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By Jeffrey Rosen
(Reuters) - During the "Red Scare" that swept the United States in the wake of Russia's 1917 Bolshevik revolution, the Justice Department launched a cycle of raids against radicals and leftists. The U.S. attorney general, a once-celebrated Progressive leader named A. Mitchell Palmer, gave his name to this unfolding series of attacks against civil liberties.
Though initially supported by Congress, the courts and the press, the 1919 Palmer raids revealed a darker side of the American psyche. They eventually provoked a national backlash, which inspired the formation of the American Civil Liberties Union, led to stirring free speech dissenting opinions from Supreme Court Justices Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. and Louis Brandeis, and ignited a political counter-movement determined to prevent similar civil liberties abuses in the future.
President Barack Obama is far from resembling Palmer in terms of civil liberties abuse, but his conviction in his own progressive righteousness is an unfortunate trait when it comes to designing and overseeing surveillance programs. Obama has also continued to defend the current invasive National Security Agency surveillance programs, even while insisting he welcomes a national conversation about the appropriate balance between liberty and security.
It remains to be seen, though, whether this current crackdown on American civil liberties can spark a new period of backlash from American citizens and the courts. The Obama administration has consistently swatted down lawsuits that challenge it by saying that citizens who believe they have been victims of surveillance lack standing to bring them. It has also prosecuted the very whistleblowers whose leaks made possible the national debate the president says he welcomes.
Constitutional conversations are always welcome, and the one we are having now could clarify the meaning of the Fourth Amendment's prohibitions on unreasonable searches and seizures. The real lessons of the Palmer raids, however, suggest that instead of continuing to compromise the Fourth Amendment, Obama will ultimately have to acknowledge that it constrains national security intelligence gathering. Otherwise, he risks a similarly harsh verdict in the eyes of history.
To understand what that historical verdict might look like, we can learn from the history of the Palmer raids.
On June 2, 1919, Carlo Valdinoci, wearing a suit and a pink bow tie, took a leather briefcase with a bomb to the home of Palmer, the new attorney general. As Valdinoci approached, his bomb prematurely exploded and he accidentally blew himself up on the front steps.
The explosion sent shock waves throughout the upscale Washington neighborhood. A young assistant secretary of the Navy, Franklin D. Roosevelt, heard the explosion in his home across the street. He spent the night helping police clear the scene and the next morning his son found a piece of Valdinoci's collarbone on his front steps.
Palmer was not the only target that night. Around midnight, Italian anarchists set off bombs in Boston, Philadelphia, Cleveland and Pittsburgh in a coordinated attack on government officials who were part of an effort to target anarchists. On the next day, a postal worker discovered 16 mail bombs addressed to political and business leaders, including John D. Rockefeller.
Washington responded to these anarchist terrorist attacks with wide-scale curtailment of civil rights, targeting anyone suspected of being an anarchist or communist. Palmer, who initiated this dragnet, seemed an unlikely person to orchestrate the program.
The attorney general, a progressive Democrat from Pennsylvania, had turned down the secretary of war position in 1912 because of his Quaker devotion to pacifism. He was beloved by progressives, having sponsored bills to limit child labor and to support women's suffrage.
After the explosion nearly took his life, however, Palmer regarded anarchists and communists as an existential threat to the nation's security. President Woodrow Wilson supported him in this, telling Palmer during a Cabinet meeting, "do not let the country see red."
A crackdown also worked for Palmer's political ambitions, since he was eyeing a 1920 run for the White House. Bashing communists and anarchists, Palmer recognized, would provide good background in the campaign season. After hiring a young lawyer, J. Edgar Hoover, to run a small intelligence-gathering unit, Palmer began planning the raids.
From November 1919 to March 2020, Palmer deported 800 people whom he claimed were radical communists or anarchists.
In a November 17, 1919 raid, for example, the Justice Department arrested 200 people suspected of being radicals. The New York Times praised Palmer as a "lionhearted man," protecting the nation. In December 1919 a small ship, the Budford, left New York City harbor bound for Russia, carrying 249 individuals suspected of being disloyal to the United States. Several high-profile writers were aboard, including Emma Goldman, whose U.S. citizenship was ignored because she was suspected of being an anarchist. This mass deportation was celebrated in the New York Times, "Soviet Ark Lands Its Reds in Finland."
On January 2, the Justice Department conducted a huge raid, arresting between 2,000 and 4,000 suspects across the country.
