Ok, everyone by now knows that Malcolm Gladwell is blogging. But who knew he was such an avid sports fan? Suddenly this opens up the possibility that he might enjoy reading Runner Up. Heck, someone needs to! O Blogosphere, I’m calling on you to help me get Malcolm Gladwell to visit my struggling labour of love!
Bush Disapproval At Record Levels
CNN has published the results of a new poll showing President George W. Bush’s approval rating at 38% and the number of people who actively disapprove of his leadership is at 60%.
The most interesting part of the poll is the downloadable PDF which tracks his ratings all the way back to February 2001. Did you know that the week before 9/11, his approval rating was at a lukewarm 51% and the week after it jumped to 86%? Thousands dead and it gave him a 35% shot in the arm. You wonder if he’s become addicted to crises to help dig himself out of his lacklustre performance.
Feedblitz
I’ve switched to the Feedblitz RSS subscription service. If you have been reading this site in an RSS reader, and can no longer read this except by visiting the site, please resubscribe using the form in the sidebar. Thanks! You can now go back to ignoring the lack of a redesign! Perhaps when I get back from Austin…
UPDATE: Ok, I realized that Feedblitz allows people to subscribe to email updates and that you can still use FeedBurner to subscribe to the actual RSS feed. Sort of confusing, but if you were subscribed before, there is now a choice of regular RSS for your reader (click the FeedBurner box in the sidebar) or updates by email (click the FeedBlitz box or enter your email address in the Subscribe box in the sidebar). Thanks for your understanding!
SXSW #6
James Invites You! (image by Kristin)
I can’t believe how fast SXSW has crept up on me. In less than two weeks, I’ll be in sunny Austin for the sixth year in a row. I remember how excited I was back in the fall of 2000 when I had already decided to attend my first time. I blogged for months and months and Nikolai joked that he’d have to create a new Bloggie Award for “Most Blogging About SXSW”. I’m older and more jaded now, not the hot up-and-comer that I was back in the pioneer days, but I’m still crazy excited to be going. Meeting up with old friends and making new ones, staying out very very late and talking geek talk. It’s going to be a much-needed shot of warmth, both meteorological and sociological. For a second year, I’ll be rooming with my buddy Neil Lee, even though he told me I snored last year.
Wikipedia = Timesink
I love the Wikipedia. I’ve spent a lot of time recently copyediting and making minor edits to articles in many different areas. But I have to wonder about the sanity of certain people when the Talk page for an extreme right-wing Belgian political party stretches to many times the length of the article itself. I mean, how many people will even read this article?
No disrespect meant to the Belgian fascists, of course.