Aereo vs. Television Networks

The case of Aereo vs. The Big Four Television Networks is complicated if you don't know the story behind the ongoing legal battle. If you know even the tiniest amount about Aereo, the tech company which essentially allows customers to rent tiny antennas and, in turn, receive live online streams of their local broadcast stations, the argument in favor of Aereo seems rather strong.

Aereo's tiny internet-streaming antennas are rented by customers for a small monthly fee along with a limited amount of DVR storage time (20 hours). The fact that Aereo makes a recurring profit off of this service without paying a retransmission fee to local broadcast affiliates (like cable and satellite companies do) is what the big four television networks are angry about. They want their cut. They ALWAYS want their cut. But is Aereo any different than cable television providers were in their infancy?

It wasn't until 1992 that congress mandated cable television providers to seek approval to retransmit local broadcast television signals over their systems and that also opened the door for local broadcasters to seek retransmission fees from cable providers. Cable television essentially had a free run of fifteen years before local network television affiliates realized that cable television was an area that they, too, could profit from.

The unfortunate part, though, is that local broadcasters are treating Aereo and their innovative format for consumers to bypass bloated cable television packages like it is an established company which has a history of immense profitability and wide adoption rates. In reality Aereo is just the opposite. It is a relatively new start-up which is still expanding into major metropolitan areas. In an era where cable television providers are trying to find ways to keep their customers tied to their services (television AND internet service), Aereo is seen as a disruption.

Are the major broadcast television networks rallying their lawyers in an effort to file lawsuits against the manufacturers of rofotop television antennas? Why aren't they? Those manufacturers allow consumers to view thier television signals for free after the cost of purchase -- somewhat in line with Aereo's business model. Sure, Aereo is an ongoing subscription service but the basic idea of receiving over the air local network affiliates is the same, only the technology has changed.

In short, Aereo is being challenged by network television's lawyers because they are a viable company with a legitimate future. Let Aereo get a foothold and see where it leads. It is unlikely in this age of hundreds of channels that Aereo would ever pose a huge threat to the gobs of cash paid by cable companies to broadcasters in the form of retransmission fees but if it does come to that then the boradcasters have a legitimate argument and can rightfully demand some sort of retransmission fee from Aereo as well.

The one marked difference here is that while Aereo's service allows consumers in selected cities to cut the cord from cable television, they still need internet service which is no longer a luxury item and should be considered as an almost essential utility service. Aereo's potential growth almost insures that cable providers will not only continue to provide internet service at the same price to customers but that their need for increased speeds will increase. And with the reluctance of the near monopolistic cable televisoon providers to seriously increase speeds at realistic prices, their profit margins will remain healthy for the forseeable future.

In short, let an interesting start-up gain a foothold with the disclaimer that the boradcasters will be revisiting the topic of retransmission fees if/when subscriber penetration reaches a pre-determined threshold.

Almighty dollars or readability on news websites?

Paywalls. The limit on the amount of news stories a user can read for free on a newspaper's website are slowly being implemented across the country. They, however, aren't being implemented without plenty of research beforehand. The number of free articles varies per site but ten seems to be a popular number per 30-day cycle.

The big gripe is that even when you pay for the unlimited access you are still faced with a litany of advertisements on most websites. What, then, is the benefit of paying for unlimited free content? Yes, you are supporting legitimate journalism but if you actually want to entice users to convert to paid digital subscribers, you must give them an enhanced experience or in some way reward them. Today's 35 year-olds have grown up with the web being essentially free regardless of the URL visited. They aren't likely to fork over their hard-earned cash for unlimited content inside the same ad-littered framework and think that it's been well worth their money.

I've seen some newspaper groups offer their unlimited digital subscription for nearly free when purchased alongside a print subscription but that, to me at least, devalues the digital content and the digital content is still in that same earlier mentioned ad-littered framework that non-paid users see. One of the few added value items with a print+digital subscription is having the archived content available as well as the often-dreaded comment sections. Oh, sure, there are infrequently updated blogs and breaking news which is more important when coming from a weekly newspaper but at its core it's still the same content as you are receiving in your mailbox in print each week.