A few people courageously stood up to Palmer's fear-mongering. Assistant Labor Secretary Louis Post, charged with overseeing the deportations, was one official who resisted. He carefully reviewed the evidence in each deportation case, and often turned down Palmer's requests.
Francis Fisher Kane, the U.S. attorney for Eastern Pennsylvania, also resisted. In January 1920, Kane resigned because he vigorously opposed Palmer's emphasis on deporting illegal immigrants. His resignation letter, quoted in the New York Times, said that the Democratic Party would lose its soul if it continued to protect the interests of corporations. In Kane's view, the raids had more to do with assuaging corporate power in fighting the nascent labor movement than in protecting national security.
The New Republic called the raids "abhorrent," arguing that America was "frightened into a fantastic attempt to annihilate a political minority by imprisonment and deportation." The Nation also condemned the actions, saying Palmer was "improving on the czar."
Palmer staked the legitimacy of his overreaching raids on predictions of massive violence during the "May Day" celebrations on May 1, 1920. The National Guard and the New York City Police Department were mobilized for the onslaught of the expected violence. But the day passed peacefully.
With this, Palmer's fear-mongering hit its break point and the public slowly turned against his overbearing attacks on civil liberties. By the end of the year, the attorney general was forced to defend his actions before Senate Judiciary Committee hearings. Senator Thomas Walsh said the Palmer raids were nothing less than "the lawless acts of a mob."
Though the Red Scare is now largely forgotten, its legacy lives on in the constitutional dedication to preserving freedom of speech. The Supreme Court's 1919 decision in Abrams v. United States upheld the conviction of dissidents who distributed pamphlets denouncing sending U.S. troops to Russia. Holmes, joined by Brandeis, dissented, stating that speech can only be restricted when it is "speech that produces or is intended to produce clear and imminent danger that it will bring about forthwith … substantive evil."
In a 1927 case, a communist organizer, Anita Whitney, was convicted of trying to overthrow the U.S. government. The Supreme Court upheld her conviction, but Holmes and Brandeis again wrote a stirring separate opinion, stressing that the government had limited power to restrict free speech. Brandeis's opinion in California v. Whitney presented the 20th century's greatest defense of the importance of free speech in the democratic process.
It would take four decades, but the Supreme Court finally embraced the Holmes and Brandeis view with the 1967 Brandenburg ruling. This decision said that speech can only be suppressed by the government when it's intended and likely to produce imminent violence.
What are the lessons of the Palmer raids for our current surveillance controversies? These government actions remind us that even the most beloved progressives can use the power of the government to menace individual liberty when they become convinced that the state faces an existential threat. They remind us as well that the excesses of progressive liberalism are unlikely to be resisted by Congress or the courts. Consider that it took the Supreme Court 40 years to enact Brandeis's dissenting opinion into law.
The Palmer raids also highlight the crucial need for principled resistance within the government as the best way of galvanizing public opposition. The NSA leaker, a 29-year-old former CIA technical assistant named Edward Snowden, has decided to reveal his identity and suffer the consequences.
It remains to be seen whether an official within the Obama administration will follow the example of Kane, the progressive Pennsylvanian, and resign in protest against the administration's warrantless surveillance programs and overly broad subpoenas to journalists such as James Rosen of Fox News and the Washington reporters of the Associated Press.
But regardless of administration officials' conduct, Obama should be more scrupulous about constitutional values, or risk being remembered - like Wilson - as a progressive who failed to respect civil liberties in anxious times.
(Jeffrey Rosen is a Reuters columnist but his opinions are his own.)
(Jeffrey Rosen is president and chief executive officer of the National Constitution Center and a law professor at George Washington University. He is co-editor of "Constitution 3.0: Freedom and Technological Change" and author of "The Naked Crowd: Reclaiming Security and Freedom in the Anxious Age".)
(Jeffrey Rosen)


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GENEVA – The future of the coroner's building – and its closed morgue – remained uncertain Friday as Kane County Board members considered Coroner Rob Russell's budget request for 2015.
Board Chairman Chris Lauzen, along with members of the Judicial and Public Safety Committee, were reluctant to discuss long- and short-term plans during a discussion in which Russell was absent.
Russell was called away from the meeting before he could present. Ken Shepro, an attorney acting as his financial consultant, spoke to the committee instead.
Preliminary numbers call for a budget of $949,547, which includes 5 percent nonunion staff raises and increases for pathologist fees. It is a 9.4 percent increase over the 2013 budget, which was used as a comparison.
