ECOPOL

Mais uma teoria da conspiração? Que confusão...
BBC Reported Building 7 Had Collapsed 20 Minutes Before It Fell: Revealing, shocking video shows reporter talking about collapse with WTC 7 still standing in background, Google removes clip
BBC Announced 9/11 Building 7 Collapse Before It Happened: Video of a BBC News broadcast from the World Trade Center area on 9/11 has surfaced revealing that the BBC reported the collapse of Building 7 approximately 23 minutes before it actually went down. The reporter is seen in the video apparently reading a teleprompter reporting the collapse while the building is still standing in the background behind her.
The BBC has claimed that it lost all of the video of its reportage on 9/11, but a copy of the report has been played on a British television program and is now posted on the internet.
Part of the conspiracy? The 9/11 conspiracy theories are pretty well known by now. The BBC addressed them earlier this month with a documentary, The Conspiracy Files, shown within the UK.
Until now, I don't think we've been accused of being part of the conspiracy. But now some websites are using news footage from BBC World on September 11th 2001 to suggest we were actively participating in some sort of attempt to manipulate the audience. As a result, we're now getting lots of emails asking us to clarify our position. So here goes [...]
BBC Responds to Building 7 Controversy; Claim 9/11 Tapes Lost: Pathetic five paragraph blog rebuttal does not answer questions as to source of report that Salomon Building was coming down, BBC claims tapes lost due to "cock-up" not conspiracy

CONTAMINANTES

Al Gore nabbed in $30,000 electricity shocker: That's an awful lot of energy-saving lightbulbs, Al
Al Gore is under fire for apparently failing to practise what he preaches, spending $30,000 on gas and electricity at his Nashville estate last year – 20 times the national average.

CONTAMINANTES

The innovation gap with the US keeps narrowing: For the fourth consecutive year, the innovation gap between the US and the EU has decreased. The Nordic countries and Switzerland continue to be the innovation leaders worldwide, while many of the new Member States are steadily catching up with the EU average. These are some of the main findings of the European Innovation Scoreboard 2006, published today. The report presents a comparative analysis of the innovation performance of European countries, the US and Japan. [...]
Based on their overall innovation score and their recent historical trend, the authors grouped the countries in four categories (...):
* Innovation leaders: Sweden, Switzerland, Finland, Denmark, Germany and Japan
* Innovation followers: UK, Iceland, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Ireland, US
* Catching-up countries: Slovenia, Czech Republic, Lithuania, Portugal, Poland, Latvia, Greece, Bulgaria, Cyprus and Romania
* Trailing countries: Estonia, Spain, Italy, Malta, Hungary, Croatia and Slovakia
Luxembourg, Norway and Turkey would not fit in any of these categories.

ECOPOL

Longe de mim defender quem ganha mais de 200 mil euros por ano :) mas não deixa de ser esquisita esta notícia ontem de que "Vítor Constâncio ganhou 280 mil euros em 2005", salientando-se que "Em comparação com 2004, a situação económica do governador não se alterou significativamente: ganhou nessa altura 272 628,08 euros".
Quanto aos outros administradores, e a fazer fé igualmente num texto replicado de O Independente de Junho de 2005, em que "Os cálculos foram feitos pelo Independente através das declarações de rendimentos dos membros do conselho de administração do BdP depositadas no Tribunal Constitucional" e "Algumas das declarações, porém, referem-se ao ano de 2003 e outras ao de 2004", eles ganham (e ganhavam então) o seguinte:
- José Martins de Matos: 244 536 euros (237 198 euros)
- Manuel Sousa Sebastião: 226 081 euros (227 233 euros)
- José Silveira Godinho: 224 634 euros, dos quais 109 379 euros de pensão (mais de 273 mil euros e pensão de 139 550 euros)
- Vítor Manuel Pessoa: 225 240 euros, dos quais 30 101 euros de pensão (276 983 euros e reforma adicional de 39 101 euros)
- Pedro Duarte Neves: 254 586 euros (não era administrador do BdP)

Em resumo, com a excepção de José Martins de Matos e de Vítor Constâncio, os outros três viram diminuídos os vencimentos (declarados e sem qualquer cálculo às mordomias inerentes aos cargos). Não seria esta a notícia?

VITAMEDIAS

À atenção das forças de segurança, tribunais e media portugueses: Top German Court Boosts Press Freedom: Germany's highest court has ruled that security services breached the constitution by searching the offices of a magazine which had published extracts from a confidential police report. Journalists have hailed the ruling as strengthening the freedom of the press. [...]
In what media are hailing as a significant reaffirmation of press freedom in Germany, the court ruled that the search had breached the constitution which enshrines the right of journalists to protect their sources.

Já agora, deste "Censorship: Still a burning issue", algumas pérolas sobre censura:
JOHN MILTON, 'AREOPAGITICA', 1644 - 'Nature knows no indecencies; man invents them.'

MARK TWAIN, 'NOTEBOOK', 1896 - 'If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all.'

NOAM CHOMSKY - 'The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth; if wrong, they lose what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.'

JOHN STUART MILL, 'ON LIBERTY', 1859 - 'The dirtiest book of all is the expurgated book.'

WALT WHITMAN - 'The fact is that we are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past. In the present ... we get nervous about her, and admit censorship.'

EM FORSTER, 'THE TERCENTENARY OF THE "AREOPAGITICA"', 1944 - 'Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, for ever.'

NADINE GORDIMER, 'CENSORSHIP AND ITS AFTERMATH", 1990 - 'Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings.'

HEINRICH HEINE, 'ALMANSOR', 1821 - 'A censor pronouncing a ban, whether on an obscene spectacle or a derisive imitation, is like a man trying to stop his penis from standing up... The spectacle is ridiculous, so ridiculous that he is soon a victim not only of his unruly member but of pointing fingers, laughing voices. That is why the institution of censorship has to surround itself with secondary bans on the infringement of its dignity.'

JM COETZEE, 'GIVING OFFENCE: ESSAYS ON CENSORSHIP', 1994 - 'Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only weapon against bad ideas is better ideas.'

ALFRED WHITNEY GRISWOLD, 'THE NEW YORK TIMES', 1959 - 'All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently, the first condition of progress is the removal of censorships'

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, ANNAJANSKA, 1919 - 'We have a natural right to make use of our pens as of our tongue, at our peril, risk and hazard.'

VOLTAIRE, 'DICTIONNAIRE PHILOSOPHIQUE', 1764 - 'Woe to that nation whose literature is cut short by force. This is not merely interference with freedom of the press but the sealing up of a nation's heart, the excision of its memory.'

ALEXANDER SOLZHENITSYN, NOBEL PRIZE ACCEPTANCE SPEECH, 1972 - 'You can never know what your words may turn out to mean for yourself or someone else; or what the world they make will be like. Anything could happen. The problem with silence is that we know exactly what it will be like.'

HANIF KUREISHI, 'LOOSE TONGUES', 2003 - 'If some books are deemed most baneful and their sale forbid, how then with deadlier facts, not dreams of doting men? Those whom books will hurt will not be proof against events. Events, not books should be banned.'

HERMAN MELVILLE, 'THE ENCANTADAS', 1856 - 'If a man is a fool the best thing to do is to encourage him to advertise the fact by speaking.'

WOODROW WILSON, ADDRESS TO THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE, 1919 - 'Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself.'

SALMAN RUSHDIE, 'THE GUARDIAN', 1990 - 'The liberty of the press is a blessing when we are inclined to write against others, and a calamity when we find ourselves overborne by the multitude of our assailants.'

SAMUEL JOHNSON, 'THE LIVES OF THE POETS', 1781 - 'Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.'

THOMAS JEFFERSON, LETTER TO JAMES CURRIE, 1786 - 'The press is not only free, it is powerful. That power is ours. It is the proudest that man can enjoy.'

BENJAMIN DISRAELI - 'He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself.'

THOMAS PAINE, 'COMMON SENSE' 1776 - 'I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.'

ECOPOL

À atenção do Ministério da Economia e da Inovação: How to Keep America Competitive
Reforming the green card program to make it easier to retain highly skilled professionals is also necessary. These employees are vital to U.S. competitiveness, and we should welcome their contribution to U.S. economic growth.
We should also encourage foreign students to stay here after they graduate. Half of this country's doctoral candidates in computer science come from abroad. It's not in our national interest to educate them here but send them home when they've completed their studies.
During the past 30 years, U.S. innovation has been the catalyst for the digital information revolution. If the United States is to remain a global economic leader, we must foster an environment that enables a new generation to dream up innovations, regardless of where they were born. Talent in this country is not the problem -- the issue is political will.

O autor é "chairman of Microsoft Corp. and co-chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. His wife is a director of The Washington Post Co."

VITAMEDIAS

Could you make it without media for 4 days? Just ask a dozen communications students at Seattle University who recently attempted a 96-hour "media deprivation" experiment:
No listening to iPods or car radios. No checking e-mail. No chatting on cellphones. No surfing Web sites such as MySpace.com or Facebook.com. No watching "Desperate Housewives" or "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart."
The experiment originally was supposed to last a week, but it was scaled back when the students protested. But even four days was too much — each of the students cheated, some more than others.

TECNOSFERA

3 types of blog: closed, conduit and participant in the conversation

Closed Blogs are, as the image here shows, at the centre of an audience that resembles a closed network.

Blogs as Conduit of Information are blogs that act as the conduit between individual audience members and information or ideas.

Blog as Participant in "The Conversation" are connectors of ideas and people, but also of conversations that flow between them.

