Lights and wires...

Running technology

2011-02-19T13:18:00.001-05:00

This is the story of how something as low-tech as putting one foot in front of the other wouldn't have become a hobby for me if not for technology.

You see, I was always the slowest kid in class. Not intellectually, but physically. I'm velocity-challenged. One year, in elementary school we had something called "Field Day" where the whole school did different physical activities for ribbons. Let's just say parents were not surprised when I came home with only a participation ribbon.

About 5 years ago I was working in a newsroom in Phoenix and I got a call from Nike. They wanted us to try out their new Nike+ system, so they asked my shoe size and sent me a pair of shoes with a tracking chip in them. The chip allows you to track how fast you run, how far you run, and shows you graphs of how much you've progressed.

I tried it for a week, and I was hooked. For all those times the PE teachers in school had made us run, it took a tiny little chip to pique my interest. Instead of feeling like the slow kid, I just felt like I was accomplishing something, and those graphs proved it. First 10, then 20, the 50 and a hundred miles!

I later moved around and stopped running as much as I used to. It was just in the past year or so that I decided to get back in to running. I'd decided to quit smoking, and running was a good complement to quitting. If you want a quick reminder of how bad smoking is for you, try smoking a bunch of cigarettes one night, then going for a run the next day.

I realized, though, that I didn't have a plan. I knew I didn't have it in me to just go outside and run a couple miles, but I didn't know where to start. That's when I found the "Couch to 5K" running plan (sometimes abbreviated C25K). This plan, posted at coolrunning.com, has helped thousands of people running a full 5K distance (about 3 miles) in around two months.

The plan has you walk a bit, then run, then walk to catch you breath, then run...and each week the amount of running increases and the amount of walking decreases until you eventually can run the whole way.

The concept was clear to me, but I still didn't have an easy way to know when to run and walk. I didn't want to jog around with a slip of paper and a stopwatch, timing each motion exactly. That's when I found the brilliant Robert Ullrey. He had the idea to create a Couch to 5K podcast, and this idea alone makes him a superhero in my book.

Instead of jogging around with a pad and a stopwatch, he just recorded some upbeat music, and tells you in the podcast when to walk and when to run. He even included a 5 minute warm up and cool down (which I still do now). All you need to do is press play and go. I've tried to find him on the Internet to email him a note of thanks, but the site was posted several years ago, and he doesn't seem to have any working contact information anymore.

Thanks to the podcast, I've run several 5Ks now, and even ran a 10K in Atlanta on the 4th of July. I had set a goal of running it in under an hour, and I did it! But I seemed to stop improving. Running was getting a bit tedious, and it felt like no matter how fast I ran when I trained, I just couldn't run much faster.

For Christmas I got the Polar FT4 heart rate monitor. I chose it because it has a strap that goes around your chest to measure your heart rate, and a watch that displays it and stores the data. An added bonus: the strap talks to most cardio equipment in the gym, so you can just wear the strap, and the machine knows its you, and shows your heart rate on the display.

So, I decided to run another 10K with this fancy device, and it taught me that I've been running too fast. My maximum heart rate is 191, which means I should be training at around 133 to 143 beats per minute. Another series of calculations showed me that my optimal fat burning zone is around 151 bpm. Problem is, every time I ran, my heart rate was, on average, at 171. I'd discovered why I was getting burned out: I was running too fast.

At first, keeping my heart rate at 151 was really challenging. I was barely running...it almost felt like I could walk faster than I was running...but after a few weeks I could run much faster while keeping my heart rate at the same level. This meant my body was getting better conditioned to running, and it made running longer distances immensely easier. Tedious, because I barely felt like I was moving at first, but definitely doable.

Now I'm training for a half marathon (it's coming up on March 7th!) and that heart rate monitor (along with the beginner's half marathon training plan from coolrunning.com) have been my new savior. I did a 10 mile run last week, and I wouldn't have been able to come close to that if I were still running so fast.

So, now I'm not that last one to finish anymore. I may never win a trophy for running, but I did win a second place medal at my first 5K...my first ever award for anything physical in my life. And I owe it mostly to technology. Oh, and Robert Ullrey.

Gmail protects me from myself

2011-02-05T17:14:00.000-05:00

The lists of common-sense things to do to protect your computer have been around for years: choose a secure password, don't download suspicious software, constantly run and update virus protection, protect yourself from spy ware.

Despite knowing this advice, I haven't always followed it. Sometimes I download stuff that I haven't checked thoroughly, or I have a simple password to access things I don't use very often. And, for all of my online life I haven't had a problem. Until recently.

Somehow my email was compromised and everyone on my contact list was sent a link to some strange Russian porn site.

That should be the end of it...now my email is done for, and I've got to come up with another address to use. But no...Google sniffed out the problem and did a few clever things to help protect me.

First, they noticed the account was sending out a lot of messages, and stopped the account from being able to send anything out. Then, in order for me to log in again, I had to jump through a lot of hoops (asking questions about what I put down as my personal information) then sent a text message to the number I had listed as my phone number and made me enter it in.

Then, once I had regained access they encouraged me to set up 2-step access. I've always been interested in information security, and the nerdy things smart people can do to keep information safe. The US intelligence agencies use special rooms called SCIFs (pronounced skiffs) to discuss classified information and have specially configured blackberries that allow for access to classified email systems. Google, of course, can't reconfigure the equipment we use, but they can take

advantage of the equipment we have.

Once you're forced to change your password, Google asks you input information about your phone, and if it's a blackberry, iPhone

or other certain smart phones it encourages you to download a program that generates a random 6 digit number every minute.

To configure the program, you take a picture of a QR code (like the one shown to the right) with your phone, and the software translates the image into the information it needs to assign the random numbers to your specific account.

Then, once your phone is configured, you need to enter the 6 digit code the first time you log in to your account. Google recognizes the computers you use on a regular basis, and only makes you put in the code about once a month once it's configured.

Then in a final turn of brilliance, they find 2 ways to help you access your email should you phone go missing. First they ask for a backup number they could send the access information to (as a text message or even a voice mail) and then they employ a form of encryption developed almost a hundred years ago: the one time pad.

US intelligence agencies needed a way to communicate secret information, and a guy named Gilbert who worked for AT&T had the idea of using a randomly generated series of numbers to encrypt messages. The sender would have a list of numbers on a small pad of paper and would shift each letter down the alphabet a number of places. The recipient would have the same list of numbers, and could decipher the message by undoing the change the sender made. After each message, you destroy the page you used and sue the next list of numbers for the next message.

Since the only two people who know how many positions each letter was shifted, and the number is random each time it's virtually impossible to crack. Google takes advantage of this, and as a last resort, if you lose access to your account you are given a list of 10 numbers you are supposed to keep in your wallet. If you don't have you phone, and the other techniques don't work, you use this one time pad to get back in to your account. Clever right?

I'm relieved the geniuses at Google protected me from my, well, dunceness.

My favorite carnivorous water-borne mammal-themed product

2011-01-22T22:02:00.000-05:00

I'm a klutz.

I think klutz-dom is much like having a bad sense of direction, or being hopelessly bad at math: it's important to just look deep within yourself, see the truth and accept it.

Some people try to fool themselves into thinking it's not true. You know this guy: he ignores the map or GPS and refuses to stop for directions, only to end up hopelessly lost and an hour late...or he swears he can split the bill for the whole table in his head, but consistent raised eyebrows around the table lead to someone breaking out the calculator on their phone.

I was the same way with my klutziness. I even went out for the basketball team in 8th grade, hoping that my diminutive height would be outweighed by hard work and determination. Unfortunately...there is no amount of determination that can undo the embarrassment of constantly dribbling the ball off your foot during tryouts.

So, I've come to accept my klutzitude. And part of that acceptance led me to purchase an OtterBox.

The OtterBox is extra-ferocious defense for your iPhone, iPad, or any other smart phone or fragile piece of electronic equipment you keep in your pocket. The makers, however, are very careful (for legal reasons I'm certain) to say that it's not indestructible.

That won't stop me from saying it, though: its indestructible! It's waterproof, and dirt proof, of course, but also shatterproof! I've dropped my iPhone 3GS on the tile bathroom floor multiple times with not even a ding. I've even thrown my phone to someone in a parking lot, only to have them miss that catch and drop it...phone's fine.

They have several levels of protection for your phone, from the low-end slinky all-rubber number to "The Defender" - a combination of silicone, hard plastic, and a clear plastic sheet that keeps your phone completely protected while still allowing you access to all the ports and jacks and buttons you need to use.

The only thing I haven't done to my OtterBox yet is throw it into an active volcano...though, that's probably good for a couple reasons. I'm pretty sure it won't protect my phone (I mean...the thing is only rubber, not tiles from the space shuttle) and I may just lose my balance and fall in if I got that close to a volcano.

I am a klutz after all.

My love affair with Slingbox

2011-01-08T14:40:00.005-05:00

Guys who love gadgets are everywhere. There's nothing particularly special or interesting about a guy who loves the latest technology: they keep things like Wired magazine or this week's CES in business. By my passion for Slingbox is a bit deeper than just geeky interest - it's a downright love affair.

Slingbox is a small black and red box about the size of a copy of Atlas Shrugged that streams video from your TV or cable box to the Internet. And, of course they have an application for the iPhone.

My job in TV News gives me a few key uses for it. For example, part of my responsibility is knowing what we (and our competition) covered in the 11pm newscasts the night before. Slingbox allows me to watch those newscasts that I have saved on my cable box with my iPhone while I'm running on the treadmill at the gym. I can even stream them in the car and listen to them as I drive in to work.

The Slingbox gives our newsroom a vital capability as well: we can use it to stream our on-air feed to CNN during breaking news, which frees up other transmission resources for live feeds and takes the burden off our team to worry about feeding the networks and instead allows us to focus more on covering the story.

I'm not alone - in terms of utility in our newsroom the consultants, reporters and news director love it too. The consultants can use it in conjunction with minute-by-minute reports of who tuned in and out during the newscasts to try to draw connections between what stories were on air when people turned us off. The news director and executive producers can see how certain blocks flowed just after they went on the air, and whether there were problems with commercial breaks. Our reporters use it to see to watch previous newscasts and see how their live shots looked on-air and how they looked in the two-box with the anchors.

My favorite use for it is in the rare event we get beat on a story, we can see what our competition had that we didn't. Let's say they had an interview with a friend or relative we were unable to find - in the past you had to hope they'd re-run the piece or post the story to their website so you could start chasing that lead. Now we can pull their piece up instantly, jot down the super, and start chasing!

Of course, it's nice outside of work: if I'm stuck at the airport, or waiting for my car to get fixed I watch saved items on the DVR, or even watch live sports. Netflix and Hulu are nice and all...but there's no other way to watch a live sporting event on your phone without a Slingbox.

I can't think of anything else that's red and black that makes my heart race...unless it UGA victory on the football field.

The Live Trucks are Disappearing

2010-12-21T21:08:00.005-05:00

The technology to transmit live video through the air has existed for decades. Until recently it's taken millions in infrastructure, microwave towers, satellite dishes, and specialized training. Local TV newsrooms continue to use digital microwave and satellite trucks to get live video back to the station, but rapid improvements have started to change the game.

Earlier this year, our newsroom to a live Skype shot to air. With the help of a MacBook Pro and a high quality camera, the video was really close to broadcast quality...but it still relied on thousands of dollars in camera and computer equipment.

Sometimes, though, broadcast quality isn't as important as live...and viewers are OK with lower quality video if there's a good reason for the lower quality. Look at the VTech camera phone video - the quality wasn't great, but because of the significance of the tape it didn't matter. Think of all the crazy surveillance tape you see on television...tape that conveys immediacy or tells a story is more important than perfect quality.

That's where UStream comes in...UStream allows regular people to stream live video from mobile devices. They even have a free application to stream video from the iPhone. Sometimes, though, your field crews don't have an iPhone or they don't have the opportunity to configure an account just to cover breaking news. That's where the recently released Cerevo cam stands out.

Cerevo Cam is a Japanese product that allows to stream video to UStream with just a couple quick button strokes. I recently had the opportunity to play with and configure one of these cameras.