Newspapers should embrace the public radio membership model. Let subscribers feel a sense of ownership in the product which they patronize. It builds much more of a community feel that allowing unlimited access to the same content average users can receive with a little creativity such as deleting a cookie. I could offer up a whole list of sensible, creative and revenue-generating ideas here but why give the milk away for free?

Music from the MySpace relaunch video

JJAMZ (pronounced juh-jams) is the band providing the soundtrack to today's MySpace relaunch video which, in itself, is pretty damn cool looking but what caught me was the music. The track, entitled Heartbeat, is catchy, infectious and seems to be custom-tailored for what MySpace is trying to achieve with their upcoming relaunch. The one lyric, "I haven't seen you in a long, long time" could be construed as meaning that the website has become a ghost town of sorts when compared to its mid-2000s heyday.

The video (below) for Heartbeat has a bit of a creepy vibe to it with an old man seeming to be chasing down a cute blond high schooler preparing for a dance.



As for the relaunch video for MySpace, it's cool as hell. If the website itself can live up to even half of the wow factor of the video touting the site's relaunch, MySpace can be a true competitor once again to Facebook and the up-and-coming Google+. The new MySpace, if it comes together as promised, has a mix of Pinterest, Facebook integration, a crisp feel due to the choice of the font package with photos at the forefront. I'm in if it can draw an audience compatible with my likings.

Feeling defeated by the day, Google AdWords

It was just one of those days today. The type of day where you just want to wipe it away and forget that it happened. Due to a whole world of changes at the office (diversification, new directions, etc.) I've been tasked with a whole pile of online tasks that, if I was asked seven years ago back when I was still a print graphic designer, I would have said that you were crazy to expect this out of me. Of course after I failed the 109 question Google AdWords for Search certification test today, I felt like my co-workers, again, were crazy to expect this out of me. A passing grade is 85% and I achieved a not-terrible 81% but it wasn't enough in the eyes of Google to achieve certification.

It's been that kind of week/month/year for me. I've been tasked with a whole host of new ventures which rest on my hopefully capable shoulders. On top of achieving Google AdWords certification, I also need to complete a framework for handling what can only be described as a whole shit-ton of data via an XML workflow and wrangling it into a hundred or-so page InDesign layout. That task is due in a couple weeks and I still haven't figured out a simple and understandable way for non-techies to input the data. Add to that having to design a rather involved (for me) companion website for that XML/InDesign project and I'm starting to feel the pressure.

Not to mention learning a rather intense and complex website monitoring/evaluation software package for my employer's S.E.O. venture and I've got simply that much more to get done.

I feel, somedays, like the future of my employer rests at least partially on my shoulders. I am confident that I can handle these tasks and more but the timeframe has me concerned. Thankfully my team has a meeting tomorrow to plan the launch dates of a whole host of service offerings so I can at bring up my concerns and mention my woeful shortcomings in front of those who, up until now, thought I was totally capable and were in awe of what I've been able to accomplish in a short time.

Hey, at least I have the musical stylings of Childish Gambino and his awesome and totally filthy rap lyrics to get me pumped up on my way in to the office each morning.

Is Netflix moving into original content?

I've never been a Netflix customer but their announcement today that they're in talks to distribute an original series starring Kevin Spacey has me intrigued. Would a company whose business model centers around sending DVDs and now streams of movies and TV series produced by others to customers move into producing their own content? It seems at least possible but maybe Netflix is thinking about some other form of distribution. Would they branch out and begin producing original content, while holding the license to eventually distribute it themselves under their subscription rental model, to syndicate it for broadcast on a traditional TV network or cable channel?

It's an interesting development but in the end I doubt that people would actually want to watch a series starring Kevin Spacey given his less than impressive roles on the big screen.

The evolution of my blogging

Nobody has ever really questioned why I began blogging and I can't blame them but if you read this blog and haven't dug deep in to the archives, I'll get you up to speed.

