Monthly Archives: March 2010

Cold War Kid

Posted on March 31, 2010 | 5 Comments

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Posted in Family Stuff

5 Secrets to Landing a Media Job in NYC

Posted on March 24, 2010 | 3 Comments


This post is an answer to a question I get all the time: “How do I get a job in the media in NYC?” I’ve written the same email response again and again over the years, so I thought I’d post it here so I could just respond with a URL from now on.

Secret #1 is a fairly obvious one: Internships. Jobs are hard to get, internships are easier to get–especially the unpaid kind. For some reason, universities keep cranking out students that want to be journalists, and while there aren’t NEARLY enough entry-level jobs for even half of them, interns are always coming and going, so there are fresh openings every few months.

The end goal of Secret #1 is to have a good internship on your resume when you start applying for paid gigs. Editors love to see clips from publications they’ve heard of, partly because it means a reputable publication has already vetted you, and partly because it reinforces our notion of a small, clubby media world in NYC. “Oh, you worked at such-and-such? How’s so-and-so?” Answer that question correctly, and you’re IN!

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Posted in New York Stuff, Tech Stuff

Mediscare

Posted on March 23, 2010 | 22 Comments

I almost never write about politics on this blog–I never seem to agree with anyone about anything, and I hate reading political flame wars in the comments (especially because I always get suckered into participating). Instead, I have a secret political blog that I almost never post to, but it’s there in case I need to put some thoughts down. But I felt like this was an issue that I can talk about with my friends without offending anyone or starting WWIII. So here goes.

I’m cautiously optimistic about the health care bill. I think it’s going to lead to good things with regards to how America cares for its poor. It’s not perfect, and it won’t help everyone, and there’s a scenario that could play out in which we end up with worse health care overall. But there’s a much better chance that lives will be improved, and even saved, on a large scale.

Universal health care is one of those issues that I’ve been trying to make up my mind about since high school (I won’t list the others, for fear of aforementioned flame war). It’s a fun issue to view through an ethicist lens, because both sides have very compelling arguments. I like issues like that–issues I can spend 15 years thinking about without being able to come to a firm conclusion.

Anyway, in the past six months, I’ve found satisfactory arguments that answer my list of public health care cons, such that I’m now very much in favor of it. Maybe having a kid has turned me liberal or something. Continue reading →

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Posted in Uncategorizable

SXSW: Privacy Parts

Posted on March 19, 2010 | 5 Comments

Got back a few days ago from my annual trip to Austin for the SXSW Interactive conference–learned a lot of cool stuff and met a lot of cool people, as always. I’ll be posting a few of my observations over the next few days, but before I do, I wanted to point you guys to the transcript from Danah Boyd’s excellent keynote address on Internet privacy and social norms.

Give it a read–the issues she’s addressing affect literally every Web user. In my former life as a tech blogger and security editor at PCMag.com, I came to realize a few things:

1) Your data is not as private as you thing

2) Your data is much more valuable than you think

3) The companies that collect data on you are using it

4) A huge subset of Web users are completely clueless. About everything. It might not even be a subset…it might be a majority.

5) It’s almost impossible to enforce any kind of privacy norms, because everyone (myself included) checks that little box that says “I agree to the terms and conditions” without reading the terms and conditions. And most of us choose the privacy defaults that we’re presented with. And most of us are completely clueless.

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Posted in Tech Stuff, Web Stuff

The Secret of Gentrification

Posted on March 5, 2010 | 4 Comments

My last NYC-real-estate rant is here. It’s a much better read.

Corinne and I moved last week (we brought the baby along too). Not a huge change, we just moved 4 blocks north to get a bit more space and some other apartmental niceties. Our neighborhood in the Upper West Side is great, and we love it up here, but at the same time, it’s a bit bizarre. We moved 4 blocks and feel like we’re in a totally different neighborhood. This whole section of town in the nineties and low 100s is like that–every block is different. You can have the quietest, quaintest little side street, and then you turn the corner and you’re in the middle of a housing project with mounted police cameras on the street lights. And then you walk one more block and you’re at the fromagerie counter at Whole Foods.

Our neighbors who’ve lived in the neighborhood more than a couple years have seen big changes. Less bodegas, more Bank of Americas. We’ve even got a Michael’s craft supply store now. The word for this change is known to all New Yorkers, but I hadn’t heard it until I moved here: Gentrification. It’s what happens to a neighborhood when middle class and professional people move in, rents go up, Starbucks flourishes, and apartments get renovated.

I’ve lived in suburbs in four different states, and never saw gentrification until I moved to New York. In California, small towns become big towns, and the older neighborhoods get crustier, home values fall, and it’s tough if not impossible to reverse that trend. Continue reading →

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Posted in New York Stuff