Rakim @ Cat's Cradle 9/27/06

"Follow The Leader"...

Rakim flowed through town last night. He put on an incredible show at Cat's Cradle, and his on-stage presence on the stage is as ultra-smooth as his voice sounds on vinyl.

I finally caught him live. He brought back a lot of memories. I've been rolling around cities to his voice since I was 16 and rewinding VCR tapes to copy Rod Strickland moves.

The show was one of those performances where you keep shaking your head and find yourself saying..."That one was dope..Oohhh that one...How did I forget that one. Damn, keep bringing 'em!"

He's the "MJ" of hip-hop. Yes, debate if you must on that one. Your ego will be flattened like you took on Marvin Hagler.

I placed some pics from the show on my Flickr. Here's a taste...I'll also place some vids on YouTube.

Peace,
IronDog

Rakim
Cat's Cradle

CourseCasting

I see it coming...Yes, I do...

What is it?...Well, after completing UNC Chapel Hill's Certificate of Media and Technology last year, I kept thinking about the impact that it would have upon learning in today's world. It looks like my thoughts of how lectures and material could be opened to the masses are coming more and more into fruition.

Take a look at the content that Cal Berkeley and GoogleVideo have provided.

Major kudos to GoogleVideo and Cal for sharing.

Yes, I'm diggin' up in that Sergey Brin lecture for the "Search Engines: Technology, Society and Business" class.



Your new ad-supported business model?..The wonderful world of 'CourseCasting.' I'm up for it.

Spongin',
IronDog

Grade A's

If you're a baseball fan, you have to give a serious look at what's going on with the Oakland A's out West again...

With their 12-3 win yesterday, the A's popped bubbly in the locker room yesterday. Why should this year's team be regarded as special?...Because Billy Beane and the A's management team have done an incredible job with rebuilding their club over the past two seasons.

Yeah, yeah...yeah...Since the release of Michael Lewis's 'Moneyball', every baseball fanatic has been glaring at the feats of the book's now legendary characters in order to wreak havoc on Lewis' theories and the depiction of Beane as an innovator.

A lot of baseball snobs sneer at the productivity of depicted draftees, Jeremy Brown and Nick Swisher, and they claim that Beane's management philosophy is overrated.

A lot of statheads now claim 'stats, percentages, and models' win...But even they're off. Look at the dull moves of the Red Sox, Blue Jays, and other squads.

They all sneered at drafting college players because they're more seasoned.

Meanwhile, every team bit on the guy's style and overspent on players with high on-base percentages and overdrafted college players.

So what does Beane do?...He switches up the game. He begins to draft guys like Hutson Street and junior college pitchers out of high school, spends dollars on chemistry guys who get walks and can throw strikes, and gambles on guys who have something to prove.

Yet again, he proves that you blend percentages and the knowledge of people's personalities to generate wins.

For the stat fanatics, what makes Beane different is that he believes success in baseball is about controlling the strike zone. Look at this one from Allen St. John's solid Wall Street Journal article last week that showed Beane's types of hitters, know how to work the strike zone. On the hitting side, the A's are currently only one of seven teams to draw 100 more walks than they've allowed.

What amazes me are the major gambles of Beane's trades. With the dumps that Mark Mulder and Tim Hudson took this past season, Beane is a master of the art of "letting go." Even though the trades of Mulder to St. Louis and Hudson to Atlanta freed up a lot of cash for signing centered around Thomas, Zito, and Chavez, they were incredibly gutsy moves that even Beane said were the hardest moves of his career. You have to give credit to his display of 'letting go', which in deal making is an art.

Don't think so...Well, it's one thing to trade numbers or sheets of paper. It's whole other ballgame when you're shuffling talent that you've been nurturing a guy since he was 18 or 21 for a period of seven to eight years. Players aren't just stock prices in a portfolio.

Now, look at his chemistry moves. He picked up a soid Dan Haren from the Mulder trade. He gambled on Frank Thomas, and look at the wonders of his play of late. Jason Kendall has been an incredible pick-up. He kept Mark Kotsay and allowed Nick Swisher to develop. Hell, this guy even calmed an injured Milton Bradley down enough to contribute.

And this year's team has accomplished all of this their second half climb with key injuries to Bobby Crosby, Huston Street, and Rich Harden...Incredible.

Beane bought and traded for talent on the cheap. He emphasized defense and picking up guys who have something to prove. More importantly, he built a team that has not only wins, but also has cohesion in the locker room.

Major kudos to the A's this year. I'm pulling for this crew in Oakland...

I only wish that I could be there sitting in the Uecker seats in Oakland throughout the month of October. Damn that Oakland fall sunset is sweet...

Wonderball in Alameda,
IronDog

Toy Loungin' with Danah Boyd

I've been a big fan of apohenia for some time...



