I’ve been reading tony pierce for pretty much as long as I’ve been reading blogs. I’ve purchased his books and rooted for him all the way from the xbi to laist to now the big time latimes. He still updates his famous busblog (where he writes about women, music, and sometimes politics, sometimes religion, sometimes his job.) As the blog editor for the LA Times, he oversees that entire section of the site. That’s kind of amazing, considering the fact that he wrote a lot of revealing stuff in his blog over the years. It says a lot about LA Times’ forward-thinking editors who clearly value and respect and understand blogging. Anyhow, seeing that we’re now working in the same kind of profession (overseeing and producing online content as part of a newspaper-branded site), I wanted to get his insight on some topics.

Me: Are there any new trends you’re seeing in the blogging world that bother you?

Tony: Most of the new trends I love: Twitter, Tumblr, FriendFeed, SocialThing, because they are helping bring back the idea that the individual bloggers’ lives matter and those tools make it easier for people to share their experiences with their readers.

The only trend that bothers me, as you say, is the ongoing obsession with people trying to make money off their blogs. I am speaking of the popularity of the Make Money Blogging blogs. These blogs don’t tell the truth about blogging which is: less than one-tenth of one percent of blogs make any real money. You’re better off playing the lottery or OMG getting a second job (or a better primary job) than thinking you can either tweak your blog into some sort of money-making machine.

There are over 100 million blogs out there and about 500 people making money blogging. You have a better chance being a starting quarterback in the NFL. So if you want to blog, blog and forget about the money. Do it because you want to express yourself. If you wanna make money: get a damn job.

Read more »

I am going to co-present a class on podcasting at UMass Amherst on Wednesday night. If you were a student (or if you are a student), what would you want to know about podcasting?

Here is a list of blogs/videos/audio that I need to get to this week.

How not to brand/market your site/newspaper (via Jeff)

Speed Up Windows XP (can’t remember but prolly via Jeff)

Adding blogs and multimedia to your newsroom (via here)

When I have more I’ll add them here

Uploaded using facebook photos plugin. Check out my facebook photo galleries here (imported using the fotobook plugin). I am into the facebook plugins, because I already use facebook to upload my photos and I like the idea of having an integrated social network where I can share photos, but also communicate with my friends in other ways. I think this is why I’ve resisted flickr and other photo sharing sites.

And to think we all used to use a phone to organize our social lives.

Ok, so I found a template in Wordpress that I’m going to stick with. My next step is to go in and search and replace all of the photos from Typepad to Wordpress. I am sort of avoiding that step. After that, I want to find a really good photo plugin.

My old site was sans serif, but I’ve taken the serif plunge. I guess as I’m getting older, this big Georgia font is easier for me to read.

Over last weekend, Amy and I went to Nikon School in Manhattan (Our instructors were Reed Hoffman and Bill Durrence). It was a fantastic experience and we learned a lot, much of which we tested out on a short excursion in Amy’s Astoria neighborhood the next morning. There are galleries on our facebooks and I will try to post some of the photos here. Not incidentally, the photo that is my banner above was taken in Astoria while playing around with white balance settings.

The trip was a battery refresher. I had a lot of time in the car to think and listen to podcasts and music and reflect on my life, since I feel like I’ve been too busy to do that lately.

I warned you. I said I wouldn’t be sharing much about my life in my blog. I have started to feel that nagging feeling that I am neglecting this space, though. I pay a lot of money per year to keep it up and, just recently, I pre-paid sighclub for another year.

2007 has taken me on many new paths and I’ve been thankful for all of them. To recap, I bought a house, became a landlord, ended a long-term relationship, met someone new and got a promotion. All in that order. The brightest highlight has been meeting someone new, with whom I have packed so much life into the past three months. I am grateful for the way my life has turned out, but really could not in any way have predicted things would be this way just six months ago.

Out of respect for all who are involved I will say that the end of the last relationship was a long time coming. Compatibility is so important (although it’s not the only thing) and I have felt with this new relationship that I am way more compatible with this person. I can’t say that I regret anything that has happened to me. I think it would be foolish to do that, considering everything I have done in the past has led me to where I am today. I might not be in the fortunate position I am in were it not for the support of my past relationship. Same with my loving BFFs who have been so steadfast. Oh my girls (not THOSE girls).

So, in the new world life is coming at me pretty fast.

The promotion was huge and although I’d expected it for quite some time I was pleased at how much of a bump-up I got. As recently as this week the pressure has begun to increase. I find that I have virtually no downtime at work, except to run out and grab a bite to eat. Recently, editorial has experienced a number of big successes, so the professional satisfaction is all part of the package. We just need to be able to continue to perform at this heightened level. THAT’s the real challenge.

I’m not going to lie. I do enjoy the job a little less than in the past, but I suspect that will level off and I’ll find my groove again.

In just a few weekends Matt will be coming along with me to Pennsylvania to meet my family. He’s already met my father, so some of the pressure is off. I am excited for him to meet my mother and other family members and to show him the land where I am from. We plan to bring our bikes, ride around ole’ Palmyra to see the sites (ahem), and probably go to Hershey Park. The added bonus is that I went against my nature and took an extra day off of work, so we’ll have another day in PA.

