When it was announced that Facebook would be allowing applications from outside developers, it originally seemed like a great idea to me. Adding new features to such a well-done community based site would surely make it more addicting than it already was. I obviously didn’t think that one through.

Now that Facebook Applications is public, the ability to send drinks and vampire bites to my friends isn’t quite as appealing as I thought it would be. Though at first the applications seemed cool, I slowly noticed my inbox filling with odd invites from people I don’t normally talk to. These invites began cluttering my inbox, and after looking at them closely, I realized they weren’t invites at all. Instead, they were advertisements for applications that my friends were using that were being sent without their knowledge.

When an application is added, users are given an opportunity to uncheck a box that states an invitation will be sent to all their Facebook friends. This box is accidentally ignored nine times out of ten, resulting in the unwanted invitations.

These invites are now cluttering my once spotless inbox and are beginning to make Facebook look like another social networking site I have long given up on: MySpace.

MySpace, the “it” website before Facebook became immensely cooler is famous for offering an inbox full of messages from fictional girls around the nation just looking for a friend.

On top of the crowded inbox, Facebook Applications are making profiles absurdly large. If a person decides to go “app happy” with their Facebook profile, his or her page turns three times longer than necessary. Scrolling for five minutes past a user’s “Favorite colors!” and “Movies I SOO wanna see” just to write on his or her wall is not a pleasant experience.

Compounding this problem, many students are accepting the invitations to add applications just to make them stop appearing three to four times a day in their inbox. “I really don’t like some of the applications on my page, I was just getting annoyed every day to add it so I finally gave in,” says Jeremy Hawthorne, a Purdue freshman. Getting people to add applications by overwhelming them with invitations is a questionable practice I wouldn’t have expected from Facebook a year ago, but with companies such as Blockbuster and Flixster using the applications as an avenue for advertisement, it’s no surprise that invitations are being sent in droves.

Facebook had two major assets that made it the giant it now is: privacy and simplicity. Facebook lost its first draw when it removed its invite-only feature and went public over a year ago. Now even the simplicity is gone with the addition of the scourge that is Facebook Applications. Unless they seriously overhaul this currently frustrating experience, I honestly see this as the beginning of a downward slip for Facebook.

MySpace, your virus is spreading.

(OpEd 2, J200)

I don’t pay for my music. Ever since Napster became a household name, I’ve been leading a life of crime and greed. When a new album comes out, I don’t wait in line at Sam Goody, I just go to the right website and click the right link. No artist has seen royalties from me since I was eleven. To record companies, this is a problem.

At first, they tried to crush our resources. I have seen the demise of many peer-to-peer file-sharing applications by the hands of the record industry, and have seen just as many rise immediately after. As a teenager with moderate resources, it’s not hard to find the new place to download music for free.

Then, they tried to crush us. Headlines telling of poor little Suzy being sued for 150,000 dollars for downloading an N*Sync song forewarned “piraters” that their nasty habit had nasty repercussions. Privacy issues were raised, and many of the cases were dropped. Music downloading applications found new ways to keep users anonymous and downloading continued.

Now, they want to work with us. Online stores offering 99 cent song downloads allow both the consumers and the record companies to strike a compromise. The iTunes Store has proved widely successful in this model, selling over 3 billion songs to date. Though online stores such as the one Apple offers are very convenient, they still don’t offer that price point people like me look for in our music: free.

In an attempt to cater to those with a similar opinion, Indiana University has partnered with Ruckus to provide free and legal access to over 1.5 million licensed songs. Though IU’s attempt to bring an affordable music vendor onto campus to help deter illegal downloading is a good concept, choosing Ruckus as that vendor muddles the entire idea.

Ruckus boasts free, legal downloading of songs. What Ruckus fails to mention is the extreme limitations placed on these songs. First, all songs can only be played on the Ruckus Media Player, forcing users to replace iTunes or Windows Media Player with the advertisement-laden application provided by Ruckus. If you want to play a downloaded song on an mp3 player, you are forced to pay a monthly fee of $4.99. Even then, the songs won’t play on an iPod or Zune, the two most popular mp3 players on the market. If listening to CD’s is more your thing, you’re still out of luck. CD burning capabilities are reserved for the purchased songs only.

The limitations render these downloads almost useless to most music listeners. With the inability to listen to songs anywhere other than the computer, Ruckus has ignored the technology that spurred online downloading in the first place. Nobody downloads music to be heard exclusively heard on the computer; as Apple recently selling their 100,000,000th iPod indicates.

