Month: July 2004

Jonathan Delacour provides an Australian perspective to all the flag-waving in an American election year. Lots of refreshing viewpoints and facts, with a few jolts along the way, like this:

the United States:
…accounts for 5 per cent of the world’s population, 20 per cent of the world economy, and fully 50 per cent of global defence spending. It is structured for war.
In the 228 years since it declared independence, the US has made 200 military interventions abroad, says the Congressional Research Service, an average of one every 14 months.

The citation here is actually a quote from Peter Hartchner in the Sydney Morning Herald, but Delacour threads these facts and other ideas into an essay of import. Thanks to Tim Bray for the pointer.

Next time you want to complain about your job (assuming you have one), pick up Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich. The author spends one year trying to live on minimum-wage jobs alone and can’t pull it off. So much for the minimum wage actually adding up to something that really is a minimum. The book isn’t preachy, and doesn’t have answers to the dilemmas it underlines, but it’s a reminder of the daily struggle to survive that consumes all too many. I often feel fortunate to be where I am with family and employment, but this reporting tweaks you more than is comfortable… which is as it should be.

I read The Bourne Identity when it first came out, in 1980. I devoured it. The movie, 22 years later wasn’t bad, and I’ll be sure to see the new one. I’ve read many of Robert Ludlum’s other books, including the very funny The Road to Gandolfo, so I was pre-disposed to grab Ludlum’s The Janson Directive in the airport ten days ago. I was happy to see that (a) I had not read one of his books and (b) that Ludlum is still alive… but he’s not. He died in 2001, and The Janson Directive was published in 2002. Apparently, he has a few more finished books that are still awaiting publishing. I wonder how finished they were? After completing The Janson Directive, I’ll sum it up as a reasonably fast-paced rewrite of the basic Bourne Identity plot, without the amnesia. A fun read, but not memorable.

For a quick laugh, read the FAQ at the Ludlum Books website. One of the frequently asked questions is “May I please get a signed copy of one of Mr. Ludlum’s books?” Remember, folks, he’s dead! (That’s not their answer, but it should be.)

On a cross-country weekend without the kids (a story for another post), I enjoyed Moneyball by Michael Lewis. In answering a “simple” question — how does a poorer team, the Oakland Athletics, win so many baseball games — Lewis tells the story of orthodoxy and upheaval in a small, very public world: professional baseball. To crudely summarize an interesting book, Lewis finds that those managing baseball teams, for the most part, fail to examine the evidence and, instead, believe their own eyes: a mistake. Long-held opinions and beliefs about which type of player (age, build, style, etc.) will succeed lead most teams in one direction. The Oakland As, under the leadership of Billy Beane, clear the smoke from their eyes and look at the data, rather than the player. Zigging, when everyone else is zagging, proves quite successful. Not coincidentally, it annoys the heck out of those who are zagging.

Tim Bray read the book a couple of months ago, and made several connections, but these words bear citation:

…it’s fascinating (particularly towards the end) as a study of how a closed belief system reacts to the introduction of fact-backed heresy. Since the human race in general and technology profession in particular tend to the development of closed belief systems, this I think will find a lot of resonance with a lot of readers.

To complete the religious references… Amen.

Thanks to its author, its controversial message, its very popular arena, its excerpt in Sports Illustrated several months ago, this book and its story are fairly well known, whether you’ve read the book or not. A week after reading the book, I realized one reason I found the tale so compelling: its parallels in the two-way controversy/fascination between media and blogging.

The parallels are not perfect. Professional media is a more diverse group than those managing professional baseball clubs. There is no agreed-upon method for “keeping score,” which lets arguments simmer without the support of facts. In contrast, it’s hard to argue with a baseball team’s record… although assigning cause and effect keeps many busy.

Bloggers and the media are not in the direct opposition in which they are someimes placed, especially when you realize that many in the professional media are also among the more widely read bloggers, whether they blog professionally, personally, or both. After all, blogging is about writing, and few have more practice in writing regularly than “the media.” So, what do folks write about, on both sides?

The vision of what is the “right way” to practice Journalism occupies some in the media, especially in judgment of whether blogging is journalism or Journalism or neither or both. In turn, some bloggers appreciate the chance to claim that this is all new (it’s not), that it’s not about being journalists (fine), and that the world is going to change radically because of blogging (yet to be seen… I’d bet it won’t).

