felicity Jones, The Brutalist
Isabella Rossellini, Conclave
Zoe Saldaña, Emilia Pérez

Best supporting actor
Yura Borisov, Anora
Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain
Edward Norton, A Complete Unknown
Guy Pearce, The Brutalist
Jeremy Strong, The Apprentice

Best original screenplay
Anora, Sean Baker
The Brutalist, Brady Corbet & Mona Fastvold
A Real Pain, Jesse Eisenberg
September 5, Tim Fehlbaum & Moritz Binder
The Substance, Coralie Fargeat

Best adapted screenplay
A Complete Unknown, Jay Cocks & James Mangold
Conclave, Peter Straughan
Emilia Pérez, Jacques Audiard, Thomas Bidegain & Nicolas Livecchi
Nickel Boys, RaMell Ross & Joslyn Barnes
Sing Sing, Clint Bentley, Greg Kwedar, Clarence Maclin & John Divine G Whitfield

Best international feature
I’m Still Here, Walter Salles (Brazil)
The Girl with the Needle, Magnus von Horn (Denmark)
Emilia Pérez, Jacques Audiard (France)
The Seed of the Sacred Fig, Mohammad Rasoulof (Germany)
Flow, Miguel Gomes (Latvia)

Best documentary feature
Black Box Diaries, Shiori Itō
No Other Land, Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham & Rachel Szor
Porcelain War, Brendan Bellomo & Slava Leontyev
Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat, Johan Grimonprez
Sugarcane, Julian Brave NoiseCat & Emily Kassie

Best animated feature
Flow
Inside Out 2
Memoir of a Snail
Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
The Wild Robot

Best cinematography
The Brutalist
Dune: Part Two
Emilia Pérez
Maria
Nosferatu

Best costume design
A Complete Unknown
Conclave
Gladiator II
Nosferatu
Wicked

Best film editing
Anora
The Brutalist
Conclave
Emilia Pérez
Wicked

Best production design
The Brutalist
Conclave
Dune: Part Two
Nosferatu
Wicked

Best original score
The Brutalist, Daniel Blumberg
Conclave, Volker Bertelmann
Emilia Pérez, Clément Ducol & Camille
Wicked, John Powell & Stephen Schwartz
The Wild Robot, Kris Bowers

Best original song
Never Too Late, Elton John: Never Too Late (Elton John & Brandi Carlile)
El Mal, Emilia Pérez (Clement Ducol, Camille & Jacques Audiard)
Mi Camino, Emilia Pérez (Clement Ducol & Camille)
Like a Bird, Sing Sing (Adrian Quesada & Abraham Alexander)
The Journey, The Six Triple Eight (Diane Warren)

Best sound
A Complete Unknown
Dune: Part Two
Emilia Pérez
Wicked
The Wild Robot

Best visual effects
Alien: Romulus
Better Man
Dune: Part Two
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
Wicked

Best makeup and hairstyling
A Different Man
Emilia Pérez
Nosferatu
The Substance
Wicked

Best documentary short
Death by Numbers
I Am Ready, Warden
Incident
Instruments of a Beating Heart
The Only Girl in the Orchestra

Best animated short
Beautiful Men
In the Shadow of the Cypress
Magic Candies
Wander to Wonder
Yuck!

Best live-action short
A Lien
Anuja
I’m Not a Robot
The Last Ranger
The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent

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2023 MLB Predictions

AL East: Yankees
AL Central: Guardians
AL West: Astros
Wild Card: Blue Jays, Mariners, Angels

NL East: Braves
NL Central: Cardinals
NL West: Padres
Wild Card: Mets, Dodgers, Phillies

AL Champ: Blue Jays
NL Champ: Phillies

World Series Winner: Phillies

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Oscar Predictions 2019

I’ll be happy if I get to 18 this year.

Winners shown below. I got 17. Shouldn’t have gone out of a limb in the Editing and Makeup categories.

