Rebecca Taibleson stated it plainly: "If you were Jewish and conservative,
you had to really mean it, and we did."
Is Andrew Sullivan's Way the Only Way for Bloggers Who Want to Make Real Money?
Amidst a raging debate, stemming from a recent PEW report on the state of News Media, whether it is theGolden Age of journalism or it is barely breathing its last, the journalistic world is keenly watching Andrew Sullivan's recent 'pay wall' experiment with his famous blog, 'The Dish'.
Though the unfulfilled expectations in advertising revenues of main stream digital news media is widely perceived as the motivation for this venture, the Blogoshphere, at large, is not holding breath, thanks to the respect bloggers are gaining as influencers in brand promotion.
Contrary to the gloom and doom perception among News bloggers, a Technorati report on digital influence in 2013 place Bloggers as an influential tribe on the up, whose real value is not grasped by those who splurge massive budgets on brand promotions.
Though blogs and influencers don't get a large portion of brands' digital spend, they rank high with consumers for trust, popularity and influence. When making overall purchase decisions, for consumers, blogs trail only behind retail and brand sites.
In fact, like the state of the media, there is much overlapping here thought he Technorati report doesn't seem to draw any distinction.
However, there is much convergence in the findings of the two reports as to the diversion of digital advertising resources from digital news media to other the digital media including blogs, with display ads, video and search claiming bulk of the spending.
Though the Technorati report further identify the preference for mobile, social and video, where the buck gets the maximum bang, as the preferred technologies, Blogging has a 30% share, only behind Facebook, twitter and Youtube.
Clearly there is huge distinction between Blogging in journalism like that of Andrew Sullivan's, which influence politics, at least in the developed world, and hugely contributes to focus on issues and change the shape of the world and Blogging as a channel to stream world's accumulated expertise for the benefit of consumers, which seem to benefit from the current trend.
In reality, with the sticky amalgam, which the TV, Print and Digital media as well as the social web tend to become, bloggers as a tribe, to remain to remain influential, may find it necessary to go behind a pay wall to win back credibility, the fundamental virtue in journalism, something money can't buy.
In fair criticism of the erosion of professionalism and standards which over a period of time will only destroy the trust, much like the paper advertisement lost its mettle decades ago for the same reasons, Bob Garfield of the Guardian rightly states:
All of that fantastic content Yglesias was gushing about is paid for by venture capitalists making bad bets, established media companies digging into their savings accounts to pay the bills, displaced workers earning peanuts, amateurs, semi-pros, volunteers and monks.
Then, there's e-payola: pay-per-post, pay-per-tweet, pay-per-review - and their cousin, affiliate advertising, which gives bloggers and tweeters incentive to steer readers toward transaction. In broadcast TV, there's the serial incest between the news divisions and entertainment divisions, and on local TV, video news releases camouflaged as reportage.
Yet, none of these gimmicks is on the way out. Au contraire, they're all growing. Which is terrifying, for what they all have in common is that, to one degree or another, they compromise editorial integrity. Readers and viewers have no way of knowing that they are being marketed to, or that the content is inherently untrustworthy.
If anything, the social web, which in the case of Facebook which has grown over one billion members only accelerate this pernicious erosion of integrity.
For example, information put on the web can go viral irrespective of its factual nature merely by human and emotional reaction, very often producing unjustified results. This is further complicated by the level of education and evolution of the society.
However, over a long term the trust deficit from this onslaught volume over quality will be compensated by economic reasons, much like the manufacturing industry is slowly returning from China.
The demand for quality and veracity will inevitably grow due to scarcity and bloggers will be no exception to this trend. This of course implies that not only News Bloggers like Andrew Sullivan but anyone who wants to keep high standards and quality will have to start expecting to be paid for it in some manner.
When Bulls, Hawks, Cubs and Bears Start Playing Hail Mary Like Lady Gaga, It Is a Different Ball Game!
CSN Chicago, a part of NBC Sports Regional Networks, is changing the meaning of sports forever!
Sports used to be something a few celebrities engaged in for the rest of us to watch and the press used to have a field day about.
