Keep (the) Santa Cruz (Sandhills) Weird

Sarah Jane Keller

I’ve heard that Santa Cruz might be weird. I live in the redwoods above the city and maybe it’s a little strange here too. Sunset Magazine called Boulder Creek, just up the road, “absurdly rural.” In a search for the absurd, I considered visiting the nearby Bigfoot Museum to see if I could scare up a Sasquatch but turned instead to the park in my backyard, Quail Hollow Ranch County Park.

Since first visited the park, I’ve been intrigued by signs along the trail that say ” Sensitive Area Closed”. What are they hiding back there, behind the big shadowy arms of the live oaks?

Entering forbidden territory. Photo by SJK

This weekend, I found out. The Fish and Wildlife Service owns the property and there’s a good reason we can’t just go tramping around on it—and it has nothing to do with protecting Bigfoot’s habitat. Behind the signs is rare ecosystem harboring the true weirdos of Santa Cruz County: four plant species, a grasshopper, a beetle and a kangaroo rat that live nowhere else in the world.

A cage protects this federally endangered Santa Cruz Wallflower (Erysimum teretifolium), found only in the Santa Cruz sandhills and nowhere else, from hungry deer. The plants live for two or three years, but only produce flowers once. If the flowers are chomped off, the plant misses out on reproducing. Photo by SJK.

The Santa Cruz sandhills are so fragile that only 60 people are allowed to visit this particular parcel each year, 15 at a time, during Sundays in April. The perilously rare plants that grow there thrive in sandy soil free of competition from other species. And they grow right in the middle of the trail. If you walk on the trail you inevitably STEP ON A FEDERALLY ENDANGERED SPECIES. During last Sunday’s tour I was caught between the perverse thrill of having permission to accidentally trammel rare plants and the horror of doing so.

At the

beginning of the walk, our guide Shane, a systems engineer with a passion for geology and botany, pulled out some fossils to demonstrate the origins of the mountaintop beach in our backyard. He presented us with sand dollars, which are found in the 15 million-year-old silica soils only a short distance from redwood forests.

The coarse texture of the sand and the way nutrients and water slip through it fostered the evolution of the rare collection of heat, sun and drought-adapted plants a

Though naturally rare, endangered and found only in the Santa Cruz sandhills, the Santa Cruz spineflower (Chorizanthe pungens var. hartwegiana) carpets the ground where it grows. Photo by SJK.

nd animals that live there today. Since the early 1900s that sand has also been attractive for many industrial uses from making bottles, and now optics and silicon wafers. There’s an active sand quarry just across the street from Quail Hollow and six have been active in the area at different times.

The sandhills habitat has been destroyed, degraded and fragmented by mining but also by residential developments like the one I live in, vineyards, orchards and recreation. During the walk, Shane credited Jodi McGraw for assembling much of what people know about the sandhills as a UC Berkeley doctoral student. Her website about the sandhills says that there were about 6,000 acres of the naturally rare ecosystem and about 60 percent remains today. However, most of that land is not protected.

Now, when I climb a hill around my house and look out on mountains carpeted with green, I see the white sandy patches peeking through and think they are some of the most special things in my absurdly rural neighborhood (though the neon lumberjack is a close second). I came expecting to be enamored by redwoods but I also found the Santa Cruz Wallflower and the Ben Lomond Spineflower. Thank goodness for the weirdos.

In California, these Ponderosa Pines usually grow above 3000 feet in the Sierra Nevadas. In Santa Cruz county they are a low elevation oddity where they survive in the sandhills.

Purple Owl's Clover (Castilleja exserta) is a grassland flower that's not rare, but it's pretty. Photo by SJK.

Plastic Number Crunching

Amy West

by Amy West

With recent news of washing machines spilling microplastics into waterways, a greenwashing lawsuit involving plastic water bottle companies, and bans on plastic bags, plastics are everywhere. Literally.

They are crammed under our cupboards, spilling from trashcans, and discarded along the road. Most families are engulfed in plastic consumables, and those with good intentions, toss them into the blue recycling bin. It feels good to divert most of our consumables and packaging into the blue bin, and helps justify purchasing food such as cottage cheese, which invariably comes packaged in plastic. Out of sight, out of mind, after all.

Plastic overload. Photo by Amy West

However, with plastics recycling the average plastic consumer may believe a few myths.

