Weekly Blog Post #5 - The World is Flat

Recently I have been seeing Cisco Systems commercial where a man is talking to his family through video over the Internet from a remote location. But he is video chatting with his family who are across the world from where he is. Cisco’s slogan for this phenomenon is the “Human Network.” A similar commercial from Cisco has an elementary class in the U.S. connected over the Internet through video with an elementary class from a different country and working together. These examples are somewhat confirming that the world is becoming more flat and our society is becoming more and more globalized. But let us not get too far ahead of ourselves. The technology Cisco advertises is still in a very small fraction of the population to video chat with someone across the world in a remote area.
Thomas L. Friedman says that information, money, and people can move around the world much faster than before. Countries like China and Dubai are boosting their economies like crazy, but what are they sacrificing? China and India accept these petty outsourced jobs from American companies that could stay here in the U.S.
Another problem I have with Friedman’s book is that most people, who live where they live, invest, make phone calls, and search the Internet there. One example, where Friedman is right about global investment, I recently read and heard about a Dubai company making a bid for the English football club, Liverpool, although buyout talks have been dissolved.

Weekly Blog Post #3 - Ziff Davis and Chapter 11

Sadly, Ziff Davis, publisher of a variety of tech magazines and websites, has filed for Chapter 11, which is basically bankruptcy. One of my favorite magazines, Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM), and the website 1up.com where all of Ziff Davis's video game publications post for the web are all affected. Now Chapter 11 doesn't mean Ziff Davis is finished. Yes, they are in a $225 million debt, but by this summer they are planning to cut it to $60 million by giving up nearly 90% of their equity to private investors.

After continually hearing Professor Mack and Michael in my news editing class talk about the dire situation at the Mercury News having a fire sale of lay-offs to my magazine Professor, Tom Ulrich, telling us the magazine business is somewhat thriving, I can't help but think how the hell could this happen. How can the magazine industry be thriving when a publication company as huge as Ziff Davis has to file for bankruptcy? Lately, it is very hard not to doubt whether I made the right decision to pursue a journalism major, I mean, will there even be a job for me when I graduate?

I need to go cheer myself up somehow right now...

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Weekly Blog Post #2 - Parsing the Future

We should all stand up and applaud Ryan Sholin for digging up these fascinating news spin-offs, some of which are created by old fashioned newspaper outlets. For example, the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly's "PolitiFact" website. At this website they compile multiple quotes from the 2008 presidential candidates such as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama and put the quotes through their "Truth-O-Meter" (basically a bullshit meter). Rarely do I ever see a news outlet have the balls to report from the horse's mouth whether what these presidential candidates are saying is true or not in such a simple manner to understand.

Besides websites that report news in new and interesting ways, Sholin also posted websites that can make things more convenient in our everyday life. Take Las Vegas Sun's "Flight Delays" feature. Similar to going to a southwest.com or a jetblue.com, it shows a visual map of the U.S. with flight paths. But this map adds an extra layer of depth by having the choice to pick any airline that fly to Las Vegas and any city that can fly into Las Vegas. After picking a airline and your city location to Las Vegas or vice versa, the map tells you how many flights and delays a certain airport has. It also shows the rank of the airport in descending order of who has the least to most flight delays.