Well, There's Some Media Parking

I'll leave the school nameless, but the signage that greets media.

Not sure if its a statement or not.

Starting the Conversation

I mentioned this a few weeks ago, and will bring it up again at the panel. Every institution will have a different approach. Some will be direct. Some will use WOMMA-style groups. Some will continue to not engage. But even the decision to not allow your staff to officially post information or return "media" requests from citizen media is a set of rules of engagement.

In drafting your own rules, here are some parameters to consider:

Monitoring -- yes or no. For heaven's sake, I hope we've reached the point now where this really isn't a question anymore. The media reads it. The fans read it. Why on God's great internet would you want to be ignorant? This runs back to the old school thought that if we just don't acknowledge it, we won't give it any credibility. That didn't work with talk radio. It really isn't working with B&B. Perhaps the larger question is will you publicly admit your read and monitor the B&B. Better say yes -- any of those boards that require registration have your IP address (see posting for more).

Posting -- yes or no. If yes, will you post "in the open" under your own names. I have an opinion here -- my screen name is Bill_Smith. The reason? The smart B&B crowd already know your subnet. If they're FOI fiends, they probably have your IP table anyway. The likelihood of you being revealed as SuperHogDude is extremely high. When they do, it will shred the credibility you may have built up.

When and what to post. My personal policy was to only engage to answer a direct question (is there a press conference today? what time is the game tonight? did we sign anyone today?) or to correct an obvious factual error (no, the current coach's record against school X is not worse than the previous coach). I never, ever, tried to sway opinions. If I can correct factual errors that are underpinning poor opinions, that will achieve the goal. More important, it's they're opinion and fans are entitled to have them.

Credentialing. This is the next great hurdle. Tread with care. SuperHogDude is the correspondent for HogDudes.com, but he just might be a lawyer (or have lawyer friends as board members). Consider that the metrics are changing. Consider that you may want to have a blogger box or blogger board (as in group).

Consistency. The most important part of how you engage (or not engage) the B&B. Whatever you decide, stick with it and enforce it evenly.

Plain Language Signage

The door sign for room 1021 at Beard-Eaves-Memorial Coliseum.

Also known as the main basketball court.

Simple. Straight forward.

How Can You Keep Up?

More small chunks of thought going into the CoSIDA presentation:

Community is the essence of Web 2.0, and the same applies to monitoring. Building your athletic department’s community starts with trust. While there are legal limits even in a public institution, the more information that is shared the better educated both the monitors and the fans will be toward the athletic department. The insider group is a prime example. Not only can they share and support the message of the department, they can watch and listen for problems, particularly with the fan base. Tap into the sport staff. At most schools, the coaching staff is charged with monitoring the social networking activity of student-athletes. There is no need to duplicate that function within the media relations office as long as there is trust that the coaching staff will alert the SIDs. Here’s a hint for the coach: there’s no such thing as you caught that Facebook post in time. Poor Andy Robinson at University of Buffalo found that out the hard way. Same can be said right at home when Patrick Beverly made a wall post that he was thinking about leaving Arkansas.

The key is distributed monitoring. No single person can keep up with every sport at your school, but as a part of the individual sport contact’s duties they can monitor what’s happening within that sport. This is more than checking the local boards that follow the institution. Encourage them to know where the national and regional boards are about their sport. Frankly, the less visible the sport the more important these communities are to the participants. Everyone wants media coverage, and absent traditional brick-and-mortar sportswriters the vacuum will be filled by pro-ams.

The End for Old Media

Continuing on the early previews of the presentation for CoSIDA:

The current business model of traditional journalism is gone. The iceburg was struck two years ago, and only now are people beginning to understand the ship is sinking. Newspapers are slashing editorial positions with literally hundreds from some of the brand names of the business: New York Times, Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times. In the past month alone, the local news operations of one of the fastest growing segments – Spanish language television – were shut down by one of the largest Univision conglomerates. Layoffs and non-renewals of experienced, high-salaried television talent is a weekly event. In June, U.S. News and World Report announced they were going to a biweekly format, with daily reports on the website. Closer to home, the very next day, Sporting News announced they were going to the biweekly format and a Digital Daily.

Meanwhile, the unemployed are not going away. They are going on-line. The fired lead meteorologists in Minneapolis and Charlotte created local webcasts to compete with their former employers. They join the Multi-Medias that were already there, making the most of their brand by selling it on the internet while keeping primary jobs in the traditional media and talk radio. This complicates the job of the media relations director. How? More traditionally trained journalists interested in upholding standards on the internet is a bad thing?

This comes back to the legitimacy question. Since the beginning of Audit Bureau and Nielson, the importance of a media outlet was easily defined by common metrics: circulation and viewership. Both were functions of capital. Increasing either measure required lots of money. For decades, press credentials were dolled out based on this pyramid of importance: national dailies, statewide dailies, circulation over 10,000, and so on. What is the measure of internet legitimacy? Click through, page views, unique visitors, persistence on page – each has its place but none are universal. As a result, the blogger or board owner that builds up substantial numbers not only presents a threat to the institution’s reputation, they can make a serious legal case that they have similar audience standing as the traditional media sitting in the press box. Consider that the last time our hometown newspaper reported circulation to the ABC it stood at roughly 15,000; this year the leading message board had over 20,000 members.

OK, Choose One

The latest in the Road Sign series: A confused set of warning signs in the downtown Lexington, Ky., area.

More on the AP War

Jeff Jarvis of Buzzmachine.com was pretty clear in today's Washington Times:

"Back off, AP. Because we won't."

The blogosphere was set on fire by AP's plan to require pull quotes to be paid for by on-line media. In the Washington Times story, there are some more details on how the one-time alliance between new and old media has broken down.

But as always, the best stuff is the mudslinging. Michelle Malkin looked as the schedule of payment and estimated AP owes her just over $130,000 -- yes, that's six-figures. DailyKos labeled AP idiots. Back to Malkin: AP's "heavy-handed attempt to bully bloggers is schadenfreude-licious."

Oops. I guess I owe somebody about $10.75.

If back in the day, we once counseled coaches and ADs to avoid pissing battles with people who buy ink by the barrel, perhaps the traditional media should take the Dan Rather warning and not jerk around the mass that is the new media. There's a heck of a lot more of them than you.

Maybe I should recast that metaphor -- the AP just rolled into the Little Bighorn Valley.

One Line Says It All

Finding ideas that reinforce your own is great. Sometimes I worry that this becomes one of the dangers of the internet -- if your physically immediate community doesn't agree with you, you can always find someone out there that does. Thus, the strength of the Web 2.0 SNW world -- the very Second Life aspect -- which leads to a weakening and fracturing of local communities.

That dark thought said, here's a perfect, one-line summation of the communication change. I discovered it while listening to one of my favorite podcasts, WeatherBrains. It's a podcast for weather geeks, but the guys that run it are very cutting edge when it comes to new media. A recent guest is the living embodiment of the problems with traditional media's financial model. He was let go as the staff weather guy in a major cutback due to falling revenue. As the highest paid, first to go.

Sounds pretty bad, yes? Not for him. He gets it, and was discussing that the future for weather in the media was directed content and on-line presentation. He's moving on, and had this very prescient comment:

Find ways to turn a speech into a conversation

V-8 moment. This is the essence of Web 2.0. It dovetails nicely with my posts (there's that reinforcement thing), but expresses the point better.

Some Local Press on the SNW

One of our local newspapers, the Morning News of Northwest Arkansas, ran a sports enterprise series this past weekend on social networking websites and college athletics. There are some very good stories for others to note. Ryan Malashock came up with one that was new to me that I found very important. University of Buffalo basketball player Andy Robinson made a one-hour mistake on his Facebook, frustrated over not getting an assignment done. Read the impact here.

You also get to see the impact of small Facebook changes, like the firestorm set off by one of our own basketball players making a post on his wall. The last part covers how new athletic director Jeff Long and men's basketball coach John Pelphrey are well in tune with the impact.

Some Signs are Just Unfortunate

I got nothing.

