I wish Sandy’s site had a RSS feed, so I could keep track of gems like this:

Cleveland is an exciting place to be. Those of us who are running around being at all these Be-Ins know it. It�??s not easy to catch our collective breath to share our experiences in a comprehensible way with the rest of the North Coast world, immersed as we are in this kinetic zone. I try to do that, though. I try to describe (breathlessly) how great things really are here, even when my listeners can only smile passively and . . eat.

Look, Cleveland has a thick veneer of hype to last for centuries. I�??m not going to add another layer. I am just saying what I see and experience. Shift your eyes and ears away from the big mouths, the top-down folks, and the dopey local talking heads, and you see clearly that change is not always about doing things in a BIG way. There are plenty of smaller enterprises and activities that will coalesce, eventually…

Survival Dance

If someone is using the internet in an abusing manner, such as emailing you junk or obsessively posting comments to your blog, most ISPs provide procedures to address that. For example, if someone using a hotmail account is spamming you, use this page to report them. Likewise, someone using Road Runner or Time Warner Cable can be reported here

Stephen VanDyke:

Short story: it�??s a win, but the eminent domain advocates aren�??t going to give up. I would write something long-winded about this amazingly good decision for Ohio property owners but it Reason Hit & Run already has the best commentary linkfest…

Hammer of Truth » Ohio�??s Highest Court Rejects �??Bogus Blight�?�

There is a BFD Comment policy. It’s linked in the sidebar under BFD Stuff.

Another arrow has been added to the quiver of those using good science to puncture the hot air balloon of global warming alarmists , according to today’s Miami Herald. Link.

Studies that link global warming to an increase in hurricane ferocity might be full of hot air, according to a research paper that will be published Friday in a major scientific journal.

The paper, co-written by Chris Landsea of the National Hurricane Center in West Miami-Dade, challenges earlier findings that hurricanes have grown more powerful in the last 30 years.

It says those studies failed to account for technological improvements that now produce more accurate — and often higher — estimates of a storm’s power than were available in the past.

In other words, we can measure hurricanes better than we could; that doesn’t mean they have increased in intensity.

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I found this fascinating, obsolutely fascinating. I think we all have stories of selling or trading something over the Internet but this really tops my list.

My name is Kyle MacDonald and I traded one red paperclip for a house. I started with one red paperclip on July 12 2005 and 14 trades later, on July 12, 2006 I will trade with the Town of Kipling Saskatchewan for a house located at 503 Main Street.

Who says you can’t make money off a blog? CNN is running a great story this week on Kyle. You can read about all the “trade-ups” he made to get the house here. Maybe the City of Cleveland could start a program whereby they start trading vacant housing for things the City needs. I just see so many boarded up homes around Cleveland proper you’d think we could come up with a better use for them.

I’m guessing it was Steve that wrote this, not Becky:

Jung teaches us that the images of loved ones or rocks or anything in out dreams are archtypes, projections of ourselves in our unconscious mind.

I believe (though I don’t know that the good doctor went this far) that our everyday, waking experiences hold the same symbolism. I had, recently, a tense moment with a loved one and perhaps this person’s behaviors irritated me so because of I saw this behavior in myself.

Not rocket science, really, but worth reminding myself…

Becky and Steve’s Blog: I’m angry at you because of the part of me that you represent

Tom Waltermine, Ed Morrison, and… Jay Miller? What happened to the Plain Dealer?

Some say Cleveland’s regional economic development efforts are on target; others say they’re missing the mark. In recent years, organizations like TeamNEO have formed, with the intention of making it as easy and as attractive as possible for companies to locate or expand in Northeast Ohio. But the success of a long-term process like economic development is not easy to gauge. And people disagree on how things are going…

So, was it satisfying or was it like eating shrimp chips? Ed’s posted additional resources here. Do you think Tom Waltermire or Jay Miller will do that?

90.3 WCPN: 90.3 at 9 Podcast Feed

I wouldn’t have notice but for John Ettorre’s post @ Working With Words. Anastasia Pantsios writes up Bloggapalooza 2K6 here.

• Bloggapalooza 2006 and the Little Rascals
  (tags: bloggapalooza)

“I am convinced we will lose money on it…there is a lot of misinformation”, Rhode Island Governor Carcieri on the proposal to allow casino gambling in his state.

He also predicted - based on what has repeatedly occurred in other states - that untold numbers of small, family-owned businesses and restaurants will be forced to close down.

