The female gaze

Plasma for baby

Well, maybe not a plasma but a new study out today says that 20 percent of kids under age 3 have TVs in their room. Umm, okay. I mean who are these people that they sample?

I am feeling secure in my parenting knowing we only have one TV set in our house. And it's in the family room. (Extra points). Surely 4 laptops and 2 PCs all DVD ready in a 1400 square foot home with two adults and 2 kids under 10 can't count .. .... .

From the Chicago Tribune story:

The number of shows aimed at babies has exploded in the last decade, with video titles such as "Brainy Baby" and "Baby Einstein" joined last year by BabyFirstTV, billed as the first satellite channel catering to infants. Makers of the shows often bill them as educational aids, though researchers say there is no solid evidence to back such claims.

Nothing like a good guilt study to come out on a Monday.

This just in: Women being sexually harrassed online

Tommorrow's WP article headlined, "Sexual Threats Stifle Some Female Bloggers" says women bloggers, more than men, are targets of sexual harrassment online:

A female freelance writer who blogged about the pornography industry was threatened with rape. A single mother who blogged about "the daily ins and outs of being a mom" was threatened by a cyber-stalker who claimed that she beat her son and that he had her under surveillance. Kathy Sierra, who won a large following by blogging about designing software that makes people happy, became a target of anonymous online attacks that included photos of her with a noose around her neck and a muzzle over her mouth.

Umm, is this any different than in the real world?

Like TV is really old

Cute article from Wired which reads like the TV soundtrack of my childhood and mixes with my adult obession on all things media studies. Did I write this?

Related, kinda: I sat through a painful informational interview the other day (some cuteish internish trying to work my boss for a J-O-B) where this 19-year-old almost college grad from Amercian U. tells me, "A television set is the most obsolete technology out there. You can't do a thing with it. It's a one-way communication device." Of course this is true but cutie pie had already hit a nerve with me what with being all, err, cute and smart and ambitous AND transparently faking her interest in everything my editor said. So in her attempt to ursurp my smarty-pants-media-savvy girl role I told her that while On Demand was surely where it was at that there would always be the lowest common demoninator who needed someone to program their world and deliver. She took out her notebook to jot that down. Had our time not almost been up I would have really started making stuff up.

 

Blitch

Why am I reading dlisted.com when should be studying up on Seattle and my new adventure in online journalism? Because apparently there are lessons to be learned from celebrity gossip about my trade! (yay)

Vogue's H.B.I.C, Anna Wintour, apparently hates the word "blog" and is forcing staffers to come up with a better word. Vogue is expanding their website and want to include a "blog" but Anna wants nothing to do with the word.

An inside source said, "She refuses to call anything on her site a blog and has charged her staff with coming up with a new word that isn't as garish-sounding. She wants it ASAP - in time for launch."

Full story here

Glam and glitz on the third-world roller coaster

I live in a city that is losing its young couples, young couples with families, by the dozens. People are tired of the crime, the inside-politics, the slow wheels of federal government to trickle down to their flooded-out doorstep. But things keep people here, strangely. Like the Saints. They are winning. They may be going to the Super Bowl. Divine intervention for a team aptly named. And there are other signs. Like the news of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt deciding to move here and to, "send their kids to school in New Orleans." But wait, that's not a sign for the good. These are the celebutantes that hand out Christmas gifts in Cambodia--in front of the pandering press. To me this only solidifies that fact that New Orleans is in the third-world realm. Our public education system is in complete disrepair.

Before Katrina struck the Orleans Parish school system was in the process of being taken over by a national financial turn-around firm and was being investigated by the FBI for wrong-doing and mismanagement of about $20 million dollars. The storm was a chance to clean house. Well, don't hold your breath. And our racially divided private school system is not helping matters. No one is invested in our public system because no one goes there. Except to urban gems such as Lusher Elementary. A public magnet school that is now a charter of the public school system and is ranked as the state's top public offering. Haves and have nots. Maybe Jolie would like to talk to me about how to get into Lusher. Or maybe they'll just charter a school themselves.

I don't mean to be cynical. It's just that every one around me is leaving this place and I can't deny that I am not thinking of it myself. My husband and I are such tormented souls. We decided last Saturday night after the Saints won that if they did indeed win the Super Bowl we would stay. We would fight for what we love and consider Sean Payton our messiah. And if they lose, well, we're outta here. So for a family that has never, ever watched a football game it is now the prime focus of our lives. This is pure insanity. So is New Orleans. And so is the idea that Jolie and Pitt would really want to move here and raise their family. But you know, they may just fit right in with the rest of us.