Got an email this week from Joe Carter, about a new online magazine / network:

I’m the managing editor of Culture11 (www.culture11.com), a new online magazine/social network that was started by Bill Bennett, David Kuo, Steve Forbes, et al. Today is our first day and rather than trying to get attention using traditional media, we’ve decided to announce our launch by reaching out to our friends.

Our goal for the site is to build a community around irresistibly interesting perspectives on life in America. From pop culture to politics, from faith to family, you’ll find original and entertaining stories here from some of the country’s most dynamic voices. …

With your help, we can make Culture11 something truly extraordinary - an online destination that has the editorial excellence of a great magazine, the thrill of a terrific conversation, and the comfort of a supportive community all rolled into one.

Now, usually I don’t care (as much) about the context of a conversation, particularly during with someone f2f in person, as I’d counter-positioned myself in contrast with Stephen Shields over Monday night dinner at Chuy’s. Don’t think we have a photo of that momentus event, but there were 4 tweets: 1, 2, 3, 4.



However, when it comes to websites, one of the 1st things I do look at is the “about us” section, especially when they want me to sign up for a free account and register my personal info with them. The “about us” page at culture11.com is sparse (at the time of this writing), and no explanation of what “culture11″ means, which is less of a concern for me.

So, good to find out names of some of the people behind culture11.com in the aforementioned email. Here’s a couple of links to what can be known about them (or, someone with the same names):

• Joe Carter - blogger at award-winning Evangelical Outpost


• David Kuo - J-Walking blogger @ beliefnet, author of Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction + dot.bomb: My Days and Nights at an Internet Goliath, cf. wikipedia entry


• Bill Bennett - hosts a daily radio show, Bill Bennett’s Morning in America


• Steve Forbes - editor-in-chief of Forbes magazine and ran for U.S. president twice

I broke the trackball retaining ring on my Blackberry Curve (8300) right before my flight SNA-DFW on Sunday. Serves me right for tinkering with cleaning the trackball without knowing its fragility and never reading instructions manuals or user’s guide. I got sand into that trackball on the day before. The Curve is next to impossible to use without the trackball. Also very hard to use sealed inside of a zip-lock bag. The past 2 days, I used the Curve with the trackball precociously set without a retainer, fearing it’d get lost in the crevices of my pocket. It was gonna be $54.13 for the trackball to be professionally replaced in 30 minutes or less. Thought it better to use that $ towards the iPhone.

Long story short, I got an iPhone 3g yesterday afternoon! Of course it is beautiful, and the switch took less than 5 minutes, after 15+ minutes waiting for a customer service rep at the closest AT&T store I could find near the meeting space where I was part of facilitating team for Missional Renaissance discussions.

Got a whole slew of twitter congrats as it happened real-time. There was evening, and there was day. While impressive, I’ve already got gobs of questions about iPhone functionality, along the lines of “can it do this” or “how about that” or “that’s so annoying”. Could I type faster on the iPhone via a bluetooth keyboard? I don’t think the built-in virtual keyboard is a disaster, but the auto-word replacement is annoying. Wish to turn that off, like you can turn off the auto-capitalization. Why won’t iTunes sync it with my Outlook address book? ad nauseum et al et tu brute

Unlike other fanatics of that Apple variety, I pledge before you my loyal blog readers, that will not be gloating about all the features and shortcomings of the iPhone. There will not be a blog iPhone category here. Besides, I’m more of an orange guy myself.

Now, onto the quest for an orange cover / case.

[Longer version of the "switch" may be posted here, as time avails.]

While I’m waiting at John Wayne Airport (SNA, aka Orange County Airport), it’s possible to connect up to the Internet via WiFi. No free WiFi hotspots (yet?), but there are several pay options.