Actually, in fairness to Vandy, this is part of the sleep disorder center co-located in the Marriott near the athletic facilities.

This is reminiscent of one of the greatest directional signs of all time. It no longer exists, and the facility is now closed. At Florida, the original university-run hotel had a basement level that connected out to the parking deck. It was little more than a long, windowless narrow hall terminating in an elevator. Very Steven King.

Directly across from the elevator, where you could not miss it every time you got out, was a sign:

"FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGY DEPARTMENT"

Parse that for a minute. It's late. It's dark. Maybe it's even stormy outside. Now, you've got to walk down this service hallway. The lights occasionally flicker. You're hoping that they're not working on Jason or Freddie.

When Words Cost

Associated Press is already backing away from an attempt to become the text version of the RIAA -- charging bloggers by the word for excerpts posted by non-AP members. Recall earlier we had AP making a deal for a new direct to iPhone service -- to which I immediately said, "and who pays for it?"

So in a pretty blatant attempt to crush fair use in the pursuit of the desperate need to pay for the services of AP, we get a rate card that calls for bloggers to pay a floating scale depending on how many words they use. Obviously, you get a heck of a discount when you buy over 251 words, a mere $100. A short quote is pretty pricey -- 5 to 25 words go for $12.50.

As a result, AP as served some cease and desist letters, and pulled them back according to the New York Times.

At the risk of blowback, here is the money quote from the NYT story, quoting Jim Kennedy, the VP and "strategy director" of AP.

“We don’t want to cast a pall over the blogosphere by being heavy-handed, so we have to figure out a better and more positive way to do this,” Mr. Kennedy said.

I can tell you where this is headed. Universities will begin to lock down the use of press releases by the B&B community. Pro sports have already broken the seal on these kinds of content restrictions on the argument that they "own the performance." That, after all, is the SOP in the entertainment community.

The end result -- everyone loses. Content gets locked up in digital gated communities. The free flow of ideas and information is lost. In the gap, cascades of fark and propaganda fill the vacuum.

It may not be a total loss. The Web 2.0 community might just take a page from the history books and employ an island-hopping campaign against the established media. Simply go around them and leave them to their own little domains, left to starve as their resources are cut off.

The Jesus Principal

Mark 16:15 tells you everything you as the sports media relations person needs to know about dealing with the bloggers and boarders:

Go into all the world and preach the good news to every creature

Now, I'm not about to put on a rainbow afro wig and start showing up in the endzone waiving a Mark 16:15 sign. Truth be told, I had to google it.

That does not make this point false: Jesus went to where the sinners were.

Simple. If you are concerned about what the B&B world is saying, you've got to do the dirty work and reach out to them. Every day I read or hear of another SID who has hardened his shell against the slings and arrows of the internet, and dismiss the people who make the posts as hiding behind anonymous postings.

This comes from experience. If you step into the room and turn on the light, the cockroaches will scurry and the angry dogs will growl. Very, very few dogs were born mean. Somebody had to make them that way.

Angry B&B traffic more often than not comes from a lack of information. Withholding information only makes it worse. And the only thing worse than that -- excuse-making spin.

In my classes -- both the SID one at UA and my history ones at NWACC -- I use Richard Nixon as the perfect example. In domestic policy, Nixon probably did more to shape the country we live in today than any recent president. He certainly did the same in foreign policy.

But Nixon lives in infamy because he screwed up massively in trying to game the system to his advantage then cover it up when his people made mistakes.

Ask yourself this question: Did Nixon get run from office because a bunch of over-zealous staffers broke the law, perhaps at his direction? Or did he lose his job because he worked overtime to cover it up?

Back to the B&B's. If you have owners that routinely allow false information to remain on-line, pick up the phone or send an email to politely correct the false information. Talking to these potential opinion shapers is no different than trying to correct errors with the traditional media. More times than not, they just want to be heard. Some of them won't listen, but the ones that do will become your allies -- your WOMMA group -- to help do battle with the fringe.

Our business has always been, and shall always be, about relationships. Even with Raman noodle and Cheeto dust sinners. So go forth and tell the good stories of your athletic department to every form of media.

Another from the Bellows Beach

This was also at Bellows Beach in Hawai'i -- great personality to the oops guy on the warning.

There's also a lot of truth to this. We'd stopped at another beach on the way, and the locals said, listen mainlander, you might want to pick another beach because of the same warning sign. Except at that beach, they'd had a pretty regular run of broken bones from people crushed against the rocks and sea floor with the shore break.

We splashed a bit, got whipped by one of those breakers and decided yep, time to move on.

On the way back, we saw the rescue crew at that beach -- the sign was right.

Vaulting Well is the Best Revenge

I get the same question from coaches and athletes, both at Arkansas and at other institutions: what do I do about negative message board posts? My firm belief is it's hard to openly battle opinions, but you can correct factual errors. Otherwise, let your performance speak for you.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Katie Stripling, Arkansas pole vaulter. Two weeks ago, a horrible day at the regionals left one of the nation's top vaulters out of the NCAAs. Then her coach, Brian Compton, recognized a rule that could put her back into the nationals. He used it. She advanced. And the howling began, notably on one national vaulting message board.

Katie and Compton were called everything in the book. All on line. All for the world to see. Did they strike back? Not on the internet, but in Des Moines. From today's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette story:

"They were pretty angry," Stripling said, referring to some posts on the Web site PoleVaultPower. com. "It gave me more determination and motivation to prove people wrong. I used it to help me."

Here's a tip to the B&B crowd: Remember what you're high school coach said -- don't give them any bulletin board material. Instead of making Katie curl up into a fetal position with their stinging riposte, these anonymous writers inspired her.

Before we go much further, for those not up on NCAA pole vault marks, Stripling had the nation's No. 2 mark at 14 feet, 2 inches heading into the meet. That speaks less to the argument an obscure rule was used to advance her to the national championship than to the painfully obvious fact that it's not really a fight for the best in the nation if someone who was ranked second during the year was left home.

Stripling got the cold shoulder from competitors; she let her pole do the talking. Her coach added the punctuation. Again from the ADG:

"She shut the critics up on the pole vaulting Web sites and blogs," Compton said. "They don't understand the rules. If they knew them, they would have used them, too."

Let's parse it out. Stoic athlete ignores the jeers of the crowd on her way to success. Great, that's pretty classic. Why not take the full high-road approach and not even acknowledge the message boards? Even better, why pay any attention to them?

Because this is 2008, and that approach is not functional. First and foremost, the athletes read everything because they live in the highly integrated socially networked world.

When I'm asked by shocked colleagues about why I spend a portion of my day -- and encourage our staff to do so in their specialty areas -- reading what is out there, this is the perfect example. It's really not an option because the media is reading it. The B&B (boards and blogs) are a force multiplier for the ever shrinking manpower of the newsroom. I encourage the pros reading this blog to take in the full story at the ADG. The athlete and the coach didn't make the blog posting important, the media did when they asked them about it. And on this day, it became the story -- the headline was Stripling's Effort Answers Criticism.

16th century Welsh poet and clergyman George Herbert may have first penned the phrase "Living Well is the Best Revenge," but Katie Stripling's all-American third-place performance at Des Moines certainly updated it for the 21st century.

Where Do We Go From Here

The series of thoughts heading into the New Media panel at CoSIDA continues . . .

There are two main scenarios by which we move forward in our relationship with emerging media formats.

Wild West: All blogs, all the time. One gigantic ball of opinion and fact and lies and data that tumble like a 21st century rebirth of the Penny Press. Chaos ensues as the information multiplies to the point of absurdity, and we split the markets smaller and smaller into ever-shrinking niches.

Evolution: Skill sets not envisioned when even the current generation of journalists were in training begin to re-establish a new type of elite media that gains dominance over the masses. The traditional media companies figure out how to monitize the eyeballs and recapture their position at the top of the pecking order. Things return to the old days as far as the power relationships go, but with Jetson toys.

As usual, I'm looking for the third way -- one that recognizes the multiplicity of the coming dispersal of media power and provides a means of managing it.

