Clunky Flow

Dan Trevino had this to say over on Jaiku on a conversational thread that spun off from something Damien Mulley said in passing here

“Twitter is for the socially inept. You cant carry on any kind of conversation there, and maybe its not designed for that. Thats fine, but to me its just too messy…Twitter love is irrational…”

I wholeheartedly dis/agree. Here’s why:

Irrational love is compelling love

I totally agree that twitter love is irrational. But irrational love is also compelling love. The most compelling kind of love. Its the kind of love you want to experience in your life. Its the kind of love you should seek to cultivate. If you are interested in getting into business, its the kind of love you should hope your offerings inspire. Ask people why they love twitter and they are likely to shrug and coyly say ‘I dunno…’ Which is charming in its own way.

Rational love is NOT compelling love…
Jaiku love on the other hand is 100% rational. And much less compelling for that. Rational love is not compelling love. Love is an irrational commitment. Rational love? There is no such thing. Rational choice is the safe choice. Its the comfort zone. Ask a jaikuist why they love jaiku and they’ll rationally assert that it has a rich set of features that make it possible to control the noise and better manage conversations.

I’m bringing the party down. Why can’t I just lighten up a bit?
Even you geekiest of geeks and nerdiest of nerds recognise that one fault they have is that their conversational instincts can sometimes tend to bring the party down. That sometimes they are inclined to be blind to the fact that considered conversation is inappropriate and should be dropped when all are gathered for the purpose of having fun.

Its a GOOD thing to LOSE the conversational thread
The socially inept are those who are considered to be blind to or choose to ignore social cues obvious to the rest. Those that shy away from messy social situations where they are required to improvise. Those that are uncomfortable in confusing social situations. Confusing social situations where it is easy and in fact socially necessary to lose the conversational thread.

Twitter’s main feature is that it runs interference against deep and meaningfuls
The socially inept might well miss the point of Twitter. Twitter is not about considered opinion and considered conversation. Its main feature is that it runs interference against the social instinct to engage in deep and meaningful conversation.

Interference is a social lubricant
This interference is a social lubricant. As I’m fond of saying, people play loud music at parties for precisely the same reason. They want to run interference against the human instinct to sit down and have considered conversation. You know. Considered conversation being the type of conversation that is not conducive to a party atmosphere.

Irrational love feels so good
Some of the people who go to parties with loud music will naturally gravitate away from the action towards the kitchen. In some ways, Jaiku is the kitchen area at the microblogging party. While twitter is the main party room. Whether we are able to join in fully or not, we are all drawn to the buzz and activity of a party. Its a hard wired instinct. Its not rational. Its instinctual. And all the more real for that. And its deeply rewarding to our psyches to engage. And if we are unable to engage. Then at least to hover nearby.

Hows that for a detailed exposition of the light and fluffy? Heavy going? Time to lighten up with a bit of music. And who better and appropriate at this time than Jona Lewie.

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First the Bad News:

An impending recession means its bad news if you are in geared in deeply with the VCs and need to move rapidly on from trading on your cool new Web2.0-ish-ness to start demonstrating substantial short-term returns on investment.

And now the Good News:

Its good news if you can bootstrap, grow organically and emerge the other side. Where it’ll be a lot quieter. And much easier to get yourself heard. And by corollary good news for the YCombinator and SeedCamp model.

Via VentureBeat.com

Jon Fisher -a board member for several Silicon Valley based start-ups- predicts a “massive wave” of start-up technology company bankruptcies in the next quarters, as they run out of funding, struggle to make money and fail to find acquirers. On the other hand, some think that if companies can make it through the next several months, they’ll be especially well positioned for the ensuing economic recovery, in part because of reduced competition.

Plus ca change.

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And loving their now famous Engrish tagline:

Enjoy our *** Komfort in a cosy harmoniously atmosphere!

And get a load of all these ski runs. They better be prepared. We mean business. Those nursery slopes won’t know what hit them.

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From today’s New York Times

Kids played Dungeons and Dragons in basements instead of socializing. Geeks like algorithms. We like sets of rules that guide future behavior. But people, normal people, consistently act outside rule sets. People are messy and unpredictable, until you have something like the Dungeons & Dragons character sheet. Once you’ve broken down the elements of an invented personality into numbers generated from dice, paper and pencil, you can do the same for your real self.

For us, the character sheet and the rules for adventuring in an imaginary world became a manual for how people are put together. Life could be lived as a kind of vast, always-on role-playing campaign.

We geeks might not be able to intuit the subtext of a facial expression or a casual phrase, but give us a behavioral algorithm and human interactions become a data stream. We can process what’s going on in the heads of the people around us. Through careful observation of body language and awkward silences, we can even learn to detect when we are bringing the party down with our analysis of how loop quantum gravity helps explain the time travel in that new “Terminator” TV show. I mean, so I hear.

Facebook and other social networks ask people to create a character — one based on the user, sure, but still a distinct entity. Your character then builds relationships by connecting to other characters. Like Dungeons & Dragons, this is not a competitive game. There’s no way to win. You just play.

This diverse evolution from [Dungeons and Dragons] goes much further. Every Gmail login, every instant-messaging screen name, every public photo collection on Flickr, every blog-commenting alias is a newly manifested identity, a character playing the real world.

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Reminder: Closing date for the Social Entrepreneurs Ireland 2008 Awards Programme is Friday 4th April.

Do you know someone who is passionate about social change in Ireland?

Do they have a new idea and can they put it into action?

Will they stop at nothing to make it happen?

Social Entrepreneurs Ireland may be able to help!

Our 2008 Awards Programme is now open for applicationswith funding of €5,000
available for Level 1 Awards and €70,000 - €80,000 available for Level 2 Awards.
To find out more and for full details on how to apply, please visit our new website,
www.socialentrepreneurs.ie

Closing date for receipt of applications 4th April 2008

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What no, danah boyd?
danah boyd will not be at SXSW, ETech and CHI this year.

What could possibly be keeping her away?
Is it a family thing? Something personal? No. She has to write up her dissertation.

Emperor’s new clothes
It’s a kind of absurdity. A kind of reverse ‘emperor’s new clothes’. We all know that danah has achieved natural social rank for her outstanding contributions to the field. We know that rank is admired by many ‘more qualified’ academics who regularly cite her work.

When an honor is a curse…
It IS a good idea to honor people for their work. But when doing so we have to consider the most appropriate way to do it. At its most basic, its counterproductive to interrupt someone’s work flow when they are doing a good job.

But this case is exceptional…
Encouraging danah to stop doing her work in the most effective way she knows how and to change tack to using a less effective process (ie writing a dissertation) doesn’t make sense.

It’s like saying

‘We want to recognize your exceptional effectiveness. But in order for us to do so we first insist you drop you existing work practices. In their stead we want you to adopt work practices that are anything but exceptional. Its true that this will prevent you from making effective contribution to the community for quite some time. Ehhmm…but that’s the way we work. (And possibly why you have been more effective than us in the first place) I know that may seem absurd and it probably is but… ehhhmm… that’s just the way we do things’

What to do about it…
Of course, danah’s case is exceptional and universities can’t make new rules for every new and exceptional case. But that’s okay. The universities already have a mechanism for overcoming such absurdities. The honorary doctorate.

I wonder is there a dynamic, progressive university looking at this disconnect right now?
What better way to mark your university out than to show that you recognize outstanding merit. Do the community a favor. Confer danah boyd with the honorary doctorate she deserves. ASAP.

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