Here He Is: Mr. 8,000!

Well, Mr. 8,000 has been crowned!

He showed up at 9:57:52 p.m. EST on a PC featuring the out-moded Microsoft Windows XP software and was humming along on the Roadrunner-Southwest ISP operated by the fine folks at the Bright House Networks.

And, he is: MY DAD!

Yes, Dean Sweetwood, you will reign as Mr. 8,000. The fabled Mark's World stein will soon find its way to your home. You know the drill: Mr. 8,000 MUST be photographed with the stein and the photograph must be shared with all of Mark's World.

Why? Well, because this is MY house and when you are in MY house... Just kidding!

Congrats, Dad! Thanks to everyone who tried to scratch their way to the top. Flawed as it is, the counter was humming all day! Don't despair, everyone else: There's always Mr. or Mrs (or Ms. or Miss) 9,000...

More later,


Mark

Calling Mr. or Ms. 8,000!

Well, the fine folks at Sitemeter have yet to get to the bottom of my screwed-up counter on the lower left. Even though July is shaping up as our most successful month ever in terms of traffic, we are only inching our way toward Mark's World's Mr. or Ms. 8,000.

The good news is that we should crown the winner this week! That will probably come just in time for Sitemeter to finally agree that Mr. or Ms. 8,000 should have been crowned in the first week in July and that we are quickly closing in on Mr. or Mrs. 9,000...

What then, you ask? Then, we'll crown double winners, if need be. Although I have no idea how such a relatively simple idea could go so awry... Just be the 8,000 visitor to the site that I can confirm via your ISP and you'll be crowned Mr. or Ms. (or Mrs. or Miss) 8,000 and you will receive the fabled Mark's World stein.

Meanwhile, that has only meant an extra-long reign for the very excellent Mrs. 7,000, Suzanne Kathro! I said "Long may she reign," and I guess that's what exactly happened...

More later,


Mark

My New Merchants and 'My Movie'

Mark's World is proud to announce that our new advertising affiliates are Amazon.Com and, by extension, Target.Com!

Now we can offer links to virtually anything you need to buy – and that will be important this holiday shopping season when we will open the shopping site of ALL shopping sites. Right now, check out the "Mark's World for Shopaholics" clickable on the left to discover stuff that Mark is either currently enjoying or plans to buy, like the big Mac OSX upgrade: Leopard. I heartily recommend all of the books listed there (and, no, Harry Potter is NOT one of them!).

Farther down on the left you'll see "Buy My Movie." A struggling young journalist in Oak Park, Ill., I was an extra in the 1988 classic comedy/adventure "Vice Versa" and you can enjoy great scenes like this one for only $9.95:



More later,


Mark

Pictures From the Dalzells

Scott has sent us some pictures from their Florida trip featuring our fun at Old Town. Up first, Scott is giving me tips on how to properly make an image. I am giving him tips on how to properly drink those 2-for-1 beers at the Sun On The Beach Bar.



Next, Scott's picture of my, uhm, legs may have been a result of too many of those 2-for-1 beers at SUN On The Beach Bar.



But, seriously folks, I believe that is Ruthann's documentation of how I dominated the Wheel-of-Fortune game at the Happy Days arcade. Hordes of children surrounded me in awe as I won THOUSANDS of points with my superior ability to slide quarters through a chute.

YOINK! In the next photo, I am snatching away a few paltry tickets from some of the children who had gathered to witness my domination of the game. They were too awed to fight back.



Actually, I have no idea what this picture shows or who these kids are...

Honey!? We didn't have any blond kids last weekend, did we?

More later,


Mark

Colbert vs. Clyde?

Well, Colbert is finally back from vacation and he's angry about ... Clyde? Check it out:



Actually, this was made over at:

ThreatDownGenerator.Com

Check it out using your own photos!

More later!


Mark

When Worlds Collide

Like his movie counterpart Clark W. Griswold, Scott Dalzell loaded up his kinfolk into the family truckster for an extended summer trip of thousands of miles on a pilgrimage to visit the world created around a cartoon critter.

And this is the tale of how Wally World, Disney World and Mark's World finally collided.

The Dalzells – Scott, Ruthann, Zack, Emma, Nathan and Luke – are friends from Crystal Lake, Ill. Mary and I used to work with Scott at the Northwest Herald and we got to know his terrific family through various get-togethers, mostly involving pro wrestling and video games, oddly enough. Scott worked in the photo department at the newspaper for many years and spent his last dozen years as photo editor. As we have moved on, so has Scott and after returning to college and earning another degree, he will start his first year as a full-time teacher this fall.

