I have made the change.

I’ve gotten hosting and setup my own wordpress install.

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Check there for the latest updates.

While watching Battlestar Galactica, I got an email tell me I had a new comment that needed moderation. The interesting thing is that after my conference debut (I guess you could call me a little microcelebrity now), I have seen a doubling in my traffic (still not much to brag about).

First I get an email asking me to help with someone elses blog, now I have that comment I mentioned.

Rob of BlogOfTheDay.org has added me under the blogging section. Check it out here: http://blogoftheday.org/page/112630

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Me with Debbie Weil

Originally uploaded by jeredb.
This is a photo from today’s PRSA conference (Part I, Part II). With me is the presenter Debbie Weil, who gave a great talk about “Blogging 101.”

Blogging is the most important thing ever!

This is very weird. I get mail. Not just from my mom and my wife! Real, bon-a-fide emails from people.

Hello Jered

I ran into a post of yours when I searched for “Creating Links” on Blogger.com

I didn’t realize blogging involved writing as much code as seems necessary. My links aren’t working and I need to debug my blog. Blogger is no help at all, there are two canned articles “Doing more with links” and “How do I edit my link list” which don’t address de-bugging your links.

Am wondering if you can shed any light on this subject

Thanks

Robert

Sure thing Robert! Send me the link to your blog and let me take a look at the source code. I’ll help you diagnose your problem.

More door prizes, a gift basket to Home-a-rama. Not me. Another set of tickets to something… not me. More museum passes, again, not me. I guess that I’m a loser today.

Oh! Corporate blogging book prizes, please, please, please. Fingers crossed. 1st copy, not me. Second copy, not me. Third copy, not me. Bummer. Oh well, I guess I could by the “Corporate Blogging Book.”

Apparently a local business rag was asking for companies that blog, eyes at my table go to me, but I haven’t been invited. Goldman & Associates, a PR firm, has been blogging, which is pretty cool. A question was asked about the books author, why it wasn’t published sooner. Publishing is slow, what can I say that’s the printing field.

Goldman blogs about “senior living industry”, which is aimed at executives in that field. They wanted to become the “thought leaders” in their niche, wanting to be the PR firm of choice. They looked at the thought of “face time”, which is genius. They could use that to push clients to the PR side of the house. Very smart. Goldman is hitting a very small niche, with over 400 hits monthly, and they have a few RSS readers and some in their podcast. They run their blog like a news organization, editorial meetings, interviews, stories.

They also podcast and found that it was cheap and easy. (Booyah, again!) They are now doing phone interviews, (Skype?) finally and they are encouraging people it is easy. Things to keep in mind:

• Pick the topic wisely. (Perfect.) They found their niche, which is great, but she is saying that she was going to say away from PR, because there are several big boys. (I disagree.)
• Software is cheap, time is not. You need to update regularly. Clients needs are important, but blogging is just as important. She indicates that it is about 2 hours of time a day. (That makes sense from a corporate sense).
• Promotion, promotion, promotion. I understand that. After talking with the presenter of the Corporate Blogging Book, she wants to link to me (holy crud!). That will be interesting.
• Do it. (that’s self explanatory.)

Introductions for the “Mona Lisa of Blogging” Debbie Weil. Corporate Blogging Book published by Penguin Press, was released this August.

Debbie starts by talking about meeting some one through the blog-o-sphere, and then you get to meet them at a conference. ( I haven’t had that experience yet…). A book for the “reluctant manager,” people to busy to do it, but they need to.

Agenda

• Why
• What
• How
• Now!

Myth #1 - “I don’t read blogs.”
Myth #2 - “I don’t have time for blogging”
Myth #3 - “If I close my eyes this blogging thing with go away.”

Whispers from my table about wishing it would.

Debbie shows a diagram about Consumer generated media verus Mainstream media. The Consumer side is larger and while not scientific, it’s very true.

Corporate blogging is as an inflection point. Everything is at 2.0, PR, Employee engagement, user generated content, everything. Inflection Point by Andy Grove (intel founder) (almost sounds like a Walt Whitman poem)

“Strategic inflection points can be caused by technology but they are more than that…. they are a change in the way business is done.”

Why? Blogs are next generation website (true, true) New social media tools are more poweful at informing/influencing/persuading that traditional PR and advertising. (again true, everyone hates corpo speak).

If you can’t be found online, you don’t exist. (Yeah… Snow and Associates). Google just bought YouTube. 1.65 billion. 100 million videos served daily (like mickey dee’s).

Youtube video from dunkin donuts. (a very good ad) Videos are passed around like crack (do you pass crack, or consume it yourself?).

Blogs are the structure, podcasts, video are just content.

Blogs are an interactive website. - A blog is not a discussion board, which requires a certain level of control, comment moderation. Blogs give you high search engine visibility and blogs put the web back in the hands of the non-technical. Blogs enable you to listen to the new “marketing conversation” as well as participate in it. Debbie then showed us pictures explaning of the blog structure, what are comments, what is a trackback, etc.

