Liveblogging the latest Clinton-Obama debate

You just don't get commentary like this on TV...

9:55: In the usual "offbeat" final question slot, the two were asked if they would form a "dream ticket." They both have some fun with it and don't rule it out. Obama has some good quips while Hillary fritters it away by plugging an upcoming TV event. But then amazing moment at end, as Obama gallantly pulls back her chair as she gets to her feet. Then they whisper to each other and nearly embrace. It's almost sexy.

Editor & Publisher blogged the debate. It's interesting reading -- the blog is available here.

Williams-Sonoma redesigns Web site

Okay, there are at least a few Foodies in this class, including me, so I thought we might analyze this Web site. No, this isn't an assignment!

Video and newsprint: the multimedia journalist

This links to a really nice blog post (in Media Nation) about the editor of a newspaper, Cathryn Keefe O'Hare of the Danvers Herald, who first captured video on Memorial Day and now uses it as a routine part of her job. The post includes links to a slide show, an audio interview and several videos, including one she shot. The text is well hyperlinked and chock full (I've never used that phrase before; where did that come from?) of information about the equipment and software the paper uses. And here are some words to live by from O'Hare:

"The thing that remains true, whether it's in print journalism or the Internet or video, you have to tell a story," says O'Hare. "And you have to tell it as true as you can make it. And you have to try to speak for those people who can't tell their story."

Blog as motivator

Friend Pat developed Gray26 and posts a photo a day hoping that the discipline of always being on the lookout for good shots will help him "see" more and better pictures. I laughed out loud at Wednesday Jan 2. Sorry for the delay in this posting. Little bit of a learning curve, never having blogged.

Food, Glorious Food

Sticking to my number one love, a friend (thanks Yvonne!) told me about Chocolate and Zucchini, a blog all about food. The fact that it is written by a French woman, who found her love of food in San Francisco, amuses me greatly. I once ran into a baker who was professionally trained, which apparently means you use French to refer to everything. I couldn't communicate with her about cooking because she kept throwing out these French terms. I was never entirely sure why it was necessary to use French when referring to a pie crust. But, perhaps that's why I'm not a chef. I seem to have wondered off topic. For those of you who love cooking, this is a fun blog. Her English is very good and best of all-- recipes!! The blog has a good amount of interesting facts regarding cooking and the entire site itself is fun to waste time on.

Blogs Coming Out of My Ears

I was turned on to the blogs o' Arnie (seen at left) by a Chicago friend who is a friend of a friend of a friend of his (wow, that was a lot of friends). Anyway, Arnie is an improv-er (as in, somebody who does improvisational comedy, not somebody who makes things better by improving them) in Chicago who has documented the last three years of his life using pictures.


2008's blog is A Year in Pictures of Comedy, documenting a show he performs in and his life in Chicago. Years past include A Year of Working, documenting his arrival back in Chicago from Arizona, where he was living with his girlfriend at the time, and A Year Following the Breakup, which is self-explanatory and actually kind of heartbreaking. He's funny, articulate and self-deprecating, all things I can appreciate in a blogger. You don't have to know the people he writes about to understand what he's talking about...I recommend starting with the breakup one and working your way forward. Considering he's a stranger, reading about his life is highly addictive.

Diversity -- and free advertising

Pepsi's Super Bowl ad is already making the e-rounds. This time, the "talk" factor is that there is no talking: it's a video of a conversation in sign language with screen subtitles. Take a look. Does it cross a line or is it an interesting way to disseminate a worthy message?

Technical Skills in Journalism

PBS' Media Shift listed Eric Ulken's site as one of its Top 5 of the week. I thought it was an interesting look at the many technology skills required of today's journalists. Good thing we're taking MCO 598.

Media Shift is a cool site itself -- it tracks all things new media. One of today's posts talks about how Google and Wikipedia have changed the way we conduct research.

Even AOL Video lets you embed now...

In this obviously newsworthy clip, Letterman messes up John Edwards' hair.

Last semester's project

Ever wonder how many steps it is from Stauffer Hall to Lot 59? One of the intrepid reporters from last year's class set out to see, accompanied by an equally intrepid videographer. In three videos and a Soundslide, the Fall 2007 class tackled relevant issues concerning the parking situation here at ASU's Tempe site.

Sharing the fantasy

Landon Pigg's "Falling in love at the coffee shop" is the wildly popular song behind the equally popular DeBeers diamond video ad now making the rounds. Spinner, a blog that focuses on music, has some of the background here.
Those of you who are want to know how to embed videos -- it's easy, especially if you're getting them from YouTube. At the end of the video or in a box near the video there are "boxes" where the embed code is displayed. You can cut/copy and paste that code into the message box of this blog. Save and publish. But here's a further refinement: If you want to reduce the size of the embedded video and still keep everything proportional, you have to change a couple of things in the code. The dimensions for width and height are in that code. This video started out at 425 for the width and 373 for the height. I've replaced those numbers with 275 and 200, thereby reducing the size. If you go to YouTube to look at it, it will be larger.

Gawker in flap over Scientology video

I can't embed the video from YouTube because it's been pulled, as it has been from other sites. Scientology officials protested its airing with a copyright infringement notice. Gawker, a staffed media blog (managing editor Nick Denton oversees two media reporters and four bloggers), decided to keep a copy of the video available on its site as something newsworthy. One thing to note on Gawker: there are links to previous posts as well as to information on other sites. Some of the traffic to Gawker (there were 1,597,036 viewings as of this morning when I pulled up the page)has been sent there by another blog, the Videologist. Its story is here. And some traffic was channeled to Videologist by AOL News's promo on the AOL welcome page. There are many other links and traffic patterns, but that's the one I followed.