Josh McHugh

The dismal science of freelancing

Grim piece at Slate on the economics of freelance writing:
My Life as a Hack - It was glorious. Now it's over. By Ben Yagoda

I'm guessing he didn't get paid $1 a word for that piece.

Yahoo, the TV Network

YahooNets
Originally uploaded by sp0re.

The Yahoo! story! is! out!/up!

It's about how Yahoo is on its way to becoming the first great Internet TV network.

Wired 13.09: The Super Network

Super!

My god, was that one a bear to report. I'm guessing the Y! PR department made things so difficult because they had some sort of exclusive arrangement with Fortune, which was (probably simultaneously) putting together a cover story about Yahoo's advertising strategy. Thank goodness for Bradley Horowitz, a fascinating guy doing some very cool stuff.

Limeburn

Lime_burn2
Originally uploaded by sp0re.

Last Saturday I spent 3 hours juicing limes for the making of margaritas. 130 limes and 200 ounces of lime juice later, I had become an experiment in human ceviche. It wasn't until the following day that I noticed some tingling, and the second day brought some fine blisters.

From Nathaniel Hawthorne : Ethan Brand:

"Father, what is that?" asked the little boy, leaving his play, and pressing betwixt his father's knees.

"Oh, some drunken man, I suppose," answered the lime-burner; "some merry fellow from the bar-room in the village, who dared not laugh loud enough within doors lest he should blow the roof of the house off. So here he is, shaking his jolly sides at the foot of Graylock."

"But, father," said the child, more sensitive than the obtuse, middle-aged clown, "he does not laugh like a man that is glad. So the noise frightens me!"

Whatevs!

I was really glad to see Nick Paumgarten's article in the July 11 New Yorker, in The Talk of the Town, about the word "whatever".

I've been fulminating against the W word for years, and the piece is an eloquent examination of why, in some sense, Russell Crowe was in the right when he went after the Mercer hotel concierge. If this case goes to court, I forsee a verdict of whatever.

How To Get Your Theory of Everything Accepted

I've gotten more email regarding the Peter Lynds story than I've received about any other piece I've written, except maybe for the one about Sony outsourcing product design to Apple.

On BoingBoing, I spotted an entry about science journalism rock-star Michio Kaku's helpful FAQ-style page for all the emails Michio gets from people who have it all figured out. Here: What to Do If You Have a Proposal for the Unified Field Theory.

I like the helpful tone of it. I think it's in earnest. Well done.

Earworm, the phenomenon

This morning, waiting for the Bay Club shuttle, I read another great Billy Collins poem over at MerrinDonahue.com, about a cheesy song sticking in one's head. That happened to me on Monday when my buddy Scott Banerjee suckered me into an entire day's rotation of "Fantasy," by Aldo Nova.

Dunkumentary

The Dunk Project now has its own site: Dunkumentary.

Have a look to see updates, trailers (coming soon), and, ultimately, the answer to the infernal question: will I ever dunk?

East Coast has some big 'uns, too

Check out the pictures of a very large tiger shark caught during a Martha's Vineyard shark fishing derby.

The Psychopathology of Everyday Mash-Ups

In which the mashup mentality pervades.

Pitchfork Column: Puritan Blister #7

yeah, rights

Good article in the SF Chron about the ridiculous state of affairs that attends getting rights clearances for documentaries

video mashing

Some great stuff here on the visual remix tip:

Eclectic Method DOWNLOADS

Hoping to get to BootieSF this Saturday to see the latest from these Eclectic Methodists

Looking (like) "Glass..."

Here's an iChat exchange I had with a buddy of mine that illustrates a couple of things: one, the kind of wacked-out stuff you get to I.M.-ing about with a fellow journalist, and two, just how far behind the vanguard I am.

J: how do you beat-match visuals?
J: cut back 'n' forth between scenes like those HBO spots?
B: my treat for finishing [x] and [y] is turntables
J: yeah!
11:00 AM
J: I think dj[ing] will eventually be a skill that almost everyone has. like word processing used to be something only a few did. Now it's required to graduate from the 2nd grade. dj-ing will be like that - like handwriting or using a phone.
B: frisky [internet radio station] is good right now
J: your kids will be djs
J: my kids will be djs
J: remixing every kind of media and info on the fly
B: how fucking cool
J: ever read the Glass Bead Game, by Herman hesse?

The next day, I find this mashup video, done by a super-talented bootlegger in my own area code:
DJ Earworm Music

Glass Bead Game: check.
The Singularity: closer, a la Marvin Minsky - "The question of what they will want doesn't make any sense. We will be them."

cackling like a madman

Check this mashup pile-up at GoodBlimey and you will be, too:

Liger!

Could it be? When I saw Napoleon Dynamite's awesome sketch of the liger, I thought it was just some bizarre thing in a quirkalicious flick.

Deb: What are you drawing?
Napoleon Dynamite: A liger.
Deb: What's a liger?
Napoleon Dynamite: It's pretty much my favorite animal. It's like a lion and a tiger mixed... bred for its skills in magic.

But thanks to the T-shirt vendor, I found the Sierra Safari Zoo page about the Liger in capitivity there. Yes!

XBOX 360 article is up

Here it is. A tad chagrined that Time's cover story is on same. Funny though - I didn't see any mad mountainbiking scenes in the Time piece - actually, I barely saw J Allard at all.