DISQUS

Thanks so much for this, Stephen. It was a big help!

One thing that did confuse me -- I did get the message from the iPhone that it could not verify my Exchange server. Now, a lot of Exchange servers have a domain like this:

exchange.domainname.com

However, many DO NOT. In my case, I thought I knew what the subdomain was, but it did not work in the iPhone.

An e-mail to our IT folks got me the answer -- there is a re-direct from the subdomain I knew, and THAT didn't work.

Just to be very clear ... I thought it was:

abc.domainname.com

But the real one was one letter different:

abcd.domainname.com

So if it's not working, just e-mail your IT guys and ask!

Nice intro, Megan. I agree with Greg -- I'm all about Google Reader. Used to love Bloglines, but GR is just cleaner, faster, easier.

How come you did not link to GR?

I like it. It's of great interest to just about everybody at UF, naturally, but also to many others in Florida. The state university system here has been going through changes ever since I arrived in 1999, and since so many Florida adults want their children to attend UF, you can do some pretty useful stuff with this story. Let them know how the money business affects not only their children's education (and future) but also the economy of their state.

TORTURE those data, YEAH!!

Gosh, isn't this cool? :) I think Megan was thinking about finding a big old dataset so she could first learn how to "interrogate the data," as they say in IRE. (Correct me if I'm wrong.) But I see how that is putting the cart before the horse if she is also going to produce a story package.

I'm concerned that she has only one semester (and other classes and stuff too) -- I would hate to see her spend too much time collecting data, and she doesn't have time for a FOIA request. What I hope she will learn is how to do the stuff Mark and Matt and Derek do -- after they've got the data.

I'm out of my comfort zone on this, however.

I filled an elective slot in natural (?) sciences with a course about paleo-geology. Or historical geology. Anyway, we went out and dug up fossils. We had amazing lectures from an older prof who really loved his field. We had labs in which -- unlike in high school biology and chemistry -- I learned how science is actually conducted. It was great. It's really the only non-journalism and non-film-studies class that I remember liking in four years as an undergrad.

Come on, go ahead and say you were in a bar with all three of them for HOURS and HOURS!

And fact-check each of those proper nouns, please. Just a suggestion.

Link, please!

Check the Amazon (U.S.) reviews -- apparently it does not like BlackBerry. But other phones, cameras, okay. And there is a pink model!

Thanks for the link, Neal. Did you see the Alberto Cairo interview at OJR? Alberto is a longtime news graphic artist, and he's got some very interesting insights: Animated infographics and online storytelling.

You will get faster at it!

White! White background! YES!!! I can SEE!

Jason, did you ever read a newspaper? Was there any time in the past when you were a regular reader of, say, a Sunday paper or a weekly arts paper? Years ago I used to get the Sunday New York Times on my way home from work about 4 a.m. Sunday morning. Then I would go to sleep. When I woke up about noon I would have this luscious big gob of interesting stuff to wallow in while I drank coffee and celebrated the end of my work week. But now that's not my lifestyle. That's why I don't read the newspaper (the printed ones) anymore.

Hey, hold that thing still, wouldja?

Hi, Megan. I like the new blog, but the green background is kinda hard on the eyes. Too intense, too saturated, something. Otherwise, nice going!