But before he starts his new gig, he packed up the family for the kind of cross-country trip that our parents once planned and we now fear. The family had already spent a week scouring every inch of Disney World by the time we invaded their condo. Saturday night, Zack and Emma got babysitting duties so Scott, Ruthann, his sister Laurie, her husband Rich, Mary and I could head out to Old Town to have a couple of drinks and eat and play.

It rained almost the entire time we were there, but its hard to have a bad time at Old Town. I had already promised Scott in an e-mail that I was going to kick his butt in that game where you use a water gun to shoot into a target and compete to see who can race to the top first. We played four rounds. Scott won three of four with Mary taking the other win (she won me a rather odd-looking Spider-Man).

Here are Scott and Ruthann, again, with their winnings. She doesn't look too happy, does she?



Ruthann might be the happiest person I've ever met. Here she is with Mary:



This picture has a back story. Scott had lost an expensive pair of Oakley sunglasses earlier in the trip. Here he is picking out a less expensive replacement pair:



It was a blast seeing all of the Dalzells again. Someone told me that one of the great things about moving to Central Florida is that you will always have visitors because, eventually, everyone comes here to play. We are definitely glad that is the case. We can't wait to visit with them again!

More later,


Mark

Put Your Newspaper On The Internet!

A couple of folks have commented about those fake newspaper pages I've been using as headers for my posts recently: How the heck did you do that?

It's easy. And I found most of these cool ideas here at this addictive site:

The Generator Blog

Essentially, these are simple, fill-in-the-blank concepts that create jpg's that you can use for blogs or to send funny e-mails (like last-minute birthday cards!). Check them out!

Fake Newspaper 1

Fake Newspaper 2

Fake Newspaper 3

Check these out and have some fun!

More later,


Mark

Update

I was informed this afternoon that the offending post over at the Northwest Herald's Web site was removed.

More later,


Mark

The No-Drama Zone

There are some days when I wonder what is in the water up north.

It does makes me happy to be way down south.

I've never seen Jim Romenesko's Poynter.Org column so full of odd tales about the Chicago-area media scene. If reporters aren't swimming with sources then editors are defending the ethics of ... No, not journalism. Promotional ads.

Tuesday morning, I received an odd "anonymous" e-mail accusing me of posting something on the Northwest Herald Web site. The e-mail was mostly remarkable for its – losing – struggle with grammar.

I went to nwherald.com and discovered that a "CWARD" had posted a link pointing to this blog with some derogatory comments directed at the Northwest Herald's editor.

I immediately e-mailed good friend and former colleague Cliff Ward ("CWARD," get it?) about the situation and he called back astounded. I didn't even have to ask; I knew he had nothing to do with the comments. Cliff and I are both former editors of the Northwest Herald and neither of us has any desire to involve ourselves in any drama or insanity NOT of our own creation. Regardless of the intention, we both object to having our names utilized on that site in such a manner.

Hey, if you like my blog, great. Feel free to share. But, please, do so in a way that is above board and honest. Use your name; don't hide behind a fake identity and don't play games another person's name or reputation. Personally, I don't like Web sites that allow unmoderated comments. So often, as I learned first-hand here, that concept seems to negatively impact the maturity of the comments posted. And what's with anonymous e-mail? Please...

I don't need to post my work on someone else's Web site. That is why I created Mark's World! If you didn't read it here, it's likely I didn't say it.

More later,


Mark

And The Hits Just Keep On Comin'

Well, the Monday New York Times did not bring comfort to the afflicted newspaper industry with a story headlined "Young Adults Are Giving Newspapers Scant Notice" by reporter Juston Jones.

One excerpt from the story, which is based mostly on a report released by the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, is especially chilling:

"The results were especially grim for newspapers. Only 16 percent of the young adults surveyed aged 18 to 30 said that they read a newspaper every day and 9 percent of teenagers said that they did. That compared with 35 percent of adults over 30. Furthermore, despite the popular belief that young people are flocking to the Internet, the survey found that teenagers and young adults were twice as likely to get daily news from television than from the Web."

You can read the article here:

Young Adults Are Giving Newspapers Scant Notice

More later,


Mark

So, I was coming out of Target Saturday having made my weekly donation, when I spied something yellow on the window of the driver's side door of my Kia.

