J. Mark Bertrand (where have I heard his name? Oh yeah, he posted about Church Marketing Sucks.) has a goofy interview with Chris Well, author of Forgiving Solomon Long. How goofy? Two words: Encyclopedia Brown.
Monthly Archives: April 2005
Top Concerns of Young Adults
The following percentages of young adults ages 18-25 claimed to be “very worried” about the issues listed below:
35% – Getting a sexually transmitted disease.
26% – Grades at school.
23% – Finding a job after school.
19% – Maintaining good relationships with friends.
18% – Getting along with parents.
18% – Relationship with God.
15% – Deciding who to vote for.
11% – Making sure you are contributing to your community.
7% – Finding a spouse.
4% – Finding a boyfriend or girlfriend.
(Reboot poll, link via CT’s weblog)
Since I’m on the tail end of that age bracket (for another two months) it seems fitting that my worries hardly line up. It’s amazing that sexually transmitted diseases are the top worry. Equally amazing that finding a spouse or even a boyfriend/girlfriend are so low on the list (they obviously didn’t interview many Christian college students).
But spirituality is still important for young adults, though it increasingly becomes a mish-mash of beliefs. Elizabeth Koke mixes Catholicism, Wicca, feminism and a strong belief in gay rights, which has allowed her to return to the church. Her bottom line? “I wanted to believe in God.”
The Boston Globe offers profiles of the spiritual lives of several young adults.
Switchfoot Wins, Shuns Doves
The Christian music version of the Grammys, the Dove Awards, where held last night in Nashville. Breakout artist Switchfoot scored four awards, including Artist of the Year, Rock/Contemporary Recorded Song of the Year (“Dare You To Move”), Short Form Music Video (“Dare You To Move”) and Long Form Music Video (Switchfoot Live in San Diego).
Switchfoot didn’t even show up. Not that I blame them
Seth Godin on Minnesota Nice
Marketing guru Seth Godin was in Minnesota this week and was nice enough to comment on our state:
In addition to extremely nice people, inspiring architecture, a vibrant arts community and surprisingly good food, there’s a vibe in the air about the work people are doing. This placed is filled with organizations that are working hard to create stuff that’s worth doing.
Thanks. I know he’s not talking about me or the hard work I do, but I’ll happily take the credit. Go Minnesota! And some people think we should move to California. Ha.
Sadly, I did miss Godin speaking before the Timberwolves game, but not being a basketball fan I couldn’t justify $24 for 30 minutes of talk (I suppose you got a free book, but still). That and youth group trumped the marketing lesson.
Jesus Farted
Did I just say that? I guess I did. I somehow managed to work the phrase Jesus farted into a rant about a pot-smoking Jesus comic book over on Real Magazine.
More Big Money Blogs
Darren Rowse, the six-figure blogger I linked to the other day, links to a post about other profitable bloggers:
- Instapundit earns $8,000-10,000 per month.
- Andrew Sullivan raised $80,000 in one week (though that was an isolated incident)
- Markos Moulitsas Zuniga made more than $100,000 on his site in 2004.
And there are others, but those are the impressive ones. This is becoming an obsession for me. It’s just so hard to ignore folks making big money from blogging. I want to make big money from blogging. Heck, I’d settle for a little money. Just something to chip away at the college loans.
I think it’s also just encouraging to see that blogging doesn’t have to be the waste of time some people think it is. I know it’s not a waste of time, but for some people it requires a montary value to be worth any time at all. I think the big money bloggers are pretty rare at this point, but what’s not rare are the folks like me who have made a few connections through blogging, which have possibly led to a job or two. That’s justification right there, assuming my countless hours of joy and satisfaction aren’t enough for you.
But I still wouldn’t mind raking in $10,000 per month.
When I Was Your Age: Driving
If you don’t read my other incredibly insightful blog, Real Magazine, shame on you. No, just kidding. It’s written for teens, so I don’t expect everyone to be into it (though I do post more pop culturey stuff over there).
Anyway, I wanted to point your attention to a ‘When I Was Your Age’ entry I wrote over there, Sixteen and Behind the Wheel. I’ve talked about this column before, it’s something I write for my youth group’s newsletter and it seems like a good fit for Real.
This post is all about the joys of driving for teens and includes some of my stupider moves in life. If you like the series, you can also check out my Christian T-shirt entry. I hope to keep adding them on a semi-regular basis.
Bring on the Webby Awards
The Webby Award nominees were announced today. Holy cow, there are so many categories. It’s like the Grammy’s.
I’m disappointed to see that the “Youth” category still pretty much covers sites for anyone under 18, from ChannelOne to Noggin (“It’s like preschool on TV”). I’m especially annoyed at the un-usability of some of these sites. Noggin has no volume control (it won’t shut up!) and the Scholastic site has one of those annoying Flash navigation systems where you just have to roll over everything to see what’s there.
I’m also disappointed to see that the People’s Voice awards no longer take write-in votes. I remember a few years ago trying to wage a write-in campaign for passageway.org. I think we ultimately lost to Penny Arcade or someone like that. Sure, write-in votes pretty much mean whoever has the most traffic will win, but at least you can see some other sites get mentioned.
Oh well. It’s a nice place to look for new and (usually) well done sites.
The Six-Figure Blogger
Pro-blogger Darren Rowse expects to earn a six-figure income this year from blogging. Yikes. He writes for 17 different blogs (and you thought I was an addict) on a variety of different topics. (link via Jordon Cooper)
Blog on Nonprofits
On Philanthropy encourage nonprofits to jump on the blog bandwagon. I think it’s a brilliant idea, provided a nonprofit finds the right voice and is willing to give a blogger enough freedom. Sadly, most nonprofits are too tight-fisted with their information to see the potential benefits of blogging. (link via Blogger Buzz)