"THE RUTHLESS PARTY"
Good commentary from The Weekly Standard's Fred Barnes on today's Democratic Party:
ON THE EVE of the election in Iraq, Democratic senator Edward Kennedy called President Bush's Iraq policy "a catastrophic failure." He demanded that American troops immediately begin to withdraw. "We have no choice," he declared, "but to make the best we can of the disaster we have created in Iraq." Kennedy said the retreat of American forces should be completed "as early as possible in 2006," and suggested that, in Iraq, American troops are a bigger problem than terrorists.
Though appalling, Kennedy's statement was not out of character for Democrats these days. "I don't like to impugn anyone's integrity," said Democratic senator Mark Dayton, before impugning the integrity of Condoleezza Rice. "But I really don't like being lied to, repeatedly, flagrantly, intentionally. It is wrong, it is undemocratic, it is un-American, and it is dangerous." After Rice took exception to being called untruthful by Democratic senator Barbara Boxer, Boxer complained on TV: "She turned and attacked me."
This is madness, but there is method in it. The talk among congressional Democrats is about the tactics Newt Gingrich used as House minority whip in 1993 and 1994. As they remember it, Gingrich opposed, blocked, attacked, zinged, or at least criticized everything President Clinton and Democratic leaders proposed. It was a scorched-earth approach, Democrats believe. And it worked, crippling Clinton and resulting in the 1994 election that gave Republicans control--lasting control, it turned out--of the House and Senate. Now Democrats, after losing three straight elections, hope brutal tactics will work for them. (full article)
Junto Boyz
Monday, January 31, 2005
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MORE FROM DAVOS... GATES CALLS CURRENT SEARCH TECHNOLOGY A JOKE
Angelina Jolie Fights Against Poverty
Was that a shot across the bow? I think it was. If I was at Google, I'm not sure if I would laugh at his arrogance or be a bit worred. Microsoft has overtaken previous leaders in other markets in the past. Interesting war developing in the next few years.
Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) Chairman Bill Gates said current Internet search-engine technology is "a joke," and promised better features in two to three years.
But the head of the software giant, in an event on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum here late Friday, acknowledged that Microsoft had stumbled in its own search-engine efforts. He said the company had been "stupid as hell" to let Google Inc. (GOOG) take the lead in the search market.
"Search today, compared to what it will be two to three years from now, it's a joke, in terms of how much it knows about what you subscribe to" and other features, Gates said in an on-stage interview with U.S. journalist Charlie Rose.
When Rose suggested search technology was "embryonic today," Gates responded "Thank goodness." That would seem to indicate that despite Google's dominance of the search market, Gates still believes it's early enough in the game to eventually overtake Google.
HatTip to Loic Le Meur. Angelina Jolie attended the World Economic Forum with an interest to support the fight against poverty in the world.
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Angelina Jolie Fights Against Poverty
Was that a shot across the bow? I think it was. If I was at Google, I'm not sure if I would laugh at his arrogance or be a bit worred. Microsoft has overtaken previous leaders in other markets in the past. Interesting war developing in the next few years.
Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) Chairman Bill Gates said current Internet search-engine technology is "a joke," and promised better features in two to three years.
But the head of the software giant, in an event on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum here late Friday, acknowledged that Microsoft had stumbled in its own search-engine efforts. He said the company had been "stupid as hell" to let Google Inc. (GOOG) take the lead in the search market.
"Search today, compared to what it will be two to three years from now, it's a joke, in terms of how much it knows about what you subscribe to" and other features, Gates said in an on-stage interview with U.S. journalist Charlie Rose.
When Rose suggested search technology was "embryonic today," Gates responded "Thank goodness." That would seem to indicate that despite Google's dominance of the search market, Gates still believes it's early enough in the game to eventually overtake Google.
HatTip to Loic Le Meur. Angelina Jolie attended the World Economic Forum with an interest to support the fight against poverty in the world.
"WHAT IN A NAME?"... SEOUL
HatTip from Mingi. Don't have the original link, so I'll just post the significant parts:
In Asia, quite a lot actually, which is why the city of Seoul is planning to change its name. The alteration won't affect the name of the city in English, French or any other European language. Seoul is changing its name in Chinese only, and therein lies the answer to the question.
In Chinese, Seoul is "Hancheng," but the city government now is asking China to use the term "Shou-er." The change would make it a closer transliteration of the internationally recognized "Seoul," and would avoid confusion with Hanguo, the Chinese name for South Korea, the metropolitan government says.
Except that, no such confusion would ever arise in Chinese, the language in question. In written Chinese, entirely different characters are used for the two Hans, and in spoken Mandarin or Cantonese, the tones are also different. Could the answer lie elsewhere?
The Han in Hancheng is the same Han used for "Chinese people" and the "Han Dynasty." In Chinese, therefore, Hancheng would also loosely mean "Chinese city."
But, this has been the case for hundreds of years. Why do anything about it now?
Well, China recently has made the case that the medieval kingdom of Koguryo belonged to China. Some may think it is silly to worry about a state that existed between 37 BC and 668 A.D., but the statement has put Koreans on notice that Beijing may be readying to lay a claim to a chunk of North Korea when the Pyongyang regime collapses. You see, Koguryo straddled the present-day border between North Korea and Manchuria.
Suddenly, there is now the beginning of an intellectual debate in South Korea about whether China's rise represents a threat.
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HatTip from Mingi. Don't have the original link, so I'll just post the significant parts:
In Asia, quite a lot actually, which is why the city of Seoul is planning to change its name. The alteration won't affect the name of the city in English, French or any other European language. Seoul is changing its name in Chinese only, and therein lies the answer to the question.
In Chinese, Seoul is "Hancheng," but the city government now is asking China to use the term "Shou-er." The change would make it a closer transliteration of the internationally recognized "Seoul," and would avoid confusion with Hanguo, the Chinese name for South Korea, the metropolitan government says.
Except that, no such confusion would ever arise in Chinese, the language in question. In written Chinese, entirely different characters are used for the two Hans, and in spoken Mandarin or Cantonese, the tones are also different. Could the answer lie elsewhere?
The Han in Hancheng is the same Han used for "Chinese people" and the "Han Dynasty." In Chinese, therefore, Hancheng would also loosely mean "Chinese city."
But, this has been the case for hundreds of years. Why do anything about it now?
Well, China recently has made the case that the medieval kingdom of Koguryo belonged to China. Some may think it is silly to worry about a state that existed between 37 BC and 668 A.D., but the statement has put Koreans on notice that Beijing may be readying to lay a claim to a chunk of North Korea when the Pyongyang regime collapses. You see, Koguryo straddled the present-day border between North Korea and Manchuria.
Suddenly, there is now the beginning of an intellectual debate in South Korea about whether China's rise represents a threat.
Sunday, January 30, 2005
AWESOME... IRAQIS START VOTING
Nice starting paragraph from the tools at AP:
Iraqis voted Sunday in their country's first free election in a half-century and insurgents made good on threats of violence, launching three deadly suicide bombings and mortar strikes at half a dozen polling stations across Iraq (news - web sites). At least 14 people were killed, including five policemen. (full article)
MORE FROM Jim Hake, Spirit of America:
Great news! We've just received confirmation that C-SPAN is planning to cover Spirit of America's Iraq election event this Sunday from 2pm to 4pm Eastern (11am to 1pm Pacific). Please watch. Your support has made this possible. Please forward this message far and wide and encourage people to tune in.
Iraq's elections are an historic event. This broadcast will provide a unique, more complete picture of the elections with ground-level news and views from the Iraqi people. You will get much more than the typical focus on violence and terrorism. We'll have reports, photos and video from all corners of Iraq. The broadcast event is described more here.
You can see reports and photos now here. And, during the show on Sunday, we will be publishing the discussion at http://www.friendsofdemocracy.info and asking for your comments. Please visit the site and tell us what you think.
If you'd like to attend and be part of our live studio audience, please RSVP to this message. We only have a limited number of seats (35) available. The event is at the National Geographic studio at 1145 17th St NW - Washington, DC 20036. If you RSVP and receive confirmation from us, please arrive no later than 1.30 or you won't
get into the studio.
All the best,
Jim Hake and the Spirit of America team
staff@spiritofamerica.net
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Nice starting paragraph from the tools at AP:
Iraqis voted Sunday in their country's first free election in a half-century and insurgents made good on threats of violence, launching three deadly suicide bombings and mortar strikes at half a dozen polling stations across Iraq (news - web sites). At least 14 people were killed, including five policemen. (full article)
MORE FROM Jim Hake, Spirit of America:
Great news! We've just received confirmation that C-SPAN is planning to cover Spirit of America's Iraq election event this Sunday from 2pm to 4pm Eastern (11am to 1pm Pacific). Please watch. Your support has made this possible. Please forward this message far and wide and encourage people to tune in.
Iraq's elections are an historic event. This broadcast will provide a unique, more complete picture of the elections with ground-level news and views from the Iraqi people. You will get much more than the typical focus on violence and terrorism. We'll have reports, photos and video from all corners of Iraq. The broadcast event is described more here.
You can see reports and photos now here. And, during the show on Sunday, we will be publishing the discussion at http://www.friendsofdemocracy.info and asking for your comments. Please visit the site and tell us what you think.
If you'd like to attend and be part of our live studio audience, please RSVP to this message. We only have a limited number of seats (35) available. The event is at the National Geographic studio at 1145 17th St NW - Washington, DC 20036. If you RSVP and receive confirmation from us, please arrive no later than 1.30 or you won't
get into the studio.
All the best,
Jim Hake and the Spirit of America team
staff@spiritofamerica.net
"BLOG OVERKILL"
I don't actually know what was said or how accurate his views of the conference was, but I lean towards agreeing with Jack Shafer's perspective here:
Memories of the video guerrillas percolated to my forebrain last Friday while I attended the "Blogging, Journalism, and Credibility" conference at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Many of the speakers, such as New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen and tech wizard/Ur blogger Dave Winer, echoed Shamberg's fervor as they testified to the socially transformative power of blogs. A blogswarm of amateurs, they proclaimed, is breaking the professionals' hold on the press. There's a major power shift going on, Rosen stated, tilting toward users and away from the established media.
In language only slightly less fervent than Shamberg's, conference participants declared blogs the destroyers of mainstream media. (See this page and this page for a real-time transcription of the conference.) Others prescribed blogs as the medicine the newspaper industry should take to reclaim its lost readers: Publishers should support reader blogs and encourage their reporters to blog in addition to writing stories. Podcasts would undermine the radio network empires. "Open source" journalism, in which readers and bloggers help set the news agenda for newspapers, was promoted as a tonic for what ails the press. Reporters were encouraged to regain the lost trust of readers by blogging drafts of their stories, their notes, and even their taped interviews so other bloggers could dissect and analyze them for fairness.
Winer discounted any chance that the clueless media would adapt to the blogofuture, saying publishers were as blind as the mainframe computer manufacturers of early 1980s who refused to believe PCs would replace their big iron.
I hadn't witnessed such public expressions of high self-esteem since the last time I attended a journalism awards ceremony. (full article)
MORE FROM Jay Rosen, "A Jack Shafer Problem," and Anil Dash here.
UPDATE... Comment posted from Jay Rosen:
"What Shafer said happened did not happen. He needed someone to de-bunk, and we were the likely suspects. So he rounded us up.
David Weinberger, who was there: "Jack Shafer's piece in Slate misrepresents what went on at the WebCred conference."
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I don't actually know what was said or how accurate his views of the conference was, but I lean towards agreeing with Jack Shafer's perspective here:
Memories of the video guerrillas percolated to my forebrain last Friday while I attended the "Blogging, Journalism, and Credibility" conference at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Many of the speakers, such as New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen and tech wizard/Ur blogger Dave Winer, echoed Shamberg's fervor as they testified to the socially transformative power of blogs. A blogswarm of amateurs, they proclaimed, is breaking the professionals' hold on the press. There's a major power shift going on, Rosen stated, tilting toward users and away from the established media.
In language only slightly less fervent than Shamberg's, conference participants declared blogs the destroyers of mainstream media. (See this page and this page for a real-time transcription of the conference.) Others prescribed blogs as the medicine the newspaper industry should take to reclaim its lost readers: Publishers should support reader blogs and encourage their reporters to blog in addition to writing stories. Podcasts would undermine the radio network empires. "Open source" journalism, in which readers and bloggers help set the news agenda for newspapers, was promoted as a tonic for what ails the press. Reporters were encouraged to regain the lost trust of readers by blogging drafts of their stories, their notes, and even their taped interviews so other bloggers could dissect and analyze them for fairness.
Winer discounted any chance that the clueless media would adapt to the blogofuture, saying publishers were as blind as the mainframe computer manufacturers of early 1980s who refused to believe PCs would replace their big iron.
I hadn't witnessed such public expressions of high self-esteem since the last time I attended a journalism awards ceremony. (full article)
MORE FROM Jay Rosen, "A Jack Shafer Problem," and Anil Dash here.
UPDATE... Comment posted from Jay Rosen:
"What Shafer said happened did not happen. He needed someone to de-bunk, and we were the likely suspects. So he rounded us up.
David Weinberger, who was there: "Jack Shafer's piece in Slate misrepresents what went on at the WebCred conference."
Saturday, January 29, 2005
JEFF JARVIS AND ERIC ALTERMAN... FIGHT, FIGHT!
"Rabid lberal" Eric Alterman and moderate Jeff Jarvis go at it on MSNBC and the blogosphere. I think Jarvis wins on a TKO. Alterman hit the canvas one too many times:
In the world of one-from-column-A/one-from-column-B TV, I spent a few minutes on MSNBC Tuesday night on the other side of rabid conservatives Pat Buchanan and Michael Medved (on The Passion of the Christ and the Oscars) and the next day I'm back on MSNBC placed on the other side of rabid liberal Eric Alterman (on Iraqi blogs and the election). I mentioned the confrontation here but didn't go into detail mainly because I long ago stopped paying attention to Alterman and didn't think he was worth the effort and moreso because I did not want to again spread the blood libel he engages in regarding Iraqi bloggers: After quoting his favorite blogger on Iraq -- who else but Juan Cole? -- Alterman repeats the irresponsible, unfounded, dangerous speculation that, gee, if Iraqi bloggers are pro-American they must be CIA plants, huh? '
I told Alterman on the air that that was irresponsible and dangerous. I said he had not one shred of evidence or reporting or fact to back up his speculation. I said that he could end up getting these men, whom I've met and whom I know, harmed.
Alterman said, well, gee, the CIA has done weird things before so why couldn't they do this?
That's responsible journalism? Not in any universe I know. That's the worst of tabloid, tin-hat, anti-intellectual, ammoral rumor-mongering. That's Eric, the rumor monger.
What he did was, let me repeat, not journalistic. Any editor worth his salt would have killed that speculation in print (well, except at the NY Times). (full post)
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"Rabid lberal" Eric Alterman and moderate Jeff Jarvis go at it on MSNBC and the blogosphere. I think Jarvis wins on a TKO. Alterman hit the canvas one too many times:
In the world of one-from-column-A/one-from-column-B TV, I spent a few minutes on MSNBC Tuesday night on the other side of rabid conservatives Pat Buchanan and Michael Medved (on The Passion of the Christ and the Oscars) and the next day I'm back on MSNBC placed on the other side of rabid liberal Eric Alterman (on Iraqi blogs and the election). I mentioned the confrontation here but didn't go into detail mainly because I long ago stopped paying attention to Alterman and didn't think he was worth the effort and moreso because I did not want to again spread the blood libel he engages in regarding Iraqi bloggers: After quoting his favorite blogger on Iraq -- who else but Juan Cole? -- Alterman repeats the irresponsible, unfounded, dangerous speculation that, gee, if Iraqi bloggers are pro-American they must be CIA plants, huh? '
I told Alterman on the air that that was irresponsible and dangerous. I said he had not one shred of evidence or reporting or fact to back up his speculation. I said that he could end up getting these men, whom I've met and whom I know, harmed.
Alterman said, well, gee, the CIA has done weird things before so why couldn't they do this?
That's responsible journalism? Not in any universe I know. That's the worst of tabloid, tin-hat, anti-intellectual, ammoral rumor-mongering. That's Eric, the rumor monger.
What he did was, let me repeat, not journalistic. Any editor worth his salt would have killed that speculation in print (well, except at the NY Times). (full post)
SO LONG SAMMY!
Even though I'm a Cubs fan, I never liked Sammy Sosa. It was especially during the days of his home run chase with Mark McGwire back in 1998 that I grew to dislike him. While most of Chicago embraced or fell in love with his seemingly likeable personality, I thought of him as insincere. Each time he said, "No, Mark is 'the man'..." I would roll my eyes. He wanted the home run crown, glory, and attention. He loved it. McGwire's contrasting style and humility highlighted for me Sammy's subtle but overwhelming arrogance and fake humility.
Finally, through years of wondering how many in Chicago and others around the nation bought his lemon, the veil as been lifted and his stay is no longer welcomed. ESPN has details of this trade:
Chicago Cubs outfielder Sammy Sosa will be traded to the Baltimore Orioles for infielder Jerry Hairston and at least two minor-leaguers, pending physicals and approval from commissioner Bud Selig and the players' association. An Orioles source told ESPN's Tim Kurkjian that the only way the trade will not happen is if someone fails a physical. (full article)
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Even though I'm a Cubs fan, I never liked Sammy Sosa. It was especially during the days of his home run chase with Mark McGwire back in 1998 that I grew to dislike him. While most of Chicago embraced or fell in love with his seemingly likeable personality, I thought of him as insincere. Each time he said, "No, Mark is 'the man'..." I would roll my eyes. He wanted the home run crown, glory, and attention. He loved it. McGwire's contrasting style and humility highlighted for me Sammy's subtle but overwhelming arrogance and fake humility.
