Archive for December, 2006

Merry Christmas everyone!!!!!  From Snowball, Shane, Robin, Joanne and Brian!

Christmas 2006
3 comments

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I just wanted to post about something that my friend Andy Walker started.

A non-profit organization called Little Geeks is where a person can donate their old computers to give to underprivileged children.  I am a big proponent to help those children less fortunate than we are.  My dad is a Children's Pastor and has made a living on helping underprivileged children, and I have been helping him for more than 15 years.  So I know what it means to help a child, especially around Christmas time.

So if you have a spare moment I urge you to Vote on the project by clicking this link to go to Givemeaning.com to help Little Geeks get funding.  They only need 90 more votes within 30 days to receive funding.  It's free to vote, and if you want to donate you can as well.   It isn't necessary, but I encourage you to.

If you want more info about Little Geeks go to littlegeeks.org

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

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You know what I'm just going to say it, I'm damn lucky.

No really, I am.  I'm so damn lucky I make the short little guy on the Lucky Charms box who has an obsessive compulsive attraction to rainbows and cereal, which could possibly make him a stereotypical gay leprechaun, look like a short midget pedophile.

I'm lucky in the way my life is leading right now, I'm lucky with the amount of friends I surround myself with, I'm just so damn freakin' lucky!  They should put a picture of me on that Lucky Charms box.  But then I would just look like Powder had just traded in his magnetic powers for rainbows and sugar, and all that sugar does not bode well for anyone.

Sure there are problems.  Who wouldn't have them?  But, my problems go away when I think about the positive things that make me smile.  Whether it be when my friends call me up just to hang out, or when my sister is scared of going into High School that I am there to comfort her.  Even when I just sit at home watching DVD's either by myself or with my family, I can't help but smile all the more.

But, there is one sad note to this little heart-wearing-on-sleeve rant, it's that some people may not be that lucky.  I'm here to tell you that you are.  When things are looking so bad that you may not even know how you are going to eat tomorrow, please try to find something positive in you.  There is one.  There is always one, and sometimes one positive thing is all you need.  It can drive away any negative emotion.  It can drive away the worry, the self-doubt, the pity party.

You want to know what that positive lucky thing is?

It's that you are lucky just to be you.

Now go on, get out of here, go eat some Lucky Charms.  You deserve it.

And bring me back a box will ya?  I'm starvin' over here!

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

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So, I've been under a lot of pressure lately to find a new job.  Pressure not necessarily from anyone else, but from myself.  The place where I work (A Call Centre none the less) is extremely boring and frustrating at the same time.  I make the same three calls all day everyday.  But anyway thats beside the point, I'm making the effort to find another job and that is what I'm going to do.

With that in mind, I have been intrigued of the idea of being paid to be a professional blogger.  I love blogging(duh, I'm here on Vox aren't I?), and I want to make good use of this as a career.  It works great with my school schedule, as well as it expands my creative writing.  Furthermore I also do love writing.  Case in point my new book project.  So I have been looking online for ways to become a professional blogger.

The best place I came up with is Weblogs Inc.  I read their blogs constantly.  TV Squad and TUAW I read more than three times a day.  I applied using their cool Web 2.0 Ajax-ish application form on Monday.  Still haven't heard back yet, but I'm hopeful.

Which brings me to the point of this post.  Anyone out there that has some pull on people at Weblogs and would like to give a struggling Broadcasting Student a chance, help a Snowball out.

References available upon Request.

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

Update:  Okay, so TV Squad just put this post up about wanting bloggers for either Lost, American Idol, and 24.  Wow, that would be great and its perfect timing too, except I'm not that big of a fanatic that they want.  Mainly I can't watch the shows live because of my current job!  That really grinds my gears.  I love those three shows, but I don't get to watch them that often so I'm behind the loop.  I don't know if I should apply or not.  They want three samples of blogs to be seen on TV Squad (which I did when I first applied) but nothing about those shows.  Whats a blogger to do?

Update x2:  Jake made a good comment to just apply then get a TiVo in regards to the TV Squad job posting.  I replied, but I wanted to give my response here as well.  It explains why its hard for me to apply for that specific job.

Here's the comment I posted:
I'm debating it, but like I said, I'm not that big of a fanatic for those shows.  I feel I would cheat the audience for those shows because I don't know as much.  I mean if I had the time I would research more about it, but I just don't.  I've come under the situation before with the podcast I did with Alex Albrecht about Star Wars Galaxies.  I was only into it because I was requested by Alex to do the show.  You could totally tell I wasn't as big of a Galaxies expert as Alex was. 

