Seattle Trip!

During the Thanksgiving break I didn't have much going on, so when my friend suggested a trip to Seattle I was all for it. I love visiting new places and I haven't been to many of the cities out west.  I used to drive all up and down the east coast, so I was ready for this trip. We got to visit a bunch of the sights, the Aquarium, the Space Needle and the Flight Museum. We also went on this cool underground tour, that takes you around the old level of the city, before they raised the street level about 15 feet. The tour had all kinds of fun local history, which I always get a kick out of. I took a few pictures so I think I will share!

a car any true adventurer would love to own

sleek plane

some cool old timey planes

These were at the air Museum, which has a lot of interesting old planes.

a freaky looking fish

Me on top of the Space Needle

Big old needle

Election Night

November 2nd is an important date for politics, and this November 2nd I got to see the process up close and personal. I was hired by the Associated Press to relay the results of the midterm elections. I reported to the Civic Center and 8pm and didn't leave until sometime after 1 in the morning. I was standing watch by the voting machines and calling in reports every time there was an update in the numbers.

Tucked away in an ancient gym in the back of the Butte Civic Center, the counting room had the haphazard appearance of a makeshift headquarters – complete with folding tables, coffee machines and extension cords running across the floor. The brightly painted floor and unlit scoreboards are a striking parallel to the temporary purpose of the space, elections are the ultimate way of keeping score. After much human effort and tabulation, the winners the current political grudge match to be announced shortly.  A friendly potluck dinner tucked away in the corner with bubbling chili and all the desserts necessary to get through a long night of counting. A couple of counting machines whir away in the background.

There seems to be a delay with the voting machines. Our modern political landscape has been shaped, for better or worse, by these electronic machines, used to collect and tally votes. In recent years susceptibility to tampering and the overall security of these machines has come into question. These machines have removed an important human element in our democratic system, one that can be manipulated in a much more subtle and hard to detect fashion. What do you do with votes the machine can't read? How are those counted? The totals can be edited in such a way that it is hard to detect any tampering. Computer security experts have demonstrated the vulnerability of the voting machines many times. Governments around the world have started shifting back to the hand counting process, even though that method comes with its own set of drawbacks.

Montana has several interesting items on the ballot this year. There are ballot initiatives on taxes, payday loans, and funding wildlife habitats. There is also the question of a constitutional convention.
The U.S House district 1 race between Dennis McDonald (D) and Denny Rehberg ( R) is getting the most attention. There are also a couple of Supreme Court races and a two contests for state house seats. Those were the races that the AP was most concerned about.

All in all, I found this experience illuminating. This is the second time I have had an interesting election night. When I was interning for my Congressman back in Connecticut, I got to be in his "war room" on election night. I got to witness the phone call telling him he had won. This time around I was with the people that were making those phone calls. It was a great experience and I recommend that anyone who is interested in a career in journalism look for a position like this next election season, it's decent money and looks great on the resume.

Resurrection - Oct 28th, 2010

   
 I am planning on going to check out the Wilma Theater in Missoula to go to this show you see above. "Missoula's Premier Electronic Halloween Experience" looks like fun, figured I would share. I might bring some equipment and take some photos and/or some video. I haven't been up to Missoula in a while, I always have a good time there so I am looking forward to it! Here is a song by Kraddy, one of the artists performing.
Kraddy - No Comply (FREE DOWNLOAD) by KRADDY


    Things are going good with The Technocrat, slowly but surely we are getting more and more visitors to the site. I have also had the chance to write a bunch of fun articles, and I've been spending time down at the Butte Public archives doing some research for a series of local history articles. If you know of any colorful local history, feel free to point me in the right direction.

The Technocrat Online!

SO after a couple weeks of obsessive web editing, The Technocrat website is finally done and ready to be used! Come down and check out all our new articles for the week, be sure and add us to your bookmarks! If you want to take a look at the articles I have written so far, take a look here.


Links:
The Technocrat online -add us to your bookmarks!
The Technocrat on Facebook - click the "Like" and show us some support!


Please help us spread the word :)

Journalism

Me covering the summit

So its official, I'm finally a paid journalist! I got a job with The Technocrat doing Electronic Content Management and writing pieces from time to time. I am trying to get the Technocrat website updated and also covering national politics and economics. Expect a lot of news from us, things are coming along nicely, we should have a nice interactive web presence up and running fairly soon.
If you take a look at the September 15th issue, you can read a couple of articles I have written. The topics are the Iraq War and student debt, topics I am sure I will be revisiting down the road. If any readers out there have ideas for stories, be sure and let me know!
The Montana Economic Summit was an interesting experience. I was there to hear Warren Buffet and Steve Ballmer, as well as several different foreign ambassadors. The topic of the day was jobs, and that was mostly what we heard about, but there was some interesting points made throughout the event. Ballmer gave an evangelizing talk on the future of information technology, and Buffet was reassuring the masses that the American economy would not enter a "double dip" recession. Not sure I agree, but it was fun to listen. I would highly recommend that anyone interested in doing business in Montana check it out next time around.

