Feeling Fuller

[Stuff] Michiana Says in Winter

2012-01-25T08:36:00.001-08:00

Watch this, then tell us what we missed in the comments!

You feel me?

AF

Feeling Christmas

2011-12-23T04:30:00.001-08:00

Maybe it's just me, but lately I find Christendom lacking in its ability to dramatically convey the gravity of the Nativity story. That's not to say the well-meaning church plays and musicals aren't good in their own right; but often they fail to bring a unique perspective to the story, a freshness that ideally would be there each year.

'Tis the season? Via

I freely allow that I may not be looking in the right places. And when more and more stories like this one and this one appear this time of year, frankly, you question whether many people even understand what the season is about, much less are able to share it with others. At the least, it makes one urgently seek a fresh perspective, no matter the source.

All of which may help to explain why the two pieces that have most impacted me this Christmas season don't come from the church at all. That fact alone may make some people uncomfortable. But if the season is about "good news for all the people," then perhaps anyone is capable of understanding and re-telling the substance of that news.

Because ultimately, what moves man about the Christmas story is not the historicity of the events - the census, the manger, etc. That is not to say it's unimportant for those events to be factually accurate. It is, and I believe they are. But few are stirred to their core by a history book. It is the implication of the events that boggles the mind and draws our hearts to a different place.

I've never been a theologian. But to me, the Nativity is best encapsulated by two states of man that hopefully are never foreign: the joy of gift-giving, and reconciliation. The following two pieces are two of the best I've seen at conveying those feelings.

The first is an advertisement for a retailer in the UK, the second a music video from a group called The Killers. I don't say anything in posting them other than that they show feelings. I'm not attempting to ascribe to God all the characterstics of a child, for example, nor am I holding up The Killers as a paragon of right-living. For me, each of them offer a unique viewpoint of the Christmas story.

Without further ado:

You feel me?

AF

What he said

2011-12-04T17:58:00.001-08:00

This blog started as an attempt at catharsis for the thoughts and perspectives that bounce around in my head. If you've been around here since 2009, you know that there isn't a particular topic or mission to which I confine myself. There are times when I blog because I think a topic needs exposure. Other times a topic is being discussed, but perhaps not in the way I feel it needs to be addressed. Other posts act as commentary on this life and the peculiar behavior some people exhibit in it.

But every so often, every commentator sees the need to step aside and let the pros do what they do best.

Enter Bob Costas, the man who does this sort of thing better than anyone else in the business. His monologue on NFL touchdown dances last week is worth further review.

I've opined about cultural rot in this space a number of times, but I would be flattered to think it was with the same kind of eloquence Costas exhibits here and in each broadcast. And while his focus is on the sports world, I think the correlation to society as a whole is very clear.

Without further ado:

What he said.

You feel me?

AF

You spin me right round(about), baby

2011-11-17T17:50:00.001-08:00

As far back as 1607 Jamestown, most people on this continent have viewed Europe as the standard for civility, fashion and overall societal evolution. And I get that. I mean, even I shudder to think about watching all those reality singing/dancing contest shows if all the hosts sounded like they were from Des Moines.

But we Americans have also shown ourselves to be a headstrong bunch. And I can't think of a better place to draw a distinction from the Old World than in the proliferation of the transportation phenomena known as roundabouts.

To be clear, I am completely on board with the concept of roundabouts. They should allow for freer flow of traffic at intersections, assuming everyone knows how to navigate them. But as any South Bend driver can tell you, very few people have the slightest clue what to do when they approach these things. For most, it's the driving equivalent of solving a Rubik's Cube.

The largest number of offenders simply have no idea what a "Yield" sign means. They'll come to a complete stop with a complete look of befuddlement on their face, as if the whole thing is some sort of Candid Camera gag. It's like they can't come to grips with the fact that their turn doesn't really need to be preceded with a stop. Somehow, these people feel a stop is their rite of passage to change directions.

But even if the car in front of you does make it into the actual roundabout, that's no guarantee you're out of the woods, I've found. Far too many times I've encountered the beleaguered soul who has stopped - STOPPED - in the middle of the roundabout because they figured the car waiting at the yield sign had been there long enough, and it was time to let them in.

Others simply give up trying to figure it out. Without exaggeration, yesterday I saw a USPS driver doing little more than taking laps in a roundabout. By the time I cleared the intersection, they were on the home stretch of lap three. Folks, if government employees don't know what to do with these things, what chance do the rest of us have?

With the anarchy that exists there, you have to wonder if roundabouts cause more accidents. Oh wait. You don't have to wonder anymore.

City planners, I implore you. This isn't 1607, and today we're dependent on Europe for little more than someone to bail out every so often. As tempting as it may be to draw up plans for a beautiful new roundabout to alleviate traffic congestion, please remember your constituency, and let's keep the right angles intact.

You feel me?

AF

Occupy perspective

2011-10-19T18:57:00.000-07:00

Meet Srustina. She's a child from India we're sponsoring through Compassion International.

We don't know much about her, but we know enough. Our financial support helps Srustina go to school, among other things. And I know that through her picture, she provides a good deal of support to me, though not of a material kind. Whenever I begin to add up the multiple projects that need completed around the house, the oil changes that are needed on the cars, and countless other items, I see Srustina's postcard on our refrigerator and realize that mine are first world, "1 in 3,200" problems.

Perspective is an elusive state of mind. It's difficult to maintain amid the bombardment of messages and pieces of information we receive on a daily basis, many of them creating demand for a new product or service or lifestyle. (And yes, I recognize the irony of that last sentence being written by someone in the advertising industry.) And it's even more difficult to keep when legitimate concerns such as health care bills and college education begin to creep in.

But when I look at Srustina or hear about something like this, I'm given a moment of clarity about my state in the world relative to others.

Which brings us to the news of the day, the movement known as "Occupy [Fill in Location]." The protests that started in New York several weeks ago have spread across the nation (organizers claim even global support), including our little hamlet of South Bend.

These kinds of political protests always draw my attention, as much because of their people-watching value as my professional background. Drawing definitive conclusions about the kinds of people who show up at these things is always a tricky prospect. (Though the poll mentioned here is interesting.) On the one hand, there's the fellow on the right (probably the only time he's been referred to in that way) - clearly an ideologue who engages in this kind of thing pretty regularly. Then there's also people like those described in the South Bend-based story linked above - folks who are just plain frustrated with the way life has turned and looking for answers or a place to vent.

We can draw a distinction between the two, but I wonder if someone in Srustina's shoes could do the same. I have to think that if we transported her or anyone among the multitudes of people on the planet living on a dollar a day or less and dropped them in the middle of an OWS protest, they wouldn't be pointing out political or sociological nuance.

Instead, they might look at the clothes the protesters are wearing, the cameras and mobile phones used to document and share the experience, the food the demonstrators likely brought with them, and the clear evidence that the crowd had been through school. They would notice the fact that by and large, the protesters are allowed to assemble peacefully without fear of reprisal. Our visitors may take note of the manner in which the protesters leave their posts - in a car they own driven to a residence that includes a TV, air conditioning, heat, and a pantry that by the world's standards is full of food.

They would see all this and turn to ask one of the group, "You want more?"

My point is not to belittle the OWS cause. And it's even less to suggest there are not real problems faced by real people in this country for which a solution must be found. I fully understand the pain and helplessness of the unemployment line and my heart truly goes out to those in that situation today. Rather, mine is a call to occupy a proper perspective as the solutions to these problems are explored. A reasoned, rational perspective.

I recognize the difficulty in such a thing when we're dealing with something as emotional as a person's ability to provide for his or her family. Desperation is a poor negotiating tool, yet it's all many seem to be wielding these days. And that's unfortunate, because given our circumstances, it's as unnecessary as it is unproductive.

Just ask the Srustinas of the world.

You feel me?

AF

What, me worry?

2011-10-10T18:55:00.000-07:00

Note the satellite in the photo. This is the kind of satellite that NASA reports fell to Earth recently in an "uncontrolled re-entry." And, despite the fact the spacecraft weighed more than 12,500 pounds, no one seemed to be all that concerned about it.

Which means one of two things. Either one, I'm apparently in the minority in my belief that a 6.5-ton object hurtling "uncontrolled" toward the Earth is highly unsettling. Or two, if the guys who know the most about this sort of thing aren't all that worked up about it, maybe I shouldn't be either.

At the end of the day, as massive as this satellite was, it's nothing compared to the overall mass of the Earth. So the odds of it landing in a place it could cause damage and injury were pretty slim. And for the record, it appears to have broken up significantly on re-entry and fallen harmlessly into the ocean. The odds you were going to be hit by a piece of this thing? Apparently 1 in 3,200.

That gets me thinking about our everyday problems. It seems most of have - with a few exceptions - what I'd call "1 in 3,200 problems" compared to the scope of what's going on in the planet around us. Our trouble may seem to be a 6.5-ton juggernaut bounding uncontrollably in our direction, but when viewed in the context of the enormity of the world around us - others' lives, others' problems, concerns many have in the world that are literally life-or-death propositions - we often end up with a 1 in 3,200 situation.

I only wish it was easy to gain that sort of understanding. It's incredibly difficult, but we're much better off when we maintain a proper perspective of the entirety of our world when it appears the sky is falling - in whatever size chunks.

You feel me?

AF

A Virtue

2011-09-21T17:57:00.000-07:00

A while back, I happened upon a vending machine that contained not just the usual sugary, salty fare, but also a life lesson. Pictured you'll see a regular size Reese's Peanut Butter Cup upstaging a king size of the same item. The larger candy is in the same row, it costs the same, and yet is still one purchase away from being obtained. It just so happens that prerequisite purchase is a lesser snack.

This is the sort of thing that can occupy my mind for long stretches. (For those interested, I went with the Garden Salsa Sun Chips.)

I guess the takeaway is a simple one: You can't get to the larger stuff until you take care of the smaller stuff.

You feel me?

AF

On Realism

2011-08-14T17:47:00.000-07:00

I work in PR and advertising. Which is another way of saying I work intensively with people. Without people - or more specifically, without people's emotional and physical needs - there wouldn't be advertising.

To paraphrase Don Draper, "Advertising is about one thing: happiness." And despite what many an erstwhile college prof would teach on the subject, there's always going to be an ample dose of art in the science of playing to people's emotions.

Maybe it's because it's part of my job to notice this kind of thing, but if you're like me, you've seen a noticeable trend in how that's being accomplished recently. It's toward realism.

Take a look at these spots from current marketing campaigns.

Sure, there are plenty of campaigns that camp it up. But I can't help but notice the trend in advertising - and perhaps in other media as well - is toward showcasing real people doing real things.

And it's a welcome shift. Consumers today are demanding more from companies. It's no longer enough to have a good product at a good value. That is a given anymore. How you treat others around you and in what state you leave the world after you're gone is the new point of differentiation among brands. Today's successful brands are the ones showing a realism, a humanism that resonates with consumers.

I wonder if there's a lesson in there that transcends advertising. Clearly many of today's top advertisers believe being real is how to win people. And we should take note. Authenticity is at a premium these days, because the supply has failed to keep pace with demand. The people who live their lives authentically and with integrity will find most interest in the "product" of themselves.

People have always been attracted to what's real, and they've always had a loathing for what's fake. Not just a loathing for it, but also an innate ability for detection of it. So it behooves all of us to ask ourselves if the product we're advertising - personally - is real. That's the kind of product people are interested in. If it's not, it may be time to go back to R&D.

You feel me?

AF

Good Friday: "Dark Was the Night..."

2011-04-22T06:46:00.000-07:00

I'm many things, but I'm not an avid consumer or reviewer of music. There are a handful of artists I listen to regularly, several more I tolerate, and a few songs here and there that I like. I wouldn't describe my tastes in music as wide-ranging.

Nor would I say they're all that complicated. For me, good music accomplishes one thing: It makes me feel an emotion. If I can find common ground with the emotion being expressed in a song, usually I'm impressed and endeared. I suspect that's what all of us do - we find music to match the mood we're in or want to be in. Or we search for music that fits a particular day or season.

So finding the right music for a cold, rainy Good Friday is challenging. But if ever there was a song that suited such an occasion, it is Blind Willie Johnson's song about the Crucifixion, "Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground."

The song was recorded in 1927, its name borrowed from a hymn popular in the South in the nineteenth century. Somehow, "Dark Was the Night" manages to express a great deal without many discernible lyrics. The first time I heard it, I wasn't quite sure what to feel. Listening to the track, you can't escape the emotions of the artist: pain, loneliness, brokenness, numbness, sorrow. It is unsettling, and yet, also strangely inviting. So many songs inextricably combine fear into the above listed emotions. I don't get that from this one. In fact, its final chord offers a finality that is oddly peaceful.

To me, these elements - pain, loneliness, brokenness, numbness, sorrow, finality - are the essential pieces in the account of the Crucifixion. For all the volumes that have been and will be written about the event, none will likely be as descriptive or all-encapsulating as Johnson's bottleneck guitar playing and simple expression, "Ah, well."

You feel me?

AF

Mouthpieces

2011-03-13T12:42:00.000-07:00

There was a lot of finger wagging in social media and public relations circles this week, after a post by the Twitter account of automotive giant Chrysler included an obscenity. The post was probably doubly offensive to some because of its denigration of Detroit, especially after Chrysler's laudable Super Bowl ad.

I'm guessing what happened was a case of mistaken posting. The employee who was managing Chrysler's Twitter stream was probably doing it from a platform that allowed for multiple accounts to be listed, including his personal account. He likely meant to post the words in question to his personal account, and didn't realize which account he was posting on until it was too late. Again, just a guess.

Whatever the case, that employee lost his job, and Chrysler went so far as to fire the firm that employed him. Ouch.

It's easy for us to sit back and point out that employee's stupidity or even wax about Chrysler's apparent lack of due diligence in doing business with that company.

But if we're honest, many of us allow a similar scenario to play out every day. Only we don't take the necessary step Chrysler took.

Like Chrysler, we all have things that speak for us. Mouthpieces, if you will. Sometimes it's what we say. More often, it's what we do - or what we don't do. Our actions are the loudest mouthpieces that speak for us on a daily basis. From the guy who cuts you off in traffic to the man who holds the door open at the store for a mother with her hands full - each day, each one of us broadcasts to the world who we are. We have for ourselves a series of "living soundbites" - pieces that come together to form the story that is read by all we come in contact with.

Like traditional soundbites, our actions are also subject to misinterpretation. So there will occasionally be times when we need to correct the record. But more often, there will be times when we simply need to "fire" the mouthpieces that got us into trouble in the first place.

Not all of us recognize this. Or at the least, all of us could use some help remembering this. The way we treat others and the way we conduct the business of our daily lives are telling people who we are. If we aren't mindful of this, we could wind up on the wrong side of a "firing" ourselves - either in our professional or our personal lives.

You feel me?