It wasn't an easy process - the thing only exists in Japan, and though the menus on the camera itself can be displayed in English (after some blind tinkering with options) it has to be configured using the Japanese-only website. (Big thanks to Google Translate for help on this...obviously).

Once you enter the information for the Wi-Fi network you're currently using, the website creates a QR code. By taking a picture of the QR code, the camera configures itself to automatically submit pictures to the Cerevo website...and with a little more configuration you can have the thing feed directly to the UStream website.

Though I appreciate the simplicity designed into the camera (once configured) it seems a little unnecessary. The iPhone 3Gs and iPhone 4 have the capability to transmit video to the UStream website, and it doesn't require extra hardware. In addition, the Cerevo camera doesn't work unless there's a Wi-Fi hotspot, so to use these in the field we need to deploy them with a mobile Wi-Fi hotspot.

We still use live trucks...but who knows how much longer that could last. Incremental developments like UStream, Cerevo Cam, Streambox and the Livestream livepack are all slowly pushing us to a day where the cost for full HD streaming live transmission drops through the basement.

The Teaching Company

2009-10-05T22:14:00.006-04:00

Remember sleeping through lectures in college?

OK, I didn't ever do that (cutting class, though - different story).\. Regardless, The Teaching Company found a way to learn about something new and ensure you get a quality experience. They travel the country visiting the top colleges and universities in the country, auditing the most popular, talked-about classes, reviewing professors, and then making those lectures available on CD or DVD.

I've been doing a lot of driving lately (over the past 4 months I've driven at least 5,000 miles) and finding some way to stay entertained on those long road trips can be tricky...but not with The Teaching Company. I've tried four courses so far (borrowed from friends), and each had something valuable to offer (even if it wasn't intentional).

The first was about Game Theory and Decision Making. I'd briefly studied some game theory in college statistics, and thought I'd appreciate the subject as it comes to decision making in my new role as a manager. However, I'd forgotten to take into account that appreciating a board full of equations and decision trees is impossible when you only have the audio version. After about 6 or 7 lessons I found myself getting lost quickly...and soon gave up.

The second was about how to appreciate the world's great music. I figured this would be great: it's well reviewed by other people who've listened to it, and I sure won't have the problem of needing to see the chalkboard this time. However, I was soon reminded that I simply don't care enough about the subtle differences of fugue among the great French composers. It got to be a little too much detail on a subject I just couldn't force myself to want that much detail on.

My next was Argumentation. The lecturer points out right away: THIS IS NOT ABOUT HOW TO WIN AN ARGUMENT. I was a little disappointed (haha), but rode through it, and I'm glad I have. It gets a bit detailed, but lecturer immediately backs off and explains terms when he gets too mired in detail, and it's been interesting to apply the technical framework of argumentation to the daily pitches I get on the phone, in email and in the story meeting. I've also been listening to it on the way in to work, and it's helped get me focused and thinking while I'm on my way in. I'm almost done too: I'm on lecture 19 of 24.

My favorite, without a doubt, has to be Understanding Linguistics : The Science of Language by John McWhorter! Every couple of days I'd come away from one of his lecture with some new fact about how linguistics work, or why it's easier for children to learn language than adults, or whether there's languages that use sounds we don't make in ours (btw, yes...check out Kabardian...they have 48 consonants and only two vowels, and it's one of the most complex things ever!) This guy somehow found a way to make an imposing and obscure field seem so clear and logical, and especially entertaining. He's another one of those scary smart people in the world that have a gift for being able to share their knowledge in a way that not only makes you smarter, but also makes you feel smart during the process. All 36 lessons just flew by (yes...18 hours).

I'm now on The Evolution of the English Language, but it appears McWhorter has another course posted...who'd have figured I'd end up caring so much about Linguistics??

If you get the chance, try finding one of these CDs and giving it a whirl...you could find something fascinating out there in the world that you never knew was waiting there all along.

Who the hell is Proust??

2009-06-29T23:46:00.008-04:00

Jonah Lehrer is another one.

There's this recurring quality I've found among some of the people I've been reading lately - an uncanny ability to distill the work and thoughts of world-changing geniuses into concepts I can appreciate and understand. Jonah Lehrer is one of those people. (I have to admit, though, most of them are people I initially heard on Radiolab).

His book Proust was a Neuroscientist, sounds overly intimidating.

Don't be intimidated. Even though it includes both the name of a long dead French author and the name of a notoriously complicated branch of science, isn't hard to enjoy.

The book compares the works of artists and finds connections between their work and a scientific field. One of my favorite examples is between Cezanne and our scientific understanding of human sight.

Cezanne is one of those names that I felt I should know, but wouldn't be able to say anything intelligent about until this book. I've pasted one of his paintings, titled Green Apples, to the right.

He was an artist who had to deal with the coming of photography, and knew that painting had to change. The old school was to make everything look as real as possible, but photography would soon be able to beat out the work of any human hand. Cezanne decided to do something different. His art, like the painting on the right, is kind of blurry...almost incomplete. When you look at that painting you can make out the apples, but that's not the point. The point is that he makes you interpret the work - the broad strokes that imply the apples are there, without simply showing them to you. Our brain resolves the blurry image on it's own, and clarifies it into a clear concept: apples on a table.

He could have made it look like a photograph, remember, this is one of the most talented painters of his day. If he wanted, they could've looked just like a photo. He didn't though - he left just enough clues for our brains to resolve this blurry canvas into a clear concept.

Turns out, many years later, scientists learned that this is how the brain works too. The brain doesn't resolve everything with crystal clarity immediately - it actually sends two images down two different neural pathways...one of them is fast, and one is slow. Lehrer explains:

The fast pathway quickly transmits a coarse and blurry picture to our prefrontal cortex, a brain region involved in conscious thought. Meanwhile, the slow pathway takes a meandering route through the visual cortex...Why does the mind see everything twice? Because our visual cortex needs help. After the prefrontal cortex receives its imprecise picture, the "top" of the brain quickly decides what the "bottom" has seen and begins doctoring the sensory data. Form is imposed onto the formless rubble...the outside world is forced to conform to our expectations. If these interpretations are removed, our reality becomes unrecognizable. The light just isn't enough.

You've likely encountered something similar before: at a magic show. You know that what you've seen isn't possible, and magic hasn't been proven to exist. Yet, when you watch David Copperfield or Criss Angel, the reason you're so stunned is because the two pathways of your vision are giving you conflicting information. 'That couldn't have happened,' and 'I just saw that happen' go through your brain at the same time...and you're stuck, dumbfounded, trying to resolve the two.

The pinpoint observations brought to light by other famous artists mentioned in the book are just as astonishing. Igor Stravinsky (yep, another one of those guys whose name I know, but don't know squat about) composed a symphony that led to rioting the first time it was performed. He played with the human brain's desire to find a complete a pattern in music...by removing all the patterns. By taking out the patterns, he affected people on a very primal level.

Getrude Stein (yeah...I got nothin' on that one, actually..I'd never heard of her) wrote these obnoxiously long poems that didn't make any sense...but in doing so broke down the laws of grammar and syntax. A study of deaf people in Nicaragua found that people are innately wired to use certain rules in language. (Turns out deaf people in Nicaragua had no form of communication - they were isolated and abandoned into crowded orphanages. The first school for the deaf was formed in there in the 80's and a makeshift language of signs sprang up. Linguists found it followed the same rules of languages from all over the planet, though the people creating it had no exposure to anything else. The whole story is fascinating.)

The world can't be described just in the sounds and strokes of art and music...nor can it be described by the theories and equations of scientists. Our experience in this world is made up of a combination of the two. The emotions we feel and the facts we gather join together to make up our reality. Neither of them alone can fully describe our lives as they really are.

A great book lets you see the world in a new and novel way...Lehrer does exactly that. He's the nerdy guy you'd wanna have a beer with. Reading his book was a worthwhile substitute...not to mention it means two beers for me!

Change is comin'...

2009-06-12T20:43:00.003-04:00

I've been saying that I thought that the increasingly desperate state of TV news is going to lead station to take novel approaches to the way they cover and present news.

An article in this months American journalism review discusses stations that are tryin g to do something different to lure in viewers with something other than the same staid newscasts of yesterday: a morning show with the rundown on the side of the screen, roving anchors who float through the newsroom doing impromptu Q&As with talent, a morning show with a set desdicated to live music acts.

Read all the details here: http://www.ajr.org/article_printable.asp?id=4767

Some may think these changes are scary...but I find them encouraging: there may be afuture for our industry yet! What do you think? Would YOU watch any of these newscasts if they were on in your market? Do you agree that 'you [don't] have to be murdered for it to be called news'?

Welcome to Ft. Myers

2009-05-28T23:54:00.002-04:00

OK...so let's say you're in my position. You just discovered that you're moving to Ft. Myers, Florida. You'll be in a small, coastal city near the Gulf of Mexico...the smallest city you've ever lived in. None of the people you know have any clue about what to expect or any advance guidance on what the place is like. All you've been able to glean is that you'll be close to Tampa and Miami.

From experience (I've moved to four different states in the past 8 years) I know that the first impression you get on a place really sticks with you. Those first few nights you have and the first random experiences you have make a really deep impression. Since this is now day 4 I'd like to share some of that experience...and some of those impressions.

The place I'm working for has corporate housing right near downtown...and that was what led me to my first quick lesson:

LESSON ONE ON FT. MYERS: THERE IS NOTHING DOWNTOWN.

Now, don't get me wrong, I've lived in places where there's not much to do downtown. For example, downtown Phoenix is nearly vacant once the big buildings shut their doors at the end of the business day. Ft. Myers is something entirely different. I've been through downtown Ft. Myers at all times of day and night, and I run into the same weird experience: empty streets absolutely devoid of cars, buildings with 'for sale' signs on the store fronts...and, the weirdest part: NO PEOPLE.

I've come to learn that there are, in fact, a couple little enclaves of activity in downtown Ft. Myers. I just went to 'Spirits of Bacchus' tonight, a cool little bar/gastropub with an absurdly delicious gourmet ham and cheese, a nice - though small - crowd, and a great bartender. That said - it's mostly a dead zone. It's as though you were driving through a movie set of empty storefronts...the nicely re-done brick streets have no cars parked on them and no people walking anywhere at all.

It's just something typical to the area: 'everyone knows there's noone downtown.'

The line you hear people here say is: they're really putting in a lot of work to build it up. Which may be true, but currently it looks as though there is a noxious cloud of poison gas in the air...and everyone else knows it but you.

Its important to point out that I got really lucky: my second afternoon here I got to go to a barbecue with an old family friend: Uncle Jimmy. Uncle Jimmy is Jim Thomas, a good friend of my brother's and a mainstay of his life when I was tiny. I got to know him pretty well (as well as any 8 year-old can know someone.) Jim moved to Ft. Myers about 10 years ago now, and he invited me to hang out with his family on Memorial day. It was especially nice in that it offered that little bit of familiarity everyone craves when faced with an entirely novel experience.

I asked about the area and Jim told me he'd get back to me with a few cool places to go check out in the city. This was when I learned my second big lesson.

I'd planned on living at the beach. I mean...obviously, we're so close to the beach, you'd be a fool to not live there. I found, though, that people would be nearly befuddled when I mentioned it. "Ohhhh," they'd say, "You don't want to live at the beach."

To any normal person outside of here, the statement sounds plain ridiculous! Why would you move all this way, be THIS close to the beach, and not want to live there. The answer has a few layers...but the truth is this:

LESSON TWO ON FT. MYERS: NOBODY LIVES AT THE BEACH.

The polite line is that, during tourist season the traffic is horrible (sometimes upwards of two hours on what is normally a 20 minute commute) but that's not the whole story. I got to spend a couple of days hanging out with people I met at the beach and found that the majority of them were...how do I put this:

FORMER 70'S FLOWER CHILDREN BOMBED OUT ON QUAALUDES.

I met only two people in that whole time who even approached my age, a 29 year-old girl who had just moved back, and just looked like she'd had a hard time of things....and a pasty mid-twenties girl who was so drunk she didn't even talk to me, she just tried to lure me with a drunken come-on look and a clumsy grab at my arm.