Mere months after moving to the Twin Cities on a cold December evening I began this blog, entitled "A Day in the Life". It had virtually no direction in the beginning and many would say that it still doesn't but it became a launching pad in future years for my more recent projects and my further involvement in social media as a whole.

After working in a job surrounded by journalists, and often times reading their stories before publication. I realized that I could probably do this. After all, I'm a creative type and blogging in any format seemed like a logical extension of my graphic and web design work and my hobby of photography. And it continued. For probably far too long I was posting 4-5 days each week and the content was dry. In short, it sucked. I went through a period where I was displeased with the political happenings in our country and with the outlet I had developed the content was very political.

Then one day I decided that being so focused on one topic wasn't what I was about. I think it was around 2006 (almost three years in to blogging) when I took a drastic turn and that's when people started really reading what I was writing. MNSpeak (when Max Sparber was running it) began occasionally linking to my posts and that simply spurred my blogging. I began looking at the weird shit happening in Minnesota and opened my eyes to how truly weird things I saw every day were - I still remember spotting a possible trend of pipe smoking coming back.

As I explored my own photography and that of others in Minnesota I began putting together MinnPics to showcase the work of those Minnesotans sharing their photos on Flickr. Much to my surprise it actually took off. I dabbled there with how frequently to update and what to showcase and have settled in to a bit of a random groove with it after over two years. I juggled this blog and MinnPics and somehow kept both going while also handling all of my other daily duties as a somewhat responsible citizen. During that time, I decided to begin moving away from happenings in Minnesota with this blog and began sprinkling in more pop culture type of stuff including what could be called Nipplegate and Camel Toe watch during the 2008 summer olympics and the big rumor of last year: whether or not Lady Gaga was transgendered. (She's obviously not)

This year, I slowed down the posting here and this summer I started Minnesota Valley Photos. It's my own photos I take in and around the Minnesota River Valley and with an archive of over 15,000 photos I should be able to keep something coming for a few more months. Or years.

Being a huge music fan, I also started up a quickly thrown together collection of videos I called The Video Playlist. It's another side project that may or may not have legs but like many of the projects at work, the mantra is "fail fast". Maybe I'll shit-can it or maybe it will silently live on in obscurity forever.

At some point I also started Strib comments because the absurdity of the Star Tribune's comments is downright amazing and finding the dumbest is always a good time! I rarely update it but it's a cool concept.

For now I'm cool with how things are but if anyone's interested in taking MinnPics to the next level, I'm all ears. ALL ears. More amazing than anything is the fact that I've stuck with something for almost seven years. Especially in a world where Twitter seems to have almost killed long form blogging like this because, let's be honest, I could have probably summed this up in 140 characters but it wouldn't have put you to sleep, would it?

National broadband internet is actually a good idea

In 2010, the internet is a vital emerging utility service like electricity was in the early to mid-1900s. I've been fortunate enough to be able to both have access to and afford broadband access since 2001 and I viewed it as vital even back then when my only other option was dial-up which seemed slow even then.

Different people will see it differently. To many, internet access has no value but I am increasingly finding those people asking those who do have internet access to "look this up" or "order this for me". Even though they know that they have no need for internet access, they still see its value which speaks volumes to how much the online world has penetrated even those far removed from most types of technology.

If you don't want the government mandating true high speed broadband internet access then I'll assume you're totally cool with paying $55 or more per month for your internet access. Think about the places you could spend even $25 of that expense is costs were to decline. What about reliability? I am unfortunate enough to have Mediacom for my internet access at home and suffered for over 3 weeks with painfully slow access. I didn't even bother wasting my breath calling the mouth-breathers they have employed as customer service representatives and instead, via my painfully slow internet, culled various forums until, after three hours, I found a potential solution. Luckily it worked and my overly spendy internet access is back to its normal speed but what other utility provider would get away with such ineptitude?

