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January 31, 2006
A State of the Union Day: For Bloggers, That Means Censorship Debates, Funny Clips, Truthy Interviews and Hard News
Let the politicos debate the nuances of tonight's State of the Union address (today's seventh most-cited phrase) by President Bush. The blogosphere is filled with so much more, such as:
Censorship in China
More than a few bloggers, including Google's own official rep (today's No. 3 top blog post), are discussing Google's presence in China and the built-in censorhip (or is it filtering?) the company has pursued in order to do business in the government-run country. For example, search for images of "tiananmen" in Chinese and then search in English...notice the difference? It's those pesky tanks. Search Views offers a slogan: We Shall Undercome.
Grins for the day
Get a few giggles at today's most-cited link, a video called "Fear of Girls," (could be subtitled, "What Really Goes on in Gamers' Minds") and the aptly named Chewy blog (No. 5 ranking today), featuring the eloquence of Star Wars' Chewbacca.
Truthiness, indeed
Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert is the subject of today's No. 24 most-cited link in an interview at The AV Club, and some bloggers traveling in Manila review the cuisine at Jollibee's, a fast-food Filpino restaurant featuring the Yumburger, among other delicacies.
Warrants, whistleblowers
No. 22 among today's top blog posts (from the American Library Association shows that getting search warrants doesn't have to be such a big deal after all, and the fifth most-cited link details Newsweek's investigation of Bush Administration lawyers who tried to curtail Presidential powers in the war on terror. It's already generating commentary and conversation.
Passings
Author and playwright Wendy Wasserstein, who died of cancer on Monday, is the day's burstiest person.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:53 AM | Permalink
January 30, 2006
Reporters, Scientists and Authors, Under Fire
"Embedded reporters," a defining practice of the ongoing war in Iraq, took a very personal turn over the weekend when ABC News anchor Bob Woodruff and cameraman Doug Vogt (today's two burstiest people) were seriously injured in a roadside bomb explosion (today's 10th-most-cited news story) while on patrol with Iraqi troops near Bagdhad. The Moderate Voice blogger provides perpsective about the dangers of journalism and Woodruff's friendship with the late reporter David Bloomfield, a print reporter who died of a lung blood clot in 2003 in Iraq.
Muzzling scientists?
So over the weekend, my husband and I decided to take a mid-winter January walk through downtown Cincinnati, supposedly the coldest winter month. We saw: outdoor market vendors selling wares in 60-degree weather, people picnicking in parks, teens lobbing Frisbees in T-shirts and a line out the door at an ice cream parlor. So why is the Bush Administration trying to stifle the scientific opinions of NASA scientist and global warming expert Dr. James Hansen (No. 8 among the day's bursty people and the subject of the day's most-cited news story). Ambivablog sees bureaucratic danger ahead, Will Robinson. Only in New Mexico sees shades of Big Brother, while Kaseido lumps the latest saga into the ongoing Bush war on reality. A BlogPulse trend graph shows a definite spike in interest about global warming during the 2004 hurricane season:
BlogPulse on Dateline: BlogPulse is a regular data contributor to NBC's "Dateline," and Josh Mankiewicz' Sunday Mank Blog looks at what bloggers buzzed about last week...namely, Oprah Winfrey's truth take-down of A Million Little Pieces author James Frey.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:49 AM | Permalink
January 25, 2006
Political News Across the Border(s)
On any typical BlogPulse Day, President Bush and Harry Potter duke it out for No. 1 position among the list of most blogged-about people. But not today. New Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and just-ousted Liberal PM Paul Martin both rank higher than the Prez. Beyond the Punchline blog already features a cartoon tapping into speculation that the new Candadian government (today's top news story) will have closer ties to the ever-eloquent President Bush.
Middle Eastern borders
Among today's top blog posts is another tale of governments across the borders: Israel and Iran. The Canadian-citizen blogger who writes about Iran at E:M (Editor:Myself) is visiting Israel: "As a citizen journalist, I'm going to show my 20,000 daily Iranian readers what Israel really looks like and how people live there." Andy Carvin calls it a one-man peace mission.
TV and Search Shakeups
It's all called "media" these days, and it's changing in big ways. Today's No. 2 top link tells of plans to merge UPN and WB into one happy CW network, operated by CBS and Warner Bros. "If Veronica Mars survives, I'm happy," says the War Liberal blogger. Logopolis has his own mathematical formula for the merger: Netlet + Netlet = Actual Network? On the Internet side of the media, Yahoo's apparently satisfied to play straight man to Google's lead in the search engine biz (today's No. 8 most-cited link). Says Micropersuasion's Steve Rubel: If Yahoo!'s giving up on dominating search, he's giving up on Yahoo!