Finally, through years of wondering how many in Chicago and others around the nation bought his lemon, the veil as been lifted and his stay is no longer welcomed. ESPN has details of this trade:
Chicago Cubs outfielder Sammy Sosa will be traded to the Baltimore Orioles for infielder Jerry Hairston and at least two minor-leaguers, pending physicals and approval from commissioner Bud Selig and the players' association. An Orioles source told ESPN's Tim Kurkjian that the only way the trade will not happen is if someone fails a physical. (full article)
Friday, January 28, 2005
SK TELECOM ENTERS U.S. MARKET THROUGH EARTHLINK
From FierceWireless below. Some more information from eWeek here and Techdirt's comments here:
Earthlink is getting quite a reputation as an ISP that will try to offer just about anything. Beyond being one of the first ISPs to offer pop-up blocking, anti-spam and anti-virus protection, they also were quick to embrace broadband, rather than sticking to dialup roots. Not only that, but they were willing to embrace all kinds of broadband -- including not just DSL and cable, but WiFi and even (misguided in the opinion of many) broadband over powerlines, while also saying they would be enthusiastic supporters of WiMax when (if) it exists. They've also moved into other areas, being a very early partner of Vonage while also offering a SIP-based softphone VoIP offering. With all that background, it should come as absolutely no surprise that they would be interested in offering their very own mobile phone service through a joint venture with SK Telecom, using Verizon Wireless's network. This is interesting for a variety of reasons. First, it's a big win for Verizon Wireless as the operator of an MVNO network. Up until this point, it seemed like Sprint was winning every major deal to be the network behind the brand in other big MVNO deals (Virgin, the "new" AT&T Wireless, Disney/ESPN) -- so now Verizon Wireless can make their own claim on the space. It's also very interesting to see SKT make their move. The company has been interested in expanding in the US for a while, and this is a great opportunity. SKT, of course, is perhaps the most innovative of all the mobile carriers in the world...
EarthLink, SK Telecom to form $440M wireless JV
FierceWireless
Earthlink today announced plans to create a $440 million wireless MVNO joint venture with South Korean carrier SK Telecom. The new venture, dubbed SK-EarthLink, will offer cell phone service using network capacity from Sprint and Verizon Wireless. EarthLink will serve as the main consumer brand for the venture, while SK Telecom will act as a technical advisor. The joint venture plans to launch services in the third quarter this year and aims to attract 3 million subscribers, or about 2 percent of the US wireless market, by 2009 with $2 billion in annual revenue by that time. SK Telecom is South Korea's leading wireless carrier. EarthLink is the No. 4 ISP in the US with over 5 million subscribers. The two companies said they expect to close their MVNO deal in the next few months.
This is EarthLink's second foray into the MVNO sector. Last year the company launched an MVNO to offer wireless voice and email service on the BlackBerry handheld. On the other side of the deal, SK Telecom has entertained plans to enter the US market for some time. This MVNO venture with EarthLink allows the carrier expand its market presence beyond Asia.
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From FierceWireless below. Some more information from eWeek here and Techdirt's comments here:
Earthlink is getting quite a reputation as an ISP that will try to offer just about anything. Beyond being one of the first ISPs to offer pop-up blocking, anti-spam and anti-virus protection, they also were quick to embrace broadband, rather than sticking to dialup roots. Not only that, but they were willing to embrace all kinds of broadband -- including not just DSL and cable, but WiFi and even (misguided in the opinion of many) broadband over powerlines, while also saying they would be enthusiastic supporters of WiMax when (if) it exists. They've also moved into other areas, being a very early partner of Vonage while also offering a SIP-based softphone VoIP offering. With all that background, it should come as absolutely no surprise that they would be interested in offering their very own mobile phone service through a joint venture with SK Telecom, using Verizon Wireless's network. This is interesting for a variety of reasons. First, it's a big win for Verizon Wireless as the operator of an MVNO network. Up until this point, it seemed like Sprint was winning every major deal to be the network behind the brand in other big MVNO deals (Virgin, the "new" AT&T Wireless, Disney/ESPN) -- so now Verizon Wireless can make their own claim on the space. It's also very interesting to see SKT make their move. The company has been interested in expanding in the US for a while, and this is a great opportunity. SKT, of course, is perhaps the most innovative of all the mobile carriers in the world...
EarthLink, SK Telecom to form $440M wireless JV
FierceWireless
Earthlink today announced plans to create a $440 million wireless MVNO joint venture with South Korean carrier SK Telecom. The new venture, dubbed SK-EarthLink, will offer cell phone service using network capacity from Sprint and Verizon Wireless. EarthLink will serve as the main consumer brand for the venture, while SK Telecom will act as a technical advisor. The joint venture plans to launch services in the third quarter this year and aims to attract 3 million subscribers, or about 2 percent of the US wireless market, by 2009 with $2 billion in annual revenue by that time. SK Telecom is South Korea's leading wireless carrier. EarthLink is the No. 4 ISP in the US with over 5 million subscribers. The two companies said they expect to close their MVNO deal in the next few months.
This is EarthLink's second foray into the MVNO sector. Last year the company launched an MVNO to offer wireless voice and email service on the BlackBerry handheld. On the other side of the deal, SK Telecom has entertained plans to enter the US market for some time. This MVNO venture with EarthLink allows the carrier expand its market presence beyond Asia.
NEOCONDOS?... KIM YOUNG-HIE EMBARASSES JOONG AHN
HatTip to James Taranto's Best of the Web Today. JoongAng Ilbo's columnist made me blush as a Korean American. What was he thinking in writing this:
Meanwhile, in the JoongAng Daily, an English-language South Korean paper, senior columnist Kim Young-hie explains the goal of the neoconspiracy: "One of the hidden purposes with which the neo-conservatives in Washington started a war against Iraq was to democratize the Middle East and build a condominium that the United States and Israel could jointly manage."
A neocondo? Taking over the whole government seems like an awfully complicated way of getting into the real estate business.
I think it was edited out after Taranto posted his comments up.
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HatTip to James Taranto's Best of the Web Today. JoongAng Ilbo's columnist made me blush as a Korean American. What was he thinking in writing this:
Meanwhile, in the JoongAng Daily, an English-language South Korean paper, senior columnist Kim Young-hie explains the goal of the neoconspiracy: "One of the hidden purposes with which the neo-conservatives in Washington started a war against Iraq was to democratize the Middle East and build a condominium that the United States and Israel could jointly manage."
A neocondo? Taking over the whole government seems like an awfully complicated way of getting into the real estate business.
I think it was edited out after Taranto posted his comments up.
Thursday, January 27, 2005
FOUNDERS OF EPINIONS SUE BENCHMARK AND AUGUST CAPITAL
HatTip to Techdirt. Story hits the NYTimes which isn't good news for William Gurley (Benchmark Capital), John Johnston (August Capital), and Nirav Tolia (Epinions co-founder) who were names as defendents in a lawsuit:
"It's rare for the founders of a company to sue their financial backers," said Paul T. Friedman, a partner at Morrison & Foerster in San Francisco. "Venture is a small world in which relationships are very important. Most people find a way to avoid disputes so they can live another day."
The basis for the suit is the proposal made in February 2003 to merge Epinions and DealTime, a comparison-pricing site. By then four of the company's five founders - Naval Ravikant, Ramanathan Guha, Mike Speiser and Dion Lim, who did not join the suit - had left the company but still owned a total of more than six million shares of Epinions common stock.
The four owned enough shares to scuttle the merger but gave their blessing, even though it meant valuing those shares at zero. At the time, investors holding preferred shares, including Benchmark and August Capital, had claim on the $45 million they had invested collectively.
The four founders, the suit says, were led to believe that the company was worth $23 million to $38 million, making common stock worthless.
The suit contends that Mr. Gurley, Mr. Johnston and Mr. Tolia failed to share "material facts concerning Epinions' financial affairs," including news of a deal with Google that the company knew would increase its 2003 profits by 1,400 percent.
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HatTip to Techdirt. Story hits the NYTimes which isn't good news for William Gurley (Benchmark Capital), John Johnston (August Capital), and Nirav Tolia (Epinions co-founder) who were names as defendents in a lawsuit:
"It's rare for the founders of a company to sue their financial backers," said Paul T. Friedman, a partner at Morrison & Foerster in San Francisco. "Venture is a small world in which relationships are very important. Most people find a way to avoid disputes so they can live another day."
The basis for the suit is the proposal made in February 2003 to merge Epinions and DealTime, a comparison-pricing site. By then four of the company's five founders - Naval Ravikant, Ramanathan Guha, Mike Speiser and Dion Lim, who did not join the suit - had left the company but still owned a total of more than six million shares of Epinions common stock.
The four owned enough shares to scuttle the merger but gave their blessing, even though it meant valuing those shares at zero. At the time, investors holding preferred shares, including Benchmark and August Capital, had claim on the $45 million they had invested collectively.
The four founders, the suit says, were led to believe that the company was worth $23 million to $38 million, making common stock worthless.
The suit contends that Mr. Gurley, Mr. Johnston and Mr. Tolia failed to share "material facts concerning Epinions' financial affairs," including news of a deal with Google that the company knew would increase its 2003 profits by 1,400 percent.
WHAT IFS... ALTERNATIVE HISTORY OF TECH
Amusing and interesting article from News.com's Michael Kanellos. Samples:
What if Moore's Law had ended as expected?
What if Apple Computer had licensed the Mac OS?
What if IBM had not allowed Microsoft to license?
What if Larry Ellison drove an RV?
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Amusing and interesting article from News.com's Michael Kanellos. Samples:
What if Moore's Law had ended as expected?
What if Apple Computer had licensed the Mac OS?
What if IBM had not allowed Microsoft to license?
What if Larry Ellison drove an RV?
ANOTHER REASON WHY I LIKE THIS GUY
"Bush Among the Morans" by Wlady Pleszczynski:
Important matters of state aside, yesterday's presidential press conference was noteworthy for the easy contempt Mr. Bush displayed for the Washington press corps. I'd hate to be a mule on his ranch! Bush no longer feels the need even to pretend to be courting any of these critters. If looks could maim, there'd not be a single Washington pressy walking steadily these days.
HatTip to Lucianne.com where a few choice comments were posted:
I loved the press conference. Especially the answer Bush gave where he was having to explain the amazing significance of elections being held in Afghanistan and in Iraq in a few days. Bush told them that if he had stood there 3 years ago and told them that we would be having free elections in Iraq, they (the press) would have been sitting there looking at him "kinda like now with those blank stares". I busted out laughing and even now, when I think about it, it makes me smile. All I could do was picture those vultures that call themselves journalists and such, just sittin there...mouths hanging open...stareing as if the President were not speaking their language. In fact, I guess if you are speaking the truth and it happens to be about freedom, it might as well be Japanese to them.
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"Bush Among the Morans" by Wlady Pleszczynski:
Important matters of state aside, yesterday's presidential press conference was noteworthy for the easy contempt Mr. Bush displayed for the Washington press corps. I'd hate to be a mule on his ranch! Bush no longer feels the need even to pretend to be courting any of these critters. If looks could maim, there'd not be a single Washington pressy walking steadily these days.
HatTip to Lucianne.com where a few choice comments were posted:
I loved the press conference. Especially the answer Bush gave where he was having to explain the amazing significance of elections being held in Afghanistan and in Iraq in a few days. Bush told them that if he had stood there 3 years ago and told them that we would be having free elections in Iraq, they (the press) would have been sitting there looking at him "kinda like now with those blank stares". I busted out laughing and even now, when I think about it, it makes me smile. All I could do was picture those vultures that call themselves journalists and such, just sittin there...mouths hanging open...stareing as if the President were not speaking their language. In fact, I guess if you are speaking the truth and it happens to be about freedom, it might as well be Japanese to them.
PEGGY NOONAN'S CRITICISMS OF INAUGURAL ADDRESS
I like Noonan. Might not agree with her viewpoints, but she's worth listening to:
I have been called old, jaded, a sourpuss. Far worse, I have been called French. A response is in order.
You know the dispute. Last week I slammed the president's inaugural address. I was not alone, but I came down hard, early and in one of the most highly read editorial pages in America. Bill Buckley and David Frum also had critical reactions. Bill Safire on the other hand called it one of the best second inaugurals ever, and commentators from right and left (Bill Kristol, E.J. Dionne) found much to praise and ponder. (To my mind the best response to the inaugural was the grave, passionate essay of Mark Helprin.) So herewith some questions and answers:
A week later, do I stand by my views?
Yes. If I wrote it today I wouldn't be softer, but harder. (full article)
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I like Noonan. Might not agree with her viewpoints, but she's worth listening to:
I have been called old, jaded, a sourpuss. Far worse, I have been called French. A response is in order.
You know the dispute. Last week I slammed the president's inaugural address. I was not alone, but I came down hard, early and in one of the most highly read editorial pages in America. Bill Buckley and David Frum also had critical reactions. Bill Safire on the other hand called it one of the best second inaugurals ever, and commentators from right and left (Bill Kristol, E.J. Dionne) found much to praise and ponder. (To my mind the best response to the inaugural was the grave, passionate essay of Mark Helprin.) So herewith some questions and answers:
A week later, do I stand by my views?
Yes. If I wrote it today I wouldn't be softer, but harder. (full article)
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
RACIST MISS JONES AND HOT 97... MOCKING TSUNAMI DEATHS
HatTip to Dave J. for sending me this. I actually heard about this the day before from some college students. Read the lyrics. What complete morons would mock the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people?!? Asians, whites, blacks,... AND she also sings "I'm gonna start shooting Asians." They just suspended her show indefinitely, but if they actually hire her back the radio station is spitting in the face of all those who died by handling the situation so lightly. The right thing to do is to keep her off the airwaves permanently.
Here's the text I got from Dave (don't know the original source. probably from one of the website links listed below):
Friends,
In what has to be one of the most idiotic displays of the first amendment, New York City radio station Hot 97 Miss Jones in the morning program has been airing the attached "parody" of We are the World, making fun of tsunami victims, apparently taking delight in the over 200,000 lives that have been lost in one of the worst tragedies in history. As if the deaths weren't enough, Hot 97 has also added an element of racism, just in case the situation wasn't desctructive enough. Sample lyrics:
"There was a time, when the sun was shining bright
So I went down to the beach to catch me a tan.
Then the next thing I knew, a wave 20 feet high
Came and washed your whole country away.
And all at once, you can hear the screaming chinks.
And no one was saved from the wave.
There were Africans drowning, little Chinamen swept away.
You can hear God laughing, 'Swim you bitches swim.'
[Chorus]
"So now you're screwed. It's the tsunami,
You better run and kiss your ass away. Go find your mommy.
I just saw her float by, a tree went through her head.
And now your children will be sold. Child slavery."
The links below offer good continuing coverage of this idiocy, including links to Hot 97's half-assed apology and another mp3 that has an asian cast member getting torn down when she has the gall to object to the content. You would think that the sheer devastation of the tsunami would unite us as to understand the fragility of humanity and that tragedy knows no skin color. Yet Hot 97 has decided to use it to further divide us, almost implying that the deaths were acceptable because it happened in third-world southeast asia. Absolutely sick. I encourage you to forward this to anyone who may listen to Hot 97 in New York and encourage them to boycott the Miss Jones show, until a more substantive apology is issued and broadcast on air. Also blitzing Hot 97's email account and their sponsors should also demonstrate the outrage that should be apparent.
SO here are links you can check out:
"Racist Hot 97 Skit Mocking Tsunami Victims" and an update here from hiphopmusic.com
Asian Media Watch's page on this here with updates on "Miss Jones in the Morning Show" indefinite suspension, which occurred today.
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HatTip to Dave J. for sending me this. I actually heard about this the day before from some college students. Read the lyrics. What complete morons would mock the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people?!? Asians, whites, blacks,... AND she also sings "I'm gonna start shooting Asians." They just suspended her show indefinitely, but if they actually hire her back the radio station is spitting in the face of all those who died by handling the situation so lightly. The right thing to do is to keep her off the airwaves permanently.
Here's the text I got from Dave (don't know the original source. probably from one of the website links listed below):
Friends,
In what has to be one of the most idiotic displays of the first amendment, New York City radio station Hot 97 Miss Jones in the morning program has been airing the attached "parody" of We are the World, making fun of tsunami victims, apparently taking delight in the over 200,000 lives that have been lost in one of the worst tragedies in history. As if the deaths weren't enough, Hot 97 has also added an element of racism, just in case the situation wasn't desctructive enough. Sample lyrics:
"There was a time, when the sun was shining bright
So I went down to the beach to catch me a tan.
Then the next thing I knew, a wave 20 feet high
Came and washed your whole country away.
And all at once, you can hear the screaming chinks.
And no one was saved from the wave.
There were Africans drowning, little Chinamen swept away.
You can hear God laughing, 'Swim you bitches swim.'
[Chorus]
"So now you're screwed. It's the tsunami,
You better run and kiss your ass away. Go find your mommy.
I just saw her float by, a tree went through her head.
And now your children will be sold. Child slavery."
The links below offer good continuing coverage of this idiocy, including links to Hot 97's half-assed apology and another mp3 that has an asian cast member getting torn down when she has the gall to object to the content. You would think that the sheer devastation of the tsunami would unite us as to understand the fragility of humanity and that tragedy knows no skin color. Yet Hot 97 has decided to use it to further divide us, almost implying that the deaths were acceptable because it happened in third-world southeast asia. Absolutely sick. I encourage you to forward this to anyone who may listen to Hot 97 in New York and encourage them to boycott the Miss Jones show, until a more substantive apology is issued and broadcast on air. Also blitzing Hot 97's email account and their sponsors should also demonstrate the outrage that should be apparent.
SO here are links you can check out:
"Racist Hot 97 Skit Mocking Tsunami Victims" and an update here from hiphopmusic.com
Asian Media Watch's page on this here with updates on "Miss Jones in the Morning Show" indefinite suspension, which occurred today.
Tuesday, January 25, 2005
ALWAYSON VIDEO BLOGGING WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM IN DAVOS LIVE
The World Economic Forum is going on right now. There is no direct link, so you have to go to the AlwaysOn site and click on the top post:
Over 2,250 leaders from more than 26 countries are arriving in Davos for the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting. Business leaders, along with over 20 heads of state or government, 70 cabinet ministers, 50 NGO heads, cultural, religious and union leaders will focus on the challenges facing the world. Their goal is to "take responsibility for tough choices", the theme of the Meeting.
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The World Economic Forum is going on right now. There is no direct link, so you have to go to the AlwaysOn site and click on the top post:
Over 2,250 leaders from more than 26 countries are arriving in Davos for the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting. Business leaders, along with over 20 heads of state or government, 70 cabinet ministers, 50 NGO heads, cultural, religious and union leaders will focus on the challenges facing the world. Their goal is to "take responsibility for tough choices", the theme of the Meeting.