Shepro noted the budget summary doesn't take into account the arrangement with the DuPage County Coroner's Office. Forensic operations have been outsourced to DuPage County since mold was found in the Kane County morgue last month.
Russell has said he intends to seek direction from the committee about his options: investing in new equipment for the existing facility or beginning plans for a new building, which could lead to a prolonged relationship with DuPage.
The cost of using DuPage County's facilities for one year is estimated at $83,050, but savings on morgue supplies could reduce the expense by $50,000, Shepro said.
Meanwhile, capital cost estimates are $75,000 for a new freezer and cooler; $42,000 for a used X-ray machine; $15,000 for a key card security system and unknown costs for an HVAC system, mold remediation, and the demolition and construction related to the new equipment.
In a written report to the committee, Russell said Don Biggs, the county's operations staff executive, and representatives from Mechanical Inc. recently visited his office.
"However, the conversation dealt only with the cleanup [remediation] and removal, not a complete plan to reuse this facility," Russell said. "Significant financial and policy concerns remain."
Board member Doug Scheflow, R-Elgin, said he would support giving the coroner a small budget increase. Lauzen, however, noted Russell last year agreed to a budget of $843,000 for three years.
The coroner's budget was the last of 13 proposals presented to the committee.
The state's attorney's office is proposing a nearly $9.2 million budget, up from about $9 million in 2014. It seeks to add two employees – an assistant state's attorney for the civil division, and a bilingual investigator for the Child Advocacy Center.
The sheriff's office also budgeted for an additional employee, a deputy. Sheriff Pat Perez said his force was reduced from 95 to 90 deputies when the economy started to sour, and his current staff consists of 85 deputies.
The total increase in the public safety budget is $362,877, or 3.27 percent. Revenues are projected to increase by $535,292.

subset: commoncrawl


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Heshe Leather Handbags for Woman Top Handle Bag Work Totes PurseSorrel Sorrel -
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Usage: Can be used as Shoulder Handbag, Top Handle Handbag and Cross Body Handbag.
Size info: (L)15.74\" x (H)10.23\"x (W)6.29 in and the weigh is 1.98 pounds.


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So, as you know, it's E3 time. And there's Minecraft there. So let's get debating over announcements so far:
6.Mobile Minecraft(Announced on the Android gaming phone that also has BFBC2 on it)
7. Minecraft on the Xbox Kinect. GTFO FORTRESSCRAFT.
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stubby wrote: my floppy penis gets first dibs on it for tradition's sake, but it doesn't seem likely that he'll want to stick around long enough to play.
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Now that the Eagles have found their 2012 starting middle linebacker, what impact will the acquisition of DeMeco Ryans have on who they might take in the first round of the draft next month?
Prior to Tuesday's trade, most mock drafts had the Eagles selecting Boston College linebacker Luke Kuechly with their first-round pick, the 15th overall. Because of his impressive showing at the scouting combine in Indianapolis last month, Kuechly probably wouldn't have made it to 15, but the thinking was the middle-linebacker-needy Eagles would target him and find a way to move up and get him.
Well, Kuechly, who scouts think could be a Day 1 starter both in the middle and on the strong side, still certainly could be a possibility, depending on the Eagles' opinion right now of Jamar Chaney, Akeem Jordan and Moise Fokou.
Defensive coordinator Juan Castillo moved Chaney from MIKE to SAM at the beginning of training camp last year because he said the SAM spot was a more critical position in his defense. But after rookie Casey Matthews struggled in the middle in the first two games, Chaney was moved back inside. Whether Castillo and linebackers coach Mike Caldwell still are bullish on Chaney at SAM remains to be seen.
Fokou opened the season as the starting weakside linebacker, moved to SAM after Matthews was benched, and made five starts there before being replaced by Jordan. Jordan did a nice job in his eight starts at SAM. The Eagles held opponents to 3.7 yards per carry those eight games.
While the Eagles got Ryans for next to nothing (a fourth-round pick and a swap of third-round picks with the Texans), they still have to pay him $5.8 million next season, which is more money than they've ever paid a linebacker. Given that and the fact that they've never valued linebackers very high, would they also then take a linebacker in the first round? Not seeing it.
