Sunday, April 09, 2006

Stop calling them podcasts

I hardly listen to radio anymore. I am one of the 1% who listen to podcasts. Today I spent painting my house. Here’s what I listened to while doing it:

• a Brookings Institute briefing on the president’s national security strategy
• Christine Rosen on rehabilitating eugenics
• Ian Buruma on is democracy a universal value
• a couple gay guys banter about the threat of a smoking ordinance in DC (briefly)
• Ray Kurzweil and Baroness Susan Greenfield debate biotech, Will it Save Us or Hurt Us

I listened to some of the mainstream stuff too: Slate & The Times & NPR & Business Week.

Now that alone is astounding to me, that on demand (I can hit pause, rewind, re-listen to passages confusing or interrupted) here in rural Georgia I can listen to this variety and depth of content. But what is even more astounding is the hundreds and hundreds of things I’ve chosen to listen to that I’ll probably never hear.

I remember Forrester reports on Internet advertising that read just like this one. Wish I had one to quote right now! Podcasting will change no doubt; it will get easier, it will get better. It may even become something altogether different. (Watch the small companies.) Dodge will get his accurate tags and summaries and more. But it is not going away.

In the meantime, I’m setting up my playlist for the drive to Macon tomorrow.

More on the Forrester report: Om Malik, Maybe we should stop calling them podcasts? Geek News Central says the numbers are wrong. Matthew Ingram says they’re no surprise.

China, empire & an important perspective on our military debt

I listened to Radio Open Source on Neo-Conservatism, the Last Throes this afternoon. Fascinating program, lots of good stuff. Two quotes struck me, the first I had contemplated on my own, the second never even occurred to me.

Niall Ferguson, Professor of History at Harvard and author, Colossus: The Price of America’s Empire and Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power:

[11:41] I think the big story of our time is the rise of China and I think that in many ways the global war on terror as we used to call has distracted American policymakers from the speed with which China is closing the gap - economically but also strategically - and there’s going to be a wake-up moment and I think it’s going to come quite soon when Americans realize they’re no longer in a position to become any kind of hegemon, benign or otherwise, because there’s a new empire on the block. And this empire really knows what it’s doing because it has a great deal more history of empire building to draw on.

And later he observes:

[45:48] There is an extraordinary imbalance at the moment. Global growth is fueled by American consumption and American consumption is based on accumulating debt overseas, particularly in Asia. We shouldn’t assume that that’s a stable arrangement. To become both the world’s greatest military power and its biggest debtor is an experiment I think which has no historical parallel and it’s hard to foresee its outcome.

Monster Rabbit & Hubba Bubba Clucker Video

The other day at dinner with friends, not one person in the group remembered Jimmy Carter and the Rabbit. I felt old!

My guess is Mark Joseph wasn’t the only one reminded of Jimmy after reading of the monster rabbit in the UK, “It is a massive thing. It is a monster.”

It’s given me reason to set up a YouTube account and post this video of the Hubba Bubba Clucker. (Easter, Rabbit, Chicken, Egg. Oh, never mind.) I bought a bunch at the Piggly Wiggly and have been giving them out across campus.

This one went to the boss’s wife. I made some jokes about “clucking up” to the higher ups and “clucking my way to the top.” I guess you had to be there…

UPDATE: I finally get around to setting up an account and then their site goes down!!! I wonder what could be going on? Will we learn more than last time?

There’s a word for it

NYTimes:

Does a phenomenon fully exist until it has a name? Dr. Edward M. Hallowell thinks not, and he knows more than a little about naming a trend into existence. He was the first to name adult attention deficit disorder, or Adult A.D.D., back in 1995, and now he is taking on the rest of modern life in “CrazyBusy: Overstretched, Overbooked and About to Snap! Strategies for Coping in a World Gone A.D.D.” (Ballantine Books, 2006). The frenzy of our wired world, he argues, is giving nearly all of us the symptoms of attention deficit disorder. To conquer the enemy, he says, we first need to name it.

He’s got a bunch of suggetions: Screensucking, EMV (Email Voice), Frazzing, Gemmelsmerch, Spammified, Cellopain, Regurgimailer, Reverberon, Telamnesia, Bluetooth fairy and my favorite, Logonorrhea. Perpetual Partial Attention doesn’t make his list. Not catchy enough I guess…

Ah, I remember the simple days of the now retired Cyperspace. Fondly. [<-MP3.]

BTW: A language maven, recall that I’m all for the use of the word fairy. And all about gay.

Gay network rejects pro-gay ad

I posted when ABC rejected the ad; now the network that promises “Programming that reflects our lives. Programming that tells our stories.” has rejected the United Church of Christ’s inclusive message:

Logo, a TV channel catering to gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people, is now among the growing list of networks to reject an ad in which a gay couple and other minorities are seen being “ejected” from church pews, followed by a welcoming message from UCC. A Viacom-owned network, Logo is operated by MTV, which states that its standards and practices could not accept the 30-second commercial “because of the political nature of its content,” according to a sales associate’s e-mail response to UCC on March 30.

When pressed by the church for an official reason, MTV Networks responded, “Our guidelines state we will not accept religious advertisements that may be deemed as disparaging to another religion.” “I guess the idea of gay TV doesn’t really mean it’s your community’s network,” Ron Buford, director of the UCC’s Stillspeaking Initiative, told United Church News. “It’s just something that’s targeted at you to sell product.” [!!!]

Even though at least 17 broadcast and cable networks have rejected the “Ejector” ad, it has been accepted and is running during April on several others, including: A&E, AMC, BET, CNN, CNN en Español, Headline, Hallmark, History, TBS, TNT, E!, Lifetime, SiTV, and Azteca Americ.

The ad is featured on the UCC’s media action Web site. Visit today.

Via PageOneQ.