Sunday, October 31, 2004

SUNDAY COMICS [Begging To Differ] 9:55:20 PM    comment []

Teaching Street to Street, Person to Person Journalism. Temple University has started a new urban journalism lab that's taking its students out into the streets of Philadelphia. Thomas Petner, a long time TV journalist, who in 1999 joined the dot.com revolution, now as an associate professor at Temple directs the Multimedia Urban Reporting Lab. Join us as we learn more about street to street, point to point micro journalism in this Journalism and the Public: Restoring the Trust IM Interview. Leonard Witt: Hi Thomas, let's start by talking about Temple University's Multimedia Urban News Room Lab (MURL). What is it and why did Temple decide to go this route? Thomas Petner: The MURL program is based out of our Center City campus. It's a newsroom environment where students have an opportunity to get a "hands on" experience. We work across platforms from broadcast to print to online. They learn journalism is this converged environment, which hopefully prepares them for the brave new media world. The why of this program is pretty simple. The media landscape is changing quickly -- perhaps too quickly -- and students need to be prepared to deal with all the pressures (Continued at PJNet Today) [unmediated] 9:52:49 PM    comment []

A Private Female Act. Voting is a private act. Women voting THEIR OWN MINDS can make a difference.  . . . VOTE on Tuesday Nov. 2 If you are having trouble voting contact: www.ourvote.com Call 1-866-OURVOTE (1-866-687-8683) [Girl In the Locker Room!] 9:43:07 PM    comment []

To Some Fool, Thanks for Everything! Love, Nigerian Spammer. BB reader jon rahoi writes, "Nigerian scammers now appear to be using webdate.com to troll for victims to save 'damsels' in distress. I've posted one damsel's emails leading to the pitch." Excerpt: # "Hi dear i have added you to my chat friend right now i left an offline for you, hope to catch you on later lol benny and one more thing your physic i like it kool keep it up, lol." # "Hi its nice to hear from you. Well i into sales of aretifacts and it carried me far and wide but this is my first visit to africa. I am currently in nigeria and its a lovely place. Well i have not visited china before would love to some day and dont worry when i come back i will tell you all about africa when we go out for dinner. Well is nice to hear from you. Lol." # "Thanks for writing back. I am glad you did. Well i dont know where to start. Well i sold my paintings to a client and he has refused to pay up i have not seen him since the last 3 days i contacted the local police here and they cant seem to find him. I dont have enough money to pay for my hotel bills and settle my agent. Please i want your assistance. I need 450 dollars to add to the money i have so i can payup clear my name and come back home this week, thanks for your kind assistance. Lol benny." [Jon continues:] "So the whole profile on webdate is just more Nigerian scammers trolling for desperate horny foreigners willing to save a damsel in distress. "Is it just me, or does Nigeria sound like the bar in House of Games? Does David Mamet live there? Is it near Mos Eisley Spaceport?" Link New group blog on e-voting Ed Felten says: [We've launched] a new group blog on e-voting, from a group of leading experts on e-voting technology. Members thus far include David Dill, Ed Felten, Joe Hall, Avi Rubin, Adam Stubblefield, and Dan Wallach. The site's goal is to provide one-stop shopping for e-voting news and analysis, to the public and the press, on election day and thereafter. Link (thanks, Xeni!) 9:43:06 PM    comment []

Catalog of Bush's flip-flops [bOing bOing] 12:42:11 PM    comment []

Iranian Lawmakers Vote to Resume Uranium Enrichment. Iran's parliament unanimously approved the outline of a bill Sunday that would require the government to resume uranium enrichment. By By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. [NYT > International] 12:41:46 PM    comment []

Sunday Oct 31: Kerry 283, Bush 246. Today's map It was bound to happen and it happened. Today we have more state polls than there are states. There are 54 new polls in 22 states today. Furthermore, the lead has changed in five states, and all five changes favor Kerry. As a result, Kerry has now passed Bush in the electoral college. If today's results are the final results Wednesday morning, John Kerry will be elected as the 44th President of the United States, with 283 votes in the electoral college to George Bush's 246. But don't count on it. Many of Kerry's leads are razor thin. Counting only the strong + weak states, Bush leads 229 to 196, with 113 electoral votes in the tossup category Kerry's leads in the tossup states mean little to nothing. The turnout Tuesday will determine who wins. Let's take a look at what happened state by state. New polls in Iowa, Michigan and New Mexico reverse Bush's previous leads and now favor Kerry by 1% in each case, well within the margin of error (about 4% in most cases). New Hampshire, which had been in the Bush column is now tied at 47% each. Finally, New Jersey is now safely back in the Kerry column with an 8% lead. Kerry retains his lead in Florida and Bush retains his lead in Ohio. Mason-Dixon, Rasmussen, and Zogby all released multiple polls yesterday in many of the battleground states. Here is a table summarizing the results. The last column shows the Kerry-Bush-Tied score, including all the polls even those not shown (also Strategic Vision). State Mason-Dixon Rasmussen Zogby K-B-T Florida Bush by 4% Bush by 1% Kerry by 2% 1-2-0 Iowa   Tied Kerry by 1% 2-2-1 Michigan Kerry by 2% Kerry by 3% Kerry by 1% 3-0-0 Minnesota Bush by 1% Bush by 1% Kerry by 3% 2-2-0 New Mexico Bush by 4%   Bush by 9% 1-2-0 Nevada Bush by 6% Tied Bush by 4% 0-2-1 Ohio Bush by 3% Bush by 1% Bush by 5% 0-4-0 Pennsylvania Kerry by 2% Kerry by 2% Kerry by 3% 4-0-1 Wisconsin Kerry by 2% Kerry by 2% Kerry by 8% 3-2-0 Since Friday, I am also producing a map showing an average of the nonpartisan polls with a lookback window of 3 days. To see it, click on Averaged polls on the menu.  . . . In the event of an attack on the site, please try www.electoral-vote3.com, www.electoral-vote4.com, etc. In the coming days I may update the site multiple times/day. Whenever I change the main site, half a dozen 60 MB files get shipped out. It takes a while so the backups aren't as fresh as the main site, so use the main site unless it becomes unreachable. I just upgraded each of the main servers to 2 GB each. They should be able to handle a thousand requests/sec each now. Just getting those down will require a very large attack. Getting all the servers down will be nearly impossible. And Sunday wouldn't be Sunday without a new cartoon of the week. Tomorrow is the big day when the Votemaster comes out of the closet into broad daylight. If you are curious, be sure to check back tomorrow. [Electoral Vote Predictor 2004] (And there's lots more, of course. Go check it out.) 12:40:49 PM    comment []