Chances are you may have come to this post because someone (me?) twittered the link. (Or you may be someone who stops by regularly via rss or other means, for which I thank you.) At the same time I have fairly recently complained about linking in twitter. Of course a real explanation takes more than 140 characters and so...here's a blog post.
The person, who had followed me so I was checking their twitter feed, and the top tweet asked, "How do you get more followers." My response was provide more content than links (as 90% of the page was links to their blog.)
So are links bad? Of course not. I tweet links all the time, including about my blog posts, and just as this person replied - I do like to know what other people are looking at on the internet. But that comes, of course, with a caveat.
I want to know what people I think are interesting, or I think have some common interests with me, or people I am friends with are looking at on the internet. There is plenty of stuff out on the internet I have no desire to look at.
When I use twitter to find these links I essentially am filtering by who I follow.
And how do I chose who follow? I ask, is the content of that person's tweets interesting, is this someone I know by other channels is interesting or shares a common interest, or is this person a friend.
As you can see by how many I follow, I follow back most people who follow me. I once tried cutting back the list followers to a "manageable amount" and that very day I had great conversation via @ message from someone I had just unfollowed. At that point I decided I'd follow those I think are interesting and would be someone I'd have a conversation with, and trust I'll catch the right things in the mighty flow of the twitter stream.
If you want people to follow you - and that is your stated goal, share who you are so people can known if you are a person they want to follow. That's the real secret, and I've read the same or heard the same from many. So share your links and announce your posts but also share some thoughts and comments in your twitter stream. We'd like to know you.
Showing posts with label twitter. Show all posts
Showing posts with label twitter. Show all posts
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
All Your Passwords Are Belong To Us
How much do you value your online identity? How often are you asked to share your login and password to a) find out your ranking b) locate your friends c) easily combine all of your feeds into one place.
I would bet that the answer to the first question is - fairly highly and the answer to the second question (if you are using social networking sites much at all) is fairly frequently. If I guessed your answers correctly then we have a problem.
Today twitter is a flurry about twitterank and the possibility that it was a twitter identity phishing site. Posts on mashable and zdnet talk about it in more detail. But calling the users gullible is really just ignoring the problem.
This problem doesn't just exist on twitter, and it doesn't just exist for people who want to rank themselves against others. The problem is that we have information, sometimes a lot of information, on many sites that we want to share with other sites.
As long as access to this information requires providing the login and password to a particular service to access that information people will continue to give out their login and password.
The truth is the services have trained us (beyond our natural tendencies) to give out that information by not implementing API's to allow access to the data in a more secure fashion.
The solution is not to be found by telling thousands of people to guard their password - that will not work. Rather the services need to implement APIs that allow the sharing of the information (and the revocation of the sharing of that information) that are as easy to use and as widely used as the "give me your login and password" solution that exists today.
Sure some features can be provided by third party tools - but (ahem, twitter are you listening) security actually needs to be implemented on a site by site basis.
There are some people who never share a login and psssword, but there are also people who still refuse to run AJAX. For the vast majority of the public there are at least some services that are critical enough to them to use that they need to share information between sites. It's time for web 2.0 to get to the next stage where there is a way to securely share that information.
I would bet that the answer to the first question is - fairly highly and the answer to the second question (if you are using social networking sites much at all) is fairly frequently. If I guessed your answers correctly then we have a problem.
Today twitter is a flurry about twitterank and the possibility that it was a twitter identity phishing site. Posts on mashable and zdnet talk about it in more detail. But calling the users gullible is really just ignoring the problem.
This problem doesn't just exist on twitter, and it doesn't just exist for people who want to rank themselves against others. The problem is that we have information, sometimes a lot of information, on many sites that we want to share with other sites.
As long as access to this information requires providing the login and password to a particular service to access that information people will continue to give out their login and password.
The truth is the services have trained us (beyond our natural tendencies) to give out that information by not implementing API's to allow access to the data in a more secure fashion.
The solution is not to be found by telling thousands of people to guard their password - that will not work. Rather the services need to implement APIs that allow the sharing of the information (and the revocation of the sharing of that information) that are as easy to use and as widely used as the "give me your login and password" solution that exists today.
Sure some features can be provided by third party tools - but (ahem, twitter are you listening) security actually needs to be implemented on a site by site basis.
There are some people who never share a login and psssword, but there are also people who still refuse to run AJAX. For the vast majority of the public there are at least some services that are critical enough to them to use that they need to share information between sites. It's time for web 2.0 to get to the next stage where there is a way to securely share that information.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
The Trouble with Twitters
I must confess, I am a twitterer. But you probably already knew that, and possibly wandered here from my twitter profile in the first place. I find I get a lot out of twitter, from useful information, social connections, news about events local and virtual, and more. The challenge is in taming the flow of the information.
Way back when I started using twitter I followed the basic policy that as long as someone who follows me isn't a bot, a commercial, or way too offensive I follow back. That was great at the beginning but once exceeding around 200 people being followed it became hard to follow the tweetstream as so much information and so many people are twittering. Sometimes the things I wanted to hear about just got missed in the rapid scroll of tweets. Some people only follow select people I can completely understand that policy, the nature of twitter changes significantly when the number gets large. Some people consider this elitist, I just consider this a different way of handling information flow.
I have considered cutting back the number of followers, but how do I pick. Once I went through a winnowing process and the next day got into a really interesting @ discussion with someone I had just unfollowed, who was promptly refollowed.
I tried setting up a second account with a "short list" but I usually ignored that stream, and keeping it up to date with new connections of people I do want to hear just proved too much bother.
The other problem is it isn't like I have one list of people I want to listen to. I'm involved in many different groups and activities and different people speak to different focuses. What I have wanted for a while was a way to group friends and be able to chose which group to look at. Twhirl's searches came close, but Tweetdeck really seems to have hit the nail on the head. I think that tweetdeck may be the start of a new breed of twitter clients.
