My Social Media Diet or Creating a Mind Sculpture

We Need a Social Media Diet  

Don’t flinch just yet.  Everyone needs to think about and plan what our minds and attention will consume.  So much content is available:  YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and more.

I read online that the last hour before going to bed and the first hour getting up should be without any electronic screen time.  Before going to bed, lay out your clothes and prepare for the next day.  Sounds like the habit of a winner, so let’s include that as part of the plan.

The guy also talks about spending his time creating content, rather than consuming it.  Not everybody is up for that, but with three blogs and a podcast and two YouTube channels, I have no excuses.

Goals of a Social Media Diet

So what would be the goal for a media diet?  For a food diet, there is a weight goal.  For a media diet, there should be goals, too.  Like hobbies, interests, entertainment, education.  Historical videos are fun.  Shouldn’t there also be production goals?  If you have them, that is.

We make a choice about what to eat, and how that will make us feel.  Shouldn’t we also do the same thing for our minds and mood?  Wouldn’t it be a good idea to step outside ourselves and take a meta look at what we want out of our life before deciding what to watch or read?

My Social Media Diet

I don’t know what is right for anyone else, but my social media diet will be one part production for four parts consumption.  It will be split into one fifth pure fun with animals and jokes and silliness.  Everyone needs that in their lives.  Another three fifths will be news and politics - from all sides.  I enjoy listening to Ben Shapiro and Jimmy Dore.  So what.  The last fifth will be hobbies: ham radio, knitting and making soap.

“Social Media Diet” 

Maybe “diet” is the wrong word.  Diets are notoriously ineffective in the long run.  “Media Plan” sounds too corporate.  “Media sculpting” means you are doing the creating.  “Media sculpture?”  There are some artists out there who already claimed that phrase.

I hesitate to use the term “information” since it is so long and cumbersome to say.  We need to make this snappy.  “Brain food” comes to mind, but its already been taken.  Or “Brain growth plan.”  Too long.  OK.  “Mind sculpture.”  Yes, that’s it!

By consciously deciding what I feed my visual senses, I have a “Mind Sculpture” plan.  I think about what I want the end result to be, and plan, roughly, how that will happen.

Let’s see how this goes.  Will keep you updated.

James Sikes and the Toyota Media Machine

One tactic to gain control of public opinion is to flood the search engines with your side of events. It helps if you have Internet sites that are large with many links to them, i.e., a lot of weight in the Google search engine algorithm. Like Toyota.

A concerted media campaign is underway to discredit James Sikes' claims of a runaway Toyota. Let's take a look at what popped up for the search term "James Sikes" over the last 24 hours and landed on the first page of Google results for "James Sikes."

Prius Chat Forums are saying that James Sikes' claims "are more fiction than fact." The home page is covered with stories accusing James Sikes of lying, deliberately trying to wear down his brakes to overheat them, and videos purporting to show James Sikes had to be lying. This web page is a an orchestrated effort of a team of people to get a message out into the public: don't believe James Sikes. There are articles, graphics, several videos professionally done, online chat groups, listservs, and even more. It had to take at least twenty people to put this message together on that web page. And the messages are all the same.

Toyotapedia.com has an article calling James Sikes' runaway Toyota story a hoax complete with a Fox news clip.

Of course others have joined in attacking Mr. Sikes, well before the NTSB has finished their review. Not that they are so impartial in the Toyota matter anyway.

What Reporters Will Never Admit...

News reporters will never admit the truth of the following:

That people care more about their dog than who the President is,

That people want to look at porn more than any newspaper or web page,

That people actually look at porn more than any newspaper or web page,

Pornography dominates Internet content, not their discoveries and thoughts, and certainly not unrelated e-commerce,

Reporters are supposed to write interesting stories that get people to look at advertisements and then buy the stuff advertised.

I have heard many whining complaints about the amount of coverage President Obama's family gets for its choice of dog. There's a secret in there. That's what people care most about. The dog. And news coverage of the First Dog is an attempt to get some of those people to actually watch the news, and consequently see the advertisements and buy the products advertised.

So you can be a purist and want only real news, or you can build a well-watched show. Producers are opting for the latter.




