If you have turned on the TV any time recently you may have seen a scrolling banner across a number of channels warning you that Time Warner was cutting some 18 channels from your local cable channel list and for you to call a number to voice your concern. If your wondering what this is all about it boils down to money. Viacom which owns the rights to things like SpongeBob want some $39 million in new fees from Time Warner and to date Time Warner has refused. Viacom has step up and said they will pull the plug at midnight tonight if a deal is not reached.

Now before you go thinking this is all Time Warner’s fault remember that any increase in fees they pay will result in higher fees paid by it’s subscribers. As more and more people move to the Internet for their entertainment the almightily advertising dollar is moving from Comedy Central to sites like Hulu. Viacom may ask for $39 million today to cover their shrinking revenues but will it end there?

You got it, WSFC Schools have called a two hour SNOW delay due to a dusting of snow that fell in and around Winston-Salem. That’s right we had snow last night but you had to be up and about to see it. Snow is snow though and snow before Thanksgiving is extremely unusual for this area. So in case you missed it here is your November snowfall:

Six Men Shot: Police report a bar fight at El Deportivo bar on Kernersville Road turned into a shooting when several men involved in the fight left the bar then returned with a shotgun. Wounded in the the shooting were: Carlos Jonas Santiago, 22, Olimpo Rodriguez Ortiz, 40; Filberto Ramirez, 34; Christine Nava Rocincuet, 35; Xandart Cristian Arellanes, 30; and Alfred Toran, 23. The men with the shotgun drove away from the bar in red Honda.

State Laptop Stolen: A laptop from the Division of Aging and Adult Services contained up to 85,000 unprotected Social Security numbers. George Bakolia, the State CIO said the laptop was stolen in Atlanta and the information was not encrypted in violation of state policy.

12 Year Old Shot: Police arrested the father of a twelve year old boy found shot last Saturday morning. Two men were found intoxicated at the scene, the boys father and Garcia Cisneros.

 N.C. Treasurer Richard Moore Against Wachovia Deal: N.C. Treasurer Richard Moore has stated he is against the Wachovia, Wells Fargo deal and will vote the states Wachovia shares help by the state pension fund against the deal.

If you currently use a Smartphone with Verizon you may want to go by the store or call customer service ASAP to confirm what packages are available to you for what phones because as of November 14th, 2008 Verizon will require a $29.99 data plan for all data capable phones. Current Verizon customers on a plan with no data plan but a Web 2.0 phone will not be required to change their current plan however if you go into Verizon on November 14th and want that high end phone which also has Internet Access you WILL BE required to buy a data plan.

This is at least the rumor based on a “leaked” document from Verizon and it appears legit enough to be worth confirming what your options are. Verizon is slated to release multiple “SmartPhones” including the Blackberry Storm and with this plan change going into effect on the 14th it’s safe to say that’s the day most of these phones will be released. Granted what use is a Storm without data however many people prefer the higher end phones so they can get things like an MP3 player, speaker phone, Bluetooth, etc which very often only comes on the phones which also support Internet Access. My phone falls into this class and although it is several years old and has Mobile Web I have no data plan as I don’t want Internet Access on this phone. If I was to walk into Verizon on the 14th and bought my same model I would have to not only pay for our nationwide phone service we use but also another $30 for something I have no use for or at least that’s how it appears.

So if your thinking of changing phones or even want to lock in the current Pay As You Go plans you better get over to Verizon before the 14th:

In typical fashion of those that don’t understand something the Administration of Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools has submitted to the Board a change in the “Standards of Professional Conduct” to ban the use of “Social Networking” sites by staff and teachers. The Board had an initial vote to approve the changes with only two nays to the following changes:

Teachers, school administrators and all other employees shall refrain from communication with WS/FCS students using, through, by and/or on social networking sites, including but not limited to MySapce.com and Facebook. Teachers, school administrators and all other employees shall not list WS/FCS students as “Friends” on social networking sites, unless the student is the employee’s child, grandchild, sibling, cousin, niece or nephew.

A “social networking site” primarily focuses on building on-line communities of people who share interest and activates or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most are internet based and provide a variety of ways for users to interact, such as email and instant messaging services.

During the Board meeting the rule change was put forth as a needed because using sites such as Facebook allow teachers to communicate with students without the ability of the Administration to monitor that communication. This of course makes no sense as stated by Board Member Buddy Collins since the current rules do allow for written, oral, telephone and even text messages as a means to communicate with students and none of those are monitored. Mr. Collins goes on to further point out that creation of such a rule shouldn’t be needed as long as the hiring process for staff was administered correctly. In other words this is not a technology problem but a Human Resource problem, something we have made comment on with businesses in the past. The need to monitor Internet use, except in cases of compliance, is not a technology problem, it’s an HR problem.

In stark contrast to the provision put forth by the Superintendant to ban the use of technology other school systems are looking for ways to expand the use of the Internet. In eSchoolNews.com Assistant Editor Maya Prabhu quotes Jared Stein, director of instructional design services at Utah Valley University:

"I believe that educators should keep a clear line separating educational relationships from social relationships," he said. "As long as the use of the tool is related to learning, education, or professional development, I don’t see it as being a problem."

Maybe even more to the point is this article in Edutopia.org:

But the rewards are worth it, he says, estimating that online school-based communities will multiply rapidly in the coming year. "You see how motivated the kids are," he adds. "Here you were, banging your head getting students to write. Then you give them a blog, and now you just can’t get them to stop."

And lastly citing Mary Madden of Pew Internet, an American think-tank dedicated to studying the social impacts of technology this post at Macleans.ca says it all:

“The fact that high-school teachers and college professors are starting to use these tools makes sense,” says Mary Madden, senior research analysts at Pew Internet, an American think-tank dedicated to studying the social impacts of technology. Teachers “are able to leverage a tool students already use instead of asking them to learn how to use a separate application,”

 

As the list of states around the US investigating voter registration applications submitted by Acorn grows server local counties have joined into the mix with their own “questionable” applications.

County elections officials have sent about 30 applications to the state Board of Elections for possible fraud investigation, Poucher said. Those applications were submitted by the grassroots organization ACORN, whose voter registration activities have been questioned in Durham and other communities, as well.

The same voters’ names appeared multiple times on the ACORN applications in question, Poucher said.

The News & Observer

With a falling stock price and horrible overall market conditions Bank Of Granite has announced they will not complete an announced 5-for-4 stock split. The split was to take place for equity holders on October 17. Last month Granite announced it was suspending it’s dividend until further notice.

On Friday the station I tend to use was out of Regular and today they were out of everything but Regular:

I just happened to be travelling to Boone for the day and on the way up and back I kept tab on the stations as I passed them by and I would say at least 90% of them had plastic bags on various pump handles. For the most part it appeared they had Regular but no other grades although at least two stations I passed were totally out of all grades.

On top of shortages gas prices in North Carolina rank 4th highest in the US. Only Alaska, Hawaii and Georgia have higher gas prices with the national average being some 30 cents per gallon lower than the $3.83 average North Carolinians are paying. Regular gas just to our north in Virginia is running $3.54 a gallon, yes you heard right 30 cents less just a few miles up highway 52.

So weeks after Ike we are still running out of gas in North Carolina with reports coming in from Charlotte that only one in seven stations open. Governor Easley has reported that things should be back to more or less normal sometime this week, how many of you are holding your breath?

Another local sign of which you have probably seen although I’m not really sure what it’s suppose to do (due<grin>) to actually help with the problem.