37th Frame

An odd spectacle

2011-12-28T00:53:00.004-05:00

Watching live video of the funeral of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is a rather surreal experience. Between the constant sound of the wailing mourners, the way-over-the-top trembling voice of the announcer, and the sight of the casket mounted to the TOP of an ancient Lincoln Continental (during a snow storm, no less), this is one for the warped file.

History revealed

2011-12-26T20:57:00.002-05:00

While taking a bike ride through North Wales this weekend, I noticed a little piece of history slowly being revealed behind a wall of chipping paint. I have seen this wall advertisement elsewhere - there is a fully-restored version on a building in Pottstown.

Mom's Kindle list

2011-12-22T16:04:00.000-05:00

On November 5 I lost my Mom to cancer.

Though she had been dealing with this horrible disease off and on for the past twenty years, she never wanted anybody to say she had been 'battling' cancer. To her, it was just something she had to deal with, a fact of life.

What really defined her life, even in her very last days, was her caring for each and every family member, her empathy for all she met (and many she did not), her life-long love of learning and teaching, her creativity, her love of animals, her deep interest in the history her ancestors and the world they lived in.

To try and describe this extraordinary woman in a few sentences would never do her justice - I can only say that I feel like the luckiest kid in the world because I had a Mom who gave me the best gift a parent can give a child - she taught me how to think.

We spent so much time talking about pretty much everything - history, culture, parenting, religion, business, education, news - whatever the topic she had a wealth of knowledge and always a willingness to examine other points of view (even disagreeable ones).

Where she got much of that knowledge was from books. From the time she was a young girl, she was a reader. Our house always had shelves full of books - both her and my Dad collected hundreds of books - history, biography, psychology, travel, art, design, current events - fiction and non-fiction. Mom didn't just read these books - she slipped bits of paper with notes or relevant news articles between the pages to add something should she revisit the book (or for the next reader). Reading wasn't just a way to relax for her, it was a way to understand.

Last year, when she started having trouble reading the small print in many books, my older sister purchased a Kindle for her. Mom immediately took to the device, downloading dozens of books and slipping her hand-written notes into the pocket of its leather case. I have no doubt that had if she been given a couple more years on Earth, we would have needed to expand the memory on that thing to accommodate the huge volume of books she wanted to read. That gadget was a blessing which she used right up to her final days.

A few days after she died, my Dad and I were looking at the list of books she had downloaded, and he remarked how that list really was a reflection of the wide variety of interests my Mom had. I agreed, and that night began transcribing the entire list on to my computer.

Here, for your reading pleasure, is Mom's Kindle list.

____

Babbit (Sinclair Lewis)

Memoirs of a Holocaust Survivor (Icek Kuperberg and Abraham Kuperberg, Ph.D)

The Hunt for Bin Laden (Washington Post and Tom Shroder

Among the Righteous (Robert Satloff)

The Invisible Bridge (Julie Orringer)

WIRED (Douglas E. Richards)

Living in a Foreign Language

What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany

Classic American Literature: The Works of Mark Twain (Mark Twain)

Works of Anthony Trollope (Anthony Trollope)

The Old Man and the Wasteland (Nick Cole)

The Mill River Recluse (Darcie Chan)

The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Leo Tolystoy)

Complete Works of Henry James (Henry James)

The Awakening The Resurrection (Graf Leo Tolstoy)

Strength in What Remains (Tracy Kidder)

Great Expectations (Charles Dickens)

The Last Lecture (Randy Pausch and Jeffrey Zaslow)

Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life (Jon Lee Anderson)

The Turn of the Screw (Henry James)

The Buddha in the Attic (Julie Otsuka)

Devil at My Heels (David Rensin and Louis Zamperini)

You Never Know: Tales of Tobias, an Accidental Lottery Winner (Lilian Duval)

Hungry Hearts (Anzia Yezierska)

Miral: A Novel (Rula Jebreal)

Remembrance of Things Past: Swann’s Way I (Marcel Proust)

Sins of the Innocent (Mirielle Marokvia)

Shadows Bright as Glass (Amy E. Nutt)

Secret Daughter: A Novel (Shilpi Somaya Gowda)

Secret Memoirs: The Court of Royal Saxony 1891-1902 (Henry W. Fischer)

A Mountain of Crumbs (Elena Gorokhova

The Palliser Chronicles Collection (Anthony Trollope)

Chronicles of Barsetshire Collection (Anthony Trollope)

Works of E.M. Forster: (E.M. Forster)

Peking Story: The Last Days of Old China (David Kidd and John Lanchester)

Remarkable Creatures: A Novel (Tracy Chevalier)

Einstein (Walter Isaacson)

The Kitchen House (Kathleen Grissom)

The Emperor of All Maladies (Siddhartha Mukherjee)

March (Geraldine Brooks)

Learning to Breathe: One Woman’s Journey of Spirit and Survival (Alison Wright)

Ghosty Men: The Strange but True Story of the Collyer Brothers (Franz Lidz)

Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things (Randy Frost and Gail Steketee)

Homer & Langley: A Novel (E.L. Doctrow)

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption (Laura Hillenbrand)

In the Garden of Beasts (Erik Larson)

Three Cups of Deceit (Jon Krakauer)

Oceanstory (Leslie Marmom Silko)

Emma (Jane Austen)

The Warden (Anthony Trollope)

They Are Us: A Plea for Common Sense About Immigration (Pete Hamill)

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (Rebecca Skloot)

Bonhoeffer (Eric Metaxas and Timothy J. Keller)

Charley’s Lake (Art Zahn)

In the Kitchen (Monica Ali)

Cutting for Stone (Abraham Verghese)

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake: A Novel (Aimee Bender)

The Help (Kathryn Stockett)

Mayor Mike

2011-10-04T09:32:00.006-04:00

Christmas tree lighting, Mike and Evan Stanley, 1998

Good-bye, Mayor Mike - a quintessential small-town mayor who

genuinely loved his borough and his job. More than that, he was a family friend who always had a huge smile and jackhammer handshake for us every time we saw him at local events (which was often). He watched our boys grow up from infants, and shared his love of antique cars and trucks with them (none of us will ever forget that final ride on his amazing antique fire engine and police 'paddy-wagon', both of which he was so proud of.

Thanks for everything, Mayor Mike. You will be missed.

Mayor Mike meets 'Albert', a teddy bear that went home with every kindergarten student at Gwyn-Nor ES for a few days. Students were to document what Albert did while in their care - when we had him, he met the mayor!

The Bow Ties Ltd, of Vermont, where Mike purchased many of his signature ties, heard about the Albert visit and asked to feature the visit in their catalogue. We happily obliged.

Ben Stanley with Mayor Mike

Merry Tuba Christmas, 2004

Mike and his son, Mike Jr. 2008

Evan greets Mike after speaking during Mike's final Borough Council meeting, 2008

Mike and his collection, 2008

I think all photographers working in Lansdale between 1982 and 2008 have at least one of these photos.

How the mighty have floundered

2011-09-21T10:14:00.005-04:00

So the big news last week was how Netflix angered their subscribers by splitting the service - and charging twice as much in the process. Now the company is planning to rename the DVD-by-mail service Qwikster, which sounds like a chocolate drink.

The big news this week is yet more changes to Facebook. Now when users open their page, they are presented with more 'news' windows which supposedly highlight topics that the crack team at Facebook thinks are important to YOU.

Or more likely, important to their advertisers.

I was an early fan of Netflix, and we have thoroughly enjoyed the streaming service, despite the fact that it is mostly loaded with 'B' and 'C' level movies. In fact most of the few really good movies are scheduled to disappear early next year after contract talks with Starz broke down recently.

The problem, of course, is that that Netflix simply could not provide all that content for the price they were charging ($8 - $13 a month in my case). That was obvious a long time ago. The price increase was not the surprise, but the way they spun it was a kick in the Wii to their subscribers was. Twice the price? Well, out goes the DVD delivery. Or maybe drop the streaming service, since new alternatives are emerging and I really don't want to pay much for movies that wouldn't even make the marquis at the $2 discount movie theater.

Facebook has been chipping away at customer loyalty for several years - while they provide a free service that hundreds of millions use every day, they don't seem to understand why those users like the service (and what made Facebook kick MySpace into i-blivion).

I don't want to know what my 'friends' are doing at all hours of the day and night. That's what Twitter and Foursquare are for. I don't want pre-selected 'news that is important to me' to eclipse all the supposedly unimportant posts. I don't use FB chat very much, but those who do are complaining that the new format is confusing their friend lists and trying to steer their social interactions.

What do I want from FB? Control. I want to choose what posts I see. I want to control my privacy settings (and not have to re-visit them constantly). I want to control how and when I use the service - Facebook may want to become the new Twitter, Foursquare and ChatRoulette all wrapped up in one, but that is not what I signed up for.

So the question is, when will these companies get it? Treat you customers with respect and fairness. Listen to them. Talk with them, not at them. Stop trying to own the world. Test innovations thoroughly before launching them. Explain pricing and charge fairly.

Loyalty doesn't mean much these days, but if an online entity leaves their users feeling left out, there are plenty of others that will quickly fill in the gap.

Before and after

2011-08-28T08:46:00.003-04:00

18 hours and a little hurricane can make quite a difference: Wissahickon Creek in Upper Gwynedd

Ready for Irene

2011-08-26T14:58:00.005-04:00

If you look at the path of Hurricane Irene, it cuts a good wide path through many of the areas served by the Journal Register Company, owner of The Reporter. These sites are located in eastern Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey and Connecticut (other operations in Michigan and Ohio will likely be spared from this storm).

The digital and print operations of all these sites depends on a vast network of computers, servers and Internet connections that keep them all working together. And of course the print operations rely a highly co-ordinated system of delivery to get hundreds of thousands of newspapers to reader driveways and local stores each morning.

So with what could be a record-breaking storm looming to our south, planning to keep the web sites humming and the presses rolling has been underway for several days.

Sites with generators will host journalists and editors from other sites; alternate print sites have been lined up should one of the presses be incapacitated; alternate and cellular networks are ready to handle the data for both print and online.

In Yardley, PA, corporate headquarters for JRC, a temporary newsroom has been set up in a computer server room is ready to host reporters, copy editors and layout editors from nearby Trenton. This space has a generator to power not only the computers and network machines, but the lights and air conditioning as well.

We don't know exactly what damage Irene is about to unleash on us, but at least our journalists will be able to keep the readers, both on the web and online, informed and updated without a break.

Merck beats Apple

2011-08-15T08:02:00.008-04:00

The planned headquarters for Apple, Inc. in Cuppertino, California, likely will be getting some major press over the next few years as it is constructed. Some are calling it 'the spaceship', and from this picture it is not hard to see why:

Of course, because this is Apple, the building will feature all sorts of people and environment-friendly extras such as solar power and will be used to boost the company's 'bleeding-edge' reputation.

Very cool, but not so new. A certain local pharmaceutical concern (okay, Merck) has their headquarters just a short helicopter hop away from Lansdale, just off of I-78 in Whitehouse Station, NJ. It is nestled in a wooded area not too far from Donald Trump's golf course, and features all sorts of people and environment-friendly extras such as solar power:

The parking garage is in the basement, the building has a wooded area in the center. It doesn't look like a spaceship (at least not one from the 1950's), but sort of blends in with the surrounding area.

If there be nothing new, but that which is

Hath been before, how are our brains beguiled,

Which, labouring for invention, bear amiss

The second burden of a former child.

O, that record could with a backward look,

Even of five hundred courses of the sun,

Show me your image in some antique book,

Since mind at first in character was done!

That I might see what the old world could say

To this composed wonder of your frame;

Whether we are mended, or whe'er better they,

Or whether revolution be the same.

O, sure I am, the wits of former days

To subjects worse have given admiring praise.

Shakespeare Sonnet 59

An opportunity in space

2011-07-20T08:18:00.013-04:00

Much has been written this week about the demise of the space shuttle program - and what some see as a lack of vision for the future of the space program in the United States. Since the Constellation program was cancelled, fans of space exploration (count me in) are worried that our country is about to lose leadership to the space ambitions of other countries (perhaps a potent symbol of where the United States is going on several fronts).

Over thirty years ago, I remember lying in bed one day (I was home sick from school) watching the first in-atmosphere tests of the Enterprise (you know, the shuttle that never shuttled). I was just five when Neil Armstrong first set foot on the moon, and remembered that space highpoint only in the fleeting way

memories happen at that age.

But the space shuttle was MY space program - I watched the first launch, took a tour of Cape Kennedy just a couple of days before one of the early launches of Columbia, saw the Challenger disaster live on TV, watched the rebirth of the program, marveled at the launch and repair of the Hubble telescope. The promise of space was wide open - moon bases, trips to Mars, a real space station like the one in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Of course, the reality of modern space travel was something different than the promises made in books and films - we never returned to the moon, Mars still is unsullied by a human footprint, and the International Space Station doesn't have a swinging lounge and stewardesses with

mushroom cap hats.

But if we adjust the vision of what space travel is about, what did come out of the program was just as exciting in a way, though maybe not quite so Hollywood.

The ISS is a truly magnificent machine, the culmination of work by the best minds and hands that several countries have to offer. The Hubble telescope has opened our eyes to an astounding (color-enhanced) universe, giving us more information about the endless space around us than the moon walks ever did. And we learned much about what it takes to have a real human presence in space - baby steps, to be sure, but still as necessary as the first trips early humans took in crude boats beyond the comfortable horizon many years ago.

So is it really all over? Have we traded our interstellar dreams for Jersey Shore reruns?

For the sake of our country and the concept of dreaming in general, I hope not. We need a space program. But maybe it is once again time to re-think what we are going to achieve in space, much like we did after the Apollo program ended.

