places I remember

In honor of the new year, I’ve added bacon to the site.

You can add it too - just head over to Bacolicio.us and serve up your own hovering slab of pork.  [ Via The Raw Feed]

Proposed Barack Obama Inaugural Address.  Then on to the parade and luncheon.

canudigit

The ever expanding reservoir of historic photos online takes on a major tributary with Google now hosting millions (yep, millions) of images from the LIFE magazine photo archive.  Most of the photos were never published. You can get at them directly by simply adding the phrase source:life to any Google image search.

From 1966, David Brower viewing slides through a loop.

Friday past witnessed yet another spirit-crushing example of why newspapers are doomed - why, despite much talk and gesture indicating a path toward transformation, newspaper people so readily come up with measures to marginalize that which they never intend to appreciate. This method assures that the transformation of newspapers will look a lot more like massacre.

I was invited to jump in on a meeting topic concerning company blogs, ostensibly to weigh in on some of the more technical aspects of the practice and some recent controversy on content. But it immediately became clear that the group’s agenda was more straightforward - to agree en masse that blogging within the company was potentially damaging to company reputation, and to chart a path toward reigning it in.  Edits before posting to the public. Full review of content, removal of posts when necessary. Even, perhaps, just making it go away altogether? So we can get on with the business of newspapering?

There was talk of language, and of proper sourcing, and of course the holy grail of objectivity, and how blogs don’t seem to do any of that stuff which defines journalism. I found myself disagreeing, partly or more often wholly, with nearly every summarizing statement made by the dozen print veterans at the table. A modicum of practical experience with blogs, reading or writing them, would have served the group well. But of that there was nothing to be found. JPD is my trendy new acronym. Just. Plain. Disturbing.

As luck would have it, Saturday I was browsing a bookstore and came across the most recent Atlantic, containing Andrew Sullivan’s excellent treatise, Why I Blog.

The same issue, newly redesigned, had a number of other good articles, some with instances of that language that people use these days. Which is to say that trashy rag might never have passed muster to come off OUR presses, by gum.

Still, I imagine one or two of the more adventurous souls in that conference room might find the Atlantic an adequate example of journalism. Indeed, well-written, strongly-produced print magazines might find far more longevity than other media rolling off the presses.  Come to think,  I’m really quite certain of it.

There may even come a day when blogging (and twittering, and whatever else we have coming down the rail) gets proper respect from our newspaperfolk. But this is not that day.

The Boston Globe’s Big Picture speaks volumes:  The next president of the United States

Not quite as glorious, but here’s a set of Flickr photos from the Obama camp on election night.

Finally, from the Newseum, front pages from newspapers after the election. And, doubtless far more relevant with this election, screen shots from major Web sites on Election Night.

A dramatic reading of a Wasilla City Council meeting.

Earlier this year I pod-played an episode of This American Life called The Giant Pool of Money, which explained the sub-prime mortgage crisis in clearer terms than the hundred hours or so of broadcast media or the thousand columns of print media that had muddled through it before. How? By letting the guys who actually facilitated the crisis - not the execs, but the poor sods in the trenches - describe the process and its brutal unraveling.

Last Saturday This American Life issued Another Frightening Show About the Economy, this one focused on the stock market disaster of these past few weeks. Again, the episode is required listening for anyone like me, anyone largely confused about the inner workings of our global financial crisis. For all the supposed market expertise at CNBC and the Wall Street Journal, the pros could learn a lesson or two about showing, rather than telling.

After hearing both these podcasts, I came away with the same basic impression:  We appear to be so screwed.

You can also subscribe to Ira Glass’s excellent TAL podcast. Often he’ll shed light on topics far less depressing, a nice diversion perhaps in the weeks and months ahead.

TPM has a disturbing performance from CNN’s Candy Crowley. Crowley has trouble here reconciling her bewilderment with McCain’s Lets Lie About Everything strategy against the reality that she, along with so many of her colleagues/cohorts, is totally in the bag for John McCain.  I imagine these are indeed difficult times for half-wit teevee journalists, what with only a limited number of hurricanes to divert attention.

Barack Obama leads the way yet again, answering “the top 14 science questions facing America” as part of ScienceDebate2008.  John McCain has indicated he’ll get around to it as well (that ought to be a treat).

Obama demonstrates an attention to detail here, and cuts right to specific policies. But the best sentence might be this one:

I will restore the basic principle that government decisions should be based on the best-available, scientifically-valid evidence and not on the ideological predispositions of agency officials or political appointees.

In every election cycle I’ve witnessed, there are inevitably those who lament the lack of substance to the campaign. Many, in fact, use this as a crutch to justify their own lack of engagement in the political process. This time around, those excuses ring particularly hollow. This campaign is about issues and substance, if you’re willing to actually take an extra minute or two and look for it. And so far, the substance ALL belongs to Obama.

I think Sarah needs to work harder at keeping her bald-faced lies a bit less conspicuous.