For those who don't know what or who "apohenia" is... "Apohenia" is the tech and culture blog authored by online social networking extrodinnaire, Danah Boyd, who is a P.H.D. student at Cal Berkeley.

As a guest of SILS, she stopped through Chapel Hill yesterday and spoke at Dey's Hall's Toy Lounge on campus.

Boyd is a major gamer due to her blogging prowess. Yet, after seeing her speak in person, you realize that her game is not ruled by blogging but nurtured by a passion for what people, in particular, teens are creating through online social networking. She understands how people and teens are relating to each other online...It's no wonder why she is part of Yahoo University's Social Research team at Cal...She's gets it.

In her talk, she explained how people are transferring their online representations of the self to the people they know through online social networks. With an online profile, people are simply transferring physicality to the oline world. Just as people have adopted fashion, music, or political beliefs as their own to express themselves in physical and real life, people have created virtual extensions of themselves in the online world.

Boyd explored the issues of what people are doing online. She explained that people or 'teens' are presenting themselves to the communities that they inhabit. As she stated...with Fred Stutzman's head nodding up and down in the front row..."People are into building 'cred' with friend and contact lists, and they're only trying to fit in with the peers and social environments where they exist"

She then touched on the questions of why it's a problem for people to be freaked out about how people are presenting themselves and interacting with communities online. With the media's blaring about individual cases of online predators and content issues, Boyd used her research on teens to depict what's happening.

Boyd finds that teens are creating a check and balance process among themselves in their communities. "When people break norms, the issues are discussed." That's good if you're fearing your teen is left alone in cyberspace.

With the amount of time teens are interacting with each other's online profiles and their online communities, they're actually creating safeguards for themselves and their communities.

She's right. Look at how teens will create safeguards for themselves in public. If they're hanging as a team at a IHOP or at a mall...They always look out for each other.

After her harrowing descriptions of how teens are addressing online predators and the dangers that are happening 'offline', she presented a solid argument to present local authorities a limited presence to investigate online behavior. However, I am glad that her research is discovering that despite what the mainstream media reports, teens can find more potential for harm in the 'offline' world through alcohol, drugs, and unsafe sex 'offline' than they can relating to each other and surfing through links 'online.'

**(Note: For marketers, heeding that statement could be good news...Just remember though when you're targeting online communities, how corny you could make your brand appear to them. Just because you market a product online, doesn't establish your product as cool...You better have an identity.

Boyd also made another solid point that could be heeded to behavioral targeting for marketers.

People are misleading in their information provided in online profiles. She believes information could be more than lightly skewed because people are putting in random numbers and places for categories such as 'Age' and 'Location.' After all, how many MySpace profiles have you seen with 'Age: 71', 'Location: Zimbabwe'...I only have to look at my own job description on MySpace. My 'Occupation' currently states 'Trainer/Cut-Man for Ken Norton' right now....She touches on a very good point.

Check back in for more. I'm on with this stuff...**

All said, a great conversation created at Toy Lounge...Leave it up to SILS and the people of ibiblio to pull online gurus into Chapel Hill...Another great guest and by the way, a good spot to have a lecture in the Hill. Nice choice.

As for 'Apophenia', you can tell that she doesn't just read her stuff in the NYTimes and spouts off about teens and online behavior...She's lives the culture, and she relates to how people are interacting online. More importantly, her research is important because a major portion of the future in online behavioral patterns lie in the work created by the youth and teens of the world.

Be sure to check in at her blog.

By the way, check out her posts of what's happening at Facebook. She made a great post on the Facebook's move of feeds. She uses a great anology by comparing the uncomfortability that people are encountering in their new Facebook profiles to the embarassment people find when the music is turned down at a party and they're left shouting out a statement that shouldn't be heard by everyone...Good comparsion.

Big-Ups to Berkeley.

Telegraph Ave.,
IronDog

UNC Chapel Hill SILS
Danah Boyd

Public vs. Private University Stadiums Processes...You Get It?

I've always loved the new stadium debate...

It has hit every town big and small over the past decade. And no one..no one is unscathed with forming an opinion on whether or not to support a new stadium in their local area.

Well, if you're into the stadium arguments, add to this case to your discussion arsensal. Stanford University's stadium expansion is all completed and they're ready to go with a home opener on Saturday...Check out "Time to Take off The Bubble" by Michelle Smith of SFGate.

What should you find interesting?

Look at the speed of the development process...Nine months!

Stanford's AD, Bob Bowlsby, who arrived from Iowa last year, says it all when comparing public and private funding for new stadiums expansion projects.

"It's nothing short of a miracle, what's happened here in the last nine months...I can tell you without any hesitation whatsoever that if this project was undertaken at a public university, that it wouldn't have gotten done in 10 months and it would have been $300 million, if it was a penny."

According to Smith's article, Stanford spent a third of that. The university financed the project largely through the Department of Athletics, Physical Education and Recreation (DAPER) Investment Fund with donations from alumni and "friends" of the university with real estate development tycoon, John Arillaga spending $30 million.

