I read the Second Life story in this week'sRolling Stone (Sept. 7th issue) and I saw a new value to the community.

More than just its' own economy, with users spending real money on virtual purchases for their avatars, it's become a music experience. Real artists have created avatars for themselves and are using the site to play "live" concerts. This is great news for musicians and music lovers.

After living through the corporate rock 80's and the manufactured pop late-90's, it seemed like never again could someone like Bob Dylan break unless he looked like Justin Timberlake and had the backing of Clear Channel. Second Life has the potentional to change that.

As artists reach consumers virtually, it will mean less for them to look like Jessica Simpson and mean more for them to have substance, sound and talent.

As a music lover, and sometimes an admitted music snob, I couldn't be more thrilled.

Thank you, BrooklynSki Club for alerting me to the fact that your site and its' contributors are not a bunch of sniffling blow addicts ripping rails through Billyburg. I can't say I'm not slightly disillusioned at the dangerous, wild lives that my imagination had painted for you all, but carry on with your boroughtastic blogging mission.
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Last night I had the distinct pleasure of witnessing this and I must say, I think Billie Jean King stole a bit of my heart last night. What an eloquent, thoughtful, intelligent, charming and engaging speaker she was at the dedication/renaming of the USTA complex.

Billie Jean King was just a little bit before my time, but coming from a tennis family I learned both fundamentals and history. I learned about the battle of the sexes and became familar with Billie Jean as a retired player who provided expert commentary and rose to leadership positions within the WTA. And then of course, her alternative lifestyle.

What I never knew, was how eloquent and distinquished Billie Jean could be. What a mentor she was to younger players - when she easily could have lost herself in her own legend and ignored progress. What a humanitarian she could be to those who came after her.

Last night she spoke passionately about public parks and tennis courts, how they belong to the people and we should use them. It struck me that one of the disadvantages of becoming such a globally connected society (through social media), is that while shifting our consciousness to crimes and concerns around the world, we can lose sight of what's right in front us. We can get lost in Darfur or AIDS or poverty or education and forget the simple pleasures that make up our offline community.

I'll admit, I waxed nostalgic during her speech, to simpler times as a child. A time without home PC's and even before atari. A time when playing wasn't Second Life, writing in your diary meant a bound book with blank pages rather than Diaryland and when talking to a friend, you meant actually next door at their house rather than IM. A time when parents spent weekends with their kids - and not checking email, answering mobile phones or driving to the corner.

During those times, BOTH of my parents, would tell my brother and I to put our sneakers on, and the four of us would walk with our wooden tennis rackets and metal basket filled with tennis balls, just a 1/4m to the nearby public tennis courts and hit balls for a few hours until dinner time.

They'd run us kids all over the court and we loved it. We'd drink from the public water fountain; bottled water only existed if your septic tank was contaminated. The four of us would laugh and yell and run and hit and not even notice that the whole afternoon had passed and it was too dark to even see the balls come over the net. Then we'd walk home and have dinner together. There isn't a single night I can remember - unless it was the rare sleepover - that we didn't all eat dinner together.

My parents celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary on July 15th of this year.

All of this crossed my mind at last nights' US Open. During the match, as a family of four sat behind me and the mother and father explained the game to their son and daughter, I found myself pulling out my mobile phone at Arthur Ashe stadium and calling my parents at home to tell them where I was and provide a firsthand account of the match.

Remember when MTV used to be cool? I do. That's how old I am.

I'll admit it, I'm still an MTV watcher. Leave me alone, I'm a music addict. I have to get my fix anywhere possible. So I went to this site to see MTV's dip into an interactive VMA's this year.

Oh. My. Lameness.

There used to be a time when MTV was the bastion of cool. Cutting edge. So I guess they decided to go back to cool and try to be a tipster on trend with NYC. They missed the mark.

Top 5 NYC blogs they list: Stereogum, ProductShopNYC, the Music Slut, Last Night's Party and BrooklynSki Club.

Now, I'm not a hater, so I'm not beating down on any blogs. That said, ummm, does Last Night's Party even cover NYC parties anymore? Great photos on the site - don't get me wrong. I love seeing naked drunk people licking strangers as much as the next person. But that site is supposed to give you a feel for NYC? I subversively love that they linked BrooklynSki Club because I always thought that site was born out of a group of Brooklynites who liked to go out and do drugs together. I mean, that *is* the double entendre, right?

No mention of my favorite NYC blogs: Gawker (I mean, you want to know what what's going on in NYC? No one chases the NY Post or the hallowed halls of Conde Nast like Gawker), animalnewyork who cribs the tag art scene around town, East Village Radio - probably the #1 coolest thing about NYC is this Internet radio station that operates out of a tiny defunct storefront in the east village with rotating locals talking and spinning on-air and hot, sometimes-major bands actually pop in and do interviews. What about Ultragrrl who is not just one of the hottest DJ's for the hottest party in town, but also now a local celeb in her own right? And of course, the city's other rawk czar, Miss Modernage.

I can't even get into the "hot parties" they've listed on the site. My head is spinning.

Must. Erase. Memory. Of. VMA. Site.

I'm back!

Vacation was excellent. I didn't update here because I truly stepped back and worked on resting my mind and as much fun as this blog can be, it is work. It's related to my work.

So I returned to the office on Monday and really hit the ground running, catching up on a week's worth of work and news as quickly as possible and then leaving to catch a flight of town for a client meeting early on Tuesday.

Had a great meeting with some of my favorite clients at 8am (not my best hour of the day) and then flew back out of town around noon.

Tonight, I had the delightful opportunity thanks to a former client to see a movie I have been waiting for: Invincible.