AF

The Digital Nativity Story

2010-12-15T18:37:00.000-08:00

I'd love to see a book or documentary examining how today's news media would cover the life of Jesus. If it was done well, I think it would be enlightening to remove all the preconceptions and biases we bring to the figure of Christ - whatever your view of him - and receive a thorough analysis of how the events of his life would be covered. Or not covered at all.

In my mind, it would need to be produced by someone who has been in a newsroom and knows firsthand how decisions of coverage are made, and has made the decisions themselves.

For example, how would the news media cover the birth in the stable? My sense is it would be mostly an afterthought, if that. Perhaps it would be what folks in the biz call a "kicker" - that lighthearted story that comes at the end of a newscast as long as the weatherman doesn't go over his allotted time. It was an event that took place with so little fanfare that it would have been easy for the media to overlook altogether.

If I had spent more of my working life in news, it might have been a project I'd taken on myself. If I did, maybe the video below would be inspiration for the forward. Merry Christmas!

It's quiet in here...

2010-11-11T18:46:00.000-08:00

An Open Letter to AEP: A Sincere Thank You for Your Diligence

2010-06-22T18:53:00.000-07:00

Dear Indiana Michigan Power/AEP:

Please receive this correspondence on behalf of those in the South Bend area still without power. We want to offer this letter as a token of our sincere appreciation for your diligence in rectifying the situation.

As of this writing, we are among those who have been without power since the thunderstorm of June 18. We first want to express to you our genuine understanding of your seeming unpreparedness for such an event. The thought of a combination of rain, wind, thunder and lightning in the month of June seems so...Southern Hemisphere. We were as shocked as you when Mother Nature threw springlike weather at us in this most peculiar time of year.

So that we'll both be prepared in the future, we've done a little research on weather patterns. The following are some other weather occurrences that we may encounter:

Turns out, severe storms can pop up all the way through May, June, July, August, even into September. I know - it's not fair. We were surprised to learn this as well. These storms could actually create a similar event in which power is knocked out.

In December, January and February, there exists the possibility of snowfall and ice. Again, don't shoot the messenger. These could also create the need to restore power if ice freezes and breaks lines and utility poles.

You get a break in the months of October, November, March and April. I would suggest implementing the necessary rate hikes then.

We write this letter because we understand your predicament and because we want to help. After all, if one of us was a day or so late paying a bill, we know you would exercise the same spirit of patience.

So again, keep up the good work. It is literally, lights out.

Sincerely,

The Flashlight Few

Getting Directions

2010-06-10T19:15:00.000-07:00

Note: This is my article for the June 10 edition of Moms Michiana, a section of the South Bend Tribune. It first appeared here.

My four-year old daughter is an avid reader. For the most part, I encourage this. I'm thrilled she reads a couple children's books before bed. I'm glad she can read directions to board games. I'm proud she can read her two-year old sister a story now and then.

I'm not as enthusiastic about her ability to read road signs.

Picture driving along Angela Boulevard on a beautiful spring afternoon. You glance over to catch a glimpse of the stadium, when from the backseat comes a shrill voice of warning: "Oh no, you're going the wrong way!" It's my four-year old, screaming with alarm because she believes the "Wrong Way" signs are meant for us.

I know full well I'm on the right side of the road. I've driven this road countless times. Yet, when you hear something so urgent, so assured, and so critical, you can't help but second guess yourself. I'll admit I tapped on the brakes for a bit.

She's done this more than once. My daughter is more than willing to point out poor execution at an intersection ("It said stop and you didn't stop!"), or act as a backseat speed radar (“It says, ‘Speed Limit four-five.’”).

Children offer little in the way of guidance while driving. In life, however, what they have to say can be very instructive. I wouldn’t listen to my daughter to get where I wanted to go in the car. I must listen to what she’s saying to get where I want to go as a father.

If you listen closely, what your children say offers a glimpse into the values and lessons you’re instilling in them as a parent. On one of our many trips down Angela, I told my daughter to look to see the painting of Jesus on the wall of the Hesburgh Library. “It’s not good to paint on walls,” was the reply. True enough. Glad that life lesson was internalized.

In other moments, I hear my daughter uttering things I’ve said in frustration that I would rather she’d forgotten. I’m sure most parents have experienced this. It serves as a humbling reminder that our children are watching us at every instance. What they will learn of patience, forgiveness, coping, and self-control is what we have modeled. However we respond to life’s problems is what they will know of responsible behavior.

I believe our words and actions also tell our children what we expect of them – sometimes implicitly, sometimes explicitly. We’ve had to be very direct in verbalizing our rule that our daughter confine her artistic expression to paper, not our walls. But when something goes wrong, or we get that unexpected phone call or expense, our children learn how to respond based on what they observe. We implicitly tell them what we expect of them by showing them what we expect of ourselves in those kinds of situations.

So in a sense, our children should be doing more of the driving than we think. Or at least, they are a sort of GPS device steering us in the right direction, if we listen. You’ll find incredible insight into your performance as a parent if you begin tuning in your children. It will rarely be as obvious as my daughter’s “Wrong Way” exclamation, but it will be more accurate.

There isn’t a journey more important than that of parenthood. There are no U-turns, no rest stops, no exits. If you’re like me, you look for reliable guidance wherever possible, because it’s important to know where you’re heading.

Especially if you’re going the wrong way.

You feel me?

AF

Finding substance in "style"

2010-04-20T19:42:00.000-07:00

Funny what will prompt a return to blogging. It could be a piece of news that only matters to a very small percentage of the population (me among them). Or it could be a spouse's commandeering of the television to watch Glee.

Whatever the case, I was reminded again today from the most unlikely of sources that, despite my best efforts and despite what you all may think, I in fact do not know it all. Remaining teachable and pliable is as much a life skill as kindness, patience, and the ability to find refuge when your wife turns the channel.

A handful of you may have heard the news that the Associated Press announced Tuesday it is changing the acceptable style of the term "Web site" to "website." Fewer of you probably cared. Most of you have been writing it as "website" since around 2001, and have thus subjected habitual editors like myself to the visual equivalent of nails on a chalkboard for the better part of a decade.

According to one source, the change "comes in response to reader input." This organization, in existence since 1846 and still considered the authority in standardizing news writing, is changing its position based on feedback.

It's tempting to look at this as a case of, "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em." After all, "reader input" could be the AP's way of saying, "You Neanderthals can't get it right, so we might as well all be on the same page." But the entry in the AP Stylebook instructs news writers that "Web site" is correct, but so is "webcam" and "webcast." Most likely, the inconsistency was too blatant to ignore any longer, and the news service did the reasonable and appropriate thing and made the correction.

I know. Given my well-noted disdain for modern journalism, it seems odd to take a lesson from the AP. So, consider as well the piece I wrote on another site regarding Heinz's new ketchup packet. Here again, an organization with longstanding success takes constructive criticism and improves itself as a result.

And that's the key. No one likes correction or being told their work is not adequate. In my former life as a politico, my congressman boss almost never liked the first draft of my press releases or statements. I could literally hand him a copy of the Bible and he would hand it back with edits. But I'm a better writer today because I was pushed to improve then.

It's not just the young who can stand to improve and successfully do so. If entities as entrenched as Heinz and the AP can evolve, there's hope for us all.

This becomes especially important when we apply it to the way we treat one another. "There's nobody living right, not even one," it's said. That quote refers to morality, but its application can be universal if we choose to make it so. In any given area, you've not yet arrived. Nor has anyone else. There's work to be done.

If you need proof, look no further than prime time television.

You feel me?

AF

But wait, I'm still fat: A call to honesty in the play on emotions

2010-02-01T17:36:00.000-08:00

Well, look at that. It's been almost two months since I blogged. And look at that, we all survived.

There's little use making excuses for taking an unintended holiday from this site. I usually mix my mea culpa with a bit of rationalization, but that won't do here. Instead, let us never speak again of what will live in infamy as the 60-Day Feeling Fuller Fast.

Onward and upward, I say.

The major new development of the last 60 days is my new role with a marketing communications firm in South Bend. It's the fourth position I've held under the umbrella of "Communications," a catch-all term that is emblazoned on my Bethel College degree. A job in communications, of course, can take many forms, but it amazes me how similar the jobs of television journalist, political apologist, and marketing strategist have become in the year 2010.

To be sure, they have always had similar threads in their fabric: Each entail crafting messages to be digested by a mass audience. The elements of sound communication are nearly universal in theory, even if they are not universal in practice.

After I left the life of a journalist, I continued to work with news people very closely in my professional life, and watched them very closely in my personal life. And I'm finding a rather troubling trend emerging. Marketing and PR (and, by extension, political spokesmanship) have long been viewed by journos as the second-tier step-children of the communications family because of their inherent appeal to emotion. Journalism, it has long been held, is a communications purist's ultimate concoction of disseminating information that is purely factual, without relying on the frills of "warm fuzzies" or emotional appeals.

And yet, as I view it, the "news" product of the current day seems much more intent on evoking emotion than informing an audience.

This is a topic I've written about several times before, here and here. I won't re-hash those thoughts, but I will add this wrinkle: If journalism wasn't always like this, if it has in recent history moved closer to marketing in its form and its function, then perhaps we can glean from current marketing campaigns something about the future of journalism.

Which brings us to the recent ad campaign for Taco Bell which reminded me of my recent post ("recent," of course, being purely relative based on the introduction to this post) on the critical lack of reality in the world today. You no doubt saw it - I'm speaking of Taco Bell's new "Drive Thru Diet" campaign.

It honestly took my viewing it several times to realize this was not a joke. A woman claims to have lost 54 pounds while regularly indulging in Taco Bell's new "leaner" menu options. Even if that is true, there are so few people for whom this would work that making it into a marketing campaign is at best disingenuous.

Of course, Taco Bell makes the necessary disclaimers about all this. ("These results are not normal...but for me, they're fantastic."m) But who's kidding who: The overall message of the ad is clearly, "Taco Bell can help you lose weight." Put aside for a minute this comes in between campaigns for the "Volcano Taco" (seriously, nothing neon pink should ever be ingested by humans) and the 5-layer nacho cheese burrito. Marketers have license to appeal to emotions, but they do not have license to pass off irregularities for readily-attainable results.

If your ad campaign is equal parts claimer and disclaimer, it's time to return to the drawing board.
And so it goes for any role, in any profession. If journalism is heading the way of campaigns like the "Drive Thru Diet," heaven help us. (Indeed, some would say it is already there.) But exercising dishonesty is not a problem confined to the field of communications. Business, retail, service - they all have sharks in the water.

So consider this a call to separate yourself from the pack. Tell the truth, without disclaimer. Let your messages speak for themselves, without the need for lengthy explanation. In other words, "Let your 'yes' be 'yes' and your 'no' be 'no.'"

Indeed, this is the quickest way to stand out, no matter how many jobs you hold.

You feel me?

AF

Don't shoot the messenger: Why Hydrant-gate beat out the Seattle police killings

2009-12-03T18:34:00.000-08:00

Note: This post first appeared as my article at Linking Indiana. I understand since the time of its original posting some of the circumstances regarding the Tiger Woods story have changed; I have no interest in researching them to update this post.

It was one of the "deadliest days in US law enforcement history." It really did read like something out of an old Western movie: An outlaw, out after being given a second chance in another state by a prominent political figure, walks into an eating establishment, and guns down four police officers before getting away. Eventually, this sets up a climactic scene in which a lone officer catches up to the fugitive, and shoots and kills him.

This actually happened in Seattle over the last five days, but you are about three times more likely to know more about the rumors surrounding the nation's highest-paid athlete's alleged indiscretions and wayward driving.

At first I thought it was just the circles I run in that made the Tiger Woods Hydrantgate episode ubiquitous. I follow a lot of PR people on Twitter and the blogosphere. Tiger's troubles, if nothing else, are a case study in poor PR management. Then I did a simple Google news search: As of Tuesday afternoon, when both stories were reaching their climax, "Tiger Woods accident" yielded 14,669 stories, "Seattle police shooting," 5,122.

More instructive: "Tiger Woods mistress" appeared as a form-fill option after typing just the first three letters of the phrase ("Tig"). Think about all the possible search queries that could be launched using the first three letters, "Tig." Google is so sure you're trying to search for information about Tiger's - ahem - "tail," it rules out all of them in half a second.

In college, we learned about something called the "agenda-setting" function of media. That is, news professionals have a great responsibility because they decide what is important enough to make it in their newscasts/paper/Web site, etc. I wasn't in college too long ago, and I was in the news business for four years after, but Hydrant-gate's outshining of the Seattle police shootings shows us that several factors are already whittling this big stick of journalism down to a nub. And it's not entirely the media's fault it seemingly focuses on sex and celebrities at the expense of more compelling stories.

First, there is the need to fill 24-hour news channels with content. How discerning can a producer really be if they are required to deliver "news" when there just isn't much happening? Some celebrity will always be doing something stupid somewhere. Content problem solved.

Secondly, we must account for the good and the bad in the rise of social media. Sites like Twitter allow people to report their experiences in newsworthy events via first-hand, real-time accounts. A major trending topic on Twitter replaces both the agenda-setting role of journalists and the journalists themselves. We saw this on full display in the aftermath of the Iranian elections, when reporters were unable to capture the events in Tehran.

But not everything discussed on social media sites should make the news. A topic's popularity among an audience is certainly a criterion for its newsworthiness, but not the only criterion. Many traditional journalists still seem largely behind the curve in leveraging social media tools, and seem to be over-compensating by elevating traditionally non-news items they find there to appear savvy.

While many people would say a third factor is the overall decline of journalistic standards (I've done my part to argue this, too), it's more helpful to remember that news in 2009 America is very much a consumer-focused commodity. The news delivered through many outlets is as market-tested, research-driven, and consultant-controlled as any soft drink on the grocer's shelf. More than ever before, increased competition is forcing news outlets to find what will attract that first few seconds of attention from viewers/readers/listeners, and developing their products around it. The disproportionate emphasis on attention-grabbing many times makes for shallow stories and even shallower anchors.

All this is means news organizations are starting to act more like advertising agencies. They are more and more in the business of marketing, which is largely based on an appeal to the emotions. This is a departure from how we normally think of news, that is, a largely intellectual and informative entity.

There's a backhanded compliment in there: We drive the news, sure, but that means what's on the news is there because they know we'll watch it. So the next time we see one of the ubiquitous blonde anchorettes on TV (seriously, is it just me who thinks they must have a machine in the back that produces these people?) deliver all the news except that which is fit to print, we shouldn't be too quick to shoot the messenger. After all, we had a major hand in sending her.

Thankful for perspective

2009-11-24T18:09:00.000-08:00

This time of year, everyone likes to engage in a ritualistic counting of blessings, and many bloggers like me try to write a meaningful piece about being thankful.

Neither of these are necessarily insincere, but both seem to smack of cliche and lack perspective from time to time.

