adamparnes

Apple Reston Store Construction Update

Since my last trip to Reston Town Center in March, the Apple Retail Store construction has moved to a new phase. In March, the barricade almost reached the street and parking was blocked directly in front of the store’s entrance.

As of June 29, only a black barrier is in front of where the new store entrance will be. The space below the fascia of the building and above the barrier, is where I’m assuming the Apple logo will be installed. Below is a picture of the construction from Market Street facing east.

You can click on the image for a larger version.

I was able to get a picture of the actual work permit you can see to the left of the DANGER sign.

You can click on the image for a larger version.

Here’s a picture of the actual work permit. I’ve copied all the text from the permit below the picture. But if you click on the picture you can pretty much read everything.

I can’t wait for the Apple Retail Store to open this fall. The Reston Best Buy has a decent Apple section, but the service there is always lacking. I’ve been spoiled by the Tyson’s Corner and Fair Oaks Apple Retail stores. I’ll definitely be in line for the grand opening.

Here’s what’s on the work permit:

Fairfax County, Virginia
Department of Public Works and Environmental Services
Permit Application Center
12055 Government Center Parkway
Fairfax, Virginia 22035-5504

Permit Number: 91120155

Job Address:
11949 Market St.
Reston, VA 20190-0000

Tenant Name: APPLE

Issued To:

PROPERTY LLC RESTON TOWN CENTER
200 State St
Flr 5Th
Boston, Ma 02109
(202) 263-8540

Structure: SHOPPING CENTER

Group: M

Issue Date: 05/05/2009

Tax Map ID: 017-3 / 10 /  /0008A1

Plan No: Q-09-1959

BLDG: N/A   FLOOR: N/A  SUITE: N/A

Contractor:

SHAWMUT WOODWORKING & SUPPLY
560 Harrison Ave
Boston, Ma 02118-0000
(617) 622-7000

Code: (USBC 2006): IBC 2006

Type of Construction: 1B

HAS PERMISSION, ACCORDING TO APPROVED PLANS, APPLICATION AND RESTRITIONS OF RECORD TO: NEW TENANT LAYOUT/PEER REVIEW

A new Occupancy Permit must be obtained prior to tenant occupying the space

Sprinklered:

Monitored: N

Code Modification: N

91120155
017-3

How Old News Can Avoid Becoming A Walking Colonial Williamsburg

My alma mater, Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, recently mailed an alumni newsletter, Newhouse Network, focusing on the future of journalism. The article was a forum of professors and professionals waxing poetically about the demise of journalism and what’s next for the industry. This topic is near and dear to my heart because I’m a magazine journalism major, class of ’99, and love all forms of media.

I’m also a fan of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Last night’s episode included a segment about the demise of newspapers. “Reporter” Jason Jones interviewed New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller and Assistant Managing Editor Rick Berke. Jones asked Berke why “aged news” was better than “real news?” Jones followed with, “newspapers are aged, name one thing that happened today?” Berke could only name a few items that didn’t happen yesterday.

Here’s the dilemma, print newspapers have become one of the many sources of news. This is a huge shift in power and money. Newspapers used to be “the source” of news. Everyone used to read a newspaper to be in the know and for more in-depth analysis of world events. Today, newspapers print “old news.”

We’re in the midst of an evolution; some would even say a revolution. The power and money once held by newspapers is being dispersed throughout the Internet and 24 hour cable news channels. Two examples of the traditional media disruptors are Craigslist’s classified business and Google’s advertising.

It’s too late to focus on the problems of traditional media. I consider traditional media to be newspapers, magazines and local/national TV news. The only way for “traditional media” to survive and thrive in this new age of citizen journalism, is to look at the possibilities.

Anyone with a blog, twitter account or even Facebook account should consider themselves citizen journalists. This idea can be pretty scary for a university that offers traditional newspaper, magazine and broadcast degrees.