Unexpected finds
Bloggers always seem to find a few unexpected tidbits, including this BBC story about economic optimism around the world and today's burstiest person, columnist Joel Stein, who's sure to rankle a few backbones with today's top blog post, his LA Times essay "Warriors and Wussies."
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:44 AM | Permalink
January 24, 2006
Canada Shifts Right (But Those Photos? Sheer (Ahem) "Coincidence")
Remember when blue staters, distraught at the results of the 2004 U.S. Presidential election, swore they'd move to a free-thinking, more liberal Canada? Not any more, not since Conservative Stephen Harper (today's third most-cited person by bloggers) ousted Liberal Paul Martin in Canada's parliamentary elections this week.
The web site for Canadian election results is today's No. 17 top link). and the CBC's Canada Votes 2006 site comes in at No. 37. Blogger Brian Maloney at RadioEqualizer looks at the impact of Canadian bloggers and talk radio on the election and the electorate. Watersblogged wonders if a U.S. network would use Shakespearean metaphors (as the CBC did) to cover an election? And a LiveJournaler compares the results to "a live grenade" down Paul Martin's pants.
U.S. conservative blogger Michelle Malkin gives sole credit for the Liberal meltdown to Minnesota-based Captain's Quarters Blog, while Captain's Quarters predicts "Canada is about to erupt." Time will tell....
But wait! A curious blogosphere juxtaposition is today's 12th-most-cited news story from the Christian Science Monitor, "Triumph of the redistributionist left," about emerging victories by American liberals on issues of federal spending, foreign policy and fiscal responsibility. Really? Says the unabrewer blogger: "The right is no longer on the right."
Bush posing with Abramaoff: the enigmatic photos
South of the Canadian border, U.S. Republicans can't seem to run away from former lobbyist Jack Abramoff fast enough, and the President is looking for distance, too. Bush originally said he really didn't know the guy, but now that photos of the two together are emerging (today's fourth-most-cited news story), White House officials are blaming it on "coincidence" (No. 22 top link) and routine get-togethers at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (as if just anyone gets invited to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for parties).
Attack of the...octopus?
Glow-in-the-dark pigs have been replaced this week by a giant squid that attacked a submarine...the topic of today's seventh-most-cited news story.
Passings...
Today's burstiest person is popular Manila DJ Ernie Baron, who died this week.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:47 AM | Permalink
January 23, 2006
Goodbye to "West Wing" and the Whale, Hello to Prizefighters and Election-Fraud Scares
Just when you think you can guesstimate what bloggers will be talking about from day to day, they throw you a loop. Such that today's two burstiest people are boxers Manny Pacquiao and Erik Morales, in which the former beat the latter at a match in Las Vegas. Filipino bloggers are crazy for their newfound hero.
Vote's in: "West Wing's out
TV fans are mourning the pending loss of NBC's "West Wing," which is why actors Jimmy Smits amd Alan Alda, and NBC Entertainment President Kevin Reilly are among today's most-discussed personalities as well. So is the late actor John Spencer, whose untimely real-life death several weeks ago apparently sealed the show's fate. (Smits and Alda are running against each other for president in the show, a well-timed theme given the contents of today's third most-cited news story about election fraud...and how easy it would be (was?) to execute. The govtv blog calls it "vapor voting." The story's starting to generate conversation.
What are TV fans watching?
So long, whale
The BBC continues to rank among the most-cited new sources by bloggers, this week no doubt because of the whale tale (the day's second most-cited news story). The GlasgowGal blogger happened to hear the news while reading The Whale Rider. Coincidence? You decide.
PostSecret...more revealing
PostSecret continues to be one of the most popular blogs (No. 5 today) for the anonymous postcards that carry people's innermost secrets. Site owner Frank Warren has started adding email commentary from viewers (and senders), to give it an even more personal touch.
BlogPulse update: LiveJournal
If you encounter "Page Not Found" errors while clicking on LiveJournal entries today, manually remove the "www" from the URL to get the link to work. Over the weekend, LiveJournal changed its standard URL format and removed the www from links, which now start directly with "username.livejournal.com" instead of www.livejournal.com/username. BlogPulse is working on a fix that will soon make the LiveJournal links work properly.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 01:29 PM | Permalink
A Weekend for Wake-Up Calls
Couldn't help but notice some of the head-scratching, thought-jarring ideas that floated across the blogosphere over the weekend. To wit:
A radical Jesus
So much for what my friends and I often refer to as the "Dan Fogelberg" Jesus of our youths...the brown-haired, blue-eyed, smiling, white-robed guy who looked like the 70s folk singer. He'll soon be replaced by a Jesus of color in "Son of Man," a film that debuted over the weekend at Sundance Film Festival and portrays Jesus involved in modern-day struggles in Palestine and South Africa. That, on the same weekend that religion professor Charles' Marsh's op-ed essay, "Wayward Christian Soldiers", was the 24th-most-cited news story.