TECNOSFERA

The 12 Main Sources of Blog Traffic: in looking over my stats and referring links here are the top ten types of links that are currently driving traffic to my blog (in order from most traffic to least):
1. Blog Post Link
2. Search Engine Link
3. Social News Link
4. Tags or Social Bookmarking Link
5. Republishing Link
6. RSS Link
7. Email Forward Link
8. Comment Link
9. Forum Link
10. Quote/Endorsement Link
11. Directory Link
12. Blogroll Link

TECNOFERA

SnoopStick is a USB flash drive type device that allows you to monitor what your kids, employees, or anyone using your computer is doing while on the Internet. And, you can monitor them live, in real time, from anywhere in the world.
Simply plug the SnoopStick into the computer you want to monitor. Then run the setup program to install the SnoopStick monitoring components on the computer. The whole process takes less than 60 seconds.

CULTURAS IN VITRO

"Famous sounds" are sounds that have been created or used by somebody, liked and then copied by many others, and thus earned a "classic" status.

CULTURAS IN VITRO

Printable Cold Sores allow us to take action! Bring these people back down to our level, and tell advertisers that you don't agree with their message. How can you help? It's easy...

.DE!

Fake Your Space: a new and exciting service which offers help to all the men and women out there who don't feel like they are popular enough on social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, and Friendster. If you are tired of seeing everyone else with the hottest friends and want some hotties of your own, then this is the place for you.

VITAMEDIAS

(imagem daqui)

Silicon Valley has become Media Valley - someone should tell NYC: Some of Silicon Valley's largest companies are media companies: Google, Yahoo, EBay, for example are media companies--they publish pages of content and advertising around it.
Some of the most interesting and most valuable new Silicon Valley companies, such as Youtube, Facebook are based here in Northern California. So is Craigslist, the seventh largest online media company in the English language world (in terms of traffic).
Take a look at Business 2.0's 25 startups to watch and look at how many of these mostly "social" media and advertising companies and are based in the Bay Area:18. Only two are based in New York. [...]
Let me help out the New York media industry...
Five basic rules for media company success:
-Tomorrow's media industry is all about being technology-enabled and community-powered.
-Get your content as near-to-free as you can with machine harvesters such as spiders and searchbots.
-Use algorithms and community-power (also nearly free) to organize the content.
-Publish it widely and in many forms (video, podcasts, etc) through the amazing scale that the global internet provides and that our media technologies (RSS, media platforms, TCP/IP, etc) provide.
-And remember Foremski's First Law of New Media: Content is infinitely scalable.

Web 2.0: Does ‘old media’ get it? The notion that high powered "old media" titans, be they in New York City or elsewhere, are somehow blind or indifferent to the rapid transformation of media production, consumption and usage, has been put forth, at length, by John Battelle. Battelle worries, however, that "old media" is beyond help! [...]
Machine and user powered "almost free" content aggregation and distribution are beautiful Web 2.0 things.
The fundamental fact that content must be produced, and should be paid for, before it can be aggregated and distributed is given short drift, however. User preference for old media expensive to professionally produce content over fellow user generated "friends and family" fare is also neglected, perhaps deemed to be Web 2.0 politically incorrect.

The real-time encyclopedia: Wikipedia had the Anna Nicole Smith story as it broke, plus a full bio -- all despite the wiseguys. [...]
But while old media struggled to get its ducks in a row, online an unlikely news team snapped into action. Toiling in a million secluded cubbyholes, the anonymous, all-volunteer army of Wikipedia brought the fastest, most complete Anna Nicole coverage to the Internet.

Time Warner Tops ZenithOptimedia Ranking of Global Media Owners: Time Warner is number one on ZenithOptimedia’s new ranking of the top 30 global media owners, followed by News Corporation in the number two spot.
The top 30 companies collectively generated $215 billion in media revenues. The rankings are based on revenues from activities that support advertising. The revenues are from 2005, or the nearest equivalent for companies whose financial years are different from calendar years.
Time Warner generated $29.8 billion, 13 percent of the total. News Corp, the second largest, generated just over half that—$16.7 billion. In the number three spot was NBC Universal’s parent company GE, with $14.7 billion in media revenues, followed by CBS Corporation with $13.4 billion and The Walt Disney Company with $13.2 billion. The five top media owners are all based in the U.S. Each has at least a 50-percent stake in a U.S. television network.
In all, 16 of the top 30 media owners are from the U.S. The other countries with media owners in the top 30 are Japan, France, the U.K., Germany, Italy and Mexico.

2007: The Online Video Era? How publishers’ work-in-progress philosophy is reaping rewards.
If collective consciousness has any power over the magazine publishing industry, nowhere is it more evident than in the pursuit of video content. During 2006, chatter about online video reached an all-time high at tradeshows as more publishers hopped onto the video bandwagon. As a result, last year became a build-up, working-out-the-kinks period for many. It was all in preparation for 2007—the year that some have dubbed as the official start of an online video era for magazine professionals.
Sure, a few publishers were ahead of the game, and, certainly, others are straggling behind. When all is said and done, 2007 will see a fusion of two seemingly incompatible entities—print and video.
But, why now? Are readers settling for nothing less, and are advertisers finally embracing the video phenomenon?

TECNOSFERA

Reflections on the first decade of blogging: Within a decade blogging has became mainstream, by virtue of the fact that bloggers are highly influential in forming public opinions, although not necessarily canonical truths. Every entity, from newspapers and political campaigns to corporate executives and PR pros, has adopted blogging as a communications medium, many from a defensive posture. So-called citizen journalists and notions of participatory journalism are reshaping, in fits and starts, how news is gathered and disseminated.

Along with the millions of voices churning out blog posts and the long tail of conversations spawned by them comes the noise, and the noise to signal ratio is way out of whack. But, the unacceptable, illogical alternative is going back to old world, with the concentration of power and expression in the hands of a few rather than spread out to reach the edges of the network. [...]

The genie is out of the bottle. It's not a battle to the death of mainstream media versus the blogosphere. Over time, better filters and search mechanisms; measures of authority and trust; and natural selection will improve the noise to signal ratio, potentially for every individual's preferences, and change perceptions about what constitutes mainstream media.

Tráfego nos blogues dos EUA cresceu 210% contra 9% dos 'sites' de jornais
"Blogosfera e jornalismo devem complementar-se"

CULTURAS IN VITRO

The movie magic is gone - Hollywood, which once captured the nerve center of American life, doesn't matter much anymore.
It is hardly news that for years now the American motion picture industry has been in a slow downward spiral. Though by some accounts attendance was slightly up in 2006 over the previous year, the box-office tracking firm Exhibitors Relations reported that attendance actually declined yet again, reaching its lowest point in 10 years. And though defenders of the industry protest that foreign markets account for 40% of a film's revenue and that those proceeds are compensating for falling domestic box office, foreign receipts have been down too, and even DVD sales are plateauing. In short, the overall trends remain discouraging.

Even more worrisome than what could be just a cyclical dip is how people are regarding motion pictures and the moviegoing experience. A recent Zogby survey found that 45% of American moviegoers had decreased their attendance over the last five years, with the highest percentage of that decrease in the coveted 18- to 24-year-old bracket; at the same time, 21% of respondents said they never went to the movies. The two most-cited reasons for seeing fewer movies were rising ticket prices and the quality of the films (a perpetual culprit).

Another survey, this one conducted by PA Consulting for the Motion Picture Assn. of America, reached an even more chilling conclusion. Eighty-three percent of its respondents said they were satisfied with the content of the films they saw, but 60% nevertheless expected to spend less of their income on moviegoing in the future, citing dissatisfaction with the moviegoing experience and the emergence of better alternatives for their time and money.

VITAMEDIAS

DN não publica direito de resposta do CSM sobre O juiz macho e o apalpão latino e explica porquê.

VITAMEDIAS

O "futurista" do Público está a fazer um bom trabalho, a "pensar os jornais".

CULTURAS IN VITRO

Primeiro filme português 'online' estreia em Março (Porém, já em 2004 o realizador David Rebordão tinha estreado na Internet a curta-metragem A Curva)
O site
O blogue

ECOPOL

4º no mundo, entre 200 países: Total police personnel per 100.000 pop.
1. Mauritius 756
2. Italy 560
3. Barbados 516
4. Portugal 491
5. Hong Kong 487

Duas questões:
De quando são os dados? É que trata-se do mesmo valor do ano 2000...
E não se contabilizam os 34.403 seguranças privados, certo?

VITAMEDIAS

A ler e a discutir - será assim o futuro dos media?
How the Coming Newspaper Industry Collapse Will Reinvigorate Journalism
The near-total collapse of the American newspaper industry as we know it is inevitable. Anything newspapers could have done to stop it should have been done years ago. (Slate recently wrote that newspapers saw this coming in the mid-'70s.) All the social, demographic and economic trends are lined up against the industry. Over the next decade, there will be agonizing rounds of layoffs, consolidation and bankruptcies. It will be painful to watch, but it will be a necessary process for the industry to reinvent itself.
In this essay, I’ll outline the reasons I believe this and propose a new and very different model of publishing and journalism that will take hold as this cycle plays out. This will be a very exciting evolution, but it will be very painful, too.

