[Edu-sig] Movies anyone?

[kirby urner]

I'm wondering if anyone is using, or thinking of using, this imdbpy to
give students an early appreciation for the power of an open source
Python package, to deliver relevant movie-related information.

Cut and pasting (excerpting) from
http://imdbpy.sourceforge.net/docs/README.users.txt, the scripts look
like this (if you've not used imdb:  every movie, actor etc. is tagged
with a number):

$ get_movie.py 0133093
Movie
=====
Title: Matrix, The
Genres: Action, Thriller, Sci-Fi.
Director: Andy Wachowski (as The Wachowski Brothers), Larry Wachowski
(as The Wachowski Brothers).
Writer: Andy Wachowski (written by) (as The Wachowski Brothers), Larry
Wachowski (written by) (as The Wachowski Brothers).
Cast: Keanu Reeves (Neo (Thomas A. Anderson)), Laurence Fishburne
(Morpheus), Carrie-Anne Moss (Trinity), Hugo Weaving (Agent Smith),
Joe Pantoliano (Cypher (Mr. Reagan)).
Runtime: 136.
Country: USA.
Language: English.
Rating: 8.5
Votes: 114,264
Plot: In the near future, a computer hacker named Neo (Keanu Reeves)
discovers that all life on Earth may be nothing more than an elaborate
facade created by a malevolent cyber-intelligence, for the purpose of
placating us while our life essence is "farmed" to fuel the Matrix's
campaign of domination in the "real" world. He joins like-minded Rebel
warriors Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) and Trinity (Carrie Ann Moss)
in their struggle to overthrow the Matrix.

I've written my own screen scraper for imdb (probably wrote about it
here, don't remember), but it never performed satisfactorily.  Used it
with one Saturday Academy class as a part of my intro.  At least
useful for explaining what "screen scraper" means.  Imdbpy would be
more impressive I think, also better than the xml-rpc script we played
with at Winterhaven (8th grade, write-up at my site).

Kirby
4dsolutions.net