Thanks to Joe Mailander of Street-Hassle.Blogspot.com for catching this action shot of Zuma Dogg, gathering information from community wisdom keepers at the Home Depot "community mediation" in Sunland-Tujunga on Saturday. (Let's just say the community was "AGAINST" it!)Michael Higby (Mayor Sam) was there, blogging LIVE.
Joe is able to write and take notes as he talks to people, without looking down at his notepad! And Mayor Sam is able to listen to people as he types into his BlackBerry. And Zuma Dogg is able to gravitate into the KNBC 4 camera shot, like a magnetic force, every time.
And everyone was excited to hear that Ron Kaye was in the house. Fresh off the heels of a recent outpouring of "community love" (after the announcement of his departure from Daily News), Ron told me about his new blog, RonKayeLA.com that he launched this past week.
Ron was very encouraging and supportive of the blogging efforts of the community. He is perfectly comfortable saying that blogger have broken stories in this town. And although bloggers may leave holes in the story...they bring the news to the forefront. (I've always said bloggers are here to send the smoke signals for mainstream media to pick up. And that's the way it works a lot of the time. And sometimes, the news and newspapers WON'T cover it (for political reasons) -- and those become the blog exclusives that have eroded away at newspapers and elevated blogs.)
Ron, who has links to other blogs on his site, told me that people gave Kaye the, "How COULD you!?!?!" routine over providing a "Zuma Dogg" link on his blog. But Ron noticed the change in ZD's style (based on community input trying to tone me down so the message won't get lost.) Ron says, "pushing it to the edge without falling over is the challenge" and he feels I am doing a lot better these days. (And when someone like Ron notices and comments...it just keeps me continuing down that path!)
I EVEN GAVE RON AN OUT: I emailed him to say, "I call my blog, 'LA Daily Blog' to take focus away from the name "Zuma Dogg"...in case some folks don't want to link to something called, "Zuma Dogg".
RON WOULDN'T HAVE ANY OF THAT! No apologizing over "ZD"...and the moniker remains!
Meanwhile, I think Ron will do a lot for L.A. blogging; and based on all his contacts in the business world and local community, maybe he can make the blog pie a bigger overall pie. And I think we will be hearing a lot of things from Ron that he hasn't been able to say...
UNTIL NOW!
RonKayeLA.com
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