Giving away music for free can’t be the main focus of a successful anti-pirating campaign. This battle isn’t against the students who have grown up illegally obtaining music. It’s too late for them, their illicit ways too familiar. Paul Imbody, a sophomore, exemplifies the mindset of the veteran downloader: “I can’t pay for something I know I can get for free, it doesn’t make any sense.”

The focus must instead be placed on offering an affordable service to the students unversed in the world of torrents and newsgroups. The same students willing to try a legal service are usually the ones willing to pay. Michael Nahmius, a student that uses Ruckus says the real appeal is the service’s legitimacy, not its price point. “I’d definitely pay to download music that I could burn CD’s with if it was cheap. Right now it’s too expensive so I just use Ruckus,” says Michael.

Instead of working with the substandard features of Ruckus just because it’s free, IU has to look into some of the other subscription-based music downloading services available and work out a financial agreement. Online music store eMusic offers packages of $9.99 per month for 30 downloads or $14.99 for 50 downloads with no restrictions. Offering a service such as this at a reduced price (much like IU currently does with student software) would be more appealing to students than Ruckus, which offers free but essentially useless music.

Though I am part of the problem, I would like to see a solution. If IU takes the correct measures in offering a quality downloading service at an intelligent price, the benefits of being legal might finally outweigh the benefits of pirating. If not, at least the students willing to pay will feel less cheated on their decision.

(OpEd 1, J200)

Various articles written for journalism classes and fun:

J200
• Woodward Packs Auditorium for Speaker Series
• War Changes Student Involvement in Past Years
• La Casa Home to More Than Just Cultural Center
• “Drunk Bus” Driver Keeps Students Safe
• Ruckus Not the Answer to Campus Downloading
• Facebook Apps Ruining Lives

J201
• Entrepreneur brings Fresh Air to Bloomington
  
• Volatile gas market proves beneficial, for now

Indiana Daily Student

• Wonder Lab’s volunteers work many hours, essential to success

Hopeless Zero is home to the work of me, Nick Bowersox. I grew up in a small town called Washington in southern Indiana and I just finished my freshman year at Indiana University studying journalism.

Besides here, you can also see what I’m up to on Twitter and view my photostream on Flickr.  I only have one video on Vimeo, but hope to make more eventually.

If email is more your thing, feel free to contact me at zeerow@gmail.com

When I’m not wasting my life away on the internet, I try to get to the field and play paintball and I never miss a good movie at the theater. Cookie Dough Bites just taste better there. I’ve recently began to DJ and plan on beginning my first global tour as soon as promoters decide to pay for my flights.

“Work at night.” The biggest piece of advice Bob Woodward gave to a packed ground floor in the Indiana University Auditorium on Monday evening.
Woodward is the first of three speakers in the School of Journalism Fall Speaker Series, an opportunity for students to meet some of the top professionals in journalism. Though the series is aimed at Indiana University students, the auditorium filled with people from all around the community, both young and old.

Sophomore Joel Hakimzadeh was excited to see such a big name at his school. “It’s great that I had a chance to hear from a piece of history, and on top of that it was free.”

Bob Woodward came to fame when he took a major role with his partner Carl Bernstein in the investigation of the Watergate scandal. His connection with the informant “Deep Throat” led to the resignation of President Nixon and also in winning his newspaper, the Washington Post, a Pulitzer Prize. His career continued with 11 best-selling non-fiction books including his latest, State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III.

The presentation began with Woodward’s investigation of Watergate. After a brief summary of his experience, Woodward focused on the pardon Gerald Ford gave to Richard Nixon once he took office. He recalled the moment when he heard about the pardon from his colleague, Carl Bernstien, over the phone. Bernstein simply said, “the son-of-a-bitch pardoned the son-of-a-bitch,” which Woodward explained was enough to understand what had happened. Woodward then spoke of his exclusive interview with Ford 23 years after the controversial pardon. To his surprise, during the interview Ford persuaded Woodward to change an opinion he had held for over two decades. “Ford convinced me that it was the right thing to do…what Ford did was right and courageous.” Brogan Lee, a freshman majoring in Photojournalism, remembered this moment the best. “I always thought that Nixon’s pardon was a scam, it’s really interesting to hear a different side of the story.”