The nature of sports and its explosive emotional upheaval has changed a long time ago by the infusion of music which has immense mass appeal. The emotional swaying power of music and its celebrity creators have blended well with the turmoil of sports, taking it to exhilarating heights in the past.
The Three Tenors Concert of Los angel Super bowl remains a musical moment etched in the history of sports. Numbers like We will Rock you by Queen still reverberate in stadiums around the world. The bears have even turned music celebrities in the past by performing Super bowl Shuffle for charity.
It is the genius of music celebrities like Lady Gaga in turning technology and the immense influential power of the ever expanding social web, to pamper and keep hold on their fan base, which the giants of sports have borrowed this time.
#Kobe Bryant: Heart of a lion.Derrick Rose: Heart of a shivering chihuahua.notsportscenter.com/koberosefacebo…
— Haceb Ehcen (@Possessed_OG) April 14, 2013
The interactive social experiences technology CSN Chicago sought out for their new social engaging feature Team Pulse is the same as the one which Lady Gaga employed with great success to engage with her fans in real time through her website, provided by ARKTAN, specialised in creating engaging user experiences on the social web and TV.
However, unlike the massive benefits such interactive features bring to celebrities like Lady Gaga in the entertainment field, the Team plus feature of CSN has far deeper and wide reaching power to convert all sports to mass sports.
For example, real time interactive facilities provided for the 'Bulls Pulse', the official site of BULLS, include real time curated time lines of Bulls Talk for fans, Press Box, Player Tweets, Official Bulls & NBA and Instagram photos. The feature also includes a Trending list of players with mentions each get during the event.
What this means is that everyone involved and watching a game live and all those away from the venue but engaged through TV or other media can express their views, opinions and criticisms, which everyone else can see and react to, anywhere around the world.
The revolution in smart phones and tablets, which has rendered such interaction easy and enjoyable and platforms on the social web like Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, Instagram and numerous Blogs and forums take the game to the level of a global event.
What does this mean in reality? Spectators can now influence players during the game. Someone can pass a valuable tip or advice the coach is missing. The commentator can see the trend and focus on a player if he is doing well or making mistakes because the tweets are benign or nasty. Everyone can see how much attention the game is catching so everything including the live ads can be changed. See where this is going ?
In fact the Instagram stream brings much fun to the experience by letting everyone express their feelings of the 'moment' before, during and after the event in an unprecedented and unique way, giving a sense of one to one community participation in the event.
Adding short video streams like 'vine' can add depth to this experience if added to the page, leveraging on the immense addictive power of this new social media platform, something CSN and the technology provider need to consider.
Further making the streams scrollable can enhance participants experience by being able to revisit and 'miss' nothing, especially if they want to share at a later time.
It is only just the beginning of a trend how the sporting world is going to change. Pretty soon, such features can become standard for several other games like football and cricket, basket ball and hockey popular in other parts of the world.
The impact of interactive features like Team pulse can be much far reaching changing the laws of the games, their engagement, betting industry, entertainment and TV and even the popularity.
Pretty soon, like Psy of South Korea who has taken the world by storm with his 'Gagnam Style' and now his follow on 'Gentleman' which had over 10 million Youtube hits under 24 Hrs, locales and national boundaries will disappear for sporting events.
One thing is sure. The way people will live and relax during weekends will certainly change. There may be nothing of interest about a game you watched over the weekend to talk about aound the Monday morning coffee in the office!
Delhi Was In Flames, Not Long Ago!! Have Forgotton, Why ?
An Angel Was Brutally Raped
Sunitha was brutally gang raped when she was 15 by 8 men. " I dont remember the rape part of it so much as much as the anger part of it. " This gang rape had stigmatized her for several years and had let her become isolated. She says in her speech sighting the plight of the victims "In [India] and across the globe, hundreds and thousands of children, as young as three, four, are sold into sexual slavery. But that’s not the only purpose that human beings are sold for. They are sold in the name of adoption. They are sold in the name of organ trade. They are sold in the name of forced labor, camel jockeying, anything, everything." And when they are resucued they are considered as victims and isolated from the society. “My biggest challenge is society. It’s you and me. My biggest challenge is your blocks to accept these victims as our own. It’s very fashionable to talk about human trafficking in this fantastic AC hall. It’s very nice for discussion, discourse, making films and everything. But it is not nice to bring them to our homes. It’s not nice to give them employment in our factories, our companies. It’s not nice for our children to study with their children. … That’s my biggest challenge.”
