• Dec 6, 2013 TT comment

Disturbing stories about the Toledo Blade stalking a private citizen

Counts as of Dec 6, 2013, regarding ToledoBlade.com stories about EconCat88:

• 7 Blade stories
• produced by at least 6 Blade employees
• over 6,000 words spilled

The daily, Toledo newspaper has been hunting videographer artist EconCat88, since at least mid-November 2013.

http://www.youtube.com/user/EconCat88

It's an easy bet that not one Toledo public official nor any of the Toledo orgs mentioned in the Blade stories will speak out against the Blade's bizarre and negative "journalistic" tactics.

The first Blade stalking story was published on November 24, 2013.

But Blade crime reporter, Taylor Dungjen, posted this tweet on November 12, 2013:

https://twitter.com/taylordungjen/status/400338283596480512

Dear Internets,
Do you know who the man behind econcat88 is? http://www.youtube.com/user/EconCat88
xoxo TD

Here are some ominous and imbecilic excerpts from the Blade stories listed at the bottom of this post:

Who is EconCat88?
The Blade would like you to help us find EconCat88 so he can be interviewed about his views of Toledo. Those with information should contact The Blade newsroom.

After publication of a story about the EconCat88 videos on YouTube, The Blade on Sunday received what appears to be a good tip as to the author’s identity, as well as a tip that he is an acquaintance of Toledo City Councilman Steven Steel. Mr. Steel said he knows of the individual through his past work as a referee for high school athletics in Toledo and promised to reach out to the man and encourage him to call The Blade.

A photo on AREIS, the Lucas County Auditor’s Web site that officially records property addresses, shows a vehicle parked in the man’s driveway that appears identical to one seen in a reflection in one of EconCat88’s videos. Another AREIS photo shows Mr. Steel’s campaign sign in his yard. The house had one sign saying “Welcome” and another saying “No Solicitors.”

So far, the man behind “EconCat88” has refused entreaties from The Blade by way of telephone, email, two visits to his home in West Toledo, and stories seeking an interview with him.

City Councilman Steven Steel, who knows EconCat88 personally and has unsuccessfully reached out to him to take public ownership of the videos ...

So this is what I would say to the YouTube videographer EconCat88: Let’s talk. Why not come in out of the cold? Why not say: Hey, I want to put my name on this stuff and be part of the adult conversation? And many people spending much time in the electronic world hide behind the wall of anonymity. If you are not even willing to state your name, why should anyone take you seriously? I would like to see EconCat88 go to the next level: Don’t be a crank hiding behind the wall of namelessness. Join the dialogue and have the courage of your convictions. Personally, I’d like to buy you a cup of coffee and hear how you got into this. And maybe we could have a public forum — perhaps at the library. EconCat, it is incumbent upon you to step up. Take off the mask and let’s have a conversation.

As for Toledo’s branding committee, maybe it should find the reclusive man behind “EconCat88” — and hire him.

EconCat88 refused again Thursday to respond to an email or a phone call. The Blade believes it knows the identity of EconCat88 based on tips received after the first of several articles ran on Nov. 24. The Blade has knocked on the door of his residence ...

Blade columnist Keith Burris exemplifies the stone-age thinking that is still way too prevalent in the newspaper industry today.

Come in out of the cold? Public forum? Adult conversation? What a pathetic joke.

The biggest and the most public forum in the world is the Internet. EconCat88 cannot reach a larger audience nor have a larger conversation by having coffee with someone and participating in forum at the library.

It seems that many in the media business resent that the Internet makes it easy for anyone to publish to the world. The newspapers are no longer the gatekeepers of information. And these knuckle-draggers dislike the anonymity that the Internet offers.

Since when does the Blade or any for-profit media org get to be in charge of conversations today? People can post comments on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, message boards, blogs, and elsewhere on the Web.

EconCat88 has been conversing for years on the Internet without permission from the newspaper industry, and that fact no doubt bothers the dinosaur media people.

Nobody is required to take anonymous, amateur publishers seriously. Ditto for named, professional media publishers. The content simply exists. Consume it, or ignore it.

But it's creepy and maybe frightening that a professional media business, The Blade, is obsessed with publicly outing a private citizen who freely publishes anonymously on the Internet.

