Monthly Archive for April, 2008
Just when you think you can run away….
Someone smart and experienced comes along and says EXACTLY what you don’t want need to hear.
This is why I mistrust smart and experienced people so much.
I saw an ad for Dry Grad in the liquor store a while back. This is where parents organize a party for their kids to celebrate graduating from high school, a party with no alcohol to protect their precious little angels from the death and destruction that awaits all who imbibe such evil toxins.
When I graduated, parents had organized transportation to a secret location (to avoid crashers) where we could all party till we puked. It was a blast, and I’ll never forget it! It seemed (and still seems) like a very fitting end to an often dry and boring, sometimes exciting, and frequently disappointing 13-year-long undertaking.
Notice, the reason why parents did this for us was to support us (as good parents should) by providing supervision and safety for what was by and large an extremely necessary release for us all. They recognized the importance and took responsibility.
What’s the reason for dry grad? Even MORE responsible parenting, you say? Not a chance! It’s simply one more lesson added on the 13 years’ worth of lessons the poor bastards are trying to celebrate the END of. Instead of supporting graduates, they are taking the opportunity to TEACH THEM SOME MORE!!!!
I’m sorry, but parents, you are seriously missing the fucking point of a GRAD PARTY!!!
If you want to sit around drinking tea tittering about Johnny’s bright future and his Honor Roll achievements, go right on ahead. But where are the responsible parents who are interested in treating their children like individuals and who care about their safety?
Here’s a new thing: Fill-in-the-blank Poetry
Ed
the fed
is ____
While you’re working that out, here’s a funny story…
A few months after I started a new job at the Department of Fishies and Oceans. My sister, who also works for the federal government here in sunny Canada, had been listening to me rant about the new job, and like a good sister tried to console me. She told me about this guy she had met, and how in conversation, she asked him, “So, what do you think of federal government employees?”
He answered with a question: “Have you seen the movie Sixth Sense?”
“Yeah…” she says, and he replies:
“I see dead people”.
Funny guy!
Reminds me of another funny guy, Will Ferguson, who wrote Why I Hate Canadians (a book that should be taught in high school — well, to Canadians of course; other people already know). In Chapter 22: Success Without Risk: The Canadian Dream, Ferguson reveals the
Ferguson Formula for Determining the Suitability of Canadian Aspirations:
CD=S-R
(Canadian Dream equals Success without Risk)
The winning career? Associate Professor. It just narrowly beat out civil servant.
My point? Buy Will’s book; it’s funny AND true — like The Bible isn’t.
One more example ought to do it (”it” being “clear the room”):
From Chapter Eleven: America is Sexy
Let’s face it, America is sexy. It is exciting, dangerous, crass, brash and violent.
The problem is not that America is screwing us daily—which they are—but that they never send flowers or call afterwards. They barely remember our name. “See you around, doll. Here,” as they toss us a coin, “buy yourself something nice.” It is intercourse without foreplay, when all we needed was a little respect. (Cue the sobbing, chest-beating litany of “I hate you’s.”)
Soo goood! Anyway, I’m digressing…
About the feds, you are either thinking “duh! what were you thinking?!” or “if it sucks so bad, why don’t you just quit?!” To which I would answer with “quit which? the feds or Canada?”
So fine, I’ll fill in the blank with “naive” and go drop some hints about flower shops…
Paul Buchheit makes some interesting comments on the potential for value of social networks like Facebook.
What I really like about the article is what’s behind what he’s saying: that the distinction between online and offline behavior is diminishing.
The title Paul chose for his article is a little too ominous sounding for me though. The idea that the online world is ruled by cheaters (or big brother) is exactly the kind of thing that keeps many of my technophobic friends from participating fully. I’m sure this is a big barrier across the board. But it turns out, social networks aren’t the problem, they’re the antidote! They give us the opportunity to behave more like we do in real life (the opportunity, mind you!).
Think about it. Way back in human history, we used to do something similar (in part) to what we do on Facebook: We used to store our names, addresses and phone numbers in a big book that was easily accessed by anyone. We even walked down the street and saw people’s faces (okay, we still do that one — the consequences for poking or throwing a sheep at someone, though, were different than they are now).
The study of Darwinian evolution teaches us that evolutionary stable strategies will always include some small percentage of cheaters. In fact, we need them. They keep us on our toes! The theory goes roughly: if there are too many cheaters, they feed on themselves and the population decreases; if there are too many saints, we all die from puking our guts out at the smarmy-smug righteousness of it all.
…or something.
Need another analogy? Imagine poker without bluffing….
Okay? We on the same page? In conclusion, don’t fear the online world any more than you already fear the real one rest of the world.
If you’re reading this blog post, you read blogs. Do you just visit the website it is on? Or do you subscribe to it and use a feed reader? Or are you seeing this through some shared aggregator-like service such as Facebook or FriendFeed?
Whichever way you got here, you have to figure out if you trust the author. In addition, you might be inclined to read other blogs, and you’ll have to figure out whether you trust those authors! (Seth Godin makes this point from the perspective of the authors.)
Users who are unaccustomed to the blogosphere can become overwhelmed and give up. But I think there’s a very high value to be had here for those who find it “too difficult” or who “can’t be bothered.”
In his artcle, Seth concludes that
“Sometimes, the web is more of a cocktail party than a club meeting.”
Bloggers (and marketers) increase their effectiveness by doing the sometimes hard work of considering their audience. Readers (and consumers) can do the same by considering the source. Participating in the blogosphere doesn’t just make you a savvy internaut; it helps you develop skills in all types of encounters where perceiving the club/cocktail party distinction would be useful.
This isn’t really that radical a notion. Avid readers have known this for a long time before the Internet showed up. The web (blogospere) simply allows us to particpate with lower barriers and higher concentratration.