For the first time in ages I can actually catch the conversations I was missing, and that also means I catch the main timeline more often too because I am getting value out of twitter again. It isn't enough to just "read what's current when you have time" because not all tweets are equal - I wanted the volume up higher on some tweets, and now I can have that. Thanks tweetdeck for giving me my twitter back.
Way back when I started using twitter I followed the basic policy that as long as someone who follows me isn't a bot, a commercial, or way too offensive I follow back. That was great at the beginning but once exceeding around 200 people being followed it became hard to follow the tweetstream as so much information and so many people are twittering. Sometimes the things I wanted to hear about just got missed in the rapid scroll of tweets. Some people only follow select people I can completely understand that policy, the nature of twitter changes significantly when the number gets large. Some people consider this elitist, I just consider this a different way of handling information flow.
I have considered cutting back the number of followers, but how do I pick. Once I went through a winnowing process and the next day got into a really interesting @ discussion with someone I had just unfollowed, who was promptly refollowed.
I tried setting up a second account with a "short list" but I usually ignored that stream, and keeping it up to date with new connections of people I do want to hear just proved too much bother.
The other problem is it isn't like I have one list of people I want to listen to. I'm involved in many different groups and activities and different people speak to different focuses. What I have wanted for a while was a way to group friends and be able to chose which group to look at. Twhirl's searches came close, but Tweetdeck really seems to have hit the nail on the head. I think that tweetdeck may be the start of a new breed of twitter clients.
For the first time in ages I can actually catch the conversations I was missing, and that also means I catch the main timeline more often too because I am getting value out of twitter again. It isn't enough to just "read what's current when you have time" because not all tweets are equal - I wanted the volume up higher on some tweets, and now I can have that. Thanks tweetdeck for giving me my twitter back.
Friday, June 6, 2008
It's not a Fishbowl, It's a Habitrail
In a lot of places I hear people talking about how we are in our little echo chamber, or fishbowl. I get that concept. I have talked with people who have written (and had published) books on film who when I talked to them about video on the net said "Oh yeah, my husband sometimes sends me funny videos from YouTube." Yes, there is a huge digital divide, no question about it.
Lately though I've been thinking it is less of a fishbowl and more of a habitrail. I have been working on building connections in Colorado and trying to create a network where those of us creating and involved in this new media/social media/web2.0 stuff in Colorado can start to meet each other and know about each other here in Colorado rather than finding our neighbors at some conference in Las Vegas.
What this means is that I am meeting a lot of people who are in the "fishbowl" who only know about some small segment of the fishbowl. Some of these people are well connected individuals yet when I mention people who I think are incredibly visible, like Loic Lemeur, Chris Brogan, Cali Lewis, or Gary Vaynerchuk they respond with a blank look. They have no idea who these people are.
After curbing my initial self righteous response I realize that chances are some of their big name people are unknowns to me. Yes I blog, but I'm not "a big blogger" my focus is video, so yes I know people who are visible in video. For those into audio there may be a whole other group of "must knows" that I may be ignorant of, and then music - who are the connectors there?
I may know a few people in each of these groups through twitter but really I swim in the social media tools, video and virtual worlds areas. Furthermore, even though I treat these areas as contiguous really each is its own area. Rather than being a big fishbowl it is more like we are in a habitrail. These worlds all connect through those tunnels but each section is mostly aware of the room they are in.
So I would say, yes we should ask, "How do we get out of the fishbowl or echo chamber?" But perhaps a first question is "How do we communicate across the habitrail?"
Lately though I've been thinking it is less of a fishbowl and more of a habitrail. I have been working on building connections in Colorado and trying to create a network where those of us creating and involved in this new media/social media/web2.0 stuff in Colorado can start to meet each other and know about each other here in Colorado rather than finding our neighbors at some conference in Las Vegas.
What this means is that I am meeting a lot of people who are in the "fishbowl" who only know about some small segment of the fishbowl. Some of these people are well connected individuals yet when I mention people who I think are incredibly visible, like Loic Lemeur, Chris Brogan, Cali Lewis, or Gary Vaynerchuk they respond with a blank look. They have no idea who these people are.
After curbing my initial self righteous response I realize that chances are some of their big name people are unknowns to me. Yes I blog, but I'm not "a big blogger" my focus is video, so yes I know people who are visible in video. For those into audio there may be a whole other group of "must knows" that I may be ignorant of, and then music - who are the connectors there?
I may know a few people in each of these groups through twitter but really I swim in the social media tools, video and virtual worlds areas. Furthermore, even though I treat these areas as contiguous really each is its own area. Rather than being a big fishbowl it is more like we are in a habitrail. These worlds all connect through those tunnels but each section is mostly aware of the room they are in.
So I would say, yes we should ask, "How do we get out of the fishbowl or echo chamber?" But perhaps a first question is "How do we communicate across the habitrail?"
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Technology and Travel
While I haven't traveled that often as of late, I have traveled quite a bit throughout my life. As a child I traveled to Europe and about 15 years ago I traveled frequently for work. However, back then travel and personal technology were not so closely linked. As a child I'd get puzzle books to entertain me. When I traveled for work I had a cell phone but it was just to make calls.
This trip I observed how technology was constantly part of the journey. I recognize this is by choice and not the experience for every traveler, but I suspect that in the future it will be the more common experience.
What follows is more simply observations of the experience. There are definitely some points below that deserve further thought. The changing focus of presence will have impact on how we interact and form relationships and what our expectations are of these relationships. It even has the potential for creating societal divides if not done with awareness. But for now, what follows is mainly my observation of my interaction with technology.
----
Of course I brought my laptop with me, but it stayed in its bag except for when at my parent's house, well and right now as I type this up at the airport. However, my little blackberry phone was in regular use. I was photoing the sights that caught my eye, some every day sights some slightly more artistic. Then these photos were sent up to the web, via email. Some went to Flickr, and more went to Brightkite, which I thought I would try to use more, since I was actually traveling rather than staying all in one zip code.
