Here’s looking at you, invitedmedia, discreet_chaos and Flotsam

The NY Times has an article on the concept of blog commenters as their own shtick. It seems there are even blogs out there where people will fight to see who can come up with the most smart-assy of smart-ass comments. Imagine! (No need for that here, what with me being the Managing Editor of said responsibility.) The idea for the article is that blog commenters add to the life of the blog by becoming characters in the play. They inhabit roles - dramatis personae - in our little tragicomedies. Good idea for an article - or even a sophomore sociology paper - but the Times comes off … so… Timesy in its execution:

Since many blogs have a readership of one — or, at best, the writer, his mother and some guy he sat next to in seventh grade who found him on Google — piggybacking on a more popular site offers a wider audience for a keyboard jockey’s gripes and quips.

To paraphrase a well-worn observation: You ever notice how old people repeat themselves a lot?

7 comments September 30th, 2007

Beta allows users to embed ESPN video

Check out the new ESPN.com video beta - they’ve stopped the popup page and put the video onto an easier-to-navigate (and whitespace-aplenty) page. They’re also making videos available for embedding, a la YouTube, by proving the embed code right next to the video. Locals: you need to do this. Demand that your vendors start developing the ability for your videos to be shared this way. If they won’t do it, find someone who will. In celebration of this achievement, I’m embedding ESPN’s preview of the MNF game between the Patriots and the Bengals.

UPDATE, 10/2/09>: Patriots 34 - Bengals 13.

5 comments September 30th, 2007

Enough with the new social networks

Mashable reports that iWon is about to add a social network to its site. This raises two points: 1. iWon is still around and 2. Mathematically, adding an iWon social network will officially mean that every frickin’ site now thinks it has to have one. This is getting silly. I now have more social networks than I have actual friends.

Read the full post 11 comments September 30th, 2007