THE GOOGLE ECONOMY => THE BLOGOSPHERE
Voices from The Blog Business Summit 2005
(Initially posted at AlwaysOn)
I'm sitting here at the first Blog Business Summit in Seattle. The conference is "okay" with some interesting information scattered throughout. So far about half the sessions are too basic for my taste. General overviews of building blogs, traffic, etc. Here are some good reviews and live blogs of the sessions at these sites:
Jeff Barr's Blog
Down The Avenue (direct example here)
Tris Hussey's Blog
One idea emphasized here is that the "heart and soul" of making money through blogging is Google's AdSense program. Most of us see Google's AdWords on our gmail accounts, blogs, and corporate sites. We know the click through rates are significantly higher than typical graphic ads (i.e. less than 1% vs. 5%... i think that's right), which is part of Google's success. But did you know AdSense is the engine of growth within the budding blogosphere? I hope it won't be the only engine, but for now it's helping to fuel the growth of the next stage of the blogosphere.
An underground economy fueled the growth of online gaming worldwide. Selling weapons and characters from NCsoft's Lineage in Asia or Blizzard's Diablo II on auction sites or third-party sites managing only these types of transactions helped to create this addiction for teens and twentysomethings. Along more similar lines with Google and the blogosphere, eBay created a mini-economy for the long tail. Millions of people made money through selling random stuff and symbiotic companies like AuctionDrop were created. Blogs with a monetary focus are the AuctionDrops of the Google economy. If you haven't tried to set up an AdSense account or even purchase AdWords, try it out if you have time. It's pretty cool and even amazing when you think about how timely and complementary these programs are with the rapid growth of blogs and blogging.
Matt Haughey, Creative Director at Creative Commons and blogger at PVRblog, wrote a well-known post within the blogosphere at his personal blog called "Blogging for Dollars" where he states:
"I launched PVRblog publicly on July 16th with half a dozen posts, then announced it on my personal blog. In a matter of hours, dozens of other sites linked to it, the site ascended Daypop and Blogdex's lists, and all told the debut was a big success.
Late that night I remembered the ads and logged into my Adsense account to see how the day went. I clicked over to reports to see the activity. From approximately 3,000 visits (not too shabby at all), enough people clicked through that I made $40 in the first 24 hours. The first thought that came to mind was this:
Great googly-moogly, holy crap. Crap, crap, crap. What the hell just happened? What did I do? What does this mean for weblogs? Would the world be covered in textads when I tell people about this? Shit!
To say the least, I was a bit freaked out. I was measuring everything in increments of $20, hoping to make my monthly hosting and in one day I had enough to pay for two months of hosting. The next day brought another month of paid hosting, and this continued until a few days later I was a Yahoo pick for new site of the day and it resulted in twice the traffic I'd seen so far and over $100 in click-thrus came in during a 24 hour period.
.....
Google doesn't get much credit for what it has done to revitalize online advertising. Google's textads aren't just a great technology because they are less of a hassle for readers (compared to micropayments or banner/popup/popunder ads), they are also better than any other textads I've ever seen...." (full post)
Anyway, I should get back to the conference session. More later.
Also my column will be up next week due to the World Economic Forum video blogging this week, which is very cool. Check it out!
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Voices from The Blog Business Summit 2005
(Initially posted at AlwaysOn)
I'm sitting here at the first Blog Business Summit in Seattle. The conference is "okay" with some interesting information scattered throughout. So far about half the sessions are too basic for my taste. General overviews of building blogs, traffic, etc. Here are some good reviews and live blogs of the sessions at these sites:
Jeff Barr's Blog
Down The Avenue (direct example here)
Tris Hussey's Blog
One idea emphasized here is that the "heart and soul" of making money through blogging is Google's AdSense program. Most of us see Google's AdWords on our gmail accounts, blogs, and corporate sites. We know the click through rates are significantly higher than typical graphic ads (i.e. less than 1% vs. 5%... i think that's right), which is part of Google's success. But did you know AdSense is the engine of growth within the budding blogosphere? I hope it won't be the only engine, but for now it's helping to fuel the growth of the next stage of the blogosphere.
An underground economy fueled the growth of online gaming worldwide. Selling weapons and characters from NCsoft's Lineage in Asia or Blizzard's Diablo II on auction sites or third-party sites managing only these types of transactions helped to create this addiction for teens and twentysomethings. Along more similar lines with Google and the blogosphere, eBay created a mini-economy for the long tail. Millions of people made money through selling random stuff and symbiotic companies like AuctionDrop were created. Blogs with a monetary focus are the AuctionDrops of the Google economy. If you haven't tried to set up an AdSense account or even purchase AdWords, try it out if you have time. It's pretty cool and even amazing when you think about how timely and complementary these programs are with the rapid growth of blogs and blogging.
Matt Haughey, Creative Director at Creative Commons and blogger at PVRblog, wrote a well-known post within the blogosphere at his personal blog called "Blogging for Dollars" where he states:
"I launched PVRblog publicly on July 16th with half a dozen posts, then announced it on my personal blog. In a matter of hours, dozens of other sites linked to it, the site ascended Daypop and Blogdex's lists, and all told the debut was a big success.
Late that night I remembered the ads and logged into my Adsense account to see how the day went. I clicked over to reports to see the activity. From approximately 3,000 visits (not too shabby at all), enough people clicked through that I made $40 in the first 24 hours. The first thought that came to mind was this:
Great googly-moogly, holy crap. Crap, crap, crap. What the hell just happened? What did I do? What does this mean for weblogs? Would the world be covered in textads when I tell people about this? Shit!
To say the least, I was a bit freaked out. I was measuring everything in increments of $20, hoping to make my monthly hosting and in one day I had enough to pay for two months of hosting. The next day brought another month of paid hosting, and this continued until a few days later I was a Yahoo pick for new site of the day and it resulted in twice the traffic I'd seen so far and over $100 in click-thrus came in during a 24 hour period.
.....
Google doesn't get much credit for what it has done to revitalize online advertising. Google's textads aren't just a great technology because they are less of a hassle for readers (compared to micropayments or banner/popup/popunder ads), they are also better than any other textads I've ever seen...." (full post)
Anyway, I should get back to the conference session. More later.
Also my column will be up next week due to the World Economic Forum video blogging this week, which is very cool. Check it out!
Monday, January 24, 2005
"HAS IRAQ WEAKENED US?"
HatTip to Lucianne.com. Good article by Victor Davis Hanson, who is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a columnist at National Review Online. Excerpt:
Finally, a number of retired generals and admirals—Wesley Clark, William J. Crowe, Barry McCaffrey, Tony McPeak, William Odom, Stansfield Turner, and Anthony Zinni—have worried publicly over the demands placed on the United States in Iraq and the specter of another open-ended, Vietnam-like commitment sapping American assets, troop morale, and public support for the military. Moved by the hard facts of finite resources and the soft reality of censure at home and abroad, these former-officers-turned-political-commentators emphasize our increasing vulnerabilities and voice a reluctance to exercise any further American power abroad except under the aegis of the United Nations and with de-facto NATO blessing.
Political prognoses in wartime are notoriously mercurial, hinging on the weekly eddies of the battlefield. But these are sometimes poor indicators of larger strategic currents. If one thing can be said with confidence about Iraq, it is that the story is not over, since so far the daily bombings have neither prompted American withdrawal nor derailed scheduled elections and reforms. In World War II, the bloodiest moment of the Pacific theater was at Okinawa, finally declared secure a mere nine weeks before the Japanese surrender, while in Europe the Battle of the Bulge, a slog that cost more American lives than the drive to the Rhine, was not finished until only about 100 days before Germany collapsed. What can be seen in hindsight, and only in hindsight, is that while Americans were being butchered in Belgium and on Sugar Loaf Hill, larger forces were insidiously working to doom Germany and Japan in short order. The last gasps of resistance are sometimes the bloodiest and most unexpected.
Just so, Afghanistan a year ago was supposedly a hopeless case, torn apart by warlords and Taliban resurgence, and unfit for elections; today the country is mostly on the back pages, as if democracy were de rigueur for a nation recently dismissed as a relic of the Dark Ages. Similarly, with all the news of bombings and beheadings coming from Iraq, the larger picture, not so easily deciphered, shows signs of real progress in most of the country. The long overdue retaking of Falluja and ancillary military operations have sent their own signal: that a reelected George Bush intends to ensure the installation and the survival of a legitimately elected Iraqi government. The specter of that constitutional authority sending troops to quash mercenaries, Baathists, and Wahhabi jihadists is precisely what frightens al Qaeda and other avatars of Islamic fascism, who have rightly grasped that their failure in the Sunni triangle will constitute a bitter defeat for global Islamic fundamentalism itself. (full article)
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HatTip to Lucianne.com. Good article by Victor Davis Hanson, who is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a columnist at National Review Online. Excerpt:
Finally, a number of retired generals and admirals—Wesley Clark, William J. Crowe, Barry McCaffrey, Tony McPeak, William Odom, Stansfield Turner, and Anthony Zinni—have worried publicly over the demands placed on the United States in Iraq and the specter of another open-ended, Vietnam-like commitment sapping American assets, troop morale, and public support for the military. Moved by the hard facts of finite resources and the soft reality of censure at home and abroad, these former-officers-turned-political-commentators emphasize our increasing vulnerabilities and voice a reluctance to exercise any further American power abroad except under the aegis of the United Nations and with de-facto NATO blessing.
Political prognoses in wartime are notoriously mercurial, hinging on the weekly eddies of the battlefield. But these are sometimes poor indicators of larger strategic currents. If one thing can be said with confidence about Iraq, it is that the story is not over, since so far the daily bombings have neither prompted American withdrawal nor derailed scheduled elections and reforms. In World War II, the bloodiest moment of the Pacific theater was at Okinawa, finally declared secure a mere nine weeks before the Japanese surrender, while in Europe the Battle of the Bulge, a slog that cost more American lives than the drive to the Rhine, was not finished until only about 100 days before Germany collapsed. What can be seen in hindsight, and only in hindsight, is that while Americans were being butchered in Belgium and on Sugar Loaf Hill, larger forces were insidiously working to doom Germany and Japan in short order. The last gasps of resistance are sometimes the bloodiest and most unexpected.
Just so, Afghanistan a year ago was supposedly a hopeless case, torn apart by warlords and Taliban resurgence, and unfit for elections; today the country is mostly on the back pages, as if democracy were de rigueur for a nation recently dismissed as a relic of the Dark Ages. Similarly, with all the news of bombings and beheadings coming from Iraq, the larger picture, not so easily deciphered, shows signs of real progress in most of the country. The long overdue retaking of Falluja and ancillary military operations have sent their own signal: that a reelected George Bush intends to ensure the installation and the survival of a legitimately elected Iraqi government. The specter of that constitutional authority sending troops to quash mercenaries, Baathists, and Wahhabi jihadists is precisely what frightens al Qaeda and other avatars of Islamic fascism, who have rightly grasped that their failure in the Sunni triangle will constitute a bitter defeat for global Islamic fundamentalism itself. (full article)
"DEL.ICIO.US: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING"
David Lewis at AlwaysOn says Furl is better than del.icio.us for online bookmarking. Both are in the arena of social bookmarking. I only have a del.cio.us account which I haven't really done much with it, but I will try out Furl on David's advice.
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David Lewis at AlwaysOn says Furl is better than del.icio.us for online bookmarking. Both are in the arena of social bookmarking. I only have a del.cio.us account which I haven't really done much with it, but I will try out Furl on David's advice.
CINGULAR SUCKS!
Cingular lost $497 million in Q42004. This is primarily due to its acquistion of AT&T Wireless and they have hit higher numbers of new customers than what analysts expected. Both companies suffer from high churn rates, and I hope this continues.
I can't effectively state how much I hate Cingular. I've been a customer since 1998 in the form of Cellular One. After Cingular's acquisition of Cellular One, it was all downhill. Even though I was in Korea for four years up until last May, when I visited the U.S. for a week to month long trips I began to hate their service. Much of my frustration is with their customer service. They have no form of customer service contact or feedback on their website. When I finally get in touch with them to complain, they tell me to fax a general letter to one of their customer service managers without a guarantee that any action would occur. Cingular sucks!
So last year with my fiance, we chose Verizon Wireless which I'm very happy with. Verizon did the little things right in terms of service and accessibility, such as allowing for email complaints on their website. Go Verizon!
Cingular suffers $497M loss in 4Q
Motorola's Razr V3 model attracts customers
January 24, 2005
Cingular Wireless Monday posted a fourth-quarter loss as expenses rose due to its purchase of AT&T Wireless, but it added roughly twice the number of subscribers Wall Street expected.
Cingular, the biggest U.S. mobile provider, posted a loss of $497 million, compared with a profit of $16 million a year earlier. The company closed its acquisition of AT&T Wireless in late October.
It recorded $245 million of merger-related expenses and $1.39 billion worth of depreciation costs also related to the deal, the company said.
Cingular, the mobile venture of SBC Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. said it added 1.8 million customers. This compared with Wall Street targets of about 900,000, according to seven analysts contacted by Reuters.
"We're off to a really good start with our net customer adds," said Chief Financial Officer Peter Ritcher. He said the growth was due to heavy post-merger marketing and the popularity of discount family plans and new phones including the hot-selling Razr V3 model from Motorola Inc.
Cingular surpassed Verizon Wireless as the biggest U.S. mobile operator by buying AT&T Wireless, but analysts have been skeptical about the combination of two companies with high customer turnover rates. (full article)
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Cingular lost $497 million in Q42004. This is primarily due to its acquistion of AT&T Wireless and they have hit higher numbers of new customers than what analysts expected. Both companies suffer from high churn rates, and I hope this continues.
I can't effectively state how much I hate Cingular. I've been a customer since 1998 in the form of Cellular One. After Cingular's acquisition of Cellular One, it was all downhill. Even though I was in Korea for four years up until last May, when I visited the U.S. for a week to month long trips I began to hate their service. Much of my frustration is with their customer service. They have no form of customer service contact or feedback on their website. When I finally get in touch with them to complain, they tell me to fax a general letter to one of their customer service managers without a guarantee that any action would occur. Cingular sucks!
So last year with my fiance, we chose Verizon Wireless which I'm very happy with. Verizon did the little things right in terms of service and accessibility, such as allowing for email complaints on their website. Go Verizon!
Cingular suffers $497M loss in 4Q
Motorola's Razr V3 model attracts customers
January 24, 2005
Cingular Wireless Monday posted a fourth-quarter loss as expenses rose due to its purchase of AT&T Wireless, but it added roughly twice the number of subscribers Wall Street expected.
Cingular, the biggest U.S. mobile provider, posted a loss of $497 million, compared with a profit of $16 million a year earlier. The company closed its acquisition of AT&T Wireless in late October.
It recorded $245 million of merger-related expenses and $1.39 billion worth of depreciation costs also related to the deal, the company said.
Cingular, the mobile venture of SBC Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. said it added 1.8 million customers. This compared with Wall Street targets of about 900,000, according to seven analysts contacted by Reuters.
"We're off to a really good start with our net customer adds," said Chief Financial Officer Peter Ritcher. He said the growth was due to heavy post-merger marketing and the popularity of discount family plans and new phones including the hot-selling Razr V3 model from Motorola Inc.
Cingular surpassed Verizon Wireless as the biggest U.S. mobile operator by buying AT&T Wireless, but analysts have been skeptical about the combination of two companies with high customer turnover rates. (full article)
AOL SEARCHES ON
Forrester's Charlene Li has some thoughts on AOL's search strategy. Godspeed, AOL... Godspeed... you'll need all the blessings you can get!
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Forrester's Charlene Li has some thoughts on AOL's search strategy. Godspeed, AOL... Godspeed... you'll need all the blessings you can get!
Sunday, January 23, 2005
HEADING FOR SEATTLE... BLOG BUSINESS SUMMIT!
Couldn't blog the past couple days since I was at Squaw Valley with my fiance. We enjoyed two beautiful days skiing with Lake Tahoe in the background. Drove back early this morning since she had to get some work done and had a flight to catch to Seattle.
As I arrived at the airport and headed to check in my baggage, a man yelled, "Excuse me. You sir. Excuse me... Yes, you!"
I walked towards a man behind a counter with a woman on the other side.
"Don't be scare. We're asking you to donate. We're raising money for children with HIV..."
Slightly annoyed by the whole approach, but I thought about it. So I replied, "Let me check in first and I'll think about it."
As I turned around, the man let's out a "ttuh" or "ttah" which sounded similar to noise coming out of some snotty Upper Eastside woman as she communicates with her friend's doorman.
I looked back and just walked toward the check-in counter. Afterwards, I walked past and just shook my head. He says to me,"Look, all you have to say is 'no'."
"What? You gave me that attitude and "ttah" after I said that I would consider after I check in. If you're asking people for money, you don't present such an attitude. Who are you doing this for? I was honestly condering, but of course you turned me off," I berated him and walked away.
Friggin annoy me. What a stupid man. This situation made me question why he was part of that fundraising drive and if it was legitimate at all. If you believe in the cause you're fundraising for, such as helping children with HIV, would your heart reflect such an attitude? Highly doubt it. He either was a paid solicitor or the whole thing was a scam, which is a possibility since the literature I looked at was done unprofessionally.
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Couldn't blog the past couple days since I was at Squaw Valley with my fiance. We enjoyed two beautiful days skiing with Lake Tahoe in the background. Drove back early this morning since she had to get some work done and had a flight to catch to Seattle.
As I arrived at the airport and headed to check in my baggage, a man yelled, "Excuse me. You sir. Excuse me... Yes, you!"
I walked towards a man behind a counter with a woman on the other side.
"Don't be scare. We're asking you to donate. We're raising money for children with HIV..."
Slightly annoyed by the whole approach, but I thought about it. So I replied, "Let me check in first and I'll think about it."
As I turned around, the man let's out a "ttuh" or "ttah" which sounded similar to noise coming out of some snotty Upper Eastside woman as she communicates with her friend's doorman.
I looked back and just walked toward the check-in counter. Afterwards, I walked past and just shook my head. He says to me,"Look, all you have to say is 'no'."
"What? You gave me that attitude and "ttah" after I said that I would consider after I check in. If you're asking people for money, you don't present such an attitude. Who are you doing this for? I was honestly condering, but of course you turned me off," I berated him and walked away.
Friggin annoy me. What a stupid man. This situation made me question why he was part of that fundraising drive and if it was legitimate at all. If you believe in the cause you're fundraising for, such as helping children with HIV, would your heart reflect such an attitude? Highly doubt it. He either was a paid solicitor or the whole thing was a scam, which is a possibility since the literature I looked at was done unprofessionally.
Thursday, January 20, 2005
"JP MORGAN APOLOGIZES FOR SLAVE-TAINTED PAST"
From Crain's Chicago Business:
J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., the parent company of Bank One Corp., apologized Thursday for two predecessor banks that took about 13,000 slaves as collateral in the 1800s.
