even better than the real thing: democracy. "We were upstairs at this point, and we looked down at him and asked, in a loud voice -- 'Why are you using a public library to promote a junk food product?'"
sometimes you have to make test posts. don't ask why.
Halcyon Days of Broadcast Ad Model Fade by Christopher Locke: "Mass media are "mass" because they have for so long served the core requirement of mass production: to move excess inventory. The more product such advertising could move, the more profit the company made, so obviously, the bigger the audience the better. Mass media are mass because they're huge. And the way such hugeness is achieved is by appealing to lowest-common-denominator tastes in terms of programming content. The content is merely bait to entice the audience. The real show, the real message, is the advertising. Therefore advertisers want to lower the common denominator so that they can get everyone possible into the audience." [via personalization newswire]
I missed this Big Panda Comics plea for micropayments when it happened, but caught it on Doc Searls Weblog. According to Doc he's been successful. Not sure how successful...but it sounds good. It's refreshing to hear someone speak the truth like this.
oh yeah, one more: make the damn punch-card system of voting illegal.
oh, and the software that runs any type of vote-counting machines should be open source. every part of an election should be open to public examination.
Dinah has some great actions that we should take as a country based on lessons learned from this historic election debacle. I agree with all of them, especially proportional electoral votes. (proportional representation in general provides for a stronger republic through greater representation of diverse ideas.) I would also add instant run-off voting to her list.
It's like this:
There's this bird
And you catch it in your hands
You feel its softness, warmth, its heart
rapidly beating
But if you keep holding it it's no
longer a bird
So you open your hands
(Catch it and let it go
again and again)
There's this bird
And you catch it in your hands
You feel its softness, warmth, its heart
rapidly beating
But if you keep holding it it's no
longer a bird
So you open your hands
(Catch it and let it go
again and again)
- Wendy Lewis
Yesterday I was absorbed by Roadside Geology of Northern and Central California. I couldn't stop reading it. I wonder if I should have studied geology in college instead of journalism. (though I struggled through my meteorology class, which is an ology. [too much math.]) Some of the book was concerned with The Big One. Word on the street is that you want to live somewhere above bedrock or franciscan rock as opposed to unconsolidated sand, gravel, and sediment. (like San Jose.) I think the most interesting part of the book was learning more about places I've been: the formation of various features around Lassen, the Klamath Mountains (mt. shasta may be an active volcano!), and Bodega Head (which has made the long journey up the coast starting near Mexico). So yeah, interesting book. ;)
At one point yesterday, we ran into a guy on a four-wheeler. It was a little strange to hear an engine cutting through the complete silence of pt. reyes. He said, "Where are you coming from?" Kay pointed a direction, and said "the trailhead." He continued, "I'm lost on 3,000 acres of farm land." A little while later, he ended up on our trail passing us. There were some very narrow parts of the trail that didn't look wide enough for a vehicle. I hope he made it home ok.