Author: Mike P. Lewis

Sports blogs are the best

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As I’ve been talking about all over this blog, traditional media is on the decline (here and here). Papers are on their way out and everyone knows it.  Ever since i was a kid, I’ve always loved the local sports pages but one thing I’ve been doing for the past few years is reading sports blogs instead of the local paper’s coverage. Why? Because there are a few benefits:

1) They are biased. Obviously, sports reporting for a local town are biased but they try to come off as neutral and objective.  They definitely aren’t and it’s nice to read a blog where the writer is unabashedly biased towards your team.  It gives them the freedom to speak freely and accomplish my next point

2) They are funny. Sports blogs aren’t afraid to rip someone down in a funny and often juvinule manner. This is sports, not world news

3) They are mean. I almost never read in a paper that someone is playing poorly.  If someone has a bad game, they don’t mention it – they only focus on who scored the points and why one team won.  They rarely go into the details of what was happening. They don’t give you a feel of the game.  Blogs will tell you straight-up what’s happening.  If you don’t watch the game, this is huge.  It’s as if you are getting a report from a friend (subjective blog) rather than a robot (objective newspaper).

4) They are passionate. These writers analyze the crap out of the team. They drum up stats that would only arise if someone was spending night and day thinking about the team. They compare players to supermodels, they conjure up theories about their pregame warmups.  They provide much more thinking about a team than a local beat writer.

5) They web-based meaning they link, embed, reference and do all the stuff that other web sites do. These are things that newspaper columns don’t do.  Having YouTube clips in a column makes it infinitely more readable.  Seeing sports is fun.  Linking to other points is a good idea.  These things doing happen with local columnists and it limits the usefulness of their output.

All of these things are why i love sports blogs and i’m also happy to see that my bud Jim Bankoff (Qloud investor/chairman) recently became CEO Of Sports Blog Nation (or SB Nation) which has a network of over 185 blogs covering almost every sport.  There’s a good article in yesterday’s WashingtonPost. These blogs and others like them are going to be my go-to for getting news (Twolves blog here) and you should probably check them out too.

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The Week is the best Aggregator and Filterer

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I’ve mentioned in my previous posts that the newspaper model is dead. Reporting and publishing every day and having a dedicated staff to do both just isn’t a business model anymore. Not to mention that can get better content by aggregating the content that exists elsewhere. Several web companies do this well and i like to call them “A & F” companies – which stands for “Aggregating and Filtering” This is what The Huffington Post does and Celebuzz and others. One of my favorite A&F companies isn’t a web company but a print magazine called The Week. What The Week does is take articles, books, and news that’s been distributed over the week and filters it into one condensed version of the best news and articles. It’s more condensed than a typical magazine and often better because it picks the best from lots of media.

One interesting quote i heard today is that The Week is one of the few print titles that’s growing. I read this today:

While newsweeklies such as Newsweek and U.S. News and World Report struggle, one magazine in the category is succeeding. According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, The Week saw its paid and verified circulation grow 7.5 percent in 2008. The publication increased its circ from 480,084 to 515,936, as well growing 60 percent on the newsstand. “The Week’s continued growth at a premium subscription price is a testament to the connection our sophisticated readers have with our editorial product,” Steven Kotok, the mag’s general manager, said in a statement. “Our readers are The Week’s greatest evangelists. In 2008 over fifty percent of new subscribers to The Week came through direct recommendations from current subscribers.”

If you’ve never read The Week, you should check it out. Anyone else seen anything similar?

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Google Latitude

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Image representing Google as depicted in Crunc...

A new feature was released today from Google called Google Latitude.  It’s allows you to post your location onto Google Maps and to see your friends’ locations.  It’s done using GPS and other technologies (Gears, etc.) and works really well.  Here are some thoughts i have on it

First, I like the way it looks and works. The interface is extremely simple.  Entering in info is done inline and the interface is definitely not cluttered with too many bells and whistles.  Adding and viewing friends is also braindead simple.  Overall, it’s a snap to use

It’s a social app but it’s different than a social network. For instance it’s (a) only really useful for people you know, (b) more interesting for people you live close to, and (c) limited to only location information. It’s only a map.  Again, very simple

google-lat

Not everything is great though. One thing i don’t understand is why they force you to access it (on the web) through iGoogle.  I have a homepage already and see no other reason to go to iGoogle.  That’s annoying and i wish it had it’s own site like Google’s Calendar, Reader, Maps, Mail, etc.  Also, I also wish it would use my profile from other Google products. It seems now that i have a different profile for Gmail, Calendar, Orkut, FriendConnect and Reader.  Why can’t there be just one?