The process of lifting payloads or even people into space is at the point where it is routine - satellites are launched all the time, and most non-space geeks are not even aware when astronauts are lifted to the space station or returned to earth. NASA is encouraging several private companies - XCOR, SpacEx, Boeing and others to create the next generation of launch vehicles, cheaper and more efficient than the behemoth rockets used now. These efforts are well

beyond the blueprint stage - some prototypes have already been tested.

Such outsourcing (and let's be honest, hasn't the space program always relied on private companies for their technology?) should help NASA to think about some of the bigger plans in the future - maybe building that moon base, a mission to an asteroid, exploring the sun.

We have already proven that we can build great spaceships. And through sacrifice and engineering, we have learned how to make them safer.

Now it is time to move ahead. No, we don't have a map of where the program is going, and that is sad. But I believe there is as much promise and possibility as there ever was, and as a country we need to think about where we want to go and the best way to get there. I hope we do.

Fake, fake, fake

2011-07-08T13:44:00.002-04:00

Looks like a major television network just got caught with it's After Effects hanging out:

CBS Caught Faking Fourth of July Fireworks Footage in Boston

The executive producer of the show, David Mugar (a Boston philanthropist who has his name on a few buildings up there) defended the fakery, saying the broadcast was 'entertainment' and compared it to shooting scenes for 'Boston Legal' in Hollywood.

Uh, sorry Mr. Mugar. Boston Legal is a filmed and edited fictional drama. The fireworks are real and live. This is a pretty simple distinction, and very, very important.

'Reality TV' has twisted the line between real and fake beyond recognition, but at least by now most viewers (I hope) know that most of these shows are heavily scripted.

But for a 'live' show, I expect better from a major TV network with a pedigree that includes Edward R. Murrow and Uncle Walt. I switched between the New York, Philadelphia and Boston fireworks that night, and enjoyed feeling like I was hovering over each city watching some of the best pyrotechnics in the country (NYC won hands down, sorry Boston and Philly).

Now I feel cheated. Once again the media has broken trust with their viewers. They may not think it is news, but it was presented as a truthful rendition of what was actually happening in Boston. Why should we trust anything else broadcast on that network, news, entertainment or sports?

Maybe we shouldn't.

Oops (the perils of automation)

2011-06-12T08:39:00.004-04:00

Keyword generation of advertising is a very, very lucrative business - after all, advertisers don't just want their ads seen by as many eyeballs as possible, they want those eyeballs attached to humans that might actually purchase their products. Many ads, including some at TheReporterOnline.com and other local news outlets, are placed automatically by services provided by many outside companies.

Of course, automatic placement of ads has some drawbacks, which is always of concern to editors. This example, which I stumbledupon this morning, is a perfect example:

This ad fails on multiple fronts, though I wonder if some of that some may have been intentional.

First, to create an ad which includes images of guns pointing left and right will lead to situations like this all the time on news pages. The layout of this ad should have been rejected immediately for this reason alone - the guns could have easily been depicted facing at an angle that would have prevented such juxtapositions.

Second, ad placement software is designed to search for keywords such as murder, rape, crime, homicide and so forth...and prevent ads like this one from appearing on pages containing sensitive material. If this ad appeared on the NRA web site, or a site geared toward gun collectors, normally that would be no problem. But a general-interst news site needs different guidelines. Local news sites might need even tighter guidelines for various stories.

Third, a clear method of accountibility needs to be present. At our local news sites, readers can always call the local editor or publisher to report situations like this one. But at a national or aggregated news site, the only feedback method is often a 'contact us' box which often warns readers that replies are rare.

Take a ride on the Reading line

2011-06-05T09:35:00.008-04:00

Or actually a ride on the West Chester RR. Old commuter cars from both pulled into the Lansdale SEPTA station during Lansdale Day Saturday, and the WCRR offered an excursion through Philadelphia to West Chester and back to Lansdale. I didn't take the ride, but got some photos (along with a few hundred other folks) of these beautifully-restored cars and engines at the station. (Click on the photos to enlarge them)

Rules of the Game?

2011-05-13T14:32:00.010-04:00

A list released yesterday by the American Society of Newspaper Editors has generated much debate in media circles. This list outlines 'best practices' for social media, and includes a compilation of the social media policies at a variety of media outlets, displaying them and summarizing.

This is what the ASNE article described as the 10 key takeaways:

1. Traditional ethics rules still apply online.
2. Assume everything you write online will become public.
3. Use social media to engage with readers, but professionally.
4. Break news on your website, not on Twitter.
5. Beware of perceptions.
6. Independently authenticate anything found on a social networking site.
7. Always identify yourself as a journalist.
8. Social networks are tools not toys.
9. Be transparent and admit when you’re wrong online.
10. Keep internal deliberations confidential.

In a recent blog entry, Journal Register Company CEO John Paton identified three rules for using social media at JRC newsrooms:

1.
2.
3.

No, don't adjust your browser. The entries are blank. While some may have seen this as an invitation to a social media 'wild west', I read it as an invitation to experiment, to write some new rules, then throw them out the window and experiment some more. Social media is an evolution, much the way as radio or television was in their early days.

So does this mean that journalists can just post anything that pops into their heads at any time?

I believe the answer lies in one word: THINK.

If a story is libelous in print it will be just as libelous online, whether on the web or on Facebook. A rumor is still a rumor, and good judgement must be applied as to the source and effect of unsubstantiated material. The ASNE list provides a few good common-sense guidelines, but is not a substitute for the simple act of thinking before posting. Restricting the use of social media won't ensure quality or success; reaching out and engaging readers in thoughtful conversation will.

As for the ASNE guidelines, I take issue with these three in particular:

3. 'Professional' should not lead to 'cold'. A social conversation needs some personality and maybe even some attitude. Journalists are human beings with likes, dislikes and opinions. Sharing them is not a weakness, it is a strength.

4. News CAN be broken on social media. Example: A large column of smoke is seen. An editor might tweet, 'Checking out that huge column of smoke.' If it turns out to be news-worthy, then a story goes on the web site. If not, then just tweet, 'Never mind, it was just somebody burning leaves.'

10. Many 'internal deliberations' can and should be a part of the public conversation. If we don't ask our readers what they think about what we publish (and how), we are denying the very interactive nature of the Internet. Keeping these conversations positive and productive is an important part of this.

Osama death analytics

2011-05-05T22:37:00.020-04:00

OK, the title is a little harsh, but so was the story. On Sunday night May 1, sleepy news editors around the country kicked into high gear after the big story broke - USA public enemy #1 was taken out in a daring raid - and Journal-Register news sites were no exception, starting with Twitter, Facebook, SMS, breaking news web updates, and finally huge headlines on Monday's front pages. The story was played big on every medium at our disposal.

Then the details started flowing in...the raid, the shooting, the burial at sea, the Obama speech, the DNA test, reactions from Main Street to Ground Zero to Afghanistan.

Local news organizations face a challenge covering huge international or national stories such as this one - what people come to us for is LOCAL news, about their region, their city, their neighborhood. Sure, we have national and world coverage on our web sites and in print, but we know that is not why (for the most part) readers come to us. So we put our efforts into covering the local news that they won't find anywhere else, and generally leave the rest to the wire services.

But when you get a story like the death of Osama bin Laden, a story that reaches deep into the emotions of most Americans, we must react swiftly right along with CNN, AP, The New York Times and others. There are plenty of local stories connected with the 9/11 attacks right in the coverage areas of our news sites - 9/11 victims and their families, rescusers who responded to Ground Zero, soldiers fighting the war on terror and their families, Muslims in our own communities - to name a few. And on Monday and Tuesday, our writers, photographers and editors set out to find those stories. And we also ran many wire stories on our web sites those days as well.

So what did our readers actually want from us on Monday and Tuesday - were they reading all the Osama stories on our web sites or getting that news from national and international sites? When a huge story like this breaks, what is the place of a local news site? And since this story is basically a dress rehearsal for the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in September, how can we use this information to better serve readers then?

To explore this issue, I took a look around the page view numbers of a few of the Journal Register daily sites for Monday and Tuesday. This was not a scientific survey, but rather a comparitive look at what stories rose to the top of the list in terms of page views both days at sites of varying size. What I found was that while not many of the Osama death stories were top hits on our sites, plenty of readers looked at both the wire and local stories on Osama on both days, filling in the middle spots on our page view lists.

At the New Haven Register, our largest site, the story 'Inside the raid that killed bin Laden' was the #1 story Monday and 'U.S. forces kill Osama bin Laden inside Pakistan' was second. At the Delware County Times, another large site, bin Laden stories only made it to #5 and #6 however, following a number of local crime stories. On Tuesday this trend continued, with more crime stories topping the list and the first Osama follow-up story ranking at #7 for the day. At the NH Register, a story about NFL running back Rashard Mendenhall tweeting questionable Osama comments was the #2 story for the day, topped by a state budget story. The #3 story for Tuesday was about the possibility of the release of death photos of Osama.

At the hard-news Trentonian, a story about a city official arrested on heroin and assault charges topped all the Osama stories both days. But the Osama story was a close second on Monday in the #2 spot, and other Osama-related stories peppered many slots in the top 20 stories of the day. On Tuesday, the heroin story, a drug raid and a home invasion all topped second-day Osama death coverage, but again, several Osama stories including one local story listing the names of greater Trenton-area residents killed on 9/11 and a pair of local reaction stories made it to the top 20. The story 'NJ Gov. Chris Christie: Osama bin Laden attack missed my wife by 2 blocks' made it to #6 on Tuesday.

At the News-Herald in Ohio, a Cleveland Browns draft story and a robbery story beat out the Osama coverage. But local reaction stories and wire stories filled slots 4, 6, 9, 10, 13, 14, 15, and more beyond that. These included 'Share your reactions on BIN LADEN DEATH', 'World cheers bin Laden's death as victory,' 'Islamics decry bin Laden's sea burial,' and 'Not everybody believes bin Laden really is dead.'

On Tuesday stories on a break-in, a bank robbery, the Kentucky Derby and a new water fee topped the first Osama follow-up story.

At The Mercury in Pottstown, PA, Osama stories took the #3-#6 slots on Monday, and a reader poll about whether the US government should release the photo of Osama's body was the top story on Tuesday. Two more Osama stories made it to the top ten that day.

And at the Morning Sun in Michigan, a smaller site, the death of Osama took a back seat to Sound Off on Monday, and again fell behind Sound Off, a car accident follow-up and another car accident story on Tuesday at the #4 spot.

So just because the 'big' story didn't make it to #1 every day, does it mean that we should not be putting efforts into this?

I would argue that the numbers show a very positive picture for our 'localized' and wire coverage of this, since so many of these stories rose very high in the rankings even if they didn't get to #1 or #2 every time. News staffs rose to the occasion, and for the small effort of posting a few wire stories and photos reached many thousands of readers hungry for details and reaction. Local reaction did well, especially for such hot-button topics as the death photos, which many readers seemed to have an opinion about. Specific questions seem to do well.

Putting more links to related stories would also help efforts to keep readers on our sites - after reading some of the most popular Osama stories at a couple of sites, I noticed that many exited the site, a few returned to the home page, and not many clicked to other Osama stories. Making it easy for readers to jump from one aspect of such a big story to another would help keep them engaged.

While the eyes of the world will be focused on New York, Washington DC, Shanksville and the Middle East in September, we have plenty of local material and unique stories that should generate interest among our readers. And though some of these stories might not top the hits generated by a barn fire or car accident story, I believe the numbers show that plenty of readers do care, and it is well worth our time to pursue them.

Seeing metrics by the dashboard light

2011-04-29T14:30:00.005-04:00

This month I have been working on something that will hopefully be of interest to my fellow JRC employees and probably of very little interest to the rest of the world. So I apologize to my non-JRC friends, but there is plenty of material on the Royal Wedding out there so you better get to it.

My current IdeaLab project is to spread the gospel of site metrics - useful not only to see how we are doing but also to guide how we position our stories and coverage to maximize the audience. Unlike the old days where we could publish our stories and photos and throw them out there hoping that lots of people would look at them, now we have the ability to analyze how many are reading each story, for how long, where they came from, how they got there, how they navigate ours sites and where they go when they leave. And many other useful facts.

The purpose of using this information isn't just to guide what we cover (yes, we know fire and crime stories always rise to the top), but also how to draw readers into stories they might not know about, even if they visit our sites. We have many ways to do this - social media, cross-linking, updates, SMS alerts - but what actually works, and when should we use these tools? Using metrics, we can see spikes in traffic at certain times of the day. These spikes are good opportunities to reach our audience with new material - either fresh or re-organized on our home pages to bring different stories to their attention.

We can see what search terms are bringing readers to ours sites - useful for writing headlines that will grab their attention and that of the search engines.

By looking at article view numbers from other sites in the chain, an editor might find a good story that would be of interest to their own readers with or without localization.

We can measure how effective our social media efforts are - posting a few links on Twitter or Facebook is good, but watch how the hits multiply when we engage our audience in a discussion about a topic or an unfolding news story. And posting to social media at strategic times could bring readers back to our sites when they might otherwise not do so.

Does paginating our web pages cost us readers? Did a recent contest really bring them in? Are a lot of hits coming from a local corporate domain? The answers to these questions can all be found in site metrics and used to guide our online efforts.

This isn't just a popularity contest - it is a way to bring extra content to our readers that they might actually want to read. It is not a substitute for good news judgement or local knowledge, but a way to KNOW our audience even better and reach out to them more effectively.

For this project I created a 'dashboard' in Omniture for each of our daily sites that do not have them yet. Dashboards are a quick and easy way to share site metrics via email on a regular basis with the staffs at all our sites. They are customizable reports that can be automatically generated and emailed, so recipients do not have to log into the Omniture system to view them. I will be sending written and video instructions to publishers and editors on how to use and customize their dashboards via email (I'd post them, but they contain some proprietary information not good for a public forum).

