Latest blog entries
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How I 'Rickrolled' Rootclip
Disclosure: I work with the Rootclip creators at Scripps. But these views are my own as a Rootclip user.
The winner of Rootclip's second chapter did not involve Rick Astley. But it did have an intoxicated Santa Claus that trounced both '80s dancing and an animated magic lamp.
Rootclip, the collaborative video contest launched in April by E.W. Scripps' Entrepreneurial Fund, was my first experience creating and submitting user-contributed video (with help from fellow Scripps project manager Casey Peters). I published my thoughts on the site while in beta in a previous entry titled "RootClip seeds video arena with creativity".
The process to create and submit a video to Rootclip is easy and fun, but the popularity contest that is voting could turn off some users from participating. Still, $500 for a chapter win and the chance to win an all-expense-paid trip to the Traverse City Film Festival to meet Michael Moore will entice many users to soldier on, myself included.
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Using Amazon S3 with Django
UPDATE: A commenter from this entry's submission on Reddit suggested setting up the CNAME to the S3 servers based on the bucket for your unique domain. By doing this, it will appear that the static files are hosted on your own servers instead of Amazon.
A lot has been changing for this site lately. Not only did I switch hosting to the Python wonderland of WebFaction, but I also started serving static media -- CSS, JavaScript, images and other files -- through Amazon's Simple Storage Service (S3).
Changing Web hosts from Dreamhost for this and my other Django apps was a must, but using Amazon's Web Service was more of an experiment really. Fortunately it's a cheap one: I owe Amazon eight cents for June.
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Scripps launches video player update
Disclaimer: I am the project manager for the Scripps video player.
The E. W. Scripps Company has rolled out an update to their video player, which we've dubbed "Flaven," that improves browse-ability and adds several new features. I wrote about this player in a previous entry titled "How Scripps makes video findable."
We aren't finished rolling out the updated player to every newspaper site yet, but you can see it on the Memphis Commercial Appeal currently.
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Newspapers' reverse-publishing idea flawed
Newspaper production teams scored a big win when technology allowed for stories entered into a print publishing system to be sent automatically to their online CMS. No longer did they need multiple employees to copy and paste text from one medium to the other. And everyone gets the same content, be it online or print.
So the concept of reverse publishing, or publishing stories first online that will later be sent to the print product, will only improve things, right? Not quite.
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Knoxville drivers: How to pass a cyclist
Cycling season is well underway now that spring has sprung in Knoxville. But that doesn't necessarily mean it's safe to venture out on the area's roads willy-nilly.
Many Knoxville drivers are ignorant of how to share the road with cyclists. This is a brief lesson on how to pass a cyclist safely.
And with gas prices rising on what seems to be a daily basis, this information will be increasingly relevant for everyone.
About me
Hi. I'm Patrick Beeson.
I'm a 20-something project manager for E.W. Scripps Interactive Newspaper Group in Knoxville, TN. I'm an avid cyclist, Web designer, journalist and blogger.
And I want to save the newspapers.
Want to learn more? Visit my biography or send me a message.
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Currently reading
"Learning Website Development with Django" by Ayman Hourieh
A beginner's tutorial to building web applications, quickly and cleanly, with the Django application framework.
Latest bookmarks on del.icio.us
- Coolspotters - The products used by your favorite celebrities. All spotted by you.
- Google Doctype - Google Code
- swfobject - Google Code
- Amazon Web Services Developer Connection : Scalable Media Hosting with Amazon S3
- Revisiting NewzJunky -- still leading Watertown, but gap narrows | Howard Owens
- NewsWare Apps | Spectra | msnbc.com
- Sixteen ideas win $5.5M in Knight News Challenge funding | Poynter Online - Romenesko
- mattwaite.com | Data ghettos
- FontStruct | Build, Share, Download Fonts
- Cloud Computing. Available at Amazon.com Today
Latest update on Twitter
patrickbeeson: Food City now caps gas purchases made with credit to $100. I'm not paying that, but I'd bet some sucka SUV owners are! #