Since i’ve had a iPhone, i’ve become much more aware of the usefulness of my location.  When this information is layered onto web services, those services can become much more useful.  I like this new app because it shows that there’s a whole other layer (location) that is just starting to be explored. I can imagine many applications starting to layer in location and serve information based on this.  Ad targeting, ticketing, messaging, groups all change when this is added.

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25 Random Things About Me

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I got tagged in Facebook to do one of these lists.  I really enjoyed reading some of my colleagues and some of my old friends from high school so i thought i’d put one together.

The rules are that once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged or however many you want. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it’s because I want to know more about you.

Here are my items:

1. I don’t like fruit (with the exception of apples) and i’m happy that my sister’s the same way. It makes me feel less strange.

2. I tend to get around. I’ve been to 49 states and hope to get to the final one, Mississippi, sometime soon.  Since college, I’ve lived in Virginia, New York, Washington DC, Boston (sort of), and now Los Angeles.

3. I have no toenails on my 2 little toes.

4. I was born in NY, then moved to CA, then moved to Texas before i finished my youth in Minnesota.

5. I grew up in Minnesota.  When i moved east in 1996, i felt like a Midwesterner.  I then lived on the east coast for 11 years.  When i moved to California last year, i felt like an Easterner.  After a few years here, who knows who i’ll be.

6. i’ve never broken a bone. I attribute this to my love of milk.

7. I love the extended Lewis Family clan and feel so fortunate that i have such great cousins, aunts and uncles.

8. When i was younger I used to dress up like a ninja and wonder around in the woods with my brother.

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The Dark Art of Rebounding

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I would like to call to attention a post written today about my new favorite player in the NBA.  Let me ask you this question:

if you take:

  • Every rookie who has ever played in the NBA since 1946 …
  • Weed out everyone who played less than twenty minutes per game …
  • And sort them by who gets the highest percentage of total rebounds while on the court …

Which rookies over the past 100 years do you think would be in that list?  I’ll give you a hint: 2 of the top 10 are rookies this year.  At number 9 you have Greg Oden. He’s ahead of Hakeem Olajuwon and David Robinson. Not bad. Not bad at all.

Another 2008-2009 rookie, however, is currently third all time. He’s ahead of Shaquille O’Neal, Charles Oakley, Buck Williams, and Bill Walton (trailing only Clifford Ray and Larry Smith, who were three years older in their rookie years than the guy I’m talking about).  It’s, of course, Kevin Love.

It’s strange considering:

Kevin Love’s total rebounding percentage is greater than his age, which just about never happens. He’s only 20, but he grabs 21.3 percent of the rebounds while he’s on the court.  He’s also smaller and less athletic than a lot of the players he’s competing against for those loose balls. And he’s best known as a passer

Whatever it is, it’s amazing to see Love haul in offensive board after offensive board.  Even more amazing to think that he’s only 20.   The article is good as it describes his mentality when playing.  Check it out and Go Kevin Love and Go T-Wolves!

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New Media – What Will It Look Like

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Toby and i have been debating and discussing what new media will look like.  His post today inspired me to lay down some of my thoughts. A lot of my thinking stems from this article in The Atlantic and Fred’s Post about his reading habits.

newspapersdead
The Atlantic post described how the NY Times is dead.  With $1 billion in debt, a $400 million dollar loan due in May and only $46 million in cash on hand, it is going down.  Even with the $250 million it got yesterday, it cannot continue to exist the way it is.  No newspaper can.  My beloved Star Tribune declared bankruptcy last too and that’s the beginning of the trend of all papers.

Why are they failing?  Because the business model is wrong.  They are trying to do too much.  They cover things that are commodities.  It’s as if every online music service tried to build an mp3 store to compete with iTunes and Amazon.  They don’t because those work great.  Newpapers try to cover every story: national and international news, sports, entertainment, etc. The local newspaper doesn’t need to cover most of they reports on today because their paper is not going to be the place where the public finds that information. When user’s get online, all of this news is available in other places, for free and in a better, deeper format.  For instance:

  • National and International news: this is covered by AP, Reuters, and CNN.com
  • Entertainment news: this can be found online (RottenTomatoes) or from national news and reviews from individual columnists (Ebert)
  • Sports: ESPN.com and bloggers will cover this

If a paper is covering any of these on their own, it is a losing proposition.  What’s left? The only thing is see is local news. I think local papers should focus on local news because everything else is a commodity.  Even bloggers will be able to fill the gaps left by major journals.

