Inspired by this post over in a thread at Metafilter about the signal to noise ration of community sites (which reminds me of this thread over at barbelith.com) I am beginning to think through the implications of information transmission and its relationship to community. Imagine two nodes on the net – designed essentially just to send information from one to another. Additional information is also transmitted however – information on the relationship between nodes, information on whether a packet has been received or not etc. This relationship is very similar to that of community sites – a site which merely transmits information is not, and cannot be a community site. Nor indeed can an individual who merely transmits information be considered part of a community. To an extent the ‘noise’ is more a staple of the community than the information – it may appear like meme fluff – unnecessary – but it’s the stuff that transmits information about disposition, affiliation, loyalty, relationships both in terms of expressing oneself, and developing one’s relationship with others. So the question becomes: what is the appropriate ratio of signal to noise?
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Never going to be famous…
It’s slowly beginning to dawn on me that I’m never going to be famous, I’m never going to be truly exceptional, or lauded over – I’m never going to travel to the moon, I’m never going to kill someone, I’m never going to gazelle on stage. This may be one of the most crushing realisations of my life.
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On Connect Flo…
The terrifyingly able Pixelflo collective present their latest project: Connect Flo. Whatever the strategy that the computer uses is certainly effective. I may be only a beginner, but I haven’t beaten it once!
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Rebirthing pure browsing via randomness…
I’ve been playing with my Surprise Me bookmarklet over at the Google Directory in an attempt to experience some parts of the internet that I wouldn’t normally think of going to. My particular favourite random destinations so far have been: Yahoo! Clubs: nosprogs (“Welcome to the club that actively opposes squirting out spawn…”), Chowbaby‘s restaurant guide (with possibly the strangest logo of all time) and a recipe for Baked Ham with a Secret Glaze (somewhat oxymoronic considering that it tells you how to make said Glaze). It’s a refreshing approach to the internet – rebirthing pure browsing as a recreational activity.
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On bad posture in photographs…
“Watch Tom slouch. Slouch, Tom, slouch.” My second link to an external gallery of the day contains pictures from Luke’s birthday drink on Sunday night. [courtesy of Brainsluice and featuring Meg, Luke and Davo.]
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A badge for my financial impotence…
The new Apple PowerBook is gradually becoming a badge for my frustrations and financial impotence. Every morning as I head towards Time Out I see it lurking in Micro Anvika – mocking me and my financial circumstances, laughing at my weaknesses and my inability to fulfill my dreams. I’m beginning to love it and hate it at the same time. Why can’t it be mine?!
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The Malevolent Photographer…
Meg finally comes clean with images of the last blogmeet. She has decided to name the gallery in question, “Test Tubes of Pure Eeeeeeevil”, which is a bit of a misnomer since it should clearly be called, “The Malevolent Photographer”. Anyone who knows me and who read my post on the matter will recognise nascent mental collapse in every picture I’m in.
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The Wizard is a man after all…
Possibly the most fascinating part of this interview with Derek about Metafilter.com is that he still has a beige G3. Somehow deep inside I think I expected him to use a Kray Supercomputer to check his e-mail…
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Blogger Past, Present and Future…
The first part of a three part interview with Ev about the past, present and future of Blogger [The state of the blog] includes some interesting information about the origins of the web-app. I started my weblog almost immediately after the launch of the new version in November of ’99, when there were only a couple of hundred sites around – originally as a space filler for the front of barbelith.com – a space I didn’t know what to do with. I certainly never expected the site to still be here nearly eighteen months afterwards…
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Stumbling around kvetching…
Found via a search for kvetch at haddock.org:
