Advanced Storytelling

Today I joined not one, but two social networking sites-- Pownce and Ravelry . I'm geeking out, even though I'm on dial-up, and am probably going to end up spending the entire weekend adding my knitting projects to Ravelry. Oh, I didn't mention is was a knitting network? Yeah, I meant it when I said I was geeking out. But not before I finish Harry Potter...

Hillary Clinton's Tentative Dip Into New Neckline Territory Okay, it was appropriately filed under "fashion" but is was on the front of the WaPo website. I cringed. Then I clicked on it: There was cleavage on display Wednesday afternoon on C-SPAN2. It belonged to Sen. Hillary Clinton. She was talking on the Senate floor about the burdensome cost of higher education. She was wearing a rose-colored blazer over a black top. The neckline sat low on her chest and had a subtle V-shape. The cleavage registered after only a quick glance. No scrunch-faced scrutiny was necessary. There wasn't an unseemly amount of cleavage showing, but there it was. Undeniable. The article goes on to talk about how sartorially conservative and masculine the Hill is, and Hilary's uncomfortable relationship with fashion as the First Lady, and her adoption of the black pantsuit as her uniform. Until now, apparently. There was the requisite "really, this isn't just about women, we swea...

Any of you other comm geeks going to watch this ? Hell, I'll watch it just for the costumes, but maybe we should start a drinking game--take a shot every time someone mentions Edward Bernays or Ivy Lee? No?

I don't know how this hasn't made the evening news. Then again, I had to hear about it from the Yarn Harlot , so maybe it has been. I'll let Stephanie explain: Tory Bowen says that she was raped. Actually, Tory Bowen, was pre-law at college when she had a drink at a bar that was the last thing she remembers until she woke up in a strangers bed, with a stranger, who was doing something she hadn't consented to. (That would be the rape.) She went to the emergency room, was treated and had a rape kit done and called the police. The police charged her attacker with 1st degree sexual assault and a trial was set. That's where things got weird. The judge decided that many words around this issue were too inflammatory. That they made the defendant sound guilty, and that they implied a crime...."Rape" is a legal conclusion- he thought. We cannot call it rape until a jury says it's rape. (Hear that women? You can't know something is rape until there's a v...

Okay, by now you know the Cluetrain Manifesto: Markets are conversations. Today at work I stumbled across a great definition of marketing, courtesy of Seth Godin: "Marketing is an act that starts a conversation."

The Ethicurean's Dairy Queen had a post today titled Truthiness and Real Food: Hellman's, get your paws off our framing! The title alone referenced, Steven Colbert, food and framing, so I had to read it. Turns out it touches on a lot more of the issues we've been covering this year in class. Hellman's Mayonnaise is starting a "real food" web campaign, and was trying to get bloggers to join in. I can't quite figure out what it all entailed, but apparently Unilever attempted to pitch an integrated marketing show (ie, "infotainment") to the Food Network, which turned them down, so they've now developed a "In Search of Real Food" website on Yahoo where people can share recipes and thoughts on "real", local, and fresh foods--and Hellman's mayonnaise. What’s keeping me up so late with annoyance is the insidious way that Hellman’s/Best Foods is trying to co-opt the idea of real food by velcro-ing their manufactured "f...

I'll admit the new Disney cartoon Ratatouille looked cute, but with the combination of being broke and still feeling well enough to look at food, I figured I'd pass on it for awhile. But according to Eating Liberally , I really should go see this movie. Its message? Yes, even a lowly rodent can learn to cook, but just like the rest of us, his culinary endeavors will succeed or fail depending on the quality and freshness of his ingredients. Am I the only one who finds this message pretty radical for an animated film supposedly aimed at kids? And it seems all the more astonishing when you contrast it to Pixar parent Disney’s Shrek the Third, with its endless tie-ins to processed foods that target toddlers’ taste buds. Apparently the villain in the movie sells junk food. How awesome is that? Now, I'm not naive enough to believe kids are going to trade in their popcorn for carrot sticks at the movie theater, especially after the Associated Press recently reviewed 57 programs a...

I had forgotten until today that I had posted my picture on The Age Project , in order to prove my suspicion that most people think I look younger than I am. Well, I was disproven. The average guess was 27, which is close enough. For those friends curious enough, the photo I posted is the same one I'm using for my Facebook profile.