If you eliminate Kuechly from the first-round equation, there's several different ways the Eagles could go with that first round pick. They could take a defensive tackle. It's probably the deepest position in the draft. As many as seven could go in the first round. It's not a position of absolute need for the Eagles. But Cullen Jenkins turned 31 in January and Mike Patterson is coming off some tricky brain surgery. The draft's top three DTs – Dontari Poe, Michael Brockers and Fletcher Cox – all should be within the Eagles' reach, if not at 15, then close enough for a trade-up.
After spending second-round picks on safeties in the last two drafts, would the Eagles use their first-round pick on the only first-round worthy safety in the draft, Alabama's Mark Barron? Probably not.
My sense is that the Eagles view their safety situation a little more positively than you and I. Even if they don't add a safety in free agency, they still have high expectations for Jaiquawn Jarrett, who they took in the second round last year and spent most of his rookie season on the bench. The fact that Barron, who is recovering from double-hernia surgery, still hasn't worked out for scouts, makes him a little bit of a wildcard. The 6-2, 218-pound run-enforcer is scheduled to work out next week. We'll see if the Eagles send anybody to watch him.
With the re-signing of left guard Evan Mathis, the Eagles have their entire starting offensive line coming back. But they still need to find somebody to back up tackles Jason Peters and Todd Herremans. There's plenty of journeymen-types they could bring in, but given Andy Reid's fondness for linemen, it wouldn't totally shock me if they took an offensive tackle like Iowa's Riley Reiff, Stanford's Jonathan Martin or Ohio State's Mike Adams in the first round. Peters is the best left tackle in the game, but he turned 30 in January and hasn't played a full season since 2006.
Then there's quarterback. Mike Vick will be the Eagles' starting quarterback this season. That we know. What we don't know is who will be the starter beyond 2012. Vick, who will turn 32 in June, has five years left on his deal. But the Eagles are only financially committed to him through this season.
Vick didn't play well last season. Finished 23rd in interception percentage, 25th in fourth-quarter passing, 26th in third-down passing and had six red-zone turnovers.
The Eagles are hopeful that, with a full offseason of field and classroom prep, he'll rebound with a big year in 2012 and everyone in Philadelphia, including Vick, will live happily ever after.
At the same time, they've got to consider their options if the 2012 Vick plays like the 2011 one. They've got to have a plan for the future. Mike Kafka? I don't think so, but maybe Reid and Marty Mornhinweg do. Trent Edwards? Uh, no.
Obviously, they've got no shot at Andrew Luck or Robert Griffin III, who will be the first two players taken, or even Ryan Tannehill, who could go third or fourth, and certainly no lower than seventh.
But what about the next three highest rated QBs, Michigan State's Kirk Cousins or Oklahoma State's Brandon Weeden or Arizona State's Brock Osweiler? None of the three are expected to go as high as 15th, but one, two or even all three of them could go later in the first round or early in the second. Osweiler, who is recovering from a foot injury suffered in Arizona State's bowl game, will work out for NFL teams next week.
The Eagles obviously have a lot of experience with trading down. It's how they wound up with Kevin Kolb in '07. With two second-round picks in their draft arsenal already, they could drop down, grab one of the quarterbacks and pick up some more Day 2 ammo to address some of their other needs.
Then again, they might just decide to mess with our heads again and take another defensive end.


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Lux Auto Brightness v1.03 Apk for Android isn't your ordinary brightness app. It intelligently adjusts the brightness of your display based on the environment you're in.
Updated: 25 february 2013
Current Version 1.03
Requires Android 2.1 and up
Category: Tools
If, for example, you step into a dimly lit room, Lux will automatically lower the brightness of your display to make it not only comfortable to read, but to also preserve battery power. Lux provides the option to automatically adjust the backlight at fixed intervals (periodic mode), when a change in environment is detected (dynamic mode), or when the phone wakes from sleep. It's also possible to adjust the backlight manually. Simply disable automatic mode and you can use it like a traditional brightness tool! Perhaps the best thing about Lux is that you can teach it how to behave. If the backlight is too bright or dim for your liking, simply open the provided Dashboard, adjust the brightness slider to the level you desire, then hold the link button. Lux Auto Brightness Apk will use this new 'link' as a reference in future.
Note: Please disable other brightness apps before using Lux. The author is not liable for any issues caused when using this app.
Lux Auto Brightness Apk features
- Custom auto brightness.
- Sub-zero brightness to make reading in the dark significantly less irritating.
- Battery efficient
- Handy brightness widget
- Option to use the camera to read in ambient light.
