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This is what we call an excellent cause. You know what's even better? The people he's trying to help grow coffee. This matters; donate if you can.
Jan. 3rd, 2003
We pause in our mobile blogging frenzy to present some biographical information regarding Jarvis A. Wood. They say you should find your niche and stick with it; possibly this is mine. Someone asked, by the by, if I knew who the businessman mentioned in regards to the Sherman Act in Special Delivery 2. I don't know, but I'll see what I can dig up.
The following excerpts are from The History of an Advertising Agency, Ralph M. Hower, Harvard University Press, 1949:
p. 79:
In 1888, Ayer took on his staff Jarvis A. Wood, a young man with a gift of ready words, who immediately began to devote much of his time to writing advertisements for Ayer customers.
p. 98-99:
In January, 1898, a step was taken that reduced the burden upon Ayer and McKinney, and promoted a more equable distribution of managerial duties. Two employes of the firm, Jarvis A. Wood and Albert G. Bradford, were advanced to partnership.
Wood had started to work for N. W. Ayer & Son in 1888 as assistant to F. W. Ayer. Genial, friendly, and gifted with a ready flow of words, he was expected to follow Mckinney as the agency's leading business getter and producer of advertising ideas. His talents, however, lay in other directions. For a number of years he supervised the preparation of copy; his business associates believe that he was the first man to head an agency copy department. Later he was made manager of the large staff of employees and placed in charge of the general routine work of the Philadelphia organization. In that capacity his tact, his fatherly manner, and his complete loyalty enabled Wood to serve the agency well.
In addition to lightening the burden upon the two senior partners, the admission of Bradford and Wood represented the attempt to provide for a continuity of management. It is significant that these two had not been brought in from the outside. Both had been employed in the agency for more than ten years and knew every phase of the work. Like Wallace and Mckinney, neither of then contributed any new capital to the business; each paid for his share out of earnings received after admission to the partnership. Their promotion, like every promotion to top management in N. W. Ayer & Son before or since, was based not on financial interest but on their ability, promise, and experience within the firm, a fact which has given Ayer employees an incentive to put forth their best efforts.
After the admission of the new partners, the responsibilities of the business were divided as follows: McKinney was in charge, as before, of the business getting activities: Bradford handled the buying of space and other dealings with publishers; and Ayer, with Wood as his assistant, exercised a close supervision over operations as a whole.
p. 125:
It is worth noting that none of them could be regarded as a specialist in space buying, and that since the death of Jarvis Wood, there was no member of the firm whose specialty had been the preparation of copy.
I've watched this trailer around five times now. Last night, this morning. Watching it again right now. And I believe. Yes, I do. I have no qualms about saying this:
In 2003, Uma Thurman will Kill Bill.
Happy Tolkien's eleventy-first birthday! At 9 PM, raise your glass and toast "The Professor." (Via MetaFilter.)
In keeping with my theme for the day (terseness. will talk more later), here's a quick link to a Bruce Sterling interview. It's happening right now. Like, real time. Maybe it is to talk about it in this thread, which is hijacked from Boing Boing. Transfictionalism now!
Shut Out: A Story of Race and Baseball in Boston looks like a fascinating book, judging from this interview. I'd never heard the Jackie Robinson story, but being a serious Celtics fan, the issues surrounding race and Boston sports have interested me for a while. He seems to have at least a little to say about basketball, although his surprise at the color barriers broken by the Celtics makes me wonder about his general research. Tagged for later consideration.
The other night, my TiVo caught a Sportscentury on Bill Russell; a lot of the program was dedicated to the racism he faced. There was a tremendously poignant moment, during the Bob Cousy interview, when Cousy almost broke down in tears; hiding his face in his hands, Cousy said, "I could have done more."
I've been peering at this Scripting News post about cell phones all day, trying to figure out what struck me as weird about it. I finally figured it out. Check this quote:
"So why not make them just a teensy bit bigger and put a real qwerty keyboard on the darn thing and let me type into it like a human being."
That seemed totally reasonable to me the first zillion times I read it. I just went out and got a Sidekick, cause I wanted a keyboard on my cell phone. But wait -- "like a human being." He wants a keyboard-based interface, cause he wants to use the cell phone for more than just the classic telephonic voice based interface. "Like a human being."
Humans aren't stuck with just talking. To be human is to have access to a keyboard!
So it's weird, but he's also right. We are the tool using ape. Keyboards are a very nice symbol that says "digital tool here."