What do you think?

Many Newsviners know that a magnitude 7.0 earthquake has struck the capital city of Haiti, devastating the city and killing or injuring thousands of residents there. Fewer Newsviners realize that they have earnings sitting in their accounts.

Well? Do you?

Nature, the debut album from Columbus, Ohio group Flotation Walls, hasn't stopped playing for me since I got my hands on the disc last week.

The album has received lots of positive press already, but I won't let that stop me from throwing my hat into the ring. Listen: this is the best disc I've heard this year.

The Sound

Flotation Walls have cultivated a unique sound somewhere between the ambitious orchestration of Arcade Fire, the dramatic indulgence of Bowie at his Bowiest, the excitement of The Flaming Lips and the layered complexity of Blonde Redhead. That they do it all without missing a beat is a feat that has be experienced - on the one hand, the simplest song on the album has something like 80 audio tracks mixed into it; on the other hand, even the most complex and layered textures on the disc do nothing to sacrifice their hooks and drive.

This is an art album - they have interesting things to say about meaningful subjects, and thematically the album rewards repeat listenings. But this is an art album produced by a group of people with a keen appreciation for pop music. It's ambitious and it's complex - but it's unpretentious and accessible, and lots of fun even when it's breaking your heart.

The Subject

The album's title, Nature, is no accident - but don't come expecting songs about sunsets and flowers. The nature they seek to explore is human - the songs play out thematically over the course of a human life. Consider the way the conception celebrated in raucous opener "Sperm and Egg" fades into the newborn heartbeat of the drums that open "Worms," the following track; there is a flow here.

The fact that said heartbeat opens a song about the inevitability of death should tell you something about what's to come - we get a spiritual journey from the innocence of childhood (the gorgeous, heartbreaking "Kids, Look at the Waves") to the stockpiled experiences of old age (the raging, futile "The Sky Ejaculates"); from existential despair (simple, sad and infectious "Body") into sacred, life-affirming meaning (anthemic concession "Willis the Fireman"); from self-absorbed adolescence (disarmingly catchy "The Flickering Projection") to the capricious cruelty of Nature (the absurd interlude "Timmy Twofingers").

The Bottom Line

This disc will have you tapping your feet along to your own mortality - and that alone is worth the price of admission. Flotation Walls have produced a serious contender for 2009's indie album of the year with Nature, and you owe it to yourself to check them out!

Flotation Walls are currently touring in support of Nature and may well be coming to a city near you - you can find their tour dates posted here. They plan to chronicle their tour with videos on their Youtube Channel and updates to their Tumblr Blog. You can also find them on twitter as @flotationwalls.

If you've heard the disc, please leave a comment and let us know what you thought below!

This article has been a long time in coming - I apologize for the delay, and rather than spit out a list of reasons why I didn't have this published two months ago I'll just say that I dropped the ball, and beg your indulgence. I hope that the meager content I managed to produce is worth the wait, and so without further ado -

Exquisite Corpse - Let There Be Plot

Some of you who know me know that I'm a big fan of Narrative - I am terribly fascinated by the way stories work, the way we use the idea of "plot" to make sense of our reality. Life as lived is nothing more than one random event after another - it's our values, ideologies, emotions and beliefs that compel us to interpret these events as parts of some larger context; it's the fundamentally human drive to turn sequence into story that allows us to find any meaning in life at all.

So with that in mind, I present you with this contribution to The Book. I used my three panels to produce abstract verbal representations of the three stages of a story - beginning, middle, and end. I extrapolated on these concepts, I made some reasonable associations between concepts and followed various flights of fancy into a few real stretches.

The idea is simple: if every page that everyone contributes to this book is effectively some "random" element to be taken in conjunction with the "random" elements contributed by others, then I see an immediate analog to life. Each individual piece of paper in this book is a life experience, and by giving the reader the ability to interject "beginnings", "middles" and "ends" into the midst of these concepts I hope to allow readers to tell stories of their own with the finished product.

A note on Dialectic

By the way - I know I said beginning middle and end, but I suffer from an acute tendency towards abstraction. In order to cram more concepts into the framework I used, I decided to steal a bit from Hegel (with my apologies) and frame the entire narrative structure as a dialectic. The beginning is the thesis - the initial conditions, the way the story starts. The middle is actually the anti-thesis - it's a perceived conflict between two states which seem unable to coexist. Finally, the conclusion is the synthesis - it's the resolution of said conflict.

