Conner's Blog

Well a tornado struck downtown Minneapolis today.  I was at work near the Mall of America when it happened and followed the action via Twitter and other sources.  I was a touch worried about my place because the tornado struck not far from it.  In fact the tornado struck the Electric Fetus which is less than a mile as the crow flies from my house.  But thankfully I was lucky and had no serious damage.  Lots of other people weren’t so lucky and I’m hoping they get things rolling quickly to get their homes and cars back in order.

In case you were wondering, here is the extent of the damage to my place.

A damp floor and damp sheets.  Nothing that a fan and the sun can’t fix.

Today was another example of how the man on the street armed with the right tools is the best source for news happening now.  The media may be able to present it better but following events on Twitter or elsewhere reported by citizens gets you a better picture right away.

There has been quite a lot of chatter the past few days about newspaper comments and what to do about them.  If you’re like me you probably rarely read the comments in the Star Tribune or Pioneer Press, let along CNN or other major media outlets.  I do occasionally read them but always walk away shaking my head at the insanity.  This isn’t to say there are no good comments on newspaper sites, but when people are calling sources pedophiles, as Dave Bauer mentions in his recent column, something is wrong.

Newspapers are put in a tough place though, they need traffic to sell advertisements and comments are one way to get pageviews.  Yet unmoderated comments don’t work and moderated comments lead to calls of censorship.  What are the papers supposed to do.  Here are a few ideas I’ve considered while reading these articles.

1. Pay to comment.  How about $5 per year to comment.  Pay walls are annoying but if your giving your content away for free why not make people to pay for the right to participate.  Even better why not charge $5 and then for every 5 comments that are starred/faved/voted up by fellow paid commentors you get a dollar to go toward next years fee.  Take it even further and for every 5 comment flagged/voted down by fellow commentors you get a dollar taken away from that pot.   If enough comments get voted down you have to pay the difference to rejoin next year.  If you get more than $5 in votes up you can choose a charity the newspaper donates the excess to.
2. Disable comments but actively seek out and link to blogs and other sources that comment on your stories.
3. Recruit local bloggers as commentors and moderators.  Local bloggers are your best source for insightful comments and they also have experience dealing with comments that cross the line.

The largest issue I see with newspaper comments is that those who can add a lot to their discussions are writing on local blogs.  When I want to comment on a newspaper story I either use Twitter or blog about it here.  I don’t comment on their site because the quality of the comments are so poor.  It’s not fun to comment on a story only to have the next comment be someone claiming Obama’s birth certificate is a forgery or posting rude comments about Michelle Bachman.

Personally I see forcing commentors to pay to comment as being the best solution, it’s one reason a site as large as Metafilter has grown so successfully.  People who are willing to pay to comment are usually going to add something useful, even if all they pay is $5.

Any thoughts on the issue, let me know I may not be a newspaper tycoon, but I love a good discussion.

I wouldn’t be writing this if I hadn’t met someone today who was actually worried about it.  ABC published this article a while ago, and it must have aired on channel five recently.  It’s your basic public safety piece.  It’s about a “reformed” thief who breaks into a car and a home and steals a bunch of stuff and how the family is shocked to find out they are vulnerable.

These pieces always drive me a little nuts.  Everyone’s home would be an easy target if someone spent time learning their routine.  In this example, the thief knew the family was at a Little League game so it was obvious he would have free reign of the home for an hour or so.

This was the part of the article the woman I met today was worried about.

Let’s start with your car. If your GPS has a key lock, use it. If it doesn’t, don’t list your home as “home.” Instead, call your address “ice cream store” or “supermarket.” That way, a thief can’t find out where you live.

Dear ABC, I really doubt car thieves make it a priority to rob the same person twice.  Additionally, it’s not difficult to find the home address in a vehicle.  The last time I checked your home address is on a few items on your car including the registration and possibly your insurance card.   If a thief was really stupid enough to intentionally rob the same person twice, its the work of a minute to open the glove box and put the address into your GPS.

For anyone reading this who might not have their address in their car.  Please don’t think your safe renaming your home address “Ice Cream Store”   Security by obscurity is a poor form of security in any guise.

Just when it looked like the Coleman-Franken race couldn’t get any more ridiculous.  This afternoon Norm Coleman banned a media member from a press conference in St. Paul.  The Uptake may not be a main stream media outlet, but I respect them more than many of the members of the MSM.  Why in the world did Minnesota vote for this guy?

Help spread the story, if Coleman wants to represent us he needs to let every media member participate in his press conferences regardless of the mode of delivery.