Andy Ihnatko is an amusing, sometimes irreverant, technology journalist for the Chicago Sun-Times. Andy's style is both self-effacing yet knowledgeable with a little theatre like presence in his style of delivering what can be sometimes abstract concepts about new media. He is a contributor to Macworld Magazine as well as a technology commentator on CBS’ Early Show. He also has written some books with his latest offering, Iphone: Full Loaded, available through Amazon. He was a featured speaker at this year's Macworld held in San Francisco. This is the year that Apple previously had decided not to attend leading many to muse as to what impact this would have to this long time event. It is a

The second workshop we have scheduled for January is a media discussion with the co-founders of Sacramento Press, Ben Ilfeld and Geoff Samek. This workshop will give you the opportunity to meet the co-founders of Sacramento Press, hear them discuss the future of media in their eyes, and ask them any questions you may have about the site, online news, etc. The workshop will be at the Sacramento Press office on Monday, Jan. 25 from 6:30 - 8 p.m. Our office is located at 431 I St., Suite 107 in the Amtrak station. We are in the same building complex as Starbucks. If you are facing Starbucks, go around the building to the left and you'll see our Sac Press sign out front. We recommend you f

The Sacramento Bee and other McClatchy newspapers are making another round of job cuts. The Bee announced Monday it will cut 25 people by month's end, while McClatchy newspapers including North Carolina's News & Observer and The State in South Carolina announced additional layoffs. The total number of layoffs at the country's third largest newspaper company was not available. Reporters will not be among those cut at The Bee, although the paper will lose a photojournalist, two copy editors, two designers and two others in the newsroom, said Pam Dinsmore, the paper's community affairs director. "We've made the decision that the reporting staff — that's not a place that can go down in any

Wednesday night, the Urban Hive was packed with people eager to hear what local media outlets had to say about the changes they've made recently in response to the economy, technology and social media. Jim Jakobs, Assignment Manager of KCRA, Jon Schuller and Anne Shulock, Office Manager and Reporter of Sactown Magazine, Jen Picard, Senior Producer of Insight, David Watts Barton, Editor in Chief of Sacramento Press, and Nick Miller, Arts Editor of Sacramento News and Review, had a lively discussion moderated by Janna Santoro. Here is the first part of the video from that night. Nick Miller joined the panel a little late. This first segment is before he arrived.    Media Panel video

There is no doubt that businesses in general have suffered through our ever-changing economy. Businesses on multiple levels have had to make sacrifices; downsizing, cutting salaries, furloughing, laying off, and certainly cutting expenses.Small business, especially in Sacramento, is no exception. One expense that seems to be a commonality, is the Company Holiday Party. Historically, no matter how large or small an office or business is, company's have celebrated the holidays and their accomplishments with their partners, employees, and sometimes, vendors and customers. It is a time when people put work aside, and come together over food, drinks, entertainment and memories that often survi

"There's the normal world and then there's Dumbworld," according to filmmaker Jayson Woodward. Hundreds of people came out to see unique art at the first Dumbworld Expo at the newly renovated Capitol Towers apartments. All of the art, showing space, lighting, food, drinks, music, and entertainment were donated and dozens of people volunteered to work the expo. "Sometimes I buy spray paint before I pay the bills," coordinator Mary Louise Picerno said. The whole complex, which includes various restaurants that opened especially for the expo, participated. The restaurants, vacant stores, and top floor penthouse acted as galleries that held unique mixed media pieces as well as graffiti whi

The fifth annual Mustard Seed Spin was held yesterday on the American River Trail  with guest speaker Mayor Kevin Johnson showing his support for the need to take care of our children and keep what safety nets we do have in place from disappearing.  The fundraiser benefited Mustard Seed School for homeless children of all ages. The ride featured area kids riding for their less fortunate counter parts and showing grit riding in temperatures well  into the nineties.   The goodwill and the social responsibility on display was breathtaking not to mention the smiles on the young riders determined faces.   Mayor Johnson reminded us we all needed to step up and pitch in the best we can during

Fans of a popular Top 40 music station have nothing to worry about -- KDND 107.9 FM "The End" isn't dropping their popular music format, they're just dropping the commercials. On Tuesday, KDND announced on their Twitter.com page that the station was going to "say goodbye" to something on the station. Fans speculated "The End" was going to change music formats or go off the air altogether. However, a FOX40 News viewer named Andrew discovered a hidden webpage on KDND's website that spelled out the station's intentions: The End was planning to announce a commercial-free format every Tuesday between 9:30am and midnight. Shortly after FOX40.com broke the news of "The End's" Tuesday announcem

This photographer/writer has been accused of being "snarky" in the past, but I'll put it right out there and warn you on this one…I'm going to be Snarky! Sacramento, CA- Metro fire executes a rapid "knockdown" on apartment fire, containing the blaze to one unit and saving the complex. Early Sunday afternoon, Sacramento Metropolitan Fire Department, assisted by Sacramento City Fire Department, was called to the apartments at 7326 Stockton Boulevard, for a report of smoke. When crews arrived they found heavy smoke coming from the windows and front door of a top floor apartment. A second alarm was immediately struck out for additional resources due to the "high density residential housing,

Sacramento-based McClatchy Co. on Tuesday announced a surge in second-quarter earnings following the latest round of company-wide downsizing. More cutbacks are still in the works to staunch a continued loss in revenue. Next week, members of the editorial employee union at The Sacramento Bee, the company's flagship, will vote on a proposal to use accrued vacation days rather than face unpaid furloughs this year. However, a small amount of hiring is still taking place. Net quarterly profit rose to $42.2 million, up from $19.7 million in the second quarter of 2008. Per-share earnings grew to 50 cents, up from 24 cents for the same period last year, according to the report released Tuesday