VITAMEDIAS

The 51 Best* Magazines Ever:
1. Esquire - Under Harold T.P. Hayes (1961–1973)
2. The New Yorker
3. Life (1936–1972)
4. Playboy
5. The New York Times Magazine
6. Mad
7. Spy - Until it was sold to fun-sponge Jean Pigozzi (1986–1991)
8. Wired - Early years until Condé Nast buyout (1993–1998)
9. Andy Warhol’s Interview - Until Warhol’s death (1969–1988)
10. Colors - The first 13 issues, under Tibor Kalman (1991–1996)
11. Rolling Stone - Before the move to New York (1967–1976)
12. National Geographic
13. Collier’s Weekly
14. New York (1968–1976)
15. Atlantic Monthly
16. Ebony
17. Details - Original incarnation, pre-Condé Nast (1982–1988)
18. Ramparts
19. Might
20. Portfolio
21. National Lampoon - From its founding through its best-selling issue (1970–1974)
22. Wallpaper (1996–2002)
23. Cosmopolitan - Under editor Helen Gurley Brown (1965–1997)
24. Highlights
25. Sassy
26. The Saturday Evening Post
27. The Face (1980s)
28. Sports Illustrated
29. Eros
30. Fuck You/ A Magazine of the Arts
31. Vanity Fair
32. The Whole Earth Catalog - Original incarnation (1968–1972)
33. Fortune - Until the death of founding editor Henry Luce (1930–1967)
34. People
35. Ms.
36. Games - Before it was sold (1977–1990)
37. The Paris Review - Until George Plimpton’s death (1953–2003)
38. Popular Mechanics - In the golden industrial years (1930s–1950s)
39. The Little Review
40. Ray Gun - During the peak of the grunge era (1992–1996)
41. Brill’s Content
42. Domus
43. Wet
44. Lucky
45. Vogue
46. The New England Journal of Medicine
47. Architectural Record
48. Punch
49. Loaded
50. The Source - Until the start of the burnout (1988–1994)
51. Tiger Beat

TECNOSFERA

Top 10 Admin Passwords to Avoid:
* 1. (username)
* 2. (username)123
* 3. 123456
* 4. password
* 5. 1234
* 6. 12345
* 7. passwd
* 8. 123
* 9. test
* 10. 1

.DE!

O que sou? Um Double Gloucester...
(já agora, ainda no plano da comida, KetchupArt)

TECNOSFERA

Shutdown Day: The idea behind the experiment is to find out how many people can go without a computer for one whole day, and what will happen if we all participate!
Shutdown your computer on this day and find out! Can you survive for 24 hours without your computer?

TECNOSFERA

Estes gráficos, retirados do texto "Working in France, in Style of Silicon Valley", mostram bem o que é a indústria de capital de risco europeia: o grande investimento é feito em 2000, quando quase tudo já está a estoirar. Podem ser empresas, podem ter capital mas risco é algo que desconhecem... e depois lixam-se, claro.

TECNOSFERA

(autoria da imagem)

Como funcionava a Enigma? A resposta.

VITAMEDIAS

Para os que se interessam pelos media, a ler estas entrevistas sobre news war.

VITAMEDIAS

Eu concordo: Nobody Wants the PDF Paper. Prefiro este formato.

TECNOSFERA

Para quem ficou preocupado com este fabuloso texto (gostei principalmente da actualidade: "os investigadores americanos do Centro para a Recuperação de Dependência da Internet publicaram esta semana no site oficial um teste" - basta ler aqui para perceber que esta foi a semana em que os autores do texto o descobriram...), recomendo este tratamento:

A 12-year-old boy is treated with a series of low-voltage shocks in a therapy that doctors at an Internet addiction clinic in China say helps patients sleep better. (By Greg Baker -- Associated Press)

In China, Stern Treatment For Young Internet 'Addicts':
Tao and his team of 15 doctors and nurses defended the treatment methods. He said that while some clinics depend wholly on medications -- in one experiment conducted in Ningbo, a city south of Shanghai, suspected Internet addicts were given the same pills as drug addicts -- only one out of five patients at the Daxing clinic receive prescription drugs. Tao did agree with Guo that Internet addiction is usually an expression of deeper psychological problems.
"We use these medicines to give them happiness," Tao said, "so they no longer need to go on the Internet to be happy."
Still, for all the high-tech treatments available to Sun at the clinic, the one that he says helped him most was talking. He looks forward to returning to school and getting on with his life.
The first task on his agenda when he gets home: get online. He needs to tell his worried Internet friends where he was these past few weeks.

CONTAMINANTES

The answer to stagnating R&D can be found in the creativity of the movie industry.
The number of new drugs that the US Food & Drug Administration has approved has fallen by half since 1996, with only 20 approved in 2005. That was the second lowest number of approvals in the history of the agency. Failures in the last stage of clinical development, Phase III, are particularly excruciating. Phase III trials consume 70% of clinical development costs, yet 40% of compounds now fall at this final hurdle compared to only 20% failing 10 years ago. Half of the failures come from inability to demonstrate superiority to a placebo, 30% are due to safety concerns, and 20% occur because no advantage relative to available therapies can be shown. These failures have a high profile and tend to perturb perceptions about the companies concerned, especially among investors. [...]
There is a precedent for pharma emulating Hollywood: Pharma's main preoccupation, the creation of blockbusters, was directly copied from Hollywood. The blockbuster model is really defined by broad and aggressive marketing, though the term is less accurately, if more commonly, used to define revenue thresholds. Hollywood's blockbuster model was created in 1951, when the term was first applied to the movie Quo Vadis because of its then-huge budget of $7 million and the unprecedented zeal of its promotion.
Glaxo created the first pharma blockbuster in the 1980's with the ulcer medication, Zantac. The drug was a modestly effective but very safe compound that ultimately attained sales of more than $2 billion a year as a result of extremely aggressive marketing.

TECNOSFERA

Blogger Gets 4 Years for Insulting Islam: An Egyptian blogger was convicted Thursday and sentenced to four years in prison for insulting Islam, the Prophet Muhammad and Egypt's president, sending a chill through fellow Internet writers who fear a government crackdown. [...]
"I am shocked," said Wael Abbas, a blogger who writes frequently about police abuses and other human rights violations in Egypt. "This is a terrible message to anyone who intends to express his opinion and to bloggers in particular."

TECNOSFERA

Conservapedia: A conservative encyclopedia you can trust.
Conservapedia is a much-needed alternative to Wikipedia, which is increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American. On Wikipedia, many of the dates are provided in the anti-Christian "C.E." instead of "A.D.", which Conservapedia uses. Christianity receives no credit for the great advances and discoveries it inspired, such as those of the Renaissance. Read a list of many Examples of Bias in Wikipedia.

VITAMEDIAS

The New Yorker portfolio of covers from all forty-seven issues of 2006

TECNOSFERA

Read me first - Web 2.0 is giving all of us a voice. But is anyone really listening?

VITAMEDIAS

Como se fazem revistas a sério (negritos meus):

What is Monocle?
We believe it’s time for a new, global, European-based media brand. With a keen focus, strong reporting, sharp wit and more classic approach to design, we’ve dubbed our venture Monocle. At the core there’s a monthly magazine delivering the most original coverage in global affairs, business, culture and design. Alongside, there’s a web-based broadcast component covering the same areas through a variety of bulletins, mini-documentaries and talk formats. Focused on informing and entertaining an international audience of disillusioned readers, listeners and viewers, it is our intention to create a community of the most interested and interesting people in the world.



MONOCLE ACCORDING TO TYLER BRULE [também criador da Wallpaper*]: Some of the 244 pages of the first issue.
A magazine-book with more than 50,000 words.
And a few quotes from Tyler Brule, founder of Monocle magazine, in The Observer: [...]
“We didn’t focus group it,” says Brule, emphasising that advertisers are paying full rate from the outset. “They had to buy a first-class seat,” he says. There were no discounts and no special favours.
“The Economist or Der Spiegel shows you can do quality journalism and hold your ground. We’ll just do it in a more visual way.”
Articles are long and well-researched, with every picture and story generated internally, and all foreign travel and expenses paid for by the magazine. “There is not one story generated by a press release,” Brule says.

VITAMEDIAS

Para ajudar à conversa sobre os novos (e velhos) media na mesa do Abrupto, Adufe 4.0 (e ligações), Bloguítica, Indústrias Culturais e Mas Certamente que Sim!, duas ideias fortes (os negritos são meus):

Content already is free: First, this is a post-scarcity media economy. Most news is a commodity. And that which isn’t faces no end of competition. OK, so I can get the Wall Street Journal only because I pay. And, yes, it’s good. But there is plenty of other media coverage of business out there, covering mostly the same news. And I don’t have an expense account anymore. So I’ll find plenty that is good enough. If your content is not free, you have to compete with free, and that’s damned hard. [...]
In addition, the value in media is — and always has been — the relationship, not the sale of the physical product (the manufacture of which also brings considerable cost not included in these envelope-calculations). If you cut off that relationship, you diminish your value — just ask those Times columnists trapped behind their wall — and cede that value to your many new competitors. Indeed, if you are really smart, you’ll realize that our “consumption” of that “free” “content” — our remixing and tagging and linking and recommending and correcting and behavioral-data-making — adds value. But you have to be quick enough to capture it.
Who cares whether content wants to be free? It already is. Deal with it.