1. All plastics collected for recycling are actually recycled.

2. Plastics are recycled in the U.S.

A report by Columbia University showed the U.S. generated 33.6 million tons of plastics and recycled about seven percent of that- just 2.1 million tons; the rest were landfilled. Why? Mostly because a market for plastics does not exist for plastics with resin codes #3 through 7.

There is a recycling market for plastic beverage containers (#1, #2) like bottled waters and sports drinks due to the very successful Bottle Bill California established in the late 80s.  Other states with a bottle law include Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon and Vermont. Unfortunately bottle laws were repealed in Delaware, and Missouri.  Allowing buyers to redeem plastics for cash is the financial incentive that really drives recycling: a nickel for containers less than 24 ounces, and a dime for containers 24 ounces or larger.

Mark Murray, the executive director or Californians against Waste explained that because of the mechanics of recycling, most of the plastics are “downcycled”, or turned into different products. For instance, California ships 60 percent of water and soda bottles overseas to turn into textiles, but the rest remain in California and molded into plastic clamshells for food or strapping. One new company Carbon Lite actually transforms the plastic into pellets so other beverage companies can convert them back into plastic water bottles- closing the recycling loop. The #2, or HDPE, containers such as shampoo bottles and juice cartons have slightly better rates- 50 percent stay in California. Detergent and oil containers can be made from these, in the case of Epic Plastics, they take these containers and a few other plastic types to manufacture thin plastic lumber for garden edging.

This 425 millions pounds of recycled plastic does not include the commingled plastic in our bins that are either landfilled, or baled into a large compressed plastic cube and shipped overseas. This scrap plastic is worth pennies, but for the recycling company, it removes the financial burden of paying to dump it.

California’s agriculture farms produce a significant source of plastic such as film, trays and covers. Known as ‘plasticulture’, the 2008 report by California’s Waste Management states this mass amount of plastic used or recycled by each agriculture sect is unclear, but is estimated to be more than 100,000 tons a year.

A Green Waste Recovery study in unincorporated Santa Cruz County in 2009 (which includes about half of the county population) found residents recycle about half of the discarded hard plastics and 80 percent of the stretchy film plastics. That percentage is relatively encouraging, but discouraging when those plastics land in Asia as scrap plastic.

The amount of crude oil involved in plastic bottle manufacturing alone is ludicrous. Oil is required to make the bottle, ship it, send it to the recycling center, ship it to plastic manufacturers, and downcycle it into something different only to go through the shipping process again. With Americans screaming about gas prices, those who purchase plastic beverage containers should reconsider their plastic consumption. They might as well be stocking their refrigerator with gold.

Beach flat (artist rendition) of Ferdi Rizkiyanto from Jakarta in Indonesia (scroll down to see on http://ferdi-rizkiyanto.blogspot.com/)

Recently I wrote an article on how companies can stop this unrecycled plastic from leaving our shores– by melting it through pyrolysis to create fuel. It just makes more sense to retain our plastics

and finance innovative solutions to close that recycling loop.

With 145,000 Santa Cruz residents generating 66,000 tons of waste a year, plastic accounts for 12 percent of it. That means nearly 8000 tons of plastic could be converted to fuel. Producing a gallon of fuel requires 7 to 10 pounds of plastic, thus Santa Cruz potentially harbors a cache of a million and half gallons of fuel. Or for those that think in barrels-37,000 barrels.

So when purchasing grocery items like juice, choose the one in glass. Remember, its REDUCE, reuse, recycle.

*******************************************

For buyback centers in Santa Cruz to bring your plastic beverage containers, #1 (PET) and #2 (HDPE) for some cash.

Origami: when math and art meet

By Marissa Fessenden

When I learned to fold a paper crane out of a piece of paper, I thought I had mastered one of the coolest tricks ever. The crane was the most difficult pattern in my little origami book. But origami is more than paper birds, cups and frogs. It is an art form and a way to gain insights in engineering and math.

Art gallery-goers make origami boxes and cups for jelly beans at the opening of an origami exhibit at UC Santa Cruz. Photo by Marissa Fessenden

Origami is a traditionally Japanese art. Purists follow simple rules: one square of paper, no cuts and no glue. By folding the paper into mountains and valleys in sequence, artists shape designs. Some are incredibly complex.

Traditionally, finding new origami forms relied on trial, error and some luck. But computers have opened up a new way to develop designs. Robert Lang, a physicist and mathematical origami artist, has even created a program that can spit out the pattern of folds necessary to make any shape—a reindeer, a beetle, a scorpion. He likes insects because their many skinny appendages posed a challenge to origami artists of yore.

