Jason Howarth's Blog

The March 14 meeting of the Jefferson County Board saw very few announcements, but those made were nevertheless vital to continuing the county’s success going forward. Most noteworthy was the introduction of Robert F. Dehring Jr., who as of April 1, 2017 will be serving as the Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge in branch III. Dehring will also be taking on the role of Chairperson of Jefferson County Security and Facilities Committee on the same day. In response to his confirmation, Dehring appeared in front of the county board, saying that upon hearing about the vacancy by the retiring David J. Wambach, “I eagerly got my application together, and when I got the call from Governor Walker I could not be happier to serve as your judge”.

The other major topic of discussion was the announcement of Tim Smith’s resignation from the board as the representative for the county’s 29^th district. According to Jefferson County Board Chair Jim Schroeder, Smith’s replacement is will be determined by county board approval. Schroeder made it public knowledge that three candidates are currently in the running for Smith’s spot, with a decision to be made at the board’s April meeting.    [Read more →]

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At the Feb. 7 meeting of the Whitewater Common City Council, the hottest issue of the night was the announcement of the organization Wisconsin RED pulling out of the annual Spring Splash event, which will take place on Saturday Apr. 29. The council deliberated for over an hour discussing the impact of last year’s Spring Splash had on the community as a whole. Although it was made clear by Whitewater’s City Manager Cameron Clapper that Spring Splash would not be cancelled, Clapper made it clear that along with Wallace O’Donell, the Council’s Legal Representative (attorney)  held many recent conversations with Wisconsin RED’s leadership. In said discussions O’Donell made it clear that he felt it would be best for both sides if Wisconsin RED did not promote Spring Splash via social media, due to the potential legal ramifications that could occur if things got even more out of hand than last year’s event. [Read more →]

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The biggest change that has been made to this blog over time has been the addition of personal touches, mostly notably photos of myself to allow for people to see the man behind the blog. I’ve also taken great care to expand the RSS feeds for blogs that I follow, as well as provide a few places of intrigue for users beyond this blog. I re-tooled the search bars to make it easier to find my various blog entries both via title of entry and category/subject matter. This is evident in that every story I wrote this semester was put in at least one distinct category. I acknowledged the importance of consistent hierarchical design, with each post following the same structure of an image at the top, then the first part of the entry, split off to encourage a complete reading, while not removing the main point of the story, with the two lines of the blog reserved to link to the original blog post I’m responding to and where I got my headline image from. I limited the amount of entries my readers would see, because I understand that most people won’t bother to read past what’s on the first page, but with less on that first page, they might just be encouraged to read more. [Read more →]

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As technology continues its rapid expansion from the sky in the form of drones, to web-searching smartphones in the palm of our hands, the question ever looming this innovative field is often what’s next and who will make it. Amazon has been one of the companies who has built their entire reputation online/through technology, alongside brands like Google are the premier examples of 21st century business at its finest. And now, at least according to Mashable’s Lance Ulanoff and multitude of others, Amazon is getting ready to change the world again with Amazon Go. Amazon Go is essentially  designed replace the grocery store, in particular the human interactions, through the use of the Amazon Go smartphone app, simplifying shopping to a grab, check-out, and leave. In addition to this Amazon is planning on bringing physical Amazon stores to aid not only this prospect, but their online delivery ones too. This all sounds great in theory and I can understand the intrigue and excitement, but this almost feels like a giant lab experiment, one fueled by online data and consumerism, basically bringing to life the things people complain about when using the internet. [Read more →]

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Journalism has been one the most affected job fields since the internet became mainstream. While not a new feeling for journalists given how technology has often dictated how their message is spread, and the internet era has been a difficult adjustment for many involved. CBS News’ Scott Pelley is just one of many journalists to offer their take on what journalists can do to ensure the integrity and good standards in their reporting during this transitional era. Pelley referred to American journalism as a house built by others (the previous generations) which modern journalists live in and “it’s on fire”. He notes how this era has made reporters less precise and correct in their stories, something which I agree with as if it is not some misinformation being fed to us to try and beat the competition to web, it’s stories and agencies that have blatant agendas. Pelley doesn’t outright blame reporters and most of the time neither do I, because as he admits their is just as much bad information as their is a wealth of helpful information to aid the accuracy of reports. [Read more →]

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One of the more interesting tech stories this year is the exploding Samsung Galaxy Note 7 Smartphones. For throughout the three months since the phone’s launch, the media has reported multiple cases of the phones exploding and catching fire, primarily due to the phone’s internal lithium battery. The media did it’s job covering these events, which were too numerous to all be mere coincidence, and as result Samsung suffered for it. According to Parmy Olson at Forbes.com, Samsung’s third quarter profits took a 30% hit and forced them to postpone the release of their Galaxy Note S7, a slimmer, sleeker version of the original Galaxy Note 7. However, it appears the S7 is finally making its way to shelves in times for the holidays, with full assurance of the phone’s quality by Samsung in a press release last Friday. [Read more →]

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Everyone fortunate enough to have toys had their favorites growing up. Some inspired creativity, some intelligence, but all toys inspired fun and imagination. Since 1999, The Strong National Museum of Play has inducted toys and games into its Toys Hall of Fame. This year is no exception, as pointed out by Andrew Liptak of The Verge, with Fisher-Price’s Little People figures, the classic swing, and the cultural phenomenon that is Dungeons and Dragons, joining already announced entrants the Atari 2600, Frisbees, and the cardboard box. Dungeons and Dragons was created in 1974 by Gary Gygax, and is a fantasy game using dice and character sheets in combination with published books to create a role-playing experience. It not really surprising that Dungeons and Dragons is going in to this Hall of Fame, in fact it has a leg up of many of its fellow toys in that the game is still played today, often being updated and refined, but never truly removing the core experience. Many of the current and past generation look at D&D as a landmark game, yet very few seem to remember the struggle it went through to be accepted, with Christian groups demonizing the game for well, leading to devil-worship and increased practice of the occult. This of course, has never been proven despite the mass media’s attempts to draw people away from the game it instead drew them in. [Read more →]

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Well the presidential election of 2016 has come and gone, and the nation seems more divided than ever. However, this not a statement to rile up the winners and losers this election, but rather to make clear,  that despite the controversy heading into the polls, more than half the nation has been tallied as “didn’t vote”. Now it is important to note that Mashable, who has the initial numbers may wrong in the actual totals, but what is painfully clear is that as it stands now 46.6% of Americans didn’t vote.  Their statistics are based on eligible voters in the US which is a staggering 231,556,622. This kind of information becomes massive media news, so its no wonder Mashable (among many others) would jump at the story, but one has to wonder if such stories aren’t a bit premature. [Read more →]

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Note: This is not meant to be an attack on any political party or it’s representatives

When it comes to connecting with other people and sharing our thoughts we are now just a click or swipe away from doing so. That doesn’t mean that media like magazines or TV are invalidated, but there is one common thing that journalists no matter how they spread their opinions shouldn’t do and that is endorse political parties and their candidates. Yet, this is what The Economist and several other pieces of journalistic media of all platforms have done with their announcement of support for Hillary Clinton presidential campaign. Now while there are others that support Clinton’s opponent Donald Trump, that is not the issue, rather it is any indication of the media like The Economist from removing bias from there reporting and trying to herd readers together to embrace their line of thinking. Now, while every human being has a right to opinion and can even express that opinion, it is different for journalists.

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