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My last couple of posts got me thinking. I put my name on a no-call list so telemarketers would stop trying to sell me stuff I didn't ask for; I set up my new Google toolbar to block pop-up ads; I've never seen a commercial on anything I watch with my Tivo; same for my 100 XM Radio channels.

I understand the content-for-attention value proposition of "free" media. But the fact remains that most people will skip the commercials if they can. Is that stealing? Have I broken some unspoken agreement when skip past the commercials? I don't think that's the important question for advertisers (and the people that sell the advertising). How effective is a commercial (TV, radio, print, online) if it's only being seen/heard/read because there was no easy way to avoid it?

The growing glut of SPAM and telemarketing calls has made me think about this more. These people are universally hated. And they know it. But they are willing to endure this because they've calculated that some tiny percent of the calls/emails DO work. We never thought about this with "old" media because it was so one-way. All radio and TV have commercials so if you want to watch Perry Mason, you'll by-god watch the commercials. Does it really do any good for me to see/hear your commercial if I have a bad feeling about your company/product at the end of those 30/60 seconds? I supect the answer is --in some twisted way-- yes. Yes, it does.

Better and better. The new

Better and better. The new Google Toolbar is pretty nifty. My favorite features are the pop-up blocker and BlogThis. The latter lets me just surf along and --when I find something I want to blog-- click a button. The AutoFill feature will also save many keystrokes. Highly recommended.

Telemarketing opt-out site swamped Some

Telemarketing opt-out site swamped Some states have seen 40 percent of wired telephone users sign up for anti-telemarketing registries in their regions. Expecting 166 million residential telephone users in the United States. By year's end the FTC expects 60 million people will have signed up for the service. Do you think the telemarketers are getting the message that we don't want their shit? Or, if we do, we'll call them. [C|Net News]

Warrior Poet.

It's hard to find one-of anything on the exploding web but Chante Mallard haiku might be unique. I didn't check. It's kind of spooky knowing that every day, I walk past the mind that's bent this way.

Just in case.

Unlike my friend in Studio C, I don't expect to ever need this but you never know.

Gellin'.

You have to respect this kind of white hot rage.

Off-shore.

So the RIAA is going after music pirates (they call them thieves). Our company produces original content and we get pissed when people rip us off. We've even gone to court a few times. What I don't understand is why the tech world can't beat this (forget right or wrong for a minute). When the CEO of one of the big record companies gets around to embezzling a few million bucks, he or she will have no problem tucking them away in some off-shore bank. Why doesn't some Arab country set up secure severs for music swapping? I guess what I'm asking is, is this technically possible? I guess the RIAA would go after the ISP (and everyone else) that makes it possible us to connect to servers in other countries. I just don't like thinking that Big Business can beat down the Internet.

Annoying.com.

How many things can you find wrong with this website. You have 60 seconds. Go. These guys handle the rental on our vacation home. They said they wouldn't link from their official site to my little home-grown effort because "you've got links to websites other than ours." I didn't even know what to say to that. But the goofs have some Google juice so they have at least one clue. Okay, okay... I'll update the links.

But we're already making a lot of money.

I have to say I'm no longer surprised to learn that media people "lack Internet vision." You'd think you might find a way to do something useful with your website if you had TV station with which you could promote it. [CyberJournalist]

Unplugged.

I'm taking the wireless plunge at home. To get the hang of wi-fi as much as anything else. Hotel dial-up just sucks and unless you happen to be in San Jose it's probably gonna suck a long time. I'll take my chances on finding a Starbucks or some other enlightened business. Yes, I'll leave the hotel to go in search of a decent connection. And I pledge to always stay at hotels with wi-fi if I can find one. I'll let you know how the home experience goes.

No problem at all.

This is so... so... I can't find the words. Comedy? Sattire? Surrealism? Sofa needs to be in LA or NY or someplace where there is weird-base worthy of his efforts.

More pages

Scott seemed genuinely surprised to learn I am a Harry Potter fan (I shreaked like a little girl when my Amazon box arrived). I'm going to see how long I can hold off reading it. Just finished re-reading Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. I loved it the first time. I loved it even more this time. 918 pages I could not stop turning. If you've had your wisdom teeth extracted or think you might one day, do not read this passage.

Page turner.

