The Sift (July 11, 2014)

Happy Friday! Here's some recent internet articles that caught my attention and I felt like sharing.

ENGADGET -- The Guardian's new US newspaper has a robot editor-in-chief

TWISTED SIFTER -- This is What Happens When You Fly a Drone Through a Fireworks Show

THE ATLANTIC -- The Trick That Makes Google's Self-Driving Cars Work

ENGADGET -- Her name is Cortana. Her attitude is almost human. - I think it was brilliant to name the fledging personal assistant after the futuristic very advanced artificial intelligence from a video game (and use the same voice actor). The fact that the AI isn't supposed to have a lifespan longer than seven years is gotta be an annoying point I assume they'll eventually retcon.

ENGADGET -- What you need to know about commercial drones

This is not news, @nbcnews

I feel bad for the injured people and the families of those killed and I'm embarrassed for NBC News. (I was also not on this flight.)

Also sad - search for it on YouTube and you'll see video people shot as well as ads above and below it for Disney/Pixar's Planes. Might want to adjust your ads, Disney.

Open Letter to Pacific Lutheran University: Disband The Mast

Dear PLU Alumni Department,

As a former Mooring Mast staff member (and just about every other student media and the school's first webmaster), I would respectfully like to make a request that the Mooring Mast be disbanded for the rest of the year and the faculty adviser be replaced.  I don't know a lot about this recent incident where their website was temporarily pulled -- except based on their own coverage on Facebook and their inexplicably obtuse apology*, but it's that very apology that seems to suggest that maybe a bigger lesson need be handed down by the University.

I know such actions (were they even to be considered) wouldn't be considered lightly and no actions would be taken on the basis of a single former alumni, but this is really embarrassing and a slap in the face to legacy and history of this publication and all the students and advisers over the years who have participated in it.

James Lamb '96

*https://www.facebook.com/MooringMast/posts/10150452414354721?notif_t=feed_comment_reply

Seven-year-olds everywhere are giggling...

While not offensive, when did that become commonplace?

msn-butt-c.jpg

The Problem with the Internet

So last night, the internet once again captivated me in the strange way it does.  It's such a good example of how dangerous it can be to someone like me, inately curious, especially when the one thing I wish I had more of was time.  The internet can so quickly rob me of that.

So last night I started on the homepage of MSNBC.  And then Arab League threatens sanctions against Syria. So then I had to look up Syria on Google Maps.And then I wandered around the Middle East until I ended up in Tarsus in Turkey.  And then I was puzzled by street names ending with the abbreviation "Cd" and "Sk" 

So, off to Wikipedia and then it was all rabbit trails from there:

• Street Names
• Streets and Highways of Washington, DC
• Malbone Street Wreck - a subway crash in New York that claimed the lives of 93 people, thanks to a train going to fast with an inexperienced scab driver on a brand new tunnel
• Circus - a bigtop misdirect, thanks Wikipedia
• Drake Circus Shopping Centre
• Charles Church - the shell of a very old church, bombed in 1941

And then just like that, more than 30 minutes was gone.  Reminds me of this NSFW xkcd.

Never did figure out what CD or SK meant.

Open Letter to the Seattle Times

Dear Seattle Times,

Please stop calling to tell me you're "going to start delivering the Seattle Times to my house for free Monday through Saturday."

I'm on the Do Not Call List. I've given warnings (and you claim you're not selling something but offering it for free. Ha. Don't care.), but from now on, I'm reporting you every single time I see you on the caller ID, even if I don't pick up the phone.

You call often. Like every day for a few weeks while we dodge your call. And then when I do finally take the call, that maybe buys me a month of peace and quiet before you start calling again.

And your salespeople are so pushy and belligerent and think you have an answer for everything.

My claim: I get my news on the internet.
You ask: Which website?
My response: I list off a bazillion in rapid fire including seattletimes.com and all of the local TV and radio websites. (Maybe next time I leave off seattletimes.com and mention seattlepi.com.)
Your claim: Only 30% of news is actually published on the internet.
My counterclaim: So much for "only the news that's fit to print" and "I guess seattletimes.com is not an authoritative source for news."
Next time: "Who takes the time to come up with statistics like that? Or did you just make it up? Because 74% of statistics are made up on the spot."

My claim: I used to get the paper. I probably didn't read 70% of it. (Callback, holler! I used it later in the call, was pretty proud of it and think it sailed right over the guy's head.)