These videos will also be made available to weekly editors, and I would be happy to assist them in creating dashboards if needed. If anybody else in JRC would like to view the videos, please email me for a link.

Something really new at the car show

2011-04-26T11:10:00.004-04:00

When I was a kid, my father would often take me to the NY car show. There I would join thousands of other fathers and sons (it really is mostly a male scene) climbing in and out of the latest that Detroit, Japan and Germany (among others) had to offer.

I have continued this tradition with my own sons - we alternate between the Philadelphia and New York car shows most years. This year we took a ride to Yankee territory to wander the vast Jacob Javitz Convention Center, which was filled with hundreds of shiny new cars, some on rotating platforms, some suspended in the air, and almost all surrounded by huge LED video screens displaying the best Adobe After Effects and video shot from multiple low-angle cameras can offer (remember that Eminem Chrysler Superbowl ad? Imagine it playing over and over and over on a 30-foot screen all day long).

The last time we went to the NY show, a couple of years ago, I was somewhat underwhelmed. I didn't find any of the new styles very different from what was already clogging the streets a few blocks away, and with the exception of a few hybrid cars, most still were all about the gasoline engine - basically the same technology Henry Ford was peddling back in the 1920's, with some more bells and whistles.

This year was different.

Front and center were the electric cars, the zero-emissions vehicles, concepts for luxury 'smart cars' designed to whisk you around the city in style without adding to the carbon footprint.

Almost every car maker, from Ford to Saab, had some alternative-energy vehicle in concept, or in the case of Chevrolet and Nissan actual electric cars you could go out and buy today. Unlike failed electric cars of the past, these actually are not under-powered, can be partially charged as fast as a 1/2 hour, and (in the case of the Chevrolet Volt) have a back-up gas engine so you will never be caught without any juice.

Due to the high efficiency of these new electric engines, they require much less energy to power than a gas engine - so even though they still draw some carbon footprint from electric suppliers, it is much less than a gas engine.

These are not (yet) long-distance touring cars - but for commuters and those making short runs around town - the technology, consumer interest and the political will has finally caught up with the electric dream. Many of the SUV's that were the centerpiece of the show a few years ago were relegated to the basement show area this year, and I overheard many visitors talking about MPG and emissions even over the luxury brands.

In this country we can talk a lot about mass transit, but we are still basically a country of automobiles. New auto technology won't cure every problem associated with private transit - overcrowded highways, suburban sprawl, safety and environmental issues - but at least we are starting to look ahead to the next big thing. And that thing is not more chrome or GPS or a built-in entertainment system.

It's bigger and far more exciting than that.

Rock On (with Garage Band for the iPad)

2011-04-20T11:25:00.008-04:00

Last month I wrote about some low-cost / low-talent options for getting background music for videos. One of the suggestions was to learn and use Garage Band, great if you have an Apple computer.

With the introduction of the iPad2, Apple has also released an iPad version of Garage Band. Happily for early adopters, this is also completely compatible with the oh-so-2010 iPad1. The cost is $4.99, a major bargain when you consider some of the powerful features it brings from the full-size version.

Musicians and non-musicians (like myself) will both find something to love. Creating a quick beat, a simple chord progression with some percussion, or even a full-blown composition is fast and easy. What sets the newer versions of Garage Band from the original is the smart instruments, which allow for one-touch chords on guitars and keyboards and time-grid drum composing in a multi-track setting. Real musicians can hook up an electric guitar to the iPad and play through several simulated classic and modern virtual amps, adding their tracks to other instruments.

The interface is similar to the full-size Garage Band. You can toggle between instrument mode:

and track mode:

when creating compositions. After I first downloaded the app, I created a drum track using the 'smart drum' option, then used the 'smart guitar' and 'smart keyboard' to lay down some more tracks (dig the music lingo, man).

Every time you start a new track, you can play it while listening to previous tracks. Garage Band iPad allows up to eight tracks, but percussion can include many instruments in one track, so in reality you are getting more. If you record a track and don't like it, just go back to the beginning and re-record. You can also toggle to the track view and 'cut' a track by double-tapping on it. Tracks can be moved, duplicated, and looped in track view mode.

After playing around for about 20 minutes, here is the first thing I created. Please be kind, I'm not a musician and I JUST got the app:

I explored for another half-hour or so, and created another Grammy-winner (not). This time I threw in some electric piano and screaming electric guitar:

And as the clock ticked toward midnight, I created one final piece - this time I set out to prove that you can never have enough cow bell and Hammond organ in a song:

I was able to add reverb and echo to each track, or these can be applied to the entire composition upon output. Each instrument in 'smart' mode offers several 'autoplay' settings, which can be switched on-the-fly while recording. This is how I varied the Hammond organ chords - I only switched between a 'C' chord and an 'F' chord, but also varied the autoplay to add variety.

To get a composition out of Garage Band iPad, you can email it to yourself or add it to your iTunes library. It creates a .M4A file, which is playable on any device with new versions of QuickTime on them. These can also be converted to MP3 or AIFF files with a freebie app such a MPEG Streamclip.

Another useful feature is the ability to record vocals and work them into a composition. If you want to create a podcast with a little background music, this would be a good way to do that.

This is a great app for creating quick compositions, and the implications for music education and composition are enormous. No, it won't replace expensive music software and hardware. But for a third of the price of an average album, it's probably the best bargain in music.

International Spring Festival

2011-04-16T15:46:00.006-04:00

The 20th annual International Spring Festival at North Penn HS Saturday was packed, as usual. The heavy rain outside helped, but this event has grown almost every year. Here's a few images:

First, a panorama photo of the action in the main gym:

Music from Native American drummers and dancing:

And a couple more photos:

Is your NYT story 20-worthy?

2011-04-14T09:25:00.004-04:00

A few weeks ago, the New York Times stunned nobody (this had been discussed for years) by invoking a 'pay wall' on their web site. Hoping that readers will happily fork over money to read stories that have been free (and available in many places on the Internet) for many years, they came up with this compromise: We'll give you twenty free stories a month, then you have to pay.

In theory this sounds like a great way to make everybody happy - they get some revenue, readers still get some free content.

The real question is whether the loss of advertising revenue from the decreased number of page views (currently estimated between 5 and 15 percent) will be made up in subscription fees. That number might not sound like a lot, but when you're dealing in millions of hits, it can really add up (sorry for the pun).

So the dilemma for those who read the NYT (which I have since I was a kid) and are not willing to part with cash because, well, we're cheap...is a NYT story 20-worthy?

A friend caught me reading a NYT story on their computer the other day...oops, that's 19 left. Sorry.

An update on the nuclear mess in Japan? Pass. Available elsewhere (hello BBC, Reuters and many, many others).

An op-ed piece about the deficit? Pass (hello Economist and many, many others).

Yet another story on how great Apple products are? Pass. Tired of this publicity machine.

How about a story on Barry Bonds trouble with steroids? Been there, done that (hello ESPN, Baseball Weekly, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, SFGate and many, many others).

Movie reviews? Pass. IMDB, Rotten Tomatoes, IndieWire, IFC, and many, many others.

Now don't get me wrong...the New York Times didn't get to be one of the greatest news sources in the world by imitating others with second-rate second-day (or second-hour) coverage. Despite some credibility problems and newsroom cutbacks over the past few years, they still lead the way in quality journalism that matters and are an important part of our American democracy.

The problem isn't their coverage. This story about the economy, this story about the harmful effects of sugar or this story about school reform might be 20-worthy. They are unique and important.

But as I cruise the Internet each day, I'll pass by all those other, less unique NYT stories and seek them out on other sites. Who knows, I might like the coverage on other sites better and find myself going there first. The New York Times on a pay wall is like a Ferrari that only comes with ten gallons of gas - sure, it's fun for a while, but I'd rather take a slower but longer drive.

As to whether people might just get used to paying, some will. But unless every credible news site in the world moves to the same pay wall model, which I don't see happening, it will only be successful for the most specialized information and audience (such as targeted business reports).

My family paid for NYT subscriptions for years, as well as subscriptions to local newspapers. So why should I expect to get the same information for free now? Remember, much of what a subscription fee pays for is the printed product and delivery. The real revenue is in the advertising, which is still delivered on the Internet. The amount of digital revenue still doesn't match that of the printed product, but that is the challenge.

Back when newspapers only had to compete with each other, or maybe TV and radio to an extent, the subscription model made sense. But now the market has changed. I enjoy getting news from many sources, but I couldn't afford to purchase subscriptions to every one of them if they went behind pay walls. I'd simply look elsewhere for the information.

This isn't about what people should do or support, but rather the realities of the Internet and capitalism. Unless newspapers want to start holding beg-a-thons like public radio, they need to find a revenue stream that works in the real world. So far, the numbers on the pay wall experiment are not encouraging.

Good luck, NYT. I hope you find something that works. Until then, I'll keep searching for those 20-worthy stories.

IdeaLab: Metrics on-the-go

2011-04-04T10:01:00.003-04:00

Great stories (in all forms) are the foundation of great news web sites.

In a perfect world, our audience would just come to us and eagerly read everything offered every day, perhaps a few times a day.

In the real world, we have to reach out and find the audience, through everything from multi-platform posting and social media to search engine optimization and cross-promotion. And more than that, we need to understand our audience - what they are reading, when do they visit, where do they come from, how can we keep them interested in our content so they stick around a little longer.

That's where metrics comes in. Adobe Site Catalyst (Omniture) is one of the tools we are using to survey information about our site visitors. For my IdeaLab project this month I am creating Site Catalyst dashboard reports for each JRC daily site, which will be customizable and easily distributed via email once a day or several times a day.

Another great tool I am using is the Site Catalyst mobile apps - if you are a metric junkie (and if you are reading this, you should be), these apps provide basic information which you can set up via dashboards on just about every metric available through the service.

On the Droid, the app looks like this:

And the iPad provides a bigger picture for the vision-challenged:

An iPhone version is also available.

The apps are free; the information can be obtained through a normal Site Catalyst login.

Scenes from Lansdale First Fridays

2011-04-02T08:27:00.004-04:00

Back outside after a winter indoors

Video of Tom Waits music at Virago Bakery

Mario has an existential moment

Phillies panorama

2011-04-01T16:14:00.004-04:00

I've been playing around with a new Android app called Photaf, it can make panoramas like this:

It's not perfect yet, but is very easy and fast to use. I made this panorama at the Phillies opening exhibition game on Tuesday. The photos took about 2 minutes to shoot and the app processed the images into a panorama in about 5-7 minutes. The app uses the camera's compass and level to line up the individual photos, then stiches them automatically.

Newsroom Cafe

2011-03-17T22:58:00.004-04:00

It doesn't look too busy in this panorama photo (taken at closing time), but I watched plenty of people come and go from this Newsroom Cafe at the Register Journal in Torrington, CT for a couple of days. Great office.

Pales

2011-03-11T18:57:00.006-05:00

Sometimes something you think will be important...

View Montgomery County flood map in a larger map

turns out to be pretty insignificant compared to...

... something else.

Tools of the trade

2011-03-10T19:46:00.011-05:00

As part of my work for IdeaLab, I have been asked to learn and share my knowledge about some items on a long list of free online tools useful to journalists.

From the list, these are tools I have actually used in my daily work:

- Audacity: One of the most useful free programs ever. It can do everything from simple audio editing to complex audio editing to audio conversions. I just found how to make it record streaming web audio (from any source!)

- Aviary: A great suite of online tools for image, audio and video editing. Despite not having music lessons for the past 30 years or so, I managed to create some decent music for videos here.

- Foursquare (not): I know, it's the best app ever and I'm supposed to love it. I just can't get into it, however. I just don't care who is mayor of Starbucks.

- TweetDeck: This is my addiction. I could stare at it all day, and sometimes do.

- WidgetBox: I actually created an iPhone app with this in an hour. It's crazy easy to use, but you still have to pony up the Apple developers fee to actually see you app in the app store.

- Quora: A database of questions and answers. A great place to find some good advice.

- SurveyMonkey: Create embeddable online polls quickly

- UStream: Free online live video streamer turns everybody into a TV network. Works with iPhone and Android, too. Or try out Justin.tv or the somewhat more professional Livestream.

Here's some accordian music recorded live at the Philly Folk Festival

- Google Voice: I use this for phone conferences, interviews, and calls to Mom. The sound is great, and it's free.

- Evernote: Good way to organize notes on your gadgets.

- Kaywa QR code: Use this to generate those zippy little bar codes for mobile phones.

- Zamzar: Convert files into something you can use. Stick it to Microsoft and their DocX's.

- Animoto: Creates effects-laden slide shows. Lots of fun, a bit gimmicky.

- PhotoSynth: I just started playing with this. It automatically stitches photos together to create a panorama. Does in seconds what used to take me hours to do.

Honorable mention (other freebies not on the list): GIMP photo editor, Google Maps-Fusion-Docs, Dropbox (the single-most useful app EVER), SynthFont (another great way to create music for free), CoverItLive. I'll think of more later.

And which ones do I want to learn more about? Aviary, Dipity, Google Fusion, WidgetBox, CrowdMap, Google everything, geocommons, fx.

I'll be posting examples of stuff I create as I explore some of these great online tools.

Face the music

2011-03-08T08:24:00.009-05:00

The music on this video was obtained directly from the musician, a friend.

Recently my wife was doing some freelance marketing work for a music licensing business. Besides learning a bit about this HUGE market (which is changing rapidly, like most of the music business), I also started listening to the space behind the dialogue on TV shows and commercials.

Whether you realize it or not, it is often filled with music. Sometimes just generic 'elevator music' and other times popular songs you might even recognize. The music drives the visuals, sets the tone for the video, and can be the difference between a home video and something closer to professional (and watchable).

Videos posted on YouTube mashups featured so many popular songs that YouTube just cut deals with some music sites to easily license use of songs on the site.

