Month: December 2006

Shannon Wynne is the head honcho at The Flying Fish, The Flying Saucer and 8.0 and has gone out and bought himself a Prius while living in all places – Highland Park.
Find out why.
Anyone else bought a Prius or considering buying one? Why or why not?

From Sojo.net…

Happy are those who consider the poor; the Lord delivers them in the day of trouble. The Lord protects them and keeps them alive; they are called happy in the land. You do not give them up to the will of their enemies.
– Psalms 41:1-2

It is in community that we come to see God in the other. It is in community that we see our own emptiness filled up. It is community that calls me beyond the pinched horizons of my own life, my own country, my own race, and gives me the gifts I do not have within me.
– Joan Chittister

The Lord provided a miracle to televangelist Benny Hinn: a Gulfstream G4SP plane to help deliver the Gospel to the world. Except, the Lord got kinda stingy when it came time to pay for the thing, dubbed Dove One. So Hinn has written a letter asking for donations.

I ask you to prayerfully read the brochure I have enclosed. I am praying that the Lord will speak to you to be one of 6,000 partners who will give $1,000 now or in the next ninety days to cover the remainder of the $6 million down payment for this powerful ministry tool for evangelism.

I’d expect a free trip to somewhere if I gave $1,000 for someone else to buy a Gulfstream. But then again I’m a little stingy.

via Frontburner

A teacher in Chicopee, Massachusetts challenged himself to cut as much electricity as possible from his new home.
According to the Christian Science Monitor, he exchanged incandescent bulbs for compact fluorescents, put switches and surge protectors on his electronic equipment to reduce the “phantom load” – the trickle consumption even when electronic equipment is off – and bought energy-efficient appliances.
The changes cut his energy bill by two-thirds. Wow!
And the energy cut earned him an audit by the local electric company.
The company thought he’d tampered with his meter. “They couldn’t believe I was using so little,” he says.
Via Treehugger.com

Seems like everyone’s throwing their hat in on the future of newspapers. What do you envision as the future of newspapers? I hope Cuban’s right. I see his future as one the readers will want – or at least I will.

I wrote a couple posts ago that sales should be a core competency and paper and local media outlets should be selling everywhere and anywhere that their customers allow them to. That local media has a local salesforce and thats a huge differentiation that needs to be a focus.
The same applies to local newsgathering. Reporters have recorders for interviews (every one i do these days). Some interviews could easily be expanded to include video. Should the reporters be required to not only write a story, but also edit the audio and even video of an interview ? ABsolutely. I recommend that EVERY reporter or columnist spend a morning with a disc jockey in a radio station. Watch how quickly and easily they edit together audio into a package they turnaround in seconds and put on air. Take a look at how easy it is to use basic video editing equipment.
Once you have packaged the interview or story, a quick fact check, and it should be posted to the net.

CNET’s Veronica Belmont breaks down why she thinks Apple Computer’s iPod Nano is the best pick for a portable music player this holiday season.