“Future.tk is a social network with an online messaging service that lets anyone schedule messages up to 50 years in advance. Using the free post-mortem feature, it can also schedule messages to be sent to recipients after a death. To use this feature, the sender must select trusted sources to notify Futuris.tk of their passing, after which your messages can be sent.”
Radio’s Future
The American Youth Study 2010 “surveys the the media and technology habits of America’s 12-24 year-olds, and represents a sequel to a study originally conducted by Edison in 2000.” Among the findings:
- Young people spend twice as much time on the Internet now as they do listening to radio.
- Radio continues to be the medium most often used for music discovery, with 51% of 12-24 year-olds reporting that they “frequently” find out about new music by listening to the radio. Other significant sources include friends (46%), YouTube (31%) and social networking sites (16%).
- 3 times as many young people are listening to Pandora radio as listen to traditional radio broadcasts via the Internet.
- More than four in five 12-24s own a mobile phone in 2010 (up from only 29% in 2000), and these young Americans are using these phones as media convergence devices.
“A radical pessimist’s guide to the next 10 years”
(October 10, 2010) There are no shortage of scary predictions on the net. But Douglas Coupland’s “45 tips for survival” give me a shiver. Here are a few of my least-favorites from his list:
6) The middle class is over. It’s not coming back – Remember travel agents? Remember how they just kind of vanished one day? That’s where all the other jobs that once made us middle-class are going – to that same, magical, class-killing, job-sucking wormhole into which travel-agency jobs vanished, never to return. However, this won’t stop people from self-identifying as middle-class, and as the years pass we’ll be entering a replay of the antebellum South, when people defined themselves by the social status of their ancestors three generations back. Enjoy the new monoclass!
13) Enjoy lettuce while you still can – And anything else that arrives in your life from a truck, for that matter. For vegetables, get used to whatever it is they served in railway hotels in the 1890s. Jams. Preserves. Pickled everything.
17) You may well burn out on the effort of being an individual – You’ve become a notch in the Internet’s belt. Don’t try to delude yourself that you’re a romantic lone individual. To the new order, you’re just a node. There is no escape
20) North America can easily fragment quickly as did the Eastern Bloc in 1989 – Quebec will decide to quietly and quite pleasantly leave Canada. California contemplates splitting into two states, fiscal and non-fiscal. Cuba becomes a Club Med with weapons. The Hate States will form a coalition.
41) The future of politics is the careful and effective implanting into the minds of voters images that can never be removed
43) Getting to work will provide vibrant and fun new challenges – Gravel roads, potholes, outhouses, overcrowded buses, short-term hired bodyguards, highwaymen, kidnapping, overnight camping in fields, snaggle-toothed crazy ladies casting spells on you, frightened villagers, organ thieves, exhibitionists and lots of healthy fresh air.
45) We will accept the obvious truth that we brought this upon ourselves
Useful dog tricks
Scott Adams: Founding Fathers 2.0
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“It was designed hundreds of years ago, and it gradually worsened over time, just like everything else that was designed hundreds of years ago. It’s the ultimate legacy system, bloated and hopelessly in need of replacement. And now, thanks to the brainwashing that all American kids get about the magic and wonder of our political system, and the near Godliness of our Founding Fathers, we’re unable to see the system itself as entirely broken. Instead, we assume the problem is that the people within the system are corrupt or incompetent. Or maybe the problem is the Tea Party, or the crazy Liberals, or anything but the system itself. There’s plenty of blame to spread around, but a good system should be excreting the crazies instead of embracing them. Why can’t we have that system?
And he has a solution:
“Suppose, just as a mental exercise, a new set of geniuses, call them the Founding Fathers Version 2.0, hold a convention and come up with a new form of government that fits the challenges of the modern age. Then, after a lengthy public debate, a constitutional vote is held in which every citizen can decide on keeping the old system or moving to the new one. If the new one wins, a transition plan is drawn up, and the move is made over maybe five years, so there is limited shock to the system.
GOP: We’re back! Did you miss us?
I started reading Rolling Stone back in the late ’60’s. I remember it as a different magazine. Or maybe I was just different (sure bet). I loved the pieces by Hunter S. Thompson. I had never read any reporting like that.
I recently subscribed to Rolling Stone, for one reason: Matt Tiabbi. I’ve been following his stuff or a few years now. I trust him and believe his reporting. I remember how disappointed I was when he called out the Obama administration for bringing in a batch of Wall Street crooks. But I didn’t doubt the accuracy of his reporting (or his outrage).
I’ve been trying to wrap my mind around the Tea Party movement (without subjecting myself to being in their presence). Here’s some excerpts from Mr. Taibbi’s piece in the October Rolling Stone: Continue reading
COMDEX
I found this convention badge on a closet shelf this morning and it brought back memories. First, a little background from Wikipedia:
“COMDEX (an abbreviation of Computer Dealers’ Exhibition) was a computer expo held in Las Vegas, Nevada, each November from 1979 to 2003. It was one of the largest computer trade shows in the world, and by many accounts one of the largest trade shows in any industry sector. The first COMDEX was held in 1979 at the MGM Grand, with 167 exhibitors and 3904 attendees.”
I don’t remember what year I first attended COMDEX. Sometime in the lates 80’s or early 90’s if I had to guess. It was my first exposure to geek culture and I loved it. Not sure how I persuaded Clyde to attend (or how I ended up with his badge) but he’s sort of a geek wannabe like me.
The move from the NAB Radio Show to COMDEX marked the beginning of my shift in interest and career path.
The Social Network
A movie is going to be made about an important part of your life. Your only imput is to choose from the following:
- A great director and screenwriter tell a a really interesting story that has people glued to their seats for 90 minutes, but bends or breaks the the truth whenever necessary to make the story interesting. And millions go to see it.
- A so-so writer and a second-rate director make an exactly-as-it-happened movie that puts the audience to sleep and it hits cable in week 4.
Maybe it’s just the film buff in me but I’d much rather the be subject of a compelling bit of fiction, even if I came off looking like an asshole.
I really enjoyed The Social Network. I never saw an episode of The West Wing so this was my first (?) exposure to the Mr. Sorkin’s snappy diaglogue and it was sharp as a mouse turd.
I read David Kirkpatrick’s The Facebook Effect this summer (not the boook upon which the movies was based) and it showed Mark Zuckerberg in a more flattering light.
As I watched the story unfold, I found myself hoping Zuckerberg did some of the sleazy things alleged in the movie. It would be pretty shitty to have this really well-made film floating around for the rest of my life portraying stuff I didn’t do.
If Zuckerberg did get the idea for FB from the Winklevoss twins, well, they should have had a lawyer. If he screwed over his friend Eduardo… that’s a weight he’ll have to carry. But all those people on Facebook will never know or care.
Will advertising become obsolete?
What does Seth Godin think of advertising? Is it unnecessary? Here is his answer from a blog post at Real Time Advertising Week
“Not unnecessary. Gradually becoming obsolete, though. The cost of the ads goes up, the impact goes down. How can it not? Once people get a TiVo and a Facebook account, the way they allocate their attention changes. And that means the people you most want to reach don’t necessarily want to be reached.”
His answer has been on my mind since I read it. Advertising is “gradually becoming obsolete?” How does someone who works at a company that runs on advertising revenue react to such a statement? A few possibles:
- Seth Godin is a smart guy and he’s been right more than he’s been wrong so we’re fucked
- He’s right but it’s going to take a lot longer than he thinks it will
- He’s partially right. Some advertising is becoming obsolete, but not the advertising that drives our company
- Advertising is changing and we might call it something else but companies will always be willng to pay to to reach their customers with selling messages
- He’s wrong. Advertising is here to stay. Period.
Did I miss any?
Frankly, to even wonder about this feels… heretical. Like questioning the flatness of the earth. I’ve written ads; I’ve voiced and produced ads; I’ve helped sell ads. Always taking it as a matter of faith that they worked. If they didn’t, why are businesses buying all these commercials we air on our (pick your medium)? And that they’d always be around.
Your thoughts?
Muhammad: A Story of the last Prophet
I finished the novel Muhammad yesterday and have been pondering what to say about it. I found the story interesting and well-told. I’ve read a number of other books by Deepak Chopra and like the way he writes.
I think I’ll let smarter, more knowledgable folks review the book. No shortage there. So, what can I say about the novel?
If you were a kid, or have a kid, or you’ve been to a kid’s party, you’ve seen those guys that make balloon animals. Before blowing up those long skinny balloons they twist and shape into giraffes and stuff, they usually stretch the balloon. And as they inflate the balloon, they sometimes bend and turn it.
That’s what much of my reading has been like in the last few years. My thinking gets stetched and expanded, often to the breaking point.
One guy makes a hat, the next a horse. I enjoy them all and try to remember it’s all the same air inside the different colored balloons.
I knew almost nothing about the Prophet Muhammad. Now I know more. And maybe a little about the people who follow his teachings.
I fear many of those who would discuss this with me a) haven’t read the book and b) would be intent on explaining why Islam is wrong. (In their world, there is only one balloon and it’s blue and round.)
For that reason, I’ll limit comments to those who have read the book. So be prepared with a specific page reference.