Yearly Archives 2006

Look, no disrespect to President Ford or to the guy who apparently collapsed a moment before the speeches at Saturday's funeral in the Capitol rotunda, but I found it kind of chilling when someone told the networks to stop showing the bustle surrounding the man who fainted and show nothing but the president's coffin until further notice. Or rather, I found it chilling when that edict was given and all three networks and CNN and C-SPAN instantaneously complied. I was watching NBC and Brian Williams was respectfully commentating as paramedics hurried in and gave care to an unidentified funeral guest who must have fainted or collapsed. The network was switching between a tight shot of jostling backs and medics, that really didn't show much, and the cool from-above shot of the rotunda floor, which was disturbed by the motion in the lower corner of the screen and the splash of…

As the poem continues in its slowing course across the web, there have been a couple of small morphs done unto it - which I don't mind all that much. But at least keep the meter, would you? Here's the poem on Marilyn's blog. She had the courtesy to thank Mr. Moore, which I didn't in our initial circulation of it, and she took the liberty (a trope I can hardly object to) of changing the end to get rid of the direct ACLU reference. But she, or the friend who sent her the poem, neglected to keep the meter. And that just makes me Kristmas Krazy!!! Humbug.com!

Over on PDF, Micah cites a Shirky article about Second Life. Shirky has extremely wise things to say about the shocking absence of long-term memory when it comes to innovation and hype in the tech sector. But let's not drink the non-Kool Aid Kool Aid too quickly. Second Life is not only being watched by MSM, it's being embraced by brick-n-mortar providers and while they all may just be trying to catch a trend before it happens, the behavior of these arms of the establishment is worth noting because it indicates an evolving relationship between consumers and the market. See Micah's PDF post for more. And here's Shirky: So here's my question -- how many return users are there? ... At a guess, Second Life churn measured in the ordinary way is in excess of 85%, with a surge of new users being driven in by the amount of press…

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