The Narragansett Times - Governor lauds tax reforms, denounces economic impact of proposed casino

This past Wednesday the Washington Post ran a great article, Rewriting the Web for Mobile Phones, that got me thinking about potential applications, hence the headline for this post. Mark Donovan, a senior analyst with the research firm M:Metrics Inc. really does a great job breaking it down to the basics:

“There are a lot more mobile phones in the world than there are computers, and they’re the most personal and intimate of these devices,” Donovan said. “Google and Yahoo can’t view PCs and the wireless world as disconnected silos. We live in this grid of connectivity, and we want to connect wherever we may be.”

As mentioned at BFD before, you can even comment on this article at the Washington Post website. Imagine that concept. I guess the PD can’t.

So what do you think about potential mobile web applications? Would you get your BFD fix on your cel phone or PDA device if you could?

It seems a shame to gather up 340 stories, then have a “panel of experts” pick 20, then publish them to bus shelter. I guess if you have a huge mass transit system, lots of people get inspired:

In April 2006, a city-wide writing program began in Philadelphia. Called the Autobiography Project, the program’s basic idea was to invite residents of the city to tell ther own life stories �?? or simply individual stories taken from their lives �?? using 300 words or less. The Project even sponsored community writing workshops for those Philadelphians unsure of their literary abilities �?? and some workshops were so successful that similar such groups may become regular fixtures at the institutions involved…

BLDGBLOG: Urban Autobiographies

An email from Michael Stein:

LeCharles Bentley blowing up his knee blew up my blog. I’ve been getting around 40-50 hits a day when things are slow and I’m not posting regularly, maybe 120 on a good day when I’m posting regularly and the news is hot.

Yesterday after I posted about Bentley I got 686 hits. Today (it’s about 10:30) I already have 711 hits.

Apparently last night, Andrew Siciliano mentioned my blog on his Fox Sports Radio national show. I didn’t hear it, but someone emailed me to tell me they heard him talk about it, then they looked up my blog and loved it. Then today I was linked in a story in the Akron Beacon Journal:
http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/15142929.htm That’s where most of my traffic is coming from.

But in my stats, I see many visits from other message boards, and people are posting a link to my blog all over the place. I also see a lot of visits from emails, so people must be sending the link around. I have posted links
myself at a few places (although not recently), so I’m just amazed at how this is spreading.

One of my trackers is forecasting 13,844 page views from 9,232 unique
visitors today — a 16,427% increase…

An update email:

The one web counter was a bit off in its forecast. I wound up with 1,616 hits (1,041
unique) Friday. July 19 and 20 were bigger days because that was a new post, but even then it was only 112 hits.

I was strong back in Feb + March when I started with maybe 150-200 hits per day, lots of days over 200. Then it would go up and down and I notice in April I had a day over 300.

In March I had 1,646 hits. Yesterday I was 30 less than that in one day. Perhaps this is my tipping point.

God Hates Cleveland Sports

Big shoes to fill. From Katherine:

Could we be any more impressive as a city? I mean, come on! Public Power Magazine, a highly reputed, you know, magazine, reported that on the list of Top Seven Intelligent Communities worldwide for 2006, Cleveland scored! It’s the only US city to be named! The Intelligent Community Forum, a technology think tank from New York, has decreed the fact that we are no longer the mistake by the lake. We beat out public power communities like Adel, Georgia, and Spanish Fork, Utah. (Wow - typing those names out makes them seem unimpressive. Spanish Fork?) Cleveland shares the honor with Seoul, South Korea, and Taipei, Taiwan…

Cleveland named one of top “intelligent power” cities in world - Blogging Ohio

Click through for links:

A new study by the Environmental Integrity Project listed three Ohio power plants among the 50 most polluting plants in the US, including the Avon Lake Generating Station at number 27.

Cuyahoga County Planning Commission Weblog Archive

The first of many of the interviews Anthony did:

This is the first of 20 video interviews from bloggapalooza 2006. In this first installment (these will be posted over the next week or so), I interview Glora Ferris of GloriaFerris.net.

Awesome stuff.

blueohioan: The bloggapalooza Interviews : Gloria Ferris

Not a bad idea. Any graphic designers out there with a spare couple of minutes to design one?

I know tons of people in Ohio that have the europeanesque 3-letter oval sticker with OBX attached to their rear bumper. It screams to the world, “hey, I’m cool. I went to the Outer Banks one year for vacation. In fact, my uncle has a timeshare down there.”

So if people from here sport OBX stickers on their cars, would they ever attach an oval sticker with the letters N-E-O to proclaim their Ohio pride to the universe?

i will shout youngstown: time to replace my OBX sticker with my NEO sticker?