Just finished Dan Brown's Angels & Demons. "It takes guts to write a novel that combines an ancient secret brotherhood, the Swiss Conseil Europen pour la Recherche Nuclaire, a papal conclave, mysterious ambigrams, a plot against the Vatican, a mad scientist in a wheelchair, particles of antimatter, jets that can travel 15,000 miles per hour, crafty assassins, a beautiful Italian physicist, and a Harvard professor of religious iconology. It takes talent to make that novel anything but ridiculous." [Amazon]

Visions of the Prairie Garden

is a collection of photographs by Henry Domke featuring images celebrating the Prairie Garden Trust, a nature restoration project in central Missouri. I attended a reception for the exhibit today. I didn't think I'd much care for "nature" photos but these jump right past that. Art might be as simple as showing us things we look at but never see.

More unborn blogs.

My first run at blogging was going to be a group effort (Joe, Susan, LeAnn and a few I've already mentioned). Alas.

You're going to pay me?!

You've heard people say they love their jobs so much they can't believe they get paid to do it. If you are fortunate enough to be one of those people --as I am-- you understand. If not, it just sounds like bullshit. But here's what I'm wondering... does enjoying your work to that degree change how you feel about money? I can't remember ever saying to myself, "Hey, I worked too damned hard for that money to (fill in the blank)." I mean, if the money is less important than the satisfaction you get from the job, it's just less...valuable. For a few weeks one college summer I worked on the assembly line of an auto plant in St. Louis. I think 62 cars an hour passed my station. Would I do that job for 5 years at $100K per? I don't think so. There'd have to be child that needed an operation or something. I'm not really going anywhere with this. For me, it wouldn't be enough to just "not hate" my job. If --like me-- you love what you do, all of this makes perfect sense. If not, well, I'm not going to tell you to find a job you love. You've got a million reasons why you can't and I don't have one why you can.

Whoa.

Channell surfing. Stopped on Bravo to watch a couple of minutes of Brian De Palma's Dressed to Kill (1980). And there's Andy Sipowicz. Young. With hair.

Let's leave it in

It's probably been 30 years since I watched the original Frankenstein (1931). When a movie has been so often parodied, it's easy to forget how good the original really was. I watched it tonight on TCM. If I could know only one thing about the making of that movie, it would be the story behind the scene (hell, it wasn't a scene...it was just a moment), early in the film, when Fritz (played by Dwight Frye) went to see who was pounding on the castle door just before the creation of the monster. As he turned to go backup the stairs, he stops...to pull up his sock. It was...perfect.

Easier than finding a baby sitter

If I was filthy rich, I'd buy some billboards just for this purpose. And I thought these were pretty pretty funny, too. [DribbleGlass.com]

Thoughtful but silent.

DeLoss Jahnke insists he has something to say but offered no explanation for why he's not blogging. But he certainly belongs on the BIWRITE list.

Unborn Blogs

Here's my free-association, lightening-round list of "Blogs I Would Read If They Existed." O. Kay Henderson, Bob Priddy, Dennis Kackley, Jim Obradovich, Kathy Obradovich, Dar Danielson, Richard Peck, Terry McVey. I know all of these people and they either have something (or nothing) to say and would say it with style and wit. Watch this space for updates.

Good blogs. Bad blogs.

Glenn Reynolds (InstaPundit), in a column at Tech Central Station, says a "good" weblog has a) a personal voice, and b) rapid response times. [via E-Media Tidbits]

Test, test, test

Recent email from Ben Krech got me thinking about Father's Day and radio. If radio has a "cutting edge" it's probably XM Radio (where Ben works). Ben's father has been in the business for 25 years. My pop was a radio "announcer" back when they called them that. A span of 50+ years. Is it even the same business? I can't wait to see how this movie ends.

Uh oh.

The following thoughts on radio are by Bob Lefsetz. I searched --unsuccessfully-- for the article or a website to which I could link.

"The only people who still believe in music radio are the conglomerates with monopolies and the major record labels. All the LISTENERS, the POTENTIAL listeners, think it's a JOKE! If you're listening to music radio, you're the lowest common denominator. You don't have a CD player in your car. Like everybody with any MONEY! And, unlike the sixties, almost NO ONE listens to music on the radio at home. Really. Pay attention. When do people listen to the radio at home. In the morning. It's PERFECT. While you're walking around the house, getting your shit together. And, is there any MUSIC in the morning? Almost none. Because the music being purveyed SUCKS! Music radio is a giant sinkhole. I can understand the majors wanting to reduce indie promo costs, but what I CAN'T understand is their reluctance to explore new avenues of exploitation. Look at the statistics. Music radio listenership keeps going DOWN! Kids especially don't listen."

