Category: Asides

Please remember to vote.

Americans, please remember to vote this Tuesday. It’s not about left versus right, it’s about choosing our own destiny.

“…for those of us who believe that government has a role to play in promoting opportunity and prosperity for all Americans, a polarized electorate isn’t good enough. Eking out a bare Democratic majority isn’t good enough. What’s needed is a broad majority of Americans – Democrats, Republicans, and independents of goodwill – who are reengaged in the project of national renewal, and who see their own self-interest as inextricably linked to the interests of others.” – Barack Obama, “The Audacity of Hope” (2006.)

P2 FTW

I’m working on a short-turnaround project with two developers, an ERP administrator, and other stakeholders. This is typically the kind of development project where any time spent on administrative overhead or communication (and re-communication) can hold up real progress.

So I set up a WordPress instance running the P2 Theme by Automattic this afternoon. P2’s closest equivalent is the Facebook News Feed: users can share status updates, blog posts, photos, links and videos with each other in realtime. But P2 is self-hosted, and can be used for just about any purpose, since you’re in control.

[wpvideo YYNW9iSj w=600 h=336]

I’ve got it set up as a private, password-protected internal development communications tool, but it can do all kinds of different stuff. I just think it’s nuts how easy the whole thing is to set up, customize, and use- a real benefit to productivity and communication, instead of a technological barrier.

Great Lessig Neo-Progressivism Essay

Lawrence Lessig has an excellent column in The Huffington Post (did I just say that?) on the history of Progressivism in America and the need for a Neo-Progressive movement today. It’s not so much about liberal policy so much as it is about  dethroning  influential special interests and lobbies. I’ve always felt like America’s true political struggles aren’t about left versus right, but rather the powerful versus the powerless, so beyond my own agreement, I think there’s a lot more potential for common ground here than the same old vicious left/right cycle.

If you’re a personal branding/social web nerd like me, you will greatly enjoy “The Myth of the Personal Brand,” a guest post on Redhead Writing by Aaron Templer. It raises some interesting questions about the very idea of branding real people instead of companies, and a lot of the commenters bring up really good points as well. (I only recently discovered Redhead Writing and have since encountered quite a few excellent online strategy articles. Highly recommended.)