Humanize the Earth!

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categories: blogging internet

Social Dynamics of the Web follow-up

This is a follow-up to my post about social dynamics on the web with what I’ve learned.

As suggested by the Happy Tutor, I went to technorati and searched for my blog and found a link to my post from him.

I then went to HaloScan which hosts my comments and turned on trackback, as suggested by Gerry by email. Turns out, trackback keeps track of people linking to my posts. Not sure if it will be retroactive and find the Happy Tutor’s post that points to my original post. We’ll see.

Gerry also suggests that “Mailing lists have their place too. Well maintained and managed lists
don’t have spam either.”

I’ve also been meaning to check out del.icio.us for a while after a post by Marnie. I’ve established an account and plan to use it to categorize posts here. I’m going to experiment with adding category lists to my sidebar. I’ve started with “family” for my posts about Skylar and Maxwell and will add more categories as I go.

I’m also putting this post in the categories: blogging and internet.

Skylar’s 1st day with Andie & Max

Here’s Skylar with her mom and proud brother.

Skylar Adair Ernst

In July I told you she was coming. In September I feared she would come right then. This morning Skylar Adair Ernst entered the world at 8:30am US eastern time. 4 pounds, 13 ounces. Skylar’s doing great, as are her brother Maxwell and her parents (my brother Chris and sister-in-law Andie) and grandparents. I’ll post pictures as soon as I get them from my brother.

Social Dynamics of the Web

Just saw this post: Many-to-Many: The Tragedy of the Comments

Clay’s essay on the difference between the social dynamics of mailing lists and blogs expresses well something I’ve been trying to say for a while - that blogs work better for discussion than mailing lists, because the blogs are owned.

Clay discusses flame wars rather than spam, but the issues are similar - people taking advantage of others’ resources without recompense. When comments are turned on on blogs, they eventually fill up with flames and spam too, unless they are carefully maintained.

If instead of commenting, you write a response on your blog, you are standing behind your words, and associating them with the rest of your writing. The social dynamics are very different; you think more before responding instead of posting a quick flame. You can’t really spam, as you are only soiling your own garden.

I can’t say I fully understand how a conversation can take place on more than one blog, nor do I understand trackback, but I immediately thought of emailing the link to Phil Cubeta and Michael Herman. They’ve both been talking a lot about how blogging helps friends get visibility and attention by virtue of being linked to friends. This could be because I blog about generosity, giving or philanthropy and link to Gifthub, or because I blog about the kind of world I’m building and what I need to make that happen and link to the Small Change News Network, or whatever it is.

Then I stopped and posted this here instead. Michael just moved to London so he won’t see it right away, but I know he’s subscribed to this blog with bloglines so will catch up eventually. What about Phil? Will he see it? With a few exceptions (Chris, Ashley and Steve), I’m still not sure who’s reading my blog, so I have no idea. Maybe I’ll have to email him the link. :-)

Hub Housing Cooperative financing update

Yesterday was a big day in our ongoing housing cooperative story. Around 4:30pm, I hand delivered the loan application for the Hub Housing Cooperative, Inc. to the Chicago Community Loan Fund. I didn’t tell the other members that the woman working the desk said, “Is this the whole thing?” when I handed her the envelope. Oh well, it’s in. We’ll see what they say.

At 5:30, three of use from the group met with Keith Johnson, a comercial real estate mortgage broker. We walked in thinking we were looking for a backup plan if the CCLF deal doesn’t work out. Keith advised us that if they can give us a 15 year fixed rate on a 30 year schedule, we should probably take it. While he didn’t seem to think it would be at all a problem to find financing for this as a regular comercial deal (8 partners didn’t faze him, co-op is irrelevant to him), he thought 10 years was the longest we’d be able to fix a rate, maybe even less. By the time he finished with us, going the conventional comercial route seemed to make a lot of sense. And we don’t have to decide now. He’s going to get started and we can decide later.

Good stuff!

Shovels & Wheelbarrows: Goal Reached!

Since my last update, we’ve received all monies pledged and the total comes out to $290! The drop cash site is showing $240 now (96% of the goal), but $50 also came in cash or checks rather than paypal.

At the end of November, I’m traveling to the Liberian refugee camp in Ghana and will bring back current photos and progress from the Campaign for Non-violence and Fight Against Malaria that members of the Humanist Movement are working on there.