I refused those advances.

It's important to note that not EVERYONE on Ft. Myers beach is this way...I work with someone who lives there and he's a very smart, aware, and cool guy. However, that does not describe the lion's share of people I met.

Then there are the accomodations. They are normally descibed as "beach cottages" but that just means 'torn up one or two-story shacks that share coin-op washers.' While I understand that people will definitely put up with the shabby quality of living if it means they can live at the beach...I also realized that quality of life also means the type of people you're surrounded with.

In this case it means dealing with a place on the steep decline: one person told me that they could name 15 different bars that had closed in the past year...and the ones remaining were hardly standing.

The sparse nightlife, shabby living, and unfamiliar crowd (again, mostly 40's or older and dissociated from reality) meant that living at the beach wasn't really for me.

So, I wondered - where ARE the younger, professional people like me? I know there aren't a bunch of them, but there have to be a few. That's where Uncle Jimmy came out HUGE. A list of three places showed up as a text message the day after the barbecue, and I went to one of them. It's called 'Reserve' and I found a mostly empty place (it was Tuesday at 8:30) with a cute girl at one end of the bar, a cool bartender named Johnny, and a band setting up on the nearby stage.

I started chatting with the bartender, then the girl, then some other people who began to trickle in. I found out that lots of people live in central Ft. Myers. The nice places to go (the cool bars, the well-known sushi place, the creative restaurants) seem to be located there. Some people go to 'The Bell Tower' (though, I must admit I haven't been there yet) or Gulf Coast Town Center (another place I haven't been, but have heard some things about) but lots of people go out in central Ft. Myers. There's even a bar known as 'the buddha' for the gigantic buddha statue out front. It's a biker bar during most hours, but it's where most people end up after a night of going out.

I was told: "If you're gonna live anywhere, you should move to 'College Pointe'" It's a nice apartment complex in central Ft. Myers near the nice restaurants, the local school (Florida Gulf Coast University), some cool bars...and that buddha is a short walk away.

I met a girl that night who lives in that complex...and in addition to giving me a rave review of the place, she agreed to split the referral fee with me if I mentioned her.

The complex I'm temprarily staying in - the corporate housing - is in an 18 story tall building that is about 20% occupied. The parking lot is just as empty most times as the downtown streets.

When I went to College Pointe, the leasing office told me that they only had one single bedroom available. Otherwise, they're totally full. No twilight zone here.

I signed my lease today.

The Ridiculous Race

2009-05-13T13:12:00.001-04:00

I think I initially read about this book in Wired magazine...and added it to my Amazon wish list. I got it for Christmas, and it's been sitting on my shelf waiting to be read. When I flew to New York last week, I figured it was the perfect opportunity to do so and brought it along.

Before my flight was over, I'd devoured 150 pages of it...nearly half the book!

The Ridiculous Race by Steve Hely and Vali Chandrasekaran is a true story about a drunken wager made between two professional comedy writers: who can travel the entire globe (every line of latitude) first without airplanes. The winner gets a bottle of 40 year old scotch (a Kinclaith 1969 )...and stories to last a lifetime.

It combines the clever writing of two former Harvard Lampoon members (one of whom now writes for the TV show American Dad) with enthralling stories ranging from the mundane (the bathrooms on the trans-siberian railroad) to the exquisite (The Cambodian temples of Bankor Wat).

Interspersed within the funny writing are mind-opening observations about the rest of the world from two people who have done as much international traveling as most americans (read: none)

One section near the end was so well stated I thought it warranted repetition here:

I got to thinking that America isn't like a bully, or a jock, or a cool kid. In the high school of the world, America is like one of those girls that's just effortlessly beautiful. So beautiful you can't even have a crush on her. A girl like that isn't deliberately mean, it's just that she can't possibly understand how lucky she is. And people always do what she wants, without her even realizing it, so she never bothers becoming smart, or savvy about the other kids in school. Just with her airhead remarks, she's always accidentally screwing up the whole order of things. She doesn't even realize it.

Now, when you have a girl like that, the other kinda-pretty girls sort of like her but sort of hate her. That's maybe Germany, or France. And the ugly girls talk about her in the locker room, but are still totally afraid of her. That's Venezuela and Iran. The regular-looking dudes can't help but be awed by her. Maybe they try to woo her with poems. That's Great Britain. And the really twisted kids develop unhealthy obsessions about destroying her, just because they're so infuriated at how unfair things are.

The quick chapters, fast-paced writing, and juvenile gamesmanship of it all kept me in rapt attention all the way thorough. I didn't expect a book endorsed by Seth Macfarlane (creator of Family Guy) to provide such a good read on so many different levels. If you have a few hours, and want to be entertained with the TV off...check it out.

Sports Night

2009-05-12T16:19:00.003-04:00

Sports Night came on the air in the 90's, and only lasted two seasons, but that was plenty enough time to make an impact.

When I started at my very first TV station in Orlando, I asked our sports director Penn Holderness (a UVA grad with a degree in Philosophy of all things) what TV best conveys what its like to work in a TV newsroom. Without pausing a beat he answered 'Sports Night.' More questions around the newsroom confirmed it showed the practical world of working in TV...

Curiously, the show talks very little about sports...instead it focuses much more on the team putting a show on the air every day. And while conveying the practicality of the TV news world, it sprinkles in some of the best writing on any television show.

The monologue below by William H. Macy about glass tubes is a perfect example, and conveys exactly the kind of impact I want to make in any newsroom I work in.

Scanwiches

2009-04-13T22:39:00.002-04:00

Every once in a while someone comes along with a crazy idea that just might work.

Frans Johansson says that the best innovations are often an amalgam of two existing ideas or technologies that are melded together in a new and unique way.

With that definition at the top of your mind, allow me to present: scanwiches.

This is a site that provides what Anthony Bourdain would call "food porn" in a new and unique way...people (normally the site administrator, but some events allow others to provide content) provide a sandwich to be scanned by a color scanner. Then the image is posted along with a brief description of the lunch in question.

The scans, performed crisply with a stark black background look almost artistic.

Thanks to Julia Im for initially facebooking about this.

And then what?

2009-03-24T02:17:00.003-04:00

I've been think more and more about the future of TV news, and local TV stations in general, but that thinking has been focused on two arenas: what happens next, and what happens way down the road in the future.

Tonight a different question occurred to me: what happens in the mid-term? SO TV stations continue to lose money for the companies that own them and those companies have few options: change their revenue models, sell the stations, or go bankrupt.

Changing the revenue model is a possibility, but most local TV stations are owned by big companies that don't adapt well to change, and the changes needed for these stations to weather the coming economic storm are going to be too drastic for most consultants to admit and too hard long-time news directors to implement. The existing structure for TV stations, and TV newsrooms in particular is built on a very particular style of news that simply isn't selling anymore. See the post on what TV news and coffee have to do with each other for why this painful collapse was brought about.

So, changing the revenue model is exceeding unlikely, so the next possibility is to try to sell those stations. There are a couple of major problems with that, the foremost being that people don't buy failing businesses with revenue negative business models. Not to mention, the people who have the money required to meet the likely asking price of these businesses would be wiser to sit on that money in the short-term than to risk it in this down economy.

That brings us to the last possibility: bankruptcy. Even if bankruptcy is filed, and the stations land on life-support for a while...eventually they will go dark as new investors fail to materialize.

I wonder, then...what happens after that? Are we going to see local markets where local media is done away with, and the nation becomes a group of consumers of network-only broadcasting? Do the nets simply pipe their signal to the local TV master control rooms, and sell advertising through the New York office? Do local newsgatherers form online collectives, breaking stories online and collecting big payouts only on the rare day they come across a piece that 'blows the lid off' some big local story that pushes traffic to their site?

There's a good reason why "news from where *you* live," and all those other platitudes we've been fed for decades as local news consumers are cliche. There *is* a desire for local product...just not the product being offered, and not sold in the way it's always been sold. Local TV stations have made their money by selling a product you can't hold to produce a result that can't be easily verified based on the premise that they were the only way to reach thousands of potential local consumers. Thanks to technology there are countless ways to reach people in your community, and do so in a more targeted, verifiable, and cost-effective way.

What does all this mean? How do you re-make the model of a business that hasn't had to change for decades? How do you re-tool TV news from a product that appears an exercise in virtual sameness across local stations into something worth watching? How do you uproot the sense of entitlement that was showered on our industry by advertisers from 20 years ago into a hungry, aggressive, adaptable fighter that's willing to scrap for every tiny piece of that increasingly shrinking pie?

There are more questions than answers, as they say, but the days when decisions need to made are increasingly closer at hand. The big newspapers are stopping the presses, newsroom staffs are being told to stay home, and the future looks much worse.

What happens after all the dust settles? As strange as it may sound...I really hope to be on the other side, bacuase that's when the real excitement is going to begin. That's when the kind of people who brought television to the world will get to be part of a new revolution. TV wasn't always a foregone conclusion: it took people with the ability to see the amazing potential that lay waiting at their fingertips to plow through problems as they arose, and find solutions to problems nobody else had ever faced. It's part of why the "originals" at CNN are such a tight group: they got to fight this battle together.

A new battle is coming, and it's not the kind of thing that's palatable to people who have grown comfortable with the certainty of a stable paycheck and a guaranteed bonus. It's the kind of thing that doesn't have a guarantee of any kind on the other side...but it offers a chance to really change things. It's a chance to be a part of the next new saga of TV and TV news.

I don't know how or where I'm going to get to be a part of it...but I know this much: I'll be there. There's too many people in the world disgusted and made cynical by jobs they hate. Working in TV is a job I love...perhaps more than just about anything else in my life, and no matter what it takes I want to be a part of it.

Not despite the fact times are going to be hard...but because of it.

A day in Savannah

2009-02-24T01:42:00.006-05:00

I got to Savannah around 5pm...I was really excited about getting to the hotel. I got a great deal on Priceline, and wanted to know exactly what I was in for $79/night. The result? AWESOME!

I'm right next to City Hall - the picture to the left was taken from my room - *and* I can see the river from my window (although I kind of have to crane my head a tiny bit.)

They told me that they can park my car for me...for $18/day. They do valet only, they told me...and parking is tricky in these parts. I later discovered that there is a lot next door that I can park in for free until 8am, and then renew my parking spot for 5 hours for $3.50...kind of seems worth waking up at 8am to save $15...especially since there are so many other things to spend that money on.

I dropped off my bags, and realized that I was a little short on clothes. I suddenly realized that I'd *planned* on bringing several shirts that I had hanging on hangers...but I left those hangers in the closet and only brought the bag I'd packed. So...I had plenty of underwear, jeans, shoes, socks, and everything EXCEPT for shirts. I'd noticed a cool second-hand clothing store (named 'The Clothing Warehouse') on my drive in, and tracked the place down and asked the guy there for some suggestions. I soon walked out with a couple changes of clothes to last me well for the next couple days of eating and drinking.

I was told to head to Jekyll Island because there's an amazing restaurant at the end of a pier there that serves amazing crab. I'm from Maryland, and telling me that there's a place to get fresh crab is all you need to say...so, obviously, that was my next stop.

Unfortunately, I didn't realize that Jekyll Island is a 90 minute drive from here...but, the promise of delicious crab at the end of a quaint pier was too much to ignore.

I worked my way down I-95 and finally got to Jekyll Island. I'm sure the place is picturesque, but it's really hard to tell in the dark...but I didn't care. I only barely noticed the ratty little barbecue joint as I drove in towards the island. I followed the directions on my TomTom and got closer and closer to the fabled unnamed restaurant at the end of the pier.

On arriving at Jekyll Island I met the toll-taker who looked crestfallen as I told her what I was in search of. She was able to give me directions but had some bad news. I drove to make sure...and she was right.

The "Rah" Bar is closed on Mondays...as are most restaurants on Jekyll Island. Suck.

I remembered that little BBQ place I saw on my drive in, and the thought of tasty, smoky, sweet barbecue really started to make my mouth water. I remembered that column of smoke rising from the place, and realized that my proximity to Brunswick, Georgia almost ensured that I was in store for a really great meal.