In a disclosure statement filed with the City of Chicago, New York-based J.P. Morgan said it had traced its roots to two Louisiana banks, Canal Bank, which was formed in 1831, and Citizens Bank, which was formed in 1833.
The banks loaned money to plantation owners, accepting slaves as collateral. J.P. Morgan, which bought Chicago-based Bank One last year, estimates that the banks came to own 1,250 slaves after borrowers defaulted on loans. The bank doesn’t know what happened to those slaves, a bank spokesman said.
"We apologize to the African-American community, particularly those who are descendants of slaves, and to the rest of the American public for the role that Citizens Bank and Canal Bank played," J.P. Morgan said in a letter to employees. "The slavery era was a tragic time in U.S. history and in our company’s history."
J.P. Morgan released the information to comply with a city ordinance passed in 2002 requiring that companies doing business with the city disclose details about any financial benefit they may have received from slavery. J.P. Morgan underwrites bond offerings for the city, among other services it provides. The city is also one of the bank’s major depositors. (full article)
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From Crain's Chicago Business:
J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., the parent company of Bank One Corp., apologized Thursday for two predecessor banks that took about 13,000 slaves as collateral in the 1800s.
In a disclosure statement filed with the City of Chicago, New York-based J.P. Morgan said it had traced its roots to two Louisiana banks, Canal Bank, which was formed in 1831, and Citizens Bank, which was formed in 1833.
The banks loaned money to plantation owners, accepting slaves as collateral. J.P. Morgan, which bought Chicago-based Bank One last year, estimates that the banks came to own 1,250 slaves after borrowers defaulted on loans. The bank doesn’t know what happened to those slaves, a bank spokesman said.
"We apologize to the African-American community, particularly those who are descendants of slaves, and to the rest of the American public for the role that Citizens Bank and Canal Bank played," J.P. Morgan said in a letter to employees. "The slavery era was a tragic time in U.S. history and in our company’s history."
J.P. Morgan released the information to comply with a city ordinance passed in 2002 requiring that companies doing business with the city disclose details about any financial benefit they may have received from slavery. J.P. Morgan underwrites bond offerings for the city, among other services it provides. The city is also one of the bank’s major depositors. (full article)
SECOND BUSH INAUGURATION
Coverage from CNN here and Fox here. The stuff of history:
"We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world."
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Coverage from CNN here and Fox here. The stuff of history:
"We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world."
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
"THE DEPOLARIZING POWER OF THE BLOGOSPHERE"
Good article by James Miller. Check it out:
Professor Cass Sunstein underestimates the Blogosphere when he argues in a recent Boston Review article that the Internet will further polarize America. Previously left- and right-of-center citizens were brought together at times through watching the same network newscasts and reading identical local papers. Now, however, we can all get our news from blogs reflecting our ideological biases. But although the Blogosphere can polarize, I believe that on net it will reduce political differences among Americans.
Few conservatives will have their views of homosexuality changed by anything they read in The New York Times or see on CBS news. The liberal biases of these two mainstream media giants are odious enough to conservatives that conservatives will filter out anything these organizations say about homosexuality. But conservative readers of the Blogosphere will inevitably come across Andrew Sullivan, a gay conservative who writes on issues of homosexuality in a manner that can appeal to conservative Christians. (full post)
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Good article by James Miller. Check it out:
Professor Cass Sunstein underestimates the Blogosphere when he argues in a recent Boston Review article that the Internet will further polarize America. Previously left- and right-of-center citizens were brought together at times through watching the same network newscasts and reading identical local papers. Now, however, we can all get our news from blogs reflecting our ideological biases. But although the Blogosphere can polarize, I believe that on net it will reduce political differences among Americans.
Few conservatives will have their views of homosexuality changed by anything they read in The New York Times or see on CBS news. The liberal biases of these two mainstream media giants are odious enough to conservatives that conservatives will filter out anything these organizations say about homosexuality. But conservative readers of the Blogosphere will inevitably come across Andrew Sullivan, a gay conservative who writes on issues of homosexuality in a manner that can appeal to conservative Christians. (full post)
TRANSMETA FLOP... THE HYPE THAT DIDN'T BECOME REALITY
Good story by Chris O'Brien at Mercury News. Remember all the hype of Transmeta back in 1999 when they first launched and then hired Linus Torvalds, founder of Linux. Read the rest:
Transmeta - how a great idea, brilliant minds and big investors equaled a big flop
January 16, 2005
Great ideas don't always make for great businesses. Just look at Transmeta.
In early 2000, the Santa Clara start-up unveiled its plans for a power-saving computer chip amid a blizzard of hype. ``If it's mobile and it has a browser, it will use a Transmeta chip,'' boasted company founder David Ditzel on the day of the launch.
Although the market that Transmeta helped create flourished, the company did not. This month, it all but said it was turning out the lights.
What happened?
While the company suffered a number of self-inflicted wounds, it also apparently fell victim to a painful reality in Silicon Valley: Innovators don't always win in the marketplace. (full article)
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Good story by Chris O'Brien at Mercury News. Remember all the hype of Transmeta back in 1999 when they first launched and then hired Linus Torvalds, founder of Linux. Read the rest:
Transmeta - how a great idea, brilliant minds and big investors equaled a big flop
January 16, 2005
Great ideas don't always make for great businesses. Just look at Transmeta.
In early 2000, the Santa Clara start-up unveiled its plans for a power-saving computer chip amid a blizzard of hype. ``If it's mobile and it has a browser, it will use a Transmeta chip,'' boasted company founder David Ditzel on the day of the launch.
Although the market that Transmeta helped create flourished, the company did not. This month, it all but said it was turning out the lights.
What happened?
While the company suffered a number of self-inflicted wounds, it also apparently fell victim to a painful reality in Silicon Valley: Innovators don't always win in the marketplace. (full article)
"REALNETWORKS JUMPS THE SHARK"
Great post by Christopher Carfi, which the subheader reads:
An inside look at the organization that has been called "anti-social" and "the worst company on the Internet."
Excerpt:
Perhaps this is a result of some sort of Rob Glaser myopia. In the ten years Glaser spent at Microsoft (1983-1993), he managed a number of different products, including Microsoft Word. Locking up the channel, and wielding the power of being thrust upon customers (as opposed to being chosen by them) seems to continue to be the M.O. of Real, as it is at Microsoft. This does not appear to be changing any time soon.
What does seem to be changing, however, is Real's focus, which is now not only on music but other downloadable content such as games. Real seems to realize that the audio/video space that they've been playing in since their inception is now crowded, and that they've been pushed to the sidelines in the process. It must irk Glaser to no end that, not only was he rebuffed by Steve Jobs, but now Apple has a 70% market share of the downloadable music market that he and Real, ostensibly, pioneered. So, in what was quite likely a move based more on emotion than sense (and probably driven by Glaser's reported bull-in-a-china-shop personality), he decides to trump up a petition and rally Real's customers to rail against Apple.
This was a bad idea. (full post)
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Great post by Christopher Carfi, which the subheader reads:
An inside look at the organization that has been called "anti-social" and "the worst company on the Internet."
Excerpt:
Perhaps this is a result of some sort of Rob Glaser myopia. In the ten years Glaser spent at Microsoft (1983-1993), he managed a number of different products, including Microsoft Word. Locking up the channel, and wielding the power of being thrust upon customers (as opposed to being chosen by them) seems to continue to be the M.O. of Real, as it is at Microsoft. This does not appear to be changing any time soon.
What does seem to be changing, however, is Real's focus, which is now not only on music but other downloadable content such as games. Real seems to realize that the audio/video space that they've been playing in since their inception is now crowded, and that they've been pushed to the sidelines in the process. It must irk Glaser to no end that, not only was he rebuffed by Steve Jobs, but now Apple has a 70% market share of the downloadable music market that he and Real, ostensibly, pioneered. So, in what was quite likely a move based more on emotion than sense (and probably driven by Glaser's reported bull-in-a-china-shop personality), he decides to trump up a petition and rally Real's customers to rail against Apple.
This was a bad idea. (full post)
WICTORY WEDNESDAY
From PoliPundit:
Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) has been one of the most steadfast members of the Senate Republican leadership. But he’s facing a tough re-election battle in 2006 against State Treasurer Bob Casey, Jr., who’s polling ahead of Santorum right now. We must keep this seat. You can help by contributing to Santorum’s campaign online.
Today is Wictory Wednesday. Every Wednesday, hundreds of bloggers ask their readers to donate to an important Republican campaign.
If you’re a blogger, you can join Wictory Wednesdays by e-mailing me at wictory@blogsforbush.com. I’ll add you to the Wictory Wednesday blogroll. I’ll also send you a reminder e-mail every Wednesday, explaining which candidate to support that day.
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From PoliPundit:
Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) has been one of the most steadfast members of the Senate Republican leadership. But he’s facing a tough re-election battle in 2006 against State Treasurer Bob Casey, Jr., who’s polling ahead of Santorum right now. We must keep this seat. You can help by contributing to Santorum’s campaign online.
Today is Wictory Wednesday. Every Wednesday, hundreds of bloggers ask their readers to donate to an important Republican campaign.
If you’re a blogger, you can join Wictory Wednesdays by e-mailing me at wictory@blogsforbush.com. I’ll add you to the Wictory Wednesday blogroll. I’ll also send you a reminder e-mail every Wednesday, explaining which candidate to support that day.
JIB JAB'S "SECOND TERM" IS OUT
Now sponsored by Yahoo!, Jib Jab has their third political short (related to Bush) out. Pretty funny, but not like the two previously ones.
The short is timely since the 55th U.S. Presidential Inauguration is Thursday. My friend invited me since he got some assigned seats, but I don't think we can go to D.C. in the middle of the week at this time. Also it's freezing in D.C. Mid-60s in San Francisco is nice.
Some "U.S. Presidential Inauguration Trivia" from National Geographic.
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Now sponsored by Yahoo!, Jib Jab has their third political short (related to Bush) out. Pretty funny, but not like the two previously ones.
The short is timely since the 55th U.S. Presidential Inauguration is Thursday. My friend invited me since he got some assigned seats, but I don't think we can go to D.C. in the middle of the week at this time. Also it's freezing in D.C. Mid-60s in San Francisco is nice.
Some "U.S. Presidential Inauguration Trivia" from National Geographic.
Tuesday, January 18, 2005
DELL CEO KEVIN ROLLINS CALLS IPOD A "FAD"
Not firing a shot across the bow, but aiming for the galley Kevin Rollins dismisses the iPod as a "fad":
"It's interesting the iPod has been out for three years and it's only this past year it's become a raging success," said Rollins, who is also Dell's president. "Well, those things that become fads rage, and then they drop off. When I was growing up there was a product made by Sony called the Sony Walkman--a rage, everyone had to have one. Well, you don't hear about the Walkman anymore. I believe that one-product wonders come and go. You have to have sustainable business models, sustainable strategy."
Strategic statement to knock on Apple? Yeah, definitely since Dell is competing directly in the same space. It is wise to tell Apple publicly "bring it on!"? Not sure if this was the best move. His words will be all over Apple HQ's walls.
I don't agree with Rollins on the iPod "fad." If it's a fad, then it will be a long fad for at least the next several years.
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Not firing a shot across the bow, but aiming for the galley Kevin Rollins dismisses the iPod as a "fad":
"It's interesting the iPod has been out for three years and it's only this past year it's become a raging success," said Rollins, who is also Dell's president. "Well, those things that become fads rage, and then they drop off. When I was growing up there was a product made by Sony called the Sony Walkman--a rage, everyone had to have one. Well, you don't hear about the Walkman anymore. I believe that one-product wonders come and go. You have to have sustainable business models, sustainable strategy."
Strategic statement to knock on Apple? Yeah, definitely since Dell is competing directly in the same space. It is wise to tell Apple publicly "bring it on!"? Not sure if this was the best move. His words will be all over Apple HQ's walls.
I don't agree with Rollins on the iPod "fad." If it's a fad, then it will be a long fad for at least the next several years.
TERRY TATE, OFFICE LINEBACKER
I got this short film series a while back and I'm sure many of you have seen these, but the "Terry Tate Office Linkebacker" short series has got to be the funniest I've ever seen. Hold-my-tummy, laugh-out-loud funny.
After a Google search, I found out that Hypnotic was the firm that created this series for Reebok and that it was written and directed by Rawson Thurber. Rawson Thurber, you're a genius.
Episode #1
Episode #2
Episode #3
Episode #4
Episode #5
An old article from ESPN here.
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I got this short film series a while back and I'm sure many of you have seen these, but the "Terry Tate Office Linkebacker" short series has got to be the funniest I've ever seen. Hold-my-tummy, laugh-out-loud funny.
After a Google search, I found out that Hypnotic was the firm that created this series for Reebok and that it was written and directed by Rawson Thurber. Rawson Thurber, you're a genius.
Episode #1
Episode #2
Episode #3
Episode #4
Episode #5
An old article from ESPN here.
CORO ENTERS THE BLOGOSPHERE... FLASHBACK
One of the best periods of my life, if not "the" best, was when I went through the Coro Fellowship program during 1995 and 1996. It's a 10-month post-graduate leadership development program for those interested in public service.
I worked with 11 other individuals ranging from 22 to 31 years, and from all backgrounds. The training emphasized organizational analysis, critical thinking, project management, and group theory. It was structured to be at least 70 hours a week and during some major projects we went through it hit upwards of 100 hours.
Intense, fun, thought-provoking, and eye-opening. I love it and how our group pushed each other. Each year and each group can be a different experience. Some groups don't push as much or bond as much as other groups since they are unique social experiments in themselves. I'm biased, but our group kicked ass. Since we operated by the consensus of our twelve, sometimes our mini-model of democracy became unruly when we debated on the colors of our presentation materials late into the night or became frustrated at each other's decision-making process.
One of the cool aspect of the program was that we experienced an overview of society by completing assignments and projects in business, government, labor, media, and non-profit sectors. So I worked for 3-6 weeks at organizations such as Commerce Bank, Bi-State Development Agency, and Missouri Progressive Vote. The last one was based on one of the program's premise to challenge and stretch a person's experience, so I was placed in the most pro-labor, pro-choice organization. I am not allowed to voice my political opinions or views, but also I am allowed to only do work that I feel comfortable with. My one year with Coro was the best development experience of my life so far.
Now I'm involved with the Coro National Alumni Association as an officer and one of the things I worked on naturally was a blog for the organization and its alumni. But the blog is not only for alumni, but for everyone interested in "the crossroads of public service, politics, and empowering people." I just put it up this past week, so check it out if it's in your realm of activity.
The first major post is my full interview with John Hinderaker, founder of Power Line. When I interviewed him, I used some of the interview for my first column with AlwaysOn, but asked additional questions more relevant to the audience of the Coro blog.
"Everyday business decisions are made in business, unions and in governmental departments which must take into account how the public will react. Those (wo)men who make sounder guesses are those (wo)men who understand and know more about the public. This type of understanding does not come from reading about the area, but from dealing with the area. This has been proved."
- W.Donald Fletcher, Co-Founder of Coro
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One of the best periods of my life, if not "the" best, was when I went through the Coro Fellowship program during 1995 and 1996. It's a 10-month post-graduate leadership development program for those interested in public service.
I worked with 11 other individuals ranging from 22 to 31 years, and from all backgrounds. The training emphasized organizational analysis, critical thinking, project management, and group theory. It was structured to be at least 70 hours a week and during some major projects we went through it hit upwards of 100 hours.
Intense, fun, thought-provoking, and eye-opening. I love it and how our group pushed each other. Each year and each group can be a different experience. Some groups don't push as much or bond as much as other groups since they are unique social experiments in themselves. I'm biased, but our group kicked ass. Since we operated by the consensus of our twelve, sometimes our mini-model of democracy became unruly when we debated on the colors of our presentation materials late into the night or became frustrated at each other's decision-making process.
One of the cool aspect of the program was that we experienced an overview of society by completing assignments and projects in business, government, labor, media, and non-profit sectors. So I worked for 3-6 weeks at organizations such as Commerce Bank, Bi-State Development Agency, and Missouri Progressive Vote. The last one was based on one of the program's premise to challenge and stretch a person's experience, so I was placed in the most pro-labor, pro-choice organization. I am not allowed to voice my political opinions or views, but also I am allowed to only do work that I feel comfortable with. My one year with Coro was the best development experience of my life so far.
Now I'm involved with the Coro National Alumni Association as an officer and one of the things I worked on naturally was a blog for the organization and its alumni. But the blog is not only for alumni, but for everyone interested in "the crossroads of public service, politics, and empowering people." I just put it up this past week, so check it out if it's in your realm of activity.
The first major post is my full interview with John Hinderaker, founder of Power Line. When I interviewed him, I used some of the interview for my first column with AlwaysOn, but asked additional questions more relevant to the audience of the Coro blog.
"Everyday business decisions are made in business, unions and in governmental departments which must take into account how the public will react. Those (wo)men who make sounder guesses are those (wo)men who understand and know more about the public. This type of understanding does not come from reading about the area, but from dealing with the area. This has been proved."
- W.Donald Fletcher, Co-Founder of Coro
Monday, January 17, 2005
MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.'S BIRTHDAY
An awesome american. Happy Birthday, Dr. King!
His incredible speech that still brings tears to my eyes when I read it:
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves, who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so we have come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must ever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream. (full text)
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An awesome american. Happy Birthday, Dr. King!
His incredible speech that still brings tears to my eyes when I read it:
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves, who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so we have come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must ever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream. (full text)
PRESIDENT BUSH’S APPROVAL RATING UP TO 53%
Bawhahahaha... I guess political pundits from the left can't talk about "below 50% approval ratings" anymore. Yes, silly post on a relatively unimportant poll, but when in Rome...
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Bawhahahaha... I guess political pundits from the left can't talk about "below 50% approval ratings" anymore. Yes, silly post on a relatively unimportant poll, but when in Rome...
CRAIGSLIST'S UTOPIAN APPROACH TO CONQUERING THE $100 BILLION GLOBAL AD MARKET
Craigslists is expanding overseas to Europe and Asia. Awesome. I'm a free market, Republican, and I still love Craig Newmark's vision for his site:
Started 10 years ago by Craig Newmark, a Internet pioneer in San Francisco, as a way of keeping friends up to date on events in the Bay Area, Craigslist spread through the United States before going international in 2003, with sites in London and Toronto. The expansion accelerated late last year with a flurry of sites including ones for Paris, Berlin, Tokyo and Sydney. About a dozen other international start-ups are planned in the next few months.
