I tweeted this earlier, but it’s worth a brief blog post, too, because this image says everything I have ever wanted to say about America.
For the record, that store is located at this address in San Antonio.
What Was It That I Was Supposed to Remember, Exactly?
Two things that play really well on the Internet: sarcasm and lists. Last summer, I tried to combine both into a segment from Beijing that I called “What I’ve Learned.” As my week in San Antonio is winding down, I wanted to post a few initial impressions from this city.
-Real late-night drive-throughs have two lanes.
-Someone named Bill Miller is making a killing in this town.
-Air conditioning is not part of the lifestyle here; it is the lifestyle.
-If Eva Longoria shows up at a Wendy’s in town, nobody will seem surprised.
-I-10 West really goes North, and I-10 East really goes South. This is understood.
-There may not be a chicken in every pot, but there is a Mexican restaurant on every block.
-Going the wrong way? There’s a turnaround for that.
-Things are bigger in Texas, but it only takes 10 minutes to drive into downtown.
-And they still rent Chevy Aveos here.
-Some people end their conversations with “Hook ’em horns.” Many people do not want to be associated with these people.
-There was something I was supposed to remember in this town. What was it, exactly?
H/T to tomasland for the photo.
Life After College. (or: Life? After College?)
This seemed to work well with my family at Thanksgiving, so I’ll try it again here.
1. Yes, I have a job (with these guys).
2. Yes, I have a fancier title than I deserve (officially: Digital Media Producer).
3. No, the use of Title Case is not necessary, but I like it anyway.
4. Yes, I’m aware that things are bigger in Texas.
5. No, I do not plan on using “You know, they say that everything’s bigger in Texas” as a pick up line.
Never fear: I’ll still be blogging at Dan Oshinsky.com. I’ll just be keeping the pornographically-related stories to a minimum.
H/T to Corey Leopold for the photo of San Antonio’s Riverwalk, and to Dave Barry for the stolen title.
Allow Me to Reintroduce Myself.
I’m noticing a massive spike in traffic from the San Antonio region, so to my new corporate overlords, I say, “Welcome!”
If you’d like to know how I feel about meteorologists, click here.
If you’d like to read about my dedication to finding barbecue wherever I am, click here.
If you’d to learn why I’m a fairly blurry individual, click here.
If you’re wondering whether or not I’m sarcastic, click here.
Thanks,
The Management.
Alone Amongst Strangers (or: a Very Brief Comment About Cell Phone Usage on Airplanes).
A brief overdramatization…
He holds her in his hands, and he watches as the whole of her shuts down, here in front of everyone, and for a moment he is vulnerable, disconnected, his eyes low, like a son watching his father step on to the 3:05 to some desert town, knowing that once that train turns the corner, he’ll never be sure when it’ll come back, and part of him is sad, because he needs her, he needs her right here, pressed up against his ear, telling him what he wants and needs, finding him when he’s lost and waking him when he’s not, and now she’s slipping away, her glow fading, and all he can do his clutch her and watch her leave him, and the voice comes over the speakers again, and it tells him to let her go, because he’s off to the Southland, and he knows that she’ll be back, and it’s time to let her rest, at least for now.
And the man watches her — watches her fade to black — and then he tucks her away into a pouch in his briefcase, and for a moment, he is unmistakably down, because he knows that for a few hours, on this flight from Baltimore to San Antonio, he’s not just disconnected from his emails and his business and his family.
His BlackBerry is off.
He is alone.
How Many ‘R’s Are There in Arugula?
A brief story, told via Twitter.
danoshinsky I may or may not have just spent 30 minutes looking for arugula at the grocery store. No one — myself included — knew what it looked like.
— this quote was brought to you by quoteurl
H/T to Jing a Ling for the photo of arugula, QuoteURL for the help posting these Tweets, and the Giant Food staff for valiantly searching for my dinner.
Bing Has Its First Killer App.
Microsoft’s new search engine, Bing, went live last week, and I really didn’t take much notice. But yesterday, I went to one of my favorite sites — farecast.com — to search for flights, and I found that it’s been rolled into Bing as the search engine’s “travel” page.
For Bing, this is a great move. Farecast is already one of the most powerful travel tools on the web, and users searching for the site will be automatically redirected to Bing. It’s going to generate traffic from users who had no idea that Bing even existed.
Now Microsoft just has to prove that its search engine beats Google’s.
Promoting Transcontinetal, Pau-Related Synergy.
This, I like: The Los Angeles Times has teamed with Spain’s biggest sports daily, Marca, to crosspost Lakers center Pau Gasol’s blog in both English and Spanish.
This, I find strange: The Times’ blog is vastly inferior.
Marca’s blog (see: top left) has a better layout and a better color scheme. It uses larger photos, and it’s much easier to navigate. In terms of Internet readability, it’s also vastly superior.
Meanwhile, the latest post on the Times’ blog (see: top right) isn’t even formatted correctly.