A Note on the Images

The images included with this article are incorrect. You'll note that they look terrible - my handwriting is offensive to human eyes, let alone the eyes of gods and children. I wrote it all up in spite of that, and when my lovely girlfriend Ryan took one look at it she demanded I tear out the pages I'd written and allow her to rewrite them.

Unfortunately, I do not have photographs of the final product. It was passed on before I realized I needed to retake the photos. So, I'm including these original images - but if anyone in the future would be so kind as to take a few shots of page two, I'll replace the images in this article.

The final part of this whole book project involves a Flash-powered flip-book and I am assuming that all contributions will be re-shot to be uniformly sized once the whole thing is done (Steve?) but yeah - there you have it. The real contribution is prettier.

While Barak Obama is likely the most powerful man in the world, there is one power greater. You and me. American public opinion. We even make the news; opinion polls. So, it would be wise for us to be informed, to understand what is happening in our country.

A while back I wrote about revising Newsvine's "Vineacity" Branch to reflect a modernized application because the community evolves, and with it, the context and purpose of the original Vineacity lost some of the value.

People are talking about "fun work", but are those words even remotely compatible, or is the juxtaposition perverse by definition?

It's been awhile since we launched Newsvine Groups. As we ramp up toward launching newly-redesigned groups, I'd like to solicit feedback on the most desired features for Newsvine Groups V2.

It's been a while since I wrote. There are a lot of reasons why, but the best one is that I didn't feel I had anything new to say. I didn't just not write here, I didn't write. Some of you will understand what that's like.

This article is cross-posted at the Flex Cookbook. It's mildly technical in nature, and definitely aimed at a specific demographic - I'm writing to Flash Developers curious about Adobe Flex. I hope at least a few people find it to be helpful!

Introduction

You know who you are: you got started on a bootleg copy of Flash 8 in high school, poked around with the drawing tools and were about to put it away when you discovered something called ActionScript which changed the way you looked at making content for the web. Flash-forward to today and you're a successful Flash developer. You don't write timeline code. You have a personal class library that's half-ported from AS2 and only you know how it works. Graphic design?  You have people for that. But you still use the Flash Authoring Tool for all of your production, and lately you're getting the sense that you're missing something.

Lately you've been hearing more and more about this "Flex" thing, but it makes you nervous - even though you don't really use the stage, you like the cold comfort of a library of visual assets that you can link directly to your classes. You've heard about this MXML stuff but it just makes you feel kind of dirty - who wants to use XML-based shortcuts instead of bathing in pure AS3? And yet, one-by-one your developer friends stop posting to Flash fora as they start picking up Flex - and they seem to be making a lot more money, too.

So, are you ready to see what the fuss is about? In this writeup we're going to take a look at a few key concepts in Flex development and examine what it is that Flex has that Flash doesn't. I'll explain to you why MXML is worth your time, we'll look at how easy it is to make custom components and then I'll knock your socks off with the concept of Data-Binding. We'll talk a bit about styling, and end up with a look at when Flash may still be a better bet.  This won't be a detailed step-by-step tutorial, more of an overview of the relevant concepts to get you started.

Ready?

MXML: It Doesn't Suck

MXML is a set of proprietary XML tags that act as shortcuts to writing AS3 code - when you compile your .swf, all of the MXML gets turned into AS3 and then compiled just like any other project in the Flash Platform. There are a handful of reasons why MXML is very useful - but if you're anything like me you'll be very skeptical at this point. AS3 works, dammit - why would you want to learn a whole new approach to creating content when the one you have works so well? Furthermore, if MXML is just a wrapper for AS3 anyway, why would you even bother? Why not write the AS3 directly?

Well, the short answer is that you can - there's nothing stopping you from porting over your existing AS3 packages and classes and importing them into your Flex projects. There's nothing stopping you from creating an <mx:script></mx:script> tag and writing your code in there. You don't have to use MXML at all to use Flex, and maybe that's the best way in.