My employer recently began accepting applications for a sales position. (If you have sales experience and could bear the thought of me as a co-worker, by all means let me know.) Filling these kinds of positions usually takes the same pattern of events: An opening announcement is made in various locations, and the resumes begin flowing. Then the screening process begins.

Our company tries to find out as much as possible about applicants seeking employment, a task made easier by this era of online profiles and internet searches. (It did with me.) Last week, our recruiter performed an internet search for one particularly promising applicant - looking for a LinkedIn profile, or the like - and was taken aback by the first story that led the search results.

It was his obituary. This young man applied at my company on Monday, and was killed in a car accident on Tuesday. He was 26 years old.

When we learned of this, a couple of my colleagues and I responded with the usual cliche, "Wow. You just don't know, do you?" It was all we could think to utter. I'm not sure why it affected me the way it did; I never knew the guy, obviously. Perhaps it was a jolt that reminded me there is much we plan in this world and much we strive for that, in the end, doesn't matter all that much compared with what we already have.

This really is not intended to be a pre-holidays guilt trip or buzz kill, but it is worth noting that many people will have trouble giving thanks at all this time of year. It will be perfectly understandable for some, like that young man's family who just eight days ago never dreamed there would be an extra spot at the Thanksgiving table. Others, it seems, may lack perspective on just what gifts they've been afforded.

Hopefully we can all gain a little perspective from the loss of a potential co-worker I never knew. The holidays bring a certain amount of "normal" stress - scheduling, traveling, entertaining, etc. - but it seems many of us have it much better than we'd like to admit. What's the point of wasting so much emotional energy over seeing family and friends, when many do not have the same number of family and friends to see?

This post may not satisfy the cliche-free criterion I was striving for, but we all need a reminder here and there of what's real and what's...real.

You feel me?

AF

Tom Brady goes to Heaven

2009-11-13T17:27:00.000-08:00

Allow me to share a slightly embellished version of a story passed along by a business associate:

After a long and successful NFL career, and a relatively disappointing post-football stint as Mach 3 razor spokesmodel, Tom Brady passed on and went to Heaven.

At first, Tom was frightened to appear before the Heavenly Father. Had he been a good steward of his talents? Had he reached his potential?

Sensing Tom's unease, God put His arm around him. "Relax, Tom," God said. "You've done well with what I've given you. Three Super Bowls, a touchdown passing record - well done. Behold what I have for you."

God gestured over to a beautiful 2-story brick home. It had drab navy blue shudders with the trademark Patriots head engraved in them. There was a Patriots flag in a holder attached to a post on the front porch. The home was, in a word, "nice."

Satisfied, Brady walked up the sidewalk and was about to enter his new divine dwelling, when something caught his eye.

A way up the road, there stood a towering mansion of royal blue brick, easily two football fields long and seemingly almost as high. The roof's white shingles glistened, and were enhanced by the blue shingles patterned in the shape of a horseshoe. Giant white columns supported a grand portico, the top of which held several Indianapolis Colts banners, each taller than Brady's home. Out front there was a circular driveway of blue and white cobblestone around which meticulously manicured shrubs gave way to a sparkling pond. In the middle of this pond, there was a fountain in the likeness of Peyton Manning triumphantly raising the Super Bowl XLI trophy. Blue horses ran wild on the estate's ample acreage.

This vexed Brady. "God," he said, "I don't want to sound ungrateful. Peyton Manning and I are friends, after all. But I broke his passing touchdowns record and I have three Super Bowl championships, and he has only one. Shouldn't his home be smaller than mine?"

God smiled. "Tom," He said. "That's not Peyton's home. It's mine."

Journalism: Another nail in the coffin

2009-11-11T18:25:00.000-08:00

It may not be a topic with broad appeal, but from time to time I write about the state of journalism in this country. I've written here about the affects of evolving technology on the profession, and here about the bizarre agenda-setting and information-killing hysterics often readily observable from major news outlets.

Consider this your warning that if this topic does not interest you, neither will the rest of this post.

Overall, people should know I take a generally cynical view of much of the news media these days. It's half the result of working in the business for several years, and half the result of working with the business for several more. Pieces like this one should give you a clearer idea where I'm coming from.

Which leads us to this story from a Michigan paper about a man suffering electrical burns. I came across it through my work. It's not a story about a major issue of the day. It's not conspiratorial. It's not tainted with liberal bias. It is, however, almost laughably inept in its reporting. And unfortunately, probably is indicative of why so many distrust major news outlets to begin with.

The headline is clumsy, and acts as a big-time buzz kill: "Worker injured...but not seriously." Well, I'm hooked. Nothing like what sounds like little more than a stubbed toe to compel readers to dive in.

Within the first two sentences, the reporter assures us they are an authority on what happened: "His condition was unknown." Hmm. How do we know it wasn't "serious," exactly? Oh, I see: "the man was conscious and breathing." What a relief. Good thing all it takes to get a clean bill of health is the ability to demonstrate consciousness and respiration. I suppose screaming in unbearable pain would demonstrate these two things as well, but then we'd lose our catchy headline. So we move on...

Our headline gets a little messy when a fire chief explains electrical burns don't always show their extent outwardly. In the next paragraph, things get even more complicated for our optimistic headline writer: "(the incident) sent about 440 volts coursing through his (the victim's) body. He's lucky to be alive," says the fire chief. The story mercifully ends after our dutiful reporter reiterates, "the extent of the victim's injuries were unknown."

So, let's review: A man suffers electrical burns. He had 440 volts of electricity course through his body. I'm not sure how to analogize that, but I'm sure it doesn't tickle. The one expert interviewed for the story says he's lucky to be alive. The reporter admits twice they have no idea how the victim is doing. But, apparently because we know he was "conscious and breathing," we arrive at the conclusion: "Worker injured...but not seriously."

Seriously?

The problem here (well, one of the problems here) is that it's apparent this reporter was rushed to post something online or meet a deadline to print, and did not check his logic. In his defense, he's not the only one to do it, and he won't be the last. How many times have cable news channels breathlessly rushed to tell us about a breaking tragedy (Balloon Boy, anyone?), only to realize upon further inspection it wasn't as it seemed.

Journalists are admittedly in a tough spot these days: The demand for news and information is constant, and pesky things like checking facts or logic can mean losing out to a competitor. How they adapt, especially with new tools such as Twitter, et al, remains to be seen.

But here's hoping we can at least expect a little congruity between headline and body, and paragraph to paragraph.

You feel me?

AF

Moving from exceptional to expected

2009-11-02T18:37:00.000-08:00

In the past several months, I've been subject to the customer service processes of the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles, HP, and today, through my work, an Internet marketing vendor. Of the three, only the BMV provided quality customer service. In fact, it was outstanding.

With HP, you'll recall, we were asked to ignore the fact they had taken our computer in for repairs once (as per our warranty) and had failed. Then they asked us to roll the dice they could get it right with another crack at it. Today, the aforementioned marketing group tried to convince me they had fulfilled their obligations of our contract, despite the fact the clearly spelled-out 14-day timeline for completion ballooned to 53 days, and is still not completed. Obviously, I'm demanding a full refund on behalf of my company.

That only the BMV treated me with respect and dignity is important for two reasons: First, you just plain don't expect that from a BMV. Second, you just plain don't expect that anywhere, anymore. At some point, quality customer service became the exception, not the rule.

I've alluded before to the fact there is a crisis of respect in our world. That certainly enters in here, but I wonder if there's not something else in play: a crisis of entitlement.

A pervasive entitlement mentality yields pervasive bad service. The degree to which people feel they are owed their paycheck - without the due diligence to earn it - is the degree to which they will shirk their responsibilities. This is especially a problem in our nation, as we increasingly become a service-based economy. The intensity of a poor customer relations experience is magnified when the only tangible item for a problem that can be blamed is a person, not a defective inanimate object.

For what it's worth, I'm not sure the constant drumbeat from Washington about the "right" of people to obtain for free things most of us pay for is the best way to solve the problem.

What will? For starters, an increased emphasis on personal accountability and community responsibility, and a de-emphasis on the individual. Parents and teachers play a role here.

Then maybe one day we won't have to look to the BMV for a positive customer relations experience.

You feel me?

AF

No, really. You feel me? Then don't forget to vote for Feeling Fuller in the Top 50 Blogs of Indiana contest here!

Ponies change their names (And other lessons from a 4-year old)

2009-10-28T18:13:00.000-07:00

It may surprise you to learn that My Little Ponies change their name upon reaching their sixth birthday.

It surprised me, at least.

The Pony Formerly Known as "Pinkie Pie" is now "Balloons," "Cheerilee" is now "Cherry Blossom," and the irrepressible "Star Song" will heretofore be known as, "Rock Star."

Just when I was no longer being chastised for confusing Toola-Roola with Scootaloo.

Such is the education of a father of a four-year with a mind blossoming before our eyes. Hardly a bath goes by without Aislynn regaling me with a made-from-scratch story about her plastic submarine bath toy she named "Soapy the Submarine." Usually some other friends ("Thomas the Tugboat" and the aforementioned Pinkie P -er- "Balloons," notable among them) must overcome harrowing obstacles in order to reach Soapy's house for a party. Miraculously, they seem to emerge victorious each time the plug is pulled to drain the tub.

Then there's our nightly devotional reading, "I Can Learn about God." At the end of each paragraph-length story, I ask a question to see if Aislynn has been paying attention. Tonight we read about how God punished Adam and Eve for disobeying him by banishing them from Eden. After we finished, I asked, "Aislynn, how did God punish Adam and Eve?" To which she replied, "He gave them a time-out." Nothing like a little personal experience application to instill understanding.

The wife and I have written before about the reason we have a deeper appreciation for such examples of mental development, and I won't belabor the point here. We're grateful for her teaching us about everything from pony nomenclature to the "Spanish" word for "catch." (Not sure she's accurate there. Also not sure if Dora the Explorer is the best tutor.)

We're somewhat less enthusiastic about her increasing awareness of her status relative to little sis. As you recall, 2-year old Isla at one time not too long ago enjoyed reign of the house over older, bigger Aislynn. It was commonplace for the younger to simply walk up to and take a toy from the older with a gentle shove, which would send the ever-subtle Aislynn running up the stairs while yelling, "Whooooaaah! Isla! Don't push me up the stairs!"

Now, big sis is reclaiming her territory. Isla is now met with stern reprimand simply for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Yesterday's round of princess hopscotch more closely resembled a theatrical blocking rehearsal, with Aislynn directing Isla where, when and how to stand. And there's the all-too-often-followed suggestion by Aislynn that Isla be sent to timeout for disobedience.

It's safe to say I'm not the only one learning a few things from Aislynn.

All of which is perfectly normal for two girls under the age of five sharing the same roof. It's a great course to take, and I'm glad class is in session every night I come home.

You feel me?

AF

P.S. - If you really feel me, click here to vote for Feeling Fuller to be one of the Top 50 Blogs in Indiana. Out-of-staters, you're eligible to participate, too!

Find out what it means to me...

2009-10-22T18:44:00.000-07:00

Over the last several weeks, a couple of media items have made me recoil in disgust. I didn't know how to contextualize them until the last 24 hours, when I happened across a keenly insightful article.

The first item was Fox Sports' and Burger King's animated jab at Jessica Simpson's weight. See for yourself here. The video was shown during Fox's coverage of NFL football.

Put aside the fact that the spot is genuinely unfunny, regardless of the subject matter. Also put aside the fact that, although the sketch attempts to demean Simpson's physique, she is probably in much better shape than approximately 99% of the males who viewed the sketch when it originally aired.

Frankly, I don't care for Simpson in the slightest when it comes to her talents as an entertainer. The idea that she is by some measure overweight is, by any objective standard, laughable. Yet the premise of this sketch, and countless tabloid reports of Simpson and other female celebrities, is that a woman's worth as a human being is drawn heavily - almost exclusively - from her ability to remain a certain weight.

The second item was Pepsi's release of an iPhone application called, "AMP up before you Score." The tie-in to Pepsi's AMP energy drink portends to give men pointers on how to "score" with different categories of women, from "Sorority Girl" to "Married Woman." The packaging is sleek and the technology cutting edge, but here again, women are given value only for their ability to satisfy the sexual desires of men.

I realize fully that Pepsi intended the app as a "joke," as did Fox and Burger King with their sketch. I also realize that Pepsi today pulled the app, and that Fox and BK apologized. The cynic would say that either move seems hollow, as the surrounding publicity has already achieved the intended PR/brand awareness objective manifold. (Sidenote: #Pepsifail is a fascinating case study in the role of social media in brand management.)

I like to think I was always so sensitive to these kinds of degrading exploitations. Fact is, I probably wasn't, at least not to this degree. Perhaps chalk it up to being the father of two beautiful little girls, and shuddering at the prospect of what they may have to deal with in a dozen short years. The lesson that beauty is skin deep while eternal value lay inside is timeless, but not easily taught or learned.

At first, I thought the lesson here is that the feminist movement, while making strides in proponents' political and legal aims, still has its work cut out in the cultural arena. That may be, but the greater lesson here was actually revealed last week when the nation held its breath watching an odd-looking experimental balloon careen across the Colorado sky, hoping the assumed six-year-old passenger would make it out in one piece, only to find out it was a hoax.

The commonality between the genuinely odd Falcon Heene saga and the continuing degradation of women is wonderfully expressed in the words of a commentary in Thursday's Wall Street Journal: We're all Balloon Boys Now.

When women are reduced to a weight or a conquest - or, pick any other humiliation of women or men - it is natural to decry the lack of respect in society. This is incorrect, or at least incomplete. At its core, what we have is a reality problem. We just don't know what's real anymore. In a culture where even the "poor" have several hundred cable channels, the lines between entertainment and news are becoming extinct, and television personalities are revered cultural icons, and issues of right or wrong are left to matters of perspective, reality takes a decidedly subjective bent.

We are obsessed with unplugging, "vegging," and immersing in an alternative reality because we are unhappy with our own. We feel uncomfortable calling anything wrong less often for the high-minded reason of moral objectivity, and more often because we just don't know any better. Eventually, this leads us to act in a manner similar to Richard and Mayumi Heene, according to the reality we believe others will want to watch. In other words, we act by what we think is expected of us.

If we can't distinguish what's real, we have no hope of viewing our fellow man for what they are: beings created in a Magnificent Image. Instead, we see them through a convoluted prism of how we believe we should see them, and treat them accordingly. That's seldom good. We treat them as objects or commodities, not organic beings with genuine experiences and emotions that contribute to an objective reality known as the human condition. Meanwhile, objective reality continues its slow death.

You feel me?

AF

Judge what I say, not what I do

2009-10-09T08:46:00.000-07:00

It is with little exaggeration that I say people the world over are scratching their heads at the selection of President Barack Obama to receive a Nobel Peace Prize. Even the president's own spokesman was caught seemingly unaware.

