Category Archives: Current Affairs

Reading List September 21, 2005

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  • Maybe You Should Decide (Micropersuasion) – Steve wonders if he should float pitches on his blog so readers can help decide what he should publish/run.  BusinessWeek is wondering the same thing.
  • WSJ Steals Our Story, Again (paidContent) – Rafat Ali is ticked off that the Wall Street Journal picked up a story he broke and didn’t attribute him.  Go get ’em Rafat.
  • Google Defends Self on Blog (John Battelle’s SearchBlog) – Google is being sued by Authors Guild and defends its position on its blog.
  • Who Will Audit the Red Cross? (Moore’s Lore) – Dana Blankenhorn would like to know if how the Red Cross is doing in response to Katrina.  Stories about problems are beginning to surface and he rightly asks if their true and if anyone is keeping an eye on them.
  • Google Flattens the World (Moore’s Lore) – Dana doesn’t think Google’s recent moves are aimed at taking on Microsoft, rather they are aimed at taking on the entire computing-telecommunications complex.
  • Guilt the Gift that Keeps on Giving (Michael’s Corner) – Via Patrick Eakes I found this Greensboro-based blog and I’m now a subscriber.  Michael’s take on guilt as a parenting tool is really making me think. 
  • Continued Demise of the Old Media (The Third Rail) – John Trainer thinks the New York Times has screwed up: "’All the news that’s fit to print’ just doesn’t work any more.
    It wouldn’t have been so difficult for you to plug yourselves into the new mainstream – the Washington Post did it by creating blog links that referenced most every blogger who, in turn, referenced one of the Post’s stories. Too liberal, too conservative, that’s not the question. Just simple tit for tat. Engagement, not detachment. The public is now apparently demanding ‘All the news that fits, we print.’"
  • True Genius: Kevin Murphy Wins MacArthur "Genius" Award" (Freakonomics) – Kevin Murphy is a colleague of Steven Leavitt’s and Steven isn’t bashful in his praise of the man who was recently named a MacArthur Fellow.
  • Exploding TV (Jeff Jarvis) – Jeff talks about the Viacom deal to buy iFilm (same story broken by Rafat Ali, and not properly attributed by WSJ).  According to Jeff it’s a "media changing moment."
  • Surprising Partners: Adding Blogs to an Existing Non-Profit Community (Global PR Blog Week) – Another very informative article from the online conference for the PR community.  This one focuses on the online community building efforts of the March of Dimes.
  • Blogs and Press Releases (Global PR Blog Week) – Shel Holtz argues that blogs can’t and won’t replace the venerable press release.  He doesn’t think they should, either.
  • Porn Site Offers Soldiers Free Access in Return for Photos of Dead Iraqis (Online Journalism Review) – The title’s pretty self-explanatory, but the OJR makes it even more interesting by taking a hard look at the role that the porn site is playing.  The thinking here is much more involved than you would expect.

Reading List September 20, 2005

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  • Seth Godin’s Incomplete Guide to Blogs and the New Web (PDF file, via A VC) – Seth Godin has posted a PDF guide to blogging and it’s free.
  • Alacra Wiki (via A VC) – Alacra, an aggregator of premium business information, has a wiki.  Could be useful on the work front.
  • Wikis (A VC) – This is a good look at the value of wikis and provides links to some good wiki info.
  • Adding Your Voice to the Conversation: Why CEOs Should Blog (Global PR Blog Week 2.0 via Doc Searls) – This article provides a nice perspective on CEO blogging and also gives lots of useful links to corporate blog resources.
  • Corporate Blogging 2.0 (Blogwrite for CEOs) – Debbie Weil thinks that the 2,000 employee blogs emanating from Microsoft provide a window in the company’s true soul. Microsoft even has it’s own Deep Throat. Me thinks Debbie may be right.
  • Minipreneurs (Trendwatching.com via Jeff Jarvis) – This newsletter piece pulls together a bunch of disparate information to highlight the trend towards consumer selling via eBay and many other services.
  • Banned Books Week (Library Boy) – This post is about the American Library Association’s annual Banned Books Week. Among the top 10 most frequently challenged books in 2004 is Maya Angelou’s "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" and John Steinbeck’s "Of Mice and Men."  Sheesh.
  • Spam Blogs (A VC) – Fred Wilson is finding more spam blogs now that Google has entered the blog search game.

