Connecticut
Post posts about what is happening in the State of Connecticut.
Sonic Comes to Connecticut
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Thu, 07/01/2010 - 15:55
I remember the first time I went to a Sonic. It was back in 2005 and I was attending DemocracyFest in Austin, TX. Kim and I were driving around trying to find some quick food and we saw a Sonic. Kim had read about Sonic on various food boards and had been told that the limeade was supposed to be really good. So, we stopped, had burgers and limeade and went on our way. Yes, the limeade was good and my recollection of the burgers was that they were pretty good as well. However, I didn’t leave Texas with any great craving for Sonic.
Recently, however, Sonic has announced that they are opening up stores here in Connecticut. The first one to open will be in Wallingford. It is scheduled to open on July 14th. Today, they sent out an email to people that have signed up for their mailing list, as well as posted information on Facebook and Twitter that they would be giving away T-shirts and other stuff at Villa Capri, just down the road from where the Sonic is going on.
After all the other stuff going on in my life recently, I figured I could stand a drive to something a little more low key. When I arrived at Villa Capri, I saw that there were signs for a blood drive. I walked around front and saw a couple tables with the Sonic of CT logo displayed. There were probably about thirty people that arrived for when the giveaway started. People picked up T-shirts, cups, Frisbees, balls and other assorted things. I ran into an old friend from social media circles and we talked a little bit about Sonic, their social media efforts.
I chatted with others that had shown up. One family was from Monroe. They were heading somewhere else, and Wallingford was on the way, so they stopped. Others spoke about having grown up in the south and about being excited that Sonic would soon be opening in Connecticut. So, now I have a Sonic T-Shirt and I’ll share the various Sonic toys with my kids.
There were around thirty people that showed up right at 11:30, with a pretty constant stream coming in for the next half hour. They limited people to a T-Shirt each, but several people talked the folks into giving them a second T-Shirt. When I left a little after noon, there were still some T-shirts left, but soon a message went up on Facebook that they had run out of shirts. Various people expressed disappointment that the limited supply of T-shirts went so quickly. It isn’t too surprising however. Sonic of CT is rapidly approaching 20,000 fans. I have to wonder what opening day will be like.
Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit - #swct, #frff
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Thu, 07/01/2010 - 08:49Each month, provides an opportunity to reflect on the past month as well as hope and plan for the next. June has been a long hard month. Various conferences and family circumstances have taken a lot of time and energy, unfortunately, the billable hours have been lacking. This coming month brings us Social Web Week Connecticut 2010. This will be a weeklong collection of events in New Haven, July 10-16. The goal of Social Web Week is “to bring people together in CT to explore how best to use the social web to improve our quality of life.”
Later in July will be the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival. This is a festival that I’ve been going to since the early nineties. We camp out at a farm, and spend days sitting in the sun, and occasional thunderstorm or worse, listening to music.
I am pretty excited about both events, and so I start off the month, like I try to start each month with the old childhood invocation of good luck, “Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit”.
Wordless Wednesday
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Wed, 06/30/2010 - 07:54
The Connecticut Gubernatorial Whine Index
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Tue, 06/29/2010 - 06:21This August, Connecticut voters will go to the polls to select the Democratic and Republican nominees for Governor. Already the press releases are flying. Some are valuable, illustrating the strengths and ideas of various candidates. Some are simply annoying whining. To help make sense of this and to encourage candidates to show their strengths and help build a stronger Connecticut, I am instituting the Connecticut Gubernatorial Whine Index.
Last year, I established the CTNewsWire. It is a Google Group that politicians, candidates, advocacy organizations and government agencies can send press releases to in an effort to reach bloggers, citizen journalists, and other interested parties. So far, the press releases are predominantly from Democrats, with both of the Democratic Gubernatorial candidates sending their press releases.
To calculate the index, I read the press release and assign a whininess score. When a candidate lays out a position on an important issue, they get five points. When they make a comment that positively reflects their character by highlighting an endorsement, expressing concern about a recent development in the state, and so on, they get three points. Updates about coming events also score a point.
On the other hand, they lose points for whining about their opponent. If the whine has merit, they may only lose a single point. Typical whines lose three points, and when the candidates start behaving like spoiled kids in the back seat, they lose five points.
I went back to June 20th as the current start of the index. Over time, I intend to add any new press releases and perhaps dig back through older press releases.
For the current scores, I’ve looked at seven press releases from the Lamont campaign. Two are whiny, and the current Whine Index for the Lamont campaign is 3. The Malloy campaign has issued fifteen press releases covered by the Whine Index. Four of them are whiny. For a total score, the Malloy campaign currently stands at 9 on the Whine Index.
The Malloy campaign has issued about twice as many press releases as the Lamont campaign and about the same percentage of them are whiny. Let us hope that both campaigns focus a little bit more on the strengths of their candidates and how they can make Connecticut a better place, instead of wasting time whining about their opponents.
Wordless Wednesday
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Wed, 06/23/2010 - 05:18