• Mozy: Free automatic remote backup
  (tags: tech)

AC is convinced that OL&E is not a bill of goods we’re being sold:

Gambling is not the SAVIOR for Ohio’s economy - nor should we want it to be. The money is already leaving Ohio for our neighboring states and their slot machines and gaming options. This will be a big boost for the 7 Ohio Racetracks, two Downtown Cleveland locations, and the surrounding communities.

That being said, the Ohio Lottery was misguided, misrepresented, and misappropriated. Legislators used to money to feed their pet projects like the 711 connector and Youngstown Convocation Center, but Learn & Earn in NOT the Ohio Lottery.
Read the full ammendment and see for yourself. I am just an educated supporter…

AC Ohio Blog: Learn and Earn is NOT the Ohio Lottery

Handy resource if you want to go to the beach because it’s so hot today in Cleveland. It appears that the bacteria levels are too high in Edgewater and Villa Angela…

Bbq_July29_36.jpg

Originally uploaded by txh62.

Nothing like a summer bar-b-que in Cleveland…

Chas blogs about what many of our friends to the east are going thru:

Spent most of the weekend cleaning the basement and after all these years, finally understand why its spring cleaning, not summer cleaning. Hauling crap outside, sorting through it and reorganizing in 85 degree weather this weekend with plenty of humidity does not make the experience more pleasant.

Not much stuff of value was damaged, but to get to it, and have room to really mop, disinfect, bleach and clean down there required a lot of extra effort. And since we hauled so much of it up, it was a chance to really examine some of the stuff we had down there and whether it should return. The verdict, I would have liked to have tossed more and the wife thinks we probably got rid of too much…

Out in Thompson where my parents live, several bridges got washed out. Fortunately, their basement stayed dry.

cleveland.com: Weblogs

From this week’s PostSecret, Lotus.

High Water

Originally uploaded by ohmomof1.

Headlands Beach closed. Click thru and read the comment.

Damn, I must be getting jaded. This comes as no surprise to me anymore:

The partners of the Greater Cleveland Marketing Alliance are ready to sell Cleveland through a jazzy ad campaign. So who do they turn to? An advertising agency headquartered in Detroit.

The Doner Agency, which has a large Cleveland office, won the contract worth up to $4 million to promote Cleveland and lure businesses and tourists. The decision isn’t sitting well with some local firms, including Marcus Thomas, the local agency that is losing its contract, much smaller, to promote the city.

It doesn’t sit well with some local firms? I wonder if they think a sentence or two in the PD’s Tipoff column is going to change anything? What can we do get organizations like this to “buy local”? Don’t they understand the impact it has on Cleveland’s economy?

On the way to the hospital in Cleveland, watch for Big Brother

But still. If you want Bloggapalooza encapsulated into 2 minutes, this is quite the outtake.

blueohioan: The bloggapalooza Interviews : The Plunderbund Shuffle

I’ve been working with Jan Limpach and Joe Becerra on a new business blog. I think it’s coming along rather nicely, and I know there’s several wine aficionados who read BFD:

You’re here on a convention and have a half-day of free time. You have always wanted to visit the Napa Valley, and this time you are going to do it no matter what happens. Your goal is to bring home at least a four pack of wine and a photo of yourself with the vineyards and mountains of the Napa Valley in the background. So, where do you go in the Napa Valley to sample the best of this fabulous wine country?

Napa Valley Wine Blog | California Wine Country Getaways

Emily guest posting from the Hebrew University:

“Less than three weeks ago, a friend of mine, and participant in one of the many tour groups in Israel, traveled through the beautiful rolling hills of northern Israel all the way to the Israeli-Lebanese Border. Just twenty days ago his tour guide showed the group the calm border between Israel and Lebanon and proudly spoke about the amicable relations between the two formerly antagonistic states. Twenty days later, this same border teems with Israeli tanks, soldiers, artillery, paramedics, and just across this border, South Lebanon now ranks the densest area in the world in terms of weaponry per square kilometer…”

The Chief Source: A Post From Inside Israel

I’m three of twenty. If you have a spare seven and a half minutes, check out my interview @ BlueOhioan.com. Just want to thank Anthony and Tom for coming out and doing these. I’m impressed at the quality of questions that Anthony asks and am glad he’ll be able to attend future meet.the.bloggers* conversations…

blueohioan: The bloggapalooza Interviews : George Nemeth

Cleveland Law Library Weblog: Cleveland Bans .50 Caliber Rifles