It appears that the blogosphere, the media, and parents everywhere are “outraged” because of this photograph being taken and used in the June issue of Vanity Fair. It seems that the 15 year old super-star allowed herself to be photographed by Vanity Fair photographer Annie Leibovitz, the FAMOUS photographer. This was done while her father was right there. A blogger by the name of Lin Burress was quoted in an interview as saying, “Parents should be extremely concerned. Very young girls look up to Miley Cyrus as a role model.” Frankly, if I had a young daughter, I would prefer that she look up to Annie Leibovitz as a role model, though I have nothing at all against Miley. 

Come on people! I’ve seen more “naked” 15 year olds in magazine ads and walking around in public. Ooooh… she’s showing her naked back! So what? Has everyone gone crazy out there? There are kids her age dying every day in Iraq, or being slaughtered in Darfur. Police just discovered that some sicko in Austria began raping his own daughter at the age of 11, and has since fathered at least 6 children with her! If parents want something to get upset about, what about these things? Where is everyone’s priorities? For God’s sake, open your eyes and look at the real world!

Almost as a followup to my earlier post about “Web 2.0″ comes another angle. I don’t personally know Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, the co-authors of “Groundswell”, a book that claims to help big companies determine what Web 2.0 strategies are right for them. They were at yesterday’s Web 2.0 Expo, pitching their book. 

Nor have I read their book, but I have browsed through some of their ideas on their own blogs. Josh Bernoff has been quoted as saying,

An important first step is to understand the cost and benefit of harnessing these new technologies. For instance, the first-year cost of starting an executive blog for a Fortune 500 company is about $285,000. Executives must be trained how to blog, and it must be vetted by lawyers and Web Designers, and that costs money.

Excuse me? $285,000 U.S. Dollars?!? Where did this guy pull that figure from? Sadly, some naive business people are buying this book and are actually taking the content to heart! The book is hard bound and comes in a sickeningly bright green and yellow cover, available for $19.77 at Amazon. But don’t stare at the cover too long, because I think there is some kind of subliminal advertising built in to those swirling circles. 

Here is what I think blogging is all about. Communication. Nothing more, and nothing less. It’s more modern, it’s instantaneous, and it can be informative, educational, and even funny. But it is still just another form of communication. I can just imagine some big CEO, trying to figure out what to write in their business blog each day, surrounded by a team of attorneys and a webmaster with a really BIG grin on his or her face.

The problem is that too many people are looking at blogging as a means of getting into your head and making you buy something. It is degenerating into just another marketing tool. Fussing over every word we write, just so we can include well thought out key words. Purposely misspelling the names of our competitors, just to get those extra search engine hits on Google directing links back to our own site.

So for the record, if any business people out there truly believes that they have to spend $285,000 in order to have a successful blog, please contact me via my blog and I guarantee that I can do this for them and it will cost much less. I’ll even make your blog pretty for you. I’ll take the responsibility of coming up with your daily posts with a minimal amount of your time and assistance, and I will even bend my own moral scruples and include keywords and search engine optimization techniques if you so desire. But please, keep those lawyers a safe distance from me. I don’t write well with someone reading over my shoulder.

photo credit: jeremyfoo

It’s amusing sometimes to read about “new” ways of doing things, when they are actually just a rehash of the older way things were done.

Here’s one example – the use of the term, “Web 2.0.” Of course, there are various definitions as to exactly what this term means, but one of the generalized definitions describes Web 1.0 as being mostly information oriented, and Web 2.0 as being more content oriented. One key element of this distinction is that Web 2.0 not only relies on content, but actually depends on user participation to provide and share that content.

In the “pre-dawn days” of the Internet, there were systems called a BBS (bulletin board system), and networks like FidoNet. A BBS was a program that was run on a host computer that allowed users to literally dial-in via slow speed modems. Today’s model of that would be the user forums on individual websites. Users shared information, discussed topics of interest, and provided file transfers for images and software. In other words, the users provided the content.

