Category: Media Arts

I’m watching G4‘s Attack of the Show. I’ve checked out the show, and the network, a few times since they merged with TechTV. I’ve not been too impressed with G4’s programming work, as it seems to mostly consist of reruns of COPs.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-HbNHFrrMU?fs=1&w=480&h=295]

Twitter takes the idea of "executive summary" and refines it to the most diminutive. Twitter's beauty comes from the speed of data transfer, as well as connecting trust agents to incentivize readership. Its downside: sacrificing depth for speed. With the mass of data blasting down the Twitter pipes, headlines replace depth. Finding the valuable, the needle within the haystack stares at us. Thus the value of our followees. The people we choose to follow capture our priorities, our interests and passions. Filtering the grand thoroughfare in this way greatly expands what trade pubs were attempting to do, in the magazine era's heyday. And the internet's grabs array of knowledge becomes more manageable. Or more so.

Earlier this week I read a rather disturbing story, Michael Finkel’s “How I Convinced a Death-Row Murderer Not to Die”. Now, I dimly remember the story from early in the decade (it happened in Oregon). Interesting, from a sociological point of view. However, for me, the story went into some depth on the murder (the subject, Christian Longo, murdered his whole family). Those sorts of details tend to disturb and haunt me. Gladly, I read the thing in early afternoon, giving myself some time to disconnect. Otherwise, my night’s sleep would’ve been disrupted (as has happened after reading/hearing other such stories). This is why I generally don’t watch the news in the evening, and defiantly late at night. If I’m up in the dark of night for insomnia, I avoid both the news, but also “true crime” shows which are so popular. And I avoid all the “mystery” shows, as well as any of the crime-based dramas.

Now, some would say this is due to my liberal, bleeding-heart tendencies, or some such rot. No, the core is the that this has come to close to me. Back in 1980, my best friend, Adam’s, father murdered Adam’s mother. We came home from school to see the coroner sitting in his driveway (he lived right across the street from me). Adam disintegrated before me, and never recovered. And, really, neither did I. To add to the ghastliness, I was with Adam when he was allowed to go back into the house (on a furlough of sorts from the mental hospital he was assigned to). It was supposed to have been cleaned up, but they hadn’t disposed of the bed where his mom had died. That still haunts my dreams.

Ms. Vasilakis, one of the presenters on Classical Destinations here performs Bloch. Lovely, simply lovely.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8cJn36r1L0&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Here’s a good post raising questions about all those “social media experts”. It’s easy, I guess, to become bedazzled by buzz terms (Twitter, Facebook, et al). However, if your company is looking to invest actual money in something like this, if behooves you to spend some time researching.

One site I learned about from this, though, is Help A Reporter Out. Peter Shankman’s effort to connect reporters with good, solid sources. It looks like a great way to help both reporters get in front of real sources (not just PR shlocks) as well as get good PR folks in front of relevant media. One of those real solid “win wins” we hear so much about.

Lately, much has been pontificated online about media hyperbole surrounding the Swine Flu. I offer something of an apologia for the current state of affairs here. Mainly, the issue stems from “the public’s” inability to pay attention to anything without an immense headline. Well, unless it has to do with a celebrity’s underwear habits, but I digress. My frustration for this element of society goes deep.

Television news focuses on the shallow, sound-bite, executive summary. Brief, quick, gone. It amazes me, to this day, that so many people use this as their primary information source. So quick, vacant and empty, full of alarmist notions and language. You see this, however, within print as well. Particularly, headlines. Most of them are barely connected with a story’s content. And many people don’t read a story past the headline.

Long ago, I gave up on this as a source of information. NPR took on a piece of it, as I have often had some commute time. My preferred source, for the longest time, was print. In my heyday I would read the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Seattle Times daily. Now, with the web, my information comes from a variety of sources. Ironically, the above are still part of my routine, just intermixed with others.

With this, I think the growth of the internet has been grand. It’s best to head to, say, the CDC for information versus Faux, er, Fox news. Plus, the ability to comment on stories, whether on your own blog or in the comments section, helps ensure balance. Yet, I wonder, if perhaps the abundance of information makes the natural inclination worse.

Government tries to navigate this fine line. Get information out, accurate and action oriented. However, people don’t tend to pay attention unless there’s doom in the language. Add to that, though, that people have a sort attention span. If the doom/gloom fails to materialize quickly, the mind will turn to vapor. Play the alarmist card with caution!

As internet access to continues to grow, and understanding of its use grows as well, I hope to see a decrease in these alarmist events. That we become better consumers of information, and better able to focus our efforts effectively.

UPDATE: My local paper, The Everett Herald has a decent piece on this.

I had a lovely interview this afternoon and feel good about how it went. However, this is balanced with the knowledge that many others have also been interviewed. Though it is for a position that I would be excited to get, I’m not all angsty. I’m just not too worried about the whole unemployed thing right now. However, that’s due to luck, and some skill (I guess). Savings will hold out for a bit yet, and my wife works…and it’s quite unlikely she’ll loose her job (she teaches junior high special ed…I shudder at the thought). Our worst case scenario is a radical lifestyle shift. Perhaps losing one of the cars (and it’s payment), and dropping such things as cable (the horror!). And I’m not so hell-bent on working. Work, for me, is more about contributing and making an impact. That, truly, is a luxury.

Reminds me of my grandfather. He was “retired” (acted upon him, not of his choice) when I was about 12. His life was wrapped up in his job. He was in the same role for 30+ years, and was devastated when it ended. I learned, way back then, that I would never fully roll my identity into my job/career.

However, there is something that’s giving me chills right now: the Swine Flu outbreak. Job loss sucks; bankruptcy sucks, too. But neither one of them will kill you, or worse, someone you love. Fortunately, here in the States, that’s less of a worry since we have some of the best medical care on the globe. Still, the severity of this helps keep all the other problems in perspective.