Jonah Lehrer on Creative Insight

Jonah Lehrer: Creative Insights from PopTech on Vimeo.

Author Jonah Lehrer explores the power of outsider intelligence. At PopTech 2009, the best-selling author of How We Decide and Proust Was a Neuroscientist, notes that, paradoxically, lacking expertise on a subject can be an asset. 

    I posted this because I found it deeply fascinating. The idea the an outsider's perspective can be a huge advantage is an idea that appeals to me. The less emotional investment you have in a situation, the more rational you can be in your thinking about it. If you are interested more in Lehrer's work, he blogs at Wired Magazine and has written a couple of books about Neuroscience. His book "How We Decide" was a bestseller and was " The first book to use the unexpected discoveries of neuroscience to help us make the best decisions."

Economics

I have always been interested in history, and curious about the forces that shape our society. This lead me to an interest in Economics, which was going to be my major for a little while, but the math requirements got the best of me. I still retain a deep fascination with the subject. We all feel the effects of good or bad economic policy, so it seems to me we should all have an interest in making sure our leaders pursue sound economic policy. However, economics is called "the dismal science" for a reason, it can be rather confusing and depressing at times. My interest in the field is mainly focused on the Austrian School of Economics. I attended a week long seminar in the summer of 2009, which gave me a crash course on the subject.
There has been a lot of interesting news for Austrian Economics recently. The first bit of good news -

Today a Ph.D.-level seminar in Austrian economics commences at the University of Missouri. What is so important about this event is that the course is not part of a niche Austrian program dependent on external funding, but is part of the regular curriculum of a mainstream program at a major research university. This is a clear signal that Austrian economics is beginning to be taken seriously by mainstream economists.

This is very exciting because the field has been marginalized for a long time, it is good to see it finally getting some recognition. The other interesting piece of news was a recent Wall Street Journal article about Peter J. Boettke, a professor at George Mason University who is emerging as the "intellectual standard-bearer" for Austrian Economics. That makes two prestigious organizations that are giving credit to the Austrian movement in the same week, wild stuff! 


My interest in economics has caused me to follow the current financial crisis closely. This video I would like to share is about 45 minutes in total length and gives a good breakdown of what happened. I have a personal connection to this video in a couple of ways. it features interviews with Peter Schiff of Euro-Pacific Capital and Megan McArdle of The Atlantic. Peter just lost his dark horse bid in the Republican Primary for the upcoming Connecticut Senate race. I almost got involved on his campaign, but I came out here for school just as it was ramping up. This summer I heard Megan give an awesome lecture about blogging and the future of journalism at the Journalism & Free Society seminar in Philadelphia this past summer.


OVERDOSE - An ABC - Four Corners documentary about the coming economic crisis, featuring Gerald Celente and Peter Schiff. Original air date: 23rd August, 2010.

Higher Education?

Hi there, I was watching my favorite TV show, The Colbert Report, when a segment came on about for-profit colleges. The clip details the difference between the non-profit schools and the newer for-profit places, like Kaplan and Devry. One thing I found very intriguing was the fact that Goldman Sachs has a 38% ownership stake in the second largest school. It's pretty safe assume that Goldman Sachs will only get into businesses that are ripping people off somewhere! I thought that some of this information might be interesting, so I figured I would share the clip.

Stephen Colbert has to be one of the greatest political pundits of all time. I love the satirical edge of his show, makes me laugh every time. I really do not know how he manages to keep a straight face throughout his bits. His writers have to be some of the best in the business. I prefer Colbert to The Daily Show, but I think that is a preference thing. I am not much of a "progressive", so many times I find Jon Stewart to be a little too preachy. Hope you all enjoy the clip!

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Stephen Colbert University - Andrew Hacker
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes 2010 Election Fox News

Fractals

  Being the "design" guy that I am, I was really impressed when I came across this short video that uses fractal animation. It gives you an idea of the infinite nature of the patterns by using extreme zooms. I watched a documentary on Benoit Mandelbrot a couple years back and I was really amazed when I found out how recently fractals had been discovered, 1975! Without fractals there would be no video games, because the fractal math is absolutely essential to render graphics on screen. Enough about fractals, lets get to the video.

Mandelbox Zoom from hömpörgő on Vimeo.

From the creator -

"The end part a single frame took 18 minutes to render, and the whole 1:27 minute video needed 12 days nonstop rendering. I felt thats more than enough at the time. It was just my first experiment with Mandelbulb 3D, a freeware program, I'm not a film director or something...And as I heard its a kind of 3D version of the mandelbrot set. A new discovery that found nearly 1 year ago."