Blogs are content management systems, by category and date. Searchability on the blog is necessary. Debbie feels that is is a good idea to have a comments policy on the main page and in a corporate setting, I can’t agree with her more. I don’t need this here. I kill your comments if want to (Argh!)

RSS: 88% of people don’t know what RSS is. “RSS is not email!” You don’t go to each blog, you subscribe and get it all in one place. Feed reader! IE 7 will have RSS reader built in (has suprisingly good feed handling).

Persistent searches in your RSS feeds. Debbie showed examples of Google Reader and Bloglines.com (which I use). Use your keywords to always have it search. Genius. Some packages (meaning money) are available, but they look a little ’spensive.

Blogpulse.com looks for trends (should look for jeredb) Blogs create more search engine entries due to their frequency.

HOW

Debbie conveyed that the best way to learn about corporate bloggin is to learn from effective corporate blogs. Gartner’s 2006 emerging technology hype cycle Corporate blogging in the trough of disillusionment, but is set to be in the adoption phase in less than 2 years. Fortune 500 blogging wiki shows that only about 30 Fortune 500 companies are blogging externally (which is very suprising, but I do have more of a Silcon Valley eye). Some examples given were Chevy Tahoe Ad contest (fastlane Blog) (which bombed!) A Youtube video from it and it was obviously not what Chevy wanted. Chevy PR people spun it and there response was lame. Chevy VP writes for the blog and is very informal, it works for them. Intelli-seek found 45% of the comments were negative. GM doesn’t care. That’s what they want. it is the direct connection they wanted. They get to listen to the consumer. They are taking the comments and using them in product development. That’s what should happen.

Blogs can be divided into multiple and single author (that makes good sense). “you tend to think that the blog is a single person entitiy, but that can be achieved with an editor.”

In working with or using the blogosphere, the back channel communications are key! (I was actually talking to a woman during the break about the back channel communication)

Wells Fargo has a blog and they maintain an internal blog on “blogging best practices.” They launched an event specific, limited time blog, which is a safe way to start. You can let the clock run out and not pick it up, which is something that we might have to consider.

Dell’s blog as an example - They had poor customer service, the “dell hell.” Jeff Jarvis started ragging on Dell and got a huge response, which created an issue. In response Dell created their own blog but it started off as very corporate. Dell was able to adapt and was better able to to react to the exploding dell laptops through their blog. The blog was more effective in the response that a traditional press release.

QuickBooks community blog includes discussion boards, FAQs and Tips and Tricks. They create a community around the product. Quickbooks Community gets 40% spam, 40% customer service related, and 20% were real comments. This comes back around to the comments policy.

Jonathan Schwartz’s blog. He “gets” blogging, “Blogging DNA”. He uses the blog to get more information out the publc, it creates a human feel with the CEO. Schwartz is petitioning the SEC to use blogs for RegFD financial stuff. Which I think just got a tacit approval.

Ghost bloggers. Are they a good idea? A middle ground has to be found, podcasting possibly. Come out and say that there is a blog by proxy.

When you get to meet the person in the flesh, after you have been reading their blog, there is a “real” connection.

Before we started, we decided to break for lunch. I had a member of the University Alumni board come and ask about a gesture I had made when Debbie suggested CEO dont’ ghost blog, but podcast. Terror! She said that she thought it was a good idea, but still, the tentacles of work reach far and wide.

Lunch. Mmm. Taragon chicken and a nice pilaf, served with a good caesar and some nice little cookies and a killer pumpkin/carrot roll.

As I am waiting in line, I spoke with Debbie about Schwartz has gotten tacit approval and how the internet and blogs really meet the SEC’s criteria for reaching a broad audience. She also told me that Mark Cuban was a difficult man to work with in writing her book. She said that she can’t stand a poorly written blog ( which now makes me very nervous ), and that while he’s cool, he doesn’t write very well. I found that really interesting. I’m talking to a woman who has had direct contact with the big ones of the blogging world.

As we are getting back to the presentation, some announcements. Take the little mugs and decorations. Carolyn won the center piece. Now on to the last of the door prizes, more tickets to museums, some tickets to Busch Gardens, again. big loser.

NOW!

Debbie is suggesting a typepad.com, not a bad system. Pick a name, which is the most difficult thing and can’t be changed. If you’re afraid, get over it. RSS is a new best friend, but remember the consumers are in control.

Blogger relations. Find your target bloggers, check out to see if they are bonafide. Read the Blog, that’s super, infact the most important. Make a relevant pitch. Technorati can be used to check out the ranking of a blog.

Micro Persuassian is the example. Steve Rubel’s site is really good. He’s got alot of information about hdimself (as an example of what to do). The Bad Pitch Blog If you make a gaff to a well known blog, they’ll post it to the bad pitch blog. They’ll make you look like an idiot. Everything is fair game.

