Tuesday, June 1, 2004

Colorful Clouds Sing the Praises The Colorful Clouds of Rho Ophiuchi (2004 June 2) [Astronomy Picture of The Day] 10:06:37 PM

Surf's Up ~ Congratulations to Miss Australia, the winner - Miss Universe! 10:03:26 PM

Perhaps an Archetypal Moment The Photographer as Shadow. 9:26:48 PM

Word of the Day - 'Infocirculation' How the Word gets around the Blogoshere. This is a great link to a study that was done to track how information circulated form blog to blog. It is definitely worth reading. Quote: The blogosphere has a strange ability to push a seemingly obscure idea into the forefront of people's minds in a heartbeat. How this happens is a bit of a mystery. Sam Arbesman wanted to know how it works, so he created a meme and set it loose. The Brandeis University senior had been reading various studies that looked at historical data on the way information works its way across the Internet. But he was more interested in seeing if he could figure out, in real time, the trajectory of a meme once it hits the blogosphere. So he came up with a plan to find out. He called it the Memespread Project Source link:  http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,63344,00.html [QuickDraft Blog] 7:49:54 PM

Marketing Redefining the traditional "P"s of marketing. Pheedo - Maximizing the Value of Weblog Advertising The famous "P's" of Marketing theory are: 1. Product 2. Place 3. Price 4. Promotion The phenomenon of Weblogs as a marketing tool has spawned a new set of "˜P's" 1. Personal 2. Permalink 3. Publish 4. Ping 5. Participate [QuickDraft Blog] 7:45:08 PM

Pistons / Lakers The fix is in. The ESPN started to run this poll BEFORE the 6th game between Indiana and Pistons started. Is the fix in already or is it ok to hope that Indiana or Pistons are given a chance to win the Finals? (An LA times article notes that the Lakers are the officials' darlings, having shot 388 more free throws than opponents this season and 49 more than the Timberwolves this series). Here's my prediction: If the refereeing is truly impartial, Pistons will win in 7, otherwise it's Lakers in 5. Prove me wrong, Stern! [chaotic intransient prose bursts] 7:39:13 PM

Pic. 2 Gary, Ken - Tempe 2004 Photo Credit Ken Smoller 7:35:42 PM

The Creation of the Media The Creation of the Media. I just finished reading "The Creation of the Media," by Paul Starr, a sociology professor here at Princeton. This is an important book and I recommend it highly. Starr traces the history of communications and the media in the U.S., from the 1700s until 1940. The major theme of the book is that the unique features of U.S. media derive from political choices made in the early days of each technology. These choices, once made, can be very difficult to unmake later -- witness the challenges now in reconsidering the use of the radio spectrum. After reading Starr's book, there can be little doubt that the choices we make now will shape the development of the Internet for a very long time. For a concise summary of the book, it's hard to beat the review in Sunday's New York Times, by James Fallows. In his limited space, Fallows leaves out one pattern noted by Starr that carries obvious lessons for us. When U.S. policy was at its best, it refused to give the titans of one technology control over the next technology that came along. For example, the Post Office was not given control of the telegraph; Western Union did not control the telephone; and AT&T was locked out of radio. The lessons for us now, when the masters of old technologies, such as the movies and recorded music, want to control Internet technologies, should be obvious. [unmediated] 6:24:49 PM

Jeanne Anne Naujeck at The Tennessean on Indies There's a New Heartbeat on Music Row. According to Jeanne Anne Naujeck at The Tennessean, you can hear a new heart beat on Music Row. Corporate mergers and downward spiraling sales has resulted in new record labels, operating under a lower-cost model, smarter in their strategies. One... [spinme.com] 7:44:01 AM

small glitch The Beatles link is working now. Enjoy. 7:25:28 AM

Goethe Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. "There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity." [Quotes of the Day] 7:07:11 AM