Forrest Gump was right about stupid?
Saturday's second most-cited news story discloses that today's U.S. college grads may not be as bright as everyone hopes, even for mundane tasks like understanding credit card offers or analyzing news stories. The blogger at PTWSTSTS: News for People Who Hate News offers the perfect headline.
Democrats, take heed
And editorialist Molly Ivins, never one to mince words, made it to No. 21 among Saturday's most-cited links for her column titled "Not. Backing. Hillary.", which has some pointed advice for Democrats looking to unseat Republicans in 2006 and 2008. Says Brilliant at Breakfast: "Molly joins the put up or shut up club."
Bloggers arrest a terrorist?
That's what the Jawa Report is claiming (Saturday's second-most-cited blog post)...that subtle and not-so-subtle links and posts in a blog led to the arrest of a would-be terrorist in Ohio.
BlogPulse on MSNBC Dateline:
Each week, BlogPulse helps the folks at MSNBC Dateline get a handle on blog activity and buzz, and correspondent Josh Mankiewicz features the blogosphere on his Mank Blog and in his short weekly segment.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:24 AM | Permalink
January 20, 2006
OBL: Still Out There...Or Not?
The networks were popping yesterday with news that an audtiotape purportedly from Osama bin Laden was played on Al Jazeera TV (today's second-most-cited link)...offering another attack or a truce, depending. (Sorry, dude). But not everyone's convinced the very bad man that President George Bush promised to capture a loooooong time ago is even still alive. "Dead man offers phony truce," is how Little Green Footballs interpreted the news (today's No. 29 top blog post). Maybe he's running on the Democratic ticket, wonders American Digest? "The end of the world is nearer to this," says Drink This blogger of the truce offer.
Files, please, asks DOJ? Google says "no"
BoingBoing has an update (No. 17 top blog post) on the Department of Justice's request for a million random Google search records (today's No. 2 top news story) so that the government can defend the legality of its Child Online Protection Act (AOL, Yahoo! and MSN apparently complied). "Big Brother Wants Your Clickstream" is the analysis from the Business 2.0 blog. John Battelle's Search Blog look at the big-picture phenomenon as more and more personal data goes online. (Here's a blog-initiated tool: Try Outer Court's Patriot Search instead!)
And you thought driving while dialing was risky?
Imagine driving while zapping killer aliens or maneuvering treacherous battlefields? A new Nissan concept car, (the subject of today's No. 13 top blog post) has an Xbox 360 built in, reports 999 Today. It'll project Gotham Racing 3 and allow players to use the car's steering wheel and pedals (while parked, of course) to manipulate the game.
Passings...
Singer Wilson Pickett, today's sixth-burstiest person, is being remembered as a soulful crooner on news that he died this week at age 64 of a heart attack. The singer was famous for "Mustang Sally" and "In the Midnight Hour," (an hour that's now dark, eulogizes The Moderate Voice).
A Brief History...
The blogger at Defective Yetti is No. 2 among all posts today for a brief history of the Iraq War if it were written in text-message format from the perspective at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Attention, sports fans
The Super Bowl takes place on Feb. 5, the winter Olympics begin Feb. 10 in Italy. How much excitement is building? A BlogPulse trend graph shows the way:
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:12 AM | Permalink
January 19, 2006
Newspapers, Machetes, Loopholes and Bombs -- Literally and Figuratively
Random discoveries from today's blogosphere:
Newspaper overhaul?
Over at the BuzzMachine, journalist/blogger Jeff Jarvis has some ideas for spiffing up the nation's newspapers, and it's major spiffing indeed (and the day's No. 5 most-cited blog post). No more small print? Local columnists or reviewers? Stock listings?
Weapons of (Domestic) Destruction
One of today's most unsettling blog posts (No. 7) comes from a Fairfax, VA, TV station, which reports that gang members are increasingly using machetes in their attacks on other gangs. Aren't they a threat, too?
Lobbying loopholes...already
For all the talk of reforming lobbying and campaign finance in Washington, today's most-cited news story from the Washington Post illuminates the loopholes that have already been built into the "reform packages." Says the FireDogLake blogger: "Ethics, Schmethics" (scroll down to find it). Seems to me, any local book club, PTA group or senior citizens bridge group could come up with better lobbying reform laws...and quicker. (I'l volunteer!)
