An Intersting Campaign Tactic
Alright, now that I have your attention. No, I’m not going to give any endorsements here. I know how things can turn if I bring up politics. However, this article I came across was just to weird to me to leave it alone.
Gordon Smith who is a Republican Senator from Oregon has recently started his campaign for re-election. I don’t know anything about Smith other than the fact that he is a Republican that somehow got elected in Oregon. So what caught my eye about this campaign, when I don’t even live in Oregon anymore?
Smith, it appears, is campaigning hard for the Oregon Duck fan votes. Look at the image above and to the right. The above image which has a simple logo of Smith’s may catch some people as having a very familiar font. Yes, it’s the exact same font as the Oregon Ducks have been using for a few years. Then in a screen-shot from his tv spot, Smith uses the appealing to hippie colors of green and yellow.
It seems very strange to me that a politician running for office in Oregon would choose to so closely tie himself (at least in appearance) to one of the three major sports teams and two major universities in Oregon. Does he figure he has the more right leaning (not by much) Oregon State vote? Does his campaign manager figure this will be a good way to get a republican voted for by the heavy left leaning Univeristy of Oregon fans, alum, and students? Also, from his wikipedia entry, I learned he is a BYU alum. Not long ago BYU and Oregon almost got into a little bit of a street fight in Las Vegas after Oregon taking exception to BYU performing the Haka at their own event.
What do you guys think? Is this going to work? Will it eliminate Beaver fans (like me, if I were an Oregon voter)? Is it just a play for the Oregon fans, or what?
Blogging, getting easier and easier…
I’m not saying that I will be updating more and more, but there are becoming more tools to make the process easier to complete. I’ve read many stories about how long blog posts take for the more professional sites, such as TechCrunch, Mashable, ReadWriteWeb, etc. Now I don’t spend as long as they do on writing each post, but each post does take a little while to complete. Through adding pictures, finding links, deciding what to write, and making sure it’s all setup right, it takes longer than I first though.
Well today I just started using Zemanta and it seems to be speeding up the process quite a bit. It reads my post as I write it, and automatically finds links, pictures, suggests tags, and other stories for me to look into. This is only the second post I’ve written with Zemanta, but it seems to be very useful so far (unfortunately there are no good picture recommendations for this post), and hopefully it will make it easier for me to continue to write more blog posts down the road. With the addition of video, I am focusing more on that and less on the writing, but I hope to continue to post thought provoking, informative pieces here.
“Over the line!”
18 fire pits may be taken away and it will solve all our problems.
Since this article I read last night made it’s way to the Drudge Report today I figured I would put in my two cents.
The Seattle Parks Department is thinking about banning camp fires at Seattle’s two popular beaches. Considering I live a short walk away from Alki Beach this is particular frustrating for me. There are six fire pits at Alki and another twelve at Golden Gardens. They want to cut this number in half next year and eliminate the pits the following year. Any idea why they may want to ban the fires? Yes, of course… Global Warming. I’m not going to get into that debate, but regardless of where you stand, burning wood has been around for quite awhile. The fact that these fires are contributing much, if any, to global warming seems absolutely ridiculous to me. I wonder how many fire pits there are nationally? To focus on 18 pits for the entire greater Seattle area to enjoy just seems ridiculous to me.
There are plenty of other places to focus your efforts to help protect the environment than a place where up to 18 fires can be going. Of course, this year, I doubt there have been that many days where people have even been able to enjoy the pits. I hope that someone comes to their senses and realizes that the Seattle government should be focusing their time on many, many, MANY other issues.
Taking away the fire pits at the beach would just be WAY over the line.
Seattle bonfires may be banned (Also calling these “bonfire” pits is ridiculous, they can’t be over a few feet high)
Seriously Seattle?
Seriously Seattle?
Well as I am trying to get to bed I decided to take a look at what the week will bring us as far as weather goes.
As you can see, it’s not pretty. I’m getting a little tired of this Seattle weather. I think we’ve had about 7 days where it’s been actually hot (er, warm) and sunny this year. Yes, since January. It’s now June! C’mon Seattle get it together. Where’s global warming when you want it?
No that’s not an ad on the right, that’s Seattle’s 10-day forecast.
Everyone’s getting into MMA these days.
This weekend will be capping off, what is probably the biggest 8 day stretch in Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) history. Last week UFC 84 took place with three big fights and many other good undercard fights. Tonight Elite XC will have their first fight night on CBS, which will mark the first time MMA has been broadcast on network television. Then, to cap it all off tomorrow night W.E.C. (another MMA league) will have the biggest fight in their history on basic cable (at least I think VS is still considered basic cable).
All in all MMA is becoming more and more mainstream with the media, the sponsors, and even more so the participants. There will be girls fighiting on the Elite XC show tonight and this morning I just saw this piece from 20/20 with John Stossel looking into kids who are now getting into MMA.
I may be jaded as I don’t have kids, but I think this is actually great. Getting kids into the sport at an early age will help teach good technique, and really, how much can these kids hurt eachother. MMA has proven to be safer than many other sports and I think teaching kids how to take a hit at an early age will be a great thing in our current society. It’s refreshing to see some parents not get so scared for their sons and daughters to even play tag or kickball on the schoolyard.
Watch the piece above if you have a spare 6 minutes and let me know what you think. Is it to early to get kids into a contact sport?
Also, if you want a good little introduction on MMA check out this blog post. It doesn’t give you everything, but at least a good base to go off of. AOL Sports Blog
Hat tip: AOL Sports blog [Stossel looks at kids in MMA]
Prince, forgets who the artist is.
Prince recently played a cover of the Radiohead song “Creep” at the huge concert festival “Coachella.” Since Radiohead won’t play the song anymore, it’s good to see that somebody is still playing the song as it’s such a great one. Well… after the concert Prince talks to his people and starts having them take the video off the internet. Flagging it as copyrighted by the owners of the content.
The problem with this, is that Radiohead owns the song since they wrote it, even though Prince performed it. Radiohead’s lead singer Tom Yorke wants to see the video and he wants the video to be spread around the internet. So in a funny, or forward thinking artist, twist Radiohead is telling Prince’s people to stop blocking the video and to let it live online and let people see it.
Funny that the person who owns the copyright wants it distributed, and that the person who doesn’t have the rights to pull it off the series of tubes that is the internet is trying to get it yanked.
You can’t find the videon on YouTube, but there are a few versions floating around. Hopefully the video embedded above will continue to work.
My new power cord.
My new, makeshift, power cord… for tonight at least.
I came home a little early today after picking up my car from the shop. After working for awhile on my laptop it was time to grab my power cord as the battery was low. After realizing I forgot the key piece to connect my Apple power supply to the wall I was a little worried I would be without my laptop for the rest of the night (Not a problem if I wasn’t downloading something, but well, you know).
Luckily I was able to remember a post I saw on Gizmodo a few months ago and was able to take another power cord, shave off a little plastic and use it for a makeshift extension cord for my macbook pro. Yes, the ground is a good safety, but when you’re in a pinch this works.
For the full instructions check out this blog post by Brian Lam.
About Otis
I live in Seattle, Washington. I am passionate about working with and interacting with others. My work experience includes marketing, account management, and sales.
I am a huge sports fan who on top of cheering for my favorite teams (Go Beavs!) also appreciates coaching strategy, as well as the marketing behind teams, players, and events.
Personally, I enjoys exploring new cities and areas (particularly small towns) and getting outside and playing.