So -- you like Second Saturdays? Do you like the way this local arts night has morphed into a street fair? Have you watched the event grow so big that you've hoped it could take over the central city more than once a month? Your prayers may be answered this month when a new Saturday street fair debuts in Sacramento. Sponsored by Sacramento News & Review (SN&R), "Design Downtown" will bring mostly locally made or "do it yourself" (DIY) fashion and art to the K Street Mall from 3 to 9 p.m. every third Saturday starting July 18. "We looked at the success of Second Saturday and said, 'Maybe that's something we can build on,' " said Clay Nutting, the sales and marketing manager for the paper

Access Sacramento welcomed more than 250 eager filmmakers to the Coloma Community Center last night for the Tenth Annual "Cast & Crew Call" event. Twelve short films were "pitched" to the large group, short video auditions of each participant were recorded by Access Sacramento staff, and sign-up sheets for each film invited all to "make a movie this summer". The festive evening was kicked off by welcoming comments from Executive Director Ron Cooper and Lucy Steffens, Sacramento Film Commissioner. Youth and adult mentors visiting Sacramento from their community media center in Honolulu, Hawaii offered a welcoming chant and presented Cooper with gifts from their home state. Each of the 12

The future of news is not paper. At the same time the future is not necessarily just computers or mobile phones either. These days a new player, in the form of a new medium has entered the fray. That new technology is eInk. eInk is, much as its name implies, electronic ink. From the eInk website, eInk is described as offering, “...the viewer the experience of reading from paper, while having the power of updatable information.” The key difference between eInk and a computer screen is that it is not backlit like a screen, so it can be viewed in bright sunlight but not in the dark. To retain the image on the screen no power is required. So does eInk satisfy those that want the feel of news

State of Play Directed by Kevin Macdonald and Sin Nombre Written and Directed by Cary Fukunaga By Tony Sheppard Capitol Weekly The news media get a bad rap for assorted reasons. Every major outlet is either too liberal or too conservative, depending on whose eyes are doing the beholding – and regardless of how much one goldilocks (see urbandictionary.com) one’s way around the news channels, the commentators never seem to find one that’s just right. If it’s not perceived bias, then it’s the perception that stories are avoided in order to appease corporate overlords with corporately overlordish ties to the subjects of scandal. This topic of avoidance surfaces briefly in “State of Play

Audiences at the Century Downtown Plaza 7 theater were required to leave the building tonight when a fire alarm went off at approximately 9pm. Among the affected were the lucky (until that moment) viewers of a word of mouth screening of the upcoming release “State of Play” – including many members of the local media for whom it doubled as a press screening (myself included). After audiences vacated the theater, the alarm was silenced and the (now diminished) crowd returned. However, there appeared to be a problem with the system as the strobe lights remained on and the alarm sounded again (with little to no response from the now jaded audience). Despite the presence of the fire department

Representatives of local media outlets and community members came together Thursday night to discuss how to make local media better and more reflective of the community. The meeting was organized by the Sacramento Media Group, California Common Cause and Access Sacramento. There was discussion and debate about the role and responsibility of our local media. Ron Cooper, executive director of Access Sacramento, summed it up when he said, “Media and your influence over media is really a local issue.” The event was well attended by a diverse mix of community activists, students, and stakeholders. There were representatives of local broadcast stations, newspapers and online ventures. The deb

This survey was conducted of The Sacramento Bee, from Monday, March 23rd to Sunday, March 29th. The aim of the survey was to pinpoint how much of the written content of The Bee was written by The Bee and of that content how much was local and how much was not. Each day was divided into the sections of the paper. Sections of the paper that had no attributable articles were simply not included. Within each section, all the different publications were separated out on to their own lines, with special lines for local Bee content and McClatchy content (from the Washngton bureau, or a foreign bureau). Each mark per line denotes an attribution for a piece of text. Shortcomings of this survey:

  Ongoing: African American Currents: Contemporary Art from the Bank of America Corporate Collection Art Exhibit Tuesday - Friday 12 Noon to 6 PM; Saturday 10 AM to 5 PM through March 28, 2009. 40 Acres Art Gallery 3428 3rd Ave Sacramento, CA (916) 456-5080 http://www.40acresartgallery.org Featuring 75 works of art from the world-renowned Bank of America corporate collection. The exhibit includes work by artists Jean Michel Basquiat, Lorna Simpson, Martin Puryear, Sam Gilliam, Faith Ringgold and Beverly Buchanan.   Smithsonian Traveling Exhibition: The Way We Worked Through May 17, 2009 10 AM - 5 PM Admission: Adults: $8.00; Ages 6-17: $3.00; 5 and under: Free California State Railroa

On Sunday, March 22, 2009, Access Sacramento and the Sacramento Media Group - California Common Cause will present the West Coast premiere of Broadcast Blues at the historic Crest Theatre.  Filmmaker Sue Wilson will be in attendance at this screening.  Given the tenant of Sacramento Press, this event should of particular interest to the community here. Broadcast Blues 2:00 PM Admission: $10.00; Students: $5.00 The Crest 1013 K St Sacramento, CA (916) 456-8600 http://www.thecrest.com About Broadcast Blues: Clear Channel neglects its emergency system, disaster strikes, and people die.  Pentagon pundits profit from the same war they promote.  Fox News gets a court ruling that news does not

That didn't take too long. Apparently there is a link to the whole Sacramento Business Journal story about The Sacramento Press. Earlier this morning I reported that the article was hidden behind a pay wall. I just got an email from Nicholas Walsh, Marketing Director of The Sacramento Press with this link to the full Business Journal article. This is a story about all of us: employees, writers, and readers. I want to thank Melanie Turner who wrote the story and Dennis McCoy the photographer.