However, as I arrived at that little barbecue place, I noticed the plume of smoke was gone...as were any cars in the parking lot. I parked and went to the front door...the sign read that they closed at 8pm. It was 7:58 by my clock...but the place was abandoned, locked, and empty.

I hoped that the TomTom would be able to help me find some sort of barbecue *somewhere* in Brunswick...but, don't be fooled. Brunswick, Georgia closes at 8pm...except for one place: The New China Restaurant. I hadn't eaten almost all day...and there's nothing better than salty Wonton soup and super-sweet tea when you're desperate for food.

I made my way back to Savannah and got back to the hotel, and realized (after parking) that there were two bars just across the street. I walked into 'Moon River' and asked when last call was. I was told it was half an hour ago...then asked what I wanted drink. The place was still stacked with at least a dozed suit-clad big-spending conventioneers...and the bartender was not at all anxious to kick *them* out...so his patience was my gain. I got a drink and a shot, and settled next to a girl in a hockey sweatshirt reading the New York Times.

She was homely and seemed Canadian...but she was really from New England. She used to be a US Marine, but now works at a funky lunch place...and is studying historical preservation. Her skill at conversation was obviously adapted from her training at recruiting agents...so it was a lot of pushing for details and little rapport-building.

I closed my tab, and wandered my way down Whitaker street and found a couple people sitting in a dimly lit bar sipping on drinks and listening to recorded jazz music. The place was named "Circa 1875"...I'm guessing that's from the date on the liquor license posted on the wall. I grabbed a Stella Artois and talked to a couple of sous-chefs from the area. We did shots (them Jameson, me Firefly) and talked about the area, places to eat, and how the economy is treating everyone. I learned that a restaurant named Garibaldi's may be the pace to go for local seafood...and, on my way back to the hotel, found out that Paula Deen's restaurant is just two blocks from here.

I've got a rough itinerary for tomorrow...but I guess we'll see what happens...time to go to bed.

Being a journalist means being a marketer too?

2009-02-16T17:32:00.004-05:00

Just finished 'The End of Journalism as Usual' by Mark Briggs in the Nieman Reports, and he makes a fascinating point about the future of journalism.

He references the blog Techcrunch and says that after just two years their coverage of technology has eclipsed the readership of similar coverage by the New York Times and bay area news outlets because they focused on their marketable content; directed it at a market segment that wanted it, and sold advertising to that market.

To some journalists the idea of thinking of targeted content and marketing detracts from the purity and truth-seeking that brought them in to journalism in the first place. However, Briggs issues a response to that line of thinking:

Digital entrepreneur Elizabeth Osder visited the University of Southern California last fall and spoke frankly to journalism students about this new environment, according to a summary posted by Online Journalism Review. She presented the following recipe for entrepreneurial journalism:

Start with the impact you want to have. Figure out what audience you need to assemble to have that impact and what kind of content is needed to do that. Then price it out: How much money do you need to do it?

After one student complained that this felt too much like business school, Osder defended the new approach as bringing to them a necessary discipline. “It forces you to be relevant and useful versus arrogant and entitled,” Osder replied.

What do you think? Do you think learning the additional skills required to make being a journalist a viable business is necessary, or does it take away from the purity of the job?

Buffalo Plane Crash

2009-02-15T23:56:00.004-05:00

A couple quick thoughts on the tragic plane crash in Buffalo from Thursday:

For as connected and technological as our society is, it's amazing to me that the mainstream media didn't pick up on this story for well over 90 minutes. The story was covered by local affiliates, specialty websites, and Twitter well before the major networks even touched it. Why?? That's a question those networks will work to answer in the coming days and weeks

Miles O'Brien was let go by CNN late last year as part of a reorganization effort. To get into whether that was a good or bad decision is something for other people to answer...though I will say his thoughtful perspective on the incident is sorely missed in network coverage of this disaster.

F*** My Life

2009-02-13T19:05:00.001-05:00

It's Friday, which means it's time for something a little off-the-wall and amusing.

FMyLife.com is a website of people complaining about unfortunate things that happened to them. It's a sort of one-ups-man-ship competition based on who had the worst experience. The content varies in terms of subject matter. Some of the posts are sexual in nature:

Today, I was having sex with a girl. After we finished she proceeded to tell me she already had a boyfriend and that his penis was larger then mine. FML.

some are disgusting:

Today, I bit into a cereal bar and thought the inside was oddly damp. I took a look at it and saw a maggot worm wriggling around. Its friend was in my mouth. FML.

some are sad:

Today, I called my dad to inform him I was coming home from college for the weekend. Expecting him to be excited, he responded with "why?" This weekend was my birthday. FML.

and some are just plain pathetic:

Today, this guy took me to Denny's on a first date and used a 2 for 1 coupon. It was expired. I paid. FML.

A good bit of the content is NSFW, but it's guaranteed to provide a little chuckle (or at least make you feel a bit better about yourself.

(thanks to Jason Reid for the suggestion)

Twitter fight!!

2009-02-12T16:13:00.005-05:00

If you're a TV assignment editor like me (especially in local news), then you've definitely encountered a public relations call or two.

Here's the drill: the PR person wants you to do a story on the product or service they are publicizing, and you want to do stories about things that are unbiased and newsworthy. Rarely do those two roads meet...though, to be fair, sometimes they do.

Normally the call will consist of some poor, underpaid intern who's been handed a script and told to call hundreds of TV stations in the country they have on a list...that person doesn't particularly care about the product or service, nor can they speak intelligently about the subject. They just want you to downlink whatever feed is going out so the company they're representing gets advertising without paying for it.

This isn't to say that there aren't smart, savvy, helpful, friendly, and awesome PR people in the world (I've known several)...but it *is* to say that they are the exception to the rule.

A time when those excellent PR people can come in handy is when you need comment on something from an expert in a REALLY SHORT TIME FRAME. TV news works fast, and calling back the next day isn't good enough...especially in local.

So, reading this outburst from a media guy towards a PR person, I can start to understand where he's coming from. She (in his mind) had all the time in the world when she needed him to do some story about her product or service...but when he needed her to help out with comment on something, she was nowhere to be found.

However, where he handled it (on Twitter) and the way he went about it (by being a jerk and using a lot of profanity) are just downright stupid.

Check it out for yourself.

Have you been on either end of this kind of phone call? Does he deserve to be called out like this (especialy since he took down the offensive messages soon after sending them)? Leave me a comment and tell me what YOU think!

Big thanks to my coworker Gary Bender (@GLBcnn) for pointing out this story.

(Original source: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%40aprildunford)

Candyland versus Mario

2009-02-11T22:46:00.001-05:00

I've mentioned before how awesome Steven Johnson is, but I think this particular blog post exemplifies how adept and fascinating Johnson's worldview is.

In this guest spot for Boingboing he discusses playing video games with his kids, then trying to introduce the games he played as a youth (Battleship, Candyland, and Sorry! for example) to his own children. The generation gap becomes rapidly apparent...and argues even more forcefully that kids today aren't dumber than those of previous generations (though they may not be in the best shape ever - childhood obesity has doubled over the past 20 years). In fact, the torrent of media that they endure on a daily basis has made them exceptional at multi-tasking and quite media savvy when it comes to advertising and biased messages.

It used to be that the advertisers tried to be one step ahead of the consumer, or that they always underestimated their intelligence. What's going to happen when those consumers haven't started high school, and easily see through the thinly-veiled product propaganda of most of today's Madison Avenue?

They're really watching us...

2009-02-10T23:00:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was somewhat newsworthy for the first press conference by Barack Obama, but what was significantly more important is that he took a question from Sam Stein.

As the New York Times reported, Sam Stein is a reporter for The Huffington Post, and may go down in history for being one of the first blog reporters to ask a question during a network televised press conference with the president. It's a huge moment for the legitimacy of new media...but not the first in this venue.

My co-worker Devon Sayers would be quick to point out that, though his question may have been heard round the world, it was Politico who made the first real dent in that glass ceiling.

There are two main seating areas for the daily news conferences, one for the mainstream media outlets (the room you see the press secretary, or their designate, speaking to every weekday - seen on the left) and a second overflow room. Politico just last year became the first media outlet that exists solely on the web to get a seat in the main daily briefing room.

That said, the continued evolution of online-only properties as a legitimate news source is a fascinating trend. In local news, the generally-accepted belief is that people under the age of 35 don't care about local news. The average age of network news viewers is in the 50s or 60s...will the upcoming generation of news consumers develop to embrace solely online content? And, if so, what does that mean for the traditional media outlets?

The story of imeem...and why you should use it

2009-02-09T21:31:00.000-05:00

Remember Napster?

Napster was the first popular digital music service that brought people to the web for the explicit purpose of downloading and listening to free music. For an 18 month period (from 1999 to 2001) it was a magical place - for the very first time any music by any artist could be found and downloaded for free. There'd been nothing like it before. It was the first time people began to see the opportunity for free content distribution that the web could provide.

Napster (in its original form) was shut down by legal challenges in 2001, due in no small part to the band Metallica realizing that people were getting their music without paying for it.

A contingent of programmers who worked on Napster started imeem...a social networking/music website that has one big change from Napster. Though you can also find almost every song ever written on imeem (much like Napster) this time you can listen to them with the blessing of the four major record labels (Sony/BMG, EMI, Vivendi/Universal and Warner Music Group).

Of course there are other differences: imeem allows you to befriend your favorite bands and meet other people who are into the same music you are; imeem allows to listen to your favorite music anywhere you can access the internet, and imeem allows you to create playlists for other people to enjoy. In essence it's a grown-up, officially sanctioned Napster.

That said...what's to stop people from downloading music off of BitTorrent?

Where do you get your music? Lemme know in the comments below...

Nieman Reports Continued

2009-02-08T21:47:00.000-05:00

I've continued reading the Nieman Reports from the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard...and came across the following two interesting quotes:

Indeed, slick production has become so closely associated in their minds with cynical storytelling that they now prefer video reports with a more amateur feel. And something similar is happening in print media; there, readers fear they aren’t getting the “real” story from professional reporters who aren’t allowed to draw conclusions and “tell them the truth.” Instead, they prefer bloggers and those who join in discussions online who are not constrained by “fairness” from calling a liar just that, especially when those writers follow their passion to develop the expertise necessary to make such calls. - Robert Niles in Passion Replaces the Dullness of an Overused Journalistic Formula

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

News consumption fares no better, according to a small but in-depth recent study of 18- to 34-year-olds commissioned by The Associated Press. The 18 participants, who were tracked by ethnographers for days, consumed a “steady diet of bite-size pieces of news,” almost always while multitasking. Their news consumption was often “shallow and erratic,” even as they yearned to go beyond the brief and often repetitive headlines and updates that barraged them daily. Participants “appeared debilitated by information overload and unsatisfying news experiences,” researchers observed. Moreover, “when the news wore them down, participants in the study showed a tendency to passively receive versus actively seek news.”

This is a disturbing portrait: multitasking consumers uneasily “snacking” on headlines, stuck on the surface of the news, unable to turn information into knowledge.
(cited by Maggie Jackson in Distracted: The New News World and the Fate of Attention)

The Philip DeFranco show

2009-02-07T23:21:00.000-05:00

Twenty-three year-old Philip DeFranco (AKA sxephil) has been doing his brand of online newscast since 2006...and it's led to a considerable bit of success.

Each newscast is honest, funny, fast-paced and entertaining: there's a little editorializing, a genuine request for viewer interaction, and review of the big stories of the day told mostly WITHOUT B-Roll!

Though these webcasts violate the gospel rules of TV news (speak slowly, avois bias, use pictures to tell the story) he's extremely popular. His newscasts have totalled over 11 million views (the 'cast embedded below had nearly 400K views in only 3 days) and he's the 9th most subscribed YouTube submitter of all time (and the leading news submitter, unless you count the What The Buck Show, which focuses mainly on celebrity news.)

The show has popular current stories, and includes links that allow viewers to go more in depth if they so choose. They cover some hard news, but mostly the talkers of the the day...and the format allows each show to be produced quickly...making them very topical. In addition to the YouTube platform, he has his own blog where content that compliments the show is posted.

