$15 for the New York Times

The New York Times began offering a paid subscription last month. Basically anyone can read up to 20 articles a month for free. After that you have to pay up or wait for the new month to kick in. I never really kept track but I was fairly sure I hit my limit well before the end of a calendar month. What surprised me was when I signed up (99 cents for the first month, $15 thereafter), when I signed up I did not feel like I had just made a NPR donation or a relief for Japan, Haiti, Kathrina or tornado alley contribution. Fifteen dollars a month is a deal.

I read the NYT often. I hunt around in the archives for research, I get three of their teaser email newsletters and click links often for the full stories or editorials. I nearly religiously read the Sunday Review of Books usually on Thursday when it comes out online. I also read the online version of Atlantic (Monthly) still free, it would be a more difficult decision to pay for it; I really prefer magazines in hard copy, particularly the longer pieces. The Economist also gets a cyber-passthru each week but again a subscription might have to be for the hands-on edition. I read both the Atlantic and the Economist at the Berkeley Public Library, along with several other research oriented periodicals; usually on a very hot or rainy mid-week afternoon.

I also am not sure about magazines on eReaders. Books yes, but there is more to a good magazine than the words. The illustrations and the New Yorker cartoons don't translate so well to the digital screen. 

Ah what literary times of choice and bounty we dwell within.

Google Art

If you haven't tried Google daily art as your cyber pencil-sharpening distraction, may I strongly recommend it. You probably use Google directly from your web browser and never actually go to google.com. If you did you would know that they change the art in and around the Google logo almost daily with different designs in different parts of the world. They honor birthdays, independence days, holidays great or small and just about anything else the logo staff down on the Google campus can come up with. Here are a few I've enjoyed in the last six months.

That one up at the top was on Cezanne's 172nd birthday (Yes, it is hard to fine the G-O-O-G-L-E sometimes).

New Year's Day 2011.

Katsushika Houkusai's birthday, I have an old fondness for this art piece.

One of several variations for Thanksgiving last year. I like the ones where you have to stretch to see the g o o g l e.

Bruce Lee's 70th birthday.

The 55th anniversary of Rosa Park's famous refusal to be moved. If you want to see more such art go to Google Doodles.

Godwin's Law

I wrote about Godwin's Law way back in January of '07, soon after I had started this here blog. Well it clearly has been too long because I have run into several discussions recently where a good dose of Mr. Godwin's logic would have served all parties well.

Here goes:

Godwin's Law (also known as Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies) is an early principle of Internet dialog or it damn well should be. This sanguine postulation was formulated by Mike Godwin in 1990. The law makes the trenchant observation that "as an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis, Fascists or Hitler approaches one." 


Or to state it less mathematically: some lame ass who can't really think for himself is going to call the other guy a Nazi or a Fascist or even Adolf himself. Sooner or later as the discussion heats up and the flaming begins, someone will pull out this universally overused analogy. Generally the user cannot spell analogy nor pronounce fascist.


Godwin's Law does not dispute whether, in a particular instance, a reference or comparison to Hitler or the Nazis might be apt. It is precisely because such a reference or comparison may sometimes be appropriate, Godwin has argued, that overuse of the Hitler/Nazi comparison should be avoided, as it robs the valid comparisons of their impact.

Although in one of its early forms Godwin's Law referred specifically to Usenet newsgroup discussions, the law is now applied to any threaded online discussion, electronic mailing lists, message boards, chat rooms and more recently blog comment talk pages. To this I would add any and all group discussions particularly one that involves the potential consumption of large amounts of wine. [Oops, did I give too much away there. Will they know I am writing about them?]

Humor

Do you train your friends to not send you internet humor? I do, or at least I discourage most of it but leave a couple of avenues open because several of my friends and relatives have very strange and entertaining funny bones. The other day someone not on my 'humor allowed' list sent me a list of 50 one-liners and a note that said "I'll bet that you wouldn't be ashamed to put at least a dozen of these on your blog." Let's see, remember he said a dozen. [added comments are mine]

3. I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die [along with emptying the contents of 'that' drawer or in the case of certain friends 'that' closet]

9. Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong [the measure of wisdom is what you say next]

16. There is great need for a sarcasm font [if only so people we are trying to insult would get it and visa versa]

21. Google maps really needs to start directions on # 5. I'm pretty sure by now I know how to get out of my neighborhood.