As I sent these pictures off I realized how much of my life I share and make public, and how different that is from only a few years ago. We live as mini-celebrities. "Look I'm here, and this is what I saw!" I suppose we have no paparazzi but ourselves, but the sharing our life as if others care is an interesting feature of our new digitally connected life. Yes,, I know other's care...but the visibility is far more than just your family/local friends/coworkers that might have seen the photos before. Even more so, because of the ease of taking and posting the photos shots of a grocery store with a Tapas bar got taken while it would have been silly or trivial to take such before.
Beyond the photo sharing nature of the trip there was also the IM client on the phone. I think I had 3 phone calls the whole trip, but I was chattering with people in private IMs and in twitter and even in chatterous.
I may have been no where near my "computer" but my phone stood in its stead. This constant partial connection is an interesting experience. Even wandering about in the world and spending time with people there were moments of communication with those distant.
Even with all that connection when I got online I still was doing catching up on missed messages on twitter and touching base with a few people through email.
I realize I have a few projects getting ramped up, and I also realize that I could have disconnected and the world wouldn't have ended. Even knowing that, it seemed natural and comfortable to be checking in and touching base with electronically connected friends. In a sense I shared my travel with others, which is a different way to fly.
This trip I observed how technology was constantly part of the journey. I recognize this is by choice and not the experience for every traveler, but I suspect that in the future it will be the more common experience.
What follows is more simply observations of the experience. There are definitely some points below that deserve further thought. The changing focus of presence will have impact on how we interact and form relationships and what our expectations are of these relationships. It even has the potential for creating societal divides if not done with awareness. But for now, what follows is mainly my observation of my interaction with technology.
----
Of course I brought my laptop with me, but it stayed in its bag except for when at my parent's house, well and right now as I type this up at the airport. However, my little blackberry phone was in regular use. I was photoing the sights that caught my eye, some every day sights some slightly more artistic. Then these photos were sent up to the web, via email. Some went to Flickr, and more went to Brightkite, which I thought I would try to use more, since I was actually traveling rather than staying all in one zip code.
As I sent these pictures off I realized how much of my life I share and make public, and how different that is from only a few years ago. We live as mini-celebrities. "Look I'm here, and this is what I saw!" I suppose we have no paparazzi but ourselves, but the sharing our life as if others care is an interesting feature of our new digitally connected life. Yes,, I know other's care...but the visibility is far more than just your family/local friends/coworkers that might have seen the photos before. Even more so, because of the ease of taking and posting the photos shots of a grocery store with a Tapas bar got taken while it would have been silly or trivial to take such before.
Beyond the photo sharing nature of the trip there was also the IM client on the phone. I think I had 3 phone calls the whole trip, but I was chattering with people in private IMs and in twitter and even in chatterous.
I may have been no where near my "computer" but my phone stood in its stead. This constant partial connection is an interesting experience. Even wandering about in the world and spending time with people there were moments of communication with those distant.
Even with all that connection when I got online I still was doing catching up on missed messages on twitter and touching base with a few people through email.
I realize I have a few projects getting ramped up, and I also realize that I could have disconnected and the world wouldn't have ended. Even knowing that, it seemed natural and comfortable to be checking in and touching base with electronically connected friends. In a sense I shared my travel with others, which is a different way to fly.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Twitter, The Sichuan Quake, and Emergency Response
Eric Rice started a thread of discussion on The Sichuan Quake and the Hubris of Twitter Users on his friendfeed. I had more than 255 characters worth of though (or whatever the comment character limit is), so I thought I would blog about it here.http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif
For those not on twitter or not following the twitter/earthquake discussion, there was much discussion about how the Earthquake in Sichuan China was reported first on twitter (see Scoble's article for an example) and a counter discussion on how we are overstating twitter's importance. What follows is my take on the subject.
Ok there are a few levels here. First off for local response first responders are going to want a coordinated form of communication. Hand talkies - whether ham or other format that convey voice would be my first choice. During a lot crisises these days people are relying on cell phones - everyone has one and they seem reliable. This isn't necessarily bad (at least in the US) because the phone companies have disaster plans and set up temporary communication towers quickly and drill on this. Yeah a ham radio may be more reliable but if you don't carry it on you and your standard system is cell phones it isn't going to help in a crisis. Finding a way to make the tools on-hand work is going to be way more useful.
Does this mean there is no use for Ham radio anymore? No, I would say that Ham radio is still very useful - they can be part of a disaster response, they have an ability to send messages great distances when local trunks will be overloaded even if functioning. Ham radio operators are part of RACES and ARES (and I suspect other country equivalents) and they drill and prepare to respond to emergencies. Ham radio is often part of the backbone that coordinates the overall response.
So that's great for local but what about outside of the local area. Well Ham radio will get some messages out, but tools like Twitter have the ability to spread the message quickly - among those who are watching. This means friends on twitter may be updated by a single SMS message that their friend is ok. This is way more efficient and taxes the phone trunks much less. This also means that interested people can know faster, and it may provide a connection to those in the situation that is helpful. Yeah it may not get a first responder to their door but when you are in a situation like that you can be perfectly healthy and safe but concerned about your friends. Twitter can provide a comfort that way.
More important than the local and the immediate friend/family connections twitter has it's true power in a great way to get the news out beyond the local area. It does give a personal face to a disaster, and it may become the source for news reports in the future, but even more importantly it can be part of early detechttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.giftion and early response, both of disasters, but also of potential epidemics. If you look at the INSTEDD program (video) it was started on the basis that scanning local messages for reports of diseases and disasters (as GPHIN was doing) was finding diseases like SARS months before organizations tasked with detecting this - such as WHO. Things like twitter are going to only speed this up - because the crawling can now see near real time chat rather than blog posts which tend to come a bit later along. I believe it is these features that extend outside of the locality of the crisis are where tools like twitter are adding something new.