WOMMA: The Word of Mouth Marketing Association. On its face, it seems a bit absurd. Peel back some of the info within this group, and you'll see they have a pretty important key to the management of the future. They see the way forward is to embrace some of the concepts of Web 2.0 and utilize them in open accountability means.

Let me contrast the WOMMA methods and code with the dark side -- astroturfing. WOMMA is about building grass roots marketing; quite frankly a populist buzz is the best marketing of all. If you fake that with hired posters and bloggers -- get it, astroturfing? -- you risk having it all blow back on your organization.

Why are building relationships with bloggers and boarders important? The B&B are your fans, your most passionate fans. When our women's basketball team is getting shelled for poor performance by the B&B, I don't worry. If someone is tearing up a coach, it's annoying. When they are saying nothing, I am scared to death. Why? Because they don't care any more, and that's the last step before finding something else to do on Saturday evenings.

The key to success with the B&B is the creation of very clear, very specific Rules of Engagement.

First in a Series

In Hawai'i, they know how to make a great warning sign. These were at Bellows Beach Park near the retired Bellows AFB. I love the help me wave in the icon.

Without a doubt, this was the coolest beach on the East Shore for a family. Lots of locals driving up with the full set of tables, grills, pop-up tents for an afternoon. Just enough pop in the surf for mainlanders and a very kamianne vibe.

The Medium is Young; the Participants are Not

Picking up from my teenage parent analogy, the communication mode is valid -- the sometimes angry talking back through message boards, blogs and direct emails -- but the image is far from correct.

Yes, the new Web 2.0 world is driven by a young generation that has a completely different sense of what privacy means. They expose far more about their lives than previous generations. At times, they seem to lack any governor on telling you -- and the WWW -- what happened at the party last night. That comes from a conscious belief by some that with the intrusions of technology -- from CCD cameras on light poles to TiVo records of television shows watched -- have made their lives glass houses anyway. As an aside, they may be right. The older generations may be the foolish ones believing privacy exists -- but that's for another paranoid day.

The great mistake made by decision makers regarding who's behind the new media is assuming that the people involved are:

A) Slackers with too much time on their hands and too much Cheetos dust on their keyboards
B) Proletariat who are using the free internet to espouse their ill-opinions
C) Not real fans, cause real fans would never try to tear down the team

This profile breaks down really fast when you get some demographics from major boards and blogs. First and foremost, people with time for the internet have leisure time. They have a computer. Or they work in white collar industries with computer access. In other words, they have means.

I would be willing to wage the average college sports board or blog is frequented more often by fans with incomes over $50K than below. I'd also warn that they probably are read by or participated in by the major level boosters of the school -- the folks dropping $10K donations on a regular basis and have incomes well into the six figures.

They are also older than you think. They are not college students, or recent graduates. They mirror a recent study of who creates technology start-ups. Guess what -- it's not the genius kid out of school. Those tech startups? Average age was early 40s. Both personal anecdotal information and surveys and registrations logs back this up.

If you ask a university development director, keeping recent graduates attached to the institution, then beginning to build a relationship with them as they begin to reach their peak earning years are the key to cultivation of new "friends" -- read, donors.

Guess where that target audience is hanging out in the late afternoon at work and the wee hours of the night at home?

And They Mean It

No great humor in this sign, but a cool image outside the old WSB tower site south of Nashville, Tenn. For those interested in the history of commercial radio -- or just geeked by really cool tower sites -- this array sits right off I-65 south.

One can imagine just how much juice this monster can create. Needless to say, walking inside the perimeter risks a serious RF burn.

The one part about this site -- it does butt up against a large youth sports park on it's east side.

Here's a look at the towers at dusk.

The Importance of the Internet

Building toward the CoSIDA convention program

This slide comes from presentations at the JumpTV Executive Users conference, and in turn from Annenburg School at USC research within the last year.

The question asked was what is the source for your information. Reinforcing the Web 2.0 aspect of community, personal sources and the internet were judged the top two answers. The traditional media were almost equal in the mid-60s.

Thus, when weighing the impact of B&B, we must consider that the rising generation and the internet-oriented part of the population may put more credence into the internet sources than we want to acknowledge.

It raises the important question: If our fans and end-users of information believe the internet, choose it as their No. 1 source of information, can we continue to ignore inaccurate, overblown, false information?

One Real Warning

In the continuing great signs series, I'm just happy to see this gas station getting a warning correct. No, your cell phone is not going to set off a terrible explosion. Yes, sliding back and forth into the car -- particularly in the winter -- will generate enough static electricity to potentially spark the fumes.

Every time I see the old "turn off your cell phone" warnings, I cringe at A) bad science, B) over lawyer-ing, and C) lazy sign administration.

Killer Apps Breaking Through on iPhone

The keynote address at WWDC has sent a pair of shots across the collective bows of college sports.

First and foremost, MLB.com At Bat looks like the full realization of portable streaming stats I've advocated for years. The question now -- is StatCrew listening?

Broader impact, and perhaps overlooked in the MLB hype, is the deal made with Associated Press. News straight to the consumer's iPhone. It is a free download from the App Store in July. Who is going to pay for the service? AP is a subscriber entity. To rehash some old ground, but who is paying for the journalism we need if you get your AP on the phone. Don't need that newspaper subscription (or USA TODAY) for national news.

Full details as given today in the WWDC keynote transcript.

The Invasion is Over

Once again, the annual Invasion of the Wal-Martians has come and gone. I coined the term back in the early 1990s when the event was just old Barnhill Arena. It's grown into a monster event that brings people from around the world to Fayetteville. As I've told every new staffer, you have to experience it at least once.

This year was no exception. For the first time, we had the chance to attend the concerts which were outstanding. My favorite side comment -- I didn't think you liked cool music. Um, yes, and in fact I went Wednesday not as much for Journey (big in my high school years) as All-American Rejects.

Thursday with Keith Urban -- look, I could care less about country -- but he can flat play. I've not seen anyone in person play as well. Any style. While running and walking around Razorback Stadium. Giving guitars and microphones (literally) to the crowd.

Two Great Internet Quotes

One is fiction; one is not -- but they're great commentaries about those darn internets.

In National Treasure 2, Patrick Gates, played by Jon Voight, mutters woefully when the press conference is held claiming his ancestor was the mastermind of the Lincoln assassination:

"It's on the internet," Gates moans. "There's no stopping it now."

What's really interesting about that passage is he's watching a press conference on his laptop. That same content was obviously available on television, but the passage rings true. Here's a falsehood that now lives forever and gets its wings because it's posted as a viral video.

The second one comes from TWIT's last week podcast.

"People are turning to their computer now to answer questions, it is the library," Brewster Kahle said. "If it's not on the internet, its as if it doesn't exist."

Kahle is the man behind the Internet Archive and the Wayback Machine. The Internet Archive does exactly what you think -- vacuuming up back-ups of the internet. A more public version of the Googleplex that I've warned you about. Remember -- once put on line, nothing goes away.

"If we're raising a generation without our best stuff on the internet, we're raising the generation that we deserve," he continued. Somewhat self-serving for someone essentially in the on-line library creation business, but one should not argue with the logic behind it.

Taken together, they present more reason why institutions that feel wronged need to take their battle to the medium and why it is in the institution's best interest to be the one that tells all the news.

A Young Media for a Young Nation

OK, maybe this is a point in the thinking about "the new media" that ranges off, but as a parent of a high school senior, it makes sense. The boards and blogs represent a coming of age in the media -- it happens every generation or so with technology shifts.

The challenge for the institution -- whether it is a university's athletic department or a major private corporation -- is figuring out how it will engage the two-way communication path of Web 2.0. It's not enough to send out a message, you have to listen to the response and react.

Or, you have to realize you're dealing with a teenager.

For decades, athletic departments sent out their messages to their fans. It was a one-way communications portal. Feedback was available for the major boosters or politically connected. It also echoed through the attitude of the media covering the team. We -- college SIDs -- operated in modes that emphasized our ability to spread an outbound mass message.

