Face to face
Interesting stuff popping out today around the net on social tools and face to face. On the OSLIST, there was a little discussion on using twitter and facebook and the pros and cons. I posted these thoughts:
I love the social tools because they allow me to connect with and get to know people in far flung areas who are closer to me in thought and spirit than those who are nearby. For me, twitter, facebook, skype and blogging are a means to an end, and that end os sharing open face to face conversations with folks that are in disperate places, but with whom I learn a lot.
And something to think about intergenerationally is that there are teenagers now who have lived their entire lives in a world with blogging, skype, and facebook. Think about that for a minute. These people don’t consider these technologies to be old at all. They consider them the default setting.
In a time when intergenerational conversation is becoming more important (how do we talk to the people with whom we have saddled with a trillion dollar debt, to explain to them to follies of our excess?) knowing a little about how these technologies enable self-organizing behaviour among digital natives is very important. And learning to use them I think is as important as employing other powerful social technologies like, say, Open Space.
So I don’t begrudge the unwillingness to particiapte in the collective monkey mind (thanks Karen!) or the pining for real contact, but I do encourage people to learn about and play with these tools, just like we have with OST and see what happens…
And then today, a couple of posts in the feed. Wendy Farmer-O’Neil dives back into blogging with a piece on “Web 3.0” and my neighbour and friend Emily van Lidthe de Jeude offers a lovely reflection on working with real world intimacy and global connectivity.
Chris, I’ve been meaning to write for a long to tell you how much I enjoy reading your blog, and this is a great excuse. (You have also had an indirect and important effect on my thinking through a story that Michael Herman passed along a few years ago; will tell you about that another time.)
Wanted to point you to a piece I wrote about Twitter and human connection. In particular, check out the link to Kevin Cheng’s thoughts, which this post reminded me of.
Thanks, Chris!
Great convergence of thoughts. Here’s another thing I’ve been realizing, lately: My youngest sister lives on her cellphone — literally. She sleeps with it, and once famously expired a phone by dropping it in the drink she was holding with the same hand. It’s only recently that I’ve opened my mind enough to appreciate that she’s not just texting all the time; she’s supporting the work of other shop employees while she’s away from work, she’s placing orders for the shop, making and keeping appointments throughout the day, checking email, bank accounts, traffic, weather and news, she’s keeping track of and coordinating the activities of our tween-aged niece… AND twittering, facebooking, following blogs, etc. etc. etc. It’s her connection to the rest of the world. Somehow the work that my father used to do at a desk in a back room of our family shop has migrated into a full mesh with the rest of my sister’s life, and somehow all the parts of her life come together in her cellphone, which is, for better or for worse, an extension of her mind. For (most) intents and purposes, it’s Albus Dumbledore’s pensieve.
Albus’s pensive! Beautiful!
That sounds like the name of a tune I might like. 🙂
Maybe I’ll have to write it.
I’ve always really liked Dina Mehta’s line … “I love my (interconnected) computer .. many of my friends live in it”