Quiet Reflections

Blog in the New Year?

Lydia Heaton (ActiveRain Corp.) — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 14:39:08 -0600

I do enjoy a good stir of the pot!

What are you doing for the New Year? Would anyone be interested in hosting a party?

Cheers,

Words Can Bite Back

Lydia Heaton (ActiveRain Corp.) — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 17:10:46 -0500

Many of us use this platform every day as a way to communicate. It is a way for us to reach out to each other, to express our thoughts and experiences, gain insight into problems or current events, and to connect with others. There are many dangers to using text as a way of communication that many of you have or are finding out.

These problems crop up from time to time here on ActiveRain, and it can be very difficult to deal with them. What starts as a small misunderstanding grows into a large insult and ends in a flame war. People of my generation have come to understand that there are somethings that are better done not over the Internet. What I am talking about here is simple communication.

People who use sarcasm as a regular form of speech have the most trouble in the online world. I would know, I am one of them. As you cruise alone in the cyber world, you will find that people will tend to add more facial expressions (what is known to many as emoticons), verbal accents (such as /sigh/ or /yawn/), and even third person references to the self. It is becoming more and more difficult to express the individual meaning behind each sentence as we read more and more into what we see online as we break away from meeting face to face with each other.

Is blogging the end of meeting one on one?

I have heard this question more often as I grow older. My generation is finding that we use the Internet, blogging and instant messaging as tools, everyday living. I can't imagine life without instant messenger. I dont know what I did without it. The ability to just toss a message to one of my friends while I am working to get an opinion about something, check up on dinner plans, or have a idea validated is one of the strongest tools I use on a daily basis.

Email, who uses snail (postal) mail any more? I used to receive letters from people, once upon a time. These days, if you do not have email, you probably wont hear from me.

Blogging. That is one of the newest to many people. It is tool to many, a journal to some. It just depends on how you view it and what you use it for. I have been blogging for more than five years, long before ActiveRain came into existence. For me, and many of my friends, it was a way to keep in touch without actually taking the time to call or write each other. You would have the chance to write a post about your day, an event you went to, something that you want to share with others, and your friends, or even the world at large would have the chance to respond to you. Most of the world wouldn't read your blog, but your friends would. They would leave comments, talk about how they wish they were with you when you did such and such, are excited for you in this and that, wish you luck etc. It is a good way to stay in touch with people that you would otherwise drift apart from.

Now for the problem!

Many people tell me I am an expressive speaker. I speak using my hands, facial expressions (most often my eyebrows), and body language. All of these things are missing when you type a message and send it to someone. How are they supposed to know that you are really laughing when you type something negative? How are they supposed to hear the sarcasm that is inside your head (narrating your text as you type) as they read it to themselves?

It is these things that are huge barriers when we use the Internet as a medium of communication. When you are getting to know someone online, you do not know how they “netspeak” themselves. You do not know if they tend to joke around or tend to be super serious. All of these things should be considered when you introduce yourself to the world online. Even in your first blog, you are creating your online persona, you need to realize that people will start to form opinions about you at that point. Your close friends will always understand you, but the rest of the world will not. You will have many arguments online. The arguments that progress, those ones that get out of control – those are the flame wars. It is a sad condition that there is a special name for those fights that are pure mud slinging for the online world. That just lets you know how often this has happened.

We are adults. If you are offended by a comment, let the person know in private (also known as email). More often than not, they did not intend that comment to go in that direction. It is all about how YOU ARE FEELING AT THAT TIME that influences how you interpret a post, comment or email. I know this sounds like common sense, but you would not believe how many times I have even caught myself being offended by what people write to me (and I get a few of them a week).

We are trying to make a community here. If we are going to function as a happy community here, we need to trust one another. Please take the time to consider your words BEFORE you type them. And when you are reading them, please take a moment to think about how you are feeling before you respond.

It is about celebrating!

Lydia Heaton (ActiveRain Corp.) — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 15:11:16 -0500

It has come to my attention that the meaning behind the Big 5 Birthday Bashes that I have been working on ActiveRain are being misunderstood and it saddens me that this has happened. It is about our community, meeting the people we write to in person. It is about coming together, not dividing! The work that has been put into these has been long in process. It is difficult to imagine that there are people out there that who want to drive wedges into the community when they could act like adults and make the choice to either not come to a gathering or put aside professional differences and take the chance to meet some wonderful people

I do realize that I can not please everyone with these gatherings. I would have thought that if you had a problem, you would have said something to me. I do not appreciate the “alternatives” that have cropped up. Please in the future, voice your opinion early to help make the gathering the best it can be for everyone.