- Power-user settings such as choice of interpolation, sensor debugging, and linked sample editing.
- Backup to SD.
- Customisable data filtering for phones with inaccurate light sensors.
- Gradual fade effect for backlight adjustments.
- Astronomer mode adds a red filter to the screen to preserve the eyesight of stargazers.
- Jitter control to prevent constant small changes to the backlight.
- Night mode, to change the colour temperature of the display for comfortable night time viewing.
- Add app specific exceptions via compatibility mode
- No ads, or other nuisances.
Whats new in Lux Auto Brightness Apk 1.03
- Fixed poll rate issue causing excess CPU load
- Made automatic night mode optional
DOWNLOAD Lux Auto Brightness v1.03
- brightness apk 1 1 1


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RTÉ Radio 1 Wins Station of the Year at the PPI Radio Awards 2012
RTÉ Radio 1 has been named as Station of the Year at the 2012 PPI Radio Awards in Kilkenny.
RTÉ Radio had received a total of 32 nominations for this year's PPI Radio Awards, across RTÉ Radio 1, RTÉ lyric fm and RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta.
RTÉ Radio 1 had emerged as the most-nominated Irish radio station, with 24 nominations across sport, news, current-affairs, drama, documentary, speech and music. RTÉ Radio 1 took home five Gold Awards at the 2012 ceremony: Best News Programme for Morning Ireland; Best Documentary for Documentary on One: Maurice - A Final Journey; Best Drama for Drama on One: The Dreaming of Roger Casement; Best Interactive Speech Programme for Liveline; Best News Broadcaster of the Year was Morning Ireland's Aine Lawlor.
RTÉ lyric fm, a former PPI Music Station of the Year, secured five nominations this year, and took a Gold Award for The John Kelly Ensemble. RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta, currently Celtic Media Festival Station of the Year, took Gold for Ronan Beo @ 3.
The awards ceremony took place in Kilkenny this evening. RTÉ Radio was recently named International Broadcaster of the Year at the New York Festivals 2012.


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Associated Press journalists open their notebooks at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah:
You'd think that when Daniel Radcliffe signs on to your independent film, the money would start flowing.
Yet John Krokidas said landing Radcliffe to play young Allen Ginsberg in his drama "Kill Your Darlings" did not guarantee the film would get off the ground.
Radcliffe came aboard two years ago, after the project had come together and fallen apart repeatedly over the years, Krokidas said at the Sundance Film Festival, where "Kill Your Darlings" premiered. The project had been looking dead for good before that, but even with the former "Harry Potter" star, Krokidas said financing was not a sure thing.
"Believe it or not, Daniel Radcliffe at that point does not green-light a movie," Krokidas said. "I was told Daniel Radcliffe cannot open a movie without a wand in his hand."
Krokidas eventually secured financing for "Kill Your Darlings," which chronicles a dark and deadly period in the youths of Ginsberg and fellow future beat writers Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs.
— David Germain
Jane Lynch doesn't feel let down that Jodie Foster didn't more directly address her sexuality in her much-discussed Golden Globes speech.
The openly gay "Glee" star was at the Sundance Film Festival promoting "Afternoon Delight" and had been at the Globes when Foster delivered her remarks.
"When I was sitting there watching it, I kept looking back at the Teleprompter to see if it was written. And indeed it was. Because it was kind of rambley," Lynch said. "But you know what? We all do it our own way. And I have compassion for what she had to go through being a kid star. She's been in the business for 47 years. So it's a completely different experience than mine and we all have our own. But I hope she felt better for it. Because it felt kind of cathartic."
Lynch said she didn't want to join the call from some gay activists who felt Foster should have been more direct in her emotional speech. "Just because you're an actor doesn't mean you have to be an activist," Lynch said. "You don't have to. Do whatever you want. Go Jodie!"
— Ryan Pearson, Twitter: www.twitter.com/ryanwrd
Steve Carell and Toni Collette already had a nice reunion going at the Sundance Film Festival with this year's premiere "The Way, Way Back," their first collaboration since the 2006 festival sensation "Little Miss Sunshine."
Now Fox Searchlight is back in the act. Fox Searchlight, which snapped up "Little Miss Sunshine" back then, has bought rights in North America and some overseas territories for "The Way, Way Back," writer-directors Nat Faxon and Jim Rash's comedy about a misfit teen (Liam James) and the oddball friends he makes working at a rundown water park over the summer.
