Amy Wohl looks at the differences between three forms of writing: her blog, her newsletter and writing for clients.
“Blogs are a new and very pleasing method for communication. Whether it’s the immediacy, the personal tone, or the ability to create a dynamic and interactive community, we like blogs. Where they will go, we’re not sure. But we are pretty sure they are here to stay.”
New York Daily news reports that Christopher Byrne, aka The Toy Guy, is a long-time paid consultant with the toy industry and also takes special fees to mention specific toys on TV broadcasts. The TV stations said they did not know that, should have been told and won’t have him back unless that is disclosed during the broadcast. The unasked question is did any stations ask before asking him to appear? His close association with the toy industry and was visible for years.
From Sree Sreenivasan writing on Poynter Online — The Year’s Best WebTips.
After David Byrnes premiered his PowerPoint art in LA, Clive Thompson writing in New York Times highlights Edward Tufte’s essay that PowerPoint is a terrible way to convey information. From the Times article: In his slim 28-page pamphlet, Tufte claimed that Microsoft’s ubiquitous software forces people to mutilate data beyond comprehension. For example, the low resolution of a PowerPoint slide means that it usually contains only about 40 words, or barely eight seconds of reading.
Wired Magazine has a column by Tufte highlighting points in his essay and a column by Byrne about making art on PowerPoint. Wired later published this interview with Byrnes. Tufte’s pamphlet can be purchased from his site.
Another use of PowerPoint: The Gettysburg Address.
Steve Outing reviews the first 10 years of online news including what news organizations are not doing well such as failing to grasp that “published content online isn’t nearly as powerful as the communication between people that the online medium facilitates. E-mail and chat were consistently the features that were most popular in the early days — not news stories published online. Most news companies still don’t grasp this.”
Also: “Carlson (David Carlson, Cox Foundation Palm Beach Post professor of new media journalism at the University of Florida at Gainesville) suggests that where the news industry makes its biggest mistake is in failing to create services that are personally useful to people. E-mail; instant messaging; e-commerce; package tracking. It’s no easy task, but the news industry still needs to figure out how to offer online services that are as personally useful as those.”
From Reuters on why funeral-home operator Stewart Enterprises laid off workers: The company said earlier this month it would cut 300 jobs, or about 5 percent of its work force, to reduce costs after several years of declining deaths in its markets. Gee, that’s too bad people didn’t die according to budget.
The Denver Business Journal looks at HR issues instant messaging raises in the workplace. Among 300 employees surveyed about instant messaging: “One-third said they had made “sexual advances” over the popular chat and real-time messaging software; and 65 percent said they had used IM to criticize company management.”
Counter that with issues about employee privacy and what happens to employee morale if employees feel spied upon, and it looks like more minefields for companies to tread.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution has a three-day series on spam including a spam entrepreneur being pinched from all the efforts to block spam. She says her business is now only break-even.
Jonathon Delacour writes a good piece about information overload and how we waste our time with unnecessary information. It’s the dilemma of urgent versus important information. Much of the day’s news is urgent, but little of it is important.
Highlight: “Self-employment, a constant Internet connection, a weblog, and a mildly addictive personality turn out to be a killer combination?even for someone who no longer feels compelled to post regularly, let alone every day”.
The Color of Money group tracks political contributions down to ZIP codes. Check out your area with their site.