Here’s the SSID list that showed up via Wireless Network Connection:

• tmobile
  
  this T-Mobile hotspot is located between Gates 7 and 8 at food court — costs starting at $6 or monthly subscription starting at $19.99, cf. subscription info; WiFi signal broadcasts from United Red Carpet Club
  


• JWA WiFi or JWA Hotspot or Nextphase Wireless
  
  hotspot throughout terminal — costs starting at $1.89 or monthly $14.89; operated by NextPhase Wireless Hotspot; tech note: security certificate expired on 8/8/2007


• GotWiFi.com
  
  hotspot throughout terminal — costs starting at $1.49 or monthly $14.89; operated by Oswi.net; tips: best signals near the windows facing the runways b/c antennas located on building rooftops next to large fuel tanks across runway + use strongest signal among SSIDs: GotWiFi.com or GotWiFi.com 2 or GotWiFi.com 3

Where are the power outlets? (outlets are often harder to find than WiFi or internet connectivity)

• opposite gates 8 and 9, behind post between Caterina’s and Sunglass Hut


• opposite flights board/ gate 5, on wall between store and exit


• opposite flights board/ gate 10, on wall between Hudson News and exit

other John Wayne Airport info:

• John Wayne Airport (official website) arrivals + departures info


• United Airlines’ Flight Status

http://ocair.com/airlines/ArrivalsDepartures.asp?Flight=

[This entry is a note to self, and for others who search for this info. I'll keep this updated.]

Tags: wifi, sna, airport, flight, internet, hotspot

This is way forward-thinking: Gnomedex is live-streaming its main sessions right now, for another day (up ’til 5:45pm Pacific Time / 8:45pm Eastern). They’ve been doing it for several years now (audio since 2006; cf. the Gnomedex philosophy)

This conference allows its non-attenders to watch it all live streamed over the web!

See the schedule to catch the segments of most interest to you.

Does live-streaming discourage people from attending and having to pay registration fees and travel costs? Nope, still sold out! Gnomedex is on my short list of conferences I really want to go to.

Know of any other conferences that are (partially or entirely) live-streamed? Interviews don’t count.

Question>> I’m about to launch an intentionally diverse church, and sometimes I get asked whether we should be intentionally diverse or just start and see whom God brings. Well, I have an answer as to why we want to seek being diverse and exemplify diversity on our leadership team. However, there are many churches that start off as Asian-American churches and seek to be diverse, yet only attract Asian-Americans. So, I was curious if you had any insight you’d like to share on this question to help me with a different perspective?

djchuang’s reply ::

As for becoming a multi-ethnic church, there are a couple of books that most clearly lays out the ingredients for such a church: David Anderson’s book Multicultural Ministry and Mark DeYmaz’ Building a Healthy Multi-Ethnic Church. And my web page at djchuang.com/multi has a lot of resources and articles and books that inform my thoughts about developing an intentionally diverse church.

So, in short, my answer is “yes” — it does take intentionality to become ethnically and racially diverse. It doesn’t happen by accident. If it just “naturally” happens (i.e. without intentionality), we’d see a lot more diversified church, wouldn’t we.

According to one study, more than 92% of all churches in the U.S. are segregated, with more than 80% of their membership representing a single race or ethnic group. I think that 92% is including Catholic and Protestant churches; less than 5% of evangelical churches are diverse, less than 2.5% of mainline Protestants. And, it’d be too overly simplistic to say that prayer and Bible study will diversify a church — most evangelical churches do that, and most are not diversified.

Now, what that intentionality looks like may be different from church to church, and depends on the cultural context of where the church is located.

Those are my top-of-mind thoughts. What would you add?

Stopped by the City Walk soft urban side of our Vantis housing community here in Aliso Viejo this afternoon.

City Perk, our local coffee shop / cafe, is doing an unofficial soft opening for a week or so, looking for feedback on the foods they’d carry. I take it that means they won’t carry everything on display right now, but who knows.

