802 Online

So what happened? Did anybody go? I checked the blog but didn't see anything. I would have been there, but I was at a wedding. Er, civil union. But everybody called it a wedding.

I wish they would have a gay marriage pillow fight on the statehouse lawn. That would be very cathartic, I think. Supporters on one side, opponents on the other. If everybody signed waivers ahead of time, it might work...

I was just reading the Chicago Reader email newsletter, and I came across this story about Chicago photographer Jason Lazarus and his Nirvana Project. Lazarus is collecting found photos of the "cultural mavens" who first introduced a generation of kids to Nirvana. Here's an excerpt from the story (I think it's from the Reader's music column):

Lazarus is mostly dealing with people in a narrow agerange, from their late 20s to early 30s — old enough to have caredabout the alt-rock explosion, but young enough to have needed agatekeeper to guide them through their first revelatory experiences ofnonmainstream culture. His Nirvana Project focuses on that gatekeeper — the boyfriend, the friend of an older sibling, whoever — as a wayof addressing the universal adolescent experience of developing anindependent personal identity. Each piece is a blown-up print of theoriginal photo of somebody's "culture maven," accompanied by Lazarus'shandwritten version of the tale behind it.

Sounds very cool. There's an email address where you can contact him.

Does anyone out there know of any good ones? Or any at all, for that matter?

If you're interested in contributing to a conversation about embedding external links in newspaper stories online, check out my latest post on the web.aan.org blog — it's a web best practices blog for alternative weeklies. I'm a guest blogger.

From Barkings! The Small Dog blog, a post in which guys play video games at work.

Went to the Harry Potter Muggle Madness Party at the Flying Pig in Shelburne on Friday night. I would have blogged about it, but I was too busy reading the book (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, with an "a," which I misspelled last week in our calendar spotlight and on our newsletter. Duh.)

Finished it last night around 11 or so. Wow, what a whirlwind!

This is a picture of Willy McKay of North Ferrisburgh, who stood behind me in line. He's dressed as Harry Potter. Obviously.

Tomatoes! Fresh tomatoes!

From Old Shaw Farm in South Peacham. God bless 'em.

Well, ok, she's not just a Vermont blogger — she's also a famous author.

Thanks, Lisa, for the tip.

And another Vermont connection: Dwight Garner — New York Times book blog author and NYT Book Review senior editor — used to freelance at the Vermont Vanguard, and was once the arts editor at the weekly Vermont Times. "During its brief heydey," quips someone in my office.

I refer, of course, to my office, in the "Red Room" at Seven Days. It's actually much messier right now than it was in this photo from March.

I just finished putting together the email newsletter, so I'm taking a breather for a minute to post here.

We're doing a bunch of new stuff. I'm pointing it out here mainly to see if anyone is paying attention and/or has feedback. Right now I'm just working really hard, throwing stuff at the wall to see what'll stick. And I want to know what you think about it all.

If you're a regular 802 Online or Seven Days reader, you know that we have a vlog, Stuck in Vermont. What you might not know is that we recently hired vlogger Eva Sollberger full-time, to do a variety of video content (which we're still trying to incorporate into our print and web operations).

Here are some examples of the non-STVT videos Eva's done lately:

VT's reaction to the Simpsons Movie win: Eva shot this video the day they announced that Springfield, Vermont, won the Simpsons Movie contest.

How to Make a Rivet Bracelet: a corollary to the Rosie's Girls episode of STVT.

Real Live Tourists in Vermont: a video to accompany our summer tourism guide.

Thrashin' Thursday: video of Ridin' High's Thrashin' Thursday in Burlington (two weeks before the proprietor was in that bad accident on Rt. 108)

Chipmunks in Charge: a video that goes with Pamela Polston's Creature Comfort story.

Poof! Drag Cabaret: a "music video" with interviews, shot at the Cirque du So Gay party after Pride.

Comments? Yes, we know that the YouTube compression sucks. We're hoping to have it on a flash player someday soon. And hey, you can see the super-clear versions of Eva's STVT videos on VCAM, Channel 15 — Monday nights at 8:30, Tuesday mornings at 9:30.

We're also experimenting with audio — I've posted several audio clips over the past few months, and this week I added a new feature in our email newsletter called "How I Got That Story." We didn't have any groundbreaking exposes this week, so I asked Mike Ives to talk about his Simpsons voter fraud story.

Here's what Mike had to say (audio link, 2:30).

Feedback?

I should also note that we're on the verge of switching content management systems. We're moving to drupal. Hurray! Fingers crossed, the first phase of the migration should happen by the end of the summer. It'll include a searchable archive (from 2003 or so on -- that's all we've got so far), and RSS feeds, among other things. No comments yet, but that's coming soon, too. I've seen the initial mock-ups, and I think it looks awesome.

Back to work.

If you want to know what you missed, Philip Baruth has a comprehensive report.