Least you scoff at the simplicity of Lang’s approach, or accuse him of taking talent away from the art, realize that the pattern still requires a master folder. Lang also tweaks the patterns to make the end result more pleasing and natural looking. Check out his gallery here. This hermit crab is one of my favorites.

(video by Wired)

Math and origami go even beyond the development of new designs. Computational origami is actually a field of mathematics where paper folding can solve problems. For example, a puzzle for geometry is to draw an angle that is exactly one-third of a given, arbitrary angle using only a straightedge and a compass. This exercise is impossible, but becomes possible when you can fold the paper.

Lang is also a master of using origami for real world applications. He helped design the optimal folding of an airbag for cars and consulted for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to develop a telescope lens that would unfold to the size of a football field once it reached space.

When he meets with a client who wants to use origami he asks if cutting is a problem. The restriction to stick to uncut paper is merely artistic. In many cases, cutting provides a better solution for practical application.

Another great example of the uses of origami is a folding, implantable medical device, known as a stent, developed by Zhong You and Kaori Kuribayashi from Oxford. Stents are tubular structures used to hold open a part of the body such as a weakened blood vessel, and restore fluid flow. You and Kuribayashi used origami to make tubular stents that fold to a small diameter while they are delivered to the right location. Once in place, the stents can expand. Traditional stents are made of wire mesh. The origami stents can be made of other, more bio-compatible materials.

I listened to Lang talk at a recent UC Santa Cruz lecture on mathematics and origami. The talk marked the opening of an exhibit honoring the late David Huffmann, a computer scientist and renowned origami artist. If you are in town and would like to visit the exhibit, stop by the Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery at Cowell College. Pieces by David Huffmann, Erik Demaine and his father Martin Demaine, Robert Lang, Brian Chan and Eric Joisel will be displayed through June 16.

And those wishing to master the art of folding paper cranes can learn here.

Let’s Get Personal

Today, I received an email asking what I found most valuable about the UCSC Science Communication program.

I could say the internships have given me fantastic on-the-job training; the instructors have made my writing tighter and livelier; I’ve had the opportunity to meet reporters from The New Yorker, the Wall Street Journal, the San Jose Mercury News and the Los Angeles Times; and by the end of this quarter I’ll have a better handle of photography, video editing and investigative reporting.

While that is all true, one of my favorite parts about the program has been the personal essay assignment. Apart from personal statements for applications, I had never written about myself in such a, well, personal way. Writing that 750-word piece was difficult and cathartic, and reading it aloud to my classmates and Janet, our instructor, was even more more so. I had to rush at certain points to keep myself together.

Most of us were tearing at one point or another as we went around the room reading our stories. That session was one of my favorite of the year. I won’t reveal my classmate’s memoirs, but I’ve pasted my first draft here:

In first grade, my blue pencil case was lord among my school supplies. I bought the VHS-sized contraption in a San Diego Toy ‘R’ Us during Easter vacation in 1987. It was pimped out with padded covers featuring illustrations of military jets. I didn’t care much for the images—I would have rather had My Melody smile at me—but the magic buttons that popped open the pencil pocket, the eraser holder, the pencil sharpener, the magnifying class and the thermometer made the pencil case more than a utilitarian gadget.

It represented the American Dream: Disneyland, Popples, Barbie, Care Bears, Count Chocula and McDonald’s.

I was born in Mexico City, but I was convinced that my true home was the United States.  I watched mostly American television series, and even had the good fortune of going to a bilingual school where I learned English from Big Bird and Ernie.

Then my dad came home one spring afternoon in 1988 and told us we’d be moving to Los Angeles in August. I was thrilled.

We went to the U.S. embassy to get our visas. I was on my way.

We packed up the essentials and divvied up what we couldn’t take among relatives and friends. I was sad to leave, but also excited. California was my golden opportunity to become American.

But when I arrived, I quickly realized my three years of English classes hadn’t been enough. I couldn’t communicate with my new compadres.

At a school interview with the nuns who ran Good Shepherd Catholic School, I smiled and nodded, and did my best to understand what they were saying.

I don’t remember what they asked, nor what my responses were, but whatever it was must have worked. I got into the school. Crisis averted!

One of my dad’s new coworkers had a daughter in my grade. Ximena was Mexican too, and she was my ambassador and translator.

We became close friends, but despite her help, I felt out of place.  Ms. Ellis kept me after school to work on my English skills, and my classmates noticed.