As you play around with it, though, you'll find that you start to use it more and more. Sure, you can instantiate a Panel component, size it and position it with AS3 and then integrate it into your application - but why write a class to do that when it's so much easier to just type something like the following:

<mx:Panel id="loginPanel" width="400" height="150" title="{user.name}"></mx:Panel>

Once you're familiar with the ideas there - "id" is the instance name, the {}'s denote data-binding (see below), etc - you'll even start using Design View to do your layouts. Strange concept, I know - but the fact is that MXML makes it quick and easy to implement components and configure them in a way that makes sense. It's faster than writing it in pure AS3 and various layout features (the design view is handy for spacing things out, aligning to edges, etc etc etc) make it really convenient to use. And don't even get me started about connecting to remote data providers - you can replace 20 lines of AS3 with a well-executed <mx:RemoteObject />.

Still skeptical? That's ok - go download a free trial of Flex and just use AS3 for a while. MXML won't be offended - that's how cool it is.

Custom Components - Err, shh, here comes Flash, pretend we're talking about something else...

Another perk of the MXML model is that it makes creation, customization and deployment of custom components much easier. Not only does Flex Builder ship with a slick library of components to help you manage everything from layout to UI to data visualization, but they're all instantly accessible and very, very easy to customize.

Flash gives you some components, sure. But in order to modify them you've got to mess with all of the visual assets on the stage (ever tried to customize the skin for FLVPlayback? It's not impossible, but it's hardly intuitive), you've got timeline code all over the place, and ultimately each component remains something of a black box. Flex is much easier - think of each component as a self-contained Flex Application. You can open it up, edit the AS3 and MXML, change the layout or style and then plop it right into your project. And the best part? All Flex Components are also Classes - so if you want to work in straight AS3 or do something dynamic, it's no problem to type var p:Panel = new Panel() and go from there. Like any other AS3 asset they can be extended programmatically, as well.

And thanks to the meta-data customizability provided by the Flex Framework, it's easy to define custom events for each component. Create your event, add the appropriate Meta tag, and then when you add the component to your main application's MXML you'll get code hinting right in the MXML letting you specify an event handler. Couldn't be easier, eh?

Code-Hinting, Project-level Browsing and You'll Never Go Back to Flash

Writing AS3 in Flash is easy, right? I mean, it lets you have multiple AS documents open, it gives you some code hinting if you're using existing Flash classes, it catches your errors when you preview...

Listen, ten minutes programming in Flex Builder and you will never write code in Flash again. Even if you don't switch to Flex Development, you'll write your AS3 in Flex and then use it in Flash. Why?

• Custom Code-hinting - every class you write will get code-hinting when you implement it. You'll see all of your methods, along with the arguments they take. You'll see all of your public variables (or, if you're using setters, you'll see those as public variables). This works in both AS3 and in your MXML - if you want to implement any of your classes as custom components, all of their properties become attributes in the MXML tag, and as I mentioned above you'll get any possible events listed along with your properties and methods. That's slick.
• Project View - Flex knows you're not going to be creating a single file and then publishing. You've got graphical assets, you've got custom classes, you've got external libraries, you've got XML configuration files - and with Flex, because it's built on the Eclipse engine, you have a mini file-manager in the upper left to help you keep track of all of that. It's a huge time-saved to not have to go to file->open every time you need to edit a different file.
• Wizards and Shortcuts - Got your file browser open? Right click on your "src" folder and create a new folder called "classes." In that folder, create a new folder called "CustomDisplayObjects." Right click on that folder and click "Create new AS3 Class" - a wizard comes up asking you for the name of the class, what class it extends and a handful of other parameters. Then it creates a class within a package that mirrors your folder structure - "package classes.CustomDisplayObjects { public class YourClassName extends Whatever { public function YourClassName{}}}" etc. Everything lines up, and if you want to change any of your folder or class names it'll automatically update all of that for you. Neat, eh?

Data-Binding - If You Weren't Already Impressed...

And that brings us to Data-Binding. This is something that's possible to do in Flash, but it doesn't happen naturally nor does it happen easily. Data-Binding allows you to declare certain variables or classes to be "Bindable." Let's say we write the following:

[Bindable] public var sample:String = "";

You can then create, say, an MXML Panel. You can bind the String to the panel's title property -

<mx:Panel id="testPanel" title="{sample}" />

Those braces in the "title" attribute field mean that the variable "sample" is bound to that field - in other words, every time "sample" changes - be it through user input, simple program progress, some sort of custom class behavior - testPanel will be automatically notified and its title will change to reflect the new value.