Music

Our first dubstep show

My brother and I have been listening to electronic music since the late 90's. After I graduated from high school, I took up the hobby of DJ'ing. I started buying vinyl records from the UK, and landed some gigs and raves and clubs around New England. It wasn't long before my younger brother Justin got interested in DJ'ing as well. He played a style of music called Drum n Bass, and I generally played electro house and techno. About a year and half ago we decided to join forces and start a project called The Swagger Jackers. We play a variety of music now, from electro to dubstep to indie rock, anything we like.We DJ and put out mixtapes, produce remixes and originals, blog, organize and promote concert events and other music industry type stuff. 

Working the controls

This summer we got to play a few good shows, I figured I would share some photos and a couple videos. This summer we have really been getting into the dubstep style of dance music. These photos are from our first all dubstep DJ set. We also have a dubstep mixtape called "War of the Worlds" that is online and available for free download. Here is a short video from our first dubstep DJ set in July.




EDIT: I have another video to share!

Summer Fun

     It has been a few months since my last post, summer is here and I am doing the best I can to not spend it attached to a computer. That is not to say I have avoided being productive however; it's just that a fresh look at my priorities seemed to be in order. My list of summer-to-do items, in order of importance: 


1. Get to the beach multiple times a week
2. Read something for fun
3. Learn something from the IHS Journalism & A Free Society conference in Philadelphia
3. Get the knee surgery I have been waiting years for
4. Forget about being dumped by my girlfriend
5. Go on computer for blogging, editing, learning new tricks etc (basically what I did the whole school semester)


     I stayed faithful to the list with the exception of the "fun reading". I just haven't found the right time to start reading, the pain after my knee surgery (ACL reconstruction) pushed my motivation levels way down. I am hoping to remedy that situation and plow through a few classics in the last few weeks of summer. There are a number of good books out there that I've been meaning to wrap my head around.


    While working on my Undergraduate Research Project (a film about the Great Depression, NCUR accepted!) I decided that journalism is  a field I was interested in. This mild interest started building into a career trajectory after I took Journalism 101 last semester and signed up for a summer conference put together by the Institute for Humane Studies. The seminar was a great experience, it was a week long networking/learning experience, where I met other like minded students from around the country and discussed advanced political topics that you wouldn't normally encounter here at Tech. The IHS features a number of different seminars they run annually. Some focus journalism, while other public policy or just even political theory, the common ground being the analysis using "classically liberal" political theory, known today as libertarianism. Some shots from the event:

Easy to make new friends here

A faculty of working professionals, nice change of pace. (National Review, Reason Magazine, The Atlantic)

The Bryn Mawr campus was breathtaking, straight out of Harry Potter

Dance Party Time...

So it is the end of the year, and my brother is driving out from CT to come visit and then we are taking a road trip back to the east coast. I don't know if I have mentioned this before but I used to DJ at a lot of clubs and raves back east. My brother is bringing some of our DJ equipment out so we can do a show here in Butte! Come and celebrate the end of the school year, here are the details :)

Here is a link to the Facebook event page!

Local Art

Thanks to Chad Okrusch and our Visual Communications class, I was able to find out about an awesome local artist, Shawn Crowe. He gave a very interesting presentation to our class about his artistic process and showed us several examples of his work. I was very impressed by his work, much of it abstract with vibrant colors. His latest series "Modern Myth", deals with retelling some classic Greek mythology. We were shown Athena, The Graces, Persephone and other classic Greek gods in some interesting poses and surrounded by beautiful colors. I personally enjoyed almost every painting that he showed us, each one rich with detail and symbolism. Even though I immediately felt the aesthetic beauty of the pieces, as he explained the motivation and the process, my appreciation for the pieces expanded tremendously. They are are very well thought out and unique. I was particularly impressed by the abstract nature of the work. I thought it was a refreshing take on classic Greek culture, a new twist on the "ideal form" that Plato popularized. The abstract nature of the work is an interesting juxtaposition of that Platonic ideal, giving the classic forms a modern colorful twist. One of my favorite pieces that he showed us dealt with Achilles, although I couldn't post that one here because it is due to be posted in a gallery soon.

If you would like to see more of Shawn's work, the Main Stope gallery on Park St. is showing a few pieces, and a few other pieces are at Jailhouse Coffee on Park St, and at the Blue Luna.

Here a few examples of his work -

  "The Graces"

"Charging Ox"

"TheStormLord"- not full title, I had it and lost it!

Bassnectar was great

So here is the short little video I made of the Bassnectar show in Bozeman, hopefully you can get a good idea of what it was all about. The crowd was really into it, I have to admit I was pretty surprised at the turnout and the intensity of the crowd.