During one of my first private sessions, she asked me where I was from.

I mumbled, “I am of Mexico”—a direct translation from the Spanish, soy de Mexico. She smiled and quickly explained the difference between of and from.

In the classroom, I adjusted rather quickly and I earned good grades. But on the playground, I sometimes still felt like the new girl who didn’t know how to talk.

I wanted to belong, but I didn’t have blond hair and blue eyes. Ximena, who had been blessed with both, must have an easier time, I thought.

As time went on, my sense of being different didn’t subside, so I shunned speaking Spanish. I felt embarrassed when someone would approach me in my native language and mortified when my mother couldn’t communicate with the non-Latino parents.

I felt this way through most of college. There, I didn’t have very many Latino friends, and I made it a point stay away from the Latino organizations on campus. The closest I came to one was living in the Spanish-language dorm, which was among the most beautiful houses on campus. It was also run by Europeans—not Latinos—a very important distinction in my mind.

I can’t pinpoint the moment when my feelings of self-hatred started to go, but I think it happened in New York.

My first semester in graduate school I had a roommate from Spain. It felt silly to speak with her in English. Around the same time, I started dancing salsa, and for the first time, I listened to Spanish music willingly.

That’s one of the reasons I love New York so much. Despite California being new Mexico, New York—land of salsa, Dominicans and Puerto Ricans—was where I became a proud Latina.

Now, I speak Spanish without hesitation. When a stranger asks me a question in Spanish, I don’t wish for the ground to turn to quick sand.

It’s been almost 24 years since I moved to the U.S., and my American Dream has shifted. I’m glad since my original concept was skewed to begin with.

Often, we don’t get to spend a lot of time together as a class because we’re bustling from school to our internships, and there’s always a deadline to meet. But this assignment gave us a chance to learn about each other in a very intimate way.

As the year winds down, I hope our walks through campus during photography class will afford similar opportunities.

Images: 1) Science Communications Programs. UCSC. 2) Los Angeles City Hall. Daniela Hernandez. 3) New York City skyline north of West 43rd St. Daniela Hernandez. 4) UCSC Campus. Daniela Hernandez.  

RoboSquirrel Lets Loose

Squirrel robots are on the loose near San Jose, and they’re helping scientists at the University of California, Davis understand how their fleshy counterparts interact with rattlesnakes.

When squirrels approach rattlesnakes, they wag their tail and use infrared radiation to signal radiation-sensitive rattlesnakes. What exactly they’re conveying is anybody’s guess, but it’s probably safe to say that “Come eat me” is not on the menu. The radiation flashing seems to shift the snakes’ behavior from predatory to defensive, according to a 2007 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study from UC Davis.

When the researchers tested how infrared robo-tail wagging affected snake behavior in the lab, they noticed the snake spent less time exploring the chamber for food and more time in the “defensive postures of coiling and cocking-to-strike,” they wrote in the 2007 study. Tail-wagging, then, may be a squirrel’s way of posturing and discouraging their predators from striking out at them. The researchers claim rattlesnakes very rarely attack squirrels wagging their tail and those who do often miss. (In the video above, only the non-wagging critter got bit, but it looks like that snake must have had better aim than most.)

So why put yourself in a position to have your head chomped off?

Assuming the rattlesnake in the video, which was filmed during the more recent San Jose field studies, was cocked to strike, RoboSquirrel didn’t fare very well. A real squirrel may not have ended up as the rattlesnake’s main course, but injury might still have occurred.

Perhaps the tailed rodents may be assessing how dangerous the situation really is, the scientists wrote in a press release. But that seems like an ill-thought-out death mission. The researchers suggest perhaps snakes leave after encountering a wagging squirrel. If that’s true, then this strategy might be a way for squirrels to protect their vulnerable pups from being eaten by hungry snakes. In that context, that strategy seems more logical. Testing whether this happens in the wild might be easier (and less cruel) with an army of RoboSquirrels. If the hypothesis holds up, shooing away rattlesnakes by deploying furry androids could have other ecological consequences.

Mushrooms Take Center Stage

Mushrooms are the main attraction all weekend long at the Santa Cruz Fungus Fair (photo: E. Loury)

Erin Loury

by Erin Loury

After four years of living near Santa Cruz, last weekend I finally ventured to the annual Fungus Fair for the first time.  With elements of nature, science, and hippie culture, it’s an event that sounded just so… Santa Cruz.