Would the local electric company get away with sending you just enough electricity to power your lights at brownout levels? But far too often that's what internet providers get away with. They provide sub-par service because nobody's watching and the competition isn't any better or cheaper. So consumers lose. It took government intervention to provide electrical service to many rural areas so why should we be afraid of the same when it comes to internet access? Either adapt to the change or be happy being left behind.

I think I'll go for anything that provides more reliable, more affordable, faster internet access. It can only help most everything I do including the world's most stunning all-Minnesota photo blog, MinnPics!

Is innovation dead?

It's a vague question but in the current rather dire times where the economy seems to be stuck in neutral and you're supposed to "just be happy you have a job at all" it seems that innovation has taken a back seat to survival. When's the last time something at your place of employment was truly an innovation? When was the last time you saw truly innovative programming on one of the big four television networks?

Think about that last one for a minute. This is the year that gave us a second NCIS series on CBS. We were given a spinoff of the animated Family Guy series on FOX. NBC generously gave us a burned out and stale Jay Leno 90 minutes earlier and without a damn desk. ABC even dug up a series from the 80s and re-imagined it - and "V" is back again tonight, it's probably the one retread I actually like. They claim survival is the reason and that this is "what people actually want" but if they were actually in touch they'd know what we truly want or that we're only watching some of those rather pathetic offerings because it's the best of the worst. If they hadn't gone through multiple decades of greed and sure cash, they'd be more willing to innovate.

But it doesn't stop with television. Innovation seems to have come to a standstill in all forms of traditional venues. Radio, outside of The Current locally, sucks. Hell, saying that radio sucks is being generous. Radio, in all its sameness from sea to plastic-filled sea, is less innovative today than it was a decade ago and that's quite a feat.

Most of the blame for the sameness and lack of innovation from traditional venues is placed squarely on the internet. Yes, the internet is a great venue to try an idea for next to nothing in terms of monetary expense but the internet is also vast and can be rather tough to gain traction in terms of what could be considered a mass audience. I have found some success with MinnPics and its unique twist on a photo blog but that's even small potatoes. The big audiences, for whatever reason, still lie with those traditional venues. Maybe it's due to convenience. I can see that because the computer has yet to truly make its way in to the American living room and replace or meld with the television. That time is coming but it will take some level of innovation for a computer/TV hybrid to become mainstream. And then there's the connectivity issue - we're pretty much at the mercy, still, of the cable companies who control high speed internet access. Rather than offer truly high speed access at an affordable price, they price it high enough that it's still cheaper to shell out the bucks for cable television because streaming something full screen is jittery and full of more hiccups than Otis the drunk from good ole' Mayberry, R.F.D.

So while innovation isn't dead it is definitely being stifled by greater powers. After all, if there's money to be made on something old why on Earth would someone spend time, energy and money promoting, developing and being innovative with something new?

Speaking of new, MinnPics has some new photos posted today - even a couple discovered via Twitter. Check it out for yourself.

The Associated Press ignorant of technology

If you don't want to pay attention to this story, don't. However, the Associated Press - the overlords of all things daily newspaper content - have slit their throats just a bit further.

Earlier this week, the Associated Press sent a cease and desist order to a Tennessee radio station, an Associated Press member, for embedding AP videos on their website. (Even worse, the AP didn't even know they had a YouTube channel)

The radio station's argument is very clear and they are in the right. If the AP is so stuck in the stone-age that they don't want their videos spread across the web and can't figure out how to disable the embed code on YouTube, maybe this archaic organization has met its endpoint.

The man is slowing your internet connection

This story opened my eyes. How many of you are reading this blog via a cable internet connection? Wow, that's alot of hands, you can put them down now.

The few big players who control cable television access (Comcast, Time Warner, Charter & Mediacom) sort of have the market cornered on internet access.

Now how many of you have read the fine print on your cable internet access contract? Yeah, not very many hands.

Did you know about the bandwidth caps Comcast and Time Warner have imposed? No? Well Comcast says they can essentially shut off your access if you go above the 250GB data cap. While that sounds like alot, it really isn't if you upload tons of photos and videos and stream TV shows from Hulu or purchase from iTunes. There are probably months when I get close to that magical cap myself because I stream or download TV shows I've missed and sometimes uploads gobs of photos to be printed or share those same photos on Facebook or Flickr.

