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March 28, 2005

Our freedoms

: Bill Hobbs gives you a quiz: Can you name the five freedoms enshrined in and guaranteed by the First Amendment?key gen phone manager

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A response from the right

: Just got back to a connection and saw that this morning, Hugh Hewitt responded to my Jumping the shark for Jesus post. Crazed doing important things like eating dinner so I don't have time to respond but wanted you to see the link.key gen phone manager

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Quake: 'Bloggers are morons'

: Peter Tan blogged during the earthquake, reporting that "my apartment is shaking." More:

I had just finished posting my latest entry when I felt my wheelchair moving. I thought I was dizzy because I have not been getting enough sleep lately. A short while later, I realised that it was another earthquake when I heard my door rattling. I quickly woke the maid up.key gen phone manager

My neighbours were fast. They had already locked their apartment door and were waiting for the elevator. I chose to stay in the apartment. There was no point rushing to get down since everybody else will be waiting for the elevator too. This is in fact a bad move since they could get trapped in the lift should the building tilt.key gen phone manager

This temblor is stronger than the one on Boxing Day and lasted longer. It began at approximately 0011 and lasted a good two minutes or more. When the taskbar clock showed 0013, the apartment was still swaying. The water in the tank in my toilet sloshed about and spilled over the edge. I looked down from my window and saw many neighbours lingering in the driveway, barely 5 meters from the buildings that are 22 storeys high....

And this great post:

Bloggers Are Morons
Blogging has fried our brains. Instead of evacuating after the tremor, we, bloggers staying in high rise apartments, sit here n blog about it, oblivious to the risk should the building topple over or collapse. I, for one, was furiously typing away as the floor swayed under me instead of making plans to leave my apartment. Should I laugh or cry at this stupidity that has befallen me?

: Amazing how quickly news from ground-level comes up on the internet. Shortly after the earthquake off Jakarta, blogs started updating. See this:

I've just been messaged by my mom who's with Oxfam in Sri Lanka and she says that the tsunami warning sirens have been sounded 2 hours ago. The country's emergency serivces have been put on standby. I've phoned my volunteer coordinator at VolunteerSriLanka in Habantota on the South Coast of Sri Lanka - and some IDP camp residents have been evacuated about 5km away from the coastal areas - thats about 3 camps I've heard so far.key gen phone manager

Meanwhile Peter Griffin & Dina Mehta have rallied and sent out an email to all current SEA EAT volunteers in the region and those still involved with the relief operation to standby to start blogging alerts via txt msgs & email....key gen phone manager

Phone lines have apparently got jammed once again in Sri Lanka & everyone is just panicking instead of remaining calm until we all know what's going on. Shall keep you all posted as i get news....key gen phone manager

UPDATE - 10.18PM - Bahrain Time (+3GMT) :
All Sri Lankans living on the coast have been asked to move away from the coast within an hour. This was about a half an hour ago. The information has been distributed fairly widely. The Commissioner of Police has also stated that they are taking steps to stop traffic on the Galle Road. People fleeing also asked to watch out for looters.
-SMS from Sanjaya with the Daily News in Sri Lanka ...

: The TsunmaiHelp blog is keeping up on the news. key gen phone manager

: Jeff Ooi, the Maylasian blogging wonder, is on the story again. key gen phone manager

: Another eyewitness blog report:

So I’m in bed with Hubby, when suddenly I felt my world start to rock.key gen phone manager

We’re mid-way through an episode of Frasier when suddenly we felt the tremors. It was pretty freaky! We were watching telly in bed and I heard loud creaks and felt my bed swaying back and forth. For a nanosecond I almost thought my cat was playing under the bed again — yes, and she had gained super strength… Look, it’s past midnight, I’m sleepy, my brain’s not all there, ok?key gen phone manager

Turns out there’s a quake measuring 8.5 on the richter scale near North Sumatra. And we felt it all the way here in Punggol....key gen phone manager

I hear dogs barking incessantly. I’m remembering all the movies and tv shows about animal instincts and I’m getting weirded out. Meanwhile, Hubby goes “hey, this is so fun”. I stare at him like he’s grown a third eye....key gen phone manager

brown suggests I get a camera phone, so that : “can snap pic with phone, send via email to flickr plus also to blog. Too cool. macam ‘Live from Mordor’ ”

The "brown" she refers to is a blogger here. key gen phone manager

: Eyewitness reports on an MSNBC community blog. key gen phone manager

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Free speech for free speech, please

: The Times today talks about censorship under the reign of Kevin Martin, new chairman of the FCC. They quote Brent Bozell, self-appointed head of the so-called Parents Television Council. key gen phone manager

But they don't quote anyone from the other side. key gen phone manager

The other side needs another side. We need an Americans Free Speech Council. We need to stand up for the First Amendment. And when reporters write stories such as this, they should see that their stories are incomplete if they don't hear from the other side, the side of free speech and the First Amendment. key gen phone manager

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Google views

: Dana Blankenhorn says that the demonization of Google has begun. He says they need an editor and he applies. key gen phone manager

I'm not so sure that solves their problems. An editor chose the neonazi hate site they had. A business strategy has to deal with Agence France Presse. Customer relations have to deal with hiding basic business terms from ad partners. A corporate policy of transparency is needed. key gen phone manager

It's really about attitude. I'm seeing in Google the same sort of aloof arrogance I saw in Yahoo and so many other online giants in their day. key gen phone manager

What we're really seeing his the humbling of Google. And Google needs it. key gen phone manager