My expectations were tempered after hearing Meghan’s first radio story for KUSP, which shadowed volunteers searching for mushrooms to display.  The weather has been so unusually dry this winter that fresh fungi seemed to be in short supply.  In fact, I overheard a fair organizer say that this was the first year they had to send mushroom collectors out of the area, in search of wetter conditions farther north.

So while I was expecting maybe a few tables with mushrooms on display, I was startled to enter the Louden Nelson community center to behold – trees.  They had recreated a little piece of forest with artfully arranged fungi springing out of the logs and redwood duff.  And the tables were loaded with mushrooms galore.

The fair is an opportunity for a little indoor mushroom foraging. (photo: E. Loury)

The diversity of local mushrooms stunned me, especially their shapes and colors.  I enjoyed hearing mycologists, such as Chritstian Shwarz, leader of the UCSC Mushroom Enthusiast club, speak about their study subjects with the same level of enthusiasm I’m used to hearing from my former marine scientist labmates when they talk about the ocean.

My main draw to the fair was a talk about sudden oak death by David Rust, co-founder of the Bay Area Mycological Society.  This quarter I’ll be learning the ins and outs of the disease as part of my feature story for Science Notes, and I was intrigued by how the disease affects not just the mighty oaks, but all the species connected to them.  Many mushrooms grow on oak trunks and roots, and some are species-specific.

A small sampling of the diversity on display (photo: E. Loury)

Rust’s talk was a great primer in the history and basics of the disease. I learned that the pathogen – a fungal-like organism related to potato blight – hitchhiked into California on ornamental nursery plants from Europe.  While the disease only causes cosmetic damage on the leaves of camellias and rhododendrons, it took a lethal turn once it spread to some of California’s native trees. Rust explained how the California bay laurel serves as a host for the disease’s multi-stage life cycle, and that the tanoak, while not a true oak species, is most susceptible to the disease.

Rust urged mushroom hunters to use caution when collecting – the pathogen can be spread by clinging to the wet mud on a hiker’s boots.  The audience uttered some groans of disappointment and dismay as Rust flashed photos of half a dozen fungal species associated only with tanoak trees – species they are in danger of losing if tanoaks disappear.

A cauliflower mushroom - my personal favorite! (photo: E. Loury)

I left the talk with my head buzzing with avenues of inquiry to explore for my story, and visited the rooms of vendors selling everything from mushrooms you could grow yourself, to beautiful fungal-inspired artwork.  I couldn’t help but buy a pair of mushroom-printed socks.  I rounded off my visit by sampling the mushroom quiche, and bringing my camera to the identification table to ask about a photo I had taken of a fungus among the redwoods on the UC Santa Cruz Campus. Most likely a conch, I was told, a hard and woody mushroom that grows on the sides of trees.

Next week Christian Schwarz has agreed to take me tramping around the UC Santa Cruz campus to check in on some of the oak trees and their mushroom tenants.  I look forward to sharing what I find!

A charismatic mega-fungus (photo: E. Loury)

David Cohn Experiments with Journalism

A new type of reporting? Photo by Meghan Rosen

By Meghan Rosen

David Cohn doesn’t look like the new face of journalism.  He’s boyish, with an untamed mop of black curls and a stubbly beard: Picture a darker Mark Zuckerberg, but more stylishly dressed.

It’s early in the morning when Cohn comes to talk with our class about Spot.Us, his three-year-old experiment in crowdfunding journalism, but he thrums with energy. If I had to pick one word to describe Cohn, I’d say ‘caffeinated.’ Or ‘bright-eyed.’ Or maybe even ‘feverish.’  You get the idea. Cohn’s passionate about his experiment, and it shows.

I’d heard of crowdsourcing before (Wikipedia), and even crowdfunding (my husband and I registered at the microlending site Kiva.org for our wedding), but crowdfunding journalism was a new idea for me.  It probably shouldn’t have been; Cohn’s website, Spot.Us has been matching freelance reporters with funding for three years.

But he’s the first to admit that he didn’t invent the concept of donating to journalism: People have been contributing to NPR for decades.  The difference is the level of transparency.

“When you donate to NPR,” he said, “You cover your eyes, throw money over a fence, and hope that it goes towards good journalism.”

With his organization, donors don’t have to trust that their money is being used for good; they see exactly where it goes.

So, how does Spot.Us work, exactly? Reporters come to the site and pitch an idea for a story. They estimate the cost of reporting (travel, freelance writing rates, etc), and then, they wait for people to donate.

