Adjectives are the enemy?

I mean I think that I have the chronic adversary just to create a post, of: things happen faster than I can process them. So I have to set aside time, like I have done just now, or I will be flailing at the Present with little direction.

I’ve been reading Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast. That book has been the first of a run of acquisitions from the Withdrawn Stock from my library. I don’t love adding to a collection that’s already too big for where we are (no collection is a good size for where we are, currently) but I also don’t want to miss out. Asking “on what” will get a vague hand gesture, because… y’know. Books.

Some filler

As I’m working on something a bit longer while listening to Public Enemy—I just wanted to say how much of a bummer it is to have had Flava Flav become a 00’s punchline after being the hype man for such a socially conscious group. Interesting coincidences, for sure.

More than four years—and half a world—away from my last post, with an extra little one to boot. Hyperconnected Web seems to finally be on its last legs, at least partially due to the promise/threat of AI. Here seems as good a place as any to do my screaming into the void. Hello (again,) world.

My Space

Somewhat serendipitously, or providentially depending on who you ask, my reminder email for domain renewal came around the time I was getting fed up with Twitter. I never had a great relationship with Twitter, mostly following comedians and occasionally live-blogging during some sporting event or another (I’m sorry). I started reading Twitter more now that I am working part-time and home with my (soon-to-be) one-year-old son more often. You can’t really settle into a long-form read while you’re waiting for the next attempt at pulling the trash can down.

Anyway, I think the emotional whiplash was subconsciously getting to me, and then I was consciously considering how Twitter is a platform for some truly odious people, who amass huge amounts of followers due to it. Beyond that are the purposeful malevolent actors, influencing negative social change and corrupting elections. And finally, a pretty laissez-faire attitude to enforcing harrassment policies that are only good business to be in print, not in effect.

And then I thought about how all social media interactions in general are filtered through how the company wants you to see them, to make them money. I’d already bailed on Facebook due to similar conclusions. I’ve just come to the conclusion that any positives to be gained don’t outweigh the negative.

So with all that said, I would rather have my own space to set my thoughts down. I kind of have too-kind memories of pre-Web 2.0 socialization, but maybe I can build on that kind of thinking and build my own “social network” that doesn’t have the side effects of warping society. Or maybe I’ll just be yelling into the void here, who can say.

Convergences

This is by no means a far leap from one to the other, but it’s nice to see when my interests intersect. I’ve recently been getting into the Saga comic series by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples, and in the letters section of Issue #29 they address being included in the American Library Association’s “Top Ten Frequently Challenged Books of the Year”. They credit the work of librarians responding to the challenges without banning or removing the book, ultimately calling librarians “heroic”. Nice to hear!