So as a parent, we told out toddlers and pre-teens what to do. We expected them to do it. We brooked no talking back.

Funny thing is, when they grow up with a mind and an opinion of their own. The day they decide to tell you what you think, it can be jarring. You want to respond in kind, or with an authoritarian "do what I say" tone.

Guess what -- it doesn't work. Eventually, you have to converse with the teenager, respect their opinion, do you best to steer their opinion. That doesn't mean you don't discipline them when they are out of line. You can't have a shouting match and think you'll win by the force of being the . Eventually, they will tune you out.

Now -- replace every teenager reference with college sports fan. The Web 2.0 world -- from SNW to message board -- enables the fans to talk back to us. We have to learn to listen, and realize that the world in which we simply managed information or opinion through a one-way dialog -- we will tell you what's important, what's correct, what to do -- is over.

It's been over for some time for politicians. It's becoming over for local municipalities as they deal with citizen media. Some may argue whether or not the battle is done in college sports, and that might vary from market to market.

At the end of the day, they will grow up.

No Computer Zone

While a lot of folks point to the "Danger Gators in the Ponds" on the University of Florida campus as the disturbing warning sign, I've always been a little concerned about the designated Surge Areas. I assume they are for flood water, but there always other ideas. Computers should be scared of the Surge Area; also any insurgents should be concerned. Wait a minute. If you're a visiting athletic team, would that make you a dangerous rebel that might be attacked if you're found in a Surge Area?

Now THAT'S Some Circular Logic

Courtesy of Center for Citizen Media blog. It is from the New York Times website and it absolutely speaks for itself.

Next Gen Talk Radio

So if you establish this is how they get their info, why wouldn't you want to influence it

I sat in Destin, Florida, at the SEC meetings in the mid 1990s and listened to my colleagues rail against talk radio. They lacked journalistic background. They let anyone get on and say anything. They were the end of the gentile sports world as we know it.

Fast-forward a decade. Talk stations are credentialed to SEC media days, complete with a "radio row" for coaches and players to appear. We have not one, but three national sports talk radio networks. One of the great launching pads for the world-wide leader in sports was its radio network component.

Are there still problems with talk show hosts? Yes. Do we regulate appearances? You bet. But the best of breed are knowledgeable -- and responsible -- members of the sports media community.

That didn't happen overnight. It took people deciding to reach out on both sides of the equation. I see where we are with the new media and Web 2.0 sites as very similar to that mid-90s tipping point with the sports talk format.

Next Sign: Little Disturbing

There are some signs you don't want to see at your airport. We wheeled up to the small airport near Clemson University. It was dark. Few lights. Kyle Kellams and I park our rental car and look up to see this sign.

Having won the game, the evac was quite pleasant. Since we were in upland South Carolina, exactly what would you be evacuating from?

You're Kidding, Right?

Perhaps Andrew Cohen of CBS is the most droll, tongue-in-cheek humorist in America. He's the legal affairs correspondent for the network. Sunday morning, he opined that all PR people were liars, just like Scott McClellan.

Of course, Cohen is getting shelled by the PR industry, with PRSA launching against him. Plus the internets are in full force. You can see the original piece and Cohen's reaction.

I have two.

Pot, lawyer Andrew Cohen, meet Kettle, the PR types -- Guess what, when it comes to ethical standards the general public sees you both as black.

Here's my better one.

From his original rant: Show me a PR person who is "accurate" and "truthful," and I'll show you a PR person who is unemployed.

Andrew Cohen, who works at CBS, as you call out the public relations profession, I have two words for you: Dan Rather.

Another SNW Event Gone Bad

The twist at Seattle University is the school officials stepped in to warn students that were planning a party Memorial Day weekend through Facebook invitations. Details at the Chronicle of Higher Ed and Seattle Times.

Students, obviously, think their First Amendment rights were violated. Sounds a lot like they opened up way to much information about the party -- to the point university officials let them know they could get in trouble with the school's code of conduct. Scared, the students cancelled.

Payoff quote from the SeaTimes:

Butterworth said the university administration monitors sites like Facebook only when something is specifically brought to their attention, and that they are acting in the Jesuit tradition of "cura personalis" — care of the whole person.

"Our education doesn't really stop when students leave the classroom," Butterworth said. "In some ways, it begins there."

Butterworth is the dean of students, who arrived at the doorstep of another Facebook-planned and advertised party earlier.

Don't ask, don't tell? Maybe. Think about it for a minute. If you told your parents in some graphic detail what you were about to do at your "douchebag" party (their label for the event), what would your parent's reaction have been.

Be practical with your SNW's, kids.

Near Miss for NCAA Track

Be very glad the regional track meets aren't Saturday-Sunday. Yesterday we had some nearby -- but nowhere near close enough to suspend or really even think of suspending -- storms. As of this post, I've already had my fifth active weather net based on severe thunderstorm warnings. Clocked a half inch of rain since 5:30 a.m. and numerous lightning strikes; including one that took our power in nearby Tontitown.

As you can see from the screen capture, active net No. 6 is just moments away.

Working on the CoSIDA Panel

Unlike previous appearances, chairing the panel is more about managing and encouraging discussion. Along those lines, I will offer the briefest of presentations at Tampa.

But to encourage that discussion, I am planning to post some of my anticipated thoughts toward Dan Gilmoor and Spencer Hall.

First and foremost -- why are these two guys on the platform? In my mind, they represent the best of breed when it comes to the theory and practice of the new media. As I've mentioned several times before, Dan runs the Center for New Media and when it comes to how the Brave New World will be structured, few short of Aldus have had a better grasp on where it is going.

Spencer as the lead of Every Day Should Be Saturday is one of those national blog/board entities that crosses all party lines. If you are associated with college football, you read EDSBS. Period. That's media, on-air talent, coaches, adminstrators, fans, prospects. Anyone who says otherwise is A) lying; or B) ignorant.

And by ignorant, I don't mean stupid. I mean the classic Merriam-Webster: destitute of knowledge or education.

So, alternating with my $4 gasoline inspired summer travel through great signs of past road trips, we'll flesh out the program.

Next in The Series

This sign is outside the UMKC on-campus basketball arena.

Pretty much speaks for itself.

Further Reinforcement for Monitoring

You can't violate my free speech -- often the lament of the college athlete caught by a coach or administrator with a problem on their SNW. A state ruling from Connecticut provides another support in the argument as a high school student's comments on livejournal.com were used to disqualify him from the student council election.

The high school had a clause that candidates must show "good citizenship." Apparently, calling a school administrator a "douchebag" or encouraging people to "piss off" the school's central office on your blog violates that policy.

Payoff quote from the Hartford Courant:

The court also emphasized that Doninger's discipline barred her from an extracurricular activity, and that the blog post was inconsistent with the school's policy that student government representatives have a record of good citizenship.

The student apparently is prepping an appeal. Good luck, because when the rules for extracurricular activity are set -- whether they are team rules for an athletic team or qualifications for a leadership or academic group -- you violate them at your peril.

The First Amendment does not cover that.

More at the Chron and the Hartford Courant

Great Sign Moments for the Road

Since there doesn't look like vacation is in the offing this summer, here's the first in a series of great road signs of the past. I started collecting these on my cell phone several years ago. This is was from the OzzFest at the Verizon Amphitheater in St. Louis. It's pretty self explanatory.

No, I'm Not That Bill Smith

When asked, I never agree to hotel check-in personnel and others that like to joke about the fact that you've got a pretty common name. I counter, it's not common, it's popular.

That said, I noticed today there's another Dr. Bill Smith from the state of Arkansas with a far more popular blog (traffic-wise), and got asked if were were the same. No, he runs a GOP-issue website.

Kind of when I was on the board for the Arkansas Air Museum, and there's a hangar in Springdale with BS on the side. No, not mine either.

No Travel this Memorial Day

Sitting on the back deck, this is the first time in 15 years I'll be home the week of Memorial Day. Fort Walton and Destin are special places for our family, vacationing there since high school for me and since elementary school for Libby. The combination of restructuring and gas prices -- no beach this summer.