“They’re pitching to the world,” Cohn said, “And the world collectively has a freelance budget.”

Potential donors peruse a ‘menu’ of story ideas, and contribute to those they’d like to see fleshed out and reported.  People can choose which news to support, and they can donate just a few bucks. (Reporters can pitch anything they’d like to write about, but Cohn weeds out certain types of stories. Breaking news, for example, doesn’t work because Spot.Us reporters have to wait for funds.)

Most of the money Spot.Us raises comes from small donors, though the largest donation they’ve received came from Barbra Streisand, for a story about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

“My mother was thrilled,” Cohn said.

60-65% of pitches get funded, and Spot.Us typically publishes two to three stories per week. Spot.Us isn’t going to sustain a freelance career, Cohn said, but it can be part of multiple revenue streams for a reporter.

“It’s just another thing for reporters to have in their toolkit,” he said.

Cohn talked with our class for more than an hour about the changing world of journalism, and how to use the Internet as a testing-ground for new ideas. How does a 29-year-old writer (he started out as a tech reporter for Wired, then worked at Seed Magazine) conceive of and market a radical concept like Spot.Us?  What can beginner journalists like us learn from this self-proclaimed ‘geek reporter’? I wanted to know more.

So, I interviewed him.  Here’s what he had to say.

20 minutes with David Cohn

How did you spread the word about Spot.Us in the beginning?

Well, first of all, I was a relentless self-marketer. And, I was lucky that I had some kind of connections and media relations already.

I also blogged about it.  At the time we launched Spot.Us, the concept of community-funded reporting was weird. So, I created this narrative: ‘Hey guys we’re trying a crazy experiment, and I invite you to follow along.’

I’m a big evangelizer in terms of experimentation. One general rule of the Internet is that it’s cheaper and easier to try something than to debate whether or not to try it.

People were watching what we were doing not just to see what happened with Spot.Us, but for this meta-narrative.

Do you think it’s important for journalists to use social media like Twitter and Facebook?

I wouldn’t get caught up in the ‘Twitterness’ of Twitter. It’s just a new way for people to communicate.

Do you tweet?

I do tweet. I am a tweeter. I jumped on it relatively early- in 2007. In the beginning I followed everybody, but now I follow around 2000 people.

How many people follow you?

10,000.

[David Cohn’s twitter handle is Digidave. As of Dec. 5, he had 10,381 followers, including me.]

After Twitter, what’s the next new thing in social media?

Twitter is not going away. The company might die, or change, or a better product might come along, but the vocabulary isn’t going to change. So, even if you spend a lot of time on Twitter, your time isn’t going to be wasted, because you will learn from it.

What topics did you initially think Spot.Us would cover?

When I first launched Spot.Us I was in San Francisco, so I had on San Francisco blinders. But I instantly started getting stories about the Oakland police.  So, we’ve done a bunch of Oakland police stuff, but there are all these other issues in Oakland that just don’t get covered- like crime spotting, neighborhood associations, and certain PTAs.  They are serious issues. The Chronicle doesn’t cover them, and neither does the Tribune.

Things are bubbling up even more lately, with the Occupy Oakland stuff.  We’ve raised $2000 to help reporters cover it.

Now that Spot.Us has spread beyond San Francisco, what’s next?

Spot.Us will continue growing. But we have big news — We’re becoming a partner with the longtime nonprofit organization, American Public Media.

It’s an acquisition, though, not a buyout. I’m not going to be a millionaire.

[David says he’s a shameless self-promoter, but when he talked with me about the APM partnership, he was really very humble. He didn’t, for example, tell me that APM is the largest owner of public radio stations in the country, or that after NPR, it’s the second largest producer of public radio.  But I didn’t have to know those things to understand that the news was A Big Deal.  David’s excitement was palpable. He made me promise not to spill until APM announced the acquisition publicly, which they did just six days ago, on Nov. 29.]

Congratulations! What does that mean for you and Spot.Us?

Spot.Us was just me and one other person, and I wanted to see if we could make it grow. As an experiment, I consider it a success. Now, it needs to become part of a larger organization.

I’m still going to be there, but technically, I’ll be ceding control. I’m excited to pass off some of the business duties. I don’t want to cut any more checks!

Are you working on any new projects?

I have a few babies in the idea phase. Some wouldn’t require that much time, but I’ve just never taken the time to get them started.