Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all the Hoopies out there.  Sorry its been a while since anything has been added to the site.  Things got busy and just snowballed from there during the late fall, and time was just not available to put towards the site.  I thought I’d give a little update on things.

First, lets do a quick year in review.  The site started slow last year and got rolling again.  At the peak, the site hit an Alexa ranking of around 374,000 in September.  For those of you unfamiliar with Alexa rankings, it is a site that ranks websites for popularity.  The 374,000 indicated that Hoopie World was the 374,000th most popular site in the whole world, which isn’t too bad if you compare that to other firefighting related sites.  We are currently around 600,000, which is expected due to the lack of updates to the site.

Hoopie World is also now on Facebook and has a Twitter account.  Spread the word to your Facebook friends to become a fan and we’ll see how many we can get.  The Twitter account allows us to “Tweet” our news stories and updates to those who follow us on Twitter.

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PA Volunteer Departments – Please Take Notice

Here on the eve of the G20 Summit, its certainly busy times for fire departments in western PA as plans are being put in place.  However, I would like to bring the following state budget news to everyone’s attention, in case you missed the news at first like I did myself.

The state has announced they may have a budget agreement after the latest changes.  One of those changes is to levy a 20% tax on small games of chance income.  Guess what that means fellow volunteers?  For every $10 you make at bingos, cash bashes, lottery ticket sales, etc the state is going to take $2 from you.  How is that for “supporting” you local fire department?

There is no mention of the state grant program for fire and ambulance services, but it sounds like that will stay in place. I’m guessing they didn’t want to touch that because the public would hear “cutting funds to fire/ems” and there would be an outcry.  If they tax small games of chance, the general public may not realize who that is really impacting.

Per the Tribune-Review

A new 20 percent tax would be levied on the profits of small games of chance, which include punch boards, pull tabs and raffle tickets. The tax will be paid by the licensee, said Andrew Crompton, a lawyer for Scarnati. It will not include bingo.

The tax is applicable to nonprofits with liquor licenses. It does not extend to church raffles, he said.

Prize limits will likely increase from the current $5,000 per week to $20,000 per week per club, Crompton said.

Looks to me just another step in getting volunteer fire departments to close their doors.  I agree, in some counties there are too many departments, and some consolidation is needed.  However, at the rate they are changing things, its almost like certain government leaders have agenda’s to close them quickly.

I recommend discussing this new proposal of the budget with your state representative.  Let them know us volunteers only have so much time in a day, and that working 20% more for fundraising is not something that the state should be making us do.  Do the state leaders really think we make that much from Night at the Races and lottery tickets?

They are back in session on Wednesday to discuss the details of this new proposal, so there is still time to make your feelings known.  Pennsylvania is still the only state without a current budget.

Bird’s Eye View Game – Round 3

Its back by popular demand!  Round 3 of Bird’s Eye View.  For those of you that missed the first 2 rounds, I post aerial photos of stations from around the region and you guess which stations they are.  I have them broken down by county to help you out.  Good luck and we’ll see how good you guys are this round! (Click on pictures for larger size)

1) Allegheny County

2) Beaver County

3) Butler County

4) Fayette County

7) Washington County

8 ) Westmoreland County

Be sure to leave your guesses in the comments below.

Further Twitter Explanation

For those of you that still don’t use or understand Twitter, FireCritic.com helps further explain what it is and how it is useful.

I see a lot of firefighters and EMT’s ask “What the heck is Twitter”. Or better yet “What the hell is A Twitter”?

I have heard firefighters in my own department, in my own station ask what it is. Some of them don’t know what email is…so it is not worth too much of a detailed explanation.Let me explain what twitter is and why it benefits firefighters and EMT’s.

First of all, Twitter (Twitter.com) is a social networking tool. Users can type whatever the heck they want as long as it is shorter than 140 characters.

Read the full article here

Props to Eric Godard From the Penguins

Eric Godard, of the Pittsburgh Penguins, just went up a notch in my book as I found out that during his day with the Stanley Cup he visited the Vernon, British Columbia Fire and Police Departments.

You can read the article covering the visit at http://www.hhof.com/html/exSCJ09_20.shtml.   Judging by this act, it sounds like Godard is just like most other NHL’s and very down to earth.  His day with the Cup was August 23rd, and also made sure he visited the local Boys & Girls Club.

