Author Archives: winterSmith

Should your son join a fraternity? Read this. Right now.

Dear Parents: if your son goes to college, joins a fraternity and screws up, you could lose your home. Do I have your attention yet? How many times in my adult life have I heard this? YOU were in a fraternity? Yes I was. Theta Chi, Gamma Omicron chapter, Wake Forest University. I know, I don’t fit the stereotype. Neither

Read more

Kelly Blazek, Cleveland’s nasty e-mailer: how seriously should we take her apologies?

IABC Communicator of the Year has a pattern of bad behavior. I’m not sure “I’m sorry” is enough. We all screw up. When we do, it’s our responsibility to acknowledge it and apologize to those our mistake in someway damaged, hurt, disadvantaged or inconvenienced. Hopefully we learn and move on, never repeating the mistake. But sometimes … sometimes apologies are

Read more

Dear women of Match.com and OK Cupid: WTF is wrong with you?

Women – and men – in online dating communities are acting like goddamned sociopaths. This needs to stop. Okay, not all of you. But some of you. Men, too – I’m guessing this isn’t just women. See if you recognize yourselves below. On multiple occasions I’ve been talking to women I met through OK Cupid. Things going great, we really

Read more

П is for Pussy Riot: thinking ahead to the next Russian Olympic Games

Pussy Riot’s commitment to social justice in the motherland is more than admirable. It perhaps merits a spot in Russia’s artistic canon. The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia closed today, and if you set aside the homophobia and generally strong-armed approach to governance by the host, one Vladimir Putin, these games were remarkable in just about every way. The

Read more

Earthrise: New video on the greatest photograph in history highlights importance of luck

Photographers everywhere can identify with William Anders and the crew of Apollo 8. Our friend Frank Dilatush forwarded a YouTube link this morning commemorating the 45th anniversary of what many consider to be the most famous photograph in history: Earthrise, taken December 24, 1968, by Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders. As it turns out, the iconic shot almost didn’t happen.

Read more

Walmart “Working Man” ad: Rush sold out their fans. Big time. #WTF

Rush’s decision to license “Working Man” to a company that has declared war on American workers is one of the biggest betrayals of trust in Rock history. Yesterday I offered up a brief post wondering what the folks at Walmart were thinking when they chose to use Rush’s iconic “Working Man” as the soundtrack for their ad on investing more

Read more

Getting a PhD was the best decision I ever made. And the worst.

American businesses are anti-intellectual. American universities are anti-relevance. The gods help the overeducated schmuck stuck in the middle. Hi. I’m Sam, and I’m a PhD. Hi Sam! For those of you who don’t know me, I have a doctorate. Communication, University of Colorado, 1999. Some days it’s the thing I have done in life that I’m most proud of. Other

Read more
« Older Entries Recent Entries »