This is how all events will be covered

AgWired’s Chuck Zimmerman shares a story that illustrates the power of the blog. Syngenta (a big biotech company) had Chuck come in and blog a “media day” event a couple of weeks ago:

“This event started around 8am and was finished around 3pm. I posted 20 times including over 20 pictures and 5 audio interviews and they were all on AgWired before the end of the day (same day). Many of the posts were done during the actual presentations.

At the end of the event I burned all the pictures and audio to a CD and left it with them. They can post them onto their own website and it’s my understanding that is exactly what they plan to do. Their investment in this is minimal and yet they have immediate multimedia content that’s online before the other media attending even get home to their offices.”

No studio. No camera crew. No editors. One guy with some consumer grade gear and a truck-load of hustle. Is this journalism? I have no idea. And the people at Syngenta don’t care (as long as what Chuck posted is accurate).

If I were in charge of media at Syngenta, I’d ask everyone that covered the event to send me a link to their coverage (or a copy of the magazine article or a video clip of the TV piece, whatever). Then I’d make up a little matrix showing the coverage; when it got “out there”; and what kind of Google ranking it produced.

Trent Tomlinson on Stern

Sirius might be a great satellite radio service but I think their website sucks. My plan was to record Trent Tomlinson’s appearance this morning by streaming the audio from the Sirius website. Couldn’t get their three-day-free-trial to work. Even borrowed a password from a subscriber and couldn’t get that to work. So, unless one of you recorded this, we won’t get to listen. It shouldn’t be this difficult to steal part of the guy’s radio show.

Quick Google search found an amazing website called MarksFriggin.com. It appears this guy posts a detailed description of each day’s show. I’ll add the archive link as soon as he puts it up (tomorrow?) but if you find the show for 7/24/06 and scroll down to 7:30 a.m., you’ll find his account of Trent’s segment. Here’s a portion:

Miss Howard Stern Performs With Trent Tomlinson. 07/24/06. 8:30am
After the break Howard said he was listening to country singer Trent Tomlinson warming up during the break and he was wondering why they were letting Andrea come in to ruin it. He said the song is a little more than country and he’s not sure how he missed the song. He’s not into country music so that’s how he missed it. Trent told Howard about how he came up with the lyrics for his song ”Drunker Than Me.” Howard told the guys to perform the song before Andrea came in since she was probably going to ruin it.

Trent and his band performed the song ”Drunker Than Me” (from the album Country Is My Rock) which is the song that Andrea sang while drunk the last time she was up there at the Stern Show. Howard said he was amazed that Andrea could remember the lyrics to the song because they’re not easy to remember. Trent said he even has trouble with them sometimes.

Howard said that Trent has opened up for bands like Bon Jovi and John Mellencamp so it’s not strictly country fans that he’s performing for. Trent told Howard that one of his guys used to be in The Black Crows but he had a falling out with them. The guys said that he’s talking to the band now but he had to get out back then because they were playing too long for him. They turned into a jam band and would just keep going on and on while playing.

 

Howard spent some time talking to Trent about his career and how his father actually wanted him to be a basketball player. Trent said his father used to play himself so he tried to groom him for the same career. He said now his father is happy with what he does and calls radio stations trying to get them to play his songs.

Miltenberger Family Reunion

Jan, Lew and MA

I didn’t take a lot of pix on recent trip to Destin because Barb’s brother Chris is a damned fine photographer and snapped about 500 images. I added 20 or 30 to my flickr set.

Someone hired a professional beach photographer to get some family shots. For some reason, all beach photogs have a thing for khaki pants and white shirts. There’s a proof page here (very lo rez) but not for long. I like Chris’s images better.

Reminder: Kennett’s Trent Tomlinson on Stern Show

A reminder for Kennett readers that hometown boy Trent Tomlinson will be on Howard Stern’s show on Monday monring. I think I’m all set to record the segment and will post it here until the Sirius lawyers make me take it down.

I wanted to play the Drunker Than Me video for some neighbors last night and did a google search (drunker than me video). It still amazes me that smays.com is number five in the search results. Power to the bloggers!

And I’m never gonna leave, ever again

Saturday: 14 hours of Quality Time with Barb as we (mostly she) drove back from Destin. Sunday: Laundry, dogs, nap, more laundry. Brother-in-law Chris shot 500 pix (which I thinned down to about fifty), but just didn’t get around to posting. Now that the bandwidth is deep and wide, we’ll try to catch up here at smays.com. Like Dorothy said, there’s no place like home.

Kennett’s Tomlinson a Stern fav

J-Dub (a foam-at-the-mouth Howard Stern fan) reports that Kennett singer/songwriter Trent Tomlinson gets some mega-exposure on on Stern’s show:

Howard Stern plays one of his tunes frequently. Mrs. Howard Stern, a little drunk vixen, chose Drunker than Me as the tune to sing along to for Howard. They love it so much, that they play it all the time on the show. Good exposure for Trent.

I love the thought of Trent and Sheryl Crow co-writing and performing a song. I gotta believe somebody is already working on that.

Dan Shelley headed for Big Apple

My old pal Dan Shelley is headed for New York to become the Executive Editor of Digital Media for WCBS-TV and WCBSTV.com. Yesterday was his last day at WTMJ in Milwaukee where he has been news director since 1995. Before that Dan was ND at KTTS in Springfield. I interviewed Dan in May, 2005, shortly after he was elected chairman of RTNDA, and he talked about journalism in a digital age. I’m trying to get a follow-up interview. Stay tuned.

Northwest Hospitality

Captain RobWe wrapped up our first full day in Seattle with a delightful boat ride (do you call a 54 foot yacht a boat?) on Lake Washington, courtesy of Rob Harris and his buddy Rich. Rob is a friend and business associate of Roger and Clyde and owns a little company called Pacific Market International (they make Stanley and Alladin containers).

Rob gave us a look at Bill Gates’ lovely home (“Wave to the security man with the binoculars.”) and the houseboat where Sleepless in Seattle was filmed. The Seattle skyline at sunset was gorgeous…the weather was perfect…and Rob and Rich could not have been nicer. Not hard to see why people who live here love it so. [flickr set]

Roger visits Starbucks #1

Roger’s efforts to get us bumped up to First Class were unsuccessful and the flight was packed. I sat next to Ma and Pa Kettle and the lady in the seat next to Roger had a chicken in her lap. Got all checked in at the lovely Marriott Waterfront (hi-speed net access for $10 a day. Given the room rate, you’d think they could throw in the broadband) and headed over to Starbucks #1 to get Roger a cup of joe.

Beautiful weather here in Seattle. Like the song says, “The greenest skies you’ve ever seen.” Had a great meal…walked along the waterfront…and traded stories from Learfield’s early days.