Thanks so much to everyone who contributed: Erin, Lars, Julie, Sue, Pam, Nicholas, Anonymous, John, John, Anonymous, Terry and Niny

Hub housing co-op financing

I spent a couple of hours this morning on the mortgage application for our new housing co-op (incidently, we’re called the Hub Housing Cooperative, Inc.). We’re working with the Chicago Community Loan Fund and they have a standard application that is very detailed and clearly geared toward larger organizations. It’s hard to know exactly how much of this applies to us, but one thing is for sure, they need a pretty clear budget. The acquisition of the building is the biggest cost, then the construction/renovation, but then all those smaller items I’m not so sure about. Environmental review? Architect? I also have to get financial information from each of the five households that are part of this deal. Until now everyone’s been acting very quickly and cooperatively whenever something needs to happen fast. I’ll have to get on the phone to contact people later on. We still seem to be on track to get our mortgage approved by Dec 20th and then we’d close shortly thereafter.

9. The Principle of Liberty 2

Gerry, John and I looked at The Principle of Liberty again tonight:

“When you harm others you remain enchained, but if you do not harm anyone, you can freely do whatever you want.”

Without remembering our previous conversation on the issue, my not voting came up again. Didn’t hurt anyone, I don’t feel guilty. Same with Critical Mass (all three of us were there last Friday): public space, people on bikes, no harm done, therefore freedom.

We ended up talking about how all the focus on elections can distract from working on our own inner violence, anger, fear and the like, and how that impacts our relationships and meaning in life, and ultimately how it impacts the evolution of the human being. There seems to be a growing consensus that now is a unique time in human history. My view is that we cannot allow ourselves to become distracted from working on our top priorities. Sure, I get distracted all the time, but I’m also making strides.

What about you?

I didn’t vote

I’m sure this is foolish, but in the interest of full disclosure, I thought I ought to divulge the fact that I didn’t vote yesterday. I suspect I tipped my hand on my way of thinking about elections to some of you at some point before yesterday, but now that it’s over, I thought I’d throw it out there again.

It was about 2 years ago that I made my first prediction about this election, maybe shortly after the mid-terms that the Dems seemed to concede. I had voted for Nader the last time and cast a blank ballot the time before that, but start to question the efficacy of those actions.

Anyway, I started to predict that Bush would either win outright, or he’d find a way to steal it, or he’d create some sort of crisis where he wouldn’t have to leave power. Until about Monday of this week, it never really hit me precisly what I was saying. I then started to really feel strongly that I hoped that bloodshed wasn’t the result.

Anyway, why didn’t I vote? I had taken the position to cast blank ballots in the past to show my disapproval with both parties while still showing that I cared enough to show up.

Watching the primaries this year it started to become obvious to me that people like Sharpton and Kucinich were only in the race to trick progressives into thinking that the Democratic party was their party and that even by casting a blank ballot, I was lending moral authority to the eventual winner. This I could not do. The high turn-out this time gives Bush even more of a mandate to do whatever he wants.

I thought long and hard about what another Bush presidency would mean and then I thought a lot about Kerry and didn’t see it being any better. I’d still have violence in my heart and I’d still have fear and anger in my daily life. My country (I have no trouble claiming the US as my own, it’s the only country I’ve ever known as a home) would still be killing innocents in Iraq and elsewhere around the world (as we’ve always done). What difference will it make, really?

Yes, of course there’s Roe v. Wade and there’s the Alaska reserve and there’s the gay marriage amendment and … and … and … but the bottom line is I do not believe that true change takes place through the ballot box. I believe that true change comes when we make personal, individual choices about how to live our lives and we make daily actions in the direction of our own meaning in life.

Of course taking 15 minutes and going to the polls wouldn’t preclude doing what I’m advocating (for myself) here, but not voting (and I feel totally coherent with myself and the result) was my own personal protest against the point of view that says we need to throw all of our time and energy and resources into elections to the expense of what we could be doing on a daily basis and in our relationships.

This post isn’t meant as a criticism of anyone actions leading up to election day, nor meant to say that anyone “should” be doing anything. This is what’s coherent for me and this is why I resent (see, there’s another place I have personal work to do) those that became angry with me for my choice.

I heard from lots of colleagues and friends today about how disappointed, sad and shocked they were today. I chose to stay silent rather than share my calm with them. Perhaps even this post is too soon.

I write it now in the hope that we all can reassess what we’re going to work on now. What steps can we take toward our own liberation from suffering and what impact will that have on those around us and on the world?