iLind.net

There's still plenty of time to vote...

You've heard of the Oscars? Well, now there are the Oscats!

And our Kaaawa Cats are nominees for this month's Oscat Award.

Please visit the Oscat nominees by clicking on the Kaaawa Cats (below) and then cast your vote at the bottom of the Oscat page.

April 9, 2005 - Saturday

I expect things will be a bit chaotic through next weekend with the arrival of Meda's sister and her husband this afternoon. Hopefully my schedule won't be too far off for the week, but bear with me.

Hawaii Island Journal, published and distributed on the Big Island, is apparently up for sale. It looks like another opportunity for Gannett to continue it's news consolidation, but Honolulu Weekly publisher Laurie Carlson is also said to be trying to negotiate a deal, a move probably more politically acceptable to HIJ publisher Lane Wick and the newspaper's regular readers.

Speaking of the Big Island, could it be true that West Hawaii Today is the second largest revenue generator in the Stephens Media Group chain, with only the Las Vegas Review-Journal bringing in more? Meanwhile, cross-island "sister" publication, the Hawaii Tribune-Herald, continues to be mired in acrimonious contract negotiations with the Newspaper Guild. There are rumblings of threats by Stephens' negotiators to close down the unionized Trib and simply expand the non-union WHT, not the first time these have been heard.

And Pacific Business News has announced that they're moving their printing from MidWeek to the Advertiser, which will add more color to their look. I suppose that frees up more press time for the new MidWeek weekend edition, but the revenue loss probably still hurts.

April 8, 2005 - Friday

The U.S. District Court in Honolulu lags behind many others on the mainland in making case documents available online. While case dockets or indexes for Hawaii cases are accessible via the Internet, individual documents cannot be retrieved online. In many other jurisdictions, though, documents can be retrieved. For example, click here to view the indictment of Paul Boghosian for conspiracy and commercial bribery for his role in an investment group that bid for Hawaiian Airlines. I downloaded the file from the courts' PACER system. Although news coverage has been good, eyeballing the actual documents is almost always preferred.

I wonder why our newspapers don't make more use of their web sites to offer this kind of substantive background--direct access to the documents that stories are based on. It would impose a good discipline by encouraging reporters to obtain source documents rather than rely on what people have to say about the documents.

With the continuing controversy spawned by the Army land grab to support its new Stryker division here, it's surprising that the recent disclosures of Stryker defects hasn't received more attention. It seems we're losing land for a lemon!

Two dog stories of note. There's the dog rescued in Iraq by Kaneohe marines that finally obtained a "doggie passport" out of the country so that he could be adopted by a marine family in California. And then there's Comet, the Seattle golden retriever that got the $45,000 stem-cell cancer treatment. I'm ready to buy stock in that vet's practice.

And checking around for cat-related stories today, I found this great cat watching column from Louisville and a Chicago Tribune story on the Wisconsin debate over a plan to allow hunters to shoot feral cats.

For an idea of the state of sophisticated multimedia marketing, try this AdWeek story about Burger King's chicken pitch.

Finally, give your brain a workout with the ZoomQuilt. Try it.

April 7, 2005 - Thursday

The recent Manoa rape triggered a decades-old memory of being attacked on the street for writer Glenda Chung Hinchey, who promptly wrote out and agreed to share her recollection.

Yesterday's Star-Bulletin editorial concerning Gov. Lingle's somewhat politicized public service announcements (PSAs) being offered to local radio stations for broadcast clashed directly with its headline, leading me to wonder whether the disconnect might reflect a political clash within the newspaper.

The headline, "Governor's radio messages are within her rights", leads the reader to expect the editorial to defend Lingle's taped PSAs, while the editorial itself takes a cautious but critical approach to the issue of whether these are appropriate. The editorial concludes that the PSAs "are unquestionably political" and, while noting that such use is no longer prohibited by the FCC, cites reasons that it might be ill-advised. The quick take provided by the headline ignores the overall tone of the editorial.

The next question seems to be whether the broadcast of "unquestioningly political" PSAs becomes subject to rules of the Campaign Spending Commission.

From the Christian Peacemaker Teams working in Iraq comes this account of civilians injured or killed in U.S. checkpoint shootings, concluding that "something is out of control."

Wet weather on several recent mornings brought out our umbrellas and left us with wet shoes, if not a dampened demeanor. But the water along Kekio Road was welcomed by the ducks that live nearby, as this photo attests.

click for larger version

April 6, 2005 - Wednesday

Noted yesterday: Both the Advertiser and Star-Bulletin featured the same AP photo of mourners at the Vatican by Andrew Medichini on their respective front pages.

Also noted: While both newspapers covered a Monday rally against rape at the UH Manoa campus, both did so in "he said-she said" style. Protesters called for changes. UH administrators said, essentially, "sure, but we're already doing everything we can and more." (Click here for the Advertiser and Star-Bulletin versions of the story).

But neither newspaper reports seeking out any additional information to evaluate the administration's protestations or independently assess the situation. This is particularly surprising since a report released minutes before the rally details both the dimensions of the existing problem and illustrates campus shortcomings. Neither paper mentioned the report. It was at least noted in a story by the campus newspaper, Ka Leo, although without details.

The full report, which is now circulating at the Manoa campus, is available here and includes lots of rich data which should support additional reporting.

I've had comments going both ways on the issue of coverage of the pope. Here's one reaction from a long-time newsman:

I disagree with you on the papal coverage. We can read what we want and skip what we don't want. TV still is equipped with off and mute buttons.

