Kai Davis

Longshot Magazine Issue 1

Kai — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 19:34:39 +0000

Longshot magazine was an exercise in an unconventional new journalism.

Welcome to Long Shot Magazine, a raucous experiment in using new tools to erase media’s old limits. As the name suggests, we write, photograph, illustrate, design, edit, and ship a magazine in two days.

In May 2010, we conducted a two-day media experiment. 8,000 people signed up, 1,500 submissions came in, 35 editors selected 70 pieces to fill a 60-page magazine.

People liked it. We broke our distributor’s sales records, received positive reviews in The New York Times, PBS, and the Village Voice, and won a Knight-Batten Award for Innovation in Journalism.

And it was awesome. The first issue – Issue 0, published under the moniker 48 Hour Magazine – had a theme of ‘Hustle’ and was inspiring. And they’re doing it again.

Here’s how it works: After unveiling a theme you have 24 hours to produce and submit your work. We take the next 24 to snip, mash and gild it. The end result is a shiny website and a beautiful glossy paper magazine, delivered right to your old-fashioned mailbox.

The opportunity to, well, hustle, on putting something like this together in such a short time is mind blowing. There are no limitations on what you can create around the theme. Just look at the excerpts from Issue 0. From the word Hustle, an array of unique content was developed. People took the theme and made it their own.

If you can’t tell, I’m excited about this. I’m excited that on August 27th the theme for Issue 1 is going to be unveiled. I’m excited that over 24 hours people will create and submit work crazy, creative, original work.

When I was in College I started a newspaper, The Comic Press, with the help of some close friends. I have fond memories of staying up until 4am writing and editing articles, laying out the issue, and then waking up at 8am to hand out each copy. We published 16 issues over 18 months. We kept writing for The Comic Press because we couldn’t stop. We loved working together to create something new and then share it with our friends.

Work is more fun with friends. Certainly when you stay up all night to do it. That’s one of the keys we took away from issue zero.

So when I saw Longshot Magazine put out the call for remote offices, I wanted to take part.

You may want to consider starting a Longshot remote office with some of your fellow writers, artists, photographers or wheelwrights. (And, when we get stories with relevant art, it makes it much easier to place them in the magazine.) It’s also just a great way to meet new people.

I’m going to organize a day-long work party for Issue 1 of Longshot. If you’re in Eugene, Oregon, (or will be on August 27th), get in touch. Send me an email and tell me

Your name
The best way to reach you (email, phone, twitter)
How you like to create things (are you a writer? artist? photographer? something else that’s awesome?)

Follow Longshot Magazine and let’s create something awesome.

Grooveshark, you’re killing me!

Kai — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 17:19:37 +0000

Grooveshark,

You’re one of the best streaming music sites around. I spend more time on you than Facebook, Twitter, and Gmail combined, and you offer a great* streaming app on Jailbroken iPhones, and you have an online store with swag, but you’re killing me.

Why? I want a Grooveshark t-shirt bad. Really bad. But you’re sold out of everything in your store and I can’t even pre-order for delivery when you do get shirts in.

So, Grooveshark, keep on being awesome, but let me give you some of my money in exchange for the promise of a future shirt. I waited a year for my Daring Fireball t-shirt to arrive. I can wait for yours.

* I haven’t installed it yet, but come on, it’ll be great like Pixies and Unicorns.

IRIS Educational Media – Sales and Marketing Engineer

admin — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 23:22:20 +0000

Kai has joined IRIS Educational media, a producer of DVD and Online behavior support trainings. Kai will be working as a Sales and Marketing Engineer within the Web Applications department and overseeing staff training, internal deployment of the Salesforce CRM, and Sales and Marketing campaigns.

Floragenex – Social Media Strategy

admin — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 23:21:39 +0000

Kai has joined Floragenex, a start-up in the University of Oregon’s Riverfront Research Park. Kai will be assisting Verve Northwest in defining, developing, and executing a marketing plan and social media strategy for Floragenex.

Arcimoto – Media Director

admin — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 23:20:09 +0000

Kai is working with Arcimoto, an electric vehicle (EV) start-up in Eugene, Oregon. Kai will be working with Arcimoto’s marketing team to define, develop, and execute their media and marketing strategy and build a passionate EV community.

PowerShift West 2009 – Director of Marketing

admin — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 23:17:34 +0000

Kai is joining the PowerShift West 2009 Conference as the Director of Marketing. PowerShift West 2009 is an extension of PowerShift 2009, a conference in Washington, D.C., that featured 10,000 highschool and college students from around the nation congregating in Washington to lobby congress for positive climate and energy legislation.