Reading List September 18, 2005

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  • Sometimes You Are The Dog (Patrick Eakes) – Patrick had a bad round of golf during a tournament, thought about throwing in the towel, but to his credit he didn’t.
  • Hackoff.com – A Must Read (A VC) – This post points to a new blog-based book publishing adventure that the book author calls a "blook."  That’s the 2005 winner of the dumbest "coinage" to date.
  • Man on the Street Tests (The Post Money Value) – The author provides a series of questions you can ask to get a handle on how prevalent certain phenomena are in your community.  Tops on the list is to say to someone you’ve just met, "Hey I love the blog" to see how many are actually blogging.
  • The Triangle: Limits of Blog Power (Daou Report – Salon.com) – A very interesting look at the relationship between the "netroots", media and political power structure.  They are the three sides of a triangle that the author believes is the new political reality.

Reading List September 15, 2005

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  • Dave Sifry – Don’t Order a Body Bag Just Yet (The Post Money Value) – Why the reporting of Technorati’s demise is premature.
  • Yahoo Launches "Instant Search" (John Battelle’s Searchblog) – Yahoo announces launch of search tool that shows results below the search box as you’re typing.  There’s some real value there as the tool will help you refine your search terms without continually having to type-search-repeat.  John’s favorite line from the release: "Why feel lucky when you can be right?"
  • eBay Motors + Google Maps = Mashup Heaven (Business2) – A blogger combines eBay’s car sales data and Google Maps to show location of all cars for sale on eBay Motors.  The guys at Business 2.0 conjecture on the next step: eBay incorporating Google Maps themselves and then having Google’s text ads appearing on the page.  It’s a business mashup!
  • Because That’s the Way We Have Always Done It (Blog Maverick) – Mark Cuban hates the "because we’ve always done it that way" reasoning. Reminds me that all the good entrepreneurs I’ve met have always been "why" folks.
  • Michelin’s Bibendum (Reveries.com) – A fascinating article about the history of the Michelin Man.  Warning: it includes the words "Latin gerundive."
  • Fat & Fit (Reveries.com) – Gyms are starting to hire trainers who aren’t hard-bodies. Could it be that people are beginning to realize that six-pack doesn’t necessarily equal fit?  I know a lot of skinny smokers with incredible abs who can’t walk down the street without gasping.

Reading List September 14, 2005

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For Those of You Who May Still Doubt that the US Congress is a Festering Boil Oozing Slimy Power Brokers

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Okay, the headline is a sweeping generalization about the legislative branch of the US government, but these folks are intent on reinforcing this image of themselves.

Today’s story involves Rep. William Jefferson, D-La. who’s district includes New Orleans.  ABC News reported that the Congressman decided to tour his district on September 2 during the height of the post-Katrina chaos.  While on this excursion the Congressman and his National Guard escorts stopped at his house and the guard members waited around for an hour until the Congressman "Jefferson emerged with a laptop computer, three suitcases, and a box
about the size of a small refrigerator, which the enlisted men loaded
up into the truck."

Here are some excerpts from the story followed by my own comments:

On Sept. 2 — five days after Katrina hit the Gulf Coast — Rep. William
Jefferson, D-La., who represents New Orleans and is a senior member of
the powerful Ways and Means Committee, was allowed through the military
blockades set up around the city to reach the Superdome, where
thousands of evacuees had been taken.

How admirable that he was making an effort to be on the ground with the people he represents.  Or could there be another motivation?  Keep reading.

The Louisiana National Guard tells ABC News the truck became stuck as it waited for Jefferson to retrieve his belongings.

Two weeks later, the vehicle’s tire tracks were still visible on the lawn.

