As forwarded my my fine associate:

> Continuing with our “Free Culture Friday” series, we’re holding an
event on Cyberactivism and Culture Jamming this Friday where we’ll
explore the interplay between digital technologies, activism, and the
ability to modify and critique cultural institutions.

Digital Disobedience: Cyberactivism and Culture Jamming
Fri., Dec 1, 6pm
Science Center 110, Harvard University (One block north of the Harvard Sq T)

Featuring four speakers:

The format will be interactive. We’ll first have short presentations
from each of the speakers, then we’ll break up into groups that will
discuss ideas, issues, and projects with each of the presenters. We
may even venture off to do some culture jamming ourselves afterwards.

Sponsored by Boston Free Culture and the Berkman Center for Internet
and Society with support from the MIT Computing Culture Group and the Culture Jam course.

See you there and spread the word!

The UK-based Online Press Gazette just released The New Media Establishment — 50 people shaping online journalism. Among the top 5: Rupert Murdoch, Ashley Highfield of BBC, Craig Newmark of Craigslist, Simon Waldman of Guardian Media Group, and Pete Clifton of BBC News Interactive.

Notice that three of those top five are from the UK, as are, ironically, #6-10 on the list (top companies include BBC, The Guardian, and The Daily Telegraph). What does this say about the future of new media? I think it says the leaders of the new media revolution are, in large part, British. As much as my brief-but-brilliant residency in the mean streets of Manchester made me hurl, I did notice one good thing about England: they valued urban art and digital media. Sure, it was nearly impossible to find employment, gainful or otherwise — but, like Germany, they had whole museums devoted to digital art, and they had tons of interactive cafes and techy-themed chrome interior design in stores and restaurants. Basically, they’ve sniffed the economic winds, and realized the future is blowing towards new media. They’ve realized they can either lead the revitalization of the newspaper/TV industry, or they can watch as everyone else does it.

Except the U.S. — we are, after all, ranked just below Estonia in fiber connectivity and #12 (after Korea, all of Scandanavia, and half of Western Europe) in Broadband subscriptions. There was an excellent Bill Moyers’ documentary on PBS that chronicled the fiber developement debacle in the U.S. in the 90s: The Net at Risk.

All this is to say, despite the large number of American bloggers and Wiki-freaks, we’re still not leading the information industry. Is this because most American media is owned by big corporations now, which is more concerned with financial returns than with embracing participatory, progressive media strategies? Or is it the inverse — that the UK conglomerates also own all the media, but their strategies are much more foward-thinking and embrace digital media and interaction?

I’m getting distracted now. We’ll continue this discussion later.

Down to the wire now, no pun intended. My teeth are slowly becoming aligned again, with the middle of the top two teeth in pleasant symmetry with the middle of my bottom two teeth. Amazing.

Not much happened today. I’m still required to wear two jaw-aligning elastics, bla bla. The only change is that they hired a new assistant, who took 45 minutes changing my ties (the invisible latex elastics that hold all the teeth together). She had some trouble holding onto my lip. The scene vacillated between mildy humorous and mildy annoying, but she was a sweet woman, and I guess she was still learning, so I bit my tongue (literally) and stayed polite.

The only pertinent news has to do with my impending finale: we’ll be done by February, Doc says now. Granted, first it was June, then it was October, and now he’s come up with another arbitrary deadline — but I actually believe him this time, because my teeth are just about done. I can see it. I can chew my food properly, etc. The FIC is fully down, and the FST (formerly sideways tooth) is in a normal position, and all the spaces have closed.

So, if you’re an adult considering whether or not to get your teeth fixed — DO IT! DO IT NOW!

The End.

toes? I know I promised the Deval video, but I forgot a power cord and bla bla. Anyway, it’ll be up by or before I return from NYC. Sorry, there are so many projects in the works.