So yes, twitter is an awesome tool and it is reporting things earlier - and better yet it is reporting it in a way that gets the message out with details that may help with early detection and early response. Should it be the only communication system. Of course not. Relying on any single system in an emergency creates a weakness in the response system, a single point of failure. Are we overstating twitter's importance. Probably, but some of this is the amazement that twitter does provide this feature so well and part of it is our desire to help explain why twitter is useful to those who look at it and go "Why?" Our excitement about our new tools shouldn't reduce our response and attention to disasters, for that would be true hubris, but at the same time these new tools have a place in improving our response and reaction time to these events.
For those not on twitter or not following the twitter/earthquake discussion, there was much discussion about how the Earthquake in Sichuan China was reported first on twitter (see Scoble's article for an example) and a counter discussion on how we are overstating twitter's importance. What follows is my take on the subject.
Ok there are a few levels here. First off for local response first responders are going to want a coordinated form of communication. Hand talkies - whether ham or other format that convey voice would be my first choice. During a lot crisises these days people are relying on cell phones - everyone has one and they seem reliable. This isn't necessarily bad (at least in the US) because the phone companies have disaster plans and set up temporary communication towers quickly and drill on this. Yeah a ham radio may be more reliable but if you don't carry it on you and your standard system is cell phones it isn't going to help in a crisis. Finding a way to make the tools on-hand work is going to be way more useful.
Does this mean there is no use for Ham radio anymore? No, I would say that Ham radio is still very useful - they can be part of a disaster response, they have an ability to send messages great distances when local trunks will be overloaded even if functioning. Ham radio operators are part of RACES and ARES (and I suspect other country equivalents) and they drill and prepare to respond to emergencies. Ham radio is often part of the backbone that coordinates the overall response.
So that's great for local but what about outside of the local area. Well Ham radio will get some messages out, but tools like Twitter have the ability to spread the message quickly - among those who are watching. This means friends on twitter may be updated by a single SMS message that their friend is ok. This is way more efficient and taxes the phone trunks much less. This also means that interested people can know faster, and it may provide a connection to those in the situation that is helpful. Yeah it may not get a first responder to their door but when you are in a situation like that you can be perfectly healthy and safe but concerned about your friends. Twitter can provide a comfort that way.
More important than the local and the immediate friend/family connections twitter has it's true power in a great way to get the news out beyond the local area. It does give a personal face to a disaster, and it may become the source for news reports in the future, but even more importantly it can be part of early detechttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.giftion and early response, both of disasters, but also of potential epidemics. If you look at the INSTEDD program (video) it was started on the basis that scanning local messages for reports of diseases and disasters (as GPHIN was doing) was finding diseases like SARS months before organizations tasked with detecting this - such as WHO. Things like twitter are going to only speed this up - because the crawling can now see near real time chat rather than blog posts which tend to come a bit later along. I believe it is these features that extend outside of the locality of the crisis are where tools like twitter are adding something new.
So yes, twitter is an awesome tool and it is reporting things earlier - and better yet it is reporting it in a way that gets the message out with details that may help with early detection and early response. Should it be the only communication system. Of course not. Relying on any single system in an emergency creates a weakness in the response system, a single point of failure. Are we overstating twitter's importance. Probably, but some of this is the amazement that twitter does provide this feature so well and part of it is our desire to help explain why twitter is useful to those who look at it and go "Why?" Our excitement about our new tools shouldn't reduce our response and attention to disasters, for that would be true hubris, but at the same time these new tools have a place in improving our response and reaction time to these events.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Peasful Thoughts
It is Friday, which means it's a Frozen Pea Friday.
In an amazing set of coincidences I was just sitting down to eat some frozen peas (that had been subsequently warmed up) when Chel Pixie asked if I could make a video for the frozen pea fund.
If you haven't made it to the site yet, click the link above or the one here, and donate the equivalent of two bags of frozen peas to the fund to support breast cancer research.
In an amazing set of coincidences I was just sitting down to eat some frozen peas (that had been subsequently warmed up) when Chel Pixie asked if I could make a video for the frozen pea fund.
If you haven't made it to the site yet, click the link above or the one here, and donate the equivalent of two bags of frozen peas to the fund to support breast cancer research.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
The Trivial Nature of Life
The past couple of weeks I have been amazed at the dynamics of communities within the Social Media Sphere. Both the Frozen Pea Fund and also the nature of debate, such as the debates in Seesmic that have spilled out into blogs has been fascinating to watch. In a sense these things have existed in online forums and the like long before online video, but the nature of the current trivial communication mechanisms, such as Twitter and Seesmic, I think have broadened who we would encounter and how we can communicate, and in the case of video by providing tone of voice and body language.
Now I realize that in person meetings and gatherings convey a whole new level connection and people can just waste time that could be spent otherwise. That said, I have found it fascinating that these tools that enable us to easily communicate the trivialities of our lives give us more of the sense of a community or a tribe - where we might go beyond simply words and move to actions - such as raising funds for someone we've only met through 140 character snippets.
Here is a video where I talk more on the subject:
Now I realize that in person meetings and gatherings convey a whole new level connection and people can just waste time that could be spent otherwise. That said, I have found it fascinating that these tools that enable us to easily communicate the trivialities of our lives give us more of the sense of a community or a tribe - where we might go beyond simply words and move to actions - such as raising funds for someone we've only met through 140 character snippets.
Here is a video where I talk more on the subject:
Friday, December 21, 2007
Frozen Pea Friday
So much to post about and so little time on winter-time Friday's but before I go, a quick post. Please check out the FrozenPeaFund.
This is an incredible example of how our online communities and "tribes" come together and support each other. It is more that talk, it really is connection. More on that later.
This is an incredible example of how our online communities and "tribes" come together and support each other. It is more that talk, it really is connection. More on that later.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Useless Tools of Importance
The latest and greatest of the web provides us with a plethora of tools to play with and communicate with. Some of the tools out there seem pretty...well...silly at first glance. Some of these probably still seem that way to people who don't "get" what we are calling web 2.0.
Of course this "useless" moniker could have been applied to a lot of stuff that is now common place. Who needs a web page? Why do you need email? Wireless - what for? The list goes on - probably forever (who needs a telephone in their home...)