Bombs, literally and figuratively
International hand-wringing over Iran's nuclear intentions is apparent today, inclluding The Belmont Club blog's "The Coming of the Bomb" post and Michael Leeden's alarmist approach in the National Review Online (today's No. 19 top news story). Bombs of another sort keep falling as a result of the Jack Abramoff scandal, and the latest involve efforts to link Abramoff directly to the White House, such as today's No. 32 news story from The Texas Observer, "The Pimping of the President." Bloggers are discussing the increasingly close ties.
And don't worry, fun stuff, too
But there's frivolity and fun in the blog universe today, including the Yarn Harlot's soliciation for the 2006 Knitting Olympics, (today's 8th-most-cited blog post) in which participants are invited to knit something during the Olympics, so long as the last stitch is finished by the time the flame extinguishes. And William Shatner's kidney stone is popular today after it was sold for $25,000 at a charity auction. "Pass it on," jokes the TaxProfBlog.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:48 AM | Permalink
January 18, 2006
Crashes in Japan, Chocolate Cities and Body Armor Brouhaha
Today's unexpected closing of the Tokyo Stock Exchange gets some commentary from Joi Ito's blog, which chronicled the raid on the Internet company Live Door (Skype's Japanese partner) and the resulting stock-selling rush that led to todays' early shutdown. Yet another example of blogging from the scene.
Cities with "flavor"
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin is today's 15th burstiest person for his expressed desire that the new New Orleans become a "chocolate city," words he quickly backtracked. While most bloggers approach his remarks with a PC attitude one way or another, ScrappleFace at least tries to find some humor by suggesting a likely corporate sponsor.
BYO doesn't apply to body armor?
At the Soldiers for the Truth web site (today's No. 5 top link), word is that soldiers and/or their families are being told that military death benefits will not be available to soldiers who bring their own Dragon Skin body armor to the battlefield...the same kind of body armor that the Secret Service, FBI, CIA, private Iraq contractors, journalists and even the President's protective forces wear, according to Daily Kos. Bloggers wonder why the issue isn't getting more media attention...and outrage. Did someone say, "support the troops"?
Golden Globe Buzz
"Brokeback Mountain" was a clear winner at Sunday's Golden Globe awards ceremony, a recognition verified by a BlogPulse trend graph:
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 12:32 PM | Permalink
January 17, 2006
Al's Back in the News...and Women Leaders Take Charge
Former Vice President Al Gore (today's fifth most-blogged personality) keeps making speeches that pop him into public consciousness again, and this time, his lambasting of the Bush Administration over its domestic spying program is the fuel that's stoking the blog fires (and ranking as today's most-cited news story). On the federal Martin Luther King holiday, he noted that Dr. King himself was wiretapped by the FBI after being declared "dangerous individual.
In fact, today's top blog posts feature several references to Gore's speech and the topic of spying. Crooks & Liars provides highlights as today's No. 4 blog post, the Los Angeles Times editorializes about the perils of unchecked power, Think Progress hints at that pesky old "i" word again and the Zogby Poll announces "i"-related opinion results.
Women rule, literally
Two women took charge of countries this week: President Michelle Bachelet in Chile (today's 10th most-cited person) and Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf in Liberia.
The 2007 war?
Today's 17th most-cited link among bloggers is an essay by Harvard historican Niall Ferguson, speculating on the potential causes of the War of 2007. Prediction or history repeating itself, the bloggers wonder?
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 04:19 PM | Permalink
VNU Joins Intelliseek, BuzzMetrics to Create Nielsen BuzzMetrics Service
There's big news today at Intelliseek, the home of BlogPulse: This morning, VNU announced that it has signed an agreement in principle to bring together Intelliseek and BuzzMetrics into a single company whose goal will be the creation of a new global standard for measuring and understanding word-of-mouth behavior and influence.
Upon closing, the new company, BuzzMetrics Inc., will operate under the "Nielsen BuzzMetrics"
brand and will be headquartered in New York City, with offices in Cincinnati, Pittsburgh and Israel (in late 2005, VNU also invested in Israel-based Trendum and merged it with BuzzMetrics).
Both companies are recognized leaders in helping major companies, corporations and brands listen to, measure and act upon consumer-generated media: the consumer dialogue that affects
their markets.