Yeah, that's right - you now have access to data objects that can notify listeners when their value changes. And it's not just strings - you can define an entire custom class as Bindable, and then whenever any property within that class changes anything that's bound to that property will update automatically. It's not magic, it's just a propertyChanged event handler embedded deep within the Flex framework - but it sure saves you a few hundred lines of event handler code in a larger application. Think about it - let's say you have a custom class called "User" which contains various user information and then an ArrayCollection containing all of a user's comments. You can change out the user dynamically, and your "Selected User's Comments" component will have its contents changed to match whoever you set to "selected user." Pretty swell, eh?

Doing it with Style

Let's wrap up our look at Flex's core concepts with a look at styling your app. In Flash, the image editor is heavily foregrounded - if you want your component to look a certain way, you just draw it that way and then link it to your class. Flex doesn't have that sort of functionality - the way you control the appearance of your Flex app is with a Flexified version of everyone's old friend CSS.

That's right - you use cascading style sheets. Now I know what you're thinking - you got into AS3 development specifically so you didn't have to troubleshoot buggy CSS rendering anymore, right? Well don't sweat it, because Flex renders the style itself - no more browser compatibility issues, no more IE6 hacks, no more uneven implementation of standards. Basically, all of the visual elements you use in Flex have visual properties - width, height, background color, etc etc etc. Additionally, you can import graphical assets that your design people give you and use them as skins for your components. All of this information can be stored in a stylesheet which then applies the information to your specifications. It'll take you a few minutes to get used to the selectors etc, but other than that it's like HTML in a perfect world.

So... when would you still use Flash?

Don't get me wrong, I love Flash - other than the AS3 editor, which is kinda bad. If you're working with something where you need specific control over the graphical assets, use Flash. If you're working with timeline animation, use Flash. If you want to be able to import video from AfterEffects and map it to your Tweens, use Flash. Flash is still Flashier.

But if you are working with a lot of information and if you prefer external ActionScript files to timeline code, why not take a day or two and poke around with Flex? If you want to give it a serious shake, take five days - apparently, you can learn Flex in a week with this handy set of video tutorials from Adobe. What are you waiting for? There are a million resources for you to consult - the Flex community is made up of developers who love to spread the word, and there's probably an Adobe User Group in your city filled with folks who will talk your ear off about MVC Frameworks and Design Patterns and all sorts of topics you never knew you were interested in until you asked. It's great.

So yeah, that's that - go download the free trial and give it a spin.

Just a quick note to direct your attention to a new Newsvine Group: Whitehouse Watch. WHW is the newsvine home of all seeds originating from the newly renovated Whitehouse Website.

Obama promises to be the most transparent, most tech-savvy and all-around coolest President in a very long time. A big part of that plan is the revamped White House website, which features not only a blog but special sections devoted to Executive Orders, Proclamations and even weekly video chats.

If Obama is going to go the extra mile to make all of this information available to the public, I'd like us to do our part to organize and discuss it here on Newsvine. So if you ever seed anything from whitehouse.gov, please join this group and make sure you publish it to this group as well as whereever else you'd like to publish it. This way we'll have a one-stop-shop for all of the various content coming from that site.

A Note on Tagging

I would also at this time like to propose a note on tagging content from Whitehouse.gov, as follows:

• All blog posts should be tagged with obama-blog.
• All proclamations should be tagged with obama-proclamation.
• All executive orders should be tagged with obama-executive-order.
• All weekly video addresses should be tagged with obama-video-address.
• Any other regular content will be assigned a tag as it is discovered

It's all pretty self-explanatory, standard stuff - but if we all make an effort to standardize it then I dare say we can (gasp) do our part to help facilitate the "radical transparency" that this administration is proposing. Who is with me?

Final Thoughts

So, go join the group if you feel so compelled. If you're reliable and want to help me administrate it, let me know in a comment below.

The only real ground rule for content is very very simple: the only thing that belongs in this group are seeds from whitehouse.gov. Not seeds from elsewhere, not original writing. Cool?