After Watergate, Woodward’s presentation focused on the Iraq War, the main subject of his recent books. After being given one year to find out why the nation went to war by his publisher, Woodward reduced his investigation into a 21-page memo for the President to read before it went to press. After reading it, the President granted Woodward a two-day, three and a half hour interview; the longest interview with a president over one topic ever. When speaking of the interview, Woodward asked the crowd to guess how many questions he asked. When an audience member suggested two, Woodward joked, “that would be if it was Bill Clinton.” In the course of the interview, Woodward asked President Bush over 500 questions. “He gives short answers,” quipped Woodward.

As the presentation came to a close, Woodward spoke of the importance of investigation in media. “Democracy is dying in darkness,” Woodward warned the audience. He asserted, “Journalism is the barrier, the antidote to secret government.” Woodward also commented on the current lack of investigation in broadcast media, or has he put it, the concept that “I know nothing, but I’m here LIVE.”

After his presentation, Woodward took a couple of questions that the audience had written prior to coming into the auditorium. When asked about his greatest wish for journalism, he hoped that media could lose its current “sense of arrogance, celebrity, and smugness,” and instead be the watchdog it is intended to be.

As for his greatest piece of advice, “work at night,”? After re-watching the movie based on his best-selling book, “All The President’s Men,” Woodward noticed that almost all the scenes took place at night. When looking deeper into the matter, Woodward realized that 20 minutes in an office versus 4 hours in a house during the evening is the difference between a cold reply and a great interview. Though Woodward claimed his wife might not enjoy his epiphany, he hoped it could help future journalists.

 (Event Coverage, J200)

With Halloween’s mysterious aura surrounding Indiana University, urban legends and ghost stories charge people’s imaginations. Though some tell of “a friend of a friend” and others take place at “a campus out west,” others find their home a little more locally.

On the busy streets of 7th and Woodlawn, the Latino Cultural Center also known as La Casa inconspicuously sits between other small homes turned into offices. Inside, the center displays various Latin trinkets hung on the white and beige walls with pamphlets advertising organizations and events scattered all around the desks and shelves. Though not the description of a traditional haunted house, La Casa’s stories are just as ghostly.

Lillian Casillas, director of La Casa, first suspected something was afoot when a male student told her of something he had experienced the night before. The student assumed he was alone in the La Casa, but had heard a typewriter being used in a room upstairs. When he inspected the room, he saw that it was empty. “The typewriter was unplugged, so it couldn’t have been a short,” Casillas said.

Casillas also said lights would randomly turn on throughout the house, something she originally accredited to the home’s aging wiring. She contacted an electrician who found no problems.

Casillas’s curiosity was finally piqued when a student came to her with yet another closing story. As the student locked up La Casa, he looked in an upstairs window and noticed he had forgotten to turn off a light in an upstairs room. Along with the glow of light he also saw a woman’s figure through the window.

The student refused to close up alone anymore.

Afraid that the woman in the window may have been an intruder, Casillas investigated the issue and began hearing stories from students and around campus about a woman who was said to haunt the home when it acted as the center for the Student Association before being turned into La Casa in 1976. Casillas said alumni from the 60’s even often visit the building, asking “Is she still here?” which is a relief to her. “I don’t want people to think just the Latinos are crazy,” she said.

After being informed of the houses supernatural history, the incidents continued to pile up.

A student told Casillas that as he had been closing he turned off the downstairs lights first and headed upstairs. As he finished turning all the lights off upstairs, the student headed back down to see that all the downstairs lights had been turned back on. Annoyed, he turned them back off and closed up.

Casillas once again contacted the electrician who once again found no problems. “I drove electricians crazy,” she said.

Faulty wiring couldn’t be used to explain everything that was happening in La Casa when a student was having some trouble and staying the night there. Casillas stayed upstairs while the student slept in the living room downstairs. The next morning when Casillas spoke to the student, he asked if she had been checking up on him the night before. When Casillas questioned why he asked, he said he had seen her in the doorway. She had never gone downstairs.

Most students that have come in contact the woman in La Casa know nothing of her story. Casillas says she doesn’t like to tell people of the haunting to keep their imaginations from getting the best of them. “I don’t want to belittle the thing,” she said. Usually it is after students experience something at the house that Casillas informs them of the woman. According to Casillas, she tells them the story to “validate experiences” and let them know that they are safe. “The woman has never done anything bad, she just likes picking on people, especially men,” she said.