Craigslist, which bills itself as a "community-based" operation in the techno-utopian spirit of the early Internet, accepts advertising for just about anything, from jobs to apartments to electronics to "erotic services." What it generally will not accept, however, is money. The sites let users post most classified advertisements for free. Only job ads posted in three U.S. cities require a fee.
"Our site is a place to get simple jobs done," Mr. Newmark said. "Life isn't fair, but we try to be fair to everyone. That's a fundamental value across the world, no matter where you come from."
More from Techdirt: "Is Craigslist Costing Bay Area Newspapers $65 Million Per Year?"
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Craigslists is expanding overseas to Europe and Asia. Awesome. I'm a free market, Republican, and I still love Craig Newmark's vision for his site:
Started 10 years ago by Craig Newmark, a Internet pioneer in San Francisco, as a way of keeping friends up to date on events in the Bay Area, Craigslist spread through the United States before going international in 2003, with sites in London and Toronto. The expansion accelerated late last year with a flurry of sites including ones for Paris, Berlin, Tokyo and Sydney. About a dozen other international start-ups are planned in the next few months.
Craigslist, which bills itself as a "community-based" operation in the techno-utopian spirit of the early Internet, accepts advertising for just about anything, from jobs to apartments to electronics to "erotic services." What it generally will not accept, however, is money. The sites let users post most classified advertisements for free. Only job ads posted in three U.S. cities require a fee.
"Our site is a place to get simple jobs done," Mr. Newmark said. "Life isn't fair, but we try to be fair to everyone. That's a fundamental value across the world, no matter where you come from."
More from Techdirt: "Is Craigslist Costing Bay Area Newspapers $65 Million Per Year?"
3,700 NEW LINKEDIN ACCOUNTS FROM PEOPLESOFT EMPLOYEES
Since Oracle just cut 5,000 jobs at People soft, 3,700 people have joined Linkedin to search of their next gig. Techdirt provides some more commentary.
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Since Oracle just cut 5,000 jobs at People soft, 3,700 people have joined Linkedin to search of their next gig. Techdirt provides some more commentary.
Friday, January 14, 2005
PRINCE HARRY IS AN IDIOT
Sorry for putting up tabloid news, but the picture here and the story deserves a post and a "what a fricking idiot" from me.
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Sorry for putting up tabloid news, but the picture here and the story deserves a post and a "what a fricking idiot" from me.
GOOGLE MINI
"Google Launches 'Mini' Version of Enterprise Search Box"
eWeek
By Matt Hicks
January 13, 2005
Google Inc. took two more steps Thursday toward becoming as well-known in enterprise search as it is for finding information on the Web.
The Mountain View, Calif., company launched a search appliance aimed at smaller organizations while expanding the types of enterprise data it supports on its higher-end appliances. Google's moves follow promises from its executives last year that it would invest more in enterprise products and expand its offerings for businesses.
Google introduced the Google Mini for use in organizations with up to about 1,000 employees or in departments of larger companies, said Matthew Glotzbach, business product manager for Google's enterprise group.
The Mini can index as many as 50,000 documents and sells for $4,995. Compare that to Google's main enterprise box, the Google Search Appliance. The three models of that appliance support indexes of between 1.5 million and 15 million and start at $32,000. (full article)
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"Google Launches 'Mini' Version of Enterprise Search Box"
eWeek
By Matt Hicks
January 13, 2005
Google Inc. took two more steps Thursday toward becoming as well-known in enterprise search as it is for finding information on the Web.
The Mountain View, Calif., company launched a search appliance aimed at smaller organizations while expanding the types of enterprise data it supports on its higher-end appliances. Google's moves follow promises from its executives last year that it would invest more in enterprise products and expand its offerings for businesses.
Google introduced the Google Mini for use in organizations with up to about 1,000 employees or in departments of larger companies, said Matthew Glotzbach, business product manager for Google's enterprise group.
The Mini can index as many as 50,000 documents and sells for $4,995. Compare that to Google's main enterprise box, the Google Search Appliance. The three models of that appliance support indexes of between 1.5 million and 15 million and start at $32,000. (full article)
STEVE CASE ACCEPTS BLAME FOR AOL-TIME WARNER
HatTip to Techdirt. ZDNet coverage here. Techdirt post:
While lots of people were down on the idea of AOL merging with Time Warner from the very beginning, it always seemed like the idea behind it made plenty of sense. It was just the execution that was an absolute disaster. AOL clearly had puffed up stock and no broadband plans. Teaming with Time Warner would give them the broadband offering in Road Runner, along with plenty of other services that they could use to transform into a true broadband company. What happened, however, was that just about everyone dropped the ball. AOL and Road Runner continued to be so separate that they even found themselves competing against each other. When Steve Case was forced out two years ago, it seemed like everyone as blaming him for the collapse of AOL-Time Warner. At the time, I suggested that Case's mistake was not the vision he had, but that he failed to bring in executives who would execute it -- instead leaving existing execs in place who got into turf wars and basically did nothing to make the deal work. In an event at the Computer History Museum tonight, Steve Case basically suggested the same thing. He admitted the failure was his own fault, but that it was one of execution, not vision. He says he never should have been running a 90,000 person company, and he failed in getting people who actually believed in the vision of how the two companies could work together, rather than against each other.
As I wrote a while back, some stupid people at AOL or Time Warner are to blame for not executing on merging AOL with Road Runner. I'm guessing it was Time Warner's fiefdom culture that prevented this:
"Ok," I thought, "this is a no-brainer. With the growth of broadband, AOL Time Warner should integrate Time Warner Cable's Road Runner service with AOL, transition their customer base to broadband, sign exclusive content deals, etc... The high-speed service shouldn't be called 'Road Runner' anymore. Just AOL or AOL Broadband..."
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HatTip to Techdirt. ZDNet coverage here. Techdirt post:
While lots of people were down on the idea of AOL merging with Time Warner from the very beginning, it always seemed like the idea behind it made plenty of sense. It was just the execution that was an absolute disaster. AOL clearly had puffed up stock and no broadband plans. Teaming with Time Warner would give them the broadband offering in Road Runner, along with plenty of other services that they could use to transform into a true broadband company. What happened, however, was that just about everyone dropped the ball. AOL and Road Runner continued to be so separate that they even found themselves competing against each other. When Steve Case was forced out two years ago, it seemed like everyone as blaming him for the collapse of AOL-Time Warner. At the time, I suggested that Case's mistake was not the vision he had, but that he failed to bring in executives who would execute it -- instead leaving existing execs in place who got into turf wars and basically did nothing to make the deal work. In an event at the Computer History Museum tonight, Steve Case basically suggested the same thing. He admitted the failure was his own fault, but that it was one of execution, not vision. He says he never should have been running a 90,000 person company, and he failed in getting people who actually believed in the vision of how the two companies could work together, rather than against each other.
As I wrote a while back, some stupid people at AOL or Time Warner are to blame for not executing on merging AOL with Road Runner. I'm guessing it was Time Warner's fiefdom culture that prevented this:
"Ok," I thought, "this is a no-brainer. With the growth of broadband, AOL Time Warner should integrate Time Warner Cable's Road Runner service with AOL, transition their customer base to broadband, sign exclusive content deals, etc... The high-speed service shouldn't be called 'Road Runner' anymore. Just AOL or AOL Broadband..."
Thursday, January 13, 2005
SCRAPING GOOGLE... A THORN IN GOOGLE'S SIDE
HatTip to John Battelle. Interesting point of view:
Daniel Brandt, Google's most relentless thorn, has released code which scrapes Google, sans ads. Techdirt covers it here. The Register (also a Google thorn) covers it here. Highlights:
Brandt fully expects Google to throw legal and technical resources at him, but says he welcomes the challenge if only to clarify copyright issues.
Google took people's free stuff and made a $50 billion business from it, he argues.
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HatTip to John Battelle. Interesting point of view:
Daniel Brandt, Google's most relentless thorn, has released code which scrapes Google, sans ads. Techdirt covers it here. The Register (also a Google thorn) covers it here. Highlights:
Brandt fully expects Google to throw legal and technical resources at him, but says he welcomes the challenge if only to clarify copyright issues.
Google took people's free stuff and made a $50 billion business from it, he argues.
OLDIE BUT GOODIE... GARY BECKER & RICHARD POSNER ON THE TSUNAMI
Slightly old posts from University of Chicago professors and economic greats, Gary Becker and Richard Posner:
"The Tsunami and the Economics of Catastrophic Risk" by Posner
"Economic Effects of Tsunamis and Other Catastrophes" - Becker A Reaction to Posner's Discussion
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Slightly old posts from University of Chicago professors and economic greats, Gary Becker and Richard Posner:
"The Tsunami and the Economics of Catastrophic Risk" by Posner
"Economic Effects of Tsunamis and Other Catastrophes" - Becker A Reaction to Posner's Discussion
Wednesday, January 12, 2005
SECOND COLUMN IS UP... UBIQUITY WILL LEAD TO INNOVATION
FYI. My second column is up at AlwaysOn. Check it out!
Where Technology Is Ubiquitous, Opportunity Abounds
What the United States and others can learn from Korea's ubiquitous broadband environment.
Back in 2001, during the second year I was living in Korea, I encountered Hangame.com just as it was launching paid services for its online casual games (for example, Tetris, blackjack, chess, and pool). The world's leading casual online gaming company was about to begin charging users a fee of less than a dollar to do things like extend playing time and host private group games.
"Only in Korea or Asia could this happen," I said to myself. Americans would never pay 50 cents for such a service. If the price were that low, Americans would expect it to be free; they wouldn't recognize the value that Korean online gamers have accepted. (full article)
UPDATE: OhmyNews International, the site that launched "citizen journalism," is reprinting my article in their English/tech section. I posted on them earlier here. Thanks to the OMNI editor, Todd!
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FYI. My second column is up at AlwaysOn. Check it out!
Where Technology Is Ubiquitous, Opportunity Abounds
What the United States and others can learn from Korea's ubiquitous broadband environment.
Back in 2001, during the second year I was living in Korea, I encountered Hangame.com just as it was launching paid services for its online casual games (for example, Tetris, blackjack, chess, and pool). The world's leading casual online gaming company was about to begin charging users a fee of less than a dollar to do things like extend playing time and host private group games.
"Only in Korea or Asia could this happen," I said to myself. Americans would never pay 50 cents for such a service. If the price were that low, Americans would expect it to be free; they wouldn't recognize the value that Korean online gamers have accepted. (full article)
UPDATE: OhmyNews International, the site that launched "citizen journalism," is reprinting my article in their English/tech section. I posted on them earlier here. Thanks to the OMNI editor, Todd!
WICTORY WEDNESDAY
From Polipundit:
Social Security reform is necessary and difficult. President Bush isn’t afraid to take it on. Helping make it happen are groups like Progress for America, who came up with the inimitable "Ashley’s story" ad during the election. Watch their new TV ad on Social Security here. Help spread the word by contributing to Progress for America.
Today is Wictory Wednesday. Every Wednesday, hundreds of bloggers ask their readers to donate to an important Republican campaign.
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From Polipundit:
Social Security reform is necessary and difficult. President Bush isn’t afraid to take it on. Helping make it happen are groups like Progress for America, who came up with the inimitable "Ashley’s story" ad during the election. Watch their new TV ad on Social Security here. Help spread the word by contributing to Progress for America.
Today is Wictory Wednesday. Every Wednesday, hundreds of bloggers ask their readers to donate to an important Republican campaign.
Tuesday, January 11, 2005
CBS'S WEAK REPORT AND FINDINGS
The American Thinker as a good post and linked articles on this:
CBS tries to cop a plea
January 11th, 2005
CBS News is undoubtedly hoping that release of the Thornburgh/Boccardi Report, with its embarrassing admissions, will satisfy critics enough that the Rathergate scandal will be allowed to disappear into dim memory. They are wrong.
Many observers, our own Clarice Feldman included, have been impressed by the extent of the incompetence (and worse) CBS has admitted with this internal report. Some, like Jim Geraghty, of National review Online, are concerned that critics of CBS should appear reasonable, and praise what is praiseworthy, while asking for more information, as a matter of political strategy.
Already, Washington Post writers Howard Kurtz and Dana Milbank are portraying the Report as a victory for conservatives and Republicans, and mentioning no further investigation in prospect, essentially taking as a given that the case is closed.
Others dismiss the report as an insult to the intelligence of the American public, intended to evade discussion of the most serious issued. Author, talk show host, blogger, and law professor Hugh Hewitt is leading the pack declaring the Report a whitewash. (full post)
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The American Thinker as a good post and linked articles on this:
CBS tries to cop a plea
January 11th, 2005
CBS News is undoubtedly hoping that release of the Thornburgh/Boccardi Report, with its embarrassing admissions, will satisfy critics enough that the Rathergate scandal will be allowed to disappear into dim memory. They are wrong.
Many observers, our own Clarice Feldman included, have been impressed by the extent of the incompetence (and worse) CBS has admitted with this internal report. Some, like Jim Geraghty, of National review Online, are concerned that critics of CBS should appear reasonable, and praise what is praiseworthy, while asking for more information, as a matter of political strategy.
Already, Washington Post writers Howard Kurtz and Dana Milbank are portraying the Report as a victory for conservatives and Republicans, and mentioning no further investigation in prospect, essentially taking as a given that the case is closed.
Others dismiss the report as an insult to the intelligence of the American public, intended to evade discussion of the most serious issued. Author, talk show host, blogger, and law professor Hugh Hewitt is leading the pack declaring the Report a whitewash. (full post)
TOPTEN EXPERIENCES IN THE U.S.
MSN City Guides made a TopTen list of "must try" experiences in 40 major U.S. cities. Also a top ten overall list that has "Watch a game at Wrigley Field" in Chicago as #1. That's right, baby! Go Chi-Town! Some others were:
6. Meet your soul mate atop the Empire State Building in New York City.
3. Ride a Mardi Gras float on Fat Tuesday in New Orleans.
2. Walk the Golden Gate Bridge at sunrise in San Francisco.
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MSN City Guides made a TopTen list of "must try" experiences in 40 major U.S. cities. Also a top ten overall list that has "Watch a game at Wrigley Field" in Chicago as #1. That's right, baby! Go Chi-Town! Some others were:
6. Meet your soul mate atop the Empire State Building in New York City.
3. Ride a Mardi Gras float on Fat Tuesday in New Orleans.
2. Walk the Golden Gate Bridge at sunrise in San Francisco.
IBM GIVING AWAY 500 PATENTS... SHOT ACROSS MICROSOFT'S BOW
Interesting development in the whole intellectual property arena, especially in light of Bill Gate's recent comments:
U.S. patent leader IBM said late on Monday it plans to donate 500 patents for free use by software developers, marking a major shift of intellectual property strategy for the world's top computer maker and a challenge to the high-tech industry.
Jim Stallings, IBM's vice president in charge of intellectual property, said in an interview that the move was meant to encourage other companies to unlock patent portfolios in order to spur technological innovation.
"This represents by far the largest pledge of patents in U.S. history," IBM said in a statement to be issued on Tuesday. "You can use them and grow and innovate (and)...to build something new," Stallings said in remarks aimed at developers.
.....
But it also puts IBM at further loggerheads with rivals such as Microsoft, which argues that open source software development undermines corporate intellectual property rights. It also contrasts with zealous patent defenders such as major pharmaceutical and media companies -- big IBM customers. (full article)
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Interesting development in the whole intellectual property arena, especially in light of Bill Gate's recent comments:
U.S. patent leader IBM said late on Monday it plans to donate 500 patents for free use by software developers, marking a major shift of intellectual property strategy for the world's top computer maker and a challenge to the high-tech industry.
Jim Stallings, IBM's vice president in charge of intellectual property, said in an interview that the move was meant to encourage other companies to unlock patent portfolios in order to spur technological innovation.
"This represents by far the largest pledge of patents in U.S. history," IBM said in a statement to be issued on Tuesday. "You can use them and grow and innovate (and)...to build something new," Stallings said in remarks aimed at developers.
.....
But it also puts IBM at further loggerheads with rivals such as Microsoft, which argues that open source software development undermines corporate intellectual property rights. It also contrasts with zealous patent defenders such as major pharmaceutical and media companies -- big IBM customers. (full article)
POST-ELECTION BLOG FUNK
A good look at the decline in traffic numbers of major political blogs since the election. Expected but interesting to look at.
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A good look at the decline in traffic numbers of major political blogs since the election. Expected but interesting to look at.
EMBASSY OF INDONESIA & ROYAL THAI EMBASSY ESTABLISHES FUND FOR TSUNAMI VICTIMS
A little late for some of you, but if you still haven't donated or are willing to donate more consider helping out these nations directly. Click here for Indonesia and here for Thailand.
My friend, Thomas, works for the lobbying firm that represents the Indonesian and Thailand governments in D.C., so no worries on the legitimacy of these solicitations.
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A little late for some of you, but if you still haven't donated or are willing to donate more consider helping out these nations directly. Click here for Indonesia and here for Thailand.
My friend, Thomas, works for the lobbying firm that represents the Indonesian and Thailand governments in D.C., so no worries on the legitimacy of these solicitations.
Monday, January 10, 2005
STOWE BOYD TUNES IN ON MY DEBUT COLUMN
Over at Corante, a great tech group blog, Stowe Boyd responds to the coining of the term "slogging""
Bernard Moon coins the term "slogging" over at Reality Media: "This piece marks the debut of my column Reality Media, in which I cover the intersection of the blogosphere and social networking, a phenomenon I'll refer to from now on as slogging (or to social network and blog)." This is a term that I hope does not catch on.
I thought this was funny since I never desired to have "slogging" catch on and coined it (not sure if i'm the first) out of laziness for my column. I was tired of writing "social networking and blogging" or "blogs and social networks," so I decided to use "slogs" and "slogging."
Anyway, check out Corante if you have time, they have some solid columnists and pieces over there.
Some other links to my article:
"Weekend required reading" at Pegasus News.
PervasiveInfo.com, a blog for people who build news sites.
"Just when you thought you’d read everything there was to know about blogging vs traditional media…" at SimonWaldman.net, who I interviewed for my piece.
"Reality Media" at John Furrier's blog, who's a frequent AlwaysOn-er.