Best Picture
“Green Book”

Best Director
Alfonso Cuarón, “Roma”

Best Actor
Rami Malek, “Bohemian Rhapsody”

Best Actress
Glenn Close, “The Wife”

Best Supporting Actor
Mahershala Ali, “Green Book”

Best Supporting Actress
Regina King, “If Beale Street Could Talk”

Best Adapted Screenplay
“BlacKkKlansman”

Best Original Screenplay
“Green Book”

Best Film Editing
“BlacKkKlansman”

Best Costume Design
“The Favourite”

Best Production Design
“The Favourite”

Best Original Score
“Black Panther”

Best Animated Feature
“Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse”

Best Cinematography
“Roma”

Best Foreign Language Film
“Roma”

Best Makeup and Hairstyling
“Mary Queen of Scots”

Best Original Song
“Shallow” from “A Star Is Born”

Best Sound Editing
“A Quiet Place”

Best Sound Mixing
“Bohemian Rhapsody”

Best Visual Effects
“First Man”

Best Documentary Feature
“Free Solo”

Best Animated Short
“Bao”

Best Live-Action Short
“Marguerite”

Best Documentary Short
“Period. End of Sentence”

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Tiki Time

The Kevdo.com blog hasn’t been very active, but I’ve been blogging nearly every day on Instagram under my Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai handle.

This recent post got a lot of likes. It’s a series of shots from an episode of Three’s Company where Jack Tripper visits a tiki bar. Those drinks are pretty strong, aren’t they?

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Microsoft Ignite Conference Session Replays

I recently attended the Microsoft Ignite Conference in Orlando, Florida.  While there, I participated as a speaker for three sessions. One was a panel around employee engagement using Yammer. I had planned this and in the last two weeks before the conference we were asked to change this from a presentation-heavy 45 minute session into an open panel discussion at 75 minutes. We also had to change days due to some travel issues with other speakers, so we had a tough time slot on the first day of the conference. The other two presentations were smaller theater sessions in the Expo hall.

Here are the replays. Click the links for additional info or to download the slide decks.

THR2133 – Microsoft Teams and Yammer: Important differences and key use cases

Despite similar appearances and some functional similarities, Microsoft Teams and Yammer are not interchangeable. This presentation discusses the important functional differences and which scenarios are best fits for each tool. This goes beyond Inner/Outer Loop positioning and digs into the feature sets of each product, demonstrating use cases that lend themselves to one tool or the other.

THR1082 – Using Office 365 to increase IT end-user engagement

Review examples of how IT teams can use the Office 365 suite for more meaningful engagement with end-users. Includes details on how the support teams can more effectively collaborate to solve issues and ways the suite can be used to deliver training and learning material. Products covered: Yammer, Microsoft Teams, SharePoint

BRK1087 – MVP Panel and Q&A: Using Yammer for employee communications and engagement

Join Kevin Crossman, Amy Dolzine, Loni French, Melanie Hohertz and Martina Grom for a Yammer MVP panel discussion led by Scott Ward. Hear about how Yammer helps organizations create deeper connections and fosters innovation while achieving company goals. Learn about Yammer-based examples of communications and engagement programs delivered at a diverse set of leading organizations. Audience members are encouraged to bring their own Yammer questions for the panel to address.

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Fearless Oscar Predictions 2018

Final Tally: 18/24, not bad this year

Best Picture:
“Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri”

Lead Actor:
Gary Oldman, “Darkest Hour”

Lead Actress:
Frances McDormand, “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri”

Supporting Actor:
Sam Rockwell, “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri”

Supporting Actress:
Allison Janney, “I, Tonya”

Director:
“The Shape of Water,” Guillermo del Toro

Animated Feature:
“Coco,” Lee Unkrich, Darla K. Anderson

Animated Short:
“Garden Party,” Victor Caire, Gabriel Grapperon

Adapted Screenplay:
“Call Me by Your Name,” James Ivory

Original Screenplay:
“Get Out,” Jordan Peele

Cinematography:
“Blade Runner 2049,” Roger Deakins

Documentary Feature:
“Icarus,” Bryan Fogel, Dan Cogan

Documentary Short Subject:
“Heroin(e),” Elaine McMillion Sheldon, Kerrin Sheldon

Live Action Short Film:
“DeKalb Elementary,” Reed Van Dyk

Foreign Language Film:
“A Fantastic Woman” (Chile)