The soldiers signaled to helicopters in the air for aid.
Military sources say a Coast Guard helicopter pilot saw the signal and
flew to Jefferson’s home. The chopper was already carrying four rescued
New Orleans residents at the time.

A rescue diver descended from the helicopter, but the
congressman decided against going up in the helicopter, sources say.
The pilot sent the diver down again, but Jefferson again declined to go
up the helicopter.

After spending approximately 45 minutes with Jefferson, the
helicopter went on to rescue three additional New Orleans residents
before it ran low on fuel and was forced to end its mission.

"Forty-five minutes can be an eternity to somebody that is
drowning, to somebody that is sitting in a roof, and it needs to be
used its primary purpose during an emergency," said Hauer.

Coast Guard Commander Brendan McPherson told ABC News, "We
did have an aircraft that responded to a signal of distress where the
congressman was located. The congressman did decline rescue at the time
so the helicopter picked up three other people.

Rep. Jefferson claims that he didn’t ask for the escort from the National Guard but they insisted because of his safety.  At this point did it not occur to him that maybe the tour could wait until it was safer and he wouldn’t be diverting valuable resources from their core mission of search and rescue?  Again, maybe there was another motivation for him to visit his district.  Read on.

Jefferson insisted the expedition did not distract from rescue efforts.

"They actually picked up a lot of people while we were
there," he said. "The young soldier said, ‘It’s a good thing we came up
here because a lot of people would not have been rescued had we not
been in the neighborhood.’"

With all due respect to the Congressman, he’s full of it.  Still, I ask, was there another motivation for getting to his house?

In an unrelated matter, authorities recently searched Jefferson’s
property as part of a federal investigation into the finances of a
high-tech firm. Last month FBI officials raided Jefferson’s house as
well as his home in Washington, D.C., his car and his accountant’s
house…

Jefferson has not commented on that matter, except to say he is cooperating with the investigation…

Last week, Jefferson set up a special trust fund for contributions to
his legal defense in light of the FBI investigation. A senior federal
law enforcement source tells ABC News that investigators are interested
in learning if Jefferson moved any materials relevant to the
investigation. Jefferson says he did not.

 

Why is it that the Ways and Means Committee seems to attract these guys
(Dan Rostenkowski, anyone?) in disproportionate numbers?  Oh, right.  Money.

After reading the last segment of the report I actually find it easier to believe that the Congressman didn’t want a National Guard escort after all.  I mean who needs witnesses?  Of course you have to wonder how he might have gotten around without them, but I suspect he would have found himself right at home in the sewage that was flowing around his house.

Reading List September 13, 2005

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  • Seven Deadly Sins (A VC) – Fred expands on a few of the seven deadly sins for entrepreneurs that venture capitalist David Beisel posted about, speaking of which…
  • Seven Founding Sins (Genuine VC) – David Beisel looks at seven deadly sins commited by many company founders.  They include inauthenticity, sloth, extravagance, taciturnity, greed, arrogance and indecisiveness.
  • Skype-eBay and Today’s Lesson (The Post Money Value) – To see the potential in the eBay purchase of Skype you have to think big.
  • Where’s the Dog Bowl? (The Post Money Value) – Rick Segal thinks that Microsoft isn’t "eating its own dog food" when it comes to the use of Outlook with the IMAP protocol.  The real interest to me is that it was the first thing I’ve read that helped me understand what IMAP means/does.
  • Positive Image and Context (The Post Money Value) – Rick has an interesting take on the memo written by the now-resigned head of FEMA, Michael Brown.  He points out that in the context of the entire memo the infamous sentence “Convey a positive image of disaster operations to government officials, community organizations and the general public” isn’t really bad.  His feeling is that if Brown had used plain language like “You’ll need to keep the red tape crap in check, show people their
    gov’t actually cares and paying taxes has somewhat of a point.”     then this wouldn’t have blown up into a PR disaster.  He makes an interesting point.
  • NYT’s Brooks Revealed that "from Day One," the Bush White House "decided our public relations is not going to be honest" — Why Hasn’t He Written About This? (Media Matters) – During an interview on the Chris Matthews show David Brooks said that from day one the Bush administration wasn’t going to admit mistakes, even if it meant being dishonest.  Duh?
  • Jackson Compares FEMA Contracts to ‘White-Collar Looting’ (San Jose Mercury News) – From the article, "The Rev. Jesse Jackson suggested Sunday that
    the federal government was encouraging ‘white-collar looting’ by
    awarding no-bid contracts to favored companies to rebuild
    hurricane-ravaged areas, rather than giving those displaced by the
    disaster priority for jobs." The Rev. is beating the same old drum, and it’s going hurt the people he should be trying to help.  The jobs need to go to those who can do it best, period.