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Over at Corante, a great tech group blog, Stowe Boyd responds to the coining of the term "slogging""
Bernard Moon coins the term "slogging" over at Reality Media: "This piece marks the debut of my column Reality Media, in which I cover the intersection of the blogosphere and social networking, a phenomenon I'll refer to from now on as slogging (or to social network and blog)." This is a term that I hope does not catch on.
I thought this was funny since I never desired to have "slogging" catch on and coined it (not sure if i'm the first) out of laziness for my column. I was tired of writing "social networking and blogging" or "blogs and social networks," so I decided to use "slogs" and "slogging."
Anyway, check out Corante if you have time, they have some solid columnists and pieces over there.
Some other links to my article:
"Weekend required reading" at Pegasus News.
PervasiveInfo.com, a blog for people who build news sites.
"Just when you thought you’d read everything there was to know about blogging vs traditional media…" at SimonWaldman.net, who I interviewed for my piece.
"Reality Media" at John Furrier's blog, who's a frequent AlwaysOn-er.
Sunday, January 09, 2005
DAILY KOS "ON FAITH AND VALUES"
Okay, I stated before that I don't think Kos, or Markos Zúniga of the lefty blog Daily Kos, is a smart man, but his latest post is so simplistic and juvenile it is amusing (mine are lazy not simplistic... some are theologically on target with some complex issues, as my pastor friend states). Also the string of posts responding to his brief thoughts on faith and his interpretation of Christianity allows me to assume a good percentage of his readers are the left-wing version of right-wingers who believe pro wrestling is real. Some comments are pretty funny.
My friend, Max, and other smart liberals need to speak up about topics like this one because Kos just lowers the quality of the discussion (some of my comments follow his statements... i'm slithering down his hole):
I have been a militant atheist all my life. Not militant in wanting to destroy religion, but in keeping it out of the public sphere.
(kos, atheism with you on its side is kicking ass. increase of church attendence last year along with the vast majority of America believing in God.)
But I have come to a conclusion recently that has startled me, obvious as it seems to me in retrospect -- it wasn't religious language that bothered me, it was the "values" promoted couched in religious terms.
(those aren't couched. they are real enough where many people try to live by such ideals daily. stop being preachy.)
I would cringe -- and continue to cringe -- when politicians and religous figures cite scripture to justify hatred towards gays or any other class of people. But I don't cringe when scripture is used to justify poverty relief, or conservation ("protecting God's creation"), or social security ("honor thy mother and thy fathers"), or oppose the death penalty, or oppose the war.
(Really, Kos? How many politicians or religious figures from the past decade can you cite that justify hatred towards gays or class of people? Are these but a couple in your lifetime? Maybe throw in a few fringe, thinkers like yourself?)
What we have in this country is the hijacking of religion by an ideological faction that is using their supposed moral authority on behalf of three narrow issues -- abortion, stem cell research, and gay rights. Meanwhile, the Bible tackles myriad issues, most of which align with liberal/progressive thought. So when did "life" become just abortion, and not war and the death penalty and even associated issues like post-natal care (child mortality is still an issue of life and death)?
(Hijacking of religion? Ideological faction? Wow. This is mainstream Christianity I assume you're referring to with tens of millions of followers in the U.S. Pretty large group to be hijacking there. Who's coordinating this incredible endeavor? Karl Rove? And yes, the Bible aligns itself with liberal and progressive thoughts, but not your type of liberal and progressive thoughts. That's why millions of Christian Democrats have been leaving your party for decades. I'll stop degraded myself. You are a tool.)
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Okay, I stated before that I don't think Kos, or Markos Zúniga of the lefty blog Daily Kos, is a smart man, but his latest post is so simplistic and juvenile it is amusing (mine are lazy not simplistic... some are theologically on target with some complex issues, as my pastor friend states). Also the string of posts responding to his brief thoughts on faith and his interpretation of Christianity allows me to assume a good percentage of his readers are the left-wing version of right-wingers who believe pro wrestling is real. Some comments are pretty funny.
My friend, Max, and other smart liberals need to speak up about topics like this one because Kos just lowers the quality of the discussion (some of my comments follow his statements... i'm slithering down his hole):
I have been a militant atheist all my life. Not militant in wanting to destroy religion, but in keeping it out of the public sphere.
(kos, atheism with you on its side is kicking ass. increase of church attendence last year along with the vast majority of America believing in God.)
But I have come to a conclusion recently that has startled me, obvious as it seems to me in retrospect -- it wasn't religious language that bothered me, it was the "values" promoted couched in religious terms.
(those aren't couched. they are real enough where many people try to live by such ideals daily. stop being preachy.)
I would cringe -- and continue to cringe -- when politicians and religous figures cite scripture to justify hatred towards gays or any other class of people. But I don't cringe when scripture is used to justify poverty relief, or conservation ("protecting God's creation"), or social security ("honor thy mother and thy fathers"), or oppose the death penalty, or oppose the war.
(Really, Kos? How many politicians or religious figures from the past decade can you cite that justify hatred towards gays or class of people? Are these but a couple in your lifetime? Maybe throw in a few fringe, thinkers like yourself?)
What we have in this country is the hijacking of religion by an ideological faction that is using their supposed moral authority on behalf of three narrow issues -- abortion, stem cell research, and gay rights. Meanwhile, the Bible tackles myriad issues, most of which align with liberal/progressive thought. So when did "life" become just abortion, and not war and the death penalty and even associated issues like post-natal care (child mortality is still an issue of life and death)?
(Hijacking of religion? Ideological faction? Wow. This is mainstream Christianity I assume you're referring to with tens of millions of followers in the U.S. Pretty large group to be hijacking there. Who's coordinating this incredible endeavor? Karl Rove? And yes, the Bible aligns itself with liberal and progressive thoughts, but not your type of liberal and progressive thoughts. That's why millions of Christian Democrats have been leaving your party for decades. I'll stop degraded myself. You are a tool.)
UN PEACEKEEPERS ABUSED GIRLS IN CONGO
HatTip to LGF. Disgusting and messed up.
DR Congo sex abuse claims upheld
By Susannah Price
BBC News, United Nations
January 8, 2005
A United Nations inquiry has found that UN peacekeepers working in DR Congo sexually abused girls as young as 13.
The report by the UN watchdog, the Office of Internal Oversight Services, investigated abuse allegations in the north-east Congolese town of Bunia.
The probe found a pattern of sexual exploitation of women and children, which it said was continuing.
Head of UN peacekeeping Jean-Marie Guehenno said he was outraged and angered by the abuse.
The report said many of the victims were under 18, with some as young as 13.
They were usually given food or small sums of money in return for sex. (full article)
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HatTip to LGF. Disgusting and messed up.
DR Congo sex abuse claims upheld
By Susannah Price
BBC News, United Nations
January 8, 2005
A United Nations inquiry has found that UN peacekeepers working in DR Congo sexually abused girls as young as 13.
The report by the UN watchdog, the Office of Internal Oversight Services, investigated abuse allegations in the north-east Congolese town of Bunia.
The probe found a pattern of sexual exploitation of women and children, which it said was continuing.
Head of UN peacekeeping Jean-Marie Guehenno said he was outraged and angered by the abuse.
The report said many of the victims were under 18, with some as young as 13.
They were usually given food or small sums of money in return for sex. (full article)
"THE NEED FOR LEADERSHIP IN DARFUR"
HatTip to another Thomas for this article by Eddie Beaver. I couldn't agree more with Petty Officer Beaver.
The Need for Leadership in Darfur
The United States can--and should--step in and lead the fight against genocide in the Sudan.
The Weekly Standard
by Eddie Beaver
01/06/2005
NEARLY 60 YEARS AGO, Allied soldiers liberated Nazi concentration camps throughout Europe, bringing an end to the nightmarish Nazi system that utilized factories of mass death to eliminate enemies and despised ethnic and religious groups. The pledge "never again" was heard then, and various agreements were solemnly made by leaders to ensure genocide never occurred again.
Over the decades, much has happened to cheapen the lofty rhetoric of the victorious World War II leaders. Genocide or something close to it has happened in the Congo, Burundi, Uganda, East Timor, Cambodia, Iraq, Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, and most recently the Darfur region of Sudan. In all but Kosovo, the international community ignored the horror of mass murder. The few interventions were thrown together haphazardly with peacekeepers whose hands were tied by weak-willed mandates that did more to aid the perpetrators of slaughter than the victims.
Darfur was supposed to be different. It came in the wake of successes by leading nations who intervened to halt conflict and potential mass murder in Kosovo, East Timor, Sierra Leone, and Liberia. President Bush had achieved more towards peace in Sudan than any previous leader. The United Nations, troubled over failures in the past, seemed eager to apply the painful lessons learned, and committed to true reform. The African Union appeared ready to accept the challenge of ending war on its territory, and the European Union claimed it was ready to support admirable goals like ending the slaughter in Darfur. (full article)
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HatTip to another Thomas for this article by Eddie Beaver. I couldn't agree more with Petty Officer Beaver.
The Need for Leadership in Darfur
The United States can--and should--step in and lead the fight against genocide in the Sudan.
The Weekly Standard
by Eddie Beaver
01/06/2005
NEARLY 60 YEARS AGO, Allied soldiers liberated Nazi concentration camps throughout Europe, bringing an end to the nightmarish Nazi system that utilized factories of mass death to eliminate enemies and despised ethnic and religious groups. The pledge "never again" was heard then, and various agreements were solemnly made by leaders to ensure genocide never occurred again.
Over the decades, much has happened to cheapen the lofty rhetoric of the victorious World War II leaders. Genocide or something close to it has happened in the Congo, Burundi, Uganda, East Timor, Cambodia, Iraq, Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, and most recently the Darfur region of Sudan. In all but Kosovo, the international community ignored the horror of mass murder. The few interventions were thrown together haphazardly with peacekeepers whose hands were tied by weak-willed mandates that did more to aid the perpetrators of slaughter than the victims.
Darfur was supposed to be different. It came in the wake of successes by leading nations who intervened to halt conflict and potential mass murder in Kosovo, East Timor, Sierra Leone, and Liberia. President Bush had achieved more towards peace in Sudan than any previous leader. The United Nations, troubled over failures in the past, seemed eager to apply the painful lessons learned, and committed to true reform. The African Union appeared ready to accept the challenge of ending war on its territory, and the European Union claimed it was ready to support admirable goals like ending the slaughter in Darfur. (full article)
"WEB LOGS ARE BRINGING RELIEF IN WAKE OF TIDAL WAVE DISASTER"
HatTip to Thomas. I couldn't find the original link, so I'm post the whole thing. I hope Doug Tsuruoka doesn't mind.
Web Logs Are Bringing Relief In Wake Of Tidal Wave Disaster
Wedesday, January 5, 2005
by Doug Tsuruoka
Bloggers are coming to the rescue in the wake of South Asia's deadly tsunami.
Deaths from the disaster continue to rise. But ordinary citizens around the world are using blogs -- short for Web logs -- to spread the word about conditions in the region and relief efforts.
Blogs are personal online journals that can cover just about anything. They've grown in prominence because they often have a unique perspective or provide news that regular media miss.
As word of the tsunami spread, blogs took on a new role. Bloggers in affected areas posted firsthand accounts of what was going on. And they told people how to pitch in.
"We decided our focus would be to tell people all over the world how they could help, where they could go and which organizations were taking relief," said Zig Zackly, who started the biggest tsunami blog, called South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami, or SEA-EAT.
The consultant and former journalist in Bombay, India, launched the blog on Dec. 28 -- two days after the tidal wave struck -- with a few computer-savvy friends.
"Within a week, well over 200, probably close to 300 people had pitched in from all over the world (to help run the blog)," Zackly said.
The volunteers posted hard-to-get information from all nations in the tsunami area. "We had close to a million hits from all over the world on our blog site in one week," said Zackly. "But it was probably more than that -- the visitor counter was busted. The servers were overwhelmed by the stuff that was coming in. The site collapsed twice."
Bloggers provided extensive Web links to charities and various nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs. They also published firsthand photos of the devastation and encouraged dialogue by getting readers to post e-mail responses.
The blogs also helped fill a bit of a media void, since many regular news outlets had smaller staffs during the Christmas-New Year holidays. Some were also slow to recognize the seriousness of the disaster and get news out.
By Wednesday, Dec. 29, three days after the tsunami hit, there had been 55,000 tsunami-related blog posts. And by Jan. 4, that number had risen to 73,300, says technorati-.com, a Web site that tracks blog activity.
Bloggers in India, the U.S. and Malaysia were among the most active.
Take Rhino's Blog, for instance. Written by Gary Rhine, a 53-year-old documentary filmmaker in California, it featured a range of tsunami information and links.
Rhine listed toll-free numbers that let readers donate to the American Friends Service Committee and Doctors Without Borders.
"My wife and I raised $20,000 for (tsunami-related) medical supplies through the blog and friends and relatives," Rhine said.
The reaction to the disaster has shown the strength of the Web community, bloggers say.
The SEA-EAT blog was sponsored by Google's (NasdaqNM:GOOG - News) free Blogspot online service. In an unusual move, Google worked to ensure that the site had "unlimited bandwidth" as its traffic rocketed, Zackly says.
The search service also created a link between Google's tsunami Web page and SEA-EAT.
The SEA-EAT blog was notable for the huge detail it provided on the disaster. It included hundreds of Web pages of information.
For example, there were province-by-province breakdowns of the dead, displaced and injured and the status of rescue operations in individual districts of Sri Lanka. Part of the blog dealt with missing persons in the tsunami area -- especially foreign tourists -- and provided family contact numbers for people who had information on the missing.
To help spread vital data, SEA-EAT volunteers sorted through the information on the blog and put it into a "wiki" news file on the Wikinews server.
Wikinews -- a service put out by Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia -- lets anyone report news on a wide range of subjects.
"The beauty of (SEA-EAT) is that it's become worldwide in the space of just one week," Zackly said. "People are collaborating from all over the world and are working in shifts to keep the blog going."
Jock Gill, who runs a new media consulting business called Penfield-Gill.com in Boston, says the blogger response to the tsunami is admirable. But there's much more to do.
The South Asian tsunami is a one-time event, he notes, while millions in Africa and elsewhere have suffered for years from AIDS, war, famine and other horrors. Bloggers have yet to fully address these sorts of long-term problems, he says.
"The question is: Can blogs help us invent a new form of person-to-person development assistance that works with government and NGO efforts to create new solutions to these problems?" he said.
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HatTip to Thomas. I couldn't find the original link, so I'm post the whole thing. I hope Doug Tsuruoka doesn't mind.
Web Logs Are Bringing Relief In Wake Of Tidal Wave Disaster
Wedesday, January 5, 2005
by Doug Tsuruoka
Bloggers are coming to the rescue in the wake of South Asia's deadly tsunami.
Deaths from the disaster continue to rise. But ordinary citizens around the world are using blogs -- short for Web logs -- to spread the word about conditions in the region and relief efforts.
Blogs are personal online journals that can cover just about anything. They've grown in prominence because they often have a unique perspective or provide news that regular media miss.
As word of the tsunami spread, blogs took on a new role. Bloggers in affected areas posted firsthand accounts of what was going on. And they told people how to pitch in.
"We decided our focus would be to tell people all over the world how they could help, where they could go and which organizations were taking relief," said Zig Zackly, who started the biggest tsunami blog, called South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami, or SEA-EAT.
The consultant and former journalist in Bombay, India, launched the blog on Dec. 28 -- two days after the tidal wave struck -- with a few computer-savvy friends.
"Within a week, well over 200, probably close to 300 people had pitched in from all over the world (to help run the blog)," Zackly said.
The volunteers posted hard-to-get information from all nations in the tsunami area. "We had close to a million hits from all over the world on our blog site in one week," said Zackly. "But it was probably more than that -- the visitor counter was busted. The servers were overwhelmed by the stuff that was coming in. The site collapsed twice."
Bloggers provided extensive Web links to charities and various nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs. They also published firsthand photos of the devastation and encouraged dialogue by getting readers to post e-mail responses.
The blogs also helped fill a bit of a media void, since many regular news outlets had smaller staffs during the Christmas-New Year holidays. Some were also slow to recognize the seriousness of the disaster and get news out.
By Wednesday, Dec. 29, three days after the tsunami hit, there had been 55,000 tsunami-related blog posts. And by Jan. 4, that number had risen to 73,300, says technorati-.com, a Web site that tracks blog activity.
Bloggers in India, the U.S. and Malaysia were among the most active.
Take Rhino's Blog, for instance. Written by Gary Rhine, a 53-year-old documentary filmmaker in California, it featured a range of tsunami information and links.
Rhine listed toll-free numbers that let readers donate to the American Friends Service Committee and Doctors Without Borders.
"My wife and I raised $20,000 for (tsunami-related) medical supplies through the blog and friends and relatives," Rhine said.
The reaction to the disaster has shown the strength of the Web community, bloggers say.
The SEA-EAT blog was sponsored by Google's (NasdaqNM:GOOG - News) free Blogspot online service. In an unusual move, Google worked to ensure that the site had "unlimited bandwidth" as its traffic rocketed, Zackly says.
The search service also created a link between Google's tsunami Web page and SEA-EAT.
The SEA-EAT blog was notable for the huge detail it provided on the disaster. It included hundreds of Web pages of information.
For example, there were province-by-province breakdowns of the dead, displaced and injured and the status of rescue operations in individual districts of Sri Lanka. Part of the blog dealt with missing persons in the tsunami area -- especially foreign tourists -- and provided family contact numbers for people who had information on the missing.
To help spread vital data, SEA-EAT volunteers sorted through the information on the blog and put it into a "wiki" news file on the Wikinews server.
Wikinews -- a service put out by Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia -- lets anyone report news on a wide range of subjects.
"The beauty of (SEA-EAT) is that it's become worldwide in the space of just one week," Zackly said. "People are collaborating from all over the world and are working in shifts to keep the blog going."
Jock Gill, who runs a new media consulting business called Penfield-Gill.com in Boston, says the blogger response to the tsunami is admirable. But there's much more to do.
The South Asian tsunami is a one-time event, he notes, while millions in Africa and elsewhere have suffered for years from AIDS, war, famine and other horrors. Bloggers have yet to fully address these sorts of long-term problems, he says.
"The question is: Can blogs help us invent a new form of person-to-person development assistance that works with government and NGO efforts to create new solutions to these problems?" he said.
SMARTEST ROBOT IN KOREA... POWER OF THE NETWORK
"South Korea claims world's smartest robot"
South Korean scientists said they had developed the world's smartest robot able to think and learn like a human.