How about people with a home office? My field handles especially large files. At my work office I routinely find myself downloading a hundred megabytes of files in a single day and if I ever took my freelance work seriously I'd likely dabble in somewhere close to that same amount of data per day with uploading and downloading files from FTP sites and so on.

The problem is that a handful of companies are trying to strangle the amount of data which a single household can upload/download all in the name of protecting the ass-rapingly large fees they charge for cable television. A few years ago their argument would have seemed ludicrous but with the advent of Hulu and the Apple TV box you no longer have to sit in front of your computer to watch that streaming television. It's now magically on your TV for those who care to invest a few hours and a couple hundred bucks. I've considered going that route myself.

The problem with the cable TV giants' argument is that relatively few people (currently) are crafty (or patient) enough to go the 100% streaming route and by capping data quantities the cable giants are stifling communication and business. They need to realize that they provide a lifeline and raping those who pay for it isn't good business. Telephone companies don't dictate how long I can talk on my landline with local calls so why should cable companies say how much use I can get out of my internet connection?

Don't worry about this tech-heavy post, the low-brow crap returns tomorrow and check out MinnPics because photos love to be looked at.

The death of the Rocky Mountain News

Today marked the final edition of the Rocky Mountain News. For those unfamiliar, it was one of Denver, Colorado's two daily newspapers.

This twenty-plus minute video is a bit on the long side but also rather captivating.


Final Edition from Matthew Roberts on Vimeo.

Many opinions were expressed in this video but the one that stuck with me is the observation that as life and technology and information moves at the speed of light, are we overlooking the small, tangible things such as the physical newspaper. Are we in danger of losing all things physical? Has the internet devalued everything and, in part, contributed to the current financial situation?

I'm heavily invested in all things online and live with all my technology. I've got more than a few feet of Cat-5 wiring running in my house. My cable modem is always on. My iPod and cell are nearly always on me during the work week. I spend many hours weekly online, not just blogging but also managing a multitude of tasks associated with my daily workflow. The advent on the internet and its rapid growth made my job both easier and more multi-faceted. I've taken on additional tasks, learned more skills than I ever thought necessary just a decade ago and have seen the entire advertising landscape change. Advertising, which drives our ravenous retail economy, recently collapsed on itself (in case you hadn't noticed). Everything essentially spiraled out of control and I think that the devaluation caused by the free online model is at least partially to blame. In inside speak, online journalism can be monetized. It can generate a profit and it can thrive and, in a turnabout, support the physical printed newspaper much as the print operations of today pay plenty of the way for the online presence.

But whatever caused the loss of just one daily newspaper, for some reason, really sticks with me. Everything lives and dies with advertising and another tangible product that had a strong virtual and physical presence was laid to rest.

Be sure to watch the video in its entirety as the seemingly endless credits roll. Those are the hundreds of people who, as of tomorrow, are unemployed because their employer had a rough ride for a year. Things don't turn around in a year. Things don't turn around without some faith in the business you run.

Village Voice Media scamming "the system"

Before I get too "inside baseball" here, Village Voice Media owns alt-weeklies across the country including City Pages right here in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis/St. Paul and any credit for breaking their essential scamming of Digg goes to The Deets.

However, after reading Ed's investigative piece at The Deets first thing this morning, I've done some digging (no pun intended) on the subject for myself.

The web "geniuses" at the various VVM properties across the country had to think that eventually someone would put the pieces together and when City Pages publisher Kevin Hoffman bragged about almost inachievable traffic increases in the past couple months, something smelled fishy.

