So... I know I haven't written much here lately - at all, atcually. But I'm finally and unbearably driven to address the impact of Twitter and all new viral forms of social media (Facebook, MySpace, etc. combined with iPhones, etc.) on the dissemination of news and information in our world today after being thoroughly consumed by it since I joined earlier this year. I'm a relatively slow adopter of such media (and dislike Facebook as noted previously), but to my complete surprise I've taken to Twitter like a duck to water (@podchef would be proud;), and now tweet regularly as @jandroid since joining in January 2009. I am a news junky, and it feeds my voracious appetite for the latest news quite nicely, as I follow a variety of professional and amateur sources and friends. (Did you hear about Michael Jackson's death a full 30 minutes before it was broadcast on major media - including NPR who I listen to all day? I did, from 3 different sources on Twitter. I know, many of you could absoultely care less - and know Twitter and/or the news isn't for you. I never said it was. Just me). I also follow and learn from lots of great sources promoting a wide range of interests including organic farming and gardening, classical music, the plight of honeybees worldwide and the weather in Portland, to name but a few specific to me. Even better, I've met about 20 cool new people including some government officials and media types in person here in Portland I never would have otherwise. That's 20 more than I knew 1 year ago. I continue to meet more almost weekly. (Thank @whiffies for providing some great nosh for same as well;).
Regardless, in my relatively short time tweeting, I've watched the impact of Twitter on things like the Iran election and watched as Dave Chappelle told just 4 people he'd be having an unadvertised impromptu show at mindnight one day in Pioneer Courthhouse Square in Portland, OR and had over 4000 show up. (Some say as much as 10,000, but this is unconfirmed. Regardless, it was way more than expected, and clearly illustrates power of Twitter and social media today.) I've had direct interaction with my local governmental leaders (the mayor dm-ed me once to ask what he could do for cause of bees in Portland, based on all my #tweehive campaign tweets), and had my comments broadcast on air on both television and radio via Twitter. More recently, news of a boy possibly caught in a flying saucer-shaped home made helium balloon over Colorado was madly retweeted and grabbed the world's attention even as wars are being fought and the national jobless rate surges - thanks to Twitter and other social media. Needless to say all were releived when the balloon landed quite accessibly and softly in a freshly plowed field after about 3 hours and it was found the boy was not inside, but had been hiding in the attic at home. But not before millions of people sat raptly watching their TV screens believing him to be stuck dipping and swirling over the Colorado countryside. Even planes were delayed for it.
This is powerful stuff folks, and hard to understand if you're not part of it. Do a search on #balloonboy or #iranelection at http://search.twitter.com and see for yourself. (No need to sign up with Twitter to do this). I would not have known about this story at the time myself if it weren't for twitter - I don't normally watch the noon news. But @TheSquare had tipped me off, and the rest is history - I became one of the enrapt millions watching their TV and speculating on the fate of Balloon Boy as he came to be known. Yet, we were all mislead to thinking he was in the balloon by the family themselves, whether mistakenly or not is yet to be determined. (And may never be). I'm positive they had no idea how far and wide their story would go, intentionally or not. We've never had the power of social media at our fingertips like this before to help spread the word so quickly/easily.
Then this morning (Saturday October 17th) I woke up to the last throes of an online campaign to raise money for cancer research via a campaign on Twitter using the tag #beatcancer. As stated on the www.beatcancereverywhere.com website (and retweeted widely):
"In a 24-hour period of time starting Friday, October 16th at 9 am (PDT) and lasting until Saturday, October 17th at 9am (PDT) people all over the internet stratosphere will be asked to send tweets and Facebook status updates and to blog using #BeatCancer in their posts. Ebay/Paypal and MillerCoors Brewing Company will donate a penny ($0.01)* for every Twitter message, Facebook update or blog post that includes the phrase #BeatCancer. All money will be donated to non-profit cancer organizations including SU2C (Stand Up to Cancer), Alex's Lemonade, Bright Pink, and Spirit Jump. All of the non-profits are 501 (c)(3) organizations and accredited by The American Cancer Society. A listing of all organizations and a live stream of postings can be found at www.beatcancereverywhere.com. "
That's pretty cool, and indeed it caught on like wildfire. I gladly joined in but noticed that the clock was winding down at 8:30 a.m. PDT on that same website. Thing was, there were 2 campaigns going on - one to raise money (at .01/"mention"), and the other to see if we could break the Guiness World Record for number of times a message was repeated via all social media sources including Facebook, blogs and Twitter. (Twitter being one of the fastest). But I was curious as the clock wound down to know if both the fundraising and the world record efforts were ending at 9 a.m. - or just the world record efforts? This confusion was increased by the label "World Record" over the countdown widget on the #beatcancer website, with no mention of fund raising ending specifically on that main page, where the countere was still running after the deadline.
