In an elaborate (and secret) ceremony, held in an undisclosed location, the newest member of The Order of the Fez was inducted last night. John Wells became the sixth member of the recently formed order and you can read his rambling, semi-coherent application statement here.
Category Archives: Media & Culture
“Things we were told about online that were wrong.”
Steve Safran at Lost Remote takes a look back at some of the responses to his suggestions regarding the web. These bring back a lot of memories:
- Nobody will break news on their site before the story airs
- Newspapers won’t put much news online because it will cannibalize sales
- Nobody will buy web advertising
- Only young people use the web, and they don’t want news
- The bubble has burst – there’s no future in the web now
- There is no need to hire a web-only salesperson
- News websites will never “blog” or have anything to do with blogging
- Social networking tools don’t belong on news sites
- The networks will never send programming directly to the audience and ignore the locals
- People won’t watch video online because the quality is not high enough
- People won’t watch video on an iPod because the picture is not big enough
- Viewers won’t upload video and pictures because it’s too hard to do
“Cops! Run for it! Uh, sorry.”
Two men, driving the same pickup truck, have been cited for driving drunk in central Wisconsin. Police stopped their truck in Abbotsford recently and found 43-year-old Harvey Miller was steering the truck. Miller has no legs. Officers say 55-year-old Edwin Marzinske was operating the gas pedals and brake.
The police report says Miller admitted he was too drunk to drive, but argued he wasn’t actually operating the truck because he couldn’t push the gas pedal. Officers disgreed and cited him for drunken driving, third offense.
Marzinske was cited for his second drunken driving offense. Both men were also cited for operating a vehicle after revocation.
— WCCN
Order of the Fez
For those who missed it, I wore my new leopard skin fez all day on Monday. It created a bit of interest (fez buzz). The most common question? “Where can I get a fez?”
My answer? “That’s what separates the fezz-less from… those with fezzorocity. If you’re not resourceful enough to acquire your own fez, you don’t deserve to wear one.”
Dear readers, I give you Bob Hague, Supreme Potentate of the Badger LaFolette Chapter of the Order of the Fez (Fez #2).
Bob and I will be drafting by-laws and deciding on The Secret Grip in coming days, and if you’d like to join us (throw your fez in the ring, as it were), just email a photo of yourself wearing a fez. (Word of caution: No fez sharing. You must own your own fez to a member in good standing)
Don’t delay. The highly prized LFN’s (Low Fez Numbers) will go quickly.
If there’s an amusing story behind your fez (“I mugged a Shriner and have the video”), please feel free to share it.
On behalf of Supreme Potentate Bob, I challenge you to get your fez on!
My kind of scavenger hunt
I’m not a state fair kind of guy. I’m just not. But that just shows you how little imagination and creativity I possess. And why I missed the Hoosier Hunt at this year’s Missouri State Fair.
The Hoosier Hunt is what happens when black humor meets the digital age. You fire up your camera phone and bring back the following images:
- Mullet
- Marlboro T-Shirt
- Woman 2x as big as her man
- Matching shirts
- Camel Toe or Melvin
- Best girl’s ass (not your wife)
- Best boy’s ass (not your husband)
- Most tattoos
- Most in need of having roots done
- Picture in stranger’s hat
- In same shot with girl with “D” cups
- Picture with someone famous
- In shot with Jeff Gordon fan
- Woman in bikini top
- Man/woman in overalls
- Someone eating a turkey leg
- Person wearing air-brushed T-Shirt
- Woman with 80’s hair
- Woman without a bra
- Big belt buckle
- Someone barefoot
- Wearing two articles of John Deere clothing
- Ugliest person with Big & Rich T-Shirt
- Ugliest person with Cowboy Troy T-Shirt
- Fat woman/man in belly shirt
- Most facial hair
If you don’t find this amusing, you’re probably in one of the photos above. And, god willing, I will be able to share the winning images with you. I’m told there were three teams competing in this Hoosier Hunt and they’re compiling the winning photos and will share them here.
Gnomedex: Day One
Gnomedex has to be one of the best covered events in that everyone in the audience is blogging, twittering, videoing and flickr’ing.
Photo: Scott Beale / Laughing Squid” laughingsquid.com
300+ intense, passionate, creative people who all happen to be interested in media, communication and –to some greater or lesser degree– changing the world. Every one a blogger and many podcasters to boot.
Many have been blogging long enough –and hard enough– to have become bored or exhausted (or both) by its demands.
Web 2.0 is familiar and comfortable to these people. Passe for some. But these are the early adopters, the adept. The advance guard of the blogosphere.
Newspapers beat TV at local video
Lost Remote points us to the latest blog entry from Bill Adee, the associate managing editor for innovation at the Chicago Tribune who wants the paper to be “the main online source of video for Chicagoland users.” And to get there, he says the Tribune has 31 staff photographers with video cameras, and the multimedia team has video cameras.
Again from Lost Remote’s Michael Gay: "Let’s be conservative and say that’s 40 video cameras shooting video around Chicago. After working in Chicago, I can tell you with certainty that there is no TV station with that many cameras out on the streets."
Why would any reporter (TV, print, radio) hit the street without a digital camera (and the knowledge to use it)?
Creators, Critics, Collectors, Joiners, Spectators and Inactives
A new Forrester report divides the U.S. online population into six groups according to their social participation on the Web.
More than one-fifth of those classified as Creators—those who blog, publish Web sites, upload videos, or participate in other content creation activities—own Macs, while only 12 percent own Dell computers.
The majority of Spectators (they read blogs, watch videos, and listen to podcasts) own Macs while the majority of Inactives (they don’t participate online) own Dells.
iPhone: The Music Video
This little ditty –by NYT tech writer David Pogue (and friends)– was posted sometime earlier today and (as I type this) has been viewed 3,772 times. I found it on the digg home page so we can assume it will be seen many more times.
I have to wonder if anyone has felt moved to this kind of hijinx by any previous cell phone? Maybe. I just missed it.
YouTube on AppleTV
I downloaded the YouTube update to AppleTV last night and watched some videos on the big (bigger) screen. Stupid videos are still stupid. Shitty quality videos still look shitty. And the good ones look pretty darned good. Watching “Internet video” on the big screen in the living room takes a little getting used to.
I had the sense that I was getting a peek at the future. Thousands of videos, downloaded from the Internet to my little AppleTV box. No idea what the business model will look like but this is disruptive technology. If I was the guy responsible for “scheduling” programs on a “TV network,” I’d be nervous.
You’ll find a real review at engadget.