Author: Spencer Davidson

Sports Director at WKTV NEWSChannel 2 in Utica, N.Y.

Long Islanders take ‘strides’ to ‘stripe’ out cancer

Members of the Carcinoid Cancer Awareness Network (CCAN) took to the pavement over the weekend in the 3rd Annual “Strides for Stripes” 5-kilometer Zebra Walk.

Supporters flocked to Eisenhower Park in East Meadow, Saturday, in order to raise funds and awareness for this cancer, all while getting some exercise with friends and family.

Participants, many of whom had a close connection with carcinoid cancer, trekked around the walk paths of the scenic park, paying a $20 registration fee, in an attempt to gain support for the research of cures for this threatening illness.

According to the CCAN’s website, carcinoid cancer is part of a group of tumors that grow in the hormone producing cells of the human body.

Although considered a rare disease, over 11,000 new patients are diagnosed every year, and there are currently 125,000 known cases of it in the U.S. today.

Since it has been considered “rare,” compared to other forms of cancer, it has had low priority in terms of medical research thus far.

For one weekend morning in November, Long Island residents attempted to promote awareness to end that trend.

And we all know, a little can go a long way.

Zebra Walk: Strides for Stripes
Click on image to access slideshow gallery of event.

 

Long Island gas prices on decline; drop could continue

Could it be…fuel for your wallet?

In this economy, everybody is looking for ways to save money, and a cheaper gas fill-up means a happy wallet for consumers nationwide.

Based off the recent trends, lower gas prices are exactly what Long Island residents may be able to expect in the near future.

According to John Callegari of Long Island Business News, gas prices fell 4.4 cents per gallon on average last week, as the downward trend continued here on the Island.

With the average retail price for gasoline on Long Island at $3.68 per gallon this past week, prices have already dropped 26.8 cents from the average last month.

However, even with the recent drop, Long Island gas prices still sit high above the national average, at $3.42 per gallon, according to GasBuddy.com.

The trends indicate that Long Island gas prices normally do sit higher than the national (and even statewide) average, which can be equated to its close proximity to a major metropolitan area.

Yet even with its higher than average prices, Long Island residents can be hopeful heading into the next few weeks.

According to CBS New York, oil analyst Peter Beutel says gasoline prices should continue to drop on the Island as we head toward the end of the month.

Wouldn’t that be nice?

Average Gas Prices Trend Past 3 Months

The roller coaster trend indicates gas prices may continue to decrease in near future. DATA COURTESY OF GASBUDDY.COM

U.S. born cleric killed in Yemen
Words relating to the C.I.A. killing of a U.S. born cleric in Yemen

Words relating to the C.I.A. killing of a U.S. born cleric in Yemen

One of the top stories circulating around the web, today, was about a CIA drone killing of a U.S. born radical Islamist in Yemen.

When I put the story headlines in the Wordle, right away I could see that it was telling me that a cleric was involved in some sort of killing in Yemen.

I was able to formulate this assumptions because the most prominent words in this Wordle were “Yemen,” “Cleric,” and “Killed.”

I was not surprised to see that these were the most prominent words as they all seemed to be in every headline I entered into the page.

However, I was surprised to see that the phrase “U.S. born” and the term “al-Qaeda” did not seem to have as much prominence, as I felt them both to be in many of the headlines that I chose.

Before entering the headlines into the Wordle, I would have expected those two terms to be among the biggest words in the cloud, however, this was not the case.

Yet while many of the headlines had similar words or phrases in them, I felt as though they all did a very good job at shaping their own way of headlining the story, by ordering the words differently, and including different terms such as “CIA,” “drone,” or “Muslim” here and there.

Every headline was slightly different in its own way.

The timeless ‘jobs’ of Apple’s departed chair

Steve Jobs over the years

This past week, a major corporation and the technology world as we know it lost an icon.

Steve Jobs, Co-founder and former CEO of Apple, Inc., who has introduced many of the gadgets that have become a mainstay in society today, passed away at age 56 after succumbing to pancreatic cancer.

In a tribute to the passing of the Apple Chairman, The Economist published an article yesterday entitled, “Steve Jobs: A Genius Departs.”