The Nielsen BuzzMetrics service will fully leverage the strategic and financial backing of VNU, parent to such renowed research names as ACNielsen and Nielsen Media Research. And for BlogPulse users, the new company remains committed to BlogPulse -- which passed the 21-million blog threshold this week -- as an important component of the new business. More information is available at a new Nielsen BuzzMetrics web page set up specifically for this announcement, including a link to the full press release and information about a 1 p.m. webinar today by the new executive team.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:08 AM | Permalink
January 16, 2006
Holy Bat Girl! The International Flavor of Blogging
We've pointed it out in the past, but blogging is definitely taking on an international flavor, and it's becoming more and more obvious in daily results. Today's top blog posts, for example, include entries in Catalan (No. 2-3) and Russian (No.s 21-23) . Today's top links also include entries in Russian (No. 2, 12, 16 and 21). And today's leading news story is in Japanese, while the third most-cited news story emanates in English from The Baltic Times. It's a small world, indeed.
Bat Girl on the drawing boards
Holy art-gum eraser, Batman! One LiveJournaler's attempt to inspire drawings of Bat Girl is today's most popular blog post (and most-cited link), and it contains plenty of links to artistic renderings of Batman's estrogenic counterpart.
The Dateline feed
Check out Josh Mankiewicz' "Mank Blog" at NBC's Dateline home page, and watch Sunday night's segment. BlogPulse is a weekly data contributor to Dateline's Sunday night's blog analysis (see Josh? You're an "analyst" in our book, too!).
Define "disruptive"?
Today's No. 37 top blog post contains a link to DailyKos' insight on this tidbit of ifnormation: the upgraded Patriot Act that President George Bush is promoting allows the Secret Service to arrest people for "disrupting" things like political conventions and Olympic events.
Super Bowl Buildup
Now that the NFL has been narrowed to four Super Bowl contenders, which teams are creating the most buzz? A BlogPulse trend graph shows the way:
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:36 AM | Permalink
January 13, 2006
Bizarre Blog Day: Green Glow-in-the-Dark Pigs Are Just the Start
Maybe the fact that today is Friday the 13th has something to do with it, but blog discussion has kind of a bizarre tone today.
Starting with today's second most-cited news story in the blogosphere: green glow-in-the-dark pigs in Taiwan. That's right, folks. Taiwan researchers have brewed jellyfish DNA with pig DNA to create pigs that are fluorescent green, inside and out. "I do not like green eggs and ham," jokes the blogger at Barking Moonbat in response. Bloggers already have names for them. Rave Pigs. Glow Pork. Porci Fluorescentes! One offers a poetic tribute to "the other green meat."
JC in the news
I'm not watcher of ABC's "Lost" drama, but the fact that the phrase "Jesus Stick" showed up as today's burstiest person (hey, sometimes text-mining algorithms get confused, too) obviously means that a reference in this week's episode to Mr. Eko's "Jesus stick" is resonating through the blogosphere. Jesus is in the news elswhere, too, as the Rev. Pat Robertson is trying to take back what he said (No. 7 news story) about the ailing Ariel Sharon to mend ties with Israel (where he wants to build a Bible theme park). Elsewhere, an anti-ACLU movement is having fits over lawsuits about Christian prayers and Wiccan priestess lawyers fees and lawsuits over what's appropriate at official government meetings.
There go those paradigms again
First, Kodak announced plans to de-emphasize its photographic paper, and now Nikon (today's No. 5 top link) is signaling a fuller shift away from 35mm/film to digital cameras. Bloggers wonder: the end of an era?
A new map of the world...
Finally, today's fourth most-cited blog post presents a new Prejudice Map of the world, created by using Google's search engine with the terms "(named residents) are known for" in the search box. Go a head. Take the tour. And see what Virginians are known for. (I tried "Ohioans," who apparently are known for "shooting the curl," (huh?) generosity, wearing layers and being hard-working folks. Whatever.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:40 AM | Permalink
January 12, 2006
What Happend To YOUR New Year's Resolution?
Oh sure, they're still hashing over Judge Samuel Alito's Supreme Court nomination in D.C., and whistleblower Russell Tice has emerged among today's burstiest people now that he's come forward as one of the former NSA employees involved in spying activities.
But it's almost the middle of January, and someone (in this case, a BlogPulse trend graph) has to ask: how well are you sticking to your New Year's resolution? From the looks of it, enthusiasm for just about every promised behavior dropped off quickly once the champagne glasses and tooting horns were put away till 2007.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 01:49 PM | Permalink
BlogPulse...Hitting the Air Waves
In case you haven't noticed, BlogPulse is developing a multi-media reputation. On an informal basis, BlogPulse and Technorati are providing weekly blog highlights and data to NBC's Dateline (7 p.m. Sundays) for a segment about what's buzzing in the blogosphere. Josh Mankiewicz' "Mank Blog" takes a look at last Sunday's segment and some of the ongoing viewer reaction.