Unveiling their creation, they said the robot that looks like a small teenager wearing a blue and grey space suit was the first wireless network-based human-like robot.
It can become wiser through learning because unlike other robots, the device is linked with an outside computer through a high-speed wireless telecom network, and is able to exchange information with the server and respond quickly to real-life environments.
"This is the first network-based humanoid in the world," said You Bum-Jae of the state-financed Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), introducing the 150-centimeter (60 inches)-high robot weighing 67 kilogrammes (147 pounds).
"We developed this humanoid focusing on intelligence capability by taking advantage of networking technology in which South Korea is strong," he said.
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"South Korea claims world's smartest robot"
South Korean scientists said they had developed the world's smartest robot able to think and learn like a human.
Unveiling their creation, they said the robot that looks like a small teenager wearing a blue and grey space suit was the first wireless network-based human-like robot.
It can become wiser through learning because unlike other robots, the device is linked with an outside computer through a high-speed wireless telecom network, and is able to exchange information with the server and respond quickly to real-life environments.
"This is the first network-based humanoid in the world," said You Bum-Jae of the state-financed Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), introducing the 150-centimeter (60 inches)-high robot weighing 67 kilogrammes (147 pounds).
"We developed this humanoid focusing on intelligence capability by taking advantage of networking technology in which South Korea is strong," he said.
INTEL BOOSTS INVESTMENT IN THE DIGITAL HOME... ZINIO? SHOULD BE INNOTIVE
Intel Corporation today announced that its venture investing organization, Intel Capital, has made three additional investments in companies developing innovative technologies for the digital home.
The new investments, made from the $200 million Intel Digital Home Fund, include a first-time investment in Gteko Ltd., an ease-of-use networking and support software company, and follow-on financing for Synacor Inc., a provider of portals and technology for delivering bundled online services, and Zinio Systems Inc., a digital magazine distributor.
Zinio? Should have been Innotive, the company I worked with, currently an advisor for, and wrote about here and here.
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Intel Corporation today announced that its venture investing organization, Intel Capital, has made three additional investments in companies developing innovative technologies for the digital home.
The new investments, made from the $200 million Intel Digital Home Fund, include a first-time investment in Gteko Ltd., an ease-of-use networking and support software company, and follow-on financing for Synacor Inc., a provider of portals and technology for delivering bundled online services, and Zinio Systems Inc., a digital magazine distributor.
Zinio? Should have been Innotive, the company I worked with, currently an advisor for, and wrote about here and here.
Saturday, January 08, 2005
OBJECTIVE MEDIA?... BIAS OR UNBIASED?
Roger Simon has a good post and something to think about, especially if you read my first article at AlwaysOn and the discussion posts that followed.
I read two interviews with Internet opinion leaders yesterday - Kathryn Jean Lopez, editor of National Review Online, and Jimmy Wales, co-founder of Wikipedia. They are interesting to read together because they seem polar opposite solutions to the same problem - journalistic bias. Kathy (obvious disclosure: I occasionally write for NRO) is an articulate spokeswoman for what one might call the "honest bias" school of journalism (and by extension blogging):
The objective media thing is a charade. I'm not sure what the point of pretending otherwise is. We'd have livelier pieces to read and more serious debates, I think, if everyone just became an honest reporter/editor/publication. Report and do it with your slant. Just stop pretending to be doing otherwise.
"Jimbo" Wales talks of the forthcoming Wikinews this way:
At Wikipedia, we have very, very strong neutral policy. We call it a neutral point of view, and it's really one of the central organizing principles of everything we do, including the news project.
But how does he preserve this neutrality and who defines it? It seems to come down to this:
One thing people don't realize about Wikipedia is that there is a strong community--this group of 200 to 300 heavy contributors, especially. We all know each other. And you get to know, within the community, who is respected and who is authoritative.
In other words, you get to know who is supposedly neutral and who is not. I have to say I am suspicious. I think what you are getting to know is who is the subtlest and best advocate of his or her point of view. There is no simple solution to this.
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Roger Simon has a good post and something to think about, especially if you read my first article at AlwaysOn and the discussion posts that followed.
I read two interviews with Internet opinion leaders yesterday - Kathryn Jean Lopez, editor of National Review Online, and Jimmy Wales, co-founder of Wikipedia. They are interesting to read together because they seem polar opposite solutions to the same problem - journalistic bias. Kathy (obvious disclosure: I occasionally write for NRO) is an articulate spokeswoman for what one might call the "honest bias" school of journalism (and by extension blogging):
The objective media thing is a charade. I'm not sure what the point of pretending otherwise is. We'd have livelier pieces to read and more serious debates, I think, if everyone just became an honest reporter/editor/publication. Report and do it with your slant. Just stop pretending to be doing otherwise.
"Jimbo" Wales talks of the forthcoming Wikinews this way:
At Wikipedia, we have very, very strong neutral policy. We call it a neutral point of view, and it's really one of the central organizing principles of everything we do, including the news project.
But how does he preserve this neutrality and who defines it? It seems to come down to this:
One thing people don't realize about Wikipedia is that there is a strong community--this group of 200 to 300 heavy contributors, especially. We all know each other. And you get to know, within the community, who is respected and who is authoritative.
In other words, you get to know who is supposedly neutral and who is not. I have to say I am suspicious. I think what you are getting to know is who is the subtlest and best advocate of his or her point of view. There is no simple solution to this.
Thursday, January 06, 2005
START OF MY "REALITY MEDIA" COLUMN AT ALWAYSON
My bi-weekly column at AlwaysOn got started today. Check it out!
Watch Out, Traditional Media!
The collective intelligence and power of the blogosphere are bringing accountability and competition to broadcast news and journalism.
The tagline for my column reads:
As social networks and blogs become more integrated into our daily digital world, we examine the events, trends and technology across the globe will affect this sector.
This is a good and fun initial foray into journalism. Even though AlwaysOn is a tech blog, the center space of the site is managed by editors similar to a newspaper or magazine. My editor, Jill, was great and I already learned some aspects of writing that I didn't know about from her. It's also interesting to see the editing process. Actually, here is a copy of my initial draft, so check this out and compare with what's up at AlwaysOn:
Shifting From Reality TV To Reality Media
It seems there was a shift in the reading and viewing habits for the world in 2004. Reality television lost its luster and people were getting tire of this genre while eyeballs continued to multiply towards content with substance – from the Internet. With blogs leading the way, old mediums were left scratching their heads like Elmer Fudd looking for Bugs Bunny after being blindsided by the likes of Power Line (Time’s Blog of the Year), Engadget, and others breaking news days before their mainstream media counterparts on everything from false documents used by “60 Minutes” to faulty Kryptonite locks.
John Hinderaker, one of Power Line’s bloggers, stated in an interview for this post:
“Whenever I look at one of those newspaper dispensers, I look at the headlines and I’m always kind of surprised because they seem so out of date. I tell myself, ‘They’re still talking about that?’ There’s always a day or two lag. Blogs, and the Internet in general, have accelerated the pace of the news cycle. In the blogosphere, there are really two or three news cycles within a day. If something is more than six to eight hours old in the blogosphere, it’s really part of a former news cycle. The speed has really changed how people view information.”
In another way, time isn’t a factor in the blogosphere. Posts on blogs are just part of a greater conversation on the Internet. They can be a starting point or just a part of the continuing discussion. As Jeff Jarvis states, “We used to think that the news was finished when we printed it, but that’s when the news now begins.”
In the old days, this piece would probably be too dated to be published, especially if I just focused on a review of activities in 2004, but through the medium of blogs it’s still timely and relevant… well, within certain boundaries.
Probably the most important characteristic of this widespread move towards “reality media” in 2004 has been the power of collective intelligence. We see it here at AlwaysOn almost everyday. No article or post is complete without some commentary, correction, or additional information from a community member. The most significant example of this in 2004 was Power Line’s lead in proving Dan Rather’s use of false documents in a “60 Minutes” story on President Bush’s Texas National Guard service. I asked John Hinderaker about whether the breaking of the “Rathergate” story was the first time he experienced the collective intelligence and power of blogs at work:
“Well, no. For years people have been predicting that the Internet would be a significant political medium, but until this year I didn’t think it happened. This year there were a number of respects in which it was. You start with the Howard Dean campaign and its use of the web for fundraising and organizing. Subsequent to that is the Bush campaign. It’s less well known, but they did a better job in using the Internet to communicate with supporters, raise money, and so forth. The thing that I thought put the whole medium over the top was the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth story. When they started out they only had $200,000 and only had enough money to buy advertising on three TV stations in Ohio. Kerry’s advisors told him don’t respond and don’t mention it. The media is not going to cover it. They can’t hurt you because they have no money. The group put the ad up on their website and we and many other blogs and websites directed traffic there. Two weeks after that ad came out even though virtually no one had seen it on television. Somebody did a poll that 57% of all respondents knew about the ad and a lot of them had already seen it. What the vets had done was circumventing all the traditional media and use the Internet to get the message out. Of course along with seeing the ads a lot of people made donations. It was the day after the survey came up the Kerry people just freaked because their assumption was that without money the vets couldn’t do any damage, and they were right that the mainstream media would blockade the story and they did. Then you had “Christmas in Cambodia” and so forth and we played a significant role in that along with various other blogs. Even without Rathergate, which I already stated in a lecture I gave in South Dakota, that this is the year that the Internet came into its own as a political medium. Obviously the CBS story was icing on the cake.”
As a reader of Power Line, the amazing aspect of watching “Rathergate” unfold was that it wasn’t just their blog, but several dozen others collaborating with hundreds of their readers who emailed numerous pieces of information that validated the forgery of the documents. The collective intelligence and power of the blogosphere still has doubters.
A few weeks ago I was reading a USA Today article on our own Tony Perkins and came across this statement by Jason Pontin, Editor-in-Chief of MIT’s Technology Review, "The blogosphere doesn't have the capacity to produce analytical, well-researched journalism." I assume this type of thinking is not limited to Jason, but also prevalent among many journalists and mainstream media people who unaware of what the blogosphere really is. I asked Simon Waldman, Director of Digital Publishing for Guardian Newspapers and a blogger (personal blog and “50 quid bloke”), about some reaction to this statement and he said:
“I think the issue is a lot less about the merits or otherwise of bloggers' writing and research, and much more about the impact that bloggers - both as individuals and as a mass are having on the shape and structure of the net.
At one level this is about the impact that individual 'power bloggers' can have on bringing a particular story or issue into the limelight. At another level it’s the bloggers en masse are having – either through aggregation services such as Blogdex and Technorati, or through their impact on Google.
Overall, I think that the combination of blogs, RSS and the ongoing integration of news readers into browsers and e-mail clients is starting to lead to a real change in the way that people will find and consume information. And, no media organisation, traditional or
otherwise, can afford to be ignorant of that change and/or to think that it won't affect them.”
Hinderaker added:
“Well, that’s just silly. Why not? Scott and I have been writing together for newspapers and magazines since 1992. We’ve produced dozens and dozens of newspaper columns, we’ve produced longer research papers, some of which are linked to off our website and some of which have been very influential before the growth of the Internet. Why would people who write blogs be uniquely incapable of either analyzing or researching? That’s just silly…
The blogosphere has made them (mainstream media) pretty nervous. I know many journalists read Power Line. It’s amazing to me how many journalists read our site. I think that the knowledge that there is a whole army of people out there fact checking them has undoubtedly has caused a lot of journalists to be more carefully. I think that’s good.”
Mainstream has taken a bit of a beating this past year in its credibility and viewership. Every mainstream medium has declined in circulation and eyeballs besides the Internet. The Pew Research Center for People and the Press put out a report that reveal how the trust in mainstream media outlets has been declining since 1996. In 1996, approximately 32% of “people who believe ‘all or most’ of what a CBS News says” versus 24% in 2004. NBC and ABC News encountered similar declines and hover around 24%. Wall Street Journal had 36% of “people who believe ‘all or most’ of” what they wrote in 1996, and now only 24% believe in them. Local papers face percentages less than 20%.
The funny aspect of Jason Pontin’s quote is that he contacted Tony and told him how the reporter from USA Today quoted him out of context. If only USA Today was set up as a blog or a blog/social network like AlwaysOn, where that reporter would get an earful from people like Ed, Jeff, or Jason himself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note by columnist:
In this column, I will be covering the intersection of the blogosphere and social networking, which I will refer to as “slogging” (slog v. to social network and blog). I was just tired of writing “blogs and social networks” or “social networking and blogging.”
When I asked our own active community member, Marc Canter, about the events of this past year in the blogosphere and world of social networks he said:
“I lump the two into one. I don’t differentiate social networking and blogging. I consider both in the new era of software which I called Digital Lifestyle Aggregation. Publishing with text is the first step, but we’re always seeing the beginning of audio and video blogging…
All software is about people. It always has been. What we see and know as social networking is simply a recognition of the fact that rather than these big companies trying to lock our names into same membership database and charge us money and treat us like consumers. It’s the other way around now. You start with the viral effect of the communities interacting with each other then from that are a lot of opportunities.”
And lots of content. Looking forward to interacting with the AlwaysOn community on the “slogophere” in 2005. If you have any suggestions for topics, please feel free to email me at bernard.moon@gmail.com or send a message through the AlwaysOn channels. Thanks!
|
My bi-weekly column at AlwaysOn got started today. Check it out!
Watch Out, Traditional Media!
The collective intelligence and power of the blogosphere are bringing accountability and competition to broadcast news and journalism.
The tagline for my column reads:
As social networks and blogs become more integrated into our daily digital world, we examine the events, trends and technology across the globe will affect this sector.
This is a good and fun initial foray into journalism. Even though AlwaysOn is a tech blog, the center space of the site is managed by editors similar to a newspaper or magazine. My editor, Jill, was great and I already learned some aspects of writing that I didn't know about from her. It's also interesting to see the editing process. Actually, here is a copy of my initial draft, so check this out and compare with what's up at AlwaysOn:
Shifting From Reality TV To Reality Media
It seems there was a shift in the reading and viewing habits for the world in 2004. Reality television lost its luster and people were getting tire of this genre while eyeballs continued to multiply towards content with substance – from the Internet. With blogs leading the way, old mediums were left scratching their heads like Elmer Fudd looking for Bugs Bunny after being blindsided by the likes of Power Line (Time’s Blog of the Year), Engadget, and others breaking news days before their mainstream media counterparts on everything from false documents used by “60 Minutes” to faulty Kryptonite locks.
John Hinderaker, one of Power Line’s bloggers, stated in an interview for this post:
“Whenever I look at one of those newspaper dispensers, I look at the headlines and I’m always kind of surprised because they seem so out of date. I tell myself, ‘They’re still talking about that?’ There’s always a day or two lag. Blogs, and the Internet in general, have accelerated the pace of the news cycle. In the blogosphere, there are really two or three news cycles within a day. If something is more than six to eight hours old in the blogosphere, it’s really part of a former news cycle. The speed has really changed how people view information.”
In another way, time isn’t a factor in the blogosphere. Posts on blogs are just part of a greater conversation on the Internet. They can be a starting point or just a part of the continuing discussion. As Jeff Jarvis states, “We used to think that the news was finished when we printed it, but that’s when the news now begins.”
In the old days, this piece would probably be too dated to be published, especially if I just focused on a review of activities in 2004, but through the medium of blogs it’s still timely and relevant… well, within certain boundaries.
Probably the most important characteristic of this widespread move towards “reality media” in 2004 has been the power of collective intelligence. We see it here at AlwaysOn almost everyday. No article or post is complete without some commentary, correction, or additional information from a community member. The most significant example of this in 2004 was Power Line’s lead in proving Dan Rather’s use of false documents in a “60 Minutes” story on President Bush’s Texas National Guard service. I asked John Hinderaker about whether the breaking of the “Rathergate” story was the first time he experienced the collective intelligence and power of blogs at work:
“Well, no. For years people have been predicting that the Internet would be a significant political medium, but until this year I didn’t think it happened. This year there were a number of respects in which it was. You start with the Howard Dean campaign and its use of the web for fundraising and organizing. Subsequent to that is the Bush campaign. It’s less well known, but they did a better job in using the Internet to communicate with supporters, raise money, and so forth. The thing that I thought put the whole medium over the top was the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth story. When they started out they only had $200,000 and only had enough money to buy advertising on three TV stations in Ohio. Kerry’s advisors told him don’t respond and don’t mention it. The media is not going to cover it. They can’t hurt you because they have no money. The group put the ad up on their website and we and many other blogs and websites directed traffic there. Two weeks after that ad came out even though virtually no one had seen it on television. Somebody did a poll that 57% of all respondents knew about the ad and a lot of them had already seen it. What the vets had done was circumventing all the traditional media and use the Internet to get the message out. Of course along with seeing the ads a lot of people made donations. It was the day after the survey came up the Kerry people just freaked because their assumption was that without money the vets couldn’t do any damage, and they were right that the mainstream media would blockade the story and they did. Then you had “Christmas in Cambodia” and so forth and we played a significant role in that along with various other blogs. Even without Rathergate, which I already stated in a lecture I gave in South Dakota, that this is the year that the Internet came into its own as a political medium. Obviously the CBS story was icing on the cake.”
As a reader of Power Line, the amazing aspect of watching “Rathergate” unfold was that it wasn’t just their blog, but several dozen others collaborating with hundreds of their readers who emailed numerous pieces of information that validated the forgery of the documents. The collective intelligence and power of the blogosphere still has doubters.
A few weeks ago I was reading a USA Today article on our own Tony Perkins and came across this statement by Jason Pontin, Editor-in-Chief of MIT’s Technology Review, "The blogosphere doesn't have the capacity to produce analytical, well-researched journalism." I assume this type of thinking is not limited to Jason, but also prevalent among many journalists and mainstream media people who unaware of what the blogosphere really is. I asked Simon Waldman, Director of Digital Publishing for Guardian Newspapers and a blogger (personal blog and “50 quid bloke”), about some reaction to this statement and he said:
“I think the issue is a lot less about the merits or otherwise of bloggers' writing and research, and much more about the impact that bloggers - both as individuals and as a mass are having on the shape and structure of the net.
At one level this is about the impact that individual 'power bloggers' can have on bringing a particular story or issue into the limelight. At another level it’s the bloggers en masse are having – either through aggregation services such as Blogdex and Technorati, or through their impact on Google.
Overall, I think that the combination of blogs, RSS and the ongoing integration of news readers into browsers and e-mail clients is starting to lead to a real change in the way that people will find and consume information. And, no media organisation, traditional or
otherwise, can afford to be ignorant of that change and/or to think that it won't affect them.”
