Poor teenage Tim Gunn. 
Glad your life got better. Love you!
I would never have known about this video, but it’s in the news today because it was pulled from Tim Gunn’s Facebook page. It’s all about the Jackie Kennedy challenge. You must watch. Follow the link below.
Anyone that has an account on a site like WordPress, Blogger, Tumblr, etc. has something to say. For the most part, our words and pictures go unnoticed. Friends may read our posts, but otherwise we’re just part of a silent fog floating around the internet.
As long as there has been individuals like myself putting free content out there, there have been traditional content sources milking off of it. While I consider myself pretty savvy about protecting myself and my intellectual property when it really counts, this week I did feel the slight slimeiness of internet content thievery happening around me.
One of my duties at my job is to be very current on subject matters related to the products and services that appeal to our customers. As such, I scan through a tremendous amount of news feeds, blogs, and social media like Twitter daily. I love being able to promote things that are off the grid. When I do, I point straight to the original source and give them full credit. This week, I found a great news story on a very small local news provider (well…local to that area. Not in my city). I promoted it in real-time on our company websites. It was a cute story. A few days later, our traditional editorial group tossed out a newsletter they were originally going to send, repackaged the content of this cute news story (with a tiny hyperlink to small-town site) and pushed it like their idea.
So why does this bother me? It’s even more promotion for that small site right? I suppose because of the latency of their content. I’m bothered by the fact that as traditional print media they are not engaged enough with their subject matter to have seen this first. The fact they had jump last minute to switch out content that I (as an non-editor) found first, is bothersome. I suppose knowing the person responsible for the switch adds to my irritation. I was not given the slightest bit of credit. The team and this person comes from the mindset of letting others do the work, swooping in last second and taking credit.
That really is a trend with traditional media sources these days. Don’t get me wrong, I love things like ABC News and TIME Magazine. But lately they’ve been doing the same thing on a more prominent scale. TIME magazine tweets constantly about things they’ve stumbled upon. Literally it links back to sources like StumbleUpon and BuzzFeed. They put 2-3 paragraphs on their website and repackage the news as their own. Just like the people at my work.
Then again, I suppose that’s all this blog is really. I find stuff elsewhere and talk about it. However, I’m not profiting off of it. They are. Maybe that’s the tipping point. Am I pissed I don’t make money off my finds? Maybe. Maybe not. I’m really not sure what my beef is. Maybe it’s just the gross feeling that a popular kid just grabbed homework out of my hand and handded it in for themselves.
I wonder if smaller sites feel the same thing when a site like ABC News feeds off their content? On the one hand, you are grateful for the traffic. But on the other, if that traffic doesn’t convert in to new readership/viewership, what’s the benefit? Just a drop in the bucket. Momentary traffic. The big boys grow in popularity and you go back to being obscure.
On a similar note I had the grimy feeling of being quoted out of context this week. I got into a Twitter conversation about a local subject and I tweeted a series of random thoughts. Not necessarily my own views, but kind of devil’s advocate stance. One of the people on the other end reading was a freelance writer. I knew this person was going to write a story, and at the time of the conversation I was actually kind of excited to see the final result.
Read it.
Bullshit.
I know I can’t control what happens to my words once they are out there. No one can. That is the peril of having a voice. But what truly bothered me is my quote was used as a example of how ignorant people are on the subject.
Oh no you didn’t!
Say what you will about my “I don’t give a fuck” sassy quick blog posts. Yes they are filled with typos. Yes my language gets a little backwards because I’m trying to sneak these things in at work and I’m multitasking. But anyone that knows me knows this – I am smart. Magna cum-laude smart. I downplay it. I don’t like calling attention to myself because I have a shitload of other problems and I like to blend in. But I am a very smart well-educated lady.
I will be damned if some low-grade freelancer takes my words out of context to set me up like an ignorant hick. I am not.
It’s one of those things that as a individual you really need to be proactive about in a digital community. Every thing we type, be it on Facebook, Twitter, or a blog, is out there for public consumption. If you are concerned about reputation management, you need to be on the ball.
I was quoted as my Twitter handle, not myself. So who cares? Well, I don’t really. It’s a made-up anonymous persona anyway. It just served as a reminder to myself not to be quite so forthright with people I don’t know. I’ve got kind of a regular posse on Twitter. We all have each other’s backs. However, this was a person recommended by another person and I don’t really know them. That’s when you get in trouble.
Trust your gut people. There are content vampires out there just waiting to suck your brilliance away.