29. Bad decisions make good stories [and great blogs]

31. I keep some people's phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call [Yep, I have two]

38. How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still don't understand a word they are saying? [I did this once on a date, I was shocked when I later discovered what I had agreed to]

42. The first testicular guard, the "Cup," was used in Hockey in 1874 and the first helmet was used in 1974.That means it only took 100 years for men to realize that their brain is also important [I like juxtapositional humor. Two contortionists walk into a bar . . .]

So, 8 out of 50 not bad but not a dozen either.

Let me leave you with a blond joke from one of my unblocked sources.

A short, thin heavily spectacled middle-aged guy shuffles into a bar, sits down in front of the bartender and orders a shot. The bartenders smirks, assumes he didn't notice he had walked into a bar called the Dyke's Den, she serves him his drink. The man downs the shot and says:

"You wanna hear a blond joke?"

The bartender says: "Maybe you want to look up here first."

The guy looks up at the six foot two blond bartender as she says:

"Wendy here is our waitress." 

Wendy has more tattoos than the guy has ever seen and she too is blond.

"Joyce at the door is our bouncer."

The guy swivels in his chair to see golden haired Joyce in full motorcycle leathers and a nasty look on her face.

"and Mary over there is the owner."

Mary seems to fill the door of the office near the back of the bar, she has to go 250 and, of course, platinum hair. 

"You sure you want to tell a blond joke?" asked the bartender.

"Well hell no," said the guy "not if I am going to have to repeat it four times."

Facebook Reality

Yes I have a facebook account. No you don't capitalize facebook. No facebook is not Big Brother, more like a big sister who is a fifteen year old gossip, an addicted texter and isn't bright enough to be on Jersey Shore.

But there are lessons to be learned from facebook or any other social networking site. First thing everyone needs to admit is that all of these websites are businesses. They are trying to turn a profit either by selling you stuff or selling your stuff. Your stuff being your personal information and internet preferences. If you equate capitalism with evil then they are indeed the spawn of satan. If you believe otherwise then you are a fool but facebook is no more evil than Bank of America or McDonalds.

But back to those lessons to be learned. Here are several examples I have gleaned from facebook.

My nephew has finally taken heed to his father's and my comments that someday he would actually want to apply for a real job and what is out there on the internet with his name attached will be there for all of his potential employers to find and consider right along with his college transcript. My rather bright nephew has found a way to play at will on facebook without having all of those beers and babes attached to his name. I am not going to give away his secret, but I will say -- Well Done Mister!

Next, in the category of double-edged sword, you will be judged by the content you post on facebook. Be sure you are reflecting the real you. I had a couple of coffee dates with a very nice lady, life intervened and our only contact for awhile was what each of us revealed online. In my case there is this blog, in hers there was her facebook page. Bottom line, I liked the person I met face to face; I really didn't care for the facebook version and that soured any future relationship.

In a similar vein, I know of two examples of rejected lovers following their former partner on facebook and coming away with exactly the same impression: "How did I ever think it would work with him/her."

Now part of this disjuncture has to do with the superficiality that pervades facebook and all the other social networking sites. They do not exactly encourage depth or insight. But even those who attempt to deepen the context seem destined to failure. I know I have a friend, someone I thought was becoming a close friend, but after following her for several months I was simply bored by the thin content of what she reflected as her life.

Final example. If you have something important in your life, like a philosophy or a mission; be careful how you reflect that on the net. I actually was asked to engage in a "conversation of depth" with a three people I thought were substantial. But after reviewing their facebook posts over the last year it was clear that they are deeply into the most superficial new age gloss on reality.

You know you can hide someone's posts on facebook without unfriending them. It's a way to not say to their facebook face: "You're an idiot!"
--
Big Brother/Facebook poster from collegecandy.com

In the News

I just don't understand why some things go viral on the net and others do not. Today two examples of stories I was sure would go as crazy as the MGM lion nibbling on its handler last week. 

First, I was on Facebook and noticed these items that were "Trending Now":

Jennifer Grey

Mortgage Rates

Gluten-Free Food

Candice Bergen

Emma Stone

Vanilla Ice

Seasonal Allergies

Liam Neeson

Escaped Cobras

Elizabeth Warren

Now I am guessing that very few of my readers are all that concerned about celebrity breakups, dieting tips or nasal irritation. But you just gotten wonder about snakes escaping, if only to ask escape from where - reptile rehab?

