Fine, Fine. Now, About That Goatee.

Hey! Makes Jon look like a Jewish version of Captain Highliner, noted Canada City purveyor of fishsticks.

Arrrrrrr…

If these people cared about putting women on the show, they’d invite Christina Hendricks to read the news while dressed in olive oil.

Isn’t the real problem that Lizz Winstead is sexist? And probably racist?

@Original Andrew: No, the real problem is she spells her name with two Zs.

I just don’t understand what all the fuss is over chicks at the Daily Show. Yeah, it would be nice if there were more of them all over the place, but it’s not like comedy and tv industries in general are teeming with laydee bits to begin with. So why are 1) Jezebel singling out TDS and 2) the blogosphere listening to them?

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ:

Pageviews

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: Not mentioned in the quote is that it was delivered at Netroots, after an apparent Jezzie reader posed the question.

In other words, Andrew is correct.

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: remember that all Gawker writers get their bonuses by the pageview. So there’s an extra bit of it involved to Andrew’s correct answer.

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: Hey, how about that federal judge’s order on SB 1070? Is the Arpaio crowd going nuts? Fast track to the 9th?

@nojo:

A recent BusinessWeek article went all in-depth into the horrifying high-tech sweatshop world of Huffpo, Gawker, BusinessInsider, etc. They will do absolutely anything for page views–like crassly slapping on photos of semi-naked women to get clicks on articles–”The Top 10 Best Swimsuits of the New Depression!” At Gawker, there’s a big electronic board posted at the front of the cube farm showing whose posts are getting the most estimated hits. They actually use computer modeling to estimate how many page views–and thus potential advertising revenue–a post will receive based on the first minute-ish of traffic. Anyway, the whole article was even more absurd and depressing than you’d expect, and ended with the explanation that the whole thing is a huge scheme to screw over the writers and creative teams and trick advertisers into funding the websites, while separating venture capitalists from their clients’ cash. Welcome to the future, it’s the same as the past, but with endless, mindless corporate tweets.

@SanFranLefty: Dunno yet. The crowds weren’t planning on assembling until early tomorrow morning. I’ll keep you posted as I learn things.

Here’s the link: http://azc.cc/87gtJq

I should add that the BusinessWeek article treated this as a perfectly reasonable and acceptable business model. Is it really insane if everyone’s doing it?

@Original Andrew: And those aren’t even the raw “content farms” that post in bulk to match Google trending terms. I’m thinking of doing an SEO-whore post just to see what happens.

@nojo: There’s a marketing guy at Ford who’s considered a leader in the new field of social media management, and his job is simply to produce mass tweets, blog posts and Facebook updates. It’s like the most deadly boring and banal William Gibson novel ever.

@Original Andrew:

Nojo has a board like that too, but I think he updates it with a piece of chalk.

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: My good friend is a community organizer for a national NGO concerned with workers’ justice. They have a lot planned in AZ right now, especially around tomorrow, and she’s there for two weeks to organize/take part in protests, possible arrests, etc, etc. I probably won’t hear anything from her until after the fact, but it will be fascinating to hear her first-hand account eventually. And it’s also fascinating to continue to hear yours–thank you!

@Original Andrew: it’s a hyperactive version of what goes on at newsrooms across America.

It’s probably an effect of all the mass segmentation of media: with fewer so-called “authoritative” sources, why pay for authority?

@Signal to Noise:

The big draw of the traditional news media is that ostensibly they have a purpose in informing the public, watching over the policitians & police, etc., anything other than just making money for the business owner. The way these websites are run openly on the owners’ greed is just so… unseemly.

I’m sure the Gawker writers are not exaggerating when they post about how broke they are.

@Original Andrew: “ostensibly” being the key word.

After visiting some former employers, talking to some biz friends, and seeing the number of people many stations and nat’l net bureaus have laid off (which leads to some very nasty morale problems among the survivors), I hate to say it, but at least the cheap fuckers who run many of our new aggregator overlords are at least honest about their greed.

There are newsrooms in very large markets who have axed their entire video editing departments, leaving that job to writers and producers and re-labeling everyone as a “Content Producer.” Others simply hire reporters who can shoot and edit their own video, calling them “multimedia journalists” (insiders call ‘em one-man bands.)

I know the loss leader days for news divisions are long gone and never coming back, but it turns the ostensibly authoritative sources into something not much better than their unseemly Web brethren, whom they spend their whole day chasing because there aren’t the boots on the ground to do it themselves any longer.

@Original Andrew: Don’t have the link handy, but I read something last night (perhaps an old Russell Baker piece) that traced the problem of newspapers lacking a mission to the transition from family ownership to corporations.

Short version: It’s all about profit. Period.

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: I thought we were the Land of Manana here.

Can I get a tilde “n” at my table?

Instantaneous flash/bang from thunderstorm. Expecting loss of power any minute now, or having my screen blow up in my face.

Speaking of manyanna, it’s the 15th anniversary for me and Mrs RML.