But for journalists, using licensed music is not an option unless you have the budget to pay for it. Under Fair Use copyright laws, you can keep SOME background music in a video (like the music playing at a dance competition, for example) but only in very limited quantities (generally 20 seconds or less). In this example, the music would reflect what is happening on the screen - the dancers are actually dancing to the song on the sound track in real time.

Fair Use does not allow you to use that background music under an ENTIRE video highlight reel, for example, even if the song was playing at PART of the event depicted in the video. So, in our example, if you used a copyrighted song recorded at the competition as a continuous soundtrack under B-roll video of the dancers arriving, preparing, an interview with an organizer, and finally the dancing itself - that song would need to be licensed. If the music was only heard in short clips showing the dancers actually dancing to it, you would be covered under Fair Use.

And remember, even a local band covering popular songs is included in Fair Use laws. The performance may not be copyrighted, but the song is. And to confuse things further, an orchestra playing a public-domain song (music free of copyright restrictions because of its age) could still be considered restricted, since the PERFORMANCE might be copyrighted. Using sound from a local string quartet playing Mozart is only acceptable if the quartet has agreed to let you use their performance, even though permission isn't usually needed for the music itself.

I need to put in some legalese here - I am not a lawyer and don't play one on TV. Many attorneys make their living on copyright law, since it is complicated and full of exceptions. For a good summary of Fair Use laws, I suggest looking HERE. Another good discussion HERE. Much has been written about Fair Use, and the definitions are changing all the time. Do your research.

So if you want to use some music in your videos but don't want to get sued, what are your choices? Here are some suggestions:

Find local music and get permission to use it. Some local bands, composers, and students would be happy to provide music in return for a link to their web sites and/or a credit on the video. This can be an opportunity to build their reputation and use the publicity to seek paid gigs.
Use non-copyrighted material. A good example is a local band 'jamming' at a concert (assuming you have permission to use their performance). Another I have used extensively is high school marching bands warming up before a game. The drum lines and percussion often play beats for several minutes, providing a great backdrop for action footage of the game.

Example of HS marching band drums used as a musical intro

Purchase a royalty-free disk. For a set amount (which varies based on the quality and quantity of music provided) you can purchase disks or downloads of music which can then be used without further compensation in your videos. Many web sites (such as Magnatune) also sell royalty-free music with the same purpose - pay one amount, use the music however you want. Be aware: Royalty-free is NOT copyright-free music - instead of licensing it for a specific project, you are buying the rights to use the music outright. Many web sites advertising 'free music' are actually selling royalty-free collections. You still have to pay.
Use Garage Band, MIDI or other music creation programs. New versions of Garage Band are so sophisticated that with even with just a little musical aptitude, you can knock out a driving loop for a sports video or a simple tune for a how-to video. Some of the 'samples' are virtually self-contained songs in themselves. Another music creation resource is Aviary - a web-based music tool (which also has some other interesting creative tools).

Music on this video was created from a public domain score found on the Internet, then rendered on a free MIDI editor, SynthFont.
Use music from musicians that have posted copyright-free material (using a Creative Commons license). Read the rules of use carefully - some ask for a credit on the video, some ask for nothing. Here are a few such sites:

www.incompetech.com: One of the oldest and most widely-used freebie sites with a HUGE selection of background music

www.audionautix.com

www.jewelbeat.com

http://dig.ccmixter.org: You can search this site for free commercial use music.

Photos matter

2011-03-02T09:07:00.006-05:00

Take a look at the photos in this Yahoo story about toxic cities (we're #1!).

Notice what three of the five of the photos have in common? They depict cities shrouded in haze.

Then read the story...Philadelphia and New York don't have an air pollution problem, they have a groundwater problem resulting from the dumping of industrial wastes.

So an editor in a hurry probably just typed in 'Philadelphia' and 'pollution' or 'haze' and threw in the ugliest photo that popped up. The photo doesn't outright lie -the city does have some hazy days - but it doesn't tell the story, either.

This is a pet peeve of mine - many web photos are generically chosen from stock or wire services and really don't have much to do with the stories they are attached to. Sometimes they exaggerate the content, sometimes they are just irrelevant. Either way, this is sloppy journalism. Images matter. I hope editors care more than this.

AOL, Patch and HuffPo

2011-02-23T19:30:00.005-05:00

Journal-Register CEO John Paton on AOL, Patch and The Huffington Post

Much has been written (and Tweeted) over the past few weeks about the acquisition of the Huffington Post by AOL as part of their strategy to trade the 'dial-up' Internet business for the rather more progressive content business.

Part of that strategy is their other recent purchase of Patch, a string of hyper-local web sites that started in New Jersey and has now expanded to over 750 sites across the country, including right here in good ol' Lansdale (yes, no link, what, do you think I'm going to make it easy for you?).

Reaction to both has run the gamut, from predictions of doom to declarations of brilliance and lots of guessing in between.

Certainly AOL has their work cut out for them - the Internet is an increasingly crowded place with many players grabbing for a slice of the advertising pie. Patch is an attempt at tapping what AOL calls the 'underserved' local market, and the billions of dollars from local advertising that they say is just there for the taking.

I tend to think it has more to do with good old-fashioned demographics - I would hesitate to label the upscale suburbs of cities like Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Chicago as 'underserved'. Many of these communities already have local news sites, though perhaps not always as narrowly-focused as the Patch sites.

And despite a perception that newspapers are fading as new technologies leave them in the dust, the reality is that most local newspaper publishers now embrace the web and have growing readerships between the print and digital products. This has been a tough transition, and is far from over. But as the web matures, so will the 'legacy' news sites. Editors and reporters are learning new skills - everything from using video, social media and online tools to embracing readers as partners in the news-gathering process. Readers expect more, and will judge our progress with a click of their mouse - or swipe of a finger on whatever new mobile gadget comes out next.

Patch can join a long list of competitors that have challenged local newspapers and their revenue stream over the years - everything from radio and television to direct-mail and competing newspapers. But I wouldn't count the 'legacy' media out quite yet. These old dogs are learning some new tricks pretty fast.

Cool tools: Fun with legislative maps

2011-02-17T09:52:00.006-05:00

Is your legislative district gerrymandered? We have some pretty odd-shaped districts here in Pennsylvania, and other states are known for some, er, creative map making.

An online database, redistrictingnation.com uses map-based geometry to rank Congressional and state legislative districts. Here is a screen shot for the 13th District of Pennsylvania:

The map itself shows the highlighted district, and the bar charts on the right rank the shape of the district using several geometry-based formulas (which are explained). Districts that rank 'low' on these charts MIGHT be gerrymandered - other factors play into districting, of course (for example, Cape Cod ranks pretty low, but the ocean probably has something to do with that).

This is a good basis for questioning and research.

Reaching out to bloggers

2011-02-16T09:38:00.008-05:00

You know they're out there...but can you find them?

Community blogs are pretty easy to find in the city. Go to Google, search for an urban neighborhood + 'blog', and you should get a few hits. But try this elsewhere, and you're likely to find more pizzerias than community news sites.

So how do you find blogs outside the city based on their location? Like most things in the suburbs, they're out there, but are often hidden. And if they are issue-oriented blogs, they likely won't be geo-tagged.

Here's a few ideas to help find blogs created in a particular area:

1. Yes, you can start with a good old-fashioned Google search. Search for towns, neighborhoods, local businesses, or community groups, scroll past the pizzerias and see what pops up. Google also offers a dedicated blog search page to help narrow your focus.

2. Use Twitter: By using geo-specific Twitter searches you can find bloggers that are tweeting their latest posts. Twitter itself offers geo-centric searching in their advanced search options, or you can use services like ChirpCity, NearbyTweets, Twellow, and TwitterLocal. Various Twitter apps for computers, iPhone or Android also have localized searches.

3. Outside.in: Shameless promo: This site has partnered with my employer, Journal Register Company, to build an online portal in Philadelphia (the actual JRC-oriented site is still in development). Hundreds of local blogs are included in the effort, which posts links to both established media and community blogs. Content isn't limited to Philadelphia, however - the site links blogs from throughout the country.

4. Links: One of the best resources I have found is searching the 'links' page found on many blogs, media sites, or community group web sites. Bloggers are interested in other bloggers and freely list them. You will have to spend some time and effort opening the links to look for outdated, missing or dead blogs (blogs are like restaurants...only a select few last). So once you find a local blog, don't stop there...keep looking.

5. Dedicated blog-finding sites: Some are better than others, but these sites offer the ability to list and find blogs -

Placeblogger.com: This Massachusetts-based site was desgined for journalists, but seems to have a fairly limited listing of blogs. Still, some are there.
FeedMap.net: Another geo-based blog search engine.
Technorati.com: Offers a blog search for over a million blogs. Not geo-based, but could be useful for looking up local topics.

6. Blog hosting sites: You can search using geographic terms at WordPress, Tumblr (sign-up required) or others. Blogger is owned by Google, so their own blog search is the best bet there.

7. Ask readers or community leaders what their favorite blogs or local web sites are. Then see item #4 above.

Got any more suggestions? Let me know and I'll add them to this post.

Newspaper helps develop crowd-sourcing app

2011-02-14T10:54:00.006-05:00

The San Jose Mercury-News, known for their high-quality reporting and photojournalism, is taking a leap into crowd-sourcing by partnering with Tackable to create a geo-based photo app. In fact, according to an article at the Poynter web site, the Tackable developers are actually working in the Mercury-News building.

The app will be social in nature - the developers hope to motivate contributors with 'leaderboard' competition and even coupons.

Here is an info video about the project, which has aspirations beyond the SF bay area:

This project is interesting because it deals with one of the biggest problems getting reader-generated content to media web sites and print - actually getting people to contribute. When somebody gets a photo of something noteworthy, they are quick to post it on Facebook for their friends to see. But sending it to the local newspaper has a higher threshold - it is simply not up there on most people's priority list. This app promises to take on that problem by building a community, fostering friendly competition and even offering some minor physical rewards.

Bad news for (former) homeowners

2011-02-11T13:55:00.008-05:00

UPDATE 2/15 : Google has just discontinued their real estate map function, citing low usage and an abundance of other sites that carry RE listings. Too bad, since most of those sites are geared toward purchasing homes as opposed to foreclosure research.

This information is available in map form on Hotpads.com, but their map is not embeddeble. It is good for research purposes (to find current foreclosures). A full search would involve a trip to the county land records office to build a database from their records).

Try this Google map trick:

Search for an address in Google maps, and add the word 'foreclosure'

You will get a map like this:

View Larger Map

As far as I can tell, these are just foreclosed properties that are for sale, many more are likely in various stages of foreclosure that are not this advanced.

There is also a 'foreclosure' checkbox under 'show options' on the left side of the Google map page, but though this worked for me last week I am not having any luck with it this week. The result is the same, however.

The Daily

2011-02-04T09:52:00.013-05:00

After much anticipation, Rupert Murdoch's latest venture finally hit the ~~street~~ iPad this week. The Daily brings a print-style publication to the online age, not the first to do so (witness the e-editions of many publications, including The Reporter), but among the first to do so exclusively from scratch and to use the iPad interface to enhance the content with videos, photo galleries and more.

Downloading the 45-mb app took some doing, as the iPad refused to do so from a 3G connection but instead prompted me to find a grounded wireless signal. Once I did so, the app loaded slowly then the current 'edition' of The Daily also loaded.

The interface is gorgeous. The reader is presented with a carousel-style page chooser (much like the Apple photo viewer), and the pages are designed to look like a magazine, complete with a cover, 'featured' page, full-page ads (with embedded videos and other multi-media) and multi-page articles. The photo display, as you would expect on an iPad, is excellent, and the layout of the pages is clean and well thought-out. As others have pointed out, the app lacks a site index, so you are forced to thumb through pages to find particular stories. The 'featured' page can take you to some articles, but not all.

Like a newspaper, the app features a crossword puzzle and Soduko in the back.

The stories are what you would expect from a Murdoch publication - hard news, lifestyles features, and lots of entertainment and celebrity content. In one edition, coverage of the crisis in Egypt included a couple of 2-3 page stories (newspaper-length), photo galleries, and some video. Coverage of the recent snow storm led the news, however, and also included a photo gallery and video.

The app and content are free for the next two weeks, so you can check it out for yourself or find it on the web at an unofficial blog that may or may not last long depending on what Murdoch's attorneys think about it. After two weeks, The Daily will be available for $.99 a week or $39 for a year subscription - a pretty reasonable price.

This is a well-executed product that obviously has a lot of talent behind it. The big question - is there an audience for this unique publication?

The Daily makes me think of what we thought 20 years ago about what an online publication would look like. The Harry Potter-like interface with moving ads and embedded videos evokes nostalgia in a way - I have become so used to reading news in an interactive, webby interface that looking at The Daily reminds me of sitting in the library and reading magazines years ago (only with less words).

And that brings me to one of the biggest drawbacks of The Daily - the content is delivered once a day print-style. Stories about the crisis in Egypt are outdated an hour after they are sent, and while the 'evergreen' features (not tied to a particular date) are nice, on a standard web interface such content can be left featured for days if the demand is good enough. Some stories or multi-media features take hours or days to 'go viral,' but it is lots of fun when they do.

Maybe an updating feature will be added at some point, so stories will change on the fly encouraging readers to check back several times a day instead of sitting down after work and reading The Daily cover-to-cover.

I wonder whether the new generation of news readers will embrace the magazine format - after all, they are all about web pages, text messages, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook - all instant, instant, now. Sitting down to read stories that a bunch of editors in New York think I want to read, with no reader comments or content, forums, links, or other webby enhancements seems like a limited experience to me. If I want news on Egypt, I can connect right to Al Jazeera and their amazing live coverage. Or I can watch Twitter (which I have been) for updates from people actually on the scene in Cairo. Pretty compelling stuff.

