Too little time / too many flames in Los Angeles

by Alex Steed

Published November 15, 2008 @ 10:57PM PST

It appears that Los Angeles is totally ablaze, and I just missed being barricaded in the city by a wall of flames/smoke. A few pre-catastrophe highlights from my time in birthplace of Guns and Roses / setting of Terminator 2:

• I met with Christian Lander of Stuff White People Like over a few beers in order to talk about an unconventional year on race (and what its like to get asked to give a commencement speech on the basis of being a very popular blogger).
• I talked with a beautiful, young, fashion-oriented woman at a hipster-posh bar who explained to me her political/modern-consciousness awakening that was dawned entirely by the candidacy of Barack Obama. What was her diet for eye-opening? A whole lot of NPR, she explained.
• I was especially sad to miss out on meeting with anyone from Participant Media, but I had to take a very-unfortunate rain check due to a case of the mixed-up insides.
• I was fortunate, though, to be able to meet up with ever-incredible Morley Winograd, co-author of Millennial Makeover, and biggest academic inspiration to me regarding the subject of political movements and modern young people. We discussed a time when publishers didn't believe there was a millennial phenomenon, so-to-speak, the role of the academic in the world of generational advocacy, and what's he plans on scribing next.

And now a few questions for you, my friend:

• Who should I have been in contact with in Los Angeles? Who should I reach out to upon my return?
• What cool stuff is happening re: digital activism and natural disasters?

To quote Steve Malkmus: "I'm on the radio - Radiooooo."

by Alex Steed

Published November 11, 2008 @ 07:44AM PST

Check out the Mp3 of my hour on the Deborah Lindsay show here.

I was just on Tomorrow Matters with Deborah Lindsay.

by Alex Steed

Published November 10, 2008 @ 04:15PM PST

Tomorrow Matters can be found online here, and I talked about the Millennials Changing America Tour for a whole hour (which really felt like it went by in a "jiffy," as super-old people say). We discussed Ryan Is Hungry and "back to the land 2.0," Focus the Nation, Abdel Kareem Soliman, and response to citizen journalists at the Republican Convention. I had a great time giving the interview, and as soon as the MP3 is available, I'll post it accordingly.

Curious about the content, my friends?

by Alex Steed

Published November 09, 2008 @ 08:57PM PST

The grand vision for this project on the whole was based around the idea that I would meet rad folks and tell their story immediately afterward by way of posting video, series of photos, and/or a narrative blog entry about our conversation/their significance/my thoughts, criticisms and concerns. Over the course of trip its become apparent that there is exponentially more input than there is any time for output and it is exceedingly difficult to accomplish the mechanics of creating output while driving / trying to find a place to crash for the night / picking seeking treatment for the staph infection that could only have come from a Motel 6 comforter. For that reason, I have basically faced the fact that the best I will be able to do is to take pages of notes, post here and there to let you know interesting stuff I'm picking up along the way (like glass splinters embedded my scalp from when I walked through a plate glass door, which you can see the evidence of in this picture, and which I'll go into greater detail in one of the next couple of posts), and then really dive into the content, observation, big questions, big picture, explosion when I am able to sit at a desk in early December. I beg you to stay tuned in the meantime. Ask questions. Make suggestions. Make fun. Tell your friends. Be a rabble rouser. Keep it klassy.

Saying 'goodbye' to Callum.

by Alex Steed

Published November 09, 2008 @ 08:43PM PST

Callum Ingram, my faithful co-pilot up until this point, is home at last in San Francisco, California. Callum, who moved out here from Cambridge, Massachusetts a couple of months back, flew back out to the Boston areato give me a hand with all of the on-the-road logistics and he's been a really phenomenal partner through and through. When I'd stress and cuss and freak out and feel like the end of it all was right around the corner, Callum was always a trooper and excellent when it came to diffusing situations. He has been extremely intellectually curious, a great B.S. buster, and an all-around pleasure to have on board. He'll be missed and whenever I sing outloud and off-key to Chuck Prophet, the Modern Lovers or Bruce Springsteen, I'll be thinking of him.

Calling all Millennials - What does Change look like?

by Alex Steed

Published November 07, 2008 @ 08:20PM PST

From Change.org: 

"I kept waiting for him to get shot."

by Alex Steed

Published November 07, 2008 @ 05:54PM PST

"During his acceptance speech, all that time he was talking up on stage, I kept waiting for him to get shot."

-Young, happy-hour-drinking hipster in San Francisco, referring to fears that President-Elect Obama will get shot because of his race.

Much like the importance of acknowledging our role as a generation that has largely felt uncomfortable finding any fort of national pride to this point, it is also important to point out that we're one that holds onto a substantial amount of skepticism with regard to our own successes. We're not quite sure what to do with them, as we haven't come by many in a political sense, and we've been raised by a generation of people who, every time a representative of social progress found some level of prominance, were disappointed to see that leader martyred.