CBS News this week also launched the Blogophile, a blog by Melissa P. McNamara. Her first entry, "Catch the Buzz on the Blogs," gives several nods to BlogPulse and captures the who-what-why behind the issues and personalities that spurred blog discussions in early January.
As they say in the biz, stay tuned for more....
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:21 AM | Permalink
January 11, 2006
Steve Jobs Grabs the Spotlight Again...but Let Us Know If We're Annoying You, OK?
When Steve Jobs announces new stuff from Apple Computers, people listen, which is why Apple's newly announced MacBook Pro laptop and the revamped iMac are the stuff of today's most-cited link in the blogosphere. Moreoever, the laptop's innards represent today's most-blogged phrase. The bloggers are Makezine predict Apple TV by the end of the MacWorld event.
First, will someone please define "annoying"?
You can nominate a blog now for the Sixth Annual Best Weblogs Award program (the "Bloggies,") but don't say anything annoying on your blog, or if you do, at least sign your John Henry. Maybe because it's such a surprising find, but a CNETNew.com article about a hidden provision in a recently passed bill takes positions 1, 2 and 3 among today's most-cited news stories by bloggers. Writes CNET's Declan McCullagh: "Last Thursday, President Bush signed into law a prohibition on posting annoying Web messages or sending annoying e-mail messages without disclosing your true identity. In other words, it's OK to flame someone on a mailing list or in a blog as long as you do it under your real name. Thank Congress for small favors, I guess." The penalty? Up to two years in prison. Hmmm....
Reaction? Plenty. "Hey, there's a whole bunch of people who annoy me online and live in America. Finally I can do something about them," says the PeanutsComment blogger. But Boing Boing digs deeper and finds an (anonymous!) legal analyst who says the new wording simply updates legislation that's been on the books from the telephone era: "In other words, the latest amendment, which supposedly adds Internet communications devices to the scope of the law, is meaningless surplusage."
News of the weird
Here in Cincinnati, we've been following the bizarre news of today's burstiest person, the late Johannas Pope. She died more than 2 years ago at age 61, but told her caregiver she didn't want to be buried, so her body was left in an upstairs air-conditioned room, where it mummfied. Police and coroner officials discovered it over the weekend. "This is just disturbing," one LiveJournaler's reaction, sums up sentiments quite nicely.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 09:50 AM | Permalink
January 10, 2006
The Mouse That...Arsonized (With a Side Order of Sex and Religion)
A tiny (perhaps vengeful) mouse has a big audience in the blogosphere today because of its role in a housefire in New Mexico. "Burning leaves" (today's most-used phrase in blog posts); it's into a pile of those that a New Mexico man threw a mouse that he'd caught in his house (mentioned in three of today's top five news stories and in the day's three top links). The flaming mouse then ran back into the house, setting it on fire and burning it to the ground. Today's four burstiest people include three fire officials from Fort Sumner NM and Luciano Mares, the unlucky homeowner. Deadpans The Circus blog: "An American Tail."
Stuff related to sex
A few items with sexual overtones also show up today, including a Utah theater's refusal to show the movie "Brokeback Mountain" (today's No. 14 top news story). Bloggers at mayfire and Blurbomat blog can't help but offer Utah-specific commentary. Today's BlogPulse Spotlight takes a deeper look. For the sexually confused, there's today's second most-shared news story which points out that novelist JT Leroy is actually female and probably a made-up author. Whatever dubs January National Literary Fraud Month. And if you're into guys kissing, knock yourself out (today's seventh most-cited blog post).
Religion and politics...questions galore
When the Catholic Church plays tough, what happens? A Polish parish in St. Louis, the topic of today's No. 14 top blog post from The Infamous Brad, provides a master plan. Question No. 2: When ministers sneak into Senate hearing rooms to "bless" the seats of Supreme Court nominees, is that a good thing? (Is it a post-9/11 security breach? Will Iraqi holy men, "copying" U.S. democracy, want to do the same overseas?). A BlogPulse trend graph plots buzz about key questions expected today of nominee Judge Samuel Alito:
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:07 AM | Permalink
January 09, 2006
Making the World Safe(r) for Blogging
According to California-based Spirit of America, a non-profit group, at least 30 people worldwide have been arrested, tortured or imprisoned for writing material on blogs that is critical of their respective governments.
To encourage anonymous blogging that carries the lowest risk of detection, Spirit of America has launched a wiki called BlogSafer that hosts a series of targeted guides for anonymous blogging in hopes of avoiding identification and arrest. Five guides are available for bloggers in Iran (Persian), China (in Chinese), Saudi Arabia (in Arabic), Malaysia and Zimbabwe (both in English).
