Meet some of my friends

Posted at 6:22 PM on November 7, 2006 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)

One of the things I like about this blog was I can introduce you to a few behind-the-scenes things. I think what's happening up in the UBS Forum right now is very exciting. Not because it's a big honkin' thing -- it is -- but because of how it happened and what it says about many of the folks at MPR.

A few people around here kicked around this idea of doing something different for election night. It's not that we have something against the usualy way of doing it, but we're online now and people consume information differently.

So a few folks talked to a few folks who talked to a few folks -- mostly at the worker-bee level -- and then pitched the idea to a few bosses and -- and I admit I was a little surprised -- nobody said no. In fact, by the time it got to Sarah Lutman, who is our Senior Vice President of Content, she not only said "this sounds wonderful," she basically left it to the worker bees to pull together.

And they did. And this might be the biggest disaster ever to hit Public Radio, or it might be the greatest thing ever. Or it might be something in between. But it will be is a great experiment, an exercise in risk, and good things happen in environments where risks are encouraged.

That said, let me give you a tour of what was happening when I shot these pictures a little bit ago.

This is Bo Hakala. If you've ever seen those great Current videos, he's the guy that makes it happen. I just met him last week. He's working on a series of short films that will be shown in the Forum tonight. He, and a work-mate (I'm sorry I didn't get his name, but they were busy) were in a side room off the Forum putting the finishing touches on it.

Here they are again. I worked in TV for about 2 months in Boston in the '80s. I didn't understand it, but I knew the people who did this sort of stuff do. It's very impressive.

These are some of our information technology putting the microphones and stuff together. Frank Hudson, in the red, is with our End User Computer group. These folks are unbelievably talented.

This is my favorite member of the ECU group. The kid in the black. It's my son, Sean. He's an intern (and got the gig on his own). I don't understand where he inherited his smarts. But if you're looking for a genius to run your computer system, he's your guy. You can read more about him at my spot on Gather.com.

Here's another picture of him... checking connections under the stage. Good day to wear black, kid.

Frank from the backside.... the glistening head with glasses is Brian Becker from our New Media department. Brian handles most of the multi-media and also handles business stuff (yeah, ads) for our Web site. He's one of the big supporters for this effort. Brian loves to do new things and challenge ourselves.

Steve Seel, one of your hosts for tonight. Tom Crann was downstairs on All Things Considered at the time I shot these.

That's the godmother of this project there on the left. My cubicle-mate Melanie Sommer, the other online editor here. When I took my two months' leave in the summer, Melanie got to do two peoples' jobs without complaint and took on pulling this stuff together. She and Brian are shown in the control room atop the Forum.

And that's the other godmother next to Seel. Stephanie Curtis. She's producing this deal. You may know her as the Movie Maven. She's incredibly talented and from the day she walked into MPR years ago, she was on my short list of favorite people I've ever met.

Now, out in the hallway is Tony Bol, who heads our events, and Jeff Nelson, who is the producer of Forum events. I talked to Jeff about this, I think, on his second day on the job. "Let's do it," he said.

There's more people in the picture that didn't get in the picture. You won't hear a lot of them tonight. You won't see them. But this is the type of stuff that goes on at MPR every day -- an immensely talented staff, giving up dinners and time with family tonight, most working extra, because there's something cool happening. Tonight it's the forum event, Sunday it was a debate, next week it'll be something else.

I've been in the business for more than 30 years, I've never seen a better group of people working harder.

Minnesota should be proud of what you've built.

But, man, I hope this works.

Comments (2)

I agree. About the workers and about the fantastic members who make all of this possible.

Posted by Valerie | November 7, 2006 10:17 PM

Bo's good folk, and managed to make my dank dark living room look pretty in his video.

Thank you Bo! (You still owe me your accountant's number, though)

Posted by rew | November 8, 2006 11:43 AM

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