508 #137: Jeff Barnard

This week’s show is a “highlight reel” of the late Jeff Barnard’s appearances on the show. Produced by Mike Benedetti and Nicole. Co-hosted by Brendan Melican. Featuring Jacob Berendes, Kevin Ksen, Anne Lewenberg, Nat Needle, Bruce Russell, and Scott Zoback. Like the episodes from which it was compiled, this show has a tremendous amount of complaining about the newspaper.

This program will be cablecast on WCCA TV13 in Worcester at 7pm tonight, and on the homepage at wccatv.com.

Audio: mp3 link, other formats, feed

Video: Downloads and other formats

Contact info.

Clips from episodes 10, 19, 37, 38, 40, 42, 46, 47, 50, 51, 100, 114, and 131.
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Witness Against Torture, 2010 recap

Here’s a video recapping Witness Against Torture‘s January 2010 efforts to close Guantanamo. WAT will be back in DC in 2011, and you’re invited.

It’s tricky to make an issue video that focuses on the activism rather than the issue, doesn’t involve anyone directly affected by the issue, and ends with the problem unsolved. Potentially unsatisfying from every angle.

Anyhow, this video’s for those of you thinking of joining WAT’s work for the first time January 2011. Wish I could be with you next year.

First Sunday of Advent, 2010

IMG_1820Today is the first Sunday of Advent, the beginning of four weeks of Christian preparation for Christmas.

Most Catholics I know have some sort of wreath, with purple, pink, and white candles. (Today we lit a purple candle.) Those with kids usually have an Advent calendar as well.

The US Bishops have some online Advent prayers and resources. This year, with barely any time between Thanksgiving travels and Advent, we improvised a bit more than usual, and used an Advent “psalm” from a book that was handy, Fr. Edward Hays’s Prayers for a Planetary Pilgrim.

Advent is one of those times, like Lent, when we laypeople are especially encouraged to receive the sacrament of Reconciliation; my Advents are usually not heavy on penitence, but I’m considering making that a focus this year. For the first Advent in many years, I was a lector in my parish, and the Second Reading (Rom 13:11-14) got me examining my conscience.

. . . not in orgies and drunkenness . . .

Doing good on these counts.

. . . not in rivalry and jealousy . . .

Here, not so much.

Msgr. Scollen, in his homily, noted that the First Reading was about “nonviolence,” the second, “personal lifestyle.” I’ll be meditating on them more this week and discerning the steps I should take this Advent.

Jeff Barnard, RIP

Jeff
Jeff Barnard: December 8, 1948- November 28, 2010

Just got word that my friend Jeff Barnard passed away today after a long battle with cancer.

Like so many newcomers to Worcester, I first got to know Jeff though his writing on Wormtown Taxi. We became friends after many a Friday morning talking for hours on the phone for the 508 show, and after all-too-few hours talking face-to-face over a coffee or a beer.

I will remember his generosity, eloquence, and good humor.

We will miss, you, Jeff.

T&G circulation down 9.3 percent; other papers down 5 percent

New York Times:

Figures released by the Audit Bureau of Circulations showed that overall weekday circulation at 635 newspapers declined 5 percent from circulation in the same six months last year. The decline last year was at more than twice that rate.

Boston Globe:

Elsewhere in Massachusetts, daily circulation at the Worcester Telegram & Gazette fell 9.3 percent from 73,207 last year to 66,397 this year.

This is not as bad as the declines at the Globe and other papers, but the T&G is still dropping fast. I’m looking around to see if there’s an explanation forthcoming–the paywall, for example.

Update: Joe presses me on the paywall issue, and on second thought the paywall probably helped their circulation numbers. At least, when they turned off their paywall a few years back, they lost like 6% of their circulation. So if they’re still using the same formula to calculate circulation, the paywall presumably helped total paid circulation. Dan Kennedy thinks it will. And supposedly the T&G’s unique visitors went up with the paywall!

That said, I don’t know anything about the subtleties of circulation calculation, and so I’m still waiting for the T&G’s explanation here.

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