Now, look at public school development projects...Check out the whereabouts on Cal's stadium redevelopment project.

3 years, 3 Phases, $125 Million.

Of course, you shouldn't be surprised that the process would be different. Yet, when you look at fundraising projects that are sped through the development process, there's always that private benefactor with the funds driving the process...Look at who helped out Cal's senior athletic director for development, Jim Bartko, during his time at University of Oregon and the Autzen Stadium $91 million redevelopment project. Damn, I have to give Phil Knight credit for that one...Saavy and classy.

Now, public universities, please take the above case as a lesson. Stop the blending of public funds and campaign drives for stadium expansions. If you don't have a major benefactor in your arsenal, stop dipping into these multi-million dollar projects without one. You're gumming the process and you have to remember for the long run...The arms race will never stop. Wait until the addition the following decade.

It's time to say enough with the public financing and mixed funding on for state university stadium expansions...Not only do they deplete fundraising efforts and funds for activities that generate social welfare, but the projects take too long.

Got to give it up for Stanford...Now, will the benefactors please step forth and continue for the public schools?


(By the way, those columns at the North end zone are tight-tight.)

Soap Boxin'
IronDog

Rights and Wrongs

Diggin' through the reads, and these stories caught my eye...Check out my Del.icio.us account as well...There are some good stories out there today...

**Super idea on the iTV movement...Now, how are they going to get people understand why they need to add a Mac to the home theatre systems that they've already dumped half of their retirement funds on? And how quick is Apple going to turn consumers' HDTVs into montiors?

After all, am I going to watch "The Departed" on a 15" Mac or PC screen?...Unless, I'm on a plane, nahhh.

**Nice info digging by ESPN's Ivan Maisel...It's always good to see when the NCAA bends in the wake of reality. Check out the story on Clemson football player, Ray Ray McElrathbey and his brother Fahmarr...We'll probably hear a ton about this story over the next few months. I'm pulling like hell for Ray Ray.

What's good is that the NCAA listened to McElrathbey's appeal. (His mother is battling drug addiction and Ray Ray has been forced to tend to his younger brother Fahmarr)...Kudos.

Also, kudos to Maryland coach, Ralph Friedgren, admitting that he made a serious recruiting snafu by not signing Steve Slaton. In today's coaching whirlpool, a move like that is gutsy...Kudos to Friedgren.

**Check out "What's your sign" by Reyman Harmaci...Man, you either have game or you don't have it...But I do have to say "Practice" does help your game, kid...

Spit Game,
IronDog

'Laggards' in the "New World of Advertising"

Online marketing is going Lennox Lewis...Mowing down the challengers of old on the ladder of competitive media dollars...

Check out this strategy article about the "New World of Advertising"...It's a long one, but bare with the length...When you see a strategy article like this one, it's good to hear that marketers are finally coming to reality.

According to Christopher Vollmer, John Frelinghuysen, and Randall Rothenberg, the winners in the marketing world are reconfiguring their strategies in these key ways.

• Shift spending and management attention to digital media, and use those media to more effectively influence consumer purchase behavior.
• Develop formats to promote interaction with audiences, especially their most likely consumers.
• Create new research approaches and metrics that measure outcomes, not inputs.
• Combine “above-the-line” advertising (TV, radio, and print) and “below-the-line” marketing (promotions, sponsorships, events, public relations) in new two-way, integrated campaigns.
• Create their own branded entertainment assets and appeal to customers directly through them.
• “In-source” new skills and capabilities to achieve greater sales impact and other measurable results.

The article also touches on a good point with regards to why some industries are moving slow with media plan changes.

They used the auto industry as a solid example. Don't forget that reallocating media dollars requires restructured alliances between dealers and manufacturers. A lot of online and offline marketing departments are not used to working with each other. With regards to strategic partnerships, you have to allow the container ships to change direction.

Good to hear the plates are shifting again...

On Top, Won't Stop,
IronDog

Makeshift Laptop Case

I've seen it all in Chapel Hill when it comes to transporting a computer...

Yet, this one takes the cake. It's right up there with the duct-tape wallet.

My buddy from the UNC-CH JOMC Program sent me this special post from isoglossia. (Great pics, and easy manual steps). If you're into Clutch Cargo style transportation, then this makeshift laptop case is for you...With a strap, this could do wonders going from room to room.



Here are the benefits for anyone asking what the hell you're doing:

• Tailor-made for your machine, with a fit as snug or loose as you design
• Provides excellent shock protection and is largely liquid-proof [*]
• Made from materials that are practically free
• Looks only slightly hobo-esque, and is meant to be tucked inside other bag anyway
• Gives you the profound satisfaction of making something with your own two hands

Now grab yourself an hour, follow the steps, and cut and roll your own...

Cuttin'
IronDog