So I think I bought a new car...

Well the paperwork hasn't gone through or anything, but I have nearly bought a new car, actually it is just new to me. It is a 2001 Dodge Intrepid with 22,000 miles. It is burgundy and seems to be a very nice automobile.

Thanksgiving Wishes

I would like to wish everyone a great Thanksgiving. As per the previous message and the impending end of my first semester of graduate school, I was not able to make it back to Austintown for the holiday, but I will be back shortly. My semester ends December 16th and I should be home either the 16th or the 17th.

Anyways have a happy holiday and if your feeling productive please feel free to write a paper for me on new media and the political process.

So my car is finally dead....

So my car finally died. Just fabulous, luckly I'm not busy these next couple of weeks.

O-H-I-O

Ok so it has been a while since I have blogged...Apparently grad school is a little more time consuming than I originally anticipated. Anyway I just wanted to give a quick update of what I have done and what I will be doing over the next number of months.

This semester:

623 - Finishing up my first actual documentary. This 15-20 minute short doc tentatively entitled, 'Skating for Jesus.' This documentary is center around a Christian skateshop and skatepark in Muncie, Ind. It examines the relationship between the seemingly unlike activities of skatboarding and practicing religion. Due Date: Nov. 30.

601 - Finishing up a paper tentatively entitle, 'Looking Towards 2008: The Effects of New Media on the Political Process.' It is going to be good and it is basically the basis on my upcoming masters thesis. Due Date: First/Second week of December.

690 - Working on a five-minute piece looking at faith during times of crisis. This piece is from the footage I shot, while I was down south after Hurricane Katrina.

610 - I am pretty much done with most of the work on all three of my projects. My first class was creating a proposal for a new class for the Digital Storytelling Masters Program. My second project was creating the concept for a bar and venue for the Muncie area. This was my group project, which I did with Betsy. My third project with is still slightly unfinished is completing a website for the head of our masters program Dr. James W. Chesebro. Here it is so far: BETA

But more importantly this post was to say I am leaving Muncie again. This time I am going down to Columbus to root on the OSU Buckeyes as they on the dreaded team from up north. GO BUCKS!!!! O-H-I-O.

Moving on to next semester, I schedule and am taking: ICom 602 (research project on facebook and other online communities), Comm 605: qualitative Research Methods (hopefully I can tie my facebook research into this), ICom 630 (not really sure), ICom 670 (a one-credit project building the greatest website ever: NickGeidner.com or themediadork.com)

Plain Dealer

The Cleveland Plain Dealer has announced that they are killing the long running Sunday Magazine. The PD's Sunday Magazine launched June 29, 1919. The last issue will be December 18th.

-Full Article

Microsoft / AP video deal

Microsoft and the Associated Press just inked a deal to supply video content to newspapers for their websites. This seems to be the talk of the town today.

LostRemote.com has two articles on it.

Launch of 2006

With the Dems holding on to the governorships in New Jersy and Virginia, Arnold going zero for four, and the Texans outlawing gay marriage (while allowing the execution of mentally retarded twelve year old schoolgirls) the 2006 midterm campaign has started.

Then just think the day after the 2006 election is the launch of the 2008 Presidential Election. Fun stuff.

NBC Nightly News

Starting yesterday episode, NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams is now available online at MSNBC at about 10:00ET every evening. The stream is free and is pretty much free of commercials. Check it out and let me know what you think.

The link to the Netcast:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/

For Mac Users:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9962131/

Election Day 2005

Today is Election Day 2005 and although there are some interesting races out there I think this more importantly means tomorrow officially starts the 2006 mid-term election campaigns. 2006 will be interesting...the whole house, a third of the Senate and 36 statehouses will be up for grabs in a races that is already shaping up to be good. Also interesting will be the use of new media in these campaigns.

I will closely be watching Congressman Ted Strickland, a dem from Ohio's 6th district, as he makes a run at the Statehouse.

The World has Changed

VOD is now real.

CBS and NBC have both inked on-demand deals with Comcast and DirecTV, respectively. NBC will sell shows such as Law & Order: SVU for 99 cents without commercials, within hours of it's original airing. This is huge and is all result of ABC's deal with iTunes.

-Pointer from LostRemote.com
-Article about NBC deal.
-Article about CBS deal.

A lawyer in the family

So the Geidner family now officially has a lawyer in the family. My brother, Atty. Christopher Geidner was sworn into the Ohio Bar Association today. The swearing in was at the Ohio Supreme Court and I assume a good time was had by all.

Congrats Chris.

Election Day

Tomorrow is Election Day '05, which means after tomorrow the 2006 mid-term campaigns will really start. I think the dems have a really chance of taking over Ohio and taking back the US Senate.

