Category Archives: Science & Technology

The reporter of the future is here today

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Micro Persuasion:

“The word newspaper is really a misnomer today. Or at least it will be soon. Increasingly news is delivered digitally and it’s interactive. People are certainly writing newspapers off for dead, but I think they have a bright future (in digital form) and it’s right in front of them.

Everyone’s looking for a solution to the newspaper problem. But the answer is right under their nose. The picture is slowly evolving through the breakthrough work of individual reporters who are using social media to build a stronger connection with their audience (and their own personal brands in the process).”

Read the post for the answer. If you work for our company and would like to know how to use any of the tools referenced in this post, I will be happy to help you get started. If you work for another company, we have a digital SWAT team that can get you started.

The next 5,000 days of the web

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The web has only been around 6,000 days. So Kevin Kelly reminds us in his presentation at the recent Web 2.0 Summit. In the beginning, we thought the web would be “TV only better.” It has evolved into something much different and Mr. Kelly takes a stab at what the web will be 5,000 days from now. “As different from the web (of today) as the web was from TV.”
Here’s what I jotted on my Coffee Zone napkin:

  • “If what you create is not on the web, it doesn’t count.”
  • “If it can’t be shared, it doesn’t count.”
  • In the next 6,000 days everything will move to the Cloud; move to Database and move to Sharing. (He explains in the video)

He ticks off several things that we now take for granted but would have considered impossible at the beginning of the web. Which, of course, means that things we now consider impossible, will be routine in 15 years. I love the idea of “Believing in the impossible.”

Still in love with my Tracfone

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I paid $19.95 at Wal-Mart for my Tracfone (sometime in 2005). A year ago I bought a prepaid card (1 year/500 minutes) that expires in a few days. I still have 172 minutes which I lose if I don’t purchase another card. Despite pressure from all quarters to get an iPhone, I picked up another prepaid card. 60 minutes/90 days. I just punched in the PIN number and I’m good till mid-December.

I gotta tell you… I love the Tracfone. It’s like a Bic pin or a Swatch or drug store reading glasses. Does one thing well. Demands no maintenance. Disposable. And I don’t have one of those little holsters on my belt. The Tracfone goes in the glove box or the laptop bag.

It has an ugly little LCD display and a charge can last me a couple of weeks (I only turn it on when I want to make or receive a call.)

What I really want is a Flip video camera that can stream live to Qik. Small, inexpensive, does one thing well.

Sports journo sees future on the web

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Sinkingship250Big time sports journalist Jay Mariotti has resigned from the Chicago Sun-Times:

“It’s been a tremendous experience, but I’m going to be honest with you, the profession is dying,” Mariotti said, “I don’t think either paper [Sun-Times or Chicago Tribune] is going to survive. To showcase your work … you need a stellar Web site and if a newspaper doesn’t have that, you can’t be stuck in the 20th century with your old newspaper.”

His bosses have a different take on things and you can read what they have to say at CBS2Chicago.com.

“web think”

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I don’t think I’ve come across the term “web think” before I saw it on a post by Terry Heaton. It describes a way of looking at information and media and, frankly, the world.

“Those who influence my thinking do not come from a media background, but are pioneers in “web think” and the running of web businesses. This puts me in almost constant conflict with the world I’m actually trying to serve and help and fuels the rolling of eyes I often witness in conference rooms or sense over the phone.”

My theory is “web think” is like learning a second language. You’re really “there” when you start thinking (dreaming?) in the new language. You internalize it.

Gnomedex 8.0

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Heading for Seattle tomorrow to attend Gnomedex. It’s a get-together for few hundred bloggers, podcasters and tech enthusiasts. I like Gnomedex because it is one of the smaller such conferences. And my pals Jamie and David will be there so it will be sort of "No Sex and the City." That doesn’t work, there’s only three of us. You get the idea.

Historically, I see or hear about things at Gnomedex that go mainstream a year or so later. But that lag seems to be shortening.

Blogging might be light for the next couple of days.

Web specs

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I stopped buying/reading newspapers a long time ago. But there are times –breakfast, for example– when it is inconvenient or impractical to open the MacBook. My solution has been to print articles I find online and take them with me.

KowonvideoglassesI’d really love to have a pair of reading “glasses” with some flash memory to which I could Blue Tooth these articles, including photos and video. I don’t see why that would be technically difficult and damned handy. This is close but likely to get my ass kicked at the local diner where I have breakfast. I’m thinking more along the lines of Clark Kent glasses.

No, I don’t need wifi access. That would be cool but would add a lot of cost. And, yes, I know there are all kinds of portable readers out there but I don’t want to tote around even a book size device.

What I haven’t tried is saving the text to my iPod. Not a great reading experience on the nano but it would work fine on the Touch. Hmmm. And if wifi was available… I suspect this wheel has already been invented.

Go mobile or go home

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I will, eventually, have to break down and get a smart phone. I don’t really want one but not having one is going to be a liability in my job. Articles, like this one from the American Journalism Review, make this increasingly clear.

“In January, ESPN reported it had more hits for NFL content on its mobile Web site (4.9 million) than it did on its PC site (4.5 million), according to RCR Wireless News. Those numbers suggest the mobile jock market has legs, since sports fans will access their cell phones to get scores and inside information even while they’re watching games on TV. Two mobile TV partnerships – AT&T’s Mobile TV and Verizon’s V Cast, both of which use Qualcomm’s MediaFlo TV-enabling technology for cell phones – have been launched with the sports market in mind. Both mobile TV services bill themselves as providing full coverage of sporting events, along with some regular network programming in English and Spanish. Content partners include CBS Mobile, NBC 2Go, Fox Mobile, Comedy Central, ESPN Mobile TV, Viacom’s MTV and Nickelodeon, among others.”