I know that traffic doesn't grow at those rates through organic measures. I can also attest (at MinnPics) that one quality Stumble can blow the roof off one's traffic. However, it dies off just as quickly as it arrived. That's where the real value in building an organic base of readers comes in. They keep coming back because they like what they are reading. I've had insane traffic bumps on here because people incessantly Google related topics (think camel toe, nipples and olympics) and they kept coming back. To me that proves having valuable keywords is far better than sinking huge amounts of paid time into an internal Digg/Reddit/StumbleUpon/Newsvine/Mixx.

Lastly, gaming the system like Village Voice Media is doing devalues the entire online ad market. As if things didn't suck enough in trying to transition print dollars to online dollars, some greedy suits at VVM get exposed on a national level and could end up essentially ruining the livelihood of thousands of Americans.

While it's okay to Digg your own content, conspiring with others to reciprocate Diggs is clearly wrong. Call it Diggwhoring but City Pages and VVM just got busted.

Important things: The Tire

Not too many people think about the inner workings of their automobile as they throw the transmission into gear and depart from their driveway each day in their journey to their coal mine of choice. It might be due to modern civilization taking conveniences for granted or maybe because not too many people understand how their automobile works.

Whatever the case is, one of the more important pieces of the modern automobile (outside of the engine) are the tires. Without these magical rubber creations, your car, truck, van, SUV or lawn mower would travel on steel and that produces a rather unforgiving ride in terms of comfort. It also chews up highways and reduces fuel economy. But the tire still gets overlooked. It gets neglected because you don't check its air pressure. It wears unevenly because you're too busy with such miniscule tasks like taking care of your toddler. So the forlorn tire suffers through this neglect and it feels used.

Today's tires guide you through sunny days, rainy days, icy days and snowy days. It's alot like the mailman of your car, truck, van, semi-tractor, SUV or lawn mower. Tires aren't admired like the rest of the car. Nobody bases their purchase of a vehicle on what brand tires it's sporting. Tires are like the bottom of your shoes. You don't notice them until something goes wrong.

I will admit to cursing profusely when I encountered a flat tire on my way to the office a couple weeks back when the air temperature was -29 degrees. I then took a step back and realized that this particular tire had piloted by car for nearly 80,000 miles. I had taken it for granted up to that point but hand't neglected its maintenance.

So today, take a minute and admire the tires you own. Take your automobile through the car wash and spring for the full on tire wash treatment. Buy a can of the shiny tire cleaning foam and treat your rubber accessories to a fancy bath. Remember that tires are indeed important things.

Nobody really photographs tires unless they are attached to a shiny, chromed-out classic car but check out MinnPics because you never can tell what photos will be showcased next.

Change keeps changing

Sometimes I sit and wonder what the world I live in now will look like in a year, five years, ten years.

This thought process runs through my mind because in my nearly thirty years here, I have seen plenty of changes. Hell, growing up we still had a 19 inch black and white TV in the living room and until the early 90s I had to physically get up from my seat and change the channel. Little did I know that before the end of that very decade I would be in charge of running a news website. Not just one aspect of it, the whole damned thing and not because I knew everything there was to know, it was because of my age. It was the one thing that someone of my age was supposed to know because the internet grew up with me.

Now I look back and realize that while I got the job done, I also completely sucked at it. Yeah, I made the company substantial piles of money but it was during the boom-time in our country.

Now I have a diminshed role more focused on what I know but it's still with websites. They've changed and everythign I do regarding them has changed as well. The world around me has changed too.

The city where I grew up recently had a fire burn down a pre-turn-of-the-century block of downtown businesses. Just blocks away, more businesses met the wrecking ball in favor of a parking lot and court house addition. Adjacent to that project, Great Depression-era bridges and underpasses were removed. The highway traffic they once served was moved to the freeway which now skirts the city in the 1960s.

The character of that city's downtown has changed so much that I don't even recognize it when I pass through.

Physical structures seem to be built to resist change while technology advances at a pace that makes some people's heads spin. Is there some middle ground that can be found to preserve the physical view of the past while making it functional for the future? Will the changes I've witnessed be dwarfed by those to come?

If existential questions like those above make your head hurt, check out the soothing yet intriguing photos at MinnPics. Great photos. Minnesota style.