As these systems began to grow, it was recognized that some method of sharing this information across the country (and later the world) needed to be designed. FidoNet was one of these new methods. If the host of a BBS wanted to expand, he could join FidoNet. Each day (usually at night), all the new material to be shared from his BBS would be packaged and compressed, then forwarded to larger FidoNet nodes. These nodes in turn would collect all the packages and send them on to the next stop. While doing this, FidoNet also combined the information it received, and sent it back to each member of FidoNet. This was the forefather of today’s Usenet. This process was done by telephone modems, and it could literally take days for someone to reply to a post you made. In my eyes, this was actually the precursor of the Internet, or what should really be referred to as Web 1.0. So “Web 2.0” should probably be at version 1.7 or something along those lines.

Another example is the concept of “cloud computing,” which is defined as the movement of software applications and services from individual PCs to centralized data centers, where they are made available via the Internet. Google and Microsoft are investing heavily in this concept. Ironically, this process also describes the old-fashioned data centers with mainframe computers and dumb terminals.

When I was a Network Consultant, I had a client that had an information system based on the AS400, but they also wanted to set up a local area network (LAN) using PCs to use more modern software tools. The solution was simple enough, as IBM manufactured a PC card and emulation software so that each PC could connect to the AS400 and pretend to be a dumb terminal while still offering the benefits of local computing on the PC.

So the CFO of this company made the decision that every employee that used a PC or dumb terminal should get a brand-new, top of the line PC with the emulation card and software installed, and they should all be networked together. As a consultant, I did my best to change his mind, even though this project was going to provide me with some hefty profits.

At first glance this “solution” may have seemed like a good idea. But the truth was, a large percentage of the people with dumb terminals did nothing but data entry. They had no use for a PC, and in fact, the AS400 emulation on a PC was not 100% bulletproof and required a larger number of IT personnel to train the users, manage and support the network, and keep the business running. The new CRTs and computers took up more desk space, and used more electricity. All of the existing dumb terminals were dumped (at the local landfill). Within the year, that company went bankrupt and several hundred people lost their jobs.

So this concept of “cloud computing” is nothing new, and it has the potential to create the same kind of problems I just described. Personally, I would prefer a hybrid of the two, but based on the needs of the individuals and not just because it is supposed to be the latest and greatest way to do things.

photo credit: twenty_questions

Since this is my own personal blog, I don’t have to worry about any mandatory number of posts per week with a specific number of words for each post. I’m glad.

As a freelance writer looking for ways to supplement my income, I often take a look at various freelance writer’s job banks. With the preponderance of new blogs popping up, freelance bloggers seem to be in high demand. Today I found a request that was unfortunately a good example of what is available out there.

This particular company wants a minimum of 3 posts per week of at least 400 words each. The posts had to be “lively” and “enthusiastic” and required a significant amount of research each week in order to come up with the type of content they are looking for. The pay offered was $84 per month.

Here’s the math. At 3 posts per week, we are talking about 156 posts per year. $84 per month = $1008 per year. That means a pay rate of $6.46 per post.

In order to earn an annual income of say, $40,000 per year (before taxes and expenses), a writer would need about 40 similar blogging jobs. 3 posts per week x 40 jobs = 120 posts per week! In order to do all that research and writing, I figure I would have to write 24 posts per day if I want weekends off. In a normal 8 hour work day, I would have to write and submit 3 posts per hour. That is only 6240 posts per year.

Excuse me, but that’s INSANE! The sad part is - this was one of the better offers. I’ve seen many companies that want bloggers, but only offer a penny per word (or less), and they want larger articles with photos and/or video - and they want you to send them two examples of posts you would write for them!

My understanding is that there are a few very rare bloggers that are making a living by blogging, but I suspect even these writers are living on a shoestring and have no life of their own. It’s all really pretty sad.

 One of the things that I have been very interested in lately is animation. The amount of work, planning, and talent involved in animation is just mind boggling. I came across this wonderful “amateur” stop-animation video and just had to share. If I ever get even half as good as this guy, I could die happy. I’m putting this one in my “Poetry” category because it is literally, animated poetry. Check it out.

A SHORT LOVE STORY IN STOP MOTION from Carlos Lascano on Vimeo.