i eat a lot of tomatoes and peppers and food quality and safety concerns me as much as the next person, but that is not why i am posting this screen capture. look closely at the lovely shot of the peppers. what’s the credit say? is that FLICKR? now i have been living in cave called “graduate school” for a few years so maybe i missed something, or maybe we discussed this shift in copyright and control IN graduate school and i didn’t but hadn’t seen this particular use prior to today. so the NYT is now using images found on flickr to illustrate their stories. did they contact the creator? i did, i have no trouble finding his blog through his flickr pages where he posted the link to it. maybe this image will bring him some business in some way. he was easy to find. it seems photography is not his major source of income though, he is in marketing. does this make him an amateur? he has a pro account and a lot of fans in the flickr community. my my, the lines are getting harder and harder to distinguish.
i am thinking back now to a campaign i worked on two years ago for a small t-com company (yes, there was such a thing) and used a photo from istock. i contacted the photographer for a larger size and more of that model. turns out the model was his sister and it would be a bit of work to get any more shots for the larger campaign. it wasn’t quite what i would have had, response wise, from a photographer with an established methodology like former roomie bryan rinnert, in terms of professionalism. who knows, maybe the kid was just starting out. none the less i couldn’t get more than what was up on istock, quickly. and at a bigger agency, that was critical.
so yes, in my opinion flickr and contributions to image making through web based exchange from people of all walks of life and levels of experience is here to stay. and when major news hubs start shopping for their images on these sites, i think this reinforces this. but it is still to be determined what this means in terms of image value as culture capital and image making skill as a way to make a living. the discussion continues …
each news outlet is looking for a new angle to report on the candidates and the upcoming election. today i read a BBC article that discussed obama’s childhood stay in jakarta. i was interested in the last paragraphs:
“It may be more about identity politics than actual policy, but most Indonesians do believe a change in the White House could bring a big change in the US’s attitude to their country.
After years of a foreign policy that many Indonesians viewed as anti-Muslim, who better to have in the most powerful job in the world, they say, than someone who’s lived among Muslims, and seen their world from the inside.”
identity politics as a motivator, a point of identification, a strategy for both sides of an argument … where does the visual image fit in with this … there’s so much to be done!
i have little to add to this photo from the BBC picture of the day gallery (published yesterday 4/9) other than to point out that the caption is really what caught my eye.
lawyers? really? is this what lawyers do from other countries when there is a disagreement? its worse than here … where i thought it had gotten pretty bad.
and by codes i mean more than the semiotic type …
these patches are worn by those sworn to secrecy under oath and code in military service. what an interesting design problem. the task is to create a symbol that has deeper meaning to the innermost circle of members, and a general meaning to those outsiders who might see it:
How interesting! Typography in the news. Here’s an excerpt:
“It’s one of the most visible choices Sen. Barack Obama has made, and
it’s burning up the blogosphere and YouTube, being debated on the
radio, even parodied.
It’s a typeface, of all things, one called
Gotham that the Illinois Democrat chose for his rally banners and
campaign signage, a collection of letter shapes some typographers are
calling the hot font of 2008.”
I am especially interested in the comments on the psychology of type and will look into the study that they mention. In my paper on blackletter, I was looking for that common cultural ancestor that linked the meaning of the typeface to multiple groups with different ideologies. In this case, Obama’s design team’s decision to use a typeface is being evaluated in terms of what it takes to have a typeface connotatively translate on a more ubiquitous level in popular culture.
“Typefaces with big round O’s and tails are considered more friendly,
whereas linear fonts evoke overtones of “rigidity, technology and
coldness,” according to British psychologist Dr. Aric Sigman who
published a 2001 study, “The Psychology of Fonts.”
I must get back to work, but this was too good not to blog about. (Thanks Marvin for bringing it to my attention)
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Millions of swarming honey bees are on the loose after a truck carrying crates of the insects flipped over on a California highway.
The California Highway Patrol says 8-to-12 million bees escaped Sunday from the crates in which they were stored and swarmed over an area of Highway 99 and stung officers, firefighters and tow truck drivers trying to clear the accident.
CHP Officer Michael Bradley says a tractor trailer flipped over while entering the highway on its way to Yakima, Wash. The flatbed was carrying bee crates each filled with up to 30,000 bees.
Bradley says several beekeepers driving by the accident stopped to assist in the bee wrangling.
The bees had been used in the San Joaquin Valley to pollinate crops.
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whoa! in sacramento at that. i can’t believe there also happened to be several beekeepers driving by who “stopped to help wrangle the bees”. how often does that happen? how often does the random beekeeper get called into action? i have been on the plane when the call goes out for a doctor, but this is unusual i would think. what a glorious day in beekeeping lore, a tale to tell for generations, the day the be truck tipped over and TWELVE MILLION BEES unleashed their fury on unsuspecting urbanites. i think they may even have tipped the truck. and what of the driver? did they list this as a worst possible cargo scenario?
i just finished a meeting with Santiago where he mentioned that many students here at NCSU take bee keeping as a general education course to fulfill credit hour needs. he said it was taught by a charismatic professor who makes it interesting. as i left his office, i wondered when one would bring up bee keeping class later in life, or perhaps need those skills. i wondered if they were transferable. well, in the case of this news item. they were usable not as metaphor but in direct application. who knew.
We all know that color connotes. Well, this is another example of color providing information for an article written for an audience that associates specific colors with meaning. Note the globe is yellow and orange. Perhaps there is a connection to code yellow in terrorist alert, yellow stoplights, orange construction barrels and so on … of course there is! And one glance shows the info they need to convey: peril and warning.
if you haven’t perused the facebook debate groups yet, i am thinking its becoming a powerful polling tool. it might be relevant for your policy and design pursuits. it brings up so many questions for me, about social network and its intersection with politics and policy. for example, where does the data go? how is it used? this is only one angle. from the user side, i find it a safe way to put your views out there, question by question for viewing amongst your community. many conversations about politics take place over meals and in bars with friends, some end well and others badly. its so interesting to think about these questions as timely and finite questions to discuss. in a way, its a great motivator to wrap my head around the issues in the midst of daily life chaos. for a moment, i am thinking, how do i feel about this? and then i make a decision and post it. i also find it fascinating that ron paul has or his staff has answered so many of the questions. i am not a supporter, but its a great idea to do that. access to a huge community.
anyway, i am going to post this to my blog but in the form of this letter to you b/c you came to mind first when i was playing around with it.
From the New York Times:
Professors with tenure or who are on a tenure track are now a distinct
minority on the country’s campuses, as the ranks of part-time
instructors and professors hired on a contract have swelled, according
to federal figures analyzed by the American Association of University
Professors. … read more
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As someone who is about to graduate with her masters, hoping to teach at a university in the near future and also having worked as one of the overloaded underpaid “adjuncts” that they speak of, this is an interesting article. Sure there is concern about teacher quality with tenured professors. No one wants to attend the giant chemistry 101 lecture section with the crusty old fart who hangs on til the last retirement dollar is in his account, but at the same time, that professor could be far and few between. Teaching is hard work. I have yet to meet an educator who is in it for the money. Its an all immersing, all encompassing, exhausting job. Maybe the tenure system isn’t the best way to handle long term security, but eliminating it poses a precarious opposite, less teachers willing to commit to their craft for the long term due to decreasing security and higher workloads with less time to do they job they want to do. Where’s the balance? Not sure …
