Media's New Frontier

You want to know where the future of media is headed? “Sea to shining sea,” those words describe the eventual expansion of the Western United States. American Progress painted by John Gast in 1872, was the representation of a new frontier that was Destined to be, “Civilized”; Manifest Destiny. Not a term usually associated with media, but it explains the power of an idea.

This is a metaphor for the media and internet convergence of today’s world.

The Angel, centered in the painting, laces the plains with telegraph wires, holding a schoolbook as she leads the settlers in wagons, followed by the, “Iron Horse,” into the new world. The painting is a wonderful symbol of human beings willingness to take risk when there is opportunity.

It was the telegraph lines laid, paving way to telephone and power lines, which soon were followed by fiber obtics cables, and eventually a digital world and communications by means of satellites. Finally, the World Wide Web.

Holding a book signifying education; the heavenly Angel in the famous painting, therefore now signifies information. The book is now a laptop. The internet invented for the purpose of exchanging information, has revolutionized how people share and exchange that information. Globalizing and making the world a smaller place, stories and events can be shared almost instantaneously, and people have access to more information than any other age before it.

Much like the great expansion of the 19th century US, this new frontier will, and already has begun invading, and changing the known world. The culture in which we are part of, has become a marketing driven society. People experience constant bombardment from almost every avenue, radio, T.V., internet, and even on your cell phone. Consumer culture is now available to people from South America to Africa.

The settlers in the painting hold their modern tools; pitchforks, farm equipment, saddled horses, and rifles. Just imagine those settlers with I-phones, Black-berrys, and laptops. Technology and the plight of the internet have blurred the lines in media, and a new world has opened up once again.

Journalist no longer just write stories, and photographers no longer just take photos. A new type of journalist has emerged, called a Multi-Media Journalist, who can do a variety of task. From write the story and take the pictures, to upload photos and even begin to edit video footage.

Just like the pain, struggle, and uncertainty the people who settled the American West faced, so too do the traditional journalist, media affiliates and even economic future face. The country has already begun to see the migration from the typical media practices to the new frontier of sharing information.

In the painting, animals and Native Americans flee from the oncoming settlers. In the new frontier of the digital world, there will be things that will be threatened. Print media, and typical journalism jobs are threatened. In our own city The Rocky Mountain News, a Pulitzer Prize winning, 150 year old publication printed its final edition in February of this year. The Seattle based newspaper, The Post-Intelligencer, also shut down their printing operation this month, although they retained a fourth of their staff to maintain a web-site.

The Train has left the station on the digital revolution. Media convergence is a continuing phenomenon, and everyday there is new information on mergers, and changes in major companies adjusting to the changing world. Technewsworld.com is one of the many sites devoted to showcasing new technologies and is loaded with articles on the converging media.

Licensed 2 Spread

People associated with this controversial industry like to boast it is the world’s oldest profession. In two U.S. states that allow prostitution (Nevada and Rhode Island), known brothels have been tolerated since 1902. By 1970 brothels in Nevada earned a legal permit to operate within certain county limits. In the larger scheme some people have suggested that the US should legalize “the world’s oldest profession”.

People who support the decriminalization of prostitution will say that by eliminating the criminal element has many different positive dividends. Economically many supporters say it makes sense in order to collect taxes from these untracked services. Prostitutes should pay taxes just like everyone else and we as a society should be able to reap the financial benefits that they can bring. As seen in the Netherlands according to prostitutionresearch.com, sexual services account for about 5% of the total financial revenue of the Netherlands. Supporters of this ideology will point to facts like this as reasons it would help local economies to legalize the industry as opposed to wasting money prosecuting the endless list of people involved in this commerce.

The supporters also downplay the suggestions that the legalization promotes infidelity. Where truthaboutdecption.com claims that up to 60% of all relationships suffer from some infidelity, factions pushing for the validation also state cheaters will cheat no matter the circumstances.

Also that society should protect the unknowing people in these relationships by being able to offer safe and healthy ways for the cheaters, helping to curb the spread of sexually transmitted disease. And by standardizing testing methods for the women in this industry, it would protect the women in the practice considerably.