Scheduled for release this summer, the film also stars Sam Rockwell, Allison Janney and Maya Rudolph.
Among other Sundance acquisitions: Sony Pictures bought worldwide rights to Jerusha Hess' romance "Austenland," produced by "Twilight" author Stephenie Meyer and starring Keri Russell as a Jane Austen-obsessed lonely-heart; Radius-TWC, a unit of the Weinstein Co., picked up North American rights to Stacie Passon's "Concussion," starring Robin Weigert as a lesbian housewife who embarks on a double life after a blow to the head; the Weinstein Co. bought rights in the U.S. and some other territories for Ryan Coogler's "Fruitvale," starring Michael B. Jordan, Melonie Diaz and Octavia Spencer in the real-life story of Oscar Grant, who was shot dead by an Oakland police officer; CNN Films and Magnolia Pictures teamed to buy U.S. rights to Gabriela Cowperthwaite's "Blackfish," a documentary exploring the deadly consequences of keeping whales in captivity; and Elle Driver-Wild Bunch bought overseas rights to Morgan Neville's "Twenty Feet from Stardom," a documentary on backup singers whose U.S. rights went to Radius-TWC.
— David Germain
Nicole Kidman came to the Sundance Film Festival for the premiere of "Stoker," in which she stars with fellow Australian actress Mia Wasikowska.
But she didn't want to hear whether Wasikowska considered her a role model.
"You can't ask that," Kidman said, sitting beside her co-star.
"No, you can," Wasikowska said. "Nicole is a role model. No, for anyone coming from Australia it's pretty amazing to be in a film with her. So it's been cool."
"Stop it, that's so embarrassing," Kidman said. "She's a role model though. She sits on the set, reading Chekov. You were reading Chekov on the set. To all young actresses, sit on the set and read Chekov. That's how you become great. Truly, and she's so good already."
— Ryan Pearson, Twitter: www.twitter.com/ryanwrd


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The Long Tail Theory: Why Webseries Creators Need Net Neutrality
The following remarks were delivered by Thom Woodley at the WGAE's Capital Hill briefing on Internet policy.
* * *
I am a writer, and a creator of content, and as such, by necessity, an entrepreneur. What I'm going to talk about today are the business models of web video, how the open web allows creators to do innovative work, and the dangers that paid prioritization creates for that innovation.
In our discussions of net neutrality today, we've a couple of times heard the comparison of the internet to highways. I'd like to expand that. Let's suppose that a state decides adopt the prioritization model to their roadwork. This would mean they don't pave roads in a certain area as well as other ones. We all know what would happen. The economy in that area suffers. Trucks can't get to it, no one wants to drive along the bumpy, dirty road.
It's the same online. Pavement equals streaming speed. If the streaming speed is slow, no one will watch. We don't force the people who live on that road, the businesses on that road, to pay directly for paving the whole thing. But Internet Service Providers want to do that exact thing to content providers. If we don't have net neutrality, ISPs could charge content providers money to deliver their content at a reasonable enough speed.
I am going to make the case that that is tantamount to killing a new industry before it has developed.
There is a business model of independent web video. There are a few. They exist, but they're still nascent. And it's very different from television or most other traditional economic structures.
I don't know how many of you are familiar with the Long Tail Theory of economics. I'll just give a quick abstract. Say we're in a book store. 80% of people who come into that store will tend to buy the same top 20% of books. The remaining 20% of people may also buy that top tier, but in addition, seek out products that are more diverse, less common denominator. When we chart these spending habits, rank of products sold against volume of sales, we get a short 'body' and a long 'tail'.
Now, in a store, there's a physical inventory. So it only makes sense to keep that top 20% in stock. Of course, for an online store, inventory is more vast. So you can open up the full 100% of products, and get that extra business. And here's a hidden secret: people in this long tail will tend to pay more for the products they love, if they are perceived as rare.
How does this relate to television? TV has a fixed inventory of time that it is selling. As well as a great expense in broadcasting it. So it only makes sense to program shows that 80% of the populace will seek out. The same with movie theaters – a fixed number of screens. But web video has no fixed period of time. It has no fixed numbers of screens. Strictly speaking, it has no distributional limits, except for streaming speed.
That means that online, this long tail of specialized content is now open for everybody.
