Jack Kerouac wrote: “Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life.”
His words are the creed of the RV set also known as Tin Can Tourists, Gypsies and Escapees. These ramblers whittle their lives down to the bare necessities, have a yard sale, sell the house, grab the kids, stuff themselves into a thirty foot home on wheels and hit the road.
Some move on every three days, some stay a month or more and work, some home-school the kids parked beside the Grand Canyon. Once they’ve tasted life like this, they don’t want it any other way
More on Media – ad rates & circulation
Tribune owned Newsday is evidently offering reduced ad rates and a guaranteed circulation minimum (“rate base”). Any business/organization that is not evaluating/changing ad spending is operating at a competitive disadvantage.
Kevin Delaney writes that new media is increasingly challenging “old media” for effective ad dollars:
When executives at DaimlerChrysler AG’s Jeep division wanted to promote an extra-rugged version of their Wrangler brand last year, they commissioned a videogame that allowed players to drive a Wrangler Rubicon up steep inclines and across rivers. The game — “Jeep 4×4: Trail Of Life” — was relatively inexpensive to produce and the company gave it away online.
Within six months, 250,000 consumers had downloaded it and handed over their names and e-mail addresses to Jeep. Nearly 40% of them said they were considering buying one of its vehicles.
Another bit of evidence that things are indeed changing. I’ve subscribed to the New York Times fishwrap version since my days at the UW in the early 1980’s. This week, I cancelled my print subscription (I no longer subscribe to any print newspapers). I’ve found that the internet is far more useful and interesting from an international, national and increasingly local perspective.
Contradictions, Polls, Politics and Public Spending
Bryan Caplan on the contradictions of US citizens: we’re for spending restraint, but won’t identify any specific cuts. 64% believe spend too much on welfare, but only 26% are willing to actually enforce a 2-year limit if welfare recipients would have to take a “low wage that would make it difficult to support a family.” Fascinating reading.
Politics & Campaign Finance Reforms
Micah Sifry and Nancy Watzman in the L.A. Times (op-ed page): After All, it’s a Multiparty System. A sample:
In a pay-to-play political system, Americans’ votes don’t matter nearly as much as cold, hard cash. That’s why we need comprehensive campaign finance reform, including full public financing, to actually change the rules of the game. Under such “clean elections” systems, which are already the law in Arizona and Maine, candidates who collect a large number of small contributions and agree to abide by spending limits receive a public grant to run their campaigns. In that way, public officials are freed from their direct dependence on private donors.
If somebody is going to own the politicians, it might as well be us.
via doc searls The need for reform is clear, after reading articles like this.
Strategic Biking: Tour de France
Stephanie Tuel writes:
The 18th stage was an excellent example of game theory at work. Lance Armstrong and the peloton were a few minutes back of a breakaway group of 6 riders (none of whom were a threat to the top of the overall standings since all were over 1 hour behind). Reading the various news reports and between the lines it appears that Armstrong’s team, US Postal, was doing all the work at the front of the peloton and the team of the closest competitors, T-Mobile, were loafing. (The crucial strategic variable in bicycling appears to be the effect of wind resistance, especially on the flat and on downhills–whoever is at the front has to work harder, and whoever is following can choose to conserve energy or share the effort.)
Shrimp Bandages
It was a couple of years ago, at least, that we first heard about bandages being developed out of chitosan and now it seems they’ve been put into service in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Chitosan, derived from shrimp shells, carries a positive charge and bonds with a wound’s red blood cells (which are negatively charged) to form a clot in as short as 30 seconds. Made exclusively by HemCon, the bandages use shrimp shells from Iceland, are processed and freeze-dried in New Hampshire, assembled and packaged in Oregon, and sterilized in California. No word on when shrimp bandages will be available to consumers.
Via Gizmodo.
Induce Act Absurdity – continued
I’ve sent an email off to Senator Kohl’s office requesting a statement on the absurd Leahy/Hatch RIAA backed Induce Act. (Senator Kohl is a member of the Judiciary committee). LawMeme has a very useful summary of the proposed legislation.
How does this affect us on Main Street? We plan to use P2P (person to person) tools to share videos from next week’s All City Swim meet.
politics.technorati.com
Very useful site in this election year.
Beside a Wisconsin Lake
Christine Cozzens on visiting Lake Manitowish.
Cars
Saw a pristine Porsche 912 today as I walked into a grocery store. I later talked with the owner who told me that it only had 65,000 miles on it! Regular maintenance is critical to a car’s longevity and reliability as Dennis Budd relates in this 6.5MB video clip (Budd’s Auto Repair on Monroe Street).