Today at the World Café Steward’s dialogue we took pictures of each other holding a piece of paper with the one word that expresses our feelings or thoughts about the World Café. This was mine.
Archive for Technology – Page 16
I listened to a Skypecast sponsored by Typepad today, with Seth Godin. I knew him briefly in my days working with Fast Company, read most of his books and have always liked him. He didn’t disappoint me this time either, declining to pitch his new book Small is the New Big by saying if we were interested we would go to his blog and buy or download it. But what he did say warmed my heart.
His message was simple. He talked about blogging being a force for authenticity in the world,
citing the fact that one couldn’t really lie consistently day after
day, and eventually the real ‘you’ would be known. And once we let
ourselves be known, people begin to relax and others can’t help but tend to love us.
In answer to someone’s question about the best, fastest way to build a massive readership, he said that it didn’t really matter. If we were telling the truth to 5 people, it was far better and more effective than talking crap to 50,000. He gave a big boost to all the small bloggers who were there, and prioritized the sharing of what is real and true in our lives rather than slavish devotion to some supposedly effective business strategy.
You can listen to it yourself here.
One of my favorite things at BlogHer was the personal connections I made or deepened with the many amazingly creative women there… (these two amazingly beautiful women standing with me at BlogHer, left, are fellow GiGis Nancy White and Tree Fitzgerald)
There were more relational revelations than I can do justice to in
just one post, but I experienced a bunch of them at a Birds of a Feather
break-out session, which the conference organizers arranged to bring together like-minded folks for a metaphoric ‘cup of tea’ around the pool.
We got to propose our own group topics so of course I proposed one on ‘Art
& Beauty’. As it happened, the beautiful woman standing in line next to me was Tracey Clark, and she was the first to sign up, saying
“I’m all about Beauty!”. Check out the stunning photographs of her children at WarmTone, and I think you’ll agree.
There was a poet there with an extraordinarily attractive business card (nice stock, white, with a simple photograph of a short, tooth-bitten pencil on it), Joan Gelfand, who wrote a gorgeous book of new poetry I had to buy, and has an equally zen blog offering sage nuggets of wisdom. She also blogs on the empty nest syndrome, which I think is a rich and under-utilized blogging subject. Or maybe she’s just more my age and I can relate to it a bit better than the younger ‘mommy blogs’.
Another of the lovely women in the group, Maria, keeps a sketchblog with glimpses into her colorful sketchbook. She says she wouldn’t paint if it wasn’t for the discipline of keeping up a daily blog. so that’s a ‘gold star’ for the world of blogging right there. Paula Kim takes startlingly fresh botanical photographs, and Megan McMillan collaborates with her husband Murray on a vast world of wild and crazy artwork. Yet another, Evelyn Rodriguez, writes a deeply juicy, long, rambling blog on art, beauty, fashion, God, and Everything.
One of my favorite workshops (on Digital Photography) was presented by an incredibly inspiring photographer, Heather Champ, who also posts her work on Flickr, where she works as community coordinator. I’m not surprised by her appointment as such because besides being extremely talented she was the most genuinely friendly, open and generous person I’ve met in a long time.
I also ran into the daughter of an old friend of mine there, Shuna Fish Lydon, who has a fabulously beautiful & quirky foodblog called Eggbeater. It’s one of those immediately addictive reads for a foodie like me, integrating poems and photographs along with recipes for the perfect pie crust and best marmalade this side of the Atlantic.
There was another fascinating woman presenting at BlogHer, Mecca Ibrahim, who blogs on the London Underground under the name of Annie Mole. Maybe I should have looked her up when I was in the UK last week, but I was too shy. Plus I wasn’t actually in London – more on this last to come.
These are just a few of the women I ran into who are seeding incredible beauty in the world through their blogs and poetry/artwork. Ah, the eternal inspiration of unbridled creativity! Long may we flourish and support each other.
I’m at BlogHer (a conference for women bloggers)… and let me tell you – Beauty is everywhere!
I’m at BlogHer (a conference for women bloggers)… and it’s pretty amazing on a lot of levels. I look around and there is a sea of women – radiant & connected both literally & figuratively.
The tables are packed with people talking to each other. They are
young and old, and with an astounding variety of color even for a tech conference (well, sort of a tech conference… most of those assembled are not techies, but regular people who happen to blog).
Still, in a
miracle of multi-tasking, almost every one of us has a sleek laptop
plugged in (sporting some outstandingly beautiful screensavers, I might
add) to a wireless connection, and a digital camera ready to capture
the excitement electronically.
Many are speed-typing their experience directly into their
blogs, making this a ‘live’ event for the 1000s of women that are unable to be
here in person. This ‘culture of generosity’ (or ‘culture of love’ as
some of my friends began to call it after the first cocktail party) was
the dominant note sustained throughout the whole conference.
While waiting for my first workshop (Primping Your Blog) to start, a beautiful woman wandered by my table looking confused. She was disoriented having come in late, so I invited her to join us. After she sat down I read her name tag & saw she was Susie Bright! She didn’t stay long, since the wireless connection sucked at that table (like everywhere else as it turned out), but before she left she gave me one of her ‘clits up!’ buttons, which was very cool.
I’m loving the lunch keynote which is on Web 2.0. Because this conversation is part of BlogHer, we’re talking about Web 2.0 through the eyes of women and how our particular sensibilities, values and concerns have contributed to and continue to impact this latest iteration of technological development.
Listening to Caterina Fake who was part of the original team that created Flikr (now acquired by Yahoo), and Meg Hourihan who helped start Blogger (now part of the Google empire) talk about the role they played in their companies, as women, was awesome. I felt an incredible pride and connection to them (& by extension all the ‘girl geeks’ in the room), hearing about how their passions and commitment to a more ‘personal’ atmosphere, to promoting individual ‘voice’ & creative expression, creating connection & community was central to the success of these seminal enterprises.
My celebration of them is a celebration of myself, and of what we as women bring to the world of technology and to everything we do. We have a contribution that makes a real difference, that has real value, and seeing it expressed this clearly all around me is hugely stimulating and empowering.
weDialogue
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