Maybe this is the next iteration in the marriage of news, entertainment, and the internet? Take a look and tell me what you think:

Rides of State

2009-02-06T21:14:00.000-05:00

It’s Friday again, which means it’s time for something fun and random from the web.

Not to worry, I’ve been delving deeper into the Nieman Reports, and I’ll have a lot more great content and notes from that in the coming days, but today I wanted to shine the spotlight onto the most original and interesting thing I’ve found this week.

The author of the blog Tamerlane’s Thoughts, named only as “kashgar216” decided to compile a list of the vehicles driven by the heads of state of every nation in the United Nations…all 196 of them.

The project took him to obscure media outlets, propaganda videos, and a good amount of detective work. This wasn’t a quick, fly-by night project (as evidenced by sentences like “After examining the roofline, the shape of the rear view mirror, and the shape of the headrest, I have concluded that this is a Merc S-class.”)

The collection is pretty impressive, and just more evidence that if you’ve ever wondered about anything in the world, there’s some guy somewhere on the internet who has likely figured out the answer.

Parents Just Don't Understand

2009-02-05T21:15:00.000-05:00

A favorite segment of mine on Collegehumor.com is titled "Parents Just Don't Understand." It's authored by Susanna Wolff and outlines brief stories from college-aged submitters. The stories outline the fundamental differences in the understanding of technology between the baby-boomer generation, and the tech-savvy kids of today. Here are a few eye-opening entries:

I caught my father on Google the other day typing in "show me snow machines". I later found out that he starts any and all searches with the words "show me", or "I want to see".
Kayla-Rose Kirkland

My mom called me over because every time she plugged in her mp3 player the computer "froze" and when she unplugged it it worked again. I asked her to show me so she bent down, unplugged the mouse, plugged in her mp3, then when she moved the mouse and nothing happened said, "See?"
Nick Calenti, Arizona State

I made the mistake of trying to explain Wikipedia to my grandmother. She's now convinced that anybody can modify any website at will, and she won't use Weather.com anymore because she's worried that vandals will change the temperature on her.
Jeff C.

My mom won't make a cell phone call unless her charger is plugged into it. She thinks that it changes to a land line and she gets 'way better reception'.
Aaron Thompson

My mom didn't want my younger brother to make a MySpace for fear of Child molesters, but finally she decided to let him make one. That same day she made him take it off because a man named "Tom" had hacked into his account and added himself as a friend. She made me e-mail MySpace to let them know of a possible child molester.
Alex J., Dickinson College

My sister got an iPod for Christmas. My dad said he wants an iPod so that he can listen to mp3s while he plays solitaire on the computer.
Shawn Cullen, U.M. Rolla

My mom asked to see my pictures on Facebook. I thought about all the drinking pictures that are on it and then I thought about my mom's computer skills. So I said, if you can find them by yourself, sure. I came back 5 minutes later and she had an empty Microsoft word document up. I think I'm safe.
C Murphy, Salisbury

When my mom tries calling my cell and I don't have it on, she'll send me text messages saying, "Turn on your phone."
Andrea Gutierrez

My mom won't scroll down on Youtube videos because she thinks then she won't be able to hear them.
Tim F, UConn

My high school Spanish teacher, on multiple occasions, has been known to photocopy blank pieces of paper in order to get more blank pieces of paper. She's completely oblivious to the fact that you can open the copier to take out the paper.
Jared Kent, Johnson & Wales University

My Mom became a fanatic about the cleanliness of our front yard at home. I couldn't even walk outside when I was at home in my pajamas. When I asked her why she, all of a sudden, cared about our front yard, she replied that the "Google Earth people" would see and post it on their web site.
Katie Phillips, Virginia Commonwealth University

Does Social Media Have a Place in Journalism?

2009-02-04T19:29:00.000-05:00

TV has always been accepted as a tool for entertainment, so TV news adopting the tools of online media doesn't really seem too big a stretch...but newspapers have always been a bastion of old-school journalism.

To TV people, newspapers have a reputation for being staid, slow-moving and slow to react. Newspapers have extensive planning operations, and TV news has to be able to move with the immediate changes to a story.

This piece, then, from a staff member of one of the largest newspapers (The Chicago Tribune) discussing the usefulness of social media is refreshing. Not only refreshing in that it shows a gr0wing acceptance of the usefulness of emerging online media...but especially so since that it outlines a plan they implemented to create an online social media identity for their operation.

So, how did this little foray into social media turn out? According to the author, Bill Adee, the "goal for [the project] was one million page views a month. By June, at its peak, it was doing more than six times that number."

The project continues with permanent funding.

There's an enormous opportunity for media outlets...and they can either buy-in now while the price is low, or be forced to play catch-up in the years to come.

One BILLLLLion Dollars

2009-02-03T22:36:00.000-05:00

With so much talk of financial bailouts, its hard to completely grasp exactly how much money $1 Billion really is. That's part of the point of this installation by Michael Marcovici. Check out this link from Geekologie for more...

The uses of Twitter

2009-02-02T23:19:00.000-05:00

Twitter is being used in more inventive ways all the time. Amanda Congdon, formerly of Rocketboom.com has a Twitter feed that informs subscribers when she’s doing her next live online broadcast or has posted new content to her website. iJustine uses it in the same way…although iJustine extends the reach and content of her Twitter account by using associated applications (like Twitpic) that allow her to link to pictures she takes while out in the world. It's much more work than I'd ever do...though I too have a Twitter account I update from time to time.

Some uses are incredibly helpful for newsgathering: The Alaska Volcano Observatory is the scientific outpost currently monitoring the situation at Mt. Redoubt…a volcano that is likely to erupt over the next days or weeks. In addition, public safety agencies (like the Scottsdale, AZ Police Department or the LA Fire Department) have been getting on Twitter as a way to distribute small bits of vital information to several media outlets quickly and simultaneously.

However, other uses are not nearly as pragmatic…the Atlanta Journal-Constitution had a story this morning about Gen. Lee Beauregard’s Twitter page. General Beauregard is no military hero mind you…he’s Georgia’s groundhog answer to Punxsutawney Phil.

This is yet another example that the development of new technology and the uses for that technology often develop independently of each other.

Super Bowl Ads

2009-02-01T23:44:00.000-05:00

The story tomorrow, now that today's game is over, is more likely to be the super bowl ads.

I noticed a few of ads that were from solely online properties (cars.com; ETrade, GoDaddy, Priceline, Monster, Careerbuilder, and Cash4Gold on just a cursory inspection) and wonder whether that is likely to increase or decrease as our economy continues to develop.

I'm sure there were many more ads for online properties in some past super bowls (the year or two right before the dot-com bubble burst comes to mind) but the continued development and expansion into the community subconscious is a telling sign of things to come in the future.

That said...let's see the ads. The good people at fanhouse.com have already ensured that they are all visible online and broken down by quarters of the game.

(my personal favorite is this one)

http://superbowlads.fanhouse.com/

How the states got their shapes

2009-01-31T20:37:00.000-05:00

How the States Got Their Shapes by Mark Stein (who looks so strikingly similar to Ben Stein that they could very well be related) had potential to be painfully boring and dry, or thrillingly exciting and full of obscure, interesting bits of knowledge. It was, at times, both. Here's my top five favorite bits of trivia:

Why does Tennessee's northern border seem to stagger instead of riding a straight line? Because people along that border bribed surveyors so that they would be listed as residents in their state or county of choice...and they bribed those surveyors with locally made moonshine.

What state is Ellis Island in? It's in New York and New Jersey. The original boundary between those two states was an invisible line under water between the two states. Jersey got to keep everything attached to their mainland, and the land underwater to the official border running along the bottom of the Hudson (which is why when riding in the Lincoln Tunnel, you cross into New York halfway through the tunnel. Developers expanded Ellis Island in the 1890s due to the crush of immigrants coming to the country, and did so with land dredges from the bottom of the Hudson. In 1998 the Supreme Court ruled that all the parts of the island made up of the dredged silt (about 80% of Ellis Island) belong to New Jersey.

Which is the widest state? Actually, from east to west, Hawaii expands over 1,000 miles.

What's with all those square states in the west and midwest? The US government wanted to make the new states as equal as possible...so, where they could, they made them 3 or 4 degrees tall and 7 degrees wide. The founders of our nation wanted our rules and our map to convey the ideal of equality.

Why even bother with Rhode Island? Well, it was developed as the first colony devoted to the idea of religious freedom...much unlike Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Maryland and others. They got their colonial charter and expanded beyond the Aquidneck Island to encompass more land...and got their official royal charter in 1663.

For someone who has driven or ridden through 48 of the 50 states, this is the kind of stuff that hits just the right nerdy buttons...though it was even a bit too nerdy for me at times. Some of the semantics of the border disputes seemed more clinical than passionate. That said...It was definitely a worthwhile read, and something I'll likely go back to before taking a trip to another state or making another long drive.

Predicting the future?

2009-01-30T16:11:00.000-05:00

It's Friday...which means it's time again for something fun. The story comes from i-am-bored who was linked by Techcrunch, who was linked by Fishbowl NY.

KRON, a San Francisco TV station did a story in 1981 about something that sounded like something out of make-believe: getting your newspaper at home without even opening your front door.

The story talks about a brand new service which allowed the '2,000 to 3,000 home computer owners in the area' to sign up to receive the newspaper on their computers over the phone.

The near-mocking tone of the reporter and anchor (why would you spend money to get the paper on your computer when you can just buy it on the street for twenty cents?!?) is what really makes this story a trip into the way back machine. What emerging technology is out there today that we may react to like this in 25 years?

I wanna use my computer on the TV!

2009-01-29T15:18:00.000-05:00

On a site that addresses issues often related to TV and the internet, it seems only logical that there'd be a mention of how to integrate the two...literally.

For years I wondered: how can I see my laptop on my TV screen? I knew there had to be an existing, simple solution...but that solution evaded me for years. I didn't even figure it out until I came home one day, and my roommate Guillaume Andrieu was watching his laptop on my television.

I was in shock! What advanced foreign technology had Guillaume recently discovered that allowed him to operate and view the content of his laptop on my decidedly outdated TV? The answer, he explained was an S-Video cable.

Nearly every TV from 1991 to last year was built with an S-Video input...and most laptops are built with an S-Video output. All you need is an (aptly named) S-Video cable to connect the two, and then tell your computer to send the video signal through the cable (usually with a command like hitting the "Fn" key along with the "F5" key) and you'll see your computer screen on the television.

There are also cables that convert S-Video to RCA jacks (those little red, yellow and white round plugs used for older video games and DVDs) as well as standard S-Video to S-Video cables.

It's rare to find such an elegant solution for an obvious problem...and figured anyone reading this blog would appreciate that as much as I do.

The art of the status update

2009-01-28T23:41:00.001-05:00

My friend Lisa Holm posted an interesting article in her Facebook status. Its a blog piece about, ironically enough, Facebook status updates.

For those of you somehow unaware, Facebook is a social networking application that allows you to post a 140 character update of your status...and the statements that people use to occupy that status can range from bizarre to utilitarian to intensely personal.

The piece Lisa posted goes through the different kinds of posts people normally put, and declares that 'Facebook is now officially open to the oldsters.'

It's a worthwhile read: http://www.good.is/?p=15011&gt1=48001

Urbandictionary.com

2009-01-27T22:54:00.000-05:00

Have you ever come across that little bit of slang that everyone seems to recognize...except for you? Maybe it's a clever acronym being used on a website or in a forum (like NSFW - meaning Not Safe For Work) or something a bit more crude being bandied about by the IT guys (RTFM for example...something NSFW, btw). Maybe it's just some expression that part of the slang at your new job or school, or a team name being used at a game of trivia at the bar.

Urbandictionary.com is here to save the day.

Just as Wikipedia has become the default place to go when seeking out common knowledge, UrbanDictionary is the place to go when seeking out common language.

In addition to an extensive database of words, expressions, and acronyms the site also has a 'word of the day' email that can range from political (see obamama) to business (like blind transfer) to topical (like 'Land it in the Hudson').