[BTW, Paulo, sobre a pobreza ou riqueza do DN Online, só um pormenor: a direcção foi demitida há dias, o novo director interino já assumiu funções e escreveu editoriais e o que se continua a ler no DN Online?
Segunda, 19 de Fevereiro de 2007
Edição Papel
Director: António José Teixeira
Directores adjuntos: João Morgado Fernandes, Eduardo Dâmaso e Helena Garrido]

CONTAMINANTES

It may hit Earth ... but don't worry, we've got a plan: A £150 MILLION space mission should be launched to deflect an asteroid which is set to pass dangerously close to Earth, experts warned yesterday.
The call for action to protect the world from Apophis - named after the Egyptian god of destruction - came from a coalition of astronauts, engineers and scientists with close links to US space agency NASA.
Scientists have estimated the asteroid has a one-in-45,000 chance of striking Earth on 13 April, 2036. Travelling at 28,000mph it could release 80,000 times the energy of the Hiroshima bomb.
The group believes the United Nations should assume responsibility for a space mission - using a vessel called a "gravity tractor" - to knock Apophis off course.
UN urged to adopt asteroid impact treaty: The number of known near-Earth asteroids which have a chance of hitting Earth in the next 100 years currently stands at 127, but that figure is expected to rocket to as high as 10,000 by 2020 , after Congress changes NASA's mandate to include surveying space for such threats.

Lista actualizada de asteróides que podem embater na Terra em Near Earth Object Program.

ECOPOL

New International Radiation Symbol

New Symbol Launched to Warn Public About Radiation Dangers: With radiating waves, a skull and crossbones and a running person, a new ionizing radiation warning symbol is being introduced to supplement the traditional international symbol for radiation, the three cornered trefoil.
Red triangle with skull and crossbones is for danger – new UN radiation symbol: A skull and crossbones, a running person and radiating ionizing waves, all on a deep red triangle, joined other more common warning symbols today as part of a United Nations effort to reduce needless deaths and serious injuries from accidental exposure to large radioactive sources such as food irradiation and cancer therapy equipment.
The new symbol will not be visible under normal use, but only if someone attempts to disassemble a device that is a source of dangerous radiation. It will not be located on building access doors, transportation packages or containers.

Ao contrário do que é dito no primeiro texto, o novo símbolo não vai substituir o antigo mas antes é acrescentado para certas situações.

VITAMEDIAS

What is the Homicide Report?
The Homicide Report is a weekly listing of all homicide victims reported by the Los Angeles County Coroner, with additional information obtained from various sources. Any human being who dies at the hand of another in Los Angeles County, and whose death is recorded by the Coroner, is included on the list.
The Report seeks to reverse an age-old paradox of big-city crime reporting, which dictates that only the most unusual and statistically marginal homicide cases receive press coverage, while those cases at the very eye of the storm -- those which best expose the true statistical dimensions of the problem of deadly violence -- remain hidden.

TECNOSFERA

Morreu Robert Adler, um dos inventores do controle remoto.
A propósito, disponibilizo aqui um texto escrito para a revista Vídeo & DVD nº 27 (Dezembro de 2005): Controlo remoto comemora 50 anos
A ideia original de ter um aparelho a comandar à distância um televisor deve-se a um homem que vendia televisores mas não acreditava no triunfo da televisão comercial.
Eugene McDonald Jr., fundador e presidente da Zenith Electronics (então Zenith Radio), considerava que os espectadores não iam apreciar a publicidade e um controlo remoto podia, pelo menos, tirar o som aos “irritantes anúncios”.
O conceito de controlo remoto foi patenteado em 1898 por Nikola Tesla. Os primeiros tiveram aplicações militares, nomeadamente na II Guerra Mundial em aviões, barcos e bombas. Terminado o conflito, aproveitou-se a tecnologia para fins mais pacíficos (abrir portas de garagens, por exemplo).
Em 1952, a Zenith desenvolveu o conhecido por “Lazy Bones” (“ossos preguiçosos”), um controlo ligado ao televisor por um fio. Apesar das pessoas gostarem do conceito, ele não pegou porque tropeçavam no cabo.
Três anos depois, surge o primeiro controlo remoto sem fios, o “FlashMatic”, desenvolvido por Eugene Polley. Funcionava direccionando a sua luz a cada um dos quatro cantos do televisor, onde se encontravam fotocélulas que activavam funções pré-definidas (aumentar ou baixar o som e mudar canais). O sucesso foi relativo porque as pessoas baralhavam-se com as definições e irritavam-se com as interferências provocadas pela luz solar.
Em 1957 (ano em que o Sputnik foi lançado para o espaço) surgiu o “Space Command”, com tecnologia de ultra-sons. Também aqui havia problemas, desta vez com os sons metálicos. O elevado preço não ajudava mas acabou por ser licenciado ou copiado por outros fabricantes. No total, foram vendidos mais de nove milhões de aparelhos e para isto contribuiu a desregulação das comunicações por satélite nos anos 70, abrindo caminho ao aparecimento de inúmeros canais por cabo. Antes, como se exagerava, “só os incapacitados necessitavam de um comando”.
No início dos anos 80 a tecnologia por infra-vermelhos eliminou a maioria dos problemas e generalizou o comando remoto nos televisores e em inúmeros aparelhos da electrónica de consumo.
Actualmente, é um produto universal. Em 2000, a Consumer Electronics Association estimava que um lar norte-americano tinha, em média, quatro destes equipamentos.
É usado tanto por homens como por mulheres da mesma forma e sem grandes disparidades no que toca a classes, etnias ou grupos raciais, revelam estudos sociológicos. Mudou a forma como vemos televisão mas também alterou a programação televisiva, tornando-a mais rápida, apostando em inícios de programas cativantes ou na interligação imediata entre o fim de um programa e o início do seguinte.

ECOPOL

Voos da CIA: Luís Amado põe "as mãos no fogo" pelos seus antecessores: O ministro dos Negócios Estrangeiros realçou ainda que "o relatório não evidencia que tenha ocorrido em território português qualquer ilegalidade" e apenas aponta "suspeitas e indícios".

"Finalmente, e mais importante, não há nenhuma evidência de qualquer acto de cumplicidade deste ou de anteriores Governos no transporte ilegal de prisioneiros e tortura de prisioneiros", destacou.

Parlamento Europeu aprovou relatório final sobre a CIA: Na versão final do relatório, o Parlamento Europeu: [...]

- Constata, em particular, o caso de Abdurahman Khadr, alegadamente transportado a bordo do Gulfstream IV N85VM de Guantânamo para Tuzla, na Bósnia-Herzegovina, em 6 de Novembro de 2003, com escala num aeroporto português, em 7 de Novembro de 2003; exorta também as autoridades a investigarem outros possíveis casos de detidos transportados através de território português (alteração 231 ao § 116); [...]

- Regista as 91 escalas de aeronaves operadas pela CIA em aeroportos portugueses e expressa a sua profunda preocupação acerca do propósito de tais voos, os quais eram provenientes de – ou dirigiam-se a – países ligados ao circuito das extradições não judiciais e da transferência de detidos (alteração 16, 1ª parte, ao § 119);

- Manifesta a sua preocupação pela lista suplementar que a Comissão Temporária obteve, que indica que, para além das 91 escalas efectuadas, aeronaves civis e militares de vários países com destino a – ou provenientes de – Guantânamo que, entre 11 de Janeiro de 2002 e 24 de Junho de 2006, utilizaram o espaço aéreo português e realizaram mais 14 escalas em aeroportos portugueses; verifica que o Governo português forneceu informações relativamente a 7 dessas escalas efectuadas no âmbito da operação "Enduring Freedom" (alteração 233 ao § 120).

Debate sobre o relatório CIA:
Giusto CATANIA (CEUE/EVN, IT) referiu o "embaraçoso silêncio da Comissão" e duvida que Durão Barroso, enquanto primeiro-ministro de Portugal, não tenha sabido de nada.

Ana GOMES (PSE): O relatório prova ainda que governos europeus, como o português, continuaram a autorizar e a não controlar voos para Guantânamo, uma prisão ilegal, nada secreta, mesmo depois de já estar criada esta Comissão Temporária do Parlamento Europeu, e procuraram manter parlamentares nacionais e europeus no desconhecimento de que tais operações prosseguiam. Assim não se colaborou na luta contra o terrorismo. Métodos destes jamais permitirão condenar em justiça os verdadeiros terroristas".

Voos - Ministro da Defesa lança repto a deputados: Se me provar isso eu demito-me
Não houve indícios de ilegalidades cometidas em Portugal. Foi esta a conclusão a que chegou o grupo de trabalho intermininisterial. O ministro do Estado e da Defesa Nacional, Luís Amado, admitiu ontem, contudo, que se demite caso se prove que passaram por Portugal voos ilegais da CIA na sua vigência, enquanto membro do Governo. E não conseguiu assegurar que não tenham passado pelo País. Apenas destacou que não tem “nenhuma prova”.
“Quero é ser julgado por ter cometido, enquanto ministro dos Negócios Estrangeiros e membro do Governo, uma cumplicidade ou uma conivência com uma ilegalidade cometida em território português e quero que o senhor deputado seja capaz de me provar isso. E, se me provar isso, eu demito-me no dia seguinte!”, declarou Amado numa das respostas ao deputado comunista Jorge Machado.

Alegadamente, efectuaram-se 91 voos da CIA com passagem por Portugal. E ninguém questiona por ou para quê?

ECOPOL

Escreve-se no Glória Fácil: Isto sim é que uma “cooperação estratégica” muito cooperativa, mas mesmo mesmo muito cooperativa
Ao início da tarde, disse o sr. Presidente:

Lisboa, 15 Fev (Lusa) - O Presidente da República, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, defendeu hoje que a Assembleia da República deve analisar as "boas práticas" existentes nos países desenvolvidos da União Europeia antes da nova lei sobre a Interrupção Voluntária da Gravidez (IVG).
"Eu próprio já estudei as práticas que vigoram em todos os países desenvolvidos na Europa e concordo com aquilo que foi dito - que se analisem as boas práticas. Deixemos que a Assembleia da República observe as boas práticas que existem por essa Europa fora", afirmou o Chefe de Estado português.