The obvious criticism over the selection is that the man - despite all the soaring rhetoric and charming charisma - has accomplished little compared to others who have a lifetime of achievements to warrant such recognition. Nominations for the award were due February 1, which means Obama was nominated before completing 10 days in office.

Obama supporters are fond of countering his impatient detractors by saying he can't fix all that's wrong with the country in the short time he's been in office. "Give him a chance," is the common refrain. Fair enough. But that tacit admission of to-date relative ineffectiveness is a saw that cuts both ways. Those who defend Obama by saying he's not been given enough time to effect the change he's promised cannot maintain intellectual honesty if they say this award is based on the change he's delivered. Obama himself said the award was based largely on, "aspirations."

It seems this is as much an award withheld from George W. Bush as it is an award bestowed upon Barack Obama. Whether you agree with that analysis or its underlying suggestion, it is a shame the Nobel process has become thus politicized.

But lying deeper here is a message becoming regrettably more prevalent in society: Judge by intentions, not results. I blogged about this several months ago in relation to an article pointing out teachers' growing refusal to correct and growing tendency to equivocate. We simply don't call a spade a spade anymore: Incorrect answers are justified by criticizing the question, half-hearted effort is encouraged for the fact it is an effort at all. The pursuit of excellence and concrete results has been rendered impotent by our obsession with "what we meant to do."

There is inherent danger when we reward words over actions. In the workplace, for example, planning and executing are two fundamentally different animals, and require different skill sets. In my profession, the most effective media campaign on paper means little if it does not enhance my employer's visibility in the industry via tangible results. The degree to which we value intention over production is the degree to which all are misled, and ultimately damaged.

We know something else about valuing rhetoric over results in life: Eventually, the bill comes due. At some point, excuses run out, and your boss (employer, spouse, electorate) will want to see results. That is why it is so important this problem of rewarding intentions be corrected in our schools and why the message the Nobel Committee sent today is so damaging.

It is now incumbent upon Obama to produce the change for which such an award has already credited him. For the rest of us, a lesson: Far better to be recognized for what you do, not what you say.

You feel me?

AF

When in Rome Wednesday: My, how Rome's changed

2009-10-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

Apologies in advance to those for whom this will incite feelings of "being old," but I am embarking on my last month as a twenty-something. Twenty-nine will soon be gone, and 30 will be the new norm.

Reflective? Yes. Sentimental? Maybe a little. Needing something to blog about? Most definitely.

Brace yourself for an understatement: November 2009 looks a bit different than November 1979. I remember once when I was very young, we visited Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry. I was given a printout of what made the news on my birthday. All I remember is something about the Pope. So, what follows is an admittedly incomplete list of the areas in which "Rome" - which on this blog takes the meaning of my current locale and its customs and peculiarities - has changed.

Technology. Probably the most obvious area, but still worth mentioning. When I was little, the concept of a phone that folded in on itself and could fit in your pocket seemed like something out of the Jetsons. (Which, by the way, was my favorite show back then. It isn't now for the sole reason I can't find it airing anywhere.) Now, my little girls take our old phones, flip them open, and begin "talking" to their friends. They know exactly what to do with them; it is just a part of their world. At age 4, I would have looked at such an item and figured it was a G.I. Joe toy missing many pieces.

Similarly, last month, the wife left Aislynn at the computer watching a show, and came back to find she had completed multiple levels of an online American Girl game. She just knew how to operate the mouse, keyboard, etc. It is a part of her generation's home life from birth. When I was in kindergarten, I remember very well several grades at Carlin Park Elementary sharing a single computer. (Yes, we used it to play Oregon Trail.) It was wheeled from room to room on a heavy steel cart. Once a classmate of mine caught a bout of the jimmylegs and kicked a wire dangling underneath. The computer sputtered and died, and the classmate was duly ostracized. Their ire stemmed from the fact virtually no one then had a computer in their home. Today, virtually no one is without.

The proliferation of the computer and Internet has brought numerous other changes - some within only the last three years - that would be the stuff of fantasy in the early 1980s. Rather than explore the issues in this post, I'll direct you to my posts here, here, and here.

Television. I mention it here largely because I believe what entertains us - and, more specifically, what we allow to entertain us - speaks volumes about us as a culture and us as a society. If I'm right, I think it's an easy case to make that we are a far more crass, vulgar culture than we were 30 years ago.

Frankly, there are certain things you can say on prime time TV you couldn't say 30, 20, or even ten years ago. There are certain things you can show today you couldn't then, too. I know mine is not the first generation to lament this, nor am I the first in my generation to lament it, but the effect of this loosening of our toleration threshold seems excruciatingly obvious. I've said before the Jon and Kate debacle is a clear example of the laissez-faire attitude Americans increasingly exhibit regarding the traditional family, and it pains me to think what challenges to this fundamental tenet of our society and our faith my children will face.

Again, much more could be and has been written on this topic by people far more qualified and eloquent than I.

Politics. At the risk of nauseating any historians reading this, it seems to me a few threads of American political life in the late 1970s are actually back again in 2009. Consider: Iran is once again/still a problem. The ruling political party is searching to bring the country out of an unpopular war everyone assumed would be over by now. A president inaugurated amidst high hope has seen his popularity plummet dramatically, even as he invites comparisons to that same president of three decades ago in policy and practice. There isn't much new under the sun.

And to be sure, there are some things I'm glad haven't changed. My dad is still the pastor of a growing church in northeastern Indiana, just as he was 30 years ago and further. My parents are still together and in good health, either of which is becoming increasingly rare among my peers. And optimists still root for the Cubs.

People in every generation reflect on the past and hypothesize about the future. It will be fascinating to hear Aislynn's and Isla's perspective in 30 years about where life was and where it is. So here's to another 30. And here's hoping blogging is still cool then so I can write about it.

You feel me?

AF

When in Rome Wednesday: The new aqueducts

2009-09-30T18:37:00.000-07:00

Those of you who follow me on Twitter (@andy_fuller) know I like to keep things positive, informative. And you also know that this has been difficult in recent days because of an ongoing customer relations dispute with Hewlett Packard. Out of that experience, a new perspective on brand-to-consumer communication has emerged.

I'm happy to report that as of this posting, Hewlett Packard and the Fullers have reached an agreement in principle on a ceasefire. Nothing is final, but at last the stalemate has been broken and we should be receiving a comparable new computer in a few weeks. (For those unfamiliar with our HP problem, I direct you to this blog established by The Wife to chronicle our bizarre misadventure.)

Long story short: Our computer flat died several weeks ago. As it is still under warranty, we shipped it to HP for repair. Approximately 10 days later our computer was returned.

And it was still broken.

It was our view that in failing to repair the unit per the warranty, HP breached said warranty. When we called back to complain, HP said the only recourse was for us to send the computer back in for their techs to get another crack at it and hope for a different result.

A wise man once called that the very definition of insanity. Eventually, we reached an impasse: us demanding a new computer, HP insisting that the warranty be followed.

The above description of events leaves out the hours spent on the phone by my wife in rather mystifying conversations with HP's customer support staff. What broke the stalemate? Social media: virtual aqueducts.

After a well-worded email to HP, I befriended two HP-affiliated Twitter accounts. In a manner of speaking, I called them out in the Twittosphere for the shoddy service we received. We went back and forth, with several of my friends "Re-Tweeting" my posts to effectively multiply their reach, and thus the negative impact on HP. Less than 24 hours later, I was speaking with "Executive Customer Service," who now had a newfound interest in resolving the issue. Admittedly, HP no doubt dealt with much more difficult fires to extinguish that day than what to that point was still a relatively meager social media dust up, but this is certain: Smart companies know that this economy combined with the power of social media to turn escalating customer complaints into viral PR nightmares could spell disaster.

Social media is empowering customers to share their experiences in real time, to influence their friends and followers in favor or in opposition of brands. And since people are far more responsive to their friends than any advertisement, no matter how well-crafted, social media represents both an opportunity and a challenge for brands looking to break in to the arena.

In ancient Rome, aqueducts were a critical part of the survival of the empire: They ran potable water to cities and took wastewater away. Smart companies treat social media and online conversations the same way. First and foremost, they listen. They see what is being said, what customers are saying about their brand. That is the lifeblood of any company looking grow its loyalty; it is the potable water that allows a corporate empire to survive.

And similarly, as in my case, @HPCheer and @HPSupport used social media to quell a growing complaint from a rational, potentially influential disgruntled customer. In a sense, they took the "wastewater" away. (Side note: They deserve some credit here. They were the first people representing HP that made the customer service experience tolerable.)

The lessons of ignoring the structure of the new aqueducts are ubiquitous. This one is one of my favorites. Much like the Roman aqueducts that are still in place today, "social media" - in whatever form - is likely here to stay. That is, consumer-to-consumer and company-to-consumer communication is changing. It may not be Twitter or Facebook or any number of the other social networking sites that stands the test of time, but it is clear the days when companies held all the cards in controlling their brand are over.

You feel me?

AF

Free the Tweets: Major media still learning best uses for social media

2009-09-18T11:57:00.000-07:00

We've examined before the changing rules of news media reporting brought on by use of social sites like Twitter and Facebook. I've even posited that while it's clearly possible for "old" media to successfully use "new" media, the examples of successful symbiosis are rare.

Enter sports information giant ESPN, which last month set rather draconian rules for its on-air talent regarding use of Twitter, Facebook, and the like. In short, ESPN apparently prohibits its sports experts from engaging in social media discussions of...sports.

I understand some of their thinking here: ESPN seems to be trying to guarantee no cats are let out of the bag. In an increasingly competitive cable marketplace, the network clearly wants to ensure fans have every reason to tune in to its flagship programs, and no reason to expect the information in another format. Advertisers don't sponsor Ric Bucher's Tweets, after all. And I also understand to a degree their assertion that their on-air personalities have a following in the first place precisely because of ESPN. It's a little bit chicken-or-the-egg, but I can see where the network is coming from. I disagree with them, but I can empathize.

What I don't understand is ESPN's failure to capitalize on one of its strongest attributes, that is, being an authoritative source of information. Yes, ESPN is the preeminent sports entertainment network because it carries countless college and professional games on several channels around the clock. But its flagship program, SportsCenter - and other sports journalism programs, including Around the Horn and Pardon the Interruption - are equally responsible for the success of this branding. And that is because of the anchors, analysts, and reporters who engage the viewer with exclusive content and irresistible style.

Virtually every other national news organization apparently encourages interaction on social sites by its personalities. Most local news channels and newspapers use the medium as well. These news journalists - at least ideally - use Twitter and Facebook to disseminate information and push to their bread-and-butter outlets at the same time. I can think of at least one exceptional example where an organization's reach has been exponentially broadened by allowing this type of back-and-forth.

And allowing two-way communication and interaction, between people and between consumers and brands, is what social media is all about. ESPN either does not trust the ability of the medium to provide this successfully, or does not trust its personalities to exercise enough discretion so as to maintain the viability of one of the network's major products. They are journalists, after all, and should have mastered the art of teasing a story long before employment with ESPN.

Either way, ESPN's is an unfortunate stance, even if offered in good faith.

You feel me?

AF

When in Rome Wednesday: Define, "Traffic"

2009-09-16T18:52:00.000-07:00

Let's just cut to the chase: Illinois drivers are maniacs. It was something I knew from comparative evidence having lived my entire life in Indiana then moving to exurban Chicago. And returning to Indiana has only reinforced this notion.

That's not to say Indiana drivers are without fault. Their proclivity to drive in the center of the road on narrow two-way rural routes is mystifying. And the equally mystical and disturbing affliction that renders turn signals useless seems to occur at a higher rate among Hoosiers.

"Traffic" to a Hoosier usually equates to five cars at a four-way stop. To a Chicagoan, the term "traffic" is not applicable until roughly 500 cars create a delay of at least three hours. And even then, they'll say, "Eh, I've seen worse."

(Side note: It is explicitly Illinoisan to create traffic jams by ignoring the dozen or so warnings that your lane is ending in order to claim your birthright of advancing by two spots in that line of 500 cars.)

"Traffic," wherever it is found, doesn't exactly bring about motorists' "better angels." Yet the manifestations are decidedly different. To a Hoosier, particularly one of, shall we say, "agrarian" stock, traffic is an imposition on the lean, mean performance machine in which one sits. The inability to cause widespread hearing loss and property damage from the sonic waves emanating from your chassis is a personal affront to your manhood, your family name, and the Confederate flag you display so proudly in the form of fuzzy dice dangling from your rearview mirror. (Yes, I've seen them on the road.)

As a result, the first chance the stereotypical Hoosier gets to put to use the hours of work that has gone into making his truck an audiological Armageddon, he will take full advantage - even and puzzlingly if that "chance" is the simple advancement of the line of cars, the movement of 15 feet to claim the place once held by the car in front of you.

While Hoosiers think of traffic in terms of a mechanical imposition, it is clear Illinoisans absorb the blow of traffic quite personally. At the risk of overstating the point in what to now has been a lighthearted post, allow me to share an example of this drawn from my own experience.

It was a Saturday morning, and I took the girls for a drive while the wife cleaned house. We took the long way through our connected towns, and eventually found ourselves stopped by a funeral procession leaving the parlor. We stopped, of course, which immediately angered the person following dangerously close behind us.

The procession was quite short - only about seven or eight cars, perhaps - which only made me feel for the family involved even more. As the caravan approached a stoplight, the hearse, limo and approximately two cars made it through on green before the light turned abruptly red. This was a personal affront to the obviously uber-critical business every other motorist on the perpendicular road was conducting on this Saturday. Though their cars displayed the clear markings of a funeral procession - an indication they were going to bury a friend or family member - the people in the remaining five or so cars were subjected to yells through rolled-down windows, obscene gestures, horn honks, and general abhorrent behavior because they had the nerve to want to stay close to the vehicle carrying the body of their loved one.

Admittedly, I don't know the exact rules of the road in that situation. Perhaps the funeral-goers were in the wrong. But no driver - not one - seemed willing to give these people the benefit of the doubt. And this on a Saturday morning, approximately 10 AM. Not exactly rush hour or the time most people conduct business of any importance, let alone in the order of that somber drive to the cemetery.

This is an extreme example, but it serves to show what anyone who has lived or worked in Chicagoland knows: Each person views their own destination as the most important and will show disdain for common decency to get there. Hoosiers, on the other hand, may be comparatively crude and absent-minded, but I have yet to see the kind of personalization of the phenomenon of traffic here as in Illinois.

It's just another example of the sometimes extreme differences that exist in different spots in a relatively small area.

Just one question remains: How is it that everyone seems prone to make mistakes on the road but me?

You feel me?

AF

When in Rome Wednesday: Guilty until proven innocent

2009-09-02T18:53:00.000-07:00

For the first time since I was 16, I'm filled with feelings of relief and and newfound freedom as a result of obtaining an Indiana Driver's License.