A few of these tools were tools I used on in my recent road trip. The two tools that took center stage were Twitter and Utterz, and to some extent the two of them together.
Twitter was definitely something that I didn't get when I heard about it. It sounds narcissistic at best, and pointless for the most part. Oh yeah, let me broadcast details of my daily life, like people care. Well the truth is - in physical space we do broadcast details of our daily life, not to everyone, but to anyone who is in listening range of our casual conversations. "Hey I'm heading to the x movie.", "I'm on my way to a restaurant", "I read this really cool book". Just over the web we didn't chat in public spaces and how many of your friends were really on line that you'd tell them online instead of in person.
Twitter sort of changed that picture, and although we may have started with only a couple of friends, or people we thought were interesting that we wanted to eavesdrop on, eventually this evolved. People we followed followed back and casual chit chat developed into relationships - in part by the other places where we could "go out and talk" like chat rooms on the live video websites, real life meet-ups and Second Life.
Utterz is a bit more recent. Quite a few people that I was following on Twitter were using Utterz (I know because their Utterz were tweeted.) At first I though it was yet another add on service - there are many out there. Eventually enough people were uttering that I had to check it out. (Ok, it got my curiosity going.) Something about Utterz is better than the other "record audio" services out there. You can call in on your phone and it records your message. You can send videos and pictures and text and also have it be part of your Utterz. And, and I think this may be the key feature, it can tie into other services - twittering, auto-posting to blogs, and the like. That feature is what let me know about it in the first place.
A road trip is an awesome time to spend time thinking, and experiencing the road. With all the thinking there is a desire to capture those thoughts because once back in the crowd of civilization that perspective can be lost. I suppose the answer for some would be to keep a journal of the adventure, or even record ones thoughts on tape. (Admittedly I did record some of my thoughts on voice recorders.) However Utterz and twitter added to this experience. They provided a way to record my thoughts and at the same time share them with others. The people who cared about my progress (and safety) on the journey could all receive messages as I progressed on my journey, and for others they could enjoy my journey vicariously. At the same time when I came to a place to stop I could check in and see the responses to my updates. It was a pretty amazing experience, and it was interesting seeing peoples responses to the journey. At the same time these "new tools" provided comfort for those who worried about me journeying alone.
Could I have done it without these tools. Sure - for now. But it may be that some time in the future broadcasting tools, and the way we gather information, will make tools like twitter and utterz essential, just like the "luxury cellphone" has become an essential item when traveling.
Of course this "useless" moniker could have been applied to a lot of stuff that is now common place. Who needs a web page? Why do you need email? Wireless - what for? The list goes on - probably forever (who needs a telephone in their home...)
A few of these tools were tools I used on in my recent road trip. The two tools that took center stage were Twitter and Utterz, and to some extent the two of them together.
Twitter was definitely something that I didn't get when I heard about it. It sounds narcissistic at best, and pointless for the most part. Oh yeah, let me broadcast details of my daily life, like people care. Well the truth is - in physical space we do broadcast details of our daily life, not to everyone, but to anyone who is in listening range of our casual conversations. "Hey I'm heading to the x movie.", "I'm on my way to a restaurant", "I read this really cool book". Just over the web we didn't chat in public spaces and how many of your friends were really on line that you'd tell them online instead of in person.
Twitter sort of changed that picture, and although we may have started with only a couple of friends, or people we thought were interesting that we wanted to eavesdrop on, eventually this evolved. People we followed followed back and casual chit chat developed into relationships - in part by the other places where we could "go out and talk" like chat rooms on the live video websites, real life meet-ups and Second Life.
Utterz is a bit more recent. Quite a few people that I was following on Twitter were using Utterz (I know because their Utterz were tweeted.) At first I though it was yet another add on service - there are many out there. Eventually enough people were uttering that I had to check it out. (Ok, it got my curiosity going.) Something about Utterz is better than the other "record audio" services out there. You can call in on your phone and it records your message. You can send videos and pictures and text and also have it be part of your Utterz. And, and I think this may be the key feature, it can tie into other services - twittering, auto-posting to blogs, and the like. That feature is what let me know about it in the first place.
A road trip is an awesome time to spend time thinking, and experiencing the road. With all the thinking there is a desire to capture those thoughts because once back in the crowd of civilization that perspective can be lost. I suppose the answer for some would be to keep a journal of the adventure, or even record ones thoughts on tape. (Admittedly I did record some of my thoughts on voice recorders.) However Utterz and twitter added to this experience. They provided a way to record my thoughts and at the same time share them with others. The people who cared about my progress (and safety) on the journey could all receive messages as I progressed on my journey, and for others they could enjoy my journey vicariously. At the same time when I came to a place to stop I could check in and see the responses to my updates. It was a pretty amazing experience, and it was interesting seeing peoples responses to the journey. At the same time these "new tools" provided comfort for those who worried about me journeying alone.
Could I have done it without these tools. Sure - for now. But it may be that some time in the future broadcasting tools, and the way we gather information, will make tools like twitter and utterz essential, just like the "luxury cellphone" has become an essential item when traveling.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Public, Private and Otherwise
As most of you probably know I am active on Twitter and Seesmic and Facebook and other web 2.0y sites. One of the themes that have been coming up a lot is about how we build relationships over these mediums. Loic Le Meur compares Seesmic to us all living together or being in the same room. Jeff Pulver calls it his social media living room.
I will admit I have some of those feelings. With these instant communication mediums we see into people's lives: Moments with their children, questions they have in life, ceremonies and celebrations, issues they think are important, what they are having for dinner or when they are drinking coffee. We develop a certain intimacy while never really being there physically. I mean, the ideal is that I will meet my Seesmic and Twitter friends but so far I have not.
That said, these living rooms, and bedrooms and kitchens we see are being shared on the public internet. Each tweet gets indexed by Google and our visages and words are easily brought up in a search. So that begs the question, how much do we share in public, even as we have the feel of a private space?
