Palin Hung in Effigy

Have you seen this? Really, nuff said. Check out the story.

Here's CNN's video, too. So far, 3127 comments.

My hometown has a blog?!?! Well, sort of...

Upon googling my hometown, because placeblogger.com wasn't working, I found one blog for Hudson, NH. Unfortunately, it was only a MerchantCircle blog to promote businesses in my town. However, I did find out about some cool businesses that I didn't know were there. I had no idea my town had a Limousine service, or an Electrolysis office.

The only other blog that I found for Hudson was a Hudson for Obama website. It's funny looking at this business blog's pictures. One of the local restaurants even has a picture of a hamburger up.

Well, overall, this isn't a very good representation of the businesses in the area. We have numerous plazas that have just gone in and there is no information on them. I did find, however, a local newspaper in town, a jeweler that I didn't know about, and a sewer and landscaping company.

Hudson, get on this! To begin, more businesses need to put their information online. Also, why doesn't my town have a blog? There are almost 30,000 people, at least one person could start a blog about it. I am deeply saddened.

Trash Can Surfing

I love my friends. When we're together, we just laugh. A lot. Well, we all practically live at the Fine Arts Center because we're music majors, which makes for some interesting times. The FAC is nicknamed "the bunker" because of its bomb-shelter-like qualities and because there are no windows where we have our classes and practice. It makes life here on campus a little more gray, but we still seem to find ways to laugh about things.

For my original videos, I decided I would include two of the few videos I have shot on my camera (turn the volume down, I'm laughing pretty hard). Two of my friends are doing what I like to call "Trash Can Surfing", on a particularly overtired day for all of us. It definitely beats rehearsing.

Comparing Sites

(© RON CHAPPLE/CORBIS, ps. check out this article from Scientific American on getting your fiber through coffee)


One of the assignments for this week was to compare these sites:
BaristaNet, LoudounExtra, and iBrattleboro.com. After poking around on the sites for a while, I noticed some things.

As far as the strengths and weaknesses for each site, I have to say that iBrattleboro.com and BaristaNet were set up well. On both sites, you could scroll down through the headlines and get short, to-the-point stories on just what you are looking for.

LoudounExtra is still loading on my computer... The top box that includes the top five or so stories has not been working for me. I clicked on a story once it was finally loaded, and now that one isn't loading. I give up! Even the pictures associated with other stories as you scroll down aren't loading. I'm sure these not-loaded things could be strengths of the site if they actually worked.

I like how Brattleboro's stories were all provided by townspeople. People get a chance to read and write exactly what they want to know/say about the area. I mean, it just makes sense. It's like talking to all of your neighbors at once, without having to deal with the morning coffee breath. I also really liked how Brattleboro has a little section for "Who's Online" so that you can potentially talk to a neighbor if they're available.

Again, BaristaNet's stories were short and clear. I wish my town had something like this. Also, Barista, as well as the other sites, had a lot of links to blogs, events in the area, and other stories of interest to readers.

I think overall, despite the fact that LoudounExtra is still loading, the sites do a pretty good job at informing locals of what's going down in their area. They all had sections that a reader can click on for specific information on a certain topic, as well as the latest news and constant updates. Each of the sites had published about 6-7 of the latest stories for the day by mid-afternoon. I say, well done.

Stolen Glances

You know those moments- a glance at a stranger on the bus, in a grocery store, or a crowded subway station that seems to connect you with that person for a split second. You make eye contact, and in those few moments, everyone else in the room disappears. Time seems to stand still. Well, at least until your subway train whizzes from your happy moment.

Everyone seems to experience these little 2-second love excursions. James Blunt even has a song about his lost connection.



CNN.com has a cool story about these lost connections, and the romance ads that have been popping up on the Internet since ISawYou.com and SubwayCrush.com were intoduced. One couple in the story even owes a lot to Craigslist, which has a "missed connections" board on the site. Question is- is the Internet making it too easy to find people? Back in the day, those lost connections would be lost forever. I guess I wouldn't expect anything less from our Internet world today. But, maybe the Internet really is bringing people together, even if it is through "girl in the red sweater on West 82nd" romance ads. Maybe James Blunt should post his lost connection...

Ch.9 Conversations, Not Lectures

(FUSION)

When reading Chapter 9 this week, I came across a paragraph that I felt strongly about in the book. The main idea of the section was that the Internet has created opportunities for the public to comment, influence, and create their own journalism. This means that,

"Journalists can no longer view themselves as the sage on the stage," Emerson College journalism professor Janet Kolodzy notes. "They must step back, step down, and team up."

I am apalled that journalists would say that "the news is what I say it is". What? Since when are journalists above everyone else by telling the world the news? Journalism means, to me, sharing with OUR world the news and even shedding light on stories that may bring justice to the citizens of the country we live in. I have never thought of a journalist as a "gatekeeper", controlling exactly what people see and hear. The whole job of a journalist is to bring the people the REAL news, showing exactly what our world is like, even if we don't want to see it. Journalists don't have the right to control what people see, they are citizens as everyone else is. Journalists should share the news with the people, and have people share stories with journalists. Journalism should be a conversation with the people, not a lecture.

Drawing Comments

My experience drawing comments has been an interesting one, that’s for sure.

