Eyes on the Street in the Early Lives of Cities

In the early lives of cities, having “eyes on the street” was the prime way neighborhood crime was policed and thwarted. The classic, semiotic, image of that early neighborhood watch was the old woman leaning out the window, delicately balancing her elbows in a feather pillow on the windowsill as she watched the activity on the street below.

Continue reading → Eyes on the Street in the Early Lives of Cities

The FDNY Firefighter Spy

We’ve turned a horrible new page in the War on Terror as the FDNY — The Fire Department of the City of New York — have joined with the Department of Homeland Security to spy on residents.

Continue reading → The FDNY Firefighter Spy

Naked Blogging as Semiotics Shall Rule the Word

We are living in the Golden Age of Text. We most effectively communicate on blogs, in email and via instant messages where The Word is King. However, in the next five years or so we will toss away our text — along with our newly enhanced ability to cogently write to persuade others — in favor of video: Semiotics Shall Rule the Word. There are active rumors that the next iPhone will have a touch screen that is a camera so you can do live video conferencing via iChat right on your phone. There is one proof-of-concept using the current iPhone that persuasively argues for video communication over text right now.

Continue reading → Naked Blogging as Semiotics Shall Rule the Word

Policing and Loving the Ordinary Enemy Civilian

I heard an interesting discussion on the radio the other day that the problem with modern policing in the urban core today is not only the matter of Pretend Police replacing real officers, but also one of the police distrusting the general public by considering everyone a danger instead of innocent, ordinary, people.

Continue reading → Policing and Loving the Ordinary Enemy Civilian

Subscribe Via Google FeedBurner

Now that WordPress.com no longer offers RSS feeds stats analysis, you can try to work around that deficit as a Blog owner by signing up for the just-purchased-by-Google FeedBurner Service. All the keen “Pro” FeedBurner features are now FREE! RSS feed stats can be valuable in telling you who is reading your blog and through what method. FeedBurner allows you to “re-burn” your default RSS feed.

On my Boles University Blogger blog, you can tell your Blogger to use the FeedBurner RSS feed instead of the default feed. That’s a great way to unify RSS feeds under a single master. I cover in-depth how to use FeedBurner with Blogger and Google Apps in my new book, the Google Apps Administrator Guide due soon from Thomson Publishing and CoursePTR.

Continue reading → Subscribe Via Google FeedBurner