Thought Overflow…Golda’s BlogIf memes are like genes, then having a conversation in which you share ideas and come up with new ones is like…?

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Archive for July, 2011

107.29.11 Writing anonymously and what’s wrong with Google Plus

Golda to TechStuff,Thoughts  

Second things first: Google Plus is too all-encompassing and controlling. I can’t get a feed to publish elsewhere, or hack at, or stream, or store as text. Anything I write there lives ONLY in Google Plus, it seems, and can be taken out only manually.

And I’m not sure I want to write primarily for my friends. If I wanted to tell my friends something, I’d send them an email. If I have an idea to share, it seems cleaner in some way to publish it anonymously – or at least without notifying my friends – so that it stands on its own merits, and the reaction to it is not muddled up with relationships and niceness. Besides, if the writing is both honest and personal, it may relate to people my friends know or would recognize, and that is the last thing I would want. Unavoidable, perhaps, but not desireable.

Postscript: Google Plus may open itself up when the API is launched: http://www.readwriteweb.com/hack/2011/06/google-plus-puts-out-a-call-for-developers.php

007.21.11 Creative Commons Case studies

Golda to RandomWrites  

Ah – I’ve been looking for this: ways people are sharing documents to make structures outside corporations. Creative Commons is building up some case studies of how CC licenses spread good ideas through the world.

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Case_Studies

Global Voices Online is a good one, I think: http://globalvoicesonline.org

107.04.11 American History Quiz: Which founding father leaked documents that triggered the start of the American Revolution?

Golda to Society & Politics  

From 1773 to 2011, leaking incriminating documents into the public eye has been a powerful mechanism to galvanize revolutions.

Nothing quite like reading in black and white the recommendation for “abridgement of what are called English liberties”.

Benjamin Franklin leaked Royal Governor Hutchinson’s letters to the press back in 1773, triggering the Boston Tea Party and the American Revolution. (Franklin was actually trying to focus anger on a local governor instead of Britain – but once the truth is out, people act on it in their own way. After this affair and the British response to it Franklin gave up on reconciliation with England and became a revolutionary himself.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutchinson_Letters_Affair

The Remarkable Benjamin Franklin by Cheryl Harness is available in the Pima County Library – its a children’s book but with some excellent information. I learn most things by reading books to my kids!

Article originally posted to bTucson.com under Politics and Government