Live West Wing

Way to go to Alan Alda, Jimmy Smitts, and Forrest Sawyer for their great performance in the east coast live performance of the West Wing Presidential Debate. It started by having Alan Alda's character, Sen. Arnold Vinnick, asking to have the strict rules and protocols of the debate thrown out the window. It was like what a real debate should be like, candidates challenging each other and asking each other to not just make 8 second soundbytes, but to actually explain themselves. Anyway, it was some good stuff.

CNN Article

Nick Geidner New Car Fund

If you'd like to donate to the Nick Geidner new car fund you can make checks payable to:

The Nick Geidner New Car Fund
c/o Nick Geidner
3488 N. Tillotson Apt. 31
Muncie, IN 47304

NPR Podcasts

NPR is doing very well with its podcasts. Four million downloads in apparently the last two months. All 17 podcasts are also consistently in the iTunes list of Top 100 blogs.

Pointer from LostRemote.com.

NewsLink Indiana

NewsLink Indiana, the organization which I am a GA for, has launched a podcast and vodcast. They should be available through the iPod store over the next few days. But either way here are the feed addresses:

For the podcast:
http://www.newslinkindiana.com/data/podcast.xml

For the vodcast:
http://www.newslinkindiana.com/data/vodcast.xml

Also look for big changes to be coming soon to NewsLink Indiana.

$50 Billion in Budget Cuts

As we spend hundreds of millions of dollars everyday on the war in Iraq and as we keep the "much needed" Bush Tax Cuts, which benefit the richer side of society, the money has to be cut from somewhere else. Here are a couple of places the republicans are deciding to do it:

'Raid on student aid'

It also imposes new fees on students who default on loans or consolidate them and higher fees on parents who borrow on behalf of their college-age children. California Rep. George Miller, the senior Democrat on the panel, called the package a "raid on student aid."
The Ways and Means Committee approved on a party-line vote a plan by its chairman, Rep. Bill Thomas, R-California, with so many difficult-to-swallow provisions that lawmakers and aides whispered about whether the intent was to make it hard for GOP leaders to win its passage in the full House.
It includes $3.8 billion in cuts to child support enforcement. Rep. Earl Pomeroy, D-North Dakota, charged that Republicans were appealing to the "constituency of deadbeat dads."
The bill also would tighten eligibility standards for foster care assistance in nine states and delay some lump-sum payments to very poor and elderly beneficiaries of Social Security's Supplemental Security Income program.
"It was abundantly clear that Thomas didn't want to do this stuff," said an aide to a Ways and Means Republican who spoke on condition of anonymity but cited meetings that occurred behind the scenes.
House GOP leaders this month directed Thomas to produce $8 billion in savings, eight times the original target he was assigned.
The Ways and Means plan also would eliminate payments to industries harmed by unfair foreign trade practices. Those payments come from the proceeds of duties on foreign goods "dumped" into the U.S. market.

ANWR drilling

The House Resources Committee approved a controversial plan to raise $2.4 billion in lease revenues by permitting oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Minority Democrats opposed virtually everything that was done, saying Wednesday's actions are part of a broader GOP budget blueprint that also calls for $106 billion in new tax cuts over the next five years.
"They are targeting programs for poor people to pay for tax cuts for rich people," said Rep. David Obey, D-Wisconsin. Once those tax cuts are passed, Obey added, deficits will be increasing again.


So apparently the republicans are deciding to keep the Iraq war and the tax cuts, but get rid of the environment and education.

The above section is from this CNN article.

Google Advertising

"Improving ad quality improves Google's revenue," [Eric E. Schmidt] said in an interview at the company's headquarters, known as the Googleplex. "If we target the right ad to the right person at the right time and they click it, we win." -NYT article

Incredibly interesting article on NYTimes.com today about how Google is going to take over the world. Specifically it is about Google's unique and amazing advertising system might be applicable to alot more media over the next few years. The by far most interesting possibility is using Google's ad structure with digital cable boxes and on-demand TV. The Google system could use what you watch to determine what ads you see, making those ads more effective and more valuable to the client.

Google is taking over the world. Watch Epic 2015.

NBC Nightly News

So apparently NBC is going to start streaming its "Nightly News with Brian Williams" on MSNBC.com. The feed will be available at about 10pm ET, after the West Coast feeds and airings.

Way to go NBC News. Between this and Brian Williams's blog "The Daily Nightly," I am fairly impressed with what NBC News is doing in the new media field. I really like this move. I mean, honestly, I never watch the evening network news. I am usually busy at 6:30, but if I could watch it whenever I want I really think I would be more likely to view it. So who knows maybe they are picking up one viewer.

NBC Press Release

Ball State No. 6????

Ball State Football was number 6 on the top ten plays of the day on ESPN. That is crazy. Ted Ginn and OSU was number 9.