Tag Archives: Twitter

Newwwwww York Is Where I’d Rah-zer Be!

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We here at All Fired Up in the Big Smoke are off to New York today on a fact finding mission. Our task? To suss out just what the big deal is about the place anyway. NYC. Gotham. The Big Apple. The Empire City. Father Knickerbocker. Simply, The City.

How come it gets so many nicknames? What exactly has the place got that makes it so fucking special, I guess is the job we’re setting out to discover. That, and Acaphlegmic scored us tickets from a friend of a friend who knows a guy who knows a guy that runs a website, and we’re going to a couple Yankee games over the weekend against their arch rivals, the Bosox from Beantown. The Walking City. The Hub. The Athens of America.

So we may be a little light with the postings over the next six days or so. There will be our regular Meet A Mayoral Candidate column this Friday, of course. And since we won’t be getting much rest as the city claims to be one that never sleeps, the odd occasion should pop up, allowing us to deliver a progress report or two about our research.

Also, keep your eyes peeled over to the right side of the page here for our Twitter entries (or easier yet, sign on and become a slavish follower.) We’re going to be spending the time away, trying to master the technology. Apparently, it’s all the rage with the younger set. And if there was ever a place that could be summed up in 140 characters, it would be New York City.

So, until next week, toodles. As they say in the outer boroughs.

— Frommerly submitted by Cityslikr

Meet A Mayoral Candidate — Part III

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Another Friday and another Meet A Mayoral Candidate post.

This week: MageeForMayor!

His name is Colin Magee and he is located in Toronto. According to his bio: The great only appear great because we are on our knees let us rise!

… after that, we got nothing.

It seems that what we’re dealing with here is a political campaign driven exclusively by Twitter. We could find no website, no other contact info. We can’t even be sure if there’s an actual person involved or simply a Twitter account. (Although.. although we’re intrigued by such a notion. No candidate. Just an account. The platform is formulated, added to and modified by a web of users. 21st-century participatory democracy at work, folks!)

To be fair, we here at All Fired Up in the Big Smoke are nothing short of raging incompetents in the field of social networking technology. All pertinent information may possibly be out there, easily accessed with a simple thumb click on a link that we remain oblivious to. So don’t write MageeForMayor off on our account. Maybe someone reading this can uncover more details and let us know.

What we did discover as we lurched clumsily through the MageeForMayor Twitterworld is that MageeForMayor likes listening to Social Distortion and The Clash with a beer on a spring day. (Has that going for him.) He tweets in rhyme. (Less impressive.) He announced his candidacy for mayor on January 7th and met with his campaign team in mid-January and again in early February. It seems that MageeForMayor was upset about the Adam Giambrone debacle. Since mid-February there’s been silence. Again, very possibly owing to our ineptitude rather than a lackadaisical approach by MageeForMayor.

It wasn’t all a total bust, our time a-Twittering. While there, we stumbled across a vibrant cyber politico-scape©™®. Groups using the internet to communicate and to arrange non-virtual gatherings of like-minded, tech savvy folks who are passionately committed to the well being of this city.

We were already aware of activists like Dave Meslin who use the internet to promote various causes including reform for fairer proportional representation in our elections with projects like Better Ballots. Through links at MageeForMayor we came across #voteTO, an online based organization that, in its own words “is a grand experiment in attempting to endow a virtual body with real-world political presence.” These are engaged (largely younger) citizens not ideologically driven, looking to contribute toward the betterment of the city where they live, work and play.

This is a deep, untapped, online well that offers a new and important method of public discourse and exchange. Serious candidates seeking political office in Toronto cannot simply ignore it especially those who have not been anointed and pre-ordained by the mainstream press as frontrunners or viable contenders. We too, following the proceedings from the sidelines, are missing out on an underground(swell) of support for new ideas and visions that will be heard in the not-too-distant future.