Thanks Eric for remembering the police officers and firefighters, and I know its not your hometown, but if you are ever in Lincoln Boro . . .

Web Design Tip – Please Keep the Music Silent

Ask anyone that knows me, and they will tell you I’m on the computer and internet all the time.  I swear my laptop is attached as a third arm of mine sometimes.  I know many of the visitors to Hoopie World run their own firefighting or departmental sites, so I thought I’d start giving some web design tips from time to time.

My first tip, is half tip – half rant.  I know many feel very strongly on this topic and it can really harm your site and chances of people sticking around and checking it out if you don’t follow my advice.  My advice is to NOT have embedded music on your site.  Embedded music is the music that starts playing as soon as the visitor goes to your site.  There is nothing more annoying, or more likely to cause visitors to click away from your site than to have music start blaring out you once a visitor lands on your site.

One reason its a bad idea is that if the visitor doesn’t like the particular song, it already puts a bad taste in their mouth, or ears in this case, while thinking and visiting your site.  Another reason is that the music player usually slows down the pages loading, which in turn frustrates the visitor.  Yes, with broadband connections pretty standard this days, its less of a concern, but it still causes a site to lag a little bit.  Lastly, its an old fad that isn’t necessary anymore.  It was neat back in the late 90’s to see what you can do with your web sites, but its really not necessary now.  People are listening to their own mp3s or Ipods, watching streaming shows and sporting events, and watching tv in the background while surfing (I could name about 12 other things that I’m usually doing while surfing) and they really don’t need to be bothered with music that in all likelihood they aren’t going to like.

Now, if you are running a band site, or have audio that you would like to share with the visitors (like our fire dispatch audio section), link to the files and let the visitors stream them or download them ON THEIR TERMS.  None of this force fed automatic stuff.  Please do not say, well all they have to do is hit the stop or pause button to stop it.  Most visitors are not on the site long enough to find the button if music starts playing.

So please, for a lot of people’s sanity, and to make your site better,  remove the automatic music from your web site.

Is Fire Buffing In Western Pa Dead?

I have been seeing a definite decline in fire buffing over the last few months in our western Pennsylvania region that Hoopie World covers.  When I refer to fire buffing, I’m talking the traditional going to a fire/rescue incident and taking pictures or video and making a report about it.  I’m not including going onto the forums and discussing incidents and strategies as part of that fire buffing definition. I thought I’d share some of my thoughts about this situation, and throw out why I think this may be occurring.

Its getting to a point now if I’m wondering if there are any fire buffs out there any longer.  I haven’t received a picture or incident report in over 4 months related to a working fire or incident.  Its been over 5 months since someone that isn’t directly tied to the site has sent in an incident report.  Yes, I have received fundraising event notifications, parade pictures, apparatus pictures, and other general information, but any featured working incidents as of late have been reported by myself and shot by myself.  In prior years, Hoopie World would average around 10 submitted incidents a month.  Some months there would be less, but many months there were more than that.  There have been over 135 individuals that have sent incident pictures in since the site’s beginning.  Where did everyone go?

I’ve been putting a lot of thought into this lately and have some suspected reasons why the incidents have stopped coming in.  However, I’ve also come up with reasons why the submissions shouldn’t have stopped. Hopefully some buffs will read this  and give some feedback as well.

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Updated With Hints: Bird’s Eye View – Round 2

The first round of the Bird’s Eye View went well, and congrats to John G. who was the first person to answer them all correctly.

To get more people involved, I tried to get a sampling from a wider area of the region.  Again, post your guesses in the comment section below the pictures.  Before the Indiana and Armstrong county folks jump down my throat for not posting any of theirs, you’re turn will be next.

I also found that not all areas have bird-eye views available, which is a shame because it really is a cool feature.  So without further ado, here are your round 2 stations:

1) Butler County 1

2) Butler County 2

3) Beaver County

4) Washington County

5) Fayette County

6) Westmoreland County

7) Allegheny County #1

8. Allegheny County #2

9) Pittsburgh PBF Station ?

Ok, no hints for now, lets see how you do . . .

Update: Ok, lets give some hints

Here are the ones you got so far:
1 & 2 – Cranberry
3 – Baden
5 – Dunbar
9 – PBF Station 4

Hints:
4 – Has a number as part of their station name
6 – Their trucks a blue
7 – They are a Hoopie World affiliate site
8 – This is one of a few stations in their municipality

Bird’s Eye View – Any Guesses?

