Late last night or early this morning we surpassed 10,000 visitors to this site since our launch in January. I’d call that a decent first 7 months. Thanks so much for reading, commenting, and spreading the word about Tropophilia. We’ll try our best to keep you coming back. -T
(2)Monthly Archive for July, 2008
Last week I griped about Mental Floss (one of my very favorite blogs) truncating their RSS feed. At the time I wrote:
Enter the most recent source of my web-frustration: Mental Floss. I’ve read the Mental Floss blog (which is absolutely terrific) for about a year and a half. While catching up on their prolific feed after a week of travel, I discovered that in early July they switched from a glorious and full feed to a sloppy partial feed. I’m pissed.
Maybe I’m an atypical feed reader, but I suspect not. The truth is, a partial feed decreases the likelihood that I’ll read something by approximately 100%. [...] When content providers refuse to provide a full feed, they disrupt [my] information flow. As a result, I read less of their material. In other words, don’t be surprised if fewer Mental Floss items end up in my Monday Links or anywhere else on this site. I still receive the (partial) feed, but I’m. Not. Reading. It.
Harsh I know, but hey: that’s why I have a blog. Well folks, it brings me great joy to share this *breaking* news:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE. Birmingham, ALA. Today, at 4:15pm EST, the editorial board of mental_floss magazine kept their promise to readers and turned their blog’s RSS feed back to full blast. The feed had been temporarily disabled due to hacking issues. The gushing stream of full RSS stories hitting inboxes around the nation was quickly followed by cheers heard across America, and the popping of champagne corks distribution of celebratory juice boxes around the magazine’s headquarters.
“This is a great day for mental_floss and this is a great day for our readers!” exclaimed a triumphant Will Pearson, President of the company. “But mostly this is a great day for mental_floss.” The comment was nearly drowned out by the thunderous sounds of high-fiving and back patting taking place.
Well done, Floss Nation. In honor of their editors seeing the light, I hereby shamelessly plug the geektacular shirts available in the Mental Floss store.
It’s a web celebration (a webebration?). Ball’s in your court now, Freakonomics.
Image used under a Creative Commons license courtesy of Flickr user ~Twon~.
At long last, some reactions from Netroots Nation:
We’ve all witnessed the rise of social media and web 2.0 tools in electoral campaigns. But at some point, in order for that increasing participation of individuals in their chosen candidates’ political fate to influence those politicians’ actions in office, the tools of the social web must extend beyond the campaign sphere to governance itself. This idea fascinates and excites me; after all, the reason many of us welcome and trumpet social media in the campaign space is exactly because we believe that participation in elections will lead to more accountable and responsive elected officials.
It’s easy to claim success on the campaign front. Sure, there are undoubtedly miles yet to travel in terms of involving all voters in the electoral process. But if the 2004 and 2006 election cycles did not convince you that online social tools will be a staple in campaigns—large and small—from now on, just look around at 2008 candidates.
What hasn’t been as visible—or, for the most part, widely accepted—is the use of social media in governance. Fortunately, a number of folks are trying to do something about that disconnect between electoral contests and policy implementation.
Andrew Hoppin moderated a Netroots Nation panel (in the running for ‘most unwieldy panel title at Netroots Nation’) called “Transparency, Participation and Reinvention in Government in the Next Administration Through Web 2.0 Tools and Culture.” Micah Sifry quickly and thankfully renamed the panel “Rebooting Government in 2009.” Hoppin framed the discussion by sharing his own experiences working for NASA in Silicon Valley (at the Ames Research Center). He recalled his frustration, years ago, at the enormous cultural difference between surrounding Silicon Valley and the NASA compound. Outside the gates, the spirit of experimentation and opening networks was driving the success of many start-up companies that are now household names. Inside the gates at NASA, on the other hand, an antiquated culture of closed knowledge and traditional communications and public outreach persisted. (More on NASA and the culture shift that took place at every geek’s favorite government agency in my next post).
Micah Sifry, of techPresident and the Sunlight Foundation, cited efforts to shed light on the legislative process and involve citizens in governance. I’m looking forward to giving these resources a closer look; for now I’ll link to them and summarize:
I’m running a bit behind blogging schedule today, but it’s Monday so cut me some slack. Links (still good, even cold):
- Here’s an example of greenwashing taken to a profoundly appaling extreme:
To celebrate 75 years of Esquire History, or perhaps in a desperate attempt to prove to the wired generation that magazines can be high tech too, Esquire will sport an electronic ink cover on its September Issue. Except for the few copies destined for the Smithsonian and other collections, that will be a 100,000 electronic pages which will be e-waste at latest when the battery runs out after 90 days.