Sunitha was inspirational because even though she was a victim she did not let it get the best of her life and ruin everything that she has dreamed of. Today Sunitha talks to people about sex slavery and helps them build confidence for a better future and to take away the power of the pain that they are faced with. Sunitha Krishnan has recused over 3, 200 girls, as young as 3 years of age to 40 years of age. Many minors who were rescued after gang rape succumbed to death because of brutal sexual abuse. It is people like Sunitha that have a big heart to take a stand and help project others from what she has been through and to help build confidence to the ones who have been through it.
Dr. Suntha Krisahnan is the co-founder of ‘Prajwala’, an organization which rescues and provides shelter for sexually abused and trafficked women and children. Most of the rescued victims were forced into prostitution by their own relatives and hence go through sex slavery and are faced with the life time disease of either HIV, AIDS, gonorrhea, or other sorts of disease.
I was raped, but it didn't end my life,
I'm a phoenix. listen to her speach:
To all the citizen of the world who are reading this, this is not a piece of wonderful literature, this is not a note to create social media attention, but this is a hand-out to all those who believe they can be instrumental in changing this barbaric social stigma, before it becomes the part of our deteriorating civilization. It’s easy to say “Bravo, Sunitha you a doing a good job” or “Hats off to you”, but the question is how many of you can be a Sunitha or rather how many of you can bring in a society like Prajwala. It’s time to act than to sit and applaud.
It’s my right to protect,
I’ll do it,
Adarsh Damodaran
Is Sonia Gandhi a Real Indian Saint Accused as an Italian Carpet Bagger?
 |
| Rajiv - Sonia File Photo Courtsey https://www.facebook.com/malayalamlive |
In fact, the personal and emotional turmoil Sonia was forced to face on account of her own personal choices are harsher than those experienced by many of India's great saints.
Today, Sonia Gandhi, like her countryman Caesar, had to do the ultimate sacrifice by taking a double stab for the sake of India, a country of saints, which must earn her sainthood.
In a single speech, Sonia had to acknowledge the cause of the Tamils who murdered her husband for their cause and denounce Italy, her country of birth which is in a dispute with India, a country she has adopted.
Italian waitress
Many in India believe, based on the western media which has proclaimed her the 4th richest politician and powerful woman in the world, that Sonia is a corrupt foreign intruder, out to destroy India. Her detractors however cannot explain what she and her family are doing in the heat and dust of Delhi, leading a frugal lifestyle, rather than basking on a sunny Mediterranean Island if she owns billions.
Not a lot is known about the circumstances in which Sonia met Rajiv, the scion of the Gandhi family and agreed to marry him despite great cultural and social differences. For a young Italian bride, hardly aware of the prejudice and taboo of archaic India, the very thought should have given nightmares.
Three Reasons Why Two Italian Marines Can Smile While India is Burning.
Are the Italians ruling India now? That is what a growing number of Indians start to ask themselves even though there is no government in Rome. However two Italian marine commandos, whose life has been ruined, have reason to smile.
The amazingly plight of two smart Italian naval commandos, Massimiliano Latorre and Salvatore Girone, whose freedom is in peril for doing their duty, has grown from a storm in a tea cup to become the hottest political furore and diplomatic stand off of recent times.
When they fired a few round of warning at an approaching boat, which they mistook for a pirate vessel, they thought they were doing a heroic job while earning a decent livelihood! Surely they would have defied orders even from the pope if they knew what they were getting in to!
They probably knew nothing of the little Indian state of Kerala, the only place still left in the world which believes in the ghost of communism, which turned the death of the two dead fishermen to a worthwhile cause to hammer the political opposition in power.