Corporate blogs.

From an article by Hiawatha Bray in the Business Section (The Boston Globe) on the Weblogs Business Strategy conference last week: "Consider: Every business needs to know what its employees know. Companies are crammed with experts on various topics whose knowledge goes to waste -- because nobody knows what they know. Now give these workers an internal corporate blog, and encourage them to use it. Let them natter away on every topic that intrigues them. Harvest and index the results. You've mapped your workers' brains. The company's hidden experts will cheerfully reveal themselves, and the firm's institutional memory gets an upgrade." [By way of JOHO]

Too funny for his job.

I admit it. I didn't think What's Your Problem? was all that funny at first. I was wrong. I think Sofa missed his calling. He's a lot funnier than sporty.

Almost home

I've been meaning to take this picture for a long time. On just about any sunny afternoon, this is the view as I make the last turn coming home.

Order of the Phoenix.

I just pre-ordered the new Harry Potter book. 60 Minutes did a segment on J.K. Rowling that was...inspirational. That woman deserves all the good stuff flowing her way.

For the record.

Have you seen the Verizon commercial where the two teenage girls fight over the telephone? I'd like to go on record as saying that I did not find it disturbingly erotic.

Is That All There Is?

Lyrics by P.J. Harvey. Best version, Peggy Lee

And when I was twelve years old, my Daddy took me to the circus
'The greatest show on earth'.
And there were clowns and elephants, dancing bears, and a beautiful lady in pink tights flew high above our heads.
And as I sat there watching, I had the feeling that something was missing
I don't know what but when it was all over I said to myself "Is that all there is to the circus?"

Bitches & Beaches Tour, Day One

Barb just called from the Green Door Bar in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. En route to Destin. Sounded pretty drunk.

Freaking. Fricking. But no fucking.

The censors (does anyone think of themselves as a "censor"?) at FX went through Good Will Hunting, carefully replacing each "fucking" with "freaking" or "fricking" (what the fuck is fricking?). That just seems so...dishonest to me. I don't care what anybody says, it's not the same same movie when you start cutting scenes and replacing words. Fuck it.

Oooh.

I stumbled across some really beautiful stuff at similarselection.org

And turn off the blinker.

A little something for those inconsiderate pricks that like to squeeze through the turn on the red light.

Me and the pups

Barb, Jan and a dozen lady friends are heading for Destin tomorrow for the 2003 Bitches & Beaches Tour. Killer rip tides do not frighten these women. So it's just me and the hounds for a week. Nothing but dog biscuits and Buds. Drunken co-eds stay away. There's nothing for you here.

Yeah.

I found this on Denise Howell's weblog (Bag and Baggage). I'm unclear on whether these are her thoughts or David Weinberger but it doesn't matter. "The Bubble was never what the Internet was about. The Web is not primarily a commercial space, not even primarily an information space. The interest is not there because 800 million people woke up and suddenly decided they wanted to be research librarians. The bubble went away, but the Web absolutely didn't. The Web remains interesting and important. Nobody would have said a few years ago we'd have 20 billion pages on the Web. It's not just markets that are conversations, it's businesses themselves."

I think they got them all.

If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen defrocked, doesn't it follow that electricians can be delighted, musicians denoted, cowboys deranged, models deposed (and eventually disfigured) and dry cleaners depressed? Laundry workers could decrease, eventually becoming depressed and depleted! Even more, bedmakers will be debunked, baseball players will be debased, landscapers will be deflowered, bulldozer operators will be degraded, organ donors will be delivered, the BVD company will be debriefed, and even musical composers will eventually decompose. As a student, I spent all my time wishing to be detested and degraded. [3Bruces]

No harm, no foul.

I am embarrassed that John Ashcroft is from Missouri. And if all the radio stations in America want to stop playing my CD, well, tough shit. My dislike for the guy goes back to the mid-eighties when he was governor of Missouri. In those days there was an annual fund-raising basketball game between folks in the governor's office and members of the capital press corps. I got invited because I worked for a statewide, radio news network.