Some bloggers seem interested in storming the (perceived) castle of “established” media, and defining blogging in opposition to “big media.” While I love the underdog as much as the next person, let’s not forget two things. First, people don’t change as fast as technology, so companies (media or otherwise) and society are rarely forced to change at the pace desired/wished for by those who would benefit from a ‘revolution.” Second, big media has been under attack for a lot longer than blogging, and I don’t know if there is a castle to storm (mental image of Billy Crystal from The Princess Bride: “Have fun storming the castle.”).

I believe the web, in its enabling of real-time text publishing, is still the catalyst which all media are still reacting to. It’s only been a decade. Blogging is just the newest form of real-time text publishing, but it’s not radically different today than when Mosaic made newsgroups come alive. Yes, it’s easier, and that’s not to be underestimated, but that’s changed how many people are practicing these arts, not what they are doing. Quantity does matter, but quantity of production hasn’t changed the human limits on consumption. Do you have more time than you did ten years ago?

I’m emphasizing the text part of this shift deliberately.

First, radio and then television brought immediacy to the world of information long ago. The web brought a combination of immediacy and persistence which If I don’t listen to the radio or watch TV at the exact instant that someone wants to tell me something or share something new, I miss it. I can’t go back. TiVo and the like are changing that equation, but it’s still rudimentary, in that’s it is driven by my decisions before the event, not my interest after the fact. I can’t decide now, two days after Lance Armstrong waltzed into Paris for his sixth Tour de France win, that I’d like to watch the final kilometers of the mountain stages where the Tour was decided. We’re headed towards a world where audio and video may share the characteristics of text publishing, but we’re likely still a decade away from marrying immediacy and persistence seamlessly.

Another reason text matters is the skillset is more widely distributed. We may all have camera videophones in five years, continuously streaming to the net (David Brin and transparency come to mind). But straight images or words don’t automatically convey ideas. Moving pictures, pictures, and sounds may convey emotion with a power that only the best writers can match. Ideas, however, are more fungible in the written word. A reader can scan, review, absorb, ignore text at his or her own pace, not the speed (and time) chosen by the producer. Maybe it’s the lowest common denominator, but when people’s time is the currency, the power of consumer control should never be underestimated.

Side note: when RSS is described as “TiVo for text,” I find something awry… as noted previously. RSS is more like a flare shooting in the night, alerting all who might care and, importantly, only those might care that there’s is something new to consume. The only people’s time I ‘spend’ — and, I hope, don’t waste — is those whom choose to give me their attention, at their leisure.

I’m guilty of mixing too many themes and ideas here, but I’m not going to take the time to rework this version any more. I’m sure I’ll read more cogent thoughts on this in the future, and maybe I’ll say “Aha” then. I did enjoy Moneyball, even if I’ve stretched Lewis’s point too far in an attempt to make one of my own. Much better than The New, New Thing, and more measured than Liar’s Poker, if not as exciting and brash.

Last night’s BlogOn panel clearly was only to whet the appetite of the crowd, so I’m looking forward to today. While I and other other panelists did need to prepare, beyond bringing our brains and tongues (and hopefully connecting the two), the panel didn’t feel much different from other public discussions. We were really only getting started, and lots of the audience wanted to get involved… but I think Chris and the organizers had a schedule to try and keep, and energy to pour into today.

One unfortunate part of the discussion was the usual broad brush strokes. Various people, most notably Jason McCabe Calacanis of WeblogsInc, tried to pretend that “bloggers” can be grouped together as a class of information or people. That’s exactly what bloggers are not. The whole point is individual voices getting a platform on which to stand, and then individual talents take over from there. Some bloggers are interesting, some are … less so. Some bloggers focus on a niche, others wander broadly across whatever grabs their fancy. The makeup of the panel encouraged a bit of rivalry, deliberately I’m sure, between “big media” and “bloggers” — but it’s not in opposition, and the lines are crossed every which way. And the positions change pretty radically pretty quickly.

As usual, meeting the people whose blogs you’ve read is always interesting, and I wish the attendee list we were all given had people’s blogs. I’m more appreciative of those blogs that have a picture of the blogger on them now… but no promises about adding my own any time soon.

Here are a few posts I found about last night, via Feedster:

• Heath Row, conference blogging for Fast Company. Seems like a pretty accurate transcript to me.
• Chris Jefferies noted the comments on brand.