In a stunning turn of events, president elect Barack Obama came out today and acknowledged that his existence has been fabricated and he is not the man that the Democratic party has endorsed throughout this epic campaign.

I have a few unanswered emails in my Inbox which I really intended to answer weeks, months ago, but then as time slipped by I got too embarrassed or felt too much shame to answer.

It is my privilege and honor to announce the birth of Sagan, our first official Newsvine baby. Sagan was born at 12:15 a.m. on January 12, 2009, weighing 6 pounds and 14 ounces, 20 inches long to proud parents and Newsviners WaltD and RWarner.

Man, hackers suck. Some 12-year-old managed to get into the live feed that Macrumors.com had up from the Macworld Keynote this afternoon. Anyone reading the feed saw a bit of information about iPhoto and then suddenly "OMG STEVE JOBS JUST DIED!"

The next few posts seemed uneasy:

9:30 amOh, wait, sorry, Steve did die. Our condolences.
9:30 amPrecision editor, advanced drag & drop, maps (2D and 3D) in your movies.
9:30 amHTTP://M.ATTHEW.NET
9:30 amWhat's in iMovie '09?
9:29 amSEX ME
9:28 amiMovie '09
9:28 amThat's iPhoto '09.
9:28 amPlaces can show a map with all photos taken in the specific area.
9:27 amSteve did not die.
9:27 amRetraction on Steve Jobs comment...we don't know how that got in our feed.
9:26 amShowing a "pumpkin patch" event with no geotag. Starts typing name, and iPhoto assists using its database of locations.
9:25 amHovering over a pin at Aspen. Click an arrow and go straight to all Aspen photos, even across multiple events.

It just went downhill from there. The feed was closed, then macrumors.com went down but the feed reopened and iff you go to the feed right now then you'll find it overrun. That sucks.

For anyone whose news was just disrupted, Ars Technica is running their own live feed.

... oh yeah, and Apple iPhoto now has facial recognition. Also, for the record, Steve Jobs is still alive to the best of my knowledge.

Well, there you go. In January, Bush is out and Obama is in. The executive branch is about to undergo as radical an ideological shift as it's capable of sustaining - if the hype is to be believed. Ok, I'll play that game. Obama is going to get everyone health care, give everyone money for college, restore our reputation in the world and tone down the violence in our foreign policy. Here's hoping.

McCain's concession speech was eloquent and humble - almost enough to allow me to briefly forget that he ran the most divisive campaign I've ever witnessed. Then I remembered that he and Palin did everything in their power to convince half the country that Obama is a closet-muslim terrorist-loving marxist revolutionary. A lot of people ate it up, and that sucks. It's going to make it difficult for Obama to be the Liberal Messiah we all want him to be.

I'm cautiously optimistic. But that's not why I'm writing this article - I'm writing this because I would like to exhort you, personally, to maintain a degree of consistency in your approach to politics. Since we're about to enter into Topsy-Turvy world, it's important to learn something from our opposites. And so:

You don't like it when Bush issues signing statements, you don't like it when he escalates foreign military encounters, you don't like it when he expands the power of the executive branch, you don't like it when he circumvents FISA, you don't like it when he lacks tact and dignity in foreign relations - you have a million legitimate gripes about the current administration, and you know that you're right.

But there are a lot of people out there who accuse you of simply being partisan - they say that you just hate Bush, that you lack principle and conviction. They say that you are simply filled with blind ideological rage, and that your activism would cease the instant someone you liked committed the same acts.

So here's my request: prove them wrong. Obama seems like a good man - but he's going to do things as President that you won't like. Call him on it. He's going to issue signing statements - call him on it. He's going to pursue controversial military policy - call him on it. He's going to cave in to special interests on important topics - call him on it. Every time he compromises some part of his vision - every time "Yes We Can" becomes "Yes I Can" - just tell him: "No, You Can't."

You remember all of those high-minded quotes about how dissent is a civic duty? That doesn't stop now. That only gets harder, because your dissent is going to have to be a bit more nuanced. It's still up to us, and only us, to ensure that our government serves our interests.

Yeah, he has some good ideas. He is also against gay marriage and he's going to escalate our presence in Afghanistan. His health care plan is a good start, but it still leaves a lot of people helpless. In a million ways he's going to fall short of where we want him to be - our job is to leave him no choice but to go that extra mile. The fight is only just getting started.