You might recall the editors of Mark's World voted the 2002 Kia Sportage the car of the year in 2006. But I digress...

Upon closer inspection, it was a yellow sticky note which read "You need air in your right rear tire" followed by a smiley face. I walked around the back of the car and – SUNOVAGUN! – the sticky note was right! A mere 75 cents later at the 7-Eleven's air machine, and the tire was back to normal.



The tire is fine. Me? I'm somewhat disturbed about the implications of the yellow sticky note.

First, who put it there? Did some co-worker notice it in the parking lot at work? How about a neighbor here on Venetian Drive? A shopper at Target or any of the places I stopped at on Saturday?

Who is this person who apparently dispenses sticky notes in an attempt to solve other people's problems?

More importantly, what does this say about me? Not only did I not notice that my own right rear tire was low, but I didn't notice the tires of ANY car I came in contact with that day. I didn't notice other cars that needed to be washed, either.

So wrapped up in my own world – not to mention Nick Lowe's "At My Age" and The Beastie Boys' "The Mix-Up" – I went about my chores unaware of any needs of my fellow man, while this yellow sticky note vigilante was out with the goal of improving the lives of others.

I'm not sure what all of this means exactly, but I, for one, am glad there is a yellow sticky note vigilante out there... Perhaps we could all heed this person's lesson and be a little more observant – and a little less afraid to help others. Perhaps the biggest lesson here is that when someone is kind enough to take the time to issue you a warning, you should take heed!

More later,


Mark

Uh-Oh! Trouble with The Hits.

If I had been paying closer attention, I would have noticed that something was wrong with the counter on Mark's World's Sitemeter.

The Sitemeter in the lower left column tracks the hits and the page views of all those who visit Mark's World. Note that it is still far below 8,000. However, while page views fell for the second consecutive month, our actual visits in June were up to an all-time high! That, despite the paucity of my posts!

Last month, I "upgraded" my Sitemeter account. Plus, the company was going through a server change and redesign. Somehow, in all of that, my counter got screwed up.

By my reckoning, using the old methodology and the raw data I still get, we should have hit 8,000 back on July 6 or 7 during my cold from hell!

Damn!

I'm looking into this...

More later,


Mark

Hey! Look! I put my newspaper on the Internet!

But seriously folks, the cat situation at the Casa de Sweetwood is starting to approach normal again. Whatever "normal" is.

Louie is slowly recovering from a bad bout of bronchitis that he either got from Mary or from Clyde, back when Clyde had a bad cold. Clyde is completely cured of his cold. Both cats are free of conjunctivitis.

By the way, Mary is slowly recovering from bronchitis that she either got from work or from Clyde. My cold, that I got from some combination of Mary/Clyde/Louie, is completely gone.

Now, a healthy Clyde is a rambunctious Clyde. And with Louie being ill and our crazy schedules, including a mid-week trip to see The Police in Tampa/St. Pete, he has been left alone and bored. A bored kitty is a bad kitty. We have caught him on the dining room table, on top of the cupboard above the refrigerator, on the plasma TV, and, generally, running around knocking things down. He is not destructive. Maybe a tad annoying.

But damned cute. Lucky for him.

So, I had to get back to my old cat training tricks circa 1986 when a young Maine coon kitty named Ditka similarly tested my resolve. Aluminum foil covers the counters at night. A spray featuring a scent (citrus) that cats hate is used to mark MY territory. A spray bottle of water and lemon is at the ready. Plenty of yelling has left him with the confused notion that his name is "Clyde NO!"

We have also added some new diversions. The first is a two-story cat "jungle gym" that features all sorts of toys and climbing areas and catnip. He loves it.



The next is a deck of cards.

I bought the flash cards in the dollar aisle at Target. I throw them and he chases them, diving and making spectacular aerial maneuvers in order to catch them. Two turns through the deck and he's winded. Ditka eventually tired of the cards. I remember the day he looked at me with an expression that seemed to say, "What? You threw them. You chase them. I am no longer performing for you. Bring me food, human!"

SEE THE CARDS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE GYM

The good news is while Louie has been sick for the past week, Clyde has been a good brother, giving Louie space and even cleaning his head.

More later,


Mark

Parents Say the Darndest Things

I was talking to my parents the other night and they were commenting on a recent edition of "Hometown News" that is delivered to their Ormond Beach home.

They had observed that our company's weekly edition in Volusia County had so many stories and features that the daily newspaper in Daytona Beach seemed to miss. More puzzling, the Hometown News would actually publish other news stories on a more timely basis than the daily.