So I tweeted about the countdown (time) and final numbers shown as counted (approx 208,000) by the deadline, and noted folks could also give directly so as to stop feeling need to tweet #beatcancer all day, and wondered same aloud. Sure enough I kept seeing additional tweets and retweets mentioning #beatcaner well after 9:00 a.m. and from what I considered some pretty intelligent and social media savvy sources as late as 9:30 a.m. PDT. So I dipped back into the www.beatcancereverywhere.com website and came up with the above quote buried on their "about" page via an unobvious link on lower right, which confirms that both a) the world record campaign was over, and b) no more money was being raised by continuing to tweet #beatcancer after 9:00 a.m. PDT. Interestingly this barely slowed down the stream of #beatcancer tweets. (Twitter campaigns often have a life of their own once unleashed). So I was grateful and relived to see another (to me) trusted source tweet that the campaign was over (true), but also that it had raised over $200,000. Wow. Well, at least they got the first part right, which made me feel better as I was hoping to get folks to "return to (more) normal programming" so to speak in their tweet streams since the campaign was done. But I wasnt' so sure about that $ figure, and suggested it might be mistakenly based on number of mentions x $1 mention, vs number of mentions x .01, which is what they said they were paying which is a little over $2000 instead. (It was also never clear if they counted multiple mentions within one tweet, or just each tweet). I sent them a link to the above which also has an * that leads to an additional note below reading "up to a specified amount". So clearly it couldn't be as much as $200,000 based on the math alone, and that still secret specified amount.
Impessively, this source tweeted a full "mea culpa" (they have over 100,000 followers) in response (good on them, and why I'm not naming them here) and sent out a corrected tweet. But it left me realizing how all of us who tweet are all really point news sources, and just like the "professional" media and news outlets (TV, radio, papers), we need to watch what we tweet (air), and check our sources. This isn't the first time I've seen it happen - just one of the larger instances. I previously fell for a hoax that Oregonian movie critic and columnist Shawn Levy had fallen for and retweeted about Gus Van Sant "tweeting his next movie idea" here in Portland. Turns out, the account he was following was a fake, and he'd fallen for it. But because I trusted Shawn Levy as a professional journalist who's actually paid for his words, I assumed he must surely be correct. It just goes to show - no one is exempt, and we're all vulnerable to attractive and shiny bits of apparent news and gossip in this age of viral information dissemination, especially from what we consider trusted sources. And I'm now one of those sources on Twitter, along with every other person/entity that tweets.
So as such, I'm starting a "Reading b4 Tweeting" campaign of my own in hopes of trying to disseminate only the most accurate and correct information on Twitter. This means I promise to take the extra 30 seconds to a minute or more needed to actually follow a link and read what the source is saying before retweeting something. If I don't have time to do this, then I shouldn't be retweeting at that moment. I hope this will help keep not only myself from mistweeting incorrect leads and info, but others as well. It's bound to still happen on occasion, but hopefully we can keep it to a minimum. Thanks to the very viral nature of Twitter, it's hard to "unring" any bell (tweet) once it's out. Join me in tweeting - with care:).
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Friday, July 10, 2009
Fixed Magic Jack beeping problem 7/10/09
Okay, I know I haven't posted in a while, but this finally pushed me over the edge. I just have to share what I went through the last 3 hours to get my new Magic Jack home phone service to stop causing a loud and persistent beeping sound on the other end of the line to my callers. (Not audible to me). This happened after I nearly lost a very important business call to the problem. Not acceptable! The service had been working fine, and I've really been enjoying it otherwise. But this was proving to be a show stopper, so had to be solved. (Friends had complained off and on since I installed it last month).
Let me start by saying that as annoying and persistent as this problem proved to be, I found the tech support at Magic Jack (via live chat) to be some of the best, most professional and responsive I've ever had anywhere. Many companies would do well to emulate their service level. They were very prompt, polite and responsive, even after my 3rd time back in a row trying to solve the problem. And apparently knowledgeable, cuz indeed, the problem appears to be solved finally.