I'll miss it, in particular the Donut Hole, which I've mentioned before. I always saw those mugs when we'd visit, and resisted the temptation to buy one until last summer. Who knew it would be our last visit for a while.

So, with my morning coffee in the Donut Hole mug, I'm thinking about the sound of the beach and never taking anything for granted anymore.

The Message is the Medium

Here's the first in a series of thoughts looking toward the new media panel at CoSIDA. Feedback to the email address is encouraged.

A generation had its opinion formed by Marshall McLuhan's theories. His post-postmortem website even starts with a link labeled "Enter the Medium". I've been more a Neill Postmann follower (as in Amusing Ourselves to ), and working this past spring in the Sports Media Relations class I've come to a new point of view. This may not be original -- I didn't google the snot out of it to check -- but the realization was strong and personal.

McLuhan was right in what I call the Atomic Era; that post-Second World War time from 1945 until the mid-1990s where we faced new technologies and the realization that for the first time in human history we really did have the capacity to end it all. Television -- the primary medium of which he spoke -- became a message in and of itself. It changed everything.

One could argue this continues today with the internet -- a distribution medium that becomes a message and a purpose into itself. Just look at social networking as a prime example.

But why?

Various mediums do influence and shape the way the message is imparted. McLuhan lived and thought far ahead of his time, but I don't think he could possibly have seen a day in which the means of distribution could become one. Television brought together picture and sound in real time, pretty jarring.

Still, a newspaper by its nature is flatland, to use Edward Tufte's term. What happens when the newspaper -- the written word -- appears on your screen that brings you color photos, moving images, sound and streams of raw data.

McLuhan lived in a world with a rainbow -- a spectrum of specific wavelengths that did specific things, albeit in new and wonderfully subversive ways to the culture at large.

We live in a time where that prism -- the medium -- is removed; all the modes of communication run together into a pure beam of light.

Look, I love newspapers and still subscribe to them. Same for news weeklies. Until someone comes up with a better user interface for the toilet, one that's fully compliant with the first 10,000 feet of commercial flight and independent of power supplies, I'll keep using them. That doesn't mean I don't RSS 40-50 news sources, use aggregators and spiders to harvest news and search and participate in Web 2.0 communities.

I do it all for the same reason we all do -- I'm looking for a message; the medium doesn't matter any more. I'll take my news on trees or flickering LCDs; I'll watch my content on a CRT, a plasma screen or a LCD phone; I'll listen to the voices over analog waves, digital downloads or in my head.

Therefore, those that command the message -- who form it, set its agenda, choose its content -- are the ones who shall rule the medium. Content is king.

More as it develops, but now I want to put my attention on Aurelija Miseviciute, who's playing in the NCAA semis about 100 miles away from my computer. But I can watch by streaming video, essentially warping space to a niche market -- people interested in Arkansas women's tennis -- that McLuhan could not imagine. He might argue the medium made it possible. OK, but that's to the credit of a bunch of engineers -- perhaps Al Gore? I seek the message, and all the medium just allows me to save $3.95 a gallon and the transit time.

Look at You All Grow'd Up

Nothing like a quality hour spent searching and writing code -- ah, for those glorious days of WordPad.

So, the blog now has its own easy to find RSS feed, plus Add This social bookmarking for the individual posts.

After all, the world can't live without the musing of The Road Scholar -- share them.

Web 2.0 Bites Clintons

The unfortunate remarks by Hillary Clinton regarding the 1968 Democratic campaign are a teaching moment for the media and news sources. Today's Washington Wire -- one of the note blogs of the Wall Street Journal -- gives the play-by-play of how her quote from an editorial board meeting in South Dakota became a world wide story.

This is a cautionary tale of technology. Just because you can stream something live does not mean you should. Clinton's meeting was made available to any media to listen in. These settings are often informal and somewhat off the record for exact comments. Often, they function as backgrounder opportunities for a candidate.

Not when the whole wide world is watching. Or not watching in the case of the media caravan with Clinton. They were shuttled off to a nearby location with WiFi to listen. The combination of poor bandwidth and dull content sent many of the journalists to the pasta bar for lunch. That is, until their Blackberrys started going off with references to a New York Post story that was already up on Drudge.

Seems the remote journalists weren't having issues hearing the Senator loud and clear, and she had uttered the assassination reference. This sends the in-country pack rushing up to the Clinton campaign for reaction. Let the clean-up begin.

Here's a payoff from the story:

And while a couple reporters — who had managed to stick with the streaming press conference — mentioned that they found her assassination reference slightly strange, few on the trail thought it would be the lead on any of their stories that day.

The fact that it did become big news is illustrative of journalistic competition in the Internet age. The entire pack of reporters sent to watch Clinton’s every move had somehow gotten beat, and forced into following a New York Post reporter who was nowhere near the campaign, but who, apparently, had a much-better Internet connection.

(A personal aside: There are some days I link the article for reference to those who want more, and certainly to provide a citation to quotes I've copied. Today my colleagues, this article is REQUIRED reading. So much so, here's the link again if you missed it at the top.)

The uber-moral for SIDs? Just because you can stream that post-game press conference live doesn't mean you should. And if you do, make sure your coaches and athletes understand they are live not just to the room of familiar faces that may or may not use their words against them.

The subtle lesson here may be the most important. For the Senator, it was a Post reporter that posted the story that launched a thousand links. It easily could have been one of those Cheetos people. Sure, it would have taken longer for the pajama media to be taken seriously and reposted by regular media -- but one a gaffe like this one they would have. Just ask Dan Rather.

I know the term Web 2.0 gets tossed around a lot at times like this -- it really wasn't the social web that caused this event. However, it was Web 2.0's enabling advanced technology -- streaming media, portable access, immediate messaging and hyperlinked media sources -- that caused it.

Happy Memorial Day weekend.

Nice to Get Noticed

This humble space got noticed by Eye on Sports Media with some positive comments and a critique. Fair on most points. As I said in my comments, I'd answer point two over here.

The main reason why I have not enabled comments, other than emailing them to me UARK account, is to protect myself. This is an important project, but as those that blog know, you may go a few days between posts either due to work or lack of intelligent thoughts. Let's be clear -- I don't have tenure -- and the last thing I need is to have someone shellaced the blog with questionable or actionable content that I would be responsible for.

But Chris is right -- I need to fix the key word tagging and the RSS -- that's coming this weekend.

Sorry -- Chippy headlines to continue.

Trying Out a New Theory

Why do sports information directors (and athletic directors and coaches, for that part) have such near universal disdane for bloggers and message boards? Aside from the obvious rumor mongering and anonymous sniping, I have a theory.

They don't know how mad the fans really are.

For the past 19 years, I have had the luxury of sitting in the stands at almost every home Razorback football game. While considering the future in which I will likely be in the press box, I began to associate the behavior of the fans with the behavior of the posters. Aside from lingering prose and far deeper detail, I don't think I read anything on-line terribly different in general sentiment about the previous football coach than I heard in the stands. Maybe that's why it didn't shock me to read things on the boards after sitting among fans -- anonymous to me and most of the people sitting around them -- through these games.

Second guessing plays. Second guessing personnel moves. Rumoring what was going on along the sideline based on body language (and occasionally, oh-too-clear to discern salty language). From the reads, it was obvious fans that shared the feelings and emotions of the ones sitting around me would go home and post (excuse me, vent) those opinions on boards and blogs.

Here goes the theory: no one screams and yells like that in the press box. The athletic officials don't hear the crowd during the game, and those they might hear are not likely to be the average fan -- a skybox owner or a low, 50-yard-line seat holder.

This follows up on my theory of the function of the message board as the perpetual coffee shop. Personally, message boards are filled with the same gossip that swirled around the local college hangouts with one very, very important difference. You had to be at the coffee shop at the same time the rumor was passed, or the athletic department official (or coach) was shooting their mouth off about something. If the rumor was juicy enough, it would circulate, but not far and not for long.