If I want celebrity news, I could hit TMZ or dozens of other sites. Sports? MLB, NFL, ESPN, or the thousands of fan blogs that cater to every pro and college team. Whatever my interest, there is a place to go to find more discussion and content than I could ever digest - free, categorized, searchable, interactive and live.

Though missing the interactive and live elements, perhaps The Daily will serve a demographic that actually misses the print publication experience - you know, those people you see on the train reading actual books and magazines; or those who have embraced the print-like Kindle or Nook readers. They're still out there, and maybe under-served in the online world?

And finally - the pay wall. Will readers be willing to part with 14 cents a day for The Daily? The price is certainly low enough to not be an issue for most folks. I question whether the loss in readership will damage ad revenue beyond the subscription price once the two-week honeymoon is over, however. The content will have to be unique and compelling enough for me to spend even a small amount - I am already overwhelmed with the massive amount of free information available and the number of content providers competing for my attention. I found the first edition a little too heavy on the entertainment and too light on the news for my tastes (hey, it IS News Corp after all), but for others this might be just the right mix. Perhaps at some point it will be split into several publications, each with their own staff directed at niche audiences.

I'll keep reading The Daily for the next two weeks and give it a fair chance, but as pretty as it is, I have a feeling once they ask for a credit card, it will end up in my 'shaky app' delete bin.

Crumbling respect

2011-01-31T22:32:00.004-05:00

OK, I guess I'm just a big stick in the mud, but this story ticked me off...

Maine wants to grab the whoopie pie as the official dessert before Pennsylvania does.

Seriously. A state legislative committee actually considered the question.

According to AP, the hearing "featured fresh whoopie pies, someone wearing a whoopie costume and even a song praising the product as 'a slice of happiness.'"

Now I love a good whoopie pie. And a good argument over food (it's what we do at holiday gatherings in my family). And I happen to really like Maine, but am also fairly fond of Pennsylvania since, well, I live here. Be happy where you are.

A number of years ago I was living in Massachusetts and a similar controversy arose, that over the naming of a state muffin. A grade-school student suggested the state adopt the corn muffin as the state's official muffin. The teacher saw it as an opportunity to teach civics to the class by introducing some real legislation.

All seemed well, until...well, if you know anything about Massachusetts, you might know that it is one of the largest producers of cranberries in the country. And yes, cranberry muffins are quite popular up there. So if you are going to declare a state muffin, why not support the local agricultural industry instead of that in, say, Nebraska?

Or better yet, teach the kids a real lesson in civics, that state legislatures should avoid dancing whoopie pies and be busy themselves with things like reducing huge projected budget deficits ($468 million for Maine, $4.5 billion for Pennsylvania in 2012). Or fixing the infrastructure. Controlling taxes. Rebuilding the economy. Restoring funding to vital programs. Yeah, I know, b-o-r-i-n-g.

But maybe once they have all these issues solved, THEN we can consider our state dessert. Personally, I'm voting for the Krimpet. Maine can have their pies.

A few visitors

2011-01-25T15:35:00.003-05:00

Journal Register Company, owner of The Reporter and other area newspapers, is busy upgrading many systems as they adapt from a print-based deadline system to Digital First. Today some editors and reporters from other sites joined our staff in our new Community Media Lab Tuesday training for a new video system, which once installed will enable us to load many more videos, post videos generated by our readers, and share videos from all the sites around Philadelphia and the other states served by newspapers in the company. Reporters will be able to post videos on location, bringing breaking news to our sites even faster.

The promise of unwanted technology

2011-01-06T14:20:00.007-05:00

An article in today's New York Times talks about the drive by television makers to convince consumers that their (mostly) new flat TV's are out-of-date, and need to be replaced with something newer and shinier. The two technologies that seem most likely to accomplish this are televisons capable of 3-D viewing or those that are Internet-ready.

Due to some vision problems, I can't actually see 3-D, but my kids tell me it is 'cool'. For the moment, viewers have to wear clunky polarizing glasses (some with their own power supply), but research is underway to eleminate these. As to whether this would be worth several hundred dollars (assuming I needed a new TV, which I don't) extra, for me the novelty isn't worth the price. Though the technology is getting much better than the blue-and-red glasses days, I still have my doubts. To me TV is still about content - I'll watch if the shows are good. People flinging folding chairs in 3-D won't make Jerry Springer any more worth watching than it is now.

On the other hand, if I was into gaming, I would probably be very interested in 3-D.

I wonder about the usefulness of putting 'the Internet' on TV. I'm not talking about Internet video - this area has a bright future as long as the structure of the Internet can keep pace with the demand. I'm talking about Facebook and Twitter and getting Skype calls through your TV - these are experiences that are really better aligned with PC's, tablets and mobile phones. Reading text from across the living room just isn't that comfortable, and I really don't want to answer my TV when somebody is calling.

All this made me think about some of the other under-appreciated promises of technology that came and went - then came and went again - over the years. Two-way video telephones are my favorite example - I think people LIKE that nobody can see them on the phone. You can be disheveled, in your underwear, eating a sloppy sandwich, watching porn - the person on the other end of your call has no idea what you are doing (unless it makes noise). This is a bonus, not a drawback.

How about automated phone operators that try to sound human (ever call Verizon?) Seriously annoying. If I'm talking to a robot, let it be a robot. Let's have some honesty here.

Flying cars (the greatest unfufilled promise of technology ever)...would you really want that guy flipping the bird while tailgating and talking on a cell phone sailing OVER your house at 106 mph?

One more...how about cameras that wait until you smile before they take a picture? "Be happy, dammit. Be happy NOW! What's WRONG with you? Never mind, we'll just replace you with a cutout from an old picture back when your WERE happy!" (also an automated possibility now).

The list goes on. But for now, I think I'll ask my TV to get in touch with the refrigerator to whip me up a tuna sandwich. When I get it, I promise I will smile, which will hopefully make my camera happy, too.

Tripods make better videos

2010-12-29T22:54:00.004-05:00

Here is a good example of why a good tripod might be one of the most important pieces of equipment for a videographer or photographer.

Though I often have gone without tripods for videos, I usually regret it. Even a monopod is better than nothing.

Howling at the moon

2010-12-21T07:31:00.003-05:00

This composite proves that yes, I got out of bed at 2:30 am to watch the moon last night. Thankfully, the world didn't end.

As I stood there freezing my Nikon off, it occurred to me that this show would have been much more spectacular if actually viewed from the moon.

Community blog meeting

2010-12-08T07:22:00.003-05:00

Here are a couple of photos of our second community blog seminar, courtesy of Geoff Patton

This was a 'Blogging 101' seminar, designed for those who have never blogged or are just starting. The first session was packed, an encouraging sign for our blogging program. The next challenge is to turn this enthusiasm into actual blogs.

Thanks to everybody who attended! More seminars to come.

Google Earth timeline

2010-11-30T23:09:00.005-05:00

The new version (6.0) of Google Earth has a few new tricks, one of which is a timeline of archive photos for areas in which they are available. Here's a striking animated looping GIF of four photos showing Montgomeryville in the area near Airport Square and Costco from 1992 to 2010:

Don't touch my Thanksgiving

2010-11-23T06:40:00.004-05:00

Being in the newspaper business for the past 23 years or so, I have been no stranger to working on Thanksgiving. This has generally taken the form of photographing some high school football game or another, running back to the office to process my photos (old school) or upload them into a computer (new century). It was work, but at least I was among people enjoying their holiday, and I was usually done and feast-ready by early afternoon.

Black Friday is another 'regular' assignment for most local news photographers. Go to the mall, go to the 'big-box' retailer, see the mad rush of humanity chasing down that elusive bargain on a new Furby, flat-screen TV, something-something Elmo, whatever.

Not my scene. But if it's good for the economy and makes people happy, let them go at it.

Unfortunately, this mad dash of capitalism doesn't seem to be enough for some retailers. A few years ago, a certain 'blue light' retailer started opening their stores on Christmas day, just in case you'd rather spend your holiday among shrink-wrapped stuff from China instead of a warm fireplace with your family. As time passed, a handful of other retailers joined in this new holiday tradition.

But at least Thanksgiving was safe. This most-American of holidays was still reserved for parades, football games, and of course over-eating on a grand scale. For those into competitive shopping, Thanksgiving was like the pep rally before the big game. For the rest of us, it is a chance to get together and argue politics, sports and various other uncomfortable topics with family members while stuffing our faces.

Now comes word that some retailers, most notably including one that once owned a tall building in Chicago, are now swinging their doors wide open on Turkey Day for 'pre-Black Friday' shopping. Throw the turkey in the oven, get in the car, and SHOP! Run home, eat the turkey, but don't stay long because you don't want to lose your place in line for the flat TV special that starts at 2 am Friday morning.

Now if football and family doesn't move you, and you are tempted to spend your holiday cruising the fluorescent-lit aisles of your local Stuff-Mart instead, just remember that somebody, in fact, many people have to work to keep those stores open. Maybe they get overtime pay, maybe they don't, but Thanksgiving is basically just another working day pretty much like the other 364 for them. And once they close the store, IF they close the store, they have to get ready for the 4 am rush for something cheap from China on Friday.

Stay home, relax, have some more creamed Brussels sprouts.

There is a time and a place for everything, including shopping.

Just don't mess with my Thanksgiving.

Browsers

2010-10-29T12:00:00.002-04:00

I like Firefox. I have liked Firefox since Firefox 1.0. All my computers have Firefox, all the work computers have Firefox (because I installed it). It's free, and I get nothing from this endorsement except a geeky satisfaction in being a little different.
What's so great about Firefox?
It just works. That's all. It handles bad HTML well, it's clean and simple, it doesn't get between me and the pages I want to see.
Internet Explorer is over-featured and buggy, IMHO. Like most Microsoft products. It's picky with code, and often loaded with all sorts of toolbar extras I didn't ask for or want.
Chrome, well I haven't tried Chrome, but I don't feel any need to, yet.
Remember Opera? Netscape? AOL? They all had their day. That day is gone.
Safari? Seems to work well on a Mac, but I don't use Macs most of the day.
So what are our readers using? Not surprisingly, they are using what came with their computers, namely Internet Explorer. It breaks down like this on an average day:

Windows XP, IE 8: 19%
Windows XP IE 7: 14.5%
Windows 7 IE 8: 11%
Windows XP, IE 6: 9%
Windows Vista, IE 8: 9%
Windows XP, Firefox 3.6: 7%
Windows Vista, IE 7: 5%
Mac OSX, Safari 5.0: 3.86%

And the list goes on from there. Here's a few on the bottom:

Linux: Chrome 5.0: .01%
Windows 2000: Firefox 1.0: .01% (is there a computer museum nearby?)
Windows Vista, Safari 4.0: .01% (see, I told you there was no point to this)
Windows XP, Flock 2.0: .01% (wha?)
And a smattering of Netscape, Mozilla and Opera leftovers.

Fight the power. Go blue and orange.

Press preview

2010-10-26T10:01:00.004-04:00

Here's a few photos of our press facility in Exton last night...I am working on a video of our press run which I will be posting tomorrow.
It's quite a place, and the people I met there are very proud of it.

Job printing for the new age

2010-10-17T23:38:00.001-04:00

Have you ever seen a photo of a newspaper office from about 100 years ago...usually a group of mustached-men and women in long dresses and hats posing in front of a brick building. Sometimes the sign on that building said the name of the newspaper; another common sign on these buildings was "JOB PRINTING."

The actual printing of a newspaper takes anywhere from an hour to a few hours, once that is complete the press could sit idle until the next run. This is why companies (like our own) have combined printing operations to maximize the amount of return they get on very, very expensive machinery.

In those off-times, newspapers printed everything from supermarket circulars to specialty newspapers, trade publications, community guides, coupon books and even the newspapers of competitors. The more the press ran, the better the investment paid off.

As pressrooms have disappeared and consolidated, individual newspapers are missing out on that revenue. Some of that business simple faded, as some groups moved to electronic publication, and others moved to the consolidated operations.

So now local newspapers are left with a newsroom, advertising and circulation departments, some administration, and a whole lot of empty space. The print product is brought in each morning by truck and distributed to carriers; otherwise the once-bustling press room sits quiet.
So now we must ask, what can replace that lost business? What can make the community newspaper the center of the community once again? We have many ongoing efforts to bring the community into our newsroom - blogging, new advertising initiatives, crowd-sourcing - yet we are still missing one important piece of the community puzzle.

A hundred years ago, a local business or organization might have turned to the local newspaper for help with publicity - job printing. What is the modern version of job printing?

A web site.

So, here is something to ponder, an idea as old as newspapers themselves but as modern as Web 2.0. Why not get newspapers in the business of creating web sites, providing a complete solution for local businesses and organizations to not only get on the web with a well-designed site, but to tie in the marketing of those sites with the news product through banner ads and other traditional web advertising?

This would require people with a very different skill set, but they are already out there creating web sites, promoting them with social media, creating video and even producing good old-fashioned paper marketing materials. We need to find those people, perhaps partner with them or even hire them outright.

The effect would be to increase the reach of a newspaper back into the community, which will not only serve to make money directly for the organization, but support the news operation as it migrates toward the web by increasing the number and visibility of businesses that advertise on their news web sites.

Once again, the newspaper, or local media center, or whatever you want to call it, could once again become an integral part of the community and not just a side show.

Then and now

2010-10-14T13:34:00.005-04:00

Retired Reporter Chief Photographer Willard Krieble stopped and joined former Managing Editor Dick Shearer for a podcast interview, which will be posted in the near future. I took a photo of Willard at his old desk:

Which is sort like this other photo we had sitting around:

Digital too complicated? Here's something, uh, new

2010-10-13T13:06:00.003-04:00

It looks like somebody got stuck with a warehouse full of crappy film cameras...

Does this mean that when you turn 65 you can't plug a USB cable into your computer?
Thanks to infomercialhell.com for this gem

Almost there!