But that’s not what I wanted to write about. I wanted to write about Harrison Avenue, and how yellow the leaves are, and how it smells, and my experiences taking the Silver Line to work in the mornings. (Photos will be posted shortly.)

Last week, a drunk man stumbled onto the bus and literally sat on me, then slumped onto the seat beside me. I did my best urbanite oblivion act, pretending I couldn’t see or smell him, but soon he started slumping over, and then I heard snoring…yes, my inebriated friend had laid back with his arm around my neck and his head beside me, snoring. I actually didn’t notice it at first, until a cute hip-looking kid across the aisle gave me a broad smile. We both looked at the drunk guy and shook our heads. Then the kid stood up and motioned for me to take his seat. I thanked him, and took it. A few minutes later, the drunk guy, now completely sprawled out on both seats across the aisle, started hissing, “Hey, you girl,” and making various lewd gestures with his fingers and mouth. What could I do? I kept laughing. The woman next to me started laughing too. The cute, hip-looking kid beside us started laughing. It was surreal.

This morning on the bus, I sat across from a John Mayerish-looking dude, travel mug in hand, collared shirt, reading a book. I stared at him for a while until we drove past a park on Washington Street which is my newest favorite thing to look at. There are always dogs and students and old people and dead leaves. It reminds me of crossing Whitworth Park in the mornings in Manchester, UK, passing disgusting middle-aged men screaming insults at me while Irish and African guys played futbol on separate sides of the field. There was something beautifully raw and equally horrible about that park. You couldn’t walk through it at night. I didn’t know then how often I’d refer back to it. I guess everything is a metaphor for something else.

I spent all day campaigning: 3 hours holding signs in Somerville and 7 hours phone banking. I promise to finally have my video of Deval Patrick’s primary victory speech online by tomorrow night. Meanwhile, the Dems have taken the House and the Senate is wicked close. Speaking of wicked, how did you like Sen. Kennedy’s intro speech for Deval at the victory party tonight? If you saw his performance, you’ll know what I’m talking about: Kennedy is truly a legend. And an animated one at that. I’m proud to live in Massachusetts tonight, and I’m proud of my peeps in Penna for finally knocking down Santorum. Way to go, homeys.

So stay tuned for Vlog9 – Deval up on this site tomorrow night, followed by Vlog10 – Burma protest @ the U.N. in NYC, which I’ll be attending (& filming) in Manhattan on Saturday.

Peace.

I went campaigning for Deval Patrick tonight, standing on the median where the highway begins. A guy selling roses gave me this for free. I’ve made a habit of photographing flowers before they die, so I can remember how awesome they were.

Is this getting boring? Are you bored, reading about my teeth every three weeks for the past 21 months? Because I’m totally bored. Frustrated, actually, is a more accurate adjective.

This time, the doc just replaced the long band of tiny conjoined latex elastics connecting all my top teeth with new ones, except this time he also added some very small wire around my FIC (Formerly Impacted Canine) to turn it a little straighter. The result: tiny white wire knots, rubbing on my upper gum. Rubbing rubbing rubbing rubbing on the dang upper gum, which, if you didn’t get the visual already, rubs until you can no longer (a) eat, and (b) talk.

The good news is, after a day or two, your gums get tougher, and the incessant rubbing no longer brings you to tears. I do, however, have a major problem chewing anything. This mostly has to do with the fact that the FIC sits directly over the bottom canine, which, if you look at your own teeth, isn’t normal. Canines aren’t supposed to fit together; they’re supposed to fit between one another. To correct my ever-misaligned bite, Doc decided to have me wear MORE elastics connecting my upper and lower teeth on the left and my FIC with a bottom tooth…which, if you’re doing the math, means I’ve got two elastics pulling my mouth closed in the front. This is in an effort to bring my top and bottom teeth into a straight vertical line, and bring my currently sideways smile back into a horizontal line, but it looks awfully stupid.

This is fascinating stuff, no?! You’re tantalized, I can tell. Ok, we’re done.