Also by legalizing the profession, we will get women of the streets and help to give them legitimate workers rights. So that they may have fair and balanced working conditions and decrease the amount of clandestine prostitution.

Morals, perceptions and uncertainty, that’s what the opposition says legalization of this occupation will change. Groups like the Coalition Against Trafficking of Women say it will demoralize not only our society but our youth as well. Having a trickle down affect on the socially acceptable sexual practices and opening up more degrading forms of prostitution.

Also that the decriminalization is a donation to the pimps and thugs of the industry, turning them into recognizable lawful businessmen. Also stating women in the industry will become commodities not only to their employers but to the state as well because of the financial contributions they will add to their cities. In essence that the states with these law changes will become more economically reliant on the sex areas.

Furthermore that it will have long-term repercussions on the perception of women, making them subordinates and put in worse positions than they are now. The legalization of this trade not only will not protect women, but will increase violence to employee’s and the areas associated with prostitution. Prostitutionresearch.com also reports that women of the industry report that substantiation of the trade will make it harder for them to report rape. Proving that they were forced into sexual acts will be scoffed at and almost impossible to prove.

A report by USA Today says that since the Netherlands legalization of prostitution, that violent crime, drug use, organized crime and illegal prostitution has significantly increased. This could increases the amount of danger for women in this livelihood.

So as far as the economic stimulating factor, nothing is guaranteed. To where as it may significantly help, it has been documented that noteworthy amounts of illegal prostitution actually increases. Because the socially accepted state of the trade increases so does the opportunity for illegitimate proprietors operating without the proper licenses or permits. Leaving large amounts of money still under the table and avoiding regulation and taxation. So it is not certain that efficient financial gains will be made.

So all this information arises many unanswered questions in consideration of this matter. Does the American constituency deem prostitution as a morally unacceptable practice?

And if it does, Are the economical positives greater than the perceived ethical deplorableness of the legalization of a sexual business? Does the legalization put our ethical values at risk? Would the decriminalization of this trade turn pimps, thugs, and street hustlers into third party legitimate businessmen?

Will the legalization actually help our economy? Will legalization of the trade help to promote better health of the women and their clients? Should we legalize prostitution in order to help our economic recession at the cost of our ethical values? These are all common questions people may have when deciding which side to stand on with this issue.

Wind, Blackout's, and Lola

Crazyness insued today at work. First of all, I Had a great time at Red Square Last night and then went throught the Fly Magazine release party, then the Tavern. It was windy and cold as hell last night, and had to run through sleet to get a cab home.

This morning at work, Lol was super slow and dragging. But as soon as they cut one busser it got busy, Murphy's Law. So the restaurant starts feeling up, at which point all of the sudden the lights go out.

The silence and complete dark was pretty strange, considering the building Lola is in, used to be a mortuary. And it didn't just flash off and then turn back on in couple seconds. The lights went out at about 1:20pm and I left at 3:00 and they still weren't on.

The timing was odd too, it was like everyone already had ordered and most were already paying. But we couldnt see anything at first. The dish pit got over filled with dishes and we closed the kitchen. But that don't stop a drinker,LOL people were still coming into the bar, and they had cash. Lola is such a chill place that the manager let every employee get a couple drinks too.

I hear that it blacked out from the middle of 16th st mall and all the way into the lower Highlands. They didn't estimate it to get back on till at least 5. I hear.
Pretty wierd day I would say.

Bigwheel

When telling someone about a new favorite band, people usually start by describing the style of music played. Hip-hop, Soul, R&B, Rock, Reggae, or whatever your particular favorite might be. It’s most interesting when you discover a band that reaches beyond the boundaries of any single style. A crew who really doesn’t recognize the barriers defining different types of music; they just play.

Regardless of genre, truly successful music energizes the audience and brings the show to life. These musicians do it. Performing original songs with some of the best vocalist Denver has to offer and also keeping it live with renditions of Hip-hop classics like Nas’s, “One Love,” and, “I Can,” or Biggie’s “Juicy”.