Well it seems a guy in southwest China was illegally breeding cobras when one hundred and sixty of them staged a break-out. This was in a small village and apparently the locals were a bit hissed off about this inconvenience. No one got bitten but there were several unfortunate encounters in bathrooms, apparently the cobras like cool, dark porcelain places. You may want to turn that light on before you take your seat. Handlers caught "all but four or five," which apparently is supposed to calm everyone.

Since this story did not go cyber-viral, here is my second choice for a huge internet story that also seems to have gained no traction whatsoever. Why I have no idea, like the cobras it struck a certain Freudian chord with me.

This story comes from an article that appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education, which might explain the lack of wider coverage; it is a preview of the upcoming 2nd Global Symposium on Cosmetic Vaginal Surgery (September 23-25th in Las Vegas). The article is titled - Frankengina. Vaginal cosmetic surgery is "the fastest growing category of cosmetic procedures according to the statistics collected by the American Society for Plastic Surgeons." Apparently so much so that a 2nd Global Symposium is necessary.

I wish not to engage in any feminist rhetoric about the hows or whys of such procedures, nor do I intend to rally round the cosmetically enhanced vulva, which an astute reader pointed out is the correct description of the genitalia in question not vagina. I just want to know where is the internet coverage of this significant event? And will there be press coverage?

[Addendum: the accompanying photo was intended as a reference to the first story only; several readers suggested potential implications for the second item; I have, in turn, recommended a good therapist]

Skype Fur Ball Safari

Now that I have become a domiciled person again, I got my Skype software issues resolved, so I am back in voice communication with Australia, France and several other distant spots on the globe. Being domestically permanent also means I have gotten the large monitor and full size keyboard out of storage; and the external hard drive; and the hand me down printer, scanner, fax. I wouldn't call it an orderly desktop exactly, I just no longer need 1200 mile USB cords.

A few days ago I "participated" in a nearly 80 minute Skype call. Participated means I listened a lot; those who know me will still find an over an hour call to be nearly impossible. I am not a phone person and running it through a computer does not disguise the fact that we are just talking without a handset. The video feed helps but unless you are juggling or stripping that too gets static in about a minute. I wonder what the Skype ratio is between free international calling and video phone sex?

But the point of my meanderings today, should you chose to believe there is one, focuses on the theme of idle hands. I have my Skype setup such that I don't have to sit in front of the computer arrays. I can stand even walk within a limited range or get down on the floor and do my back exercises. But over an hour plus, you can run out of non-distracting things to do while paying attention to the person on the other end of the cyber conversation.

Surfing is much too distracting. I would not tolerate such an extended conversation if I were not truly interesting in the other person and in the content of the exchange; so I am not going to multi-task in any way that distracts my mind. My hands, however, did find a task that grew to the point of . . . well to the point of this post.

First, I noticed the tub of wet wipes that were not fully expended cleaning the apartment for human occupancy. I tugged out one of those and wiped down the big keyboard that had been in storage for over a year. Being careful not to press down on any of the keys that would cause audio blips and pings. That took about a minute but I noticed some black schmutz on the front side of the space bar. Resistant to a gentle wiping, the removal required some pressure to effect a clean space bar, which only revealed a larger build-up of potentially contaminating crud on both the B and N keys. These would be more difficult to reach. Since neither duct tape nor WD-40 would solve this common household crisis, I went for the bent paper clip and spent perhaps another five minutes of the Skype call (you did remember I am on a call right?). About five minutes cleaning keys, only to discover that once the front side of the keys were de-filthed, I only had to lean slightly left or right to see the accumulation of grime on those surface.

I am going to cut the key cleaning soliloquy because I haven't yet gotten to my point for the day. At some point, while I was actually talking I let the paper clip stylus slip between the keys and when I recovered it, I discovered -- furr! Another more digitally directed sweep brought up a loose ball of fuzz the size of a dime.

Yes, my keyboard had cohabitated with not one or two but three cats as far back as Michigan (2006) and without Skype to free me to ponder the pelted possibilities, I had never thought to delve into the depths of the keyboard recesses. It took about fifteen minutes to fish out 97% of the cat fur without being too distracted from the conversation, which naturally took a serious turn at this exact time. Multi-tasking can be such a burden.

So that's my deep introspection for this Saturday morning. Should you need to take a break to ponder the existential aspects of these revelations, I would recommend the following supporting text:

High Quality Pencil Sharpening

Let me just say up front that I derive no monetary benefits from your potential use of the website profiled in today's post. I am not an affiliate member, nor do I have any financial interest in said website, nor do any members of my immediate family or any recent lovers.