Lusa/14:50

E assim falou o ministro da Presidência, Pedro Silva Pereira, umas horas depois.

Lisboa, 15 Fev (Lusa) - O ministro da Presidência, Pedro Silva Pereira, frisou hoje que o processo de regulamentação pelo Governo da futura lei do aborto será "eminentemente administrativo" e procurará corresponder ao exercício das melhores práticas europeias.
(…) O Governo terá então "o sentido de procurar que essa regulamentação corresponda às melhores práticas europeias" ao nível da interrupção voluntária da gravidez, acrescentou.

Isto sim é entendimento, entre o engº José Cavaco Silva e o prof. Aníbal Sócrates…


E, digo eu, o entendimento é anterior porque assim falou o primeiro-ministro no dia 11 (cujo autor da notícia também é do Glória Fácil):
Sócrates recusou, por exemplo, explicar que taxas moderadoras serão aplicadas no Serviço Nacional de Saúde. Tudo o que afirmou, repetidamente, é que a legislação irá ter "presente boas práticas" europeias. "Temos tempo para fazer a regulamentação", afirmou.
Eram 21.00 quando o secretário-geral do PS comentou, na sede nacional do partido - e, como de costume, auxiliado na intervenção inicial pelo indispensável teleponto -, os resultados do referendo, nessa altura já claramente indicando uma vitória do "sim". [...]
Toda a intervenção inicial foi destinada a passar a mensagem de que agora é tempo de "virar a página" nas fracturas provocadas pelo debate do referendo. "Os portugueses querem que este tema deixe de ser um foco de conflito e de disputa política e que haja também uma mudança na realidade que permita combater o aborto clandestino na linha das soluções adoptadas pela larga maioria dos países mais desenvolvidos da Europa", afirmou.

Ou seja, a cooperação estratégica parte de Sócrates, bate em Cavaco e rebate em Silva Pereira...

ECOPOL

Virus: un relato sobre el peligro de los rumores en las organizaciones, com "Generador de rumores" (via)

.DE!

Isto é serviço público? National Public Toilet Map, A project of the National Continence Management Strategy.

Já agora, mantendo o nível da conversa, a ver este Male Restroom Etiquette

CULTURAS IN VITRO

Il corpo racconta

VITAMEDIAS

Mais um aviso. E quem está a ouvir?
Old v new may cost billions: IBM has warned of a looming crisis with old and new media on a collision course over how and where content such as TV, news and user-created will be carried, and says billions of dollars in revenue are at risk.
The report, to be released later today in New York, warns that the conflict between traditional and new media is seeing the emergence of a media divide that could erase hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue from the bottom line of the world's leading media companies.
"The current clash between traditional and new media has reached a fevered pitch," says the report, Navigating the Media Divide.
"Industry incumbents are responding - but perhaps not quickly or completely enough. While they are fighting an escalating competitive battle on this front, traditional media cannot ignore the impending division in its own ranks."
Steven Abraham, global industry leader, IBM media and entertainment, said the music industry had already demonstrated the dangers of mismanaging the transition.
"We estimate that the music industry lost between $US88 billion ($114 billion) and $US190 billion in its transition to digital," Mr Abraham said. "Television and film companies will be next if companies don't systematically navigate the media divide. Now is the time to determine changes in business models, innovate and re-evaluate partnerships. Media companies must take action before it is too late."

CULTURAS IN VITRO

Arte das ruas
Artists want to send a message: Signs made by the homeless are to be used in a performance art work at a Santa Ana gallery.

Graffiti Artist's Work Goes for $200,000: Bombing Middle England, a work in acrylic and spray paint by the artist Banksy depicting well-heeled lawn bowlers tossing bombs, sold for double its pre-sale estimate at Sotheby's auction house.

TECNOSFERA

Microsoft warns of calendar problem: For three weeks this March and April, Microsoft Corp. warns that users of its calendar programs ''should view any appointments... as suspect until they communicate with all meeting invitees.''
Wow, that's sort of jarring -- is something treacherous afoot?
Actually, it's a potential problem in any software that was programmed before a 2005 law decreed that daylight-saving time would start three weeks earlier and end one week later, beginning this year. Congress decided that more early evening daylight would translate into energy savings.

.DE!

Momento tablóide: The man who fell 12,000 ft ... and survived (vídeo aqui, para que não falte nada)

VITAMEDIAS

Don't spread panic about bird flu, WHO urges media: The United Nations health agency urged local and international media on Tuesday to boost coverage of bird flu and avoid misleading information about the disease.
"We are appealing to the media to make people more aware. We need awareness, not panic," said Ibrahim el-Kerdany, a World Health Organization (WHO) regional media adviser.
"Just this morning on one of the television stations we saw wrong messages being transmitted, people talking about vaccines when there are no yet available. The vaccines are for birds not for humans," he told reporters.

VITAMEDIAS

Isto é uma boa notícia: 1º Ranking Netscope de Tráfego de Sites: O Netscope, como ferramenta site-centric de métricas web, recolhe todo (trata-se de um recenseamento) o tráfego de um site gerado por cibernautas, independentemente da sua origem geográfica e do tipo de local (lar, trabalho, escola, etc.). Trata-se, portanto, de uma cobertura universal, enquanto o Netpanel mede por amostragem e apenas os acessos de um universo mais restrito: Portugal continental e, presentemente, apenas a partir de casa. A vocação do Netpanel é fornecer dados de perfil dos cibernautas, como o perfil socio-demográfico e os hábitos de consumo dos internautas, e fornecer informação inter-sites, como é o caso da duplicação de audiências entre sites. Estes são dados que não podem ser recolhidos por medição centrada nos sites, como é o caso do Netscope.

VITAMEDIAS

Disponíveis desde 31 de Janeiro, as cartas ao director da Economist já estão "online". A última, a repor a verdade:
"Sir -
Your article ("A Painful Choice", Feb 10th 2007) contains two inaccuracies that reveal rushed research, quite unusual for such a reputable and respected publication, I am sure. First, you describe Portugal as one of “Europe’s most conservative, religious and rural countries”. That might have been true in 1970. Maybe it is time one of your correspondents made a visit? The Communist Party and the “left block” party (Marxist left) consistently win more votes than Portugal's CDS/PP, a prominent, moderately conservative, centre-right party. The share of agriculture, forestry and fishing combined in the country's GDP is below 7%, a very small figure for the world’s biggest cork exporter that at the same time has a sizeable production of wine, olive oil and paper pulp. The service sector accounts for over 60% of GDP. On the religious front, church attendance is at an all time low, with less than 20% of those polled claiming to attend mass regularly.
Second, you claim that in Spain the abortion law is “somewhat more liberal”. It isn’t. It is almost identical to Portugal's, the real difference being the way doctors interpret it. Whereas in Spain most doctors will claim serious psychological harm to the mother in order to perform legal abortions, invoking an identical clause in Portugal's and Spain's abortion laws, most doctors in Portugal take a different view.
Francisco da Cunha e Távora"

TECNOSFERA

Radiografía de la blogosfera: El perfil del bloguero europeo se corresponde con una mujer de 31 años, licenciada superior o estudiante y que pasa 16 horas de media a la semana conectada a Internet.

Atão e eu, o que sou?...

"una minoría de blogueros, sobre un 7%, son los auténticos creadores de contenido, los innovadores. Un segundo grupo de tamaño similar, los críticos, revisan y mejoran lo creado. En una tercera fase, le toca el turno a los recolectores. Su misión es la de recoger y difundir por la Red el nuevo material. Por último, la gran masa de lectores, los pasivos, reciben la información".

VITAMEDIAS

Jornalismo "open source"?
Wikia Launches Three "Open-Source Magazines": Three new magazine-style wikis launched at Wikia.com today: Entertainment, Politics and Local.

Jornalismo tradicional?
Twelve of the Top 25 Newsstand Publications Saw Declines in the Second Half of 2006

ECOPOL

A 135 mil euros cada conferência, Al Gore pode muito bem recusar isto: Does Al Gore really believe in catastrophic global warming? Since Al Gore was offered the opportunity (in person) to facilitate serious debate on the underlying science of global climate change, 1 year, 1 month, 1 week, 2 days, 5 hours, 32 minutes, and 10 seconds have elapsed.

Curioso foi só ter visto esta imposição escrita num blogue, de onde retirei a imagem: "N.B.: Registe-se que, por razões contratuais, esta Conferência não é aberta à comunicação social, não podendo ser registada em nenhum suporte, pelo que as Senhoras e Senhores jornalistas convidados são-no a título pessoal e não enquanto profissionais da imprensa, no exercício das suas funções."

Não vi qualquer outro jornalista a assumir isto mas afinal houve quem a tivesse relatado (não procurei muito mais).
Outro lado curioso é como a agência Cunha Vaz organiza a conferência e não quer o relato da mesma, tão só os efeitos paralelos da mesma. A comunicação hoje em dia anda mesmo estranha...

[act.: An experiment that hints we are wrong on climate change: Nigel Calder, former editor of New Scientist, says the orthodoxy must be challenged: Twenty years ago, climate research became politicised in favour of one particular hypothesis, which redefined the subject as the study of the effect of greenhouse gases. As a result, the rebellious spirits essential for innovative and trustworthy science are greeted with impediments to their research careers. And while the media usually find mavericks at least entertaining, in this case they often imagine that anyone who doubts the hypothesis of man-made global warming must be in the pay of the oil companies. As a result, some key discoveries in climate research go almost unreported.
Enthusiasm for the global-warming scare also ensures that heatwaves make headlines, while contrary symptoms, such as this winter’s billion-dollar loss of Californian crops to unusual frost, are relegated to the business pages.]

