Fame Monsters All
I remember seeing an ABC report with John Stossel a while back that looked at America’s growing obsession with fame. They were interviewing people in a wintry Times Square who had stripped down to bathing suits and body-painted themselves in various colors for an audition to play, of all things, M&M’s candies. “Everybody wants to […]
Keep It Short, Pastor
I just read about a guy on a quest that seems almost as daunting as the rich man’s challenge to thread a needle with his camel. Chris Juby, a worship director at King’s Church in the northern English city of Durham, has determined that he will summarize the Bible in a series of daily tweets—one […]
The Age of Technology
The New York Times recently posted an article about mothers and technology, using a study from Parenting magazine and a woman’s social media Web site called BlogHer. The moms surveyed said that new tech could be a good thing for their families, even though it demanded more effort to keep up with the latest advances […]
The Eyes of Facebook Are Upon You
It looks like there’s another way that Facebook is serving mankind: By helping fix traffic problems in India. Hey, don’t underestimate the little social network that could. It all started when overburdened police officers in New Delhi started a Facebook page to let the public friend-up and give them suggestions on how the endlessly snarled […]
If You Can’t Text Something Positive …
According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 75% of all U.S. teens have a cell phone. When you drop the age to 12 years old, it’s still a whopping 58% with a ring-tone piping out of their pocket. 90% of all those kids are texting each other at any given moment—to a tally […]
Park Well, My Brother
NEW TECH ALERT—woo-woo-woo In case you haven’t heard, Google has created a new Android app for all you frustrated city folk who endlessly round the block looking for someplace to jam your ride. It’s called “Open Spot.” With it you can open a little map of your area decorated with bubble markers that indicate an […]
Your Tweet is My Command
Did you hear about David Perez and his recent adventure? If not, let me fill you in. This 29-year-old advertising guy wanted to attend a weeklong fete at the Cannes Lion’s International Advertising Festival in France. (Yeah, I had no idea that advertising guys threw big shindigs in France, either. But there it is.) Anyway, […]
The Twilight of Addiction
This is the age of addiction. Think about it. People are pointing to new addictions just about every day. The Internet, now, there’s a real life-stealer. Reality TV shows, wow, just can’t get enough of those dancing stars of yesteryear. Movies. Music. iPads. Videogames. Seems that everybody is up-ending their lives to mainline something or […]
Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Online
I just saw a New York Times article that I had to comment on. The piece, by Tara Parker-Pope, asked the question: “Is the Internet making teenagers do more dumb things than ever?” Now, it’s easy to rationalize that teens are gonna do stupid stuff no matter what. So why blame the Internet? After all, […]
MTV’s Muddled Movie Awards
If you missed Sunday night’s presentation of this year’s MTV Movie Awards and you’re still wondering who won, the answer is, well, nobody. Nobody who tuned in anyway. This crude presentation didn’t do any favors for the films it cheered (The Twilight Saga: New Moon) or the soon-to-be-released flicks it advertised (Grown Ups). Shackled with […]