This is the latest album from the group I helped found in college. They’ve done a great job on it, and they’ve done me the great honor of including an old bit of comedy I used to do on the circuit way-back-when. If you’re really into it, just drop me a line, and I can send you the bootleg of me proposing to a cute coed and passing out on a stranger’s balcony.
Since I’m on the subject, even the Christian Science Monitor is getting in on the blogwagon:
Blogs: Here to stay – with changes
My favorite quote from the former, lending such credibility to blogging as a web-publishing tool:
“My blog is freedom,” Natalia says. “It’s an outlet for ideas and thoughts that don’t have another place to go. If I feel like going on about an actor I think is cute, or music I like, or typing out my Spanish oral [exam] in order to memorize it, I can do that.”
See, I love that Natalia has the freedom to type out her Spanish oral. But why does teen-blogging have to be a focus of every single article I read on this stuff right now?
My dad just started a blog. OK, I started the blog for him as a birthday present, and he’s on the verge of really taking to it. The idea behind it was to get him up to speed on the future of digital journalism public so he feels more prepared when he hits his master’s program in International Journalism in the fall at Cardiff University in Wales.
It feels like I’ve been talking more and more about blogs and blogging of late, amplified in no small part by my first experience actually teaching public relations at the University (more on that whole experience later). What I’ve taken from all this discussion is that, primarily, people are taking to this stuff. They’re reading them. They’re writing them. They’re appreciating them. They’re learning about their friends and family, and they love being in on the scoop when part of their circle has something profound to say about the world.
So it’s frustrating when I stumble across old-world journalists who see blogs as self-righteous and pitiful. In a recent call to arms for traditionalists, Frank Catalano writes of blogging:
Sure, blogging is a new publishing mechanism (sort of). But it has more in common with wanna-bes who self-publish deathless prose through vanity presses, or pre-teens who pour their hearts out into diaries with flimsy locks, or little old ladies who write poetry with quill pens to read to their cats and store in the sock drawer, than with actual, grab-your-audience-by-the-hair (or other body parts) and get’em to think writing.
This is chronic hyperbole, and at some level, I’m ashamed that this is the quote I’ve picked to represent his piece. But it’s the one that makes the hair stand on the back of my neck, and that’s the way it is.
See, Catalano’s not doing service to the point. It doesn’t matter what people are writing on their websites to journalism-at-large, it matters to the handful of people who read them. The beauty of blogging, and the real boon of the blog to the traditionalists, is that the important stuff — the stuff that changes worlds — bubbles to the top and makes its way to the rest of us.
Catalano’s own blog, Byte Me Online, is one that I actually read. It’s infuriating that this rant does more disservice to people with a yen to write to their own little audiences than to teach the point about actually finding an audience for a speculative blog.
I say the more, the merrier.
Never mind the sweet irony that I never would have discovered Catalano’s piece were it not for another blog. Such is the point:
Like pubs, weblogs can become a huge part of the everyday life of both individuals and a community. Unlike the bricks, mortar, and beer on tap pubs, you get to the digital variety by simply turning on your computer and “walking” into the URL. Time and space become of secondary importance, though we often find that we want to hang out there when something big is happening in the world around us.
I like this for the echo of the often sweet innocence of some blogs and the tough critique of others. The importance of weblogs lies less in the ability of the writer to present the world than in the reader’s ability to assimilate it, which is what journalism was all about once.
I really liked Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom. I thought the science fiction was compelling and original. And now, come to find out, Doctorow was right on the money with his tech the whole time!
It appears that NASA has discovered a way to actually record sub-vocalization — talking to yourself. According to Gizmodo, they want to use it to control rovers and such. Me, on the other hand? I want to use it to talk to the dead.
Here’s a little something from journalist Peter Martin down under on the latest trends in CD sales in Australia. P2P a sales tool? Naaah…
I find this immensely amusing.
In an episode that shows both the promise and peril of a corporate embrace of blogging, Richards helped Dr. Pepper/Seven Up run a blogcentric campaign last spring for its new milk-based drink, Raging Cow. It started a blog for the cow–“the cow had his own site,” says director of corporate communications Mike Martin (who’s a little fuzzy on bovine anatomy). Then it screened hundreds of young bloggers to find a suitable group to help promote the drink. Dr. Pepper flew the five winners and their parents to Dallas to try the product and gave them several hundred dollars in Amazon gift certificates.
While Martin says the campaign was a success, it provoked an angry backlash in the blog world, where the relationship between the company and the blogs was seen as crassly commercial and poorly disclosed. “A case of crude corporate cluelessness,” wrote one widely read pundit and law professor. Todd Copilevitz, director of interactive strategy at Richards, admits the company should have had the bloggers repeat disclosures more often.
This, from an article on the ever-blurring line between blogging-as-teen-journal and blogging-as-commercial-outreach on FastCompany does a great job of initiating those new to blogging on the dangers and opportunities therein.
One of the issues most intriguing from an advertising and public relations perspective is the meta-ad. Blogs may be great for corporations to decrease costs and increase what they’re saying is communication with their customers, but as Curt’s said time and time again, blogs are tragically under-equipped to handle discussions, which may pose a challenge when the hype dries up. Are these blogs really successful at communicating with customers, thus driving support for the organization? Or is the support there simply because the organization has jumped on the weblog bandwagon?
This is a damned important distinction:
MR. RUSSERT: But you yourself believed that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction.
DR. DEAN: I did, because the president told us. And I’m inclined to believe presidents in most circumstances. I think most Americans, Democrats or Republicans, ought to believe the president of the United States when he does something as serious as send us to war.