My Mom and Dad represent the kind of customers a newspaper company dreams about these days. They get two dailies delivered every morning. They look forward to the weekly, too. They make many buying decisions based on ads and they are occasional visitors to several newspaper Web sites.

They are also the kinds of customers newspaper companies once arrogantly believed would "always be there." Hence, they are the kinds of customers many newspapers have taken for granted.

In addition to noticing that the daily newspaper is chasing the weekly for some of the news, they also have noticed the daily is changing. Long-time features that they had come to expect when they pay their subscription fee are gone. The papers are getting thinner. Their observation: "Newspapers are really going downhill," my Mom told me the other night.

Ah, really? I mean, you weren't fooled? Damn. Some newspapers have been trying so hard to deceive you. Seems like a good idea for a book...

So, I am fighting off this summer cold and surfing a bit on the computer when I came across an item on Jim Romenesko's addictive Poynter.Org page. Dean Miller, executive editor of the Post Register in Idaho Fall "says the problem with (newspaper industry) layoff stories is that they provide zero context. He'd like to see a Romenesko Contextual Calculator that shows what percentage of staff is being laid off," Jim writes.

Read Miller's piece, "The Problem With Layoff Stories," here:

The Problem With Layoff Stories

Of course, I have to respond... Blame the cold meds.

While Dean Miller's idea for a contextual calculator seems a well-intentioned concept, it begs the larger question: Why start now? 
 
In what other previous circumstances might a "contextual calculator" have been utilized? 
 
Did the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it began to cut reporting positions and features in the past decade with no other goal than to protect 25-40 percent NOI when revenue began to be siphoned off by the Digital Age? 
 
Did the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it removed readers' favorite features (TV listings, stock tables, local political cartoonists, local film reviewers, "chicken-dinner" news, reader-submitted items, calendars, et al) from its pages? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it reports on ABC/FAS-FAX circulation figures but omits the layered realties of third-party sales, "the 25-percent rule," et al from readers and advertisers? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when errors are magnified daily because seasoned (i.e. "expensive") pro's are pushed out and replaced by cheap labor that makes rookie mistakes? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it departs from basic customer service like delivering a paper precisely where the reader requests it and guaranteeing a delivery time? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it increasingly farms out every job from reporting to photography to newspaper delivery to free-lance non-employees? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it rejects audience-friendly zoning opportunities and creative publishing tools like address-specific delivery to embrace a one-size-fits-all methodology for a broad spectrum of diverse peoples over diverse geographies? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it stands by and allows the death of photojournalism as a valued and respected practice? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it promotes the death of a "local voice" as it drives columnists, editorial cartoonists and daily, local editorial opinions from its pages? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when it abandons its watchdog role in a community and succumbs to the trend of "light" news? 
 
Does the daily newspaper industry apply a contextual calculator when, in the Internet push, it fails to note that so many weak Web sites are really a front for the lucrative bonanza some publishers envision when they can stop buying newsprint by the ton and stop spending so much money to deliver a "newspaper?" 
 
"Clarity Movement?" If the request is to be clear or even fair, then there is much that must be put into context. It strikes me, however, as a little late in the game to cry "Context!" in the aftermath of so much daily newspaper industry arrogance. 
 
I know I am painting with a rather broad brush and I know that good people are doing some good work. There are some innovative publishers and editors working to create and broaden the intuitive media perspective and to invest in the various futures. The problem is that too many others are doing the cut and run. So, before anyone works too hard to apply context to certain aspects of the dilemma, perhaps the entire situation needs an honest evaluation. 
 
More later,


Mark

Quick Update!

Hi, everyone! Sorry for the lack of posts in the past week. It was eventful, not that you could tell from here...

Mary's bronchitis is nearly licked. We survived a harrowing 24 hours without air conditioning. Our work week is on a weird schedule because of the holiday. Mark scored three cases of snacks from Amazon for a total of $15.

July looks to be crazy (the week from July 8 through July 15 alone includes Grandma's 92 birthday, The Police concert and, fingers crossed, a visit with the Dalzell family) and we celebrate our 10th anniversary in August.

Meanwhile, the cats are starting to get used to each other. Last night, I snapped these exclusive pictures of Louie and Clyde not hating on each other:

KITTY TREATS: THE GREAT EQUALIZER

YOUR BREATH SMELLS LIKE CHICKEN LIVER!

More later!



Mark