First of all, I didn’t know how popular whiffle ball was. We played a lot growing up… but this kid is sick.
HT to Digger
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Problems and Distractions
Yesterday a major problem halted the forums at Youth Ministry Exchange. It started off with some odd forum behavior overnight and continually got more strange until about 3:30 PM when the forums came to a screeching halt.
And a dozen or so people emailed me and/or contacted me through AIM. (Even with my away message up.) It’s amazing how much of a distraction people saying "help" is, isn’t it? It’s really hard to ignore.
As I investigated the problem and discovered that my solution wasn’t all that fun (loads of steps that were scary because it could mess up the forums permanently e.g. destroy the business) I had to deal with all sorts of "normal" distractions. Such as, things that I normally should be doing… like going to soccer practice with Megan.
Why is it so hard to distinguish between what you should be doing and what is a distraction? -
Halo 3 and Video Game Balance
I recently wrote this for the church’s newsletter/magazine, The Romeo Peach. (Check out our new online home of the Peach)
For gamers all around the world, September 25th was as big a holiday
as Christmas. When Halo 3 hit stores at 12:01 AM cash registers rang
totaling $170 million in sales within the first 24 hours. By
mid-morning on September 25th, XBOX Live had come to a standstill as
servers were overwhelmed with gamers playing online. For those who
aren’t certain just how many people bought this game, Halo 3 sold more
copies than any Harry Potter debut and had more customers in the first
24 hours than any movie in history. Here’s a link to the rest. -
Sibling Rivalry
Our kids fight over everything. Any menial inequity is a big deal. This morning Megan and Paul were fighting, crying/whining/punching, because of the last waffle in the house. They weren’t willing to share it… one of them had to have the whole stupid waffle. No one has to convince me that we are born with a sin nature. I love my kids, I’d do anything for them. But they gotta figure this whole fighting over nothing thing out. Mom and dad are going crazy.
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Is the church ahead of academia?
Check out the following video and ask yourself… is my church, my youth ministry, my household… am I educating my students in a way that is relevant to today’s culture?
I am sick of hearing people complain about the church saying that we are ineffective communicators in today’s society. In this video you will see just how far ahead the typical church is when it comes to communicating messages that matter. That doesn’t mean we right where we need to be… but we’re closing the gap. (I really think that talkback SMS will become a regular part of worship services in the best communicating churches within 5 years.)
For those parents dropping serious coin on a college education the following video may be disturbing when you realize most of your money is not going to actual classroom education. Of course, college isn’t all about classes, but $20,000 in debt is a lot of coin to drop so your kids can get educated in today’s social media.
How is your church doing? (I looked at this and did an internal high 5!)
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A fun technorati prank
I wonder how long it will take them to sort this one out. Don’t tell… it’ll be our little internet secret.
Observers of this blog will not that in recent weeks I’ve been adding technorati tags to the bottom of my posts. The main reason I do that is so that other people who are interested in what I’m writing about can easily find my blog to read about what they are interested in from my perspective.
So, I have a feeling this little game is going to be exploited in the upcoming election cycle.
What is it?
Let’s say I post about how much I think Al Gore is sexy. Well, in fact Al Gore is an attractive man but I wouldn’t call him sexy because I don’t swing from that side of the plate.So the mere mention of his name will make a couple people who are monitoring technorati for the search term "Al Gore" take notice. So they may visit my site to see what it’s all about… no big deal in web land. It’s called "ego searching" since you can actually set up an RSS feed for any term on the internet and you’ll be notified as soon as someone posts something with that search term. How do I know? I have a few ego searches in my feed!
But if I use the technorati tag "All Gore" on this post, the post will automatically appear on sites like GoreHub.com. See… sites are popping up all over which are actually publishing links to stuff that people think their readers may be interested in. They can’t moderate what goes on there, only the search parameters which populate the feed. In other words, there are websites about donkey’s where the text about donkey’s isn’t written by a donkey expert… it just populates with blog posts about donkey’s.
How will this effect the elections?
Let’s say you are a supported of Barack Obama for President instead of the former Vice President who never said he invented the internet but people claim that he did say that. (Say "Barack Obama Mama" five times fast, it’s fun!) In order for Pro-Obama supporters to get anti-Gore messages on Al Gore’s websites… all they’d have to do is put a technorati tag for "Al Gore."
Is it really that simple?
Uh… it is. It’s the easiest hack you could ever do.Does this really matter?
In the past elections were won and lost by controlling the message on television. In 2008, the person who can control the message of bloggers and internet media will be the President of the United States. Don’t believe me? Just ask the people running the campaigns.
Is that the only trick to the election?
Actually, no. Let me clarify and say that I think the person who manages Web 2.0 resources the best will be President of the United States. Allow me to be an active supporter. Allow me to support you with your resources. Make them fun to use. Make them catchy. Design them in a way that allows me to be creative. Allow me to take your logo and tweak it. Allow me to remix your videos. Create that kind of stuff… and you will win the election.
In 1960 Kennedy defeated Nixon after out-using the media during the first televised debates. 47 years later, the candidate who masters Web 2.0 in a way that makes them look like the other candidate has a sore leg and a five o’clock shadow will call the White House home in January 2009. -
Pictures and Videos of the Trip
This is the perfect example of what our trip (life, marriage, child-rearing) was all about. Kristen is cute and studious taking millions of thoughtful pictures. Adam is the same idiot no matter where he goes. Check out our snaps. And for bonus… here are a couple videos.
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David Crowder’s New Toy
This has been making it’s way around the blogosphere. I’m looking forward to seeing this addition to the keytar Mr. Crowder is infamous for. Ladies and gentleman it is true. DCB is hooked on Guitar Hero.
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Vacation Reads
I am not a prolific reader. In fact, I almost never finish a book. Furthermore I tend to read 4-5 books at a time. So here are the books I pounded out while on vacation last week.
The Man Called Cash by Steve Turner
I can’t lie. I wanted to know what all the hype was about. Certainly, Johnny Cash is a known name to me. But I never really knew his story. Now I can see why so many people are fascinated by this man. The thing I found interesting about Cash was just how authentic he was. He sinned, knew he was a sinner, battled sin, wrote about sin, and just kept on trying to do life "right" and always managed to stumble into wrong. This was a book that kind of cleared the air about a lot of things and a good way to start off my trip.
The Dip by Seth Godin
I don’t want to say too much about this little book. (Other than go buy a copy and read it.) Starting in November I’m going to be hosting a series of guest bloggers who reflect on the principles of this book. Bob (my friend, pastor, and boss) kind of turned his head funny when I told him I was reading a book about knowing when to quit… stay tuned to see how this twists and turns.
Raising Less Corn, More Hell by George Pyle
Not sure why I picked this one up. It was very interesting to say the least. Half propaganda and half a reality check for a consumer. I was hoping to kind of look at this as a metaphor for small internet businesses versus the big dogs of internet media. But it didn’t really come through clearly. But now I know how the farming business works.
John Adams: Party of One by James Grant
As a lover of all things biographical I knew I would dig this one. It’s half academic look at the life of a founding father and half whimsical look at his personal life. The main problem with this book is that it’s kind of a bruiser at about 500 pages. Since it’s not a page turner it is going to land on my night stand for a few more weeks.