Casillas says that the spirit in the home has become more of a family member than a horror. “She connects with us,” she said. So much, that last year during La Casa’s Day of the Dead celebration, a student created an altar in her honor. According to Casillas, as long as La Casa is around, the woman will always have a place to stay. “She is a part of our home, part of La Casa,” she said.

(Halloween Assignment, J200)

In a lecture hall with over 200 students, Le Anh Long brings up the topic of the Iraq War to her Y100 class. Immediately, students raise their hand to express their thoughts. A debate breaks out among the students as Long tries to moderate.

“Heated debates seem to just come with the territory in Political Science classes, especially on topics like the war,” said Drew Litherland, a sophomore majoring in Political Science. With the presidential primaries nearing, along with the Iraq War progressing towards its fifth year, students at Indiana University are becoming more politically aware.

Karen Rasler, a Professor of Political Science and author of three books on international conflict, has seen this increase in awareness in many of her classes. Rasler noted that before the Iraq War, students came into the class with neutral opinions and formed their stances as they learned more in class. Today, Rasler said, students often come into class with fully developed stances and opinions on many issues.

Long, a recent graduate student and now a professor at Indiana University, has seen the same increase in engagement among students. As Long was finishing her graduate degree, the Clinton/Lewinski scandal had just occurred. Students often discussed the issue in class, but Long felt that there was no real activity among the student body. As a teacher during the Iraq War, Long has seen quite the opposite. Long said that students are now becoming active in local and national politics in an attempt to change the situation with the war. She credited this to the fact that students are in the demographic most greatly affected by the Iraq War. “People are dying,” Long said, “and those people are the student’s peers.”

Rasler also commented on the change of opinion among students in the past years. In the first year of the war, most classes had a supportive view on the administration’s actions towards the war. As the war entered its second year, however, “There was more willingness to talk about the administration in a negative sense,” Rasler said.

“The conduct of the war has been handled poorly,” Rasler said. According to Rasler, students share this point of view.

Long has seen a similar decline. After the September 11th attacks, Long said students and most Americans “rallied among the flag” and supported the U.S.’s decision to go to war. Long continued to say that as time passed and Saddam Hussein’s control was isolated, Americans saw there was still much to do. It was at this time, Long said, that students began to feel “married to the war,” and their opinions changed. Long also stated that the “d-word” hasn’t helped either. “Draft is a scary word among students,” Long said.

One positive change Long noted has been the increase in Muslim engagement on campus. The Muslim Student Union, Long said, has begun reaching out to help the community and educate others of their culture to lobby against the sudden increase in the religion’s negative public exposure. Long said that, “people suddenly cared, but not in a good way.” The Muslim Student Union recently held a “Fast-a-Thon” to encourage solidarity among Muslims and non-Muslims while raising money for the Bloomington Community Kitchen.

Russ Gault, a sophomore majoring in Business, is focusing on listening to the presidential debates and deciding which issues are most important to him, including the Iraq War. “I wanted to see President Bush make his move out of Iraq in his second term, but he’s let me down. Hopefully the next president can do what he couldn’t. I don’t know a timeframe, but I definitely want to see an exit strategy from the political candidate I vote for” Gault said.

(Major Assignment 1, J200) 

On a Thursday at 11 p.m., Robert S. Schmidt begins his south route for the Bloomington Shuttle Service. Tonight, his route will not be taking passengers to and from the airport.

“It’s pretty dead for the first two hours,” he says, as he takes his second loop through his route on the Midnight Special only stopping at the designated sign on Third and Jordan, waiting for a passenger to appear magically from the empty street.

As Schmidt enters his fourth trip on Third Street, students down the road begin waving their hands frantically. “Yes!” one student says as the door opens. The first riders of the night enter the bus, and the smell of alcohol comes rushing in with them. “Where ya goin?” Schmidt asks. After getting his destination, the doors close and Schmitt is back on his route. As the bus nears Kilroy’s Bar on Kirkwood, the students head to the front of the bus. “You guys are awesome,” says a student as he puts money in the cheese puff container now turned into a tip jar. Schmidt cracks a smile and wishes the riders a good night as they exit.

Schmidt is part of a joint effort between Indiana University and Bloomington Shuttle Service to battle drunk driving on the IU campus. Four shuttles, each known as The Midnight Special, run every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday from 11 p.m. until 4 a.m., picking up students for free.

From 11 p.m. until 1 a.m., the buses run on separate, fixed routes spanning the entire campus. After 1 a.m., the buses stop following a specific route and instead take students anywhere they want to go within city limits.