Today, you can walk into the digital coffee shop at any time and from anywhere. By the miracle of the cached file, you can catch up on all the talk -- it never goes away. Thus, if you knew how mad they were in the stands, the kind of things they anonymously said out loud for all to hear, would what they wrote later be so shocking?

Feedback on this please at the email address.

What Good is it to Have it All?

Once upon a time, time and space had more meaning. Drop into the house, on the sat is one of my favorite movies, Stranger than Fiction. Harold Crick knows one song, and he sings it to Ana. It catches my ear. Is that on the soundtrack? Don't remember the name, but iTunes awaits. Nothing quite makes sense, so a quick google of "one song Harold Crick knows" -- yeah, longshot. No, spot on. A Yahoo! Answers query pops right up with Whole Wide World by Wreckless Eric.

Consider that not that long ago, I could not just sit down and get the instant gratification of finding a song and just buying it from my home desk. What do you do with that kind of access and power? Seriously. It's no wonder we are a culture obsessed with now. It can happen now. It can be discovered here.

Perhaps it reveals both the attraction and the impatience of the sports fan. When you go to the stadium, you have certain expectations, but it is after all the only true reality program (or Speed Racer, the Grand Prix has been fixed for years). The inability to know or predict is what brings people in. But, when it doesn't work out they way they want -- both result and style -- the fan can have immediate gratification in the form of lashing out with opinion.

Interesting Nielsen Online Numbers

The Newspaper Association is promoting how strong digital circulation is for their members, accounting for just over 40% of the unique visitors in the first quarter. For all those horrible cost numbers we've recounted (and budget cuts), on-line has a 12.3% increase over last year. A very remarkable change. You can read more on the study here.

At the same time, there are some really interesting inside baseball. Notice that Gannett Newspapers is No. 12 -- is that an aggregate of all their papers? I see USATODAY stands at 29th by itself.

Equally relevant -- of the top 30 sites, only nine are print media traditional newspaper. Two of the top ten are text media content creators (and that's stretching it for Daily Kos, as much a political SNW). Three of the top 10 are TV networks (Fox, CNN, MSNBC). The big leaders -- Drudge, AOL News, Yahoo! News, Google News, etc. -- are only repurposing content that comes from . . . . oh yeah, those AP and traditional newspaper journalists.

The Good (and Bad) News on Community

A random thought while waiting . . .

Community is the big thing on the internet, and people spend a lot of time building profiles and finding community. That's a powerful, and positive force.

I'm afraid what drives it is a growing lack of community in the RealLife. No one keeps a job for the length of a career. Mobility within the culture is the rule; not stability. We seek others of like mind and the internet allows that. Good, but at the same time it allows us to not relate with those we see daily.

Aggressive Tactics in Politics?

Somehow, a candidate that is quick to send his campaign workers out to correct perceived errors in the media is being A) aggressive or B) new. At least, that's the impression at the Washington Post today about John McCain. Some interesting quotes from the pros involved, but the tone of the whole article begs the question -- do you not remember the War Room? Does the name James Carville ring a bell? How about Karl Rove? Really, this isn't rocket science. But, to the hot quotes:

"If stories are wrong, we have an absolute obligation to say so, and to say so as loudly as we can," said Mark Salter, McCain's longtime confidant, who writes the rebuttal letters. "It's not working the refs. It's just correcting things when the refs blow a call."

That's a lovely mix of sports metaphor with politics; except we really don't get to correct the ref, even if he does blow a call. Nevertheless, nice to see someone else recognizing that if there's a factual error, there's no shame in calling (or in the case of a board or blogger -- emailing or posting) the correction out. Tactically, here's one to keep in mind as you build an overall strategy.

The McCain camp also circulates these letters to conservative radio hosts and bloggers, hoping to provide an alternative narrative for the press. "There is no point in calling the reporter," said McCain strategist Steve Schmidt. "There is no point in calling the [story] editor." When confronted with untrue accusations, he said, "we will use that to communicate with our supporters and donors to take advantage of the unfairness."

An interesting take -- one used often by sports media relations on the radio host part, but not particularly exploited to date in the new media realm. More on that concept later.

Bad News for PigBoy14

You may be aware of the Lori Drew case. The 49-year-old created a fake MySpace 16-year-old to cyber-bully and terrorize 13-year-old Megan Meier in her Missouri hometown. Meier eventually hung herself. The state could not find a way to charge Drew for her behavior even though most media accounts point to an almost direct impact on the suicide. The feds, however, have a new angle.

By creating a fake name, Drew is being brought up on federal hacking charges. From the AP story:

Prosecutors alleged that by helping create a MySpace account in the name of someone who didn't exist, Lori Drew, 49, violated the News Corp.-owned site's terms of service and thus illegally accessed protected computers.

Legal experts warned Friday that such an interpretation could criminalize routine behavior on the Internet. After all, people regularly create accounts or post information under aliases for many legitimate reasons, including parody, spam avoidance and a desire to maintain their anonymity or privacy online or that of a child.

This new interpretation also gives a business contract the force of a law: Violations of a Web site's user agreement could now lead to criminal sanction, not just civil lawsuits or ejection from a site.

More to come.

Happy Birthday, Will

17 years old today, my not-so-little boy. Still, he and his friends stayed up until midnight to open up his main present (RockBand -- but that might be more the friends who knew what it was driving that decision process).

It seems like yesterday he was sitting down on the press row as a precocious second grader, eager to score games and run errands. A part of working the games since that time, I hope that continues with the new administration.

Anyway, hope you got the text message about your birthday, which the newspaper reports tell me you share with Isreal. Knowing your respect and fascination with your GramGram's side of the family, I'm sure that's something you'll be proud of for years to come.

Bill Smith's Day Off

Well, not really. More like three hours between the end of the JumpTV conference and heading to O'Hare. By the way, if one must connect through Atlanta on the way to heaven, O'Hare is the purgatory you may be sentenced to prior to getting to that connecting flight.

Ah Farris. Workday downtown Chicago retains its Bueller-like charm. The stores change -- Ernie Sucheck couldn't name off the waterfront today. But the Billy Goat is still here, and a great power walk takes me past the Weber Grill Resturant -- kind of a high alter of all that is guy with all the cooking being done indoors on, yes that's right, Weber kettles. Harry Carey's. The House of Blues. And without a doubt one of the largest mega McDonald's (I know the one on Broadway is larger, but it's not true to the arches, which are golden yellow and huge in Chi-town).

As if on cue, John Edwards has provided the Clinton-Obama drama I so expected being in the bifurcated home of these two political rivals -- sitting in the airport Edwards has endorsed Obama. A patently obvious counter to Clinton's crushing WVa win (quick, Rich Rod isn't the only connection between WVa and Michigan, the state Hillary needs back in play to keep this thing going now).

Did anyone catch the Monday reference? Bueller? Bueller?

Elmer of eBay

In my favorite hobby -- amateur radio -- there's a term for a wise mentor: Elmer. Ironic the new major domo of the JumpTV group we're meeting with goes by the name of Elmer. From the very feng shui powerpoint to a fierce commitment to community, he cuts an impressive swath through the event. Of course, when you hear someone echoing your own theories, why they must be a genius.

He should know a little about communities, having spent the past five years with eBay. For the immediate future at UA, it is reassuring to hear white is the new black in color scheme (better to let you school color through), that white space (not to be confused with the color) is not waste, that we have turned the corner to where clarity of message is more important than cramming something into every last corner of space. Too often in the past we've seen this with an interior decorating motif best expressed as no wall goes "un-hogged".

Elmer has graciously agreed to share a pair of his PPT slides that hit home on Fan First -- that the rising generations go to the internet and their friends for their opinions and news and the fastest growing segment of domain visit in the past year was social networking. The first is not that surprising, but it's great to get some numbers to support. The second note bears a follow up. Consider that SNW holds 16% of the traffic -- a category of website that did not exist in the surveys three years ago.

If You Have the Means . . .