Last night, while my internet was down, I wrote up a post explaining why I haven't been posting which included the personal story of my past year, and ending with basically "I've been thinking lots, still have questions, am not satisfied, but time to get posting again." As you might note that post is not here. That might change, but putting those details down in my blog seemed to be too much of an exposure.
Now there are a a few points that make a blog differ from a Seesmic post or a tweet. My blog is, in a sense, where a person would go to find out more about me. Sure they might check my tweets or videos, but those sort of stream by. It is a public statement, but with so much volume as to make the information a bit of blur - at least for a human reviewing the data. So a statement here is a bit more permanent and likely read. Also, other than bits of data that slip I rarely share my questions and doubts and challenges with others, so perhaps I am just a bit less likely than most to share.
But I wonder how much people chose to show of their inner side. What makes someone comfortable to share the information? When is it appropriate? Is this sense of "private" and "public" a generational thing? a cultural thing? Do we become less sensitive to that boundary as we share more often, more consistently and more in private public areas? Or do we, in our minds, come up with our personal boundary - that we many not be aware of - and share freely on one side, and keep private what is on the other? And how do these boundaries, and the ubiquitousness of the social milieu affect how we interact in our actual private lives and relationships?
Right now all I have are questions, but I thought I would share them with you. Let me know your thoughts.
I will admit I have some of those feelings. With these instant communication mediums we see into people's lives: Moments with their children, questions they have in life, ceremonies and celebrations, issues they think are important, what they are having for dinner or when they are drinking coffee. We develop a certain intimacy while never really being there physically. I mean, the ideal is that I will meet my Seesmic and Twitter friends but so far I have not.
That said, these living rooms, and bedrooms and kitchens we see are being shared on the public internet. Each tweet gets indexed by Google and our visages and words are easily brought up in a search. So that begs the question, how much do we share in public, even as we have the feel of a private space?
Last night, while my internet was down, I wrote up a post explaining why I haven't been posting which included the personal story of my past year, and ending with basically "I've been thinking lots, still have questions, am not satisfied, but time to get posting again." As you might note that post is not here. That might change, but putting those details down in my blog seemed to be too much of an exposure.
Now there are a a few points that make a blog differ from a Seesmic post or a tweet. My blog is, in a sense, where a person would go to find out more about me. Sure they might check my tweets or videos, but those sort of stream by. It is a public statement, but with so much volume as to make the information a bit of blur - at least for a human reviewing the data. So a statement here is a bit more permanent and likely read. Also, other than bits of data that slip I rarely share my questions and doubts and challenges with others, so perhaps I am just a bit less likely than most to share.
But I wonder how much people chose to show of their inner side. What makes someone comfortable to share the information? When is it appropriate? Is this sense of "private" and "public" a generational thing? a cultural thing? Do we become less sensitive to that boundary as we share more often, more consistently and more in private public areas? Or do we, in our minds, come up with our personal boundary - that we many not be aware of - and share freely on one side, and keep private what is on the other? And how do these boundaries, and the ubiquitousness of the social milieu affect how we interact in our actual private lives and relationships?
Right now all I have are questions, but I thought I would share them with you. Let me know your thoughts.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Regional Elitism & Web 2.0 - A Video Response
A video response to the thread that Eric Rice started on regional elitism.
(Scobleizer's rejoinder to Eric can be seen here. Other parts of the discussion are scattered about the web)
(Scobleizer's rejoinder to Eric can be seen here. Other parts of the discussion are scattered about the web)
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Twitter Tutorial
If you aren't already on twitter - or if you have a friend you are trying to get into twitter here is a tutorial of twitter. The basics are covered in the first 11 minutes and the rest of the video goes into a slightly more in depth view of twitter.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Bacn and Paper Towels
Ok, now that I'm seeing even people I think would know better complaining about Bacn, like Seth Godin I have to speak up about Paper Towels.
You want the info but later (otherwise you probably would have turned it off on the configuration of your twitter/facebook/pounce/jaiku/8apps/etc.) What do you do?
People - this has been around forever. When you are on lots of mailing lists you don't necessarily want the news in your in-box either - that is why G-d invented mail filters.
Each mail program has its own special way to set up mail filters - but you can have the bacn go straight to its own special folder. You know the domain the email will be coming from - it's really easy to filter.
So stop complaining about bacn - enjoy it in its right place and keep your email useful.
Below I will provide some tips on how to set up mail filters on some of the more common mail programs. (Sorry Linux users I don't know what the "common email program" would be for you but I suspect you already know how to do this.) Enjoy your paper towels and consume bacn responsibly.
(And if you don't want the service notifications - check your preferences - most of these services let you turn off their info emails.)
On to the email filters.
Gmail - They are called filters but the power comes from the labels. Label the mail and archive it (Skip the inbox checkbox.) Then click on the labels on the side bar (towards the bottom) to read your bacn when ready. Learn how to set up filters here: http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=6579
Apple Mail - Set up rules and dump the mail in its own special mailbox. If you want you can create a bacn folder and then have a mailbox for each service - or you can just dump it all into a general bacn box. Ok...I'm not finding a great page on this but I'll augment the Apple support doc I found.
1) Create your bacn box (Mailbox-> new mailbox)
2) Select some Bacn
3) Follow the directions to set up a rule here http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=151480
because you already selected the mail you want to filter it will already fill in the the email address to filter on (you can chose other criteria if you prefer). Tell it to move the message to your new bacn folder.
Outlook - What you are looking for is user defined filters. Check out this page for the details: http://www.uh.edu/infotech/php/template.php?nonsvc_id=247
Outlook express - Details on filters for Outlook express can be found here: http://www.opentechsupport.net/forums/archive/topic/7626-1.html
You want the info but later (otherwise you probably would have turned it off on the configuration of your twitter/facebook/pounce/jaiku/8apps/etc.) What do you do?
People - this has been around forever. When you are on lots of mailing lists you don't necessarily want the news in your in-box either - that is why G-d invented mail filters.
Each mail program has its own special way to set up mail filters - but you can have the bacn go straight to its own special folder. You know the domain the email will be coming from - it's really easy to filter.