I have to say that one byproduct of getting a promotion is that even though I am much busier than in the past, I didn’t feel bad about taking a day off. I think that is one thing that I should have done more of in the past but I was always worried it would reflect badly on me, that I wouldn’t be seen as a hardworker. So mea culpa and here’s to more balance. Work hard, play hard, right?

The landlording hasn’t been perfect, but overall I’m so proud to be a homeowner. Last weekend Matt and I did some mulching in the front and are now proud to call our mulch job the Patch of Grass Garden or PoGG for short. We tried to mulch around the phlox, but since the flowers have all fallen off and there is grass growing with the phlox, it just looks like 4 to 5 patches of grass. All in all though, it’s pretty freakin’ cute. I need to get the handyman here to start working on my railing. The insurance company is requiring that I install it because of how steep and slopey my front stairs are. This is on my huge to-do list. Also, a big piping problem in the basement was affecting the (let’s say) plumbing in the business part of the house, so that was an added expense. And now, let’s just say that I 1) unfortunately got to see what a (my) sub-basement looks like and 2) the smell of mothballs permeated the house for a while. When I would come home it would stink of them as I walked up the stairs. One day Matt was walking up, the smell hit him, and he yelled out “Mothballs!” Molly was standing right there, so we took to calling her Mothballs for a while. Nicknames always seem to wear off of her, though. Guess that means Molly was a good name for her.

My dad came to visit me a couple of weekends ago. It was a lot of fun! We went to the Basketball Hall of Fame, ate a lot of dinners out, took pictures at the top of Mt. Sugarloaf, went shopping for a camera and a little garden buddha (for his GF), went bowling. I kicked ass at bowling. I’ve still got it people. My dad generously bought me a nikon d40 with an extra zoom lens and 2GB SD card so I have been enjoying getting out and using it. It was his housewarming gift to me and I am grateful for it. I also got a piece of stained glass from he and his GF Maggie when I first moved in. I am trying to find the most perfect spot to hang it. It may end up in the office for now, though, because that’s the only window in the house without mini-blinds. I think it would look funny to hang a piece of beautiful stained glass piece behind a mini-blind, don’t you?

If I can be diary-a like for minute, today is going to be nuts. I have
to drop my car off at the mechanic, work like a dog all day, go into a
meeting at 5:00 (!) and in between all that I have to figure out a way
to get back to my car. I’m sure it will all work out, though.

I know that I glossed over a few parts, but I felt you deserved a proper update. I won’t make any promises, but I will at least be posting new pictures as I get them.

my company is looking into finding people who would like to blog about certain topics… like the red sox or music or anything of that nature. If you have an interest, please send an email to sighclub @ gmail dot com. we’re launching a brand-new blog platform this fall that will feature a huge multimedia package.

-kb

I feel like I really can’t be all that honest on this blog. I guess I shouldn’t say honest. I mean I can’t be too forthcoming, because too many people know who I am. Which isn’t a bad thing. I like people and I like the people I’ve met through blogging.

I am worried too much about what this person or that person is going to think if I post this or that, or what persona I am throwing out there. Of late, I think this blog is just kind of silly. Which is not my nature. At least not all of it. But since it takes so much energy to work what I really want to say into something that is OK to say, seems like a lot of work. So instead I kind of just type silly things or provide links to funny things. To string you along. To make sure that you keep reading. Why? I don’t know.

I wish I was tony and could say that nothing in here is true.

I’ve come to terms with the idea that people are defined by what’s in their blog. I’ve realized that for most people it’s not who they are. Unless you’re anonymous, do you really want to go around looking like a lunatic? No one does. But we write things anyway with varying degress of regret following behind us. And it’s not that we’re lunatics, it’s just that we end up looking like lunatics, or whatever it is we’re projecting out there that we don’t see ourselves.

I have no point. I often don’t. I just type until it’s over.

i wanted to go to this event, but I decided against it on account of not wanting to overspend this weekend. I know I could have gone without actually bowling, but who goes to a bowling alley just to watch other people bowl? And did anyone know that bowling is very expensive now? So, I’m not going. I apologize to the person who invited me.

I would like to report, however, that we had two very delicee-o-so meals this weekend already. The first was the Munich Haus in Chicopee. What’s that, you say? You never thought I would go to Chicopee on purpose? Well, I did. The Munich Haus, despite its frightful yellow awning, is a lovely place to eat German food, if you like that sort of thing. Which I do. I splurged with the combo platter. It included the Jaeger Schnitzel, Rahm Schnitzel and Paprika Schnitzel and there is plenty for leftovers tonight.

Our second delicious meal was our late lunch today at Baku’s African Restaurant in Amherst. Cheap and tasty. I had the chicken curry with rice, plaintains and collard greens. All for $6.

I changed around my blog links a little bit. I took out some dead blogs, killed others that I don’t really read (sorry for the tough love) and put the links in alphabetical order.