From an advertising perspective, we know that a message moves farther and more effectively when it is highly tailored to its audience. You are three times more likely to watch a video if a friend shared it to you. So advertisers have an excellent model here. Let's take as an example, an award-winning and very popular series I participate in called The Temp Life. It is sponsored by a staffing agency who could never afford to buy TV time. But they could afford a more specified and tailored web production with Hollywood celebrities like Milo Ventimiglia and Illeana Douglas. And the show just finished its 5th season, which is longer than most real Hollywood shows.
Web video, due to its long tail nature, has the tendency to gather audiences of more specific demographics. These shows function with a smaller audience, but they become more valuable to the sponsor. My show The Burg gathered an audience of hipsters and influencers mostly based in New York. It's the kind of audience TV shows desperately try to attract, but had not reliably done so. Sure, the show did not rack up the millions of views per episode that a TV show needs. That's okay. We did not need it. We had a highly activated audience who, when we did do sponsorships, were much more accepting of our sponsors' products.
Web TV will not be, in the future, about gathering the 'most views', but gathering the 'best views'.
But it's worth pointing out that putting any of this content behind a paywall, or tiered download situation where it didn't stream quickly, that would have killed it. People would not have watched.
There are two more models I'd like to briefly discuss.
One is the audience-supported show. Take the show Anyone But Me. It's a multiple award-winning show about a lesbian teenager and her struggles. It's excellent. It tells a difficult story about a topic some would think is controversial. And it likely would never have been made on TV. They are able to make this show because they have an audience who is demanding it. Again, it's a smaller audience, but they are so passionate about this show that they pay for it. Not per download – by donation.
But it's tight. Profit margins are slim in both of these models. If we were charging Anyone But Me an extra fee to stream fast enough so that the audience can watch it, then they probably would not be able to make it.
Another model that is developing is even more interesting to me, as a small business owner: the local webseries scene.
Distribution is, at present, open to everyone. I can make a video and put it up – there are no walls between me and a prospective audience of millions. At the same time, the means of film production are accessible to everyone, with consumer-level editing software and digital cameras. This means that a webseries can be generated and created anywhere, for any audience. This is of course different from film and TV, where you have to be in LA or NY.
What we are seeing now is communities of content creators and webseries makers beginning to pop up in every state of the union. In places that never had any sort of film industry before, we suddenly see one popping up. And it can be sponsored by local advertisers. I point to one of the shows I'm involved in, Greg and Donny, which is about two guys just chatting about stuff going on in the small, post-industrial steel town Johnstown, PA. Now, that sounds like a very specific show that no one outside that town would want to watch, right? Well… stay tuned.
I believe in a few years, we will be seeing small town film scenes. Communities of webseries creators and vloggers from Maine to Utah. Decentralized micro-industries of creative professionals from Alabama to Wyoming. I believe we will see this… down the road.
But not if the road is too expensive to travel on.
Net neutrality is vital to keeping the lanes of communication open. The creative economy of the future depends on it. Thank you.
Writer and web video pioneer Thom Woodley created one of the first narrative web series "The Burg", the Streamy and Webby nominated shows "The All-For-Nots", "All's Faire" and "Greg & Donny", and is the founder of DIORAMA, a new web video channel aimed at programming television-quality independent content.


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The quarterly earnings call is coming to a close but the major news is out for all things Activision Blizzard.
In the recent quarterly earnings call from Blizzard, we learned that the "Chuck Norris spot was super effective!" for the MMO king World of Warcraft, and they are now only down to 10.2 million subscribers. This is great news for Blizzard, as WoW's biggest competitor, Star Wars: The Old Republic, was launched during this earnings report. To top it all off, the annual subscription service climbed to over one million, possibly in part due to the free digital copy of Diablo 3. To round off the call, Blizzard added that Diablo 3 is being pushed to Q2 of this year and Blizzard DOTA being free-to-play.
Things are definetly looking up, as WoW's decline in subscriptions is starting to level off. Speculation can only hold that as the excitement builds for Mists of Pandaria, if Blizzard can hold onto its title as king of MMORPG subscriptions for some time to come.


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Personal Fitness Trainer (A.A.S.)
Department of Labor statistics indicate Personal Fitness Training will be one of the fastest growing occupations over the next 10 years. Students successfully completing this degree program at HCC will be competent in the field of personal training. The Personal Fitness Trainer Program is recommended for those desiring employment after the two year degree. The individual will obtain a solid background in the areas of fitness, nutrition and wellness.
Suggested Program of Study