Charles Village : Buzz

PR News has recognized Jamie Watt Arnold of Baltimore's Profiles among its 15 to Watch. The weekly publication bestowed the honor on budding public relations professionals under 30.

"To promote client Freshii, a quick-service restaurant, Jamie Watt Arnold coordinated a grand-opening celebration that attracted Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and secured nearly 70 media hits in outlets such as the Baltimore Sun and Style Magazine," PR News writes.

You can read more about the recognition here.

Johns Hopkins University's engineering department started the New Year with a big bang, accepting a $30 million gift from John C. Malone, chairman of Liberty Media and a Hopkins alum, to build a new research building.

Here's an excerpt:

"The gift will finance construction of a 56,000-square-foot building for studying social and industrial systems and individualized health-care treatment, the university, in Baltimore, said in a statement on its website today. The building will be named after Malone."

Read the story.

Many fans of the former HBO drama "The Wire" consider the program thought provoking. Students and a professor at Johns Hopkins University agree. In fact, they are devoting an entire class to the drama. The show will help students understand the problems that big cities face, according to an Associated Press story that appeared in the Washington Post.

The creator of the Baltimore-based crime drama, David Simon, has been a guest speaker in the class. You can read the rest of the story here.

Lacrosse players have gotten a bad rap in recent months. But some in the industry are counting on Johns Hopkins University graduate Paul Rabil to elevate the sport's image, according to an article in the New York Times.

Named the most valuable player by Major League Lacrosse, Rabil has snared Red Bull and Baltimore's Under Armour as sponsors.

Newsweek/Kaplan has released their annual lists of the nation's top ranked schools. Several universities in the Baltimore area were cited in the "25 Best" categories. The US Naval Academy took the No. 9 spot in the "25 Most Desirable Schools" category. Johns Hopkins University came in at No. 18 in the "25 Most Desirable Urban Schools."

Here's an excerpt:

"At the United States Naval Academy, the government foots the tuition bill. That could be part of the reason why the public school holds the No. 9 spot on Newsweek's list of most desirable colleges and the No. 3 spot on its roundup of most desirable suburban schools. "Annapolis is said to be the sailing capital of the world," writes one student on CollegeProwler.com. "During the summer it lives up to its billing."

Read the entire article here.
Check out the full list of cateogories here.

The Swedes have been at it again, handing out prizes to American researchers. It ain't a Noble Prize, but the work of Rita Colwell, a professor at the University of Maryland and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Heath has won the Stockholm Water Prize for her research that has helped solve many water-related public health problems including cholera.


Here's an excerpt

"Colwell, 76, received the award for her "numerous seminal contributions towards solving the world's water and water-related public health problems," the jury of the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) said.

Her work, especially on preventing the spread of cholera, "has established the basis for environmental and infectious disease risk assessment used around the world" and "is of the utmost global importance," it added in a statement.

The 76-year-old professor at the University of Maryland and Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health was also honoured for being one of the first to study "the impact of climate change on the spread of disease," SIWI scientific director Per-Arne Malmqvist told a gathering in Stockholm where the prize was announced."

Read the entire article here.

While Baltimore's tech community, local business leaders, government reps and citizens make a push to be the lucky city chosen to recieve Google's ultra-highspeed broadband network, it seems our fair city is already pretty darn wired, according to Forbes' list of America's Most Wired Cities.

Out of 20 cities, Baltimore ranks no. 8 on the list just three spots behind the Washington, D.C./Northern Virginia-area, the only other city in the Mid-Atlantic region to make the list. The ranking does take into account the estimated 66 percent broadband adoption rate in Baltimore, the 18 broadband providers and 10,141 people per wi-fi hot spot. It didn't count the citywide Wifi, Clear, available in Baltimore using WiMax technology.

Here's an excerpt:

"...we compiled the list by computing the percentage of Internet users with high-speed connections in a particular city and the number of companies providing high-speed Internet in that area. Since many urban residents access the Internet by wi-fi, we also measure the number of public wireless Internet hot spots."

Read the entire article here. Read the Baltimore blurb here.

Baltimore's grassroots effort to be one of the lucky city's chosen as a test ground for Google's ultra-fast 1-gigabit per second broadband deployment is just one of several currently taking shape in city's across the country. See what the other cities competing for the prize doing...

Here's an excerpt:

"Broadband-starved cities and towns across the country are going to great lengths to grab the attention of Mountain View (Calif.)-based Google, which in February said it will set up a network that can deliver speeds of 1 gigabit per second, about 20 times faster than the speediest ones sold by Verizon Communications (VZ). Google will spend "hundreds of millions" on the effort, Richard Whitt, Google's Washington telecom and media counsel, said in a recent interview with Bloomberg News.

To set themselves apart, some municipal officials are naming cities after Google, owner of the world's largest Web search engine. The city of Greensboro, N.C., is preparing an "Operation Google" gift package for delivery to Google headquarters and has earmarked $50,000 for promoting a Google broadband effort."

Read the entire article here.

The Inner Harbor Arts Festival is a free event that will take place Aug. 22-23 at the Power Plant.

An excerpt from the article reads:

Mayor Sheila Dixon announced the Inner Harbor Arts Festival on Monday. It will be held the weekend of Aug. 22 near Cordish's Power Plant retail center.

More than $15 million in artwork, varying from handmade jewelry to more expensive fine art pieces, will be on display. Dixon said the new festival is not intended to compete with Artscape, the city-sponsored street fair.

Download the entire article here.

Home sales in the Baltimore area rose for the second straight month, giving residents a hopeful sign that the housing market here is strengthening.

An excerpt from the article reads:

The number of homes sold in July throughout Greater Baltimore rose 10 percent to 2,240, up from 2,038 during the same month last year. That's according to Rockville market research firm Metropolitan Regional Information Systems Inc.

Meanwhile, the median sold price in the Baltimore area � including Baltimore City, Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Carroll, Harford and Howard counties � declined by 6.5 percent to $259,950.

Both home builders and economists have said the uptick in sales could be linked to first-time buyers taking advantage of the government's $8,000 tax credit and overall better real estate prices. Units sold in June rose nearly 2 percent, marking the first year-over-year increase in Greater Baltimore in more than two years.

Read the entire article here.

Baltimore people on Twitter love their city and aren't shy about telling all twitterdom in 140 characters or less. Check this space every week as we comb Twitter for the best of what they're saying. And follow Bmore on Twitter here.

@Tawilkins says she feels sorry for people outside of Baltimore who have not experienced the pleasure of a summer snowball.

@Petote, affected by her trip on the cultural side, says the visionary art museum in baltimore was so interesting, but also, disturbing, it wouldnt get out of my nightmares last night

And that leads us to our Tweet of the Week, from @Ayakobing, who just wants everyone to know that B-more rocks! RT @hollisthomases: I am very proud to say that so many Baltimore peeps "get" Twitter. Baltimore rocks!!

Feedback from Twitter on our recent launch was very supportive. Thanks for the love, and here's a sampling:

MissMktr who tweets that if @RyanatMGH Need a reason to move to Union Square?, then Read @bmoremedia's article http://bit.ly/UG9su

DanieljGross sees a future for the 'zine @BmoreMedia just checked out the site that was recently launched. I think it could definitely catch on. Can't wait to see its growth!

GBMCMedia cosigned on Erica Mechlinski's tweet, announcing both had signed up for our e-newsletter, have you? RT @EricaMechlinski New fan of @bmoremedia. Just signed up to have it delivered to my inbox weekly. http://bit.ly/YD2Ts so did I :-)