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Elitism as a solution?
Here’s a problem I’ve been dealing with more often as of late.
As a news organization we are constantly embracing fancy technologies to tell our stories and keep our business models in the black. If we want to increase circulation, we publish to the Kindle. When breaking news breaks, Twitter, Facebook and iPhone apps wait to instantly inform.
But what about the considerable percentage of people who barely understand computers, don’t want to understand Twitter and can’t afford an iPhone? It’s easy to assume that those people are so old or so poor that it doesn’t matter, but that’s not the case. There is always going to be poor people, and while it’s true that my generation and those below are born with a knowledge of texting abbreviations, that doesn’t always mean they want their news that way.
Mainstream media has always had a problem combating it’s own elitism – so can we really stake our future in developing for faster, flashier and more expensive technologies?
How about some thoughts from my audience.
A man and his monkey
Great drinking buddy and occasional friend, Ching, came up with the idea for a Jacksonville urban-core scavenger hunt a few months ago.
Now, there are lots of details to appreciate and background story to reveal, but as usual, I don’t want to spend the time necessary to tell the tale, so I’m going to skip right to our third clue.
There it is. One six-foot tall work of glorious wheatpaste. This clue is the simplest of the three so far. You find the poster above, take your picture with it, and e-mail it to the monkey. Only those people who e-mail in their pics w/the monkey will receive the third, and final, clue.
Since we’re still technically in the guessing stage for this clue, I can’t reveal much about the process, but I do want to thank one person in particular – Tommy Armageddon. Without him, the third clue wouldn’t be possible. There. There’s another part to the third clue. If you know Armageddon, you know where our wheat paste is.
Now go, children. Find our third clue, e-mail the monkey, and revel in the fourth, and final, clue.
Triumferant return!
Yes yes ya’ll.
Who knew that planning a wedding that’s just three months away would take so much of my free time? I mean, don’t get me wrong – Diana is doing all of the work, but damn, I get tired watching her do all of the work. I’ll have to talk to her about working without making me tired.
Plenty of things I’ve had on my mind to write about, so let’s get started. Most recent first
Excuses, part deux
I’m over working at thegingerandthegypsy.com, a totally bitchin’ wedding site for Diana (the gypsy) and me (the ginger) when I come up with this gem of a tale for our “About Us” page. Ten internets for the first person to tell me the inspiration for the tale. For sooth.
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Gather round, friends, for the story of Jonathan and Diana doth make an inspired tale.
Twas the year of our Lord 1193 (February 2002) in Barnsdale, South Yorkshire (Columbia, SC). Jonathan was but a simple yet strapping yeoman, cheerful and stout (in between majors and afraid of the sun), especially gifted in the art of the cudgel. Diana was a doting maid, daughter of the local Sheriff, known throughout the wood for her kind doings and she truly was fair in face and loin (that’s all true). The two met at a goodly fair (Math 113) organized by the brave Richard the Lionheart (some teaching aide who barely spoke english). True, thou hast never seen such colorful banners and even-handed archery matches as were met that day.
Whilst the fair progressed, under the cool shade of a mighty oaken tree, Jonathan and Diana first met over a cool pint of freshly-tapped ale at The Green Man pub. (they sat across from one another. assigned seats ftw!) For sooth, it was love at first sight. Diana immediately took Jonathan to be the most strapping man in the shire, tall in stature and daring in wits (he looked OK and was kinda mean). Jonathan considered her the fairest beast ever imagined by the Lord’s endless mind, and the perfect use of a rib (all that’s true).
Though they both knew their love to be a tainted love (way before that stupid song), and impossible by the common law dictating their every day, Jonathan and Diana met whenever possible, on the soft green mosses next to singing brooks and away in lofty boughs of tall birches (they studied together once or twice, it was pretty average for a while).
Eventually, once their love had been whispered from the lips and to the ears of every maidservant in the shire, and was known by every goodly resident of Barnsdale, the Sheriff caught wind of the lovers. Truly their had never been such a commotion in the shire! The kind Sheriff, however, took pity on the lovers and united them in a wedding that has since been immortalized in word and song, not to mention a few sculptures and busts.