Friday, November 18, 2005, 06:46 PM - Technology
because I don't really like taking pictures. Now other people do it for me. Here's one of how the sunset looked the other night while I was running around Bernal Hill. Too bad no one was looking the other way to see the full moon emerging from the hot pink clouds. 
Friday, November 18, 2005, 06:41 PM - Politics, Technology
So yesterday I wrote a conference proposal for dotOrganize - a social change technology initiative that I've been helping to get off the ground (find out more about that here), and I was proud of myself for crafting something with actual measurable objectives - x # of new collaborative projects, x# of people connected for ongoing peer support. It made me wonder how I've gotten this far in life without attending more conferences that had a point. Can we justify the environmental costs of travel to these kinds of events, when they tend to be so limited in their usefulness? In all the roles I've played in conferences and events (organizer, presenter, attendee), the worthwhile outcomes are the connections between people, not the content of the workshops. I tried to write something that would require actual work to be done, with real results - no doubt just one more example of my rampant idealism. I mean, I know it's important to meet new hotties that one can both make out and talk shop with, but I'd rather find them closer to home. Hopefully if we get this event funded, we'll find out if we can raise the bar...on all fronts.
OK, I lied, maybe it is sexy if Danah Boyd (who is clearly some sort of blog sage compared to my toddler status) is also writing about the challenges of making a good conference- especially in terms of limiting/ expanding social networks. Nice ideas about diversity of audience, and some support for my ideas about having attendees from multiple sectors at our planned event. I knew having all those great parties full of random people was preparing me for something...
Monday, November 14, 2005, 06:24 PM - Politics, Technology
The World Summit on the Information Society is happening this week in Tunis. Tunisia apparently has 10% of its population online, undoubtedly on the high end of the range for Africa (I would imagine South Africa must be higher?). I am fascinated by the MIT proposal for very low-cost hand-cranked laptops for distribution to students in developing countries - and clearly wireless solutions (whether through phones or laptops) are the right answer...the last thing we need is more cable strewn across the earth. Tensions over the control of the internet infrastructure by the U.S. are bubbling up again, unsurprisingly. At what point do technological underpinnings become an international public asset, and not a national prerogative? Kind of snarky piece in Foreign Affairs on the issue here.
Update: apparently there is a compromise document that leaves most of the structural control of things to the U.S., but creates some international advisory stuff...Here's the dreamy summit doc if you get off on bureaucracy porn.
Thursday, November 10, 2005, 05:46 PM - Politics, Technology
So I attended three things over the last two days that I think fit together somehow...
The first was the first Net Tuesday hosted by Net2 - a project of techsoup that's trying to involve the nonprofit community in web2.0 - obviously a worthwhile concept, interesting plans, all very preliminary at the moment, potentially a very nice fit with dotOrganize. Crowd was very technoriffic, as expected, but which also brought home the yawning divide that still exists between people. And cute as flock was, I'm not sure it's the mechanism by which to bridge the gap.
Yesterday morning I got up terribly early to go see Malcolm Gladwell give UCSF grand rounds. The most interesting components of his message centered on how less information often leads to better decisions - somewhat anaethema to an enlightenment/technocratic sensibility, I think, but borne out in my experience of creating decision models on the campaign last year. More variables do not, I believe, always lead to better decisions, especially in a time-pressured context. There is a limit to regression as a tool, and it's too easy for the academic side of life to take over and value results that are significant but not important.
My last event was my first blogger call - with Chuck Schumer on the DSCC reaction to the election. (Why, pray tell, was I the only woman?) Although there were some interesting questions at the end, I'm not sure that people took full advantage of the situation - I certainly didn't. But the different levels of access that are available in the world, if you know who to ask always amaze me. And really, I wouldn't mind taking back the Senate. I do have to say my reaction to the call confirms my suspicion that my strenghts are all in structure, not content.
Monday, November 7, 2005, 01:43 PM - Dancing, Technology
So it has to be a good sign that the auto-generated word that came up when I submitted this little project to google was "ravers", right? Oh, if I had only taken a screen shot. I guess it's possible they've gotten much farther ahead than I would have imagined with profiling my innermost characteristics....Back
