Category: Uncategorized

I don’t read Hemingway online. Or e.e. cummings. In other words, I don’t read online for an intellectual or spiritual experience. I read for information, and sometimes it’s damned hard do that with all the white-text-on-black-background and 9-point-text troweled on the page by some designer who thinks words make pretty wallpaper.

So, unlike Slate’s Michael Aggar, I don’t have my undies in a bundle about visually effective online communication making readers “lazy.” (Or making writers condescending.)

However, I did enjoy reading his July 13 piece, “Lazy Bastards.” You’ll see why.

(Thank you to Anita for calling my attention to it.)

Are we so busy taking advantage of our new abilities to customize our own experiences that we’re missing important opportunities to listen to other people?

There are only so many hours in the day. And there is no question that technology and culture are giving us easier and more entertaining ways to do what we want with those hours. But, whether we’re using our time to text message, shop online, blog, Twitter, knit, or write the great American novel, the key factor is that we can now do it any where, any time. And we do — with less and less regard for what might be going on around us.

The paradigm reminds me of eating — if you engage in constant snacking, you never find yourself with enough of an appetite to enjoy real sit-down meals. And it’s not that the new ways of spending our time are inherently bad; it’s simply that they are being employed so that they compete with and shut out valuable traditional forms of learning.

In this post on SmartMobs, social networking authority and college professor Howard Rheingold ponders the challenge of helping students “train their attention” to appreciate a variety of learning experiences—even (gasp) non-interactive ones.

Opal (who left a comment on my previous post) was right: .Mac has mutated into MobileMe, though as of the moment the (login required) version of the .Mac site is still up and probably will be around for a while changes are announced to the .Mac membership.

The non-member page, however, says “.Mac will soon be MobileMe.”

The message to current .Mac members is:

• You keep your .Mac services.

• The new web address is me.com instead of mac.com.

• You will have a choice of keeping your @mac.com email address or getting your same email name for @me.com. (Oooh, tough choice. Go with the legacy address or the trendy one?)

What I’m not seeing is any mention of how iWeb web publishing and hosting will work with MobileMe. Will my current web resume address (“web.mac.com/karenand”) have to be changed? I’ve put in some questions to iWeb authority Steve Sande.

I’ve just signed up for Seattle BarCamp, and am playing around with ideas for a session.

Guy Kawasaki always impresses me with the way he asks friends and readers for suggestions in situations like this. So I’m turning to you — my readers, browsers, lurkers and casual visitors. What should I unleash on my fellow campers? A few thoughts:

• Smart about tech, stupid about money
• Does your brain need your body?
• Post-SEO: Your site visitors are here — now what you do with them?
• Permission-based email marketing: One-night stand, or longterm relationship?
• (Your flash of brilliance here)

Email your vote or suggestions to karenwrites (at) gmail.com

Best in-town suggestion gets lunch, best out-of-town suggestion gets cookies, and if you’re going to BarCamp and would like to co-offer a session with me, you’re really in for a treat!

Iain Rowan‘s guide to egregious book-reviewing clichés (the second comment on this post at Detectives Beyond Borders) had me laughing hysterically. I’m sure I’ve used at least one of those clichés, but will be less likely to slip up in the future.

My 20-something friend (let’s call her Jayne) has quite a temper. The term “feisty” comes to mind. She’s articulate, she’s gutsy, and she rarely bites her tongue.

When people come up to me at parties and say “I want to you look at my website and tell me what you think,” I view it as an opportunity to educate them about the costs/benefits of fussing with websites. Bottom line: As long as your site isn’t fluorescent pink type on a bright green background (a la MySpace) and doesn’t greet unwary visitors with loud music or disconcerting pictures of your recent medical procedure, you’re likely on the right track. If you’d like to make improvements, your best bet is to find a website of the same genre (blog, small business, family site, etc.) that you like, and then move your design in that direction.

You’d be surprised how much business I get from people who hear me handling these inquiries at social events.

My friend the Samurai Radiologist gets requests for professional advice all the time, of course, most of them from people with far more urgent concerns than the appearance of their websites. He’s devised some cutting-edge on-the-spot treatments using his handy iPhone.

No matter what your nationality, if you appreciate creative, entertaining online marketing, you’ll like this website. (CAUTION: Content is not office-friendly. Though that might depend on your office.)

The tech mavens over at Backup Brain join the chorus asking Salon.com to drop tiresome shock jockess Camille Paglia, and refer to the late Molly Ivins’ 1991 Mother Jones article about Paglia.

I could care less whether (or where) Paglia goes, but was delighted to read the Ivins piece, which I’d missed on the first go-round. What magnificent writing! An inspiration to start off the week.

To my mind, the upcoming presidential election is less about the candidates than it is about the American voting (and non-voting) public.

I know that many people vehemently disagree with me when I say that all three of the presidential candidates would make quite decent chief executives. I can get a bit of traction for my stand when I point out that none of the three candidates is closely affiliated with a hidebound party structure. The good-old-boy Republications are putting on a stiff upper lip about McCain, while the career Democrats are maintaining fixed social smiles as they back either Obama or Clinton.

Oh, I like the discomfort of the party hacks.

To my view, all three of the candidates are decent people and seasoned public servants, perfectly willing and capable when it comes to doing the hard work required take the high road to the White House over the next six months.

The question is: Do the voters (and our neighbors the non-voters) want them to?

Or would the American public rather be entertained by six months of mud-slinging, mud-wrestling, and racist, sexist, and ageist trash talk? Be assured that the U.S. infotainment industry is just dying to do its worst if anyone shows the slightest interest. And the candidates will be sorely tempted to take the bait if that’s the only way to win the election.

The rest of the world is watching—not just to see if we can do better than Bush, but to see if we deserve better.