Question Time

Blog frequency updating, how often? - RSS! Don’t worry, they’ll get it. People generally don’t blog for a living. They do it for other reasons. Become and thought leader. Blog at a minimum 1 time a week, but you have to have quality. Should you let your reader know that it is weekly, daily? - Sure! don’t tie yourself into daily stuff.

How do you develop a comments policy? - Develop one. “we reserve the right…” GM blog doesn’t have comments edited. You have decide how far you are going with grammatical corrections. Political blogs are dangerous (the asker is from a city government), even non-political blogs will get political comments (in her case). - School districts have the same problem.

Bloggers and emails: How do you stop them from using emails? - Ya can’t!

Comments and linkage? Will they smell a pitch? How do I get to them? - Comments are critical. You can put links in your comments and it’s important, put up microsite, your blog etc. Is there a trade association? - Nah! That’s the nature of the beast.

Corporate peons blogging, how can you control them? - You can write it into an employment contract. You have to watch them, ask them…

How do I find what I want in blogging? - Technorati, Google Blog Search. It’s out there.

www.debbieweil.com

Wrap ups and goodbyes.

I’m pointed out that I’m going to have photos and blogs linked. EEEK!!! Oh crud! Maybe I should self censor… nope.

9:22 AM

Door prizes for the early birds. Free stuff, delicious. I forgot to pick up a program. Oops. I guess I should have looked at the registration table. The President-elect is now reading sponsors, those who make it possible for us to be here. Amy is the first winner. She gets her pick of the door prizes. All pretty nice stuff. A woman who’s name everyone had a hard time pronouncing won the next prize and made some jabs about Portsmouth having museums, the room moans. Carol wins the Portsmouth museum passes. Select individuals in the crowd are making up for Portsmouth museums.

Now we have introductions and welcomes. Online newsrooms (is that a nice way of saying professional blogs?). Kelly Brighton, Director of Marking communications, is the first presenter, from Vocus (based in DC). She does web stuff and metrix. Their about us reads:

Our web-based software suite helps organizations of all sizes manage local and global relationships and communications with journalists, analysts, public officials and other key audiences.

Screech! Mic interference.

Kelly thanks us for being here, thanks to the coordinator, etc and then begins.

Topic: What journalists want to see on your website.

Some topics may be really obvious, but they might be missing from “your” website.

• What makes a good Online Newsroom?
  Surveying journalists about what they want to see and we are seeing a compilation of what the results are. About 1000 journalists were surveyed and then PR people were surveyed to guess what journalists want to see.
• Who has a online newsroom?(crickets…)Mostly news releases are posted. Most people (PR) think that new releases posted on the internet constitutes a digital newsroom. Journalists are wanting alot more. Online newrooms are
  1. difficult to locate and access
  2. they are inadequate in content.

  Journalists want to get to the newsroom from the homepage. They want new releases, bios and more on there and they want it all accessable from the homepage.
  Michael O’Laughlin, CFO Magazine:

“… only one in 5 sites contained basic name spelling, mailing information and phone numbers.”

• Make it easy to make news
  An online newsroom should be a online clearinghouse of information. It should be one-click from the homepage and should be easy to search and navigate. It needs to be self-containted for journalists or they will find another story.
  It can have a variety of names:
  • Online Newsroom,
  • Press Center,
  • News Center.

The biggest thing is that it must be kept current. If it isn’t current you could lose credability.

Kaiser Permanente does a good job.

They make it really easy, but it is geared towards filtering types of visitors. It is clear how to get to it though.

• Key elements
  56% say that no contact information is a pet peeve. They want real names, phone, email, after-hours information. Journalists hate a generic PR@mycompany.com, they think it’s a black hole (which it probably is). They want a phone number instead.Vanguard has a good example, it has titles, phone numbers, including cell phones. It also has tertiary levels of contact information.
• Question: What about cell numbers. Is that okay? What about calls afterhours, or funneling through a central line?
  Answer: Change your workflow, put the afterhours contact on your mainline.
• Research Data and Studies
  Journalists want validation, they are skeptical due to corporate scandals (yup) and they also validate your positions if you can use third party research. 99% of reporters want this information.Blue Cross and Blue Shield does a good job.They have data about costs, etc, good or bad, becuase the bad stuff can be used to show what you are working on.
• Corporate Background
  Most journalists want that in the media section as well. They want the vital statistics, number of employees, corporate financials, executives & bios. Avoid jargon! (duh!) Use non jargon, “… when you refer to the enterprise, are you referring to the aircraft carrier or the space shuttle?” (or the vessel piloted by Kirk (damn, he’s sexy)).
• Question - Do you duplicated your information that is already on the site? Answer - Yes, for the most part. They don’t need the investor relations information, they will need some of the basics, probably a sub-set of information.
  • A rabbit is sitting outside the window now. It drew everyone’s attention (all the people sitting around me).
    