Film Editing:
“Baby Driver,” Jonathan Amos, Paul Machliss

Sound Editing:
“Dunkirk,” Alex Gibson, Richard King

Sound Mixing:
“Dunkirk,” Mark Weingarten, Gregg Landaker, Gary A. Rizzo

Production Design:
“The Shape of Water,” Paul D. Austerberry, Jeffrey A. Melvin, Shane Vieau

Original Score:
“The Shape of Water,” Alexandre Desplat

Original Song:
“Remember Me” from “Coco,” Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Robert Lopez

Makeup and Hair:
“Darkest Hour,” Kazuhiro Tsuji, David Malinowski, Lucy Sibbick

Costume Design:
“Phantom Thread,” Mark Bridges

Visual Effects:
“War for the Planet of the Apes,” Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, Daniel Barrett, Joel Whist

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Favorite Albums of 2017

It was a weird year music-wise for me. I listened to a total of 2345 songs according to iTunes play counts, which is up a lot from last year. Most of the increase was in the Exotica genre, where I loaded up on releases from past years including Tiki Joe’s Ocean and Tikiyaki Orchestra/Tikiyaki 5-0.

In terms of albums released in 2017, here is my ranking.

1. Voodoo III – Robert Drasnin
Plucked from obscurity in the 1990s when his 1959 exotica album Voodoo was discovered by tikiphiles, Drasnin spent his later years working on two follow-ups. Voodoo III was recorded just before his death and released in a limited edition at Tiki Oasis in 2015. The first “anyone can buy it” release was this year, so we’re counting it as a 2017 release. This is great stuff if you like Exotica, the mostly instrumental mix of jazz and Latin percussion. Voodoo III includes several songs with wordless-vocals. One song features sung lyrics, the appropriately entitled “Aloha.” It’s a great album.

2. Wonderful Wonderful – The Killers
A comeback album featuring one of their best singles, “The Man.” I still like the Killers and saw them live for the first time this year.

3. Number 1 Angel – Charli XCX
I was surprised I liked this “mixtape.” Most songs feature a hip-hop collaborator but I’m still digging Charli’s give-no-fucks attitude. I’m not sure what the genre is called but it is definitely more of a mellower electronica. I like Charli’s more alt/pop leaning material but this will do (I wasn’t a fan of her Pop 2 mixtape released at the end of the year)

4. I Love You Like a Brother – Alex Lahey
Song pop hooks from Australian alternative singer-songwriter Alex Lahey. Her single “Every Day’s the Weekend” was one of the best of the year.

5. Concrete and Gold – Foo Fighters
An OK release from the Foos, with a few songs I thought were really good but mostly were fairly generic. I totally dug the song “Sunday Rain” featuring regular drummer Taylor Hawkins on vocals and guest drummer Paul McCartney (the song does have a Beatles vibe).

6. Songs of Experience – U2
An okay album but nothing special from U2. Nothing overly catchy or memorable but at least I do like listening to it.

7. Witness – Katy Perry
I got this album when I purchased tickets to her concert, so I guess I’ll count it. Follows the more mellow pop trend. I liked the lead single “Chained to the Rhythm” but like most music fans felt this was a step back from the pop hooks we’re used it.

8. Spirit – Depeche Mode
Disappointing release with only one just-okay song “So Much Love.” Otherwise forgettable.

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Be the Yammer rock star at your organization with the Yammer Mobile App and device notifications

I had the pleasure of presenting at Microsoft’s Ignite conference a few weeks ago. My Expo Theater presentation was a 20 minute session and I covered how Yammer’s mobile application can be used by community managers, Yammer network admins, power users, group owners, and even folks new to Yammer to be more engaged with their networks.

The session’s presentation deck is available in the Microsoft Tech Community, but the session itself was not recorded. So, I recorded a version of the presentation and uploaded to YouTube.