Due to the confidential nature of some projects I’m working on, I’m looking for alternative topics. I decided to go with old-faithful… politics.
When I first started blogging back in 2003, I was very active and well-read on politics. At the time I was living in south Florida, an area of attention for both local and national elections. Having volunteered and surrounded by it, I spent quite a bit of time writing about it. I love the American system of government and think writers have made been a major contribution to its strength. At one point, I even considered doing a joint Masters in Public Policy and Business Administration. As fate would have it, my life took a different turn as I watched people burn out and get passed over for consideration at the close of the ‘04 campaign season. I took my hiatus from politics and refocused my attention on business strategy and entrepreneurship, ending up in East TN with a MBA and career in community development venture capital.
Now its 2008, and I find myself being pulled into the wonderful pandemonium that is a presidential election year. I’ve been slightly adrift over the past few weeks, wondering what role I should play. After getting very involved with a primary candidate (and being left a little heart broken), I’ve kept my distance. This ends with this series of posts, categorized as Election 2008.
The topics I’d like to post are:
The candidate I won’t vote for
The candidate I will vote for
What are my important issues for this election cycle
Thoughts on the current state of affairs
Review of the Bush administration
To be honest, I’m not sure how this series of blog post will be taken. I’ve found it difficult to have conversations about the upcoming election. I feel like the general public is broken into three categories: 1. Obama fan boys/girls, 2. wandering hero-worshippers, and 3. a silent majority. Let me define:
Obama fan boys/girls: Typically come from the young professional crowd that grew up on eco-friendly public service announcements, a healthy dose of racial guilt, and the sitcom image of a president. This audience is naive enough to believe in diplomatic talks, troop withdrawals, etc. They are also skeptical enough to think that America and/or its leaders are some how involved in most of the world’s problems and therefore responsible for fixing them (i.e. global warming, world hunger, etc). There is also the ever present intellectual liberal that in their wisdom can ”see some of the evil of capitalism and good of socialism.”
Wandering Hero-Worshippers: These people cling to some former icon, whether it be Regan, Kennedy or even F. D. Roosevelt. In today’s political climate, these folks are looking for someone that seems to embody the vision of these gone servants. I guess I fall in this category… I’d vote for ghost of Reagan, ghost of Goldwater, or ghost of Buckley ticket. Secretly, I think most politicos are hero-worshippers.
A Silent Majority: That’s right… I’m borrowing a term from Richard Nixon. The truth is, I do believe that the majority of Americans are hard working, down-to-earth folks that just want to live their lives. They don’t run around looking for things to be offended by, object to, or become zealots about. And they are confused. They are confused by the mud slinging and pandering of our politicians, by the complexity and spending of our government. They want something different, but don’t know the what or how. They need a hero (insert cliche ’80’s song “Holding Out for a Hero”)…
Okay, so I have an undergraduate degree in English from a southern college. You probably expect me to be well read in southern literature, right? Well, wrong. I actually focused on Romantic and Victorian writing with a secondary focus on the history of the English language. Since American writers have only recently taken prominence on the literary scene (by recently, I mean the last century), only a small piece of my college reading included southern writers. As for my reading since graduation, I’ve been focused on non-fiction American history, politics, technology, and business. Throw in the required reading and study associated with getting an MBA, and there goes any hope for leisure reading. When I did have time for leisure reading, I’ve been working my way though the works of Christopher Buckley and Nick Hornby.
I’ve decided to fill this gap in my literary experience. After some research and consultation, I decided on the following criteria for selection:
Author must be from the American southeast or spent a substantial amount of time in the American southeast
The author must have received a Pulitzer or be credited with developing a specific style of writing
The writing must be a novel
The novel must be set in the American southeast
As such, here are the authors and works on the list:
William Faulkner “The Sound and The Fury” (Pulitzer– 1955 and 1963)
Harper Lee “To Kill a Mockingbird” (Pulitzer– 1961)
Cormac McCarthy “Suttree” (Pulitzer– 2007)
James Agee “A Death in the Family” (Pulitzer– 1958)
Robert Penn Warren “All the King’s Men” (Pulitzer– 1948, 1958, and 1979)
Tom Wolfe “A Man in Full” (founder of New Journalism)
As a promotion for their upcoming comedy Tropic Thunder (yes, the film that has received some controversial attention due to Downey’s make up enhanced portrayal of a black man), the above-mentioned trio has created a viral marketing video on YouTube. This video had me laughing out loud in the office, and I had to share it.
Not to get too analytical, but the video does a handful of things that make it a good video:
Celebrities as off-camera people (the “Entourage” effect).
There are three reasons why I felt compelled to write about Weezer’s new music video. First, Weezer was one of my favorite bands growing up. To this day, a handful of songs from “The Blue Album” and “Pinkerton” reside on my iPod. Some days, Weezer just makes good soundtrack music for my life.
Second, the lead rythym guitar and backing vocals is Brian Bell, a Knoxville native. I think this is very cool.
Third, the music video for “Pork and Beans” takes advantage of a very fun and promising marketing technique called viral marketing. The point of viral marketing is using word-of-mouth to grow awareness of a product or service. In this case, the goal is to raise awareness of Weezer and the new song. Much like I heard about the video from Silicon Valley Insider, hopefully someone will wander across my blog and keep sharing.
Check out the new video. It stays true to the bands fun-loving sound and spoofs some of the most popular video clips on the web. Its kind of fun to watch and see which ones you can identify, but for those of us that don’t have the time or attention span, here is a video providing a rundown of the 24 original shorts (hat tip Valleywag).
I previously wrote about my frustration with Twitter’s growing pains. I know this is part of the start-up experience, but I was becoming frustrated by what I perceived to be Twitter’s lack of interest in solving the problem. Since blogging should be as much about the positive as the negative, I am happy to report that Twitter is taking steps to correct the problem (hat tip to Venture Beat).
First, Twitter’s chief architect has left the company. It is still speculation as to whether this was an amicable parting of the ways, but it is clear that Twitter has struggled to keep the service running in the days since his departure. As a lesson in entrepreneurship, sometimes key people have to go. This gives an opportunity for new blood to come on board with fresh perspective, energy and ideas. Maybe this is needed? Let’s face it, the simple service hasn’t really increased the robustness of its service in the 16 months I’ve been using it.
Second, Twitter has hired some mercenary software development staff form Pivotal Labs. Not to get the techno-geeks too excited, but this is like hiring the A-Team of software writing. On the down side, this is a mercenary team. Once the work is done, Hanibal and company collect big paychecks, enjoy a cigar, and move on to the next project. Let’s hope Twitter has someone to learn the new architecture and help it evolve with future needs.
As an interesting study in developmental strategy, I think Twitter has been forced into taking these steps. First, I don’t think they have any substantial intellectual property to protect their service. Second, many big name people in the tech business have hinted at the simplicity of Twitter’s architecture and an interest in creating a rival platform. I’ve heard that those efforts are being kept in stealth mode, but this could create an interesting environment for Twitter. Given the Townhall project by Microsoft (MSFT),I wouldn’t put it past MSFT to develop something in house. Lastly, Twitter experiences competitive pressure from Google acquisition Jaiku.
I previously wrote about my frustration with 