It’s a perfect example of how news organizations should — and should not — be packaging their news. Deliver your unique content in bold ways, and you’ll be rewarded with an almighty click.
Happy Birthday, Casey.
It happened 121 years ago today: The San Francisco Examiner published a poem called “Casey at the Bat,” and Mudville was born.
But it wasn’t until 1906 when the poem became famous. DeWolf Hopper recorded a version of the poem in New York, and his is still “Casey’s” quintessential reading. It’s a great story told by a great storyteller, and I’ve embedded it below for your listening pleasure.
Why Steve Brill is Wrong (or: The World is Flat, But Also Sort of Elongated.)
Steve Brill is wrong.
He’s pitching a plan to save newspapers, and it’s based around the idea that newspapers should begin charging for all-access passes to their sites. And when he’s giving his pitch, just before he’s finished riling newspaper executives into believing that the public is just going to start handing over money in exchange for the printed word, he mentions that journalists are going to have to “change consumer expectations that journalism is free on the web.”
Steve Brill is wrong.
He’s not wrong that journalists are going to have to change the way the public thinks about paying for news. He’s entirely right about that, actually. Free, sadly, is not a sustainable business model.
But he’s wrong when he characterizes this as an “expectation.” It’s not. It is, sociologically speaking, a norm.
If I go to a bar and buy a beer, I’ll leave a dollar for the bartender. Society understands that bartenders work on tips, and we’re willing to self-police those who don’t tip well. There is no requirement that you tip; but certainly, those who tip poorly (or not at all) will be shamed by their peers for breaking a norm.
And if I go a restaurant, eat, and then leave without paying, I’ll be prosecuted (or find my face suddenly plastered on every restaurant wall in town). You won’t find a society in the world where stealing is acceptable.
In the first case, the norm is enforced by peers. In the second, the norm is enforced by the owners of the establishment, or by police.
But look at what’s happening with newspapers. Society does not frown upon those who get their news for free, because:
A.) There’s no norm that says that good journalists should receive extra financing (via tips) from the public for performing a public service 1..
B.) There’s no norm that suggests that getting news for free is stealing.
And without going into the full, 10,000 word Malcolm Gladwell-style breakdown, I’ll say this: norms are hard to create, and even harder to break down.
Arno Peters is proof.
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What you’re looking is a map of the world as — according to many cartographers — it actually appears.
No, really.
In 1973, Peters presented that map at a conference for cartographers. He suggested that Mercator project map — first used in the 16th century — was inaccurate, as it distorted the size and shape of countries. The Mercator map was created for explorers — specially, European explorers — to use when traveling by sea. In that map, countries closer to the poles become especially elongated, while countries near the equator appear smaller.
Essentially, it’s a map that places Europe at the center of the world.
Supporters of the Peters project map say that the map does not treat the Southern hemisphere fairly. They’ll also note that Greenland has an area fourteen times smaller than that of Africa. But on the Mercator map, they appear similar in size 2..
But you won’t find the Peters projection map in elementary school classrooms, and for good reason: it looks ridiculous. The map you trust looks like this, and that’s the way that you’ll probably always envision the world. The norm — since the late 1500s — is that the Mercator map is the true representation of the world, and any suggestion otherwise would be to deny a universal truth.
Could we, as a country, come together and decide that the Peters map is the better, more truthful map? Hypothetically, yes. But it would take decades, because we’d have to change the public’s perception of how the Earth really appears. And can you imagine the looks on people’s faces when we tell them how big Africa really is?
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As new Internet users log online, they’re discovering all of this free content, and they’re already sinking into the idea that free content is normal. It’s those who are charging for content who are the abnormal ones.
The truth is, for newspapers, the window to succeed in changing this norm is shrinking every day.
So what can newspapers do? Maybe a model like Kachingle — which works like a tip jar for journalists — could work, and maybe society will make examples of those who aren’t tipping their favorite sources in the news industry.
Or maybe Steve Brill’s model will catch on, and society will accept the idea that reading news for free is stealing.
Maybe.
Here’s where I’d start: I’d prove that the content that I’m providing is essential. We can live without news of the weird or the latest baseball box scores. But we need news that allows us to remain a informed, dedicated citizenry. The newspapers that provide such essential content will survive.
If I’m going to argue — as newspapers are — that I’m essential to a democracy, then it’s about time I started living up to it. Do that, and maybe I can expect the public to starting paying up.
I’m not advocating premium content. I’m just advocating better journalism.
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1.) And can you imagine if journalists were told that they’d be earning a lesser hourly wage and then making back the rest of their salary via tips? One thing’s for sure: on a tip-based-model, you’d see journalists working harder than ever. >back to article
2.) If this sounds familiar, it’s probably because the map was featured in an episode of The West Wing. >back to article
H/T to Hamed Saber for the image at top, and petersmap.com for the map