A plea to American voters

At this point in the electoral game, I am sure that most people get nauseous at the mere mention of politics but hear me out and read through to the end.

The U.S.A. has changed drastically during even my short lifetime. That much I am sure of. When I first began elementary school in the mid-1980s, the internet was still only a military technology that for the average civilian would have been meaningless. The first computer I used in 1st grade was an Apple IIe. It was perfect for Oregon Trail and Number Munchers and some very rudimentary word processing (typing).

Based on that one item, the world has changed drastically. Couple the advances in computer technology with other tech advancements and that one sector alone has changed our world in ways my parents could have never imagined when they were my age.

Technology has changed the way we live in so many ways but it hasn't changed everything.

Cartoons of the 1960s envisioned a world of the not-too-distant future where robots would clean our houses and prepare our food and we would travel in vehicles that never came in contact with the ground we have walked on since the dawn of time. Obviously, those imaginitive creations have yet to come to fruition.

Computer technology has obviously outpaced other forms of technology and it seems to be an ever-increasing reality that technology is the way to move not just our country but all of society ahead in ways we can only dream of. Those dreamers are the future.

The future can surely be a time of change which we could not even imagine. Going back to the computer/technology aspect, computing speeds alone have increased thousands of times over but for much of our daily lives we rely solely on technology born at the turn of the 20th century to keep those computers running.

Isn't it ironic that the paperless technology that many of us work on every day of our lives is tied directly to such an archaic source of power?

That source of power, of course, is derived from the burning of coal. If you've ever seen a large pile of coal at a power plant, you know that it's black and quite a lot like charcoal in its cleanliness factor. Now imagine burning it. Think about just how clean your charcoal grill isn't after you've cooked up some hamburgers. Now multiply that by a few million times and that's what's powering our high-speed, ultra-powerful computers.

Is there a better alternative? Of course there is. Making those alternatives a viable reality seems to boil down to this November's presidential election. Like never before, we are at a crossroads. We've seen what can happen when an economy (and a country) is tethered to old ways.

Resisting change is what gets people left in the proverbial dust.

This year we have the power to decide whether or not to pursue that change head on.

This changing of our entire way of doing things isn't going to come easily. It isn't going to happen overnight. It is going to mean a lot of work. It is also going to mean plenty of opportunities. It will offer up the chance to be great once again. It will present us with the chance to once again be role models for the world. It will require cooperation and unity. It will require a great leader.

Most of all, it will require the voters of America to make a choice. That choice is yours.



That choice is clear. That choice is Barack Obama.

Minneapolis Star-Tribune publishes article about irony

The tech gurus behind the Star-Tribune's website must have their hands full when their RSS feeds seem to be perpetually broken.

Ironically, the story I wanted to read was about some in-house topic about a new way to communicate with the newspaper's opinion staff. This seems to tell readers "don't waste your time".

Could the net vanish in 4 years?

It sounds like some delightful conspiracy theory for the foil hat crowd but the arguments put forth by the iPower guys in this video seem valid. I, for one, would rather be safe than sorry.

The subject of net neutrality came to the surface in June 2007 with online radio streaming being the hot button issue but has since disappeared. Thinking about that development, maybe there is a lot of truth to this topic about the major ISPs being in cahoots with the major web portals and sites to develop a tiered subscription plan within four years which would effectively shut down those who don't pay a "carrier fee" to the ISPs. The internet would essentially turn into cable television where the channels catering to the masses would be basic but if you like yourself some online beastiality, you might find yourself out of luck. Plausible?

Today I pick on websites

Businesses of all sorts need to face the facts, as much as many hope that the internet is a passing fad like hula hoops or He-Man, it's here to stay. I make it a part of my blathering at the office that many of our customers have websites that are hopelessly out of date, have extremely poor functionality and that they should be rather ashamed that they even have this poor online image available for all to see. Hell, plenty of websites look like something I would have created in my high school multimedia class and that's not a good thing.