Rohm and Haas does this (the screen shot got cut off, which wasn’t great)

• Press releases
  Journalists start with press releases, post them ASAP or you lose credibility. Make them searchable possibly by keyword. Catalog them so they are easily accessible. This could be where they start looking for quotes or stats.Arbitron has a pretty good example, albeit an ugly one. They are search able by title, keywords, type (executive, product, etc.) and by date range and year.
• Online Media kits
  93% of reporters want this. They want photos diagrams, illustrations, quotes, tech specs, experts video, it enhances the press release and gives them more for the story. If it’s online, you have a great 24/7 resource.Citgo does a good job. They have logos, photos. presentations (some PDFs).
• Past coverage
  26% of PR people think it’s important, but 87% of journalists want it. Include the positive and negative coverage. It gives them a way to shape their angle. These are from outside sources.
• Question - We can’t copy it, but how do we link?
  Answer - Link until the article expires. possibly get permission to get a PDF for your hosting. At the very least a mention is good.
• Question - PDFs, what do we do? News releases can be pirated.
  Answer - Not necessarily a good idea. make it part of the webpage, not Word Documents. Don’t send attachments!!! Huzzah! (PDF’s can be pirated…)
• Question - What about subscription based websites (i.e. Washington Post)?
  Answer - Link to it with a warning about passwords or copy it if you can (with permission).Goodwill does and excellent job. Post-Katrina they had a lot of information. They created a special Katrina section, which made it really easy.
• Executive Team
  91% of journalists say they need it. You need to include photos, bio’s and education. This helps position them as a thought leader.

(the presenter is switching back and forth between Powerpoint presentation and IE… Come on! Get some screen shots, it gives you a better chance of getting what you want.)

• Other things to include
  Photographs and logos are really good. upcoming events, white papers (83% want), awards and recognition (72% want), speeches and anything else that sets you apart. Events are important, the media wants to be part of that, or at least know about it. Involvement in industry groups and community, etc.
• WHOA! Too much data on a slide!!! About 20 rows of text, three columns with numbers!!!, I’m sure it’s important, but GEEZ!
• Other communication channels
  Blogs, Podcasts, RSS (booyah!). PR is only beginning to embrace these technologies.
• Diagram (Old PR)
  Us -> Media -> Consumer
• Journalist (with cheezy stock photo)
  They are gatekeepers of information, they get to filter the information. It’s one directional, and centralized. Consumers don’t get to give feed back on information given to the journalist. To get a story out to alot of people, over news wires etc, can be really expensive.
• “Now we have the internet”
  Realtime inforamtion, citizen journalists, feed back is instantaneous. Connection is nearly ubiquitous. “No need for programmers or graphic designers.” (I beg to disagree.)
• Question - Is the media less effective? Are people more likely to just search? Answer - We’ll get to this.
• Web 2 dot Oh
  Um… Yeah! Wikipedia definition, blogging, podcasts, wikis, social media. Web 2.0 and PR Blogs, wikis, RSS, Podcasts, Video casts are all part of this user centric/audience specific PR. All of these things generate communication, awareness, trust and credibiltiy. It is complementary to old PR, and is more about the social powers of the internet.
• Diagram
  Showing a triangle between company, media, consumers with bloggers in the center.
  
• Media
  Todays press releases need to be designed for search engine optimization. Search, Search, Search! SEO, SEO, SEO!
  • Syndicated content (RSS) = Third party distribution. Brings more eyeballs back.
  • Particpation in blogs is important!
    Engage them! communicate with the blogs.
  • Links!
    Link to the photos, keywords, and get them to more about the topic, or order forms or back to the website.
• Question - Copying links is a pain. I have to take them out later… what do you think?
  Answer - Really there are two forms of communication, normal releases via email and then to blogger-ready form.
  • Podcasts (booyah!)
    Example - Vocus: Keywords link back to relative information. All of it is search optimized. Logos included, but not in their attached files section (shame, shame). Dynamic quotes, podcast links. Dynamic is fun! (not really a commercial for their company, but sounds like it… ) Podcast interviews are complimentary.
  • The Blog
    A website with regular posts about the same topic (huh?) chronologically ordered. Comments, track-backs, email. Some blogs are becoming prominent and you need to be aware of them.
• What can bloggers do?
  Search engine marketing, direct communication to your consumers. Relational marketing, (i.e. A CEO does a little call to the bloggers, the bloggers report about it and they can put good spin on things, where if you don’t contact them, you can totally suck!) Blogging is Niche! You can reach some really specific peoples. (i.e. Cigar company links to cigar blogs to reach their audiences). Blogging is another avenue for media relations, and it gives an expert position. It can work for reputation management. It can help spin and “manage your reputation”. Example - Blog from Vocus (or a guy who is close to them).
• Question - Who are bloggers?
  Answer - Not a clear answer. They have jobs, they do this full time. They use blogs to promote themselves. You find out about credibility over time.

Busch Gardens monitors 15-20 blogs and they have a variety of people, some experts, some are just hobbyists. Political blogs - Duh! Blogging directories! Again, Duh! You need to find them, there is no science to finding the “perfect” blog. But you need to pay attention.