Says the Spirit of America press release: "These countries were chosen because they are representative of the kinds of repressive tactics that have ben used in the past several years against bloggers...filtering, interrogation, torture and imprisonment." The BlogSafe wiki provides a workspace for international bloggers. Spirit of America also sponsors the Anoniblog.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 12:30 PM | Permalink
A Day for Relatively Unknowns...and a Joke That's On You
From the "people/stuff you've probably not heard about before" department comes a few tidbits from today's blog discoveries.
Unknown hardware:
From the time it was hinted at in 2005, the Optimus keyboard has drawn plenty of curious interest, and as the source of today's most-shared link, it may soon be a commercial reality. Starting Feb. 1. Engadget has the scoop on this multi-task keyboard development from Russia-based Art Lebedev Studio. ShaolinTiger calls in the "best keyboard in the world." The BlogPulse Spotlight provides more analysis.
Unknown general:
Identifying himself only as "General Wager," a Vietnam vet has a few choice words for Sen. John Murtha at a town hall meeting...and then walks out when Murtha responds. Michelle Malkin provides a link to the C-Span video (today's No. top blog post). Discussion leans mostly right.
Unknown privacy invasions?
Did you know that cell phone records are for sale? That's the top of today's most-shared news story, from the crime reporter of the Chicago Sun-Times. MediaGirl.org calls it "Big Brother: Free-market style."
Unknown men
Also among today's blog disucssions are the names of two men, recognized for vastly different reasons. First is Hugh Thompson, a Vietnam vet (and today's No. 26 burstiest person) who died of cancer last week. He's best known as being a 24-year-old helicopter pilot who intervened and helped put an end to the slaughter of the residents of the village of My Lai. MarineCorpsMoms offers a tribute. Also on the list is 100-year-old Albert Hoffman, the Swiss inventor of LSD, and the subject of a New York Times article that's today's No. 4 top link.
The joke's on you?
For topical grins, check out today's No. 18 top link titled "Dean's Song," appropriate with the start of today's confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Judge Samuel Alito. But if you're looking for the best blonde joke ever (the subject of today's top blog post), I get the feeling the joke's on you. You can keep clicking, and clicking, and clicking, and....
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:42 AM | Permalink
January 06, 2006
Let Us Pray...for Religious Integrity? Legal Proof? A Gag for Pat Robertson?
Not exactly sure WHAT God would think about religiously-oriented blogosphere buzz today, but I'm guessing she's not very happy about it.
Among today's most-shared links are these No. 2 and No. 3 gems: the Rev. (it hurts to type that title) Pat Robertsonis blaming Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's recent stroke on his decision to divvy up the Promised Land (which is apparently deeded to God). Media Matters (today's No. 8 link) provides access to the video. Read the reaction and comments at the Titusonenine blog, and you'll get a sense of how average people react to Mr. Robertson.
Sexual set-up? Hmmm...
Elsewhere, a Southern Baptist preacher known to rail against the evils of homosexuality was arrested this week for...you guessed it...soliciting gay sex outside a hotel in Oklahoma City. The Rev. Lonnie Latham is today's No. 2 burstiest person, and Capt. Jeffrey Becker, who described the arrest to the media, tops him at No. 1. "We wish we could say we were surprised," deadpans the Pink Dome blog.
Law and Order: the Jesus episode
And today's most-cited news story, for the intrigued, takes visitors to an Italian court, where a judge is trying to decide a squabble over the existence/true identity of Jesus Christ. May the best man win? The Jolly Blogger provides diferent viewpoints, and finds it somewhat ironic that the legal case coincides with the coming release of Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code on the big screen.
God is...
For today's graphical sermon, we turn to the wisdom of the BlogPulse trend graph, into which we plotted the word "god" and the words "love," "angry" and "vengeful." Not hard to guess which one was most associated with god (whatever one's beliefs). Take that, Pat:
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:56 AM | Permalink
January 05, 2006
Tragedy in the Mines
Grief and anger continue to rock the West Virginia town where 12 coal miners died this week in an explosion (today's top-ranked news stories). Randal McCloy, the lone survivor, is today's burstiest person, and in fact, eight of the day's burstiest people include the victims' family members and other key players in the mine tragedy. What went wrong? -- both in the mine and in the communication foul-up that followed -- is a common refrain among bloggers.
Longhorns No. 1
Could blog buzz have predicted the outcome of Wednesday's Rose Bowl? A BlogPulse trend graph shows that the Longhorns, leading up to the game, consistently created more traction that the USC Trojans, who lost 41-38:
Angry at Ralph
Scattered among today's strange news, including a dolphin wedding (No. 6 news story) and legalized mooning in Maryland (today's 12th-burstiest person), there's unusual animosity toward consumer advocate Ralph Nader and the Public Citizen group with which he's affiliated. PC's successful effort to remove the drug Cylert from the U.S. market because of liver problems has a Cylert user and the blogger at Making Light angry, hoisting her rant to the No. 10 and No. 19 positions among today's top blog posts. BlogPulse's Conversation Tracker follows the discussion.