2010-10-07T14:51:00.002-04:00

The cubicles are out...and the tables are in. I had no idea office furniture weighed so much.

The transformation continues

2010-10-07T07:52:00.003-04:00

Last time I looked, 'hauling' wasn't on our list of job responsibilities in the newsroom.
But that didn't stop reporters Dan Sokil and editor Tony Di Domizio from volunteering their afternoon to help me and building maintenance guru Tony Arena to disassemble and haul away 25-year-0ld cubicles from the middle of our newsroom to make way for the new Community Media Lab.

Next up - cleaning out five and ten year old documents and media guides from old file cabinets, then we bring in conference tables and chairs purchased from the Chamber of Commerce.
When were done, we'll have a clean, open space for our staff and the community to use to meet, collaborate, and cover this community like nobody else.

The transormation begins...

2010-10-05T14:43:00.002-04:00

Except for some paint, a new carpet and some new computers every decade or so, this newsroom has not changed much in at least twenty years, probably many more.
Back then two reporters shared each writing terminal, and the pagination machines (what the pages were laid out on) were as big as a filing cabinet and twice as heavy.

Now the reporters use a mix of terminals andPC's, as do our paginators. We're looking at different approaches for the future, likely something mobile such as a wireless laptop so they can work in and around our towns and post stories as soon as they write them.

But our beloved newsroom, like many, is overflowing with old computer equipment, piles of press releases, municipal documents and old newspapers. Besides not being a very comfortable place to work, it is also not very inviting to the public. If we're serious about turning our readers into partners in covering our communities, we need to create a space where they can meet with us and get some help putting their news on the web.

So we're gutting the newsroom - just the center part - and turning it into our "Community Media Lab." We'll add some conference tables, chairs, our video editing station and a computer or two. We're planning some classes on blogging, how to add audio and video to your blogs, monetizing them, and giving you a chance to come in an talk with our reporters about how we cover the news and how we can do so better.

We thought about putting this lab in other parts of the building, but decided that if we are serious about turning our news readers into news gatherers we had to bring them right in the center of our operation.

A digital revolutionary

2010-09-28T08:55:00.004-04:00

Here is some great news for our company (JRC), and me, and you...

Emily Bell, one of the great minds behind the gaurdian.co.uk web site, has joined the advisory board of Journal Register Company. I have already been privileged to meet and have great conversations with current advisers Jeff Jarvis, Jay Rosen and Betsy Morgan.

Emily was the director of leadership and digital content at the Guardian, which has been one of my favorite web sites for several years. If you have searched for just about anything on the web to do with, well, anything, likely you have come upon the Guardian site. This is a testimony to the fantastic variety of great content and their understanding of how to get it to an international audience.

Her expertise and insights will set the bar very high for the future of TheReporterOnline.com and all other JRC web sites.

One last round

2010-09-26T12:05:00.005-04:00

Today marks the last day for a local institution, Garden Golf and Go Karts. The Montgomeryville complex, which has been slowly shrinking in the past few years as surrounding retail development took over, is the planned site of new townhouses.

With mature trees, fountains, a man-made mountain, caves, and a signature waterfall that greeted motorists as they drove into the Costco parking lot next door, Garden Golf was the site of countless birthday parties, dates and family outings for the entire area. Despite some reports to the contrary, the grounds were still beautifully maintained on their next-to-last night, when I took both my kids over for one last round of golf. Somebody has put a lot of time and love into this place.

One less community gathering spot. It will be missed.

Does bad news make us happy?

2010-09-25T01:00:00.002-04:00

Among the many reader comments under the story about a former Pennbrook Middle School principal accused of inappropriate contact with a 13-year-old male student was this comment:

Although if this guy is found guilty, he deserves what he gets in jail, I can't help but think how happy the North Penn Reporter is that they have this story. The Reporter must make 90% of its online ad revenue based on stories about the NPSD.

This brings up a not-so-well kept secret of the news business - yes, we enjoy it when big news descends on our usually quiet suburban newsrooms. And between two major teacher strikes, a handful of high-profile crime stories and enough political bickering to put us in the 'Chicago' league, we had plenty of material for our web site and the recycled tree edition (note the sanitized cliche) to keep the hits coming.

I'd be lying if I told you that the adrenaline didn't run every time the police scanner pops to life or I hear a siren in the distance. There is a thrill in not only finding out what is going on but being the first to share that information. Family, friends and strangers have come to expect this from us - after all we're the newspaper and we're supposed to know what is happening whether it has to do with our area or not. That is who we are. If a journalist is not motivated by covering these things, he or she is in the wrong business.

So the next question is - and it is a fair one - do we enjoy bad news? Are we secretly hoping that the fire alarm turns out to be a building in flames, or the whispered political gossip turns out to be true?

The best answer I can give you is that like the rest of the planet, what motivates us to do what we do and how we react to the situations we are presented varies greatly from person to person. Some do like disaster, and thrive on the energy of the rescue. Others simply record the facts dutifully, getting satisfaction from their first narration of history. Some are analytical, some are motivated by a particular cause. We have outsiders, who don't quite fit into the neat categories that can be applied to their friends and neighbors. Others are pillars of the community, involved with many traditional activities.

And while bad news and scandal does bring in readers, web hits and revenue, I believe what really motivates journalists is someting more complicated.

Fun with RSS and Google

2010-09-23T10:09:00.000-04:00

RSS (which stands for Real Simple Syndication, though that sounds just too goofy to be true) is a great way to pull headline feeds from just about any blog and many web pages. Here is a great example of a way to use RSS to pull information from one web site, in this case the Montgomery County WebCAD.

WebCAD is a site hosted by our home county (Montgomery) which has a live listing of fire, EMS and traffic situation calls. It is a great resource for local journalists who can't listen to the police scanner constantly, especially since many of the new frequencies are hard to locate or are encrypted.

The problem with this site is that the listings expire quickly on a rolling basis, so you might only see calls from the past hour or two. Useful during the day, but what I needed was a way to archive those calls at night or over a weekend, for example, so our reporters could review calls the next morning.

The solution is to use RSS feeds, which luckily are available on this site. Getting the feeds are as simple as pulling a link from the WebCAD site, which I simply added to a Google RSS reader on a iGoogle page (the customizable landing page you can create with your Google account). This reader remembers well over 1,000 of the previous RSS entries, so now we have a good archive of everything that happened in the county over the past few days.

The RSS feeds don't include much information about the incidents, but at least give reporters a good idea of what happened and lets them know who they need to call for follow-up.

More fun with Droid

2010-09-22T13:22:00.002-04:00

OK, so they gave me this smart phone, an HTC Incredible Android. I know it's smart because it always knows where it is, which is better than I can do some days.
Ask any teenager and they'll tell you the best use for a smart phone isn't the phone at all - in fact recent articles have suggested many smart phone owners don't use the phone much at all - it's the apps. Texting, Facebook, Twitter, games, camera, music, maps...it's basically a little computer that happens to have a phone app.
So I loaded this thing up with things I figure journalists would use - voice recorder, camera, video camera, Twitter, Facebook, a cool app that finds local police scanners and plays the audio for you, a map/gps program, live video streamer and a few others.
And OK, maybe I loaded a game or two. But I need these for 'research.'
After a month of carrying this thing around, I can tell you what I have used the most so far for business and for pleasure.
For business - by far the most useful thing is the camera. I used it to send photos of accident scenes which were loaded on our web site before I even left the scene. No longer do I need to wait until I return to the office - with this thing EVERYWHERE is an office - from the side of a highway to a remote campground. This can be good or unfortunate, of course...now I have no excuse to not check email or post something even when I am 'relaxing'.
Second most-used app is the police scanner. It draws feeds from hundreds of police scanners monitored online across the country. The GPS-enabled program automatically finds the nearest scanner and plays the audio for you. Now when I hear a siren or see a fire truck race by, I can quickly find out what is going and whether it is newsworthy. Very useful.
Posting live video is very easy with the Android, though the final result can be a little jumpy. 3G just wasn't made for video - I am a little jealous of my 4G colleagues who get nice hi-res video. This, too shall pass. Like early cell phone cameras that produced 320x176 pixel images, the technology will soon catch up to the concept and we'll all be broadcasting from our watches like Dick Tracy.
I am only just starting to explore the thousands of apps available for this gadget. Though many of them are awful (Lady Gaga wallpaper, anybody?) others are amazing.
This weekend I spent a night camping with a group of hyper Cub Scouts at a nearby Scout camp. With little to do at night (since the recent drought put our hopes for a camp fire out) I broke out the Droid and a little app called Google Sky Watch. This GPS-enabled app actually places a sky chart on the screen that matches the real sky, labeling all the stars and planets. As you move the Droid, the sky chart moves. We had a great time identifying the constellations, Polaris, the dippers, and Jupiter, which currently is so close to earth it looks like a 767 on final approach.
This hopped-up group of grade-schoolers, fresh from a s'more sugar rush, actually stopped chasing each other for a little while and begged to be the next to try and find a star or two.
Now, that's amazing.

Fun with Droid

2010-09-15T09:10:00.006-04:00

To call an iPhone or a Droid a phone is like calling a computer a word processor.
Yeah, it makes calls, but if you look around at people using these things, the vast majority of time they aren't making calls at all. They're texting, Facebooking, watching videos, Tweeting, scanning bar codes, transferring files, checking maps or about 200,000 other things. Some actually have a separate old-style clam shell phone for calls, since smart phones are actually pretty uncomfortable to mash against your face for any extended time.

I didn't think too much about the camera aspect of a Droid until I got one - I figured the Droid camera would just be a good way to get a quick photo on our web site for breaking news, or as an emergency back-up if I didn't have a real camera handy.

Then I started playing around with some of the camera apps - Retro Camera (simulates photos from old cameras, including a Brownie and a Polaroid), and my new favorite, Camera 360 which offers a good variety of artistic effects such as sepia toning, b&w modes, sketch conversion, fisheye lens simulation and more.

The one that really got me shooting was the HDR (high dynamic range) mode, which has become very fashionable among professionals recently. Normally this involves shooting several frames of a scene at varying exposures. Then, using software, you combine the photos to create an amazingly detailed final result with details in all exposure ranges, from deep shadows to bright highlights. It is a great effect.

Camera 360 has a HDR simulation mode. It uses software to simulate this range instantly, and while not as good as a real multi-exposure project, it captures the effect pretty nicely. Here's some examples:

Note the details in every range - this effect looks even better on a large screen.

Here's another very cool option: tilt-shift. Normally this effect is accomplished with special lenses or lens mounts that allow you to mis-align a camera lens with the film plane (or digital imaging chip), giving a unique soft-focus effect.

There are many more. I'll post them as I try them out. But don't call me to talk about these, I'll probably have the phone turned off while I am taking pictures with it.

Rock and roll cruise

2010-09-10T23:30:00.001-04:00

What happens below decks when things get rough on a cruise ship

IdeaLab

2010-08-26T09:55:00.010-04:00

For the past two weeks, I have been heavily involved with two major initiatives from our corporate parent, Journal-Register Company (JRC).

Now for those of you that know about the recent history of JRC, they weren't exactly known for such things as progressive thinking, investment in their properties and people, or financial stability. They cut staff, cut budgets, shut down presses (mostly by consolidating operations) and eliminated many under-performing newspapers. Web sites were cobbled together, internal communication was miminal, outdated technology failed.

How did this strategy work? Their stock plummeted to (literally) to nothing and the company went into bankruptcy (at least it was the good kind, which allows re-organization).

That was 2009.

Now, JRC has exited bankruptcy (with a much-improved debt situation), they changed much of the senior management, hired new leaders (including a CEO (more HERE) that some describe as a 'radical') and brought in a group of respected outside advisers to not just make the company profitable again, but to completely transform it from a manufacturer of print products to a major producer of content delivered on many platforms, especially digital.

So what does all mean to the readers of The Reporter (or the over 160 publications they own, including 19 daily newspapers in six states and scores of related web sites)?

It means that this company is finally staring down reality.

The number of print newspaper readers has dropped, here and everywhere. They're not coming back. Though many newspapers (including The Reporter) are still profitable, the expectations of our readers and advertisers are changing rapidly.

Newsprint may be fading, but the demand for local news and advertising is still very strong.

The big question - how do we reach people on new digital platforms (everything from web sites to web-enabled mobile gadgets), interact with them and actually MAKE MONEY doing so?

That's where Project Thunderdome and IdeaLab comes in.

Project Thunderdome (remember Mad Max?) is the code for nothing less than the complete transformation of JRC to a dynamic, customer-focused media company.
I know, that sounds corporate-speak, but what it really means is that if we don't find ways to provide content - ALL KINDS of content - to our readers, interact with them and make money by bringing local and national advertisers with us, we won't have any jobs in a few years.

Bad for us, bad for our communities, bad for democracy.

We are competing not so much with other nearby newspapers, but rather with every web site, every blog, every Facebook post, every Flickr gallery that carries local content we do not have.

Example - many high schools post dozens of football game photos on their web site, taken by parents or staff right after a game. The newspaper site posts 3. Who wins?

If you think about it, everybody on the Internet is a start-up. Whether TV, newspaper or web entities from blogs to that school site, everybody is searching for just the right formula to reach an audience and last more than a year or two. Some succeed, many do not.

But since we come from the world of print, we have all sorts of costs that other internet start-ups do not. Buildings, presses, trucks, newsprint - all those things that get a newspaper to a driveway each morning are very expensive. Also, our whole news cycle is built around a print deadline - get the story in by 11 pm, the paper is on the street at 5 am.

Digital demands are very different - constant news updates, instant access to archives, interaction, video, audio, links...the list goes on. And by the way, don't forget to format that content for web, iPhone, TV, refrigerator screen or whatever new gadget that will inevitably come out next week.