Currently, the fastest growing news sources are hyper local blogs. An example of a hyper local blog is the Restonian. The Restonian is a blog that only follows and reports on news and happenings in Reston. It’s become a more legitimate news source recently when the head of a local civic association complained that blog was in fact not a traditional news source. I believe acknowledging the blog, actually legitimized it.

“Traditional media” needs to look to the future. A possible future when printed newspapers are no longer delivered to subscribers’ homes, local citizen journalists will have more clout and advertising revenue, news aggregation will be as important as publishing original content, newspapers are no longer for-profit and when the skills being taught at journalism schools become interdisciplinary.

I believe converting newspapers and other news sources from for-profit to not-for-profit as a viable and a good idea. The biggest problem with newspapers today is that they are not making enough profit, and their parent companies are not able to provide the needed shareholder returns. Going not-for-profit, or even employee owned, would allow newspapers and other news sources to focus on producing and delivering great content. It’s a win for journalism, a win for journalists and a win for their audiences.

Another evolution could be the creation of a new Media degree by combining newspaper, magazine and broadcast degrees. This new program would equip students to have the multifaceted skills needed in today’s evolving media environment. I believe specializations are a career limiting endeavor. Possessing general print and broadcast skills with a solid journalism background would be much more marketable, and to me, more fun.

It’s pretty late in the game for traditional media to change and correct their course. Every day now provides an opportunity to look to the future and envision how traditional media can stay relevant and evolve. If they don’t, they’ll become what Jason Jones coins as, “A walking Colonial Williamsburg.”

Staffing My First Job Fair

I helped staff a careerbuilder job fair today at the Reagan building. I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into. I was warned it was going to be draining, but also a lot of fun. To be honest, I didn’t really know what to expect. I got an idea, when the line to get into the fair was over 150 deep before the doors even opened.

Once the fair opened its door, the 12 companies looking to hire were inundated. At one point, I think we had over 100 people waiting in line to learn more about our jobs.

Most of the folks I met were looking for a job, any job. They came from all walks of life and had all sorts of experience and skills. I think I personally shook hands with over 250 people today. At the end of the afternoon, my legs were sore and my throat was raw.

My experience today game me a glimpse of how the economic meltdown is effecting real people. I’m truly lucky to have a job at a great organization that cares about its staff. My association is one of the few organizations that grew this year by adding almost 20 new jobs. We currently have around 15 open positions, ranging from IT, finance, administrative and investments. I felt good being able to steer folks to our openings, and possibly giving them hope of finding a job at a great organization.

The ironic part of the job fair was the company located in the booth next to ours. It was my former employer. I could write for hours and pages about my experience there… To keep it short, working for an investor owned utility and then moving to a not-for-profit opened my eyes. I don’t think I can ever go back to work for a company more focused on its shareholders return than its customers and/or its employees.

I’m truly blessed to have a job I love at an organization that cares about its employees and the community its in. I’m going to redouble my efforts and really try to make a bigger difference at work and in my community.

What Does the New iPhone 3.0 OS Mean for Productivity?

I’ve actually turned off the email notification on my iPhone because I was getting too distracted when I received email. What am I going to do when apps get push notification? I’m going to go nuts. I’ll need some ADHD meds just so I stay on task. It’s hard enough as it is.

Getting push updates from ESPN on my favorite teams or getting a notification of an IM message from friends in real time will drive me crazy. I think I’ll actually need to turn off my phone or at least the notifications, which kind of defeats the purpose of push app notifications.

I’m really curious to see how Apple implements the app push notifications and what options we’ll have in the settings.

Life’s Lessons from Barbecuing

In Gary Wiviott’s Low & Slow barbecue book, he recommends to follow the KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid).

For the last year I’ve been trying to master the art of smoking on my off-set grill. I thought I knew what I was doing. After reading the first few chapters of Gary’s book, I realized I was working way to hard and I wasn’t really smoking our food. I was definitely smoking the food, but not truly cooking the food low and slow.

Gary’s instructions boil down to learning how to use your grill and then starting to experiment. I was looking for the silver bullet of grilling, a trick or shortcut. Cooking low and slow requires a lot of trial and error and patience.