While surfing the net recently, I got this idea from the Raleigh/Wake Firefighting Blog and thought it would be cool to try here.  If you don’t know by now, bing.com has a map feature that allows a Bird’s Eye View feature.  This new feature allows you to look down from a satellite view and actually rotate the camera.  No more straight down views like we are used to seeing.

So, I have inserted some images of stations into this post.  I want to see who has some eagle eyes and see how many people can tell which stations they are.  Use the comments at the bottom of this article to post your guesses/answers.

I may do this as a weekly feature and possibly give away some prizes if it catches on.  We’ll see how it goes, knowing half of my visitors, there may be a lot of cheating going on (I’m joking, well not really, but thats ok )

So, round 1, the hint is that these 4 departments are all in Allegheny County and are all on Mon Valley UHF.

1)

2)

3)

4)

Update: SPOILER ALERT:  If you want to try on your own, don’t look below at the comments as users have figured them out and the answers are posted.

Fire Scene Photography – Gear

I’ve recently been recruited to be the “official” photographer at an upcoming wedding which made me dig my camera gear back out and refresh myself on it.  Unfortunately I haven’t done as much shooting as I should have over the past couple years, and I had to get back into the swing of things.  I’ve been doing research on wedding photography, as I know its a whole different ballgame than fire scene photography.

As I’ve been researching, it has re-ignited my interest in photography.  I thought that I would start some discussions regarding fire scene photography, as we have quite a few fire buffs in the area (although not too many incident scene pictures have been sent to my inbox lately – hint, hint, nudge, nudge, wink, wink).

So my first article in this series is just about gear.  I figured I’d explain what gear I have and hope others via the comments or on the forums will chime in on what they have, use, and works best for them in different situations.

I personally have a Canon Rebel XT body.  I bought it back around 2003 and have been very happy with it.  I found the learning curve to not be too bad, but I also found now that I know what the settings do, I have to better work on picking the right settings.  I have a kit 18-55mm lens and a 70-300mm lens, both of which are just basic low end lenses.  Due to the upcoming wedding, I came to the conclusion it was vital for having an external flash and not rely on the built-in flash, so I recently picked up a Canon Speedlight 430 EX II.  I also have a tripod that I rarely if ever use, and a couple of batteries, memory cards, uv filters, and other miscellaneous stuff.

I was fortunate enough to borrow a 70-200mm IS L 2.8 lens from a co-worker for the wedding and a 24-70mm L 2.8 lens.  To quote Borat, “Wow wow wee wow!”.  These lenses are sharp as hell, and I can’t put them down.  The only problem I’m finding with them is since they retail for about $1700 and $1200 respectively, I’m nervous I’m going to scuff them up or scratch them.   The wedding hasn’t taken place yet, but I’m confident with those lenses that I will get some results that I want.  I have been keeping the scanner close by, waiting for a call that would be worth shooting, but to this point things are quiet or I’m busy when the calls come in.  I’d love to see what these two can do on a fire or accident scene.  The 70-200mm gives you enough zoom power to catch the shots when you are on the sidelines at a scene and the 24-70mm is a great walk around lens.  The only thing missing for me would be a more wide angle lense, like the 10-20mm Canon lens, but hey, beggars can’t be choosers, especially when the lenses have to be given back in a week or so .

After being spoiled with the borrowed lenses, I’m looking to upgrade my gear with at least a nice walk-around lens.  For those not into photography, a walk-around lens is a lens that has a nice range of focal points, meaning it will get some close ups and some wide angles with the same lens, without the need to be changing lenses for every shot.  Like everything else though, money is a factor and I’m stuck with that decision of, will a $500-$600 lens be good enough instead of a $1200 lens?  I personally think that if I’m buying, to bite the bullet and get the better lens.  I mean, I have this web site and I get use out of the camera (when its not sitting on the car seat or my locker at the station) during fire incidents and regular home use.  I guess it really doesn’t matter, as I don’t have the funds for the lower range at this point anyways.  I have been looking at used ones though and it seems like that may be the way to go.

Well, if you read through all the rambling, and are still reading this, you now know what Mr Hoopie World is equipped with if you see him at incidents or parades.  I’m curious to hear what gear you all have.  Be sure to leave a comment or discuss on the forums what gear you have.

Look forward to future fire scene photography articles, including techniques and best practices.

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