On the Bowery in the East Village. I’ve noticed that a lot of the Obama posters and stickers put up during the election would soon be scratched and torn. But I imagine if someone had the temerity to express their admiration for McCain in a sticker that it would not survive long at all in this neighborhood.
Change has come to America! Well, change.gov, that is.
President-elect Barack Obama on Thursday unveiled change.gov, a Web site that will provide details on the presidential transition.
“Change.gov provides resources to better understand the transition process and the decisions being made as part of it,” according to a blog post. “The Obama administration will reflect an essential lesson from the success of the Obama campaign: that people united around a common purpose can achieve great things.” PC Magazine
November 4th, 2008. In the area around the Army recruiting station, ABC has several large video screens and their news center. A large crowd of what was probably 99% Obama supporters spontaneously gathered to watch the election results together. I included three clips from Obama’s victory speech, dubbed over the video.
Times Square is the traditional place for New Yorkers to gather for the observance and marking of big events. I knew there would be the large video displays of the election results, that it would be bright enough there for my camera to shoot video. Around 9:30 when I could see that the results would tip soon, I took the F train to Times Square.
For the most part the crowd could not hear what was being said on the screens. I was able to hear the speeches with my trusty battery powered portable transistor radio, way out-of-sync with the various video feeds displayed around me. I’m surprised no one in that large crowd thought to bring a boombox. It was interesting being there, but there was little cohesion to the crowd. Video was flashing 360 degrees. Animated Budweiser ads displayed over the NBC feed all night. The ABC camera crane swooped over our heads, generating random screams and waves at the camera at intervals. I’m glad I was there to witness history, and get this video, but it would have been good to hear the speeches along with a crowd actually listening to the words. ABC had a sound system that boomed out over the street, but it must have been highly directional. It was only a muffled background cadence when I was a half-block away.