When thinking about what to write to draw comments, the first thing that came to mind was music. Music is a big part of my life and I figured it would be a good idea to post something related to something I care about. So, I posted a video of a contemporary saxophone piece about a samurai warrior. Unfortunately, that first post was not successful at all. I didn’t get any comments on it. True, I only left it up for about a day, but I thought it might at least get one.

After that first attempt went awry, I decided to take the post down from my blog. I figured people probably weren’t used to contemporary saxophone, and that I should try to go for a bigger audience. I thought about posting funny videos, cute videos of puppies, anything to draw some comments. Nothing, however, felt good enough to post.

Fortunately, later that day, I had a conversation in Franklin Dining Hall (as my post says) that led to the youtube find of Total Eclipse of the Heart. Wow. After watching that video, I knew right away that it was going on my blog. It was just the kind of thing I was looking for: something absurd, hilarious, creepy, or just plain crazy that people would want to talk about. And it worked! Turns out, people thought it was just as atrocious and wonderful as I did.

All I did to draw some comments was show it to my friends (who were conveniently in my dorm room at the time, and usually are in my room at all hours of the day and night- we’re kind of like Seinfeld, always talking about nothing. I’m Jerry, in case you were wondering. Ps. One of my friends is here now and is making vomiting noises) and asked them to comment on it. Then, I talked about the crazy video in as many of my classes as I could, telling people about my blog and asking them to check it out. I also updated my status on facebook to: CHECK THIS OUT: http://is.gd/3KlS WTF?!?!, so that people would see that if they looked at my profile.

This process was harder than I thought, and easier than I thought, if that makes sense. I realized that I had to post something that wasn’t so specialized as the contemporary sax video, but I could never make up my mind on what to do. When the 80s video came up, however, I knew that a lot of people would think it was ridiculous. Things became a lot easier from there. I was really excited about the video because of how insane it was, and I think that rubbed off on my friends, and their friends, and so on. I really wanted people to see this video, not because it was on my blog, but because it was definitely something I would want to share with as many people as possible anyway. Thank you, Bonnie Tyler!

Amazing.

I guess lately I've been interested in youtube videos, and I just couldn't pass up posting this one. If you have ever danced in your lifetime, you know that it takes quite a lot of balance, discipline and work to make movements fluid and beautiful. Well, this duo makes it look easy. The thing is, the man lost his leg while he was a child, and the woman lost her arm in a car accident. Their dance, however, is one of the most beautiful I have seen between a man and woman.

The dance shows the value of mutual support and friendship in their lives.

(Fast-forward to 30 seconds in)

Turn Around...

This evening after marching band, I went to what I like to call Frankenfurter (otherwise known as Franklin Dining Hall). While eating my cereal, fruit, and peanut butter and fluff (because there is nothing else there I would put in my mouth), I noticed a friend of mine was sitting at a table behind me. He was facing away from me, chatting with some friends.

Being the person that I am, I decided to be creepy like someone who was watching him from behind and text him: Turn around....

From there, a text frenzy ensued of the lyrics from the song "Total Eclipse of the Heart" across the dining hall's expanse. This then spurred a google search of the music video.

What I saw next took my breath away- heh heh. I hope you too, can experience this total 80s mind fuck.







What the hell is going on in this video?!?!?

Twitter Debates

(Photo from Donkey Dish)

Wow. Unbelievable! Last night's presidential debates produced some mad twitters. It seemed like there was a new twitter faster than the seconds were passing. I just plain couldn't keep up. The tweets I did get to read, however, proved interesting and humorous.

My favorite tweet of the night had to be that McCain looked like he was walking around the room like he lost his keys. Priceless. From that point on, each time he spoke I could only laugh because McCain was indeed searching for his lost keys...or marbles.

Anyways, what an experience. I felt like I was in a huge living room where millions of people were saying exactly what they wanted to each other just as the thought came to mind.Those are the best kind of conversations. Never a dull moment.

I liked getting both Democrat and Republican views. It was nice for a change to hear what people are really thinking about, even though I didn’t always want to hear it. I feel like I have connected with my fellow American citizens.

Besides all of that, seeing what people were talking about and watching what was actually happening was enlightening: a million takes on the same few words.

Woops! 3 minutes!

Ok, so, the Daily Beast.

I thought this site was pretty interesting. I liked the line up of the Cheat Sheet, the top 10 must reads from all over. You can get informed on popular topics pretty quick with those links.

"Read this, skip that" was a good motto I think. I got to everything I was interested quickly and could scan and find a lot of information. I also read Tina Brown's blog on Palin, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

I have to admit, I feel like I need a lot more time to rate a site like this. However, overall I think the site's ideas are good: getting the information out to people fast and in short bursts.

Drudge vs. Huff Post vs. NY Times

In comparing these sites, I've come across some characteristics that separate them from eachother in the world of online journalism.

Drudge Report seems to update very often. Although, there are so many links to other stories and blogs that are updating constantly, it seems a little unfair. Huff Post and NY Times I feel are sort of tied on the updates, although, NY Times has more original content and Huff Post has a lot of video and other material that is updated.

I like how Huff Post has so many videos and links to explore, however, I also like how NY Times almost has the layout of a print newspaper with front page info and then links at the bottom.

Out of all three, only Huff Post and NY Times attracted my interest enough for me to click on some of their material. I watched this funny SNL skit of the VP debates on Huff Post and I found this cool article on a bar in Chicago from NY Times. Props to them.