Dave vs. Bill
Late-night host David Letterman is the sixth-most-blogged-about person today for taking on Fox News' Bill O'Reilly earlier this week. NewsBusters has a link to the video.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:12 AM | Permalink
January 04, 2006
Blog Censorship? And The House That Jack Built Crumbles
It's pretty well known that the Chinese government often censors bloggers or blocks the URLs to blog sites it doesn't like. But is MSN Spaces is on the act, too? That's the question raised in today's most popular blog post, by Rebecca McKinnon, founder of Global Voices Online, at RConversation, "Microsoft Takes Down Chinese Blogger." She provides plenty of details about how certain phrases, words are blocked by servers, linking the take-down to MSN Spaces.
Blogger reaction? "Microsoft serves the great red firewall," observes blogger San Bei Ji. "Is globalization exporting censorship?" asks a MetaFilter discussion (and the conclusion: yes). Microsoft blogger Robert Scoble's not happy either and has offered the Chinese blogger space on his own blog, risk-free.
Nervous nellies in D.C.
Lobbyist Jack Abramoff is the blogosphere's third most-discussed person today after pleading guilty on Monday (today's No. 2 top news story) to fraud, tax evasion and conspiracy -- and agreed to cooperate with investigators by spilling the beans, apparently, on leglislators who succumbed to his donations and influence. ThinkProgress outlines the issue in a post called "The House That Jack Built" (today's No. 8 blog post). So far, former Speaker Tom DeLay and Ohio Congressman Bob Ney have been linked to Abramoff:
Read the comments at WizBang!'s recap, and you'll discover that many folks hope BOTH parties learn a lesson, clean house and adopt federal term limits for Congress.
A Soldier's Father Speaks: A Life Wasted?
Today's 20th most-cited news story is a touching essay by the father of a soldier who died in Iraq. "Though it hurts, I believe that his death -- and that of the other Americans who have died in Iraq -- was a waste. They were wasted in a belief that democracy would grow simply by removing a dictator -- a careless misunderstanding of what democracy requires. They were wasted by not sending enough troops to do the job needed in the resulting occupation -- a careless disregard for professional military counsel.
"But their deaths will not be in vain if Americans stop hiding behind flag-draped hero masks and stop whispering their opposition to this war. Until then, the lives of other sons, daughters, husbands, wives, fathers and mothers may be wasted as well."
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 10:10 AM | Permalink
January 03, 2006
2006 Lists (Already), Cool Energy, and Sir Tom Jones
Those year-end lists, like the BlogPulse 2005 Year in Review, usually appear at, well, the end of the year. But 2006 is already sprouting its first crop of lists, including a few among today's top blog posts, such as Google Blogoscoped's 10 Web Trends That Should Die in 2006 (No. 4), Quick Online Tips' 50 Extensions for Firefox use in 2006 (No. 5) and at the RSS Blog, Randy Charles Martin's Web 2.0 predictions for 2006 (No. 37).
But wait! That's not all! Among the day's top links are the BBC's "100 Things We Didn't Know This Time Last Year" (No. 8) and Lake Superior State University's List of 2006 Banned Words (No. 24, and you've been warned. You can also submit your own for 2007). The Washington Post offers what's out/in for 2006 (today's No. 27 top news story).
Intelligent...energy?
Today's No. 20 top link from Quantum Biocommunication Technology blog, outlines what may be 2006's version of intelligent design -- a cool form of energy, part of what scientists are calling the supernatural universe (and comparing it to the "force" in Star Wars). They write: "The human mind and body are not distinct and separate from their environment, but a packet of pulsating energy constantly interacting with this vast energy sea."
Here's what's new, Pussycat
Not sure whether his skin-tight pants follow him, but singer Tom Jones (today's 38th burstiest person) is now Sir Tom, now that he's been knighted. "It isn't a sign of the end of the world, but it should be..." observes blogger Mark Daniels
International rumors
And can't help but notice today's international speculation, from Der Spiegel and the Jerusalem Post.. Does the U.S. have sights on an attack on Iran?
BlogPulse Spotlight
The Spotlight blog kicks off 2006 with a look at the new Coldplay CD and its embedded DRM "protection," which makes it unplayable to some of its owners.
Posted by Sue MacDonald at 11:32 AM | Permalink
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