Web Comic Beef on Digg

The world’s widest web is constantly widening and hey, there’s money to be made because of a new audience. With this new audience comes new genres of self expression. Some of these are good for the world like the new genre of brilliant remixes that used to be quarantined to the ears in the club they’re being played in. Some of these are bad for the world like homemade sex tapes that show what exactly it would look like if that frightening looking/smelling couple you pass on the street were to hump in front of you. One of my favorite genre reinventions that came with the Internet is that of the comic strip. Though there have been plenty of brilliant comic strips since the Yellow Kid came out, there is also a place for Rose is Rose, Cathy, and the always disturbing Family Circus:

Damn you, Bill Keane. Damn you.

These have been kicking around for a year because they are simple, nice, and digestible for the masses. This pandering has made the Sunday Funnies page harder to look at than even some of the most ghastly of sex tapes. Luckily the rise of the Internet and the death of print media has revitalized an art form that was choking itself:

The web comic is a genre that is alive and well. Probably because of backlash towards what the art for had become, its main  weakness is that it too easily falls into the trap of being crass to shock, rather than to say anything, but web comics have a potential to be provocative in ways that so few print comics had been.

The target demographic for some of the more popular web comics is 20-something male nerds, also a target of Digg. To a web comic artist making the front page of Digg is the new way to know you’ve made it, when in the past, it was being under Mary Worth. (Still respectable. She’s quite the fox). Emerging web comic artists are naturally emulating the existing, highly-Dugg strips.

College Humor made the front pages of Digg a few days ago with a strip drawn in a suspiciously similar style to the unique one employed by The Oatmeal. Well the artist for The Oatmeal saw this and the next day published a response. Could this be the “Hit Em Up” of the web comic world? College Humor’s a beast in the Internet humor lexicon and will probably emerge unscathed but The Oatmeal made a statement that should be heard by the newcomers. Don’t mess wit a pro.

Here is a clip from a panel with the creators of xkcd and Cyanide & Happiness, Digg’s most popular comics:

Top Words on Digg

Here is a graphic with the top words in Digg titles over the past month. It provides us with a visual representation of what interests Digg users. The biggest words are pic and video, which says a lot about where people click to most impulsively, stuff they don’t have to read. But the next step down is Apple and iPhone. This shows what an influential juggernaut that company is because those words are roughly equal in size to our country’s top news maker, Barack Obama.

This graphic was created using Wordle, a visualization tool that can show some very distinct trends for the ‘visual learner’ in all of us. Here is a slideshow created about ways to utilize Wordle in the classroom:

 

UConn Journalism Crowd Sourcing Project

In my Social Media class, we read Jeff Howe’s book, “Crowd Sourcing.” In the book Howe explains the theory which basically means outsourcing a task to a large group with an open call. The Internet has exponentially increased the power of this and my class wanted to further explore the concept. So, we crowd sourced a project exploring it. My role was to find the main criticism of each chapter. Then I tweeted the posts to https://twitter.com/jgrabjournalism

Check it out!

Top Story Spotlight: Miracle Whip -vs- Colbert

There is new beef forming in our popular culture. Jay-Z and Beanie Sigel? Unimportant. John and Kate? Even less important. Stephen Colbert and a condiment? Earth-shattering.
A few months ago Miracle Whip, a company that makes a mayonnaise-like product that doesn’t call itself mayonnaise started reaching out at that profitable 18-35 market. How do you sell condiments to hip young people? With commercials like this obviously:

So, that commercial is so absurd it hurts. My roommates and I have been laughing about it for months now. One night I was watching “The Colbert Report,” and I saw a segment where he made fun of this bizarre moment in American culture.

A few days ago, a story that flew up the ranks on Digg was this copy of a letter the hip folks at Miracle Whip sent to Colbert. Looks like they came to play ball. This has turned from marketing nausea to marketing bliss. And guess where the 18-34 year-olds are? Sitting on Digg reading about Miracle Whip. Chalk one up for THE MIRACLE WHIP REVOLUTION. (Potential band name. No one steal that).

Here is one of the commercials MW aired during the 11/12 show. Touche. What’s next? Maybe they could make some serious cash off the Miracle Whip bong featured in the Colbert vid.

