April 03, 2004

So many daves, so few georges.

This George reads Chapter 1.

Nicety Nice, George -- We like! George and George need to start their own voice over business. Any other Georges out there gonna play?



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"Free Culture" popup audiobook

FREE CULTURE by Lawrence Lessig (and friends) - Reflections, part 1

Scott Matthews has a great site up giving a home to the chapters folks have read.

Eric Rice also has a great one.

Can you imagine if, let's say, Lessig was some other author with a publicist and PR firm, and on the off chance the publisher would even consider tossing the audio online for free (which they wouldn't), how long it would take to make it happen. Hire the professionals, rent a studio, get design involved, build a portal with links hither and yon. What's your guesss--I say a month on the absolute short end. Probably more like three. You'd have strategy and messaging and project plans. You'd have brainstorms and travel and legal involved.

This is one of the best examples I've seen of how ideas catch fire in the blogworld, and the best example I've seen of quick turn around on a collaborative venture with a tangible deliverable.

Would it have worked if there were money on the line? If this had been anything other than a labor of love? I'm guessing the backtracks and backbiting would have put a stop to it. Because giving, not gain, was the motivation.

It's been a fascinating week watching this develop. I think I'll have more to say on the phenomenon of the priest with the idea that inspired dozens to open their mouths.

April 02, 2004

I wish they had a lotto for bloggers

Damn, I wish I woulda put money on this one. ;-)

Well wow

Shelley wrote several screens full over the last few days when all I was trying to do was upload a big file.

Good reads, all of them.

BLX 1.0 - you better believe it.

BLX 1.0 compliant and proud of it.



All 'Bollocks' all the time.

George Sessum, with Intro by Jenna, Reads Chapter 13 of Free Culture, by Lawrence Lessig

Well it was a while coming, but thanks to the advice on burnatonce, we got the file up. George reads Chapter 13 of Lawrence Lessig's new book, Free Culture, ala AKMA's great idea.

Here it is, with an intro by jenna.

John Didion Rocks Our World

Thank you John for turning us on to Burnatonce (that's burn at once, not burn atonce as I first pronounced in my head) as a way to get the Lessig Chapter 13 file George read OFF the music computer as a data file and up to our server. Upload is in progress. Crossing fingers and toes. Three cheers for burnatonce, a nice, simple, elegent CD burning application that just won our hearts after FOUR days of catch 22s trying to get the CD to take data as data.

March 30, 2004

almost done...

chapter 13 is long. files are big. we're almost done. george is reading. jenna kicks it off. i am, what would you call it, executive producer? Soon. Coming soon as we get small enough files to upload. Don't abandon us. We'll be back to our regularly scheduled program soon. In the mean time go read Jay Rosen's comments (referenced four posts down). good stuff. i am tired. jenna has an ear infection and more -- found out after 10 days of trying to kick this sinus/cold/asthma thang. She held her own but finally took her today to see. she's a trooper.... i am in a stupor. live and love among yourselves.

I think my blog frightened a potential client today. I giggle when that happens. Luckily, since I have some good clients in my court these days, I can giggle. I like to giggle. I like sleep more.

Kombinat! Newest product - take waste from sleep and turn it into productivity. we like carbon dioxide. K! Hi marek.

AKMA’s Random Thoughts: Let’s Start Something

I'm late on blogging this, but I have been hard at work behind the scenes, doing such heavy lifting as driving to barnes and noble to buy the book. Yes, the Sessums intend to lend their voices to the noble (not barnes and) idea of AKMA to perform (read aloud) Free Cluture, Larry Lessig's new book. This is a way cool idea and my mind is racing on what *else* we can do to perform this work. music, yes. Art anyone? Poetry? What moves you? Let's turn it inside out and put the "form" in perform.

Okay, jeneane. focus.

Kombinat! Goes Public a Week or So After Launch

Kombinat! announces: Kombinat!: IPO of first ever Public Domain Corporation. In a stealth move this conversation recycler and enviro-friendly Borganization has given ownership to, well, everyone. Always dreamed of being a shareholder, stakeholder, or CD holder? Dream no more. With Kombinat! dreams are a thing of the past. Only the instant matters. Kombinat! repurposes instants in an instant.

K! got mine. got yours?

March 28, 2004

Well, now see?

If I'd known Tom had already covered the topic in the way Tom does, I would have just hushed up. Dag. Tom says, here's what journalism could do about blogging:

"What journalism can do about blogs is to use them to begin to understand what it is not. To explore whether in this extraordinary range of expression and human storytelling there might not be some shade of expression that it should consider adding to its five-key piano. And to consider, upon reflection, whether its resistance to expanding its palette and scope is based upon legitimate concerns of journalistic craftsmanship, or is in fact a matter of kissing the arse of the marketplace."

yes, well, that certainly works too.

"What is Journalism? And What Can Weblogs Do About It?" = Jay Rosen

Jay Rosen's panel at bloggercon looks very cool. There, I said it. See? I can say nice things about Bloggercon. Well, one nice thing anyhow.

I added some thoughts in Jay's comments as have some hard thinking folks.

I'm not sure I made sense in Jay's comments, what with it being 11:08, Jenna being sick, and me being fully medicated for bedtime.

So, the cliff notes version of what I said is:

Blogging isn't journalism -- and shouldn't much care about journalism -- because it's blogging.

Wshew. That was a lot easier to type than what I said in Jay's comment box.

The same things that make blogging different from other kinds of writing make blogging differentt from journalistic form and function: The thread from me to you to him to her.

So I ended by saying it this way: In blogging, the reader (not the writer/reporter) is the journalist--the one responsible for drawing from any number of sources to inform, and ultimately form, his or her own story.

Even better, if the reader is a blogger, then the reader helps write the story, with a post, links, comments, trackbacks --whatever--of his or her own.

wow. I'm almost excited about bloggiing again. It's been a month. Nothin's moved me. But maybe there's hope.

Something about conversation, many ends, and things joined loosely.

I like to call them...

Bill Clinton Oreos.

I hear Kerry's eating these like crazy.