Of course, I'm 29 now, but I would have preferred re-taking Driver's Education with its Saturday mornings full of parallel parking drills to the bizarre and frustrating bureaucratic nightmare of the last four months.

It began in early May, when I sought to finalize our recent move from Illinois by obtaining my Indiana license. It was easy enough at first. I passed the written test easily. (Though if my car is ever submerged with me in it, that's ballgame; I missed that one.) The one final step was the standard background check through the Problem Driver Pointer System (PDPS; yes, I've now become very familiar with this term).

"Mr. Fuller?" called Kim of the Linton Branch of the Indiana BMV. "We have a problem."

"Oh?"

"You've been flagged in two states," she explained, asking if I had ever resided in New York or Pennsylvania.

"I've never lived there, or even visited there for more than 24 hours," I said, still naively confident this would be resolved after a second check run.

"Well, it's telling me I can't issue you a license."

Hmm. Upon further questioning, I learned that someone (or some people) named Andrew R. Fuller with my birth date had raised a ruckus in the Empire and Keystone States, respectively.

"Can't you just run the last for digits of our Social Security Numbers?" I said, still with the naive confidence that common sense would rule the day.

"No, it won't let me do that."

Now I was annoyed. What came next from Kerri, the Branch Manager, didn't help: She explained that I would have to contact the BMV's of both New York and Pennsylvania to ask what I needed to do to prove I was not the person they were after. To reiterate, the burden of proof was on me.

"And what happens if someone comes in here who is named 'John Smith,' and they come up in 38 states?" I asked semi-rhetorically, hoping to point out the absurdity of the situation.

"Well, they would have to go to each state and prove they aren't the person they're looking for."

Having rammed my head into a brick wall enough that day, I set out to be processed in the BMVs of two of the most populous states in the Union. It couldn't have been some place like Montana, where likely a notorized letter stating I had never killed an animal with a firearm would be enough to prove my non-residence (and preclude any future residence). No, it had to be New York, where probably 12 Andy Fullers had whacked someone by lunch. Nevertheless, I picked up the phone and made the call.

Only to find out the office within the New York BMV I needed to contact was only open 8:30 AM to 12 Noon Monday through Friday. And it was 12:15. On Friday.

The following Monday, I was able to connect with actual human beings (after roughly an hour on hold and navigating menus) in both states. In New York, I was informed "Andrew R. Fuller" had been running drugs in 1996. As for myself, I was a sophomore in high school in Angola, Indiana. And our drug czar apparently did not even have the same birth date. I was told the proper material to fax to prove my innocence, including a type-written letter, and I complied within minutes.

In Pennsylvania, my namesake had made a habit of evading law enforcement. Here, I had to mail a notorized letter and four pieces of evidence to prove my innocence. They would mail a letter back to me. That shouldn't take long, right?

It took four months. When I finally received the letter stating my clearance, I triumphantly marched back into the Linton branch to begin the process again.

Only to find out I was still wanted in New York.

I showed Kerri the receipt of the fax I sent to submit my ID materials to prove I was innocent there. She got on the horn (it was 11:45 AM - my fingers were crossed) and learned from New York that the material I had submitted "was not legible." Evidently, they're not fond of the Times New Roman font on the East Coast.

Kerri volunteered to write a letter on Indiana BMV letterhead and fax it immediately, along with all the appropriate evidence proving my innocence, to New York. Props to her for this effort. She sent it, and I figured I would hear back in a week or two. Instead, Kerri called a couple hours later to say she had received a fax from New York stating I was clear.

I returned to the BMV after work that Friday figuring I would at last put all this behind me. I took the photo, signed my name on the computerized pad, and repeated the process I had now completed a half dozen times prior.

Only to find out I was still wanted in New York.

Apparently the Empire State was quick on the fax, not so quick to actually push the button on the computer to take me out of the system. Kerri made several calls to Indiana BMV officials. (By now, she was getting as annoyed as I was.) We ran the background check three more times.

And each time, I was still wanted in New York.

It would have been funny if it was happening to anyone else: I and two BMV workers are sitting in the branch, staring at a piece of paper saying I'm not wanted in New York, only to be at the mercy of a computer and a system that said I was. At 6 PM on Friday evening, an hour after the BMV had closed, we called off the hunt.

Tuesday, Kerri called again stating I had, indeed, forever and amen, been cleared from the system. I marched back in to the branch today with no small amount of nerves. They ran the background check.

And I was clear in New York.

All told, it was 4 months of waiting, and 6 hours in the BMV to resolve the problem. Along the way, a couple of important lessons were reinforced:

First, the people who work at the BMV are as much a slave to the system as you are. Don't blame them personally if things get fouled up. Kerri and Kim went out of their way to help me, and I am truly grateful for it.

Second, all the good people in the world will not be able to overcome unnecessary bureaucracy. Even the best intentions of large government programs (the Real ID Act in this case, which, ironically, I shilled for while I worked in politics) will inevitably be drowned in red tape and lead to assumptions like an Indiana high school sophomore moonlighting as a New York drug lord. There is no substitute for good, old fashioned human reasoning and service to our fellow man.

Oh, and one more lesson. Name your children the most unusual names you can think of. You just may save them a world of grief in 16 years.

You feel me?

AF

Know your audience: A lesson from Food Network

2009-08-28T12:19:00.000-07:00

Today I received the following Tweet from the most-watched network in the Fuller home, the Food Network:

"This one's for fans of NFNS runner-up, Jeffery Saad- the Ingredient Smuggler is back with exclusive web-only videos! http://bit.ly/tIoqC"

Avid viewers like myself immediately recognized the name of the second-place finisher on their wildly-popular show, "Next Food Network Star." And, if they're anything like me, they immediately clicked on the link to be regaled by Jeffrey as he made tilapia tacos with Anise seed.

Jeffrey was an early front-runner for the show's grand prize, a series on the Food Network, and was clearly very popular with FN viewers. But this strikes me as something exquisitely more well-planned than just a bone-throw to the runner-up and his fans. What the Food Network is doing is exhibiting excellent understanding of audience, medium, and content.

In the end, NFNS judges deemed Saad's appeal slightly too narrow for an entire series on the network. Saad's "culinary point of view" focuses on unusual ingredients folded into everyday cuisine. It is hip, exotic, and appeals to a different set than the deserving winner, Melissa D'Arabian, whose specialty is providing helpful tips to survive everyday culinary challenges drawn from her equally impressive reservoir of food knowledge.

It strikes me that the Food Network's marketing team did its homework in launching Saad's online series. Generally speaking, the set attracted to Saad's style view food in an almost recreational capacity: It is sustenance, to be sure, but for these adverturers food also represents a hobby, a way to experience new cultures, and a chance to branch out from the mundane. These are seekers and travelers who enjoy spice in their lives as much as on their plates.

The most effective way to reach these people - and they are still a demo FN should reach - is not a 30-minute show airing at 12:30 PM ET on Sundays (when D'Arabian's show airs), when many of them are mid-weekend adventure or recovering from it. Instead, this audience is better-served by cutting the "unnecessary" portions from a 30-minute show, briefly describing a new ingredient, and showing how it is made in 5-7 minutes online, when it can be viewed at their leisure.

My hunch is the FN was looking for a chance to try this web-only launch of a show. In Saad, they found a known entity with a built-in fan base through which to give it a go. Kudos to them on a fine job of marketing and audience recognition. Content is always king, but it is surely helped by providing the right medium to the right audience, as Food Network has done.

Marketing/PR colleagues, you feel me?

AF

Don't sweat the small stuff

2009-08-27T18:51:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know. It is an odd title given my last post, but I came across a news article just now that is ripe with perspective, and as you'll see, the titles of this post and my last aren't really incongruous. Let me explain.

What got my wheels turning is this story relating how Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on his trip to Germany, received blueprints to the Auschwitz concentration camp. The gesture, made by German journalists, appeared to be not so much a macabre gift as it was a means to provide Israel's top diplomat with a connection to the darkest chapter in his family and his nation's history.

Netanyahu's family was nearly wiped out by the Nazis in World War II.

Particularly interesting was this quote:

"Kai Diekmann, editor of Bild, Germany's top-selling newspaper, said as he handed Netanyahu the plans that there could never be a real normalization of German-Israeli relations after the Holocaust."

That may be true enough, though I doubt many in 1945 could have foreseen an Israeli Prime Minister visiting a unified Berlin, for a variety of reasons. History has a way of making fools of fortune tellers.

I also doubt many could know just what was going through Netanyahu's mind as he looked over this decades-old murder map with words like "Gaskammer" on it, a symbol of the unspeakably horrible place where 1.1 million of his people died. The article describes that he is also slated to visit the site where plans for Hitler's "Final Solution" were made.

And while it's true that Netanyahu's meeting with German Chancellor Merkel was probably mostly centered around Iran's nuclear program and the sausage-making that at times is diplomacy, that doesn't preclude the fact there can be inspiration in this episode, if we choose to see it, and it deals with perspective.

The moral courage and emotional fortitude it must take to visit such sites strikes me as compelling and noteworthy. And it kinda makes me not so concerned that the bosses might not like my Web designs.

Perspective is what allows us to decide which "stuff" to "sweat." In a strange paradox, I think we're better off sweating the stuff that allows us to help others - if even in small ways - but not sweating it when they stand in our way/disappoint us/wrong us.

I don't know if Netanyahu's trip and interactions are a sign that he's forgiven what was done to his people, or if this is a cathartic journey, or if this is merely political show. But I do know all of us tend to dwell on minutia at the expense of the bigger picture; we devote our toil and sweat into that which divides us - even seeking it our sometimes - instead of dismissing it as "small stuff" as we should.

Apply this however you will - or not at all. Pehaps the only takeaway for some of us is simply asking, "What makes me sweat?" And then ask yourself, "Is it really worth all that?"

You feel me?

AF

Sweat the small stuff

2009-08-21T04:30:00.000-07:00

Those who run in Marketing/PR/Social Media Marketing circles probably heard about the unfortunate incident described in this post from Douglas Karr's excellent Marketing Technology Blog.

To summarize, a seemingly seasoned PR professional (at least, if seasoned means she helps run her own firm founded in 1988) tried to pitch a product to a group of industry heavyweights in slipshod and clumsy fashion. The result was not only a failure to advance the client's product, but also a whirlwind of backlash that has likely done serious damage to the firm's credibility and trustworthiness.

And though we live in this ever-changing, ever-higher-tech media world, trust is still a (the?) vital component in any relationship, professional or otherwise.

Her major mistake? Among other things, failing to put the addresses of her email pitch recipients into the BCC field.

That got me thinking about not just work, but life on the whole. Sometimes, it can be the "small" stuff that makes all difference. Yet regrettably, it seems attention to detail increasingly yields to sensationalism, self-promotion, and self-service today.

The truth is that often it is in the details that we show we care for the people we come into contact with on a daily basis. This is true in every interpersonal interaction, from respecting our clients' time and privacy, holding the door for a perfect stranger, or allowing someone to change lanes on the freeway (thanks, Geggy Tah). And it's especially true in marriage, as caring for the small things shows you care for your spouse in major ways. (Thanks for setting the coffee maker this morning, Mrs. Fuller.)

So that's my encouragement today: Sweat the small stuff. Show someone - everyone - you care by paying attention to the details of your interaction.

You feel me?

AF

When in Rome Wednesday: Welcome to southern Indiana

2009-08-12T17:04:00.000-07:00

As mentioned at the start of this series, southern Indiana is in ways strikingly different than the state north of Indianapolis. The geography, the values, and yes, the accents, make this place distinct from the Indiana I knew north of I-74. To be honest, I guess I always figured the Ohio River acted as some sort of impenetrable cultural barrier that made Indiana homogeneous, and kept the South at bay. I was wrong.

Not that this is all negative. In fact, maybe it's best to issue a disclaimer and say virtually all the posts in the "When in Rome" series should be understood to have been written with my tongue firmly implanted in my cheek. As I've seen, there is a trusting nature and a moral clarity among the people here that are redeeming.

Still, at least one lifelong resident refers to this region as, "the dumb end of the state." And so, without further ado, allow me to recount a few vignettes that have immersed me in a new culture in the same state in which I was raised.

The Skoal Stop. On my first day of work, executive management took me to lunch at a local eatery, The Double Dog. It was your typical small town sandwich shop, located in an old storefront the ceiling of which still maintained the intricate designs of its 1800s grand opening. On the way back to the office, with country music pulsating the speakers, one of the vice presidents announced he needed to make a stop at Casey's. His purpose? To obtain his canister of Skoal chewing tobacco. My colleague noted, "You're getting a nice taste of southern Indiana: Country music, stopping for Skoal." Indeed.

The Homeless Name Game. One day while running a work-related errand, my co-worker and I passed by a homeless man on the street. "Oh, there's Reno," said my colleague, waving to the man with with dirty gray hair flowing from his Mopar cap. "Reno?" "Yes, Reno," he informed me. "He's one of the three homeless people who live here." He then went on to tell me the names of the other two, but I was still trying to wrap my head around the concept and didn't catch them: Everyone in town knows the names of the three homeless residents. In some ways I suppose that's oddly comforting.

The Wild West Coffee Shop. I have discovered a fine coffee shop in town, one that would rival many in other, more cosmopolitan areas. That's not to say the clientele would appreciate the relocation, however. Upon my first visit, I strode in and immediately felt like the buckaroo who mosies into the dusty saloon in an old Western movie. Everyone froze and stared at me and knew immediately I wasn't local. After I ordered my Americano, the barista and owner asked me as much. He was quickly distracted though when an elderly regular asked where he got the light fixtures. "At a store...in Chicago...called 'I-kee-ah'," was the reply.

The Fee-for-Service Honor System. The local quick lube establishment will pick up your car at your work, change the oil, etc., and bring it back. When I inquired how I should render payment, I was told, "Oh, just come in and pay when you get a chance." I guess that's the nice thing about a small town: You know where everyone lives and/or works.

No Sleeves, No Problem. It's true - virtually every male aged 25-75 feels it is his birthright to go sans sleeves if the forecasted temperature is above 82 degrees. This is apparently viewed as appropriate attire in virtually every public setting, from stores and restaurants to the workplace. Even despite the mild summer, I have been an involuntary party to too many gun shows this year.

There are other stories, like the previously covered road maintenance debacle, and the first-I've-seen Confederate flag fuzzy dice hanging proudly from a rear view mirror. But perhaps another time.

In the end, it bears mentioning that what this place may lack in sophistication it more than compensates for in the kindness of its people and the beauty of the landscape. I am looking forward to the change of the season and getting around to learn more about the people and places of southern Indiana.

Just don't expect me to stop for Skoal along the way.

You feel me?

AF

Rather or not...