Like I said I would cheapen the audience.

I could use the same email address they gave to apply directly to TV Squad for something else though.  That might work.
Feedback anyone?

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As soon as I saw this I had to show it.  I remember watching TechTV when I was a young teenager and thinking it would be my dream job to work on that show.  Well 8 years later I'm not working for the Screen Savers but I did get to work for Call For Help.  Thats close enough right?

DellParody Screensavers

Trust me when you watch this, you will miss TechTV even more.  I forgot how funny these commercials were.

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

P.S.  Check out Leo in the back.  hahaha

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This was a post I made for the Labrats blog

Merry Christmas from the Labrats Team

T’was a few days before Christmas
And all through Andy’s House
Biff and Boo were stirring
While chasing a mouse

Sean was editing Lab Rats 55 with care
With hopes that the fans would enjoy and stare.
Intro to Linux was what this episode was about
“It’s really easy!” Sean said, while Andy pouts.

Its been a good year for the labrats team
Trips to CES, Macworld and PME
Topics of Vista, Macs and Motherboards too
Was there anything this dynamic duo can’t do?

But before you enjoy this Christmas 2006
We remind you to give a child a Little Geeks Christmas wish.
So as we wrap up this year good and tight
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”
P.S. The picture was made by me.  Just had a little bit of fun in Photoshop

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What the title said.  I hate having to write exams because it feels like I'm regurgitating information that is not needed.  It causes uneeded stress only to somewhat prove you can cram information in your brain that you can barf on the paper.  It makes no sense.

Anyway here are the exams I have this week.

Here are the exams I had on Tuesday:

TV Production – I did really well.  If I didn't ace it I will be really upset

Film Production – Did okay, not great but ok.  Possibly in the 70s or 80s precent range

Computer Applications – Did really good.  Update – Got 57/65 on the Exam 87% baby!  Way better than the midterm.

Here are the three exams I have today:

Radio Production – Exam was okay, there was a bunch of us that studied together and we think we did alright.  Some questions through us for a loop, but overall not too bad.

Writing for the Media – Within hours after taking the exam we got our marks back.  I got 46/60!  Which is 80 percent.  Woot!  Overall in that course I have an 84 percent!  Thats what I like to see.

Broadcast Journalism – Was tough, there was one section that was so confusing that the professor had to explain exactly what she wanted to the entire class.  Overall I think I did okay.  Not the greatest but good enought to at least get in the 75 to 80 percent range.

What I have tomorrow:

Current Events – Took that today and it was okay as well.  Some questions were extremely easy and some made me think, but overall I did okay again.

I'll keep everyone updated soon as to how I did. – Update:  Now with the exams done, I'll keep everyone updated on the marks as they come in.  Heres hopin'

Here's hoping for an 80 percent average overall!

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

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Well, today is my birthday (23rd if you must know)and you know where that will get me, bloated stomach from cake, brain overloaded with birthday wishes(which I don't mind by the way), and lots and lots of freakin presents!  Damn straight, there better be…….lots of……freakin……presents.

Okay, okay.  Maybe one or two would be really nice.

At any rate, I'm going to say Happy Birthday to me!

Thanks me!

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I'm making this post to patent this phrase as mine before it gets out and someone else takes it.

I said it live on Hak5radio.com and XNETRadio.com on the Dank and Chew Show tonight.  It was fun.   Anyway here's the phrase.  It's a gamer phrase.

“Welcome to the noob store, How may I pwn you?”

Boo…..freakin….yah!!!

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

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Well, I guess the analogy if a Snowball calls out into the Web is there anyone to hear him definitely does not apply according to this humble blogger.  Because people definitely heard me.  It seems that within the past two days of posting my thoughts on what I wanted to do online has gotten a big response.  At least for me anyway.  Getting 7 comments in 2 days is pretty darn good in my book.  First of all thank you for caring, and thank you for writing.

I was going to post my thoughts and responses to the feedback I have gotten, however I thought since other people and even myself couldn't explain it any better than what was posted in the comments, I will post the comments here for you.  Every response is something genuine, and special to me that really helped me figure out the chaos that is my life right now online.

So here goes:
Comments
Naamah wrote:
on Dec 6, 2006 at 4:52 AM | Reply | Delete
Everyone wants to be successful. It's normal. And everyone goes through copycat phases….as silly as we feel for it sometimes, it's just us trying to become inspired. One day you'll get it, no worries.