Thunderdome is about finding out ways to provide that content, build a loyal audience that sees us as THE place to find local news 24/7 (from many sources), and interact with that audience in a way that newspapers never could. If print can reach an audience and make a profit doing so, that can be ONE of the platforms. But just one.

On the business side, we must provide a clear path for advertisers to reach local audiences, and become THE place for them market their products and services.

All these things will require some pretty out-of-the-newspaper-box thinking, everything from mobile apps to reaching out to community bloggers to enable them to add their voices to our own content.

IdeaLab is another JRC initiative to figure out HOW we are going to accomplish this. The company picked fifteen employees (and three 'honorary' members) from the entire chain of 2,700 full-timers to take some gadgets, including a wireless netbook, an iPad and a smart phone, to figure out ways to change our culture from newspaper to media.

After a public competition, in which interested employees were asked to write why they wanted to participate, I was happy (and honored) to find out I was among those chosen for this project.

Participating in IdeaLab and Thunderdome is giving me a very up-close and personal view of a cutting-edge transformation that is being watched closely by the entire media industry. Lansdale is on the map!

I recently received my gadgets, and am already looking for ways to help our reporters spend more time reporting and less time babysitting a desk and phone.
Last week Lifestyle staff writer Brian Bingaman spent an entire day at the Philadelphia Folk Festival, walking the grounds interviewing campers, musicians and fest organizers. He used a Droid, a Flip camera and the netbook to record and upload a dozen videos, and even wrote his story for the print edition at the festival site and sent it remotely.

He never set foot in the office that day.

We turned his reporting into a blog, and added photos and more stories over the weekend. The day was not without some technical glitches, but we are experimenting, learning and actually having some fun.

I hope to use technology to improve our sports coverage this fall, from providing in-game score updates to extensive video and photo coverage. We are working with our sister publications around Philadelphia to provide complete coverage of all HS teams in District One, as well as enhanced coverage of Philly pro sports (one of the other IdeaLab members is Anthony J. SanFilippo from the Delaware County Times, who covers the Flyers for us).

Our advertising department already has designs on the iPad, if they can rassle it away from me.

Now, none of this will matter, of course, if it doesn't matter to our audience. So each and every idea will be scrutinized for the following:

- Does it help us do our jobs more efficiently?
- Does it help us reach our audience in a new or better way?
- Will it help us reach the goal of being THE local source of information and conversation in our communities?
- Does it help the audience participate instead of just reading or viewing?
- Does it help 'outsiders' join us to build a digital community?
- Does it help advertisers reach our audience quickly and effectively?

And I will be looking toward readers, family, friends, co-workers, strangers, anybody anywhere for ideas, new resources, cool web sites, suggestions, complaints - anything that help chart a new course. Despite my snazzy IdeaLab status, I know most of the best ideas are not in my head but out in the world somewhere waiting to be discovered and utilized.

I do not believe in the inevitability of the death of newspapers. Though we all miss the days of full newsrooms and morning deadlines, we now have a chance to re-invent this business into something just as useful, necessary and hopefully profitable.

Here goes!

15 miles in 31 seconds

2010-08-23T12:09:00.002-04:00

Driving from Lansdale to the Philadelphia Folk Festival site Friday morning, with a couple of construction delays.

I'm distinguished

2010-08-16T07:23:00.005-04:00

Recently you were selected as an inductee into the Distinguished Professionals Online Registry Among Executives. This selection was based on our research committees efforts to identify top professionals around the globe.

Wow! To open your email and find such an honor is a great way to start a week! I bet they really agonized over this decision. Think of all the phone calls they had to make and interviews they conducted.

Consider this: if you make just one contact using the connections and visibility that Who's Who provides, it will benefit you for a lifetime. As we are trying to build a comprehensive network of business professionals, there is no cost for your inclusion. Please click the link below to fill out your basic listing. Our community needs you as much as you need it.

They need me! And I can be included for free! I sure hope they publish a book of all the winners, or something. As Distinguished Professional, I'll probably get a copy for free.

Our registration deadline for this year's candidates is August 31st, 2010. To ensure you are included, we must receive your verification on or before this date. On behalf of our Committee, I salute your achievement and welcome you to our association.

Sincerely,
Robert Patterson
Vice President, Research Division

You know, that's coming up soon. I don't think I can chance missing out on this opportunity. Luckily, they left their address, and it's right up in New York! I'd like to meet my fellow honorees, perhaps sit outside the ivy-covered walls of this fine institution, sip some brandy and discuss leadership for the next generation. Their address - 26 Bond Street, Westbury, NY. Sounds regal.

I can't wait to meet Robert Patterson. Maybe he'll show me how to make a million on the backs of a bunch of suckers, just like he did.

sweet and sour

2010-08-14T10:12:00.002-04:00

Another DSLR film by Vince Laforet with a dark twist

Chapter 1: The Cabbie from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.

A B&W world in color

2010-08-13T12:40:00.004-04:00

A time that we most often visualize in black & white rendered in sharp color photos. Check out some amazing color photos from the late depression to the WWII era from the Denver Post 'plog'.

Also thanks to another seriously awesome blog, LaughingSquid.com for bringing this to my attention.

High School Video

2010-08-06T12:45:00.004-04:00

Here is a video produced at a high school in Washington (state) that would have been amazing even if it had been produced by professionals.

Taking the Kodachrome away

2010-08-02T16:46:00.006-04:00

London, 1949 (Chalmers Butterfield)
Photo shot on Kodachrome reversal film

For 74 years, many of the best color photos and films in the world were shot with Kodachrome slide film. Now the very last roll manufactured has been processed, containing images taken by National Geographic photographer Steve McCurry. Read this story to find out what he did with it.
If you still have any old unprocessed rolls of Kodachrome sitting around your house, you better hurry. The last lab that will process them is shutting down their K-14 machines in December.

Hi-tech media guide

2010-08-02T14:18:00.003-04:00

For many, many years, media types covering the Eagles (and die-hard fans who need ALL the facts) relied on the trusty media guide throughout the season for player and team spellings, hometowns, obscure stats, trivia, and everything else Eagles.
Now that trusty little book has been replaced by this:

Once you pop this into a computer (or iPad, maybe, I haven't tried that yet) it opens up a pages similar to the old print version. Except this version has space for updates during the season, which are downloaded automatically.
Or depending on how the season goes, maybe it will eliminate things we'd rather forget?

A man of many talents

2010-07-30T13:45:00.005-04:00

Some sad news rolled across our screens this week - Dr. Fred McConnell, Jr., best known to many in our area as the proprietor of McConnell's Orchard in Woxall, died at the age of 89. This multi-talented man was not only a good farmer, but a respected professor of philosophy for 25 years at Moravian College and a fellow graduate of Boston University.

Visits to his farm were always a treat not just for the delicious produce, but for the chance to spend a little time with the McConnells, who were always as welcoming and helpful as could be. The many friends they had return year after year to help with the harvest was a testament to that fact.

LINK: Obituary for Dr. Frederick J. McConnell, Jr.

Sky scraping

2010-07-22T15:06:00.004-04:00

US Airways, who has taken the art of chintzing to new depths in the past few years, announced a $5 charge for seats near the front of their aircraft so you can get off faster.
Which actually sounds sort of reasonable considering how crammed and inhospitable their cabins have become.
In their spirit of buck-wringing, here are a few more suggestions to improve their revenue stream (from whatever passengers they have left):

1. Enhanced oxygen replacement, $4.50.
2. Reserved space in the overhead bin, $6.00.
3. Reserved space in the overhead bin big enough that your laptop computer doesn't form fissure cracks: $12.00.
4. Reading light, $2.00
5. Meet the pilot, $4.00
6. Have the pilot give your child a set of little plastic wings: $3.50 (with meeting)
7. Steer around that big thunderstorm, $3.00 (all passengers must agree to pay)
8. Guaranteed 'no baby zone', $10.00, $20.00 on weekends or all flights to/from Orlando
9. Keep the entire can of soda, $1.00
10. Seat in front of you can't lean back, $8.00
11. Inspirational DVD video of Sully's flight: $17.50
12. Tickets for a competing airline: Priceless

Shooters

2010-07-22T08:41:00.003-04:00

Does anybody else find this disturbing?

Mad Men plan the world of tomorrow!

2010-07-21T07:11:00.005-04:00

If 1940's ad men (and yes, they probably were all men) had their way, this is the way the world would look by now. Some of it did come true, except the cars looked better then.

Solar panels, now in designer colors

2010-07-06T11:15:00.006-04:00

Forget the iPhone, this is really cool. Just think about the potential - walls and windows that soak up light and generate power. Here's the guy who invented it (and just won a major award for his work):

Blog blog

2010-06-25T21:12:00.000-04:00

I really hate the word blog.
I don't hate blogs themselves, just the word. It sounds like something you would utter after eating a pepperoni Stromboli and a 20-ounce bottle of soda.
Linguistics aside, I have found much confusion among the public as to what a blog actually is. Many see it as a personal journal, much like the blog you are reading right now. And most are just that.
But blogs can also be news sources, photo or video galleries, kiosks of public opinion.
Like a web page, it can be whatever you want it to be.
Earlier this week we gathered a group of our bloggers and some potential bloggers for two very interesting meetings, one held at Saxby's in Lansdale and the other at Pizza Time Saloon in West Point. These bloggers represent a wide variety of styles and topics, from parenting and music to real estate and non-profits.
We introduced them to Mark Potts, a former journalist and current entrepreneur who is CEO of the start-up GrowthSpur.com.
Potts is among a group of heavy-hitters in the new media world who are looking ahead to what local news coverage will look like in the not-so-distant future. What he sees is greater participation by community members, both journalist and non-journalist, who can use blogs to cover the news in their own back yard using writing, photography, video, and social media.
GrowthSpur is designed to help these bloggers get some local advertising to support and hopefully encourage their efforts.
So where does a newspaper come into all this? Well, they could simply ignore this rapidly developing concept and hope readers stick around, or instead they could foster and encourage outside bloggers, who could supplement newspaper coverage, providing readers with a wider range of voices and more stories than they could ever hope to produce on their own.
Win-win? I think so.
Decide for yourself - here is a video of our meeting at Saxby's.

Not your average bear (movie)

2010-06-20T08:03:00.005-04:00

I have been very lucky to have kids in this decade, if for no other reason than I have an excuse to watch Pixar films over and over.

Since Toy Story I, this company has churned out a string of successes that defy expectations and raise the bar in the way Disney did back in the forties and fifties. While basically inventing the technology that created a whole new genre of movies, they never let that get in the way of the most important aspect of movie-making, great story-telling. Each of their movies takes audiences in different directions, from wit to action to deep themes exploring a wide range of human emotions.

Toy Story 3, which I saw in a packed theater Saturday night with three kids and two grandparents, is possibly their greatest achievement yet. Technically it is a leap ahead in terms of complexity of fluidity of characters, scenics, editing, music, and pretty much everything else.

Emotionally, well, the adults were crying by the end everybody, old and young alike broke out in applause more than once.

A good childrens film entertains the children, while providing a break for their caretakers. A great childrens film engages and entertains all ages; TS3 does this brilliantly by exploring deeply themes of courage, friendship, abandonment, redemption, losing and re-gaining ideals, endless hope. Each character goes on an emotional and physical journey with different motivations; most find what they are looking for, some do not. Just like life.

If you don't have kids, borrow some from relatives and go see this movie (or just go - you probably won't be the only one there without kids). TS3 certainly has the best animated feature Academy Award already wrapped up; in my opinion it should be a strong contender for Best Picture overall, animated or otherwise.

Get out

2010-06-16T17:55:00.002-04:00

I find something scary, not only as a journalist but as a citizen of a supposedly free and open country.
Read this article.
This is seriously troubling. Let's be realistic, here. We're talking about public beaches, public airspace, OUR land. What is the danger in this 'hot zone?' That a photographer will step on a tar ball? That a worker will be inconvenienced for 30 seconds while they tell a writer they have been told not to comment on what they obviously are doing?
This is not a BP tragedy, a local tragedy or a private tragedy. It is a communal tragedy of epic proportions for the entire country and we might as well treat it as the public event it is. Just because BP has deep pockets or local law enforcement prefers to work without questions doesn't mean we should throw out our principles and accept what they say as absolute.
If this doesn't bother you, it should.

Phillies invade Phenway

2010-06-14T12:07:00.002-04:00

Boston, which is normally filled with tourists and students from all over the world, had a distinct Philly flair over the weekend as the Fightin' Phils invaded Fenway Paaaak for a three-game interleague series.

While the Red Sox pretty much humiliated Moyer and Blanton during games one and two Friday and Saturday, Cole Hamels and brought some respect back for Philly during game three on Sunday with a 5-3 win.

Here's a few scenes from that final game...

The tree

2010-05-29T09:07:00.004-04:00

For ten years we had a scraggly arborvitae tree outside our house, right next to the front door.
At times it looked more dead than alive, but each spring new branches would grow, and the tree continued to climb past the children's bedroom windows, then over the roof.

"I need to cut this thing down," I often said to my wife. The roots were right over a sewer line, and the branches would spread in front of our front door. In winter, snow would push them down over the door making it hard to leave the house. The tree was uneven, and while the outside branches were bright green, those inside were dry and brown. Most of my neighbors have well-trimmed, compact shrubs in front of their homes. Our tree stood out.

But it was alive, and grew every year.

I let it be.

Each spring, a pair of doves would arrive and make a nest in our tree. We would hear their quiet cooing and know that winter was really over. The nests were low enough that we could lean over the porch rail and see the eggs, then watch as the mother sat with her offspring for weeks, until they were ready to fly away.

Some years the doves would go two rounds with the nests. Sometimes we would see another dove, maybe the father, sitting on a high utility wire nearby, his gaze fixed on the nest and the humans that walked so near to it many times a day.

