Magzalez’s eyes on media

So I have been trying my hardest to make my site and me more googleable. One of my main problems is that my name, Matthew Gonzalez, is actually quite common among first- and second-generation Hispanic-Americans.

Today I was happy to see that when I googled “Matthew Gonzalez” (without the quotation marks) that magzalez.com was fourth. Now, any first-page hit to me is awesome, I don’t need to be No. 1.

Even though Matthew Gonzalez is a common name however, there is really just one Matthew Gonzalez that gets me every time, former San Francisco mayoral candidate Matthew Gonzalez. This guy is a Green Party member who came dangerously close to becoming the first Green Party member to ever win anything including, but not limited to, mayoral races, presidency, beauty pageants, raffles*.

Well guys, things are going to get even tougher around here. I was watching Jay Leno’s monologue last night, and he was dropping some jokes about Ralph Nader and the ridiculous nature of his presidential candidacy. Out of the blue Leno says Nader has chosen a running mate, and he drops the name of our favorite San Francisco lawyer, activist and Green Party Member, Matthew Gonzalez! Now the idea of his joke was to just say his name and then say “Who’s that guy anyways?” Naturally the joke was wasted on me because I know who that guy is. I know him very well.

¡Ay Cuba, tus hijos lloran! What is this going to do to my googleability?

Paradox of the day: I need to vent about my googleability, but I am just adding to that other Matthew Gonzalez’s googleability by linking to stuff about him.

Fun stuff for today: I won’t have another post on Feb. 29 for four years.

*This may or may not be hyperbole.

I came across a very interesting article on MSN.com. They have some pretty cool stuff from time to time. I personally have MSNBC.com, MSN’s newsier cousin, as my homepage. They always have cool lists, and I love lists.

This article in particular is about how a regular consumer computer in 1988 could cost you $1,400, but you can get a 2008 computer for about $1,000. Interesting how that works out. Overall, it is just a good comparison of what we came from and where we are now technologically.

Video:

For my applied interactive newspapers class I have begun shooting video of Gainesville’s Brazilian Cultural Arts Exchange. The video will be a short look into capoeira and its emergence in Gainesville. Prof. Borracha, the BCAE’s highest capoeira instructor, has been a great help.

This topic is great because it allows me to double up on my school work. I am taking a Portuguese class right now that brings up the topic of capoeira.

I will also be presenting a prospectus for my individual learning project in the same class. It will most likely be a longer, documentary-style video to be completed by April. The topic is still up in the air. I will have to find a book that will help me further my skills in video production and visual story telling. Any suggestions?

Work:

I am doing some research on CMSes and Subversion.

Newszine:

We’ve begun redesigning the Newszine Web site. There is going to be a big visual emphasis that wasn’t necessarily there before. Some other new things:

• A featured story for each section with a big picture that will pull a headline and excerpt from the CMS; The stories will then rotate on the users’ command.
• Shared spaces for video, slideshows and maybe photogalleries
• Wider, more spacious design
• Emphasis on original content
• A map to plot where each world and U.S. story is from
• A most viewed/shared stories type thing

Speaking of Newszine, I made an Soundslides the other day on Fidel Castro’s resignation as president of Cuba. Unfortunately I didn’t realize when I was making it how darn fast I was talking. Alas, practice makes perfect.

Adeus for now.

I’m realizing more and more that working anywhere, you’re going to be confronted with problems with your work and your co-workers.

I said in my last post how video wasn’t going to work for this week’s Gainesville Explorer. I called the person in charge while I was out and assured her that the video was not compelling enough. I thought a photo story would be much better.

The lady in charge, God bless ‘er she works hard, told a photographer that this needed to be done. I called her up again later to clear my conscience so to say because I knew I would have to go back to the location in order to get all my footage and, more importantly, my interviews.

Well wouldn’t you know it, I got a call late afternoon the next day telling me the photographer forgot to go out to do the assignment. I was asked if I could still put a video together. I was reluctant, but I knew I had a job to do. I made the best of what I had, and I am luke warm, but not disappointed, in what came out of it.

I just had to chalk one up for life experience. The problem is, I don’t know what to take note of. Should I have gone back the second day anyway? Should my trust in my co-workers/peers be as diminished as it is right now?

Things I do know:

• It’s not the editor’s fault
• It’s not entirely my fault
• Everything worked out OK
• I need a damn photo camera

Well, this is the final product:

I went out on a new adventure for the Gainesville Explorer series for The Independent Florida Alligator. I was supposed to visit the Santa Fe Community College teaching zoo. I was pretty excited because I like zoos.

Now, this zoo wasn’t exactly everything I expected it to be. It was very fun, and there were lots of animals, but I am used to really big zoos like Miami Metrozoo.

So, when I got there I started filming the animals. First animal up was a type of monkey. These cute, little, animated simians were making some good video. The next animal however was a very lazy parrot, then another lazy parrot, then a very lazy deer, iguana, parrot, kookaburra, etc.

I quickly realized that these critters were not feeling particularly animated. Granted, it was hot, so I should have known that the animals were going to want to sit in the shade all day, if not hide away all together.

I knew what had to be done. I called up The Alligator’s managing editor for online and told her that she should send out a photographer, because the visual stimulation was there, the sound was there, but the movement was not.

This was a clear case of needing an audio slideshow versus a video. We’ll see tomorrow if it worked out or not. All I know, is that that video was not worth putting up on a news Web site.

Was that clear?