And think a Twitter political campaign demeans and diminishes the process, old man? Our leading contenders for mayor are already abiding by the 140 character rule. Cut! Cut!! Cut!!! Sell!!!! Sell!!!!! Sell!!!!!! Kick Union Ass!!!!!!!

Nailed it with 71 characters to spare!

This week we’ll answer our own pathetic question we’ve been posing to mayoral candidates. If the present mayor would like his legacy to be that of the Transit Mayor, how would a Mayor Colin Magee like to see his legacy written?

Wait for it.. wait for it…

Mayor Colin Magee made everyday feel like a warm spring day, listening to Social Distortion and The Clash with a beer in hand for every Torontonian.

— dutifully submitted by Cityslikr

More Media Massaging

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If we’re rounding up emerging media narratives for Elections 2K10®©™ it would be remiss of us to ignore other, non-Toronto Sun ones that are beginning to percolate. (And frankly, that one is so predictable as to be non-newsworthy. Corporate elitist anti-progressive screed wrapped in an outraged grassroots populist package. My colleague, Cityslikr’s obsession with Sun columnist Sue-Ann Levy teeters perilously close to an I-hate-her-so-much-that-I-just-might-be-in-love-with-her line that we may be witnesses to a tempestuous journalistic romance in the making.)

How about the Toronto Star’s coverage of candidate Giambrone’s announcement soirée? Hip hip and squeals greet Adam Giambrone from Katie Daubs and Paul Moloney. The title itself underlines the idea of ‘young’. Hip hop music is the kids’ music. Infants squeal. Second sentence in hit that mark with “teenage supporters” squealing. (I’m assuming one of either Daubs or Moloney verified that claim by tracking down the squealers to confirm their age.. their teen age.)

Third sentence, be sure to state Giambrone’s age, 32 which, holy mackerel, that’s young. He wants to be mayor? Fourth sentence use `boyish’ to describe the candidate. His reaction to the overwhelmingly positive response his initial appearance elicited from the crowd? A ‘bashful’ smile. Beautifully used as it not only denotes a certain youthfulness once more but also a hint of girlishness. Nicely done.

Then after a brief stop to report on something Giambrone actually said, it’s back to squealing teenagers, hip hop music and Twittering which is a social networking tool that only the youngsters really understand. Young. Youth. Teenagers. Hip hop. Tweeter. Inexperienced. Inconsequential. Not worthy of serious consideration. Etc., etc. etc.

Now, I was in attendance and recorded the proceedings as I do most dialogue driven interactions (both public and private) in order to sift through them afterwards to discover hidden, subliminal meanings and messages. (Don’t look at me that way! I am an academic. I research!) Replaying Giambrone’s speech, I can hear no squeals from either teenagers or anyone else. There is plenty of cheering, hooping and hollering, yelling. But these are sounds one might expect to hear at a campaign rally especially one where the candidate is announcing that he/she is running for office.

Perhaps the teenage squealers Daubs and Moloney incessantly talked about were not in my vicinity. Perhaps they had been cordoned off, away from the cash bar where I had taken up residence. Or maybe (to borrow some stylistic panache from Sue-Ann Levy) Daubs and Moloney were “editorializing” on the news rather than “reporting” it. That is purely conjecture on my part but at least I’m admitting to it unlike either Ms. Daubs or Mr. Moloney of the Toronto Star.

As for the tales of protestors that both start and end the article? On my way out of the venue, I counted in the neighbourhood of 20-25 of them. That’s not only a number heavily dwarfed by the amount of supporters inside but the protestors were even less numerous than people who were standing in line, waiting to be allowed into the already full house. So, in fact, the protestors were significantly less prominent than the article would have readers believe.

While the Toronto Sun wears its antagonism toward Adam Giambrone on its sleeve, the Star attempts to be much more subtle in its disdain of the man. Either way, both newspapers are advocating rather than reporting. That’s an important factor when readers go about trying to gather information.

Thank you for reading.

— submitted by Acaphlegmic