I am not a fan of solitaire and having recently given up online poker, so I was in need of some cyber-pastime other than my interest in english language newspapers from non-US countries. Then I discovered Sporacle.com. I apologize to any of my readers who become addicted to Sporacle but as all consuming websites go, it is more educational than most and a lot less stress on your wrist than many more pictorially oriented sites.

Sporacle describes itself as "mentally stimulating diversions." It is that and also frustrating, embarrassing and challenging. It is design to be "played" solo but while in Indiana on my recent trip, my brother and I found with a laptop each we could have Sporacle Challenges.

Basically, Sporacle is a factual, quiz, trivia, general to specific knowledge set of tests which as of now number "2,782 published games plus 60,865 user created games that have been played 199,855,339 times." Allow me to tweak your interest.

How about can you name all fifty U.S. states? Easy right? Well you get 10 minutes and yes they do give you a map.

Think you are geographically intelligent. Name the countries of the world. There are 195, you get 15 minutes and if you manage half of them, you are a star. Oh, did I mention spelling counts. Is it Herzegovina or Herzagovinia or Herzegovinia? Kasikhstan right?

You can pick from the most popular lists or go with geography, history, entertainment or sports among the fourteen categories.

Can you name the Seven Dirty Words?

How about the three most populous cities of the world by letters of the alphabet? Nope not Athens or Atlanta.

There are quizzes on corporate logos, college mascots and famous Dicks.

Some trending topics are topical, there are a lot of Olympic ones right now.

So go ahead give it a click, why not it's only time you could be spending with your family or planning your retirement or solving global warming (hint: fewer people being entertained by a power gobbling computer). Have fun.

Autumn Leaves

One of the great pleasures of autumn in a temperate climate is the turning of the leaves. While I am not going to experience the true warmth of an Indian Summer this trip, I did get my one blissful dose of nature's color yesterday. Early frosts, high winds and rain can severely foreshorten the fall color experience, this year falls somewhere in the middle of the color enjoyment experience.

I was out running errands yesterday, when I ducked down a side street and there were five or six blocks of brilliant yellow maple trees. Interspersed every block or so was a burst of red or a still fading green tree. The browns of late fall have yet to appear, so we have peak colors or at least what will have to stand as peak for this autumn in lower Michigan.

I particularly have noticed quite a few trees that seem to blush with a reddish-pink as opposed to the usual dark red maples of most fall palettes. Some combination of summer heat and fall rain has produced more of these light red patterns than in my memory of past autumns. It was cloudy yesterday but a weak sun broke through while I was on that side street, so I got the full experience of the color and light. There is a feeling of bliss that hits the spectrally attuned at these times. A light and satisfying experience that all is right with the world. It mimics that first blush of warmth that comes with a new lover. Before the heartless shrew defiles your heart and leaves you alone and barren as the trees shall be in just a few weeks.

I know, I know but sometimes these things have to be said. Besides she still owes me money and she took my parrot. Meanwhile back to our autumnal musings...

Today, the wind and rain have come and the lawns are littered with thousands of yellow leaves. Time to put up wood for the winter, get those last few storm windows snugly in place and in my case, consider heading south.

---

photo credits: the interwebs

Wandering the InterWebs

Today's adventure began with the word paraphernalia. I tend to spell it wrong because I pronounce it wrong, it's that pesky third syllable. Well anyways I wondered about the uses of the term that do not have the word "drug" in front of them. This query led to several webpages and before you know it I am on the U. S. Department of Justice website, where I find this culturally interesting information.

Drug paraphernalia is any legitimate equipment, product, or material that is modified for making, using, or concealing illegal drugs such as cocaine, heroin, marijuana, and methamphetamine. Drug paraphernalia generally falls into two categories:

• User-specific products
  
• Dealer-specific products
  

User-specific products are marketed to drug users to assist them in taking or concealing illegal drugs. These products include certain pipes, smoking masks, bongs, cocaine freebase kits, marijuana grow kits, roach clips, and items such as hollowed out cosmetic cases or fake pagers used to conceal illegal drugs.
Dealer-specific products are used by drug traffickers for preparing illegal drugs for distribution at the street level. Items such as scales, vials, and baggies fall into this category. Drug paraphernalia does not include any items traditionally used with tobacco, like pipes and rolling papers.
Under the Federal Drug Paraphernalia Statute, which is part of the Controlled Substances Act, it is illegal to possess, sell, transport, import, or export drug paraphernalia as defined. The law gives specific guidance on determining what constitutes drug paraphernalia. Many states have also enacted their own laws prohibiting drug paraphernalia.
With the rise of the drug culture in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, the country began to see the appearance of “head shops,” which were stores that sold a wide range of drug paraphernalia. While some of the paraphernalia was crude and home-made, much was being commercially manufactured to cater to a fast-growing market. Enterprising individuals even sold items openly in the street, until anti-paraphernalia laws in the 1980s eventually ended such blatant sales. Today, law enforcement faces another challenge. With the advent of the Internet, criminals have greatly expanded their illicit sales to a worldwide market for drug paraphernalia. For example, in a recent law enforcement effort, Operation Pipedreams, the 18 companies targeted accounted for more than a quarter of a billion dollars in retail drug paraphernalia sales annually. Typically, such illicit businesses operate retail stores as well as websites posing as retailers of legitimate tobacco accessories when in reality the products are intended for the illegal drug trade.
Drug paraphernalia is often marketed specifically to youth—with colorful logos, celebrity pictures, and designs like smiley faces on the products—the items are meant to look harmless and belie the dangers of taking controlled substances. Other paraphernalia like magic markers can conceal pipes, and small, hand-painted blown glass items look more like pretty trinkets than pipes or stash containers. Parents need to be aware that these kinds of products often conceal drug use.

Another click, still on the DoJ website, I found this:

If you visit our site to read or download information, we collect and store the following information about your visit:

- The name of the Internet domain and the IP address from which you access our site;

- The type of browser and operating system used to access our site;

- The date and time you access our site;

- The Internet address of the Web site from which you linked directly to our site; and

- The pages you visit and the information you request.

This information is primarily collected for statistical analysis and technical improvements to the site. This government computer system uses software programs to create summary statistics, which may be used for such purposes as assessing what information is of most and least interest, determining technical design specifications, and identifying system performance or problem areas. In certain circumstances, however, we may take additional steps to identify you based on this information and we may share this information, including your identity, with other government agencies.

A final click locates this information:

The Department of Justice is pleased to participate on open, un-moderated forums offered by commercial social networks sites in order to increase government transparency, promote public participation and encourage collaboration with the Department.

We currently maintain official Department of Justice accounts on Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Twitter.

Today's information is provided by Keeping Your Head in All the Games for your personal edification and is therefore provided without political commentary or paranoia. Those are your responsibility as a citizen of a democracy or other form of government depending on where you are reading this post. KYHiAtG does not collect information on its readers. OK, we do but we are not going to tell you what we get or how we are going to use it.

---

photo credit: archives

Tweets, Twitter and Two-Faced-Twaddle

Two experiences in the past 48 hours have led me to write this post and say what dozens of others observers have said before: "Many, if not most users of social media internet sites are completely oblivious to the long term ramifications of what they say and post online."

Recently a friend's kid was going for a job interview. He was told to "read the interview guidelines on the website." Now I went to the site and mostly thought the guidelines were very helpful, particularly for a first time job interviewee. I completely missed the subtleties of the section on employee dress code. It was strongly suggested that the job applicant present themselves in the manner which all customer service members were expected to appear on the job. This was a consumer retail store position and if you walked into any of the retail outlets, you could not help notice that everyone wore white short sleeve shirts or blouses with slacks or a skirt. Ties were not required. You didn't even have to visit a store, there were exemplar employee pictures on the website.

What I missed was that with such a mode of dress you could not hide certain tattoos. Upon a second inspection of the employee photographs, it was clear that this employer did not allow tats or body piercings beyond a limited number of earrings. I checked on West Law and at present it appears that the employer wins on this one. I am sure as the current, heavily inked generation moves higher up in the corporate world there will be changes in policy. But I have to wonder how many career advances will be retarded by some youthful skin art. I know, I know, who wants those jobs anyway. Well, I am willing to guess that the answer in many cases will be the thirty-five or forty year old with two kids and a fading satan on his forearm. As my friend Birrell says: "Tattoos: the only permanent impermanent creation."

Wait you say, this post was about social networking.

This comes from from the coverage of the final table at the World Series of Poker Europe from last night. Yes, I know, I am out of poker. But the example is just too ripe to avoid. The finals heads up competition was down to one of the poker world's favorite players: Daniel Negreanu. He was up against Barry Shulman, the publisher of CardPlayer magazine and not a favorite of many in the poker world. It was a classic confrontation between good and evil, light and dark, satan and... well you get the idea. The problem is it was really just two guys playing poker in London (with about a half a million dollars difference between 1st and 2nd place).