@SanFranLefty: This is one of my favorite passages in the ruling so far:

Pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1373(c), DHS is required to “respond to an inquiry by a Federal,
State, or local government agency, seeking to verify or ascertain the citizenship or immigration status . . . for any purpose authorized by law, by providing the equested verification or status information.” DHS has, in its discretion, set up LESC, which is administered by ICE and “serves as a national enforcement operations center that promptly provides immigration status and identity information to local, state, and federal law
enforcement agencies regarding aliens suspected of, arrested for, or convicted of criminal activity.” (Pl.’s Mot. at 6-7 (citing Palmatier Decl. ¶¶ 3-6).) Mr. Palmatier states in his Declaration that LESC resources are currently dedicated in part to national security objectives such as requests for immigration status determination from the United States Secret Service,
the FBI, and employment-related requests at “national security related locations that could be vulnerable to sabotage, attack, or exploitation.” (Palmatier Decl. ¶ 4.) Thus, an increase in the number of requests for determinations of immigration status, such as is likely to result from the mandatory requirement that Arizona law enforcement officials and agencies check the immigration status of any person who is arrested, will divert resources from the federal government’s other responsibilities and priorities.

In other words, if this law isn’t stricken, the terrorists win. Haha. Good one, federales.

@Signal to Noise: And the transition of network news departments from prestige loss leaders to profit centers is the other half of that equation.

This, by the way, is why the J-school dean told us wide-eyed freshmen to Get the Hell Out back in 1977. He had no clue that the Internet was coming twenty years later. He was talking about Gannett.

@redmanlaw: Happy anniversary! Tildes for everybody!

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: Happy aññiversary!

Corrected.

@redmanlaw: Congrats! That sounds like a good solid run so far, here’s hoping it continues for a long time into the future.

@SanFranLefty: The governor is now saying they will take this to the 9th but haven’t yet decided which portions of the ruling to appeal.

ETA: Rally at the capitol to begin at 5pm MST.

@redmanlaw:

Give her my love, and congratuations!

@nojo: I missed that spiel by not going to J-school. I’m told there are still varieties of it being given by every J-school grad or student I run into these days. Of course, I had my parents as a big flashing red warning light, and entered the business anyway.

Many of us are willfully naive as 21 and 22 year olds when given solid advice, mostly because we have a hard time finding other environments in which we can function. (And make no mistake: many people in news are in it not only because of the public service, idealism, etc., but also because it’s one of the few places where eccentrics and other types who would not function well in normal 9-5, suit-and-tie/blouse-skirt environments are still allowed.)

@redmanlaw: (applauds)

@Signal to Noise: I have no idea what I would have done without journalism as an option. (And, much more to the point, the college rag.)

Oh, right: Computer science. But watching geeks running around with giant trays of punchcards was not an edifying sight.

@redmanlaw:
Bonne anniversaire

@Original Andrew: What these sweatshops need to do is attach electrodes to the writers’ genitals that can deliver shocks until they achieve a profitable level of hits that covers their salaries and benefits and a 600% margin for the owners.

@nojo: I would have become an English major and then a barista.

@nojo: I’d probably have formalized my recording engineer track by getting a year of schooling in it and then enter another terrible job market while supplementing income by tending bar.

It would have been college all over again.

@rptrcub: I did both of those…and then joined the Peace Corps. But I eventually landed in an editorial position and I really enjoy it. I feel like I’m fairly good at it too (the Great Rent/Rend Incident of Two Days Ago notwithstanding).

@Signal to Noise: @nojo: @rptrcub: If I hadn’t been a J-major I probably would have been Poli Sci. No real change in my life trajectory as I would have still ended up in law school, just probably more quickly w/ a Poli Sci degree due to the dullness of opening mail for a Congresscritter.

@flippin eck: Right, you can spend all day and all night on your yacht, drinking and laughing and posting tormenting posts to the plebes on Stinque.com, chained to their desk and cursing their bondage to grim labor.

@flippin eck: We’ll never let you forget about rent/rend. At least, not as long as you keep reminding us. ;)

@redmanlaw: Felicitations!

@redmanlaw:

!Feliz aniversario!

Thanks, guys. We’re in rehersals now (15 years ago) in the 150year old adobe church in the ancestral homeland (the old was was destroyed by US Army cannon to suppress a rebellion), with the poolside pizza party later (our friends and relatives had a lot of kids on hand).

I have a degree called the Bachelor of University Studies, which meant I could take whatever the fuck I wanted and still graduate after dropping out of the pinche journalism program at New Mexico. That’s how my 80-hour EMT program fit into my class schedule.

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: It is a carefully drafted, thoughtful opinion that will be awful hard to overturn.

In otherwords, a Kenyan-Mexican declaration of war on America’s future on Fox News tonight.

@redmanlaw:

Congrats! As I always say to Ms. Still on our day – a good start.

@rptrcub: I went from an English major straight to law school. I knew I needed to learn how to write, and at my liberal playpen, that meant English major,

@TJ/ Jamie Sommers /TJ: On a semi-related threadjack note:

Ms. Still and I are just back from Culture Clash’s American Night – a hilarious fantasia on the immigrant experience in America featuring a cameo for Joe Arapio and (probably) the first use of “refudiate” in the American theater.

@Original Andrew:
Have you a link to the BW article? My search skills are failing at finding it.

By show of hands, who’d heard of Olivia Munn before she showed up on The Daily Show? If your hand is up right now, it’s officially time for you to start looking for a job. Bonus points if you’d heard of The Screen Savers first.