They certainly knew nothing of the Indian paranoia about all Italians. They had no clue how the fairy tale romance and marriage of an unfortunate Italian girl called Sonia to an even more unfortunate Gandhi scion has turned in to national Italian phobia.
They didn't know that the Somalian pirates, from who they were protecting their ship, don't count in India even if many Indians have been taken hostage or killed by the pirates.
That, it is nearly impossible to shoot to kill from a bobbing ship to accurately hit two fishermen on a bobbing boat and that the boat was listing towards the ship with a sleeping driver, defying warnings by the marines also didn't cut mustard with the Indian public.
So the Italian government had so far put up with the Indian claim of "wrongful" murder of its citizens in its territory and let the Indian police retain the two marines pending painfully long and inefficient judicial process of India.
Diplomatic and other conciliatory efforts had lead the Indian Supreme court to grant bail and permission for the two marines to leave the country for Christmas and more recently for voting in the Italian elections and celebrate Easter. So what has changed now and why the commotion and turmoil in India and the Indian parliament?
The obvious cause of the recent furore is the refusal of the Italian government to send the two marines, who are currently in Italy, back to India to face trial, raising a dispute as to India's right and demanding International mediation.
However or Machiavellian minds and probing observers there could be several plausible reasons behind the current development
What is election for Italy is election for India.
The ruling UPA bashing power of the shooting incident with an Italian connection, rampantly used by the Indian political opposition during the course of last year, and being ruthlessly used before the elections due in a year, is pretty evident.
However, that, there was political mileage to be made also in Italy was not clear until the high profile Italian rescue kicked in before Christmas, eventually securing bail and homecoming for the two marines.
The pomp and circumstances with which the marines were given a heroic welcome back home, turning a relatively minor incident to a major national issue, whipped up enormous national pride. The national heroic welcome which reflected the sentiments in India defied any signs of electoral campaign, but was part of one none the same. In the confusing political landscape of Italy, it is not clear who was the major beneficiary.
It looks like the same political forces are having a second go at the "national pride" commodity by whipping up and creating a stand off with India, posturing a protective role for the benefit of Italians. The timing, before another round of elections, is what gives the clue, as the Italians could have refused to send the marines back when they visited in December, if it were for the reasons now being bandied.
Augusta Westland Helicopter Scam
A raging storm of a major scam, which most likely have political reasons and justifications to surface just before the Italian elections, unfortunately and most inappropriately is also most ill timed for the ruling UPA of India, due to face elections soon.
A major diplomatic stand off, blocking revelations and communications can seriously benefit the two governments. It is mere commonsense to attribute reasons to a foreign country when you can't give explanations and justifications, at least until the elections are over.
Besides diplomatic stand offs, when it creates uproar in the parliament prompting stern warnings from the country's prime minister and creating a huge bump in the media and social web, have an amazing capacity to drown the fall out from major scams in both countries.
Hot potato for the Indian Government.
However, the most ludicrous explanation going the rounds on the social web, yet so plausible is the Indian dilemma of having to make a judgement in the case. Knowledge and cogniscence of the unreasonableness of the case makes the judiciary and the government look ridiculous before an international audience to give a guilty verdict.
On the other hand, the political fall out if the marines go un punished, especially in an election year could be costly in the best of times.
In an year, when the Italian phobia is whipped up by new scams with in India and in Italy, resurrecting old ones like the Bofors, settlement of something like the shooting incident, even by absconding of the culprits can be a blessing in disguise. Chances are both governments have decided to bite the bullet and forget.
In reality, it could be all of these which has put a smile on the faces of the hapless young men, whose life is being ruined by powers they have little control of.
.
For £39, Sandstrom is a Real Plastic Princes You Will Fall in Love With
If you wonder what the heck a Sandstrom
is, it is my new Bluetooth headphone. If you ask what is there to write about
it, the answer is, with a Sandstrom, you can experience the feeling of falling
in love at first sight. If you don’t get it, mate, it is the headphone itself I
am talking about.