To accommodate the multiple interpretations that slang words can carry around the country (and the world) there are multiple entries for many words...and each one is voted up or down by readers...so that the most popular definitions rise to the top.

BE WARNED - Like most slang, there's plenty of foul, inappropriate language used on the site. That said, it can be an invaluable reference...especially when you're faced with the situation of not knowing what a slang word means and are too embarrassed to ask.

Kthxbi!

I don't understand...

2009-01-26T23:53:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite internet memes is that of Oolong, the rabbit.

The meme started in 2001 when the context of a post on 4chan wasn't really clear, and instead of stating that the context of the post was unclear, the respondent simply said:

I have no idea what you're talking about...so here's a bunny with a pancake on its head

The picture, and the rabbit soon became a part of the internet lexicon, and the meme lasted for two solid years before dying down in 2003.

As with many things internet-related you can delve into this story as deeply as you like, or simply ignore it in favor of more substantial fare...but don't worry. This rabbit doesn't care:

Hulu - the brainless way to watch TV on the web

2009-01-25T18:24:00.000-05:00

More and more, I find myself surprised to discover how many people have STILL never heard of Hulu. I initially heard of it in some TV industry publications about the future of video on the web, and the conclusion among those smarter than me about this is that Hulu.com gets it.

The great qualities about Hulu seem endless:

Great, established, popular, new content from FOX and NBC that comes in on a daily basis (Simpsons, The Office, Monk, SNL, Prison Break, Family Guy, etc)
no requirement to register
looks great when played full screen (you can even play it on your TV - it's easy...but that's something to be explained in the near future)
takes only seconds to buffer (over a broadband connection and a decent machine)
FREE MOVIES! (and not crappy movies either...how about The Fifth Element or Liar Liar!)

Here's their little explainer video, but I'd recommend just checking it out for yourself!

BitTorrent

2009-01-24T16:42:00.000-05:00

The use of torrents has exploded over the past couple years...and it's done so for good reason. BitTorrent is way to download huge files (like movies or software) quickly and easily. However, most of the explanations I've read on how torrents work are extremely hard for non-technically minded people to understand. For example, here's the start of an entry in Wikipedia:

BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer file sharing protocol used to distribute large amounts of data. BitTorrent is one of the most common protocols for transferring large files, and by some estimates it accounts for about 35% of all traffic on the entire Internet.^[1] The initial distributor of the complete file or collection acts as the first seed. Each peer who downloads the data also uploads it to other peers, even after they have dismounted the original seed. Because of this...

Look at these words: file sharing, protocol, files, distributor, seed, dismounted...no wonder people who aren't technically minded are scared off by all this talk.

In a way, the people who use bitTorrent like it that way - the inexperienced user won't look past all this complicated jargon to fully understand how powerful and useful this system is - and the users who *DO* get it will be left alone to do whatever they want.

The fact is that BitTorrent is simple to use, once you have a very practical understanding of how it works.

There are two pieces that you need to start downloading files using bitTorrent - the software and the torrent file:

Software - this is a program (like uTorrent...my personal favorite) that can read a torrent file and download what you're looking for. This is also referred to as a "client" or "client software"

Torrent file - This is the file that tells your computer where to get the file you want. You can download torrent files from any number of free sites (such as isohunt or torrentscan) or membership sites (like Demonoid)

As an example - let's say you want to download 'America's Army' a free video game created and distributed by the US military. First, you would need to download some torrent software (assuming you haven't done so already), then just do a search on a torrent site (like isoHunt), find the torrent for 'America's Army,' download it, and open the torrent file with the software. That's it!

There are some illegal applications for torrent use, such as downloading files that aren't free or things you haven't already paid for...but those are issues for the lawyers to handle, and I'm no lawyer.

Though there are some drawbacks; the files don't download instantaneously, which could mean a wait of hours or sometimes days depending on the size of the file. Also, sometimes you'll get a bad torrent - especially if what you're looking for is obscure - and the file may never show up at all.

That said, it's little wonder more and more people are using bitTorrent.

Can graphs be fun?

2009-01-23T16:51:00.001-05:00

Yes...just ask the fine submitters at Graphjam.com

Its Friday, so its time for something fun from the interwebs.

Graphjam is a site where really creative people have found ways to merge the boring, generic excel graphs and have morphed them into clever pop-culture references.

Submissions are voted on by visitors to the site...and the very best submissions take a minute for you to decipher. Like a personalized license plate, but more clever. Check it out.

Help implementing your devious plan

2009-01-22T17:47:00.000-05:00

Let's say you're an up-and-coming Dr. Claw (from Inspector Gadget) or Brain (from Pinky and the Brain) and you need some kind of start screen for your computer. You need way to monitor the world in advance of implementing your plan for domination of it...what do you do?

Well, if you were on VSL daily email list, you'd already know where to go - henchmanshelper.com. The site is a collection of live cameras from Dusseldorf to Prague and atmospheric conditions over areas of the US...even a world sunlight map so you'll know when to implement your devious plans so they happen under cover of night.

VSL (which stands for Very Short List) emails a daily collection of clever and interesting links, cleverly captioned pictures, and interesting (albeit sometimes bizarre) products. Yes, VSL has ads, but they are very clear about what is sponsored and what they really like.

The concept behind VSL is to find a way to shine the light on interesting sites or products on the internet that you may not have otherwise known about. In their words they point "to excellent new (and sometimes vintage) entertainment and media that haven’t been hyped to within an inch of their lives."

Like most successes, it isn't rehashing information you already know...instead it points out deals and links you may have likely missed out on otherwise. Most refreshingly, it is presented in a fun, casual way that makes their regular emails fun and worthwhile reading...which is, really, the way the intarwebs were supposed to be, right?

The future of journalism...

2009-01-21T13:24:00.000-05:00

There's a fascinating series of articles from the Nieman Foundation for Journalism about the future of the medium. The first section appears to be geared mostly to newspapers...but, seeing as newspapers are in more dire circumstances than local TV, they are the most likely to take on major changes (and thus, eventually learn the lessons that local TV will be forced to endure in the near future). I'm still working my way through it all, but here are a few highlights from what I've read so far:

"The future of journalism is selling expertise, not content...We are operating in the most creative phase of the media industry’s history. A time when broadcast, text and social media are colliding." - Edward Roussel (To Prepare for the Future, Skip the Present)

It is the nature of disruptive technology that we almost always get it wrong when we try to guess the real use and impact of a new invention. The debate is over. Hand-inked bibles, horse-drawn carriages, pagers: A few still exist, but they have mostly been overtaken by newer technology. The same is true for the monopoly of the publisher. Journalists no longer control the message. -Katie King (Journalism as a Conversation)

[Jeff] Jarvis, who teaches at the City University of New York, argues that journalism today is a “process not a product.” Journalists must sift, sort and curate the news, he contends. “Do what you do best. Link to the rest.” The question Jarvis poses is this: Do we need more information or do we need, as a society, journalists dedicated to finding the gold nuggets amidst this raging river of content? -Katie King (Journalism as a Conversation)

I also came across The Daily Beast as a result of my reading these pieces. They call themselves 'curated news aggregation,' both a fascinating term and a potential model for the future. Its definitely something worth checking out...

Just imagine...

2009-01-21T00:06:00.000-05:00

the challenges that are waiting for our next president...

Now it's official

2009-01-20T18:01:00.000-05:00

We all know how the vote went, but it isn't official until it crosses the wire.

Cool inauguration stories

2009-01-19T05:30:00.000-05:00

Just a quick post to link to a couple cool stories about the inauguration.

First, THIS STORY from Politico (written by Michael Calderone about the different considerations the networks are having to take into account for the big day.

also, THIS STORY (referenced by a producer friend of mine, Deanna Siste, as well as Lost Remote) from the New York Times about CNN.com's new mission - to create fans who LOVE the site.

Have you seen any interesting stories? Let me know...post something in the comment section below!

The Ghost Map

2009-01-18T14:49:00.000-05:00

Steven Johnson's The Ghost Map, a story about an 1850s Cholera outbreak in London surprised me in a couple of ways.

Initially, I expected the story to somehow surprise me in a very fundamental way...but that's not really what Johnson was going for here. WYSIWYG (What you see is what you get), it's the story of how a disease outbreak unfolded, and the two men who ended up cracking the code of its cause and cure.

Once I got past the let down of failing to find a mind-blowing surprise waiting for me (Johnson does little to hide the cause or resolution during the telling of the story - this is no mystery novel) I grew to enjoy the clear way in which he describes the approach and thinking of John Snow and Henry Whitehead. The book allows you to understand the way in which they approached the problem and the (assumed) thought process they undertook.

The epilogue of the book brought me to the kind of writing that I really enjoy from Johnson - multi-threaded contemporary commentary from a scientific and cultural bent. The reason for the meat of the book is a bit more personal.

Johnson's undergrad thesis was on epidemiology, and his graduate work in literature focused on Victorian society...so the intersection of those tow ideas in this book made for a natural confluence of interests. Though the amount of detail in the book is substantial, it's not overwhelming, and it is explained in Johnson's usual fashion of approachability without condescension.

That said, though I appreciate the reasons for his departure from his (in my view) traditional style...I certainly appreciate the final chapter of the book where he returns to the style for a few fleeting moments. His fascination with the topic grows on you as you read it...but I personally have a rough time trying to practically absorb the problems and world-view from so long ago and let it color the way I now see the world.

It's that adjustment of the way I now see the world that separates good books from those that truly fascinate me, and sadly I didn't find this book to cross that line.

An interesting segue

2009-01-17T17:43:00.000-05:00

The Segway personal transporter is an invention that encourages all the worst characteristics about the U.S.: laziness, useless technology, and conspicuous consumption. It takes the worst stereotypes about our culture and bundles them all up in one machine.

The inventor of the Segway (Dean Kamen), however, has taken his profits from that invention (and his other, more medically beneficial inventions) and decided to use them in a way that could actually help humanity. He's developed the Slingshot water purifier and the Stirling engine generator.

These two boxes, each about the size of a washing machine can take any source of liquid (in Kamen's words: 'anything wet') and turn it into purified drinking water. The other can use anything flammable (cow dung, for example) and turn it into enough power for a small village (about 70 low-energy light bulbs).

The invention was announced last year (Newsweek wrote an article, as did Wired on their blog) but I'm just now getting around to hearing about it. There's a mention of it near the end of the book The Ghost Map by (you guessed it) Steven Johnson. Expect a review of it in the coming days...

O'Reilly producer

2009-01-16T23:03:00.000-05:00

Its Friday, so it's time for something fun!

The tape of Bill O'Reilly cursing and yelling during a taping of Inside Edition came out in the middle of last year, and by itself is very entertaining, but the guys at barelypolitical.com did something that made this thing much, much more creative and entertaining.

They imagined what his producer was saying to him as this meltdown went on...here's their take on what might have happened:

Why are faxes still around

2009-01-15T21:43:00.000-05:00

Lots of madness in work today around the plane crash into the Hudson river. It's an amazing story, likely to be titled "Miracle on the Hudson" by a made for TV movie in the near future.

A close friend of mine, Devon Sayers, noticed that the newsworthy beginning and end to President Bush's career may, in fact be plane crashes (9/11 and today's crash on the Hudson)

That said, I'd like to point out this interesting piece from Wired about something I hadn't thought to wonder about until I read it: why are fax machines still around?

I mean, we have email and teleconferencing and PDF files...so why would there still be a need for such antiquated technology? Read this brief piece to find out their answer.

Radiolab

2009-01-14T22:43:00.000-05:00

Radiolab is a radio show from WNYC, New York Public Radio, that deals with science and technology...but to couch it in that way makes it sound like NOVA or some other super-boring public programming. By their own definition, however:

Radiolab is a show about curiosity. Each episode is an investigation - a patchwork of people, sounds, stories all centered around one big idea.

The show is primarily produced by two people - Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich. I'd first come across Robert Krulwich when I was learning about how TV works. I'd gotten my first job at WOFL in Orlando, when I'd started shadowing the people in the different parts of the newsroom. Throughout this self-imposed training, I'd learned how hard it is to write stories, shoot video, and craft words and pictures together into something poignant and useful.