My claim: The internet is more efficient, better for the environment.
Your claim: Uh... wha... what do you mean? (Not really a claim, more of a stammer.)
My response: You have to cut down the trees, transport them to the press, print the paper, put it on a truck and drive it to my house. That's all kinds of bad for the environment.
Your response: Your computer is worse for the environment than the newspaper.
My response (unspoken): You are truly one world class moron, with amazing tenacity.

Your claim: But you won't get the coupons.
My response: But we do get the coupons. They come in the local newspaper we get for free. And my wife has other (legal) methods of acquiring additional copies of coupons for free.
You: Again, stuttering and stammering.
My response for next time: And besides, aren't the coupons in the Sunday paper, the one you're not delivering?

You didn't mention comics again this time, but if you did, I'd ask - do you have a week's worth of Dilbert in color? Because my Dilbert-a-day calendar at work does. Do you have Garfield minus Garfield? No? Because Google Reader does. Do you have Calvin and Hobbes? No? But that's the only comic I like. Is there big advertisements taking up the places where you used to have comics? Because that's what I remember from the last time i had the newspaper.

My claim: You can't update your stories with new information like the internet can.
Sullen silence.

Journalism needn't die, but the printed newspaper is anachronistic (I think I'll use that word next time and then ask them if they know what it means) and needs to go away. I know that without the tangible some people forget to get news, or they only get it from Jon Stewart, The Onion and The Colbert report, but that's not their problem, that's the media company's problem for not being a product people want.

So Seattle Times, stop calling.

Thank you.

Literacy is Dead

Or at least proofreading is. Apparently neither Reuters nor MSNBC employs copy editors or proofreaders?  (My best guess is that this was written out by hand and then scanned in, but this just proves again how wrong an idea it is for Oregon to allow students to use spell-checkers during writing tests.)

(click to enlarge)

Print is Dead

Everywhere I've lived, I've been harassed by unsolicited calls asking me to subscribe to a newspaper, I've even been conned once or twice by less than scrupulous salespeople.  I've had paid subscriptions to dailies, the Tacoma News Tribune and Los Angeles Times.  I've delivered a free weekly.  And now I live in a town with two newspapers - one that comes once a week in the mail and one that comes twice a week delivered to the edge of our driveway.  I've had letters to the Editor in more newspapers than I can remember, and been featured in the everything from our local twice-weekly to The New York Times.  In Jr. High, High School and College I worked on the school paper, as a reporter and copy editor.

But I've also been known to say "Print is dead."  But now, to see it happen, I'm a little saddened.  A few months ago The Hearst Corporation announced to The Seattle Post-Intelligencer newsroom that it was putting the newspaper up for sale and giving the process 60-days.  A few days ago I was talking about it with friends and I was thinking "Yeah, the time limit must be nearing the end."

Tomorrow, it turns out, is the end.  The last issue has been printed and will be delivered to subscribers tomorrow.  And on Wednesday, 117,000 people will start receiving The Seattle Times instead.

According to Wikipedia, The Seattle PI was founded before The Seattle Times, on December 10, 1863.  It had lost money every year since 2000.  E.B. White was an employee at one time.

Can an online only newspaper survive?  Time will tell, but I'm not sure.  It'll really have to rely on distribution/syndication partners like Google News, CNN or MSNBC.  And while being able to publish a news story at any time on their website, I think without needing to fill a certain number of pages on a deadline that focus will be lost.  And competition online will be fierce - all the other local newspapers, radio stations, televison stations - all of whom have another media source to help cross-promote.  Not to mention bloggers and national media and other online news sources like Crosscut.  If it's got anything going for it, it is supposedly one of the most visited newspaper websites in the country.

The article also noted a bunch of new initiatives the new online-only newspaper was planning.  My only questions is - what had stopped them from launching those initiatives online and in print years ago.

Onward.

Cool Site: Newsmap

I think this is pretty cool. Would make an excellent screen saver. Newsmap pings Google News to find out what the biggest stories are and displays them all on a grid. Brighter color for newer article, bigger box for bigger story. Refreshes itself every (15?) minutes. I like to leave it on my second monitor at work when I'm focusing on something on the other monitor.

Tree of News

MSNBC.COM -- For 10 years, a woman (now 24) has been reporting on local news, women's issues, and lately, the war in Darfur -- in handwritten dispatches she's hung on trees in her city. Recently, her work has been picked up by an African Union-run publication and someone's recently provided her a computer and printer to allow her to do more. Kinda cool. More...