So I walked in, greeted the managers, and walked out with a box of yummy cookies. They’ve got mini cheesecakes, croissants, cookies, muffins, and of course, coffee and espresso drinks. The concept is that mini pastries would accompany the coffee. Looking good - it’ll be great to have a cafe so close to home and with good eats. City Perk is located at 21 Vantis, and the hours will probably be 6:00am to 9:00pm (call them at 949-600-5169 to make sure.)

Andy Crouch has a new book, Culture Making: Rediscovering our Creative Calling, that’s making its deserved rounds. You can even read the introduction and the 1st 5 chapters for free(!)

The bigger news for us webheads is that Andy Crouch has not only a newly redesigned website, Andy is now blogging on a daily basis! The web address is www.culture-making.com - beautiful, isn’t it? [cf. RSS feed to Andy's blog]

I’m very grateful to have a copy of Culture Making in my non-Nicotine-stained hands, and started browsing it this afternoon. The book presents a clear and compelling framework for what it means to live out the Gospel’s implications through the stuff of life that’s collectively known as “culture.” To use a trite term, it’s a seminal book that points to the notion of being missional, much more comprehensively. I think the book helps us, as Christians and as the church, to aspire to something more than mere community service or having an inspired motivation, but to develop our gifts and talents to serve society at every level / eschelon / sector and in every way possible.

Good Will Hinton recently interviewed Andy Crouch — listen there [or, link to mp3 audio].

And, culture-making.com has a very timely set of 5 questions about the Olympics with an open comment thread — love it!

Unbelievable. My 7:00am JetBlue flight got cancelled. I had gotten up at 4:00am to catch an airport shuttle to LGB and didn’t find out about cancellation until I was en route. I scrambled (ie. Getting online on my lap via blackberry curve tethering, and finding a flight same day out of LAX, b/c customer service didn’t open until 500am) to find another flight on my own so I could get to Seattle today.

Due to Crew Legalities, your flight #294 on 11-Aug-08 for travel from Long Beach, CA (LGB) has been cancelled. We apologize for the disruption in your travel plans.

You may rebook your itinerary without a fee by visiting this Change/Cancel section of our website. (You may also call 800-JETBLUE.) If you do not want to rebook, you may instead receive a full refund* or travel credit on JetBlue which is good for one year.

http://www.djchuang.com/wp25/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/jetblue /
home_1218469797595.png" alt="" title="jetblue-flight-status" width="500" height="298" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-1716" />

Turns out I’m not the only blogger with a cancelled flight. Cf. CNET News’ If JetBlue’s reading this, guys, it’s time to grok the blogosphere:

“The filthy, lying, money-grubbing whores we call…the airline industry.”

(Credit: CNET News)

Now that’s a headline.

Bill Baker, a technology publicist from Connecticut, was not about to mince words after JetBlue left him stranded by canceling his return flight from Portland, Ore.

“I wrote that when I was especially angry,” said Baker, still seething one week later when we spoke. “I’m still pretty postal about it.”

Here’s the Reader’s Digest version of what happened.

On July 23, Baker’s red-eye to New York was twice delayed from its original midnight departure time. Then around 5 in the morning, JetBlue told waiting passengers that it had to cancel the flight because there was no crew to fly the plane. That announcement set off the invariable scramble at the service desk, where JetBlue offered either to refund the $229 return leg of Baker’s trip–along with a $100 voucher–or put him on the next available flight to New York three days later. To add insult to injury, Baker would have to go out on a midnight flight.

But the story gets worse. While JetBlue said it was not responsible for finding sleeping accommodations, all the hotels Baker called were booked solid. JetBlue also informed Baker it was not going to book him on a different plane because it does not have inter-line agreements with other airlines.

The ending to this novella was pre-ordained: The only way out of town was going to be on Baker’s tab–and so he paid $977 to fly back via Detroit on Northwest and Delta.

