This is actually my second draft of today's newsletter. The first was longer, and it tried to riff on my holidays, the new issue of Filmmaker going to the printer, the Firefox extension Boomerang, New Year's resolutions, angry tweeting while standing in a long line at the post office and Kanye West. But it didn't really work. I wanted to knit all these seemingly random things together, end on an unexpectedly resonant endnote ("Don't be that angry guy tweeting from the post office") and make you think about your own 2011 ahead. But it was a little too ambitious - at least for the year's first newsletter. I'll have to work up to something like that.

Instead, I'm just going to wish you a happy New Year, which is what I really wanted to do from the start. And thank everyone who took part in our very successful holiday subscription drive. The new magazine hits the stands in about two or three weeks, so watch for it, and while you do check out the website. There's a lot of new stuff up this week, including Gregory Bayne's accounting of a year spent self-distributing his film. Someone wrote that they thought his post was depressing, but I don't. It's honest and full of conviction, and that's never sad. And then there's my "New Year's Resolutions for Filmmakers" post, which I got a lot of nice feedback on. There should be least one resolution for you on the list.

See you next week.

Best,
Scott Macaulay
Editor

P.S. If you haven't seen "Idiot with a Tripod," Jamie Stuart's viral blizzard video, check it out. Roger Ebert called it Oscar-worthy and it's up to almost a million views.

P.P.S. Did you know we are sponsoring a new award at Cinema Eye? It's called the Heterodox Award (kudos to A.J. Schnack for the cool name), and it honors "a narrative film that imaginatively incorporates nonfiction strategies, content and/or modes of production." Click on the links to see the nominees.

IFP/ROTTERDAM LAB FELLOWS SELECTED FOR 2011 Through its long-standing partnership with CineMart, IFP annually selects two producers to participate in the Rotterdam Lab, a four-day training workshop for producers designed to build up their international network and experience. The Lab runs concurrently with the CineMart Co-production Market (1/30-2/2/11), held during the Rotterdam International Film Festival.

This year New York-based Billy Mulligan and Alicia Van Couvering were chosen from an incredibly strong pool of applicants. Billy Mulligan is the producer of numerous independent films, including the upcoming feature film Yelling to the Sky. The film marks the debut of writer/director Victoria Mahoney and stars Zoe Kravitz and Gabourey Sidibe, and it will premiere in competition at the 2011 Berlin International Film Festival. Mulligan brought the project through the IFP's 2010 Independent Filmmaker Labs. Alicia Van Couvering's first feature as a producer, Lena Dunham's Tiny Furniture, received multiple Gotham Award and Independent Spirit Award nominations, won the Jury Prize at SXSW 2010 and was released by IFC Films. She is currently in production on Bryan Wizemann's An Entire Body, Whit Stillman's Damsels in Distress, and a new film by Ronald Bronstein (Frownland). Van Couvering is a contributing editor to Filmmaker Magazine and a 2010 Sundance Institute Producing Fellow.
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