Rail Jam this Sat

This Fri/Sat there is a Rail Jam at the Gallatin County Fairgrounds in Bozeman. It seems I have finally found something going on in Montana that caters to my specific taste, as one of my favorite dubstep producers, Bassnectar, is going to be Dj'ing at the event. I am planning to bring my camera so maybe I will have some pictures/video for my next post.

In other news....

The Clark Fork Watershed Education Project (CFWEP) has published my review of Milltown, Montana on their blog, " The Waterblogger "

Milltown, Montana: Film Creates a Cultural Portrait of Western Montana - by Aaron Briggs

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a moving picture must be worth considerably more. Judging by his latest work, I believe Rainer Komers must have taken that old adage to heart. His film Milltown, Montana takes the motion picture genre on a journey of “poetic minimalism”.

Fear the Boom and Bust

Click to visit my other blog!

***NERD ALERT***
May contain obscure knowledge of social sciences

I just have to share this video with you all, as I am very interested in the topic being discussed. It involves the controversy surrounding the two opposing philosophies of economic thought, the Austrian School vs the Keynesian. This video is great because it presents the material in a fun way, as a rap song by two historical figures. You may not have heard much about this debate, but it has shaped the fabric of American life since John Maynard Keynes influential "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money " was published in 1936. This was countered by the Austrian school when Friedrich von Hayek received a Nobel Prize in 1974 for his work on Austrian Business Cycle Theory, which generally opposes most of the ideas set forth by Keynes. Our elected officials usually do not acknowledge this debate, as the Keynesian philosophy allows for plenty of government spending. As Milton Friedman once said, "we are all Keynesians now"

"Fear the Boom and Bust"

Digger Digital

Digger Digital is another web project I have been working on in my spare time. I have always been interested in news and how it is delivered. I am currently taking a Journalism class where I am hoping to refine my reporting skills a bit, and I am hoping my new blog Digger Digital can make some waves here in Butte! The concept behind the blog is "Hyper-local" meaning it is made by residents of Butte, for residents of Butte. I got inspired to create this blog after reading the local newspapers and feeling as though the stories were boring. The beauty of a blog is that you can utilize many different news sources to have a good variety of content up there, as well as get feedback from your readers through the use of comments. Another great aspect of blogging is that you don't have to kill any trees to share the news, which is a change of pace from all the newspaper and magazines that go right in the trash after they are done being read. I am hoping with this blog to make some interesting news videos and to write some good articles. Right now I am looking for contributors so if you are interested in becoming a blogger, get in contact with me! Or even if you have a story you think other people should hear about, my contact information is on the staff page.

Scholarly Pursuits

I received some interesting news yesterday, regarding my submission to the National Conference on Undergraduate Research. I submitted my abstract for my Undergraduate Research project and it looks like they are interested in my research, and have accepted my abstract and I will be a presenter at the conference. I am pretty surprised by this, I didn't really expect much when I had submitted it. The conference is in April in Missoula, so I am looking forward to spending the weekend there and doing a little sight seeing, and visiting my cousin who goes to school at U of M.

If anyone is wondering, my project is a short documentary film, centered on explaining some key events in American history, from the perspective of Austrian Economics. The main focus will be around the events leading up to the Great Depression, as well as the often overlooked Depression of 1920-1921. I have been interested in Austrian Econ since I learned about it from the speeches of Ron Paul in 2008. Last summer I was able to attend something called Mises University, which gave me a solid educational foundation on the subject. It was also one of the funnest educational experiences I've ever had, met a lot of smart, and interesting people from all over the globe while I was there. I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in Economics, but isn't satisfied with the mainstream "Keynesian" approach. My major is in Communications, but I think it is important to be aware of other disciplines, to really help you see the "big picture". One of the great things about our Technical Communications degree program is that you can use your Communication skills to learn about and work with other subjects that interest you. I consider myself infinitely curious, so this works out for me pretty well.

Ode to the Ocean

So, here I am five months into my new life as a Montana resident, and I must say I feel like I am assimilating into the local culture quite nicely. I have become accustomed to the frigid mornings, the constant snow and awe inspiring natural landscapes.

There is one thing that Montana lacks, and one thing I am just realizing that I hold dear, close proximity to the watery depths of the ocean. There is something about the raw size and majesty of the ocean that draws one to it, like a moth to flame. There is a certain mystique surrounding all of the creatures that roam the murky depths. Some are tasty, and some would like to taste you! The ocean demands respect for all of its mystery and power, especially the power over life and death. At the same time, the ocean is a place of much fun and enjoyment, especially along the beaches in my home state of Connecticut. I know Montana has some wonderful lakes, I am headed up to Flathead Lake this week for a short vacation with my girlfriend. But it just isn't the same. Luckily I don't have to dwell on that fact too often, as Montana has been keeping me occupied with all of the cross country skiing and hiking around its beautiful parks and mountains.

My dad at Mt. Haggin

Me outside the trail at Mt. Haggin