Andrew Wilkow, Barack Obama, Bill Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, David Brooks, Democratic Party, George F. Will, Gitmo, Goerge W. Bush, Guantanamo, John Gibson, Jon Stewart, Lawrence Kudlow, Mark Levin, Michelle Obama, Mike Church, Peggy Noonan, President Bush, President Obama, Rachel Maddow, Republican Party, Rich Lowry, Rupaul, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Media News, Columnist James Brady Dies, James Brady, James Brady Dies, James Brady Page Six Creator Dies, Page Six Creator Dies, Media News, Limbaugh Obama Comments, Mike Pence, Norah O'Donnell, Rush Limbaugh, Charles Grassley, National Science Foundation, Online Porn, Porn, Stephen Colbert, Video

Imagine - A Note to Bailout Bimbos

Imagine a radical shift in the U.S. economy such that everything is paid for up front. That businesses have cash on hand for payroll, people have the money before they buy a car, and no one uses credit.

I understand the wails of the financial industry: our economy does run on credit. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe we need to shift our mind sets to saving first.

Something I've noticed about saving for something before you buy it: you don't want to pay as much. Even if you have the full amount that you might have borrowed.

We are in for a tough transition, folks.

And the Bailout Bimbos are Paulson and Bernanke for thinking the United States Congress would just hand them $700 billion dollars without accountability.

AOL Time Warner and What's Wrong With America

Yes, I'm still going on about this. AOL Shopping had a pictorial warning older women not to dress too sexily. Cougar, indeed. My initial anger has given way to deeper thoughts 'on this crisis.' (Don't you love that phrase? Will anybody give me $700 billion dollars now?)

Patriotic American electrons are being manipulated, in the form of the Internet, to tell women that they have to buy certain clothes. It's all part of the media machine telling the public to consume, consume, consume.

Remember after September 11? We were not advised to enlist, nor to become a paramedic, but to buy, buy, buy. We have built a culture and an economy based on relentless consumerism. What a surprise it didn't last.

I will be denounced as naive for observing that content is being skewed to sell things. It began so long ago.

But after the financial collapse on Wall Street, hasn't the message filtered down to AOL Time Warner web site staff? Americans can no longer buy-buy-buy. In fact, we will have to stop buying whether we want to or not.

Dress Like A Cougar!! - AOL Shopping Bad Advice

AOL Shopping has a whole pictorial dedicated to How Not To Dress for older women, accusing older women of being "cougars" for sexy dressing. Its admonitions failed - I want to be a cougar. I now want a velour track suit. I never wanted one before. I want to wear excessive gold jewelry and have big hair - all cougar-like signs, apparently.

Oh, and by the way, what's wrong with being a cougar? I'm supposed to hide my sexuality now? To sell clothes?

This is all power-based. As the ultimate glass ceiling is being battered during our Presidential election season, the media machine AOL/Time Warner backlash is against older women expressing self-confidence and power. It's a shame-based strategy. The message is "you will be held up to ridicule if you express your sensuality, even if you do reach the impossible size six. So nothing you do is good enough. Here, buy this."

What a pleasant way to control older women! Like the age-old technique of telling women how fat they are unless they buy your clothes/shampoo/cigarettes, AOL Shopping has a list of items older women shouldn't wear. And how convenient! There are links to things you can buy to wear instead.

This AOL pictorial has made me turn a corner - watch out Juicy! And you, too, Miss Twenty-Something.

Pakistani Prez Admires Palin, i.e. The Role of Flirting in Diplomacy

A recent widower, his wife assassinated, the new President of Pakistan apparantly is an admirer of Gov. Palin.

"You are more gorgeous than you are on [television]," he told Palin after she declared that she was honored to meet him. "Now I know why the whole of America is crazy about you," Zardari added, flashing his trademark teeth-baring smile. (From TIME magazine. Click on title of post to see full article.)

It seems Pakistani feminists are outraged. But really, is it so bad? He was flirting with a potential U.S. leader. So what? As women enter the field of world leadership, isn't flirtation part of the communication repertoire? I think it should be.

I can see my husband saying something like this. He says things like this to every woman that moves, especially the old ones. And they love it. "O-o-ohh!" they squeal with delight, clap their hands, and even jump up and down. When we shop in upper northwest DC, he goes up to obvious 40-something women with babies and says, "the au pairs are getting younger and younger every year" and - without fail - they giggle and say "I'm the mother!"

So a little flirting to grease the wheels of international relationships isn't a bad thing at all. Didn't Thatcher and Pinochet have a little thing going on like that? Maybe not the best example, but you get the point.

Palin Campaign's Not Answering That Question Anymore

Sorry cheesecake. Here in America, that won't stop us from asking about Troopergate. And we can make you answer the questions.

Imagine the audacity of announcing that from now on, you aren't going to address questions you don't like. Recently, I've read a book on the history of U.S. elections and nowhere does any candidate tell the press that they aren't answering any more questions on a particular scandal.