ECOPOL

The Baghdad Battle Mess in a Map: The information presented in the Baghdad Order Of Battle is based entirely on open source information, which includes Multinational Forces Iraq press releases and media reports.
We believe this an accurate representation of the Baghdad Order Of Battle, and will update the map with any corrections or changes on a weekly basis.

CULTURAS IN VITRO

AWN's "Best of the Web" Showcase 2007: a showcase of 20 of the best animated productions to premiere on the Web in the last year.

CONTAMINANTES

Imagining the Ten Dimensions: incredible flash presentation that explains every single dimension, from the first dimension to the tenth

CONTAMINANTES

Credit: Fred Espenak, NASA/GSFC

Lunar Eclipse: The next eclipse is right around the corner: Saturday, March 3, 2007. Stuck on Earth, we can't see the ring of fire, but we can see the red glow it produces on the moon. The phenomenon will be visible from parts of all seven continents including the eastern half of North America.

VITAMEDIAS

Quantos dos jornalistas que escreveram que a Wikipedia podia acabar dentro de três ou quatro meses vão escrever sobre isto?
The Wikimedia cash crunch story: what Devouard really said
Let's start by saying that the most-digged story on this (by several thousand people) was by a blogger that was not at the conference. Laurent Haug, the producer of LIFT, has already made clear that Devouard did not say that Wikipedia is going to shut down, nor used the word "disappear" during her speech. [...]
So Devouard's call for support at LIFT07 was a legitimate and serious one, because Wikipedia's growth requires resources. But she did not suggest at any moment that Wikipedia, which has become an essential resource for the world, is going to "disappear" or "shut down" anytime soon.

VITAMEDIAS

Quando será colocado o primeiro jornalista nacional no Second Life?
Certo, os portugueses são apenas 0,39 por cento daquela população e existe uma muito boa cidadã-repórter. Mesmo assim, há muito trabalho, a julgar por este Journalists: Get a Second Life - and explore a bigger patch:
BBC Radio 1 recreated the 2006 One Big Weekend event on a 64-acre virtual island in Second Life.
Dell sells PCs in Second Life.
Endemol is running version of Big Brother in Second Life.
And Reuters has a news bureau, which reports news in the virtual ‘SL' universe: secondlife.reuters.com.
There are even a number of Reuters news feeds including the Second Life feed available to players via RSS.

Mas há mais:
It is quite conceivable to make a small virtual living, enough to make the rest of the game free, as an SL reporter.
If you can get yourself a decent story and dash off a couple of paragraphs then you can make 300 to 1,000 ‘Linden Dollars' per post, paid by the 'papers'. There's currency conversion to Sterling, so you can pocket what you earn. Or buy up some virtual real estate.

CULTURAS IN VITRO

€755 million boost for Europe's film industry: Launched yesterday evening in Berlin, the EU's new MEDIA 2007 programme will provide a €755 million boost to Europe's film industry over the next seven years. Almost 65% of the total budget will help broader circulation of European works to other countries in Europe and worldwide. MEDIA 2007 provides easier access to finance – in particular for SMEs – and increases the use of digital technologies, making Europe's audiovisual sector more competitive.

VITAMEDIAS

Are blogs really that important?
John Zogby, president and CEO of Zogby International, gave some stats that showed the different view of the media inside and outside the industry.
- Only 27% of the public said they were satisfied with the news but 76% of people inside it are satisfied.
- Only 12% of the public read newspapers but 26% of the industry reads them.
- 32% of the public get their news from Tv but only 5% of the media does.
- 40% of the public gets their news form the internet but 60% of the media industry does.
- Just over half the public said blogs are important but 86% of the media said they are.

VITAMEDIAS

(Sean Mackaoui)

'Content' is king again — this time, on the cellphone: Videos and blogs invade mobile phones
Yahoo Will Show Ads on its Mobile-Phone Home Pages

VITAMEDIAS

Partidas na rádio (já é antigo mas só agora descobri). Muito divertido, apesar da pronúncia irlandesa...
A ouvir este Little Becky wants her school demolished, com a história da Becky.

TECNOSFERA

Discover Hackistan

PHOTO-GRAFIA

Amazing flame fractals

VITAMEDIAS

O próximo Clube de Jornalistas na 2:, dia 14, debate o direito de resposta (a ler o CAPÍTULO V, SECÇÃO I da Lei de Imprensa).
É o próprio Clube que o divulga atempadamente. Longe de mim imiscuir-me na sua grelha de programação mas posso deixar uma sugestão, se o programa ainda não estiver gravado?
E que tal ouvir Pedro Almeida Vieira, aquele sobre o qual citam logo de seguida (ou antes, como se quiser) porque "A Entidade Reguladora entende que o jornalista «free lancer» Pedro Almeida Vieira não pode invocar o direito de resposta", referindo a peça com o elucidativo título "Caso inédito de direito de resposta invocado por jornalista recebe recusa do regulador" e a propósito desta deliberação.

VITAMEDIAS

O futuro P(úblico) pelo seu público:
Experimente o novo Público:
Público número 0
Novo Público
Público? não! P (só)
Está bonito o Público, pá!
o novo público.
seremos parvos?
O novo Público
O novo Público
O NOSSO (NOVO) JORNAL
um novo público
Vem aí… o novo PÚBLICO
Um novo "P", de Público
Enquanto espreitava o 'novo' Público
O Novo Público
O NOVO PÚBLICO
O novo Público
NUMBER ZERO OF PUBLICO
NEW PUBLICO IN PORTUGAL
público lava a cara
Un nuevo Público
A actual campanha publicitária do Público é interessante porque parece voltada em parte para esse público da "cultura de blogue", apelando às suas referências culturais, para o trazer para a imprensa escrita em papel, o que é uma contradição nos seus termos.

VITAMEDIAS

À atenção dos canais portugueses de TV
Wake-up call to a.m. news: moms tuning out: "Watching morning television for me is the equivalent of reading People magazine in the dentist's office," said Lauck, who writes for websites from her home in Santa Rosa, Calif. "They don't have anything new or particularly relevant to my life. It seems like a lot of fluff. I feel like I can get information faster and cleaner on the Internet."
Lauck's not alone in souring on network news programs. In particular, this season has seen a significant erosion of the morning shows' demographic sweet spot: 25- to 54-year-old women.
Almost 450,000 of these women — coveted by advertisers because of their household purchasing power — turned off the three broadcast morning programs so far this season, a decline of 10% compared to the same point last year, according to a Times analysis of Nielsen Media Research data. (Male viewers the same age also fell by 9%, but they make up a much smaller portion of the audience.)

TECNOSFERA

Coitados destes bloggers, que são bons, têm sucesso e se vendem a troco de dinheiro...
Blog marketplace reports strong sales: You won't find blogs for sale on eBay, but there is a marketplace for Web blogs. Hundreds are being sold monthly through a little-known two-year-old auction service based in Vancouver, Canada. [...]
The price for blogs is increasing. A year ago, a blog might sell for 10-20 times monthly sales. A blog in a hot category -- like directories, mobile telephones, celebrity gossip or video sharing -- will sell for more than a 100 times that.

TECNOSFERA

Telecom Italia and Polymer Vision announce the "Cellular-Book": The First mobile device with rollable display for reading personal information, newspapers and books

CONTAMINANTES

Importam-se de ler?
Global Warming: The Cold, Hard Facts?
So why is it that when scientists who have studied the Global Warming phenomenon for years say that humans are not the cause nobody listens? Why does no one acknowledge that the Emperor has no clothes on?
Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide (CO2). This in fact is the greatest deception in the history of science. We are wasting time, energy and trillions of dollars while creating unnecessary fear and consternation over an issue with no scientific justification. [...]
So how has the world come to believe that something is wrong?
Maybe for the same reason we believed, 30 years ago, that global cooling was the biggest threat: a matter of faith. "It is a cold fact: the Global Cooling presents humankind with the most important social, political, and adaptive challenge we have had to deal with for ten thousand years. Your stake in the decisions we make concerning it is of ultimate importance; the survival of ourselves, our children, our species," wrote Lowell Ponte in 1976.
I was as opposed to the threats of impending doom global cooling engendered as I am to the threats made about Global Warming. Let me stress I am not denying the phenomenon has occurred. The world has warmed since 1680, the nadir of a cool period called the Little Ice Age (LIA) that has generally continued to the present. These climate changes are well within natural variability and explained quite easily by changes in the sun. But there is nothing unusual going on.

TECNOSFERA

Yahoo! Pipes
Pipes! & Pipes!
Remixing the Web with Yahoo! Pipes
Yahoo! Pipes remixes the syndicated web
Yahoo Launches Pipes, an RSS Remixer
Yahoo Pipes - The Internet is a Series of Them

CONTAMINANTES

VaC ou AVC?
A Portuguese Science Association Reaches Out: How do you change the public's perception of science in a country where it's not valued?
In a country where philanthropy for science is almost non-existent, organizations like [Associação Viver a Ciência (VaC)] face enormous challenges. Nonetheless, I believe VaC is already making a difference because it is in the process of changing attitudes towards science and scientists in Portugal.

