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I've been meaning to look into whether there were any consistent criteria for "most e-mailed" articles. Lots of media sites must have large datasets by now. I'd like to see an analysis of them.
I did find this article from Slate in which some thinking is slapped on the question. It's focused on only one story and the tone is thuddingly cynical (which is saying something coming from me), but it's interesting.
I.A. is due less than a month from now and his speaker list is filling out nicely. Here are some of the people we expect and sort of what we expect them to say/do:
Alexandru Rosu on the Romanian Peasants Museum (I'm a big fan of the Museum. I'd live there if I could.)
Anne Charbonneau on an as yet unspecified interesting subject
Chidi Onwuka on urban nomads
Daniel Bonn on the physics of quicksand
Devon Reid on love
Esme Vos on building municipal wireless networks
Geert Wissink on cognitive psychology and social software
Jeff Ubois on personal digital archives
Jennifer Benavidez on salsa and The Seven Deadly Sins of the Dance Floor (with actual dancing! (which in retrospect, should have been the conference tagline))
Massimo Benvegnù on the enduring legacy of Russ Meyer
Nina Siegal on something involving Rembrandt, Golden Age Holland, autopsies and the Anatomical Theater (if she could just get zombies in there somehow...)
Otto Berchem on a kidnapping in Memphis (He's putting together an art piece based on a choir singing an ode to a girl who was kidnapped 25 years ago and hidden in the church where the choir...well, you just have to hear it.)
Otto Kokke will describe his system of the world (I didn't know other people had them too.)
Paul Hughes on an as yet unspecified interesting subject
We're expecting confirmation from someone who herds bacteria and a boutique beer brewer with samples for the audience. We'll keep them apart.
A friend of mine sent me a link to a music school in Myanmar where students and teachers, many of whom lost their own homes, are now coordinating and carrying out cyclone relief projects. Gitameit Music Center (gita=music, meit=friendship) is both a school for local musicians and a focus for international music exchange, and their connections to Western musicians have helped them get the word out about what they're doing and how important it is since many international efforts are being blocked at the border.
Listening to the stories of their students and teachers got me to donate when general reporting on the overall devastation had not. That's not so surprising. Personal stories are generally more powerful than broad description. More surprising, at least to me, was how credible and impactful I found the fact that they aren't experts, just people who were trying to learn a part, lost in some difficult passage, when they were reoriented by the weather.
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