But what it took to get there was quite amazing and convoluted indeed. First we tried "rebooting" the Magic Jack itself. This is done by simply going to menu, advanced users, restart within the software. Then we tried plugging it in without using the extension "cord" that came with it. This proved trickier, as the shape and size of it, although small, still can cause a bit of a jam up for your other USB devices when they can't squeeze in next to it. So I was bummed to have to let this go. (I may try putting it back in, as I think it was something else that solved the problem, ultimately;).
Then, we also tried tweaking settings to make my Windows firewall happier. We added a couple of ports to the "exceptions" in the firewall software. Then we also added a couple of preferred DNS servers. After reflecting, repenting and rebooting, it seemed like this worked. Until later - when a friend and I talked for just over 2 minutes, and sure enough she heard beeping yet again. Oy.
So back to Magic Jack LiveChat I went. (You have to jump a couple hoops to get it going but that's normal). I was able to tell them to look at what "Paris" already told me, so I didn't start all over again from scratch with the next person. I ultimately got escalated to a more "senior" tech named Rodney who had me hack the registry, deleting some old keys, then reinstalling and rebooting. Again, we thot this worked, but then it didn't. Sure enough, in a later call from another friend, she heard beeping - just less frequent. So, back to LiveChat I went again! (2 hours in).
This person (Adam), had me tweak the audio settings - making sure I was using telephone and not headset. (Do this under menu - right click, I believe). And checking the volume settings for both and set them to 1/3 of max for both - even if not using both. Then we re-installed the latest update once again, and tried again, after unplugging yet again. Finally, on this third try I was able to talk for 6 minutes with no beeping. (Prior record was about 2:45). So I'm calling it good. But what a day.
Again, as frustrating as this problem was (persistant, at least), I will again say that the folks I "chatted" with were all polite and responsive to a person, netting a rating of 5 or Excellent from me after each time. I know others may feel otherwise - and granted it took 3 tries before we finally nailed the problem. But, they were never anything but polite and helpful and responsive and knowledgeable the whole time. I can't ask for more. And, the problem seems to be solved. So... though my jury is still out on the full verdict for Magic Jack - they did just go up in my esitmation based on this experience. Hope others have equal or better success. Happy calling.
Let me start by saying that as annoying and persistent as this problem proved to be, I found the tech support at Magic Jack (via live chat) to be some of the best, most professional and responsive I've ever had anywhere. Many companies would do well to emulate their service level. They were very prompt, polite and responsive, even after my 3rd time back in a row trying to solve the problem. And apparently knowledgeable, cuz indeed, the problem appears to be solved finally.
But what it took to get there was quite amazing and convoluted indeed. First we tried "rebooting" the Magic Jack itself. This is done by simply going to menu, advanced users, restart within the software. Then we tried plugging it in without using the extension "cord" that came with it. This proved trickier, as the shape and size of it, although small, still can cause a bit of a jam up for your other USB devices when they can't squeeze in next to it. So I was bummed to have to let this go. (I may try putting it back in, as I think it was something else that solved the problem, ultimately;).
Then, we also tried tweaking settings to make my Windows firewall happier. We added a couple of ports to the "exceptions" in the firewall software. Then we also added a couple of preferred DNS servers. After reflecting, repenting and rebooting, it seemed like this worked. Until later - when a friend and I talked for just over 2 minutes, and sure enough she heard beeping yet again. Oy.
So back to Magic Jack LiveChat I went. (You have to jump a couple hoops to get it going but that's normal). I was able to tell them to look at what "Paris" already told me, so I didn't start all over again from scratch with the next person. I ultimately got escalated to a more "senior" tech named Rodney who had me hack the registry, deleting some old keys, then reinstalling and rebooting. Again, we thot this worked, but then it didn't. Sure enough, in a later call from another friend, she heard beeping - just less frequent. So, back to LiveChat I went again! (2 hours in).
This person (Adam), had me tweak the audio settings - making sure I was using telephone and not headset. (Do this under menu - right click, I believe). And checking the volume settings for both and set them to 1/3 of max for both - even if not using both. Then we re-installed the latest update once again, and tried again, after unplugging yet again. Finally, on this third try I was able to talk for 6 minutes with no beeping. (Prior record was about 2:45). So I'm calling it good. But what a day.
Again, as frustrating as this problem was (persistant, at least), I will again say that the folks I "chatted" with were all polite and responsive to a person, netting a rating of 5 or Excellent from me after each time. I know others may feel otherwise - and granted it took 3 tries before we finally nailed the problem. But, they were never anything but polite and helpful and responsive and knowledgeable the whole time. I can't ask for more. And, the problem seems to be solved. So... though my jury is still out on the full verdict for Magic Jack - they did just go up in my esitmation based on this experience. Hope others have equal or better success. Happy calling.