Patrick O’Brian’s The Commodore handles one of the more challenging steps in Aubrey’s career: promotion. Simply put, if the author removes one of his main characters from the sea, it’s hard to imagine the result. Promotion in the Royal Navy eventually removes a captain from commanding a ship. First, the rising officer commands a small group of ships, but is master of none. Further advancement can mean the officer now commands from port. The Dilbert principle states: “The most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage — management.” In the early 19th century, a related process was at work: the better you ar at one job, the faster you are promoted out of that position. Of course, we’ve all seen evidence that this phenomenon is not limited to the past.

I’m going on at length about this career move because in C.S. Forester’s Hornblower novels, I found that the later books were less interesting because the protagonist, Horatio Hornblower, is one step removed from the direct action due to his high rank. The later novels are not bad, but they pale after the rip-roaring adventures of the young Hornblower. As Aubrey and Maturin age — and there’s three more volumes to cover — I want them still in the thick of daily sea life.

Note: if you want a plot summary, click that first link to the official site.

I’m driving to the Albany, New York airport on Sunday morning. As I enter the Northway (US 87) at Exit 30, my tenuous link to North Country Radio, the regional NPR group of stations, finally fades into static. So, I start the Seek experience. And I find eBay on the radio.

WOKO, 98.9 on your FM dial, offers The Sunday Morning Radio Flea Market from 7-11 each Sunday morning. I’ve learned since returning home that WOKO, out of Burlington, Vermont, is a country station, but I heard no music that morning. I listened to Lee Bodette (scroll to the bottom of the DJs page) answer the phone, listen to people rattle off their offer, and then move on to the next.

“Hi, I’m Christy from Keene. I’ve got a 1986 Thunderbird with 130,000 miles on it. New tires and nicely tuned by my father. $900 or best offer. My phone number is 555-1212.”

Lee repeats “Caller number 104, 1986 Thunderbird, phone number 555-1212.”

And on it goes.

Lee’s bio says: “I’ve been hosting the North Counrty’s [sic] largest Radio Flea Market for about ten years.” So, this has been going on for a decade, probably more. Decades? I’m not a big radio listener, but never heard the like before. And, possibly more interesting… are there others? Lee claims his is the North Country’s largest… are there smaller ones? I would think the network effect would make it the only one. There’s a reason eBay’s marketplace size hampers competitors. No reason same rules wouldn’t apply here.

The whole experience made me smile, and wonder what else I’m missing in the world. It also brought to mind William Gibson’s epigram about the future; how it’s already here, just not evenly distributed. I now have proof.

If so, read on. As I try and keep up with my reading, and blogging my reading, I got pretty excited by Booxter. A Mac OS X application for cataloging your book collections, Booxter seems to be a smart, focused, network aware application that does one thing — record your book collection — very well. I write “seems” because I just learned about it this morning and I don’t have time to experiment just yet… but I’m intrigued. Besides smart application of the online infrastructure that has sprung up around books, Booxter employs the iSight as a ‘scanner’ for ISBN #s. That’s just one of the many, many ways it offers to make a difficult, potentially dreary, task as painless as possible. The feature list offers export to a text file, which opens up a way to get the information onto a website… say, like a blog. I would think that tying an application that is already so network-aware to a website would be very compelling. In a similar vein, take a look at Guzzlefish.com for a collection management site for movies and music.

Seth Godin hardly needs an introduction if you’ve been paying attention to online marketing for the past decade, so I won’t bother. One of the books a colleague at work keeps in her “lending library” is Purple Cow, his penultimate book. Subtitled “Transform your business by being remarkable,” Purple Cow is in style a magazine article stretched into a book. (Here’s the free magazine excerpt.) A few basic points, repeated and illuminated, fill less than 150 small pages. Since I don’t need an O’Brian novel or a Clancy brick every time I start reading — who does? — the length is not a negative. Godin gets his point across and then finishes up with a bunch of Brainstorms, paragraph-length discussion starters. Godin is his own Purple Cow, which is actually pretty remarkable. Side note: has anyone since Telly Savalas made being bald a signature item like Godin?

I’m looking forward to being part of BlogOn on Thursday, as a member of the opening panel. I’m doing some thinking on the term “social media.” It’s not a term I’ve heard before this conference was put together, despite my general interest over the last several years in blogs and (more recently) Wikis. Am I missing something, or is this a recent coinage? We’ll all know more after Thursday and Friday’s conversations.

Maybe three more people will read this after following the link in my bio on the conference web page.