So stop complaining about bacn - enjoy it in its right place and keep your email useful.
Below I will provide some tips on how to set up mail filters on some of the more common mail programs. (Sorry Linux users I don't know what the "common email program" would be for you but I suspect you already know how to do this.) Enjoy your paper towels and consume bacn responsibly.
(And if you don't want the service notifications - check your preferences - most of these services let you turn off their info emails.)
On to the email filters.
Gmail - They are called filters but the power comes from the labels. Label the mail and archive it (Skip the inbox checkbox.) Then click on the labels on the side bar (towards the bottom) to read your bacn when ready. Learn how to set up filters here: http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=6579
Apple Mail - Set up rules and dump the mail in its own special mailbox. If you want you can create a bacn folder and then have a mailbox for each service - or you can just dump it all into a general bacn box. Ok...I'm not finding a great page on this but I'll augment the Apple support doc I found.
1) Create your bacn box (Mailbox-> new mailbox)
2) Select some Bacn
3) Follow the directions to set up a rule here http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=151480
because you already selected the mail you want to filter it will already fill in the the email address to filter on (you can chose other criteria if you prefer). Tell it to move the message to your new bacn folder.
Outlook - What you are looking for is user defined filters. Check out this page for the details: http://www.uh.edu/infotech/php/template.php?nonsvc_id=247
Outlook express - Details on filters for Outlook express can be found here: http://www.opentechsupport.net/forums/archive/topic/7626-1.html
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Operator 11 Twitter Vox
Wednesday I remembered that Loudmouthman had mentioned the Twittervox Show on Operator 11 and I asked him when it was. It turns out it was in about three hours from when I asked him. I was able to join in on the show, and it was the first Operator 11 show I joined and it was a ton of fun. Once the show got going it really felt like a round table discussion. We talked about twitter and second life and relationships built over virtual spaces.
Warzabidul, the host, blogged about it and pointed out that it was the featured show for today. You can check out this weeks episode here. If you can, join us next week on August 29th at 12PM PST for episode 3.
Warzabidul, the host, blogged about it and pointed out that it was the featured show for today. You can check out this weeks episode here. If you can, join us next week on August 29th at 12PM PST for episode 3.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Promote Yourself
Eric Rice was talking about the skills rating feature of 8apps on Twitter, and there was a bit of discussion of whether people like/don't like such a feature. Given the way the tool is implemented, the feature can be a great tool, because it lets you know how other people perceive your skills.
You know what you are good at and what you like to do, but if others aren't seeing it they aren't going to think of you when they need that skill. Tools like these help let you know how others are seeing you. By knowing how others rate you, you can know if you need to work on how your being perceived.
Perception, in part, comes down to promotion, or more specifically self-promotion.
I don't know about you, but for me for years self-promotion seemed selfish and egotistical. My attitude was "I did it, that should be enough for me to get recognized." (Ok...now what attitude was egotistical.)
The truth is, everyone is busy living their lives and has their own priorities. They may notice that the job was done but not bother to see who it was that did it. Alternatively, maybe your work was fundamental to the success but not the flashy front-line work that everyone notices. In our fast paced information filled lives there is only so much we can pay attention to.
This means that we need to promote ourselves if we want to be recognized for what we do. AND...and this is the part that took me a while to get... it isn't selfish. If you don't promote yourself people won't know what you can offer and you will be denying them the use of your skills.
Now how to promote yourself, well Chris Brogan has an excellent post on this. As he points out: make it about your audience. This is true whether it is your new product/website/gadget or if it is about your skills at your everyday job.
There is a time and place for anonymous action. Just make sure your anonymous actions are chosen and not caused by an oversight.
You know what you are good at and what you like to do, but if others aren't seeing it they aren't going to think of you when they need that skill. Tools like these help let you know how others are seeing you. By knowing how others rate you, you can know if you need to work on how your being perceived.
Perception, in part, comes down to promotion, or more specifically self-promotion.
I don't know about you, but for me for years self-promotion seemed selfish and egotistical. My attitude was "I did it, that should be enough for me to get recognized." (Ok...now what attitude was egotistical.)
The truth is, everyone is busy living their lives and has their own priorities. They may notice that the job was done but not bother to see who it was that did it. Alternatively, maybe your work was fundamental to the success but not the flashy front-line work that everyone notices. In our fast paced information filled lives there is only so much we can pay attention to.
This means that we need to promote ourselves if we want to be recognized for what we do. AND...and this is the part that took me a while to get... it isn't selfish. If you don't promote yourself people won't know what you can offer and you will be denying them the use of your skills.
Now how to promote yourself, well Chris Brogan has an excellent post on this. As he points out: make it about your audience. This is true whether it is your new product/website/gadget or if it is about your skills at your everyday job.
There is a time and place for anonymous action. Just make sure your anonymous actions are chosen and not caused by an oversight.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Rez Day Writings
Eric Rice just twittered about it being rez day for when he first joined Second Life (SL), and that reminded me that today is my rez day too. One year ago today I joined SL. So what prompted me to join SL. Well, Robert Scoble had been blogging about SL so I had a bit of curiosity. What finally tipped the scales was when I heard that they were having a Barcamp in SL (which I later found out Eric Rice had something to do with). I figured that if there are having conferences in SL it was high time I figured out how to use the tool.
Of course, that's what I thought I was joining SL for. In truth I think I was joining for other reasons. I am a rather social person. Right now I work from home, and at the time I was in serious pain and not leaving the house for anything, except maybe a doctor's appointment. SL gave me the opportunity to meet people again. It also gave me a way to rethink movement. Even though movement in SL can be a bit wonky compared to how I was moving in real life it was a big improvement, and there was no pain when I walked.
So far I've only gone to a few conferences here and there. I tend to spend my time role playing, dancing, building, and getting to know people. I've been adopted as mom, been the one to talk to about problems, planned and executed a coronation, and done a whole bunch of fun stuff in a year. And the friends I made gave me the courage to go through with two hip resurfacing operations, go to England (6 weeks after one and before the other) for my graduation at the University of Liverpool, and think a lot about who I am and what I can contribute.