However, in the online immediacy of the social media (Twitter, FaceBook and the various poker forums) it was good against evil. No problem it's the internet, who cares? Well the problem for me is that many members of the poker writing community, that is those who call themselves journalists; those folks were actively rooting for Daniel Negreanu and often making derisive comments about Mr. Shulman at 140 characters a slander.

Again so what?

Well, as I have mentioned before; the openings for poker writers is dwindling every day. Hopefully, at some point the poker economy recovers but if and when that happens, who do you think will get the calls for the recovered jobs? I know if I were hiring, I would check your resume and the I would take a look at your Twitter postings and your FaceBook page. I would want to know who I could count on for fair and honest reporting. And I would make that decision based on what you have written in the past.

This is really simple. Your brain works incredibly fast on an incalculable number of thoughts and computations. If you write them down and post them on the web, they never go away. It is simply a matter of common sense, a bit of understanding of personal boundaries and some small modicum of understanding that not everything you think should be in the public domain.

Lots of the writing on the internet does not stand any sort of ethical test, which is fine. The net is the net. But when you work there, when you derive income from what you post, you should perhaps ponder the effects of spewing out your inner most thoughts or your random upsets into the great, eternal void of cyberspace. Just like that fading tattoo, your words will never go away and sometime in the future you may well be judged or hired (or not) because of something you just had to type and send after one too many glasses of cabernet.

Let the writer beware.

---

art credit: archives - title: social media clutter

Digital Meandering

Twitterverse, Interweb, Digital Forest, InYourFaceBook . . . Most of the Luddites of my generation consider me an early adopter. And yet other than a page for the Matusow book, I have not as yet ventured into the time sink called FaceBook. Until today that is. I have sent out my first batch of friend invitations and will see where this goes. I figured since I am physically wandering from friend to friend on this current journey of mine, I might as well embark on a similar path in cyberspace. Also an olde acquaintance and internet critic showed me several long lost friends she had reconnected with via her short FB experiment, so I am now officially in your webface.

Twitter is a different attraction all together. The World Series of Poker was twitter infected this year with great success. For the non-poker infected among you, first I will acknowledge that my "no poker" content promise will take awhile to completely mature. So if you haven't surfed on yet, information from hundreds of poker tables is difficult and tedious to view and report on. But with a sizeable number of players twittering their own reports, the tournament coverage was much more accurate and up to date, at least for those players who were continually twittering. 

More interesting for me was the rumor control exercised by WSOP Commissioner Jeffery Pollack. The Commish (or Knish) put out over 700 twits during the Series and although most were PR and updates. He was able to comment on rumors in nearly real time. There is some surreal but inherent paranoia that leaks into a room of several thousand poker players and stomping out the first flames of ridiculous rumors gave this year's Series a more calm and less psychotic atmosphere. 

Osama and Obama should get twitter accounts--world peace 140 characters at a time.

Run good challenge

[Content Disclosure: 114% Poker, 66% Poker Tournament, 49% Poker Blogs & Poker Bloggers]

One of the perks of writing about poker is that esteemed poker bloggers get invited to play in esteemed poker events. OK, so they don't ask us to play in the World Series of Poker but we get a media event there and this year there were nice cash prizes to donate to you favorite charity. Now, however, PokerListings is running an elite poker bloggers tournament, rightfully named: the Run good challenge.

This month long series of tournaments will be played out over four Saturdays with three preliminary events and a final table playoff. The game and structure will change week to week. The aforementioned elite list of esteemed bloggers will be:

Dr. Pauly
Change100
Michelle Lewis
Pokerati Dan
Kid Dynamite
Shortstacked Shamus
The Entities (A WickedChops conglomerate)
Spaceman
Poker Shrink (that would be me)
Lacey Jones (tentative)
Dan Skolovy (PokerListings ringer #1)
Matthew Showell (PokerListings ringer #2)

The PokerListings players are there for promotional purposes only, as they pose no actual threat to this elite lineup of esteemed poker bloggers. There are actually substantive cash prizes involved, so we may expect some semi-serious play from the one or two invitees capable of anything but donkey moves.

The whole spectacular kicks off on Poker Stars next Saturday, September 6th at 2 PM EDT. The multitude of rabid fans, avid readers and greedy family members are invited to stop by and harass the other players.