I enjoyed attending the premier party tonight at WCTV, Richmond's local public access cable television station. As I've encountered the station over the years I've come to appreciate that it's another amazing (but underutilized and oft-overlooked) resource that sets Richmond and Wayne County apart. Three stations with a diverse lineup that ranges from government meetings to church services, free-form poetry to public health info - high-quality production studios, a highly professional and knowledgeable staff, and a huge pool of willing volunteer producers...cool stuff. (Evan and I took the producer training course there a while ago and had high hopes of working on a few different programs, but they still haven't materialized as yet.) It's also a glaring omission from my post on public dialogue in Richmond; surely the existence of this resource provides endless opportunities for improving the quality of the conversations we have and what we learn about our each other. I hope with the station's recent rejuvenation in staff and programming, it comes to be appreciated for the gem that it is and can be.
Tag: blogging
It's been a while since I've posted here - I've had a couple dozen half-finished entries that just didn't seem worth bothering to finish, a barrier I've certainly encountered before. It's also been a busy month and life's been full of some great joys (cooking, consuming, community service, conflict resolving, cat transport, Co-op-ing, colluding in concomitance, celebrating the solstice, cultivating connections, etc.) and concerns that take place away from the world of my keyboard, so things are just quiet around here. Thanks for reading, check back soon. May the peace of the season be with you.
Coming up this Thursday, I'll be presenting a TechTalk seminar in Richmond on "A Newcomer's Guide to Blogging." I thought those of you who read here, especially other bloggers, may be interested in attending and contributing - please come if you are!
Related, I think it's important to note that NBC Nightly News has enabled comments on their weblog that chronicles the production of their nightly network newscast. I didn't really consider it a blog until they did that, and even though the comments are moderated, they've really taken what I would consider to be an important (and somewhat risky) step in bringing the culture of blogging to mainstream media. Today's series of posts on Brian Williams` travels with President Bush were particularly unique. Next in line: during commercials, instant messaging with the anchor about the segment that just aired? Hmmm.
My weblog has gotten a lot of traffic in the last week...but you wouldn't know it from the lack of comments on the posts drawing attention (mostly the ones related to the recent EDC controversy). It makes me wonder what's keeping folks from sharing their two cents, especially since blogs are such a great tool for such things. I know at least some are constrained by their own organizational/business affiliations such that making a public comment of even the most innocuous sort could backfire. (Maybe I should follow their lead more...hmmm. 🙂 ). Others who have contacted me directly seem wary of or inexperienced with the medium of a blog as a place to have a discussion, and I can certainly understand that. Still others seem content to observe without participating just because, which I have to admit is usually my preferred role on the other blogs I read unless circumstances merit otherwise. But certainly if there's anything about the way this site is set up that anyone would like to comment upon -- content, tone, posting tools, or otherwise -- I'm certainly eager to make any improvements that I can. In the meantime, here's a big shout out to all you folks just joining us...thanks for reading!
In response to my post about the Pal-Item's reporting on the controversy surrounding the EDC president, Don Holbrook has posted a lengthy explanation addressing some of the issues brought up in those stories. I believe it's the first publicly available statement from him since the Pal-Item's series on Sunday. Holbrook also commented on my account of the IU Business Outlook panel, and his thoughts on what it will take to move our community's economy forward.
One: Dave Pollard has posted a really interesting (and quite long) series of essays, studies, and narratives about how to build the ideal collaborative team and the collaboration process in general. Though I haven't grokked all of the implications yet, I generally find their primary conclusion, that attitude is more important than experience or specific knowledge in collaborative work, to be quite true in my own experience. Two: I've posted a list of my personal and professional affiliations. As the traffic on my blog increases and I get some more feedback about some of the more "controversial" posts, I want to make sure I fully disclose what kinds of organizations and projects I'm involved with and have allegiances to - noting just as emphatically that none of them necessarily endorse or agree with what I write here. Three: As reported by Slashdot, the Federal Election Commission has issued a draft advisory opinion essentially finding that bloggers can qualify as journalists for the purpose of the 'press exemption' in federal campaign finance laws. As a blogger, I don't really consider myself a journalist, but I know plenty who do and it's interesting to see this conversation evolve about what protections and privileges bloggers should have.
A few quick notes: 1) As promised, I've completed the transition to having all my photos hosted at my Flickr account, so feel free to browse around there. 2) I've posted a short little poem I wrote some time ago, but felt compelled to add to the site now. 3) I believe it's safe to say that The Review of Indiana Blogs has suffered and possibly expired at the hands of its own (perhaps unanticipated) scope - no real substantive entries since mid-October, a few links breaking, and no word from the maintainer. 4) I can't really talk, though - I've been working on several posts but none of them have made it out the door yet, and that developed into a more intentional hiatus from blog posting (if you can call two weeks a hiatus). But I'll be back soon with all sorts of self-indulgent musings. Until then, check out my favorite website after which Summersault models all its work, Zombo dot com. And as the recently spray-painted words of wisdom in the alley behind our office say, "fall in love, not in line."
Back when the Internet was small enough to fit on my current 80GB hard drive, there were no other Chris Hardies in the world. I was it, and I was certainly the only one with any sort of online presence. Even though I come from a long line of Farquharsons, if you looked for my name in search engines, you could find all sorts of stuff about me, but ONLY me. I was special, a beautiful unique snowflake.
These days, I am apparently part of the same decaying organic matter as everything else. I have some company from other Chris Hardies out there, some of them surprisingly close to me in either geographical, occupational or metaphysical location. Here's a survey:
Continue reading "The other Chris Hardies out there"
One of my blog entries that is most often commented upon is The Pieing of William Kristol, about the incident in March where Earlham Student Josh Medlin hit conservative commentator Kristol with some sort of pie. As the paper reported yesterday, Medlin pled guilty and will be required to perform community service and pay court costs. Fellow blogger and local attorney E. Thomas Kemp defended Medlin in the case, and it's good to see that it's mostly resolved in the eyes of the judicial process. I don't know Medlin personally, but the incident as a whole would seem to put him in a unique position to reflect on or even talk about some interesting issues related to dialogue and debate, direct and indirect activism, the nature of unintended consequences, and related topics - perhaps his community service could be an opportunity to make use of that.
Continue reading "Kristol Pieing, Dialogue Redux"
Thanks to the folks at TRIB (The Review of Indiana Blogs) for the kind mention over the weekend. As I told them even *before* they were nice enough to link to me, it's good to see a resource like this devoted to covering the Hoosier blogosphere. I've already enjoyed reading through the posts and learning about other folks in Indiana who are bothering to comment on happenings around the state and in their own lives.