DJ Checkone on the live drums, Charlie Mertants on the bass guitars, Jared Silo on keys, Dominic Lalli on keys and sax, and DJ Vajra keep the heads nodding in agreement and faces smiling everywhere they go. Denver (drum roll please)… Introducing Bigwheel!

Bigwheel stems from the intuitive mind of Dameion Hines a.k.a. DJ Checkone. Hines is not only a drummer, also a local DJ, and young prodigy. During the Democratic National convention, and through the presidential elections, Hines sold catchy t-shirts with the image of Barrack Obama using turntables as a DJ. His little idea sold 40,000 shirts.

So like a true business man, Bigwheel resulted from another one of his ventures, Dragonfly, falling apart. With tenacious commitment, he pulled some close friends together to continue making the bands scheduled gigs. What came of it was a funky fresh collection of flows, beats and sounds.

Don’t be fooled by the kind of music the band describes as Electrosoul; emphasis on Soul. The band has a live feel, similar to The Roots, and the energy of a Hip-hop show, smoothing it through with wonderfully strong vocals from local artist like Venus Cruz. The sound created can appeal to anyone who enjoys music.

“The coolest thing about it is that there are so many people that play in the band, we really don’t deal with much friction. The songs that we play for are most part different every time, because everybody’s so improvisational personality magnifies the stimulus of the magical transition… Do you know what I mean?” DJ Checkone reveals. The cohesive sound and style of Bigwheel shines through in each song and performance, utilizing different local artist and musicians who all connected.

The feel the band crafts is more like a bunch of friends just having a good time, “It seems like a house party every week. There's just lots of happy smiling people wherever we play, as cheeseball as it sounds,” Checkone says in response to questions about the vibe going on around the group and elaborates with, “Our fans are our friends, and everything has been great. It's your basic friendship. To the people that don't know us, we plan on becoming your friend pretty soon”.

Alluring is the fact, since they have no one style they are trying to stick with, crazy and ingenious collaborations of sounds and songs come together. An interpretation of Warren G’s, “Regulators,” is a fan favorite at a local gig Bigwheel performs at, and one imparticular song is ear-catching. The instrumental to a song by J-Dilla is combined with the infamous MLK Jr. speech of, “I Have a Dream”. The outcome is a fresh collaboration that is unheard of and is memorable and inspiring.

Hines stays hard at work coming up with bright new songs, and ideas. Hines work can be seen through Bigwheel performing every Tuesday at the Apalooza Grill from 10 p.m. -1 a.m. or you can check them out at Myspace.com/bigwheelcamp.

He Stood Before the Crowd

We are into a new, historic presidency. However it is a presidency that happened over 150 years ago that we must never forget as we move into this new time of change. Barrack Obama will be the first African-American president this country, and there is one man who stood up and eventually died for that to be possible.

It was Abraham Lincoln who stood before crowds all over the state of Illinois, to profess, “a house divided cannot stand”. Seven historic debates with took place with Steven A. Douglas, on the opposing side for The US Senate in Illinois. In these debates the main focus was the issue of slavery, and more specifically it’s spread to the territories, and any new expansion. He delivered seven passionate debates, in which Judge Theo Lyle Dickey accused him of being too close to the abolitionists, meaning he wanted freedom to all the slavery states.

Lincoln eventually lost the seat to Douglass in 1958, but the controversy and social equality chatter he drummed up with his ideology in those debates, eventually propelled him into the presidential race of 1960. His victory in the campaign, which amongst other factors, lead to the Civil War, and eventually empowered the African-American population, along with other minorities to push for civil rights.

Ironically, Obama is taking the presidency from the same US senate seat Lincoln debated so passionately for. He is tall and slender like Lincoln, and has had to fight the status quo in his political career. Obama represents the Democrat party, which ironically is the same party that opposed Lincoln. How much the world has changed since Lincoln’s day. I can’t help but imagine if Lincoln had lost, then Obama’s parents never would have meet at the University of Hawaii as students.

Lincoln’s assassination came from the hands of the Confederate supporter John Wilkes Booth, who was known to absolutely loath Lincoln for ending slavery. So this month having President’s Day and the presidential inauguration, we can remember a martyr, and patriot who empowered our current cultural melting pot of a society, in Abraham Lincoln. And we will celebrate the fruit of his efforts, for a country which has finally shown growth and change, to elect the first bi-racial president in Barrack Obama.






