lotusmedia 2.0

UPDATE: Added links to the Independent article “The Revolution Will Be Blogged.”

If you haven’t heard the amazing new rap song “It’s Carrboro,” you have been missing out. now you can watch It’s Carrboro: the video! I am in it but you wouldn’t notice. And really it does just fine without my obvious presence . But if you want to catch me, freeze the video at 2:10 (I am on the left) and at 2:26 (in the back).

These guys are so cool they have even released the song under a Creative Commons license and posted instrumental and vocal only versions for remixing. I’m proud to say that OrangePolitics is a sponsor of It’s Carrboro.

In other news, I was featured prominently in the Independent Weekly’s article about political blogs today. (I’ll add links when the issue is posted online.) In addition to a nice sidebar profiling OrangePolitics.org, they also wrote several paragraphs about important it is in Orange County, and and ran a huge picture of me on the article’s title page! If you weren’t deeply in love with me, you might find it a bit much, but I’m not complaining.

I was very amused to get this e-mail from a friend this afternoon:

… in happier news, two GREAT pictures of you in the Indy this week! Have you ever had a full page picture of yourself in a newspaper before? You’re a definite celebrity.

He obviously wasn’t around in 1999 when I didn’t just get a full-page - I was on the cover of the Indy. Unfortunately, that article (about my ill-fated Chapel Hill Town Council campaign) was a piece of trash that could not be considered journalism and that certainly did not make me proud. In fact, it made me want to move to another country.

Fortunately the hack who wrote that article is long gone from the Independent, and they have great writers like Bob Geary, who wrote today’s piece and the fabulous and multi-talented Kirk Ross as their Managing Editor. I’ll admit, I often space out on articles that long, but this one was very engaging and well written.

I recommend reading Geary’s article if you want to learn more about political blogging in the Triangle or about Crashing the Gate, a book by two major national bloggers about how the “netroots” can save the Democratic Party. (A goal I don’t especially share with them.) The Independent’s coverage of the authors/book tour was certainly more interesting and informative than their appearance on WUNC yesterday which got raspberries from the folks at BlueNC.