Greetings from Florida! I arrived here but a week ago, and can't help but feel that my summer is off to a late start. There I was Friday, finally on the transcontinental flight home, so antsy to arrive that I couldn't even watch the in-flight episode of Two and a Half Men. And by the time I did reunite with my friends and acquaintances later that night, the conversations were way off; my “catch-up” questions were just too May. By mid-June, “how did finals go?” is passé.

Work-wise, though, I came home just in the knick of time. DailyMe had earlier agreed to take me back for another round of interning, and it wasn't until early June that they cleared me office space. Turned out to be worth the wait: by the time I got back, they had cleared me a whole suite’s worth of space. Well, not me personally. More precisely, Sales and Marketing--the two groups I work with--recently moved to a different set of offices within our building. This was partly to help accommodate the burgeoning company's staff increase, but also to give the Sales and Marketing a little space as they matured into teenage departments. The CEO even let them get bunkbeds in their new pad.

So I've been relegated to the new suite with another recent hire and Mrs. Boss--but the function goes hand in hand with the new features on DailyMe's site. DM just incorporated some news organization tools meant to help readers find the most important news at a given time. Users can still prioritize DailyMe’s articles based on their personal preference survey, but now they can also see what headlines our editorial board thought worthy of attention along with the most popular news of the day, DailyWe, as determined by what fellow DM’ers are reading.

I don't mean to wax nostalgic, but it felt funny to experience another DailyMe launch so soon after returning. It was more than 7 months ago, but I remember the original service's initial Beta launch like it was yesterday. I had just finished my first summer internship, and watched the old site go live on a laptop screen not unlike the one I'm viewing now. Reliving that excitement all over again last week was great, and I hope we continue the trend of one grand unveiling per summer. Pretty soon, I'll have seen more launches than an astronaut's wife and the mayor of Cape Canaveral combined.

Until then, though, I’m just happy to be back and be bloggin’.

Peace, Love, and Personalized Media,

- John the Intern

I just finished my freshman year of college, but—I must say—the occasion felt less momentous than anticipated. This is probably because, unlike other years, it wasn’t really defined by a discreet, culminating moment. You know, the one you come to expect after the first twelve transitions from academic year to summer: a bell rings, papers start flying, kids start rejoicing, and—although it’s optional—the song “School’s Out Forever” should begin playing somewhere in the background.

By those standards, 13th grade ended in somewhat disappointing fashion. Everyone finished their exams at different points in the week, and I was one of the stragglers. And even once all the academic obligations were out of the way, it was still no occasion to deck the halls with reams of loose-leaf. Quite the opposite, actually: dorm rooms had to be spic, span, and thoroughly emptied of our possessions by move-out day. The worst part is that I couldn’t even play “School’s Out Forever” because I had already sent my speakers to storage. Somewhere, Alice Cooper was wincing.

But “all’s well that ends well” isn’t a saying I always ascribe to. On the whole, freshman year was good to me. Maybe it was me who wasn’t good enough to it. I could have flossed more, slept less, checked my mailbox more, spent fewer monies. But what am I saying? “Self-improvement” is something to think about at the end of the real year, not the academic one. I’m just happy to be back within 30 miles of DailyMe’s Florida office again.

I'll be working part-time for my favorite personalized news service this summer, and can't wait to be back. Expect to read about some intern adventures that are twice as funny, twice as wacky, and twice as office-y as last year's.


As Always - Peace, Love & Personalized Media,
- John the Intern

There’s a rumor going around that my school plans to rid itself of all printed books and literature in the next 25 years. Somehow I doubt it’s true, but the hypothetical is funny to think about. The transition would just leave too much space. It would be gratifying to see my alma mater blossom into the least claustrophobic school in the country, but that’s about the only foreseeable perk. Space saving is cool and so is the security of digital archives, but let’s face it—books and shelves are essential ingredients for aesthetically-pleasing interior design. To get rid of one would be to render the other useless, and then what would we fill rooms with? Still, after experiencing a year’s worth of frustration at campus libraries and bookstores, the solution doesn’t seem all that bad.

On the surface, my college’s undergraduate library is no more offensive than the one at my high school: No drinks allowed, no talking allowed, and—if you really have to—try not to be too loud. The major difference, though, is that my high school library was just a study space with decorations. Here, I have to interact with the leather-bound stacks that once served as background. And I’ve learned that checking out books is harder than it used to be. Of course, then I only researched within the kids’ section (where the books are arranged by color, and separated into “pop-up” style or “not”.)

Today I have to contend with something called the Dewey Decimal System if I want to find the right title. The name may sound like it belongs to some sort of candy-making machine, but mark my words-- DDS is not delicious or systematic. It’s just an ineffective method of sorting books. Here is the argument I would have with the guy who invented the Dewey Decimal System (presumably Mr. Dewey):

ME: “With all due respect, sir, I find it much easier to find books in stores, when they are classified by genre and positioned alphabetically-by-author. Why don’t libraries just do that?”

MR. DEWEY: “Well does your hot shot bookstore even have an eighth as many texts and multimedia as a college library?”