Want to know what the estimated environmental impact of this completely useless and indulgent distraction looks like?
150 tons of CO2 equivalent, similar to the output of 15 Hummers or 20 average Americans for an entire year, and a 16% increase over the carbon footprint of a typical print publication (based on calculations by Discover Magazine, Time, and In Style). The potential environmental impact of the E Ink covers increases even more when you consider that the units are designed to be disposable after one use and they’ll make it more difficult or impossible to recycle the paper portion of the magazines.
- Let me set a scene for you: Steve Jobs, after appearing a bit pale and very thin at Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference, is the subject of various industry and media rumors about his health. Apple’s PR department writes off concerns, saying that El Jobso was suffering from a “common bug.” Many tech writers and bloggers don’t buy this (shocker), and continue writing speculative stories about what is going on with the Chosen One. Well, Jobs finally responded with a phone call to NY Times business writer Joe Nocera (emphasis mine):
“This is Steve Jobs,” he began. “You think I’m an arrogant [expletive] who thinks he’s above the law, and I think you’re a slime bucket who gets most of his facts wrong.” After that rather arresting opening, he went on to say that he would give me some details about his recent health problems, but only if I would agree to keep them off the record. I tried to argue him out of it, but he said he wouldn’t talk if I insisted on an on-the-record conversation. So I agreed.
Because the conversation was off the record, I cannot disclose what Mr. Jobs told me. Suffice it to say that I didn’t hear anything that contradicted the reporting that John Markoff and I did this week. While his health problems amounted to a good deal more than “a common bug,” they weren’t life-threatening and he doesn’t have a recurrence of cancer.
Well then. Okie dokie.
- I’ll be writing about NASA’s adoption of social media and information sharing in a post later today on open government; in the meantime, check out the amazing NASA Images website that just went live. Unbelievable pictures. One of my personal favorites, the untethered spacewalk:
[Hat Tip OhGizmo]
- Here’s a throwback link from the good ole days before Mental Floss started pushing a partial RSS feed, thus infuriating me. From their (now sadly dead) full feed: here’s a surprisingly fascinating story about laying trans-atlantic cables (you know, like the ones that were accidently severed earlier this year).
- Lego jumps on the alternative energy bandwagon with a wind turbine set.
- I will be trying this Huevos Rancheros recipe just as soon as possible.
The following is a guest post from Daniel H. Welcome back, Dan!
In a recent NY Times column, David Brooks describes a deterioration in American culture over the past century, noting that “America once had a culture of thrift…but over the past decades, that unspoken code has been silently eroded,” and now we exist in a “culture of debt.”
He partially blames the effects of a rapidly growing economy, noting how some luxury items which were once unaffordable for the middle class suddenly came within financial reach (especially within the reach of creditors if not within the reach of one’s own cash). He also blames the deterioration of the norm of personal responsibility, and claims that those who fell victim to marketing schemes were also furthering the deterioration of a norm of thriftiness, in themselves and in those around them.
I thought it was a good opinion piece, really. But the whole time I was reading the article, I kept getting distracted by shoes.
Lots of shoes.
The whole top and side of the internet page on the New York Times website was full of shoe advertisements, which of course, exist because the Times wants to collect on extra revenue whenever possible and because advertisers are willing to pay prime dollar for space on a site viewed by perhaps millions of people per day. And so as I was challenged by Brooks’ thoughts on how we, as Americans, should seek to be wiser consumers, I also felt that this change cannot and will not happen if I do not seek to monitor the ways in which I take in information, most especially on the web, but anywhere for that matter. If Americans truly desire to become wiser spenders, we must question our acceptance of the commercial advertising industry and its self-imposition into our day-to-day lives.
While I don’t think internet advertising is wrong at all, it might be helpful, as technology and the internet becomes more and more central to our means of gathering information, to ask several questions: First, what space is sacred? What space or information should not be corrupted with advertisements? At what point, if any, is the value of information corrupted or degraded by advertisements? Would we put corporate sponsors on our holy scriptures or governmental documents? What about on websites that contain this kind of information? What about good literature? The unspoken reality here is that corporate sponsors help keep quite a bit of the internet free and available to all, which I tend to find is a good thing. I only wonder where we go from here?
Image used under a Creative Commons license courtesy of Flickr user bcjordan.
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