Toby talks in his post about the Huffington Post which i think is a piece of the puzzle but it’s only interesting because they are trying to be a news portal.  And i agree.  In my mind, most “papers” will shift online and instead of reporting the news, they will be filtering it. And if they don’t, they will die.  They better hurry up too, becuase places like the HuffPo are trying to get there first. You can already see how this is happening.  Filters are already part of people everyday lives the same way a paper used to be.  Technology aggregation and filtering is done at Techmeme, sport aggregation and filtering at ESPN, and news filters like CNN can replace almost any newspaper’s news coverage.

I’m not the only one who thinks this way.  More evidence came yesterday when ESPN announced a partnership with TrueHoop to place NBA blogs in their site because they know that they can’t cover everything.  You can see how techmeme is the “paper” of choice for Michael Arrington from TechCrunch.  He writes:

Image representing Techmeme as depicted in Cru...
Image via CrunchBase

TechMeme is another four-year favorite. It is the blogosphere’s daily newspaper, and one of the sites we use most often in seeing how stories develop.

Will papers become local news sources?  I think that’s all that’s left for them.  But they better hurry up because local blogs like LAist.com and DCist.com are already attacking this niche and doing a better job than they are.

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Leaders and Followers

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There’s a new book by Seth Godin called “Tribes” which talks about the startup culture and out-of-the-box thinkers.  Two interesting parts of the book are the parts about followers and the parts about Leaders.

A good question exists talking about the difference between employees and followers.  Employees show up each day and do their tasks whereas a follower is someone who is following a calling. Followers work because they believe not because they are told to do so.   Great companies illustrate this.  You can see people flocking to Facebook and Apple because those companies inspire.  They don’t recruit but spread gospel.  It’s interesting.

This relates directly to the talk about Leaders.  The following characteristics were thrown out in the book:

  • Leaders challenge the status quo.
  • Leaders create a culture around their goal and involve others in that culture.
  • Leaders have an extraordinary amount of curiosity about the world they’re trying to change.
  • Leaders use charisma (in a variety of forms) to attract and motivate followers.
  • Leaders communicate their vision of the future.
  • Leaders commit to a vision and make decisions based on that commitment.
  • Leaders connect their followers to one another.

Makes me think about how i interact with my coworkers and how i behave at work.  Some people are better than others at finding a vision and staying focused on it.  What do you think?  Is this hard for you to do? Do you know some people who are particularly good at it?

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Clint and Gran Torino

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I saw Clint Eastwood‘s latest movie, Gran Torino, last weekend and really liked it. Clint played an over-the-hill retired Detroit autoworker who is sour. He’s pissed off at the lack of respect displayed throughout society and his family and his bitterness creates some pretty funny moments.

I also was able to read this month’s Esquire magazine which features Clint. In this article you hear Clint describe an earlier time when kids had it rougher and people weren’t afraid of getting their hands dirty.

Some of his quotes:

we were always moving. Redding. Sacramento. Pacific Palisades. Back to Redding. Back to Sacramento. Over to Hayward. Niles. Oakland. So we were constantly on the road, and I was always the new guy in school. The bullies always thought, Here’s this big gangly guy. We gotta take him on. You know how kids are. We gotta test him. I was a shy kid. But a lot of my childhood was spent punching the bullies out.

My father had a couple of kids at the beginning of the Depression. There was not much employment. Not much welfare. People barely got by. People were tougher then.

We live in more of a pussy generation now, where everybody’s become used to saying, “Well, how do we handle it psychologically?” In those days, you just punched the bully back and duked it out. Even if the guy was older and could push you around, at least you were respected for fighting back, and you’d be left alone from then on.

I don’t know if I can tell you exactly when the pussy generation started. Maybe when people started asking about the meaning of life.

I’ve been hit from Clint from all sides. After i read the article, i then heard an interview of him on NPR where he talks about his Dirty Harry days and how he actually enjoys playing characters that are very different from him.   The mp3 for that interview is here.

I will say that i think Gran Torino is one of his better movies.  Not as good as Million Dollar Baby but still pretty solid.

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The Most Environment-Friendly Gas Station Ever

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I went to fill up yesterday at this gas station in West Hollywood on the corner of Olympic and Robertson and was amazed what i saw.

This place has the following:

  • The facade was made from farm-raised renewable cedar
  • The wall behind the station is wrapped with vines (require almost no upkeep)
  • All the lights are motion sensitive
  • The bathroom is all made from recycled aluminum and recycled glass
  • The ouside structure is highly durable uncoated stainless steel and is completely recycleable
  • 90 solar panels are on the canopy which produce enough energy to power 2-3 average American homes
  • Glass is mixed into the concrete which removes the need for sand
  • The canopy collects rainwater which is then filtered and reused onsite for irrigation and landscaping

All in all it’s pretty impressive for just a standard gas station.  You can read more about what BP is doing at thegreencurve.com

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