After realizing how hard it was to do such a thing, I sought out places on TV where news was presented in a clear, intelligent, and entertaining way. The search led me to two places: Frontline on PBS (which is some of the most amazing television being created right now...almost without equal) and Nightline. This is Nightline several years ago, when they would take one issue and focus on it in depth for the entire half-hour.

Robert Krulwich did a story about the 2004 election and how political parties had shifted their focus from trying to convert people into die-hard party members (and make them vote) and instead to focus on people who were leaning towards their party and bring them solidly on their side. He told the story with interviews and personal stories, of course, but also with the use of animation to explain exactly what was meant by a "wobbly two" (essentially someone who is leaning in favor of a party, but neither die-hard nor neutral). I was hooked.

Krulwich has a way of distilling the very complexities that make up human existence in a way that not only make them clearer, but let you feel like you've been in on the joke the entire time.

Jad Abumrad is a radio producer...though he doesn't care so much about news as he does about SOUND. Abumrad is an audiophile in the purest sense. He isn't the guy who spends $40,000 on audio cables, but he's the guy who lives to expose people to sound in a way that tells a story they would have never expected to notice or appreciate.

The first time I came to truly appreciate the way Jad thinks is when I was exposed to the opening of Radiolab's Morality program in which he asks two questions:

First scenario: There are five men working on a railway, and a train is bearing down on them - they don't see it, and you can't shout to them to warn them. If you do nothing, the five men will die. However, next to you is a lever, and if you pull the lever you will make the train shift tracks onto a track where one man is working. He will be killed, but the five other men will be saved. Do you pull the lever?

Second scenario: Ok, same thing, the train is coming, and five people are working on the tracks...however this time, you're not standing next to a lever, you're on a bridge overlooking the tracks. Next to you, though, is a large man, and if you throw him off of the bridge, the conductor of the train will see him, and stop the train, saving the five men.

Most of the time, the people who are asked if they should pull the lever say they would pull the lever, but they also say they would not push the man off of the bridge. Why? It's the same accounting, right?

The way this is presented got me hooked on the combination of the talents of Krulwich and Abumrad. There's really nothing else like it. Other amazing introductions he's crafted are for the show on Emergence (a topic now close to my heart, thanks to this show and Steven Johnson), Choice, and this week's episode Yellow Fluff and Other Curious Encounters.

I can only ask (if I could beg you in person, I would) to take 3 minutes of your life, to listen to the introduction to the show, Time.

This intro gives me chills and hits me in a way that lets me know there are brilliant people who see the world in a beautiful way...and can convey it to you in a way that may improve the way others see the world.

A second amazing thing about these shows is how they stand up to repetition. In the book "Everything bad is good for you" (again with the Steven Johnson stuff) Johnson points out that the shows that have a lasting imprint on contemporary culture (Simpsons, Seinfeld, Family Guy, even) stand up to multiple viewings. They each have such an amazing attention to detail in the crafting of the show that on the second and third go-round you absorb more from the show than you did the first time. Radiolab has this endearing characteristic as well...so that even if you like it the first time, you'll like it even more on each successive listen.

Radiolab - what can I say about it that hasn't already been said about Leonardo da Vinci?

Jake and Amir

2009-01-13T14:10:00.000-05:00

There's something so refreshing and stupid-funny about Jake and Amir, a video blog/web series about two real co-workers at CollegeHumor.com who sit across from each other: Jake Hurwitz and Amir Blumenfeld.

Like most funny, popular things on the web, its attraction is hard to describe. Amir is the hapless, kiss-up poser who idolizes Jake, the everyman, regular guy. It's essentially your typical comedy duo with Jake as the straight man.

The best way to describe it is to show you a few of their episodes (which each run about two to three minutes) so you can see what it's like for yourself. If you don't see them here, though, CollegeHumor just signed a deal with MTV, so you may see them there soon.

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Ace from Jake Hurwitz on Vimeo.

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Nutrition from Amir on Vimeo.

The Medici Effect

2009-01-12T14:56:00.000-05:00

Frans Johansson has taken on an interesting, albeit potentially fruitless task. Johansson teaches in his book The Medici Effect, how people and corporations can embrace and encourage innovation from among their ranks. The only problem is - very few corporations will ever implement the necessary changes.

Don't get me wrong - the book is brilliant. One example: Johannson talks about the concept of risk homeostasis. Don't let the term intimidate you; the concept is simple and brilliant: people are hard-wired to allow for a certain amount of risk in any given situation. If the situation itself is dangerous, they will approach it with care, but if the situation is relatively benign, then they'll be more careless.

For example, when your local department of transportation spends millions of dollars to make a road or highway safer, the end result is NOT fewer crashes - because people drive on those safer roads MORE recklessly (to meet their hard-wired allowable amount of risk).

Another example: child-proof lids to medication have actually been found to INCREASE the number of poisoning among children. Why? Parents are more careless about leaving medicine around their kids, now that it has a child-proof cap.

The entire book is very well thought out and researched, and chock full of examples to follow so that individuals can get a better sense of how to really create groundbreaking innovation. He talks about working 'at the intersection' of two different fields, then using the combination of skills and concepts within those fields to generate truly innovative ideas.

I found the thing very helpful personally, as it speaks to the kind of mindset that generative and creative PEOPLE need to cultivate in order to become innovative and creative individuals...but the idea of foisting these concepts onto an organization is just downright silly.

Perhaps whether these corporations actually implement the ideas isn't really the point; the point is to be available for expensive speaking engagements, and to realize your clients will FEEL more innovative, without genuinely applying these ideas. If a company is to truly foster innovation among the ranks of all its employees, further ideas should be considered.

Companies should regularly host gatherings where staff members from different divisions congregate to come up with new ideas, and those ideas should receive genuine feedback.
Focusing on low-hanging fruit (really easy-to-implement ideas) is a cop-out for taking on the work of real innovation.
Innovation should be encouraged and mentored within different parts of the company...and mandatory implementation of ideas should occur.
A regular meeting where a tiny portion of the budget is allocated to implement an idea every quarter should happen, and people from all segments of the company should be encouraged to participate. The money MUST be spent in that quarter, mandating action from senior executives as well as input from staff.
The implementation of innovation must be the sole focus of one person or group, and their evaluation must include metrics for the QUANTITY of ideas followed up on (instead of on the number of successes, removing the focus on from how polished an idea is to the sheer brute-force mindset of quantity of ideas).
The economy continues to falter in the US, and companies are looking for places to balance their expenses. Cutting of R&D and innovation are the first places to look - especially at large, publicly-traded, quarter-to-quarter focused enterprises. Companies that fall into that trap will become cautionary tales for the coming generation of business leaders.

The Medici Effect will give you a lot to think about, both in terms of its potential effect on the corporate sphere and in your personal evolution. Johansson has succeeded in compiling an amazingly insightful book - but I wonder if he gets discouraged by all the lovely feedback he gets from corporations, only to see them follow the same directional line of development they always have. For his sake, I hope he views a successful speaking engagement is a victory in itself - or else he may become a very discouraged man.

Metalsome

2009-01-11T13:31:00.000-05:00

Unless you happen to live here in Atlanta, you've probably never heard of anything like Metalsome. Though the concept is commonly understood here now, there's still only one band I know that does anything like it in town.

Metalsome is a full rock band that allows you to become a rock start - at least for one song. They play the entire song live, and you get to sing. There are monitors showing the music video for the song behind you, and the lyrics are on a monitor in front of you...if you happen to get stage fright.

The best thing about the Metalsome experience isn't that you hear some amazing (and amazingly terrible singing) but that the energy and excitement of the person on stage can easily work it's way out into the crowd. You find everyone else signing along to a song that, in other circumstances would be aggravating background noise.

Check out this (poorly shot) clip from inside a Metalsome show last night at 10 High in the Virginia-Highlands neighborhood of Atlanta - you can see the girl on stage really getting in to signing the song, and crowd feeding off that energy (at about 1 minute into the clip) and singing along with her.

I really like the idea that people will still come out to be involved in a larger group of strangers...whether it's a concert, or poetry, or even just going out to get coffee and talking to someone new. It's so easy to get all you need through technology, without having to go out and interact with new or different people - Metalsome reminds me that technology may never be able to fill all our needs

The different kinds of smart

2009-01-10T18:11:00.000-05:00

I wrote in yesterday's post about the different kinds of smart people - referencing a couple ideas I'd heard in the past.

The best consolidation of those ideas, and the one that hit closest to home, is this paper from Carol Dweck, a professor at Stanford. I initially found it through a posting on boingboing, but ended up putting a diagram from her piece on the back cover of all the new training manuals for the CNN assignment desk.

Dweck says that some people have a "fixed mind set" for intellect or achievement - meaning that you are either born with a certain ability or you aren't, and there's not much you can do to change your circumstance. Some athletes believe that the talent they have is innate, and practicing too much is foolish...what's the point when nothing you do will affect whether you have the inborn ability or not.

Others, she says, have a "growth mind set" towards intellect or achievement - meaning that applying the right kind of practice and effort can improve your ability and outcomes. These people may fail, but they take lessons from that failure, and use those lessons to strengthen their abilities for the next attempt.

These different outlooks are both hard-wired, and the your personal view will be plainly obvious on just a tiny bit of self-evaluation.

I think that what separates the truly special intelligent people out there is this difference - the growth mind set. The growth mind set, if you have it or can find a way to cultivate, means that anything in the world is really possible. The other kinds of people may succeed, but deep down they'll never feel that they did the work needed to earn what they got, only that the inborn characteristics they happened to have carried them to success.

Unassuming intellect

2009-01-09T22:27:00.000-05:00

Malcolm Gladwell has written a pair of famous books: Blink and The Tipping Point...both of which are worth reading. In fact, some would say they're increasing become part of the conversational pop-science lexicon...you know, one of those books (like Sun Tsu's Art of War) that people like to talk about at parties...and that other people pretend to have read - even if they haven't.

Gladwell has an interesting characteristic I'm growing to appreciate more and more - unassuming intellect. I worked with a reporter in Orlando named Scott Fralick, and he told me something that's sat with me for years. He pointed out that intelligent people like to be challenged on a piece of knowledge, because they want to find out about things they don't know, so they can learn more. Not-so-smart people will be intimidated by someone who calls them on something they don't know, because their identity rides on being all-knowing about everything in a certain field. They get defensive and brutal when challenged, falling back on their educational credentials or breadth of experience.

I'm still trying to understand these different types of people (and try as hard as possible to be the former), but much like Steven Johnson, Malcolm Gladwell is definitely one of the natively intelligent ones. He's smart, and conveys that intellect in approachable ways that all of us can appreciate. If you haven't read one of his books (which, you kinda should, since they're short and really enlightening) just read this latest piece of his about how football coaches and schools try to find the best people for the job.

Yes, it's in the hoity-toity New Yorker...but don't let that throw you - it's good stuff.

If you'd prefer, you can also listen to a discussion with Malcolm Gladwell at the 92nd street Y at Robert Krulwich's Giants of Science series on iTunes (Robert Krulwich, also, is an intellectual bad ass when it comes to simplifying complex ideas, though I've mentioned that before).

Who else do you think is smart, and makes you smarter just by being exposed to them? Let me know what you think...leave a comment.

The future of local news??

2009-01-08T18:34:00.000-05:00

I've been half joking and half serious this week in the newsroom when I've asked: "Is this the future of local news?"

What you see pictured here (and clickable for your enjoyment) is from a copy of WeGotBusted.com's periodical titled "Who's in Jail in the ATL."

It's a collection of mugshots, some of them broken into unique categories like "Repeat offenders" "Sex Offenders" and, my personal favorite, the "Oh No You Didn't Hair Mugs."

The magazine is available around the city for $2...I picked it up at the BP on Boulevard between Freedom Parkway and Ponce.

While somewhat joking, I do kind of wonder, though...as local news appears to be trending to lower budgets, daily crime news, and the accumulation of as many eyeballs as possible, could this really be the future of TV journalism?

What do you think??

What's that song??

