Tag Archives: Interview-Steve

Interview conducted by Steve Mays

Teaching Chinese

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One morning I noticed a gentleman sitting on the other side of the coffee shop flipping through a big stack of 3×5 cards. It was obvious he was using them as flash cards so I took a peek and saw what I assumed were Chinese characters (pictographs?) I introduced myself and asked about the cards.

The man’s name is Landis Duffett and he teaches languages at one of the local high schools. Beginning this fall he will teach a couple of sections of Chinese and he’s using the cards to get ready.

A couple of days ago we chatted for a bit about how he got interested in teaching Chinese; how the language differs from others (Spanish, French, Germans, etc); and the growing influence of China in all areas. The video runs just over six minutes.

Jay Parks – Drummer

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Jay Parks drums for the sheer joy of it. Most afternoons he can be found sitting in his truck (waiting to pick up his wife when she gets off work) drumming along with tunes on local radio stations. He was kind enough to let me record a minute or two. I don’t think Under the Boardwalk by the Drifters would have been his first choice but he’s a trooper. As I drove away I could hear him keeping time to Ike and Tina’s Proud Mary.

I recorded this video back in 2012 and would have sworn I posted here but I can’t find it.

Mastodon: Ash Furrow

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Mastodon is a microblogging platform, often compared to Twitter. If you’re not familiar with Mastodon, you can probably skip this interview. Ash Furrow is the administrator of one “instance” of Mastodon. In this 25 minute interview he answers the questions below.

  1. Would you mind telling us a little about yourself? What do you do when you’re not feeding and caring for Mastodon.Technical?
  2. How did you get involved with the Mastodon movement?
  3. When did Mastodon.Technical go live? Do you recall who was Tooter #1?
  4. Are you (now or previously) active on other social media platforms?
  5. While a lot of people are apparently happy with Facebook and Twitter, many others are fleeing and looking for something else. What’s happening?
  6. What are the important differences between Mastodon and the more established social platforms?
  7. There have been no shortage of Twitter “replacements” but few have gotten traction. Is Mastodon different? Why?
  8. The “federation” concept seems pretty simple to me but I keep reading about users who find it confusing. Is this a problem?
  9. Are there instances operated by hate groups? Have you had to ban users from your instance?
  10. What is the biggest misconception about Mastodon?
  11. How much time do you invest each week working on your Mastodon instance?
  12. As it grows, do you feel trapped in any sense?
  13. As the admin for your instance, you are — I assume — all powerful. You’ve published user guidelines, have you had to exercise that power?
  14. What would you like the Mastodon Federation to look like a year from now?

Tom Boman, VP Operations, Learfield Sports

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Tom Boman is Vice President of Broadcast Operations for Learfield Sports. He and the people that work with him are responsible for all of the game broadcasts and coaches shows for many of the top colleges and universities in country. He’ll be overseeing broadcasts for 130 schools this fall.

Based on my 40 years in and around radio, I’d say sports play-by-play announcer might be the most coveted — and hard to get — job in broadcasting. And Tom knows as much about what it takes to land one of those jobs as anybody. If you’ve ever wanted to be a “sportscaster” or know someone who does or if you just like listening to sports on the radio, you might enjoy this interview. It runs 20 minutes.

Interviews

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This is a little housekeeping post. A list of people with whom I have done interviews. A search by name should take you to these. This link will pull them all up.

2024-2014

2010-2009

2008-2003