Hinderaker added:
“Well, that’s just silly. Why not? Scott and I have been writing together for newspapers and magazines since 1992. We’ve produced dozens and dozens of newspaper columns, we’ve produced longer research papers, some of which are linked to off our website and some of which have been very influential before the growth of the Internet. Why would people who write blogs be uniquely incapable of either analyzing or researching? That’s just silly…
The blogosphere has made them (mainstream media) pretty nervous. I know many journalists read Power Line. It’s amazing to me how many journalists read our site. I think that the knowledge that there is a whole army of people out there fact checking them has undoubtedly has caused a lot of journalists to be more carefully. I think that’s good.”
Mainstream has taken a bit of a beating this past year in its credibility and viewership. Every mainstream medium has declined in circulation and eyeballs besides the Internet. The Pew Research Center for People and the Press put out a report that reveal how the trust in mainstream media outlets has been declining since 1996. In 1996, approximately 32% of “people who believe ‘all or most’ of what a CBS News says” versus 24% in 2004. NBC and ABC News encountered similar declines and hover around 24%. Wall Street Journal had 36% of “people who believe ‘all or most’ of” what they wrote in 1996, and now only 24% believe in them. Local papers face percentages less than 20%.
The funny aspect of Jason Pontin’s quote is that he contacted Tony and told him how the reporter from USA Today quoted him out of context. If only USA Today was set up as a blog or a blog/social network like AlwaysOn, where that reporter would get an earful from people like Ed, Jeff, or Jason himself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note by columnist:
In this column, I will be covering the intersection of the blogosphere and social networking, which I will refer to as “slogging” (slog v. to social network and blog). I was just tired of writing “blogs and social networks” or “social networking and blogging.”
When I asked our own active community member, Marc Canter, about the events of this past year in the blogosphere and world of social networks he said:
“I lump the two into one. I don’t differentiate social networking and blogging. I consider both in the new era of software which I called Digital Lifestyle Aggregation. Publishing with text is the first step, but we’re always seeing the beginning of audio and video blogging…
All software is about people. It always has been. What we see and know as social networking is simply a recognition of the fact that rather than these big companies trying to lock our names into same membership database and charge us money and treat us like consumers. It’s the other way around now. You start with the viral effect of the communities interacting with each other then from that are a lot of opportunities.”
And lots of content. Looking forward to interacting with the AlwaysOn community on the “slogophere” in 2005. If you have any suggestions for topics, please feel free to email me at bernard.moon@gmail.com or send a message through the AlwaysOn channels. Thanks!
Wednesday, January 05, 2005
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"TOP 10 DIGITAL ENTERTAINMENT TRENDS FOR 2005"
Pretty good TopTen list by Michael Stroud at AlwaysOn.
Actually, my first article for my bi-weekly column over there is going up tomorrow.
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Pretty good TopTen list by Michael Stroud at AlwaysOn.
Actually, my first article for my bi-weekly column over there is going up tomorrow.
WIKI FEEDS SUCK
Agree with Jeremy Zawodny on this and his statement that he's not a big fan of Wikis. They are interesting in terms of how they spur collaborative projects and efforts, but there are also situations were agreement doesn't take place. With no primary moderator, things can become chaotic. A minor example is on Wikipedia how entries such as President Bush's creates so much conflict and back and forth changes.
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Agree with Jeremy Zawodny on this and his statement that he's not a big fan of Wikis. They are interesting in terms of how they spur collaborative projects and efforts, but there are also situations were agreement doesn't take place. With no primary moderator, things can become chaotic. A minor example is on Wikipedia how entries such as President Bush's creates so much conflict and back and forth changes.
EXEEM... A LIGHT FOR BITTORRENT
From News.com...
Just weeks after legal attacks crippled the popular BitTorrent file-swapping community, an underground programmer from its ranks has stepped forward to announce new software designed to withstand future onslaughts from Hollywood.
Dubbed Exeem, the software has already been distributed in a closed beta, or early test format, by the creators of the SuprNova.org Web site, which was until late last month the most popular hub for the BitTorrent file-swapping community. (full article)
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From News.com...
Just weeks after legal attacks crippled the popular BitTorrent file-swapping community, an underground programmer from its ranks has stepped forward to announce new software designed to withstand future onslaughts from Hollywood.
Dubbed Exeem, the software has already been distributed in a closed beta, or early test format, by the creators of the SuprNova.org Web site, which was until late last month the most popular hub for the BitTorrent file-swapping community. (full article)
Tuesday, January 04, 2005
HECTIC, SORRY... "FOCKERS PUZZLED BY SPATE OF PRANK CALLS"
No links or blogging today. Sorry, I was swamped today. Here's an amusing post at The Daily Ripper.
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No links or blogging today. Sorry, I was swamped today. Here's an amusing post at The Daily Ripper.
Monday, January 03, 2005
ORB NETWORKS... "START-UP BEAMS TV INTO YOUR HAND"
News.com has an article on Orb Networks, but it was written a week before at AlwaysOn. There's actually a good discussion at Tony's post with Mitch Ratcliffe and Jeff Hearon there.
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News.com has an article on Orb Networks, but it was written a week before at AlwaysOn. There's actually a good discussion at Tony's post with Mitch Ratcliffe and Jeff Hearon there.
WHO IS COREY PEIN?... KISSING CBS NEWS ASS
Okay. It's not good when I use "ass" twice in a row in my headers. I'm going to be in trouble from my fiance who says I degrade the quality of my writing with such words.
Anyway, Corey Pein at Columbia Journalism Review writes an article kissing some mainstream media butt. He spins the whole "Rathergate" affair against the bloggers involved. I think he wants a job at CBS News.
UPDATE: Power Line tackles Pein... And he fumbles!
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Okay. It's not good when I use "ass" twice in a row in my headers. I'm going to be in trouble from my fiance who says I degrade the quality of my writing with such words.
Anyway, Corey Pein at Columbia Journalism Review writes an article kissing some mainstream media butt. He spins the whole "Rathergate" affair against the bloggers involved. I think he wants a job at CBS News.
UPDATE: Power Line tackles Pein... And he fumbles!
PEJMAN YOUSEFZADEH KICKS NICK COLEMAN'S ASS
HatTip to Power Line. Pretty funny and good post by Pejman Yousefzadeh over at Tech Central Station (excerpt from somewhere in the middle):
Reading the column, one does not know whether to laugh at Coleman's evident immaturity, or cry over the fact that he's actually getting paid to write opinion columns. Coleman's column mixes amateurish insults (calling Power Line "Powertool," speculating on the state and function of -- I kid you not -- Hinderaker's and Johnson's . . . er . . . reproductive organs and calling Hinderaker and Johnson "Rottweilers" and "partisan hacks,") with lousy fact-checking. Breathlessly seeking to contradict Scott Johnson's statement that the Time Magazine "Blog of the Year" award was "totally unexpected," Coleman informs us that "Powerline campaigned shamelessly for awards, winning an online 'Best Blog of 2004' a week before the Time honor. That online award was a bloggers' poll, and Powerline linked its readers to the award site 10 times during the balloting, shilling for votes." What an online "bloggers' poll" has to do with winning an award from Time for "Blog of the Year," Coleman does not explain (you can find the online poll here in the event that you are really interested, and just for full disclosure, let me state that my blog was a candidate for one of the awards and finished fourth, thank you very much). Blogger and UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh is treats Coleman's incoherent ranting with the contempt it deserves:
"Wow, they won an online poll! And they wanted to win it, and tried to get their readers to vote for them. Therefore, they're lying when they say that they didn't expect being named Blog of the Year by Time Magazine. The penetrating logic astounds me."
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HatTip to Power Line. Pretty funny and good post by Pejman Yousefzadeh over at Tech Central Station (excerpt from somewhere in the middle):
Reading the column, one does not know whether to laugh at Coleman's evident immaturity, or cry over the fact that he's actually getting paid to write opinion columns. Coleman's column mixes amateurish insults (calling Power Line "Powertool," speculating on the state and function of -- I kid you not -- Hinderaker's and Johnson's . . . er . . . reproductive organs and calling Hinderaker and Johnson "Rottweilers" and "partisan hacks,") with lousy fact-checking. Breathlessly seeking to contradict Scott Johnson's statement that the Time Magazine "Blog of the Year" award was "totally unexpected," Coleman informs us that "Powerline campaigned shamelessly for awards, winning an online 'Best Blog of 2004' a week before the Time honor. That online award was a bloggers' poll, and Powerline linked its readers to the award site 10 times during the balloting, shilling for votes." What an online "bloggers' poll" has to do with winning an award from Time for "Blog of the Year," Coleman does not explain (you can find the online poll here in the event that you are really interested, and just for full disclosure, let me state that my blog was a candidate for one of the awards and finished fourth, thank you very much). Blogger and UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh is treats Coleman's incoherent ranting with the contempt it deserves:
"Wow, they won an online poll! And they wanted to win it, and tried to get their readers to vote for them. Therefore, they're lying when they say that they didn't expect being named Blog of the Year by Time Magazine. The penetrating logic astounds me."
BLOGS, BLOGS... THEY'RE EVERYWHERE!
Year end articles on blogs in major magazines. Finally this sector is getting the press is deserved. Of course Time had Power Line as their Blog of the Year, which I posted previously:
Blogs Have Their Day
How three amateur journalists dethroned an icon and turned the mainstream media upside down, all without quitting their day jobs. (subscription needed)
Fortune in this month's issue has, "Why There's No escaping The Blog"
Time again has this one, "10 Things We Learned About Blogs"
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Year end articles on blogs in major magazines. Finally this sector is getting the press is deserved. Of course Time had Power Line as their Blog of the Year, which I posted previously:
Blogs Have Their Day
How three amateur journalists dethroned an icon and turned the mainstream media upside down, all without quitting their day jobs. (subscription needed)
Fortune in this month's issue has, "Why There's No escaping The Blog"
Time again has this one, "10 Things We Learned About Blogs"
Sunday, January 02, 2005
"U.N. OFFICAL BACKTRACKS AFTER CALLING U.S. 'STINGY'"
Old but annoying article. What a bitter dork. Should he be even representing the U.N. after such biased comments that stem from deeper emotions? Huge lack of professionalism, and slanted views that blind him from the facts:
Despite his claim of being "misinterpreted," a review of the transcript of Mr. Egeland's initial press briefing confirms that he asked reporters at the United Nations why Western countries are "so stingy" and specifically cited the United States as an example of a country whose citizens want to pay more taxes so that foreign aid can be increased.
"An unprecedented disaster like this one should lead to unprecedented generosity," Mr. Egeland said in his Monday briefing.
Mr. Egeland complained that the United States gives only 0.14 percent of its gross domestic product to foreign development aid, compared with 0.92 percent given by his native Norway. In this category, Norway ranks first and the United States ranks last on a list of 22 industrialized nations compiled by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
"The foreign assistance of many countries now is 0.1 or 0.2 percent of their gross national income," Mr. Egeland said on Monday. "I think that is stingy really. I don't think that is very generous."
He pointed out that only Scandinavian countries like Norway, Sweden and Denmark, as well as the Netherlands and Luxembourg, give at least 0.7 percent of their gross national income, a level suggested by the United Nations 25 years ago.
Mr. Egeland — a former journalist, deputy foreign minister of Norway and head of that nation's Amnesty International chapter — did not mention that the U.S. government gave $15.8 billion, more than any other nation, to development aid last year, compared to $2 billion by Norway.
The U.S. figure does not include massive infusions of cash to Iraq and Afghanistan. Nor does it include the category of food aid, where the United States is the largest donor in the world, or charitable contributions by private American individuals, churches and other organizations.
MORE from Power Line:
Via Tim Blair, Chuck Simmins has tried to tabulate contributions by American individuals and companies to tsunami relief efforts. His total so far: $169 million.
And that doesn't even count the aircraft carriers.
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Old but annoying article. What a bitter dork. Should he be even representing the U.N. after such biased comments that stem from deeper emotions? Huge lack of professionalism, and slanted views that blind him from the facts:
Despite his claim of being "misinterpreted," a review of the transcript of Mr. Egeland's initial press briefing confirms that he asked reporters at the United Nations why Western countries are "so stingy" and specifically cited the United States as an example of a country whose citizens want to pay more taxes so that foreign aid can be increased.
"An unprecedented disaster like this one should lead to unprecedented generosity," Mr. Egeland said in his Monday briefing.
Mr. Egeland complained that the United States gives only 0.14 percent of its gross domestic product to foreign development aid, compared with 0.92 percent given by his native Norway. In this category, Norway ranks first and the United States ranks last on a list of 22 industrialized nations compiled by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
"The foreign assistance of many countries now is 0.1 or 0.2 percent of their gross national income," Mr. Egeland said on Monday. "I think that is stingy really. I don't think that is very generous."
He pointed out that only Scandinavian countries like Norway, Sweden and Denmark, as well as the Netherlands and Luxembourg, give at least 0.7 percent of their gross national income, a level suggested by the United Nations 25 years ago.
Mr. Egeland — a former journalist, deputy foreign minister of Norway and head of that nation's Amnesty International chapter — did not mention that the U.S. government gave $15.8 billion, more than any other nation, to development aid last year, compared to $2 billion by Norway.
The U.S. figure does not include massive infusions of cash to Iraq and Afghanistan. Nor does it include the category of food aid, where the United States is the largest donor in the world, or charitable contributions by private American individuals, churches and other organizations.
MORE from Power Line:
Via Tim Blair, Chuck Simmins has tried to tabulate contributions by American individuals and companies to tsunami relief efforts. His total so far: $169 million.
And that doesn't even count the aircraft carriers.
BUILDING "ROBOTECH"
Old but pretty cool article on a guy building a giant exoskeleton like the ones in the old "Robotech" cartoons. I loved "Robotech" when I was in younger and also playing Battletech in my college years.
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Old but pretty cool article on a guy building a giant exoskeleton like the ones in the old "Robotech" cartoons. I loved "Robotech" when I was in younger and also playing Battletech in my college years.
WEBJAY... POWER OF COMMUNITY ON THE WEB
Check out Webjay, which is a MP3 playlist sharing site. Pretty cool. Download it for your iPod, Rio, or whatever.
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Check out Webjay, which is a MP3 playlist sharing site. Pretty cool. Download it for your iPod, Rio, or whatever.
BLOG BUSINESS SUMMIT... JANUARY 24-25 IN SEATTLE
Blog Business Summit is coming up. It's in Seattle on January 24th-25th. If you're interested in attending, just click below.
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Blog Business Summit is coming up. It's in Seattle on January 24th-25th. If you're interested in attending, just click below.
Saturday, January 01, 2005
HAPPY NEW YEARS! 2005 HERE WE COME!!
Looking forward to this coming year. Time really does fly. Hope everyone had a safe and fun New Years celebration. I just chilled with my fiance at a small gathering at a friend's house. We had a gift exchange and played some board games.
Couple of my friends did a midnight run in Central Park and chilled afterwards. Of course some friends partied hard, but many of us are just getting older and entering a different phase of celebrations. I remember two years ago party hopping in Seoul with my friends, Billy, Mike, Jimmy J. and others. Good times, but old memories now. This year's celebration was perfect.
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Looking forward to this coming year. Time really does fly. Hope everyone had a safe and fun New Years celebration. I just chilled with my fiance at a small gathering at a friend's house. We had a gift exchange and played some board games.
Couple of my friends did a midnight run in Central Park and chilled afterwards. Of course some friends partied hard, but many of us are just getting older and entering a different phase of celebrations. I remember two years ago party hopping in Seoul with my friends, Billy, Mike, Jimmy J. and others. Good times, but old memories now. This year's celebration was perfect.
Business & Technology, Politics, and Random Posts from the Left, Right, and Elsewhere
Place of Birth: Seoul, Korea
Hometown: Northbrook, IL USA
Lived in: Seoul, Chicago (Villa Park & Northbrook), Madison, WI, Springfield, IL, St. Louis, New York City, Chicago (Glenview), Seoul, San Francisco
Also blogs at: AlwaysOn, Coro Blog, SportsBlog
More on Bernard or Blogger profile or GoingOn profile or Linkedin profile
Max Yow
Homeland: Canada
Sports: combative sports, sports you play with a ball, sports with no swimming, sports you can play while drinking and smoking (pool, darts, bowling, video games).
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"You cannot go on explaining away things over forever or you will find that you have explained even explanation itself away. You cannot go on seeing through things forever because the whole point of seeing through something is to see something else through it." - C.S Lewis
December 11, 2005
"This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." - Western Union internal memo, 1876
December 4, 2005
"You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individual. To that end each of us must work for his own improvement, and at the same time share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful." - Marie Curie
November 27, 2005
"One cannot step into the same river twice." - Heratidus
November 20, 2005
"The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference and undernourishment." - Robert Maynard Hutchins
November 13, 2005
"We are moving away from the old idea of leadership -- leadership has less to do (now) with heroism. We don’t look for... unblemished omnipotent heroes, but leaders who are complex, dependent, changeable... We do not need one dominant authority structure telling all our inner voices to shut up..." - Walter Truett Anderson
November 6, 2005
"To know oneself is to know one’s [country]. It is also... paradoxically a form of exile from that world... to know oneself is, above all, to know what one lacks. It is to measure oneself against Truth, and not the other way around. The first product of self-knowledge is humility, and that virtue is not conspicuous in any national character." - Flannery O’Connor
October 30, 2005
"Men content themselves with the same words as other people use, as if the very sound necessarily carried the same meaning." - John Locke
October 23, 2005
"In order to thrive in a world of change and chaos, we will need to accept 'chaos' as an essential process by which natural systems, including organizations, renew and revitalize themselves." - Margaret Wheatley
October 16, 2004
"Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary." - Robert Louis Stevenson
October 9, 2004
"We will be better and braver if we engage and inquire than if we indulge in the idle fancy that we already know - or that it is of no use seeking to know what we do not know." - Plato
October 2, 2004
"Man's mind stretched to a new idea never goes back to its original dimensions." - Oliver W. Holmes
September 25, 2004
"What you learn intellectually lies in the shallow pools among the wrinkles of your brain. What you learn through the skin of experience sinks deep into your roots." - Hank Taft
September 18, 2004
"In commanding us to glorify him, God is inviting us to enjoy him." - C.S. Lewis
September 11, 2004
"A society is judged by how it treats its least desirable people." - Anonymous
September 4, 2004
"This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no "brief candle" to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to the future generations." - George Bernard Shaw
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