Clever Thoughts

Tron: Legacy is all sex and violins

// January 7th, 2011 // No Comments » // Musings

Elliptical Communication…

// October 28th, 2010 // 3 Comments » // Musings

Photos used under Creative Commons from Davide Restivo

I once had a professor in college that referred to my writing as elliptical. To him, it felt like you could put an ellipses (‘…’) before and after many of my statements, leaving large wholes in my arguments like potholes in the road.

Even today I am plagued with this style of communication. I think and write at the big picture and detail level, failing to connect the two. I have real problems adding context and building connective tissue in my communication.

There are many reasons why this might be. I have minor forms of dyslexia and ADD. I assume everything is obvious. I have trouble seeing the missing details. Did I mention the ADD… ooh… shiny.. BRB

In my life I have found that my closest friends and I seem to be able to communicate telepathically or my friends are smarter than I and can piece my thoughts together. Sometimes my thoughts are no greater than gestures at possible strings of thought.

So why is this a topic to bring up on my blog?

A moment of revelation…

I realized that one of the reasons I love and flourish in social media circles is because of my elliptical thought. This media is one place where elliptical thought is not only OK, but a powerful tool.

Twitter is a great place for dropping my big ideas in little packages.

Blogging let’s me tease out and examine some of the smaller details of some of my thoughts.

And with both, I do not need a connection point, it can all be tangential and that is perfectly acceptable.

Long live elliptical thought and social media!!

Student Loan Scheme

// September 3rd, 2010 // No Comments » // Musings

Infographic by College Scholarships.org

Overloaded

// June 6th, 2010 // No Comments » // Musings, Projects

Thanks to Brooklyn Museum and Flicker

Growing up I was taught to be inspired by the art and ideas of the Renaissance period. It was a time of great creativity and production. There was great opportunity for those who were looking for it. There was also a sense of holistic value, as we all know “Renaissance Man” refers to one who is edcuated and caught up in many topics.

To be a “Renaissance Man” means to have a lot of good ideas about lots of different things.

Today… it seems, we may be experiencing a new Renaissance. Through the internet and social media we are all connecting to new opportunities and trying out new ideas every day. We share our ideas through blogs, our news through twitter, our pictures through flicker… and on and on. This shared content becomes a way for opportunity to come to find us, as much as giving us the ability to find opportunities.

Well… great… this sounds like a good thing, but I am begining to wonder if it is really a good thing or not. Here is the problem:

I have lot’s of ideas, and they are blowing my brain up and leaking out my ears…

I begin to wonder how I choose the ideas that are of value, hell… I begin to wonder how to decide what is of value. The way I see it is that somethings we do for love, and others for money… but there must be a way to combine these things??

Currently the big themes in my life are GIS/Technology(work), Knitting/Fiber, Community Building, Social Media, Family… I find myself tagging on new ideas to each of these categories everyday, and am not sure where to spend my time. For example, I have a programming idea that relatest to the fiber world, so I could be working on that, but then it distracts from me learning new technology for GIS?

I am sure that i am not the only who feels pulled in all direction these days, perhap we need to start a tweet-up for people who need to find focus.

Speaking of dieing…

// August 14th, 2009 // 4 Comments » // Musings

(photo White House by phototram)

Having recently had my aunt pass away I am keenly interested in how people people face death. My aunt showed an incredible amount of strength in spirit as she faced her own mortality. She had been fighting ovarian cancer for years before getting to the point where there were no other options, at which point she began to work on her memorial and spend her time expressing her feelings to her loved ones with the energy she had left.

I love her and miss her.

This morning I read an article in the Boston Globe(paper copy) that stated “Senators eliminate end-of-life provision“. For those of you who don’t know, the provision in question allows for patients to speak to their doctors about their medical options when dealing with death in the current health care reform bill that is currently being fought over debated.

This really depresses me.

Basically, opponents of this provision have turned this into a question of putting old people down like pets. They refer to it as the “death panel” provision. The fear here is that if the government gets involved in health care the choice of who gets care will also include a choice of who will be killed off for the betterment of the nation.

How is it that this issue is being dropped. Isn’t it important for patients to talk to their doctors about living wills and who will make choices in case the patient is no longer capable. Where are all the cancer walkers and the democrats? Why is it so easy to convince everyone that talking to your doctor about death means you are talking about euthanas?

It’s just heartbreaking that this is being dropped. I guess it’s insane that this was the focus of the debate when the whole health care system costs and quality at large is really what is at issue with this bill… no?

Twitter is to conversation as Direct message is to…

// August 12th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Musings, Social Media

Rules of conversation are relative. It all depends on what you learned from your family and friends and where you are from geographically. In some places you can end a conversation over the phone without saying good bye (I would find this very disruptive)

With the advent of Twitter it seems that we are all learning a new way to converse. With only 140 characters and a few explicit ways to manage and direct the conversation flow, I find that is more important than ever to understand how to interact with others.

With this in mind I would like to share one of my core beliefs about the the Twitter conversation.

If Twitter is a conversation in a huge cafeteria where everyone can select the people they want to listen to, then Direct Messaging(DM) is the equivalent of asking someone into the hallway for a moment.

Using this understanding of DM, it would be ok with me to have you DM me about something personal, like your email or phone number. it would be ok to DM me something that might embarass me or you in front of the rest of the group, like asking what a hash tag is or telling me my avatar is super sexy.

It is NOT OK to direct message me generic information. If you DM me to thank me for following I get suspicious. If you DM me about a pyramid scheme or how to get more followers, I stop following all together.

Today I received multiple DMs about a charity that is trying to get people to tweet their specific congressmen about their cause. They created an app that puts out a message with a hash tag about your local politicians. Clever… but it also has an opt out button that asks to DM all your followers.

By sending DM to all your followers you will be setting a bad rep for you and thing you are sending the DM about. Follow me, based on what I have said so far… I have been asked into the hallway multiple times today to ask to join a cult charity. This was ok the first time, but with every new DM I get from a friend about this, I start to get more tired and unfriendly about the cause.

So, am I crazy about what the meaning of DM is? Is this how you see DM? Let me know what you think.

(The img used above by creative commons use is Lunch by adactio )