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Not again

: A large, 8.2 quake has hit near Jakarta. Tsunami warning issued. Command Post is on the case. GoogleNews feed here. key gen phone manager

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The new CBS News

: Even before CBS News is redone it is redoing itself. In a comment on the post below, Andrew Tyndall of the Tyndall Report says he studied the show for Broadcasting & Cable and sees big change already:

Less than three weeks after Dan Rather's departure from the anchor chair, Schieffer has already markedly revamped the job description, showcasing a more inquisitive, interactive style than his predecessor or his competitors....key gen phone manager

This anchor approaches his role more as a viewer's representative than as a reporter's leader [yes! - ed]; Schieffer's emphasis is more on summing up a story than on introducing it.key gen phone manager

Specifically, Schieffer's CBS Evening News actually makes constructive use of the live sign-off that often ends a correspondent's taped report. In the TV news business, the live sign-off tends to be just an ornamental transition, but Schieffer makes it a valuable access point, posing follow-up questions to reporters on a couple of stories each night. He reminds the reporter that, like the viewers at home, he has just watched the preceding package himself. He drives home the story's lead. He cites the angle that interested him most. He uses vernacular, even blunt language, to ask for more...key gen phone manager

The before-and-after is striking. Schieffer's live interactive style was used in 40% of CBS' items (ABC used it 9% of the time, NBC 3%); in Rather's final days, CBS used those techniques only 11% of the time (ABC 17%, NBC 3%)....key gen phone manager

The questions that Schieffer asks out loud are the same routine ones every anchor and executive producer asks of correspondents before a story is filed. What CBS Evening News is doing is showing that Q&A in action, rather than simply weaving its results into the on-air report.key gen phone manager

So Schieffer makes more of the anchor's behind-the-scenes job visible for all to see. How modish is that? At age 68, our oldest rookie news anchor is not only interactive, but transparent, too.

I've been of the view that CBS News can change with Schieffer in the anchor chair. key gen phone manager

It's not about what's before the camera but what's behind the camera -- changing it and showing it. key gen phone manager

It's not about new faces but new voices. key gen phone manager

It's not about format but attitude. And it sounds as if the attitude is changing. key gen phone manager

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Wikicities

: The Wall Street Journal writes up Jimmy Wales' Wikicities business (another free link). It's just starting so it's hard to tell whether this will work as well as Wikipedia. I think that wikis work best when they try to gather the ongoing wisdom of the crowds on lasting topics; they work when they hit a critical mass of interest, people, contributions, and time. That's why I remain dubious that Wikinews will work; it's too transient: By the time enough people swarm around a topic to add their collective wisdom, the world has moved on. Wikipedia did, in fact, do a good job collecting news during the tsunami, but that had enough interest, people, and time to make it work. WikiCities is a third model: A portal where people can create free, ad-supported special-interest wikis. On the one hand, I wonder whether people won't just do that on their own sites, in their own communities. On the other hand, perhaps special-interest wikis need a portal to gather that critical mass of contributors. We'll see... key gen phone manager

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Godcom

: The Wall Street Journal reports (free link) that TV programmers are trying to exploit this God thing said to be sweeping the nation:

Judging from several comedy and drama pilots now in progress that are already getting close consideration, America's couches will be turning into pews.key gen phone manager

A splashy drama called "Book of Daniel" is in development at NBC, a unit of General Electric Co., while Viacom Inc.'s CBS is building a supernatural thriller around a character described as "a brilliant physicist with strong religious beliefs." News Corp.'s Fox, meanwhile, has "Briar + Graves," which the producers describe as "The X-Files" goes to church....key gen phone manager

"We try in the entertainment business to find veins of interest to tap, and religion is a huge one that is currently very underserved," says Kevin Reilly, president of entertainment at NBC, which is set to begin airing "Revelations," a six-part apocalyptic miniseries, next month.key gen phone manager

Also weighing heavily on programming executives' minds is President Bush's re-election. In addition to giving religion a starring role, several shows this development season are set deep inside "red" states and feature ultraconservative characters in the mix. In fact, Walt Disney Co.'s ABC is looking at "Red & Blue," about a conservative grandfather.

An essential rule of entertainment: If a show (or magazine or any media effort) starts with a creative vision that clicks, it will succeed. If it starts merely trying to pander to a demographic or a trend in polls, it's likely to fail. But network programmers never learn that. key gen phone manager

Having that said, a religous reality show would be a hoot. Churches are filled with drama, politics, what the American TV audience loves best: humiliation. I can't wait for ConfessionalCam.key gen phone manager

: See also my post yesterday: Jumping the shark for Jesuskey gen phone manager

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Command and control-key

: Fascinating discussion of the military using blogs to get to what's really happening in command. This is about more than media. It's about new ways to communicate and inform and manage... and take over the world. See Sgt. Stryker here and Joe Katzman's follow here. key gen phone manager

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Vlogging again

: I just put up a new vlog I made to demonstrate citizens' TV for the Radio Television News Directors Association. I was invited to be on a panel at their Vegas confab but had a conflict and suggested blogcasting and vlogging (it is a TV conference, after all). To any who've been subjected to my blatherings on ciitzens' media and exploding TV and all that, there's nothing new here but it's a brief demo. I hadn't used Visual Communicator since I made these Fred Flintstone attempts more than two years ago. I had problems getting the newest version to work on my Bedrock laptop but the prior version works well; it is a neat tool. Serious Magic, creator of the software, say they will have the lite VlogIt version out in a few weeks.key gen phone manager

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New news

: Cory Bergman at Lost Remote notes changes in the CBS Evening News already -- and likes them. key gen phone manager

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