. . . I highly recommend Chicago. Arriving here today for the first of two days of meetings hosted by the JumpTV folks on the programs and tool-set driving our website. Gino's East remains the king, the Watertower is always this oasis of 19th-century Americana plopped in the middle of the corporate 21st century. Is it no small coincidence it is catty-cornered from Macy's, nee Marshall Fields before the shotgun wedding?

There should be an interesting sideshow -- Hillary's hometown and Barak's home district -- with the West Virginia primary on the horizon.

Interesting Twist on What Makes the Internet

Lee Smith's essay in this week's Chronicle -- The Wealthiest Colleges Should Acquire "The New York Times" -- has several pithy and useful insights into journalism today. The gist is Smith believes the elite colleges should take a small percentage of their endowments and create a private for-profit of the NYT to keep the Grey Lady afloat in its current form.

This is a lot of the usual "who will pay for the journalism we need" screed, but at least he admits that what could be worse for the Times -- that people accuse it of being influenced by East Coast Liberal bias? Like they don't now? Good point, Lee Smith. His plan is not to make it a non-profit, but relieve the pressure of stockholders for short term profit, or rates of profit not consistent with "good journalism."

Enough -- here's the key quote:

". . . the Internet is not a source of information; it is a means of distributing information in bewildering bulk -- true, false, significant, trivial, timely, old, brilliant, maniacle -- from an endless array of sources. Some of it is wonderfully rich in detail, reliable, and level-headed; some of it is fantastical and malicious."

That has to be one of the best definitions of the InfoWeb 2.0 I have seen. He continues to point out that most of the "reliable information" on the net comes from reporters paid for by traditional media sources. True, and the crux of the monetizing eyeballs problem of InfoWeb 2.0.

Smith's column in whole is well worth a tumble. I'd like to give you a link, but of course, it is a subscription item (ironic, no?). Those that have a Chron subscription can jump here.

Convention is Coming

For those that attend CoSIDA, this is a shameless promotion of my panel New Media & College Sports: Understanding the Impact of Citizen Media and the Blogosphere. We're lucky that Dan Gillmor from the Center for Citizen Media and Arizona State's Cronkite School will present along with the man behind Every Day Should Be Saturday, Spenser Hall.

I'll try to follow those titans with a perspective of how we in the college sports community must reach out and be a part of this new media -- both as a participant from our institution with our own new media platforms and interact with this brave new world.

I'd be a shameless hypocrite if I didn't take advantage of this platform to vet and collect feedback on my part. So, watch this space for topics out of the talk for feedback. You can send that or suggestions direct to me at UA (bismith at uark [dot] edu).

Well, When the Paper Names You POTY

An item from the Palm Beach, Fla., paper was forwarded by a colleague with the exclamation -- why in the world would they care, it's softball. A tough lesson for a young woman headed off to college as the paper dredged up a week-old arrest for DUI. According to the story, it was her second driving violation.

At first glance, well, it did seem a bit excessive even if she is the best softball prepster in the state. On re-read, the payoff is in the second paragraph. "Jane Doe, named the two-time Palm Beach newspaper player of the year, . . ." -- yep, if the paper's invested in your career on the good side, the police blotter reporter probably will remember your name.

One of those unfortunate good times-bad times publicity moments.

More on the E-Mail Frontier

You may recall how student email became a central part of the Mitch Mustain business at Arkansas, and that private commercial email could not be used as a means to circumvent public record university emails in the Pokey Chatman case at LSU. Florida weighs in today with a search of student emails in pursuit of a leak regarding admissions to the university's College of Medicine. Here we see some interesting new twists -- the UF accounts can be searched but the Google or other private email account of a student carries some level of FERPA protection. This will be a case to watch.

iPodder

Usually, I'm an early implementor on technology, particularly software and technique. The one place I just wasn't impressed, wasn't moved was the iPod. Why do I need another level of complications? As a veteran of the Broadcast.Com to RealPlayer to Real to Windows Media -- what could possibly make it worth it to move my MP3s once again. I could copy them straight to players, like the old Axim V51 and now my ATT Tilt. Who needed another system, another device.

Of course, all the Dell DJs weren't enough for my oldest, he got his iPod a couple of months ago. My wife had complained about the difficulty of moving files (what, honey, you just drag and drop) on her various MP3 players. My 11-year-old daughter, she's a Napster plays-for-sure swapping fool.

But, the breakdown of Juice and Vista has driven me to try iTunes and a Classic for podcatching.

My co-workers were shocked to overhear my conversations with our New Media director and Kyle Kellams over at KUAF as I was deciding between a Nano and Classic. After listening to my rants about iTunes jacking up desktops (which, lets be frank, it use to do in a corporate environment), they were stunned to learn I was crossing over. A week of fitzing with the interface on the iPod, I have something to say:

I

Was

Wrong

Oh, so, incredibly wrong. How much of my life was waisted on learning the ins-and-outs of various Windows-based players? I have learned one thing -- only old people have Classics. When I bought it, the 17-year-old at the checkout looked at the box with some kind of twisted nostalgia and proclaimed, "Huh, it's been forever since I've seen one of those."

Yeah, but I've got 80 gigs of jams, dude; a lot of it the original versions of the things you're banging your head on you Nano.

Chalk this one up for all those people who've said I was inflexible. Hah!

Speed of the Net

Once again, proved with today's press conference announcement. And yes, there is one today regarding John McDonnell. That note went out around 9 a.m.; general department staff at 9:24 a.m. Back through the Google News Alert chain by 10:21 a.m. off a posting at USA TODAY that at this moment (10:40) is showing 45 minutes old.

The boards had it almost immediately upon the press alert -- first found post at 9:10 a.m. That's because the media is a part of the boards, and the blogs.

The Bad News Fit to Print

New York Times Company reports today in its flagship publication that the group posted a first quarter loss.

The company’s main source of revenue, newspaper advertising in print and online, fell 10.6 percent, the sharpest drop in memory, as the industry suffers the twin blows of an economic downturn and the continuing long-term shift of readers and advertisers to the Internet.

Meanwhile, Google's first quarter was up 30%.

Solving the Mismatch

File this under thought for the day. As I was sipping my morning brew and reading over some of the local sports and news on the internet, I realize that because of the ability to see more detail, to read commentary and to interact, I'm probably more connected with local issues than when I simply read the newspaper each day.

Same can apply to college sports -- folks are now "insiders" that do not fit the traditional definitions. They are not giving at the levels that once gave them access. They often aren't in the same town as their school of interest. The medium both brings in new faces and dilutes the position of the old guard. The mismatch comes when the newcomers believe their opinions have the same strength as the contributions of the supporters. That's a huge challenge.

Ideas are suppose to have force, particularly ones that are for the good. Lot of frustration when they aren't heard.

Then again, it seems all the new book deals are going to the innovative bloggers. Today's print edition of the Chronicle speaks of the $300,000 book deal with the 29-year-old internet copy writer who started Stuff White People Like. Reminds me of Will Leitch's book, and the growth of Mental Floss on-line and magazine items into published works.

A Few Words on Surveys, Blogs and the News

Funny as it folds in on itself, there's a note on the Chronicle's wired campus blog that reading blogs can be habit forming. Goes on to detail a study at Cal-Irvine, but when you hit the bottom you realize that:
A) 15 people studied at one college
B) That's not a sample worthy of mentioning
C) Wasn't the concept (that people will read the same blogs habitually) a foregone conclusion?

Strikes me the same as if I asked 15 people at UA if they read the newspaper each day. As blogs -- a term I'm increasingly sick and tired of using -- become news sources, why would be be surprised at all if people feel compelled to check them each morning.

Could we now say that ESPN SportsCenter is an addiction? Looking up the forecast through Local on the Eights on the WeatherChannel is habit forming?

People seek information. They gather it through the easiest method to their particular circumstance. They value it in proportion to the proven ability to provide what the end user sees as truth. A person with computer skills would use on-line sources. A news-o-phile picks it up in print on the doorstep. A radio fan hears it through a talk show.

In this case, the new versions of a medium get confused with the truism running through time.

Hyper-Local Tabloids?