The crowd saw a thin, well dressed man,
They did not know where his feet had taken him.
He had been through the great state of Illinois,
From Springfield to Charleston,
From the backwoods at night,
to the majesty of Chicago’s city lights.
He stood before the crowd,
Ready to speak with from his heart.
Many said he words were said in vain,
he would not bring about change.
But he spoke his words true,
And never gave in or withdrew.
It was by believing with his heart and confessing with his mouth,
That brought him to the head of the House.
I know you know about whom I’m speakin,
…….That man’s name was Abraham Lincoln.

No Escape

You can never recall the incident specifically. But you can distantly never forget that dark nocturnal shadow of fear. The one that chased you, once upon a night, through the empty neighborhood as you lied wrapped between your bed sheets. The rollercoaster feeling in the deepest part of your stomach, which gripped the very breath you fumbled to find, as you were falling quickly to the inevitable pavement below. Only to wake suddenly to a cold sweat and the chilled breeze of your empty bedroom.

That these magnificent vivid Hollywood productions of our brain occur is conceded by modern science and the theological societies of the world. Not often are the specific details of the horrifying experience remembered but the incredibly realistic feeling of fear and terror they impress on us are immovable objects in the museum of our memories.

However we want to know not where they come from neurologically, but if they originate from something in our daily lives, or if they result from a traumatic event of some kind, or are a premonition alluding to an oncoming train of events in our lives. So to be more concise in my question, are hidden trepidations revealed in our dreams or are they simply reflecting the known worries we may have? For this is the fundamental question that has been discussed since the work of Aristotle to our present ideas about dreams.

Instead of trying to rephrase the entire library of information, documented by many scholarly philosophers and modern psychologist, I decided to research about the most commonly reported nightmares people experience and then seek opinions that could help illuminate ideas about them.

Researchers say that 60% of all dreams are related to stress or anxiety. × Also nightmares are estimated to be experienced at a much higher rate in children, 20 to 39 percent in children between ages 5 -12.≈

Nightmare.info lists the most highly reported nightmares as being chased of some kind, falling, being in class and unprepared for impending test, drowning, witnessing a murder, teeth falling out, or showing up to some crowded place like school or work and being the only one naked.

Some of my own nightmares fall into one of these fright filled categories, so I wanted to see what kind of nightmares people on campus had experienced lately. Also if their occurrences could be easily linked to a specific stress or anxiety related origins and if there was a higher rate of the nightmare experience during their childhood.

So I randomly surveyed 20 people on the Auraria Campus to see how common these kinds of dreams are among them. I based my questioning on the idea that nightmares were more frequently experienced by children and adolescence. Also that fear or anxiety may have had a big part in the reason the nightmares occurred. Of the 20 surveyed, 18 out of 20 reported to have had a nightmare in one of the common categories. Also 15 out of the 20 reported to that more nightmares occurred frequently as a child ages 5-12. Significantly surprising was that 19 out of 20 said that they could directly relate having these nightmares as a result of stress, anxiety or an emotional state of mind at the time.

The most surprising factor was that only 1 out of the 20 said that they had a nightmare recently they could actually remember. This was very insightful about the fact that hardly are the details of nightmares remembered, but the impression of the feelings that were invoked is scarcely forgotten.

In order to shed a little more light on the topic I decided to interview one of CCD’s psychology teachers. Diana Joy is a new addition to the CCD faculty and she is also an adjunct professor for Metro and Argosy University at Denver as well as being the advisor for Psibeta, which is the Nation Honor Society in psychology chapter for CCD. She graduated in 1986 with a master’s degree in marriage and family therapy and has over 20 years in medical practice in a variety of different fields.

The first thing we discussed was the definition of nightmare itself. As the nightmare is defined as ; a dream occurring during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep that results in feelings of inescapable terror, fear or extreme anxiety .× However how people define a nightmare may differ; where as some people may perceive an unpleasant dream as a nightmare and some must be outright terrifying. So for our purposes we want to include all.