• Example - Feedback stuff, trackbacks, comments. (the example uses typepad)
  
  
• Podcasts
  Podcasts give common person a voice in “real media.” Both blogs and podcasts are subscribe-able. A podcast is an MP3, usually radio show format, in RSS feeds.
• Why Podcasts?
  Complementary extension of existing PR. People can listen when driving (like I do). Niche audiences, people who want to hear more than read. A younger audience. and You can be a leader in a new medium with low costs.Example - PR Web (again), simple links. Looks like they have Podcasts and streaming as well.
• Questions abound about podcasting being compilentary and how they are done technically, how they are subscribed to, how they should be formated, etc. Most of the answers given are suspect at best. I think that this is such a new medium that the presenter is barely using them herself.If you are going to speak about podcasts, you need to know now to produce, how to put it out and how to listen. She’s talking about how its pretty simple to integrate it, but I don’t think that that is completely accurate. She’s now talking about using a webinar to record and convert to a podcast, which I guess is true. Finally! She says that “new media” is good for small non-profit and such! Talking about using traditional media methods to create “new media”. Eh. nevermind, I thought there was some kernel of genius.
• End of presentation…
  rah rah, come use Vocus. (I’m going to pass.)

We need to look at 37signals about their Customer Resource management software. I think that we could really use it to our benefit. Apparently Vocus has some major clients like Coca cola, Lowes. Interesting.

I didn’t win the next round of door prizes. Bummer! More sponsor information. And we are getting ready for a break. I had a talk with a woman behind me about the length of a podcast. The presenter said it should be no more than 5 minutes, which I totally disagree with! If you want to become a leader in the new media space, you get to set the standard. You can create a show and determine the length by listener feedback. Oh well.

Technorati Profile

Tomorrow I am attending the local PRSA conference with some of my coworkers. It’s about blogging in higher education and digital newsrooms (fancy blogs?). It really sounds like something that I will get something out of. I will be attempting to “live blog” the event, but I don’t know if the location has wifi. Plenty of pictures will be up with it though.

** Update **

One of my coworkers sent an email to the Norfolk Botanical Gardens and asked about internet access / wifi. The response she got was close to this:

We do not have wifi access and there are only a couple of computers in the library section. They don't have access to myspace, hotmail, yahoo mail or many other sites.

This seems a little odd that a conference about blogging and “new internet media” is in a place that doesn’t have internet access. I still plan on bringing my laptop, but instead I will be “off-line blogging”, writing about the conference, taking photos and putting together a mega-blog post after the event, when I have wifi access again.

The situation with former Representative Mark Foley is crazy. The former congressman is alleged to have sent “inappropriate” text messages, IMs and emails to underage pages.

Part of the interesting thing is Foley’s lawyer has been laying out every excuse he can. “Mr. Foley is not a pedophile … um … he was molested … um … wait … he was drunk … or, um … wait, wait … he’s gay!”

Um. No. He’s a pedophile. How is this guy any different from the people caught on NBC’s To Catch a Predator? Oh, he’s famous (sort of). He’s powerful (really?). He’s a creep. He needs to be treated like any other child molestor or pedophile. And if people knew about it, they should be treated similarly.

In my semi-zombified state this morning, while driving to work, I noticed something scary in my rearview mirror. The guy driving the mini cooper behind me was reading a novel while I driving. I noticed it at a stop light, but he didn’t really stop once the light changed.

Is that scary? Maybe it’s just me.

Yesterday, Esther and I woke up in our normal lazy fashion and decided to get some delicious donuts for breakfast. After I made my run to what America runs on, we ate and did some cleaning up around the house before our friends came by.

After I put the laundry away and made the bed and a few phone calls later, our friends Casey and Kristi arrived. Casey, with bike in tow, and I started on a pretty intense bike ride out to Yorktown and back. We were averaging a really quick pace, probably 17.5, the whole time … Needless to say, I’m exhausted. While out on the bike, Esther went and did a little shopping while Kristi got her hair cut.

When Casey and I got back, Esther was finishing up a plum tart/cake and Kristi showed up a little while after that. Trader Joe’s is apparently a destination now. Esther had been talking to Kristi about it and this weekend was finally the time that all the cosmic forces aligned and the four of us were able to go. It’s interesting to learn that our friends are a ecologically/sociologically similar to us. While we were getting in to their car, I noticed they had the first issue of Good magazine, which I had just heard about on the Amanda Across America videocast. Very interesting.

After fighting the crowds at Trader Joe’s, we came back to our house to put away some of the more perishable items and then proceeded to have some of Esther’s plum tart/cake. It was great! On the way home we had kind of decided that we were going to go out for sushi and as it got closer and closer to dinner time, I started to get really hungry. Maybe it was the thought of sushi, or maybe it was the crazy fast bike ride, who know.