2009-08-04T17:35:00.000-07:00

I spent four years in the news industry. It's admittedly not much, but it does give me a perspective into the business some do not have. Moreover, I spent my college years single-mindedly studying for a career in broadcast journalism (that is, when I was studying at all), so it's fair to say it is my first love of sorts.

Like most first loves, television journalism and I have grown apart. Perhaps I was naive not to notice 10 years ago when I started to pursue it as a career that the profession at times is little more than a veiled (and at times, not so veiled) bully pulpit for the group winning the appropriate ideological support: a corporation, a political group, whatever. And don't get me started on the precious newscast minutes devoted to Britney Spears and the Hollywood Idiot Class.

For these and other reasons, I decided to leave journalism and pursue a more honest profession: Politics.

Yet I still keep a keenly interested eye on the state of journalism in this country, which brings us to veteran newsman Dan Rather's emotional plea for what amounts to a bailout of news organizations in this country. Rather's complaint can be summed up in this clip:

"Corporate and political influence on newsrooms, along with the conflation of news and entertainment, has created what Rather called 'the dumbing down and sleazing up of what we see on the news.'"

Rather's solution is for President Obama to develop a commission to ensure this "dumbing" and "sleazing" is stopped, and competent journos are trained.

Put aside for a moment the irony of someone whose hands are far from clean when it comes to degrading the quality of network news now calling the kettles black. Interestingly, I find myself in a position where I cannot disagree with Rather's assessment. In fact, it sounds vaguely familiar.

What is puzzling to me is how Rather, who believes our system of government, "American democracy," depends on a press that is free and independent from that government, also believes the press can (must!) be saved by making it considerably more dependent on said government in the form of this "commission."

This proposal exposes many things about Rather and the state of journalism in America, but the most interesting, the freshest revelation is this: We are currently witnessing a changing of the guard between the Cronkite-Rather-Brokaw era and the new media - a faster, more agile, less-predictable form of journalism that is still pre-adolescent. Rather objects to this new brand of journalism as he apparently holds it responsible for the "dumbing" and "sleazing" of the product of news.

Rather's lamentation is largely misplaced, in my view. While it may be these new mediums are given to extreme brevity which often breeds sensationalism, it is not true this is solely a product of the medium itself; rather (excuse the pun), it is a growing pain brought on by the old guard's lagging ability to adapt. We saw this on full display in June during the Iranian elections, when Twitter was more reliable than CNN. As unbelievable as it may have seemed in 1980, the 24-hour cable news network was too slow and too unwieldy to capture events as they unfolded.

Do I think smart, savvy journos working for large networks can use sites like Twitter well and evolve with the times? Yes, some already do. Yet network news increasingly plays second fiddle to online sources offering on demand timing and complete consumer control of the product.

In the end, I believe folks like Rather know network news is dying, and with it a part of themselves withers away too. For Rather, the self-made son of a ditch-digger from Texas, it is all too painful to watch your first love pass on. You see, he still held on even when he and broadcast news were growing apart. His criticisms of the news, even in spite of their merits, come off now as little more than the sneering of a jealous ex-spouse.

You feel me?

AF

The sweetest bully on the block

2009-07-22T17:36:00.001-07:00

It may come as a shock to you that I used to know absolutely nothing about child psychology. Fatherhood has begun to change that to a degree. I figure my still profound lack of knowledge on the subject will manifest itself multiple times over the years, but for now I know this: My little 20-month-old is the cutest, sweetest, most innocent-looking, bully on the block.

Isla has developed a brand of determined assertiveness that would make many politicians cower. Our 3-year-old, Aislynn, is bearing the brunt of this behavior.

Consider if you will the other day, when Isla stole a toy from Aislynn. Aislynn meekly attempted to recover the toy, only to be met with a Heisman-worthy stiff arm. The resulting touch caused Aislynn to reel and exclaim, "Whoooooooooooooooooooooooaaah!" as she ran up the stairs. Upon reaching the top, she pleaded, "Isla, don't push me up the stairs!"

Aislynn's rather compliant temperament (see: wimpy) serves to exaggerate Isla's surliness, to be sure. A number of times last week, a stern "Mine!" from the youngest accompanied by that patented stiff arm would send the oldest running for cover in the downstairs bathroom while registering the complaint, "Isla pushed me into the bathroom!" Isla, meanwhile, remained unmoved by her sister's plight, judging by her furrowed brow.

From what little I've read, the second child is not necessarily more aggressive purely by virtue of being the second child. I am, after all, a second child, but I don't remember being told I was all that aggressive as a toddler. (Mom, chime in any time here.)

So it is what it is: Isla, all 22 pounds of her, has run of playtime, while Aislynn fails to figure out she's older and bigger. To be clear, I'm not at all worried that my girls are abnormal in this or that there's a problem. Isla clearly loves her "Sish," as she calls her. Besides, I have a feeling Isla will find out soon enough there are some people she can't push around - like mom and dad.

That's when the charm will be employed. And there may not be any stopping her then.

You feel me?

AF

When pigs fly

2009-07-20T18:13:00.000-07:00

I hate to say, 'I told you so.'

If you're like me, you've noticed a clear uptick in the amount of news coverage devoted to swine flu in the last couple days.

To wit, these headlines ripped from The Drudge Report (H/T): "Airlines will ban swine flu suspects." "Doctors' notes required." "Drug companies to reap swine flu billions..."

For those late arrivers, we last heard of the swine flu in early June, when the media yawned to us that the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic. I said then that the decidedly reserved tone of the coverage of the pandemic announcement was in stark contrast to the breathless hysteria we saw when a few dozen were killed from the illness in May. Moreover, I explained why the declaration was by far a bigger story more deserving of an urgent tone. I also predicted a return to mania in July.

My hypothesis rested on the fact that television (and increasingly, print) news is designed these days to evoke, not inform. And at no time on the calendar is this more apparent than in a ratings month such as May and July. Admittedly, the above linked stories are obviously from print sources. But if the television networks have not already followed suit, they will. (Especially with that juicy drug company story. Nothing demagogues like more than a money-making corporation.) Television is notorious for following the lead of its print counterpart as part of their strange, devolving symbiosis. Rest assured, they'll catch on to the terror of the day.

(And speaking of...)

You feel me?

AF

"When in Rome" Update: The Blog is Mightier

2009-07-17T17:03:00.000-07:00

Those of you who are regular readers will remember the first installment several weeks ago of "When in Rome" Wednesdays, a series in which Feeling Fuller explores the vast differences of ways of life within a relatively small geographic area. The first in the series dealt with, shall we say, less-than-thorough road hazard labeling in Southern Indiana.

For those needing a refresher, read up.

It gives me great pleasure to announce that, clearly as a result of the grassroots set ablaze by the above linked post, Greene Co. Indiana has capitulated and addressed the need to fill holes in the road, not just vaguely point them out with neon spray paint.

Feast your eyes on the before and after shots:

BEFORE

AFTER

A big thank you to what I can only imagine was a rabid mob wielding pitchforks and torches at the last Commissioners' meeting. It humbles me to know this blog effected change so quickly.

And if you believe my post actually had something to with this, and it wasn't just some auspiciously-timed rant, I have a set of Greene County road cones I'd like to sell you.

You feel me?

AF

Congress furious over secret program it approved (again)

2009-07-13T16:21:00.000-07:00

I really wish I had the imagination needed to make this stuff up.

It seems some Members of our dutiful Congress have proven once again that putting on a political show for the news channels is far more important than playing it straight with the American public.

The piece du jour is here, CIA Chief Panetta's bizarrely timed revelation that the Agency had a secret program to hunt and assassinate al Qaeda operatives that was hidden from Congress. Now some Members are full of (self-) righteous anger over not being told of the program (which, it turns out, was never even close to becoming operational), and are demanding an investigation.

Put aside for a moment the lunacy of a politician angry over a conceived, yet not implemented, program to hunt and kill the leaders of an organization with which we are at war. Put aside also the fact that the Executive Branch has legal authority to direct the CIA in just this way. Instead, get a load of this, which by now may not come as much of a surprise.

Yep. Turns out Members of Congress gave their approval to this program in 2001, at least according to one intelligence official. The soundbites and grandstanding you'll see on the issue are likely to be from Members who were on the Hill then, too. In typical politician fashion, they were for it before they were against it.

Sound familiar? It should, if you remember the imbroglio over who knew what about waterboarding and when. Or if you remember the brouhaha over the AIG bonuses paid for by taxpayers with knowledge of Congress. This is the same Congress whose Members raced to outdo themselves on the airwaves to declare their outrage over that bill, which they passed easily.

And to be fair, the maniacal drive to lead the next 6-hour news cycle with your soundbite conveying hysteria is a bi-partisan affliction.

Which probably means you and I are partially to blame for all this. Apparently we have yielded to a society that is perpetuated by short soundbites, the juicier and controversial the better. We desire entertainment, not information. Context, perspective, meaning - these are not things American society as a whole demands in abundance. Thus, we elect people who leverage these sparingly.

There's probably no clearer indication we value entertainment above all else than many of the people we send to Congress. This group - and I'm speaking largely of both sides of the aisle these days - has an uncanny ability to snatch baffoonery from the jaws of competence. If only their jobs were indeed a laughing matter.

You feel me?

AF

"When in Rome" Wednesday: We're all Romans

2009-07-08T04:39:00.000-07:00

Greetings all.

It's been a wild 10 days, so allow me to recap and explain the extended break I took from this blog.

It began June 28, when I left Indy bound for San Antonio, TX, for a major trade show. After three days pounding out leads - editorial and otherwise - I returned to Indy, only to hop in my car and drive to Vernon Hills, IL, where the girls had been staying with the in-laws. Then there was the Fourth, and return trip to Bloomington, all of which made getting to a computer to post impossible or inappropriate.

But the miles logged did impress upon me something important as we come to another "When in Rome" Wednesday: In a real sense, we're all Romans.

During the trip I witnessed several moments of warmth:
- Two total strangers of opposite race discussing the joys of grandparenthood.
- Another complete stranger remarking how cute our little girls are.
- Weary travelers at the airport at 6 AM allowing a young girl to cut in front of them in the security line so she would not miss her flight, without comment (or at least, without audible comment).
- Members of competing companies laughing over drinks.

My point is this: No matter where you travel, good manners remain good manners, courtesy remains courtesy, civility is still civility, and there are some joys in life that are universal. So it seems fitting that before this series pointing out our differences gets too far, I take time to acknowledge that there are many things that make us more similar than different.

You feel me?

AF

Global warming? Try global firing

2009-06-26T18:52:00.000-07:00

I lost my job today. It's a little embarrassing to talk about, and frankly, I could use some help determining if my boss was justified in showing me the door. Here's how it all went down:

I am in charge of my company's advertising activities. I plan the message, vehicle, and specifications of each ad we produce. This requires me to review each contract with each trade news outlet thoroughly to ensure we both are getting what we want. This can be tedious work. Sometimes the print is incredibly small; there are numbers, footnotes, and other general clutter that make suffering these contracts quite brutal indeed.

Recently, we began negotiations for the largest ad buy in our company's history: a contract that represents a commitment well beyond the next decade. Unlike normal ad proposals from trade outlets, this one required significant examination by every relevant member of our staff. When negotiations began, several objected to certain components of the contract, but I believed most of these concerns were alleviated.

There was never any tight deadline to make the deal official. We are about to enter into trade show season, which requires key members of our team to be on the road and therefore apart from the negotiations, but there really wasn't any pressing need to sign and stamp the deal. Still, by late yesterday, it appeared we were ready to let everyone sleep on the agreement one more night and finalize it in the morning.

Then the trade media outlet did something unprecedented: In an email time-stamped at 3:00 AM Friday morning, they included a large appendix to the contract. It increased the number of pages in the contract by nearly a quarter, and appeared to be mostly legal in nature.

That's when I made the move that ultimately cost me my job: Without reading the complete text of this most important document, I approved it and entered into the contract. My boss actually read the contract late in the day, and was about to call the whole deal off. Then he learned of my action. Apparently, the section included in the middle of the night was a game-changer. I couldn't have known.

For the sake of my family and friends, the above narrative is fictitious. It never happened. Only a fool would act to alter the course of history without first knowing what his action entails, right? Well, apparently such due diligence is too much of a hassle in the United States Congress.

As you all now know, historic global warming legislation was passed late Friday in the House. I won't bore you with the details of the 1,500-page bill, but know this: It fundamentally alters how you and I consume energy in this country. And by alters, I mean dramatically increases its cost.

According to one analysis of the bill:

If the latest Waxman-Markey proposal is signed into law, its economic impact by 2035 will be as follows:

Direct energy costs will rise by more than $1,500 per year for the typical family of four. Pain at the electric meter will cause consumers to reduce electricity consumption by 26 percent. Even with this cutback, the electric bill for a family of four will be $754 higher in 2035 than it would have been in the absence of Waxman-Markey, and $12,200 higher in total from 2012 to 2035.
Higher gasoline prices will have forced households to cut consumption by 15 percent, but a family of four will still pay $596 more in 2035 and $7,500 more in total from 2012 to 2035.
In total, for the years 2012-2035, a family of four will see its direct energy costs rise by $22,800. These inflation-adjusted numbers do not include the indirect energy costs consumers will pay as producers raise prices to recapture their higher production costs. Also excluded are the higher costs of developing more energy-efficient cars and appliances, the disutility of driving smaller, less safe vehicles, and the discomfort of using less heating and cooling.
As the economy adjusts to shrinking GDP and rising energy prices, employment will take a big hit. On average, employment will be lower by 1,105,000 jobs per year. In some years, cap and trade will reduce employment by nearly 2.5 million jobs.

You can quibble with this assessment if you like. Politics, if nothing else, is a game of cherry-picking facts. But the part that is most troubling to me - scratch that - the part that infuriates me, is that as of Thursday night, this bill was 1,200 pages (which is the basis for the above assessment). By Friday morning, it was 1,500 pages. In the middle of the night, 300 pages were added to this historic piece of legislation.

And virtually no Member of Congress read it.

And this has happened before.

In my fictional account, my boss would have been completely justified in firing me. Just as we are completely justified in firing those who voted yes on this bill without reading it.

For the record, I am one who errs on the side of caution in the global warming debate. I believe we should search for ways to "get greener" (nuclear energy, e.g.). But consider this: The only analysis I've found that speaks to the bill's impact on lowering global temperatures suggests it will cool us off to the tune of two-hundredths of a degree over the next century.

Kind of makes you hot under the collar.

You feel me?

AF

Introducing: "When in Rome" Wednesdays

2009-06-24T09:09:00.001-07:00

I am always fascinated by the sometimes profound differences brought on by living in different spots of a relatively small region. I was raised in northern Indiana, went to college in the same area, and moved to central Indiana for work after graduating. All of these places seemed fairly similar.

Yet when I took a job in Illinois, just a couple hours to the north and west, I noticed a very profound change in people, mores, and values. The culture shock was even more pronounced when we recently moved to southern Indiana. Yet, on a map, I've never lived more than a few hours' drive of any other spot I've called home.

