Sick Friday Roundup
I've got part three of the series coming soon, but I figured I'd use this sick (fluish) Friday night to fill in the week.
Barcelona
See the whole photoset at Flickr. The place is amazing. Gorgeous architecture and art, obviously, but also the city is full of an amazing energy. It's big, but feels small. The food is fantastic. I can't say enough good things about it. I'm going back as soon as I can.
likemind.ny Round 2
Once again likemind.ny went off without a hitch, we've even now got our own commercial thanks to the friendly staff at 1938 Media. Check it.
I was thinking a lot on my walk over at 8am about what makes likemind special. More than anything else, for me it's the self-selection. We don't organize anything, or define what a 'likemind' is, yet for the second time in a row people clearly of likemind showed up. If you are wondering whether it's the right place for you and you show up, it was. If you don't show up, it wasn't.
When I was thinking about this, I was reminded of something I read yesterday. After racking my brain all day to remember, I finally decide to put my google where my mouth was. After about 15 minutes of searches I had made the connection, it was an article from Digital Web Magazine about "Understanding the Unconference".
In the article is a description of Harrison Owen's 'Open Space,' which is defined by four principles: "1) Whoever comes is the right people, 2) Whatever happens is the only thing that could have, 3) Whenever it starts is the right time, and 4) When it’s over, it’s over." That is likemind. Expect more on this in the future.
Other
Finally, I want to leave you with a comment Vaspers the Grate left over at CK's Blog:
Average people now have the tools and networks to make their own products, promote and distribute them, especially online objects and downloadables.
Thanks to blogs, and only to blogs, the web is now fully democratizable, to usher in the Universal Content Utopia.
Business models for this new blogospheric/Web 2.0 user paradise?
One of the best is the All User Content product, like PostSecret. You do next to nothing, letting the users do all the work, which is posted freely to your blog, then assembled into a book, and possibly a blockbuster movie. Heh.
Get rich doing next to nothing is now viable. Not get rich quick, but get rich with the robots, RSS feeds, blog portal masters, and computer programs doing most of the work.
Blogger, you are an infobot, searching your consciousness, the internet, and offline sources for benefits to present to your readers. They contribute content to your blog via comments. So it's a We Media based on lots of Me Medias hooking up and sharing and caring.
The whole comment's great, but that last line in particular hit me. The crowd is only smart if all its members are working off their individual wisdom. It's not strictly a 'we media': Lots of people going out of their way to do good things for other people. It's a shitload of fantastic 'Me Media'. Thanks to the tools inherent in blogging like comments and RSS, all those individual media channels can hook up to create a larger community/good. That's revolutionary.
Alright, I don't feel good, I'm off to bed. To all those I talked to at likemind, thank you. It was a pleasure to have you and a pleasure to speak to you. Honestly, there wasn't one conversation I didn't enjoy.