Now, I have no surprise that Gov. Palin asked that books be banned from her local library and then fired the librarian when she refused.

What does this announcement on acceptable questions say about Sarah Palin's commitment to democracy, as opposed to order? She seems to feel that she can dictate the line of discourse. I have never actually heard that before.

Imagine Ronald Reagan telling the press corps, "No more of this arms-for-hostages stuff. I won't answer your questions." Or if Nixon said, "No more wiretap questions."

Governor Palin, running for office must be difficult for you outside of the cocoon you have always known. The presumptions you must have to really believe you can tell the U.S. media what questions will be allowed and which won't - wow. It doesn't say good things about freedom of press in Alaska. And it doesn't say good things about you.

Bruce Ivins: Sorority stalker! Anthrax killer!

Now reports are coming out that Bruce Ivins, the scientist driven to suicide by an impending arrest as the Anthrax killer, was obsessed with a sorority.

Way to go, FBI leakers, way to go. And shame on the media for going along with it, once again.

So it isn't enough to harass the wrong scientist for years. It isn't enough to try to ruin his life through leaks in the investigation. Once his innocence is shown and actual damages are needing to be paid, the F.B.I. then does the same routine with another scientist.

It is interesting to note the evolution of the leaks. Right off the bat, the FBI knew they had pushed the guy too far. So they let loose with his alleged homicidal plans. But let's face it, there isn't real evidence to connect Bruce Ivins to the Anthrax killings, so the next piece of evidence to emerge was the DNA connection.

Funny thing about DNA. It's everywhere. DNA from your coworkers is all over your house. The presence of DNA in itself doesn't prove anything unless there is no other way for it to be there except that the person committed the crime. The FBI knows that. Most people don't.

And in leaking little tidbits to the media about DNA, the FBI is trying to justify its actions in harassing a man to death.

The latest salvo in the "Slaughter Ivins" campaign is to paint him as a weird sorority stalker. Again, there is no evidence. But who cares? The media is eating this up just like they did with the first innocent scientist.

Where is press responsibility in all this? It is not their role to eat up whatever is given them and spit it out at well-timed intervals. Reporters are supposed to ask questions and challenge assumptions. Why aren't they now?

There is NO EVIDENCE linking Bruce Ivins to being in Princeton the day those Anthrax letters were mailed. NONE. Let's not forget that while you are pounding the drums for yet another potentially innocent man.

Stephanopolous Wears Too Much Makeup

Dude, if I can see your eyeshadow and mascara, you are wearing too much. And if you are interviewing the Republican candidate for President and he says that al Qaeda was in Iraq prior to our invasion, it is something you should pick up on and pursue.

In fact, a glimpse of George Stephanopolous on This Week interviewing Senator John McCain was a study in contrasts.

The skin color: McCain looked like a regular guy on t.v. Stephanopolous looked like he sprayed food coloring on himself.

The teeth: McCain had normal teeth with the usual variations. Stephanopolous looked like his mouth was full of industrial chicklets, glued together so tightly that he wouldn't even be able to floss.

The eyes: McCain had regular, droopy eyelides. Appropriate for a man his age. Stephanopolous was wearing eye shadow and mascara. Bleh!

Next to John McCain, Stephanopolous looked like a pretend man. Call me an old-fashioned girl, but I like a little rough edge on my men. And a little spine in my reporters.

Note to Ari Fleischer

Ari Fleischer has it wrong. The criticism of the press corps for failing to properly investigate the claims made to justify this war is not limited to the uncomfortable questions they asked him while he was Press Secretary.

It is the failure to investigate and report.

So Mr. Fleischer was asked questions he found tough. So what. It probably would have been easier on him if he wasn't a part of the campaign of deception in the White House that talked people and countries into a war that wasn't justified.

Leaking the National Intelligence Estimate

The National Intelligence Estimate revealed that the Bush Administration knew since September that Iran has not had a nuclear weapons program for several years. The Bush Administration could not suppress this information because it knew that the moment it did, it would be leaked to the press.

Lamentations that in the old days such things would never happen were a source of mirth to many. When an Administration scapegoats an agency, what is it expecting? Loyalty? It's more like they were expecting stupidity. What happened the last time? Intelligence information was misused and the country was led into war with Iraq.

Poor President Bush. It seems those civil servants make a difference after all.

Note to Britney Spears

Hang in there. You are talented and a lot of people care about you.

Don't listen to the idiots, lay low for a while, and get your head together. Worry about everything else later. The media machine will find somebody else to digest soon enough.