Friday, February 6, 2009
On blogging and tweeting 2/6/09
Okay, I've just been surprised by several things tonight, and felt like I just could not contain so many thoughts any more, so out they come.
First off, I just learned that the great writer's community site "Thisisby.us" has folded as of February 1st, 2009. I'm so sad! I had just gotten going on the site, tho had admittedly lapsed for about a year when I attempted to return there to write again tonight, and found it no longer running. Instead, there was just a simple and rather sad note from the "owners" announcing its demise, and their shared sadness to say as much. Truly! it was a great writer's community, and I was just about to get back into it. Too bad. Another victim of the economy, I fear. Those who know of which I write will understand. Further, it also had the potential to pay a bit for your writings. (I think I made a whole .06 there in 2 years, but it still left me hopeful that one day I might "score" with the one post that got "reddit"-ed or "diggit" -ed. Ah well. Back to free blogging here.
Secondly, I then went to look up my old blogspot to update, and while I found I could view it, I found I could no longer update it ~! Foiled again, with lots of juicy (to me) thoughts on the whole social phenomenon of twittering racing through my head. (Hold that thought;). Alas, I've been forced to start YAB (Yet Another Blog) here, and thus, The Pensive Android is born. For that is what I consider myself, among you humans;). A very pensive android on this very interesting planet indeed. (No worries, all you mental health professoinals, I'm very secure in my androidality - er, humanity. You don't need to send the little men in white coats after me. You'd be too late;).
Leading me to the third item tonight, and the main reason I wanted to blog - this whole new twitter phenomenon that's arisen. Okay- I'll fess up, I'm a 41 year old single (never married) hetero female human born and raised in Portland, OR, though I fit very few other "normal" molds for such humans beyond that. I read voraciously, everything from Trughout.org, HuffPost, Newsweek and The Oregonian to Reader's Digest and People, watch everything from NBC Nightly News to OPB to ER and Inside Edition. (I mostly listen to NPR all day tho when not at work;). I have worn heels and hose, but also Birkenstocks. Eat mostly locally sourced organic food I cook myself (omnivore, tho light on the critters) but occasionally slip in a fast food meal or (mea "gulpa"), a frozen Stouffer's entree now and then in desperation from low blood sugar, tho as infrequently as possible. I own a 1990 Subaru Loyale, but walk as much as possible, and take the bus downtown. I don't smoke, and hardly drink, but have been known to down my share of margaritas in my day. I like everything from Janis Joplin and Pink Floyd to The Winterpills, Dolly Parton, Norah Jones and Beethoven, though prefer Vivaldi and Gypsy Brass lately. I have used computers since 1984 where they were introduced to me in highschool. But I don't text message and hate Facebook and chatting, yet I love email. That is to say, I'm not easily categorized. I feel like I cross a few generations and genres. All this to say, wherefor Twitter?
I've very reluctantly gotten into both Facebook and Twitter in this past year, "just because". To see what all the fuss was about. As for the former, I've decided it is a giant time-sucking vortex for people who have not much of a life off of the computer. (Just my HO). All this business of keeping up green patches and sending drinks and superpokes back and forth - I could literally spend the entire day at it, and never keep up. Yet, I've connected with folks from long ago I'd assumed to be long lost, so I guess it's had some value there. And people I'd never have thought would do so have gotten on it, and urged me to do so also, whence I have. Friends be forwarned however: I resent the amount of time I have to spend on it, so don't be offended or feel singled out if I ever fail to respond to some kind of small applet request you've sent me of some kind (poke, drink, cute thing, you name it). I just don't have time for them all, tho I randomly dip in and try to respond to some. As for communicating via Facebook - just email me! Really. I'd prefer a "private" (or seemingly private) conversation at my leisure in email than publicly on Facebook.
And now for Twitter, which I reluctantly looked into and joined for the very same reason: to see what all the fuss was about. (You can follow me @jandroid). And, after realizing it was excatly the same thing as just the "What are you doing now?" applet on Facebook, minus all the pix and flash (ahhh, my aching eyes;), it provided its own level of intrigue for me: why in the world would anyone want to tweet, and more interestingly, why in the world would anyone give a rat's patooty what the heck I'm up to at any given time of the day? (Or even half a rat's patooty). Other than my closest (and youngest) friends, that is. Ah, this new technology. How it seduces us. Well, after following a few people for a bit, and posting a few things, I've decided the following.
