Another approach to paying for news includes this bright idea (???) of Moving from Journalist to Content Strategist. My favorite quote about journalism is "News is what somebody somewhere wants to suppress; all the rest is advertising." - -Lord Northcliffe. In this context the strategy link is holding the bar a bit low.

I think the best analysis is from Clay Shirky Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable that basically makes the case that we are in a time of revolution and it will be ugly, unpredictable, and uncomfortable.  It is also full of possibilities, and some of us are working on the next thing for this area.

Defining what model will work here to pay for investigative journalism and what it will look like on the web is one task--if you have any ideas, drop an email to us at admins[at-sign]kicktime.org. Other issues are accessibility (how about free wireless in downtown areas?) and computer skill help (look for an update on that tomorrow.)

Pitch in on any of these projects by dropping an email at the kicktime address.

image from Paul Bradshaw

Fear not. If enough people think it is a good idea we could have community evening sessions about common computer issues. Bring in your laptop, or learn on PC and Mac laptops that leaders bring, and figure out what is making you crazy. We could meet at Main Street Station, or WTC or some other place with free wireless.

If you think this should happen, vote in the poll. Never fear, community free help is possible...but you have to vote. (right column and scroll down to see the poll)

Of particular relevance to KickTime is that this site is about 4 years old, captive of its own history and choice of platform, and also not a money-making venture.  So might KickTime fail by not keeping up with the next advance and flexibility in platform?  The site needs to change and expand, and moving it to the next step is under consideration.  Time is probably not on our side.

Citizen Garden Episode 11: Whither Ma.gnolia? from Larry Halff on Vimeo.

And yet there is a big chill in the air for Ma.gnolia users who stored bookmarks and other info via the cloud.  Ma.gnolia's cloud burst last Friday with data corruption that rivals Chicago politics.  Alas I was using the service to communicate dozens of bookmarked articles to collaborators on a project.  Last Friday it all went poof, and without a back up it seemed I was sunk.

The happy sun dog news is that I had an RSS feed on Firefox of the bookmarks and that effectively stored the important ones I was concerned about.  I created the feed on my browser as a test to make sure it was working for others--as it turns out it saved the day.  I still hope Ma.gnolia comes back, but given they are dishing instructions about finding bookmarks via Google cache, I'm beginning to think the signs are not good.

Have you heard about Iceland's new openly gay leader, or a bomb going off in Northern Ireland (can it be...), or the Hamas rocket delivered to Israel, or a gas tanker explosion in Kenya leaving 50 dead.  In each case @ckanal assembles some of the reactions on Twitter of people in country and even near the scene.  The editor of this site is Craig Kanalley who is in DePaul's school of journalism.   I think he is onto something successful.

Find the breakingtweets here on Twitter, or the website here.

If you join Twitter please follow KickTime and I'll follow you back

Lightning Over Viroqua. Thanks to Tony M for the use of the photo.  See his website here

The news is that the calendar is up and functional. The old one was unreliable with different browsers. The new Google calendar should work, although they may not be fully functional with Safari. They say take your chances.

Many organizations already maintain their calendar on Google. For those out there who lack an online schedule, think about it as a way to get your information out quickly and accurately. If you tell me it exists it can also appear on the KickTime calendar. ( admins[at]kicktime[dot]org )

That's the big news. Might also see a change in the left hand column soon. Send an email about what you want to see there. Most likely change would be links to area organizations and businesses with websites.