(And sometimes I wish I had a bigger audience too, secretly.)
Steve Saylor replied to Naamah’s comment
on Dec 6, 2006 at 4:55 AM | Reply | Delete
Well I hope I do.  It's starting to get stressful though.
Shinmaryuu wrote:
on Dec 6, 2006 at 6:06 AM | Reply | Delete
When it comes to this new medium i think it's not about success or failure yet. That should be left for commercial media who always have to compete with each other for air time and money. We are more like Woodstock. It don't matter how big the band is that plays etc it just matters everyone is together and fighting for something. What i have decided with my new show is i don't care if i have 5 viewers because i enjoy doing it. That and just trying to be different. I just want to be part of the movement more than making a million or having 100 adoring fan girls….although that would be ok .

When you break it down there really is only 3 things to do to do your best in indy media. 1 be consistent with your releases. All the big boys do this like Hak5, Twit, CommandN, etc all have regular releases to keep people locked in. 2 always be there for your fans. Your pretty much selling yourself so if your there for people they will be there for you. Your actually darn good at this . 3 is just always make sure your having fun doing the show because that is what is going to get you though the times like this where you feel the like tree in the woods that falls, can anyone hear me.
Steve Saylor replied to Shinmaryuu’s comment
on Dec 6, 2006 at 9:20 AM | Reply | Delete
[this is good]
Thanks dude.  I do agree that this medium there is no real competition.  I think I am just feeling that the fun of it is starting to fade away.   Not due to doing the shows I do, but the fact I can't keep a consistent schedule as the rest of the shows do.  It's just frustration on my part.  The only thing that is consistent for me right now is my school and work, and my vox blog.  I am still having fun writing on Vox, and that is what drives me to keep writing. 

I think creatively I am starting to gear towards the writing side more so than the media side, it could be because I am working on the media side at school thats where the fun is going into and my own projects suffer because I already am being creative in media at school. 

I will come back soon with cool stuff, I want to, I need to.  But hopefully I can get to a point where I can be consistent with what I do.  I think that is my biggest problem. 
Eloise wrote:
on Dec 6, 2006 at 12:10 PM | Reply | Delete
I see there is already some good advice here. And I totally agree that you should do it for the fun of it and not for the sake of finding a mass audience. There are times when I wish I had more readers (or more comments) but then when I look at other places where there are large audiences, I take note that what is being presented isn't a fun thing for me to do. So I think if you just do what feels natural to you, then the audience will grow from there. Anyway, I think your doing a good job, so just keep at what is fun for you and eventually you'll get to where you want to be!
Steve Saylor replied to Eloise’s comment
on Dec 6, 2006 at 2:57 PM | Reply | Delete
[this is good]
Thanks Eloise.  That made me start to think of something I heard a while ago about if I'm interrested in something then it will come out interresting which would allow people to grow with you.  that's why I love Vox right now and I feel really good about the audience I have here on Vox.  It's because I'm interested and having fun doing what I'm doing on here.  For my other projects(other than my writing) I feel like I'm not having as much fun as I wanted to.  I don't want to give up on the audience I already have, but I felt I have tried too many times to revive an audience that I feel like everytime I “revive” myself in independent media that the audience gets smaller.  Partly because of my own doing because I'm moving things around in an attempt to simplize what I want to do. 

At any rate thank you all for your advice, it has given me some things to think about.  Keep them coming.  I still have a lot of doubts as to what my next plan of action should be at this point.  Should I give up on what I do and focus on what I like (such as here on Vox) or should I keep going the way I'm going?
Shane Shennan wrote:
on Dec 7, 2006 at 10:07 AM | Reply | Delete
Steve, I really agree with the comment that you ae great at selling/branding yourself.  There is nobody like you, and certainly nobody with your special enthusiasm.  Your podcast is a lot of fun to listen to because you are yourself.

What about having a 15 minute podcast every two weeks?
Now I haven't responded to Shane's comment yet just because there is something I wanted to talk to him in person about, so that response won't appear here.  But like I said, there are things i still need to work out, and obviously more feedback is totally welcome.  I will never refuse any help from anyone if I know I need it.  Which at this particular time, I do need it.

At any rate, some big decisions will have to be made soon, and when I do I will keep everyone posted here.  In the meantime, I need to go study for some exams and work on my new book which can be found here soon.

Take care, and I'll holla at you soon.

Toodles!

Steve Saylor “Snowball”

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