A Digg Movement Against Full Background Ads

Yesterday on Digg, a story rapidly rose to the top, where it sits today. But this was not your average story, rather more of a gripe. Users are protesting the full background ads that seem to be sweeping my favorite websites. I was devastated to see the scourge of the Internet hit my beloved Digg. My processor can get pretty bogged down at times and loading these flashy ads certainly doesn’t help.

There is also the looming prospects of what this may show about the future of advertising. Until now, watching TV, listening to the radio, or reading a magazine meant you would get bombarded with ads but they were separate from your desired entertainment. Then product placement came along and is becoming accepted as inevitable. Sorry guys, but I do not see this stuff going away.

Hopefully Digg will listen to the people but something tells me there’s too much money to be made here. From a design viewpoint this makes me queasy. It is visually intrusive thus affecting the site experience. Kevin Rose, listen to the thousands of users who just hate this crap.

Everyone pretend that any advertisement you see is for the Slim Suit. Way more enjoyable.

Shark Bitten in Half by Other Shark Show’s Potential of Internet Nature Programming

The nature of the nature documentary business is quite sluggish. Crews post up in rainforests or on towering piles of bat guano for hours, days, or weeks waiting for the perfect shot. I mean look at Planet Earth, probably the most successful nature doc in a long time. It took four years to film and this is a crew of 71 in 204 locations.

When something truly remarkable in nature is captured on film, the Internet provides a place for news to spread. Prior to the web, there was no way for news of natural curiosities to travel, aside from blurbs on page 6 of the paper. Social media gives a means of distribution that is so effective, we rarely have to wait for any Discovery Channel premieres.

This week an incredible story broke off the coast of Australia where the body of a Great White Shark was found. This shark was measured at 10 feet long and had some pieces missing. It turns out these pieces are the chomp marks of another shark, estimated to be around 20 feet long. Surfers are staying extra cautious, which is generally a good idea when your supposed biggest fear’s body is found with jaw-shaped pieces missing from its side.

This is just the beginning but a profit-distirubtion system needs to be worked out so the guy who has to capture a shot of hippopotami marking their territory with a mist of fecal matter, gets the money he has earned. Once there is a reliable platform, the web will revolutionize this type of documentary and change it from being something you watch months after filming to possibly something you watch live. Imagine Grizzly Man live-blogging. The value of Animal Planet and Discovery Channel increases exponentially with digital video archives.

I’ll leave you with an epic hippo fight:

Digg Ups the Ads

Digg’s advertising has been on the incline of late. It started with the banner ads. Though I was slightly miffed to see them, I was fine with it. Digg gots to get paid too.

Next, the fake stories on the front page. Hmm. These are stories that are denoted by faint lines and “sponsored by” disclosure on them, but I just recognize their noticeably lamer vibes. There is specifically a protein powder ad that reminds me of when miracle workout plans used to advertise in the back of comic books. I tried reloading until it came up but it seems like “Paranormal Activity” got all the upcoming story love for the weekend. Though these are annoying, the fact that they can be dugg and buried makes them seem a lot better.

Today Digg, you took it too far. Not only did they insert a top 3 list of “Where the Wild Things Are” stories ABOVE MY TOP STORY LIST, but they have a banner ad that sends audio screaming out of my speakers every time my icon brushes by it.

Now, not only do I have to scroll to get to the top stories, but I also have to dodge the banner ad. I don’t have that kind of energy or hand/eye coordination. Stop it Digg. Apparently they are only doing this in certain test markets. My response is a resounding NAY.

Thank You for Saving the World, Stanislav Petrov.

On Sept. 26, 1983, one man saved the planet. He attributed a heroic action (inaction) to “a feeling in the gut.” He was persecuted for maintaining peace and avoiding a nuclear holocaust. Who is this social pariah? Never before (probably) have nerves of steel and icy veins combined to prolong the existence of mankind.

The 44-year-old Soviet Union lieutenant colonel went to work in his facility located outside of Moscow at the height of the Cold War. His job was to oversee a group monitoring satellite signals. After signals came in that the U.S.A. fired five nukes their way, the room went silent. Petrov reported this to higher-ups but the decision eventually fell into his hands. Petrov realized that no sel-respecting country would start a nuclear war with only five warheads, so he did not press the red button. Yes a red button. A blinking, red button.

