Saturday, 10 September 2022
Tryouts For The Human Race
Thursday, 1 April 2010
Is Social Media About Being Opaque?
Wednesday, 11 February 2009
Stuff I know, Stuff I don't know
There are probably two communications books that were prophetic. McLuhan's Understanding Media which is still breathtaking given it was first published in 1964 and of course The Cluetrain manifesto which we all really wanted to be true 10 years ago, but had to hold our breath for a while before it manifested itself as brilliantly prescient.
That doesn't mean both are flawless, but the sheer volume of predictive accuracy gives them a slightly mystical halo which they both solidly deserve.
However, the notion of markets as conversations is completely contextual (everything is contextual) and was (still is....) a brilliant summary of the anthropological traits that drive much/most of commerce and life.
But let's be clear. Markets are transactional micro and macro models of human interaction, and here's the point that the Cluertrain authors were brilliant enough to articulate; conversations too are transactional. It’s a two way street to be absolutely perfick as the Darling Buds of May once showed us.
Furthermore even though we talk about the ability to just be human and refrain from carpet bombing each other with marketing jargon through what is evidently (to me), a completely new dialectic (based on ancient principles), the hard truth is that many of us often don't know how to engage in a conversation because to be really good at it requires incredible patience, lots of concentration and a paradoxical lightness of touch so as to make it fun, informative, comforting or constructive. That’s just for starters. The list is endless as are contexts.
We talk about ‘The conversation” as if it's not rocket science but here's an heretical view I hold. We think humans are terrific at communication. We think that the evidence shows quite clearly that throughout the entire animal kingdom, the human species is the finest and most sophisticated of species for communication because we get those featherlight nuanced nods of humour about prophylactics and hey, we've got the internet too, which if continuous partial attention is anything to go by could well be something akin to extra sensory perception. But let me park that ticking time bomb to one side for another day/blog.
The reality is that the human species is borderline cretinous at communication. A quick look at the 20th century and its two global wars (everybody fighting everybody) plus say Gaza and Zimbabwe for good measure should be sufficient evidence of our astonishing ability to, say the wrong things, misunderstand what was said, take offense, read intent that doesn't exist, put pride before pragmatism, or pragmatism before pride when necessary.
Point is we've always been rubbish at communication, and the internet seemingly adds a depth of understanding that was never there before. Or is it just me that would quit smoking or TV in order to keep my internet connection?
But to suggest that a conversation is easy...... Fuck me.....
Try striking up a conversation about the most pressing problems of our time with the next person you meet.
As I said. Everything is contextual.
And I do know that I just spent a couple of weeks or so thinking about the sort of people I took a picture of below (in 2006 on an i-mobile phone camera (how I loved you)), who watch every Baht they spend (how I love you more), and it was good.
Monday, 14 November 2011
Not In His Image - John Lash
Thursday, 16 February 2023
NATO
NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) is a military alliance between North American and European countries that was established in 1949 to ensure Russia and Germany never fought on the same side. The alliance was formed spuriously in response to the threat posed by the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies during the Cold War, even though all those years of posturing and propaganda were synthetic as the Hoover archives demonstrated once Tony Sutton D.Phil collated the evidence and published it. People realised the Germans lost WWII but the Nazis won it in part through Operation Paperclip and other less documented channels.
Additionally, NATO's commitment to collective defence has been criticized for leading to a lack of accountability. The alliance operates on the principle that an attack on one member is considered an attack on all members. This has led to military interventions without proper debate or consideration of the long-term consequences. The gravity of this is not missed despite no country ever declaring war on a NATO member. Trigger happy doesn't quite encapsulate the visceral inversion that only the memory wipes are incapable of recalling.
Furthermore, NATO's focus on military power as a means of achieving security has been singled out by historically prominent states people for neglecting diplomatic solutions, and addressing the 2014 root causes of conflict, for example, in The Ukraine. Some argue that NATO should prioritize diplomacy and conflict resolution, rather than relying on military force, fictitious claims of weapons of mass destruction and invading the wrong country for possible opportunism and then high tailing it, and leaving billions behind in military hardware as was the case in Afghanistan.
Thursday, 6 October 2011
Alex Putney Interviewed By Henrik Palmgren Of Red Ice Radio
More topics discussed: giants in Ecuador, Acamboro artifacts, acoustic resonance field change, gravity, oxygen levels, dinosaurs and humans existing at the same time, the shift of the ages, 1968, in South Africa, "Valdar", "Sola Kananda", Billy Eduard Meier and the Plejarans, Ptah, magnetic reversal, Betelgeuse supernova visible from earth in 2012, Charles Fort, Fortean Times, sinkholes, mining, oil, earthquake lights, infrasound standing waves, birds and fish temperature related, low resonance, HAARP, psychopathic elite, the power of nature, high resonance change, making choices, Urandir Oliveira contact in Brazil, lightwater, protium, deuterium, pure form of heavy water, water in Antarctica, HHO plasma, Malta underground spiral structure, red dawn, waves of UVA Infrared light, Hopi final warning, levitation stones, heartbeat resonance of pyramids, energetic waters, physical laws changing, entropy decrease, return to a 360 day year, the golden year, straightening of the earth axis, modern alchemy, Semjase, metals alloy and Low Energy Nuclear Change (LENC). Part two of this interview is available here.