Following Gary’s instructions of keeping it simple and experimenting, I think I grilled the best chicken I have ever grilled over Memorial weekend. From the way our friends devoured the chicken, I think they’d agree.

While experimenting with the grill, I started thinking about a lot of what I do and realized if I wanted to master the art of grilling and other interests in my life I really needed to start keeping things simple. I’ve made my life complicated. I have so many interests and spread my attention so thin, I’ve become a master of nothing. I’m realizing I need to follow my passions, learn more and start doing.

It’s scary and exiting. Stay tuned for what comes next.

WSJ iPhone App is the Best News App Yet

I downloaded the WSJ’s iPhone app as soon as I heard it was available. From the moment I started the app I could tell it wasn’t going to disappoint.

The WSJ’s home screen opens on the What’s News section and includes articles, videos and WSJ radio. You’ll notice as soon as the app loads that the headline text seems a lot larger than the USA Today and New York Times apps. Normally, I’d prefer smaller type so I can read more on one page, but I think the font size works well for headlines. I personally like the WSJ and AP News’s headline format more than the New York Times and USA Today’s headline and subhead layout. I’d hope the news headlines would be enough to grab my interest.

Another benefit you’ll notice right away is the WSJ’s speed as it opens and loads its content. It’s one of the fastest news apps I use. The other feature I really like is the ability to easily save and access content offline. With no AT&T Wireless signal in the Metro tunnels yet, it’s a nice feature.

As a WSJ paper and online subscriber, I really like how they created an iPhone app to house their online content. I still prefer to read the actual newspaper and getting my fingers dirty. But, the WSJ iPhone app is now my favorite news application and is a great tool freeing me from having to take the newspaper with me on my morning bus and train commute.

How TweetStack Successfully Uses Twitter

Some companies understand how important it is to engage their customers. Some other companies understand how important it is to engage their customers and know how to leverage their energy.

Here’s my recent experience: last week I read on Mashable about a new Twitter application that was now available on the iPhone. The post mentioned that if you tweeted mashable and tweetstack you’d get a free code to download the application. I sent my tweet on Friday and then received their response along with the direct message with the code.

I downloaded TweetStack and quickly put it through its paces. I compared tweetstack to my current favorite twitter iPhone app, tweetie. While tweetie was the best twitter app on the iphone, tweetstack added a few features I’ve just started to use in tweetdeck. Mainly creating twitter groups and search topics.

Tweetstack provides the ability to add search and group stacks to the main view of the application. I’m finding this feature is key to increasing the value of accessing twitter on the iPhone. Tweetie requires users to click on the more button for saved searches and doesn’t offer the ability to create groups. Another feature I really like about tweetstack is the icon badges. These are the little numbers letting me know I have replies, direct messages and/or new search results. Tweetie requires a separate touch and search for replies and direct messages. Tweetie does load a little faster than tweetstack, but tweetie doesn’t search and load replies and direct messages when you open the application.

After testing the application I tweeted about my experience. I quickly heard from someone who was having trouble importing tweetdeck groups into tweetstack. I wasn’t really familiar with what he was trying to do, so I told him I’d have to give it a shot later. I also heard from tweetstack that they’re looking for any feedback or recommendations on how to make the app better.

I did have an idea. On the main page of tweetstack, the name field of the folks you are following only allow for a limited amount of characters and shorten longer names with ellipsis. Within minutes of tweeting my recommendation, I heard back from them about the idea and that they’ll look into it.

Twitter is a great medium to communicate with and engage people. Some twitter users see the space as more one-way communication. The true value of being on twitter is engaging customers and people with similar interests. The two-way communication is where the value of twitter can be found. Solely sending tweets about yourself is okay, but misses the point of the community and its potential.

Tweetstack’s engagement of their customers creates a bond and the potential for loyalty. If they continue to engage their customers, they’ll begin to create a solid user community. This user community will be a great resource for new ideas and features as well as be their best source of word-of-mouth marketing. I’m looking forward to see how tweetstack’s app and community evolve.