Within the article, the magazine included a time-line of Jobs’ many accomplishments from his co-founding of Apple in 1976, to his resignation from Apple’s CEO position in August of this year.

This time-line did, in fact, enhance the article’s credibility as it added a valuable visual element to the already detailed text portion it contained.

The article spent a lot of time discussing Jobs’ many different accomplishments, and innovations he brought to the technology world during his career in the business.

It included great detail to go along with each accomplishment in order to educate the reader about just the type of man Jobs’ was, and how valuable he had been to our society’s technological revolution.

With the inclusion of the timeline in the article, it allows the reader to take a break from the long, detailed text, and lets them see all of his accomplishments listed, by date, in one simple chart.

This makes it easier for people to read the article (as it basically bullet points a good portion of it), and it allows the reader a visual representation that helps them to better understand Jobs’ progression through his life and career, and his influence over the current state of the global technology world.

Steve Jobs was an innovator, and through the use of this timeline in The Economist‘s tribute article to him, now everybody can see just how innovative he really was.

Kenny Albert: Fox Sports Broadcaster, MSG Network Talent, Twitter Fiend
The official Twitter page of Kenny Albert

The official Twitter page of Kenny Albert

Kenny Albert, is a man of many faces.

Aside from being an on-air talent for FOX Sports, and the play by play voice of the New York Rangers, he is also an avid Twitter user.

When looking at his profile, it is apparent that he keeps his usage of Twitter very professional.

He keeps most of his tweets short and sweet, and usually writes just to update people on something that has happened within the sports world, or his field of profession.

It seems as though his main goal on Twitter is to inform his followers (mostly sports fans) of the latest happenings within the sports world; and he does it quite well.

The last tweet that he sent at the time I wrote this was: “Huge win for the NYG in Philly. We’ll see them again next Sunday in Arizona,” after the New York Giants beat the Philadelphia Eagles 29-16.

In addition to this, he also wrote a few tweets prior to this game, including links to pictures at the stadium and articles from FOX sports’ website in order to enhance the network’s coverage of the game, and the fans’ viewing experience of the game as well.

He aims to keep people as up to date as possible, tweeting very often (every hour or two), with the latest news and events surrounding the teams he covers, and does what I believe is a fine job of keeping people not only informed, but also engaged.

Albert also seems to be very authentic with his tweets.

He just reports the facts, and nothing more; nothing extra. He doesn’t tweet random conversations or personal messages that have no relevance to his professional duties.

Kenny seems very personable on this medium, answering many of his followers questions regarding sports topics quite often. In this way, he also uses it to interact with the fans of the sports community and offer them personal insights from a professional perspective.

Much like with his other tweets, Albert doesn’t respond to questions to create personal interactions for no apparent purpose, but rather he uses it to enhance his professional duties by giving it to the public at a slightly more personal level, away from the booth (giving the viewer an “inside look”).

He primarily uses it for broadcasting purposes, and while he does occasionally use it for conversations, they are all conversations in a professional manner.

Because of his status as a professional broadcast talent, Albert has many followers. Currently, 4,106 Twitter users follow him, mostly from the sports community, who read his tweets for informational purposes regarding their favorite team.

However he only follows 296 people, most of them being athletes, people in the sports community, or other sports broadcasters (such as Mike Francesa of WFAN radio). It doesn’t seem as though he has many ‘personal’ follows, and it appears he aims to keep it strictly for professional use.

Keeping with his professional intentions, Kenny does not use Twitter for his own self-promotion.

He does occasionally tag his network’s Twitter account (@NFLonFOX) whenever he tweets about Football,  to represent the topic and network he is tweeting for, but he does not attempt to draw attention to himself personally through his tweets.

Albert’s Twitter profile appears to be an exemplary model of how people in the professional world, and especially the sports broadcasting world should use Twitter.

He keeps his updates short, sweet, and to the point, and writes only about what he makes money for; sports.

After taking a little longer to analyze the Twitter page of Kenny Albert, I find that his persona on the social network is very admirable, and something that I will aim to replicate when I graduate from college, and enter the professional world of sports broadcasting.