2009-01-07T16:45:00.000-05:00

There's a classic episode of Married With Children from 1991 in which Al drives his family crazy while he tries to remember an old song. The problem? He only knows a tiny bit of it, and sings that part to anyone who'll listen. Here's the clip:

A website I was just told about today, midomi.com, is here to actually solve this problem. Hum a bit of that song that's been stuck in your head all day and Midomi can identify it for you! I tried two songs...a random Billy Joel song that's been stuck in my head, and an Outkast song. It worked on Billy Joel, but not Outkast (though, maybe the software would just prefer I let 'Kast bust flows on their own).

A little favorite section of mine is where people record themselves singing popular songs. It's just as cringe inducing as karaoke, without all that awkward eye contact. They even have an application for the iPhone.

Just another great way that the internet is working to make our lives a little bit easier...

The most bad ass kid ever

2009-01-06T11:20:00.000-05:00

Pictured to the right is a bad ass kid.

Nine year-old Drew Heredia was out walking a dog with a female friend when a pitbull ran up and started attacking the girl's dog. When the girl tried to get the pitbull to stop, it started attacking her.

Drew leapt into action...unwilling to allow the ferocious mongrel to continue. He "jumped on the pit bull and applied a choke hold that he learned at a local Brazilian jiu-jitsu studio."

Drew kept the dog in a choke hold until animal control arrived...and the girl and her puppy were safe. They were both taken to the hospital, but are expected to recover. He's my hero. Check out the video below from KGPE:

Steven Johnson is smarter than you...

2009-01-05T22:38:00.000-05:00

but don't feel bad. He's smarter than me too.

I first came across his work after he was interviewed in an episode of Radiolab titled "Emergence" (also the title of his phenomenal book on the subject). Radiolab is a radio show from WNYC that delves in scientific, technical, or metaphysical issues in a way I've never, ever encountered. The team that puts it together (Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich) is the perfect combination - Abumrad is a sound engineer and audiophile, Krulwich is an award winning science journalist from ABC. I'm sure I'll blog about them more in the future...suffice it to say they're bad ass.

(listen to a stream of the Emergence episode or download it...you'll be hooked after 5 minutes)

I finished Steven Johnson's book "Everything Bad is Good For You" last month, and it's made for great conversation ever since. He approaches the 'common knowledge' that pop culture is making people stupid (especially TV and video games) and is rotting the brains of our kids.

He starts by taking on TV and engages the reader by suggesting a comparison of the TV shows of today (Lost and 24 are two good examples) to popular TV shows from a couple decades ago (Cheers, Murphy Brown). The sitcoms of yesterday had a predictable layout, a joke at the beginning, a plot that played out among a few key characters, a story arc that followed one story line, and a joke at the end that tied in to the opening scene. Today's shows, in comparison, don't follow just a few characters...they have multiple ongoing sub-plots involving dozens of characters engaged in deep social interactions. Each show ties in to the previous shows in specific ways that only have context in comparison to earlier shows. Even recent comedies (Seinfeld and Simpsons) can be enjoyed again and again, since they have subtle jokes and references that play out the more you repeatedly view the shows.

Even the trash TV of today - reality shows (Survivor, the Apprentice, the Pick Up Artist) should be compared to their equivalent from the recent past - game shows. Compare Survivor to Family Fued, and the added levels of complexity are plainly obvious. Earlier (and even current) game shows give you the rules up front, and have an obvious beginning, middle, and end...but reality shows often don't tell you the rules as the play out, and each successive show build on the previous one.

He starts addressing video games by explaining them to people who may not have played them - pointing that video games of today are not about who can push the buttons as quickly as possible or memorizing button combinations. Games like Pac Man and Asteroids are nothing like the games of today...but not just in terms of how realistic they look. Current games, like Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto depend on the player to figure out what the rules are, how to interact with the environment, and how to proceed. It's a much more complicated proposition than simply shooting everything or eating all the power pellets.

Steven Johnson has a new book out this week, and though I haven't bought it yet don't get the wrong idea. The only reason is that I got his earlier book The Ghost Map as a Christmas gift, and I'd like to read that first. He has a blog on the interwebs as well...but don't let the fact that he's on CSPAN or in the New Yorker intimidate you. He's not one of those arrogant intellectuals who use complicated words in the name of precision (when, usually, it's just to show off all the research the author has done or education they've endured) - Johnson is a fantastic writer, and a model for the way nerdy people everywhere should be: pragmatic, approachable, and genuinely interested in the way the world works. Most importantly, he knows how to explain it to the rest of us.

Password strength and Twitter Hacks

2009-01-05T13:00:00.000-05:00

I was about to link to this great story (found through boingboing) about the 500 weakest passwords people use (here's a little hint - "123456" and "password" may not be the best to use). You can find the whole list here.

So, this is where I'd planned to go on and on about how awesome boingboing is, when my friend Adam Gilman gave me a heads up on a story on techcrunch. Apparently someone hacked into Rick Sanchez's twitter account (along with Britney Spears and Bill O'Reilly).

Just another cautionary tale: be careful with your passwords or else hilarity will ensue (possibly at your expense).

Marketing to the Social Web

2009-01-04T20:08:00.000-05:00

I'm currently reading "Marketing to the Social Web" by Larry Weber...a brief, though comprehensive look at the new applications of marketing on today's internet . The book was written in 2007, which is important as anything over two or three years old feels dated (especially in the realm of social networking, which has only really taken off over the past 4 years or so).

It feels like the most coherent and professional thing I read so far, as relates to such a nascent field. He takes you through all the steps of developing a marketing campaign for the web, and utilizes a few case studies to emphasize the considerations that specific companies would face (as well as how he would choose to go about solving them).

It is these case studies in particular that give you a really great sense of how smart this guy is, and his ability to apply laser-focus to the issues big companies face when trying to take advantage of the immense capability of the internet in general (and social media in particular).

He references successes in advertising on the web, such as the Gillette campaign designed to counter the popularity of the scruffy, unshaven look on guys (see one of the viral videos they posted on the site, which is now, unfortunately, down) as well as failures such as fordboldmoves.com (which has also since been taken down.)

The Ford site, the company proclaimed that it was genuinely looking for customer input to take a bold new direction in the way they do things, and became, in practice, a series of ads with little user input (comments of even the slightest negative or constructive tone were deleted and ignored, and only positives left on the site...leading to its demise.)

Among the most patently obvious (though often ignored) pieces of advice for corporations is this:

As technology and markets evolve, you can't simply create a site and leave it unchanged. If you don't regularly improve the community's benefits on terms that make sense to the members, your site could fade away. Remember Friendster

I was a bit surprised at how tricky it is to find insightful books about marketing on social media (or, actually, anything at all)...but Weber's book has been full of insight. Check it out on Amazon here...or wait for the second edition, slated to come out next month. He also has a website related to the book. Do you have any suggestions on other insightful books to read? Leave me a comment!

Nerdiness and Skill

2009-01-03T13:13:00.000-05:00

Some people love video games so much that they feel the urge to do something to make them better. Video Game platform emulators (ways to make your computer work like an old school NES or Sony Dreamcast) were invented by people just like this.

It is the rare occasion when nerdy interest in video games actually intersects with genuine skill at something else. Such is the case with Andrea Vadrucci and his drumming ability. This guy from Italy has written and performed drum tracks for the classic Super Mario Bros. series of games...and the performances are amazing.

He just posted his rendition of Super Mario 3 (embedded below) but his entire catalog can be listened to on YouTube as well as MySpace. I particularly like what he did with the Barber of Seville

Top tech flops of 2008

2009-01-02T12:20:00.000-05:00

Found this article through a link on Asylum...a fun place to breeze through occasionally fun and interesting content.

It's a list of the top tech flops of 2008...included are the painful demise of E3, and (uh-oh) the hologram on CNN. That hologram got so much hype and free press - I think it was worth it. Not to mention, the rumor is that they got it for free, since the Israeli company that created the technology was willing to provide the infrastructure to "beam people in" to New York wanted the publicity.

In the interest of full disclosure, I work at CNN on the National desk.

Check out the link below to see what else made the list:

http://www.switched.com/2008/12/31/top-tech-flops-of-2008/

New year, new number?

2009-01-01T17:18:00.000-05:00

Something brief and nerdy trivia for ya while you watch football, nurse your hangover, or just relax (or, if you're in news like me...working in the newsroom).

The new year marks the use of a new number on our calendars, but did you know there are such thing as "illegal numbers?" Yes, in the United States.

It sounds like a communistic concept, but it exists for a couple reasons. for one example, HD and Blu-Ray DVDs are encoded using a process that requires both the DVD and the player to be able to communicate and ensure that you're using the genuine article. Hackers figured out what that number was, so that they could make free copies of HD and Blu-Ray DVDs and distribute them online. They even created the flag shown to the right to tell people what it is (The code for the color values in the flag combines to create the number). Eventually, DVD equipment manufacturers and DVD makers had to change the number because it'd been publicized.

You may be wondering: what's the number? Well, it's normally shown in hexadecimal (or Base 16 for the math inclined) but in standard decimal notation the number is:

13,256,278,887,989,457,651,018,865,901,401,704,640

Another example is in the instance of child porn. Digital files, including pictures, are just a series of zeroes and ones...so if you have child porn images on your computer, you are in possession of an illegal numbers (and you deserve to be shot in the crotch and bled out until dead).

Here's more info on illegal numbers, and the DVD encryption key discussed above.

Who will be the Starbucks of local TV News???

2008-12-31T14:58:00.000-05:00

Cory Bergman is the creator of a blog called Lost Remote, which talks about TV news, technology, and trends connecting the two. It's good stuff...especially for an unabashed TV nerd like me. Cory posted a really interesting insight about the current state of local TV news websites...and how bright the potential unclear future could be:

...younger viewers — ages 18-34 — are watching less and less, or not starting to watch at all. It doesn’t speak to them anymore. It’s not relevant.
You might argue this decline is due entirely to the internet. But TV stations have websites, too. And that lack of on-air relevancy is translated online, where they’re reflections of their on-air editorial product, handcuffed by old thinking and cost structures. You’ll often hear local TV execs talk about on-air’s tremendous reach — that even with declining ratings, it’s still a terrific vehicle to reach large audiences. Yes, that’s true, but that reach isn’t translating online. And that’s a very big problem.

Check out the entire posting HERE and check in on their blog LostRemote, HERE. I'll also add them to my list of things I like at the top.

Favorite year-end music video

2008-12-31T12:41:00.000-05:00

Creed Sh reds

It's not just the content, and the backhanded insult to Florida-based "rock" band Creed that makes this so funny to me...but that the editor made sure the vocals and drums hit right on time with the video. Super-creative.

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Know Your Meme

2008-12-30T12:13:00.000-05:00

Some people are confused by all this randomness on the interwebs. I know from being a journalist that people thirst for context to the stories and quirky bits of entertainment on the web.

A internet meme (PRON: meem) is a catchphrase or concept that spreads quickly (thanks, wiki). On the internet, that usually means a viral bit of video or music that gets stuck in your head and you just HAVE to show your friends. There are plenty of Chappelle Show skits and hip-hop lyrics that have become catchphrases amongst my current co-workers, and the internet allows us to replay them at a moment's notice.

We'll get into those other inside jokes another time, perhaps...

To start, you should be familiar with the biggies, and Rocketboom has set up a really cool new site called "Know Your Meme." Some of them are a bit more obscure (Disaster Girl, La Caida de dgar) but others have risen to the level of common knowledge among users (FAIL, lipdubs, O RLY, Boom goes the dynamite)

So...check out "Know Your Meme "...it's kinda awesome.

Kicking off the blog

2008-12-29T20:10:00.000-05:00

This is my first post...so, nothing too controversial, but maybe kind of interesting!

I saw this website yesterday, and I have since proclaimed the nerdiest thing I've seen this week (destined to become a somewhat regular feature).

Students at USC have come up with a way to display things three dimensionally using a spinning mirror. It's kind of like a, hologram...they can even play live video three dimensionally through the thing!

Check out video of the thing in action (the most impressive stuff starts at 1:16 into the video)