We went to Mr. Li’s which is really kind of a homecoming for Esther and me. We had a difference of opinions about the bill with a certain waitress. Several months ago, we questioned an 8 dollars of additional “taxes” on our check and hadn’t been back since. The problem is that Mr. Li’s really has the best sushi we have found in Hampton Roads. Luckily the evil waitress was not there and we had a great dinner.

During dinner we were joined by Adele, a member of Esther’s cohort (cohort just is a weird word) and she came back with all of us to our house. We watched the movie “What the #$*! Do We (K)now!?” which was fascinating, but while watching it, I almost drifted off to sleep, probably the bike ride. I think that either I was to exhausted to understand the incredibly complex subjects being talked about or that they weren’t being presented in a completely coherant fashion. I expected there to be more research to back of the claims and information that was presented and while quantum mechanics, granted, doesn’t have a lot of concrete research, I did expect a little more. Maybe I’m should not have the impetus to go and research it myself. Ehh.

After the movie and alot of talking, everyone headed home and I fell into bed …

Photo Link (Flickr)

Download the movie

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Esther just called me. Apparently she got a C on her first paper. It was a little bit of a tearful call. I hope that she has a better day. I know it sucks. Gotta keep her positive.

Episode 1: Gin Blossomettes

Welcome to the Jeredb podcast, today you’ll hear about the our weekend which included cycling and a concert. Also hear about Esther’s remarkable progress towards her Ph.D.

For more about Jeredb: www.jeredb.com
For more about Esther: www.estherknits.com

Download Episode 1

RSS feed for future episodes

In my previous post, I reffered to Esther and I creating audiocasts. For those who don’t know, audiocasts are the same things as a “podcast” (™ or © or ®, not sure which).

Everyone on the web has been writing about Apple’s recent move to own the word podcast by sending a C&D letter to PodcastReady and having followed this event, I am a little miffed.

I think Dave Winer has it right:

“Apple has been coasting on other people’s work, as well as contributing their own, but they’re not very generous when it comes to sharing the credit. I’d be inclined to work with them on this, and other things, if they would be kind to us and our creations. Instead Apple sneers at the people who gave them this innovation, and sends demand letters to members of the community.”

If you didn’t initially create the concept, the you just have to suck it up. I’m sorry Apple, you might be the dealer of cool when it comes to portable audio and computer design, but in this instance, you are not cool.

Esther and I have recorded our first audiocast, but since I forgot my powercord at work, I’m stuck waiting until tomorrow to upload it. Bummer.

After recording, getting it edited together and saving, we made a Walmart run, usually what Esther likes to do when she’s bored. While wondering through the electronics isles, I found a great deal on an ipod attachment from Belkin.

Belkin creates a voice recorder for the iPod, specifically for a 3rd generation one, which is great, because that’s what Esther has. The idea behind us buying it was that we can now create mobile audiocasts. (It’s weird that we are planning on doing mobile audiocasts with interviews before we have gotten our first one published … ambition?)

Tomorrow we should have a audiocast posted. Over the weekend we might also be transitioning both of our blogs to a WordPress.org install. This should get us ready for blogging, audiocasting, and videocasting.

Esther and I called up our friends and went for a bike ride. They rode down from Williamsburg, we rode up from home and met halfway on the Parkway. We went down to the Yorktown Riverwalk and tried to find a place to eat. All of the places were either not tasty (i.e. ice cream) or too expensive. After snacking on a couple of snacks brought by Casey, we rode to our house for some real food. Esther made some great pasta and we had a great conversation before I had to drive them back up to the ‘Burg.

Esther and I are watching the final parts of the House DVD Season 2. Just so ya know: we love House, the show not the character.

I was looking through the stats on my blog and I found a very interesting tidbit.

I am #7 on DogPile.com when you search for the Posiedon Adventure.

Apparently, the Famousity post is popluar…hmmm.

This morning Esther and I woke up a little later than we thought we would and had to jump in the shower to get ready to drive out to Ditchley. I am shooting a wedding at Ditchley in two weeks and wanted to get acquainted with the area before I get the camera out.

Maggie came by at ten o’clock on the dot and Esther and I had to scramble to get some coffee and everything ready to drive out there. It is out in Gloucester, which is about 30 - 45 mintues away (map), and it’s pretty confusing to get there, so I’m glad that we did this. I’ll be a little more familiar with getting out there so on the day I won’t get lost or freak out.

On the way back from Ditchley, Esther and I peeled off from the main road and made our way to Williamsburg. We were going to the Gin Blossoms concert at the Harvest Festival. Esther had arranged for us to meet a couple who we have recently started to hang out with, Kristi and Casey. We got to our parking space and started walking to the stage setup in the middle of a field, crossing over an orange fence. We walked around the vendors and searched for our friends, but didn’t find them. What we did find was the entrance to the concert, where we had not gone. It was funny because earlier Esther had commented on how they didn’t check for a ticket. Oops.

After going through the proper entrance and getting our tickets and wristbands (it was at a winery after all), we saw one of Esther’s professor and one of the women that I used to work with. We said hello to her professor, I didn’t say hello to my former co-worker; does that make me a misanthrope?