And now, here I am wandering the web2.0, social network, blogosphere, virtual and real worlds one year later.
Of course, that's what I thought I was joining SL for. In truth I think I was joining for other reasons. I am a rather social person. Right now I work from home, and at the time I was in serious pain and not leaving the house for anything, except maybe a doctor's appointment. SL gave me the opportunity to meet people again. It also gave me a way to rethink movement. Even though movement in SL can be a bit wonky compared to how I was moving in real life it was a big improvement, and there was no pain when I walked.
So far I've only gone to a few conferences here and there. I tend to spend my time role playing, dancing, building, and getting to know people. I've been adopted as mom, been the one to talk to about problems, planned and executed a coronation, and done a whole bunch of fun stuff in a year. And the friends I made gave me the courage to go through with two hip resurfacing operations, go to England (6 weeks after one and before the other) for my graduation at the University of Liverpool, and think a lot about who I am and what I can contribute.
And now, here I am wandering the web2.0, social network, blogosphere, virtual and real worlds one year later.
Monday, May 21, 2007
Kings and Queens - or Kabbalah On One Foot
In a discussion on twitter about whether or not conversation is King I made a bit of a flippant comment "but a King is always best with a Queen, perhaps content is queen (although kabbalistically conversation is queen. I digress)". To elaborate on this comment would take more than 140 characters, so I thought I would blog about it.
One of the central concepts of kabbalah (however you want to spell it) is the tree of life. I often think of it as being a bit like a fractal design. If you've ever played with fractal programs you can look at a pattern and zoom into a part and find the pattern repeating itself. The pattern of the tree of life is used from the beginning of creation - with the shattering of the vessels of Tohu (chaos) (think big bang) - all the way down until we see the pattern in our own body.
Leaving Keter/the Crown aside for the moment we have:
Wisdom and Understanding being the two hemispheres of the brain.
Kindness and severity being the two arms (one pushing away (severity - the left arm/the weaker arm) one drawing close (kindness - the right arm)
Beauty or harmony - the torso (- think of classic Greek beauty - it was the definition of the torso that reflected it and how the lines of the arms drew the focus into the core of the body.)
Victory and Appreciation - the legs
Foundation - the base of the torso or "The organ of procreation"
And Malchut/Royalty - often translated as Kingship - is the womb....or the mouth.
Although Malchut is translated as kingship it is a feminine aspect within the tree. (No duh Goldie - you said it was the womb.) So what do the womb and the mouth have to do with each other?
One aspect of the womb is that it conceals something yet at the same time it is the place where gestation occurs and it gives forth a new being. It reveals and conceals. It takes something internal and intimate and creates something which is separate. If you think of the nature of speech - or communication - it takes an idea that a person had and through a process of development (taking it from thought to communication) those thoughts become words, which are expressed by the mouth and then becomes separate. Some aspects of the original thoughts are concealed - but it also reveals an idea that was hidden before.
Now where did all of these ideas come from that are suddenly revealed - did it just spring forth from the mouth fully formed? Of course not - it came from the mind, from the emotions from the weighing of how to best say something and choosing ones words, and then with the mouth we speak. The content comes first, and then based on the content produced by that process the words have value, or lack thereof.
If we go back to the tree of life above the nearest source for the content, that which coalesces the ideas before they reach Malchut - is a masculine aspect - the King who joins with the Queen.
Thus we have Content is King, and Communication is Queen. But content without communication isn't nearly as powerful as the two combined. (And the reverse is also true.)
One of the central concepts of kabbalah (however you want to spell it) is the tree of life. I often think of it as being a bit like a fractal design. If you've ever played with fractal programs you can look at a pattern and zoom into a part and find the pattern repeating itself. The pattern of the tree of life is used from the beginning of creation - with the shattering of the vessels of Tohu (chaos) (think big bang) - all the way down until we see the pattern in our own body.
Leaving Keter/the Crown aside for the moment we have:
Wisdom and Understanding being the two hemispheres of the brain.
Kindness and severity being the two arms (one pushing away (severity - the left arm/the weaker arm) one drawing close (kindness - the right arm)
Beauty or harmony - the torso (- think of classic Greek beauty - it was the definition of the torso that reflected it and how the lines of the arms drew the focus into the core of the body.)
Victory and Appreciation - the legs
Foundation - the base of the torso or "The organ of procreation"
And Malchut/Royalty - often translated as Kingship - is the womb....or the mouth.
Although Malchut is translated as kingship it is a feminine aspect within the tree. (No duh Goldie - you said it was the womb.) So what do the womb and the mouth have to do with each other?
One aspect of the womb is that it conceals something yet at the same time it is the place where gestation occurs and it gives forth a new being. It reveals and conceals. It takes something internal and intimate and creates something which is separate. If you think of the nature of speech - or communication - it takes an idea that a person had and through a process of development (taking it from thought to communication) those thoughts become words, which are expressed by the mouth and then becomes separate. Some aspects of the original thoughts are concealed - but it also reveals an idea that was hidden before.
Now where did all of these ideas come from that are suddenly revealed - did it just spring forth from the mouth fully formed? Of course not - it came from the mind, from the emotions from the weighing of how to best say something and choosing ones words, and then with the mouth we speak. The content comes first, and then based on the content produced by that process the words have value, or lack thereof.
If we go back to the tree of life above the nearest source for the content, that which coalesces the ideas before they reach Malchut - is a masculine aspect - the King who joins with the Queen.
Thus we have Content is King, and Communication is Queen. But content without communication isn't nearly as powerful as the two combined. (And the reverse is also true.)
Thursday, May 3, 2007
Welcome to My Blog
With all these great tools and portals and new thangs out there it seemed time to add a blog to the mix to tie in the twitters and the kyte.tv and the whatnot else. Maybe I'll even have something to say. Right now this is more of a test platform to try out stuff but maybe it will become something more. You never know.
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