Whatever your position on the war and the justification behind pursuing such, this very point is another leading indicator in the unraveling of public trust in the presidency by the left. Those in the 45% approving of the Bush administration’s actions may not be so affected, but those on the other side have been pushed one more inch. Because in their hearts and minds, it’s not as safe today as it was yesterday to trust the words of our leader.
This, in my view, will be Kerry’s biggest hurdle. How do you tell a populace that you’re the guy to follow when every prior leader in the past 25 years has been, in some fashion or another, an accomplice in the degradation of The American Presidency, one right after another?
I didn’t see the interview, but if the CNN recount is to be believed, it wreaks of back-peddling.
Bush was asked by moderator Tim Russert whether his statement on the night the U.S. began the war in Iraq that intelligence “leaves no doubt” that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction was “apparently, not the case.” The president responded, “Correct.”
But Bush said Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein “had the ability to make weapons at the very minimum.”
And on his willingness to cooperate with his shiny new commission on intelligence?
Bush said he’d be glad to visit, but not testify before the commission.
As a voter, I don’t care what you say about his military record. He was honorably discharged from service and because I trust the military more than I trust the man himself, I have to believe it was a just discharge. But the mania with which this man has pursued all out war against a country with such limited support continues to call into question his ability to lead.
When he finished the interview with Russert, the President adjourned to the south lawn for some exercise.
I didn’t see the interview, but if the CNN recount is to be believed, it wreaks of back-peddling.
Bush was asked by moderator Tim Russert whether his statement on the night the U.S. began the war in Iraq that intelligence “leaves no doubt” that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction was “apparently, not the case.” The president responded, “Correct.”
But Bush said Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein “had the ability to make weapons at the very minimum.”
And on his willingness to cooperate with his shiny new commission on intelligence?
Bush said he’d be glad to visit, but not testify before the commission.
As a voter, I don’t care what you say about his military record. He was honorably discharged from service and because I trust the military more than I trust the man himself, I have to believe it was a just discharge. But the mania with which this man has pursued all out war against a country with such limited support continues to call into question his ability to lead.
When he finished the interview with Russert, the President adjourned to the south lawn for some exercise.
CNN.com – Microsoft takes on teen’s site MikeRoweSoft.com – Jan. 19, 2004
I’ve heard that part of copyright Gestalt says that you can’t let even the slightest infringement take place, or you set the precedent for far greater transgression, which is exactly why this whole engagement should be less of an alarm to copyright advocates than it is to anti-industrial complex supporters. I’m not a fan of Microsoft’s tactics, to be sure, but they’re not alone in their stance on these issues in big business. It’s time for the humanist revolt — Microsoft, RIAA, and MPAA all of them are on a far more slippery slope than ever before: alienating more existing customers every day than they are recruiting new ones.
I wonder what Mike Rowe’s development platform-of-choice happens to be?
OK, I’m gonna say it: iLife ’04 is worth easily five times what you pay for it. As it is, the dramatic speed increase in iPhoto was worth the $49.99 I paid for it all by itself.
I remember the uproar of those calling for the heads of Apple marketing on a giant silver platter when Steve Jobs announced the auspicious iLife-for-money plan a year ago. Then, you could still download iPhoto for free, not to mention iTunes and iMovie, but iDVD was the bully that required a DVD to install it, and thereby the price tag.
Yeah, I woulda have bought the thing if I’d needed it (I already had a new Mac that had all the apps pre-installed. I woulda bought it because I’m an addict. But I could see the arguments of those who wouldn’t buy the suite back then. With iLife ’04, no excuses. This simply kicks.
Garageband is the pinnacle. I’ve been using it for about five minutes, and I’m thinking of changing my name to 49-cent. Yeah, I’m almost there. The coolest part of it is how they’ve organized the GUI — I can use it quite effectively on my 12″ screen and still have access to all the loops and tools I need. I know I’ve only scratched the surface of the power of this little guy, but it’s already making me sound like a champ.
All right, how silly is this? Like the network has never run an issue ad or special during primetime? Whatever.
There was a time when I worked in Windows every single day and knew it inside and out, from 3.1 to XP. When friends needed advice, I was the guy they’d call. When they screwed something up and needed to be bailed out, my phone would ring.
So, even though I’ve been a Mac user for two years, it was me who got the call when my friend Lauren’s Sony VAIO started acting up. She’d told me that she thought it was acting up because it was full. It was — at least one partition — so I started going through apps to dump to free up some space.
We got to Hotbar. I really detest Hotbar. It insinuates itself into every little thing you do, from Explorer to Outlook, really ugly. So I ask her — do you use it? No? Mind if I delete it? No? Great!
The file MSVCRT.DLL is a shared file. If you delete it, other programs may be affected. Do you want to delete the file MSVCRT.DLL?
We were talking and catching up, and I was sort of haphazardly clicking and said, “Yes.” Everything continued to work.
A few hours later, I was sitting in my office, and my phone rang. It was Lauren. “Do you know why my computer won’t boot up?” Damn. I buzzed back by her place at 4:30 in the afternoon and rebooted myself. This is the error, I swear to God:
Explorer cannot find the file MSVCRT.DLL. You must reinstall Windows. OK.
So, this is it. As of this moment, I’m no longer qualified to do Windows tech support for friends. That’s it, there it is. I knew the day would come, and today is it.
This is fodder for an idea I have about creating open source marketing and sales organizations.
Yeah! This is fantastic. Not only did I get to brush up on my chiral chemistry, but I also learned a helluva lot about sweeteners. Did you know that saccharine is a derivative of coal tar? Ugg. Check thisout over at Wired.com, and then get a diet Slurpy. And hurry!