I was less intrigued by JetBlue’s tin ear than by what happened next. We’re long past the era when companies could cavalierly screw over their customers without risking public humiliation, and Baker knew what to do next. See, there’s this thing called the Internet…

After getting nowhere fast with the customer complaint department on his demand for a full refund–”I got a reply back saying basically, “You’re out of luck”–Baker put the entire blow-by-blow on his blog.

Turns out that JetBlue was also interested in what he had to say. Three days after going public, Baker heard back from JetBlue, which had been tracking his blog posts.

JetBlue offered him another $60 plus flight certificates worth $229. But no salted peanuts.

… By the way, Baker told me, he was “a huge JetBlue fanboy” before all this happened.

Obviously, no longer.

So, what do I expect from JetBlue — a full refund without service fee plus an inconvenience charge for my scrambling to find another flight at another airport (LAX instead of LGB). I think $75 would be reasonable. I do not want to hold for 10+ minutes on my cell phone for customer service to get this resolved. My new flight via Alaska Airlines is now boarding.

In other news, about JetBlue, cf. USA Today:

JetBlue announced Monday that it will begin charging $7 for a blanket and pillow on its flights… the airline’s in-flight “TV remains free.” Customers can keep the blanket and pillow.

… JetBlue says customers can bring their own pillows and blankets if they don’t want to pay the $7. Paul Hudson, executive director of the Aviation Consumer Action Project in Washington, D.C., tells Newsday he thinks many may do just that. “The public will decide (whether the fee will work), … but in general I can tell you this nickel and dime stuff doesn’t work,” Hudson says to Newsday.

Justin Taylor posted this gracious plea titled “Should You Pass on Bad Reports?” by Tim Keller & David Powlison.

Permission is granted to mirror the article, and I’ve chosen to extract several excerpts:

… One obvious genius of the internet is that it’s “viral.” Information explodes to the whole world. … Instantaneous transmission produces some wonderfully good things. Truth, like joy, is infectious. A great idea feeds into a million inboxes. But it also produces some disastrous evils. Lies, rumors, and disinformation travel just as far and just as fast.

So what should you do when you hear “bad reports” about a person or church or ministry? We want to offer a few thoughts on how to remain constructive. To paraphrase Ephesians 4:29, “Let no unwholesome words come out of your computer, but only what is constructive, in order to meet the need of the moment, that what you communicate will give grace to everyone who ever reads it.” [nb: other key verses = James 4:10-11, Proverbs 17:9.

… Passing on negative stuff always undermines love and respect. It’s never nourishing, never constructive, never timely, never grace-giving.

… To savor the tasty morsels of gossip and bad reports is very different from grieving, caring, and wishing nothing less than the mercies of Christ upon all involved.

… you only really need to know something if it touches your sphere of life and relationships.

… If you hear bad reports about other Christians you must either cover it with love or go to them personally before speaking of it to any others.

… to simply suspend judgment. Don’t pass on bad reports.

Read the full article.

We desparately need more civil conversations in the public square of the blogosphere, especially among professing Christians. I think this article masterfully deals with not passing on bad reports via blogging, and to deal with personal sins personally. What may show up in a follow-up article or in the collective wisdom of the crowds, is how to discuss issues online when individuals have obvious disagreements.

What have you noticed about watch blogs? I find it unfortunately ugly when certain individuals equate a difference of opinion / conviction as if it were a public moral sin. It’s not.

ShareYourStoryNow.org is hosting this Flips Ahoy contest for a free FlipCam! Enter the contest this month by sharing your story of how the Bible has changed your life — using your phone, webcam, or email.

The rules of the Flips Ahoy contest are really simple… either videotape, write or call in your story on our site and you are secured your entry into the contest. At the end of the month (from August 4th - September 1st) we will pick a winner at random.

The winner will receive a Flip Video Camcorder AND… the American Bible Society will donate $1,000 in your name to the Light of the Amazon project happening in Brazil! Without having to leave the comforts of your own home, you will have impacted the lives of thousands!

[disclosure: I participated on the launch team of ShareYourStoryNow.org back in 2006]