Out of this is born the idea for a weekly feature on this blog: "When in Rome" Wednesdays. Each week, I will relay some of the experiences unique to different spots in our corner of the globe. Most of the time they will be stories from the the small, two-state radius in which I've lived. Other times they will be experiences of friends or co-workers. We've all had moments where the best we can do is shrug our shoulders and say, "When in Rome..."

In the inaugural installment, I present to you what apparently passes for road maintenance in southern Indiana:

A little background: For close to a month, I have been aware of at least a half-dozen large holes in the road on my way to work. I became aware of these by hitting them at 50 mph. Since said road is a well-traveled route, I imagine many other drivers discovered these potholes in the same manner.

Enter the Greene Co. Highway Dept, which last week, instead of filling the holes, decided the best course of action was to alert motorists with a neon pink spray-painted "HOLE" with an arrow the length of which ends flush with said hole. This helpful gesture has been replicated for each hole on the road. So now, instead of a few axle-bending, tire-shredding hazards, we now have a handful of blindingly distracting axle-bending, tire-shredding hazards.
(And yes, you are correct when you imagine the kinds of looks I received when I snapped these pictures with my camera phone.)

This method of dealing with road hazards is somewhat new to me for a variety of reasons, the main one being that virtually every road in and around Chicago, IL is under construction. Thus, a road with holes such as these would not be dealt with via Krylon can in that region. Rather, entire crews would spend months shutting down one lane at a time to complete a project that could be handled in an afternoon with a guy with a pickup and some hot mix.

Which area's method of road maintenance is better? Hard to say. But, I'm here now, so...When in Rome.

You feel me?

AF

Don't blame me, I voted for Jon and Kate

2009-06-22T18:33:00.000-07:00

Let's get one thing clear immediately: This is not a post about who's right and who's wrong in the Jon and Kate business. Unfortunately, that will be hashed out ad nauseum over the next 24 hours on talk shows and "news" shows. On this we can all agree: It is tragic when a marriage crumbles, no matter the reason.

Yet it's abundantly clear not all Americans would agree that what is happening to a family in Pennsylvania is not the most important news of the day. On the contrary, the world is seemingly standing still while the public at large watches another marriage fall apart.

Except, of course, that the world is not standing still. There is an historic uprising in the most influential player in the Middle East; the President of the United States is making cryptic remarks about the future of health care in this country, to name a few pressing matters.

Countless other items of endlessly more consequence are occurring before our eyes, yet America chooses to spend its time watching the nation's divorce statistics padded. Health care didn't just take a back seat to Jon and Kate, it was placed in a horse trailer dragged by a 50-foot rope (see fourth and fifth posts here). On Twitter, the once-dominant "#iranelection" trending topic was surpassed by "Jon and Kate" while the climactic episode aired. Much earlier in the day, Jon and Kate had passed up trends on "Neda," the iconic Iranian woman brutally murdered by government forces.

What's most upsetting is I'll bet most of you who read the preceding paragraph were not surprised by it. That may be statement enough. It's not that no one is allowed some down time to decompress in front of the television, but it seems to me perspective is in order, and - if I may indulge in some high-horsemanship - this perspective is sorely lacking for many people.

It is not lost on me that misery loves company, and the state of marriage in this nation is such that many Americans can relate very closely with the Gosselins. The fact they're on television does not make Jon and Kate's divorce any more tragic. As in all dissolutions involving children (whether eight or one), the real victims are the young people who have no say in the matter, and can't understand why mommy and daddy don't live together anymore.

The final verdict, in my view, is at least a partial indictment of the media machine. Because my wife watched the show from its early days, I can say with some certainty that this stopped being a series about a family meeting everyday challenges amidst unique circumstances at least a couple years ago. When it became an exercise in publicity for tourist destinations, cross-promotion for other shows, and a thinly-veiled cash cow for TLC, its raison d'etre ceased. Yet it continued, to a family's peril, because ratings and revenue soared.

Would the Gosselins' marriage have survived absent the constant stress of life in front of the camera? We'll never know. And my guess is most people really don't care. What else is on?

You feel me?

AF

Mom's night out, Dad's night in (trouble)

2009-06-18T18:39:00.000-07:00

Let me say at the outset that I like to think I have it together as a dad, for the most part. I stepped up to the plate when our incessantly fussy newborn needed comforting (see photographic proof here), take initiative changing obscene diapers (no photos of that), even don the occasional set of bunny ears or a princess hat for dress-up time (no pics of that either, sorry).

And the other night, all of that experience amounted to precisely nil.

As the wife headed out for a long-overdue night out with some new girlfriends, the task of putting our girls to bed fell squarely to me. That's fine: At least half this task falls to me on a nightly basis. I've put both to bed at different times in their lives. But those instances, I was about to find out, were under "normal" circumstances.

It started as I rocked our 18-month old, Isla. She had the sniffles and made it clear from the early going she wanted mommy to execute this chore. After vocalizing her preferences for several minutes (see: screaming), she eventually nodded off. Perfect.

I gently placed her in her crib, a move she evidently equated with some of the worst acts of betrayal in modern history, for she let out such a protest I'm half-surprised the window in her room is still in its pane.

At this point, I resolved it was best to let her cry it out for a while as I began Aislynn's routine. This did nothing to assuage Isla, and even caused dismay for Aislynn, who was forced to forfeit her usual "song time" with mommy before being tucked in. (I was a poor, poor substitute, despite putting all I had into my rendition of "There Were 12 Disciples.")

Here, it is probably easiest to relay the events that followed in a manner I have before, via timeline:

7:56 - I return to Isla's room to begin the second round of rocking, only to hear Aislynn promptly emerge from her room.

7:57 - I carry Isla with me to the hall to discover Aislynn requires a drink of water. I comply with a screaming toddler peforming her best koala grip on my arm.

8:10 - After resuming what is now round 3 of rocking Isla, I hear Aislynn beginning her own tantrum in her room. I place Isla back in her crib, bracing for the inevitable seismic yells.

8:11 - I make it to Aislynn's room to discover she is upset because...well...I don't remember anymore. She requires her eyes and nose to be wiped with a tissue.

8:20 - Very shortly into my 4th attempt to coax Isla to slumber, I hear Aislynn yelling again. I repeat the procedure of 10 minutes ago, which by now Isla assumes is a cruel joke meant to incite her to anger of unprecedented levels. She obliges in this.

8:21 - Aislynn is upset because she needs a new tissue. I hand her roughly a dozen.

8:25 - Figuring at this point it is futile to try to put this little girl to sleep, Isla comes downstairs with me to watch Wipeout.

9:00 - I try once more to get a now-exhausted Isla to sleep. The 5th time's the charm.

I like to think all three of us are stronger because of that night. In all honesty, if the wife was going to take a break, it's probably best to time it to avoid the biggest meltdown of the summer to date. Though I have expressed to the wife my fervent wish that future "Girls Night Out" excursions don't begin until approximately 10 PM.

You feel me?

AF

Thoughts on new(s) media

2009-06-16T18:11:00.000-07:00

Back in college, in a certain broadcasting class, our professor imparted that he believed the day was quickly coming when mass media as we knew it then in the year 2001 - particularly broadcast journalism - would cease to exist. In its place, a new kind of citizen-oriented news product would emerge, wherein the consumers would bypass any story they did not deem worthy of their time, and the traditional 30-minute broadcast would be history.

I believe what happened over the weekend did more to hasten that prediction than any of us yet realize.

As many readers know, I have a general distrust and suspicion of mainstream media (see here and here), having worked in the field if only relatively briefly. In general, I believe too often news today is intended to evoke and provoke the audience, at the expense of informing them. More and more what is blatant opinion is passed off as "analysis," if an excuse is made for it at all.

In the end, the ultimate casualty is the lofty and most noble goal of journalism: telling the stories of people. That is what the audience craves: to be provided with context and to be able to empathize with our fellow man, no matter their race, creed, or religion. The best journos are the ones who place events, however complex, into the context of their most important implication: the impact on real people living real lives. Good reporters make the world smaller by showing what unites us, with an honest, tempered assessment of that which divides us. It is a difficult task in and of itself, but it is impossible when you throw in the added proclivity of most today to sensationalize and advance an agenda.

Which brings us to Iran, and the extraordinary role "social" media played and continue to play in the aftermath of that country's election. For a quick primer, read this. For those without the time, allow me to summarize in fewer than 140 characters: Social media is doing the heavy lifting for traditional outlets that can't or won't cover the popular uprising against the Iranian gov't. The microblogging from inside Iran has been remarkably candid, insightful, and informative. It is through these updates from "citizen journalists" that the world learned of events there, and rose to stand with them.

In the States, Tweeters changed profile pics green (to show solidarity with the Iranian opposition party), changed the location and time zone listings of their accounts to confuse potential Iranian censors, and set up proxy servers so Iranian Tweeters could circumvent government firewalls.

And in the process, what emerged is that purest form of journalism to which all young reporters ascribe: The audience interacted with and advanced a truly remarkable story. Not that this was the goal of the protesters in Tehran; there's was a simple relay of events as they unfolded. The tendency of sites like Twitter to encourage brevity allowed no room for long-winded and misguided "interpretation" or "analysis." (Indeed, how can one embellish in only 140 characters?) The purity and simplicity of their "reports" is in dramatic contrast to most of what we see and hear from traditional media, not because of the form these messages took, but truly because of their content - both what was included (a quality of information not found in traditional outlets) and the filler which was left out (and found in abundance in traditional outlets).

As Thomas Jefferson said, "The most valuable of talents is never using two words when one will do." The mainstream media, in the scramble to fill 24-hours' worth of news programming, almost never exhibit this talent. Social media enforces it upon its users.

All of which should serve as a powerful wake up call to the traditional media: As choice in information outlets expands to include real-time descriptions and pictures of events in places you have not yet or will not cover, your relevance shrinks. While my college prof. may not have envisioned this chain of events specifically, it is clear the world is changing in how it receives, disseminates, and responds to information.

You feel me?

AF

Divide and conquer

2009-06-13T17:52:00.000-07:00

The following took place at the Fuller home, Bloomington, Ind., between the hours of 6:00 and 7:00 PM EDT:

6:32 - Aislynn (speaking on behalf of herself and Isla): "We want to watch some shows."

6:32 - Me: "I'll have to think about it."

6:33 - Aislynn: "Isla, mom will help us. I'll be right back." (Exits up stairs.)

6:37 - Brooke comes downstairs and puts Veggietales into DVD player.

They learn early, my friends.

The above illustrates Aislynn's newfound capacity for manipulation. Another favorite ploy is a shrewd rhetorical device by which she makes her desired activity sound like your idea. For example: She'll start by meekly asking, "Daddy, do you maybe want to play dress up?" I'll counter with a response I think is cutting to the heart of what she wants. Why not just come out and say it, right? "Do you want to play dress up, Aislynn?" Then she has me: "Ok, good idea." There's really no combating this.

I have about 12 years to learn how to stay a step ahead.

You feel me?

AF

Congratulations, it's a pandemic!

2009-06-11T18:12:00.001-07:00

At this point, I don't know which would be worse for my digestive system: watching media coverage of swine flu, or actually contracting the illness.

For those unconscious for the last 24 hours, the World Health Organization declared the swine flu (or H1N1, for the porcine-sensitive among us) to be a global pandemic. That means it is unstoppably spreading on every continent on Earth. There's nothing that can be done to contain it at this point.

Yet I doubt I'm alone when I say I've noticed a decided reservedness on the part of the dutiful media to report this troubling news. By way of experiment, check out popular news sites here, here and here. As of this posting, news of the swine flu announcement had crept below the fold, in deference to such impact-laden stories as the Letterman-Palin tiff and the possibility of the discovery of a planet in a galaxy we'll never see, and on par with a story of the military allegedly covering up fireballs in space.

Here's the first of my problems with all this: Pandemics are the types of things that change life for ordinary citizens. While not yet declared and currently expressly discouraged by the WHO, a pandemic can lead to travel restrictions and otherwise general encumbrances on mobility. Yet the dutiful media feels it is far more important to focus on a late-night comedian's obfuscation of the line between humor and politically-driven obscenity, which happens on one channel or another almost nightly.

Inasmuch as a criterion for solid news is its impact on the audience, a global flu pandemic far outweighs any of the stories mentioned above.

Which leads me to my second mini-sermon: Where is the outright hysteria we saw at the end of April and the beginning of May? When swine flu came into its own, the media couldn't outdo one another in pounding the panic button. Contrast the link above to the pandemic declaration story to this one, from late April. Do you see a difference in the words used to describe it? In the former, current story, the situation is described in terms such as "moderate." In the latter, this "baffling" illness is "frightening." ("Frightening?!" Really?) All such reporting was only hastened by our eloquent Vice President.

This is not just explainable by the passage of time, which allowed officials and media alike to re-evaluate their breathless hysteria. No, even in early May, worst-case projections for swine flu were so mild compared to normal, seasonal flu that there really was not much cause for alarm. "Moderate" applied then more than it does now.

So what's changed? The cynic in me says this: June is not a ratings month. May is. You see, a broadcast journalist worth his or her salt would never let perspective or facts get in the way of a chance to scare people into viewing during sweeps. One local station even ran a promo one May evening promising "overnight developments on the swine flu" in the next morning's broadcast.

Here's the point: Most news today is meant to provoke and evoke, not inform. An informative piece of news is the action the WHO took today regarding swine flu; an evocative piece of news is repeating what a 62-year-old comedian said about the sexuality of a 14-year-old girl. Which story won the news cycle battle today?

This dynamic is intensified during sweeps, when third party groups monitor the audience levels of broadcast stations, which in turn determine advertising rates for those stations. During this time, media types seemingly long for tragedy and upheaval so viewers have a reason to watch. (I have anecdotal evidence to back this up, but will not expound for brevity's sake.) Rest assured if the pandemic declaration had occurred just three weeks earlier, there would be a race to see which media outlet could so overstate the facts they become the story themselves.

So with that comes a prediction: We have not heard the last of swine flu. Unless there is another manufactured crisis, the media will be back in the business of fear-mongering on this issue come July. Why? July is the next ratings month, and even the media can't make Independence Day that scary (even with the perfunctory manequin-gets-its-hand-blown-off-by-a-firecracker story).

Before ingesting news, we would be wise to run the news we are exposed to through the filter of this question: Is what I am watching/reading/hearing on the news because it's important, or is it important because it's on the news? You may find that you'll avoid stomach problems of every kind.

You feel me?

AF

PS - If anyone can identify the pic at right, leave me a shout in the comments. You will make my day.

