Aussie working the herd. Round em up, pup!

Rescuing The Reporters, shirky.com
This is a great post. Clay Shirky breaks down the hometown paper and asks hard questions of what’s locally produced and puts some of the “newspapers should do x to survive” into context.

The Audacity of Free, chrisbrogan.com
Hey, I like free stuff as much as the next guy. I like getting paid, too.This post makes a great case for charging something for stuff. But the tricky question is how to boost value of the something enough that someone will part with sheckles for it.

NPR lands $3M grant for hyperlocal initiative, lostremote.com
Look out. Take a look at this report about how National Public Radio’s growth has tracked over the past few years, most importantly in how they’re working to create bonds with audiences.

With msnbc’s purchase of everyblock and local tv stations poised to launch local blogs, local is going to get pretty crowded. NPR will be a force to be reckoned with.

Google unveils new local search for mobile, lostremote.com
This is great: star stuff while searching and get an interactive list on your phone. But it skews toward chain stores in my quick tests. Will have to experiment to see if local joints can be preferred.

Is the revolution over?, collegemediainnovation.org
Is it safe to say that the rehash of micropayment proposals or bitching about comments signals a completed technology distribution curve. Game over.

I’m not so sure. In fact, I’m afraid there’s much more pain as advertisers really get a handle on (and more savvy than ever about) what they really want for their dollars spent.

I do think, though, that the pace of change in types of new tools will slow. That means microblogging as a concept will stick around, but self-hosted solutions or outright competitors to twitter, for example, are likely. Mobile as a viable platform is established, but how people interact with it is sure to change. Etc.

That circular talk, though, will continue as long as the old guard is still waking up to the discussion and cycles through the phases of how to “save journalism.”

Someone ought to make a primer! “So you think you can save journalism: A primer on what’s already been talked about so wired journalists at the bar don’t roll their eyes when you walk away.”

Happier, getrichslowly.org
There’s a whole blog post wrapped into the concepts that come to mind with this post. Until then, chew on this:

The shift from being a rat racer to pursuing happiness is not about working less or with less fervor but about working as hard or harder at the right activities — those that are a source of both present and future benefit.