I liked this in today's Toronto Star: "He looks neither serene nor pained. He looks, simply, dead.' "

But another reader took a contrary position:

Ian, gotta agree with you on the "All pope, all the time, coverage." It's really gotten out of hand. And I'm a Roman Catholic. His history is impressive and his contributions to mankind are as well. But we really don't have to get into all the details of the rituals of the church in selecting a pope.

As a society, we're missing the point. He was a great leader of the church and set an example for us all. The Vatican had no army, no large foreign aid package and yet influenced the world, based on ideas, faith and morals. We should follow that example.

Not fawn over the mundane details of a reporter's near pope experience. Tim Russert was mentioning something about a visit to Rome with Bryant Gumbal, Jane Pauley and others and how they gave him an Easter basket from Poland and a NBC baseball cap. Wow, talk about "must see t.v.."

Let's remember him for his efforts and his tribulations. As you point out, he was a messenger of God, not God and we should not worship him as God on Earth, otherwise we miss the "message."

April 5, 2005 - Tuesday

A group of online publishers, including the New York Times, has agreed to pay up to $18 million in royalties to freelance writers whose work was distributed online without their permission. It's a major victory for writers and at least a temporary setback for media companies asserting global rights to anything they publish.

Reuters trouble with its employees has become an issue for investors, according to a recent Motley Fool column.

Local news media missed a bet by failing to cover the 50th Oregon State University luau attended by a reported 1,000 people in Corvalis, Or., over the weekend. You read that right--50th!!

Business Week Online reported last week on the Hawaii land holdings of Steve Case.

At least one reader disagreed with my "no more Pope" comments yesterday:

Most of the time I find myself nodding in unconscious agreement while reading your diary entries, but I have to go against the grain on the "Enough of the Pope already." thoughts.

With the possible exception of China, there are more people who identify themselves as Roman Catholics than there are citizens of any single country. And with the possible exception of the oppressive Kim Jong Il, the Pope commands a stronger feeling of loyalty than any ruler of any nation. This particular Pope served for 26 years, is given much of the credit for the fall of Communism, and has personally touched the lives of millions of individuals, while indirectly influencing over a billion more.

I'm not a particularly religious person, but I believe that Pope John Paul II deserves every bit of the worldwide press he's receiving, and probably more.

I think even you would at least agree that he deserves it more than Ronald Reagan?

Well, I still say the quantity of coverage is excessive--he wasn't God, after all, just a focused guy who rose to the top of a what is likely would be recognized as a cut throat political entity if we had any substantive reporting of its management, dynamics, powers and impacts. I've for reporting that goes beyond the basics to get at those dymanics. If we don't get that, the rest is just spin draped in religious claims. Propaganda that few are willing to question. In my view, not good. Sorry.

April 4, 2005 - Monday

Enough of the Pope already.

The amount of newsprint and reporter-hours spent on maudlin and superficial reporting of his decline and death was enough to keep me from looking at the newspapers for the last several days. The Star-Bulletin's front page yesterday belonged in the pews rather than the news racks with it's "Into God’s embrace" photo and headline in huge letters that spanned the full width of the page.

I suppose everyone is so jumpy about the politics of religion these days that it's almost impossible to find straight forward reporting on the business and politics of Catholicism, or Mormonism, or any of these faith-based corporate states.

Coverage of the pope is a reminder that there's space in the news hole for coverage of religion. Too bad it's mostly the fluff, spin, and glitter worthy of a sacred cow (or graven image).

Political junkies will appreciate this report on an upcoming application of existing technologies, linking GPS-capable phones to campaign contribution databases. All I can say is, "wow!"

Here's another of those "why are our county officials wasting money flying to a convention in Hawaii?" stories, this one from Florida. One sentence captures our problem:

"It's not an unusual event," she said. "It just happens to be an unusual location that will get some attention because of its location, when Minnesota and Philadelphia don't get much attention."

The rest of the country apparently considers us an "unusual" location, for good or ill.

With the changes in our feline household, it was time for another annual census. So here it is, Census 2005. Just click on Harriet's photo and you'll be transported to the big count. Here's a hint: Any more cats and I'll run out of fingers and toes.

April 3, 2005 - Sunday

A reader notes that yesterday's Advertiser still wasn't available online at 6:59 a.m., although it apparently was posted just a few minutes later. Of course, this page appeared much later, so I'm not pointing any fingers.

Oh oh. The Federal Election Commission is proposing new rules governing how campaign finance law will be applied to the Internet and soliciting public suggestions and commnets. This will likely become a very hot topic.

I'm still digging through old stuff, ranging from writing samples (grade school through college), newspaper clips, some boy scout merit badges, an old Aloha Week ribbon, correspondence from my year as high school student body president, and this 6th grade self-portrait. There are also more local publications from the 1970's, obscure documents from Hawaii protests of the same period, and books that will enrich someone else's life at the next Friends of the Library sale.

One other item caught my eye. It's a notice of the availability of student health insurance dating from my second year at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington. The cost of health and accident insurance for the full year (1966-67): $17.65. That's for the whole year, not per week.

Today's insurance offered UH students runs around $1,000 for the year.

There are times of day when you would be hard pressed to find any of our cats. They disappear into hidden sleeping spots or melt into hunting territory. Then there are those other tmes when it seems cats are everywhere. This was one of the latter. Just click on the photo for a closer look.