Which is that, for the most part, I think Twitter attracts mostly narcissists... for who else would want to let everyone know what all they're up to all the time? At least, that was my first impression. Plus, I sure felt like one, continually saying what I was up to at any given time. Which is the question one is posed, after all. But then I came to realize you could also answer "what are you thinking"? And this became a little more interesting. I started by following a couple good friends, and then a couple "famous" people. Plus, realized I could actually respond to Stephanie Stricklen's Live at 7 show questions by replying to @TheSquare - and did, twice:). Then I was truly baffled and a little wierded out when total strangers began to follow me for no apparent reason I could determine, including BurgervilleUSA. (!) Except then I realized that they were following a friend of mine, who mentioned wanting to eat there. So perhaps they're trying to gauge their consumers' interests by our tweets. Boy will that be a warped consumer view;). Surely only a tiny fraction of their consumer base even tweets, and very few will mention them at that. But I suppose it is a way to watch your market.
As well as to promote causes and issues you care about and believe in, which I also started to do more recently - lobbying to close the Boardman coal-fired power plant the other day. (Really, we don't need it any more. We have excess power now every spring, and if we just spent 1/3 as much on conservation as we'll spend "scrubbing" the darn thing's stack, plus another 1/3 on renewables, we could ditch it altogether, easily, IMHO. But I digress;). Along with my friend's concert tomorrow, among other things. (Like responding to questions posed by @TheSquare and @StephanieStricklen). I confess, it's got me thinking, in a new and different way. I feel my brain creaking in its aging case, as new neural connections are formed while I take in this new medium. Again, I find it a little weird, as I don't want to have conversations with friends there - it feels much too "public" to me for that. (Keep emailing me guys, really;).
At this point, my jury's out on Twitter. I do like its simplicity. I'm intrigued and baffled by its attraction. (I just figured out I could try following some more famous people, or people I like). I'm going to keep ruminating on the attraction of both Facebook and Twitter. And bemoan the loss of Thisisby some more, since it engendered conversations more handily in its comments. Ah well. Life, plus ca change, plus ca reste la meme.
I'll confess this blog isn't too well thought out. And was interrupted by several TV shows and the news along the way, thus interrupting my train of thought. (Or trains?) I normally feel much more coherent than I think I do here. However, best to just hit post and get this baby off the ground. I can edit it later, after all. Feedback welcome. Til next time - Jandroid, the Pensive Android
First off, I just learned that the great writer's community site "Thisisby.us" has folded as of February 1st, 2009. I'm so sad! I had just gotten going on the site, tho had admittedly lapsed for about a year when I attempted to return there to write again tonight, and found it no longer running. Instead, there was just a simple and rather sad note from the "owners" announcing its demise, and their shared sadness to say as much. Truly! it was a great writer's community, and I was just about to get back into it. Too bad. Another victim of the economy, I fear. Those who know of which I write will understand. Further, it also had the potential to pay a bit for your writings. (I think I made a whole .06 there in 2 years, but it still left me hopeful that one day I might "score" with the one post that got "reddit"-ed or "diggit" -ed. Ah well. Back to free blogging here.
Secondly, I then went to look up my old blogspot to update, and while I found I could view it, I found I could no longer update it ~! Foiled again, with lots of juicy (to me) thoughts on the whole social phenomenon of twittering racing through my head. (Hold that thought;). Alas, I've been forced to start YAB (Yet Another Blog) here, and thus, The Pensive Android is born. For that is what I consider myself, among you humans;). A very pensive android on this very interesting planet indeed. (No worries, all you mental health professoinals, I'm very secure in my androidality - er, humanity. You don't need to send the little men in white coats after me. You'd be too late;).
Leading me to the third item tonight, and the main reason I wanted to blog - this whole new twitter phenomenon that's arisen. Okay- I'll fess up, I'm a 41 year old single (never married) hetero female human born and raised in Portland, OR, though I fit very few other "normal" molds for such humans beyond that. I read voraciously, everything from Trughout.org, HuffPost, Newsweek and The Oregonian to Reader's Digest and People, watch everything from NBC Nightly News to OPB to ER and Inside Edition. (I mostly listen to NPR all day tho when not at work;). I have worn heels and hose, but also Birkenstocks. Eat mostly locally sourced organic food I cook myself (omnivore, tho light on the critters) but occasionally slip in a fast food meal or (mea "gulpa"), a frozen Stouffer's entree now and then in desperation from low blood sugar, tho as infrequently as possible. I own a 1990 Subaru Loyale, but walk as much as possible, and take the bus downtown. I don't smoke, and hardly drink, but have been known to down my share of margaritas in my day. I like everything from Janis Joplin and Pink Floyd to The Winterpills, Dolly Parton, Norah Jones and Beethoven, though prefer Vivaldi and Gypsy Brass lately. I have used computers since 1984 where they were introduced to me in highschool. But I don't text message and hate Facebook and chatting, yet I love email. That is to say, I'm not easily categorized. I feel like I cross a few generations and genres. All this to say, wherefor Twitter?
