Blob
>the blog of david n wallace [aka Lifekludger]

Back in 2005 after thinking about “Attention, Recognition & Context” I wrote in 2006 that I was “hung up on the concept of context“  and a bit later “On context and openness”

Which lead to the thinking about how I do what I do at Lifekludger, documented in the “Contexts and Clues” section of the About page as — “To get from one context to another takes a Kludge!“….

So just the other week I get a ping from @fang about the book kluge —–

Then I see a tweet from @kanter asking “what is the sweet spot between personal productivity and connectedness?”

My response (below) gets quoted by her in a blog post “What’s the sweet spot between personal productivity and social productivity?” here ……

Which leads me to read Stowe Boyd’s post about “Information Overload, Schmoverload“, and his thoughts on network productivity here ……

Then I talk about it with Mike on our podcast here …..

And so there I am, reading Stowe again, critiquing more mainstream media articles on the so-called ‘curse of multitasking’ and the over emphasis placed on ‘personal’ productivity - “…the war on Flow” here ….

And what do I read? “In the wonderful book, Kluge, Gary Marcus makes a solid case that the human mind is really bad at memory, and that we have developed all sorts of compensating techniques to counter that weakness. Our memories can be demonstrably changed by simple shifts in context ….”

From Context to Context via a connected kludge.

We need connection to others and to other’s thinking if nothing more than a technique to counter our weaknesses - we need a networked life.

And this holds true in any area of application - personal or professional.

That, my networked friends, is life network productivity.

Dave

Technorati Tags: beth kanter, connection, context, fang, information, overload, network productivty, stowe boyd

Took a quick trip bush.

Getting into the van, this line came to me:

Into the cockpit of our future
Fly the memories of our past

That’s not quoting anyone, it’s my original thought. There’s a poem in there somewhere. Maybe the rest will appear sometime. Or maybe it’s just stimulus.

Sitting in the back of the van, half sleeping, gives lots of
opportunity for catching up on podcasts and things I haven’t listened
to for a while….or thought about.

Here’s a line from Bruce Cockburn that resonates:

You’ve no idea how I long
For even one loving caress
For you to step into my heart
Without deception or duress

That comes from “Life Short Call Now” the song, off the album by the same name. I also got stuck on the song “Slow Down Fast”. (I’ve quoted these before, last year, but without context).

I wonder about the dichotomy that seems to exists between the two songs. “Life’s short”, seemingly urging us to speed up action and “Slow Down” drawing us to the opposite conclusion. Of course the answer lay in the detail, and in context the songs are both valid and both saying the same thing - think about what you’re doing, right here, right now.

In my common parlance they’re both saying - find and focus on the signal.

Tension, balance, change.

Which got me to thinking why it is I’ve never driven change in my own life. So much of my life seems to be having change forced upon me. I admire people who can say I want a change, I want to be doing this, this and this, and do it.

Sure, those who know me know that there’s reasons I might feel this way. We all have limitations and things we can and can’t do, I’m talking about changing those things we cam. But I especially think this stuff is harder when it comes to fundamental personality issues. Like always wanting to be a poet, or architect but for various reasons becoming a doctor. But you can’t deny who you are.

So I thought perhaps I need to draw a line in my own sandbox and take a step over it. Even if it’s just a little step; a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

I decided to make a decision (there’s an odd line for you). I’m going to do that writing course I’ve been thinking about for the past couple years. I’m telling you here so you’ll hold me to it. If I’m bad at creating the change I want in my life, rather than that I think others do, then maybe I should get help. Tag, you’re it, dear reader!

I might fail, but then again, as they say in the excellent Australian movie “The Dish” - “Failure is never quite as bad as regret“.

Dave

Photo from flickr by zacklur

As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin’.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’.
-Bob Dylan

" onclick="javascript:urchinTracker('/outbound/www.stoweboyd.com/message/2007/07/new-models-of-w.html_br_/');">Stowe Boyd puts it well. At last, I actually read something that points to where the real power of an open distributed web will be - with the individual as the centre of gravity and full-focus attention enabled - just like Linda Stone predicts.