EconCat88 is not harming anyone. The idea that his videos are harming Toledo's image is beyond moronic. The idea that positive videos about Toledo will improve Toledo's image and somehow improve the city is also moronic.

Toledo's population has declined by 100,000 people since 1970. Toledo's problems are deeper and more complex than videos and an image.

It's mentally infantile to think that the alleged conversation that the Blade and some public officials want to have with EconCat88 will produce positive results for Toledo.

So why does EconCat88 produce his art? Because he can. That's it. Apparently, he likes doing it. It's his way of editorializing. What's wrong with that? He likes producing videos. Maybe it's a hobby.

Who gets decide which hobbies are acceptable? Who gets decides which content is acceptable?

It would be a boring world if only agreeable content was published.

Maybe the real issue here is that too many people dislike the truth being published by EconCat88. Toledo contains many truths, both good and bad. Why are only some truths acceptable?

Just because some may disagree with EconCat88's editorials, that doesn't mean they shouldn't exist. Plenty of people have produced counter opinions in Blade stories, Facebook comments, ToledoTalk.com comments, etc. And that's the way it should be. That's the conversation, scattered around the Internet.

The Internet/Web is the conversation, the forum, the platform.

Blade stalking stories about artist, historian, political scientist, and journalist EconCat88:

http://www.toledoblade.com/local/2013/11/24/EconCat88-Trashing-Toledo-one-negative-video-at-a-time.html - by Nolan Rosekrans - 1566 words

http://www.toledoblade.com/local/2013/11/25/City-critic-s-videos-spark-calls-for-action-agreement.html - by Tom Troy and Mark Reiter with contributions by staff writer Tom Henry - 1346 words

http://www.toledoblade.com/Keith-Burris/2013/11/25/Toledo-must-be-defined-by-those-who-build.html - by Keith Burris - 525 words

http://www.toledoblade.com/Culture/2013/11/26/Most-scathing-videos-vanish-from-YouTube-s-public-view.html - by Tom Troy - 838 words

http://www.toledoblade.com/Keith-Burris/2013/11/26/EconCat88-come-in-out-from-the-cold.html - by Keith Burris - 515 words

http://www.toledoblade.com/Featured-Editorial-Home/2013/11/29/Video-brand.html - by anonymous writer(s) - 520 words

http://www.toledoblade.com/local/2013/12/06/EconCat88-resurfaces-with-harsh-new-videos.html - by Tom Troy - 950 words

Dec 6, 2013 TT comment

For those interested in the latest box score about the Blade's bizarre stalking of EconCat88, the counts as of Dec 6, 2013 are:

• 7 Blade stories
• produced by at least 6 Blade employees
• over 6,000 words spilled

With the money spent by the Blade on the labor surrounding its obsession with EconCat88, the Blade could have paid Madhouse Media to produce the positive Toledo video that so many desire.

Oh, when you execute a search at YouTube on Toledo, Ohio, the Toledo Blade's video on Toledo's gang activity still appears in the top 5 search results. Why is this video permitted to exist?

When people list the positives of Toledo, is gang activity mentioned? If not, then this must be a negative, which means the Blade's video is severely harmful to Toledo's image.

We should not waste resources informing Toledoans. Our energies need to be spent on projecting a positive image to the rest of the world. We should be concerned only about what a resident living in Columbus, Ohio or Santa Fe, New Mexico thinks about Toledo, and we should ignore the concerns of Toledoans.

Why would people visit Toledo after searching YouTube and seeing a video on Toledo's gang culture that was produced by a for-profit Toledo media business? Disgusting. Has mayor-elect Carty Collins spoken out against the existence of this video that is obviously destructive to Toledo's future?

Here's the number three video at YouTube:

Battle Lines: Gangs of Toledo Defining Boundaries - "An introduction to gang culture in Toledo, Ohio." - published on Apr 28, 2013 by TheToledoBlade - 31,651 views

Quotes from the video:

"Are gangs more violent today than they were back in the late '80s around here? Absolutely. Absolutely."

"Toledo families have been ripped apart by gang violence. Children grow up without their parents. Parents are forced to bury their children or watch as they're sent to prison. The violence has been going on for years, and there's no end in sight."

That seems like a negative video about Toledo. How can we be certain that this type of negative message doesn't deter people from visiting Toledo?

#video - #toledo - #politics - #media - #moronism - #blog_jr