Posted in Controversies, Ramblings
Tagged blogging, freelancers, journalism, social media, social networking
The YMCA is rebranding and officially changing its name the “the Y”.
The Village People have sworn they will still sing YMCA at their concerts. In their offical statement they said, “We are deeply dismayed by today’s announcement from the YMCA that they feel a name change and a rebranding are in order after 166 years. Some things remain iconic and while we admire the organisation for the work they do, we still can’t help but wonder Y.”
LOL. “wonder Y.”
Belated rant, but the morning radio show I listen to was all over the Mel Gibson tapes yesterday morning. The guys LOVED it. Fucking loved it. Played certain parts over and over in a loop.
I understand the comedic potential of this one. I’ve watched the YouTube disco remix. HOWEVER…
The fact these guys were all “yeah you tell that ho” was just disgusting.
I am not saying this Russian mistress chick wasn’t in it for the fame and connections. She totally was. Mel was a moron who went ahead and made his own record label just for her. And she can’t really sing. She totally played him. But that doesn’t give Mel carte blanche to be a mean drunk who verbally and physically abuses the mother of one of his children. If he didn’t want this whole massive clusterfuck of problems, he and his Catholic morals should have used a condom and been decent to his ex-wife Robyn. My god that woman must be tough as nails to have lived with him all those years.
Anyway, the point of this is that it bothers me quite a bit that guys are all hive-fiving and cheering Mel for talking shit about his mistress. She’s not a saint, but he’s certainly not a hero.
Seriously, I wish I hadn’t.
The link is spreading on all the main celebrity blogs. It sounds like he’s about one more comment away from hitting her. Bad stuff.
Lunch today pretty much centered on LeBron James talk. I couldn’t have cared less. My only contribution to the conversation was the observation that he has a gnome beard.
This led to my mind wandering into a different direction.
What exactly would a gnome beard be in slang terms? Dating someone to mask the fact you are in fact a garden gnome? Would this happen in fantasy realms? Would say a gnome dating a fairy give off the appearance he’s really a dwarf?
Are gnomes considered asexual? I mean people in England are getting in trouble all the time for sexy garden gnomes. Then again, garden gnomes tend to be pretty old little sprites. It’s all white beards and sensible shoes. They probably would need gnome Viagra (Gniagra? The power of the falls in your pants?).
Fairies are always lying around like Playboy models on dew-covered flowers, but I don’t really imagine gnomes are getting it on in the tulips after midnight.
Then you have dwarfs who are like mini-Vikings, off mining various types of ores and beating the shit out of other mystical creatures with their big clubs. I think a dwarf would love to bang the bejeebus out of a fairy. So if a gnome were going to try and pass himself off as something other than gnome, hooking up with a fairy, dying his beard, and getting clunkier shoes to pass himself off as a dwarf would be a definite path in life.
Gnome beard. Random thought for the day.
News of the day is that L.A. police have opened up a domestic violence investigation of Mel Gibson and his Russian girlfriend.
This pains me. I had a massive crush on Mel back in the day. Loved Braveheart. Think he’s a talented guy. But news like this is pretty hard to swallow. I’m not a huge fan of actors who are a mess in real life. I like the ones who are good people. I’ll forgive just about any stinker Hugh Jackman makes because he seems like a really nice guy in real life. Nicolas Cage? That guy has to be awesome at dinner parties.
But Mel? Wow. You really have fallen. I can’t forgive you on this one. I feel really bad for your kids.
A few weeks I ago, the #1 reader of this blog and I went to Stillwater to see Neil Gaiman speak. It was wonderful. I talked to the man, touched him, and all-in-all it was a helluva day.
This past week our local newspaper the Star Tribune wrote a cover story about the program that brought Gaiman to Stillwater in the first place, Club Book. The paper did it’s best to stir up controversy about the speaking fees of the authors, with Gaiman’s being the highest. He was paid $45,000 to appear. Given his pop culture status and what he could have commanded, I actually find that pretty reasonable. But now every loud-mouth wannabe Fox News reporter is claiming indignity on the subject. Another tax payer brouhaha. First of all, not paid by tax payers. Second of all, it was allocated as such that it could not be spent on the libraries themselves (books, computers etc.) Thirdly, it was fucking Neil Gaiman and he brought his dogs. It was awesome.
STFU Star Tribune. If this make Neil Gaiman change his mind about the HOTR party in October, I’m storming the damn offices.
Don’t bother looking for tickets on Ticketmaster. I tried. Nothing available. Would have been great to see Coco live. Oh well.