That absurdly intense moment caused some waves in their government. The Soviets never officially commended or reprimanded Petrov, but he was essentially forced into early retirement. This story flew to the top of Digg last week. It is amazing how a story so pivotal to the history of the world can be so widely unknown. It exemplifies the new dimension of knowledge the Internet gives us. In print, our articles that recount such significant events are usually limited to “This Day in History” pages. Today not only are articles of historical significance available in full text, permanently and free (for the most part).

Historical articles are also going to be looked at and surge in popularity at telling points in society’s time line. Could story have a little more weight to it because we live in a world where a president in two wars was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize and Petrov was shunned from his military. Or maybe people just need a reminder of one of the craziest fucking moments in the history of mankind. Big ups to my friend, Owen for sending me a link to a documentary about the incident I will be checking out later. Here is another historical news item, the first ever hydrogen bomb detonation.

Digg iPhone App Awkwardly Confirmed By Kevin Rose

This week the FOWA (Future of Web Apps) convention went down in London. There, two lucky bloggers for the tech sitre, Sofaprat, got to interview Kevin Rose, founder of Digg. Before their recorded interview, Rose let the reporters sneak a peek at the Digg iPhone app, currently in development.

Rose certainly did not think these guys were going to corner him into talking about the app on camera, as evidenced by the nervous geek cackles that follow the question. But because he is such a laid-back guy, Rose let them break the story. Though other iPhone apps exist for Digg, the community has voiced requests for an app with a user-friendly function for commenting on stories. It seems like this is a little late in the game for Digg to be just now perfecting an iPhone app, so expectations are high.

Also worth noting are Rose’s plans for the future “Long Tail” approach for Digg, in which categorized stories are pushed for a more individualized online experience. If Digg figures out how to make the Linux stories never again appear for me, this sounds like a good idea.

Glenn Beck Hatred Fail

Let me start this off by saying that I detest Glenn Beck as much as the next reasonable human being. Politics aside, the man uses his startling, glossed over, Precious Moments eyes to hypnotize fear into an ignorant target audience while his disjointed logic goes unquestioned by his faithfuls. Today, Conservatives are much less powerful than their foes and trying to get their groove back. Beck’s faithfuls belong to a demographic of that group that is angry and scared. The current President’s policy mirrors their own on Opposite Day and their influence is has been inconsequential for the most part. It is okay to be angry, but fear has never solved anything in the United States.

I think this guy needs to be made fun of until he is banished to the Elephant Graveyard, but his adversaries need to figure out a better way to get him out of the spotlight. The Digg community has been quite vocal against Beck’s lust for harvesting fear. There have been 1,028 Glenn Beck submissions to Digg over the last 30 days and though I didn’t check but probably about 3 are not ripping him to shreds. But just like with any self-respecting backlash, things have gone a little overboard.

Yesterday a story appeared on Digg’s front page and eventually rose to its top 10 most popular list, entitled “Glenn Beck Throws A Live Frog Into Boiling Water.” I clicked because I am after all, partially human. Beck has this thing he does where he treats his audience like a fourth grade science class and uses props to drive an idea home. Soon, Sean Hannity will start building dioramas of Saddam’s forbidden WMD stash. Today for his demonstration, Beck decided to tell the audience he was throwing a live frog into boiling water explaining the frog would jump out because of the sudden temperature change, as opposed to how a frog will die in a pot of water slowly being heated up. He purported Obama was “galvanizing the country” us with his extreme bills. So Beck picks up the frog in his hand and rants about how Obama has “made us think,” (God forbid) and builds it all up to his thrusting his hands toward the water like a failed magician as the audience scratches their heads and wonders if anything even happened. He then goes “Forget the frogs,” as nothing jumps out and continues speaking his ca-ca. The stunt enraged some users, so they Dugg it up. Well, nothing happened. Even taken apart frame by frame you see nothing leave Beck’s puffy, pink fingers. And I am no master of detail who picks up on the world’s subtleties. This is obvious.

The Digg community that dugg up this story have damaged the credibiltiy of Digg as a potential news aggregator. By pushing this utterly stupid lie, Digg looks like the most biased and most ignorant news source going. Even the Huffington Post, who essentially ran a day-long ad for the new Michael Moore movie as their headline, did not touch this crap. Digg has given us an opportunity to, as a community of forward thinking networked individuals, do some good in the mysterious world that is journalism today. Every time that privilege is abused, it is less impactful the next time. Don’t blow that on sensationalism.