CONTAMINANTES

Study: Moral beliefs may sway docs' care
A disturbing number of doctors do not feel obligated to tell patients about medical options they oppose morally, such as abortion and teen birth control, and believe they have no duty to refer people elsewhere for such treatments, researchers say.
The survey of 1,144 doctors around the country is the first major look at how physicians' religious or moral beliefs might affect patients' care.
The study, conducted by University of Chicago researchers, found 86 percent of those responding believe doctors are obligated to present all treatment options, and 71 percent believe they must refer patients to another doctor for treatments they oppose. Slightly more than half the rest said they had no such obligation; the others were undecided.

O estudo: "Religion, Conscience, and Controversial Clinical Practices"
Conclusions Many physicians do not consider themselves obligated to disclose information about or refer patients for legal but morally controversial medical procedures. Patients who want information about and access to such procedures may need to inquire proactively to determine whether their physicians would accommodate such requests.

VITAMEDIAS

Direcção de programas.
Os tempos de antena são, geralmente, maus e ninguém lhes liga (felizmente que há tevê cabo). Mas o absurdo não é isso; absurdo é que a RTP tenha de os transmitir às horas a que os partidos querem. Como escrevi antes, o que me interessa é que a Anatomia de Grey passe a horas decentes. Já sobre isso, os partidos são omissos.

[com a devida vénia ao autor, em concordância total, salientando que o exemplo deve ser generalizado para todos os operadores: anunciem e cumpram os horários, excepto por razões de força maior. Outro pedido: não eliminem ou acelerem as fichas técnicas dos filmes.]

CONTAMINANTES

I Want to Demand This Freedom for Future Generations: [Richard] Feynman rounded out his first lecture by reminding students and faculty that "This freedom to doubt is an important matter in the sciences and, I believe, in other fields." Public policy is one of those fields. Feynman went on with words we would do well to keep in mind today:

"[The freedom to doubt] was born of struggle. It was a struggle to be permitted to doubt, to be unsure. And I do not want us to forget the importance of the struggle and, by default, to let the thing fall away. I feel a responsibility as a scientist who knows the great value of a satisfactory philosophy of ignorance, and the progress made possible by such a philosophy, progress which is the fruit of freedom of thought. I feel a responsibility to proclaim the value of this freedom and to teach that doubt is not to be feared, but that it is to be welcomed as the possibility of a new potential for human beings. If you know that you are not sure, you have a chance to improve the situation. I wan to demand this freedom for future generations."

CULTURAS IN VITRO

Copyright Infringement in a Borderless World – Does Territoriality Matter?
Abstract: The recent decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada v Canadian Association of Internet Providers [2004] 2 SCR 427 is significant for two reasons: (a) the Canadian Supreme Court held that Internet Service Providers should be exempted from copyright liability as long as they provide only a conduit service in transmitting copyright materials between Internet users (a point which is consistent with many national copyright laws); (b) the majority of the Canadian Supreme Court arrived at the conclusion that the appropriate test to determine whether an infringement for the unauthorized transmission of online copyright material has occurred within the Canadian jurisdiction is the ‘real and substantial connection’ test (LeBel J, however, dissented and was of the view that the correct test to apply is the ‘host server’ test). This paper studies these two tests as propounded by the Canadian Supreme Court and assesses their strengths and weaknesses, especially in light of the territoriality principle in copyright law.

VITAMEDIAS

Invocado pelo Luís Carmelo como blogue com "vocação" para lidar com "as vertigens dos media" (conceito de que espero uma clarificação, obviamente), não viro costas e apanho-me a ler e a descobrir coisas inesperadas.

A primeira: a propósito do último parecer do Provedor do Leitor do Público ("O oito e o oitenta"), o Luís revela que "Alberto Magalhães - posso revelá-lo com autorização sua - é psicólogo clínico, exerce há trinta anos e é Mestre em sexologia)".

Podia ter acrescentado que desde Maio de 2006 um outro ou o mesmo Alberto Magalhães colaborou com o blogue Alandroal a partir de uma crónica na rádio DianaFM.
Ou seja, a verificar-se a ligação, o lado clínico dilui-se assim num lado mais... mediático?

A segunda tem a ver com a crítica aos textos no Público (nota, para conforto de todos, que não conheço pessoalmente nenhum dos intervenientes do que aí vem) e é feita apenas a partir do que é escrito pelo provedor.

Este não tem razão, em ambos os casos - exceptuando os dados estatísticos que a jornalista assume como erros. Porquê?

No primeiro caso, questiona o jornalista pelos detalhes sórdidos do artigo ao que este responde: "As alusões feitas pelo leitor estão fora de contexto" (...) "Porque estão seccionadas. O leitor pega em algumas passagens da notícia e junta-as como se elas assim tivessem sido publicadas" e ainda que "são resultado do acórdão proferido em tribunal e, também, expressões utilizadas pela juíza que presidiu ao julgamento." Mais, "havia matéria, por chocante que possa parecer, que deveria ser relatada para que, desse modo, os leitores pudessem ter uma mais profunda percepção e conhecimento da acusação e do caso em julgamento."

E qual é a inesperada resposta do provedor? "O problema é o jornalista ter confundido informação e opinião e descrito exaustivamente pormenores da vida íntima que não são, de todo, indispensáveis para a boa compreensão da notícia."

Eu duvido que a explicitação sobre o tipo de sexo havido no casal contribua para "uma mais profunda percepção" mas, como disse, não li o artigo original (e considero um erro o provedor não o(s) divulgar neste tipo de casos, quando tem um blogue). Mas como é que o jornalista "opinou sobre a suposta miséria social do casal, o que é uma conclusão da sua lavra" se citou o acordão? Porque é que o provedor não explicita o que é opinião e factualidade sobre um texto de 14 de Dezembro? Alguém se lembra?

No segundo caso, o provedor (e não se entenda isto como uma crítica ao cargo do provedor mas apenas e só a este texto), propõe-se rectificar os dados escritos pela jornalista (que assume alguns dos erros). Mais uma vez, refere-se a questão da opinião integrada num texto noticioso. Sou contra, obviamente.

Mas admirável é o provedor do Público propor-se considerar e discursar sobre o que é o progresso (ou o seu "Progresso"): "O provedor considera, por outro lado, que os conceitos de Progresso são discutíveis". Claro como a água suja, obviamente, sem dúvida. E elabora:
"66% de mulheres na universidade é um sinal de progresso?
Os casamentos homossexuais são um sinal de progresso?
A diminuição dos casamentos é um sinal de progresso?
O aumento do número de filhos nascidos fora do casamento é um sinal de progresso?"

Bem, como o próprio provedor costuma fazer (e não, não estou a falar de retirar frases de contexto), podia-se pegar num qualquer dicionário e explicar que progresso é o "movimento progressivo da civilização e das instituições político-sociais; tendência do género humano para a sua perfeição, para a felicidade". Também se podia falar em "progredir" ou "desenvolver-se" mas chega para consubstanciar a ideia, ideia sem resposta à pergunta quase bíblica "O que é o Progresso? E de acordo com estes critérios onde se situaria o Progresso absoluto?
A única constatação a que o provedor chega é que a instituição Família está a sofrer uma profunda mutação".

Mas alguém pediu ao provedor uma constatação sobre a família (no caso dele, com maiúscula)? E como é que ele chega a essa constatação e a essa passagem - quântica? - entre progresso e família (sem maiúscula)? E quererá ele explicar o que é o "Progresso absoluto"? São palavras vãs ou há conceitos científicos ou religiosos nas suas palavras?

Finalmente, "O provedor duvida também do carácter científico da seguinte afirmação: "A legalização das uniões gay é vista como ‘um sinal de progresso porque é sintoma de orientações sexuais mais diversas e de práticas menos discriminatórias’."
É uma afirmação tanto mais polémica quanto não está no artigo. Foi "rematada" a posteriori pela socióloga (como reconhece a própria jornalista). É, portanto, uma opinião, discutível por definição. E o provedor recusa peremptoriamente juízos de valor de natureza social travestidos de informação. A jornalista tornou sua a tese da socióloga e promove a opinião dela (sobre a matéria) a facto indiscutível".

Ou eu não li bem, o que assumo, ou também eu duvido do carácter do provedor sobre a afirmação: então ele pede uma explicação à jornalista, ela clarifica e o próprio provedor assume que a resposta da mesma não está no artigo publicado mas mesmo assim permite-se referir que é "uma afirmação tanto mais polémica quanto não está no artigo". Não percebo e a falha é minha, obviamente.

Por tudo isto, e para abreviar, aproprio-me das frases do referido provedor:
1) "No primeiro artigo o "rigor" foi elevado a 80; neste fica-se pelos 8", para acrescentar que o provedor se fica pelos 800.

2) "Seriam dois casos de somenos importância se não ilustrassem a actual tendência dos jornalistas para o "facilitismo"", tal como parece suceder com o único provedor a sério nos diários em Portugal.

Para rematar este triste episódio, caro Luís, espero ter explicado que a vertigem, neste caso, não é minha.

TECNOSFERA

Today’s Blogosphere: Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah Apple wants to drop DRM blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah Microsoft embraces OpenID blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

[talvez até porque foi pela TSF Rádio que soube que Carlos Oliveira é um dos cinco finalistas do concurso para o videoclip oficial de "Dig" dos Incubus.

Escolham.]

VITAMEDIAS

Uma história muito mal contada. A publicação deste texto é uma vergonha: o autor não sabe do que fala, o editor aceita sem pestanejar e... publique-se.
Talvez agora que "Italianos da RCS confirmam compra do 'Diário Económico'" [são os detentores do Corriere della Sera], mudem este tipo de cronistas!

