Facing Forward, Pursuing Progress
My son & I discovered Danny MacAskill via his film Way Back Home (on Netflix). As a long-time avid mountain biker, I have a particular respect for trials riders. The first rider who impressed the heck out of me was Hans Rey. Anyway, Danny’s riding is urban-centric, which really gels with me.
Anyway, below is the YouTube bit that launched Danny. Give it a look. You won’t be disappointed.
I’ve been spending more time on Google+ lately (here’s the link to my Google+ page). Twitter has been my biggest site of late, with Facebook being a solid second. However, I’m beginning to see some solid value in the Google+ platform.
The main thing I like: larger posting sizes than Twitter. Twitter was designed around SMS limiting factors. The character limits don’t, as a general rule, bother me. However, there are times I like the larger posts and Google+ seems to fit the bill better.
Also, especially when compared to Facebook, filtering content and controlling what you see, and who sees your posts, Google+ is clearly better. The interface is cleaner and more straightforward.
It also helps that Google has stated on multiple occasions that it is prioritizing Google+ posts and content. One does need to consider SEO value as well.
Lastly, and most important to me, Google+ is still pretty new. The feeds I see are still quite free of trollish behavior. It’s a much more pleasant experience. Will that change if/when the platform takes off? That’s my concern. But, for now, it’s a fun world with interesting discussions delightfully free of troll-bait.
I’m having a bit of fun today coming up with a playlist of “Halloween” tunes. The caveat: tunes you won’t find on your standard set list (i.e.: no Monster Mash or Thriller…nothing against them, but I grow weary of the over-played). So, here’s what I’ve crafted on Spotify for your listening pleasure. Let me know if there’s anything I should consider adding.
I knew that Word had some solid image editing tools, but no idea they were of this caliber.
I keep hitting Twitter’s 2k follower limit. Perhaps I need to garner a massive number of followers and achieve uber-Twitter status. At this point, though, I need to sort through my lists and drop a few. Some choices will be easy. No tweets in an extended period of time? Gone! A topic I lost my interest in? Likewise. Just a few of my criteria.
So, I hope nobody takes being unfollowed personally. I find myself trapped by my technology’s limits, just like most folks.
My random web thought of the day: remembering the webring. For it’s time, a very powerful tool for finding related content. I spent many an hour perusing sites under a variety of topics: fantasy literature, science, science fiction, politics….the possibilities were extensive. Seems they still exist, but connecting to them a lot less critical. Seems few people drift through webrings now. Rather, they move through Google search results. I wonder, though, if webrings provide any SEO benefit? That would be my expectation, at least.
So, the point? Tastes change, behaviors follow, culture modulates and we both find ourselves reacting, as well as leading.
Am I the only one who hates justified text? I find the cleanliness of the aligned ends to be more than offset by the weird spacing. I’m sure it can be made to work with forethought and focus. That brings back memories of fiddling with typeset, adding up all the characters and spaces, figuring out how to word the thing in order to best utilize the space.
Anyway, just being a little snarky in response to an e-flyer I received today. Perhaps just being a bit too cranky and perfectionist. Maybe I just need another cup of coffee.
I’ve heard so much discussion about texting and driving. Mostly angry rhetoric about “those guys”, and how terrible they are. But the real culprit here is our lack of taking driving seriously.
Operating cars is a core part of American culture, a rite of passage, cultural status symbol (what you drive says so very much about who you are), etc. We drive so much (we invented the ‘Sunday Drive), and from such a young age, it’s hard to remember how dangerous this is.
Thousands of pounds of mass hurtling through space, bearing an amazing amount of force. And yet we eat, apply makeup, text, talk…rarely do we fully focus on driving. Funny, really, that we minimize the power of driving. Such a powerful act, controlling amazingly powerful forces, keeping everyone around you (as well as yourself) safe. That wound be worthy of adding to your resume for anything less mundane.
The solution requires a more rudimentary cultural-psyche change than many realize. We must elevate driving from the mundane to the serious. Or, I guess we can automate it. Acquiesce another thing to our machine overlords at Google. Taking the human out of the equation might be for the best.
A self-observation: I have several hundred contacts in my addressbook. Synced automatically with the cloud, my laptop, and OTA with my iPhone, I just haven’t thought about them. I can search for who I want. Or, even better, when I’m typing an email, boom, it pops up. Done!
However, I’m certain I have duplicate info, and, worse for a data-driven geek like myself, bad data
Cheap storage and good search tools have made this something of a non-issue. But I like my data clean and accurate. Plus, this does provide opportunities for confusion. I have a few folks I infrequently email, and have with multiple email addresses. I’m sure only one is accurate or active. So when I email I send it to all, then clean out based and bounce-backs. Not efficient, but effective.
I’ve thought about tools like Plaxo, but have found many folks won’t respond. Facebook solves many of these problems. Most of my friendly contacts are on FB, so I don’t need a contact at all.
So, I’ve identified a problem, but not a solution. Or even if its worth the time to repair. But it nags at me.