I've very reluctantly gotten into both Facebook and Twitter in this past year, "just because". To see what all the fuss was about. As for the former, I've decided it is a giant time-sucking vortex for people who have not much of a life off of the computer. (Just my HO). All this business of keeping up green patches and sending drinks and superpokes back and forth - I could literally spend the entire day at it, and never keep up. Yet, I've connected with folks from long ago I'd assumed to be long lost, so I guess it's had some value there. And people I'd never have thought would do so have gotten on it, and urged me to do so also, whence I have. Friends be forwarned however: I resent the amount of time I have to spend on it, so don't be offended or feel singled out if I ever fail to respond to some kind of small applet request you've sent me of some kind (poke, drink, cute thing, you name it). I just don't have time for them all, tho I randomly dip in and try to respond to some. As for communicating via Facebook - just email me! Really. I'd prefer a "private" (or seemingly private) conversation at my leisure in email than publicly on Facebook.
And now for Twitter, which I reluctantly looked into and joined for the very same reason: to see what all the fuss was about. (You can follow me @jandroid). And, after realizing it was excatly the same thing as just the "What are you doing now?" applet on Facebook, minus all the pix and flash (ahhh, my aching eyes;), it provided its own level of intrigue for me: why in the world would anyone want to tweet, and more interestingly, why in the world would anyone give a rat's patooty what the heck I'm up to at any given time of the day? (Or even half a rat's patooty). Other than my closest (and youngest) friends, that is. Ah, this new technology. How it seduces us. Well, after following a few people for a bit, and posting a few things, I've decided the following.
Which is that, for the most part, I think Twitter attracts mostly narcissists... for who else would want to let everyone know what all they're up to all the time? At least, that was my first impression. Plus, I sure felt like one, continually saying what I was up to at any given time. Which is the question one is posed, after all. But then I came to realize you could also answer "what are you thinking"? And this became a little more interesting. I started by following a couple good friends, and then a couple "famous" people. Plus, realized I could actually respond to Stephanie Stricklen's Live at 7 show questions by replying to @TheSquare - and did, twice:). Then I was truly baffled and a little wierded out when total strangers began to follow me for no apparent reason I could determine, including BurgervilleUSA. (!) Except then I realized that they were following a friend of mine, who mentioned wanting to eat there. So perhaps they're trying to gauge their consumers' interests by our tweets. Boy will that be a warped consumer view;). Surely only a tiny fraction of their consumer base even tweets, and very few will mention them at that. But I suppose it is a way to watch your market.
As well as to promote causes and issues you care about and believe in, which I also started to do more recently - lobbying to close the Boardman coal-fired power plant the other day. (Really, we don't need it any more. We have excess power now every spring, and if we just spent 1/3 as much on conservation as we'll spend "scrubbing" the darn thing's stack, plus another 1/3 on renewables, we could ditch it altogether, easily, IMHO. But I digress;). Along with my friend's concert tomorrow, among other things. (Like responding to questions posed by @TheSquare and @StephanieStricklen). I confess, it's got me thinking, in a new and different way. I feel my brain creaking in its aging case, as new neural connections are formed while I take in this new medium. Again, I find it a little weird, as I don't want to have conversations with friends there - it feels much too "public" to me for that. (Keep emailing me guys, really;).
At this point, my jury's out on Twitter. I do like its simplicity. I'm intrigued and baffled by its attraction. (I just figured out I could try following some more famous people, or people I like). I'm going to keep ruminating on the attraction of both Facebook and Twitter. And bemoan the loss of Thisisby some more, since it engendered conversations more handily in its comments. Ah well. Life, plus ca change, plus ca reste la meme.
I'll confess this blog isn't too well thought out. And was interrupted by several TV shows and the news along the way, thus interrupting my train of thought. (Or trains?) I normally feel much more coherent than I think I do here. However, best to just hit post and get this baby off the ground. I can edit it later, after all. Feedback welcome. Til next time - Jandroid, the Pensive Android
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