After getting a little italian ice, we walked back towards the stage and after scanning the crowd for a bit, we had our friends show up behind us. We made our way to the seats and blanket they had just as the first song started.

It was a very interesting concert. The Gin Blossoms were big when I was in 8th grade and it was a very odd middle school flashback. Of course they played the songs that they made them famous in the early nineties and some tracks off their new album, but the oldies got a rise out of the crowd. I wondered through the entire concert about what they had been doing in the 10 years between their waning first fame and this recent resurgence. I also wondered it they felt really let down by the fact that they were playing to a really small concert. There had to be less that 300 people there. I guess that is what happens when you have a hit in the early nineties and then fade in to pop music obscurity. I really wish that I would have brought the video camera, because it would have made a great little video podcast. Oh well.

After the hour-long concert wrapped up, we walked around the vendors again, joined by one of Esther’s cohort-mates (is that the proper term?) Adele. Kristi and Adele then got a bottle of wine, Esther got some kettle corn and we stood around eating the popcorn as the ladies enjoyed the wine.

After finishing the bottle and packing up, we walked around the winery a little and then decieded to get some coffee. We went to the Coffee House and I had a satisfying Large (triple shot) Latte. Mmmm. Caffeine.

After a little coffee and alot of good conversation we went to Adele’s apartment. Casey and I helped take apart a table and load said table and four chairs into Adele’s SUV, and after we had finished that we had some pizza and more conversation.

It’s really different to have a couple that Esther and I both click with. I have al lot in common with Casey, she has a lot in common with Kristi. Esther and I have been kind of picky about our friends in the past and its finally nice to have friends that we don’t have to be picky about.

Overall a great day.

Oscar, our dog, has taken to hopping up on the bed at night when we sleep.

Most nights it isn’t to bad, but last night was interesting. He was cuddled up to me all night long, but then early in the morning he had moved into a position that wouldn’t let me move or cover up. I decided that he must be cold. I tried to coax him into moving but that was hard to do. When Oscar is asleep, he really doesn’t want to move. I finally did get him to move, but he essentially ended up under the covers, with me spooning him.

Needless to say, it was a little odd.

I have my macbook back!

I spent all of last night working on getting all the software back on the machine. It’s been interesting being on a computer diet for the past 3 weeks. I’ve been checking my bloglines more at work and less at home. Over the weekends, I would read more (which is a change for me) and got out and did more. But I have to say, it is nice to have my computer back.

Even after only a few hours of shake down, I can tell that the work that I had done was necessary. The shop that I took it to changed out the main logic board (which has had a lot of problems on the macbooks) and the bezels around the keyboard and screen. The only thing that I have noticed is the mouse is not as “clicky”. The left side doesn’t have the distinctive click that the center does. That’s a trade off I’m willing to make.

Over all, the mac is back. Stay tuned for more things coming from Jeredb.com

I have always been fascinated by military technology. Probably due to my upbringing as the son of a military man. Happy Birthday tank.

Boing Boing: Happy birthday, tank

The new ipod shuffle unveiled today does not impress me. Apple’s “Its Showtime” event was really a big let down.

The movies… eh.

The new ipod… marginally impressive, 80 gigs, but the same ipod.

The “redesigned” nano… feh! You can spend $250 for an 8 gig nano or the same amount for the 30 gig ipod. While it’s the form factor you’re paying for, it’s also stupid.

The hardest pill to swallow, which apparently now you could, is the new ipod shuffle. The new tiny shuffle has an aluminum exterior, which I find interesting and rather snazzy looking, but lacks the USB function that my current shuffle does. That’s the whole point of the of the shuffle. You could throw a paper on there and retrieve it later, you could drop a program on there and get it later. Now, you have to have a dock.

While I find if extremely interesting how you can put the music on it and charge it all via the headphone jack, the lack of the dock if a little disturbing. And won’t the fact that you charge and transfer data from the same socket that you listen to effect the sound quality? Is there a risk of shock there?

Overall, “Its Showtime” was a underwhelming event.

I’ve been serving on a committee for the past 4 or 5 months trying to create a new minor. We have been conceptualizing a design minor titled “New Media and Digital Culture”, which is essentially a communications, art/design and computer science interdisciplinary song-and-dance.

As we are firming up the curriculum, talk about who would teach the capstone course of the minor came up. Knowing that any professor from the Comm, Art or CompSci department would not want to take it on and only having one department chair available to authorize payment, talk turned to me being hired as adjunct faculty.

Yes. Me. Adjunct faculty.

That was great enough by itself but today, I got an email from the department chair which contained a conversation that she had with the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. The conversation essentially said this (heavily paraphrased):

Dept Chair (DC): Remember that minor thing, it’s going great. We have a class that we need staffed. It’s the capstone class.

The Dean (TD): Cool. You got any ideas?

DC: Um yeah. It’s this guy from a “non academic” department.

