iReality

Wow, it is March. March. Is that possible? Apparently. I am impressed by how time has flown, and put it down to an incredible flurry of activity for me.

I went back, after a hiatus of feeling lazy, to putting together a structure for my novel. I'm also brainstorming with the proprietor of Falkora Jewelry, on some fun social media campaigns to increase her network. She does great sales when she goes to shows and conventions, but as we all know, 140 character virtual tweets are now how we communicatively define our lives.

Seriously, though, I've been having a real love-hate relationship with technology lately. I recently read an article about AT&T and Verizon's predictions that within the next couple of years, we will have serious spectrum issues trying to handle the volume of data being volleyed through the ether by smartphone users. P.S., trying to find that article again to repost it here, I had to wade through about 3,000,000,000 articles about the iPad 3 or 4 or 8 or whatever. Another tangent.

I really hate how slow my android Motorola Citrus is most of the time. We pay for an unlimited data plan, but half the time I feel like I could walk to Google's headquarters in California before their homepage finishes loading on my tiny touchscreen, which is covered in my tiny-hand fingerprints. I also hate myself for caring about something so trivial. What do I really do on my smartphone that's that worthwhile?

I want to be disconnected from this crippling need to constantly be connected, and yet it is supposedly critical to social and economic survival in this world. Isn't it? I don't know.

I would like to be a writer, and a marketer, who makes peace with the monsters of technology. But is it possible to compete in a world of communication, without being constantly in communication?

mindful attention

a friend recently posted this article on facebook, concerning the limiting aspect of twitter for the newspaper world and the philosophy behind it:

"i worry that microblogging cheats my students out of their trump card: a mindful attention to the subject in front of them, so that they can capture its sights and sounds, its smells and tactile qualities, to share with readers. how can twittering stories from laptops and phones possibly replace the attentive journalist who tucks a digital recorder artfully under a notepad, pencil behind one ear, and gives full attention to the subject at hand?"

the author, a journalism professor, worries that twitter is come to be seen as the sole neccessary venue by which to convey information--that is, the newspaper article (online or otherwise), with its thoroughly investigated knowledge, is superfluous.

we've started playing with twitter in regards to admissions, but i question how much value it really has. i'm willing to go along for the ride and experiment with 'twittering,' say, application review, but to hear that so many people see the space of 140 characters as a replacement for a fuller--and consequently more accurate--account of the most important moments of human record, is kind of unsettling.

it also makes me wonder, am i joined in this feeling, or have i become too old for my generation? maybe i'm supposed to embrace twitter more. but i couldn't have told you all of this in the space of 140 characters.