I hate to be a downer in your moment of triumph, but you need to adjust your thinking now. Obama is the President - he doesn't need your rabid support anymore, he can't go any higher. Now you need to remember that you support the ideals behind the man and you need to work very hard to maintain that distinction and you need to start today. You owe it to yourself, you owe it to your country and you owe it to your new President.

...Andy Min, after Jackie conceded in the middle of week 7. These two viners each wrote an article a day, five days a week. Just when we were all getting settled in for the long haul, Jackie graciously announced that the participation and the portfolio were reward enough for her - and that Andy could take the grand prize.

I want to thank everyone for their participation, and I hope you all had fun. Special thanks to the judges - Jack, Eric, Chasing and Scott, we couldn't have done it without you - and special thanks to our various Friday contributors.

If you'd like to read the various entries from this contest, you'll find them collected under the LVS2 tag. If you want to make sure you catch the next one, you should add the LVS3 tag to your watchlist today!

So, now that that's over I want to put together some additional contests going into the holidays. As anyone who tracks such things knows, this is the single best time of the year for Ad Revenue - so let's celebrate by being productive, writing a lot and figuring out how to maximize our pageviews. I've got a few ideas for contests revolving around "pop writing", which is a valuable skill to have if you want to make more than 5 bucks a month in earnings.

Who's interested? If you are, ad the nvpop tag to your watchlist and when I start the next contest you'll be right there with me.

Thanks everyone, and finally a big thanks to Calvin for making the LVS2 possible. Until next time!

And both Andy and JLP Coos have made it through the 6 weeks required to earn the iPhone. Now, whoever is the Last Viner Standing will win the grand prize! Congrats to you both!

Week 7 links in this thread please, folks!

This is it, Andy and JLP Coos - if you can make it through this week, one of you gets an iphone. You've both done a tremendous job so far, and I wish you both the best of luck!

And then there were two.

Good luck, kids - gotta make it through 10 more articles to be eligible for the iPhone. Please, in the name of all that is holy: neither of you quit early!

Post links below!

Anyone familiar with my political views knows I lean a bit to the left. Ok, really far to the left. I'm frequently accused of strong anti-american values because I have these crazy ideas like "The government should pay for health care and education for every citizen that needs it" and "Hugo Chavez taught one million of his people to read by investing government funds in a concentrated education campaign, and I like that."

These ridiculous ideas - that the government can and should spend tax dollars to increase the quality of life for all of its citizens - are enough to get me railroaded out of many "serious" political discussions. I'm called a communist, a socialist, some kind of monster - not, I think, because the ideas are intrinsically bad but because here in America we've all been brainwashed to think that Socialized Health Care is two steps shy of a Stalinesque genocide. Everyone says "Let the market sort it out!" and goes back to praying to their Ronald Reagan idols.

But suddenly, now that the "free market" has failed us so catastrophically, the most fervent anti-socialists are singing a very interesting song.

(Incidentally, and this is what one might call a "parenthetical aside" - as denoted by the parentheses - we haven't been living in a "free market" since at least the depression. The highways you drive on are the result of socialist programs, and the tax incentives and loopholes that riddle our tax code are examples of government meddling. To say nothing of our lobbyist culture, which allows Corporate America to function as a sort of fifth estate and play a direct role in our legal process. Somehow, though, the Cult of Reagan overlooks this - it's the "good" kind of socialism, so it gets a pass?)

"Get behind the bailout," we're being told. "Agree to spend 700 billion US dollars to prevent the economy from collapsing. The widows and orphans banks and corporations that sustain us are in dire need of publicly funded health care and education financial backing with no oversight. Help them, you heartless bastards!"

Now, you may be surprised to hear this but I'm not intrinsically opposed to the bailout. I think that it's necessary, due to the unsustainable business practices that led to it and the utter lack of accountability that defines financial sector culture. (Note: 3 months ago, to point out either of those problems was grounds to be railroaded out of the conversation as a dirty socialist. See above.)