In fact Sandstrom SBTHP11X has
all the romantic qualities of someone you will easily fall in love with in real
life. Weighing a mere 102 g, it is so delicate; Hilary Mantel might have called
it precision made and a plastic princess.
Sandstrom is one of the best
precision made pieces in plastic I have come across since some time.
It was indeed a stroke of luck.
Looking out for a cordless headphone for my aging Nokia 900, which is the only
Maemo5 phone ever built, I decided to take a trip to the local super store. I
was shocked to see the array of head sets displayed, nearly a hundred, yet couldn’t
find what I was looking for, a light weight, comfortable, blue tooth head phone
with audio controls and active noise cancellation, which I could carry on my
head for hours without wanting to take it away.
After spending an hour testing
the audio experience from nearly all of them, some of which was really
impressive, I was about to walk away as I didn’t see what I was looking for, when
a young sales guy cornered me.
On hearing what I was after, he
bent down and pulled out a flap packed box and suggested it might just be what
I was looking for.
It was a Sandstrom SBTHP11 and
amazingly he was right. The box had an impressive image of a stunning pair of
ear cups and a very nice, expensive feel about it.
‘What make is it?’ I asked, not
seeing a brand name or logo on the box. ‘Sandstrom’ replied the sales guy. Having
never heard the name I asked ‘Where is it made?’ ‘No idea.’ said the sales
assistant.
Turning the box around, both of
us discovered it was made in China. Something didn’t add up. Stunned, we went through the list of features,
which sounded unbelievable for something as light as feather I was holding in
my hand. It read like my own list of what I intended to get.
· Portable wireless headphones for stereo sound
· Bluetooth 2.1+EDR digital wireless transmission technology
· Integrated track, volume and call control
· Padded swivel cups and adjustable headband for added comfort
· Integrated microphone for hands free calling
Though active noise cancellation
was on top of my list, after a fair bit of investigation and audio testing of
some top of the range headsets in the store, I came to the conclusion that I
can’t have it unless I go for a bulky one or an ear bud, except in a few.
Besides it looked like the inherent loss audio quality in lower frequencies associated
with this feature wasn't worth.
After a week of testing,
including some driving around and hour long conversation with friends 5000
miles away, I am excited that what I have on my head is not just a piece of
exquisite Swedish design but also a headphone which packs some sharp, high end
technology.(Not sure if that is Swedish as well!)
The audio quality and the
loudness you can take it to is easily comparable or even better than some of
the others I had tested.
I have never accessed my music on
anything by just one soft touch or cut it off by just two. Sandstrom gives you
the real feeling that your music is always there with you.
You can relate to the music
creator as each of his instruments come alive as distinctly as the vocal chords
so much so that you become aware of the distortions and disproportion in mixing
of audio levels. Suddenly music you thought was heavenly is no more flawless. You
become music critic from a connoisseur.
Enjoying all of this or hour long
conversation should take a heavy toll the battery you think. Amazingly, the
Sandstrom battery which gets charged fully in an hour, through a US b port of
your laptop or PC stays alive for more than three days on stand by or a few good hours on full use.
However there is no instruction
how you can change the battery. It is also not clear how the ambient noise
is eradicated, which means that you really can retreat into your own world when
listening to your music, by the passive noise isolating technology.
Nevertheless, the proof of the
pudding in the case of this superb piece of technology is in the very high
quality and fidelity of sound it produce with very little power consumption.
The location of the microphones
which will face to the rear when the headset is worn is intriguing, but they
work so well, the people I spoke to had no idea that I had not actually been
speaking in to a microphone.
Over all if you are looking for a
petite headphone you can carry around and use with amazing ease, Sandstrom is
for you.
As icing on the cake, I was indeed shocked when I paid at the check out, a measly £39 after a incredible discount of £40 for something I thought had value for much more.
I love my Sandstrom, my Plastic Princess; irrespective
of What Hilary Mantle will like to call it.As icing on the cake, I was indeed shocked when I paid at the check out, a measly £39 after a incredible discount of £40 for something I thought had value for much more.
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