Next we discussed the involvement of memory and how it relates to our dreams. As found in our student survey, most people could not recall not only the most recent dream they may have had, but neither recalls specifically any dream they have experienced. Because the time the most dreams occur, during the deep stages of REM sleep, our memory does not operate fully during that time leaving us only to vaguely remember the last dream that was occurring before we awoke. As just as some people may have a better memory than others, likewise some people remember more dreams than others. So it is not that you are actually having more dreams but simply just that you remember more than someone else. Lending some credibility to the idea that more important are the feelings invoked because of the dream then the actual details themselves.

Finally, I wanted to discuss some of the most common specific dreams that people experience and what are some reasons that could be linked to our own anxieties and fears? So my original question was going to be that of; why do people experience falling dreams? Or see their teeth falling out? However after discussing the topic with her, I found that almost all of the causes could be derived from the same variables. Regardless of the specific dream it’s the variables in our daily lives that could determine the origin of our dreams. So it is in essence the totality of our brain, not only trying to make sense of the worries around us, but possibly bringing subconscious worries to our attention. So the cause for someone having a falling dream can be attributed to many different variables. To where as many people have many different fears ranging from fear of social rejection, possible physical harm, isolation, inability to compete a task, or even fear of destroying a current relationship amongst many other fears. So where one person may experience a dream of their teeth falling out because of their inability to secure a much wanted job, another may experience a similar dream because they are growing into a new area of life and therefore are dreaming of their old teeth falling out in order to make room for new ones. It’s obvious the possibilities of origin can be endless as the variables are so broad.

So because of these ideas I thought the next logical step would be to help students identify the possible reasons of nightmares and help to find good coping methods for them. First of all professor Joy and I discussed some ways students could help to evaluate why they may be having certain dreams. First of we may want to identify the factors in our lives that may be causing us anxiety. For example, financial situations, intimate relationship problems, living conditions, work related stressors, and any other reasons we may be experiencing a high amount of stress.

Next she told me that our actual sleeping patterns and environment could be closely related to our dreams. So we must ask ourselves; am I getting the right amount of sleep? Is the environment I sleep in related to comfort and relaxation, or is it cluttered and disorganized? Am I maintaining a consistent amount of sleep or is my sleep time erratic? This evaluation of our sleeping area and patterns can help to alleviate some of our dreaming problems.
Also we did explore the variables of mental disorders, post-traumatic stress, or the effects of drugs and alcohol, and the great difference in experience with these variables. But because they change the dynamics of dreams extremely, let’s just conclude that these variables in themselves must be dealt with on another level of therapy.

As a final point we talked about ways that a person can evaluate their dreams and deal with them. One method which has seen recent success, developed by Barry Krakow of the University of New Mexico∞, is to immediately wake and record the event of the dream. So when you wake up grab a pen and a pad and just begin to write about your dream in detail, not necessarily in good sentence structure but more like a free writing exercise. This may help dealing with uncomfortable dreams. Also another method employed by Krakow is that shortly after the dream to change the outcome of the dream. For example if we have experienced a dream that’s feelings continue to linger throughout our day, just take a few minutes and close your eyes.

Imagine the dream over again, but this time change what may have happened. So if you were in a class and the teacher throws a test at you that you’re unprepared for, maybe this time envision that you are fully prepared for the test. This has shown outstanding success in Krakow’s studies with children experiencing nightmares.

Also not to be forgotten are the simple stress reduction methods and exercises. So getting your stress management in better order, or trying something new like Yoga, meditation, or breathing methods. Whatever may help you deal with your particular stressors better.

In close it is inevitable that at some time we are going to experience these nocturnal terrors of the night. It is an inescapable occurrence we are all going to have to deal with in our lives. The variables in which they originate from seem to be closely related to stress, anxiety and possibly emotional state of mind.

So knowing these factors can give us the insight to the need to explore variable in our daily lives that may be causing these dreams. By employing a learning method like recounting the dream, imagining it over again and changing the outcome, or utilizing some form of stress management can help us not only in our daily life but in the time our eye lids are closed to the world.