It was fantastic! If you're a football fan, if you love to root for the underdog, if you ever watched a professional sports game and thought "what would it be like to be on that field?" - you've got to see this movie.

I'll admit it, I am religious Philly sports fan. That basically means that I set myself up for heartbreak every year. I know it going in. I know we'll probably never win a professional sports championship again in my lifetime. I scoffed at Sox fans and their curse. PUH-lease. They don't even know curses. Philly knows curses. It's a town built on heartbreak. Even one of our greatest landmarks - the Liberty Bell - has a crack running through it. That doesn't stop this town. Philly's got HEART.

And yeah, maybe we threw some snowballs at Santa, but can you blame us? What the heck has Santa brought us? Not a Superbowl ring. Not a Lombardi trophy. He brought us T.O. one year and I think we see where that got us. And maybe we threw some Duracell's...I can only assume the batteries were already dead...

Anyone who knows me, knows I am Rocky obsessed. I love the movie because it's a great triumph-over-the-insurmountable story and it does a superb job of showing the color of Philly. The character of the town. Philly's got real flavor. But my favorite thing about Rocky, that he has a one in a million chance. Just a bum from the streets. That's a story that most of us can relate to. It's the American Dream - work hard, be focused, determined and you can succeed.

Invincible is the new American Dream: an average Joe playing in the coveted NFL.

Dream on, everyone. Or live the dream with Papale.

I'm on vacation and let me tell you, it's fantastic. Right now I am sitting alone on a porch on a quiet street in a seaside town, with a cool breeze, drinking a very light pinot noir. This is my idea of heaven.

In between riding my bike around town and to the beach, challenging 9-year olds to fierce boogie boarding competitions and visiting a rotating circle of local friends' houses for happy hour in beach attire, I'll also be sorting through my delicious. Great time to catch up on all of that reading I haven't had a chance to get to.

Beyond that, I've also been trying to work out the kinks with my winksite feed. Has anyone else noticed that it's a chore to navigate to find your links? More often than not, I can't access my feed on my mobile and end up going to the member directory to choose my favorite blogs manually.

That's it for now. I'll be sure to check in and tell everyone how GLORIOUS my vacation is....;)

I'm up late playing catch up and just read something from Mike Manuel that struck a chord for me.

As a PR person who focuses on the emerging media arena to service all existing agency clients and client prospects, I see how critical it is to maintain the Brand champion POV and focus on the fundamentals of PR.

The numbers and viewership for emerging media vehicles can be exciting. For years we wondered what happened to TV viewing audiences as they dropped lower and lower. We are finally finding those audiences on other screens and hearing their demands for how they want their content.

It's easy to get caught up in the excitement of new vehicles or tactics and lose sight of the fundamentals. PR comes down to generating NEWs. It's not just how we serve it up but more importantly, what we choose to serve, in order for today's consumer to take a bite.

It's good news and bad news for both ends of the PR industry. The need for senior level counsel and strategic thinking isn't going away; experienced professionals must still lead planning and management. That said, mid-level to junior staffers and new grads have enormous, valuable contributions to bring to the PR business. They bring the knowledge of the new tools in our toolbox.

I know we all say it and hear it all the time, but at the risk of sounding cliche, I'll say it again. Today is a golden age for PR. At time when we truly function in our capacity and relate to the public, vis a vis how they want to reached, on behalf of our clients. After a long period when advertising and controlled messaging ruled mainstream media, the tables have turned and PR has the power to influence the new gatekeeper to consumers - consumer generated media.

I think it's exciting. It may require an enormous amount of work, however the opportunity to be a pioneer and establish new models for our business is riper than ever.

If I haven't updated as frequently as I should or would like to it's because I've been busy working and monitoring all of these changes that have been evolving with emerging media.

How about that Digg Kid making the cover of BusinessWeek? Good for you, Kevin. Certainly makes my work easier as I spend a great deal of time educating colleagues and clients about influential community edited sites like digg.

There's a lot of campaign talk starting. Campaign engines are starting. I love campaign time, not only because I get excited about the democractic process (although I do...) but also because I love to see campaign tactics evolve. I guess it might be similar to a someone with a passion for carpentry watching "This Old House."

Howard Dean changed the game a few years ago by showing how the Internet can be used to mobilize voters and support fundraising. MoveOn.org picked up where he left off. The Bush campaign used an old smear tactic made-new and "swift boated" Kerry.

And now, ages before campaign time, we have an Al Gore parody already on youtube.

I expect the podcasts, viral videos, social network profiles, rss feeds, text messaging opt-in's and blogs to amp up any day now. And I look forward to it.

The world is in the process of a massive social revolution and if a candidate can't navigate these waters, I can't imagine I'd feel confident in him or her as representative of this nation.

Further to the last post, apparently the truck tagged with the Times iconic "T" wasn't a marketing campaign at all, but part of a shoot being produced for The New York Times Magazine. Thanks Animal, for setting me straight.

And props to ESPO for their work.

It's so hot that I'm actually running out to purchase an emergency cell phone battery after work...because, you know, God forbid I be without text capibilities in the event of another blackout.

Oh, BTW, that's little tip for anyone out there caught in a blackout. Texting rather than making calls on your phone uses less battery power.

And finally, I can't decide how I feel about this. As a long time fan of street artists worldwide (Go Banksy), I can appreciate the idea of going street for a marketing campaign, but I'd hope that you have the product to back up that approach. And I'm not thinking the "Old Grey Lady" that we all know and love is street.

That said, who knows? Maybe she's about to announce a new grandaughter? Hopefully something goth. I'm seeing a tabloid sized black-sheet with white English Gothic font. Underground, black market. A broadsheet you can only get if you know where to find it and what the password is. Something people store inside trenchcoats.

Now's a great time for the NYT to step it up. Live up that campaign.