No, I understand that without the injection of money our economy may very well collapse. I'm a good progressive, but I have no desire to live through another Great Depression (a point in US History that we only survived due to the socialist policies of FDR. Oh, and WWII). I say give them the bailout - but do it in a way that 1) enforces accountability, 2) gives us tax dollars some sort of return on our investment (yeah, some of us dirty hippies know those concepts) and 3) opens the discourse to the idea that government money can and should be used to fill in the gaps of the "free market" economy. I kinda like this guy's plan, but if you say his name you get railroaded out of the discussion because he's another one of those crazy radicals. *eyeroll*

So, desperate corporate thugocracy that controls our government - we'll bail you out. But next time we want socialized health care and you shoot it down, at least be honest and tell us that you're doing that because you're greedy, not because "the government shouldn't be giving out handouts." And then let us discuss the merits of that.

Because as much as I don't want to live in the dark ages, I feel that the health care crisis is in many ways worse. For once, George Bush and I agree - there are situations in our political landscape that require a dose of socialist policy to address.

So let's just make sure we remember that lesson when our economy is healed and our working classes still can't afford to go to the doctor - or to become doctors, for that matter.

Ok?

Usually I only write one of these after a huge flame war, or when I'm trying to gauge the pulse of the community for some wacky new endeavor. Right now, though, I feel like there's enough going on to warrant a Special Edition.

Welcome to Tyler

The first thing I want to mention is that we have a new sheriff in town. Everyone say hello to Tyler, who will be replacing Emily and doing the thankless work of banning spammers and pretending to care about the bruised feelings of grown adults who act like children in online fora. It's a dirty job but someone's got to do it - and really, I think Calvin deserves the help.

I like Tyler already - he's got personality, intelligence and a willingness to engage with us on our own terms. As it stands, I'm waiting for that "Good golly, I sure do like my new job and my new co-workers and this community and everybody and everything!" sheen to wear off so that we can get a sense of the man underneath it all - but hey, I can wait. Shouldn't take more than another week. In the meantime, it looks like everyone is willing to work with him and he's gotten off on the right foot. So that's good.

There are a few pointers I would offer him, though:

• Many members in this community can smell bull@!$%# a mile away. If you thing someone or something is full of crap, don't sugar-coat it. Be honest with us, treat the community with the respect it deserves, and I promise you you'll earn our loyalty right away. Tell me to go to hell if I'm being a dick and I'll respect you for it, and I think that probably goes for most people here. Leave the diplomacy for Calvin and Mike, it's their job.
• Engage with us sincerely. Write articles about the things you're interested in, take off your moderator hat and join in the discussions from time to time and be a community member. Don't be our "friend" the way high school teachers try to be "friends" with their students or step-parents try to be "friends" with their step-kids - just be yourself, and in those cases where you have to choose between being Tyler and being The Moderator just make it clear that you have to put your work hat on - we'll understand.
• If you build it, they will come. That's the one lesson I've learned around here. If you have the time and the inclination, put together some community events. Organize writing contests, issue reporting requests and do your best to challenge us. Then, reward those who rise to the challenge - not necessarily with some sort of physical prize, but with recognition and publicity. You're in a good position to do that, and I know you're going to be pretty busy but every once in a while throw something like that out there - it's a lot of fun for everyone involved.

That should do it. Also, next time someone puts together a Vinemeet you should hop on a plane with Calvin and come join us, yeah?

Anyway, since we have a new sheriff in town I want to say a few words about the old sheriff's deputies. I'm in the CoH Militia group and I understand and sympathize with their purpose. But there are some pretty obvious flaws with the implementation and since we've got a new Moderator starting up this week I figure this is a good time to discuss them.

Disband the CoH Militia

Recently there's been some drama with Newsvine's own crew of home-grown vigilantes. Scott Butki wrote an article to discuss some of the issues arising from this drama, and initially they talked about things like clarifying the mission statement and possibly changing the group's name to something less, oh, militant.

Steve Mock, though, came out and said that the group should be dissolved - and I agree. Here's why: Newsvine groups are good and useful, they provide a place for like-minded users to produce content under a specific brand. They facilitate communication between friends, logistics for group projects and and a sense of cohesion among members.

But when the purpose of a group shifts from producing certain content to speaking for all of Newsvine then new dimensions appear. All it takes is a single instance of members exploiting the group for personal ends - censoring political opponents, ganging up on unpopular viewpoints, failing to enforce their standards with consistency - for the entire group to lose its legitimacy. And that's happened, and it will happen again.