When we got to the gym we learned that the governor had salted his team with a few good men from the Missouri State Highway Patrol. But it was all for a good cause so what's a few ringers? It stopped being fun when the governor started throwing elbows and whining about getting fouled. If you've played much pick-up ball, you've run into guys like this. They get pissed real easy. Call lots of fouls but bitch if you call one on them. If we'd been on a playground, someone would have knocked him on his ass. But he knew --and we knew-- that wasn't an option in this game. Looking back, Reverend Ashcroft is the perfect guy to go to DC, cover up the naked statues, and keep an eye on everyone. I think the year was 1984.

I'll take two.

Beginning this fall, Microsoft plans to offer a new wireless information and messaging service that will run on evolving smart watch devices. The software company's MSN Direct division says the service, which costs $9.95 a month, is geared to deliver customized information to a new category of watches. MSN Direct said the service would provide consumers with information including news, weather, sports scores, stock quotes, movies, dining, and games. Microsoft is expected to leverage some of its original content and existing media licensing arrangements in order to provide the data for the wireless watch information service. [InternetNews.com]

Smile.

Let's face it. Most of the people I know are not capable of taking a photograph with digital camera...transferring the file from their camera to their laptop...hooking up to the net... and emailing that photo or posting it to a website. Along comes mobile phone photography. Photos on this page were taken by one of our sales reps.

When you're having fun.

I started working for Learfield Communications on June 4th, 1984. When that rolls around again it will The Big 20. Annother one of those "ends in zero" anniversaries. I kept all of my pre-computer calendars (Day-At-A- Glance, Day Timers,etc). That first month it was one of those desk blotter/month calendars. Lots of memories. On my first day, my predecessor --Jeff Smith-- presented me with a list of projects-in-progress. An interesting snap-shot of the regional, radio network business in 1984. We were trying to get programming cleared in Kansas City and St. Louis. We called them "custom casts" and they worked for a while. We organized a series of debates between the candidates for governor (we fucked up the broadcast). We cooked up a statewide public opinion poll that got us a lot of ink (not all good). But my favorite project was a series of daily, one-hour talk shows featuring shills for various associations. On Monday, somebody from the Missouri Chiropractors Association; on Tuesday an optomotrist; on Wednesday a podiatrist; etc. Station managers just laughed at me. Rule One: Don't let commissioned sales reps cook up your programming. Looking back, I must say I'm surprised how little our networks have changed. For some reason, I'm reminded of something Charlie Warner said. Your method of distribution defines the nature of your business. That was true back in the days of land-lines and analog satellite distribution and it's sill true as we move more and more content to the web. Maybe it's all about band-width. Radio stations have a bunch and you can move a lot of data over those frequencies. Factor in that those frequencies are rare commodities, granted by the FCC. No competition. Fast forward to a world where any DJ/reporter/entertainer/you-name-it can reach an audience. New ball game?

Did you feel that?

According to the National Earthquake Information Center, we had a little earthquake "down home" as we used to say. Magnatude 4.5.

All the news, all the time.

According to CyberJournalist, Google News beat out BBC News Online, MSNBC.com, Poynter's Romenesko and allAfrica.com to win 2003 Webby Award for best news site. I'd sure like to be a fly on the wall at AP headquarters. I spent a few (pre-Web) years trying to develop and market an "alternative (to AP) wire service." All of the news and information was "out there." And there was no shortage of radio stations (our target market) hungry for the information. The challenge was connecting all the dots. We had a big old expensive satellite channel to move the information one way and we busted our hump to "aggragate" (I always liked that word) the information. But people just didn't want to pay for information. At least, not very much. Fast forward a few years and damned near every newspaper in the world is putting some or all of their stuff online.

The big record labels tell me that although I paid for my copy of the Metallica CD, I can't rip the songs to a CD and give it to a friend. While they might win this one, keeping me from sending a copy of today's big news story to five friends (who each send it to five friends).

I always thought the most important part of the Associated Press wasn't it's reporters and editors but the "connectedness" of all those newspapers. A way for them to share the news they gathered. Can we agree that has changed forever?

Tweet, (gasp) Tweet.

"Radio is a very sick canary in the coal mine, and we're about to infect television with the same disease". From FCC Commissioner Adelstein's dissent on last week's decision regarding broadcast ownership. Andy is even more concerned. While I can't muster Andy's outrage, I do feel something's happening here.