What's next? The end of the world? No, the regrettable next step in new media is to bring you the local version of the Enquirer. Welcome to TheDirty.com. Yes, it's the home of Matt Leinart photos, but as the current top guy at the website said, it's really not about the rich and famous (although, they're not above using them go get publicity).

"Ninety-eight percent of our stuff is through submissions from a regular person of just funny stuff someone was doing, or stuff maybe they shouldn’t have been doing," said The Dirty's COO, Ray Levine

So, instead of the local newspaper, you'll check your Google alert feeds on news items, read through the local bloggers on politics, check out the local music scene with the on-line version of the old free entertainment paper and now, get your local dirt -- both at TheDirty and, if you're like a lot of smaller areas without a lot of contributors, the hyper-local coverage via Topix.

Good to See Coaches Aren't the Only Ones

How often has this happened -- coach rolls out to a booster function they believe is "closed" only to have off-the-cuff remarks posted on the internet and taken as gospel.

Barak Obama, join the head coach's gaffe circuit. At a closed fundraiser in San Francisco, he made some comments about rural voters. Now that might come back to haunt him, but at least I'll give credit that he hasn't tried to say he didn't say them.

It serves as a constant reminder that if you're in the public eye, you never leave it.

The World is Flat

Periodically, I spend quality time perusing the periodical racks of the local stores. Want to know the trend? See what these other folks have spent tons of money deciding what was hot.

The discovery? Flat is in. No more layered text mastheads. No faded overlays. Drop shadow is dead. Shockingly, not even stroked text.

Don't believe me? Even the Photoshop magazines are doing the non-Photoshopping of the logos, mastheads and text.

This is no big surprise. The layout work reminds me of the late 1970s, early 1980s with a very minimalist look, a reaction to the psychedelic overlays of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Bauhaus is back, baby.

It's all about the font once again. Good news for someone who can tell his Futura from his Univers, knows that Helvetica is just for the squares and Arial -- yeah, maybe as a Disney character but not the characters on my publications.

Big test coming up for some folks on this. It will be interesting to see if they are hip to the trend.

One Great Day

Today was spent helping my wife set up her garage/estate sale. Aside from battling unseasonably cold weather and gusts to 32 (as measured on ye olde anemometer), this was a fantastic day. I'm helping the wife. We're clearing out the house of a lot of old stuff [and committing to the fact that once it leaves the house, it isn't coming back].

Part of that was a visit by Dickson Street Books to see if my deceased mother-in-law's old books had any value. They're quite patient with the junk, helping me separate the wheat. While waiting, I turn to see not one, but two Menken first editions (Prejudices, Second; Prejudices, Third). Um, yes, I'll take that as store credit; and with that Second comes home to bring my collection to almost complete. If anyone out there has the First they'd like to part with . . .

Standing there with Menken in hand -- it just feels good to handle the old books of a master. At the end of the day, it is about classics. Starbucks found that out the hard way. For all the marketing, the research, the product placements, the collateral items -- Starbucks lost its way because it forgot what made it Starbucks. Good coffee, and a coffee-shop atmosphere.

Read the other day they're going with this Pike Place "revival" to have more coffee beans handled and ground in the store. The result? The Starbucks smells like it should. An inadvertent huge error by the corporation -- when you go to vacuum sealed products, and pre-ground items you might save a little coin, but in the process you lose the soul of the coffee house.

There's a lesson in my cup of coffee today. Sometimes, the way to your future is through remembering what got you to where you are today. Lot of folks forget that. If passion got you there, keep it. If your fan base got you there, remember them. We'll see.

Start Your Day Refreshed

Every time I get that "Noli nothis permittere te terere" kind of day, I am vividly reminded it can be worse by Randy Pausch. The former professor who has added incredible grace and dignity to his departure from this life has managed to live long enough with pancreatic cancer to see the publication of his book based on his famous "last lecture."

In other internet news, our good friends at Center for Citizen Media have a pair of stories.

One is not so good for TV as CBS adds to its public woes. After acknowledging talks with CNN to "outsource" its national coverage, huge cutbacks are on the way for its 27 company owned local stations.

But, if you jump across the digital divide, according to the New York Times, blogging will kill you. The story starts by describing the digital-era sweatshop -- your home -- and relates the unfortunate coronary demise of three bloggers. I also find the counterpoint from ZDNet compelling, and reassuring in a Pausch-like way:

Let’s put a little perspective on this blogging thing. You could be getting shot at in Iraq. You could be a single mom working three jobs to stay afloat (Happy Birthday mom). You could work in a coal mine. You could be in a life and death battle with Leukemia. You could be doing any one of thousands of high-stress jobs. Sure, the Web has a lot of stress but let’s get real: If you’re stressed out over 5,000 RSS feeds chances are good you’d be stressed by any profession you chose.

So what's that phrase at the top? Oh, you thought I meant Illegitimi non carborundum, but of course, being connected citizen I was able to discover that old chestnut is at best dog-Latin, bastardized (all pun intended) by "Vineger" Joe Stillwell. The Second World War general was a constant nemesis of Claire Chennault. It does my heart good to learn how illegitimi his Latin was, since in regard to many issues Stillwell certainly was a bastardes himself.

More Things You Shouldn't Do on Facebook

As college athletes in particular and students in general complain that their freedom of expression is being stifled by people looking at their Facebook pages, this just in from Michigan as the East Lansing PD is looking into a student's page that launched a 3,000-4,000 street party and riot. The originator of the event is being considered for charges -- doubt that happens -- but the groups that were created to celebrate the event (notably, I got Gassed at Cedarfest 2008) are being looked at for potential legal issues. There is more here at the Chronicle of Higher Ed.

On Crisis Management

Today, we'll be covering crisis policies in the SID class. Having a plan and working on media relationships before the crisis are the big keys to success. Consider last night's national championship -- did Kansas win it in overtime, or back in October when they were working on conditioning and free throws?

There's quite a shift in the approach by colleges toward the media, and a lot of resistance to change in being open during a crisis. Christine Syme of Montana State had an excellent piece in the NCAA News a month or so ago about "aggressive disclosure." The text for our class has an absolutely golden quote about the old-school duck-and-cover mentality:

"The silent organization sets itself up for a public flogging in the media."

I'd only add, that it won't be the three newspapers, four TV stations and a couple of radio hosts warming up the cat-o'nine-tails. It's more like the classic scene in Airplane as the entire cabin lines up to take a slap at the program as the average anonymous fan on the message board, the citizen media bloggers and the established media bloggers will join into the fun.

You're Missing the Better Final Four

After taking in the men's blowouts, can anyone doubt that the women's battles tonight were the better games? The Candice Parker-Sylvia Fowles battle has been titanic tonight. Physical, gutty as both fight injury. The essence of championship basketball.

Now tomorrow night, the men's final might be something really special.

By the way, how in the world can a major venue not be able to control the floor clocks? All night the "right" goal to the broadcast position has been off. It had 8.0 seconds left when the horn went off at halftime of UT-LSU; it was off a full minute during the UConn-Stanford game.

Hooray Caffine

A tip of the hat to Andrew Sullivan's blog which turns up this British study on the positive effects of a daily cup of coffee in regard to Alzheimer's.

We Have Met the Blog, and The Bloggers Better be Us

Henry Jenkins is a new media theory guy at MIT. So, why should athletic departments care? From one of his many Chroncle of Higher Ed essays, the payoff quote:

Prospective students. A rising percentage of the students we admit list these blogs as the primary way in which they learned about the media-studies program. New students come to us with a much sharper understanding of the strengths of our program and how their interests might align with our continuing research efforts. The blogs thus raise the number and quality of applicants, and may have had some impact on our yield — the percentage of accepted candidates who enroll. New students are increasingly integrated into the life of the program well before they arrive in September.

Do I really need to translate? OK, right in the middle -- blogs thus raise the number and quality of applicants -- re-read that with the word recruit for applicant.

If you need more sources, check out the Chron's companion piece on whether or not Marshall McLuhan matters anymore by Jenkins -- it is filled with links to the people he thinks are the vital bloggers in this area.