Reading, 'Riting, Resisting

2009-06-08T17:50:00.000-07:00

Our little Aislynn surprised us over the weekend when she took the initiative to write out the word, "MOMMY," on a sheet of stationary. Our congratulations quickly turned to consolation, however, when she became overly upset that she could not spell out "DADDY" in the same manner. For whatever reason, her little fingers couldn't make the letters. And she was upset. Her "D" was really more like...well...no perceptible letter in the Roman alphabet. There was really no way to spin what she created into anything resembling its intended purpose. And naturally, all of this got me thinking.

This article from Reader's Digest points up an all-too-common phenomenon among parents of "Millenials," children born after 1981: They are afraid or unwilling to let their children fail, even in the most seemingly harmless and constructive, instructive ways. The article has several telling anecdotes, from a teacher who foregoes the traditional red ink to grade her third graders' papers, preferring instead blue or black because, "They're less harsh," to a description of the author's unkempt child who wins a trophy for "Neatness," purely for the reason of inclusion, not success.

When we were given the definitive diagnosis on Aislynn, we were told that one of her major problems at the time was a set of parents who provided an ubiquitous safety net. We were operating under the assumption Aislynn was in some way incapable of whatever task was at hand, and therefore refused to let her try and reach inevitable failure. Cue Harvard PhD Robert Brooks, from the same RD article: "When parents rush to the rescue or take over, it sends the message, 'I don't think you're competent to handle things. I'm not sure I trust you to succeed.'"

So we resist the temptation to pre-empt more often now. When Aislynn makes a mistake, we tell her she's wrong, not that she has offered the correct answer to a different question. If she thinks she will give the correct answer every time, where is the incentive for actual achievement?

This may start with letters, but it will have far more critical implications later in life. After all, "if multiplication tables and the capital of Virginia are open for interpretation, what can youngsters really believe?"

You feel me?

AF

If only we could all be so "delayed"

2009-06-03T17:13:00.000-07:00

Okay, enough petty stuff. Time to talk about something that matters for a change - being a father. Every father loves to brag on his kids, so indulge me while I do the same.

At left, you'll see my 3-year-old, Aislynn. At the risk of stealing my wife's thunder, I need to relay how she's touching lives, including those of her mother and father.

Aislynn has befriended two little people her own age who are suffering from neurological cancer. The kids are staying in Bloomington at Jill's House, a residence for children fighting cancer to stay with their families while treatment is administered. These precious little ones often travel from significant distances - Aislynn's little friends are from Chicago and Nashville, TN - to be here.

Aislynn's involvement started with my wife's sensitivity to a mother who needed a baby carrier (for the full story, see link above). That mother's girl, Donna, finished up treatment this week but not before being befriended by my little girl.

When my wife delivered the carrier, Aislynn immediately sought to play with Donna. No hesitation, no "kid gloves" because Donna is very visibly ill - Aislynn just saw a little girl who might want to play, and checked apprehension at the door. The two had such a rousing time that my wife and daughter were invited to Donna's going away party.

At the get-together, Aislynn greeted Donna with a sincere, "I'm so happy to see you!" Ever the socialite, it wasn't long before my little girl befriended another patient, a boy her same age named Asher. She has asked several times since that night to see Asher again so they can watch Go Diego Go and play pirates.

All of this has really impacted my own life on several levels. First, it served to reiterate just how far we've come with Aislynn. For those who don't know, there was a short stretch in which we were told Aislynn was likely autistic. (My wife does a wonderful job of chronicling this time here.) Long story short, we found she did not have autism, but rather some developmental delays affecting her speech and socialization.

Neither Donna's nor Asher's parents would have believed that. They were genuinely moved by this little girl who didn't seem to notice the pick lines and incision marks on their children. Aislynn only saw someone to value in the most cherished way she knows - a playmate.

And that is why this has touched me in a deeper way than just the pride of a father whose daughter is making new friends. Aislynn interacts with people - in this case, children of a special set - in a way most adults would envy. We all strive to look past appearances, to muster empathy from the throes of apathy, to see people for their abilities and not their disabilities. Yet we all fail. How is it this girl who is "developmentally delayed" is so far advanced from most of us in this area?

Luke 18:17

You feel me?

You know what they say about politics and raw fish...

2009-06-01T17:22:00.000-07:00

Back in the television news days, I was responsible for booking guests for the morning newscast I also anchored. One particular morning, we had a sushi expert on the show to teach us some of the finer points of the Asian cuisine. He brought with him some samples.

I had never tried sushi before that day. But, I had observed countless others enjoying it, and therefore figured it was something I had to do to earn some sort of bizarre credibility.

For those of you who actually enjoy sushi, my guess is you've not had it after it had been sitting under television lights for approximately 90 minutes. The thought crossed my mind that actually consuming the sushi at that point was not in my best interest, but pride and peer pressure took over. And not long after, so did Mother Nature.

I bore you with that story to reiterate the time-honored truth that just because everyone else is doing it, you don't have to.

The politically-minded among you likely saw news of President Obama's hot date to New York to see a Broadway play. Much ado was made about the cost to the taxpayers, the unseemliness of such a venture when General Motors was about to announce its death a few hours later, etc.

The GOP ripped the president in a press release that said, according to reports, "As President Obama prepares to wing into Manhattan’s theater district on Air Force One to take in a Broadway show, GM is preparing to file bankruptcy and families across America continue to struggle to pay their bills." (I say according to reports, because I have been unable to find the release on the RNC Web site, perhaps intuitively so.)

A meek suggestion for the GOP: This is not a battle you should choose, because it's not a battle you can win. My problem is not with the above statement, or indeed, with any criticisms of a lavish evening at taxpayer expense while thousands more face the prospect of unemployment due to an iconic American industrial figure's failure. Rather, attacking Mr. Obama on this rings of desperation and petulance.

Republicans need to realize the class warfare argument is spoken for. The other side is decades ahead of the GOP in seeking to pit the "working class" versus the "wealthy" (to wit, this shining example of misinformation from which you could be forgiven for thinking the only people who ever receive tax cuts are those with six-figure incomes).

Painting Obama as out of touch is a losing political battle, even if the argument is technically correct. As LA Times blogger Johanna Neuman rightly points out: "The truth is that the real cost of the trip, the political cost, is something Obama can shoulder because he is a popular president in his first year of office. Next year's date nights might not be as extravagant." Moreover, even if the public cared (and I'm not convinced they really do), the parallel could always be drawn (no matter how tenuous) to President Bush's trips back and forth to Crawford.

Republicans will always lament their impotence so long as they borrow the tactics of their opponents. They would do much better to stick to issues, and not give Obama's press corps an excuse to paint them as grumpy, petty whiners who are devoid of anything new to offer. Take the high road, no matter how tempting that glistening sushi may be.

You feel me?

AF

The Week in Food

2009-05-30T17:18:00.000-07:00

Quick background - I never cooked as a bachelor. Before marriage, max effort at dinner time generally meant preparing an all-in-one boxed dinner (See pic at left - I've actually had this one...you might be surprised to know it's actually "decent."). There were several reasons for this: First, I was only cooking for one, so whipping up one of these wonders would actually mean dinner for about 3 nights. Second, I only had myself to please, and mealtime in those days was more about getting rid of hunger than actually enjoying food. More importantly, I didn't know how to cook - or, didn't think I knew how. But most importantly, I lacked motivation to embark on the adventures of quality food preparation.

That changed when I got a new, faster-paced, higher-stress job. Seeking a release from the restlessness and pressures of work, I turned to the kitchen to try to find solace. And it worked. Most nights, preparing the family meal combined just the right elements of therapeutic activity to prove quite cathartic. Today, while still well behind the prowess of my wife, my repertoire has expanded considerably from the traditional "male" fare prepared in outdoor settings (though I do still smoke a mean rack of ribs), to include a host of items to suit any occasion and time of day.

And so, every so often on this blog I will detail where my culinary journey has taken the Fuller family in the past week. This week, we start with what has become a staple.

This, my friends, is Chicken Ragout Spaghetti (pronounced like, but far different from, that Ragu). Preparation begins with the chicken in a large skillet, sauteed with fresh garlic and olive oil. Next add tomato sauce, and seasonings. The seasonings will ultimately make the dish. My goal is always to achieve a flavor experience that begins with sweet, and ends with heat. I never cook from a recipe; it's always an add-and-taste procedure. I always use oregano, basil, just a pinch or two of chipotle powder, about the same amount of crushed red pepper, more garlic, and a few tablespoons of sugar. Again, I don't have exact measurements, but I always go heaviest on the oregano and garlic. This particular batch was made with herbs from my wife's herb garden (yes, that herb garden). The garlic bread you see pictured is a store-bought baguette liberally covered with a mixture of butter, fresh garlic, and basil, and toasted in the oven for about 10 minutes.

This week also included sandwich night at the Fuller's.

This is a roasted turkey club with avacado spread, and homemade chips. Pretty simple here - store-bought turkey lunch meat browned in a skillet with olive oil, malt vinegar and worchestshire sauce (go light on those last two). Pile the turkey on one side of a Hawaiia n Sandwich Roll (if you haven't tried these things yet, I highly recommend them), while on the other place the bacon (prepared ahead) and Muenster cheese. Toast in an oven for about 10 minutes, in the meantime smashing half an avacado. Remove the sandwiches from the oven, and spread the avacado directly on the turkey.

For the "chips," we copped out on our normal homemade fries (seen at right). We simply cut a potato and fried it in our fryer. Nothing fancy there, although I will take a moment to say I do not know how anyone enjoys quality fries without malt vinegar. It is standard issue at our table.

So that's what we've been eating this week when it's my turn to cook. It's become an unlikely favorite hobby of mine borne from some difficult circumstances. We all need an outlet; might as well be a tasty one.

You feel me?

AF

Hot under the collar on climate change story

2009-05-28T17:30:00.000-07:00

Most of you who keep up on such things no doubt saw this story on Drudge today. If you haven't, read as much as you can stomach or the rest of this post isn't going to make a lick of sense. (As if it would have in the first place, right?)

In a single beaming missive on Speaker Pelosi's visit to China, this story is both a shining example of lazy, sensational journalism (though that sounds conflicting, they are one and the same, I can assure you) and typical politician fare (usually of the Left variety).

First, the journalism. It is point of fact that Drudge posted this story with its correct headline, if by headline one means the most important/impactful takeaway message of the story. "Pelosi calls for China's help on climate change" is the stuff of a regurgitated press release (I know - I used to receive them and write them). Virtually no reader in the U.S. cares what Pelosi is telling the Chinese about what the Chinese need to do to combat climate change (as if they'd help at all - but that's another post); what they do care about is how this woman, third in line for the presidency, will force Americans to combat climate change.

Telling readers via headline that the story they are about to read is nothing more than a fairly benign report about how Pelosi is building a coalition to fight climate change is at best lazy, and at worst dishonest and agenda-advancing. As Drudge points out, the upshot of the story is Pelosi's declaration that, "every aspect of our lives must be subjected to inventory" to combat climate change. That statement completely counters the notion that this is a story ostensibly focused on the Chinese. What, exactly, does the most powerful woman in the nation mean when she implies Americans' lives will be altered considerably in the name of this issue? Regardless of one's feelings on the topic, every American should want to know how their every day life will change. Some may welcome new enviro-friendly regulations and punishments for infractions, but they'd still want to know about them. We evidently don't get any follow-up of that sort from this dynamic reporter. If it's not laziness, it's promotion of an agenda, and neither are acceptable.

Whatever the cause, its effect is shown when a sentence like this passes for objectivity: "(China and the United States) are the biggest emitters of carbon gases that are causing warming temperatures." What irks me most here is that this could be made objective (if even selectively so) by adding two words: "scientists say." A good reporter attributes every statement of fact, especially on an issue as contentious as climate change. This writer states that carbon is warming the earth in the same manner that the sky is blue - no need to qualify this for this reporter; it is a fact. The notion that there are still some highly intelligent people - even *gasp* professional scientists - who disagree with the human-emitted-carbon-leading-to-warming-catastrophe theory is never given a drop of ink.

Moreover, writing the sentence as, "that scientists say are causing warming temperatures" lends credibility to the story. Placing the onus of proof on the numerous scientists who have argued for this theory at least partially absolves the reporter from the burden. This writer does his readers and himself a disservice by failing to attribute. This failure is quite suspect, but perhaps not unexpected.

And while we're on the topic of completely unsurprising surprises, is anyone still in denial that it is only a matter of time before politicians mangle this issue into another power-grab, if they've not already done so? Let me clue you in on a startling secret: Your Congress really doesn't care all that much about you. Sure, there are notable exceptions, this guy and this guy come to mind immediately. But on the whole, your suffering is only a concern to the political elite so long as they lack for a scapegoat they can ride to re-election. As soon as they can pass the buck convincingly, how you and I are impacted by their decisions matter little. How else do you explain this and this?

As to the broader issue of global war - er - climate change (indeed, how much of a consensus can it be when we need to develop euphemisms!), I am probably like most Americans when I say I come down somewhere in the middle. I am not convinced by the cherry-picking of facts by the likes of Al Gore, but believe the issue is of such importance it would be prudent to err on the side of caution. But here again, the elitists in Congress fail to take a pragmatic approach: While so far all the initiatives we've heard are penalty-based, I prefer the method offered by other notable conservatives that is reward-based. Let's make it attractive for companies and individuals to act in an environmentally responsible way by creating more rewards - tax cuts, expensing, etc. Don't wield an iron fist and create an envirocracy in which no one is compelled to do what you want. As the saying goes, you attract more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Of course, I'm not holding my breath. There is too much money at stake for the government in the form of federal fines and backroom payouts to give this legs. So, you and I will likely watch with shaking heads as we're handed a new set of rules from people who have no empathy for the implications of said rules, while the dutiful media does its best to stay awake and cover all the news that's fit to regurgitate.

You feel me?

AF

35 is the new 50

2009-05-27T17:40:00.000-07:00

For those who don't know, I drive approximately an hour one way to work. That's fine. I don't mind the drive itself, per se. Most of the trip is peaceful, even idyllic countryside. Normal folks would appreciate this. However, my temperament does not allow for that.

Like most male drivers, I view any chance to take a trip of 2 miles or more as a personal challenge to set new land speed records. I am obsessed with making good time. Add this to the fact I lived and drove in Illinois for more than 2 years, throw in that my commute is 40 miles of 2-lane road with precisely 2 chances to pass (I am a meticulous topographer), and there just isn't room to cope with folks like the driver in the truck pictured here.

I have no problem with folks who go the speed limit. Well, I do, because I'm incessantly going at least 5 MPH over the limit, but I can't get too mad at someone moving at the posted speed. Who really make me impatient, however, are the "Silver F150s" out there who treat 170-degree turns as if they are covered in 3 feet of snow with marbles and banana peels thrown in for good measure. Seriously, buddy.

So that's my peeve of the day. I promise not all posts will be like this, but I've had enough of this over the last couple months to develop a need to get this off my chest. Folks: Go the speed limit. That's all I can really ask.

You feel me?

AF