The question remaining to be worked out is how business models will evolve to support such individual-centric knowledge flows and not keep relying on the silo model.

Watching Bob Dylan this morning on YouTube I thought of Facebook.

The times still are a changin.

Dave

Technorati Tags: linda stone, facebook, focus, signal, bob dylan, change, stowe boyd

Got a track back to a post I wrote last year about openness on the Net. It was a link from a post on what appears a fairly new blog called naked yak.

Looking around, turns out it’s the blog of a team of people from Naked Ltd who is a start-up company working on a new open messaging service that will enable people to share thoughts, feelings, and experiences, through lightweight mixed-media posts.

Reading through the posts on the blog I’m struck by the vibe that seems to be driving the development - personal openness, human connection (and anyone whose watched ‘The Castle’ knows ‘the vibe’ is everything :)).

Their plain spoken manifesto is:

Being Naked means that:

I say what I mean
You mean what you say
I’m more in touch
I’m in touch more

If they can deliver on something that enables us as people to filter out the noise so we can find the signal that matters to us, more power to them. I can’t wait to see it.

Dave

After events of recent times, like the podcast with Laurel, this blog post by Kent and my response here and the Facebook boom, I really like this following quote from Adam Fields, via Doc.

“There’s really only one rule for community as far as I’m concerned, and it’s this - in order to call some gathering of people a ‘community’, it is a requirement that if you’re a member of the community, and one day you stop showing up, people will come looking for you to see where you went.”

Whatever form it takes, that’s the kind of community I want. How about YOU?

Dave

Photo by Jeff Kubina via Flickr & CC

In this fast changing Web 2 world of fancy tools and moving objects; where’s your attention?

Original source: Cognitive edge

Dave

Just made my first yahoo pipe to follow just my fellow Munge Brothers feeds and tweets between them and a couple select friends.

Ahh…filter=signal

Munge Twitter Pipe

The other day one of the feeds in my reader came alive and I notice radio baily is back on the air.

Gday UnclePaul.

Stickyness of connection only works if you don’t kill the signal (feed).

Dave

In the light of what Nick and I talked about on this podcast I posted last night, this video presentation is a brilliant synopsis. A must look.

From Park Paradigm, via JP

Just wish I had a clearer view…persevere, it’s worth it.

Edglings - some previous thoughts about life on the edge

Dave

I like Kent Newsome. Besides the fact he has good taste in the blogs he reads (mine!), he seems to carve out his own way amongst the goat tracks on paddock blogosphere and stick to it.

Recently he developed another of his own guides to direct his twitter use and is only going to follow twitter conversations of people who follow his own. A fair idea I reckon. He calls it his ‘Pink Floyd Policy‘.

I love Pink Floyd. As it turns out, Kent has hit on a theme song I’ve aquired since my accident, albeit in a different context. But I digress.

Twitter. I’m not signing up for twitter - yet. You may’ve seen I wrote that I’m watching my friends twitter away, including Kent, and that it’s a shame that I cannot see what one of my real, not-twitter friends is saying simply because according to twitter I’m not her friend!

So, in a sense, I’ve created my own twitter policy and it revolves around not fragmenting my life any further than it already is. You could call in my ‘Brain Damage‘ policy. I’d rather think of it as ‘Breathe‘.

You see, I realised something today. It became clear when typing in google chat to one of my very good real-life friends who, although living nearby, we can’t seem to syncronise calendars to meet up. She made the comment something about having no life yet still can’t get to see me. I returned that my time is so fragmented currently that my life’s not a life. I recorded in my google notebook :

fragmentation=existence

signal=life

So, for now, I’m resolved not to sign up for twitter, even though I see it has potential - even as a ’signal filter’ too. But let it be known, I’m the one making the policy and hereby reserve the right to re-make it later. But this is not easy for me, being the alpha-geek I am. This is no easy line in the sand I’m drawing.

So Kent, here’s my Nod. I can hear you. If you can’t hear what I’m saying, it’s because my lips are not moving. I am still home. We all don’t have to live in the same home (silo) to communicate effectively.

Peace

Dave