Top all-time · #1717
John August
Personal blog · johnaugust.comwritingculture
John August's personal blog at johnaugust.com covers writing and culture. Since 2008, 45 different Hacker News readers have linked it 58 times, most often “Introducing Courier Prime”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-30, and you can follow it by feed.
The official site of screenwriter and author John August
Most-linked posts?
- Introducing Courier Prime4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2013-01-29
- Missing Movies (2018)3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2019-02-25
- /scriptnotes2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2023-11-02
- /podcast2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2017-04-02
- /2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2012-01-21
What Hacker News says?
Most good blogs and communities are more specialized than that. Aspiring screenwriters go to John August's blog [1], documentary filmmakers go to The D-Word [2], cinematographers go to forums like DVXUser [3] and RED User [4], sound folks go somewhere else, etc. Your idea sounds swell, though. I think a lot of people would be interested in a such a site, if done well. [1] http://johnaugust.com/ [2] http://www.d-word…
Comment linking /
on “Request for Startups: Kill Hollywood.”Submitted Missing Movies (2018) as a story · 70 points
HN discussion- wj · 2011-12-29
Blog post titled The purpose of drama, and its relationship to Cameron Diaz’s ass. It is by the writer of Charlie's Angels Full Throttle. Great blog for those interested screenwriting. http://johnaugust.com/2008/the-purpose-of-drama-and-its-rela...
Comment linking /2008/the-purpose-of-drama-and-its-relationship-to-cameron-diazs-ass
on “I'll tell you why movie revenue is dropping...” Submitted Things I Learned from World of Warcraft as a story · 49 points
HN discussionScriptnotes #403: How to Write a Movie[1], where screenwriter Craig Mazin (Chernobyl, The Hangover 2/3) meticulously lays out one approach to crafting a screenplay around thesis and antithesis. (TLDR: put your characters through agony.) It’s the most impactful episode this year because I’ve been keeping these ideas in mind lately whenever I’ve watched a movie, and it has really given me a different way to understand…
Comment linking /2019/scriptnotes-ep-403-how-to-write-a-movie-transcript
on “Ask HN: What were your most impactful podcast episodes from 2019?”Submitted What does “execution dependent” mean? (2009) as a story · 28 points
HN discussionNow I just wonder if script readers will react "ooh, I don't know why but this looks nice" or "ugh, something's weird about this script but I can't tell what." The original announcement that someone posted [1] says that Courier Prime was developed by iterating on blinded feedback from actual screenwriters reading sample screenplay manuscripts, so I'd expect it to be reliably better in practice. Interestingly, and ag…
Comment linking /2013/introducing-courier-prime
on “Courier Prime: It’s Courier, Just Better”- ed · 2009-01-14
Submitted Ask HN: Would you fund this show? as a story · 26 points
HN discussion John August also talks about it in episode 74 of his podcast with Craig Mazin called Scriptnotes: http://johnaugust.com/2013/three-hole-punchdrunk Although you need to pay to access archived podcasts they have all of them transcribed: http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-ep-74-three-hole-punc... I highly recommend the podcast to anyone even remotely interested in the movie industry. I've been listening for around…
Comment linking /2013/scriptnotes-ep-74-three-hole-punchdrunk-transcript
on “Courier Prime: It’s Courier, Just Better”Submitted On Google and evil as a story · 18 points
HN discussionalangpierce commented with the original announcement, which has a much better close-up comparison: http://johnaugust.com/2013/introducing-courier-prime
Comment linking /2013/introducing-courier-prime
on “Courier Prime: It’s Courier, Just Better”Submitted Introducing Courier Prime as a story · 7 points
HN discussionLooks like here's the original announcement, which has more background on motivations and has a comparison with regular Courier: http://johnaugust.com/2013/introducing-courier-prime
Comment linking /2013/introducing-courier-prime
on “Courier Prime: It’s Courier, Just Better”Submitted Topping the charts and racing to the bottom as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThat way of boiling down Finding Nemo seems to miss why the story is designed that way. It doesn’t describe anything about what happens to Marlin as a character, just a few basic plot points, and then in the end he somehow learns that “love depends on trust”. Uh, ok. If you actually want to understand why Finding Nemo “consistently tugs at heartstrings worldwide”, Craig Mazin used it as his primary example in “How t…
Comment linking /2019/scriptnotes-ep-403-how-to-write-a-movie-transcript
on “Use Pixar's story formula to win over investors”Submitted Punching the Hawk: Karateka 2.0 as a story · 3 points
HN discussionA refrain on the Scriptnotes podcast[1] (hosted by John August and Craig Mazin) is that you're more likely to be an NFL player than a working screenwriter[2]. 1. https://johnaugust.com/scriptnotes 2. https://johnaugust.com/2015/scriptnotes-ep-215-pg13-blood-bo...
Comment linking /2015/scriptnotes-ep-215-pg13-blood-boobs-and-bullcrap-transcript
on “Of 55 students in my class at Columbia’s Film program, 4 made a career out of it”Submitted Getting rid of books as a story · 3 points
HN discussionThere are a surprising number of movies that aren't available on any streaming platforms. https://johnaugust.com/2018/missing-movies
Comment linking /2018/missing-movies
on “Popcorn Time 4.0”Submitted Kindle formatting for web geeks as a story · 3 points
HN discussionI'm disappointed in the shallow look people are giving this. You can't just read the marketing copy and take it at face value. Amazon Studios is actually pretty terrible for creatives, as many successful screenwriters et al. have been pointing out for over a year now: http://artfulwriter.com/?p=1103 http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/motion-captured/posts/the-mornin... Since those were written things have improved slightly…
Comment linking /2011/amazon-studios-now-slightly-less-terrible
on “Amazon studios”Submitted Customers vs Final Draft as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> It's a real term [..] the showrunner can also have one of several actual official titles Q: Is "showrunner" an official title, or not? EDIT: apparently not[0]: "The highest ranking producer is the showrunner, the man or woman ultimately responsible for the creative direction of the series. Showrunner is a function, not a title — this person is credited as an Executive Producer. In many cases, he or she has “Create…
Comment linking /2004/producer-credits-and-what-they-mean
on “Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series”Submitted Fountain, open source plaintext screenplay formatting as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> Or, in other words, they don't have their own version of this strategy chart: https://johnaugust.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/disney_cha... . (Disney corporate synergy, dated 1957) I really love that chart because it tells you so much about the company culture that drew it up. Almost any other company would draw this diagram in some depressingly corporate way, but Disney drew it as a cartoon with little characte…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/2014/07/disney_cha..
on “Why are toys such a bad business?”Submitted Why the Netflix/WB deal isn’t a bad thing as a story · 2 points
HN discussionBecause most toy companies don't / can't understand vertical integration and increasing value capture. Or, in other words, they don't have their own version of this strategy chart: https://johnaugust.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/disney_cha... (Disney corporate synergy, dated 1957) Your primary consumer has the attention span of a 10-year-old, and no disposable income. Why are we surprised this is a terrible indust…
Comment linking /wp-content/uploads/2014/07/disney_chart.jpg
on “Why are toys such a bad business?”Submitted Getting Things Done in a Pandemic (2020) as a story · 1 points
HN discussion- wj · 2015-10-30
Two Hollywood screenwriters really dove down into Groundhog Day and is a discussion you might find insightful: http://johnaugust.com/2014/scriptnotes-ep-133-groundhog-day-...
Comment linking /2014/scriptnotes-ep-133-groundhog-day-transcript
on “The Thirty-Seven Basic Plots, According to a Screenwriter of the Silent Film Era” Submitted The Hollywood Standard: Courier and margins (2007) as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