Once or twice the baby birds fell from the nest. Using a towel, we would gently pick them up and return them. I don't know if that old tale about touching baby birds is true, but their mother never left them.

Now it's been ten years since we moved into our house. The tree grew well over the roof, needles fell into the gutter. The roots spread toward the foundation of the house. The branches had to be constantly trimmed. It was an eyesore in a mostly neat neighborhood.

"I have to cut this thing down," I thought.

With some reluctance, I finally took the electric chainsaw out one Saturday early this spring, and cut the tree down, five feet at a time, starting at the top. I had to cut carefully, as one of the branches had grown over a cable TV wire.

As I cut, the needles piled up so thick that I had to use a shovel to scoop them up from the sidewalk.

The whole job took about an hour.

I left about four feet of stump, and attached our house numbers to it to make it look like I meant to do it that way. In reality I just need to hire a service to remove the stump, another project for a later time.

The house looked brighter, neater. Light poured into the window on our front door. We all agreed, this was a huge improvement. Way overdue.

Weeks went by.

One morning, just a few days ago, I walked out the front door early in the morning, the time when the birds in our neighborhood are the loudest. A flash of motion caugt the corner of my eye, in the ground next to the stump of our old tree.

I leaned over the porch rail and six small, round, brown eyes stared back at me. There, sitting next to the stump in a patch of overgrown weeds was a mother dove and her two babies. I don't know where they nested, or how long they had been sitting there. But for the next few days, they stayed at that spot, leaving only to find food or to practice flying.

We could walk right up to them, and could have touched them if we wanted. They trusted us - what else could they do? They had no choice.

I placed a large rock near the site to shelter them; my kids cut an empty orange juice carton and put it next to the stump as a birdhouse.

A couple of days later, the doves were gone.

Today I am looking out the window of my office, and a dove is sitting on the utility wire outside my window, facing away from our house but with his head turned toward the tree stump.

Staring.

There is no nest there. No baby birds. Just a stump and some weeds.

What are you looking for? Scouting a new location, perhaps? Looking for something that was lost that won't be found again? There are hundreds of trees and shrubs in our neighborhood good for nests. Surely there must be someplace else to go.

Some place just as good as that old tree.

Webcam collaboration

2010-05-26T05:32:00.002-04:00

Award-winning music video created entirely with webcams. Crazy.
Hibi no Neiro (Tone of Everyday) by Sour

Ben Franklin

2010-05-25T19:05:00.002-04:00

This is going to be a wild month. I'm starting off by adding many new bloggers to our web site. Of course, my blog is fascinating, but opening up our site to our readers will be a hurricane of fresh air.
Producing the newspaper and web site for the Ben Franklin project using only online, free tools will be a real challenge. But we have already identified most of the tools, and it is very do-able. Scribus, Gimp, Google Docs...here we come. July 4 is the target day...stay tuned.

Princess

2010-05-24T05:14:00.000-04:00

Ever wonder what happens once you save the princess in video games?

What's in a name?

2010-05-21T08:05:00.003-04:00

In keeping with the new spirit of public relations set forth by the North Penn School Board, from now on The Reporter should be referred to as a 'content logistics support provider' instead of the hard-to-remember 'newspaper.'

Confused? Read this

Windy day

2010-05-08T20:32:00.002-04:00

Attempting to lauch a kite in the wind Saturday afternoon at Peace Valley Park.

Art in unlikely places

2010-05-07T16:49:00.003-04:00

These have started showing up in area roads and parking lots.

Masters of PR

2010-05-05T12:14:00.009-04:00

Whatever you think of big oil, big corporations or big disasters, you have to appreciate the public relations efforts of BP. They are masterful.

- They avoided big advertising campaigns in favor of grass-roots town-hall meetings in affected areas and social networking.
- They have talked continuously about their role in the disaster and their plans to try and stop it with cutting-edge techniques.
- Their people are visible and available for comment.

There will be plenty of lawsuits and blame to go around once this thing is capped. And they certainly won't please everybody, especially people opposed to off-shore drilling or those in the Gulf states who depend on the ocean for their living.
But BP has learned the lessons of Toyota and Exxon, which will only help them in the court of public opinion as they try to recover.

Open source subtitles

2010-05-05T07:19:00.003-04:00

Mozilla is embarking on an interesting new project to create open-source subtitles for videos. I think this isn't a technical solution, but rather a community solution. Videos are 'tagged' by somebody who wants a translation, and others can volunteer to do so.

Artsy Sunday

2010-05-03T09:10:00.003-04:00

A few photos from a pay-whatever-you-want Sunday at the Philadelpha Art Museum.

iPhoney, part II

2010-05-01T07:55:00.002-04:00

More on the iPhone / Gizmodo debacle: A Q&A with an attorney in the NYT.
It appears that the legal cards are stacked against Apple in this one. I'm still not sure how anybody could claim that they didn't know what they had when the iPhone was found, however. The fuss Gizmodo made on their web site over their treasure proves that.
In Gizmodo's favor: They did return the phone when finally asked.
A co-worker painted this scenario for me: If I found secret new plans for Main Street development laying in the Madison parking lot, would this not be news-worthy for our local paper? Is this not also proprietary information not yet meant for public consumption?
It's a good scenario, but in that case I see it as something of interest to the public. An iPhone is private property, created by a private company, sold to private buyers. Somehow I still don't see this as being so in the public interest that trade secrets and property ownership rules can be violated.

A moment in time

2010-04-30T10:44:00.002-04:00

What are you doing on Sunday, May 2 at 11:00 am (ET)?
Take a picture and send it to this project:
NYT: A Moment in Time

Bridge game

2010-04-25T18:29:00.004-04:00

Fun with reflections behind the Wissahickon Valley Watershed Association building:

And my assistant for this photo shoot:

Call of Duty

2010-04-24T07:46:00.003-04:00

Two Reuters employees (a driver and a photographer) were killed in Iraq when an Apache helicopter fired upon a group of insurgents. Video of the incident was leaked to WikiLeaks:
Warning: Disturbing footage.

Here is a New York Times article about the incident.
There is also a healthy debate about this under the video on YouTube.
This is modern warfare.

I-phoney

2010-04-20T06:56:00.003-04:00

Here is an example of checkbook journalism at its worst:
NYT: Web buzzing over possible new version of the iPhone
To be clear, it's not the NYT in question here, but rather one of my favorite gadget sites Gizmodo.
Depending on how you think things like this play out, somebody 'found' a next-generation iPhone prototype in a San Jose bar, and sold it to Gizmodo.
They proceeded to photograph, analyze and even rip it apart, documenting their findings in great detail on their site. The result: millions of hits.
Now it is possible that Apple 'leaked' the unit in an effort to gain some free publicity, but this is not their usual tactic.
Perhaps it was a disgruntled employee, but again, that would be unusual for Apple.
This story is disturbing for two reasons - first being the idea that somebody can buy 'lost' property from the finder. I would call that fencing.
Second, once Gizmodo had the phone, they clearly understood what they had, and who it belonged to. Analyzing the phone publicly and tearing apart it at best ethically questionable, and possibly criminal. Gizmodo claims their lawyers cleared the vandalism and story, but even if it was legal (and even if Apple was secretly complicit), that doesn't make it right.
Have we become such zombies to this gadget that we are willing to throw ethics out the window just to find out a juicy detail or two about it?

Sunday afternoon at the ESC

2010-04-19T11:15:00.002-04:00

When you play baseball with your kids near a bunch of news crews staking out a meeting between the school board and the teacher's union, this happens:

Me

2010-04-15T13:18:00.004-04:00

I was honored to be featured as one of three speakers at a journalism seminar at Bucks County Community College Wednesday morning. Each year the college invites students and the public to check out the media facilities at their beautiful Newtown campus (it really is something) and interact with working professionals in various journalism-related fields. This year I appeared with Bill Johnson and Rachel Canelli from the Bucks County Courier Times to talk about journalists 'doing it all' - using new technology to reach our readers in many different ways. I webcast the entire seminar, which you can see here (note to my vast fan club - I am the third speaker):

This was a great experience, despite the fact that I'm not one who generally likes appearing before a crowd with a booming microphone (but hey, you have to get over that in this job). I concentrated mostly on talking about videos, but spent some time on the new community outreach efforts at JRC, the parent company of The Reporter.
I love sharing what I do with students and the public, and hope that this showed in my presentation.

2010-04-06T12:16:00.001-04:00

Space residue

2010-04-05T13:10:00.003-04:00

Former Reporter Chief Photographer Willard Krieble sent this awesome photo today from Florida. It's residue left over from the space shuttle launch early this morning.

Moving magazines

2010-04-01T22:53:00.001-04:00

What can you do with a magazine on the iPad? Check this:

VIV Mag Featurette: A Digital Magazine Motion Cover and Feature for the iPad from Alexx Henry on Vimeo.

The end of photography?

2010-03-30T06:28:00.003-04:00

We tend to think of paintings as interpretations and photography as truth. Of course, this has never really been true - since the early days of photography images have been manipulated in many ways, from cropping and lens selection to darkroom tricks and Photoshop tools. But somehow the basic building block of a photo was reality, framed and captured by the photographer, tweaked just enough to give it their style.
With every version of Photoshop that came along, new tools were introduced to enable photographers to change the reality in their photos by moving, shaping, warping, or eliminating elements. The clone tool was revolutionary in the early 1990's; the healing tool even more so a few years later.
The newest version of Photoshop, CS5 (which is not out yet) includes a tool that not only can automatically do what all the other tools did, but can actually 'interpret' the reality in a photo and fill in what it thinks should go there.

The Content-Aware tool gives photographers the power to change photos so quickly and so accurately that I wonder if photography as we know it will cease to exist. Don't get me wrong, there are more cameras and photos in the world than ever before, and that seems to only be accelerating. But when entire elements of photos can be changed so easily and so well, I wonder if we aren't actually looking at something different, something closer to a painting. Photos become our interpretation of reality, and now need to be 'read' differently. If I like what I see in an online photo gallery, the correct response is now 'great image' instead of 'great shot'. And since we don't know the history of every photo we see, we have to assume that they might have been manipulated unless we know otherwise.

This blog has moved

2010-03-26T10:22:00.001-04:00

This blog is now located at http://thirty7thframe.blogspot.com/.
You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here.

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Mad

2010-03-25T10:38:00.003-04:00

It used to be when you lost Walter Cronkite, you lost America. Is losing Alfred E. Newman worse?

Double-duty

2010-03-24T16:23:00.003-04:00

In line with our new multi-platform storytelling plans, staff photographer Geoff Patton rigged his SLR to shoot video without missing a frame:

He can now shoot video with the flip cam next to his left hand while snapping away on the DSLR with his right hand. Clever, isn't it?

Four-minute fish tank

2010-03-15T16:15:00.004-04:00

If you have a wide-screen computer monitor and a reasonably fast computer, play this video full-screen. If they had a live feed, I'd watch it all day.

Kuroshio Sea - 2nd largest aquarium tank in the world - (song is Please don't go by Barcelona) from Jon Rawlinson on Vimeo.

The main tank called the “Kuroshio Sea” holds 7,500-cubic meters (1,981,290 gallons) of water and features the world’s second largest acrylic glass panel, measuring 8.2 meters by 22.5 meters with a thickness of 60 centimeters. Whale sharks and manta rays are kept amongst many other fish species in the main tank.
This find courtesy of Mental Floss, one of my fav sites.

Seriously

2010-03-03T17:28:00.007-05:00

JFK - one of the busiest airports in the world. Thousands of planes, millions of passengers.

At any given moment, dozens of huge jumbo jets are approaching and departing, zipping into one of the most crowded airspaces in America at hundreds of miles an hour.
The air traffic control center is the hub of it all, legendary for the stress and 24/7 activity.
What a great place for a cute kid moment!

One lucky grade-schooler got to direct REAL JET PLANES into the sky recently at the side of his parent, an air-traffic controller at the airport. Just like Jay-Jay the Jet Plane, only REAL! And with HUNDREDS of LIVES at stake! What fun!
Now, the parent was right there, and probably nobody was really in any danger. But as much as we like to joke around and have a few laughs while working here at the newspaper, nobody will DIE if we screw up a headline or misspell 'committee' in a story. But even a small distraction could be an issue for the folks at the radar screens, which made me wonder WHAT WAS THIS PARENT THINKING?

In this spirit, I offer a short list of jobs that I believe require a high level of 'serious.' I'm not against fun, but when you're sitting in a pressurized metal tube waiting to defy gravity in a sky full of other fast-moving metal tubes, I'd like to think somebody very serious is in charge of it all. Here's a few other times I like 'serious':

- Hospitals. Nothing like hearing doctors or nurses laugh about a recent blow-out party out in the hallway while you're in your room pondering life-threatening surgery.

- Airport security. They say 'no jokes' on the sign. I'm with that.

- TV news. Isn't it great when they switch right from the earthquake footage to the footage of a piano-playing cat just by saying, "now, on the lighter side of the news..."

- Funeral director. Unless you're in Vegas. Or maybe Los Angeles.

- Dentist. I'm in the chair. My mouth is jammed open. Drool is running down my chin. I'm possibly in pain. Get this over with FAST.

- Airport van driver (mostly applies for early, early flights). I'm still asleep. Can't think of witty comebacks. The less you talk, the more I'll tip.

- High-rise crane operator. Imagine him/her bringing the kid to work. "Easy now, careful, NO, NOT THAT SWITCH...Ooooh, that's ugly..."

- Torturer: Well, if the jokes are that bad, maybe...

- Drug dealer: Ever see a happy-go-lucky drug lord in a movie? There's a reason for that.

- Missle launch operator: OOPS!

- My desk-mate Geoff Patton suggested executioner. You don't want Hee-Haw when they're pushing the plunger on the poison.

It's new, really new

2010-03-02T10:38:00.002-05:00

I can use this when I'm not listening to my transistor bracelet radio: