My 3-year-old Gateway started freezing up so rather than watch it suffer, I called Dell and told them to send me the biggest, badest box they had (listing the specs would be in bad taste). I unpacked but didn’t set-up and boot-up. It’s just sitting there. Untouched by viruses. Loaded with the very latest software. Perfect. Pristine. I almost hate to fire her up. Is there anything on this corporal plane closer to rebirth than a brand new computer?
Tag Archives: Digital Life
Gnomedex 5
Presenters at this year’s conference include: Adam Curry, Dave Winer, Steve Gillmor, Steve Rubel, Robert Scoble, Marc Canter, John Battelle, Dan Gillmor, and others. Okay, this is the kind of stuff that interests me. If sitting in a conference room for three days listening to people talk about blogging and podasting and RSS and shit like that doesn’t sound like any fun to you… you can start to understand why your idea of a vacation doesn’t make me clap my little hands.
Don’t worry, be happy
Thanks to John for pointing us to this iPod thread on a forum at MissouriRadio.net. Interesting look at how real radio folk view what’s happening:
“For Christ’s sake, QUIT WORRYING about all that other crap. Movies didn’t kill us, TV didn’t kill us, satellite won’t kill us, and iPods sure as hell won’t kill us. So why all the damn fuss over this crap? Let’s just do some good radio, and all the hype over “Podcasting” and all that other irrelevant (yes, irrelevant) crap will eventually die down.”
Pope fatigue
A reporter friend (not from Iowa) wrote this satirical piece on the endless coverage of the Pope’s death and funeral:
(Decorah) Many Iowans gathered around their TV sets to watch the funeral of Pope John Paul the Second this morning. John Smith of Decorah says he had never met the Pope, but he felt a closer bond to him after reading about him in the newspaper over the past week. Smith says he will miss the Pontiff’s appearances on network newscasts every Good Friday and Easter Sunday, even though he could not understand the Latin spoken by the Pope, and Peter Jennings usually spoke over the audio anyway. Smith believes the Pope will be missed by many Iowans in his bowling league, who thought John Paul seemed to be a nice man, even though he probably was not a bowler himself. He says the early TV coverage of the Pope’s funeral provided a special moment while he was trying to get ready to work the early shift at a local poultry plant, where he says many of his Hispanic coworkers are Catholic, too.
“Telemarketing Wiz”
This is a true story although I have changed the names to protect the innocent and the clueless.
A couple of months ago, a friend (I’ll call him Ishmael) started a blog called “Telemarketing Wiz” and began posting all kinds of interesting stuff about telemarketing. He started hearing from others in the telemarketing business and people started linking to his blog. He got a little buzz going. Not a raging wildfire, but a little brush fire. Google “telemarketing” and his blog is #3 in the results.
One day recently, Ishmael has a meeting with someone at a publication called “Telemarketing.” (Remember, all of the names have been changed. This has nothing to do with telemarketing) The Telemarketing executive tells Ishmael they are not happy with him using the name “telemarketing” and they’d really like for him to stop. They even offered him a few worthless incentives.
Ishmael was shocked and said he’d think about it but wasn’t inclined to change the name of his blog. There were dozens of companies using the term “telemarketing”… why was the Big Publication concerned about him? Could it be that Big Publication was getting tired of hearing about Telemarketing Wiz?
Legal issues aside, this is a nice example of cluelessness on the part of MSM. I suggested to Ishmael that he change the name of his blog to “TelemarketingSucks.com,” but he’s more of a grown-up than I.
Would it have made more sense for Big Publisher to say, “We’ve noticed what you’re doing and think it’s pretty exciting. We’d like to hire you to blog for our publication.”
I’m sure that Telemarketing is a very good publication. Maybe the best. With lots of talented writers and editors and advertisers and big building with a nice lobby. A great place to read about telemarketing. But not the only place.
If Ishmael was writing a little paper newletter and mailing to a few hundred people, Big Publisher probably wouldn’t care what he called it. But the web is national. It’s global. Anybody can play. It’s no longer about who can come up with a few hundred thousand (million?)dollars to start a magazine. One guy, with a computer, and a head full of good ideas can get in the game. It’s a new day.