Steven Davy's notes from the net

Exploring multimedia. Occasional maker of GIFs.

[theparisreview]

Sylvia Plath was born on this day in 1932. Listen to her read her poem “Daddy.”

[stevendavy]

POTUS did a little tango yesterday. Not bad.

[stevendavy]

What is TATP? Well, ISIS’ fav bomb-making chemical for one.

[stevendavy]

This monkey is driving his wheelchair with just his mind. Yep http://qz.com/631026/with-only-their-minds-monkeys-are-driving-these-wheelchairs/

[stevendavy]

Edgar Degas’ new muse: Misty Copeland.

[stevendavy]

How serious is the threat from ISIS in the US? Excellent viz over at the NYT.

[stevendavy]

In Holland, they are training eagles to take out drones.

[socialmediadesk]

[stevendavy]

Sharing What We Learn in the Social Space

[stevendavy]

Why did I save these posters?

When I was living in Belgium in 2002, a local radio station, with the awesome moniker "Radio Scopio", promoted their concerts and events using a simple black and white poster design. I thought they were great.

Whenever I was out and about and saw a new one, I felt strangely compelled to grab it for my own walls. Over time, I had a nice little collection.

I forgot all about the posters until we ran a piece from Alina Simone the other day about ephemera. Totally fascinating.

Then I remembered the posters and that for whatever reason, I had actually saved them. Take a look:

[explore-blog]

I love the visceral quality of sound and that it just feels good when you hear a noise that you like.

[explore-blog]

Radiolab's Jad Abumrad on telling stories with sound. Also see Abumrad on "gut churn" as the secret to creative success. 

[explore-blog]

You need to remove from your life the day-to-day problems that absorb most people for meaningful parts of their day. ‘You’ll see I wear only gray or blue suits,’ he said.’I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make.’ He mentioned research that shows the simple act of making decisions degrades one’s ability to make further decisions. It’s why shopping is so exhausting. ‘You need to focus your decision-making energy. You need to routinize yourself. You can’t be going through the day distracted by trivia.’

Barack Obama on optimizing decision-making, excerpted from Michael Lewis’s fantastic Vanity Fair profile of the President.

More on the psychology of how we make decisions.

(ᔥ swissmiss)

[pritheworld]

The World newsroom shares its favorite stories of 2013

[sarahmarshall3]

I joined the Wall Street Journal as social media editor for Europe, Middle East and Africa a fortnight ago. I’ve gradually been collating Twitter lists and a Google Doc of the 410 editorial staff we have in the region.

After adding names and Twitter handles to a Google Spreadsheet, I wanted to...

[stevendavy]

Kai Ryssdal in Eastport, Maine narrates the action where workers handle the cargo down at the pier.

"Five bails go on a truck, once every 90 seconds, 30 tons of paper gets lifted high off the ground and swung out into the hole.

And up on the cargo deck, the Filipino navigator of this Norwegian flagship, takes chopped up American trees to China to make paper to sell it back to us."

Great storytelling.

[stevendavy]

There are lots of gems in Wired's interview with former NYT director of multimedia, Andrew DeVigal, but I really like his thoughts about the role of audio and an audio producer on a multimedia project:

Wired: How do you weigh editing visuals against audio?

AD: I’ve found it successful to send out the videographer/photographer with an audio producer. The audio producer will come back, work as the video editor and also edit images with the photographer. I prefer the videographer/photographer not to be responsible necessarily for editing. That intended disconnect is helpful; photographers tend to be sensitive in the editing suite. Photographers are essential collaborators but shouldn’t be leaders in the editing.

Audio is the backbone to multimedia. So, if the audio producer out in the field is also the video editor, it allows for audio to drive the narrative and the visuals to support that. Editing can be more nuanced and less literal. For example, there is no need to repeat something in words or in audio that is on already in the visuals on-screen.

The entirety of the interview is definitely worth a read.

[stevendavy]

If you haven't read Kara Swisher's open letter to Jeff Bezos, you should. Among all the ink spilled last week over the Bezos purchase of the Post, Swisher's thoughts on the future of the storied news org offer some terrific insights. While the whole of the open letter is a good read, pay attention to her "An Immodest Proposal" section to the end.  Here's a nice excerpt to get you started:

To me, the most important trick is to deeply inculcate the joy of Internet journalism, without losing (actually restoring to some degree, after recent cutbacks) the great editorial values and breakthrough journalism of the Post. Fusing the old-media storytelling and news-integrity values that I learned at the Post with the Internet values of speed and personality — and, well, some level of fun at the right times — is critical.

In other words, make it clear that it is possible to do great journalism in an Internet way — even more possible because you’re freer and, most of all, readers want to read it that way. That entails inspiring the staffers of the newspaper to create content that is — as it has been — accurate, ethically sound, of high quality, but also much more compelling, and delivered in a way that modern customers want to consume it. Formulate those big stories primarily on the Web, and allow a conversation with readers to bubble up from there.

Read Swisher's post here.

[explore-blog]

The oldest pencil in the world, found in timbered house built in 1630, from this surprising history of the pencil.