“Oh my god, we hit everywhere. Anywhere and everywhere,” says Schmidt.

It is 12:45 a.m. and he has gone through his loop five times. As he enters the circle drive of the IU Auditorium, Schmidt parks the bus and takes his only break of the evening. He heads inside for a bathroom break and then has two cigarettes. Sitting in the bus with the lights off, he waits until 1 a.m. to pop a Commit lozenge in his mouth and start the bus back up.

At the Third and Jordan stop, riders wave their hands as the shuttle comes close. A group of students jump on the bus, and the same smell of alcohol from before saturates the air. “You learn to keep the window down. No matter how cold it gets, that window stays down,” Schmidt says as he heads downtown.

On a sharp turn, one of the students falls out of his seat. “I think this seat is broken,” he says as he sluggishly gets up and chooses another. The seat hangs on one hinge like a teeter-totter as Schmidt looks back. “The war is just beginning for the night,” he says. Dropping off the students at Kirkwood, the bus is once again empty. As the bus begins to take off, two female students come running out of Jimmy John’s, arms flailing. The door opens and the students get on. Before the door can shut, a hand blocks the door and a large group of students get on.

Destinations include: The Bluebird, Rockets, Kilroy’s Sports Bar, McNutt dormitory, and a house on Second and Washington.

The bus travels down Dunn St. and passes the front of Kilroy’s Sports Bar. A worried rider screams “SPORTS! SPORTS!” and Schmidt continues down the road. “I know, I know, I got a different route,” he says as he drives down a back road and takes a sharp right turn towards the side entrance of the bar. As the bus swings into the alleyway, the riders all scream and throw their hands up as they bounce into each other like thrill seekers on a roller coaster. The bus clears out at Kilroy’s Sports Bar and Schmidt continues to the next destination.

In an intersection, Schmidt a car blocks Schmidt’s path and he is forced to stop in the middle of the turn. “Here we go again,” he says as the car backs up after realizing it is in the way. With room to turn, the bus takes off again.

“People see the front of this bus and think it’s like any other truck. It’s not. We’re just like the big buses and we need room to turn. Just about every intersection, I have to stop and wait for cars to get out of the way,” Schmidt says.

According to Schmidt, that’s not the only annoyance of driving the Midnight Special. Every night, Schmidt expects at least one fight and one person throwing up. “If you don’t get any more than that, you’ve had a good night,” says Schmidt. Fighters get thrown off the bus immediately and as for people throwing up, “Let us know in advance,” he says. “It may be the drunk bus, but we don’t like to clean that up.”

The bus stops to pick up students in front of Forest dormitory, this time going to a fraternity on North Jordan. As the female students get on the bus, one unlucky soul chooses the broken seat. Immediately, the seat teters and the girl’s mouth drops. “I didn’t do it,” she says. “She’s a heavy girl, but we love her anyway,” her friend jokes. Another offers to let Schmidt borrow her super glue to fix the chair. The smell of perfume mixes with the familiar smell of alcohol and the girls giggle as one of them makes pig-snorting noises. The bus reaches their destination, and empties.

“When you pick up freshmen at the dorms, you never know where they’re goin,” says Schmidt. “Some say the frats, others ask to go to Kirkwood. Now what could they be doing at Kirkwood?” He makes a motion with his hands imitating holding a fake ID and smiles. “But I’m not the police, it’s not my business.”

The night progresses in much the same manner. Riders continue to fall in the broken seat after being warned. “You should fix that seat, its bad news,” one student offers. Complaints are almost guaranteed as Schmidt passes Kilroy’s Sports Bar to take the back way. The phrase “thank you” almost loses it’s meaning as it is repeated time after time.

“It’s like fun to me,” Schmidt says. Though the route ends at 4 a.m., Schmidt will not be going home for another two hours. After the last riders are dropped off, he will have to clean the bus entirely and refuel it for the airport shuttle service in the morning. “You’re pretty dead,” Schmidt says, “but some of us actually enjoy it.”

With the late hours of the route, Schmidt says having a family is tough. “No way in hell I could make it with a family. Most drivers have families, but I couldn’t do it,” he says. A recent diesel technology graduate from Vincennes University, Schmidt has been driving the Midnight Special for almost two years.

“This is what we do to try to help you guys out,” Schmidt says. “I have a certain pride in my work. Keeping you safe, keeping you from getting locked up. That’s a sense of pride people don’t realize.”

(Major Assignment 2, J200)