TD: Okay, what’s the catch?

DC: He doesn’t have a masters. Is that a prob?

TD: Well. You know that accrediation thing we do, it’s kinda tough. There is a way though.

DC: I’m listening.

TD: If they have 18 hours of graduate work, they’re golden.

DC: Uh, yeah. Would it be bad if he didn’t?

TD: There’s that other option. If he’s got experience in the field then that could work.

DC: Awesome.

Shortly after that conversation was forwarded on to me. Needless to say. I’m stoked like a forest fire.

Updates as they come.

Dang it! Sundays are really boring. And Sunday nights are even more boring! I broke down and watched TV. Shame on me. I think it will be a whole lot easier during the week. I was pretty “read” out by the evening.

I will say that trying to find something to watch on TV on September 10th is really hard. A whole bunch of 9|11 stuff, and while I know it’s good to memorialize the events, the dramatic tugging on the heart strings is a little too much for me. Call me cold hearted, call me un-american, but I don’t think that we need to have so many dramatic reinterpretations of the events.

Stepping off soap box.

Saturday night, Esther and I went to the Mythbusters. They came to campus as part of our family weekend program and I was really excited. It was Kari and Grant and I really had no idea what was going to happen. As we drove the the venue, I was thinking: They can’t possibly bust a myth on stage. How would that work. They have to do hundreds of repetitions to ensure accuracy. If they aren’t going to do mythbusting, what are they going to do?

Ah! All was made clear once the lights dimmed. Kari and Grant came on stage, sat in two armchairs and proceeded to show the audience a blooper reel. While it was funny to hear them talk about NanoSiemens (get it seamens?), it was over in 15 minutes. It was definitely a rough cut, an odd voice over and sometime unintelligible dialogue took a little bit of the myth out of the experience. It might have just been my ears or an improperly calibrated sound system (I’m betting on the latter).

After the video they started with a canned Q&A session. The questioner, a student who I know, was mediocre at best in delivering the questions and in getting a better answer out of them. Being a super-fan of the show also took alot out of the answers. I knew everything that they were talking about, so their explanations held nothing new for me.

Esther and I ducked out just before the end. When the opened it up to questions, they went down hill really fast. I think the fact that young children were in the audience, lead to the type of questions: What’s the biggest explosion you’ve had on the show? How do you get your guns?

The oddest thing about the experience was the realization that it is a tv show. I know that it is a show on TV, but when Grant was talking about auditioning for the show and them discussing Scotty leaving for “personal reasons” (air quotes included), it really brought it back that it was a television show with all the some what slimey reality show editing involved.

Overall I enjoyed it, but I would say that the myth of Mythbusters… has been busted.

I have found in recent months that I have been watching a lot of TV. I mean a lot, so I have decided to stop watching TV for a week. The only television I am watching is movies that we have gotten from Netflix. I don’t want to let those go to waste, but other than that, I’m watching no TV.

I started this morning, which was weird. I didn’t pop on the boobtube like I normally do. I’ll continue to update with how my will power holds out.

parachutes >> Originally uploaded by jeredb.
Last night, after a gruelingly long day of work, Esther and I, along with her mom, brother and some close family friends, went to the Oceana Airshow. It was dark by the time we got the air base, but as we were pulling into the parking area Esther was able to see parachutists, who we later learned were the Special Operations Parachute Team - the Black Daggers and the British Red Devils. I know you are thinking It’s dark, how did you see them? They had pyrotechnics streaming off of them during their descent, which was pretty impressive, but Esther didn’t belive they were parachutes. Won’t they get burned?

As we made our way to the hospitality tent, there was a race betweena prop plane and a jet-powered truck. Shockwave the jet-powered truck is from a town less than 50 miles where Esther and I went to school. Does that make us “redneck?”

We got to the hospitality tent really late. We barely got dinner, but we did get a good spot to watch the fireworks from. A very impressive fireworks display if I do say so. After the copiously patriotic music and songs from the Top Gun soundtrack died down, we walked back towards the car, through the static displays. On our way back we saw an F22, F35, AH-64, F-14, F-16, F-18. A vertiable plethora of boyhood memories. It was actually alot of fun.

It was too bad that we pretend to be patriotic, up-standing, kind citizens while watching the air show but as soon as we get to the parking lot it’s every man for himself. Getting out of the parking lot was a bear. Needless to say, we made it home and promptly fell asleep.

So apparently an Apple store is opening up this Saturday in Norfolk. Norfolk is closer than the other apple store in the state. This is a bummer in one sense becuase I have turned over my lovely (yet broken) macbook to some “apple certified repair” shop. I would have much rather taken it to the real Apple store, but that wasn’t really an option.

But now that there is a store opening locally… Oh yeah… macbook goodness here I come.

The Macbook is in the repair shop. I’m without my new toy. I am very sad right now…

It’s been giving me all sorts of problems. Random restarts, laggy harddrives… I’m hoping its going to be fixed soon.