Bloggers as Sources (Schilling Speaks)

There has a been a view recent examples of traditional news sources using citing blogs has news sources. This article from the New York Times is a great read on the subject.

This idea is really playing-out these days in the Boston sports world. Outspoken Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling has taken to the blogging world recently with his new site 38pitches.com. Curt has been banging out content at a herculean pace that puts columnists to shame. Even better, he's raising the ire of these same people and causing some serious, albeit sarcastic, worry among the print set.

Basically what Schilling is doing is taking out the traditional middleman and communicating right to the public. It presents an interesting dilemma to the regular newspaper columnists and beat reporters and raises the question of what could happen if all athletes starting taking to the Internet to express their opinions? It could seriously put their profession in danger.

Of course, this would require all players finding the time to actually blog. Something that will probably never happen. But, Schilling is a start. It will be interesting to see how this plays out over the course of the season. While I doubt he will be able to be prolific once the regular season starts, I'm sure there will be a handful of times during the summer where he will cause some controversy. Not only will the media's reaction/response be something to look forward to, but I'll also be curious as to how the Red Sox PR team chooses to handle things.

Technology & the Aging Man

I started tonight with every intention of writing something of substance. Instead, I got caught-up in trying, and failing to make this blog look somewhat visually appealing. You can be the judge, but please allow me to cast my vote of failure.

I think this looks like shit. While I am willing to take my share of the blame, I'd like to heap some on blogspot as well. Blogger has certainly evolved significantly from its humble beginnings in terms of offering more templates for all of our ramblings. However, I think the customization of templates is still a bit limited.

I've been playing around with this thing for an hour or so know, trying simply to get an image for my title. But I couldn't. You would think it would be easy to had an simple user-generated image to your blog, but you would be wrong. In order to get the above, I had to manipulate the actual HTML code. While I'm sure this is probably an easy thing to do, my HTML coding dates back to the stone age of the web when I was creating "gems" like this. As you can see, I was clueless enough that even archive. org doesn't have it stored. (Fortunately, I was able to get some help to offer this design.) Still, I hate to think I'm that dumb that I can't manipulate the code for this page.

Obviously, I am.

I still hold out hope that I'll be able to get this to something that is moderately visually appealing. But, the jury is out. For now, I just feel a bit like a technological dinosaur and hope I can move past this and actually deliver something worth reading soon.

Quick post

I can't muster much for Monday, but did have a couple of interesting things I came across today.

You've probably seen the preview for the new Adam Sandler movie Reign Over Me. As you've also probably guessed, its title is taken from the classic Who tune Love, Reign O'er Me. Pearl Jam did an amazing cover of this tune for the movie, although it wasn't without some initial apprehension. Apparently, the couldn't use "O'er" because test audiences had no idea what it meant. Which, I can only conclude means these audiences are morons.

Second item is from a guy who bills himself as the "Angry Video Game Nerd." I guess he's been around for a while, but some of these spoofs are hysterical. If you grew up in the 80s/90s, you have to check his site out. Here's a primer:


Enjoy.

Badmotorfinger

There is something satisfying, and invigorating about rediscovering the brilliance of an album years after the fact. In this case, the brilliance is Soundgarden's "Badmotorfinger."

Setting aside the sobering realty that this album was released more than 15 years ago (a fact that seems impossible), but playing off the notion that it has been years since I've listened to this disc in its entirety, I'm blown away by its sonic brilliance.

This all started thanks to Sirius' new alternative channel, when the channel served up the album's "Jesus Christ Pose" to me the other day. I was looking for something to get my through a funk at work, something heavy, but loosely familiar. I dialed it up on my iPod and proceeded to be blown away in the same way I was when I first got lost, frightened and then split open by "Searching with my Good Eye Closed."

Soundgarden was obviously an important part of the early 90s grunge scene, along side the usual Seattle players likes Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Alice in Chains. But, it really their "Superunknown" album that most people remember. In fact, I recall about three years ago, when I proclaimed its brilliance after listening to it in its entirety after a similar long layover. But, Badmotorfigner blows it away.

It's so dark, driven by think bass lines, soaring guitars and Chris Cornell's otherworldly vocals. I remembered the "bigger" hits from the album: "Outshined, Rusty Cage, and the aforementioned "Jesus Christ Pose", but it was the lesser known "Room a Thousand Years Wide" and "Mind Riot" that took my right back to remembering how freaking incredible this album was. It really encapsulates the general feeling of malaise and uncertainty that was present in the era.

