Finding my way through the Pile

My desk... Wait, let me back up.

When I use my computer at home, I don't use a traditional desk. My work surface is a solid core door laying on top of two deep file cabinets. I've used this system since Dan Brian introduced me to it while we were working at Clockwork Internet in the mid 1990's. Since then, the functionality of the setup has been hard to match, let alone beat (not for lack of trying). This will sound horrible, but the only way I can see getting more versatillity, space, and functionality would be to get 1) a Steelcase office setup, or 1) a custom build desk.

Now, it is true that I have a huge pile of stuff in my "office" at home, and lots of things find their way to the expansive horizontal surface that is my "desk." Perhaps with a more modest space (something smaller than 2400 square inches) would permit me to use just the things I need while keeping the other materials at bay, but I've not yet found the solution that is attractive and in my proce range. I'll have to keep looking... and quickly, as the piles seem to be looming, moving in, trying to take over my jasakfnasufasasdfalksfasleuraieuracn lseruluil zsifhn.

Novel Ideas

Ideas for great new products can come from anywhere. When the muse of invention strikes, it's not like opportunity knocking at the door, it's like a bulldozer knocking it down and the operator standing on the seat with a megaphone yelling "get it together and get it done!"

My head is constantly filled with ideas for product improvements and new product ideas. 99% of these ideas are completely asinine and have no real practical value... but because my brain rarely stops churning through new concepts, that 1% still comes up pretty cool.

The challenge is how to protect the ideas from being capitalized on by someone else... the complexities of a patent filing make it a daunting process, and one that may well be quite expensive. Nonetheless, I'm going for it with this latest idea. It's simple, but useful. It solves a simple problem with a simple solution, marrying products that have not yet been put together as a single item. I really hope that it is a hit and that a big company wants to 1) buy the idea or 2) license the idea for production. and of course, it would be helpful if millions of consumers want one (or several).

More on this in the indeterminate future - perhaps when the patent filings are complete...

Starting again. Again.

Delivering coherent, written commentary on one's own existance is a curious effort indeed. In 2009, we're surrounded by methods and means for projecting oneself onto the electronic stage upon which a world of interconnected people now validate themselves through participatory surveillance.

Excuse me, I meant "social networking." This phenomemon may have no equal or precedent in human history, if not in fact, than at least in scale.

Using my mobile phone, I am able to present to the world as detailed a view of my life as I prefer to share, whether personal, existential, philsophical, sexual, culinary, educational, or any other topic I choose. While this does not make much of a difference to readers (be they nonexistent or multitudinous), as far as I can tell (absent any scholarly research on the topic), the underlying reason for spewing forth the factoids and trivial events of one's life in an online journal is threefold:

1. Emotional aggrandizement
2. Social exhibitionism
3. Chronological retention

Let me walk through each of these areas in turn.

Emotional aggrandizement

Let's face it: as human beings, we're generally on the lookout for things that might make us feel better or feel better about ourselves. The internet and all it's various trappings allow us each to seek out new ways to feel good about ourselves, from complimenting the accomplishments of friends to mouthing off about bad bosses. We blog, twitter, facebook, linkin, and myspace our way to constant, but simulated emotional connectedness. Perhaps in writing a quick note about the fact that we've landed at the airport in our hometown is somehow cosmically important... or maybe we just think that people really want to know that we're full of airplane food and getting ready for the excitement that is waiting for stuff at an autmoated luggage turnstyle. In any case, the fact that we hold to the belief that our friends and colleagues are holding out for that one more tweet about being caught in the most boring meeting ever. It's actually quite staggering, not to mention historically egotistical, to think that we've somehow lifted our every thought and action to HEADLINE status. We hope people will comment on our facebook posts, or perhaps click that "like" link to flag to others how witty we are.

I won't deny that I'm caught up in this electoninc maelstrom. I'm here, writing about it when I should be sleeping. If we find ourselves feeling emotionally wealthier because of our blogging, whether because of the compliments or gripes from the teeming masses of potential readers, then I believe we're falling victim to emotional aggrandizement, and not really noticing that many of our face-to-face interactions don't stroke our egos in the same way. Yes, I think that is sad and we need to reset our understanding of non computer-mediated communication. I say this to myself as much as to anyone else: don't type, go visit. Your mother will be glad you came by in person.

Social Exhibitionism

You've seen it: the literary equivalent of "Hello World" contained in millions of inaugural blog posts and web sites. Many of these sites never display another word. And others, well, they display far more than I could ever have expected. Perhaps I'll be considered an old codger for having been on the web since Prodigy in the late 1980's, but the depth of content on the internet has reached new heights - and depths - since those early days. With an internet connection of even modest speed (and a government that does not pre-filter content for you), one can find just about anything online, from recipes to home repair, from surgery to slot car racing, and, of course, the hordes of people who just have something interesting to say (like me!). So what is social exhibitionism? It's my way of expressing the notion that the web brings out a side of people that they would generally keep to themselves. This does not mean that everyone is posting dirty pictures of themselves or making inappropriae remarks about their employer, but rather that there is a veil of social distance which (ostensibly) allows us to write and publish things that we might not be able or willing to say to a live person. I've written and published articles online about topics that I would not normally discuss with my family (would likely bore them), and similarly, the gushing praises for my children and their accomplishments (they are 5 and 3 years old as of this writing) are not really that welcome in the office, no matter how many "oh, they're cute!'s I might hear. Still, we write and publish seemingly random "stuff" with the knowledge that nobody may ever read it... but we hope everyone on the whole planet actually does. And that they click "like" before they head off to read something else.

Chronological Retention

This is the most obvious notion. Really, a blog is a diary. A weird, not-very-secret diary. I remember from my childhood that many of the girls in school talked about their secret diaries, the place where they wrote their most secret thoughts about school, and boys, and whatever it was that they wrote about. But these diaries were kept under lock and key, and shared with only the closest of friends. Mention of these diaries by others was likely to get you in trouble, or shunned, or whatever punishment was deemed socially appropriate by the various knots of friends. Still, the notion of the diary continues with the blog, it's a way to look back at the events of the day, week, or year. In words and pictures, we can trace our steps into the past, all the way back to that "hello world" post we thought was so witty when we initially clicked that "publish" button.

But our timelines are somewhat disjointed now, a mashup of quasi-emotional rants and sometimes-logical musings about our life. Some people do a winderful job of collecting their thoughts, carefully recording them for posterity, like a dilligent archivist. Unlike other now-public diaries, like those of Anne Frank, Buckminster Fuller, or Henry David Thoreau, modern diarists seem to be writing for public consumption and comment, not simply capturing life's moments in an attempt to understand self, or place in the world, or the meaning of it all. Sure, there are blogs and web sites that touch on these topics - even some that do it well and engage their readers - but to me, this all feels like a cheaper version of the old-fashioned diary. It works, and is representative of our interconnected, collaborative, socially-neteworked time, although it does leave me wondering why we've suddenly, at this moment in human history, chosen to electronically expose ourselves to the world while simultaneously withdrawing from face to face interaction.

So at the end of this rather lengthy "hello world" post, I feel compelled to say that while I have every intention of adding entries here as methodically and consistently as a ship's log, the reality of life is that I truly hope that I am often distracted by real interactions with real human beings, and that musings that manage to make it out of my head and onto this screen come only at times when that contact is not possible. I also have no idea what topics might find their way from cranium to any given post, and I can offer no assurances that the material will be fit for consumption by others, or even by myself somewhere down the road. My current contribution to history: complex confusion regarging the human condition.