In the end, if we didn't like it when other groups in Newsvine's history used block-voting to collapse the comments of political opponents then how can we justify arming a militia to essentially do the same thing - even if their mission statement is more clearly defined and a little bit more public?

I don't deny that the group has done some good, but I think in the long-run it can only cause harm. This opinion, it seems, is shared even by the group's founder. Dave McGirr, here, says:

If I'm honest, the group was born of anger, and I don't know if we can continue to use it if we try to reel it in with rules and protocals. One of the main reasons for starting the group was to try and cut out a lot of the red tape admins face by reading the threads, reporting the worst of the worst en-masse, and thus getting things done quicker.

I'm starting to think that all I've really done is added an extra layer of red tape.

My only problem with closing down the group is that all of our detractors will jump up and down shouting justice, writing about a dozen meta articles rubbishing us all, and saying they were right all along. Borderline CoH violations in their own right.

So, I think everyone is more or less in agreement that the group should go - it was a good idea and a noble effort, but it fails when put into the context of "Oh yeah, everyone is human." I'd like to extend a formal request to everyone out there who "told us so" - you were right, so enjoy that but don't rub it in, k? By and large the members of this group set out to make Newsvine a better place for everyone, and if the experiment failed the sentiment was still pure, so please respect that even if you were opposed to the endeavor.

But if there's no CoH militia, what do we do?

New Sheriff, New Rules

My proposal is simple. We maintain the neighborhood watch idea, but instead of implementing by means of a group (which is by definition exclusive) implement it as a community-wide effort (by definition inclusive). Anyone who wants to help can, and they can help as much or as little as they want. They don't need to join a group, they don't need to associate and collaborate with people they don't like, they don't even need to make their participation public.

How does this work? Two steps.

1) Tyler writes a comprehensive set of guidelines. "X is wrong. Y is wrong. Z is ok, unless A, in which case it's wrong." These can be fairly informal, since the judgments will always be subjective - the important thing is that they're clear. Think of this as an expanded and well-commented Code of Honor, to clear up issues currently suffering from ambiguity. I suggest Tyler get help from the community as he drafts this.

2) Anyone who wants to help can do so by reporting content that violates the stated standards. Yes, this means using the [!] button with reckless abandon.

If the staff wants to facilitate this, they'll expand the options available - right now we've got "No Value," "Inflammatory" and "Advertising." I suggest replacing that with "Intentionally Inflammatory", "Demonstrably False", "Spam", "Worthless" and "Stupid but fundamentally harmless." You can tweak those.

Then, when a user clicks the ! next to a comment, each of those options has a little number next to it indicating how many people have reported it in each category. This makes the "censorship" mechanism more transparent, allows new users who maybe aren't used to newsvine's standards to understand why their comment was collapsed and ultimately provides visual, tangible feedback that the system works. Right now it's binary - either something gets enough negative attention that it gets collapsed, or it doesn't. I feel that it would be helpful for that binary system to become a bit more analog - let us see each increment.

Conclusion

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Tyler, welcome. McGirr, a valiant effort with your group but thanks for being honest enough to acknowledge problems when you see them - not many in your shoes would. Everyone, try to see the good in each others' intentions and forgive the bad.

Cool?

I look forward to your thoughts, below.

And we're down to four viners.

Good luck, everyone!

So, I'm out of the contest ladies and gents and that means today I am going to be the special guest judge.

What? No, it's not because nobody else got back to me about the role...honest...

Anyway, this week you get to get a little meta. The challenge is this:

If you were to organize and implement a newsvine writing contest (like, for instance, LVS or Newsvine Survivor), what would you do? You are to outline the rules and regulations, the mechanisms by which you'd enforce the rules, etc etc etc.

Please try to be original - don't just riff of of LVS. Remember that you can get people to do anything if you provide the right structure for it. How would you promote it? How would you select participants? Would there be prizes?

Extra points go to creativity, and if it's something totally unique then...well, there may even be a special surprise.

I look forward to your entries, and I'm sorry I didn't get this up until 8am. As a result, all entries for this topic are due at 8am Saturday Morning, EST - that's only a 5 hour increase on the deadline and I hope you won't need it, but it's there.

Thanks and I look forward to your submissions!