ECOPOL

Dinheiro que não custa a enviar?
U.S. sent giant pallets of cash into Iraq: The Federal Reserve sent record payouts of more than $4 billion in cash to Baghdad on giant pallets aboard military planes shortly before the United States gave control back to Iraqis, lawmakers said Tuesday.
The money, which had been held by the United States, came from Iraqi oil exports, surplus dollars from the U.N.-run oil-for-food program and frozen assets belonging to the ousted Saddam Hussein regime.
Bills weighing a total of 363 tons were loaded onto military aircraft in the largest cash shipments ever made by the Federal Reserve, said Rep. Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
(imagem daqui, sem qualquer relação com o tema)

VITAMEDIAS

Ainda sobre o tópico anterior
Old media, new media: You can't get much more old media than the Economist, a magazine established in 1843 that calls itself a newspaper. Its editor, John Micklethwait, even described it today as "fusty," although I think he had his tongue in his cheek when he said it. [...]
The Economist keeps adding new blogs to its Web site, and Micklethwait believes they will supplement its model of in-depth analysis and reportage of international news.
That model is encouraging, although it's supported by a financial structure that is certainly rare. The Economist is run by a trust, virtually independent of its owners, Micklethwait said. So it has to make money, but it is under none of the sort of pressure that publicly traded U.S. media companies labor under.

VITAMEDIAS

As pessoas para as pessoas ou como está a melhorar o jornalismo feito lá fora...: washingtonpost.com Adds Compelling Multimedia Feature That Offers Interesting Points of View From Everyday People: The feature, "onBeing," is a presentation of observations, lessons and tales offered by everyday people from every walk of life.
The unique videos present the musings, attitudes, passions and quirks of people in an up-close documentary style. Each person speaks to the camera against a stark white background. The uncomplicated presentation intensifies the viewing experience and focuses the spotlight on each person's story without distraction.

VITAMEDIAS

Americans Devoting More Time to Media: This year, the average American will spend 3,518 hours (nearly five months) watching TV, surfing the Internet, listening to the radio and reading. That's a prediction from The Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2007. This is the 126th edition of the Statistical Abstract, which is published annually by the U.S. Census Bureau. [...]
"One private group did a forecast that for 2007, people will spend 65 days watching TV, 41 days listening to radio and a little over a week surfing the Internet, they will also spend about a week reading the daily newspapers. Teens will also spend maybe another week listening to recorded music."

TECNOSFERA

Finalmente, EFF Europe Office Opens in Brussels: The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) opened a new office in Brussels today to work with various institutions of the European Union (EU) on innovation and digital rights, acting as a watchdog for the public interest in intellectual property and civil liberties policy initiatives that impact the European digital environment.

VITAMEDIAS

À atenção dos operadores de câmara:
Jail Record Near for Videographer Who Resisted Grand Jury: A freelance videographer who refused to cooperate with a grand jury investigation will become the longest incarcerated journalist in modern American history on Tuesday. The freelancer, Josh Wolf, will pass Vanessa Leggett, an investigator and a journalist who served 168 days in 2001 and 2002 for refusing to surrender information in a murder case.
Mr. Wolf, 24, has been in prison since August, with a brief break in September related to his appeal, after refusing to cooperate with a grand jury investigation of an anticapitalist protest in 2005 in which a police officer here was injured and a squad car was slightly damaged by a small explosive device.

ECOPOL

Os BRICs foram relevados em Outubro de 2003 no documento da Goldman Sachs "Dreaming With BRICs: The Path to 2050". Pouco depois, a revista Business Week falava do assunto: "The BRICs Are Coming--Fast".
Ontem, 4 de Fevereiro de 2007, soube-se finalmente que as "Economias emergentes são um novo pilar da diplomacia portuguesa": "Falando em Macau, no final de uma visita de cinco dias à China, José Sócrates expressou mesmo a vontade política de reorientar os esforços da política externa, de modo a um melhor relacionamento com os chamados BRIC (Brasil, Rússia, Índia e China), países que estão a começar a ter uma força dominante na economia mundial.
Sócrates lembrou que o mundo está a mudar muito rapidamente e que Portugal tem tudo a ganhar em se adaptar a essa mutação." (negrito meu)

Mais de três anos depois, vai-se finalmente "reorientar"? E "estão a começar"? E "o mundo está a mudar muito rapidamente"?...
Sacana do mundo, sempre a correr e nós com o Obikwelu em Espanha!

VITAMEDIAS

Exploring Six Media Fictions:
1: Traditional media are dead
2: Only blogs are relevant
3: Social networking sites are just for kids
4: Young adults don't read newspapers
5: Word of mouth cannot be managed
6: The company Web site is the best way to communicate

VITAMEDIAS

Coisas que fascinam:
quando amanhã quiser comprar o Sol, cuidado com o que pede.
Sol é uma marca que ainda está em processo de estudo e aguarda despacho no INPI, com o número 396806, com este logótipo.

Já no ICS, o semanário está registado como "Sol - Todos os Sábados" (propriedade da "O Sol é Essencial S.A. e com um email da afma.pt, referente à António Frutuoso de Melo & Associados Sociedade De Advogados, RL).
Curiosamente, enquanto o logótipo no site do Sol omite o "Todos os Sábados",

a frase está inscrita na edição em papel.
Em resumo, para o adquirir correctamente deve pedir: "quero o Sol - Todos os Sábados".
Parabéns aos criativos :) Que outro jornal se pode orgulhar de compradores tão fiéis?
(obrigado, António)

ECOPOL

Da China:

Primeiro-ministro assiste curioso a quem pisa Portugal num chão multimédia (via)


The fishes "packed" in the uniquely designed fish tank of a hotel's main hall in Beijing may seem like a grand decoration, but the fishes will only survive for six days! New fishes will replace the "old stock", and the cruel cycle repeats.

CULTURAS IN VITRO

Alguém sabe se o Plano Nacional de Leitura já garantiu algum "apoio a blogs e chat-rooms sobre livros e leitura para crianças, jovens e adultos"?

VITAMEDIAS

New Rules for Newspapers: The Internet has changed everything. If newspapers want to play – and win – then we need to follow the new rules:
1 Get real about the Internet
2 Tie journalists' pay to circulation
3 Ignore your loyal readers
4 Stop running news stories
5 Feed the cash cow
6 Drop the price
7 Solve the online revenue riddle
8 Promote as if success depends upon it
9 Join hands and sing Kumbaya

A ver também:

Best Front Design

VITAMEDIAS

A globalização no jornalismo (via, negritos meus):
Here is the US news from Bangalore: They are journalists employed by the world's biggest news agency, Reuters.
Their job is to cover US financial news.
And they are working overnight so that they can report company news live as it happens on the New York Stock Exchange - from India.

No limite, tudo é possível: para quê ter jornalistas de política nacional se a Lusa pode fazer esse trabalho? Para quê jornalistas de economia, de tecnologia (ok, esta é piada...), fotógrafos, gráficos? Tudo pode ser feito de forma mais barata noutros países, fora dos meios que divulgam as notícias. O que se perde? O que se ganha?
O glocal é isso mesmo: fazer globalmente com atenção ao local. Porque haveria o jornalismo de ser diferente dos têxteis ou de uma fábrica de chouriços, que podem ser produzidos num qualquer lugar para serem vendidos noutro?
Só uma rápida reflexão: não é isso que já está a acontecer na maior parte dos nossos meios de comunicação social, encher espaço com coisas de fora sem serem adaptadas aos interesses locais?

TECNOSFERA

Depois deste "Tag, You're It: Scientists Describe Collaborative Tagging Sites like Del.icio.us", Tagging: Just as the internet allows users to create and share their own media, it is also enabling them to organize digital material their own way, rather than relying on pre-existing formats of classifying information.
A December 2006 survey has found that 28% of internet users have tagged or categorized content online such as photos, news stories or blog posts. On a typical day online, 7% of internet users say they tag or categorize online content.

.DE!

Natalie Baraova também vai ter uma campanha para "habeas corpus"? (negrito meu)
Czech baby must return from Portugal to mother: Sara Baraova, a six-year-old baby, will return from Portugal to her mother on February 13 and she will be entrusted to her care, according to a court decision in Portugal in a lawsuit between her parents today, Marie Vodickova, director of the Fund of Threatened Children (FOD), has told CTK.
In early January, a different court ruled in the opposite way. The baby was removed from her mother and entrusted to the father who lives in Portugal.
"The mother can see her tomorrow, but then, until February 13, she cannot," Vodickova said.
Sara will have to travel to see her father for holidays three times a year, Vodickova said.
"It is certainly a victory as everyone was afraid that no one will see the baby here any more," she added.
Sara's mother Natalie Baraova had been ordered to send her daughter to her father to Portugal. She ought to have returned her two years ago. However, she kept the baby in hiding.

TECNOSFERA

Adventures in Ugly Design: The Cable Carpet: Designed by a German student, this rug has cable patterns cut out of it, designed for you to pass your cables through.

TECNOSFERA

What was the first thing ever sold on eBay? a broken laser pointer

VITAMEDIAS

"A partir de Fevereiro, o suplemento de “O Primeiro de Janeiro” “das Artes das Letras”, com nova editora, Filipa Leal, passará a contar com uma coluna sobre online. Haverá paralelamente o nascimento de um blog, ainda não na própria estrutura do jornal (batalha perdida) mas externamente".

CONTAMINANTES

The science of origami: The science underlying paper-folding is leading to new technological and artistic applications for the centuries-old craft of origami
(dedicado ao Origami, a ver se volta :-)