"I think the pleasure of completed work is what makes blogging so popular. You have to believe most bloggers have few if any actual readers. The writers are in it for other reasons. Blogging is like work, but without coworkers thwarting you at every turn. All you get is the pleasure of a completed task."
Once again, Mr. Adams is on the money.
Good story in the NYT Small Business section on blogging as a marketing tool:
“…while blogs may be useful to many more small businesses, even blogging experts do not recommend it for the majority.
Guy Kawasaki, a serial entrepreneur, managing partner of Garage Technology Ventures and a prolific blogger, put it this way: “If you’re a clothing manufacturer or a restaurant, blogging is probably not as high on your list as making good food or good clothes.”
Blogging requires a large time commitment and some writing skills, which not every small business has on hand.”
Mindy McAdams’ Teaching Online Journalism:
“New U.S. graduates with a bachelor’s degree in journalism or mass communication had a median annual salary of $30,000, according to a survey of spring 2006 graduates. New graduates with a master’s degree in journalism or mass communication had a median annual salary of $38,000. Jobs held by all these graduates included those in public relations and advertising as well as online, print, TV and radio journalism.
Does this mean getting a master’s degree will increase your salary? Maybe in some fields, but not necessarily in journalism. I’d like to see this survey cut the grain a bit finer on the master’s degree data, because in my experience, a hiring editor at a news organization doesn’t give a hoot about your degree(s) or your GPA — a hiring editor cares only about your experience in the field.
This marks a distinct difference between journalism jobs and jobs in some other fields, where the extra one or two years in graduate school are assumed to make the candidate more fit to do the job. In our field, the only thing that makes you more fit is more work experience.”
I haven’t been involved in hiring for our newsrooms for long time, but I think experience would trump grad degree for us.
A lovely Christmas Eve at Susan’s with her family and friends. Janny (an anglicized version of her Chinese name) gave several us Lucky Money Toads. From the Wikipedia entry:
“Chan Chu means “toad; frog”, especially the “Lucky Money Toad” or “Three-legged Money Frog”, a popular Chinese symbol for prosperity. It is often portrayed with red eyes and flared nostrils, sitting on a pile of traditional Chinese cash, with a coin in its mouth. According to Feng Shui lore, it is believed to drive away evil, protect wealth, and increase income.”
I like that drive away evil part. Thank you, Janny.
Sometime in the 70’s I interviewed Lee Garrett on the Grapevine, a talk show we did at KBOA. If memory serves, Garrett –who was blind– was in town visiting his momma (or some relative). I recall him being a funny guy. Following the interview, I walked him out to the parking lot (where his driver was waiting) and he said that he could drive himself, but only at night.
I sure would like to know the Kennett connection. Can anyone out there help me with that?
“The fifth and final season of ‘The Wire’ (January 6) centers on the media’s role in addressing – or failing to address – the fundamental political, economic and social realities depicted over the course of the series, while also resolving storylines of the numerous characters woven throughout the narrative arc of the show.
This season of ‘The Wire’ is based in large part on series creator David Simon’s experiences in 13 years at The Baltimore Sun. Simon decries recent trends in the newspaper industry that have conspired to make high-end journalism vulnerable: out-of-town chain ownership, an economic climate in which the share price of media companies matters more to industry leaders than the product itself, and a newsroom culture in which prizes, personal ambition and the cult of the “impact” story has replaced consistent and detailed coverage of complex issues as the primary goal.”
It pains me when really good shows like The Sopranos (early seasons), Deadwood, and The Wire come to an end. But not as much as seeing them drag on after everyone (but the network accountants) stopped giving a shit.
It seems pretty clear that the NCAA wants to prohibit anything approaching real-time coverage of the event. Companies –like the one I work for— pay millions for the exclusive broadcast rights to collegiate sporting events. A reporter (or a dozen reporters) up in the press box live blogging the game –in theory– dilutes the value of the rights we purchased.
“The NCAA this week announced a formal program limiting how often bloggers with media credentials can update their blog while attending championship college events.
The sports governing body set blogging limits for each sport. For example, those at football games can update their blogs three times per quarter and once at halftime. For basketball, bloggers can post five times per half, once at halftime and twice per overtime period.
The policy even sets rules for water polo (three per quarter, once at halftime), bowling (10 blog posts per session) and fencing (10 per session).”
The phrase that caught my eye was “bloggers with media credentials.” If
I’m just a fan, can I blog at will? If your credentials are at stake,
you probably wouldn’t fight this. But if you’re a civilian, you could
tell the NCAA to piss off. Does this mean the NCAA thinks only bloggers
with some media connection can/will have a significant audience?
One of our affiliate relations reps shared this story with me a few days ago and I’m posting it so I can find it later. And I might have some of the particulars wrong but they don’t change the point of the story.
Small market radio station manager gets a call from a program syndicator, trying to clear a three hour Christmas special. The station manager doesn’t want to commit that much time but likes the program and suggests they put the program on the station’s website, clear the syndicator’s commercials on the radio station and promote the special (online) on the air.
Hmmm.
Now, every program provider will tell you how important it is that the spots air inside the programming. They might have even sold that aspect to the advertisers. But when all is said and done (note that I did not say, "At the end of the day"), it’s really about getting the spots on the air.
Is there some obvious synergy here? Could web-savvy radio stations take this approach to enrich their online offering and pull more local listeners (and advertisers) to their websites?
And while there are only 24 hours in the on-air programming clock, there are no limits online. A station could have a sports "channel," an ag channel, a home fix-up channel and on and on.
Yes, I see the limitation. For now, it’s those 30 second radios spots that have value to the advertiser. The radio station still has to program a radio station the people want to listen to.
And all my "what if’s" and "how about’s" are predicated on the idea that radio stations must be more than "radio" stations. They’ve got to find a way to survive online. We all do.
If I had a little AM Daytimer (insert joke here), I might fill my air time with excerpts from a wide variety of programming (as local as I could afford to make it) on my website(s).
As for networks and syndicators that rely on getting their programs (commercials) on all those radio stations… their fortunes are tied to the radio stations. To paraphrase the old saw about land, God isn’t making any more 30’s and 60’s. But He/She has an endless supply of web pages.
28 Days Later… was a pretty good zombie movie. But I found I Am Legend way more disturbing. Will Smith did not phone this one in. (I think he gives his all in just about every film I’ve seen him in).
I usually like a good post-apocalyptic yarn but this one… the people behind me kept shushing me because I was saying, "It’s only a movie, it’s only a movie" in my outside voice.
Take the worst thing that anyone can imagine (the extinction of mankind) and cast an actor who can make you believe it for even a few of the 100 minutes… (shudder).
Comment Assignment: Best (?) zombie movies.
The thing I love most about this video is that it exists. That one of the hunter’s buddies (I assume) had a camera and the good sense to keep rolling.
My friend — and small animal veterinarian — Dr. T. Everett Mobley thinks this scene was staged:
“I think that is a staged video with a trained deer. Note that when the deer quiets down, the guy cues him with a couple of gentle kicks. The deer never uses his antlers. The deer does not appear distressed. Deer hooves are usually quite sharp. People have had their throats cut by a kicking deer. Maybe it’s real and the guy killed his buddies with an axe afterwards, but I doubt it.”