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Category Archives: communication
You’re Dead. Stop Kicking Me.
Interactive Television has always failed, and will always fail. A lesson from the early days of telephony is significant. Early on it was thought that telephony would provide a subscriber with a way to listen to opera in the convenience … Continue reading
Hasta la Vista, Baby
We’re cancelling DirecTV service. It’s been about a year since purchasing the HDTV and the associated DirecTV package. Meanwhile, our viewing of “normal” television fare has been steadily declining. We hardly ever watch anything live: we have other things to … Continue reading
Why Do I Use Facebook?
It’s quite simple, really. I use Facebook because I know people who use Facebook. If I say something witty, they can read it, and comment, or laugh silently to themselves, which I imagine is more often the case. If they … Continue reading
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Observations Made While Waiting for an Oil Change
Are the anchors on Fox News trained in rhetorical technique, the use of logical fallacies, and paranoid sarcasm? Or do they just come by it naturally?
Posted in communication
Tagged journalism, journalism schmournalism, media, news, politics
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Parrots
The differences between American media and the BBC World Service in treatment of the financial situation with the automotive industry, or anything really, are just striking. I’ve been listening to WNYC on my drive to the office, so hear NPR‘s … Continue reading
DirecTiVo, your return can not be too soon
Our DirecTiVo was dying. Every now and again, frequently at times, it stopped, hung. Maybe it waiting on a bad block on disk. Maybe it was just the heat. But the only option offered by DirecTV was a replacement with … Continue reading
Posted in communication, rant
Tagged directv, rant, television, user-unfriendly design
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Pointless Distinctions: barriers to entry to Real Journalism
Journalists can obtain a copy of this publication via the Password-protected Web site for accredited journalists or from the OECD’s Media Relations Division (tel. + 33 1 45 24 97 00). Non-journalists can download the raw data underlying each indicator … Continue reading
What Benefit are Wire Services in a Well-Connected World?
As a former employee of The Associated Press, it’s been somewhat embarrassing to watch their plodding attempts to control data which has already escaped from their control. I recall some discussions with graphics and photo editors in 1996 or so … Continue reading
Friend or Foe?
I’ve added Google Friend Connect. I see that Feedburner says that there are 164 subscribers today, so I expect to have more than two members on the site.
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Recommendations
John Battelle made some comment about Facebook and Twitter that Rick Klau shared in Google Reader the other day, and which I’m too lazy to find the link to at the moment, but the gist of which was that sites … Continue reading
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Not Enough Time
We’ve been very busy with work over the past month, preparing for a release this past weekend, and so parts of my normal routine have slipped away, such as grooming and eating dinner with my family. One might almost think … Continue reading
Navel Gazing
For one of her classes last year, D. wrote a paper which analyzes an effect of the self-absorption of the media, in response to one of the unfounded assertions in the class’s text, that the rise of the Internet and … Continue reading
On the Infrequency of Posts
I wonder if Google tweaks PageRank to reflect links shared in instant messengers, Google Reader, Twitter, and other semi-public channels.
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All Kinds of Jargon
After reading The Austrian Economists site for a while now, I notice it shares some features with some papers Niall Ferguson posted on his website. Namely, name-dropping. I’ve been out of academia for 15 years now, since I graduated from … Continue reading
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Counterdisintermediation, in an attempt to remain relevant
A famous character once opined, Never underestimate the power of human stupidity. The executives at ABC are determined to prove that axiom by launching a video-on-demand product that does not include the ability to skip the commercials. But those of … Continue reading
Telephonus Interruptus
Perhaps I have a one-track mind recently, but on viewing this public service announcement [via Movie Marketing Madness, via Rick], I understood the tagline “We won’t interrupt your phone calls” a bit differently than perhaps was intended.
Posted in communication, liberty
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Telephony Substitutes for Transportation
One oddity of visiting my family in Virginia is that there’s little to no cellular phone coverage in Highland County. This is partially due to the landscape, and partially to the lack of antennae, though some claim it is because … Continue reading
Posted in communication, economics, transportation
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Use English, not Jargon
My elder daughter is in first grade. She loves to read almost as much as she loves math. She’s just started the thirty-third book in The Magic Tree House series, Carnival at Candlelight. She was reading Misty of Chincoteague, but … Continue reading
Posted in communication, learning
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Can I Get a Real Person Here?
What does it take to get a real person on the phone these days? I don’t want to talk to the computer. I’m not talking to the computer. I did not buy from a computer, and if you don’t stop … Continue reading
Posted in communication, rant
Tagged customer disservice, customer service, directv, television
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Cablevision Offers TiVo
CED Magazine reports that Cablevision has signed a deal to market TiVo equipment to DISH and DirecTV customers. Someone’s been reading my journal. “For many satellite customers in our service area, there is significant value in the TiVo product and … Continue reading