ME: “No, but a bookstore exists that carries eight times as many books as my bookstore. You can alphabetize no matter how many you have.

MR. DEWEY: “By gosh, Lad, I stand corrected. You have decimated my decimals.

But don’t get me wrong, it’s not like campus bookstores aren’t irritating in their own right. Go in to buy a hoodie your first week there (obligatory,) but don’t waste your time when it comes purchasing books at the beginning of term. 40% of the time they are cheaper elsewhere, 40% of the time you can borrow one from someone who already took the class, and 20% of the time they aren’t even necessary.

Books complicate my life these days, but I’m still glad that they exist. Whether they die out at the hand of the computer scanner--or else by something more Bradbury-esque--I’ll appreciate them while I can.

Peace, Love & Personalized Media,
-John the Intern

It’s always relieving to hear that an event will occur “as sure as the seasons turn,” but I think the figure of speech itself is misleading. After all, the transition from winter to spring is hardly a sure thing: we leave it up to a groundhog—not a discreet turn of the calendar—to tell us when we need trade snow for pollen. We have historically put our seasonal fates in the hands of a burrowing buck-toothed mammal, and it turns out those aren’t good hands at all; they’re paws, and chancy ones at that. I call for a new annual reference point to mark the turning of these seasons—one that is consistent, and unlikely to be pushed back six weeks just because some varmint can’t see his shadow.

So what are our other contenders? We could do the ole’ first day of the month—get “springy” on March 1st. I don’t think, though, that many things are in bloom by then in certain parts of the country. The first day of spring is supposed to be representative of spring, and it defeats the purpose of picking a new day if that day still carries the burdens of winter.

Then what about ‘dem “Ides of March,” which falls right on the 15th each time. It sounds like the first approximation of a good seasonal marker—consistent year by year, appropriate weather-wise—but I fear Shakespeare gave it too much of a bad rap. It would be silly to pick an important new date that stands stigmatized from the start.

Bottom line: we need a marker with a good reputation, and few events fit the criteria as neatly as March Madness (formally known as the NCAA Men’s Division 1 Basketball Championship. It is inarguably the best play-off tournament set-up of any spectator sport, and it makes sunshine a requirement of yesterday. That is, even if its March 20something starting date isn’t late enough to guarantee good weather, most people are satisfied enough with the light emanating from their television screens to not notice. Late enough, reputable enough, and not contingent on the weather outside—I think we’ve found the perfect occasion for a Back to Spring celebration.

I guess only one question remains: is March Madness popular enough for this new significance to work its way into collective memory? I’d vote yes, and for a reason. The Tournament involves only single-elimination games, so viewers are always watching two teams with everything on the line. The mere suspense behind such a reckoning is bound to get anyone excited, regardless of his/her level of fanhood prior to the game. Also, it provides conversation fodder for weeks on end. This is important, because the departure of winter means no more generic comments about the weather.

In sum, I call for the abolition of Groundhog Day followed by the inauguration of March Madness’s play-in game into the Season Turner Hall of Fame. C’mon people, lets lend some credence and constancy to the old saying.

Go Stanford & UNC!!!

Peace, Love & Personalized Media,
- John the Intern

It’s mid-February, a time of year typically characterized by chilly weather and the red glint of St. Valentines Day. On a college campus in the wake of the 2008 Presidential Primaries, though, these are negligible conditions. The political climate here is hot, and I’ve only seen red when it’s accompanied by white and blue. All I’m trying to say is that my school, presumably like all others, has gotten really into this election. And like anywhere else, no two students are very like-minded on the matter.

Walk through the campus plaza on a given afternoon and you’ll be given a million different sides of the story: vote for him, vote for her, vote for the other him, vote for the old guy. At least Ron Paul’s people tried not to impose less than the others, asking only that I YouTube their candidate. Considerate, except I still use a 56K Modem; that’s still asking a lot of me.

As an impressionable freshman just shy of 230 months old, I feel pressure from all sides. People more verbally affrontive but not necessarily more informed than me are trying to push my hand in all sorts of directions. It’s a time that calls for self-inquiry. Who do I want to lead my country? Should I even belong to a major party? My generation has been raised on the “none of the above” option, so it’s not my nature to feel satisfied with choice A or choice B. That is, until I found out that only members of a major parties can vote in primaries.

So I ultimately compromised my round views to fit into a square party’s peg, but I wasn’t very enthusiastic about it. Without enthusiasm, it seemed a feat to brave the long line at my polling station. Fortunately the mail-in-ballot I had acquired earlier allowed me to bypass the queue. I was surprised that most of the other people turned out the old-fashioned way, waiting for hours on end to cast their vote on the spot. We’ve all heard about poorly informed political decisions, but these were poorly informed methods of getting the piece of paper on which they could make these political decisions.

It is important to note that the ballot wasn’t all about choosing a new president; in fact, there were three additional legislative propositions for my state to vote on. I answered “no” to all of them without reading descriptions, because my parents didn’t raise me to be a “yes man.” And isn’t that the sort of logic that has driven the system for years? Not a rhetorical question, I seriously want too know if my reasoning seems too faulty.

Peace, Love, and Personalized Media.

-John the Intern