I know that many businesses will say "nobody uses my webiste". Well, of course they don't. Frankly, it sucks. I'd then ask "when was the last time you picked up the yellow pages for information?" I know that my desk at work doesn't have a phone book because it would do nothing but gather dust. My phone books at home are used to prop up our electric griddle in a kitchen cupboard. If I need a phone number, a map or hours of operation, I look to the internet. That, like it or not, is where information resides and it's easily and instantly updateable.

Still, plenty of businesses fail to understand how people consume information. With more being available each and every day, they consume it faster and in more streamlined ways. I, for one, use a plethora of RSS feeds on my iGoogle start page. I've got blogs, local news, CNN, local news blogs, local blogs, Star Tribune, movie times and the weather all just a click away.

The worst offenders, though (that I'll single out today), seems to be smaller city newspapers. A former semi-competitor newspaper, the Fairbault Daily News, has at least launched its second version of its website but it is rough at best. First impressions, as I said last Thursday, count for plenty and their website leaves plenty to be desired. I feel bad for the folks in Faribault, Minnesota as well as former residents who attempt to use this site on a somewhat regular basis. It contains elements that don't function, motion which is choppy at best and seems to exist merely for the sake of existing and the biggest problem (and the reason I visited it in the first place) is the lack of any visible RSS feed. I wanted to add it to my collection but can't and now won't because of that single reason.
I've said my piece about one missing item turning me off from a website but what website shortcomings have turned you off?

A better Prius is coming

This is of interest to me for two reasons. First off, the Toyota Prius is a great example of how to make a car with exquisite fuel economy coupled with technology no other car maker seems even interested in using. Secondly, Toyota is managing to make the upcoming Prius model bigger, more powerful and with better fuel economy and it's likely going to be the car which replaces my aging Pontiac Grand Prix.

The idea of the exact same Prius that currently gets around 45-50 miles per gallon having more power and even better gas mileage is perplexing to me because current gas-only cars seem to think that it's some grand accomplishment that they can eek out almost 30 miles per gallon. Well, auto makers of the stone-age, only Fred Flintstone would be impressed with that but I, naive fools, am not from Bedrock.

I have to wonder where the former great American innovation has gone. Where are the dreamers who sent our astronauts to the moon? How soon before Toyota pushes the 100 mpg barrier? How long before they come up with viable and affordable technology that is gas-free? Why do the "big 3" automakers seemingly refuse to try anything new and are they firmly in the pockets of big oil? Come on, anything's possible.

Make the future your bitch

Change. It's something that's ongoing and inevitable. People can try to stop change but in reality all they are doing is postponing it. The people that failed to learn how to use computers in the 1980s and early 1990s are officially on the outside looking in. My oldest sister-in-law fits in that category. It's a recipe consisting of two parts stubbornness and one part ineptitude.

Other changes are inevitable as well. I was reading this story about the impending development boom along the last stretch of undeveloped freeway frontage in the Twin Cities stretching from Interstate 494 to Hudson, Wisconsin and the analogy there is that one small town (Lake Elmo) has had so much in-fighting that they have wasted four years that could have been used to prepare for the inevitable and Supreme Court ruled expansion. But, as I said, they pissed away four years postponing what most everyone had to know, at least in some part, was going to happen.

Delaying the inevitable, though, isn't restricted to only people and short-sighted towns in Minnesota. The past few years have shown us that media companies would rather file lawsuits than work to embrace change and make the future their bitch as opposed to being made the bitch. Layoffs run rampant locally and nationally at a plethora of media companies. They failed to see what was coming and are now forced to play catch up. Those employees whose salaries were deemed to be too bloated were cut loose. Those employees who themselves had failed to embrace new technology and failed to contribute new ideas are viewed as expendable.

The lesson here is not to try and see the future but inform yourself, don't get far behind and blaze your own trails. If you do those things while contributing to the greater conversation, you are at least less likely to find yourself in the unemployment line. But these are just my tips and experiences. What have you done in your job to better prepare yourself in the face of change? What skills have you added that you didn't have half a decade ago?