Now That’s More Like a Leader

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A while ago I wrote a post saying that President Bush could take a lesson in leadership from Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks.  Basically I was impressed by the guts that Cuban exhibited when he took responsibility for some of the bad personnel moves made by the team over the last few years.  To paraphrase he said, "I was wrong and I’m going to learn from my mistakes."

According to an article on the Washington Post website, today at a press conference the president made the following comments:

"Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all
levels of government," Bush said at a joint White House news conference
with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani. "To the extent the federal
government didn’t fully do its job right, I take responsibility."

Bush’s comments came in response to a reporter’s question as
to whether the United States was capable of handling another terrorist
attack in light of its sluggish and inadequate response to a natural
disaster like Katrina, which unlike a terrorist attack came with some
warning.

"Are we capable of dealing with a severe
attack? That’s a very important question and it’s in the national
interest that we find out what went on so we can better respond," Bush
said. He repeated his earlier assertions that he wanted to know both
what went right and went wrong with the federal response to the
disaster.

That’s a big step for the president in that it’s the first time I can recall him publicly admitting that he or his administration has made a mistake.  Now hopefully he can follow it up with even more leadership, like:

  • Getting rid of some of the sycophants he’s surrounded himself with, or at least balance them out with people who will give him the bad news as well as the good.
  • Making the hard decisions needed to fix the problems that the government’s response to Katrina exposed.
  • Finding any more Michael Brown’s who might have gotten their leadership positions due to Republican influence or fundraising abilities and quietly getting rid of them. He should do what some traditional Japanese businesses do to executives they feel are failures; give them a beautiful office with a nice view and absolutely nothing to do.  Their egos won’t let them stay around long.
  • Calling Rep. Virginia Foxx (see this post) and getting some advice about doing the right thing, both conscientiously and politically.

I’m not holding my breath, but today’s press conference does show that anything’s possible.

Voting Your Conscience: Potentially Politically Priceless

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The elected representative to the US Congress from my home district is Virginia Foxx, who won a hotly contested Republican primary last year by defeating Winston-Salem’s blogging city councilman Vernon Robinson.  Until now I’d say that’s been the most newsworthy part of her political career.

Well now she’s done gone and made a name for herself.  She’s one of just 11 US Representatives who voted against the $52 billion emergency-appropriation bill for Katrina victims.  In an article in the Winston-Salem Journal she’s quoted as saying:

"I want to know that
there are safeguards and that there won’t be abuses, and I have to do
what I think is the right thing to do," she said…

Foxx argued that it
would be better to allocate the money in stages. The government’s
approach to spending on Katrina sets a bad precedent for how it deals
with future disasters, she said.

In a sign that voting her conscience might have also been a shrewd political move for Foxx, all 12 of the comments that the story garnered on the paper’s website (as of 5:48 p.m., September 13, 2005) were in support of Foxx’s vote.

Me thinks Ms. Foxx might be getting a call for advice from some of her Republican counterparts in the near future.

Reading List September 12, 2005

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  • Swimming to New Orleans (AlterNet via Moore’s Lore) – A first-hand account of a New Orleans native’s venture back into the city the weekend after Katrina.
  • Hurricane Katrina Timeline (PMwiki) – A wiki with a timeline of the Katrina disaster.  Fascinating, even if a third of it is factually off (which I doubt) due to the "citizens media" aspect of this, it’s a damning statement on the performance of the US government.