Each of the following people deserve a round of applause:

Jeff Turner was wonderful in Los Angeles.
Craig Schiller was fantastic in Chicago.
The Lovely Wife is gracious enough to assist me in Florida.
Luke Constantino and members of Sellsius are tireless in New York.

They helped me find venues, cake, a place for some people to stay and pointed out a few things about each area that could only be done by someone local. These are all things I could not have done by myself. I owe each of these people a debt of gratitude.

Image courtesy of samueljohanneswill em's photostream

Party in Seattle, June 2

Lydia Heaton (ActiveRain Corp.) — Thu, 31 May 2007 12:52:33 -0500

Thats right Seattle. We know how to start off a month of partying! Here is the plan.

June 2nd. Magnolia Park Time is 1:00.

It is going to be a BBQ right there on the water front. Seeing as this is the home of ActiveRain, this is where most of us live. We voted on this location in a democratic fashion, meaning Matt didn't get his location because the rest of us wanted to see the water, not play softball.

I am asking that people RSVP here in the comments so I can get an idea of how many are coming so I know how much food we are going to need :) You can also tell me what you like to eat.

Don't forget... we get to sing happy birthday!

******UPDATE******

1:00 pm

That is when I would LOVE to see your smiling faces!

What are we going to eat? We will be cooking up some hamburgers and hot dogs and some chicken. If you want something else thrown on a grill—feel free to bring it. We will also be providing drinks and a few sides.

I encourage you to bring something to share with each other!

If we all are having such a good time and are not ready to leave each others company, we will move the party somewhere else around sundown.

You can RSVP as a comment or you can send a message to activerain.seattle@gmail.com

Current RSVP's: at least 31

Happy Birthday ActiveRain Big 5

Lydia Heaton (ActiveRain Corp.) — Mon, 07 May 2007 14:15:44 -0500

That right. As of June, 2007, ActiveRain will be one year old. I wanted to do one huge birthday party, but I dont know how everyone is going to fit into our house, so that wasn't going to work. The other option was to ask a few members to help us throw a a few parties in different cities across the States. These are just a few that we could plan. If you can't make one of these, please throw your own! We would love to see photos and short videos of everyone celebrating the birthday of a good thing.

June 2, Seattle, Washington

June 9, Los Angeles, California

June 16, Chicago, Illinois

June 23, Orlando, Florida

June 30, New York, New York

You should be seeing guest appearances from the AR guys. We are hoping these to be regional events and hope to meet as many of you as we can. You will find the links to these individual five blog posts on the main page shortly. I will be hosting the Seattle Gathering and will be letting the other four parties be announced by their hosts. I hope that you are excited as we are about it.

ActiveRain Gatherings

Lydia Heaton (ActiveRain Corp.) — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 12:32:29 -0500

In all the excitement these days of people getting together, I have decided to start a group dedicated to ActiveRain Gatherings. This is the place for people to start Gatherings and post information about them so others know about them. It is a place to finalize details about Gatherings, to gather the excitement of the moment! And once we have a few Gatherings under our belt, I'll set up a separate area for comments and photos of those Gatherings to share with everyone after it has taken place.

You may be nervous about starting a Gathering, there are many things to consider. Where can we do this that will hold enough people since you don’t know how many people will be coming? When is the best time to do it, how do you go about it all? That is what this post is for. Below are some good things to think about when setting up a Gathering. Now mind that it isn’t a complete list, and it will vary slightly region to region, but it is a good place to start.

*If you can, plan your Gathering a few weeks out. That will give time for people to put it in their calendars and for others not so close to make travel arrangements.

*Pick your time and day. Middle of the week gatherings are great for smaller very local gatherings, weekend day or evening gatherings are better for more regional gatherings.

*Location. Depending on what you will be doing, either just meeting up in a park for a picnic (summer is coming) or in a restaurant, make sure your place has ample public parking and is easy to find.

*If you choose an eating establishment, talk with the proprietor or management to let them know you will have an unknown size of group. Sometimes they can recommend the best night of the week for their establishment or just set aside a section for you.

Most of all-have fun!

Bring cameras and remember to tell us all about it!

There is a place for us to share our experiences and photos with each other. Keep an eye out for the links after a Gathering has happened.

If you have more ideas, let me know! Sharing anything here will only help us meeting each other and make the experience better.