It also got me thinking about what college kids these days are hanging their proverbial hats on. Is there a sense of uniformity these days? Then, there was a feeling of solidarity, like we were all dealing with the craziness of a changing society and an uncertain future. What to they have know...or do they have anything? Maybe this current generation is a little too self-important...at least according to this article it is.

I'm not sure what my point is, or if I just sound like an old soul trying to relive his past glory. But, damn if things didn't mean something then. If anything, its refreshing to realize that an album that was so important to me back then, still holds up against time.

I was slipping through the cracks of a stolen jewel
I was tightrope walking in two ton shoes
Now somebody is talking about a third world war
And the police said this was normal control

And the candle was burning yesterday
Like somebody's best friend died
And I've been caught in a mind riot

Circadian Rhythms

I'm not well-suited to this new daylight savings time schedule. I'm all for the energy-saving reasoning behind it the earlier change, but my circadian rhythm certainly didn't get the message. While it's nice to know my feeling "off" is an actual physiological issue, it certainly hasn't help my ability to function these last couple of days.

The extra daylight is nice, but there is something unsettling about this extended daylight in March. Although. it seems it only a matter of time before we move to permanent daylight saving time. At least the potential problems with computers ended-up being as eventful as Y2K. Except for these guys.

Continuing with the latest from Deval Patrick, he announced this weekend that he will be cutting back his hours to help his wife battle depression. Sure, he's received the expected criticism from the usual right wing folks, but I applude him. Depression and mental health are still too much of a taboo topic in this day. But, its something that affects many every day. I applaud him for not only making this public, but for helping to raise the awareness of depression. Of course, some would say its just a PR stunt to deflect attention away from this recent issues.

7

The number seven has always served a time-line of demarcation for me, a sort of boundary diving the recent and distant past. It's not sensical at all, and I really don't have a reason why, other than for some reason, the distance between six and seven has always seemed much greater to me than reality. I bring this up because, well, it's 2007.

A memory crossed my mind the other day where I was remember something that happened in 2000. I don't quite recall what it was, but it struck me that seven years ago is a long time.

The cruel irony of time is that its realative; the older you get, the faster time seems to pass. Yet, this reality doesn't seem to want to sink in. And I worry. Not so much about the past, but more so, that my attempts to "live in the present" are being lost. I'm starting to wonder if because of my life-long battle of trying to rectify the past, I'm missing the present. Maybe my "living in the present" is really living just slightly behind real time.

RIP Brad Delp

One of the best voices in rock history met his untimely death today. Brad Delp of Boston found dead today at the age of 55.

Boston was a staple of my high school life, particulary as it realted to my days playing hockey. Boston was always fixture in the locker room before games and on bus rides to long away games. Being local, I'll always have a fond spot in my heart for them.

What's coincidental is I loaded Phish's 7/12/99 show on my iPod this morning; the show where the band returned to Great Woods after four years, and opened with Boston's Foreplay/Longtime. I haven't listened to it in years prior to today. Weird timing. You can download it here.

The offical Boston web site, has a simple statement on his death: "We've just lost the nicest guy in rock and roll."

Don't look back.

Meandering

Updating this on a regular basis is already prooving to be a bit tough. Part of the problem remains, I'm still trying to figure out if I'm trying to achieve anything here.

I'm doing my best to try and get myself as educated as possible about the Web 2.0 world. It's a bit easier said than done, which I'm guessing is a equal parts playing catch-up, battling my own generation tendancies and the sheer massiveness that is the Web. There is just so much out there, that, when combined with my tendancy to constantly menader from one topic to the next, often gets me nowhere. It's the jack of all trades, master of none philosphy that I've always pursued. I tend to always chase down knowledge that I seldom take the time to really digest things in thier entirity. I guess my hope is that all the little bits I pick up with somehow meander there way toward on cohesive eureka moment for me.

For example, take this article I stumbled upon today about a kid who invented a refrigerator that will automatically toss you a beer. Cool ides, but from it, sent me to this site, which seems to be another version of YouTube. I had no idea this site existed, but it looks to be in the same spirit of YouTube. I guess it goes to show that YouTube has become the Kleenex of user-generated videos.

I've got a long way to go. So, on to the fun stuff. But, before I do, I need to give myself a lesson in brevity when it comes to my writing.

New England's golden boy Tom Brady has apparently done it again. A few week's ago it was revealed that his ex was pregnant with his child. Now, he''s done it again with is current Victoria's Secret lady. Even's the man's sperm are the stuff of legend. ESPN's DJ Gallo sits down with a few.

Finally, I never intended this to deal much with politics, but our beloved governer continues to slip-up.