With three days of use under my belt, I moved Tweetstack to my iPhone’s home screen. It’s the best twitter iPhone app yet.

MLB’s Mistake

I thought Major League Baseball understood new media, but they don’t and can’t deliver.

MLB actually took a few steps backward by removing their official MLB.tv blog. The MLB.tv blog included updates and comments about their new video player and the technical issues they were working through. Now when you visit mlbtv.mlblogs.com you are redirected to MLB.tv support. Brilliant!

Here’s a good article about MLB.tv’s issues from computerworld.com.

Instead of being transparent and communicating with their fans, and paying customers, MLB decided to retreat. MLB is missing a great opportunity to engage their customers and communicate about their problems. Most folks are reasonable and if they knew what was going on and the issues MLB was working on, they’d be more likely to understand.

By removing blog posts and comments, MLB is creating the perception they aren’t being 100 percent honest. Perceptions are the only thing that matters when someone is considering paying over $100 for HD streaming video of their favorite baseball team. I know I’m going to hold off even considering MLB.tv until they are more forthcoming about their problems and engage their customers.

MLB was doing the right thing, but when they hit a few bumps they retreated from the openness their fans and customers expected. MLB is making it even worse, since they were more open and engaging before their mistake to remove their blog.

MLB Gets New Media

Major League Baseball understands how their fans want to be able to watch and access their content. They understand their fans want to watch their favorite teams where and when they want to. Separating their content (baseball games) from cable and broadcast television and moving to the Internet is a natural evolution.

I think it makes sense to ask fans to pay for access to live audio streaming through MLB.com At Bat 2009 on the iPhone or live HD video over the Internet. While I’m a baseball fan, I can’t see spending the amount of money required for the live HD video yet. Maybe I’ll change my mind after a half-season with At Bat 2009. I really enjoyed listening to the Mets’ season opener on my phone. It helped that they won too.

MLB Advanced Media CEO Bob Bowman mentioned they might be able to stream a few games a day on the iPhone without raising the initial $9.99 app price. I can’t wait for the iPhone 3.0 software update, which will enable the direct video streaming Bowman alluded to. The iPhone is such a great device because of its software, not the network or even the hardware.

The ability to watch live games on my phone is a great feature. I already enjoyed watching Syracuse play its first two NCAA tournament games on my phone. Broadcast and cable better be paying attention. Content providers are already selling their content directly to their fans. This shift is already destroying old media’s business model. I wonder if broadcast and cable can adapt better than print media?

While this may be more expensive for everyone, it provides the opportunity for fans to select and pay for the content they value. I’d love to see an A la carte cable option. I’d select maybe 50 channels, and I’d hope to pay less than for the hundreds of channels I already don’t watch and/or care about.

I can’t wait to see how MLB.com At Bat 2009 evolves with the new software update coming in June.

I <3 Tivo

I wish I could get Tivo installed in all my TV’s, or at least in all my Verizon Fios boxes. The Tivo HD with two cable cards is close to the best most-perfect home entertainment technology.

I really can’t watch broadcast TV, I mean TV over-the-air on someone else’s schedule. Sports is a different story, but I really have trouble sitting down and watching TV with commercials. I love Tivo because I can watch my shows when I want to and how I want to.

Boxee.tv is getting close to making another great entertainment technology. If only Hulu.com would wise up and let Boxee.tv use their content. Boxee will continue to be able to get around Hulu’s attempts to block their content from being used. I really don’t understand why Hulu wouldn’t embrace Boxee and really try to gain and grow a new audience.

I see this behavior in the newspaper industry and other old school industries. I wonder if NBC and Fox realize they’re next. Unless they adapt to the new environment, they’ll become obsolete. They really need to be ahead of the curve instead of trying to slow change.

We’ll see. Once Boxee.tv is able to get more content providers, I think even Tivo will have to start changing its business model. Until then, I’ll continue to <3 Tivo.